The sun is setting in the west, a crescent moon slowly rises, and the cold moonlight is sprinkled on the world like silver.

In the sky above Hangu Pass, hundreds of crows roared and circled, and more than a dozen vultures swept the sky, lingering for a long time and unwilling to fly.

Under the sky, the ancient pass, which had been tempered by the fire of war, was already bloodstained and devastation, but it still stood proudly in the mountains and streams, stubbornly guarding the ancient road of the Western Capital from east to west.

At the foot of the city wall, more than a month ago, there were golden dead grass everywhere and a dazzling array of tenacious growth of artemisia grass and wild trees, but now there is no trace of it, and all that remains under the corner of the wall are broken arms, red and dazzling pieces of flesh and blood, and bright red blood frozen by the cold.

"Dingding??????dingding"

With a crisp and loud sound of gold, the tens of thousands of surviving Allied soldiers ran away from the city wall as quickly as the cold wind, leaving the bloody and dark red Hell Pass.

For hundreds of thousands of Allied soldiers, this pass is their haunting nightmare, an abyssal hell that has claimed countless lives, a source of real nightmares, a source of fear.

Seeing the hasty retreat of the siege, the soldiers of the Xiliang defenders on the city tower did not take advantage of the situation to chase and kill with arrows and further expand the results of the battle, but watched the Allied troops flee from the pass with cold eyes, and then supported each other to return to Loudiyuan, the Allied camp.

Up to this moment, the allied forces of the princes had attacked Hangu Pass for a month and ten days in a row, that is, a full forty days. During this period, not counting the two heavy snowfalls that suddenly occurred in the middle of the siege, if you add up the ten days of delay of the two snowfalls. Then the battle of Hangu has been two months now, and almost half of the winter has been consumed.

Two months earlier, at noon, the Allies stormed Hangu Pass for the first time.

Yes. Yuan Shao personally sent 50,000 soldiers and horses under his command to attack the city, including 30,000 infantry troops to storm the city, 10,000 bow and crossbow battalions to suppress the formation, and 10,000 heavy siege equipment to assist in the siege, and the siege lasted from noon to late night. In the end, most of the 50,000 Yuan troops were lost, and less than 20,000 soldiers survived. Thousands of wounded soldiers of the Yuan army fell under the city wall, howling and wailing, but no one dared to risk death to come to rescue them, and the remaining more than 20,000 Yuan soldiers all died at the foot of the city wall, and the corpses were piled up into a mountain. More than ten miles in front of the city pass were dyed bright red with blood, which was shocking. After the war, the Xiliang army opened the city gate and carried all the wounded soldiers back to the pass for emergency treatment, and then transferred to Tongguan for resettlement.

Since the first day, Yuan's army took the lead in attacking the city. The next day, the princes' army sent 30,000 infantry troops to continue the siege. However, this time the siege soldiers were united. The princes of the three towns of Yuan Shao, Zhang Yan and Lü Bu each sent 10,000 troops to attack Chengguan. After a whole day of fierce fighting, the allies once again left more than 10,000 casualties and soldiers to evacuate the front of the pass, but this time the Xiliang army in the pass did not open the city to treat the wounded, so that thousands of wounded soldiers froze to death in wailing and groaning. Since then, the Xiliang Army has no longer treated the wounded soldiers of the Allied army, even if they watched the wounded soldiers freeze to death in the dark night, they did not move, and they were indifferent.

This is war. Mercy is occasionally acceptable, but it cannot go on endlessly. so as not to leave an opportunity for the enemy to take advantage of.

For two months, as long as there was no snow, the Allies came to attack the city every day. Each time the troops were dispatched, ranging from 20,000 or 30,000 foot soldiers to more than 10,000 men and horses to make a tentative attack, and even sometimes thousands of foot soldiers would be sent to come to the front of the pass to make a bluff feint, and when it was a little dark, they could not wait to collect their troops and return to the camp.

