On the fifth day of the twelfth month of the Jiayin year, thirty miles south of Taizhou City, the gateway to the Wentai Defense Line of the Qing army, in the dense forest, more than a thousand Taiping cavalry were waiting quietly in the forest. The trees here fell layer by layer, lush branches and leaves, covering the figure of this cavalry tightly.

Under a poplar tree, the Taiping Army general Zhang Wenxiang sat on the ground with an angry face, constantly snatching the green grass in front of him, and then put it in his mouth angrily. A red and black horse behind him lowered his head and ate the tender grass on the ground, "Captain Liu, you can eat grass faster than your horse."

Zhang Wenxiang came to his senses, spit out a few times, spit out the grass in his mouth, and looked up and it was Zheng Yantuo, the trainer of the Second Cavalry Regiment of the Second New Division of the West Palace of Taiping Army. This man had been a book of the Western Prince's Mansion and was considered an old man in the Taiping Army. Zhang Wenxiang said embarrassedly: "Director Zheng Xun, don't you mock me. Am I anxious? What's wrong with this? We have been waiting here for three days. If we kill it early in the morning, those Qing demons will become real ghosts."

Zheng Yantuo smiled and sat on the ground and said, "Aren't we waiting for the general order of Shangshu Li? The order is about to fight!"

Zhang Wenxiang said depressedly: "The turtle grandsons of the General Staff Office always look forward to the front and insist on deploying the logistics supplies when they are in place. You haven't seen how many people have these Qing demons killed along the way?"

Zheng Yantuo shook his head, glanced at him sideways and said, "I also said that you, the person with the best grades in the Shanghai Cavalry Department, know what it means to defeat the enemy with one blow. Soldiers take obedience as their duty. Although Qing Yao has done many evil deeds, we are soldiers. This battle requires complete annihilation. Don't you understand?" Zhang Wenxiang is from Ruyang, Henan. In the 29th year of Daoguang, he went south to Ningbo to sell felt hats to make a living, and he has been living in Ningbo. He is also a small leader of Ningbo pirates. After the Taiping Army defeated Ningbo, Zhang Wenxiang joined the Taiping Army. Originally, Zhang Wenxiang was a navy organization, but Liu Lichuan saw that he was skilled in horse racing, so he allowed him to join his cavalry team, and later he went to Shanghai to reorganize.

After studying the cavalry department of Shanghai Martial Arts School for more than half a year, Zhang Wenxiang studied very hard and seriously, and he seemed to be born as the material for commanding the cavalry. He graduated with the first place among the cavalry department of thousands of people and was awarded the commander of the Second Cavalry Regiment of the Second Division. During this reorganization, the West Palace adopted the practice of not looking at past experiences but only looking at academic performance, and promoted a large number of new talents. Zhang Wenxiang was the most dazzling one among them.

Zhang Wenxiang lowered his head and said, "I know, but I feel aggrieved. If this continues, the people will be killed by Qing Yao sooner or later."

Zheng Yantuo said lightly: "After a while, you can go to the battle at noon."

Zhang Wenxiang exclaimed and asked, "Will the Jiangling Wu arrive?"

Zheng Yantuo smiled and said, "Staff General Yang in the regiment made a calculation yesterday. According to our transportation capabilities, all logistics supplies will be in place at noon today at the latest. Li Shangshu wants to fight a beautiful battle. After the supplies are guaranteed, can you tell the clear demons can block our thunder strike?"

Zhang Wenxiang turned anger and said, "You didn't say it earlier, I'll go and prepare." After that, he sorted out a grass-green camouflage uniform, put on a green cotton armor on the outside, and put on an iron helmet with feather feathers. He smiled and said, "This is the first time our Taiping New Army is fighting in its own uniform, so we can't be embarrassed."

The equipment of the Taiping cavalry includes sabers, short carriage rifles, cotton armor and feathered iron helmets with eaves. It is not the heavy cavalry of British and French breastplates but the light cavalry. With the development of firearms, light cavalry is more cheap and practical. The heavy breastplates of the cavalry are just a heavy target on the battlefield, so the cavalry of the Taiping army is all light cavalry.

