Chapter 364 Continuation of the Night Attack Part 2

Following a loud explosion, the south barracks quickly became chaotic.
When humans were bombarded, they could still hide and withstand the attack, but their rations could not.
Without rations, Dayao didn't even need to attack and the enemy army would starve to death.
This Great Xia army immediately reacted the same way, and the soldiers who stood guard at the barriers had already made preparations as well.They all knew that the aboriginals were about to attack.
The first wave of assault that Great Xia was faced with wasn't from the winged cavalry. Instead, it was a round of mortar strikes by Ren Baqian. Over ten shells were fired consecutively, aimed at areas where the enemy forces were the most concentrated, and spread toward the side. A huge part of the attack struck the position where the other party's soldiers were the most dense, and a few of these shells disrupted the region where the winged cavalry were launching their attack.
Thereafter, 1,000 winged cavalry warriors emerged from the darkness by the river. As a streak of sword gleam flashed across the air, an area of fence immediately collapsed. The winged cavalry formed into a wedge shaped battle formation and charged ahead, killing their enemies.
Like a hot knife through butter, the soldiers of Great Xia were slashed apart even before they were able to recover from the previous chaos. The front of the battle formation pierced through first while the other winged cavalry warriors followed up and split the gap further apart.
Whenever the head of the wedge shaped formation was hindered, a few of the warriors would leap forward and continue forging deep ahead. In just a short period of five minutes, they had managed to fight their way from the border to the center.
The surrounding winged cavalry warriors immediately spread out like a blossoming flower or, in other words, like a closed fist spreading out into an open palm. Row by row, the soldiers in the middle of the Great Xia battle formation started to collapse.
At the same time, some of the winged cavalry were setting fires all over the place while others were flipping the ration carts into the flames. This intensified the blaze, which also ensured that more of the rations were destroyed.
Li Qianqiu kept jumping up and down in the darkness in order to observe the tendencies of the Great Xia army because the two meter radius area of ground that he was standing on was half a meter lower than the other areas. This attracted Ren Baqian's attention, so he looked toward Li Qianqiu.
Under the command of Li Qianqiu, before Great Xia was entirely surrounded like a dumpling, the winged cavalry attacked the weakest part of the northern area. After knocking down the fence, they escaped from that little piece of land in the middle of the north barracks and rapidly disappeared into the darkness.
Previously at the south barracks, if the Great Xia army had separated their rations and made use of quilts to put out the fires, it would have reduced their losses. However, the fire was currently too immense, and they had totally ditched this idea.
At least half of their rations were engulfed by the blaze.
In the middle of the Great Xia battle formation, the middle-aged general from the previous attack turned pale as he looked upon the huge blaze right in front of him. The radiance of the flames shone on his face and turned into a strange red color.
"Fetch water and put out the fire!" He managed to yell out these words with much difficulty.
"Sir, they are afraid that the enemies may be waiting outside. The chaos at the north barracks just now was a result of their rations being burned. However, those barbarians didn't attack the north barracks," one of the soldiers immediately reported.
"Those wielding blades and shields, the spearmen as well as the crossbow battalion, get ready. Archers, fire three volleys toward the outside," the general of Great Xia commanded.
After that, the troops began rearranging themselves according to the orders passed down from the general and exactly 20,000 people formed up into a battle formation on one side of the river. At the front were the soldiers wielding blades and shields followed by the crossbow battalion, two rows of spearmen, and three rows of archers at the rear.
During the mobilization of these soldiers, there were two people jumping up and down in the darkness outside the camp…
"No other ideas?" Ren Baqian heaved a sigh as he descended from midair. Like jumping on a spring mattress, his entire body felt fatigued.
"This is the first time I realized that you are actually a genius!" Ren Baqian lamented as he jumped into the air again and descended after he reached the apex.
Damn it, when you die in the future, the cause of death must be stupidity.
Also, why are you erecting a tent?
…
"Sir, we managed to retrieve half of the rations, but couldn't make it in time for the rest… Shall we still fetch the water?" one of the commanders asked as he pointed toward a huge bonfire. That area was already hopeless and couldn't be saved even if they were to splash water on it.
As the winged cavalry had played their role too well when they set fire to the surroundings during the attack, Ren Baqian had even planned to lure the Great Xia soldiers over to the river to fetch water in order to fight the fire. However, Great Xia had eventually decided to give up on that thought.