After two months of continuous siege of the city, at least 100,000 infantry troops of the princes and allies ambushed the corpse pass, of which forty percent of the soldiers were seriously injured and froze to death, and only about 50,000 allied soldiers really died at the hands of the Xiliang defenders. Among the 100,000 allied soldiers killed, the Jizhou soldiers under Yuan Shao accounted for 40%, Zhang Yan and Lu Bu each accounted for 20%, and the remaining 20% was shared by the princes of the four towns such as Sun Ce, Cao Cao, Zhang Miao and Zhang Yang.

Chen Liuzhang Miao originally did not have many soldiers and horses, and only had more than 3,000 guards around him, but since he was instigated by Yuan Shao, Cao Cao and others to become a prince of Ziyi, he secretly ordered his younger brother Zhang Chao to urgently mobilize more than 20,000 men and horses from the rear of Yanzhou. Although most of the nearly 30,000 soldiers and horses under his command are new recruits and young men who have never been on the battlefield, there are tens of thousands of soldiers and horses, which can be regarded as sitting on the position of the princes of a town and saving face for himself.

As for Zhang Yang, who stayed in Hedong County, although he was not in the Allied camp, his soldiers and horses had all crossed the river and were temporarily under the control of Yuan Shao. As a result, after two months of storming Hangu Pass, the 30,000 soldiers and horses of Zhang Yang's headquarters were almost completely destroyed under Yuan Shao's dispatch three times and four times. At this point, the princes of Zhang Yang are considered to exist in name only, and there is no way out in the future except to rely on Yuan Shao, and they were completely annexed by Yuan Shao; The two counties of Hanoi and Hedong naturally fell into the hands of Yuan Shao, and the 70,000 soldiers and horses stationed in the two counties were also completely controlled by the Jizhou army.

In the two months since the fierce battle of Hangu Pass, the original army of 360,000 princes, plus the 30,000 soldiers recruited by Zhang Miao and the more than 20,000 soldiers privately recruited by Sun Ce, Cao Cao and others, a total of more than 400,000 soldiers; However, after two months of siege, the princes' army was full and there were still 300,000 troops left, and the total strength was reduced by nearly half, and the strength was sharply reduced by about 30%. The reason why it is thirty percent instead of forty percent is because the siege soldiers are all weak soldiers under the tents of the princes of each town, and the really strong elite soldiers have never been dispatched, or they are reluctant to take them out to attack the city.

Therefore, after removing the chaff, the remaining 300,000 troops are the elite division of the princes' alliances, and they are also the biggest reliance on their reluctance to withdraw their troops or dissolve the alliance after fierce battles so far.

————————————

"Has the enemy collected his troops and returned to the camp?"

In Hangu Pass, on the main hall of the general's line, Li Li asked softly to Guo Jia, who walked into the big tent to report on today's battle situation, after reviewing a pile of bamboo slips that needed to be disposed of.

"The Lord is wise, and it is so." Guo Jia replied respectfully.

"Oh, Wenhe is here too. You can both sit down, and you don't have to be formal. Stretching his arms and stretching his waist, Li Li realized that Guo Jia and Jia Xu had come together.

"I just saw that the lord was busy with official business, I didn't dare to make a noise to disturb, and I hope the lord will not blame the rudeness."

"Wenhe doesn't have to be polite, sit down. After two months of fierce war, there is a lot of backlog of government affairs, and today is just time to deal with it, and if it is delayed, I am afraid that Yuan Zhong will come to urge it in person! Hehehe???????"

Waving his hand to signal Guo Jia and Jia Xu to sit down, Li Li said with a smile, got up and walked to the bottom of the hall, and sat on Jia Xu's head.

