Chapter 310: Cavalry Lance in Hand, None Can Withstand

Ma Shacai and Wang Tongxin charged side by side to the very front, both wearing light cotton armor.

Almost simultaneously, the two drew their longbows to the full, and almost simultaneously, borrowing the forward momentum of their galloping horses, they suddenly released the bowstrings.

In an instant, arrows shot forth like shooting stars!

Fifty paces ahead and to their left, the Lanzhou Li clan Wenmo cavalrymen who had been harassing, intimidating, and howling with their mouths, toppled to the ground one after another.

And behind Ma Shacai and Wang Tongxin, the brave warriors from the various Liangzhou tribes also loosed the arrows in their hands.

Unlike the Lanzhou Wenmo Li clan, which lacked iron weapons, after the people of Liangzhou's Liugu tribe submitted to Zhang Zhao, their brave fighters had all received armor bestowed by Zhang Zhao.

Although it was mostly three-layer leather armor or four-layer leather armor, it was still far better than having no armor at all.

The ultimate essence of cavalry archery duels is mutual pulling and dragging — sometimes you are chasing others, and sometimes you are being chased by others.

Both sides constantly adjusted their galloping routes and postures to the most comfortable position before pouring wave after wave of arrow showers at each other.

The Li clan cavalry were like waves along the banks of the Yellow River, dense and endless, howling as they threw themselves at Ma Shacai's force.

But they were simply too weak!

The gap in horsemanship and archery was not very obvious, but the gap in equipment was far too obvious.

Although Ma Shacai's cavalry numbered only a little over four hundred, they had close to fifty sets of cotton armor, and the rest all wore leather armor or chainmail; their arrowheads were all forged from refined iron, with excellent penetrating power.

But the opposing Lanzhou Wenmo Li clan cavalry mostly wore only leather jackets; some who could tie two wooden boards or iron plates to their chests were already considered very well equipped.

Only about half of them had iron arrowheads; the rest of their arrowheads were still made of bone, or even ground from long, slender, pointed stone strips.

The horse bows in their hands were even more limp and weak; Ma Shacai estimated that some of them might even be five-dou or six-dou bows.

At this moment, at the south gate of Lanzhou, the long drawbridge had already been lowered. Originally, the Li clan chief had planned to arrange for the cavalry outside the city to enter Lanzhou through this drawbridge.

How could he have known that Ma Shacai's sense of smell was so keen, and that he would also rush toward the south gate, forcing him to choose to fight a fierce light-cavalry duel with Ma Shacai's cavalry here.

"We can't keep fighting like this!" A chieftain of the Li clan tribe spurred his horse to the side of the Li clan chief.

He looked at the Li clan chief and shouted loudly: "The Liangzhou riders all have armor, and their arrowheads far surpass ours. If we keep exchanging arrows with them at a distance, we won't gain any advantage at all. We must charge in and fight!"

The Li clan chief wiped the cold sweat from his forehead. This was not just failing to gain an advantage — this was being completely and utterly beaten one-sidedly!

In at most a quarter hour of exchanging arrows, his side had lost at least a hundred men, while the other side had not had a single man fall from his horse.

Especially those leading cavalrymen wearing strange armor, their bodies stuck full of arrow shafts like hedgehogs, yet they simply would not fall from their horses.

"Have everyone take up long spears. We charge in! If arrows cannot break armor, I refuse to believe long spears cannot either!" The Li clan chief snorted coldly and issued what he believed was the most correct order.

And it was indeed correct. Using bone arrowheads to exchange shots with fully armored cavalry was no different from walking up to be beaten. Charging with long spears, with the added impact of the horses, would at least break armor better than arrows.

Wang Tongxin laughed heartily. In just that short quarter hour, he had shot down at least seven or eight enemy cavalrymen. The frustration that had built up for so long was finally released, and his mood became much lighter.

He pointed excitedly into the distance at the Lanzhou Li clan Wenmo cavalry beginning to assemble under several large banners, and said to Ma Shacai: "It seems they no longer dare exchange arrows with us, and now want to charge in for close combat."

