It is worthy of being the most elite Western Army of the Northern Song Dynasty. When Zhao Rong rode the vegetable horses he bought in Guanzhong to the highland west of Zangdihe City, the Song army's partial division led by Wang En, the general manager of Jingyuan Road, had already concentrated heavy infantry to arrange them in the north of the partial division battlefield, protecting Wang En's command flag formation and front of the position. The Song army light infantry brigade, which had insufficient defense, was arranged on both wings to form a solid square formation to meet the enemy, protecting the Song army's crossbow team and siege reserve team that were lined up outside the city. The only thousand light cavalry under Wang En were placed far away on the east side of the battlefield with a backing against the river, and used as mobile troops.

The Song army was moving fast, and the number one ace of the Western Xia army, the Iron Harrier, moved faster. He stopped at the high ground. As soon as Zhao Rong pulled out his monocular lens, he saw that the Iron Harrier from the north had arranged a fish scale formation in units of hundreds of people. There was also a blue-toothed flag for every 300 people. In the middle and rear, there was a white-backed eagle flag with teeth and claws as the commander-in-chief, and a charge and assault posture.

There was no war drum horn, only the strong iron cavalry. As the white-backed eagle flag fluttered in the wind, one thousand five hundred iron kites charged forward, roaring and screaming, charging forward, rushing diagonally towards the Song army's relatively weak defense, and on the right wing on the east side. It was also the junction of the Song army's cavalry position and infantry position. Even though it was several miles away, Zhao Rong could hear the rumbling sound of horse hooves like thunder, and saw yellow sand and dust rolling, with an amazing momentum.

"Stay firmly! Sta firmly! Stoke arrows! Stoke arrows!"

According to the command of the generals of the Song army, the soldiers of the Song army holding the divine arm bow desperately pulled the trigger and shot the powerful divine arm bows and crossbows at the charge of the Iron Harrier. However, it was a pity that the Iron Harrier soldiers and horses were all wearing cold-forged steel armor. Even if the crossbow arrows shot on the Iron Harrier, most of them were broken arrows and fell to the ground on their own. Only a very small number of crossbow arrows could be embedded crookedly on the Iron Harrier soldier's armor, which was almost zero in damage to the Iron Harrier soldier, and it was like this after several waves of arrow rains.

By the way, the armor worn by the Iron Harrier soldier is made of cold forged with low sulfur, low phosphorus and high-quality steel imported from Central Asia. Not only is the extension and fatigue resistance far better than the hot-forged armor, but it can also achieve the lightest weight under the same defense. Within fifty steps, even the Divine Arm Bow can't be shot through.

The crossbow was almost useless, and the Song army could only expect the dense formation to block the enemy. However, it was still a pity that the Iron Harrier soldiers were locked together in a series of five teams. The five war horses raised their hooves at the same time, how powerful could it be stopped by human power? So when the Iron Harrier soldiers hit the dense formation of the Song army light infantry, countless unwilling roars sounded in the crowd of Song army soldiers. Many soldiers were hit and flew up in the air and hit the companions behind them. The Iron Harrier soldiers were as powerful as bamboo shoots, trampling on the bodies of the fallen Song army soldiers and continuing to advance. At the same time, they waved the sabers and spears in their hands fiercely, desperately reaping the precious lives of the Song army soldiers.

Not only that, through the telescope, Zhao Rong also clearly saw that the spears in the hands of many Song soldiers had stabbed the Iron Harrier soldiers with all their strength, but they still could not penetrate the Iron Harrier's strong steel armor. Many spears were directly broken because of the impact force being too strong. The iron swords that the Song army infantry struggling to cut on them were all bounced away, and like bows and arrows, they could cause minimal damage to the Iron Harrier soldiers.

