With the beating of the drum, Jiang Yiqu gave an order, and one hundred and twenty long archers and eighty short archers stepped out of the team. They moved forward four to five meters and stood in a line in front of the entire queue.
Okay. Everyone looked suspiciously at the bandits advancing towards them.
There are now a total of 200 long archers and 150 short archers in the militia. This time there are 200 with the army. Except for the seventh team of one main force group, which is an archer team, the others are scattered to other places.
However, when the whole army officially fought together, Shang Yi also gathered the archers from each team and placed them under the unified command and dispatch of the seventh team of the main force to form a concentrated superior force.
At this time, the bandit soldiers advanced to a distance of only more than a hundred steps away from the militia formation, but they were basically scattered. At first glance, Shang Yi saw that it looked a bit like the scattered attacks of later generations. But they were all doing their own thing.
A battle, without an overall or local team, is simply a mess.
"Longbowmen prepare, draw their bows."
Although the militia has now begun to use drums as a signal to issue orders, at each group level, it still depends on the commander of each group to give orders verbally. Therefore, the bandits rushing in front use the sound of the bandits to give orders.
Within a hundred steps, Jiang Yiqu, the captain of the seventh team of the main force, ordered again: "Fire the arrow."
One hundred and twenty longbowmen released their bowstrings almost at the same time. After one hundred and twenty feather arrows broke away from the bowstrings, they immediately shot towards the bandits' men and horses, causing a rapid and sharp whistle.
Voice.
One hundred steps is more than 150 meters in the metric system. Within this distance, even if you use a copycat Scottish longbow, it will be difficult to block it with ordinary leather armor, cotton armor and light iron armor, let alone bandits.
Most of the thieves did not have armor on their bodies, only civilian clothes. Therefore, a series of screams immediately rang out in the bandit formation, and at least thirty bandits fell to the ground after being shot by arrows. Even if they were not dead for a while, they would still rise.
not coming.
Zeng Hualong, who was watching the battle from the city tower in Yishui County, was also shocked. Not only was the range of the bows and arrows, but he also did not expect that there would be so many archers in the militia.
Because making bows is inherently a time-consuming, labor-intensive and expensive job, and the army in the Central Plains is not a nomadic people, everyone is an archer, and it is not easy to support a qualified archer, so naturally they are reluctant to let them charge into battle.
Therefore, in an army, if the proportion of archers is too high, it will affect the combat effectiveness of the entire army.
Generally speaking, the ratio of archers in an army is not large, about ten to one, and eight to one is considered extremely high. This is also an important reason why the Central Plains army can never defeat the nomads.
Almost all of them are qualified archers and do not need any training at all. But this militia group of 1,500 to 6,000 people actually brought out 200 archers at once, which is considered a big deal.
At this time, at the foot of the city, the longbowmen had no intention of using Jiang Yiqu and gave the order again. After shooting the first arrow, they immediately pulled out the second arrow from the quiver, put it on the bowstring, drew the bow again, and shot.
As the longbowmen fired three or four rounds in succession, a large number of the bandits who rushed up fell down. If it was in a village fight, the opponent would have been hit like this, and they would have turned around and ran away. But
Bandits are bandits after all. Even if they are a group of bandits who are scattered, they are much stronger than a group of peasants who are scattered. Therefore, there are still many people who are stubbornly pushing towards the direction of the militia, and some of them have begun to trot.
Rushed forward.
Jiang Yiqu gave another order, ordering the short archers to join the archery group. Therefore, the density of arrows fired by the militia nearly doubled, which also caused greater damage to the bandits. Some of them The bandits finally couldn't stand it anymore and began to retreat. But most of them continued to move forward.
It wasn't until the bandits came within thirty steps that the archers of the militia stopped firing and retreated to the back of the queue. By this time, the bandits had reduced by nearly 300 people and were retreating. The number of people was also gradually increasing. However, the bandits in the back row continued to rush forward, and the two sides were jostling each other, which also caused some chaos.
However, seeing that the opponent's archers finally put away their long bows and retreated to the back of the queue, some of the bandits who were charging forward finally felt relieved. It seemed that the most difficult time was finally over. But not yet. When they came to their senses, they saw a dense forest of spears in front of them, advancing toward them like a wall.
It would have been easier if only three or five spears had arrived, but the militia had a row of sixty spears, and they didn't dodge at all when facing the enemy's weapons. They all made one move: lunge forward.
When Shang Yi was training spearmen, he often arranged for two rows of spearmen to practice fighting, and no one was allowed to block or dodge. They were only allowed to stab each other to see who could strike quickly and strike hard. Therefore, almost all the spearmen of the militia were It's like a conditioned reflex. If you don't dodge or dodge, if you don't parry or fight, you'll stab everyone you encounter.
