Just after I made a deliberate decision to ambush the invading troops of the Luope people near Jiantoupo on the East Tengger Prairie, Ling Tianfang's reply letter also reached my hand, and the letter contained only a short sentence: "If the work of keeping the army's march secretive can be done well, this plan is really the best way to solve the problem of the Luope people." "In fact, with or without Ling Tianfang's support, I have already made up my mind to implement my plan.

According to my order, the first part of the Guards Brigade disguised itself as two horse thieves under the pretext of changing guards, quietly slipped out of Qingyang, and infiltrated the East Tengger Prairie, these two teams were led by Yue Shan and Wei Chibin respectively, responsible for cleaning up the Luobei herdsmen in the area from Qingyang to Jiantoupo, and the order I gave them was that no matter what method was adopted, they could act cheaply, and there was only one requirement, strictly keeping their identities secret to avoid startling the snakes.

Soon the news came back, the clean-up operation went very smoothly, because the Luope people had no regular garrison in this area at all, Yue Shan and Wei Chibin led the "horse thieves" frantically burned and plundered in this area, and constantly sent people to create rumors, saying that the horse thieves will be active here for a long time, will rob the herdsmen and their property, and the herdsmen will be sold to the Heathrow Empire as slaves, these news soon spread among the herdsmen in this area, many herdsmen simply moved their families north, drove livestock, dragged their children and daughters, and fled this area.

Yue Shan and Wei Chibin led the "horse thieves" to carry out a carpet inventory of this area, but fortunately, there were not many herdsmen in this area, and soon this area was cleaned up into a vacuum area, and even the passing caravans learned that a large number of horse thieves appeared in this area, and they also made a detour.

On September 14, 693 in the continental calendar, I received an intelligence report that the Luope people's expedition to the east had been mobilized, and on September 8, the whole army set out to begin the eastward invasion operation, and according to their normal marching speed, it was estimated that they would reach the area around September 27. I immediately made corresponding arrangements and ordered both Qingyang and Jinzhou to be under martial law, especially since September 15, Qingyang Province has only been allowed to enter and leave the city, and no one is allowed to move freely without my warrant, and the Security Bureau and the Police Department have also gone all out to carry out my orders and prevent enemy spies from spying on them.

Cui Wenxiu's Qingyang Second Garrison Division also retained only one wing of infantry stationed at the junction of Qingyang, Jinzhou and Bonan, and all of them withdrew to Qingyang, and at the same time strengthened Qingyang's city defense and vigilance, posing as if they were going to fight with the Luope people in Qingyang Fucheng.

At the same time, I also made frequent movements of troops day and night, and declared martial law in Qingyang, and no ordinary residents were allowed to go out at will, otherwise they would face imprisonment. These measures were mainly used because the secret agents of the Luope people could not effectively grasp the movement of my army, and I also used these real and false movements to constantly transfer the troops out of the capital city separately, secretly assembled outside the city, and personally led the army to set off on September 20, and secretly infiltrated the Jiantoupo area on the East Tengger Prairie on September 23, and hid in the ambush site that had been prepared for a long time.

Before leaving, I ordered the troops to carry ten days' worth of dry rations, drinking water, and forage, and the small engineering units that had infiltrated in advance also secretly built some facilities in the ambush to facilitate the subsequent stationing of large troops.

Time passed, and I had been in this damn place for five days, but there was still no news of the main army of Rope. In order to prevent the enemy's scouts from discovering the problem, I strictly restricted the entry and exit of my own scouts, and I did not send any other personnel out to reconnoitre, except for a very small number of elite guard scouts. According to the analysis, the Rope should have reached Jiantoupo yesterday, but the scouts brought back the news that no sign of the army had been found in the vicinity for fifty miles.

I immediately denied the idea, and if they had found us, they would have only made a detour behind us and attacked, and I am afraid that we would have been wiped out. That is, the Luope people are delayed on the road, but if it is really delayed for a long time, I am afraid that there will be no need for the Luope people to attack us, and we ourselves will have to flee back to Qingyang with our tails between our legs, and the food and forage can only support for two days at most.

I was also a little uncontrollable, but on the surface I had to pretend to be confident and calm, as if everything was under my control, and from time to time I led other officers to various barracks to inspect the living conditions of the soldiers, cheering for the already restless soldiers.

"Report!"

"Come in!"

It was already evening, and just as I was sitting in the big tent worrying about the whereabouts of the Luope people, Kang Jianguo and the other people who had gone out to scout finally came back and brought back the good news I had always dreamed of.

"Report to your Excellency, I and several brothers have delayed some time because the scope of reconnaissance is a little larger, and we have to verify it again, so please forgive me. Kang Jianguo was also a little excited. Because of the importance of this reconnaissance, he personally led a few quick and agile brothers out for several days in a row, and finally paid off today.

I could see the joy in his eyes, and knew that there must be good news, so I calmed down a little and asked, "What did you find?"

"My lord, my brothers and I discovered the enemy's scouts about thirty kilometers from here this afternoon, and the enemy's vanguard sixty kilometers from here. "His chest was still heaving dramatically, and I don't know if he was overly excited, or if he was too physically exerted, or both.

