Section 5: The Death of Xiang Yu

  With a few grains of hoarseness in his thick voice, the folk song he sang was even more in line with the essence of this folk song than Zhang Kuang's clear and loud original version. Many Huangjin warriors, while singing, suddenly burst into tears without realizing it.

  In this world, where can we ordinary people find a way to survive?

  Suddenly, a sharp voice broke the chanting of the Yellow Turban rebels. The voice was filled with extreme terror and loudly shouted:

  "Enemy attack! Enemy attack! It's the county soldiers! It's the county soldiers!......"

  A cavalry scout, flustered and riding a horse from afar to report back. Along the direction of the scout's arrival, the Yellow Turbans looked out and saw a group of Han troops, several hundred steps away, advancing towards their camp in a strict formation.

  What is meant by "one step" is the distance covered by a person's two feet, each taking one stride. In the Han Dynasty, six chi was considered one step, roughly equivalent to 1.4 meters later on.

  If it weren't for Zhang Kuang sending out several groups of cavalry as scouts after the last battle, they might have been caught off guard and ambushed by the enemy.

  However, even with prior knowledge of the news, the Yellow Turban army, which lacked discipline and training, still inevitably fell into a small-scale chaos.

  Until the Han army approached within a hundred paces, the Yellow Turban soldiers only managed to form a square formation facing the enemy under the scolding, rebuking and physical punishment of several key leaders including Zhang Fei, Zhou Cang and Jian Yong.

  Zhang Kuang raised his eyes to look, this wave of incoming Han army, the number is no more than 150, less than 200, but they are fully armed and equipped with all kinds of weapons. Plus their strict formation, although they are outnumbered, it makes people feel that they are the ones who have the absolute advantage!

  The so-called "Guo Xiangbing" is not a crack Han army.

  The territory of the Great Han was divided into thirteen states. Under the state, it was divided into several "prefectures" and "countries". The "prefecture" is the directly administered area of the Han Dynasty court, while the "country" belongs to those close princes of the Han Dynasty in name.

  The local garrison troops of the "prefectures" and "states", collectively referred to as "Prefectural-State Troops". Compared with the Han court's directly-controlled "Southern Army" (also known as the Imperial Guard) and "Northern Army", or the border region's "Border Troops", these Prefectural-State Troops could only be considered secondary troops of the Great Han.

  However, in the eyes of the poorly trained Yellow Turbans, even the provincial soldiers were extremely difficult to deal with. Without a five-fold advantage in numbers, ordinary Yellow Turban rebels completely lacked the courage to provoke these second-rate Han troops.

  "Halt!"

  The leader of the Han army drew out his voice and gave the order to stop advancing. The entire Han army came to a halt with a "whoa" sound, stopping in unison. Seeing this scene before them, many of the Yellow Turban warriors couldn't help but swallow their saliva.

  The Han army in front of us is indeed a genuine and valuable provincial soldier!

  The Yellow Turbans began to recall the painful outcome of their last encounter with the Han army's provincial soldiers. A whole "square" of Yellow Turban troops, numbering six or seven thousand men, was a vast and powerful force! But when they clashed with just over a thousand Han army provincial soldiers, the result...

  The Han army suffered only minor casualties, but the Yellow Turbans were completely defeated, and even their leader was wounded and unconscious. Even now, more than a month later, there are still some Yellow Turban warriors who cannot shake off the nightmare of that brutal defeat, often waking up with a start from their dreams.

  However, fortunately, after this battle, the commander unexpectedly gained good fortune from misfortune and obtained the blessing of "Nanhu Laoxian" in his dream, possessing the ability to "enlighten". This phenomenon once again brought the entire Yellow Turban army together.

  But now, the terrible Han army appeared again in front of them. For many Yellow Turbans who had experienced the previous defeat, this scene made their morale plummet.

  "Take aim!"

  The Han army is ordered to camp again.

  These county and national soldiers formed a simplified version of the "Crane Wing Formation". The first row of over twenty people were all skilled crossbowmen using strong crossbows with three stones or more. At the commander's order, these well-trained veterans immediately raised their cocked crossbows to chest level, aiming at the Yellow Turban soldiers in front of them.

  "Crossbow!"

  "Ah!"

  "Shield! Is there a shield?"

  The Yellow Turban soldiers present had mostly witnessed the terrifying killing power of the strong crossbow, a military national instrument. As soon as they saw the formation of the crossbowmen in front, their formation immediately became unstable. For the Yellow Turbans who lacked armor and shields, those endless crossbow arrays that fired in three segments were simply heart-palpitating, life-taking monsters!

  "Don't fall back! Shields! Shield bearers in the front row!"

  Newly appointed General Zhang Kuang, along with this group of newly appointed Taiping Heavenly Kingdom soldiers, worked hard to maintain their formation. Although he had some knowledge of military tactics, this was his first time formally commanding a regular army formation battle.

  For Zhang Kuang, he realized for the first time that maintaining a basic formation on a tense battlefield was actually so difficult!

  Damn it! Which book said that as long as you bring your subordinates to train for a few days, they will become elite troops that can be commanded at will?!

