Chapter 166: Foolish Nikan vs. Foolish Tartars

"Hahaha, they've fallen for it!"

Duolong, the foremost warrior of the Manchus, sitting on a folding camp stool, burst into loud laughter once again.

"The Zhangjing's command is truly divine!" Geng Zhongming suggested from the side. "Why not strike a blow while they're still unsteady on their feet? There's no need to trouble the Manchu warriors of the Zhangjing's Plain White Banner—let this old man's Han troops go instead."

"No rush, no rush." Duolong shook his head. "Let's save the horses' strength first. We'll fight once they've all come ashore!"

"The Zhangjing means to wipe out Zhu's bandits in one sweep, doesn't he? This old man is full of admiration!"

"My Prince, Baya Guard Banner Zhangjing, it seems Zhu's bandits have deployed a great many arquebusiers!" A company commander under Geng Zhongming loudly reported at that moment. Holding a single-tube telescope, he sat astride a tall, large horse, staring fixedly at the dock four or five hundred paces away. There were some buildings and piled-up goods on the dock that could serve as cover. The Ming arquebusiers who had landed first were using these buildings and goods to set up their defenses, and they were actually showing a fair amount of order.

"Arquebusiers?" Geng Zhongming burst out laughing at these words. "Arquebusiers? Hahaha, aren't they just walking to their deaths? Zhangjing, it seems this battle is as good as won!"

Duolong's face was likewise beaming with delight. He nodded and said, "Zhu's bandits' arquebusiers are indeed beneath mention. But we must still be careful. After all, we came in haste and had no time to build shield carts to block their bullets."

"Zhangjing," Geng Zhongming again seized the chance to request battle, "why not let this old man's Han troops go and test them?"

"Testing them" was merely an excuse. His real intention was to seize the first merit, to make up for the loss he had suffered earlier in the Battle of the Pontoon Bridge.

"No need," Duolong said with a smile. "The Prince's men contributed greatly in the Battle of the Pontoon Bridge. Now it is time for the warriors of the Plain White Banner to go up."

At these words, Geng Zhongming's face instantly flushed bright red, and he no longer dared to request battle.

"My Prince, Baya Guard Banner Zhangjing, Zhu's bandits also have quite a few pikemen!" That Zhangjing of the Plain Yellow Banner Han troops had made another new discovery.

"Pikemen guarding arquebusiers—now that's a bit more interesting!" The foremost warrior of the Manchus had already risen from his camp stool. He stood with his arms folded, watching the Ming troops form their ranks with a smile, and did not order his Manchu warriors to charge first while the enemy's formation was still incomplete.

Perhaps in his view, no matter what formation the Ming troops set or what weapons they wielded, they were all just a small side dish for the lords of the Eight Banners.

The only question now was how many Ming troops could get off the ships. And whether that Crown Prince of Zhu's Ming would dare to disembark.

Geng Zhongming, too, shifted his gaze from the Ming formation still taking shape to the six dragon banners of Zhu Cilang. When the Ming pikemen had first appeared, he had paid them a little attention. But he quickly spotted a fatal weakness in the Ming formation—the pikemen were split onto the two wings, while the arquebusiers were concentrated in the center. Moreover, the arquebusiers' formation was far too thin: only three ranks in all, and the first rank was drawn up loosely and sloppily, hardly a formation at all. The second and third ranks, by contrast, were far too dense, standing almost shoulder to shoulder.

This formation was obviously the work of an amateur at a glance. The pikemen on the wings could hardly cover the arquebusiers in the center. And the arquebusiers themselves could neither fight hand-to-hand nor withstand the shock of the Manchu iron cavalry. Besides, why place one loose rank of arquebusiers in front of two densely packed ranks?

Furthermore, two ranks of arquebusiers standing shoulder to shoulder would find it very difficult to reload—the matchcord of one arquebus might ignite the drifting gunpowder while powder was being poured from a powder flask, causing an accident.

"The dragon banners are moving!" That company commander of the Plain Yellow Banner Han troops suddenly shouted.

"If they're moving, then they're about to die!" the Manchu warrior Duolong said with a laugh. "Maersai, take three hundred death-sworn soldiers and lead the first assault!"

