Chapter 373: Breaking the Enemy and Overcoming the General Below Puguan

The May heat along the Yellow River was still intense, especially in the afternoon, but once battle was joined, there was no room left for idle thoughts. Under the blazing sun, the fighting at Pujin Ford on the west bank had reached a fever pitch — nearly ten thousand troops on both sides were locked in a desperate, all-out struggle, so much so that the dead and wounded piled high and the riverbank was stained with blood.

The Youzhou Army was elite, no doubt, but because they had to cross the river to attack, they naturally lost the advantage of terrain; and since they had to ferry men across, the ordnance and supplies they could bring were inevitably somewhat scant. Beyond that, as had been said before, a single crossing could carry no more than a thousand-odd men, so in terms of local battlefield strength they held no numerical superiority.

Correspondingly, although the Guanxi Army numbered only five thousand, and although they were deeply unsettled by the Youzhou Army’s covert crossing and sheer desperation, the fact remained that they not only had five thousand combat troops but also an even larger number of auxiliaries and able-bodied laborers — men who, armed with crossbows and long spears, could still kill just the same. They even had a fortified camp to fall back on.

Under such circumstances, it was only to be expected that the Youzhou Army would suffer grievous attrition.

One could even say outright that if the fighting stopped at this moment, then based on the exchange ratio so far, Zhang Ji would absolutely rank among the realm’s renowned generals — because never before had a single battle inflicted such heavy losses on the Youzhou Army’s elites when facing a mere five thousand men.

The earlier battle in Hedong had certainly cost them considerable numbers, but back then the opponent had numbered a full hundred thousand.

Take Gao Shun’s Formation-Breaking Battalion, for example. His unit was among the finest elites under heaven, no doubt, but after fighting battle after battle — from Jinyang City to Gaoliang Pavilion, from Gaoliang Pavilion to Maojin, and from Maojin to the Puban Ford before their eyes — they had led the charge in nearly every engagement, so their losses were in fact the heaviest and their exhaustion the greatest. Earlier at Gaoliang Pavilion they had already lost thirty percent of their strength; after replenishing with selected surrendered troops and fighting here again, they were in truth far less resilient than when they had first set out.

Thus, after leading the charge and breaking the enemy lines, fighting bitterly up to this point, his unit had already lost over a hundred men killed and nearly three hundred wounded. At this rate, by the time this battle was over, his unit would likely have lost close to half its strength. Had it been any other force, it might well have been struck from the rolls entirely.

And if the Formation-Breaking Battalion was in such a state, the other units need hardly be mentioned. It was only thanks to the fact that one side fought with its back to the river, with no road of retreat, while the other side had execution squads patrolling strictly, beheading any who fell back — otherwise, some units might well have already broken and fled.

The bitter fighting on the riverbank continued unabated. Amid it all, the Youzhou Army, braving death and wounds, had already firmly seized three full beachhead positions, and follow-up reinforcements were streaming ashore in an endless flow. It seemed they had weathered the hardest moments and gained the upper hand.

But…

“Brother Yuanhao, what if we cannot take the stockade before nightfall?” Lou Gui, watching the situation on the opposite bank, could not help the sweat beading on his forehead. This was the first time Gongsun Xun had entrusted full command authority to others, and he, Lou Zibo, happened to be the one bearing the lead responsibility — how could he not be anxious? “A foothold on the beach is just a foothold on the beach. If we cannot seize the stockade and hold the ramparts to protect ourselves, what will happen when Dong Min and Guo Si arrive tomorrow? The enemy will have a full fifteen thousand troops; caught between hammer and anvil, how can the men already across possibly hold out?”

In truth, Lou Zibo’s worry struck at the heart of the matter.

When crossing a river to attack, the most critical thing is to establish a foothold. But a foothold comes in two kinds: one is, naturally, a beachhead; the other is a tactical foothold from the perspective of a large corps — that is, establishing a strongpoint on the opposite bank to secure follow-up military operations. Otherwise, it is all meaningless.

And the methods for establishing a strongpoint are likewise no more than two: one is to seize a city or stockade, the other is to build one’s own ramparts.

In the present case, how could ramparts be easily raised on a riverbank in a single night? This was not winter, when one could simply throw water on the ground and freeze it into ice. Therefore, they could only pin their hopes on seizing the stockade.

But as for seizing the stockade, the problem now was this: thanks to the Youzhou Army’s daring and bitter fighting, the entire army’s beachhead foothold was no longer in doubt. Yet, lacking siege equipment and effective troop strength, to ask soldiers who had fought wearily all afternoon to then go and storm an enemy stronghold that had been repaired and prepared for two full months was undoubtedly asking too much.

