Chapter 476: The Victory Report Arrives

The Ming army began cleaning the battlefield and tallying their own losses.

The Ming army was no longer in a hurry to attack. After this victory, the Jianzhou barbarians had lost all ability to resist and could not possibly hold the Jianning Three Guards. The entire Dongning Guard and Jianning Three Guards now belonged utterly and completely to the Ming dynasty.

As for whether to continue advancing, that would have to await Your Majesty's orders. Even Sun Chuanting knew that the likelihood of continuing the advance was not great.

Building a city here and defending it in place was the best course of action.

After this battle, the Jianzhou barbarians had been greatly weakened, and their route westward had been blocked. They could no longer make trouble.

Glancing at Lu Xiangsheng beside him, Sun Chuanting said directly: "Dispatch a report of victory immediately, send it back to report the good news to Your Majesty, and let Your Majesty know that we won this battle, that we have recovered Dongning Guard and the Jianning Three Guards!"

"Yes, Marshal!" Lu Xiangsheng said with a broad laugh.

After winning this battle, the tide of war was instantly reversed, and the situation had turned for the better.

And these men had earned merit great enough that rewards were certainly guaranteed—they might even receive noble titles. The entire army was jubilant.

Soon, the casualty count was tallied.

The personal troops had lost over four hundred dead, over seven hundred severely wounded, over sixteen hundred lightly wounded, and over twelve hundred combat-ineffective casualties. The rest still retained full fighting capability.

This let Sun Chuanting breathe a sigh of relief, and at the same time he understood that this battle was over.

Having taken Dongning Guard, even without advancing further, relying on these men alone to defend Dongning Guard was sufficient. If the front line were stretched too long, the losses would outweigh the gains, so Sun Chuanting would not advance any further.

At this moment, Hong Taiji sat on his horse, his expression extremely grim.

This defeat was simply too devastating! After reaching Dongning Guard and confirming there were no pursuers, Hong Taiji and his men finally stopped and began gathering the routed troops.

When the troops had all been gathered and no more stragglers returned, Hong Taiji's face turned very ugly.

In an entire day, he had managed to gather only a little over eleven thousand men, and most of them were wounded. Most importantly, morale was extremely low—they simply had no confidence left to fight the Ming to a final showdown.

Daišan walked up to Hong Taiji and said directly: "Great Khan, we cannot stay here any longer."

Hong Taiji was silent for a long while.

Hong Taiji also knew this place could not be held. With the forces he had on hand, meeting the Ming army head-on here was hopeless. He could not win; he could only retreat.

If the Ming army continued to advance, and they used this to stretch their supply lines, launching surprise attacks on their grain convoys, perhaps the Jurchen still had a chance.

"The Tieling and Qinghe line can no longer be held either." Daišan looked at Hong Taiji and continued: "We cannot waste more men at Tieling and Qinghe. We should withdraw the troops there and concentrate our strength."

Hong Taiji understood that they must concentrate their forces to preserve themselves; otherwise, they could easily be defeated piecemeal.

Hong Taiji nodded and said to Daišan: "Send men with orders immediately, have them withdraw from Tieling and Qinghe."

After saying this, Hong Taiji raised his head, looked at Daišan, and asked directly: "Have Manggūltai and Dodo returned?"

These two were the banner masters who led the first wave of the assault. How terrible it had been—both Daišan and Hong Taiji had seen it with their own eyes.

Now that Hong Taiji asked this, it was merely out of a sliver of hope in his heart. He hoped they were not dead, hoped they had returned.

But seeing Daišan's expression, Hong Taiji's face turned even uglier. Clearly, that hope had been shattered.

Daišan said nothing, nor did he have anything he wanted to say.

Manggūltai and Dodo were both dead. Their corpses had not even been recovered—or rather, there had been no time to attend to their corpses. Even if they were not dead, they would by now have fallen into the hands of the Great Ming.

"Rally the men. We withdraw." Hong Taiji looked at Daišan and rose to his feet, saying: "If we wait any longer, the Ming army will be here."

Meanwhile, within Shanhai Pass.

Zhu Youxiao was waiting anxiously, his heart filled with worry.

If this battle was won, then everything would be fine; if it was lost, the situation would collapse, and most critically, it would affect his own prestige—that would not be a good thing.

Zhu Youxiao still had reforms to carry out next; if he lost, that would be very troublesome.

So Zhu Youxiao was somewhat anxious as well. Even though he had confidence in Sun Chuanting, at a moment like this he could not remain calm.

Just then, a commotion suddenly broke out outside.

"Victory report!"

Zhu Youxiao vaguely heard someone in the distance shouting something, but could not make it out no matter how he tried.

"Victory report!"

After Zhu Youxiao confirmed it was indeed a victory report, he sat directly down on the dragon throne, looking as though he had breathed a sigh of relief.

Wei Chao ran in from outside, his face full of excitement, his whole body practically flying—he had even run right out of his shoes.

Though there was an element of performance in it, one could still tell the joy was genuine.

Upon seeing Zhu Youxiao, Wei Chao fell to his knees with a thud and said loudly: "Congratulations, Your Majesty, felicitations, Your Majesty! Sun Chuanting, Lord Sun, has won a great victory! This is the victory report!"

As he spoke, Wei Chao remained kneeling, shuffling forward on his knees to Zhu Youxiao's presence, raising Sun Chuanting's victory report with both hands before Zhu Youxiao.