Ma Shacai glanced back at the south gate of Lanzhou. Unfortunately, they had been entangled by the enemy cavalry and forced to fight several charges, and as a result, the dozen or so soldiers at the south gate had taken the opportunity to pull the drawbridge back up. There was no longer any chance to seize the gate.

However, he still had confidence in Wen Chongle and the others inside the city.

With only the Li clan patrol troops in the city, as long as there was no support from outside, he believed that Wen Chongle, together with the guards of the Chief Monk Controller Long Bian, as well as the monk-soldiers of Weiyan Temple and the Khitan warriors, could at least hold an undefeated position.

If the Su Lun family had a few clever people, they could even take Lanzhou city, or at least controlling the west gate and south gate should not be difficult.

"Switch to cavalry lances, prepare to charge!" Thinking of this, Ma Shacai laughed aloud and took the cavalry lance from the side of his horse into his hand.

Wang Tongxin also put away the hard bow in his hand and began switching to a cavalry lance.

There was almost no need to relay orders; the cavalrymen around him already knew how Ma Shacai would fight. In fact, light cavalry duels still had to be decided by close combat.

Because when both sides are moving targets, the killing power of mounted archery is quite limited.

Mounted archery can only display good killing power basically when the opposing cavalry or infantry are fleeing, or when facing infantry with little ability to counterattack or move.

The force had just finished assembling when Ma Shacai snorted coldly again. The opposing Lanzhou Wenmo cavalry had actually formed a crane-wing formation, with troops massed thickly in the center and both wings spread out.

They wanted to use numbers to overwhelm, and finish him off in one go!

Wang Tongxin also smiled silently. These people had no idea that at least forty riders on their side were elite cavalry originally from the Fengtian Army, now called the Hanhai Garrison.

The weapons in their hands were all top-quality cavalry lances, and they had followed Zhang Zhao in campaigns across Anxi and Hezhong, invincible wherever they went. What kind of battle had they not seen?

If the enemy had formed a boar-charging arrowhead formation, with their two thousand-plus men, they could indeed have caused some trouble for Ma Shacai and his men.

But now they had formed a crane-wing formation, hoping to use the method of outflanking from both sides to wrap Ma Shacai's cavalry in the middle and devour them. That was pure wishful thinking.

Because those spread-out wings were the best targets for a breakthrough.

Ma Shacai waved his hand broadly. "Pass on my order: everyone follows my red flag. We fight desperately toward the left, punch through their left wing, then wheel our horses around and give them a blooming from the rear!"

By the time the commanders on both sides were issuing battle orders, the cavalry had actually already begun slowly closing in. Both sides, with tacit understanding, had not drawn their bows; they all needed to conserve their own and their warhorses' strength.

Boom-boom — two drumbeats sounded. Several small flags in the Lanzhou Wenmo Li clan cavalry formation waved fiercely a few times, and shouts seemed to come from the edge of the sky as more than two thousand cavalry came sweeping overwhelmingly toward Ma Shacai and his men.

Ma Shacai raised his cavalry lance high. His four personal guards each had a bright red flag stuck into their backs, signaling that everyone was to charge in the direction of the red flags.

Eighty paces!

Sixty paces!

Forty paces!

Closer and closer. The two sides could now see each other's long spears and horse sabers. The two wings extended by the Lanzhou Li clan Wenmo cavalry's crane-wing formation had already begun to close in.

At that moment, Ma Shacai suddenly let out a thunderous roar and charged out first like an arrow loosed from the string. The folded-ear horse beneath him exploded with far greater burst power than an ordinary Lanzhou horse, and the four hundred-plus cavalry suddenly increased their speed by no less than two or three levels.

The left wing of the Lanzhou Wenmo cavalry had only three or four hundred riders, because they were the extended "crane wing," whose role was to outflank.

But suddenly, they discovered all the Guiyi Army cavalry charging at them at tremendous speed, and were instantly terrified out of their wits.

A distance of thirty paces was crossed almost in the blink of an eye. The four hundred Guiyi Army cavalry, guided by the four red flags, formed a remarkably orderly arrowhead formation and plunged straight in.

The Wenmo cavalry facing them no longer cared about outflanking or not. In their eyes, the combat power these Liangzhou cavalry had just displayed was plain for all to see.

