The night was deep and it was already past the curfew time to go to bed.
In the Dafeichuan military camp, there was still a lot of noise and bustle, which was very different from the past.
The military order to evacuate Dafeichuan has been issued. Although none of the soldiers were willing to retreat, they had no choice but to obey.
In the mourning hall of the Chinese Army Commander's tent, Xiao Lou'er, who was wearing sackcloth and mourning, finally understood that his father would never come back. At this time, he lay in Chen Yan's arms and cried sadly. The sergeants were busy silently, carrying Qin Mubai's coffin out and loading it into the car, preparing to transport it to Shanzhou.
The hurt was so deep that there were no tears.
At this moment, Chen Yan's face turned pale. From the moment she stepped into the mourning hall and saw Qin Mubai's tomb and portrait placed in front of her, she never spoke again. He just hugged Xiao Lou'er tightly and kept replaying all the past episodes in his mind.
"Yan'er, this is Mu Bai's relic." Li Daozong brought a golden crown with double peacock feathers to Chen Yan and said to her, "I remember that you gave this to him. Several times during the expedition, Qin Mubai also wore this, please keep it as a souvenir!"
"Thank you, foster father. But, it's not necessary." Chen Yan declined with a bitter smile.
"What's wrong? Are you afraid that seeing things and missing people will make you more sad?" Li Daozong sighed, "Just keep it!"
Chen Yan hugged Xiao Lou'er tightly in her arms, "Don't I still have Xiao Lou'er!"
"..." Li Daozong was speechless and could only sigh softly, patted Chen Yan on the shoulder and left.
Returning to his daughter's room again, Li Daozong saw Li Xueyan getting up and changing clothes with the help of the maid, preparing to board the car and set off tomorrow morning.
"Hey, there are Yan'er and Chen Yan in front of me; there are Princess Gaoyang and Wu Meiniang in Lanzhou... Qin Mubai, a romantic seed, is not afraid of breaking a woman's heart? What a sin! Compared to him, this king was nothing !" Li Daozong could only smile bitterly and shake his head.
At this time, on the fort.
Xue Wanjun boarded the fort as he had done countless times before. In the darkness, twenty Shenwu cannons wrapped in red cloth pointed proudly to the northwest.
He stepped forward, stretched out his hand to touch the cold cannon body, and frowned in silence.
At this time, two sergeants carried a large bucket and also climbed onto the fort. When I saw Xue Wanjun, I greeted him with courtesy.
Xue Wanjun was very familiar with these two soldiers. They are a father and son, natives of Lanzhou, and their surname is Xu. The father is fifty years old and the son is only nineteen years old. Originally, Mr. Xu had four sons, three of whom were killed on the battlefield in Dafeichuan. He himself was injured and walked with a limp. The one who is following him now is his youngest son. He was hit by the Tubo cavalry once on the battlefield. His brain was hurt a little and his mind is a little unclear.
It stands to reason that this father and son should have retired and returned home long ago. But they had been in Dafeichuan for several years and were used to it, so they were unwilling to return home, so Xue Wanjun took care of them and did a job in the army - wiping Shenwu cannons every day and being raised by the army.
"Old Xu, we will evacuate tomorrow, and all the baggage must be thrown away, including the Shenwu cannon." Xue Wanjun said, "It's already midnight, what else are you doing? Go back and pack your bags early!"
"General Xue, I have been cleaning this cannon for several years. If I don't clean it for a day, I will be in a hurry!" Lao Xu said while wiping the barrel with an oiled rag, "This thing is good! A cannon can withstand thousands of troops! What a pity, why don't you want to leave tomorrow? Come to them, hey!…”
One sentence stung Xue Wanjun's heart.
"Old Xu, you go back and rest!" he shouted suddenly!
Xu and his son were stunned for a moment, so they had no choice but to lift the oil drum and leave.
"Put your things down and leave!"
"yes… "
After Xu and his son left, Xue Wanjun picked up the rag, dipped it in oil, and carefully cleaned the cannon.
After wiping and wiping, he suddenly couldn't help but sob. Finally, he hugged the cold Shenwu cannon and cried loudly, hitting the cannon heavily with his fists.
At some point, there was another person behind him. Suddenly he came back to his senses and turned around to see that it was actually Hou Junji.
"What are you looking at!" Xue Wanjun shouted, feeling ashamed and annoyed.
Hou Junji didn't say anything, but just handed his hand forward, which turned out to be a pot of wine.
Xue Wanjun was stunned for a moment, then snatched the jug, pulled off the lid and opened his mouth to drink. After drinking most of the pot, he looked up to the sky and screamed, "Why! Why is this!!!"
