Chapter 637: Luring the Enemy into Field Battle

The Ming army halted at Weinan for only a single day.

The night before, commanders Li Guozheng, Liu Jinjue, Zhang Jizai, Sun Shoufa, and others were invited by the Nan clan to accompany the two shangshu uncles, Nan Zhongqi and Nan Juyi, in discussing military affairs.

They debated using Weinan as a base — advancing to relieve the siege of Xi'an Prefecture, or retreating to hold the strong city and plan for a protracted standoff.

At the same time, they mobilized the gentry of Weinan County, demanding they recruit troops and buy horses, reinforce the city defenses, prepare arms and equipment, and supply provisions and fodder.

The discussion was fervent; with the two retired shangshu Nan Zhongqi and Nan Juyi holding the line, everyone from field officers to gentry was exceptionally enthusiastic, as if the grand cause of raising a righteous host to punish the unprincipled was right before their eyes.

But the next morning, just as they opened their eyes, before the commanders could even assign their tasks, an alarm suddenly sounded — Li Guozheng's 1,300 troops of the Han-He Battalion, encamped outside the moat at the West Gate, had been surrounded.

The ones who came were Liu Chengzong, along with Xie Erhu leading a thousand Mongol cavalry.

They had ridden hard through the night, reaching Lingkou outside Weinan's West Gate just before dawn. After briefly resting the horses, they ordered Xie Erhu to lead a charge into the encampment, trampling three camps in succession; Li Guozheng was shot dead on the spot.

Several hundred routed soldiers swam across the moat, throwing the 3,000 troops of Liu Jinjue and Zhang Jizai's commands, encamped east of the river, into a panicked stampede.

Both of them were men of Hancheng.

Zuo Maodi, as the local county magistrate, had the primary duty of being responsible to the locality, and so he carried a heavy mental burden.

But for Liu Jinjue and Zhang Jizai, as military officers, it was different — warriors are born for war.

Once Chen Qiyu's verbal message was relayed by Zuo Maodi and the uprising swept through Weibei, the two commanders had no grounds to stay safe inside the city; each led a few dozen household retainers, recruiting troops along the way and throwing themselves into the war.

Only... neither of them was familiar with their own soldiers.

The soldiers were all landlord militias and village troops from surrounding areas like Zichuan, Heyang, Baishui, and Chengcheng.

Call them a rabble or a swarm of ants if you will — it's not that the soldiers' quality was poor. In truth, by this stage of the war in Shaanxi, combat had become common knowledge.

Whether official, bandit, or civilian, anyone pulled from the ranks could march in formation and wield a weapon.

But the troops came from disparate sources, had never drilled with their officers, and their pay and provisions were a tangled mess — this left the field officers lacking authority, unable to give their soldiers confidence in battle, while the entire army also lacked organizational capacity.

Roused from sleep and thrown abruptly into battle, every man's legs trembled; amid the panic and chaos, let alone crossing the river to fight, Liu Jinjue and Zhang Jizai spent a great deal of effort just locating their own subordinate officers.

This left the two of them terrified in hindsight.

It was only because Liu Chengzong did not order his troops across the river — otherwise a single charge would have shattered and scattered them.

As the two men were rallying the troops and calming their nerves, just at that moment, a surrender demand arrived from the Marshal's Army on the far bank of the moat, making them realize that Liu Chengzong had come in person.

The two then put their heads together based on the current situation and immediately saw the problem.

Liu Chengzong did not seem to have come to fight a battle; it looked more like he was acting out of spite.

The Mongol soldiers under his command appeared exhausted and weary, men and horses alike in a daze. Their single charge on the far bank that had routed Li Guozheng's Han-He Battalion had relied entirely on the momentum of their headlong rush; now they showed absolutely no inclination to cross the river in pursuit.

The troops were scattered in twos and threes across the western outskirts — those needing to graze were grazing, those needing to rest were resting; some had even taken off their helmets and lit fires to boil water, showing none of the wolf-like ferocity they had displayed charging the camp moments before.

So the two of them mulled it over: the enemy troops are exhausted, while our troops have rested and wait at ease, and we outnumber them — crossing the river to fight might not be unwinnable. If we could capture Liu Chengzong in one battle, wouldn't that... mean promotion and ennoblement just around the corner?

