Five green fireworks rose one after another, which meant that all five cavalry teams had succeeded. Chen Yong, the captain who was following Wei Yan, raised his hands and said, "General Qi, do we want to continue killing?"
Wei Yan waved the sword in his hand fiercely and said: "Kill, why not kill?"
Chen Yong glanced at the Hun women and children who were gathered together and cried bitterly because their camp was burned to ashes by a fire, and said: "General, would you like to select a few of these people and let them serve as guides?"
?”
The Huns are a people who live on horseback. Although these people are just women and children, their riding skills are definitely not inferior to those of the Han cavalry. As long as they are given a horse, they can keep up with the team.
speed.
Wei Yan looked at the women and children with disdain, took out a small gadget from his arms, held it in his hand and pondered it for a while, pointed his sword forward and said: "There is no need for these barbarians, let's kill them due north.
That’s it.”
This gadget is the compass Liu Xin spent great efforts to develop. Although records of directions have appeared in various myths and legends of the Han people a long time ago. It is said that the Yellow Emperor once broke through the fog and defeated Chi You with his compass, but Liu Xin
Xin has never seen the actual compass, nor has she found any relevant production information. However, both Liu Xin and Ma Yun have used compasses from later generations, and have also seen the replica of the big spoon-like Sinan in the museum.
.
They all know the principle of the compass very well. Although there are not many natural magnets, it is not impossible to find them. However, it takes a lot of effort for the craftsmen of the institute to process a natural magnet into the shape of a spoon. In the end, the number of magnets becomes more and more.
Small, the spoon was still not processed. In the end, Liu Xin asked the craftsmen to grind the natural magnet into a needle shape according to the style of the compass of later generations, and made a compass that was very close to that of later generations. Of course, there was no glass cover, so he had to use
Crystal came instead.
Due to the lack of suitable production machinery, this kind of compass, like clairvoyance, is very difficult to process, and it requires high-quality crystals, which is very expensive, so it is impossible to equip the army in large numbers. This time for the grassland expedition, although several major generals were equipped with
Sent a compass
and clairvoyance, but after the battle, they have to be handed back again and cannot be taken as their own. Even so, being able to use them once, in the eyes of Wei Yan and others, is not only an eye-opener, but
It can even be said to be the blessings they gained from their previous lives.
The team had already been assembled. Chen Yong had received the order and was about to lead the team away when he heard another captain say: "General Qi, do you want to take away the leftover beef and mutton?"
Although the fried noodles they brought with them tasted good and were enough to satisfy their hunger, they were not as delicious as beef and mutton. Many soldiers wanted to bring some, but military discipline was strict and no one dared to make their own decisions without Wei Yan's order.
However, bringing these beef and mutton meat will definitely affect the speed of the march, and eating it will inevitably require a fire to barbecue. Wei Yan remembered that several other teams had also succeeded, and he was not far behind. He waved his hand and said: "Burn.
Burn them all together with the fodder!"
All Xiongnu tribes are the same. In order to survive the cold winter smoothly, they will accumulate a large amount of fodder in the camp to meet the needs of cattle, sheep and horses throughout the winter. The thousand-man team just escorted the captured Hun women, cattle, sheep and horses back to the territory of the Han Dynasty
When they arrived, only a small part of the forage was taken away, and their horses ate some of it, so the remaining forage still accounted for the majority. Wei Yan's order completely left no way for these women and children to survive.
.
The winter in the prairie is not only difficult for people, but also for the hungry wolves. If these women and children do not want to lose their lives to the wolves, they have no choice but to defect to other tribes as soon as possible. Of course, other tribes will not rescue them for no reason, waiting.
Their only option is to become slaves of other tribes.
Wei Yan didn't care about the lives of these people. After he counted his troops and made sure that no one was missing and no piece of equipment was missing, he set out on the road to continue completing his "arduous mission".
Ten days later, the five cavalry teams sent out to participate in the battle against the Xiongnu tribe returned to the border of the Han Dynasty. Many of them had not finished eating the rations they carried, because they had to fight to support war along the way.
To meet the supplies, they attacked the grassland this time and attacked a total of twenty-seven Xiongnu tribes. As if they had made an appointment in advance, each cavalry team captured 370 young Xiongnu women, but they beheaded a total of two
There are more than 18,000 levels, which greatly exceeds the task target assigned by Liu Xin, because everyone wants to independently complete the 4,390 places. As for the cattle, sheep and horses, there are countless others.
Surprisingly, after such a long-distance attack, the casualties of the 50,000 Han cavalry were less than 300, and a considerable number of them accidentally fell off their horses during the attack and were trampled by the horses. The main reason was their riding skills.
There was no practice. Due to Liu Xin's strict orders in advance, not a single piece of equipment of the 50,000 cavalry was lost, and there was not a single incident of raping women or concealing property, which shows how strict the discipline of this Han army is.
In fact, the losses suffered by the Xiongnu tribe were far more than that. Except for the cavalry team led by Zhao Yun, every time a Huns camp was destroyed, a small number of cattle, sheep, and horses would be left for the women and children. The other four teams were all
The fire burned them all. They lost their cattle, sheep and horses. Except for a few lucky ones who escaped to neighboring tribes, most of these Huns women and children died of cold and hunger, or died in the belly of wolves. Those neighboring tribes who learned the news were also suddenly killed.
