Chapter 377: Linked Cavalry and the Hengshan Foot Mountaineers

Murong Xinzhang was galloping back at full speed. He rallied the two hundred or so light cavalry he could still command and fought desperately to shake off the Tangut light cavalry that were clinging to them.

At the same time, the infantry of Luo Yu'er's camp from Hanhai Town, the ones closest to Zhang Zhao's position, were also closing in at top speed.

Luo Yu'er and Murong Xinzhang exchanged a single glance and understood each other's intent at once.

Luo Yu'er spread the Second Camp across the key entrance near the salt pond, blocking the Tangut cavalry that were chasing Murong Xinzhang's tail.

Murong Xinzhang was thus able to break away cleanly and charge at maximum speed to where Zhang Zhao was.

From where Murong Xinzhang stood, a conspicuous figure in golden armor was surrounded by several hundred Tangut cavalry, the situation growing more perilous by the moment.

His dear son's soul nearly flew out of him, and he was so frantic that tears came to his eyes. He thought Zhang Zhao was about to be killed by the Tangut cavalry, so he paid no attention at all to the arrows shot at him or the cavalry lances swinging at him. Man and horse became one as he crashed straight into the chaotic mass of Tangut cavalry.

But just after knocking down two men, his mount, exhausted from the long sprint, went weak in the forelegs and threw him off.

Murong Xinzhang, his face smeared with mud, blood, and water, rolled with the fall, just barely absorbing the momentum, then immediately pulled a pair of iron maces from the side of his horse.

Xue Li Yanchen blinked her big eyes twice, wanting very much to get up, but after struggling a couple of times, she truly had no strength left.

Murong Xinzhang glanced at Xue Li Yanchen, then let out a long howl and charged at three or four Tangut men head-on, like a fierce tiger descending the mountain, his iron maces whirling into afterimages.

Tuoba Chongde, one eye narrowed, led a dozen or so of his most robust personal guards around behind Qiong Reduojin.

He swung the iron hammer in his hand with all his might and smashed it down on Qiong Reduojin's head in one blow. Qiong Reduojin staggered a few steps, then slowly toppled over.

"The Tibetan rebel King of Han is dead!" Tuoba Chongde howled in excitement, and his personal guards moved in to finish the job.

At that very moment, Murong Xinzhang arrived. He threw himself at them with a howl, not dodging blade or sword, smashing his iron maces down on Tuoba Chongde blow after blow.

His dear son had only one thought in his mind now: he absolutely had to beat this Tangut wretch into pulp.

Tuoba Chongde and his men had been fighting for half a shichen, holding on by sheer willpower alone. Now that they saw their objective achieved, they could hold out no longer.

Though there were still a dozen or so men around him, all they wanted was to retreat quickly, but Murong Xinzhang clung to them and they could not shake him off.

In his fury, Tuoba Chongde took five mace blows from Murong Xinzhang, and his head was smashed directly into pulp.

The moment he saw his enemy dead, the strength seemed to drain out of Murong Xinzhang all at once.

He wailed and ran toward the "Zhang Zhao" on the ground, but was unexpectedly stopped by a burly man in padded armor. He looked up — who was it but Zhang Zhao himself?

"Still crying at your age?" Zhang Zhao was also somewhat moved. He reached out his right hand and, as if to a true son, gently wiped the blood and tears from Murong Xinzhang's face.

"My lord!" Murong Xinzhang clattered his iron maces to the ground, suddenly dropped to his knees and clung to Zhang Zhao's leg, and with a wail, truly burst into tears.

At the same time, Qiong Reduojin was helped over to Zhang Zhao by Man Xiong, his head covered in blood, his body covered in wounds, his armor plates shattered, one arm hanging limp and unable to lift. Only his mouth, baring a set of big white teeth, was still smiling at Zhang Zhao.

"I, Zhang Erlang, owe you my life! Go and rest now. Share in my wealth and honor — I will never forget!"

Zhang Zhao embraced Qiong Reduojin and said this with deep sincerity, then had the personal guards beside him carry him off to rest.

Then Zhang Zhao turned to Murong Xinzhang and said, "Can you still fight? Father and son, let us go forward together. Today Li Yiyin must die on this field!"

Murong Xinzhang grinned widely. "How could I not! Your son will still be your vanguard!"

By now the battlefield was in complete chaos. Both sides had been locked in bitter combat for nearly a shichen and were almost at the point of utter exhaustion.

But the more it was so, the more the Guiyi Army's advantage in hard, grinding battles showed itself.

