Chapter 133: Breaking the Camp (Second Request)

The right wing of the Wuhuan encampment housed three thousand cavalrymen, one hundred and sixty tents, and over three hundred stables. The camp was laid out in a circular formation, custom-designed for nomadic tribes. Patrols of horsemen rode past the tents at intervals, their figures shifting like blurred shadows. The watchtower at the front of the camp appeared squat and low, falling far short of the broad field of vision provided by the high watchtowers in Han military camps.

When cavalry charge an encampment, there is no need to send men ahead to clear the guards at the gates; one can simply charge straight into the array.

Tonight's moonlight could hardly be called bright, yet it was not entirely dim either. Beneath the moonlight, a vast expanse of elite Han cavalry formed a dense, dark mass. Their formation was rigorous, the atmosphere was murderous, and an intense silence hung in the air.

Qin Cheng slowly drew his ring-pommel saber, moving as though in slow motion.

Behind Qin Cheng, three thousand soldiers waited quietly for him to give the charge. Three thousand pairs of eyes, six thousand gazes, focused squarely upon him.

It was very quiet, yet scorching with anticipation.

Ever since learning that the Cavalry Commandant Qin Cheng had returned to the camp, every soldier—especially the cavalrymen—had experienced a surge of spirit. For no other reason than that Qin Cheng had once led them on a thousand-li raid deep into the desert under unimaginably adverse conditions, slaughtering nearly half of an elite force of ten thousand fierce Xiongnu horsemen. Thus, a tacit understanding had already formed deep within their hearts: as long as the Cavalry Commandant was present, victory was never a difficult feat. Upon subsequently receiving the order for tonight's surprise attack, a fire had begun to burn secretly in the hearts of these cavalrymen. They knew that tonight's battle would undoubtedly be exhilarating and unhindered!

It was unclear which warhorse gave a sudden snort. Like a signal, it pulled back the curtain on tonight's grand battle.

Qin Cheng swept his long saber forward, his military order consisting of a single word: "Charge!"

The silent night was finally shattered by the sound of hoofbeats resembling a raging sea and towering waves. Slumbering birds were startled awake, flying in panic from the treetops. Dust surged abruptly, killing intent burst forth, and three thousand cavalrymen bore down directly upon the right wing of the Wuhuan encampment.

Throughout the charge, there was only the sound of sudden hoofbeats; not a single battle cry was heard from the lips of the soldiers.

The charging horses breathed heavily, their heads lowered as they snorted from time to time.

Qin Cheng took the lead, riding at the very forefront. The thousand soldiers flanking him held their reins in their left hands and gripped their bows in their right, their eyes fixed on the Wuhuan encampment looming just inches away, closely tailing Qin Cheng. The two thousand soldiers further behind similarly held their reins in their left hands, while the long sabers in their right hands gleamed with a cold, fierce light.

A distance of one li was just enough for the cavalry to build up their charging speed.

"Bows!"

Qin Cheng shouted.

The thousand soldiers kept their eyes fixed straight ahead, releasing their reins with their left hands and transferring their long bows from their right hands to their left. At the same time, they drew iron-tipped arrows from the quivers at their horses' flanks, nocked them onto the bowstrings, and aimed their sights at the Wuhuan defenders within the enemy camp right before them.

No sooner had the thousand soldiers executed these movements than Qin Cheng's next command rang out without a moment's pause.

"Loose arrows!"

The roar had barely exploded in the air when five hundred iron-tipped arrows, primed and ready, instantly soared into the high heavens, emitting a heart-stopping, whistling sound as they drove fiercely into the Wuhuan encampment!

The Wuhuan guards stationed around the camp gates heard the commotion of the Han advance. Taken aback, they hurriedly raised the alarm, but when they turned back to take a closer look at the enemy in the dark of night, they felt only a blur of shadows flash across the night sky before a flurry of iron arrows embedded themselves deep into their bodies!

Before drawing their final breaths, these night-watch Wuhuan guards were still cursing inwardly, wondering why the scouts outside had failed to emit even a single signal beforehand!

With three consecutive volleys from the elite Han cavalry, three thousand iron arrows plunged into the Wuhuan camp. These iron arrows either reaped the lives of the Wuhuan night-watchmen or smashed into firebasins, sending sparks flying in all directions. Following this, at Qin Cheng's command, every man drew his long saber and charged into the encampment virtually unimpeded.

The defensive measures of the Wuhuan right wing and those night-watch guards proved utterly useless against the suddenly materializing elite Han cavalry, their lives as fragile and transient as ants.

Qin Cheng cleaved a Wuhuan soldier who attempted to block him with his bare flesh into two halves with a single stroke of his blade. Without the slightest reduction in his horse's speed, he bore down on another rider who was attempting to flee but had tripped over an unknown obstacle on the ground. The horse's hooves trampled ruthlessly across the man's back, crushing his internal organs and squeezing them out of his body until they became a mass of indistinguishable flesh and blood.

