Chapter 443: The Great Tiyin's Horse Stumbles

Gao Huaide was no fool, but he understood that his options were few.

If these several thousand laborers could not be scattered, and were allowed to dig for another three or four days, this deep trench and high rampart encircling Qicheng would be completed.

When that happened, he and his father would be trapped to death inside Qicheng.

So after the Khitans sent out six hundred cavalry, Gao Xingzhou in Qicheng also personally led three hundred cavalry out of the city, and the north gate was thrown wide open.

The two thousand infantry of the Songzhou Guide Army under Gao Xingzhou's command, bows in hand and spears at the ready, marched out of the city and formed battle lines, using crossbows to support the cavalry.

The six hundred riders of the Iron Pigeon and Iron Falcon armies of the Right Leather Chamber all wore iron armor and gripped long lances. Though compared to Gao Huaide they were fresh and waiting at ease, they still did not rashly increase their horses' speed.

Instead, one hundred of their riders had gone without armor from the moment they set out, and with swift horses and long bows they thrust in behind Gao Huaide, harassing and pulling at him repeatedly.

Their intent was to further exhaust the strength of the horses of Gao Huaide and his thirty riders, and then suddenly attack when the horses could hold out no longer.

And after seeing Gao Xingzhou of Qicheng send out three hundred riders, these six hundred riders split off four hundred to the left, preparing to tangle with Gao Xingzhou's cavalry.

This was the correct choice: unhurried, at ease, waiting for the exhausted foe. Even if they could not keep Gao Xingzhou, they could still take Gao Huaide. As long as they captured or killed Gao Huaide, the Jin army of Qicheng would have no daring general left who would venture out to fight the Khitans in the open field.

However, this also gave Gao Huaide an opportunity. Taking advantage of the fact that the Khitan heavy cavalry had not drawn near, he charged into the Khitan laborers with his thirty riders, throwing those laborers and the Han troops of Youyun into chaotic flight in every direction.

They had been forced by the Khitans to dig the trench in the first place, so the moment they saw someone attacking, they very readily made the pretense real: before they had even seen a single enemy, they were already running everywhere.

Yelu Wuzhi frowned almost imperceptibly. This famous Jin general Gao Xingzhou truly had some skill.

The two thousand Guide Army troops under his command were fully armored and equipped, and they were always coming out of the city to provoke a fight, then relying on the strong bows and hard crossbows on the city walls to wage a war of attrition against the great Khitan host.

When they could not hold, they retreated into the city. If the Khitan host dared pursue, they would form ranks behind the drawbridge and lure the Khitan troops into continuing the fight.

The drawbridge was narrow; no matter how many troops you had, only a few hundred could cross at a time, and the advantage of numbers vanished at once, while the Jin army still had the strong bows and hard crossbows on the walls to rely on.

Yelu Wuzhi had led his army against Gao Xingzhou three times in all. Each time the Jin army lost a hundred or so dead and wounded, while the Khitan army lost at least three or four hundred, with over a thousand wounded, which left Yelu Wuzhi thoroughly vexed.

This was also the reason for digging trenches around Qicheng: he was truly somewhat unwilling to fight Gao Xingzhou while the man carried half a city wall's worth of crossbowmen with him.

At this moment, the somewhat vexed Yelu Wuzhi deeply suspected that Gao Xingzhou was once again trying to use this method to lure him under the walls of Qicheng to take a beating from the winch crossbows.

In the distance, amid scattered snowflakes, Zhao Yanshou personally spurred his horse from the left of the Khitan formation and rode to beneath the great central banner of Yelu Wuzhi.

This wretch, who was desperate to become a second Shi Jingtang and dreamed of becoming the Great Yan founder, was even more zealous about the southern campaign than the Khitans themselves.

He cupped his hands and said: "Tiyin, please allot me three thousand cavalry. I am willing to lead my own men into battle.

That Gao Xingzhou dared to let his son plunge into our laborers; this is truly profit blinding judgment. As long as we can swiftly cut him off from the Jin army, we can surely capture him, and perhaps even force Gao Xingzhou to surrender."

Tiyin was a Liao state office, equivalent to the imperial clan minister of the Central Plains.

However, because the Liao state still carried strong traces of the clan system, the Tiyin's authority was very great, far greater than that of a Central Plains dynasty's imperial clan minister.