Of course, Shang Yi is definitely not using the spearmen as death squads. Replacing them one by one is not cost-effective for today's militia groups. In order to protect the spearmen, Shang Yi also specially equipped all the spearmen with full iron armor for combat, and in The armor between the chest and abdomen is also thickened. Therefore, even if both sides stab each other with spears on the battlefield, although both sides can stab each other at about the same time, the spearmen of the militia are protected by iron armor and can remain unharmed. , but the bandit's protection was much poorer, and he could only be penetrated by the spear and died.
As for the bandits who use knives or other weapons, because the length of the weapon is not as long as the spear, they will be stabbed by the spear before they can hit the opponent. It is even more impossible to escape. The sixty spears stabbed at them almost at the same time. There is no way to hide. Moreover, the spear tips of the militia are all three-spindle shaped, which not only has greater lethality, but also can be easily withdrawn after stabbing the opponent for the rest of the battle.
Therefore, when the spearmen of the militia group fought with the bandits, the bandits almost fell down in rows. Even if some of the spearmen of the militia group died in the battle, there were new spearmen immediately behind him. Come up, still maintaining a complete formation, and slowly advance forward.
On both sides of the spearmen, there were thirty machete wielders on each side. Like the spearmen, they did not parry or dodge at all, but just slashed with their swords. The battle was more intense than on the spearmen's side, because the spearmen A shot would leave a bloody hole at most, but a knife would cause flesh and blood to fly everywhere, blood splattering, and sometimes it would be unknown how many other things would be brought out.
At the same time, the archers retreated to the rear of the array. After a brief adjustment, they rearranged their team and used projectiles to continue firing bows and arrows at the bandit's rear array. Although the penetration of projectiles was much smaller than that of direct shots, But for bandits who lack armor, the lethality is still quite high. Every time a round of arrows falls, at least twenty or thirty bandits will fall to the ground after being hit by arrows.
In this way, although the militia's advance was not very fast, the bandits could not resist it at all. They could only retreat step by step as the militia advanced, and after the militia pushed past, there were countless bloody and bloody marks on the ground. Some of the corpses were still alive, but they were unable to move and could only lie in a pool of blood, groaning and struggling.
At this time, on the tower of Yishui County, Zeng Hualong's eyes showed a lot of joy. It seemed that what Shang Yi said was right. The combat effectiveness of this militia was indeed extraordinary. And beside him, , Meng Honggong, the magistrate of Qingzhou Prefecture, was already overjoyed. How could he not be happy to have such a strong army under his command? In his mind, he began to calculate based on the scriptures. Once Shang Yi took office, he would first send him to annihilate that group. It's better to support bandits.
Liu Tianxi, Ma Hanfu, Yang Mingyuan, Feng Zhigang and other generals were all ashen-faced at this time. This kind of fighting style of the militia was something they had never seen before, but it is undeniable that this kind of tactics is indeed very effective on the battlefield. Effective. When they watched the militia training yesterday, their estimate was that when both sides had approximately equal numbers of people and weapons, their own army would never be able to defeat the militia. However, judging from actual combat, even if their own troops doubled, they would probably not be able to defeat the militia. It is difficult to defeat the enemy militia. How could a young boy like Shang Yi have such great ability to train such a strong army? I am afraid that even if Qi Jiguang was reborn, it would be nothing more than that.
Seeing that the militia had the clear upper hand on the battlefield, Zeng Hualong nodded frequently and said to Meng Honggong beside him: "Prefect Meng, it seems that this Shang Yi is not just talking on paper. He really has real skills and practical knowledge. No wonder he If you can lead a group of militiamen to exterminate the bandits, it will not be in vain for me to recommend you to the imperial court."
Meng Honggong hurriedly patted his horse and said: "If you don't have the discernment to recognize people, I'm afraid that Shang Yi will be buried in the mountains and fields no matter how talented he is. But if you don't use him because of his humble background, he will definitely make me the Ming Dynasty court in the future." With the addition of another general, my lord, the name of Bole will become famous all over the world."
Although he knew that Meng Honggong was flattering him, he was telling the truth, so Zeng Hualong naturally accepted it all. Just as he was about to say a few polite words, a messenger came behind Zeng Hualong and whispered: "Sir, Urgent notice from the imperial court."
"Oh!" Zeng Hualong hurriedly took the announcement, tore off the paint and took out the letter. His face couldn't help but change drastically. He was both frightened and angry, but in the end he sighed and turned into a look of helplessness.
Meng Honggong was next to Zeng Hualong. This official document was not confidential, so Zeng Hualong had no intention of hiding it from him. Meng Honggong saw it with his eyes and saw very clearly: the Qing army that had entered the Pass had bypassed Beijing along the way. They even conquered Bazhou, Hejian, Yongqing, Hengshui and other places. The imperial court summoned people from all walks of life to resist the Qing army.
Seeing this, Meng Honggong also had a sudden thought in his heart. Hejian and Hengshui had already reached the border of Shandong, so would the Qing army invade Shandong again this time?