Chapter 42: Confrontation, the overwhelming rain of arrows!
"Really? Thirty thousand versus two hundred thousand. Do you, Ji Hao, really think that the power of the Human Emperor is truly invincible and that one's personal bravery alone can really decide the outcome of a battlefield?"

Liu Bei said this and waved his hand.

Ji Ling, Sun Ce, Guan Yu, Zhang Fei, and Gao Shun each led two thousand cavalrymen, assembled ten thousand elite cavalrymen, and launched a surprise attack on Ji Hao's army of 30,000.

In the face of absolute strength, there is no need to use fighting generals to boost morale.

The approach with the highest chance of winning is to start fighting directly.

As long as the elite cavalry can break up Ji Hao's formation, the 190,000 troops in the rear can launch a surprise attack and capture Ji Hao in one fell swoop - someone may ask here, why not just send 190,000 troops to attack directly?

That's not how war is fought.

Having more people means having an advantage, but the quality of an army is more important than its quantity.

If you attack rashly, the enemy will break up your formation by interweaving back and forth, and it is possible that 30,000 will defeat 100,000, or 10,000 will defeat hundreds of thousands. Therefore, marching and fighting depends on morale, formation, and number.

We must first break Ji Hao's formation before we can launch a large-scale attack.

However, Ji Hao's army is not only well-trained, but also well-equipped and even equipped with "powerful technology". Is it so easy to defeat them?
"Array up!"

Ji Hao did not go into battle, but personally waved the flag and gave orders.

In an instant, the "Haotian Army" composed of his personal soldiers and the surrendered Bingzhou Army set up shields, inlaid the bumps and grooves on the edges together, and formed a "shield wall" two meters high in the manner of human ladders.

At the same time, the Chengtian Army automatically dispersed and formed a formation inside the shield wall.

It was the "Eight Gates Golden Lock Formation" set up by Cao Ren.

Immediately afterwards, the Datong Army passed through and walked through the gap of the "Chengtian Army", but their formation was neat and did not affect each other, as if they were transparent people!
If there were modern people watching, they would find that it was very similar to the shot circulating on the Internet, where two teams of people were running head-on.

That is, under the right design, each formation should be absolutely neat.

They could "become invisible to each other" without causing any chaos, which made Jia Xu, who was watching from afar, change his expression instantly. He said to Liu Bei: "My lord, quickly send a confidant back to Langya City to meet us!"

Liu Bei had a face full of question marks.

"What does the military advisor mean?"

"Everyone has underestimated Ji Chengtian and the Qingzhou Datong Army!"

On the other side, as if in response to his words, when the Datong army came behind the "shield wall", they immediately lined up neatly, took out the powerful compound bows on their backs, lay on their backs, stepped on the bow, and pulled the string with both hands.

ready.

"put!"

At Zhao Yun's command, ten thousand arrows rose into the sky in an instant, and rushed straight towards the oncoming army in a black mass.

The compound bow, made of blast furnace steel, had a range more than twice that of an ordinary bow and arrow. It was fired down before Guan Yu, Zhang Fei and others who were charging into the battle could react.

Arrows are like rain.

In one wave, at least several hundred cavalrymen were killed or injured, and the casualties were nearly 10%.

"Hold on, hold on for this wave, and the rest will be easy!" Sun Ce, the Little Overlord of Jiangdong, who was nominally still a subordinate of Yuan Shu and also participated in the battle, shouted, "We are only a hundred steps away from the enemy. Shooting arrows from such a long distance will consume a lot of physical strength, and the bow will be very slow, so we can't shoot many times!"

This is common sense.

However, as soon as he finished speaking, the second wave of arrows came from behind.

The third and fourth waves followed.

It was only a distance of one hundred steps and only ten seconds, but seven waves of arrows came!

Not only that, when they rushed to the front of the Haotian Army, the enemy took advantage of the opportunity again and shot arrows from the holes specially left on the shield, shooting several arrows in a second. As a result, when Sun Ce, Guan Yu, and Ji Ling rushed to the front of the formation, they found that there were only a few scattered soldiers behind them, and all the people were gone!
Not killed in action.