While deliberately controlling my excitement, I motioned for Kang Jianguo to sit down and speak slowly.

"As we departed, the enemy's vanguard had begun to camp and prepare for rest, on the flat ground by the river, about thirty kilometers from us. The enemy's vanguard force is the ironclad heavy cavalry, about 40,000 people, the Chinese army is mainly infantry, the hoplites are deployed in the rear of the vanguard ironclad cavalry, the light infantry and baggage troops are close behind, and finally some light cavalry and heavy cavalry, the enemy's handsome banner can also be seen there, it is estimated that the enemy's large camp is located. The whole unit dragged for miles, and there was no end in sight. ”

I pondered for a moment, and then asked, "Do you think there is anything unusual about the enemy, and what is the enemy's alertness?"

Kang Jianguo thought for a while, and immediately replied, his tone was very affirmative: "I don't see anything abnormal, the enemy's alertness is also very average, their scouts are just routinely searching for a mile or two on both sides of the road, I think it's all perfunctory, after all, this is still about three hundred kilometers away from our territory, and the march will take four or five days, and one of their villages will have to pass." ”

I quickly calculated in my heart that if the enemy's vigilance was high and it was possible to detect an abnormality here, I would prepare to lead the cavalry to attack the camp tonight, but my cavalry was only 30,000, and I was not sure whether I could defeat the enemy's main force in one fell swoop. Since the enemy was so careless that he was not aware of our presence in the slightest, I decided to proceed with the original plan and ambush at the predetermined location tomorrow.

The order was quickly conveyed to the ministries, and it was another sleepless night, and I looked at the moonlit and starry night sky, and prayed silently, hoping that tomorrow's battle would give me a satisfactory ending.

After dinner, the general of the Eastern Expedition, Uller, was contented to lie in the big chair of the handsome camp, and the tea set on the desk was exuding a curling fragrance. "Buda, has the scout returned?"

"Already back, nothing special about the anomaly. However, according to the scouts, horse thieves were quite rampant in this area some time ago, and many local herdsmen fled to the north. I always felt that something was wrong, but I couldn't tell what was wrong. The reply was Uller's lieutenant Buda, who was a very cautious general, and Ulle had always been very relieved of his affairs.

"Maybe it's the horse thieves among the Motts or the Qiuer people, maybe they want to follow us, and when we defeat the Tanghe people, we can take advantage of the fire and rob them, and get a spoonful of soup. Uller didn't think about any other unfavorable situation, after all, this place was still far from the territory of the Tang River Empire. "They don't dare to attack our idea, I don't know where they are hiding at this time. ”

Although Buda felt that something was always wrong, he couldn't think of what was wrong after thinking about it again and again, so he had to order all levels to strengthen night duty patrols to avoid any accidents.

But the night passed quietly, nothing happened, and Buda, who had not slept well all night, felt that he was a little suspicious, and the troops were assembled, and according to the normal march route, like a winding giant snake, slowly moved forward.

Before dawn, the whole army was like a giant who had woken up, and all kinds of preparations before the battle were carried out in an orderly manner, and the soldiers had finished their breakfast, put their weapons and bows and arrows in place, and the horses had been fed and drunk, but the cages that prevented neighing were still hanging on their mouths.

Soon the soldiers of the various divisions were assembled under the leadership of the officers and entered the designated ambush area as planned. Everything was going on quietly, everyone knew the important and serious surnames of the campaign, and the mobilization for war had already been carried out many times long before the departure.

According to the plan, Liang Chongxin and Cui Wenxiu and I led 30,000 light and heavy cavalry to ambush on a shallow hill about four miles away from the flat land on the bank of the river where the Luopei army marched, where dense forests grew. Kamapov led nearly 30,000 light infantry to follow behind the cavalry, and after the cavalry had broken down the enemy lines, he followed closely to eliminate the remnants.

Mu Lige's task was also quite difficult, he led 15,000 hoplites and 10,000 lancemen and a small number of engineers to ambush in the woods at the bend of the sharp slope, shouldering the 40,000 ironclad heavy cavalry to intercept the enemy's advance, which was also a battle of life and death. The heavy infantry under his command had to firmly stick to the enemy's forward troops and not let the enemy get out. Because the enemy did not know whether there were cavalry in ambush behind Mulige's troops, they had to break through Mulige's defense line and defeat them before they could free up to deal with our main cavalry, otherwise they would venture back to the division, and if there were cavalry in ambush behind the infantry, it would cause the whole line to collapse. But as soon as the enemy breaks through our hoplite defense in a short period of time, he can quickly return to his division and form a flanking attack on our main force, and the situation will be very passive.

And this battle will first be fought on the infantry defense line of Mulig, and Mulig has also made a military order for me to ensure that I can withstand the onslaught of the enemy's ironclad cavalry. Whether the hoplites composed of the Gaoyue people have a stronger shield, or the ironclad cavalry of the Luope people have sharper spears, who will win and who will lose in this contradictory battle will be verified by the facts.

;