dognovel Chapter 223 King Huai's Defeat
Chapter 223 King Huai's Defeat
Gaozong shouted in panic, "Your Highness, I dare not conceal the truth. The number of soldiers and officers heading south is indeed 50,000."
The counselors immediately asked, "Your Highness, could it be that the troops from Hushan Pass have also moved south?"
This worried King Huai. He looked around and asked Emperor Gaozong, "I'll give you 10,000 vassal soldiers and 30,000 more troops. Can you stop them from advancing south?"
Gaozong shook his head bitterly: "Your Highness, it's impossible. They are really difficult to defeat, and there are 10,000 imperial guards among them."
This made everyone gasp. Everyone knew how powerful the Royal Guards were.
Even King Huai, who felt that he was the best vassal king in the world, did not dare to say that his vassal soldiers could defeat the Imperial Guards.
The counselors advised: "Your Majesty, please withdraw your troops first. Otherwise, when we are attacking the city, we will be attacked by the troops coming from the south and our army will suffer heavy losses."
Looking at the crumbling Jingying, which was so close and about to be breached by his army, King Huai was very unwilling: "Wait a little longer, maybe..."
"Report."
Before King Huai could finish his words, another fast horse came from the north and said, "Your Highness, something terrible has happened."
Why are you saying this again? When King Huai heard this, he was trembling in his heart.
"what happened?"
When the general arrived, he shouted in panic: "Your Majesty, thousands of cavalry have arrived from the north and have suddenly attacked and defeated the northern siege army."
"What? Coming so soon?" King Huai couldn't believe it.
The other counselors were also panicking: "Your Highness, withdraw your troops quickly, otherwise the army attacking the city will be defeated by the cavalry, and then our army will be completely defeated."
"What can you do to me with just a few thousand cavalrymen?" King Huai roared.
But others kept persuading him, "Your Majesty, it will be too late if you don't withdraw your troops now."
King Huai roared, "Where are my cavalry? Go and take care of them."
King Huai still had several thousand cavalrymen, which he had secretly built at great expense.
Although there were still 3,000 cavalrymen, as soon as these cavalrymen went to the north, they immediately confronted the Royal Guards cavalry heading south.
King Huai breathed a sigh of relief. His three thousand cavalrymen should have no problem dealing with the several thousand Royal Guards cavalrymen who had just come south and were still very tired.
King Huai continued to call for help, immediately forcing an attack on the city, and sent people to the north to gather up the young men who had been defeated.
But in less than an hour, the cavalry also ran back.
"Your Highness, tens of thousands of soldiers from the north have reached the north gate. Our army cannot resist. Please make the decision, Your Highness."
"So fast?" Everyone was panicked.
"Your Highness, please withdraw your troops. Tens of thousands of troops from the capital have already reached the north gate. We cannot take the capital."
"Yes, Your Majesty, please withdraw your troops, or we will be dead."
King Huai was extremely unwilling to give up. He looked at the large number of strong men who rushed up to the city wall and were fighting bloody battles. His face was dark and he gritted his teeth and said angrily: "Wait and see, if it is..."
"Your Highness, something bad has happened." Someone else shouted and came running over on a fast horse.
King Huai almost started cursing. Could you use different words when reporting the news?
One of the commanders who came this time exclaimed, "Your Majesty, the soldiers are already rushing towards us."
Sure enough, when they looked to the north, they saw a large number of flags sweeping in from the north, and the army attacking the city in the north was constantly collapsing.
As if infected, a group of strong men were collapsing towards them in panic.
"Your Majesty, retreat quickly. We cannot be caught up in the fleeing soldiers."
"My Lord, please go."
A group of close confidants pulled King Huai to run westward.
King Huai was still roaring: "I will not accept this, I will not accept this."
"Come here, let my elite soldiers defeat them. Where are the elite soldiers?"
A large number of able-bodied men who were attacking the city were driven to run around by the continuously attacking Beijing troops. The entire western part of the capital was in chaos, with able-bodied men shouting for help everywhere.
On King Huai's side, all the generals were shouting at the elite army that had not been on the battlefield and was quite strong to move quickly to the west.
As for those able-bodied men, no one cared about them. To them, as long as there were elite troops, there would be as many able-bodied men as there were.
However, the Beijing troops who arrived did not pursue them after driving them away, as they were all exhausted.
Some of the officers and soldiers on the city wall cheered, saying that reinforcements had finally arrived, while others were so tired that they sat down on the ground and couldn't get up.
Ning Yi also rode a fast horse and arrived at the west gate in a dusty state.
He was also surrounded by a group of exhausted servants, as well as hundreds of highly skilled guards led by Qin Haifeng.
"Your Highness, we've finally arrived. Shall we go into the city first?" Qin Haifeng asked breathlessly.
They hurried as fast as they could, fearing that King Huai's army would break through the capital, and were constantly urged by Ning Yi to rush forward.
As for the two so-called blocking armies they encountered on the road, they were easily defeated. They were just a group of civilians holding messy farm tools. They had no fighting power at all and were defeated by a hail of arrows.
But upon arriving in the capital, everyone on the outskirts suggested that the Sixth Prince should not be so anxious and should rest first and set up his formation.
Anyway, we have returned to the capital, and we need to prepare our physical strength to fight King Huai. Everyone thinks that King Huai has an army of 100,000 to 200,000 soldiers, and at least 50,000 to 60,000 elite soldiers.
This is what almost everyone thinks, even Emperor Wu thinks so, otherwise he would not have hid in the palace and dared not come out.
Only Ning Yi knew that the so-called 200,000-strong army actually consisted of only 20,000 elite soldiers, and the rest were a group of coerced civilians.
Ning Yi could easily defeat such a force. King Huai must not be allowed to drive this group of rioters to break into the city, otherwise the capital would become ruins.
In Ning Yi's eyes, the capital city was in his pocket, so how could it be attacked and destroyed?
Therefore, the Sixth Prince did not allow any rest and forced a strong attack. No matter how much everyone complained, they did not dare to delay and could only attack while dragging their breathless bodies.
Even Feng Zhong, who wanted to come back to rescue the emperor as soon as possible, felt that the Sixth Prince was too anxious.
In the past, when the Sixth Prince was urged to send troops, he was hesitant and kept delaying along with Duke Dingguo.
But now, he didn't care about the fatigue of the army at all, and shouted for a quick attack. If anyone dared to be negligent, he would chop off their heads for delaying the rescue.
No one wants to be dealt with by the Sixth Prince like this, so let's stand up and continue the attack.
But when the battle started, they realized that this so-called King Huai's army was made of sand and fell down with a single push.
It turned out that the so-called 200,000 troops of King Huai were actually this kind of stuff. Then they had nothing to worry about. Even now, they felt that they should continue to advance westward as soon as possible, catch up with the so-called Jingnan Army, annihilate them all, and capture the traitor King Huai. That would be a great achievement.
However, Ning Yi refused: "Our army has been running all the way and is exhausted. The elite troops in King Huai's army are well rested and waiting for the opportunity. Now is not the time to pursue us. Rest well. King Huai can't escape."
Ning Yi did not need to seize the great achievement of King Huai. For him, defeating these miscellaneous soldiers and resolving the crisis in the capital was enough.