After the soldiers left with tea, Guo Jiagong said: "My lord, the person who led the troops to attack the city today is Zhang He, a general under Yuan Shao, who led 20,000 infantry troops to attack the city in turn, and the attack was fierce, which brought a lot of pressure to the soldiers defending the city, and it was quite orderly. After a day of fierce fighting, Zhang He's troops lost more than 6,000 soldiers and horses, and more than 2,000 wounded soldiers, but the wounded soldiers were all taken away by Zhang He's order. ”

"Zhang He, Zhang Junyi?" Li Li groaned when he heard this, and said with a smile on his chin: "I heard that he is good at arranging troops, good at using terrain to fight, and his own martial arts are extraordinary, and he is one of the 'Four Pillars' of the Jizhou Army, this person is a good general." When the troops were collected, they dared to order someone to carry away the wounded soldiers, if I remember correctly, this is the first enemy general who dared to carry the wounded soldiers under the city wall, this Zhang He is really brave and knowledgeable! ”

As he spoke, Li Li suddenly changed his words: "Oh, by the way, what are the casualties of our army today?" Gao Shun and the soldiers of the trapped camp can hold on for a few days, if there are too many casualties, they will withdraw and rest, and let Bo Cai lead the military battalion to defend the city, right? ”

Guo Jia's expression changed slightly when he heard this, and his expression was a little unnatural: "The lord is too worried." In the battle of defending the city for two consecutive months, General Gao Shun commanded well, and the soldiers in the trapping camp were all strong elite soldiers with one as ten, and only more than 5,000 soldiers were lost in the camp so far, and they were all lightly armed infantry troops, and the 5,000 heavy armored infantry troops have not been used so far. In today's battle, the camp guarded the city gate very properly, and Zhang He was not allowed to get close to the city gate from beginning to end, and the casualties were not large, with more than 300 killed and 200 wounded soldiers in the whole battalion. Just ??????"

Seeing that Guo Jia wanted to speak and stopped, Li Li smiled indifferently, knowing that Guo Jia and Jia Xu had completely recognized the combat effectiveness of Gao Shun and his submerged camp, so every time he mentioned Gao Shun, he would always think of the words he had questioned before, and he felt deeply guilty about it.

It is true that in the two-month offensive and defensive battle, Gao Shun and the trap camp were responsible for garrisoning the city gate, never letting the allies get close to the city gate, and minimizing casualties on the premise of ensuring that the city gate was not lost. This shows that Gao Shun's ability is extraordinary, and the soldiers in the camp are all elite soldiers who are one as ten.

"Just what? There is no need to shy away from filial piety, and it doesn't hurt to speak out. Li Li smiled.

Guo Jia nodded lightly and said worriedly: "The lord is graceful." So far, although the casualties of the trapped camp have not been large, the county soldiers stationed in the city towers on the left and right sides have suffered heavy casualties. General Teng Xiao had 15,000 Anyi County soldiers killed and wounded, but now there are only more than 3,000 people, and everyone is wounded, and they are no longer able to fight. The 20,000 county soldiers under the accounts of the two generals Hu Zhen and Yang Ding were almost completely lost, and now there are only more than 1,000 wounded soldiers left, and all the remaining soldiers are killed.

That is to say, so far, our army has lost as many as about 40,000 people, and there are very few infantry troops available to defend the city, and now only 20,000 soldiers under the account of General Bocai who were transferred from Tongguan are left. If the 20,000 infantry army is completely lost, then our army can only defend the city with cavalry, and there is no other way. ”

"Hu Zhen and Yang Ding's 20,000 horses have been lost?" Li Li frowned slightly, and an extremely complicated color flashed in his eyes, faintly unbearable.

Compared with Guo Jia, who looked solemn, Jia Xu looked calm at the moment, looking very calm, light and unfathomable.

"Bonghyo don't have to worry. The soldiers of the county government and the soldiers of Anyi are not in the sequence of the main camps of our army, and it is inevitable that the combat effectiveness is limited, and the heavy casualties this time are also expected. ”

———————————— (To be continued......)