Zheng Yantuo also stood up and said, "But we have to agree first, you have to stay behind. I know your temper very well. When the war is blown, it will rush faster than anyone else."

Zhang Wenxiang widened his eyes and smiled embarrassedly: "No, I will listen to you and stay behind obediently."

While speaking, a cavalry came, dressed in camouflage, wearing a feathered iron helmet, and the horse, the cavalry's body was covered with branches. Since the beginning of the year, the Taiping Army began to produce iron helmets for cavalry according to Xiao Yungui's design drawings. In this battle, all the participating troops were replaced with camouflage outfits and iron helmets, and finally got rid of the annoying Taiping Army's robe. They all looked a lot more energetic and their morale was even higher. In Zheng Yantuo's words, there was no need to mobilize them to fight the demons.

The cavalry rushed closer, turned over and dismounted, saluted the two of them and said, "Report that there are more than 200 Qing demon soldiers outside Taizhou City escorting hundreds of people on the plain ten miles away. It seems that they are going to be taken to somewhere and then executed."

Zhang Wenxiang said angrily: "Baby, I'm a bastard, I'll send an order to gather." He turned to look at Zheng Yantuo and said: "Save people is like putting out fires, don't wait until noon."

Zheng Yantuo pondered for a moment and gritted his teeth and said, "If you are in a hurry, just go to war. Be clean and neat. As long as you don't get rid of a demon, we will not alert the snake."

Zhang Wenxiang hurriedly said, "If the cavalry of our second regiment let the Qing Yao's infantry escape, we can wipe our necks by ourselves. Let the third battalion and the third company take the lead, and the rest of the troops are surrounded in a fan shape. Remember to rush forward. If there are people in the Qing Yao team, you must rush forward to separate the Qing Yao from the people so that you can annihilate them. Fewer people will be killed or injured." The cavalry took the order and roared away on horseback.

Zhang Wenxiang and Zheng Yantuo, led the regiment guards, rode on horseback and led the rest of the troops to walk north. A little further away, there was a sound of shouting sound. The officers and soldiers of the Third Battalion and the Third Company took the lead and galloped away. When the rest of the soldiers heard the shouting sound, they silently urged the mounts and began to move quickly.

Zhang Wenxiang rode on the horse and said to the messenger: "Thank you to the Second Infantry Regiment behind and the Artillery Regiment of the Second Division, our troops have begun to take over the battle and let them follow up later." The messenger was ordered to roar away.

After leaving the woods, there was a plain. Zhang Wenxiang looked from a distance and saw a group of Qing soldiers escorting hundreds of people on the road of the plain. The Qing army was very fierce. As long as anyone fell behind, they would definitely be cut. After that, many bodies were left behind, and the braids on the back of the men in the heads were cut. At a glance, it was known that the Qing army had captured ordinary people and cut off their braids, intending to kill good people. The people in the team cried and shouted, and they were very miserable.

Zhang Wenxiang was so angry that he had seen and heard all the tragic things in the world since he arrived at the Wentai front line. The Qing army could not gain any advantage in the long-term confrontation, so he often swept around nearby villages, burning, killing, looting, and the Qing army called it the removal of troublemakers to prevent collusion with Changmao.

The soldiers around Zhang Wenxiang were also extremely angry. Their eyes were about to emerge, but they did not move, and they didn't even speak. The Taiping Army was very strict, so the soldiers could only bury their anger in their hearts. They slowly accumulated and waited for the order to be issued. The thousands of anger in their hearts were about to vent their anger to these Russian soldiers.

The soldiers of the cavalry regiment were all covered with branches. In addition to the camouflage uniforms and cotton armor were all disguised as branches. From a distance, it looked like a moving forest, but it was as quiet as a forest. The solemn aura of Xu Rulin slowly floated up.

The third company of the Third Battalion received the order first, urging the war horses to rush out of the woods. The new rear-mounted short carriage rifle in his hand was already tightly clamped and galloped straight towards the marching Qing army.

