Chapter 200 Baptism of Zhang He (2/2)

After they charged forward for 300 meters, the horse momentum began to die down.

There were over 10,000 reserve troops scattering about in the vicinity, yet Zhang He could not kill all of them with a single charge even though they did not fight back.

*BWOOOH*

Zhang He blew a horn to get the attention of his troops. During the horse charges in the middle of a chaotic battlefield, it was easy to lose oneself in the killing and forget one's surroundings. Zhang He knew about this fact from a scroll he read in Ye City, so he had prepared a countermeasure for this occasion.

”Disengage! Pull back! Follow me!”

The horsemen snapped back from their sense from the sound of the horn and listened to the command. They stopped charging and turned their horses around, running back and heading toward the direction that Zhang He was pointing.

The reserved troops of Wang Yun, who survived the onslaught, looked at the leaving cavalries in fright and relieved. However, their nightmare was not over yet.

From two hundred meters further away, Zhang He stopped and turned around. He shouted.

”Reform the formation! Form four wedges and one square, one platoon for one group!”

Instead of using the previous formation, which they grouped together in bulk, Zhang He separated his troops into five platoons. Each platoon consisted of one thousand men, and the lieutenants took their men and formed rank, getting ready for another charge.

'The bulk charge isn't efficient in an ambush. I'm still inexperience!'

Zhang He was learning as he was commanding his troops. All tactics and strategies he had learned from Ye City library were being revised in his brain. Combining with his photographic memories of the enemies' previous known location, Zhang He pictured a 3-D map within his mind.

”The square formation, head north. There's another slope that horses can climb on your right side. You will notice it when you see it. Get on the cliff and regroup with the others. Tell them to start shooting until they run out of arrows!”

”Four wedges, charge with me again!”

Four thousand cavalries rushed toward the panicking troops again. The untrained soldiers did not know what to react in a situation like this. They ran away and screamed in chaos.

The spears of the two thousand horsemen caught the running soldiers, skewered the Imperial soldiers without resistance.

While the four platoons of Zhang He chased after the fleeing soldiers, the lieutenants of Wang Yun Army came with a battalion of spearmen. The combat infantries could be seen a hundred meters away from the charging troops.

'This should be their rearguards spearmen I saw earlier. The number should be around one thousand.'

Zhang He thought as he peered at the incoming force with the corner of his eyes. 'They don't have shields, so I can exploit this.'

The general blew the horn again, ”Pull back and regroup! Form line!”

Zhang He galloped back another one hundred meters. He stopped his horse and turned around, which his men also used the general as their landmark as the center of the formation. The four thousand men regroup as four straight lines formation.

The spearmen saw that the horsemen stopped and reformed their ranks. They stopped chasing and set up a spear-wall formation facing Zhang He and his troops.

”Call the reinforcement! Hurry!”

”Spear wall! Get ready to defend!”

The lieutenants of the spearmen shouted, which Zhang He and the horsemen also could hear it as the distance between them was 150 meters away.

”Crossbow!” Zhang He shouted.

The cavalries switched their weapons from spears to crossbows. They loaded the clips and aimed at the front without Zhang He's further instruction.

”Fire!”

Five thousand crossbows fired the first volley. The arrow wall was so dense that the Imperial spearmen looked at them with awe before the arrow rain pierced their bodies.

With a single volley, the spearmen unit collapsed and routed. Only a dozen lucky soldiers survived by using their friends as shields.

”Withdraw! We're going back to the top of the cliff. Follow me!”

On the way when he was scouting the Imperial Army, he saw several groups of heavy cavalries, donned in full bronze armors. Since Zhang He's unit was entirely light horsemen with light armor, they would not be a match in a melee fight with these groups. Therefore, Zhang He chose to play it safe by avoiding direct confrontation with the enemies.

'Treat my soldiers as if they were my sons! I won't let a single of them die!'

…

Meanwhile, the other platoon of Zhang He's men reached the troops on top of the cliff. They managed to pass the order. The one thousand horsemen, who leaped down the slope earlier, also joined ranks with the standing-by battalions.

”Get ready!”

”Aim!”

”Fire at will!”

The six thousand men launched several volleys at once upon Zhang Yang's men below the cliff. Because each repeating crossbow clip contained 10 arrows, 60,000 arrows poured down on the 10,000 unaware soldiers.

The Imperial soldiers, who were targeted, screamed in fright. They tried to run away from the arrow rain, but there was no space that the arrows did not cover. Each soldier pushed and shoved the others to protect themselves in a panic, creating a chaotic scene.

The first clips of ten arrows were emptied within half a minute. However, it was enough to cripple two platoons of ten thousand men.