In history, Yelu Wuzhi served through five reigns of the Liao state — Taizu, Taizong, Shizong, Muzong, and Jingzong — and amid the Liao imperial clan, which was always full of sordid affairs, his prestige was very high. He was accomplished in both letters and arms, a famed minister and brave general of his age.

But when it came to understanding the Later Jin court and the power structure of the Central Plains, Zhao Yanshou far surpassed Yelu Wuzhi.

The Gao family had produced military merit for generations. Such families generally selected one or two highly gifted members of the main line for focused cultivation, to serve as the next generation's leader, ensuring the continuation of the family's power and wealth.

It could be said that in Gao Xingzhou's heart at this moment, his son Gao Huaide was far more important than Qicheng.

If they could seize Gao Huaide, then even if they could not persuade Gao Xingzhou to surrender, they could still make Gao Xingzhou hesitate to act for fear of harming his son.

When Yelu Wuzhi heard Zhao Yanshou say this, he immediately looked out from his elevated position and at once saw the problem.

It turned out that Gao Huaide had been fighting too smoothly. The prestige of driving several thousand enemy troops before him like a flock of sheep was very easy to go to one's head.

Although these were laborers and not soldiers, it still went to one's head.

Behind this imposing display, Gao Huaide had already opened a gap between himself and Gao Xingzhou, who had come out of the city to support him. As long as they could press forward swiftly with a large force and cut off Gao Huaide's retreat, they could keep this young man here.

"I will give you all one thousand riders of the Iron Forest Army and two thousand mounted skirmishers of the Iron Falcon Army. I ask the Prince of Yan to lead his brave warriors into battle, and be sure to hold onto that Gao Huaide."

Yelu Wuzhi issued the order very quickly, but for the Khitan army at this moment, troop movements required some time.

Because the battle of Qicheng had already become a grinding stalemate before this, Yelu Wuzhi could not possibly have pulled all sixty thousand troops to within a few hundred meters of Qicheng and kept them armored at all times.

If he did that, before the Jin army even came to fight, the Khitan army would exhaust itself half to death.

Besides, the fighting men in the army were not known for their good tempers. This kind of handling would be seen by the officers and soldiers below as making things hard for them, as reckless meddling.

When the time came to fight, they would harbor resentment and might well refuse to exert themselves.

This was the difficulty and the key point of leading troops in war.

When should one use strict military law to enforce discipline, ensuring that orders are obeyed and prohibitions observed?

And when should one stroke the fur the right way, maintaining morale and unity between superiors and subordinates?

These were all things a commander-in-chief needed to master.

Handled well, ten thousand hearts become one and nothing can stop them; handled poorly, grievances fill the air.

In the distance, Gao Xingzhou saw command flags moving everywhere in the Khitan formation, war horns sounding continuously, and the troops of Zhao Yanshou beneath the great banner bearing the character "Yan" beginning to don their armor. Then he looked again at Gao Huaide's position, and his heart suddenly tightened.

And at that very moment, the four hundred riders of the Iron Pigeon and Iron Falcon armies that had advanced forward had already fought their way to Gao Xingzhou's front.

He could only order the Guide Army infantry that had come out of the city to risk advancing to support Gao Huaide, while he himself led his three hundred riders to first smash the Khitans' four hundred elite cavalry.

In the Khitan formation, by the time Gao Huaide had finished enjoying himself and realized things were going badly, it was already somewhat late.

He was, after all, a seventeen-year-old youth. This Gao Wumu of history had not yet acquired the seasoned cunning of his later years, and in a moment of carelessness he had fallen into a heavy encirclement.

However, facing the Khitan cavalry racing toward him, Gao Huaide was not particularly alarmed.

While calling on the twenty-odd riders around him to spare no horse-strength and fly south at full speed, he set down his bronze-ribbed iron-backed bow and switched to a horn bow.

The Khitan mounted skirmishers charging at him wore no armor, so although they were fast, their protection was poor, and a horn bow was quite enough to deal with them.

Gao Huaide retreated while adjusting his posture in the saddle, shooting arrows behind him continuously. The skilled archers around him shot together with him, and the pursuing Khitan skirmishers fell with screams ringing out, their pursuit slowing at once.

But at that very moment, the two hundred riders of the Khitan Iron Falcon Army that had been hanging behind Gao Huaide finally seized their chance.

They first charged in fiercely with light cavalry, and Gao Huaide could only set down his bow and fight with his cavalry lance against the Khitan riders who had already thrust into his face.

