Chapter 287 The mantis stalks the cicada and the oriole follows behind
As usual, the Eastern Yan army sent cavalry to provoke and show off their power in front of the formation.

Hundreds of cavalrymen, led by General Dugu Huaijie of the Eastern Yan army, shouted and ran back and forth in front of the Western Yan formation.

But what was different from usual was that the Western Yan army sent troops to attack.

Li Er personally led more than a thousand black-armored cavalrymen to the expedition, and the fierce generals Zhai Sixun, Cheng Zhijie, Zhang Jin, and Qiu Xinggong followed closely behind, rushing towards the hundreds of Eastern Yan cavalrymen.

Dugu Huaijie was shocked when he saw this, and immediately led his cavalry to retreat. Because his mission was to provoke the enemy in front of the battle, and if the enemy went to fight, he would lure the enemy into deep.

But Dugu Huaijie felt somewhat panicked when he saw the cavalry chasing behind him, because this group of black-armored cavalry had an amazing momentum and looked like elite troops.

The slogan raised by the other party also made Dugu Huaijie lose the idea of ​​fighting with them.

"General of the Western Expedition, Governor of Liangzhou Li"

He knew this flag. The second son of King Li Yuan of Tang was now the most famous general in the Western Army.

If it was really him, it would be foolish to turn around and fight.

If it really is him, then it would be a great achievement if we could lead him into the encirclement.

After Li Er led his troops to attack, Li San and Li Si also led their troops out of the camp one after another, each leading their elite infantry and cavalry to follow closely behind.

"General, Lord Dunhuang is chasing the enemy too closely. I'm afraid he's trying to lure them out. Do you want me to lead the army to support him?"

Chang Yanheng, who was half a body length behind Li Si, said with some concern.

"General Chang, don't worry. Just wait and see how General Erfeng defeats the enemy." Li Si said with a relaxed smile, and Li San also smiled without saying anything.

The generals of the Jingzhou army and the generals of various departments in Guanzhong all fought together with Li Er and Li San from Longyou all the way to Guanzhong, so they naturally knew Li Er's style of using troops.

However, the various units of the Jianghuai Army saw Li Er on the battlefield for the first time, and they couldn't help but feel a little worried.

But Li San and Li Si, who were also the chief commanders, had no worries at all. Instead, they were very relaxed. This reaction made the generals in Jiang Huai somewhat suspicious.

Could it be that the two brothers deliberately did not send troops to support?
But why were the Guanzhong generals who followed Li Er not panicked at all?
With doubts, everyone followed the infantry and cavalry army forward.

Li Er took the lead, riding the BMW Teruel under his crotch at full speed, holding a longbow and chasing the cavalry at the end of the Eastern Yan army.

Every time an arrow was fired, someone fell down.

In the wilderness between the Ru River and the Ying River, the smoke and dust raised by the cavalry rose straight into the sky. The Eastern Yan cavalry brigade, which had been waiting in the south of Linying City, was waiting under the shade of the trees by the river under the leadership of the Right Huben General Pu Gusu, the Left Longwu General Duan Wuchen, the Right Baotao General Chen Leng and others.

Seeing the dust raised by the charging cavalry in the distance, they naturally understood that the strategy of luring the enemy had worked.

As a result, 20,000 elite infantry and cavalry went out together. Duan Wuchen and Pu Gusu each led 6,000 cavalry and directly surrounded the enemy from both wings.

On the front was a large formation of 8,000 infantry led by Chen Leng, ready to attack.

Li Er ignored the encirclement formation formed by the large cavalry troops on both wings and continued to pursue the hundreds of cavalrymen who were used as bait.

The result was that Li Er directly chased the bait and broke through the encirclement formation of the Eastern Yan army.

After all, Dugu Huaijie couldn't lead his cavalry to attack his own infantry formation, so he could only flee to the connection between infantry and cavalry.

Shouldn't he have quickly turned around and fled to his own camp after realizing he had been ambushed?
But why do you keep chasing after me, the bait for hundreds of people?
Dugu Huaijie didn’t understand, and didn’t have time to figure it out, so he could only go around and look for a loophole in his own encirclement.

Li Er continued to pursue relentlessly.