Without any effort, the first five hundred-man phalanx of the Song army's light infantry was easily broken and broken through by Iron Harrier. The soldiers in the formation either died or fled, and they were everywhere. Another phalanx next to them was also affected. The Iron Harrier Scouts did not lose their power and continued to break up another Song army formation behind them. They screamed and rushed towards the third Song army infantry formation. The generals of the Song army desperately yelled and demanded to firmly grasp the position, trying to use the dense formation to pull the Iron Harrier Scouts into the battle, but it was still useless. The crowd of Iron Harrier Scouts swept through the dam, like a flood breaking the dam, and once again broke the Song army's infantry formation, tearing a huge gap from northeast to southwest on the Song army's position, pointing the blade to the Song army's crossbow team and the siege reserve team hiding behind the position.

"It's over!"

Seeing this scene in the monocular telescope, the Western Xia Army's Iron Harrier easily stormed the three light infantry phalanxes of the army and disrupted one of them. Zhao Rong's face suddenly turned white. He knew that the Song army's crossbow teams that were shooting arrows to cover the city wall immediately turned around and shot arrows to stop it. It was impossible to stop the charge of the Iron Harrier Scouts. What was waiting for the Song army to attack the city soldiers would inevitably be a cruel massacre of tigers entering the flock of sheep.

Zhao Rong did not expect the Song army heavy infantry lined up in front of the position to be dispatched for rescue in time. These days, Zhao Rong had tried to pass through the infantry armor of the Song army heavy infantry. The infantry armor weighed 58 Song jin (each Song jin is about 1.2 square meters) was worn on his body. Zhao Rong, who was weak, just wanted to maintain a normal walking speed, so of course he did not dare to expect these Song army heavy infantry to be dispatched in time to rescue the Song army's crossbow team and the siege reserve team that had lost their protection.

At the same time, Zhao Rong did not dare to expect Wang En to send out the more than a thousand light cavalry he had to rescue. The light cavalry was originally looking for death to attack the heavy cavalry, and the more it was a waste of time to fight with less! Unless the Song army infantry could create miracles, entangle and block the Iron Harrier Army, block their charge momentum, and force them to stop fighting, then the Song army's light infantry could rush up and play a role, otherwise even if they rushed up now, they would be destined to crush the Iron Harrier Army's iron hooves.

Of course, the miracle did not happen. After the Iron Harrier Army rushed towards the Song army's crossbow team with a team of five people one after another, although the Song army soldiers also shot arrows with all their might to stop the Iron Harrier Army, no matter how dense the feather arrows were, they could no longer stop the charge of the Iron Harrier Army. The Iron Harrier Army was like a rushing stream. They rushed into the crowd and tried their best to stab the spear, killing and killing the Song army soldiers frantically, and easily slaughtered the Song army soldiers in chaos like chopping melons and vegetables. Although the Song army's siege reserve team also resisted tenaciously, the equipment gap was too great and still could not stop the Iron Harrier Army's footsteps. They were also quickly destroyed by the Iron Harrier Army and scattered everywhere, which made the Song army light cavalry lined up in a distance unable to find a mobile phone.

Seeing this in the monocular telescope, Zhao Rong was so painful that he clenched his fists tightly, but Zhao Rong still forced himself to open his eyes wide, trying to observe the Iron Harrier soldiers' every move on the battlefield, looking for their flaws, and silently muttered, "As in the legend, they were indeed fighting together with iron chains. Five people were a small team. Even if one horse was killed in battle, the remaining four horses could still pull the dead horse to maintain a certain speed, and could also urgently untie the hook rope and put down the dead horse. Until now, there was no one Iron Harrier falling off, so there should be something to fix them on the horse, so even if they died in battle, they would not be caught."

"The speed is not as fast as the light cavalry, and it may even not be better than the cavalry of my cavalry, but it is far better than the heavy infantry and light infantry. The weapons are mainly swords and spears for close combat, and are assisted with axe and hammers and long-range attacks..., Huh?"

After silently talking about this, Zhao Rong suddenly remembered something and quickly looked at the weapons and equipment of the Iron Harrier Soldiers. He also quickly discovered that although the Iron Harrier Soldiers carried melee weapons such as steel swords, spears, axes, and hammers, they did not carry long-range weapons such as bows and crossbows. Zhao Rong immediately had a question in his mind, "Is this the habit of the Iron Harrier Soldiers? Or is it just that they did not bring crossbows this time? This is worth noting. You must inquire carefully when you go back."