In fact, the reason Zhang Ji on the opposite bank could grit his teeth and sit steadily atop his command platform in the main camp was precisely because he still had a fortified camp, a sufficient number of auxiliaries and laborers, and fifteen thousand reinforcements to serve as his reserve. And it went without thinking that once the Youzhou Army ferried over another two thousand men before dark and the situation completely reversed, he would certainly set about withdrawing his forces at once and holding out behind his camp ramparts.

“Then we fight at night!” Tian Feng, his face grim, had been watching the battle on the opposite bank for half the day and finally spoke. “At a moment like this, we absolutely must not hesitate. The moment we hesitate, all our previous efforts will be wasted. But if we push through, not only the battle but the entire balance of power under heaven may suddenly open wide before us!”

Lou Gui opened his mouth. In truth, he very much wanted to ask: never mind how grueling night combat would be for the soldiers, or how dangerous ferrying boats across the river at night would be — what if they ferried another five or six thousand men across during the night and still could not seize the stockade? Then the next day, when the enemy crushed the entire army’s utterly exhausted elites on the riverbank, wouldn’t the Youzhou Army exist in name only?

When that time came, others aside, how would the three of them — the de facto decision-makers here — face Gongsun Xun?

But in the end, Lou Zibo said nothing. Instead, he nodded fiercely. There was no other reason: the soldiers at the front were fighting, staking their lives on victory or defeat, and were steadily gaining the advantage. As decision-makers in the army, they could consider the worst-case scenario, but they absolutely must not fail those men before the real danger arrived.

The time to speak of giving up had, after all, not yet come.

At the same time, across the Yellow River, atop the rammed-earth command platform in the great camp on the opposite bank, the Guanxi Army’s overall commander Zhang Ji sat with bloodshot eyes beneath his great banner bearing the character “Zhang,” holding a steel blade stained with blood reversed in his grip. Looking down from his elevated position at the battle on the riverbank outside the camp, he too had steeled his resolve to fight to the death.

If one reckoned carefully, roughly half of Zhang Ji’s resolve came from the battle itself — after all, they were all soldiers; once the killing frenzy took hold, no one was willing to let their previous efforts and sacrifices go to waste. The other half, however, came from personal enmity. Let it not be forgotten that his clansman’s nephew, Zhang Xiu, had died under the blades of the Youzhou Army.

Zhang Ji himself had no son, and keeping this nephew at his side had in itself carried the meaning of an adopted son. He had raised him to adulthood, a youth of outstanding valor and thorough military acumen, just on the verge of being able to entrust the future to him — only for him to be cut down in a confused melee by the Youzhou Army on the riverbank. Even now, General of the Household Zhang still did not know exactly who had done the killing; from the accounts of defeated troops, he could only roughly surmise it had been someone like the White Horse Volunteers under Gongsun Xun’s command.

And this was precisely why the sight of the banner bearing the character “Zhao” stirred such unquenchable fury in his heart — he had made a point of inquiring about those young commanders who now stood out among the White Horse Volunteers: Zhao Yun, Tian Chou, Tian Yu.

So, laughable as it might sound, yet terrifyingly real, it was the three banners — the two Tians and one Zhao — now appearing on the riverbank that truly hardened General of the Household Zhang’s resolve. Otherwise, even with the killing frenzy upon him, given the casualties before his eyes, Zhang Ji would have already wavered.

“Pass on my order!” The sun was sinking in the west. Seeing that the Youzhou Army on the opposite bank was, heedless of hardship, desperately organizing yet another wave of fresh troops — and that among them, quite a few siege implements were being loaded onto the boats — Zhang Ji understood in his heart that the enemy was preparing for night battle, and so he gave the order bluntly. “Have the troops withdraw from far to near, by echelon, and prepare to enter the camp. All of you, go out and deliver the order in person!”

The personal guards and attendants around him dared not delay and went out one after another to personally relay the order.

This, too, was a matter of necessity, for the fighting had reached such a pitch that both sides were utterly exhausted and laden with casualties, with no mind left to watch for signal flags. On the other side, on the beachhead, the roar of the Yellow River’s waters was so tremendous that it largely drowned out the battlefield’s drumbeats and gongs. Thus, to deliver orders, they could only rely on these plumed personal guards beside the commander to carry them out in person.

But what no one expected was that the sound of the Yellow River’s current, combined with the maddening summer sunlight, also served as a natural screen for another sound.

Even Zhang Ji, looking down from his elevated position, only noticed it when, after all his attendants had left, he inadvertently turned his head to the north — and then rose to his feet in shock. As it turned out, near sunset, a cloud of dust came rolling in from the north, and within that dust, a large body of troops, whose banners could not even be made out, had faintly revealed itself.

Zhang Ji was not only the first to spot this force, but quite possibly the only man on the battlefield to guess their identity the moment he saw them. And so, he was truly thrown into panic and alarm — but by this time, it was already too late for anything.