"We will come back again." Hou Junji said calmly.
Xue Wanjun turned to look at Hou Junji, his eyes red, "Don't make sarcastic remarks here! You won't understand!"
"What do you know?" Hou Junji's voice was still calm.
"These cannons, these camps, and every inch of land here were once fought and defended by us with our lives!" Xue Wanjun said loudly, "Now, don't want it, throw it away! Personally, can you feel happy?"
"Only when you can afford to lose can you win." Hou Junji said, "When a person holds something tightly with both hands, he will always have only this thing in his hand; when he loosens his hand, he can hold something more. Lots of stuff.”
“I don’t want to listen to your nonsense!” , chaos and desolation. Now, thousands of houses have been built in dozens of miles of military camps. There are herds of cattle and sheep on the Qinghai Lake, and the Shenwu cannons are stationed on guard. Once Shuai leaves, the Kansai Army will be completely destroyed! Lanzhou will no longer be what it used to be!"
"Brother Xue, don't be too pessimistic." Hou Junji said, "It is natural that the fortunes will rise and fall. Maybe it won't be long before we are back, and Dafeichuan will be more prosperous than before?"
"I hope so!..." Xue Wanjun sighed heavily and asked suspiciously, "Why didn't you quarrel with me today and still talk so much nonsense to me?"
Hou Junji smiled calmly and said, "What's there to argue about? After all, aren't we all here to win the war and for the good of the Kansai Army?"
"You finally understand."
"I've always understood. It's you who don't understand but I understand."
"..." Xue Wanjun didn't know whether to laugh or cry, "I'm too lazy to talk nonsense with you. You are such a mean person!... You have to force others to quarrel with you!"
"Then let's go! It's past midnight. It's time to make food and assemble the army and prepare to move! - By the way, the cannon cannot be moved for a while, so don't leave half of the ammunition!" Hou Junji said.
"You don't need to say that? Could it be that we leave it to the Tibetans and wait for them to use cannons to bombard us?" Can you use cannons and make cannonballs?"
Hou Junji immediately laughed and said: "Then Mr. Hou is almost like a barbarian. Except for the red-coated artillery specially trained by the young marshal, who can use these things? To be honest, I have always been jealous of you. Yes. Because of these cannons.”
"Are you finally willing to tell the truth?"
"I didn't intend to hide it."
…
Two days later, at noon. The top of the Huanyue Valley.
Qin Mubai looked at the bottom of the valley. The Kansai army, all lightly armed, crossed the canyon in an orderly manner and let out a long sigh.
Everything was going smoothly as planned, and he felt a little relieved.
"Master, when the army completely passes through the valley, shall we start taking action?" Qin Shi asked.
"Yes." Qin Mubai nodded and said, "I'll leave this to you later. You have followed your adoptive father in the Xiangyang Iron Mine for so long, and you must be an expert in mountain blasting. Lu Youhai and Those two hundred fire gods are also experts at handling the five-fingered thunder, I can rest assured."
"Master, don't worry. This little guy can still handle this little thing." Qin Shi said, "Master is so smart, how could he think of burying the Five-Finger Divine Thunder on the cliff halfway up the mountain?"
"You didn't remind me that day by cutting down trees to build a hut." Qin Mubai smiled and said, "Look at the peaks on both sides of the valley. They are very steep. They are almost connected at the top of the mountain, just like the tree crown. If you blast it from the middle of the mountainside, the top of the mountain will be too heavy and will fall down, just like the willow tree you cut down! Moreover, if you bury the Five-Finger Divine Thunder on the ground, it will be easily discovered, leading to failure. "
"Then in this grand canyon that is dozens of miles long, I really don't know how many Tibetans will be buried!" Qin Shi said with a sigh.
Qin Mubai was silent for a moment and said: "It's a war, and people have to die. It's better to kill the enemy than to kill one of your own. That's the truth."
"The villain knows." Qin Shi gritted his teeth and said, "Master, don't worry! Within two days, the villain and the Vulcan will bury all the five-finger divine thunder! Then according to the master's instructions, the villain will stay in Here he is pretending to be a woodcutter, and when the Tibetan army enters the valley, the villain will personally detonate the divine thunder and send those barbarians to their death!"
"Be careful." Qin Mubai patted him on the shoulder and solemnly warned, "Success or failure depends on this one move."
"Master, don't worry!"
At this time, the Tubo army commander was in a tent.
