Chapter 776 Xu Rong Leads the Troops
The whereabouts of the Chang'an troops have always been in Huangfu Chaobo's attention. After receiving the news that Guo and Li did not send troops to Hongnong again, everyone in Luoyang breathed a sigh of relief. Now at least the west is safe.
This is not the first time that Huangfu Chaobo has tasted the taste of being besieged on all sides. Although he has turned danger into safety every time, only he knows the taste. On several occasions, he has laughed with Pang Tong and others, perhaps this is what people often say that the first bird to stick out its head is shot.
After Zhou Tai's fleet escorted Xu Rong and his dozens of ships to Liyang Port, it handed the fleet over to Pan Feng, who sent 10,000 naval forces to escort Xu Rong to continue eastward. According to Huangfu Chaobo's request, Xu Rong's 20,000 troops will disembark at Baima Port and join the battlefield in Yanzhou to deal with Cao Cao's army, but tens of thousands of family members will continue to go east and will be settled in Qingzhou Donglai.
After the war, Xu Rong's Qianniu Camp will be arranged in Qingzhou, guarding Qingzhou together with Meng Gang's Canglang Camp, threatening Cao Cao's east. Huangfu Chaobo believed that with Xu Rong's ability, given time, he would be able to drive Cao Cao's army out of Qingzhou.
At present, among Huangfu Chaobo's subordinates, only Huang Zhong could be compared with Xu Rong in terms of commanding ability, and even Zhao Yun was far behind. Apart from other things, Xu Rong grew up step by step under Dong Zhuo, and was able to command tens of thousands of troops to fight Cao Cao when the princes were fighting against Dong, while Zhao Yun only started to lead troops in recent years.
On October 5, Xu Rong's 20,000 troops landed at Baima Port. Together with Zhao Yunlong's camp of more than 10,000 soldiers in Baima City, and 20,000 defenders in Baima City and Baima Port, the Sizhou Army's concentrated forces in Baima have reached 50,000, which is basically equal to Cao Cao's troops.
After receiving the news of the Sizhou Army's reinforcements, Cao Cao, who was besieging Baima City, immediately led his troops to relieve the siege, and the army retreated 20 miles to set up camp again, waiting for a life-and-death battle between the two sides. At this time, Cao Cao's army had only 40,000 soldiers, of which the heavy infantry and Qingzhou soldiers were less than 10,000, but the Tiger and Leopard Cavalry still had 10,000 cavalry. After several days of siege, the ordinary infantry had lost nearly 10,000, leaving more than 10,000.
After re-camping, Cao Cao ordered another 10,000 ordinary soldiers to be transferred from Puyang, increasing the number of soldiers to 50,000 again.
In order to repel Cao Cao's army, Huangfu Chaobo once again led nearly 10,000 troops of the personal guard camp to Baima to join Xu Rong and Zhao Yun.
In this way, the number of soldiers and horses on the side of the Sizhou army, in addition to Huangfu Chaobo's 10,000 personal guard camp, there were also 8,000 infantrymen of Zhao Yunlong's Xiangying and 5,000 Baima Yicong, plus Xu Rong's 10,000 Niuying soldiers and 10,000 defenders, and then a school of defenders were drawn from Baima City and Baima Port, with a total of 50,000 soldiers and horses, and the two armies were basically equal.
After the three discussed, they decided to fight a decisive battle with Cao Cao's army in the wild.
On October 10, Huangfu Chaobo's 50,000 Sizhou troops and Cao Cao's 50,000 Yanzhou troops confronted each other at a place called Baidaokou between Baima and Puyang, and a war between the two sides was imminent.
In this war, Huangfu Chaobo handed over the command to Xu Rong. In order to appease Zhao Yun, Huangfu Chaobo specially summoned him to appease him. What made him extremely happy was that Zhao Yun did not have any dissatisfaction with this. Instead, he said that he had long admired Xu Rong's talents, and this war was a good opportunity for him to learn.
