The battlefield was divided into two parts. On one side, Wang Yu led 3,000 infantry and fought hard against 10,000 Cao Bao's troops. On the other side, Zhao Yun led 500 elite cavalry and defeated 3,000 Danyang soldiers with a heavy rain of fire.
The strong soldier could not lift his head.
The situation seems to be very favorable, but those who know the military know that this is just an illusion.
Hardness cannot last, softness cannot defend. With an outnumbered enemy, it is useless to just gain the upper hand. You must have the power to deliver a fatal blow. The advantage is only temporary. If the strength of both sides is similar, there will be no follow-up weakness. Then Cao Bao will be defeated.
It was a done deal and irreversible, but now, the balance of victory and defeat was tilting in Cao Bao's favor.
The cavalry's tactics are closer to the harassment method, focusing on destroying morale and disrupting the formation, rather than killing.
In this battle, Cao Bao was too incompetent and had poor command, otherwise the light cavalry would not have been able to cause such great damage. Cao Bao was confused by the paper armor on the light cavalry. He thought it was iron armor and that the opponent was trying to charge into the formation, but there was no
He made timely adjustments, but was caught off guard.
If it were Cao Cao, Sun Ce would have seen through the true face of Zhao Yun's cavalry here several miles away. Whether there would be any means to counterattack depends on each person's ability, but they will definitely be able to make corresponding adjustments.
In order to minimize the lethality of cavalry tactics.
But with Cao Bao's ability, if the troops he led were consistent with his style, he would have been completely defeated in this battle, but who makes him a special case? In the Three Kingdoms era, he was probably the only one who could make a weak army strong.
Son.
After the initial heavy blow, the generals of the Danyang Army began to make spontaneous adjustments without waiting for orders from the Chinese Army. The formation of the armored soldiers in the front row remained unchanged, and the light armored soldiers in the rear row began to evacuate.
The dense formation turned into a fish-scale formation with teams as units.
The sword and shield bearers in the team gave up holding their swords and were at the front with their shields held diagonally with both hands. The long soldiers stood in the middle and end of the team, holding their spears diagonally and swinging them back and forth above the head of the robe. The archers stood behind the shield bearers, holding their bows.
Arrows, according to the order of the team leader, were launched in unison.
Even with the command of a general, an army that can complete this adjustment withstand the enemy's attack can be regarded as the strongest army in the world. An army that can complete the adjustment spontaneously without even a vague order from the general... Even after reading military books,
Kong Ming and Pang Tong, who were well-informed in Qingzhou, could only be dumbfounded.
The Danyang soldiers are well known all over the world, and there are also Danyang soldiers in the Qingzhou army. However, the strength of this powerful army can only be truly demonstrated under the hands of a person like Cao Bao.
This is simply a group of warriors born for war!
Faced with a sudden onslaught, completely unfamiliar tactics, an incompetent general behind him, and disorganized command, this powerful army completed self-adjustment and adopted the most appropriate tactics to face the enemy.
So far, the only highlight of Cao Bao's command is that he has left sufficient reserves.
But that's not because his military strategy is great, it's just that he has too many troops. Without a reserve, he can't devote all his troops to the attack. This is not even a satisfactory order.
His mistakes were not ordinary, they were countless. Regardless of the details, the fact that he mixed the county soldiers and Danyang soldiers together to form a front army to attack the mountain was an extremely outrageous mistake.
Zhuge Liang didn't realize it until just now. It's not that he is slow, it's just that he didn't understand the strength of Danyang soldiers in advance.
At present, the county soldiers in the front army have collapsed. It is precisely because of their collapse that the Danyang soldiers' formation was disrupted, and more than 10,000 people were crushed by 3,000 people, so that they could not hold their heads up.
After discovering that the Chinese army had not adjusted for a long time, the Danyang soldiers in the fierce battle also made adjustments. They spontaneously formed a small formation and faced off with swords and guns against anyone who dared to attack the formation.
Although it was a bit cruel to raise the sword to Pao Ze, this adjustment was very effective. The county soldiers who were defeated by the killing did not dare to face the ferocious enemy, nor did they dare to face their comrades who had turned against each other. They circled around and fought fiercely from a distance.
Both parties fled towards the rolling hills.
Speaking of which, this scene was somewhat similar to the previous scene after Wang Yu's lecture, except that the scale of the collapse was larger and the proportion was higher.
Almost in the blink of an eye, Cao Bao's army was reduced by 3,000 people - the county soldiers were less than 5,000 before the war. The casualties in Zhao Yun's harassment were mainly county soldiers. They died or fled in the fierce battle, and nearly two more were lost.
Thousands and the rest actually lost their will to fight. When they saw the flag of the Qingzhou Army, they either retreated or fled.
The Danyang soldiers changed their formation, leaving them room to flee, but not allowing them to get close. So these three thousand people were like water from a floodgate, and they all ran away in one go.
Judging from the number of people, the strength of both sides has become much closer. Cao Bao's army has been reduced to less than 8,000, while Wang Yu's has been reduced to less than 1,000. However, the faces of Zhuge Liang and Pang Tong became more and more solemn.
Because it is only now that the strength of Cao Bao's army has been fully utilized.
The momentum of Wang Yu's advance is getting weaker and weaker. In the previous assault, Langya Yulin consumed a lot of physical strength, and the advantage of the geographical location has been exhausted, and he is no longer as brave as before. However, Cao Bao's front army has become a pure Danyang soldier.