  Fire!

  More than 20 strong crossbows fired at the same time, although not too big in momentum, the results obtained were quite good. In the Yellow Turban Army, seven or eight people fell to the ground with arrows on the spot. At this hit rate, as long as four or five rounds of simultaneous shooting came up, these extremely poorly trained Yellow Turban soldiers would collapse completely.

  Of course, Han Jun Tun Chang also just thought about it. The "bandits" in front of him were all young and strong men, obviously the elite of the Yellow Turban Army, and different from the ordinary "bandits" who dragged their children and wives.

  Against those old and weak mixed with women and children "bandits", the Han army commander was confident that he could defeat ten with one. However, in front of these, the elite Yellow Turban Army that can form a simple formation, the Han army commander only had the confidence to defeat three or four with one.

  If it weren't for the dozens of large carts brought by this yellow scarf army, Han Jun would not have come to find trouble with such a small number of troops.

  But little did they know, how much wealth was being carried in these large vehicles?

  The Han Emperor has already issued an order, the spoils of war captured in battle, as long as four tenths are handed over to the superiors, and the remaining six tenths will be distributed by the troops who participated in the battle. This command not only greatly enhanced the combat consciousness of various Han armies but also greatly increased the combat risk of the Han army.

  It's just like this, if the Han army commander wanted to be on the safe side and contacted the two nearby Han armies to jointly attack Zhang Kuang's troops, then there would be no suspense in this battle. Fortunately, the heavens blessed us, and the Han army commander was willing to fight alone for the treasure he coveted.

  Only then did Zhang Kuang leave a glimmer of hope.

  "Hold on! Hold on!"

  Zhang Kuang exerted his utmost efforts to suppress the panic among his troops, trying to restore their formation. However, his efforts were doomed to be in vain. Suddenly, a loud shout was heard from the rear ranks, and a figure burst out of the camp, charging alone towards the Han army!

  "Who's the damn..."

  Zhang Kuang's face turned red with rage as he tried to figure out which good-for-nothing had disobeyed orders and rushed out without permission. He took a closer look and found that this reckless fool was exceptionally tall and large, and although it was just a back view, it gave people the feeling of a great mountain moving.

  Such a despicable thing, is and can only be:

  Terrific!

  "You're a Han soldier raised by a dog! How dare you provoke Da Ye!"

  Dian Wei had no intention of taking action in this battle. Firstly, he was actually a half-prisoner and not a true Yellow Turban rebel; secondly, Dian Wei also had doubts about the combat effectiveness of these Yellow Turbans and planned to take advantage of this battle to observe the comparison between the combat effectiveness of the Han army and the Yellow Turbans.

  But man proposes, God disposes...

  An arrow, neither biased nor leaning, fell right next to Dian Wei, hitting one of his fellow villagers straight in the brain through the eye socket. Watching a familiar person who was just talking collapse silently, even someone as bold as Dian Wei was greatly frightened.

  Let's think about it again. If this arrow from the sky had deviated a foot and a half to the west, then the person who would have been killed by this shot would have been Dian Wei, the great master.

  Thinking of this, Di Wei couldn't help but fly into a rage!

  Of course, even at this time, Dian Wei had not completely lost his mind. He snatched a door plank and made a large shield out of it, shouting loudly:

  "Come on and fight with me! Kill those sons of bitches..."

  A month after the great defeat, the Yellow Turban warriors who were still able to follow Zhang Kuang were mostly those with a firm stance and a fierce temperament. Even if they had some fear of the Han army's provincial soldiers in their hearts, they could not suppress the desire for revenge within them.

  Dian Wei's loud shout, seeing someone charging forward as an example, many Yellow Turban warriors could no longer maintain their formation, and followed suit, swarming behind Dian Wei's tall figure, shouting and charging towards the Han army in front!

  "Mob!"

  The Han army was stationed for a long time and disdainfully snorted out these two words from their nostrils.

  Such a scene, he has seen many in the past month. These "bandits" are always like this, with disorganized organization and unclear discipline. Attacking and retreating are all chaotic. If they didn't have five to ten times the number of personnel on their side, they wouldn't even have the strength for one battle.

  Since ancient times, on the battlefield, long-range weapons have always been just auxiliary. In battle, what really determines victory or defeat is still hand-to-hand combat. These "bandits" actually think that the great reputation of my Han army was shot out with bows and arrows?

  "Charge!"

  "Take aim!"

  Fire!

  Although facing the Yellow Turbans' fierce and pressing offensive, the first row of crossbowmen, under Tun's command, calmly reloaded their crossbows and took aim. At a distance of 100 paces, after the enemy launched a charge, they could only fire once. This was the biggest weakness of the crossbow: its firing speed was somewhat slow.

  When Dian Wei led the charge, bringing the Yellow Turban soldiers with him, and reached a distance of thirty paces from the Han army, they were met with another wave of strong crossbow arrows. Since Dian Wei was in the lead, at least six or seven crossbows were aimed directly at him.

  In the Han Dynasty, one dan was also known as one hu, equivalent to a weight of approximately 22-25 kilograms.