Chapter 39: The Great War Looms

  "That's not it!" As soon as Chen Xuanli asked this, Fan Zhicheng was startled and quickly shook his head in denial, and explained with a forced smile: "General, I didn't mean that. We must rescue Tongguan, but the timing of General's army entering Tongguan City must be grasped!"

  "Hmm, this matter will be known later, you don't need to say more, be careful not to let it enter people's ears!" Chen Xuanyu said, no longer paying attention to Fan Zhicheng, he cracked his whip and shouted "Jia", the horse ran away quickly. Fan Zhicheng and Chen Xuanyu's personal soldiers followed closely on their horses.

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  When the execution of Bian Lingcheng was carried out in public, he once again wielded his sword to assert his authority, winning over the hearts of the people and earning the respect of his generals. Yang Hui's mood improved greatly.

  But he knew that the situation had not undergone a fundamental change, and at present, our army was still at a disadvantage, while the rebel army held an absolute advantage. To reverse this situation, there were only two ways: either to strike the rebel army with great force by various means, annihilating a large number of their effective strength; or for the reinforcements rushing to arrive as soon as possible to replenish and expand our forces, otherwise the situation would not change fundamentally.

  The previous small-scale ambushes and the beheading of Bian Zheng's actions can only serve to boost morale, gather momentum, and increase personal prestige, but cannot fundamentally solve the problem of defending Tongguan.

  Wiping out a large number of enemy troops is possible, but in doing so, our own strength will also be depleted. Even if the loss ratio is much smaller than that of the enemy, it is still an unbearable loss.

  To completely turn the situation around, we can only hope that the follow-up reinforcements arrive as soon as possible to strengthen our defensive forces.

  The defensive force is sufficient, relying on the geographical advantages inside and outside Tongguan City to block the rebel army outside Tongguan City, which should be achievable.

  Yang Kai was eager for reinforcements to arrive as soon as possible, lest Tongguan fall into the hands of the rebels.

  He again sent a request for urgent assistance through the relay station, asking the court to send troops as soon as possible, to send more troops, and to urge Chen Xuanli to speed up his march, striving to arrive at Tongguan as soon as possible. He prepared such an urgent report every two hours, throwing the problem to Emperor Li Longji of Chang'an and his prime minister father Yang Guozhong, letting them urge Chen Xuanli to hurry to Tongguan!

  The rebels retreated for over ten miles after suffering some losses, but Yang Hui knew that this was only temporary. As the mountain fire gradually died out, the rebels would definitely attack again. It was unlikely to set another mountain fire, as the area from the east towards Tongguan had lush vegetation, while other areas had sparse trees and wild grass, making it impossible to start a fire even if they wanted to.

  The rebels will definitely launch another attack today or at dusk, and the fierce battle under Tongguan City is inevitably breaking out!

  The prophecy was soon fulfilled. Just as Yang Huiyan took a short rest in the city gate tower and had a bowl of green bean soup sent by the soldiers to relieve the heat, the soldiers who were sent out to investigate reported back with an urgent report that the rebel army had set off again and was heading towards Tongguan!

  "Prepare for battle immediately!" Yang Hui was shocked and immediately put down his bowl and chopsticks, ordering all soldiers to make preparations for battle.

  The rebels are moving so fast, now it's estimated that there are still nearly two hours before nightfall, it seems that the rebels plan to attack the city at night!

  Yang Hui stood on the gate tower of the east gate again, looking far into the southeast direction.

  Although there was no air pollution and no smog at this time, a bright sun shone on the ground, making the visibility super good. Looking far away, you can see the scenery tens of miles away, but it's just visible, not clear.

  The scale of the rebel army's advance and its specific movements could not be clearly seen, only a vague outline was visible.

  He was in dire need of a telescope, one that could see distant scenery clearly and stand on the city wall to see the changes in the distant situation.

  Special forces are versatile and have super good hands-on skills. Yang Ke, of course, can assemble a simple but usable telescope by himself, but he needs materials. During the rest just now, he had already ordered Yang Zheng to go into Tongguan City to collect transparent things like crystal or glass, and make them into a certain curvature according to his instructions. He planned to assemble a usable telescope by himself. But this idea may not necessarily come true.

  Nowadays, Tongguan City only has soldiers, and the civilians have almost all escaped. On the official road from Chang'an to Tongguan, refugees can be seen everywhere. When Yang Gui led his army to rescue Tongguan, he was blocked on the official road, which slowed down his speed, mainly because there were too many refugees.

  The number of soldiers who fled through Tongguan towards Chang'an was not many, just look at the number of soldiers Liu Guangting finally gathered!

  The people inside Tongguan City have almost all escaped, so it's extremely difficult to find crystal or glass. Yang Hui vaguely knew that glass was still a very precious thing at the moment, rarely seen and not of good quality. What could be easily obtained should be water crystals with similar transparency to glass, but Tongguan City only had soldiers left, and they had to search for crystal or glass as soon as possible, which was an extremely difficult task, at least so far there were no results.

  Unable to get the telescope, Yang Kai could only rely on his own eyes to observe the situation and make analysis and judgment of the enemy's situation based on the information fed back by the scouts or observation posts.

  From the information he had gathered, he concluded that a fierce battle would erupt under the city of Hantang in less than half an hour.

  What he is now hoping for is that the more than 2,000 horses led by Pang Zhong and Li Fude can hold out in Hantangguan City for a longer period of time. The worst-case scenario would be to hold on until after dark. Darkness will be unfavorable to both the attacking and defending sides, but the troops under Pang Zhong's command are very familiar with the local situation, whereas the rebel army is much more unfamiliar with it. To some extent, the darkness that makes it difficult to see the situation clearly is beneficial to our military defense.

  If they can hold out until after dark, the rebels will not be able to attack Suizhou City tonight. The earliest the rebels can arrive at Suizhou City is tomorrow, and the rebel attack on Suizhou City will be delayed by at least one night, or even longer.

  However, Yang Gui would not allow these two thousand men and horses to be completely annihilated at the city of Hantonguan. He planned to withdraw this army after a fierce battle with the rebel forces attacking the city, so as not to suffer too great a loss, which would lead to insufficient defense strength in the city of Hantonguan and damage the morale of the entire army.

  If the city of Hantang Pass was breached by the rebel army, and all the defending troops were killed, it would be a huge blow to the morale of the remaining soldiers, and might even lead to chaos. The small victories in the morning had boosted morale, and the military's spirit had been consolidated to some extent. Yang Gui did not want to see this morale consumed again by the annihilation of several thousand people.

  The current guardian of Tongguan City is the most critical place in the entire Tongguan Pass, several times more critical than the dilapidated Hantongguan City. The final defense requires concentrating all forces to defend the most critical place.

  The Hanzhong city wall is already very dilapidated and can only serve as a defensive point, but cannot be used as the last stronghold.

  Yang Kai knew that he was not good at commanding large-scale battles in the Cold Arms era, and needed further study and exploration. But under current circumstances, he knew that the only thing to do was to find a way to defend Tongguan City, not allowing the rebels to occupy this gateway city leading to Chang'an, and his deployment would be completely centered around this goal!

  Yang Kai's order was also quickly passed on to Pang Zhong and Li Fude through the soldiers.