Chapter 1701: The Ming Emperor Slays the Foremost Warrior of the Mongols in Battle!

When they saw the Ming army's iron-armored cavalry all dismount and form an infantry formation, the Mongols on the opposite bank of the Imperial River were stunned. These Mongols were troops from the Arachu Great Camp of the Chakhar Eight Great Camps, commanded by a distant cousin of Khutugtu Khan, a jaisang named Daichin.

This Jaisang Daichin was also a veteran of the Chakhar tribe who had fought many battles, and had fought the Ming army more than a few times. He was thoroughly familiar with the Ming army's tactics, but among them there was no such tactic as mounted household retainers dismounting to form a long-spear formation against enemy cavalry!

Even when mounted troops crossing a ford cannot build up a charge, and are vulnerable to being struck by enemy cavalry on the riverbank, there is still no reason to dismount and fight on foot!

Normally at such a time, the household retainers should be driving the regular troops to charge the shallows! Even if they had to pile up corpses, they had to pile open a passage, and only then would the household retainers spur their horses in a charge.

Where was there ever a case of household retainers dismounting and coming to throw their own lives away? These household retainers looked very well equipped, every one of them clad in iron armor, and some even wore gold armor — that gold armor looked very expensive. Where in the world did these household retainers come from? Did they even know how to fight?

Besides, where was Guiyingqia, the foremost warrior of the Mongols? Had he not crossed the river with a sumun of iron-armored cavalry? How had he vanished? Even if they had lost a battle, they could not possibly have been annihilated to the last man. The opposite bank was not the Jianzhou Jurchen, so how could they be so ferocious?

"Jaisang, they—they really are crossing the river! What do we do?"

A chieftain following Jaisang Daichin shouted out at that moment, interrupting Jaisang Daichin's thoughts. The old Chakhar general narrowed his eyes and looked. Sure enough, they had begun wading across the river, the long-spear troops behind and the arquebusiers in front.

"Warriors," Jaisang Daichin opened his throat and roared, "take up your bows and shoot dead these southern barbarians who are courting death!"

Jaisang Daichin's subordinates were all armed herders of the Chakhar Eight Great Camps, a cut below the herders of the Great Khan's ordo. To say nothing of iron armor, they did not even have a good bow. All of them had soft, flimsy bows that could not shoot through iron armor at all. So these herders could only spur their horses forward, close the distance, and then shoot at the faces of the Ming armored soldiers. That was not easy to hit, so they had to charge in very close.

When Sun Chuanting and Hu Dawei led the square formation of five hundred armored soldiers wading to the middle of the Imperial River, more than a hundred Mongol herders came charging up on horseback, shrieking wildly as they charged. But the Ming armored soldiers paid them no mind at all, simply pressing forward with heads lowered, until the distance between the two sides had shrunk to only twenty or thirty paces. Only then did a piercing suona horn sound, and the square formation halted its advance.

This so-called square formation was actually rectangular. The five hundred men were drawn up in ten ranks, and the first two ranks of armored soldiers all held aloft Lumi muskets, loaded and with match cords lit.

When the suona sounded, the fifty arquebusiers standing in the first rank halted, then leveled their muzzles as one. They did not fire immediately, but waited a while longer, until the Chakhar armed herders had charged into the river water some ten-odd paces away. Only then did they hear Wu Sangui's command: "First rank — fire!"

Bang—

Fifty Lumi muskets fired almost at once! A cloud of gunsmoke drifted away, and the herders who had been preparing to draw their bows and nock arrows had seventeen or eighteen men knocked down, all of them tumbling into the river like dumplings into a pot, splash after splash. Screams of agony rose up too — they sounded dreadful to hear, and painful even to think about!

The remaining herders who had not been hit saw this, and how would they dare shoot any more arrows? They fled at once. More than a hundred riders turned about in confusion right there in the river channel, and all one could see was a mass of four-legged horses thrashing about in the water — a livelier scene could hardly be imagined.

But the other fifty Ming armored soldiers with muskets, who had not fired before, did not shoot either. Having struck once, the Ming troops simply pressed on, following the herders as they retreated in disorder, and waded across the Imperial River.

Just as they set foot on the riverbank, Jaisang Daichin ordered his men to sound the attack horn.

The Mongol herders' chaotic charge began!

Although armed herders were not cavalry, in the end it was four legs charging two, and their numbers were not small — they looked to be over a thousand men, enough to divide into several waves and attack in turns!

