Chapter 1090: Great Generals Move Out! (1/2)
Translated by: Hypersheep325
Edited by: Michyrr
”Release!”
”Release!”
”Release!”
Su Hanshan's hair was blown about in the blustering wind while his cold and harsh voice rang out in everyone's ears: composed, confident, and utterly emotionless. Even though the closest Arab horsemen were no less than ten feet from the ballistae, his voice remained as calm and unperturbed as ever.
Rumble! One wave of Arab cavalry after another collapsed in front of the ballista army. Six thousand, eight thousand, ten thousand, fourteen thousand, eighteen thousand, twenty-six thousand… More than forty thousand Arab cavalry had left their corpses strewn around the ballistae before the seemingly endless shouts and yells finally died away.
In the distance, countless gazes stared at the ballista army in the sea of corpses and Su Hanshan in the very center with looks of deep fear. These elite Arab cavalry had fought in the cruelest of battlefields, through which they had forged their steely resolves. But in the face of this group of soldiers that truly seemed to be made out of steel, all of them felt a deep dread. They could sense no emotion in these soldiers, no fear, joy, panic, unease… none of them existed.
These were once just bandits and brigands of the Silk Road. Who could have imagined that Su Hanshan could train them into such a dauntless and determined army?
And it was still far from over. The appearance of the Tongluo Cavalry and the power exhibited by Su Hanshan's ballista army quickly set off a chain reaction. The Divine Martial Army, the Divine Prison Army, the Ultimate Martial Army, the Dragon Stallion Army… all of the elite armies began to rally once more.
As one side waxed, another side waned. The morale of the Blood Beast Army, Death Army, Fearless Army, and Ironblood Army began to plunge as unease and consternation gripped their minds. Though they had been able to maintain a stalemate just moments ago, their fighting power now dropped and they became incapable of contending against the Tang elite armies.
No matter how strong an army was, once it lost its will to fight, it would immediately face defeat. Squelchsquelchsquelch!Blades sliced and hacked through flesh as row after row of the Arab elite armies were cut down.
One thousand, two thousand, three thousand… In their exhausted and demoralized states, the four top-class Arab armies swiftly suffered heavy casualties. Even though the Arabs were a people that lived for battle, even they would find it hard to endure the deaths of so many top-class soldiers.
At the same time, the one thousand ballistae under Chen Bin's command were also in the process of displaying their might.
”Release! Release! Release!”
One volley after another shrieked through the air. Although Chen Bin's ballistae did not possess as much killing as power as Su Hanshan's, they still could not be underestimated. Six thousand, seven thousand, eight thousand… ten thousand. From the moment the Tongluo Cavalry had entered the battle to now, Chen Bin's ballistae had killed more than ten thousand enemies.
'Pull a hair and move the entire body.' The rout in three areas was fatal to the Arab forces. Three became four, then five, then six… More and more areas in their army began to crumble under the pressure.
In the short period after the Tongluo Cavalry had appeared, the Arabs had lost an enormous sixty thousand men!
The wholesale rout made the Mamelukes, Mutri Great Cavalry, and Celestial Wolf Cavalry fighting with the Wushang Cavalry extremely uneasy. The situation had reversed from 'major victory' to 'major defeat' far too quickly. It had only taken an eyeblink for the entire army to show signs of complete collapse.
”This is impossible!!” Governor Osman bellowed, his hands clenching into fists.
Abu Muslim and Ziyad had equally nasty grimaces on their faces. Each of them had believed that the Great Tang had exerted all their power, that the Tang no longer had any reinforcements. No one had expected this second batch to arrive, and that this wave of reinforcements would be even stronger than the first.
”Retreat! Retreat!”
”Blow the horns; order the army to retreat!”
……
Abu Muslim had an extremely gloomy face. This battle had gone completely differently from how they had predicted. If they did not retreat now, their army would truly utterly collapse, and the Tang would probably charge straight through it.
”Aybak, Osman, you must stop them no matter what!”
A sudden change had resulted in a completely different result from this battle.
Abu Muslim had planned to move out in the first place, but while the original intention had been to crush the Tang with overwhelming power, they were now moving out to suppress Wang Chong and the others and prevent the army from being completely wiped out.
Bwoooom!
The horns sounded the call for retreat, ringing in the ears of the Arabs, Tibetans, and Turks. The Arabs in the rear were the first to retreat, which caused the soldiers on the front line to collapse into disarray as they fell back.