"Marshal, we've found out! The Tang army really withdrew, and not a single one of them was left!" Wei Ru General Danba Urji laughed heartily and reported back to Gar Qinling, "The general was ordered to personally take the numbers with him. Thousands of soldiers checked carefully and found no one within a hundred miles. They were indeed gone in a hurry! —By the way, the last general’s brother, Damba Wangjie, left in a hurry! He has also been rescued. The general will let him go for treatment and recuperation first, and the marshal can ask him for details later! "
"How could this happen?" Gar Qinling frowned suspiciously and murmured to himself, "First, Qin Mubai suddenly died suddenly, then the Tang army came to take revenge regardless of life and death, and now they suddenly withdrew! - Every piece of this brown color has something weird about it!”
"Marshal, there's nothing weird!" Danba Wuerji laughed and said, "Tang Jun was never our opponent. In the past, when Qin Mubai was here, he could still hold on with just one breath. Now they don't have a coach. It must have been defeated by a pile of sand! I heard from my brother that after Qin Mubai's death, the generals of the Tang army, Hou Junji, were at odds with Xue Wanjun, and they had no choice but to invite Li Daozong, the king of Jiangxia. Taking charge of the overall situation. In the end, Li Daozong gave some military orders from Qin Mubai and ordered the army to withdraw! "
"Qin Mubai's military order?" Gar Qinling raised his eyebrows in surprise, "What's going on?"
"Uh... my brother is not too sure." Danba Wuerji said, "I guess it was Li Daozong who forged it, right? He has been dead for so many days, where did the military order come from? Isn't this nonsense! It is probably Li Daozong. Knowing that they could not win, and fearing that Xue Wanjun and others would risk their lives, they wanted to preserve their strength, so they withdrew! - Li Daozong was a prince, and his heart was for the emperor and the court. He and these generals led the troops! They are different. Isn’t it reasonable, Marshal?”
Gal Qinling glanced at him but ignored him and fell into deep thought.
Damba Urji was so bored that he had to shut up.
After a while, Gal Qinling suddenly said: "Tomorrow morning, five thousand cavalry will be mobilized to accompany us. I want to go to Tangying to see it myself!"
"yes!"
After noon the next day, Gar Qinling led five thousand cavalry to the Dafei Sichuan and Tang Army camp.
Everything in the camp was in good order. Even the earthen stoves built by the Huotou Army still had some large pots (huge iron pots used for cooking) that had not been removed. Only some light cooking utensils and food were taken away. The camp beds, tables, chairs and weapon racks in all the barracks are still there, and even the heavy transport vehicles are neatly placed in the warehouse.
Only men, horses, rations and weapons were missing.
"I really left in a hurry. I didn't even take my family property." The suspicion in Gar Qinling's heart grew. He wandered around the military camp for a while, and then he felt enlightened and sent someone to find the Shenwu Fort.
When they boarded the fort, the Tibetan people almost cheered!
"Marshal! We captured twenty cannons during the fierce battle the day before yesterday, and there are still twenty cannons left here that have not been evacuated! In this way, all the forty cannons in Dafeichuan belong to us!" Danba Ur Jile shouted loudly.
"Is there anything worth laughing about?" Gal Qinling said coldly, "These things are just a pile of scrap metal in the hands of people who don't know how to use them. Besides, who can make this kind of medicine specifically for cannons? Bombs? ... These techniques are unique and important secrets of the Kansai Army, not even us, even other Tang troops may know about them."
"Then, let our blacksmiths think about it!" Danba Urji said with a smile.
Seeing his silly look, Gal Qinling was so angry that he shook his head and said with a smile: "Okay, you move them all back and think about it slowly. When will you figure it out? As a marshal, I will... The time will come for you.”
"Uh!..." Danba Wuerji was dumbfounded and did not dare to say anything anymore.
After wandering around the camp for more than half an hour, Garqinling finally confirmed that the Tang army had indeed withdrawn completely. Moreover, there were no ambushes or traps left behind.
"Could it be that... Qin Mubai is really dead?" Gar Qinling was still suspicious and thought to himself: The commander was killed in battle, the generals were at odds, the commander was changed before the battle, and the group was without a leader, these are all taboos for military strategists. According to the consistent style of the Tang Army, it was time to temporarily retreat back to the defense at this time, and then turn over and fight again after the internal reorganization was clear. Although Li Daozong was also a famous general, he had probably become a Qingping prince in recent years, and his prestige in the army was declining day by day. He would definitely not be able to replace Qin Mubai and command the Kansai Army to continue fighting. If a group of dragons has no leader, its army will be defeated - with this said, it is reasonable to withdraw the troops... But I always feel that there is something strange in this, and there is a vague shadow of 'conspiracy'