The twenty-odd riders had barely managed to beat back nearly a hundred skirmishers when one hundred heavily armored iron cavalry in iron lamellar armor arrived.

With a single charge, they scattered Gao Huaide and his men.

In just a few breaths, only three riders remained at Gao Huaide's side, and the Khitan cavalry seemed to have marked him out: at least sixty or seventy riders came chasing after him.

At this moment, the Guide Army infantry that had come to support Gao Huaide also ran into trouble.

Zhao Yanshou was closing in fast with three thousand Lulong Army troops, his aim not to defeat the Guide Army but to keep them from reaching Gao Huaide.

The infantry on both sides roared till the heavens shook, trading crossbow volleys, then locking spear and staff into formation to fight.

But before even the time it takes to drink a cup of tea had passed, a thousand Khitan Iron Forest Army cavalry arrived. The front ranks of these thousand horsemen were uniformly clad in iron lamellar armor, and they fell hard upon the Guide Army's left flank.

After being repeatedly charged and cut down by the iron cavalry, the Guide Army no longer dared advance. They could only hurriedly form ranks to hold them off, and now, far from supporting Gao Huaide, they could barely protect themselves.

In the distance, Gao Xingzhou's eyes were splitting with fury, but he too was entangled by four hundred of the Khitan's finest Pishi Army armored cavalry and could not break free.

Gao Xingzhou was just about to raise the great black square banner and summon the thousand reserve troops inside Qicheng to come out in support.

At that very moment, war drums thundered in the distance, and a stir ran through the left side of the Liao army under Zhao Yanshou.

Zhao Yanshou, who had thought he was about to seize Gao Huaide, was badly startled. He spurred his horse to high ground to look, and his heart gave a sudden lurch.

Because Jing Yanguang had never dared to send troops across the river to the rescue, Zhao Yanshou had posted only half as many scouts near the pontoon bridge as he originally had.

And it was not only he who had grown careless — his scouts had too.

This was the twelfth month, after all. Who could bear to go out scouting in wind and snow and cold that could freeze a man's hands right off? Most of them just took one look at the Yellow River, then found a place to hole up.

So by the time Hu Guang led a hundred-odd riders creeping up on these Khitan scouts, they were either huddled away warming themselves by fires or fast asleep. There was no one left to send word.

Hu Guang and Fu Zhaoqing, Fu Yanqing's eldest son, charged at the very front.

Unlike the tactics of other cavalry, the Liangzhou cavalry, possessing the finest warhorse stock of the age, had Han-blood horses and fold-eared horses that exploded into speed with terrifying quickness. Thus their heavy cavalry in lamellar armor sometimes charged faster than light cavalry.

To obtain those three hundred-odd top-grade Hexi crossbred fold-eared horses, Shi Jingtang had originally paid real gold and silver to buy them from Zhang Zhao.

That was only to be expected. I, Great King Zhang, gave you the cavalry — the equipment, of course, you had to pay for.

And Zhang Zhao knew that Shi Jingtang had no choice but to buy, because at the time the Child Emperor's seat was far from steady. Without those seven hundred men of the Hucile, Shi Jingtang probably could not even sleep.

Back then, Yang Guangyuan had the ability to burst into Daning Palace at any moment and cut Shi Jingtang down with a single stroke.

So it was fortunate that Shi Jingtang was already dead. Otherwise, learning that Zhang Zhao had gotten another free ride off him here, he would surely have died of rage all over again.

On the battlefield, from the moment Hu Guang and Fu Zhaoqing appeared in Zhao Yanshou's sight to the moment they struck the left formation of his army, less than the time it takes to drink a cup of tea had passed.

Zhao Yanshou had no time at all to make dispositions before the great Liangzhou horses were upon him.

When the Lulong Army infantry saw the Liangzhou cavalry arrive, though thrown into confusion, they still quickly formed ranks and loosed wave after wave of arrows, while the front-rank soldiers snatched up their long spears.

But Hu Guang and his men were fully armored. Through three volleys of arrows, only a few unlucky ones were shot from their horses, and the two sides rapidly closed.

Then, unexpectedly, Hu Guang and the others did not charge in. Instead they drew horn crossbows from the sides of their horses.

They slowed their mounts slightly, strung their weapons at speed, then collectively took aim at one of the Lulong Army's long-spear formations and loosed a dense volley.

