On the twelfth day of the fourth month, the great army went north.
After Kou Qianzhi calculated, he said that this day was an auspicious day, he was a Taoist priest, and he was quite familiar with the astrology.
So, for a while, the mighty Montenegro camp suddenly seemed to wake up like a giant dragon. From the hinterland, a team started to march, winding towards the north.
Perhaps the days Kou Qianzhi said were really good days. The spring should be rainy, but the sun was shining brightly. The sun made the soil hard, but the turf provided the best protection for the hooves of war horses. This way, the soft and hard ground was the best. It is suitable for the army to pull out, and even the wheels are rarely plunged into the ground.
Before leaving, He Mulan and the other generals were summoned to the camp of Chief Situ Sun Han and told what they were going to do next.
It is nothing more than breaking through the camp of the Rouran people, plundering their population, cattle and sheep, killing their young men and leaders, until they reach the soft court.
For some reason, He Mulan frowned slightly when she heard such an order.
But she knew this was the way of the day, so she just frowned and didn't say anything else.
Just as He Mulan had obtained dozens of slaves, many enemy generals and soldiers were captured in the Montenegro camp. Through interrogation and various means, the Northern Wei Dynasty investigated the pastures where all the herdsmen in Rouran were grazing, and even made it clear which tribes often camped and where.
Countless scouts had found places with water sources along the way long before the Northern Expedition, and the map that Di Yefei sent back also helped a lot.
For Rouran, there is no hope of victory in this war.
Whether it is the right time, the right place or the people, they all have none.
The route that He Mulan and others are responsible for is on the west line. Like the Xiongnu, Rouran takes the place where the sun rises to the left, like a person with his back turned. Therefore, most of the people living on the west line are ordinary herdsmen and other Huns. In the east, there are descendants of King Rouran Khan and other great tribesmen.
The marching process was very boring. Most of the Northern Wei Dynasty were cavalry and chariots. Up.
Want to pee? Get off your horse and find a place far away.
I thought, um, take the horse to a far place, and finish riding to catch up.
It stands to reason that He Mulan is now the leader of the Hu Ben Army, but in this respect, he is no different from other soldiers.
I don't know if there is a general who was solved at a convenient time. If he really died like this, it would be too embarrassing.
He Mulan tried to drink less water and eat less food. Their journey in the past few days was very slow, because they had to occupy the water source and camp in the territory of Rouran. After they had a base camp, they could use cavalry to loot everywhere.
Otherwise, if you grab something, but there is no water to drink or cook, in this vast grassland, you may not die from hunger, but you may not die from thirst.
On the first night, they stopped at an unknown water source and set up camp. Because I walked with luggage, I didn't walk very fast on the first day, and I haven't entered the Rouran territory yet.
biquge.name
The left and right armies of the Montenegro camp couldn't wait to fight the squirrels. At this speed, they couldn't help being a little impatient, relying on their superiors to comfort them.
This was the first time for He Mulan to march with tens of thousands of people. Along the small river that came from nowhere, hundreds of thousands of bonfires formed a swaying band of light, and because they were all tents pitched along the water source, it looked like there were two rivers.
All the generals' camps were set up on higher ground. It was said to be higher, but in fact it was not much higher. Peanuts around He Mulan and other subordinates were fetching water, lighting a fire, and cooking in a pot. When marching, even a general, there is nothing special about it. At most, it is made by his subordinates.
That night, Changsun Han called them to the military tent, pointed to a few maps and said, "We will reach our destination in two days. Now there are two ways to go. One is to occupy this water source first. , and then divide the troops into five groups and break through several large tribes in the vicinity..."
Changsun Han pointed to several major tribes near a water source.
"This one takes more time, but it's more secure."
"There is another one, the baggage is walking slowly behind, the cavalry will go first, break through the five tribes, and then bring the obtained population and spoils here, and set up the camp."
Changsun Han tapped the water source again.
Yuan Poqiang, the general of the Zuo Army, looked at the map, pondered for a while, and said, "Lord Situ, this water source is too large, if you want to occupy it, it will not be taken for a while, in case it will be taken by the worms. Got the news and fled in all directions, but delayed the fighter plane."