The general of the south barracks was full of a murderous aura. He then said, "Pretend that you are going to fetch water and send some men out to probe. If the aboriginals are indeed out there, fire arrows immediately."
Following his orders, the battle formation that was already formed started moving toward the river bank. They held their position when they were about 60 meters away from the fence and the archers fired three rounds toward the outside.
Under the command of Ren Baqian, the aboriginals soldiers that were fighting outside lay in a prone position outside the fence and were protected because the arrows couldn't reach them.
In the scene of the night, the arrows screeched through the air and landed in the river.
Following which, a few hundred Great Xia soldiers faced death with equanimity and rushed out with water buckets. Thereafter, blood-curdling screeches filled the air.
"Fire!" Without hesitation, the Great Xia army fired another three volleys of arrows from the camp. This time around, sounds of arrows piercing through human bodies could be heard.
Throughout the duration of this war between Great Xia and Dayao, full scale arrow fire within a fixed proximity like this had incurred the most casualties. Whenever both parties engaged in close combat, there were in fact much less casualties, but the casualty rate would be on a constant rise.
Ren Baqian and Li Qianqiu looked upon the situation from somewhere far away as Great Xia fired volley after volley of arrows and felt a little suspicious.
"Something doesn't seem right."
Amid his suspicions, the other party sent a few hundred kamikaze soldiers that charged toward the outside. When the slaughter started, countless volleys of arrows immediately came raining down from the camp.
"Damn, they obviously aren't trying to fight the fire. They are fishing!" Ren Baqian had a sudden realization as he looked at the Great Xia battle formation that stood rooted to the ground.
According to what he had planned out originally, if the enemies were to fight the fire, they would definitely move their battle formation to the river bank. Once they had stepped outside the barriers and moved further away from the remaining soldiers in the camp, the aboriginal soldiers would then strike and take down those 20,000 soldiers.
One had to know that in order to contain 80,000 soldiers, a camp like this had to have an area that spanned at least a five kilometer radius.
It was only one kilometer from the center of the camp to the gate at the river.
Now, however, the rear of the battle formation was only one kilometer away from the center of the camp. It would only take a few minutes for their reinforcements to arrive. The enemies stood rooted in their positions and wouldn't move forward an inch even if they were beaten to death. Instead, they consecutively sent out hundreds of men and immediately fired their arrows the moment the blood-curdling screeches sounded. They didn't even bother worrying about their own soldiers out there.
"Damn it! This is totally different from what I expected," Ren Baqian cursed.
Currently, this enemy unit was much closer to the rest of the Great Xia army in the center of the camp than Ren Baqian had previously expected. If they were to charge over now, it would be impossible for them to retreat before the enemy reinforcements arrived. It would turn into a head-on attack, which was contrary to his initial idea of reducing casualties.
However, the other party wasn't a marionette, and it wasn't possible for them to act according to his expectations.
"Do we attack or not?" Li Qianqiu asked. Based on his opinion, if they were to strike head-on against their enemies right now, they could kill them together with their reinforcement troops when they arrived later. No fear! With 6,000 aboriginal soldiers and 1,000 winged cavalry warriors against 80,000 Great Xia soldiers, the success rate would be rather high.
The higher number of casualties would be the only problem.
If they were to act according to Ren Baqian's plan, the number of casualties would be reduced, and Li Qianqiu was also supportive of this idea. As for the sentiments of the soldiers, these were more profound when compared to Ren Baqian. Although a soldier wouldn't be affected by compassion, if given a choice to do something that would reduce casualties, they would rather take that option.
"Attack if the circumstances are favorable. Even if they are not, force yourself on them!" Ren Baqian spat out a mouthful of saliva and continued talking, "Winged cavalry, assume your positions. As for the others, get ready to retreat. I will first hit them with a round of mortar bombardment before the winged cavalry strike with a sudden attack. Just kill two soldiers each and retreat."
After all that ferocity, Ren Baqian still felt that there wasn't any need to face their enemies head-on. There were still seven more days to go, which was still a pretty long journey ahead.
They still had to conserve some military strength and fight against the Yun Nation when they headed back!
However, he was very thankful to have the assistance of the empress's winged cavalry. With this group of elites, even if they were up against the assault of 100,000 soldiers, the current blitzkrieg situation, a night attack, or even a long distance raid, there was nothing that they couldn't handle.
Unfortunately, they were up against Great Xia in this war. Currently, the winged cavalry's total strength had fallen from 1,500 to just 1,000 warriors, and even Ren Baqian started to feel the pinch.