These horn crossbows were crossbows all the same! Fired at close range in volleys, ordinary infantry could hardly withstand it. In just a few breaths, the spearmen in that spot lay strewn across the ground.

A Lulong Army Captain was just about to direct other spearmen to fill the gap when Hu Guang and his men had already ridden off, and the second wave of chargers under Fu Zhaoqing arrived.

They pulled no tricks. They simply came on with cavalry lances in hand.

Hu Guang's men had not come to break the formation just now — Fu Zhaoqing's men were the ones for that.

And now the Lulong Army's dense spear formation, having suffered heavy casualties under the horn-crossbow volleys, had no time to bring up infantry from the rear to fill the gap. They simply could not hold.

At once Fu Zhaoqing and his men poured straight through the breach.

Moreover, their charges were highly disciplined — one hundred riders per wave, the intervals between them arranged in advance.

By the time Fu Yanqing and Yao Yuanfu and the others took the field in person, the pressure on the Lulong Army grew heavier still. They could not stop these fierce generals at all.

And Fu Yanqing and the others did not spread out left or right to widen their gains. Their charge had only one direction: the Khitan central army, where the great banner of the Grand Tiyin Yelu Wuzhi stood.

Now it was the Khitans' turn for trouble, because Yelu Wuzhi had by this point already sent out essentially every armored cavalryman he could move.

At this moment, around Yelu Wuzhi there were only a little over a thousand Zhangwu Army infantry and a few hundred personal guard cavalry.

Fu Yanqing and the others charging in were somewhat fewer in number, but far more elite.

Yelu Wuzhi was a veteran of a hundred battles. One look told him how formidable the oncoming cavalry was. His mind reeling, he could only steel himself and organize a defense.

Zhao Yanshou, his soul fleeing in terror, abandoned Gao Huaide and came racing back with over a thousand cavalry in hot pursuit.

With this back-and-forth, the Khitan battle array fell into complete chaos. Many formations lost contact with the central command.

"Fu Guanhou of Chenzhou has arrived!"

The restlessness deep within the forty-four-year-old Fu Yanqing was thoroughly awakened. With a roar, he led from the front, the very first to charge ahead.

In his haste, Yelu Wuzhi organized three square spear formations for defense.

With a howl, Fu Yanqing smashed straight through the first spear formation before its spears were even fully set.

At the second line, the Khitan formation was far more orderly, but by now Hu Guang and his men had come back around.

The horn-crossbow volleys against the spearmen played out once more, and then the third wave under Yao Yuanfu and the others charged again, quickly breaking through.

The third line of resistance was Yelu Wuzhi's personal guard, among whom there was even an eagle-shooter.

He stood on high ground, and his arrows came streaking like meteors. The cavalrymen around Yao Yuanfu toppled one after another, and the momentum of the advance faltered.

But very soon, on Hucile's orders, over two hundred riders of the great Liangzhou horses dismounted and formed ranks. They too drew strong bows and hard crossbows and shot up the slope, and even while shooting they advanced in neat, ordered lines.

Forming ranks and dismounting heavy cavalry to fight as heavy infantry had always been the greatest hallmark of the great Liangzhou horses.

Though the eagle-shooter was elite, and single-handedly shot down four or five Later Jin cavalrymen, he could not stop the soldiers of the third defensive line from being shot to pieces.

Seeing Fu Yanqing and the others behind him already reforming for another charge, Yelu Wuzhi gave a long sigh and could only choose to flee.

He had miscalculated! He had sent out all the armored cavalry around him, never expecting a force of fierce Jin cavalry to slip straight through the gap.

Nothing he said now would help. If he were captured or his great banner seized, it would be an utter disaster. To withdraw now would cost only a few thousand men.

On the battlefield, Fu Yanqing, Gao Xingzhou, the somewhat bedraggled Gao Huaide, and Zhao Yanshou alike were all watching Yelu Wuzhi's great banner.

They saw the great banner sway once, then begin to move to the rear.

Across the battlefield, the Khitan army erupted in an uproar!

The Jin army roared with joy like thunder. Thousands of Guide Army soldiers bellowed, "The Son of Heaven has arrived!" and pressed forward with all their might.

More than twenty thousand Khitan troops fell back in panic, and Gao Huaide and the others turned from the hunted into the hunters.

The situation changed in an instant.

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