At this time, a new shout of killing came. Seeing that the iron harness had successfully disrupted the Song army's siege queue, the north gate of Zangdihe City suddenly opened, and a team of Xixia infantry suddenly charged out, killing left and right towards the Song army soldiers hiding under the wooden donkey. As a result, without the cover of the self-armed crossbow team and the rescue of the reserve team, the Song army, who were struggling to drill the city, were naturally killed and dispersed soon. The pointed wooden donkey was also destroyed by the Xixia defenders, and the crisis in the north gate of Zangdihe City was quickly resolved.

That's not all. After the defenders of Zangdihe City quickly destroyed the pointed-headed wooden donkey outside the North Gate City, they tore out a large hole from the Song army's positions from northeast to southwest, and then went south to the south of Zangdihe City. They changed the direction of charge and came a diagonal charge from northwest to southwest, directly attacking the Song army's crossbowmen team near the city wall. The Song army's crossbowmen team commanded by Liu Zhongwu himself also quickly collapsed. The heavy infantry of the Song army, who had fought all the battles and moved extremely slowly, did not dare to leave their posts. They could only give priority to protecting Liu Zhongwu's flag formation and light infantry brigade. They watched the Iron Harrier Army dispersed the self-bowmen team and the siege reserve team, covered the defenders out of the city to assault, killed the soldiers of the Song army's city drilling, and destroyed the pointed-headed wooden donkey that could have caused huge damage to the city wall.

After the Iron Harrier Army completed these two charges like thunderstorms, there were of course the joy of Zangdihe City, and the morale of the defenders was greatly boosted. The morale of the Song army completely fell to the bottom. The morale of the army was extremely depressed, but the Iron Harrier Army continued to stop and detoured along the periphery of the Song army's battle formation. It surrounded the Song army's positions with great might and rushed back to the west gate of Zangdihe City. Then, she laughed and howled, charging northward and retreated.

It was also at this time that Zhao Rong, who lacked experience, discovered that the Western Xia army had also put a lot of effort into the site selection of Zangdihe City. Not only did it use the mountains to protect the east and west wings, but it took into account the water intake issue, but it also chose a gourd-shaped location open north and south. Both the north gate and the south gate were open areas, which were extremely conducive to the advantageous cavalry battle of the Western Xia army and also provided a huge space for Iron Harrier to operate.

He was almost injured by the enemy, and the Iron Harrier Army successively destroyed his two siege positions in the north and south, and also destroyed more than three infantry phalanxes. The huge humiliation made Liu Zhongwu very angry. In a rage, Liu Zhongwu decisively ordered the army to reorganize the queue, and once again launched a strong attack on the north and south gates of Zangdihe City, intending to take the city and vent his anger.

But it was useless, the morale of the army was depressed, and the pointed-headed wooden donkey that poses the greatest threat to the city wall has been destroyed by all the Xixia defenders. Therefore, even though the Song army soldiers mustered up the courage to launch two consecutive charges towards the city head, they still did not achieve any results. On the contrary, the Xixia defenders, who were highly motivated, were killed and injured by the city defense advantage, and it was difficult to make progress. Seeing this, the generals of the Song army were helpless and could only persuade Liu Zhongwu not to waste their troops in vain. Liu Zhongwu's face turned pale and after a while, he could not helplessly ordered: "Ming Jin."

Hearing the sound of the gold, Zhao Rong, who was still watching the battle on the high ground, did not rush to move, but looked at the direction of the Iron Harrier Army going away, and said in his heart: "I heard that the Iron Harrier Army has a total of 3,000 people. Wei Mingcha doesn't need to be dispatched every time. He only needs to send half of the Iron Harrier to attack our siege queue, and rushed back and forth from the weak point of our position twice, and storm our crossbow team and siege team. We will never think of taking Zangdihe City. If we want to take Zangdihe City, there is only one way, which is to clean up these primitive tanks!"

After racking his brains to calculate for a long time, he could not think of a way to deal with the Iron Harrier Soldiers. Zhao Rong could only shake his head helplessly and said in a low voice: "Go back, and think of a solution when you go back slowly."