Huangfu Chaobo was relieved, but for Zhao Yun, it was indeed a rare learning opportunity. The field battle of more than 100,000 cavalry and infantry, let alone Zhao Yun, Huangfu Chaobo himself had only seen it twice, and these were still the battles when the princes were fighting against Dong, so this was just an opportunity for Zhao Yun.
Huangfu Chaobo was also looking forward to the upcoming war.
Xu Rong was a talented general. Although he knew it in his heart, the generals of the General's Mansion in An Dong did not know it very well. Therefore, the generals in the army were still somewhat dissatisfied with Huangfu Chaobo's use of a surrendered general. So this war was also a test for Xu Rong.
Cao Cao's army had already attacked Sizhou several times, so both Huangfu Chaobo and the generals in the army hated Cao Cao's army very much. Therefore, when Huangfu Chaobo handed over the command to Xu Rong, he just said one sentence: "Hit him hard. Only when he hurts, he will remember it. Otherwise, this guy wants to mess with us every other day."
After learning about the strength and combat power of both sides in detail, Xu Rong quickly made detailed arrangements for the war.
Although the number of troops on both sides was equal, the strength of the Sizhou army was slightly stronger than Cao Cao's Yanzhou army. So after consideration, Xu Rong decided to defeat Cao Cao's army with a grand formation.
In terms of troop deployment, Xu Rong arranged Zhao Yun's two schools of infantry from the Longxiang Camp and his own one school of infantry from the Qianniu Camp in front of the formation. The three schools, totaling nearly 15,000 troops, will serve as the front of the army, facing the front of Cao Cao's army.
Behind the three schools of combat soldiers are Zhao Cen's Yuanrong Crossbowmen in the middle, Gao Shun's Xianzhen Camp and Chen Jing's Tieying Ruishi on both sides. Although the number of Xianzhen Camp and Tieying Ruishi is small, they are the sharp blades for Xu Rong to break through Cao Cao's army formation this time, and the Yuanrong Crossbowmen provide cover for the two advances.
After the three schools of combat soldiers of the front army stabilized the front line, Xianzhen Camp and Tieying Ruishi began to break through the Cao army formation with all their strength under the cover of the Yuanrong Crossbowmen. The combat battalion followed closely after the two broke in.
Xu Rong had his reasons for daring to make such arrangements. Whether it was the Longxiang Camp or the Qianniu Camp, the soldiers were all veterans with many years of experience. However, this was not the case with Cao Cao's army. Although the heavy infantry and the Tiger and Leopard Cavalry were strong, they had only been trained for more than half a year, and they were relatively limited in terms of speed and flexibility.
Qingzhou soldiers are strong in attack, but average in defense. Once they break through the formation, they can do a lot. This is the experience gained by the generals of Sizhou when the Qingzhou soldiers besieged Huangfu Chaobo's central army last time.
Cao Cao's Tiger and Leopard Cavalry is one of the few quasi-heavy cavalry in the game. If he encounters infantry without cavalry guards, his 10,000 cavalry can sweep tens of thousands or even hundreds of thousands of infantry, but now there are 10,000 light cavalry and 5,000 quasi-heavy cavalry in the Sizhou army, so he can only laugh.
Behind them are 15,000 soldiers from the guard camp, whose role is to follow the battle camp and kill into the enemy formation.
There are less than 35,000 infantrymen in total. In addition to the 500 Iron Wall Camp guarding Huangfu Chaobo's central army, there are 2,500 ordinary soldiers guarding the central army, but their clothes and armor are the same as those of the trap camp and the iron eagle warriors in Huangfu Chaobo's personal guard camp, and all the soldiers and horses are arranged in the battle formation.
The 15,000 cavalry, the White Horse Volunteers and the Western Liang Iron Cavalry were deployed by Xu Rong on both sides of the infantry formation to guard the two wings of the army. The 5,000 cavalry from the Royal Guard Battalion and the Iron Wall Battalion guarded the central army. Once the opportunity was ripe, the 5,000 cavalry would be the last straw that broke the camel's back.