The armor on the others alone was enough to outclass them by several streets in combat power; they simply could not withstand it.

In an instant, when there were still less than a dozen paces before contact, the Lanzhou Wenmo cavalry on the left wing scattered in a single rush.

Ma Shacai grinned savagely, raised the cavalry lance high in his hand, and whirled it until it hummed.

He lashed and struck, whirling like the wind, and the several dozen elite cavalry behind him did the same, scattering the opposing cavalry in an instant.

The supple cavalry lance needed no thrusting at all — a direct lash was enough. These unarmored Wenmo cavalrymen, if so much as grazed, would at the very least suffer broken ribs. In moments, dust rose on all sides and screams rang out without end.

The Li clan patriarch's eyes went wide. He had not expected the left wing to be broken through so quickly — though fewer in number, there were still three or four hundred cavalry there, were there not?

Four hundred against four hundred — how could they possibly have been defeated so fast?

What he had not accounted for, in truth, was how explosive the folded-ear horses' burst and sprinting speed would be.

The feeling was like watching what you thought were some old men's happy-mobiles across from you, only to find when they launched that these were no old men's happy-mobiles, but Wuling miracle cars modded with at least six cylinders.

And with that, every plan laid beforehand became completely useless.

The Li clan patriarch was exactly in this situation. Originally, even if the left wing was struck, the main formation and right-wing cavalry could quickly outflank the enemy — the crane-wing formation's effect would still have been achieved.

But now, by the time he thought to rescue the left wing, his own side's warhorses were far slower, and there was simply no time to outflank.

Ma Shacai, riding the terrifying burst power of the folded-ear horses, had caught them completely off guard.

Still, even if they could not catch up and could not rescue them in time, they still had to try, did they not?

The Li clan patriarch's eyes had gone red. He howled in grief and fury, driving his cavalry to wheel their horses around and pursue Ma Shacai's unit, which had punched through the left wing.

A single fierce charge had pierced straight through the enemy's left wing. The thrill of it was intensely strong, and Ma Shacai barely clung to his last thread of reason, holding his men back from chasing down the scattered Lanzhou Wenmo left-wing cavalry.

Instead, he led the main force straight through the formation, then cut a small n-shaped turn and charged back again, the cavalry's arrowhead aimed directly at the rear of the Lanzhou cavalry's main formation.

And for this charge, they did not use the distance-opening whirling-lance charge method, but directly formed a boar's-head assault formation.

"Couche lances! Couche lances!" Ma Shacai bellowed from horseback, and his personal guards nearby took up the shout.

At the command, all the cavalrymen tucked their long lances or horse-spears against their waists and ribs, then adopted the left-hand forward grip.

Together with Ma Shacai, they let out a thunderous roar as one, and in an instant pushed their horses to maximum speed.

At that moment, the Lanzhou Li clan cavalry were still in noisy confusion, wheeling their horses to chase after Ma Shacai and his men — never expecting that Ma Shacai's force, having just scattered the left-wing cavalry, would return at once, and still have the strength to launch a second charge.

This meant the Lanzhou Wenmo cavalry, still in the middle of turning and adjusting their direction, were directly and viciously stabbed in the thickest part of their waist and rear by Ma Shacai and his men.

In the midst of extreme panic, this cavalry force of over two thousand men was like butter meeting a hot knife — a bloody lane was brutally plowed straight through their formation.

They had been truly, savagely pierced through. The instant chaos descended, the Li clan patriarch did not even have time to call the cavalry guards around him — the situation collapsed in a flash!

Countless Lanzhou Wenmo cavalrymen fell from their horses like dumplings dropped into boiling water, clattering down in waves. Before they could even strike back, they had already scattered everywhere.

Wails, terrified shouts, and hoarse, desperate roars resounded across the battlefield.

Every Lanzhou Wenmo cavalryman lost his wits in an instant — those in the center still resisted on instinct, while those on the flanks had long since fled in panic.

The two sides had been locked in a standoff for close to two quarters of an hour, with at least ten thousand arrows loosed, yet the true decisive clash was settled within a matter of minutes.

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