The heavy infantry of the three units — Hanshan Du, Hanhai Town, and Yucheng Town — in particular were almost beating the Dingnan Army back at will.

They had more heavy armor, more bows and crossbows, and even the Divine Arm crossbows, and their will to fight was stronger as well.

The Dingnan Army had always excelled in cavalry, but now their light cavalry was no match for the Guiyi Army's, and the horse-archer duel had produced no winner. They were forced to fight with their weakness against the Guiyi Army's strength.

So although they had somewhat greater numbers, they had already been pushed back four or five times, and some of their infantry had been driven all the way to Li Yiyin's side.

At this moment, Li Yiyin's decisive play was in fact Tuoba Chongde's three thousand cavalry.

He stood on high ground and saw rejoicing in the distance. Guessing that Tuoba Chongde had succeeded, he was overjoyed.

"Attendants, raise the cry: the Tibetan rebel King of Han is dead!"

"The Tibetan rebel King of Han is dead!"

"The Tibetan rebel King of Han is dead!"

Li Yiyin had specially kept a group of loud-voiced soldiers by his side. Now they shouted in unison, and the sound spread at once to every corner of the field.

Zhang Xiaobiao fired left and right, and three more Tangut men were shot dead by him amid the chaos.

At the start, when both sides' formations were still intact, individual valor had indeed not been of much use.

But now, with the two sides intermingled, individual ability was instantly magnified.

Zhang Xiaobiao, with his uncannily accurate archery, had killed even more men than the Wang family strongman. A first-rank merit award was, at the very least, secured.

But now, suddenly hearing the cry everywhere that the King of Han was dead, Zhang Xiaobiao panicked at once. If the King of Han was dead, what did it matter how many more men they killed?

"Impossible! The King of Han is the reincarnation of a god and Buddha, and gods and Buddhas do not die!"

Compared to Han Chinese like Zhang Xiaobiao, the Six Tribes warriors, Tuyuhun, and Tatars whom Zhang Zhao had recruited — people whose culture and customs leaned Tibetan — were more steadfast.

In their hearts, the King of Han was the Dharma King Bodhisattva, the reincarnation of a god and Buddha. How could he possibly die?

After a Tibetan archer in a leather robe with chain mail underneath roared this out, a Tuyuhun heavy infantryman of the Seven Tribes of Shanzhou, wearing Tibetan-style lamellar armor, spoke with absolute conviction.

"Right! Master Jinzhu said the King of Han is a bodhisattva from heaven. He brought good days to the people of the snow mountains. Since the King of Han came, there was no white disaster last winter. The Dharma King Bodhisattva will not die."

By now the formations had been broken up, and the men below came from various town armies. They shouted back and forth, constantly bolstering those around them, and miraculously did not collapse and flee.

But their spirits had fallen somewhat, and they were pushed back once more by the Tangut.

Just then, the rumble of drums seemed to come from the edge of the sky. Beneath banner after banner of the sun, moon, and stars, Zhang Zhao wore no helmet and no armor, but a white robe, and in his hand was his signature hengdao saber.

Escorted by over a hundred drummers and musicians, amid the drumming and music, Great King Zhang ran left and right across the battlefield. He wanted everyone to see that he, Zhang Zhao, was still here.

"Ten thousand victories! Ten thousand victories!" Wherever he went, cheers shook the sky. Everyone saw that the King of Han had not died.

Zhang Xiaobiao was instantly enraged. These Dingnan Army barbarian bandits had dared to curse the King of Han. In that instant, he could not even feel the soreness in his arms. Amid excited roars, Zhang Xiaobiao and the Wang family strongman pressed forward together.

Zhang Zhao was like a human shot of stimulant. Wherever he ran, the morale of the Guiyi Army there soared.

On the Dingnan Army's side, they had just claimed the enemy commander was dead, but were instantly slapped in the face. Morale plummeted, and at the same time the soldiers felt they had been deceived.

Watching at least four or five thousand Guiyi heavy infantry pressing toward his position under the direction of their officers, Li Yiyin still maintained a measure of composure. He still had two trump cards he had not played.

The six hundred linked cavalry under Li Guangrui's control.

Li Yiyin also had five hundred Hengshan Qiang infantry around him — the same troops later known in Western Xia as the Hengshan Mountain Striders.

The five hundred Hengshan Mountain Striders wore thick leather armor and carried powerful bows. These Qiang people who lived in the Hengshan range were the finest mountain infantry, and were not normally used as heavy infantry drawn up in formation for battle.

