Chapter 1087: The Strategy

"Yes, Khan!"

As Wulanba's voice fell, the Northern Di generals shouted.

"Hmm?" Hearing the generals call him Khan, Wulanba was not happy; instead, he furrowed his brows tightly.

"Yes, General." The generals reacted one after another and corrected their form of address.

After this period of reorganization, not only was Wulanba's title General, but they were no longer Wolf Records or Thousand-Man Commanders and the like, but had been changed to Colonel, Major, and so on.

After emphasizing some rules of war again, Wulanba let the generals leave.

Although they had received guidance from Ross officers, the discipline of their Northern Di army was still not as good as that of the Ross army or the Great Song army, which was also a headache for him.

Therefore, before the battle, he had summoned the generals to urge this matter.

To him, the era when Northern Di cavalry relied on individual bravery to be invincible under heaven had ended.

From now on, they had to integrate into Ross and become a part of the Ross army, fighting according to the Ross army's way of warfare.

For the next six days, the battlefield was exceptionally quiet.

Both armies were doing their own things, not interfering with each other.

But everyone knew that this was merely the calm before the storm.

And this tranquility did not last too long, ending on the seventh day amidst the roars of artillery.

This morning, the Central Army artillery gathered three hundred and twenty howitzers and forty-two rifled cannons to shell the Northern Di's trench fortifications.

"Whoosh... Boom..."

Cannonballs soared into the air one after another, landing in the trenches and exploding, kicking up clouds of mud and grass.

The moment the shelling began, the Northern Di soldiers crouched in the trenches, wishing they could burrow into the ground, terrified of being hit by a cannonball.

The instant the artillery fire sounded, Wulanba and Ivan rushed out of their tents.

In their field of vision, the entire trench position was covered by artillery fire.

Cannonballs fell like raindrops onto the dry dust, kicking up clusters of dirt.

Mixed with the dust was the smoke produced by gunpowder, making the entire battlefield appear foggy.

"Damn Great Song people!" Looking at the battlefield filled with artillery fire, Wulanba almost bit his teeth to pieces.

The opponent's artillery range was too long; facing the shelling, they did not even have the ability to fight back.

But in order to hold on, they had no choice but to endure it.

To a general, this situation of only being beaten without being able to fight back could drive a person mad.

Ivan's expression was equally ugly.

They could not see the position of the opponent's artillery at all, which meant their artillery was very far from the battlefield.

Seeing this scene, he finally understood why their Ross army had also fled in a sorry state on the Yongzhou battlefield.

"War is always like this," Ivan said to Wulanba at this moment.

In fact, even if the artillery ranges of both sides were similar, they would still have to endure the opponent's shelling.

The only difference was that now they were suffering casualties alone, whereas the latter would mean both sides suffered casualties.

But their advantage lay in relying on the Khan Court, where they had more manpower and resources.

Currently, to reduce the soldiers' casualties, some Northern Di herdsmen had already been ordered to enter the trenches.

On each side of every soldier would be a herdsman, acting as a human shield for the Northern Di soldier.

To them, as long as they lost, these old, weak, sick, and disabled people would either be killed by Great Song soldiers or become captives of the Great Song people.

Rather than that, it was better to be a human shield on the battlefield to resist the shelling.

They could even directly use their corpses as sandbags for cover.

"Hmm." Wulanba nodded, pursing his lips tightly.

The Great Song army's goal of inflicting heavy casualties on their soldiers through shelling would ultimately be discounted.

This was his determination; in this war, he would use every means possible.

"Boom, boom, boom..." The shelling continued.

But the two no longer paid attention and returned to their respective tents.

Meanwhile.

At the Central Army camp, Chang Wei, accompanied by Bai Shang and other generals, was discussing the details of the night raid.

Originally, he had planned to launch the night raid after three days of shelling.

But these past few days, the gun cavalry searching for other royal tents on the Grassland had suddenly captured Northern Di herdsmen of the Great Song.

So Chang Wei had a flash of inspiration and ordered the gun cavalry to keep only the cattle and sheep, but to let the Northern Di herdsmen into the Khan Court.

As for the shelling, they would continue, but it would last for a longer time.

He had his own purpose for this.

After arranging the direction of the attack for Bai Shang and the others, Chang Wei picked up a telescope to observe the battlefield for a while.

In the telescope, there was only the scene of cannonballs kicking up dust in the trenches; everything else was quite calm.

"This shelling must be very uncomfortable for the Northern Di," Bai Shang laughed at this moment. "Back in Yongzhou, facing the shelling, Mule Hongzhen still dared to charge with cavalry, but now they can only cower."

"Indeed, having understood the power of the machine guns and gun cavalry, they know they can do nothing," Chen Hu said, hands on his hips.

No one felt nervous about this war.

Because they knew this was equivalent to a bandit-suppression campaign; the Northern Di could not make a big splash in Yongzhou, and they could not make one in the Khan Court either.

The only thing they needed to do was to take the Khan Court while minimizing casualties.

"But this bunch of dog pups are ruthless to their own kind; they've driven quite a few people into the trenches, likely to use them as human shields," Lv Chang snorted at this moment.

The Northern Di's movements were fully visible to them, so they naturally saw the scene of the Northern Di people being driven into the trenches.

"The madness before destruction," Chang Wei sneered.

While Wulanba doing this could certainly reduce the casualties of his own soldiers, the Northern Di soldiers were also the sons of the Northern Di people.

They were vicious toward the Song People, but they cherished their own kin very much.

I fear that some Northern Di generals will inevitably grow cold-hearted.

Even if they remain silent, cowed by the authority of Wulanba.

But if the war turns unfavorable, they will surely be the first to lose the will to fight.

As everyone chatted, the sun climbed higher step by step.

By noon, the shelling stopped, and the smell of gunpowder on the battlefield was suddenly replaced by a rich aroma of food.

The various units began to take turns eating.

And these rich aromas, besides the freshly steamed buns, also came from canned goods.

The cooks in the army opened the cans and poured them into large pots to heat.

The scent of braised horse meat immediately drifted very far.

Besides this, there were also canned Potato, canned yellow peaches, and so on.

The Central Army soldiers ate hot steamed buns with delicious dishes, each of them eating with great relish.

It was precisely these abundant supplies that allowed them to maintain their ample stamina even now.

The rich fragrance of these meals drifted to the Trench of the Northern Di, and many Northern Di soldiers immediately began to swallow their saliva.

In fact, since the Dasong Gun Cavalry besieged the Khan Court a month ago, their situation had become increasingly difficult.

Especially in the past few days, the Dasong Gun Cavalry had only seized cattle and sheep, but let the herdsmen inside.

This caused the supplies of the Khan Court to be consumed at an alarming rate, and their food was visibly worsening day by day.

Therefore, suddenly smelling such a tempting aroma, they were simply unable to control their drool.