Meanwhile, inside Weinan city, Nan Juyi, nearing seventy, was having servants carry his sedan chair at a rapid pace toward the city wall.

The battle on the western outskirts had unfolded too quickly. He received word inside the city, and by the time his sedan chair was ready, he had already heard that Li Guozheng had been shot dead outside the city, and the 1,300 troops of the three Han-He Battalion camps stationed west of the moat had been routed with more than half dead or wounded.

Stunned by the dire news, Nan Juyi hurried all the way and climbed onto the city wall. His dim old eyes scanned the situation outside the city, and at a single glance, he grew anxious.

Nan Juyi was no clueless little old man.

When he served as Grand Coordinator of Fujian, he personally commanded ten thousand troops, crossing the sea to besiege and blow up the Dutch bastion Fort Zeelandia on Penghu; he was deeply knowledgeable about firearms, cannons, warships, and even the relations and situation among the Nanyang pirates and colonizers.

Later, in the first year of Chongzhen, he served as Vice Minister of Revenue and Director-General of the Granaries. That year, when the court issued part of the back pay, it was at his proposal that 300,000 taels of Shaanxi's tax revenue were withheld for the payment.

Later, during the Jisi Incident, he was in Tongzhou, where the defensive methods he devised were exceptionally thorough. It happened that the Minister of Works, Zhang Fengxiang, was imprisoned for inadequate preparation of military equipment, and the Emperor appointed him to succeed as Minister of Works.

In the end, because he spoke well of someone to save them, he was stripped of office and reduced to commoner status by the irate Chongzhen Emperor. It was not until his service defending Tongzhou was recognized, and Chongzhen's anger had subsided, that his official registration was restored.

By this time, however, Nan Juyi was already advanced in years and had been living in his hometown all along.

When Liu Chengzong led his troops on this eastern campaign, Nan Juyi had actually been unwilling for the Nan clan to get mixed up in this murky water.

For one, having served in the Ministry of Revenue, he understood better than anyone the grievances between Shaanxi mutineers like Liu Chengzong and the imperial court. If not for his memorial that year withholding 300,000 taels of Qin territory tax revenue for pay, the Shaanxi rebellion would have broken out a year earlier.

For another, Liu Chengzong was no petty raider coming down from northern Shaanxi. If it were those earlier roving bandits descending from the north, fighting them would have been one thing — they were no real threat.

Now the Marshal's Office had taken Gansu, Qinghai, and even Longxi, and its eastern campaign had entered Guanzhong. Emotionally, Nan Juyi was also loath to see the Ming court and the Marshal's Office fight a grinding war of attrition in Guanzhong.

From Nan Juyi's perspective, in this era of rampant natural disasters and years of chaos, if a decent regime could restore the vitality of the Northwest, that would not actually be the worst outcome.

And the most important aspect was that earlier, when Wei Qian'er and Zhang Tianlin had led their troops through in succession, Nan Juyi had stood on the city wall and seen the Marshal's Office's two most elite battalions.

Those two battalions were superbly equipped; even just marching and encamping at a distance, one could see their rigorous training — they were by no means a force any ordinary army could match.

What's more, the entire battalions consisted of armored cavalry and horse troops, equipped with war chariots, and carried light and heavy muskets as well as light and heavy red-barbarian cannons.

In Nan Juyi's eyes, if a unit like that were on the court's side, even just a single regiment could serve as the vanguard regiment of the most elite force; with only a few cannons cast, it would be enough to hold Weinan until the end of time.

And now, a full two grand battalions — ten thousand troops — of such a force had crossed through Weinan as if it were child's play, heading toward Tong Pass.

Nan Juyi considered this an invincible opponent.

But the Nan clan's properties and lands were too vast; Liu Chengzong's land-redemption policy had terrified the clansmen out of their wits.

If no one in Weibei had risen in arms, Nan Juyi might still have been able to restrain his clansmen. But now that Weibei had already risen, people saw this as a once-in-a-millennium opportunity, and the flames of war reaching the Nan clan had become unavoidable.

On the city wall.

The younger generation clamoring for war, watching the Mongol cavalry prowling outside the city and the fields strewn with corpses after the Han-He Battalion's defeat, were all scared out of their wits, their faces drained of color.

Nan Juyi, on the contrary, showed an irrepressible look of delight.