After the defeat, the Song army camp was full of depressed atmosphere, and the dejected Song army soldiers were everywhere, and the wounded stretchers were carrying wounded soldiers and the painful moans of the wounded. They walked in the middle of the horse. Zhao Rong's heart was like a knife, but there was no way. He could only move forward silently with a lot of worries, unwilling and helpless in his heart.

At this time, Liu Qi suddenly came to Zhao Rong, with unwillingness and depression on his handsome face. After a long time, he forced a smile and said to Zhao Rong: "Why are you back now? I thought something had happened to you?"

"Thank you for your concern, it's okay." Zhao Rong also forced a smile, then returned the personal soldiers to Liu Qi first, and asked: "Fourth Generals, I noticed a situation. Why didn't the iron kite of the pseudo-Xia thief army be equipped with bows or crossbows today? Are they just not equipped this time, or are they not equipped normally?"

"It is not equipped in normal times, nor does it need equipment." Liu Qi replied helplessly: "The iron kite of the pseudo-Xia thief army is mainly used to rush into the plains. There is no need to shoot arrows from a distance to disturb the opponent. It only needs to rely on the impact of the war horse and the protection of the war armor to rush directly to the formation. It is a little roundabout and rush to the opponent's weak spots, so it is never equipped with crossbows."

After saying that, Liu Qi added another sentence and said, "The situation today is pretty good. Thanks to Wang Dehou's side who stopped the main brigade of the pseudo-Xia thief army and did not give them the chance to go south to join the war. Otherwise, Tie Yaozi would disrupt our formation first, and Bu Bazi of the pseudo-Xia thief army would charge, and we would definitely suffer even greater losses."

Zhao Rong thought about it and suddenly asked: "Since that's the case, why don't we consider using light cavalry to deal with Iron Harriers? Hiding in the distance, constantly shooting arrows, forcing Iron Harriers to charge, and then our light cavalry retreated while shooting arrows. In this cycle, we use bows and arrows to kill the Iron Harriers alive?"

"Talking about war on paper." Liu Qi laughed at Zhao Rong without hesitation and said, "Didn't you see that even our divine arm bow can't shoot the armor of the Iron Harrier, let alone the strength and range are far inferior to the horse bow of the God Arrier bow? If you can't shoot the armor of the Iron Harrier, isn't it a waste to put more arrows? Besides, the Iron Harrier is not a fool. Even if you do this a little bit of a problem, if you find that the situation is wrong, they will definitely go north to retreat to seek infantry cover. Will we ask our light cavalry to attack the infantry formation of the pseudo-Xia thief army at that time?"

Recalling the history books carefully, I found that the reason why Mongolian cavalry could defeat the heavy infantry in Europe using the Manguda tactics was not only the quality of the soldiers and the ability to ride and shoot, but also the more critical reason was that the defense of the heavy cavalry in Europe was not as good as that of the ancient Chinese fish scale armor, and could be shot through by bows and arrows. Zhao Rong also died and followed Mu Zhenxin and asked instead: "Have you contacted General Wang? Did you tell me the reason for letting Iron Harrier break through his interception?"

"Contacted." Liu Qi replied: "He failed to stop the Iron Harrier because he could not stop it at all. Seeing the Iron Harrier of the Pseudo-Xia thief army was dispatched, he could only concentrate heavy infantry to protect the front. The pseudo-Xia thief army divided the Iron Harrier into two, one team was responsible for confronting him head-on, and one team detoured from the side. His heavy infantry did not dare to move. He only relied on light infantry to intercept, of course, was only for death in vain. So he sent news that he could only guarantee to stop the infantry brigade of the pseudo-Xia thief army with all his strength, and he did not guarantee to stop the Iron Harrier of the pseudo-Xia thief army."

Zhao Rong nodded and said, "So, as long as we find a way to deal with the Iron Harrier, we can attack the city with all our might."

"Cleaning up? How to clean up? Do you find a way to clean up?" Liu Qi asked his soul three times and said, "If there was a way to clean up the iron kite, we would have killed all the iron kites in total, which is only 3,000 in total. Do you have to wait for you to clean up the northwest front?"