While Qin Cheng was dispatching these two panicked Wuhuan guards, Ji Zhu swept past him like a gale. Without pausing for even a single instant, Ji Zhu pressed forward, leading his subordinate soldiers straight toward the tents one after another.

Those Wuhuan horsemen who had heard the alarm rushed out of their tents—some managed to don their armor, while others did not even have time to put it on. Yet the moment they emerged from their tents, before they even had time to clearly perceive their surroundings, their heads were lopped off by Ji Zhu and his men, sending them flying through the air. Warm blood instantly splattered across the white tents, dyeing them a bewitching red!

The fires began to swell, the screams began to swell, and the chaos began to swell! Spreading outward from a single point into lines, and from lines into a surface, the carnage cascaded in sequence.

Ji Zhu had suffered a setback at the hands of the Wuhuan cavalry at dusk yesterday, so this time he had bottled up his fury. The moment he broke into the Wuhuan camp, he began his frantic retaliation! He led his subordinates with a singular, clear target: the tents, one by one. For the tents undoubtedly held the greatest number of men, and horsemen who had just stumbled out of a tent possessed zero combat effectiveness when facing cavalry!

Ji Zhu refused to give these horsemen a chance to reach their mounts. He blocked them right outside their tents, cutting them down one by one, completely sealing off their paths to the stables! Along the way, he casually set fire to the tents before sprinting toward his next target!

When Qin Cheng's heavy halberd impaled yet another Wuhuan horseman who lacked a warhorse, this night raid transformed into a thoroughly exhilarating slaughter!

At the same time, Ma Dashan led his men straight toward the right wing's stables, completely demolishing the facilities. In accordance with Qin Cheng's prior military orders, regardless of the methods Ma Dashan employed, absolutely none of the warhorses in the stables were to fall into the hands of the Wuhuan horsemen!

As long as the Wuhuan horsemen lacked warhorses, their combat effectiveness fell short of even ordinary foot soldiers when facing the elite Han cavalry!

Of course, there were also a few Wuhuan horsemen whose reactions were swift, or whose tents happened to be located close to the stables. Shortly after the Han troops breached the camp, these men vaulted onto their warhorses and charged out to meet the onslaught. However, confronted by the Han elite cavalry—who surged forward like ravenous beasts—these men found themselves at an overwhelming numerical disadvantage, fighting a hasty and disorganized battle. Even if individual Wuhuan horsemen possessed extraordinary valor, they could do nothing to alter the grand situation, and were gradually swallowed up within the formations of the Han cavalry.

When elite cavalry raid an encampment, if the camp fails to mount an effective counterattack in a timely manner to stabilize the situation, it takes very little time for the tide to turn into a one-sided rout.

And organizing resistance to stabilize the situation required the presence of the camp's commanding general.

The commander of the right wing was a veteran of many battlefields named Zhamuer. The moment the first note of the warning horn sounded, he bolted awake from his dreams, donned his armor, snatched his saber, and rushed out of his tent in a sequence of movements that was exceptionally practiced and fluid.

When Zhamuer burst out of his tent and took in the scene before him, he could not help but draw a sharp breath of cold air.

Tents had begun to catch fire, and countless dark shadows darted back and forth across the camp like ghosts, hunting down his subordinates and severing their heads. He heard the gloating laughter of these wraiths, and he heard the miserable shrieks of his own men—sounds he hoped never to hear for the rest of his life!

He had never once imagined that Han troops would come to raid the camp tonight! For the Wuhuan king's direct orders had been to conserve their strength tonight and prepare for battle tomorrow!

"Duwei! The Han troops have broken in! What... what should we do to repel them?" The deputy commander of the right wing had barely managed to escape with his life from the midst of the Han cavalry formation. Stumbling frantically to the commander's tent, his voice trembled uncontrollably.

"What is there to panic about?" Zhamuer rebuked the deputy commander harshly. Seeing that the man's body was still shaking uncontrollably, a surge of rage rose from the depths of Zhamuer's heart. He lashed out with a kick, sending the man sprawling, and cursed him as a piece of trash.

By this time, several of Zhamuer's personal guards had already led his warhorse over. Although the sudden Han assault had thrown the camp into great disarray, the situation had not yet degraded beyond redemption. Zhamuer's bodyguards were elite troops; they knew precisely what must be done at such a moment.

Zhamuer vaulted onto his horse, cast a glance at the twenty or thirty personal guards who had gathered around him, let out a mighty roar, and took the lead by charging directly toward the Han forces.

"Hold your ground! Hold your ground!" Zhamuer roared at the surrounding soldiers as he hacked and slashed his way forward. "Anyone who retreats will be executed without mercy! Follow this Duwei and charge back, drive the Han troops out of the camp!"

"Follow the Duwei and charge back, drive the Han troops out of the camp!"

