Chapter 85 85 Facing the Enemy Alone

Know yourself and the enemy, and you can fight a hundred battles without danger.

The Chinese civilization, which is said to have a history of five thousand years, has always developed and grown in the baptism of war, and it also formed its own war thoughts very early.

But at this time, because they came from a long distance and did not know the details, the Ming army fell into a disadvantage in the first confrontation with the Japanese pirates.

The first Japanese pirates Anqing Guard and Luzhou Guard encountered were thrusts with those ridiculously long spears. The spears in the hands of the Ming army gunners were naturally very disadvantaged. The formation was in chaos.

At this time, the Japanese pirates holding Japanese knives also quickly followed up and attacked the shield hand. The pikemen behind the shield man began to be attacked by the archers in the Japanese pirate formation before they had time to support them.

These days, the Japanese weapons used by Shinwa are generally the same. Japanese swords are good for chopping, spears are good for long-distance thrusts, and bamboo and bows are good for close range shooting.

Regardless of the Ming Dynasty military formation or the previous dynasty, most of the use of bows and arrows concentrated the archers to form an area strike. The only people who fired bows and arrows at close range were generals and their soldiers.

And most of them are projectiles, pursuing long distances without paying attention to the so-called aiming. The purpose is nothing more than to disrupt the opponent's formation before engaging in battle. Even if they encounter an opponent who is not determined enough, they can directly shoot down the opponent's impact.

The words "thousands of arrows fired together and arrows rained down like rain" are not an exaggeration. Before the widespread use of firearms, strong bows and crossbows had always been an important factor in measuring a country's military force.

The archers have completed their work if they shoot the dozen or twenty arrows in the arrow silo, but close combat is not their task.

Although the Japanese pirate archers held intimidating longbows, their projectile performance was not very strong. Due to the material, the bows they held were mostly capable of shooting flatly at a distance of tens of meters.

When the Japanese pirates charged, the few shots they fired were just to attract the Ming army archers to fire their bows in advance and create chaos in the military formation. This was the time for these Japanese pirate archers to fight. They kept targeting the stronger ones among the Ming army. The soldiers just rushed over with an arrow, and the Ming army's formation, which was in direct contact with the Japanese pirates, soon collapsed.

Those brave soldiers in the team were shot by Japanese pirate archers. They were either killed on the spot or seriously injured and unable to fight anymore. This had a greater impact on the already low morale. Even with the generals shouting behind them, it had no effect at all. The Anqing Guards of the Chinese Army and The Luzhou Guard's front began to retreat continuously.

The Chinese army's formation retreated, and the positions commanded by the guards directly behind the formation inevitably began to retreat, widening the distance from the two wings. At this time, the two wings that should have completed the encirclement could only start to retreat, trying to minimize the distance between them and the Chinese army. Clearance.

"Why is the guard flag retreating?"

Wu Zhankui and Wei Meng and their men were about to join forces with the Chuzhou Guards a few hundred meters away to complete the encirclement of the Japanese pirates. Although there was still a group of Japanese pirates in the distance, they no longer paid much attention to it at this time, but the encirclement But it started to move to the rear. How to fix this?

"Didn't the Chinese army withstand it?"

Wei Meng said worriedly.

"I can only speed up and catch up."

Wu Zhankui hesitated for a moment and said.

"But those bowl-mouth guns can't keep up."

Thinking of Wei Guangde's suggestion, Wei Meng finally persuaded Wu Zhankui to pick out the bowl-mouth blunderbuss in Qianhu's collection and picked out seven that seemed to be of good quality and brought them with him. However, he seemed to have better luck and did not fight the Japanese pirates at sea. , naturally there has been no room for performance.

At this moment, these bowl-mouth guns were not only useless, but also slowed down the movement speed of their Qianhu Division troops.

"not good."

Wu Zhankui looked back at the heavy bowl-mouth blunderbuss carried by the soldiers behind him, and inadvertently looked at the group of Japanese pirates in the distance. At this time, a small group of Japanese pirates appeared further away and were running towards them quickly. Joined the group.

The group of Japanese pirates before had only about a hundred people, but now a small group of Japanese pirates has joined them, and the number has reached a small number of two hundred people. If this group of people is also desperate, I am afraid it will be a shock to the two hundred households under my command. It's a bit dangerous.

It felt before that as long as the more ferocious Japanese pirates in the front were surrounded, the ones behind would not be a concern, as long as they could join the Chuzhou Guards on the right.

But now, Nima, the entire formation has changed. The Chinese army keeps retreating, fearing that it will collapse at any time.

And if at this time, the encirclement has not been formed and has not merged with the Chuzhou Guards on the right, no matter whether the remaining Japanese pirates attack the left army or the right army, the encirclement will be easily overwhelmed.

"Alarm the commander of the guards, and also report to Qianhu of the rear army, asking them to leave the group and join us. The Japanese pirates behind are afraid of charging into the formation."

Seeing the crisis of the situation, Wu Zhankui immediately ordered his soldiers to find Qianhu, the nearest rear army station.

He had no right to command other Qianhu units, so he could only express his worries at this moment. As for the choice of Qianhu in the rear army, he had no choice.

"The bowl-kou blunderbuss was set up on the spot and loaded with shotguns. The whole army separated from the main group and formed a whole group to meet the enemy."

While Wu Zhankui asked someone to report the news to the guard commander, he also reorganized his team to prepare for the possible impact of the Japanese pirates behind him.

And just as their team was completed, the two groups of Japanese pirates completed their rendezvous and began to attack them.

Wu Zhankui glanced back. The men and horses at Qianhu Station of the rear army were still retreating. The distance between them was getting farther and farther, and the speed of retreat seemed to be accelerating.

"What the hell."

Wu Zhankui cursed in his heart, but there was no way out. The team had already separated from the main force. If he wanted to retreat at this time, it would be a complete defeat.

Wei Meng had already run to the front and arranged the bowl-mouth guns and bird-gunners. The strength of the two sides was close this time. There were more than 200 people on his side, and the other side had only more than 100 to less than 200 people. There was still some strength to fight.

As long as this Japanese pirate unit was defeated, the Japanese pirate brigade that was surrounded would be doomed to be annihilated unless he could directly break through the central army and break out of the siege. Even if he had to sacrifice his life to win the battle, the Ming army at this time could still afford it.

For the Ming army generals at this time, soldiers were nothing. There were still a large number of military households under their command. If the people were killed, they would just give some pension silver to them. Anyway, it was all allocated by the court, and they would just recruit people from the military households below.

Those military households, dare they not obey orders to report?

In the eyes of these generals, human life is really worthless, at least not as valuable as military merit.

Wei Meng in front had already arranged the formation. After all, they had been training together all the time. There was no barrier between the two centurions, and they easily formed a military formation.

After the formation was arranged, seeing that the Japanese pirates were already pressing forward, Wei Meng naturally would not play the role of leading the troops, but retreated to the back and stood with Wu Zhankui. As for the command, it was the personal soldiers and the general flags in front who took over.

The general flag was responsible for controlling the soldiers below, and the personal soldiers directly conveyed their orders.

"Start continuous bombardment at one hundred steps."

Wu Zhankui had already understood the tactics of this unit. Seeing Wei Meng arranged the bird gunners in five rows, he quickly gave the order.