Pu Gusu saw this and had to send Xue Wanche to lead the cavalry to intercept after maintaining the encirclement. Xue Wanche was a famous general in the Eastern Yan army. He also made great contributions in the Battle of Hulao. As a general of the Youzhou cavalry, he was always known for his bravery.

After receiving the military order, he immediately led hundreds of cavalry to block Li Erfeng's route to pursue Dugu Huaijie's troops.

However, he did not expect that when Xue Wanche, holding a large spear, rushed towards Li Er within only a few dozen steps, Li Er saw that the man was coming with great momentum and bravery, so he quickly shot an arrow, which directly hit the front hoof of Xue Wanche's horse. The horse knelt down and threw him out.

The commander-in-chief was having a bad start, so the cavalry under his command naturally stopped and tried to rescue the commander first.

Li Er continued to lead his men to chase Dugu Huaijie, and he was determined not to give up until he caught up with him.

Dugu Huaijie looked back repeatedly, horrified in his heart, wondering why this guy was so stubborn and would not let go of him.

Duan Wuchen and Pu Gusu were also helpless when they saw this scene. Although they had roughly encircled the vanguard led by Li Er, the encirclement formed by the combination of infantry and cavalry was very large, and the defense of the junction between the various units was actually not tight.

The reason why Li Er kept chasing Dugu Huaijie was actually to find out where the key point of the formation was reserved for Dugu Huaijie's cavalry.

If not, Li Er would force Dugu Huaijie to lead the way for him.

Duan Yihong and Lou Jushi in Dingying City received military reports from scouts and learned that Li Er was surrounded and that Li San and Li Si were leading their troops behind.

Without any hesitation, the two men immediately gathered their troops to prepare to cross the pontoon bridge and fight the Western Army.

The entire Yingchuan was home to as many as 170,000 troops from Western Yan.

Among them, there were about 130,000 infantry and more than 40,000 cavalry.

There were more than 60,000 infantry in Jianghuai, about 30,000 infantry in Jingzhou and Guanzhong, and 7,000 infantry in Wagang.

As for the cavalry, the cavalry of Jianghuai and Jingzhou combined were less than 20,000, while there were more than 20,000 cavalry in Guanzhong and more than 3,000 cavalry in Wagang.

In addition, Chen County was also home to the armies of Liu Yuanqing and Xiao Shizhi, totaling 18,000 men.

This time, there were only 50,000 infantry and cavalry following the Li brothers into battle. The rest of the troops were led by Yuwen She, Chai Rong, Zhu Deyu, Murong Sanzang, Li Huaizhen and others. They each occupied their camps and cities, ready to go into battle and waiting for military orders.

The troops that went into battle were all elite troops selected from each tribe, and were mainly cavalry, with only more than 10,000 infantrymen.

When brothers Li San and Li Si saw the enemy's ambush troops launching a siege, they smiled at each other. Then Li San led more than 20,000 cavalrymen including Xue Renmei, Yuwen Xiao, Dou Cong and others, and pressed straight towards the encirclement of the Eastern Yan army.

Li Si led the remaining 30,000 elite infantry and cavalry towards Dingying City, and directly blocked the seven floating bridges outside Dingying City that connected the north and south banks of the Ying River.

The division of labor among the three brothers was that Li Er led a small group of elite troops to lure the enemy, and after the enemy's ambush formation launched a siege, Li San led the main force to press forward.

Li Si needed to block the large group of reinforcements coming from the direction of Dingying City.

The two experienced veterans, Lou Jushi and Duan Yihong, would never have imagined that after being silent for two long months, the Western Yan army would rush forward to wipe out the set ambush in one breath.

When the two saw that the other side had sent out tens of thousands of elite troops, they also hurriedly mobilized their elite troops and prepared to cross the river from the floating bridge.

When all the troops had assembled on the north bank of the Ying River and were preparing to cross the river, they were horrified to find that the Western Yan army had driven away the soldiers who were originally guarding the pontoon bridge, and had formed a battle formation with Wugang chariot links, erected large shields and long spears, and followed by strong bows and crossbows.

The Western Yan army was far more fully prepared than the two veteran generals had expected. Under such circumstances, Duan Yihong could only order seven captains to lead their respective infantry to attack, and he gave a death order.

"Seize the bridgehead within half an hour, or you will be beheaded."

(End of this chapter)