On the opposite bank of the Imperial River, Man Gui saw this and his heart seized up.

But Zhu Youjian remained full of confidence. The five hundred personal guards of his headquarters he had sent out had formed a simplified version of a Spanish tercio. If it could not hold back the Eight Banners, so be it — but could it not hold back a thousand-odd herders charging in disorder?

Bang—

Another volley of musket fire!

The herders charging from the front were immediately knocked down by more than twenty men, but relative to their numbers, such losses truly counted for little, so the charge did not stop. And the Ming armored arquebusiers had no time to reload, so they all shrank back into the spear formation, and under the cover of horse lances with points ground mirror-bright, they began reloading.

How would the Mongol herders have the courage to charge a spear formation? They used their old method — circling and shooting arrows.

The Ming side had no archers (in fact every man carried a bow and arrows, but they had all been left on horseback), only one hundred Lumi muskets, dispersed across the front, left, and right faces of the spear formation, repeatedly loading and firing — not in volleys, but firing at will.

Although the Mongols' bows outnumbered the one hundred Lumi muskets several times over, every man on the Ming side wore a full-length suit of armor, and the Mongols' soft bows could not shoot through it at all. But when the Lumi muskets fired, every shot brought a man down.

"Commander Man," Zhu Youjian observed from the west bank of the Imperial River for a while, and feeling the moment was about right, said to Man Gui, "take your household retainers across the river and strike them once. Remember — driving the enemy back is enough!"

"At your command."

Man Gui saluted, but before he could lead his household retainers across the river, Li Zicheng came up with a hundred-odd light cavalry. These hundred-odd light cavalry were something else — every man had two or three human heads hanging from his horse's neck! And Li Zicheng himself had a head skewered on his horse lance — it was none other than the skull of the jaisang of the Chakhar central army's ten-thousand household!

"Your Majesty, we've picked up a big one," Li Zicheng saluted Zhu Youjian from horseback, then pointed at the head on the lance with a grin and said, "This Tartar is the superintendent of the Chakhar central army's ten-thousand household, called Guiyingqia. According to the prisoners, he was some kind of foremost warrior of the Mongols!"

Zhu Youjian looked at Guiyingqia, whose eyes were open and mouth agape, plainly full of unwillingness, and said to Man Gui, "Commander Man, take that head with you. Tell the Mongols that We have just slain their foremost warrior, and now We challenge Ligdan Baghatur!"

"Your Majesty, you wish to challenge Khutugtu Khan?" Man Gui was startled again. "That is a Tartar—"

Zhu Youjian laughed heartily. "Our martial skill is supreme. Ligdan Baghatur is no match for Us!"

That was true enough. However high Ligdan Baghatur's martial prowess, he still could not beat Zhu Youjian, who used Lumi muskets!

"This subject obeys the imperial decree!" Man Gui had no choice but to accept the imperial command, and had someone take Guiyingqia's head across the river with him. He also had his household retainers who could speak Mongolian shout out together: "The Son of Heaven of the Great Ming is divinely brave and peerless, and has slain in battle the foremost warrior of the Mongols, Guiyingqia! Here is Guiyingqia's head—"

The shouts quickly reached the ears of Jaisang Daichin on the opposite bank of the Imperial River. The old man knew Guiyingqia well, and when he heard that he had been slain by the Ming Emperor, he nearly toppled off his horse. But he still did not quite believe it — how could Guiyingqia, whose martial skill was so high, possibly have been slain by the Ming Emperor?

So he immediately ordered the herders who were besieging the Ming square formation to pull back, and sent two of his men who knew Guiyingqia to go and look. Before long, his two men came back weeping.

"Jaisang Daichin, Jaisang Guiyingqia truly was cut down by the Son of Heaven of the Great Ming — his head has even been hung up for display."

"Jaisang Daichin, Jaisang Guiyingqia is truly dead — his head has been cut off, absolutely certain."

Jaisang Daichin's mouth hung open and his eyes bulged, unable to speak. Then an even more unbelievable shout rang out.

"The Son of Heaven of the Great Ming is peerless in martial prowess, invincible under heaven, and challenges Khutugtu Khan of the Chakhar tribe!"

What? The Ming Emperor challenging the Mongol Great Khan? A duel? The Emperor and the Khan one-on-one? How could such a thing happen under heaven? Since when did the Ming have such an emperor?

(End of Chapter)