The Maersai he had named was a company commander of the Bordered White Banner, of the Wusu clan. He had an uncle named Qichongge, a trusted confidant of Dorgon who held the post of Grand Secretary of the Academy for the Advancement of Literature. By giving Maersai the vanguard, Duolong was doing Qichongge an enormous favor. Even setting aside capturing Zhu Cilang alive or slaying him in battle, merely seizing Zhu Cilang's banners would be a merit as great as heaven itself.

Maersai asked, "Baya Guard Banner Zhangjing, shall we exchange fire with heavy arrows, or charge their formation directly?"

The Qing troops did not fear firearms. For one thing, they themselves possessed quite a few firearms; for another, they had a special trick—using shield carts to cover their archers as they approached, then wearing down the enemy with arrows. But today Duolong and Geng Zhongming had come on a surprise raid and had brought no shield carts. Moreover, because they had encountered a heavy rain just as they set out, they had not even brought firearms—and even if they had, the damp powder would most likely have kept them from firing.

Duolong smiled and said, "No need to dismount and shoot on foot. Without shield carts for cover, shooting on foot would cost us many warriors! Besides, our bowstrings are all soaked through and have no strength in them. Better to charge the formation directly!" He paused. "Pay no attention to anything else—just fix your eyes on those six dragon banners and charge! If you can seize the banners, that alone is a great merit!"

"Orders received!"

"My Prince!" Duolong then said to Geng Zhongming, "I shall lead the picked troops out myself. I must trouble the Prince to command the Plain Yellow Banner Han troops as the reserve. Be sure to watch out for Zhu's bandits sallying from the city of Dagukou."

"Rest assured, Zhangjing. Leave it all to this old man." Inwardly Geng Zhongming was cursing up a storm, but outwardly he still had to flatter Duolong. After all, the man was a true Tartar, wasn't he?

Just as Duolong and Geng Zhongming began deploying their troops, the Ming troops opposite suddenly let out a deafening cheer.

"The Great Ancestor, the Lofty Emperor, lives again! The Great Ming is invincible under Heaven!"

Both Duolong and Maersai understood Chinese, but when they heard these words, they merely exchanged a smile.

You shout loudly enough, but what kind of formation have you drawn up? Anyone can see it's the work of amateurs—and you call yourselves invincible under Heaven.

"Maersai," Duolong said, "charge when you hear the horn. Advance without retreat. One charge and we'll smash them!"

"Ja!"

Maersai answered loudly. He gazed at the Ming troops three or four hundred paces away, and could hardly wait to charge. That thin horizontal line of arquebusiers—wouldn't it break at the first rush?

Behind the horizontal line of arquebusiers, several hundred cavalrymen now appeared, all wearing iron armor, clustered around the Crown Prince of Zhu's Ming's dragon banners, the Banner of the Army's Commander, and the banner of "The Great Ancestor, the Lofty Emperor, Lives Again." These armored cavalrymen were somewhat impressive, but they were also positioned badly. They were too close to the arquebusiers; once the arquebusiers were routed, they would crash into the cavalry formation. Moreover, cavalry needs a stretch of distance to build up speed, yet this group of horsemen was practically right up against the arquebusiers. Once the arquebusiers broke, they would not be able to charge at all.

Deploying troops like this was simply the fighting style of amateurs. Duolong and Maersai could only laugh at the sight.

"Woo-woo..."

The horn for the attack had sounded. The somewhat short and stocky Maersai gripped the reins with one hand and drew his saber with the other, then let out a great shout: "Manchu warriors, charge with me! Smash through the arquebusiers dead ahead!"

Then he spurred his horse forward, leading his five hundred-odd elite troops of the two banners, and charged at the three ranks of Ming arquebusiers four or five hundred paces ahead, without the slightest hesitation or the slightest worry.

The Ming arquebusiers were a joke—either their guns burst, or they fired wildly. The weapons in their hands were little better than fire pokers. If fifteen hundred pikemen had been arrayed in front, Maersai truly would not have dared to charge head-on. But arquebusiers—beneath mention!

He urged his warhorse on with all his might, charging toward the enemy line, his ears filled with the rumbling of hooves and the strange war cries of the Manchu warriors.

The Ming arquebusiers ahead were drawing closer and closer, but somewhat to Maersai's surprise, they did not fire their arquebuses early out of fear, nor did they show any sign of scattering and fleeing. They simply stood there, steady and unmoving.

They seem to have some skill! Just as wariness was rising in Maersai's heart, the first rank of arquebusiers ahead began firing their turtledove-foot arquebuses one after another.