Historically, when Li Yuanhao was contesting the Hengshan area against the Northern Song, he often used the Hengshan Mountain Striders' ability to cross mountains and ravines as if on level ground to delay the Song armies in the Hengshan range.

Then he would use them to select favorable battlefields for the Western Xia army, and for rapid penetration, exploiting their mobility to create local superiority of force.

At this moment, however, Li Yiyin's military talent was far inferior to that of his fifth-generation grandnephew Li Yuanhao, and the Hengshan Mountain Striders were in fact being used by Li Yiyin as his personal guard.

Li Yiyin used their swiftness of movement to cover his own escape, or, as on the battlefield now, to protect his safety.

After thinking for a dozen or so breaths, Li Yiyin made his decision.

"My son, lead the Chained Horses out and charge straight at the enemy infantry opposite. Their formation is already in disorder — smash them quickly.

Sanlang and Wulang, draw off every light cavalryman who can still be moved and follow behind the Chained Horses to kill more of the barbarian rebels. The Hengshan infantry will form up and guard me!"

The so-called Chained Horses were the Dingnan Army's own term for its heavy armored cavalry.

However, constrained by the Dingnan Army's economic strength, these six hundred Chained Horses could not be fully armored in iron for both rider and horse.

Only the riders could wear iron lamellar armor, or oxhide armor with interlocked ring mail. The horses had iron plates only at the skull and a section of lamellar armor across the chest to defend against arrows.

The reason the Dingnan Army's heavy cavalry were called Chained Horses was that the warhorses were linked together by iron chains. In battle, several or even several dozen horses would generally be linked together.

But if you think that when they charged, they also charged linked together, you would be greatly mistaken.

Cavalry live by speed. If warhorses are linked to one another, then as soon as one has a problem, all the rest are finished — a fall would bring down dozens of horses. How could they charge?

So in fact, the chains of the Chained Horses were used to regulate the uniformity of the charge.

At this moment, after Li Guangrui dispatched the six hundred Chained Horses, they were linked twenty horses to a chain. With the chains binding and coordinating them, the six hundred heavy cavalry actually managed to trot out in a formation as neat as if cut by knife or split by axe.

The Guiyi Army infantry, who had been pressing the Dingnan Army hard, spotted the Chained Horses slowly moving in the distance, and all began to grow panicked.

Some wanted to mix in with the Dingnan Army infantry, while others began forming up under the direction of their officers.

Li Guangrui wore a cold sneer. Forming up at a time like this — wasn't it a little too late?

The Chained Horses were now linked by chains, but once they came within a hundred paces, the chains would be released and the warhorses would charge. A disordered infantry formation could not possibly withstand that.

This was the second special feature of the Chained Horses. In training, they were repeatedly made to wear the chains and could only trot, and when the chains were released they could charge at full force — this stimulated the warhorses to form a conditioned reflex.

At a hundred paces from the enemy, the chains were released, so that when the warhorses charged into the forest of spears, they would be governed by their daily habit, forget the danger, and be all the more fearless.

Wooo! The horns sounded. Within a hundred paces, the Chained Horses began their rapid charge. The six hundred Chained Horses advanced with three hundred in front and three hundred behind, the warhorses separated by a gap of no more than three men.

The target of their charge was the Hanshandu infantry, who had formed up the fastest.

Li Guangrui could see that this infantry unit was the main core of the Guiyi Army.

If they were shattered, the surrounding friendly infantry still holding on could seize the moment to sweep in and break the enemy in one stroke.

The attack went extremely smoothly. The Chained Horses easily broke through the Hanshandu infantry, whose formation had never been tight to begin with. But before they could expand their gains, thunderous drum and music sounded from the distance.

Li Guangrui raised his eyes and looked. Far away, between heaven and earth, a vast black mass of "dark clouds" was pressing toward them.

"Armored cavalry! The barbarian rebels have armored cavalry too!" The terrified Dingnan Army soldiers were shouting.

Li Ruotai clamped his horse lance under his arm, gripping it overhand. The six hundred Guiyi Army armored cavalrymen wore uniform black padded armor, their helmets crowned with golden-red pheasant plumes as crests.

Like primordial monsters, they charged at the Dingnan Army's Chained Horses and the infantry behind them.

"Charge! Charge!" Li Guangrui shrieked, wanting his cavalry to surge forward — but everything was already too late.

The Chained Horses, having lost their speed, were shattered in an instant by the Guiyi Army's six hundred armored cavalry. The infantry behind them scattered in terror and began to flee.

A routed army collapses like a landslide!

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