"Furthermore, Woo Woo is more familiar than us here. If we find out our whereabouts first and put poison in the water, we are even more dangerous. Although it is said that there is some risk in the rear, we are cavalry after all. Time, there is no pressure on supplies."
Yuan Po Qiang clenched his fists.
"The last general thought that we should break through the tribe first, and then set up camp!"
"What about the rest of you?"
Situ Han would lead the left and right armies because Xia Hong, the general of the right army, was his subordinate, and Yuan Po Qiang was the junior he took care of in Pingcheng.
Yuan Po Qiang and Situ Han had a good personal relationship, so they naturally dared to offer other opinions. Xia Hong thought that no matter what kind it was, it was similar, but he thought about it and finally said:
"It's nothing more than a quick word, and the last general also chooses the second type."
The battle policy has been determined, and the rest is the question of how to divide the troops. When the scouts get the news back, the attack will be done.
"Don't be in a hurry to leave after you have conquered the squishy camp. This is the season for grazing. When the herdsmen who are grazing come back in the evening, if you wait for the rabbits, you will be able to catch many herdsmen and cattle and sheep.
Changsun Han knows the creeps well.
"If someone runs away, you don't have to chase. Our people will guard the water source all the way to the royal court. As long as these herdsmen don't want to die of thirst, they will eventually surrender to us."
"General Xia, if Chouchou surrenders to us, what should we do? Are we tied up and wait for someone behind to pick him up?" He Mulan couldn't help but say, "There are also old and weak women and children..."
Changsun Han glanced at her unexpectedly, and when he found out that it was this young general, his eyes showed a clear expression: "My great Wei military power is calculated by the head, but this time to break the crawly, the purpose is to break the root and weaken its national strength, So His Majesty has ordered that if there are young men and women, they should be taken back to serve in the country as much as possible. Those old and weak women and children, if you want to get military merit, as long as you don't do too much, no one should say anything..."
"The last general is not about military merit..." He Mulan was stunned, knowing that Changsun Han had misunderstood, but he didn't seem to want to say more.
With the goal, after the generals returned, they summoned their lieutenants and generals to convey the orders of the commander of the West Road; the lieutenants and generals then called the generals and centurions to continue to communicate.
This is passed down one level at a time, everyone knows that there may be a big battle after three days, everyone is gearing up, and they can't wait to fly.
On the other side, the well-trained scouts in the Montenegro camp are hiding in the grass and behind stones. Some of them don’t even need to dodge. As long as they sit there wearing tattered and outdated clothes like Squirrel, they can spy on them without any danger. information.
The Crawlies never thought that the Wei people would come over, even though the Wei people were a country founded by the Xianbei people, and the Xianbei people were also a nation on the grasslands.
But the Xianbei people have been away from the grasslands for too long. They built their houses with solid stones and wood, and let themselves live in the stones and woods. They learned the language and etiquette of the southerners, and gradually abandoned the blood of the grassland people and became "more" civilized" people.
From the squirrel's point of view, Rouran has nothing for Da Wei to snatch.
cattle and sheep? They also have cattle and sheep.
land? Nothing but grass can grow on this land.
dignity? Now it is they Rouran who are being beaten and retreating.
Just like a poor beggar who doesn't worry about a rich man visiting his dilapidated house, the squirrels graze and play safely, without any premonition of danger.
A scout sat behind a scooter, wearing a leather cap that could hide his face, and counted the number of tents the Creepers had built out of animal skins and sheep felt.
He had to figure out how many people there were in this camp and how many men could fight.
The scout saw men beside carts and tents sharpening arrow shafts and the tips of wooden spears, crude weapons that used to be seen in the hands of crawlers heading south in winter.
' Now used for hunting, and when winter comes, it will come to hunt our brethren. ' the scout thought to himself, 'crawly people are better at archery, but so what, they can't even find much wood. If you really want to fight, you will surrender...'
The scene in front of him was not all like this. He also saw the dancing girl, heard the crying of the baby, the woman beat and scolded the child and then chased the figure that ran by.
Not far away, lambs and calves roamed freely, cattle searched for grass, the smell of mutton overflowed from the campfire, and hooked scouts were like thunder in their stomachs.
