Chapter 29: Peaceful Dream

  "Great, you've finally come out!" Gong Sun Ce gazed at Li Le, the only cavalryman of the enemy army, and drew out the goose feather knife from his waist. This goose feather knife was similar in shape to the one at home, with a relatively straight blade body, a slightly curved arc-shaped tip, and a reverse edge within half a foot from the tip to the back of the blade. The blade was 90 cm long, 4 cm wide, and 0.7 cm thick at the ridge, with a 15 cm handle wrapped in unknown leather.

  This goose feather knife has a majestic and elegant overall shape, especially the blood groove at the tip of the knife. When you touch the arc with your fingertips, your heart will fluctuate with the arc. What's even more rare is that this goose feather knife is handmade, not only can it kill military souls and evil spirits, but also it's not afraid of the erosion of golden spirits.

  Li Le found it strange that the defending army directly abandoned the first line of defense, hiding behind? The most basic quality of a qualified general is caution. Li Le pointed to a hundred people and ordered: "Take someone to take a look, don't be rash, clarify the situation and report back quickly!"

  The hundred-man commander led his troops cautiously across the first line of defense. The hundred-man commander suddenly saw another line of defense fifty meters ahead, also a three-meter-high low wall! He also saw several bowmen on the houses on both sides of the road, and thinking of his own general's military order, he did not dare to advance further and led his troops to slowly retreat.

  "This will definitely make the enemy troops guard behind the second wall, with just a few hundred people, it's easy to destroy them!" Li Le guessed half of it correctly, and the other half was also inevitable. Also because he guessed wrong, he had to pay the price for it. Li Le looked at the silver-armored Gong Sun Ce standing on the rooftop, seemingly guessing that the silver-armored guy wanted to fight him to the death.

  One-on-one? Li Le, who retained most of his memories from before, loved this way of fighting. Licking the dry corners of his lips, he seemed to have already seen his countless troops drowning the village, and that silver-armored enemy general being beheaded by him! Li Le put away the fantasy in his mind and gave a stern order: "Left and right wings take turns attacking! No rest until death!"

  Bai Bojun's two generals, on the left and right, heard that Li Le's army had only three or four hundred men, and they clamored to be the first to attack. Li Le watched this with a cold eye, but he pointed his sword at Gong Sun Ce and said: "Whoever takes this man's head will be the first to achieve merit!"

  The two battalion commanders stopped, looked at each other, and turned around to lead their troops in an attack on the small village. Li Le saw that the two battalion commanders were leading their soldiers with no discipline, although the soldiers' morale was high, he also knew that such morale would not last long. However, it was enough to deal with the few hundred people in the village, and Li Le didn't care much about this.

  He is now concerned with rebuilding the command system of the troops after taking revenge. The previous battle will be completely destroyed, and he has to lead the army personally. As for the performance of the two generals on both sides, they were directly put on the blacklist.

  Gongsun Zan saw the enemy army split in half, with about two thousand troops. Charging towards a small village, their formation was disorganized, and he seemed to know he had won. As this chaotic group of enemy soldiers broke through the first line of defense, Du Yuanjing could no longer hold back his boiling killing intent, gazing at Gongsun Zan from a hundred meters away. Gongsun Zan raised his goose feather knife towards him, and after confirming it, Du Yuanjing's heart was greatly settled.

  "Aim and shoot! Keep your strength at all times!" Du Yuanzheng suddenly stood up, shouting loudly, with his bow and arrow at the ready. This attracted the attention of hundreds of White Wave soldiers who were staying between two short walls, these White Wave soldiers were about to cross the second short wall, when they suddenly found Du Yuanzheng standing on the roof, several alert White Wave soldiers swung their blades directly towards Du Yuanzheng!

  Du Yuanzheng finished speaking, the iron bow in his hand was like a full moon, facing the nearest hundred people under the house. His line of sight only saw the arrow turn into a black dot, and it was blurry when he blinked, and he also saw several weapons flying towards him. Before he could see the result, he turned around and retreated a few steps, narrowly avoiding a spinning blade, standing sideways behind a smoke pipe.