, all of them fought to the death and refused to retreat, and they also had a thousand more troops!
The advantages accumulated previously are being erased, and as time goes by, the situation will only get worse.
In fact, if Cao Bao hadn't been a fool and mixed elites with miscellaneous soldiers, the current situation would have happened earlier. Wang Yu's strong attack was certainly ferocious. If Cao Bao's men were all county soldiers, Zhao Yun might not have been needed.
Can gain victory.
But standing in front of him was a powerful army that was no less than the elite of Qingzhou. If you want to achieve victory simply by relying on bravery and fierce attacks, you would be taking the heroes of the world too lightly.
On the other side, after the Danyang soldiers changed their tactics on their own, although they still couldn't do anything to Zhao Yun and his Qingqi, their losses were greatly reduced. There were no more screams that could be heard from time to time around them, and they couldn't see their fellow countrymen rolling and struggling in pain.
The morale of the flanking troops also began to recover.
As for Zhao Yun, the stormy cavalry offensive is actually unsustainable. Continuously firing bows and arrows is a great burden on the body. Zhao Yun himself is superb in martial arts, so it doesn't matter, but there are several Qingzhou cavalrymen who can compete with him.
compared to?
The mighty arrow rain was weakening, and only the war horses were running back and forth, and the smoke and dust kicked up by their feet still covered the sky and the sun.
Cao Bao breathed a sigh of relief.
He has long been accustomed to the generals under his command acting on their own initiative, and this is how he gained his affinity in the military. He usually has no airs, and he is a brother-in-law with the rebellious generals under his command.
In fact, Tao Qian himself was the one who strictly enforced military orders in the army, and Cao Bao was the one with a shameless face. When someone made a mistake, he helped to plead for mercy, when someone made a meritorious service, he helped to ask for a reward. Such a person would not have high affinity.
?
When the battle was going smoothly, everyone gave him face and obeyed his orders. Once the battle went unfavorably, everyone would do their own thing and no one would pay attention to this idiot general. Cao Bao was accustomed to this and never looked for trouble.
Therefore, even though he knew that he was not very capable, Tao Qian still regarded him as a future general. Firstly, there was really no talent under Lao Tao, and secondly, Lao Tao also knew that Cao Bao was just a decoration.
Not much, as long as you are loyal enough.
In fact, except under Tao Qian, Cao Bao's ability would never be reused by anyone. Even if he wanted to rebel, he would have no way out. This was something he himself knew very well.
Tao Qian's use of Cao Bao was usually very safe, but he could not count his own death, and he did not expect that Qingzhou's new policy was implemented so quickly that Cao Bao and others could not find their place at all, which led to the aftermath of his death.
This battle.
But in any case, the Danyang soldiers who have completed the adjustment have basically restored their combat strength to their heyday. Although there is no unified command from the general, the battle situation has entered a stalemate. If there are no special circumstances, there is no need for unified command. Now
It takes courage and endurance.
In this regard, the Danyang soldiers were the one with the upper hand.
Seeing this, Cao Bao waved his hand and ordered the last battalion of soldiers and horses around him to start taking action and join the siege of Wang Yu's army.
"Baozi, don't you have some backup?" Xu Dan carefully kept a distance from Cao Bao. The kick just now was really painful, and he didn't want to take another one. But there were some things that he still needed to remind him.
, who makes the three brothers know each other's ins and outs and have nothing to say? If the three cobblers don't pool their ideas, do they still want to imitate others and act arbitrarily?
"It's no use." Cao Bao didn't use violence this time, but he was not as high-spirited as before. He said in a calm tone: "Zhao Yun's cavalry can't be hit, so he might charge hard, but I've seen paper armor before.
, the anti-arrow is very useful, but the close combat is just mediocre. He can't break through the formation on the flanks. Wang Yu's last backup force is that the 500 Hidden Mist Army is still half a full force..."
He pointed to the top of the slope and gestured: "However, that is his last backup force. No matter how strong the five hundred infantry are, they cannot defeat the enemy. He has never put these five hundred soldiers into battle. Firstly, in order to wait for
Opportunity, secondly, it also means leaving a way out, otherwise why would you stay on the top of the mountain and not come down?"
Xu Dan nodded. There were five hundred infantrymen who were good at mountain warfare. There was no point in joining the battle group. However, when escaping, sniping with crossbows from a high position still posed a great threat. It could also play a certain role during the escape.
It does make sense to say it was a back-up move.
"Then...what happened to that noisy arrow just now?" Zhang Lie suddenly asked.
"Maybe it's reconnaissance? Reconnaissance on Que Xuan's movements..." Cao Bao replied in an uncertain tone: "Que Xuan may have gone straight to Tancheng, so the soldiers and horses in the city did not dare to come out to fight. If they had come out earlier,
If you cooperate with Zhao Yun when he launches it, maybe..."
Cao Bao convinced himself first, and shuddered as he spoke.
This made him feel a little embarrassed, so he coughed twice, clapped his hands, and said confidently: "In short, I am investing another thousand troops now just to cut off Wang Yu's hope as soon as possible and let him know that nothing can be done.
Retreat, we have won this battle, he has been spared his life, and everyone has his place."
"..." Zhang Jie was speechless. Does this mean everyone gets what he deserves? But forget it, it's God's blessing that he can win. It would be too greedy to ask for anything more.
Seeing the look on his companion's face, Cao Bao felt a little embarrassed. He cleared his throat and was about to explain a few more words. At this moment, something strange happened! (To be continued.