"Yes, how do you deal with these iron kites?"

Zhao Rong fell into deep thought again, constantly thinking about various ways to deal with Iron Harrier, such as luring the enemy into a narrow road, blocking the road with wood and stone, digging pits on the ground, laying traps for Iron Harrier to drill, and even thought of the Wuhou Nail Zhuge Liang used to deal with cavalry, the Golden Scythe Gun spear technique used by Liangshan to break the serial horses in Water Margin, but it was useless. None of them was realistic, and none of them were not talked about on paper. It was easier said than done.

Especially the Golden Scythe spear technique is even more unrealistic. How could it be possible to pull five heavy cavalrymen in a high-speed charge with the arm strength of one or two infantrymen? Not to mention that they finally hooked the iron lock, but then the person was dragged to death!

"What should I do?" Zhao Rong, who refused to give up, continued to think, and thought to himself: "Iron Harrier is a heavy cavalry, which is equivalent to the primitive tank of this era. How can infantry light cavalry deal with tanks? Wait! Tanks!! Tanks!!!"

After roaring three times in his heart, Zhao Rong suddenly screamed, which scared Liu Qi next to him and asked, "What happened? Why did you suddenly wonder?"

"It's nothing, I suddenly thought of something very important." I was not sure yet. Zhao Rong did not tell Liu Qi his own intentions, but said, "Fourth General, sorry, I have something urgent to do. I must do it immediately. See you some time. I'll wait for you to drink somewhere."

After saying that, Zhao Rong took the horse and walked forward. Liu Qi was inexplicably surprised and could only remind him quickly: "Remember what you promised to give me!"

"I can't forget it, I will definitely deliver it tonight!" Zhao Rong said without looking back: "Also, maybe I can give you a surprise then!"

Let Zhao Xiaoyi and Wu Song wait in front of the back camp with their horses. Zhao Rong quickly stepped into the back camp where the military supplies were hoarded. After meeting the military supplies, Zhao Rong immediately lit up his waist sign and said directly: "Assess the official affairs of the Palace Front Office, the military supervisor, and the order of the senior military supervisor, come and get some military supplies, and get some for me immediately..."

After saying that, in order to get the quarantine officer to bring the things immediately, Zhao Rong generously donated his money, took out two consistently valued jackpots, stuffed them directly into the quarantine officer's hand, and then, naturally, the things Zhao Rong wanted were quickly delivered to Zhao Rong...

ps: Regarding whether there are chain horses? Is the iron kite connected together like chain horses? This is a question that made the pure wolf scratch his head for a long time. Both the "Song History·Biography of Yue Fei" and Yue Ke's "E Wang Xingshi Chronicle" record that there are also records of chain horses in "Zizhi Tongjian", "Book of Jin", "Book of Jin", "Book of Jin" and "Zhu Zi Yule". In "History of Liao·Biography of Xixia", there are vague records that "the iron kite used the iron cavalry as the front army, rode a good horse, and did not penetrate it; used hook ropes to tie it, and the horse would not fall even if it died." It can be understood as a chain of war horses, or it can be said that it connects cavalry and war horses, and even if it is killed, it will not be dropped. Some historian experts have therefore firmly denied the existence of chain horses, believing that the records of "Song History" and Yue Ke are all nonsense.

Regarding the combat situation of the serial horses, the 132nd volume of Zhu Zi Yulei is recorded most clearly - Zhang Dong (namely Yanfu) said to Liu Xinshu (i.e. Liu Qi) personally told him: In the battle of Shunchang, when the Jin people surrounded the city, there were not many soldiers in the city. Liu sent someone to write a letter to make an appointment for a battle. The enemy laughed. The morning that day, the enemy cavalry forced the city to form a formation, and the iron formation in the mountains was very close and did not move. Liu first rewarded the army with meat rice, and rewarded a team with axe, and ordered only the enemy cavalry (vard) to be lifted and the horses were cut off. The troops and horses were all equipped, and one cavalry fell down, and then the enemy cavalry was blocked. There was no way to start the enemy.
Chapter completed!