It was not a volley, but scattered fire, and they ran as soon as they had fired—clearly a rabble!

Maersai was not hit, nor did he pay attention to how many of his comrades around him had been knocked from their horses by the heavy bullets of the powerful turtledove-foot arquebuses. He did not even much heed the screams of the warhorses or the wretched cries of men—in war, after all, people die. Still, the casualties could not have been great, because the enemy had fired far too early, discharging everything when the attackers were still seventy or eighty paces away. That was wild shooting; it could hardly have hit more than a few.

So Maersai continued his charge. But then he noticed a strange thing: after the enemy's first rank of arquebusiers withdrew, their second and third ranks stood utterly unmoved! And they showed not the slightest intention of firing wildly—they had not even leveled the muzzles of their arquebuses. They simply watched him approach rapidly, with perfect composure...

What is this? Are they frozen with fear? Maersai thought. Why have I run into a bunch of stupid Nikans today? Why aren't they afraid of the Great Qing's heavenly troops?

Afraid of Tartars?

How could that be?

If Hao Yaoqi knew what Maersai was thinking, he would certainly have taken him for a fool too. He was a true hero of the Shun's veteran camp—one who feared neither heaven nor earth. Would he be afraid of two or three hundred stupid Tartars who just charged head-on?

And those Tartars didn't even look formidable. After the arquebusiers of the sniper battalion had picked off a wave of them with their turtledove-foot arquebuses, several dozen had already fallen! Their formation was also somewhat disordered: some of the Tartar soldiers had slowed their pace, while others continued charging head-on like fools. They were simply stupid Tartars!

It turned out that of the three ranks of arquebusiers Hao Yaoqi had deployed, the first rank were "snipers"—also called skirmishers or the sniper battalion—over two hundred men in all, made up of arquebusiers who served as drill instructors in the Vanguard Brigade. Half were eunuch arquebusiers whom Zhu Cilang had brought from Beijing, and the other half were experts selected from among the arquebusiers under Shen Tingyang.

Their marksmanship was superb. Using the powerful turtledove-foot arquebus, they could easily hit a moving man-shaped target at over a hundred paces. The turtledove-foot arquebus was a heavy musket of astonishing power; at a range of over a hundred paces, nothing could withstand it! It could even pierce the Qing troops' shield carts with ease!

Therefore, in the tactics Zhu Cilang had designed for his arquebusiers, they served as skirmishers (snipers), spread out in front of the formation and responsible for firing the first shot.

In the round of sniping just now, they had taken out at least thirty Tartars—not necessarily killed or wounded; they might also have brought down their horses—and in doing so had thrown the Tartars' formation into some confusion and weakened the force of their assault.

Watching the red and silver-white cavalry surging forward in leaps and bounds ahead, feeling the rumbling tremor of the ground, Hao Yaoqi and most of the arquebusiers under his command kept their composure!

Most of them were veterans of the Shun's old camp who had been captured in the two battles at the Tianjin garrison, and some came from Chen Yongfu's troops. None of them had ever crossed blades with the Tartars, nor did they know how fearsome the Tartars were. But they all knew that if they dared to fire wildly or flee in the face of battle, the battle supervisors behind them would immediately cut them down with their long-handled sabers!

Moreover, they had a weapon to steel their courage: a three-foot-odd armor-piercing spike! With the armor-piercing spike fixed to the arquebus, it became a short spear seven or eight feet long. Two ranks of arquebusiers could instantly transform into a dense pike wall, giving them a certain defensive capability against cavalry.

"Fix spikes!"

Hao Yaoqi, standing behind the line with a long-handled saber to oversee the battle, let out a great shout, and at once the drummers began pounding the war drums — boom, boom, boom.

At the sound of the drums, the matchlock men all drew out their prickers, inserted them into the muzzles of their matchlocks, and then leveled their pieces. The front rank rested their arquebuses on the stands they carried with them, while the rear rank, all armed with matchlock muskets, simply braced their pieces on the shoulders of the men in front.

But no one opened fire; they only waited quietly for Hao Yaoqi himself to strike a brass gong.

Over the past twenty-some days, these veterans of the battlefield had been training for exactly this. Only when they heard the gong could they fire; anyone who fired early would inevitably get a sound beating from Hao Yaoqi.

Those who had not yet been beaten senseless had all learned to fire only on command!

(End of Chapter)