The menacing cavalry entering the grassland were frightened. On the one hand, they strengthened their guard and on the other hand, they sent people to the royal court to report the situation here to their Yuvluo Shanyu.
The Xiongnu were a nomadic people and did not build their own city. The so-called royal court was actually a camp, but this camp was relatively fixed and much larger than other tribal camps.
There is a huge tent in the middle of the royal court, which is the big tent of Yufuluo Shanyu, the lord of the Huns. If you look at it from the outside, compared with other tents, this tent is not only larger, but also has a golden tent.
There is no other difference between the top of the tent. However, the inside of the tent is extremely gorgeous, with all kinds of utensils available.
At this time, the three leading figures of the Southern Xiongnu, Chan Yufuluo, Liu Bao, the Xian King on the left, and Hu Chuquan, the Xian King on the right, were all in the tent. In front of them, there was a roasted roasted man with a golden color and an alluring aroma.
All the sheep, but their faces were all solemn, obviously shocked by the Han army's raid on the Huns camp. Indeed, the Han army had not entered this desert for nearly a hundred years. This time, they not only came, but also directly destroyed them.
They killed dozens of Xiongnu tribes, large and small, killed tens of thousands of young Xiongnu, and kidnapped countless cattle, sheep, and horses. This has never happened before, not even when Han Wu defeated the Xiongnu. Because
The Han people uphold Confucianism, and they will not do such things as arbitrarily killing innocent people, even if the other party is a foreigner, they will not do this, at least on the surface.
Yufuluo glanced at the people in the tent and said in a deep voice: "According to those who escaped, the reason why the Han army killed so many people this time was in retaliation for Tumulan's plunder of a small village on the border of Liangzhou. They wanted to Let me, the Huns, repay you tenfold."
Huchuquan said in surprise: "Repay ten times? There are actually more than two thousand people in that small village? There are only a few hundred men left in Tumulan's tribe."
Tu Mulan is the leader of the Xiongnu tribe that raided the border of Liangzhou this time. There are indeed only a few hundred men left in his tribe. The folk customs in Liangzhou are fierce and fierce. In the past, the Huns also suffered many casualties when they attacked the border. The strength of the Tumulan tribe is simply not enough to deal with a village of more than 2,000 people. In fact, Tumulan chose this season to harass the Han border, just to take advantage of the common belief among the Han people that the Huns would invade the border in spring without taking any precautions and attack them. He was caught off guard, and he succeeded, but he didn't expect it would bring disaster to his tribe.
Yufro sighed: "Only Tu Mulan knows this."
Liu Bao asked: "Where is Tu Mulan?"
Yuvluo snorted and said: "The Han people had their heads cut off a long time ago, and many tribesmen were killed along with him. I don't know where these Han troops came from. They were merciless, unlike usual." Make a show."
Liu Bao suddenly realized something and said, "I know where they come from."
Everyone quickly asked: "Where are they from?"
Liu Bao gritted his teeth and said: "This must be the army of Jingzhou Shepherd Liu Xin!"
In response to Dong Zhuo's call, Liu Bao personally led 100,000 people into Guanzhong. He originally planned to take advantage of the opportunity to gain a vote, but ended up wiping out his entire army, and his status among the entire southern Huns was also shaken. For those who were in Guanzhong and The battle between the Jingzhou cavalry was still fresh in Liu Bao's memory. Just think about the whole Han Dynasty, who else besides that cavalry could go deep into the desert, roam across the desert for more than ten days, wipe out dozens of tribes and then return intact.
Yufuluo said angrily: "Why did he, a shepherd from Jingzhou, manage to come to Liangzhou? Who is willing to send an envoy to the Han Dynasty to ask for an explanation from their emperor!"
Although the Southern Xiongnu were attached to the Han Dynasty, they did not really take the Han Dynasty seriously. When the Han Dynasty was strong, they would keep to themselves. When the Han Dynasty became weak, they would jump out and cause trouble. Not only would they harass the Han territory, but they would also compete with the Han for control of the Western Regions and ask for peace with the Han court. Now, at a time when the Han Dynasty was in chaos, if it weren't for the fact that there were various problems within the Xiongnu, They had already attacked the big man, so how could they tolerate a Jingzhou shepherd bullying them?
Liu Bao sneered and said: "Asking for an explanation from the Emperor of the Han Dynasty? I'm afraid the emperor is now in Liu Xin's hands."
After he escaped from Guanzhong, he was busy fighting the Huns' civil war with Xubu Guduhou. He was completely unaware of the many changes that had taken place in the Han Dynasty, and thought that Liu Xie had fallen into Liu Xin's control.
Yufuluo also knew how powerful the powerful ministers of the Han Dynasty were. It seemed that in the past few years, Dong Zhuo had the final say in matters in the Han Dynasty. The emperor was actually just a decoration, so he said without thinking: "Since the Emperor of the Han Dynasty is in the hands of Liu Xin, then people I went to Liu Xin to ask for an explanation. Who is willing to be the envoy?"