Indeed, the newcomers were none other than Xu Huang and his troops.

Seven days ago, after crossing the river at Caisang Ford, Xu Gongming had first raced a hundred li in three days to break Xiayang. Early the next morning, he set out again, spending two more days racing seventy li to break Heyang. And now, heedless of hardship, after resting only half the night, he had once more led his troops on a day and a half’s dash of sixty li to reach Pujin.

Along this entire march, of his five thousand-odd troops, hardly any had died in battle, yet those who collapsed, fell ill, or fainted from heatstroke along the way — all manner of non-combat attrition — amounted to over a thousand. Even the few marching mounts seized from Xiayang and Heyang had mostly dropped dead along the road.

Thus, when his force arrived on the Pujin battlefield after enduring countless hardships, only four thousand utterly exhausted men remained.

But it was enough.

“Company Commander Zhang, take a thousand men, raise my banner, and launch a fierce assault on the north gate of the main camp!” Xu Huang, seeing the battle situation from afar, gave the order directly and crisply. “The rest of the army, do not halt your steps — follow me and strike the enemy forces outside the camp from the flank!”

With these words, he dismounted, and without even taking up a spear, simply pulled his hand-axe from behind his back and led his men straight toward the riverbank, intent on leading them into close-quarters combat.

Zhang Ji, watching clearly from the high platform, could not help stamping his feet repeatedly. How could he not see through the enemy’s ruse? This Xu Huang, who had risen from the White Wave Bandits, had seen through the true and false of the battle situation at a single glance. The man knew the main camp could not be taken in a sudden assault, and that killing the troops on the riverbank was the best course — yet instead of sending his entire force to flank the troops on the beachhead, he had detached a thousand men to make a noisy feint against the main camp, precisely to make his own troops outside the camp mistakenly believe the camp was in danger and thus rapidly fall into a state of wavering, all in pursuit of maximum results.

Truly, truly cunning.

On the other side, whether it was Lou Gui and Tian Feng on the opposite riverbank, or the various commanders who had already crossed, the sight of Xu Huang’s banner appearing outside the enemy’s main camp filled them with shock and wild joy.

With one side rising as the other fell, each gaining what the other lost, and with a full three thousand troops plunging silently straight toward the riverbank, the battle on the beach began to collapse instantly, starting from the upstream direction where Xu Huang had come. Before their eyes, one wing of the Guanxi Army was on the verge of total rout.

Zhang Ji stared blankly for a moment, then swiftly calculated the situation in his mind. He was now exceptionally clear-headed. If he could not receive the troops outside the camp and bring them back inside, if he sat and watched the entire army collapse — never mind whether his camp could hold through the night — if he allowed both wings’ morale to waver and the troops to rout and flee, and then the enemy, at sunset, swept into the camp alongside the routing soldiers, how was he supposed to defend it then?

With this thought, Zhang Ji knew he could not hesitate. He hastily assembled the last usable force in the camp, scraped together over a thousand auxiliaries, then personally cast aside his blade, took up a spear, mounted his horse, and opened the camp’s north gate, preparing to go out and smash the enemy before him.

This was the correct move, because Zhang Ji’s troops, though somewhat “hollow,” were genuine fresh forces. Meanwhile, that thousand-man unit bearing Xu’s banner, after continuous forced marching, was also already exhausted to the extreme and was fighting now entirely on the residual momentum of sweeping downstream.

If he could break this thousand-man feint in full view of all — not expecting that the troops on the upstream beachhead, now attacked from behind by Xu Huang, could come back alive… that would truly be difficult… but if he could make the downstream troops regain their confidence and withdraw into the camp in good order, he could still struggle to hold the main camp.

However, Xu Gongming turned his head, saw Zhang Ji’s banner coming out of the camp of its own accord, and adapted on the spot, making a decision that would completely alter the course of the battle — he actually abandoned the enemy troops on the beachhead, turned around, and led his forces straight toward the camp gate to meet them.

Outside the main camp, what had been a feint instantly turned into a real assault.

On the other side, once Zhang Ji descended from the command platform, he could no longer see the movements of Xu Huang’s main force, which bore no banners. He threw open the camp gate and sallied forth to meet the enemy, only to run headlong into Xu Huang’s main force. Far from smashing the enemy before him, he instead became locked in bitter combat, with the trend of Xu Huang’s larger force counter-charging and pushing them back into the camp.

At the same time, the main combat troops on both wings of the Western Liang Army, seeing Zhang Ji’s banner sally forth from the stockade to engage the enemy and become entangled with that great Xu banner — yet unable to break the enemy before them, and instead showing signs of being counter-charged — grew increasingly panicked, every man thinking of retreat. Moreover, with sunset imminent, and with orders to withdraw and the reality of withdrawal already underway, their formations gradually began to loosen. It could only be said that, just as Zhang Ji had feared, a rout was imminent.