The casualties were only about 30%, but faced with the overwhelming arrows, the soldiers chose to flee.

There are very few people who can actually rush to the front of the enemy.

"Oh no, with so few of us, we will surely be killed if we rush in!" Seeing that things were not going well, Sun Ce decisively ran away. Ji Ling, who was also a general under Yuan Shu, also quickly returned.

The "heavy cavalry" formation led by Gao Shun was the least affected, with less than 10% casualties.

However, Guan Yu and Zhang Fei's subordinates suffered serious damage, almost as high as 50% - they were composed of surrendered soldiers of the Xiliang Army and recently recruited soldiers, and their armor was incomplete.

Only relying on the bravery of Guan and Zhang can we have fighting power, but bravery cannot stop arrows.

Guan Yu himself was almost hit by an arrow.

"Second brother, should we retreat or continue attacking?" Zhang Fei asked Guan Yu.

"To see him!"

Guan Yu looked at Gao Shun, the only soldier still left.

"We are determined to break into the enemy's formation and fight to the death!" Gao Shun roared and led the army to charge in. Seeing that he was not afraid, Guan and Zhang naturally would not be afraid either.

Together they charged into the army.

You know, they are not fighting alone. As long as they can break the enemy's formation, Liu Bei still has 190,000 troops!

However, what the two did not expect was that when the Xianzhen Camp rushed into the enemy army and prepared to meet the enemy's thundering counterattack, they found that the "Haotian Army" guarding the outermost layer had dispersed.

Let them in proactively.

Even the Tatung Army withdrew.

Facing them is the "Eight Gates Golden Lock Formation" of the Chengtian Army!
"It's the flag of Chengtian, the main force of the enemy army, kill!" Guan Yu said, and he took the lead to charge in from the "Death Gate", wanting to risk his life and survive, and break the formation.

However, as a man who could defeat thousands of enemies, after rushing in, he was stopped by two generals who looked 70% similar to him.

Two against one, two unknown young men blocked his way.

"Don't be so arrogant, you villain! General Xiahou Dun (Xiahou Yuan) of the Chengtian Army is here to fight you!"

Although they were still nameless for the time being, they became the "Two Xiahou" among "Huang, Xu, Sun and Tai, the Two Xiahou" after "One Lu, Two Zhao, Three Dian Wei, Four Guan, Five Ma, Six Zhang Fei".

It’s not among the top ten in the world, but it’s definitely eleventh or twelfth.

One of the best warriors of the time, very close to being top-notch!
Two against one, how can Guan Yu, who is not at the peak level but still among the top-notch ones, win in a short time?
At the same time, on the other side, Zhang Fei's situation was not good either: Cao Hong and Cao Ren were not idle either. Although they were only middle and lower-class, not stronger than Hua Xiong, they were still first-class after all.

With the help of ordinary soldiers, they also delayed Zhang Fei and prevented him from entering.

So in the end, after Gao Shun led the Xianzhen Camp into the "Eight Gates Golden Lock Formation", he faced the entire formation alone, which was like a meat grinder, and he lost 20% of his troops in a single formation change.

Considering the losses caused by the previous rain of arrows, only a little over a thousand of the two thousand cavalrymen were left.

They are all veterans of the Xianzhen Camp!

"Charge, charge!" Gao Shun remained organized.

The Chengtian Army changed their formation again to strangle the enemy, but this time, they only lost dozens of people, which shocked Ji Hao, but he was reluctant to let them go - in his plan, Lu Bu would surrender sooner or later, and Lu Bu's trump card was his trump card, so how could he waste it here?
not worth it!

"Zilong, lead the Datong army to join the battle, use the 'eye-blinding cloud (special quicklime)', and capture the trap camp for me in the shortest possible time!" Ji Hao ordered.

(End of this chapter)