Chapter 260

They were just like ordinary people in the late Qing Dynasty, having never seen the world!

Seeing a camera in a foreigner's hand, they shouted "Soul-Stealing Machine!"

Even a foreigner's phonograph made them cry out "Wailing of the Wronged Souls!"

Seeing a lightbulb glow, they immediately knelt on the ground and shouted "Divine Being!"

And there was the Ma La train, personally invented by Empress Dowager Cixi, which single-handedly dragged the wheel of history back by a hundred years!

However, the Xiongnu soldiers were not the Qing army, and Chanyu Modu Chanyu Chanyu Modu was certainly not Cixi!

Although the Xiongnu soldiers here were not yet comparable to the Mongol Iron Cavalry of later generations, they were still one of the most ferocious and formidable armies in the world today!

Chanyu Modu Chanyu Chanyu Modu was the first man in steppe history to unify the entire grassland!

Without exaggeration, without Chanyu Modu Chanyu Chanyu Modu, there could never have been the Xiongnu Empire that later had the four Han emperors pinned to the ground and ruthlessly rubbed!

Without Chanyu Modu Chanyu Chanyu Modu, Genghis Khan could never have possessed the ambition to unify the grasslands!

Nor could the Great Yuan Empire, which swept across Eurasia, ever have been born!

If the glorious history of the Central Plains began in the era of the First Emperor, Ying Zheng!

Then the glorious history of the grasslands undoubtedly began in the era of Chanyu Modu Chanyu Chanyu Modu!

Seeing his own soldiers one by one like this, he was so enraged his liver and intestines seemed to snap.

He wished nothing more than to kill a few immediately to steady the army's morale!

But he also understood that this was not the time for indiscriminate killing; the army's fear was not of these cannonballs, but of the Eternal Heaven!

In that instant, he closed his eyes again, raised both hands to the sky, murmured for a moment, then suddenly opened his eyes and shouted to all the Xiongnu troops:

"I, Chanyu Modu Chanyu Chanyu Modu, am the Son of the Eternal Heaven, the messenger of the Eternal Heaven! Just now, the Eternal Heaven was angry because it saw you had lost your fighting spirit, each one knowing only fear. Now, it commands me to lead you across this swamp, or else its wrath will never be extinguished!"

He shouted loudly.

And it must be said, this rhetoric of being the Son of Heaven was very effective!

Moreover, it was not only effective among the Xiongnu of the present; it worked in the Xia, Shang, and Zhou dynasties, and it still worked during the Spring and Autumn and Warring States periods!

It worked equally well in the Western world!

It was the same across the land of Huaxia!

Otherwise, why did every Emperor claim to be the Son of Heaven?

In the late Qing period, there was even a fierce man named Hong Xiuquan who used the concepts of Heavenly Father and Son of Heaven to create the formidable Taiping Heavenly Kingdom!

Now, at this very moment, this same rhetoric works just as well!

After Chanyu Modu Chanyu Chanyu Modu spoke these words, in that instant, all the Xiongnu soldiers were as if injected with rooster blood.

In that instant, their eyes all glowed with light!

Does the Eternal Heaven think we are not brave enough?

Then we shall show it our bravery!

Does the Eternal Heaven say we are like cowards?

Then we shall regain our fighting spirit!

"Kill!"

"Kill!"

"Capture the Emperor of the Central Plains alive!"

In that moment, everyone roared!

Everyone charged forward recklessly, risking their lives!

However, cannons do not care whether you are brave or cowardly!

Zhou Yafu on the other side of the swamp cared even less about all this!

Just now, the distance was too great; the cannons' range was limited, so they could not be used on a large scale.

They had merely fired a couple of shots to test their power!

But now... they were charging up, and the two armies were less than three li apart!

This distance was almost the perfect range for smoothbore cannons!

Almost every cannonball could accurately strike the enemy!

This truly was the perfect distance!

In that moment, he wasted no time and directly ordered the firing!

Boom, boom, boom!

Instantly!

Eighty cannons fired in unison!

From the cannon mouths, tongues of fire lashed out like thunder, launching the cannonballs!

Then, they exploded amidst the crowd!

Bang, bang, bang!

The explosions rose and fell in succession!

Although the precision and accuracy of smoothbore cannons were far from perfect.

But... the distance was truly too close!

Only about three li!

At this distance, even a blind man could hit the target!

Plus, with their ranks so densely packed, this first volley alone directly killed and wounded twenty thousand of Chanyu Modu Chanyu Chanyu Modu's men!

Add to that the ambushes of grappling hooks, crossbow bolts, and other traps within the swamp!

Before the army had advanced even one li, the casualties had reached an utterly grotesque number!

At this moment, even Chanyu Modu Chanyu Chanyu Modu felt his heart grow cold; he was in utter panic!

But he wasted no time, immediately shouting at the top of his lungs: "Charge! Charge! Charge!"

"For the Eternal Heaven!"

"To appease the wrath of the Eternal Heaven!"

"Charge for me!"

"Let the Eternal Heaven see what bloodthirsty spirit his people possess!"

He cried out in a hoarse voice!

At that moment, they charged once more!

Yet, the more fiercely he charged, the more excited Zhou Yafu became!

Boom, boom, boom!

In the blink of an eye, three more volleys were fired..

Explosions rose up one after another!

And as the distance closed, Chanyu Modu Chanyu Chanyu Modu grew even more panicked!

Because... after glancing forward and then looking back, his heart was truly on the verge of dying!

One hundred thousand men!

One hundred thousand men are gone!

Now... the entire Xiongnu army combined numbers less than one hundred thousand!

Moreover, even among these remaining few under one hundred thousand, the number of wounded is enormous.

Many were missing an arm or a leg.

Almost everyone was wailing!

"Chanyu Modu Chanyu Modu Chanyu, retreat! We cannot break through, we really cannot break through!"

"I see it now; this is not the Eternal Heaven unleashing its wrath, but them!"

"Those weapons beside them!"

"They are too fierce!"

"At such a distance, even our finest archers cannot shoot this far, yet their weapons can strike this far!"

"And every time those weapons spew flame, they kill dozens, even hundreds of us!"

"Retreat!"

"Retreat!"

At that moment, a Xiongnu general, clutching his severed arm, cried out repeatedly to Chanyu Modu Chanyu Chanyu Modu!

And countless Xiongnu soldiers were wailing!