'Can't look at it like this any longer. ' The scout said to himself, he felt his heart softened by the smell, which made his fighting spirit less firm.
'Anyway, it's almost time to inquire, so let's go. '
He pretended to be upset and ran away in a hurry.
"Hey, grandma, why didn't Abo come to eat sheep together?" A girl was helping her mother roast the sheep, and she blinked strangely when she saw someone running behind the car.
The woman craned her neck and looked at it. Seeing that the man was covering her stomach and running out, she smiled and nodded her head: "Have you ever seen a stomach upset? The more you smell it, the sadder your stomach will be."
Before the "belly" scout left the tribe, he turned his head back unexpectedly.
The little boy wrapped in fur ran around on a horse, apparently just learning how to ride a horse. Several adults next to him laughed at him wantonly, making him even more breathless.
"Run, run farther, it's better not to come back..."
The scout jumped on his horse, bowed his head and walked on the reins.
Because this place will soon be razed to the ground.
***
In the battle between the Montenegro camp and the crawling south, He Mulan only felt two words - "difficult to deal with".
They are like hyenas that follow their prey. They are not strong or vicious. They will break up after a dozen, but they will also bite you to death when they attack in groups.
They will abandon their companions without scruples, just to be able to escape. They will also throw other affiliated tribes - Gaoche, Xianbei, Turks or other races as cannon fodder, and shoot arrows or escape behind them.
He Mulan hated this race, because they let her see too many blood and tears, because they had no dignity and honor as warriors.
But she just hated, not hated. Because in this era, the development of each nation is often the blood and tears of another nation. She can't change the general trend, nor can she change people's hearts. Creepy's collapse is inevitable. What she can do is to live up to the Heart.
The Tiger Ben cavalry led by He Mulan set off after the scouts returned detailed information about the tribes in this area. The information was so detailed that He Mulan even guessed, thinking that the scout might be disguised as a worm and swaggered in to walk in and shake the collected information.
The scouts in the Montenegro camp are all bold and daring, and the Metropolitan City has some creepy words, so it is not surprising that they can do such a thing.
They didn't raise the flag or play it, and although they weren't called the soldiers, they didn't make much fanfare. In the silence, there was only the sound of momentum that seemed to condense even in the air, and the sound of the armor colliding on the soldiers.
In their rear, the handymen and soldiers who accompanied the army took care of their replacement horses. Each batch of their horses was a war horse that had just been replaced, with sufficient horsepower and ready to charge at any time.
There are eagles flying in the sky, overlooking the people and horses below. He Mulan heard that many tribes in Donghu would keep falcons. He Mulan didn't know if they were raised by the crawly people, but at this time she didn't care whether to shoot these eagles.
The tribe they were going to attack was less than a thousand men.
She brought three thousand fine knights.
No matter what they fight, they will win, and with their crawling temperament, I am afraid that they have already cried and surrendered before they even started fighting, right
Surrender sooner.
So that she has a name to kill less.
Hu Benqi soon arrived at the place where the scouts found it. As he said, the herdsmen go out to graze in the morning and come back in the evening. It is best to attack at night.
This was indeed the case. When He Mulan led his subordinates to break through this tent, many people still didn't understand what happened.
There are many people in Wei who look alike. They are both tribes of Donghu. They move around. After mixing blood, there are people of all kinds of looks. So when He Mulan rushed into their tribe with a tiger and a cavalry, these crawlies People thought it was their own cavalry.
An old man ran out of the camp, scolded them, and was shot dead by impatient soldiers. There were cries of children and women everywhere, and the tigers and riders lived up to their names, like tigers descending the mountain, panicked everywhere they went.
Without the crying and begging for mercy He Mulan imagined, those who could take up arms or other tools to resist resisted, and there were women who drove their cattle and sheep to resist the cavalry.
But how can cattle and sheep resist war horses and geese? After a while, blood was flowing.
"What are they shouting?" He Mulan had no intention of participating in such a massacre, but as the head coach, it was impossible to order the attack to stop.
Creepy people can shoot arrows even children, and even rabbits will bite people when they are in a hurry.