Reaching out to take the report, Zhu Youxiao quickly glanced through it, and a look of wild joy spread across his face.

Over four hundred of their own dead, twenty thousand enemies slain—such results were simply unprecedented and unheard of!

His thinking had been right after all—an army like this was absolutely unmatched in the world!

Equipped with rocket launchers, equipped with cannons, equipped with flintlock muskets, equipped with hand-cranked rotary machine guns—before metallic cartridge ammunition appeared, this was the pinnacle of firearm forces!

Rising to his feet, Zhu Youxiao laughed and said: "Spread the victory report far and wide, let everyone know we won! Send the victory report to the Nine Border Garrisons, let them all know! And immediately send men to deliver the victory report back to the capital!"

"Yes, Your Majesty!" Wei Chao hastily acknowledged, then turned and ran out.

Glancing at Chen Hong beside him, Zhu Youxiao said: "We won this time. I am very pleased. Everyone is to be rewarded—prepare a banquet to celebrate!"

"Yes, Your Majesty!" Chen Hong hastily acknowledged.

The news of the great victory spread in an instant, and the victory report reached Guangning city at once.

Wang Zaijin looked at the victory report in his hands, his face full of disbelief.

He walked to the front of the map, stared at the locations on it, and sank rapidly into thought.

Sun Chuanting had fought this battle beautifully—fifteen thousand men against thirty thousand Jianzhou barbarians, and in open field combat at that. Twenty thousand enemies annihilated, with their own losses under four hundred.

If not for the news that had come from the Emperor, Wang Zaijin would have thought this was utter nonsense.

This was in Liaodong, and Wang Zaijin had his own channels of information. According to the reports from his sources, his men had already seen the corpses—the bodies of the Jianzhou barbarians were lying right there.

Men from Liaoyang had even rushed over and begun helping to sort the corpses and clean the battlefield. The warhorses killed in battle had already been butchered, and it was said the horsemeat was being transported over, with every region set to receive a share.

Letting everyone have a meal of horse meat — this was said to be Sun Chuanting's gesture of goodwill. Wang Zaijin knew this was plainly showing off, but there was nothing he could do about it; the man had won, after all.

The Son of Heaven's own troops — truly extraordinary indeed!

Staring at the battle report in his hands, Wang Zaijin's eyes grew brighter and brighter.

Although he admired Sun Chuanting and thought him capable, that was not what Wang Zaijin valued most. What he truly coveted were the firearms that had displayed such devastating power in this battle.

Those rocket shells, those hand-cranked rotary machine guns — to Wang Zaijin, they were utterly irresistible.

In Wang Zaijin's view, if he had those things, his own men could win too. His troops might not be as elite as Sun Chuanting's, but he had far more of them.

It seemed he would need to find a way to request some equipment from His Majesty.

Turning around, he glanced at Zhang Cong behind him and asked, "Anything you want to say?"

"Sir, could we possibly get some equipment too?" Zhang Cong's eyes gleamed as he spoke with some excitement.

In truth, ever since the Hundred Works Bureau had delivered all kinds of equipment, the Liaodong army had come to understand that this equipment was all fine stuff, capable of unleashing tremendous power.

Because they had witnessed it more than once — especially in the last Liaodong campaign, when Xiong Tingbi killed Nurhaci with a single cannon shot.

This had driven home to the Liaodong soldiers one truth: everything produced by the Hundred Works Bureau was top quality. Under such circumstances, it was impossible for them not to want it.

But now look — look at the equipment the Imperial Guard Corps had. That kind of equipment was enough to make anyone's mouth water!

If they had it themselves, they could win battles too!

So Zhang Cong stared at Wang Zaijin with burning, pleading eyes, hoping they could get some of it.

Wang Zaijin let out a sigh and said helplessly, "I won't hide it from you — this stuff costs a fortune. They say it's drained His Majesty's personal treasury dry."

"Just the other day there was debate at court, with people saying the money wasn't well spent. After this battle, those people will probably shut their mouths. But for us to get some — that won't be easy. The war in Liaodong has gone on this long, and the Jianzhou barbarians are already half crippled; they probably can't make trouble for more than a few years. And the Mongols — do you think they can stir up much?"

"Not in the short term, I'm afraid." Zhang Cong said with a grimace.

Indeed, things were just as Zhang Cong had said. The war between the Inner Khalkha and the Khorchin was proceeding smoothly; the two sides had quickly slaughtered their way through the Taining Guard of the Doyan Three Guards, and were now fiercely assaulting the Doyan Guard itself — taking it was only a matter of time.

According to the battle reports sent back from the front, although the war was progressing smoothly, the losses were not insignificant either.

Still, they had seized their spoils of war, and their tribes had been expanded — it would just take time to digest. Until they made up their losses and absorbed their gains, they would have no mind for further expansion. For the coming period, they would probably behave themselves.

The Great Ming and the Mongols would focus on trade. Even if someone did make trouble, it would only be Ligdan.

And given Ligdan Khan's abilities, Zhang Cong felt he couldn't stir up much trouble anyway.

So for the Guangning regular army to obtain such fine equipment — it was unlikely to happen anytime soon.

Wang Zaijin glanced at Zhang Cong and said, "I'll still ask for some, but not too much. I believe His Majesty will grant a little. Don't get your hopes up too high."