The Qing army was always a vicious person who killed people and set fire. He had long been used to the weakness of the people on weekdays. He never expected that a large number of Taiping horses would be ambushed near Taizhou. Although Fujian Admiral Li Tingyu was in charge of Wenzhou and had already put the cities on the Wentai defense line on guard, the Qing army in these places did not believe that the Chang Taiping army would launch a large-scale attack in winter and was still lax. At this time, General Qian was thinking that after killing all these people, he should be able to find a lot of valuable things from them, and there were also many beautiful women in the team. He was very excited to think about this.

Just when he was happy, a soldier beside him shouted, "It's strange, God, you can see that woods will move!"

Mr. Qian turned his head and saw a large piece of green branches moving quickly, coming towards his own team, with a large area of ​​dust rising from behind. Mr. Qian was stunned. After a while, he shouted: "It's not the woods, but the cavalry, the cavalry. Where did they come from?"

The Qing soldiers also saw it and were anxious and asked repeatedly: "What should we do?" These Qing soldiers were recruited by Li Tingyu and local regiments. Li Tingyu gave the name. After the local regiments trained themselves to arm themselves, they guarded the villages near Taizhou. The Qing soldiers here were considered bandits, and they were easy to deal with ordinary people. However, in the eyes of the Taiping Army, they were no different from ordinary bandits. Moreover, the Qing army had never seen such hidden cavalry tactics. They only saw a large forest flying towards them, and they all felt spectacular and didn't know what to do.

Mr. Qian knew some military affairs and quickly shouted and asked his subordinates to concentrate. More than 200 Qing troops formed a shallow horse-resisting formation with spears in front and short swords behind, preparing to resist the enemy. Because they were armed by themselves, the weapons in their hands were also varied, and some even used sickles.

When the Taiping cavalry company commander of the Third Battalion saw that the opponent had arranged a horse-resisting formation, he shouted. More than 120 Third Company cavalrymen raised their rifles in their hands. With a command, fire lights appeared among the moving woods, and gunfire sounded like fried beans, and gunshots filled for a while.

For a moment, dozens of Russian soldiers were shot and fell to the ground. Mr. Qian was so scared that he had never seen a horse rifle that could shoot so far. At hundreds of steps, on the bumpy horseback, these cavalry could still fight so accurately. He forgot that his team was lined up with a dense horse-resisting formation.

The Taiping cavalry generally mainly used semi-rotary tactics in combat, namely charge-shooting-revolving-reloading-restoring, but the Qing army in front of him was too weak, and just one charge made the battle without any suspense. The Taiping feathered cavalry's sabers raised their sabers, and the Qing army scattered in a panic. Regardless of the people being escorted, they fled to Taizhou City in panic. However, they did not expect that other cavalry around them also surrounded them, and dozens of Qing soldiers were even desperate to kneel on the ground and raise their weapons in their hands to surrender.

When Zhang Wenxiang and Zheng Yantuo arrived with their men and horses, the battle had ended, and no casualties in the third company made Zhang Wenxiang very happy. The cavalry untied the people, sent some food and water to eat and drink. The people all widened their eyes, looking at the soldiers wearing strange accents such as Jiangsu and Zhejiang accents, Huguang accents, etc., and did not believe that they would be the soldiers of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom. It was not until the cavalry took off their iron helmets and exposed their short hair that hundreds of people cheered in tears.

The third company commander ran to Zhang Wenxiang and asked, "Captain, what should I do if I caught 63 Qing demon soldiers?"

Zhang Wenxiang spitted and said fiercely: "Do you still need to ask? Kill them all."

Zheng Yantuo smiled slightly and said, "The first battle is bullish."

Zhang Wenxiang widened his eyes and said, "Are you let go? No one of us guards them."

Zheng Yantuo sneered and said, "Tie them all and give them to the people to deal with them."

Zhang Wenxiang understood and laughed: "Director Zheng Xun, I didn't expect you to be so cunning."

Zheng Yantuo snorted and said, "It's good to let the people vent their anger."
Chapter completed!