Zhang Ji could neither advance nor retreat, and the two wings of the Western Liang Army were gradually losing their grip. At the critical moment, what truly triggered the total collapse was the newly arrived wave of reinforcements from Hedong — these were genuine fresh troops. The moment this force reached the west bank, under the command of Zhao Yun, the commander at their landing point, they charged recklessly straight at one enemy unit and thoroughly routed them.

Under the lingering glow of sunset, the Yellow River rolled southward. The entire Western Liang Army, starting from the beachhead positions, collapsed all along the line. Zhang Ji, seeing the situation turn dire, tried to force a retreat and shut the camp gate, but was pinned down relentlessly by Xu Huang and pursued all the way into the stockade.

“Victory!” On the rammed-earth command platform of the Hedong main camp, Tian Yuanhao’s previously grim and cold expression transformed as he clenched his fist, raised his arm, and shouted.

And Lou Zibo, the nominal Regional Commander of this place, had already collapsed, limp, upon the high platform.

On the other side, Zhang Ji fled into the camp in panic. Back atop the rammed-earth command platform, he leaned on his spear to assess the situation, but all he saw was this: of the two gates, north and south, one had already been forced open by the Xu banner, which had pursued all the way to a point not far off, while through the other, that very Zhao banner, chasing the routing troops, had been the first to enter the camp.

Seeing this scene, how could a veteran general like him not understand that the situation was irretrievable?

And as this General of the Household’s gaze swept over the severed limbs, broken arms, wounded soldiers, and dead bodies on the riverbank outside the camp, he felt he had failed Dong Zhuo’s grace in recognizing and promoting him, failed the soldiers who had entrusted their lives to him, and, even more, failed his own nephew who had died so young in his prime. So he simply threw down his long spear, picked up that blade stained with blood from the ground, and, directly and without hesitation, cut his own throat atop the command platform. He was forty-three years old.

On the seventeenth day of the fifth month of the first year of Chuping, as the sun finally set, thanks to Xu Huang's especially outstanding performance, the Youzhou army, at the cost of extremely heavy casualties, captured Pujin, the vital transportation hub of Guanzhong, within a single day.

And at this very moment, Dong Min and Guo Si at Huayin had only just received the message calling for reinforcements.

——————I am the slow-on-the-uptake dividing line——————

"When Huang passed through Caisang Ford, he rushed along the river for days on end, raiding and fighting bitterly. The soldiers all complained and begged for a brief rest, but Huang did not permit it. Someone advised him: 'The army is all men of Hedong; how can you, my lord, earn the resentment of your countrymen and lose a reputation for leniency?' Huang sighed and said: 'The ancients worried about not encountering an enlightened ruler. Now I have been fortunate to meet one, who has entrusted me with great affairs. I constantly strive to repay him with merit; what use have I for private reputation?' He then urged the army to march swiftly. When they reached Pujin, they encountered a bitter battle crossing the river. Seeing the fighting at its height, Huang raised his banner and attacked the camp of the enemy general Zhang Ji, while personally gripping a hand-axe and secretly shifting to fight on the riverbank. Zhang Ji was on a high platform and, seeing the riverbank about to collapse, personally led over a thousand infantry and cavalry out to battle. Huang immediately turned and struck at him, forcing him to retreat, then pursued, trapping him as he fell back in fear into an encirclement, and destroyed him. In barely a quarter of an hour, Zhang Ji cut his own throat on the command platform, the remaining troops all surrendered, and Pujin fell. The Grand Ancestor heard of this and said: 'Of all those famed in antiquity as skilled commanders, I have never heard of one who, following a river for seven days, dashed two hundred li, broke two cities, and seized a stronghold. Gongming in this battle can be said to have displayed such military might that it was like splitting bamboo—after the first few joints, everything yielded smoothly to the blade.' Those around him were all convinced." — "Old Book of Yan," Volume 71, Biography 21.

PS: A note to mention, it has been one year since the book started. The readers have been very enthusiastic, and although the Hundred Alliance failed, it was already enough to leave one deeply grateful. So the comrades in the reader management group seem to want to organize some activities to give back to everyone. I am completely muddled about the specifics, and was only informed today (just like the Hundred Alliance event) about one thing: it seems there is first a chapter-commentary event, apparently a supercharged version of the official Qidian event—so, I hope everyone will enthusiastically participate in the chapter-commentary event. Beyond that, I solemnly invite all Alliance Masters and legitimate subscribers to join the reader group 931557287... because there are other give-back activities, but as for the specifics, I truly have no idea.

(End of Chapter)