He murmured, "Good, good, good!"

He had only feared that the ones coming were again elite troops like Zhang Tianlin's and Wei Qian'er's. Seeing the Mongol cavalry scattered in small groups outside the city, he was instead relieved.

After all, though Mongol cavalry were fast and fierce in the charge, they had brought no heavy cannons and would struggle mightily against a walled city.

But immediately, what puzzled Nan Juyi also became apparent: "The battalions below the walls — why do they not cross the river in pursuit?"

The Mongol soldiers were scattered loosely across the plateau — was this not a perfect opportunity for pursuit?

Yet the government troops outside the city did not pursue.

Just as he was about to send someone down from the wall to point this out, he heard routed soldiers report that it was Liu Chengzong commanding outside the city, which made him hesitate again.

A man's name is like a tree's shadow.

Over six years, Liu Chengzong had fought across the northwest without a single defeat — his name alone was enough to scare several thousand men into hiding inside the city and pissing their pants.

What was more, Nan Juyi reckoned that Liu Chengzong showing up with only a thousand Mongol cavalry had to mean he had another card up his sleeve, so the commanders outside the city not taking the initiative to attack wasn't really wrong.

At least it was prudent.

Only, the commanders outside the city didn't pursue — not because they didn't want to, but because they couldn't.

They hadn't thought it through at all, or rather, Liu Jinjue, Zhang Jizai, and Sun Shoufa were all Defense Commanders, and retreat was simply not an option in their duty, which made them extremely good at fighting to the death.

All three had made the same calculation: calm the troops, get the battle formation in order, then immediately beat the war drums and advance, leading their forces across the moat to sweep westward and strike.

This sudden turn of events infuriated Nan Juyi so much that he slapped his thigh on the city wall.

They should have fought just now but didn't, already missing the best chance; now that the other side had rested a while, charging in to attack would be hard-pressed to gain any advantage.

Meanwhile, Liu Chengzong, who had been letting his horses graze west of the moat, heard the distant drumming, stood up on his mount to watch the Ming army crossing the river, and clapped his hands in delight on the spot: "They've come just right!"

It was exactly as Nan Juyi had imagined from atop the city wall.

Who was Liu Chengzong? Ever since he raised his army, he had attacked without fail, commanding battles as if by instinct — especially in a local skirmish like this, he didn't need to expend any extra thought, much less childishly place himself in danger.

The reason he had rushed over with only a thousand assembled Mongol soldiers did carry a sliver of hot-blooded venting — he wanted to get there fast and deal with the Ming troops.

But more than that, he was afraid that too many troops would make the enemy afraid to leave the city, turning his venting into nothing and instead becoming him coming here to fight a siege battle.

It wasn't that attacking a city was impossible, but massing tens of thousands of troops to storm Weinan County was — it was too close to Xi'an Prefecture. The prefectural city would need to be besieged, and Weinan would too, which practically meant the Marshal's Manor would have to commit all its forces.

The two places were less than a hundred li apart; massing tens of thousands of troops would strip even the grass roots in the fields bare.

Besides, Weinan was a strong city. With several thousand defenders holding it to the death, and if there were stockpiled grain inside, it couldn't be taken even by next spring, and would instead wound the manor's soaring morale.

So his plan from the very start had been to use a thousand Mongol cavalry as bait — to screen and control the battlefield, lure the Ming army into field battle, and give the supporting units time to enter the formation at leisure.

Now, seeing the Ming army crossing the river, Liu Chengzong felt relieved. He waved over a Feathered Forest rider and said, "Send word to Brigade Commander Xie: have him assemble his men, put up a slight defense, and prepare to withdraw."

At the same time, he told two other Feathered Forest riders: "Send word to Tang Tong, Chiliarch of Gao Yingdeng's force on the west bank of the Wei River — order him to cross the river and prepare to engage the enemy. And to Ma Ke, Chiliarch of the Tiger Guard Battalion on the north bank — lead your troops eastward along the north bank and envelop the Ming army."

The Mongol cavalry, seeing three or four thousand Ming troops crossing the river in a dark mass, had their various large formations sounding horns one after another, unconsciously tightening their ranks — those who needed to don armor did so, those who needed to mount up mounted up.