  Du Yuanzheng's face was covered in cold sweat, gritting his teeth to overcome the fear in his heart. He thought of Guo Liang, who had been seriously injured and barely survived. He wanted to live, not die, and he still wanted to discuss the philosophy of life with the little sister from next door. He also thought about how Du Jianghuai died, and he didn't want to die like Du Jianghuai, all muddled and confused!

  Thinking of relieving the tense nerves, he turned his head and saw Gong Sun Ce commanding the halberd soldiers to thoroughly block the second line of defense. He followed the halberd soldiers and saw the crossbowmen's array, as well as the cavalry! In an instant, he understood everything, overcame all fear, and in his eyes were only the White Wave bandits with white headscarves.

  Zhang Gong shot arrows at the chaotic enemy army again, and there were also several Du's heavenly soldiers beside him, hiding under the eaves of the house from the weapons thrown by the enemy, while shooting arrows with Du Yuanzheng. Du Yuanzheng had already thoroughly figured it out, that his two hundred men on the rooftop had only two outcomes, one was Gong Sun Ce winning, they would survive, and the other was Gong Sun Ce losing, they could only be surrounded by the enemy army on the rooftop, slowly letting the enemy play with them to death.

  Want to live, must fight desperately. Du Yuanzheng didn't say anything else. In his heart, there was only a murderous intention, not only towards the chaotic army below, but also towards Gong Sun Ce. He was just an ordinary citizen who wanted to live a peaceful life, without too many ideals or ambitions. His only wish was to get married to the little girl next door and spend the rest of his life in peace and happiness.

  So he didn't want to do anything risky, and when it came to the safety of his neighbor's little sister, he dared to take up a hoe and kill again. Seeing that Gong Sun Ce's combat power was not weak, and all his subordinates were cavalrymen, he surrendered without hesitation. All for personal safety, early on clinging to a golden thigh, living a safe and stable life, what a wonderful thing!

  Unexpectedly, Gong Sun Ce still schemed against him when distributing tasks! This made Du Yuan Zheng extremely angry. An angry man is the most terrifying, and the iron bow in his hand was repeatedly pulled full, with each shot of sharp arrows piercing through three or four military souls, and pinning the last one to the ground!

  Despite the archers firing around the second line of defense, the White Wave Army remained high in morale, ignoring their comrades who were constantly dying from the arrow rain. They made a concerted effort to pass through both sides of the second short wall, and some of the White Wave Army began to climb the second short wall. The top of the short wall was cluttered with all sorts of things, and these White Wave soldiers advanced slowly, and those who climbed to the top were either shot dead by archers or hooked to death by halberdiers stationed behind the second short wall.

  Gongsun Ce's chest was boiling with murderous intent, but he endured. In this battle, several troops and arms must be commanded to cooperate, only with close and reasonable cooperation can they grind the enemy army to death, like squeezing juice from a fruit, extracting their essence bit by bit.

  The second row of short walls on both sides, the White Wave Army was divided into two groups and kept rushing over. It went very smoothly, but in front of them was a semi-circular formation of halberd-wielding soldiers, with four layers of halberds that were both attacking and defending, with some above and others below, coordinating tightly. The White Wave Army continued to charge at the halberd formation, either being pushed back by a single halberd or being hooked to death or pecked to death by the swinging halberd blades. Circle after circle of White Wave soldiers died, but still no effect was seen.

  "Big brother!" An Meng walked into the small courtyard, passing through several Yu Bing guards on alert under the house, climbed up the ladder to the rooftop and stood beside Gong Sun Ce. Watching one by one enemy soldiers being shot dead, killed by Yu Bing, their corpses rotting layer by layer, as well as heavily injured enemy soldiers, Yu Bing, and Du Shi Tian Bing letting out mournful wails from the depths of their souls, made An Meng feel slightly uncomfortable, but he quickly got used to it.

  "What is the little sister doing here? Hurry back, fighting is men's business." Gong Sun Ce stared at the occupied area behind the second short wall, one hand holding a goose feather knife and the other holding a tiger tally, constantly dispatching and arranging the positions of the halberd soldiers. At this moment, his spirit was highly concentrated, and the mental pressure was no lighter than fighting in person.

  An Meng also knew that disturbing Gong Sun Ce during the war was a very foolish thing, but she had her own reasons. An opportunity to prove one's ability was important to her. She pointed at the crossbow array and said: "Big brother's crossbowmen still need to retreat 100 meters! Otherwise, they won't be able to achieve an effective killing effect!"