But she was still curious about what the squirrels were shouting while desperately resisting.
He Mulan's northern expedition brought out peanuts. She didn't understand Rouran's words at all, and she brought peanuts in order to have an interpreter at a critical time.
Peanut's face was complicated, and he replied to He Mulan softly, "They... They said that before the winter war came, the cattle and sheep from last year had already been handed in... They seem to regard us as those tribal masters."
He Mulan was stunned for a while, never expecting that this was what they were calling.
At this time, the tent was broken. He Mulan had ordered before he came here that he was not allowed to kill anyone who did not resist at will. Those were all prisoners, the population of the Great Wei, and the spoils of war.
But when it is really red-eyed, there are also manslaughter.
A tiger ben was riding a horse and was about to step over a child's body, but was slapped by a horse that suddenly rushed from the side, and slanted a few steps in the other direction.
The man was about to scold the other for not having long eyes, but suddenly saw He Mulan sitting on the horse, and was so shocked that he hurriedly shut up.
"We are warriors, not beasts." He Mulan said with an ugly face. "Prepare to withdraw the troops, tie up these captives and hand them over to the people behind to deal with them, leaving 200 cavalrymen ready to meet the returning shepherds, and the others will go with me to attack other tribes."
"General, we haven't cleaned the battlefield..."
"When you're done cleaning, all the tribes in this area will run away!" He Mulan ordered the horn to blow, and ordered two more centurions to stay in the camp, and continued to advance eastward with his tiger cavalry.
There are about seven or eight tribes in this area, and she has to pick all the camps before sunset, and then return to the camp at night.
If so many people run in one direction during the day, their whereabouts will soon be revealed.
The second, third, fourth, tribe after tribe was razed to the ground by He Mulan's subordinates.
Everyone didn't know why their coach seemed to be in a hurry to go somewhere and left immediately after finishing a camp, but because He Mulan's reputation as a "smart general" was too obvious, these people were puzzled and even a little dissatisfied. There was no time to collect the loot, but they continued eastward with their master.
Only He Mulan knew that she was not in a hurry, but was afraid that after the battle, countless women and children would look at her with despair and hatred.
Why would anyone be so happy under such eyes? It should not be a pleasure to be hated at any time.
By the time the scouts found the last tent, perhaps the Wei people made too much noise, or maybe a few who had escaped earlier sent the news, leaving only an empty tent.
The cattle and sheep are still grazing, and the cattle and sheep at night are even roasting on the fire, cooking some kind of broth, but there is no one in the entire tribe.
It is easy for young people to run across horses, but it is so difficult for a tribe to escape all because they have old people, children, pregnant women, and sick people. If you run away, even the old, weak, women and children will run along with you, and you will be caught back in an instant.
It was getting late at this time. Although He Mulan's generals were somewhat regretful, their achievements today were enough to satisfy them, so Na Luohun looked at the camp regrettably and said to He Mulan:
"The people here should have received the news early and ran away. Are we going to join the other generals now?"
In each tribe, they left their troops to count the spoils, and the handymen did not dare to deduct it. Those young men, women, old people, and children would be driven back to Wei, but most of the time, only the strongest people could reach Da Wei alive.
If it were other generals, the command department would probably search again when they saw the smoke curling up here, but He Mulan ran all the way from noon to evening today, and she was already physically and mentally exhausted. She was not someone who had any ambitions for military achievements. Following his words, he said:
"Leave… "
At this moment, an inaudible cry came from out of nowhere. Although it was not very obvious, in the empty camp, the crying of a baby suddenly appeared, which was naturally very obvious.
"I... did I hear it wrong?"
"I seem to have heard it too, is there a child crying?"
"Why does it seem to come from the ground?"
"It's weird, does Crow also have a cellar?"
Without waiting for He Mulan's order, many experienced scouts led the tiger Ben knights and began to search along the tent.
Crimson people are often oppressed by large tribes, and they are also fighting endlessly within themselves. If there is any place to hide, it is not surprising at all.
He Mulan wiped his face wearily, and really didn't want to see anything more.
She even thought that she hadn't heard the cry.