Zhamuer's personal guards shouted in unison.

A general is the backbone of his soldiers' courage. At this juncture, they had to ensure every Wuhuan soldier in the camp knew that their commanding general was charging into the Han forces, and that the commander was ordering everyone to counter-charge the Han troops. Only by doing so could they hope to find a chance to steady their footing.

Qin Cheng slashed and parried left and right through the encampment, having already cut down no fewer than fifteen Wuhuan horsemen without encountering a single adversary capable of putting up a real fight. Even when exceptional, fierce warriors occasionally appeared, they were swarmed by his personal guards and hacked to pieces alongside him.

The army's charge was proceeding smoothly, but Qin Cheng still felt as though something was missing. When he caught sight of the hundred-odd Wuhuan cavalrymen charging toward him, especially when he locked eyes with the leader who was still issuing continuous shouts, he knew precisely what had been lacking.

Qin Cheng pointed his long saber arrogantly at the hundred-odd Wuhuan horsemen charging from the opposite direction and roared: "Charge!"

"Charge!" Zhamuer's movements mirrored Qin Cheng's with uncanny precision.

This collision between the two bodies of cavalry marked the first direct clash between the Han forces and the Wuhuan horsemen tonight.

Qin Cheng locked onto Zhamuer, driving his ring-pommel saber straight for Zhamuer's throat. When Zhamuer raised his blade to block the blow head-on, the sheer force of Qin Cheng's strike compelled him to lean his upper body far back just to narrowly avoid it.

The two horses crossed paths, and each man plunged into the enemy formation, unleashing a flurry of slashes and cuts.

Following the initial charge, the losses on both sides were substantial. General matched general, bodyguards matched bodyguards—this was a combat fought entirely between elite forces. Yet, in battles between elites, the outcome differed little; over a hundred men were permanently unseated during that clash of lines.

However, because Qin Cheng possessed a greater number of cavalrymen behind him, the hundred-odd horsemen Zhamuer had hastily rallied were trampled and chopped down by several hundred Han cavalry, leaving only a scant few standing.

Seeing that scarcely any of his horsemen remained by his side, Zhamuer felt not a shred of cowardice. Bearing a fresh wound across his back, he let out a savage roar and issued his final military command to the remaining men around him: "Kill them!"

The few surviving Wuhuan cavalrymen let out fierce war cries and charged forward together.

Qin Cheng uttered no further words, spurring his horse forward to meet them.

The warhorses of the two commanding generals crossed paths once more. Before they had ridden more than a few paces further, Zhamuer's body swayed, and he tumbled headlong from his saddle.

Qin Cheng glanced down at the fallen Zhamuer on the ground, knowing that the success of tonight's raid was now a foregone conclusion.

...

Qin Cheng had dispatched Li Gan and his men to spearhead the breakthrough. Their mission was to cut straight through from the camp's front gate all the way to its rear, carving a path entirely through the encampment to create the maximum possible chaos and thoroughly disrupt the Wuhuan battle array.

By the time Li Gan had plowed through the greater part of the camp, the entire right wing of the Wuhuan encampment had dissolved into a boiling cauldron of chaos. If the Wuhuan forces had still possessed the will to resist when the Han troops first breached the camp, now, with the Han army in complete control of the situation, these soldiers had been reduced to a rabble whose sole remaining option was to run for their lives.

For to not run meant certain death.

The tents at the rear of the right wing's encampment remained undamaged because the Han troops had not yet reached this sector. However, the Wuhuan soldiers stationed here watched as their comrades from the forward camp fled toward them in total defeat, looking utterly wretched, with many covered in blood and crying out in agony! Confronted by such a scene, an overwhelming wave of terror instantly propagated through the ranks.

The elite Han cavalry attacked in complete silence; not a single man shouted battle cries or war roars. They moved like a silent group of grim reapers, coldly harvesting the lives of the Wuhuan soldiers.

The soldiers stationed at the rear of the right wing camp were first thrown into disarray by their fleeing comrades, and upon seeing countless Han horsemen bearing down upon them, terror ultimately caused them to abandon any notion of offering resistance. They turned and joined the retreating soldiers, fleeing headlong toward the central army encampment.

Panic is even more infectious than fervor, especially on a pitch-black night like this, when no one had any psychological preparation, facing a silent and cold-blooded group of death gods.

Fear destroys fighting spirit; when an army is stripped of its fighting spirit, how can it possibly wage war?

Three thousand Han horsemen rampaged through the encampment, letting loose to slaughter at will, severing countless heads, burning countless tents, crippling countless warhorses, and then—trailing in the wake of the routed Wuhuan army—they surged toward the central encampment of the Wuhuan forces with the unstoppable momentum of a rolling wave!

"Charge!"

Amidst the roaring flames, Qin Cheng raised his high saber, swept it forward, and spoke in a chilling tone.

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