  Gongsun Zan was somewhat puzzled, and he didn't have any extra impression of the crossbowmen. The only deep impression he had was the Great Qin's crossbow array in "Hero". So he set up a crossbow array 100 meters behind the third line of defense, with five rows of light crossbows that could shoot and kill at a distance of over 300 meters. Therefore, he believed that the crossbow array would be powerful enough to wipe out most of the enemy army on this route.

  Seeing Gong Sun Ce's appearance, An Meng patted his own forehead and said with a helpless expression: "Big brother, don't mention the accuracy of the crossbowmen's shooting, just talk about their power. Those three short walls are just terrain, whoever occupies the terrain is who it belongs to. You can use this terrain to ambush them, they can also use this terrain to avoid crossbow arrows!"

  Moreover, these crossbowmen were all new recruits and had no experience in using the five-linked light crossbows. It's possible that their arrows killed as many of Du's heavenly soldiers as enemy troops!" An Meng pointed in the direction of Du Yuanzheng, Gong Sun Ce followed his finger to look over, Du Yuanzheng was being surrounded by several of Du's heavenly soldiers, seemingly trying to rescue him!

  "Big brother arranged the archers on the rooftops on both sides of the highway, this move is brilliant but also very dangerous. It's brilliant because with this arrangement, we can fully utilize the terrain of the three short walls and provide great assistance for our next counterattack, making it impossible for the enemy to effectively use this terrain. As for the danger, if we lose the battle, Du Yuanzheng's 200 archers won't even have time to escape, they will definitely be annihilated!" An Meng explained in one breath, panting with exhaustion.

  Gongsun Zan also understood that this battle was a defensive counterattack, the first stage was to consume the enemy's morale and elite, the mid-term was to step by step counterattack, striking the enemy's morale; the later period was a big stride pursuit, pursuing again! He now hasn't even achieved the combat goal of the first stage, if in order to achieve this goal, making crossbowmen launch a shooting, ignoring the killing of the enemy for the time being, it will definitely cause the death of Du Shi Tianbing!

  These Du Shi Tianbing are all flesh-and-blood people, originally with casualties. They must have grievances against their commander-in-chief. If they let their crossbowmen kill a few more of them, they will definitely rebel! In the worst case, they may even directly leave their command system and turn against each other!

  "Sister, you're so clever! This victory is all thanks to your credit!" Gong Sun Ce said with a smile, glancing at General Li who was anxiously waiting for the outcome of the battle outside the village. He then used the Tiger Tally to command the Light Crossbowmen to retreat another hundred meters, forming three concentric rings, and ordered the troops from Qin to press forward, protecting the flanks of the two Halberdier arrays that were engaged in a fierce melee.

  The battle situation is currently only entangled in the second line of defense, with a ratio of enemy and our losses extremely disproportionate, almost not less than one to ten. Gong Sun Ce also felt relieved, took a light breath, pulled out a cigarette, just lit it and took a puff, saw An Meng twisting her neck looking at him. It made him unclear, thinking she was protesting his smoking.

  Jian Anmeng stretched out her palm, and Gong Sunce was still a bit bewildered. Anmeng made a gesture of smoking by pursing her lips. Gong Sunce took out a cigarette, he was a little uncertain if his guess was correct or not. Anmeng snatched it away, put it in her mouth, and gazed at Gong Sunce with eager eyes. Gong Sunce took out a match and lit it for her.

  "Ah..." An Meng took a deep drag on his cigarette, slowly exhaling as he narrowed his eyes and said: "It's been ages since I last smoked. From that night onwards, I've been constantly on the run for my life. Either there was fire but no smoke, or smoke but no fire."

  "A girl's family, still less smoking." Gong Sun Ce does not oppose women smoking, but opposes pregnant women smoking. Cigarettes are not good things, this is everyone's consensus, harming oneself is already done, no need to harm the next generation and others. So Gong Sun Ce only smokes in places where there is no one, which is one of his few public morals.

  An Meng held the cigarette between her fingers and asked with round, shining eyes: "Big brother doesn't like me smoking?" She thought she could change many things about Gong Sun Ce, including his smoking habit.