But these scouts and cadres who accompanied the army had sharp eyes. These people were not her followers, and she could not order them not to continue their search.
After a while, a pothole hidden in a remote corner of the tribe was discovered. Maybe it's because the Rouran people have become commonplace, so many tribes have hidden places prepared at the beginning, but He Mulan's cavalry came too fast, other tribes didn't have time to hide people, and the most There is a lot hidden in this far place.
The hole was covered with felt and piled with a lot of fresh grass. It looked like an ordinary place for fodder, but it was still found.
Many old people and women were taken out from the inside. It seemed that the children and young people had been taken away. What shocked He Mulan the most was that the cry was really from a baby!
A pregnant woman actually gave birth at this time!
In the pool of blood, the pregnant woman stared wide-eyed at the bottom of the pit, and the blood under her body penetrated into the soil, dyeing the soil maroon.
She's not dead yet, but she's not far off.
Beside her, lay a little baby with a black body all over, with a small hand exposed, telling everyone that he was a boy.
He had just come into the world and let out his first cry. What he was waiting for was not the joyful laughter welcoming the birth of the male, but the deadly hand covering his nose and mouth.
Everyone, including the meritorious officers and scouts, looked at the bottom of the pit at a loss. Such a scene was more depressing than killing the enemy on the battlefield and seeing corpses everywhere.
With the discovery of the first pit, several more tunnels were turned over, and almost all the elderly and disabled people who climbed out were gone. Anyone who could ride a horse had already left.
"General, what should I do?"
Killing Ghost rubbed his hands, feeling an indescribable sullenness in his heart.
"these people… "
He Mulan was still standing. Since the child was seen by her, she hadn't changed her posture.
Her breathing was long and short, and her chest rose and fell. Her eyes were fixed on the pothole in front of her, as if concentrating on studying why such a thing could appear in a flat field.
She walked over slowly, crouched down and touched the baby's face and neck.
Soft and smooth to the touch, it seemed that the child was still alive, but he had no pulse and no physical features. It was probably because the hands were too heavy, or the scouts were too slow to find him, and even if the child did CPR, he could no longer live.
He was very strong, with amniotic fluid and other turbidities on his face and head, and the umbilical cord was even on his belly button.
He Mulan had seen many baby corpses in the past, and there were always irresponsible parents who abandoned the baby in the wilderness or other places where they could not survive.
At this time, He Mulan and his colleagues would blurt out curses, treat these little creatures with care, send him or her away, and pray for their next life to be safe and happy.
But she never thought that she would indirectly cause the death of a child.
Creepy people may be guilty, but what about a newborn child
"Peanuts, help me tell them..."
He Mulan stood up swayingly, gritted his teeth and said, "We are soldiers and horses of the Wei Kingdom. We will not kill if we surrender. We are also human. We will not kill people casually or eat people..."
Peanut seemed to wake up suddenly, stammered a few times, and finally shouted He Mulan's words loudly in soft language.
He Mulan ordered people to fill the hole, bury the baby and the pregnant woman, and let their mother and child be buried in one place without further harassment.
She couldn't do anything but this.
As the handymen and generals who arrived later came to deal with the "booty", these old people were tied with ropes, and together with the cattle and sheep, they were driven to the place where the Western Front army gathered the "booty".
If they met other generals, these useless old people and disabled people would probably be killed as military merit. When He Mulan ordered these people to be taken away because of the appearance of the bottom of the pit, no one was there. What objection is raised.
These crawly people thought that waiting for them was the enemy's butcher's knife, but they didn't expect that the other party didn't even kill the old, the weak, the sick and the disabled.
An old man cried especially sadly. He cried for a long time, with hot tears, but the pain was silent. He cried softer than a woman, and more flustered than a child.
Why was he crying, and how long did he cry like that? What did he do after crying? Can these old, weak, sick and disabled people really survive after going to the big tent
No one can know.
He Mulan had just started the Northern Expedition, and He Mulan already had the heart to understand Jia's return to the field.
"Mulan, compared to the 'invader'..."
He Mulan smiled wryly.
The silky touch still seemed to be on her fingertips.
"...I prefer 'Defender'."