Once the Ming army crossed the moat, they immediately sent out several squads of cavalry to seize the terrain and further challenge the gathering Mongol cavalry, compressing their maneuvering space to create conditions for the subsequent infantry and artillery crews to deploy their formations.

Even so, the attack that Liu Jinjue and Zhang Jizai had pinned such enormous hopes on still failed to achieve its effect.

Xie Erhu and his Mongol troops were simply too slippery.

The Marshal Manor's Mongol Battalion, aside from that small standing Mongol force, was mostly temporarily conscripted into battalions from the Garrison-Pasture Camp, and the officers were mostly Mongol nobles.

These men were the best at weighing the situation in battle — they were brave and could fight to the death, but generally they wouldn't.

After all, fighting to the death cost too much. The Garrison-Pasture Brigade already had few people, and few cattle and sheep; lose a few more men, and the cattle, sheep, and horses would all be gone.

So on the battlefield, they had no problem with roaming, grazing horses, scouting, filling in the map, and maintaining a presence — but fighting a hard battle against the Ming army held no appeal.

The equipment gap was right there, after all. Apart from those reckless lancers from the Khoshut tribe, the other tribes were all rather unwilling to clash head-on with a well-formed Ming army.

To Xie Erhu, Liu Chengzong's order basically amounted to "clocking out" — telling him the rest of this battle didn't require him to exert any real effort.

That being the case, Xie Erhu simply let himself go. First he gathered his troops and formed ranks, putting on an eager, raring-to-go appearance.

Once the Ming army entered range, he brought out the cannons left behind earlier by Li Guozheng's force from the Hanhe Camp and fired a volley at them.

Xie Erhu had given a death order: his soldiers were forbidden to carry the cannons when they fled.

His Mongol soldiers absolutely adored Ming army cannons.

They didn't like the Marshal Manor's standard Lion Cannons and thousand-jin field guns, nor did they like the Ming army's Great General Cannons — those things were too heavy and too slow.

They were exclusively enamored with Swarm-Bead Cannons and small Frankish breech-loaders.

To them, those things were divine artifacts. You could ride up, drop them on the ground, and fire — they shot fast and scattered lots of pellets. As long as the enemy entered range, you couldn't miss. Bang-bang-bang, a quick volley, pick them up, and you could run.

Pure joy.

The charging Ming soldiers were dumbfounded. Weren't these just a bunch of Tartars? How the hell were they firing cannons?

By the time the Ming army pushed their own cannons forward, all they heard was a flurry of whistles from within the gunpowder smoke, and several hundred cavalry scattered like birds and beasts.

They collapsed without even being touched.

When the Ming army hurriedly chased after them, what greeted them were not Mongol cavalry fleeing in panic, but Marshal Army elite troops wearing the same uniforms as themselves.

It was Tang Tong, who had crossed the river from the Wei River bend to the west.

Discovering that Marshal Army reinforcements had arrived, the commanding officers Liu Jinjue and Sun Shoufa showed no fear — after all, they still held the advantage in troop numbers.

Only, the long spears and heavy muskets in Tang Tong's hands, at the very first clash, not only erased the disadvantage in numbers but also halted their offensive. Moreover, a large number of Mongol cavalry screened the flanks, steadily driving off the Ming army's limited horsemen.

In cavalry numbers alone, Xie Erhu's thousand riders were no fewer than the cavalry of Liu Jinjue and Sun Shoufa.

As the Ming cavalry squads were driven from the battlefield one after another, the infantry left behind soon wavered under the fire of heavy muskets and blunderbusses.

Xie Erhu got fired up. If not now, when?

This kind of tailwind battle — he could always fight it.

The Mongol Brigade's light cavalry burst through the gunpowder smoke, loosing arrows in a wild volley as they charged, and together with the firearms, routed one cavalry unit and three infantry units head-on, which then triggered a total collapse of the Ming army's entire line.

And for Nan Juyi, watching helplessly from the city wall as the Ming army was defeated, this was not yet despair.

True despair came from the north bank of the Wei River.

Ma Ke, Chiliarch of the Marshal Army's Tiger Guard Battalion, was leading nearly a thousand armored riders, bearing battle flags, across the riverbank, cutting off the retreat of the routed Ming army from the rear and spreading out beyond the city.

This sight turned the faces of the gentry on Weinan's city wall ashen as death!