Chapter Eighty-Nine: Escort Defense Battle, Part Three

The new assault yielded nothing at all and only left several comrades’ bodies behind. This made the cavalry commander at the head of the column rather furious. After the middle-aged steward was struck down by a hidden shot from Ding Li, the commander finally hardened his heart.

After withdrawing more than two hundred paces with his men, he did not launch another charge at once. Instead, he reined in his horse, called over a squad leader and several section leaders, and quickly devised a fresh plan for a full-frontal assault.

"You lot had better help if you don’t want to die."

At the same time, Ding Li, inside the wall of wagons, turned his attention to the drivers while the others caught their breath. He knew full well that they might not prove terribly useful, but at such a moment, one more person meant one more hand. After all, everyone inside the wagon wall was now tied together in a single rope; their only way out was to work together, either to drive back the cavalry outside or kill them all.

When Ding Li saw that everyone was looking at him in astonishment, especially the blank fear on the drivers’ faces, he sighed inwardly, but still said aloud what he had just been thinking.

"The enemy will not keep wasting time like this. This time, they’ll surely reform and launch another hard charge. We must change our response too, or else once they break through the wagon wall before us, what will wait for us is their blades and spears at our throats!"

Having said that, Ding Li merely swept his gaze lightly across the crowd, not caring about the mixed expressions on their faces. He then spoke again, this time to Boss Li Shan of the escort agency.

"Boss Li, if the enemy goes in hard, it will naturally be cavalry charging. In a moment we’ll still have to rely on you to lead our escort brothers in holding them back as best we can. Right now we still have the wagon wall to defend, and with the long spears in our brothers’ hands, the problem should not be too great."

"At the very least, at the very least they won’t break through in an instant!" Ding Li added after a pause.

Li Shan immediately nodded with equal force and replied solemnly, "Rest assured. None of our escort brothers are cowards!"

"Good." Ding Li nodded, then turned to Second Boss Huo Lang of the Huo family stronghold. His tone was more like a discussion than a command.

"Second Boss, I imagine the brothers of Huo Family Ridge are also skilled in riding and archery. Whether we succeed or fail this time will depend on your men."

There was no shortage of flattery in those words, but Huo Lang was no fool. It was obvious that Ding Li was gilding the lily to win him over. Looking around at their own brothers, he did not immediately promise anything. Instead, he frowned and answered in a low voice.

"At a time like this, there’s no need for roundabout talk. Whatever you need our men at Huo Family Ridge to do, just say it plainly. As long as it’s within our power, we’ll not refuse a single thing."

It sounded bold and straightforward, but the last sentence made Ding Li’s meaning clear enough: if he intended to send them out as bait or cannon fodder, that would certainly not be something within their power, at least not in the sense Huo Lang had meant.

Ding Li naturally understood what he was implying. He shook his head slightly and explained with a grave expression.

"Our wagon wall is not enough to withstand the enemy’s full assault. Even with the escort agency brothers, we may not be able to stop even half of their attack. So I want your brothers from Huo Family Ridge to split ten skilled riders and archers from the group. When the enemy launches its hard charge, they will strike out from both flanks, circle around behind them, and attack by surprise. The rest of your men will need to suppress them with bows and crossbows before the charge begins, then mount up and stand ready to support the escort brothers at any moment."

After hearing this, Huo Lang merely considered it for a moment before nodding without further hesitation. Ding Li’s arrangement had not deliberately made things harder for him. On the contrary, although the tasks assigned to the people of Huo Family Ridge all involved meeting the enemy head-on, given the present situation, when the enemy’s hard charge arrived, who could avoid a direct clash anyway?

"You all must help too!"

After Huo Lang agreed and turned to arrange the specifics, Ding Li waved to the two groups of trembling drivers. Knowing full well that their combat strength was virtually zero, he did not make things difficult for them. The task he gave was as simple as could be.

"It seems you’ve been doing this work for a day or two already, so you should be quite practiced at looping ropes around livestock, right? In a moment, all you need to do is use ropes to snare beasts. Whether it’s a man or a horse, just treat them as livestock. Remember: for every beast you catch, you’ll receive a gold leaf as payment afterward!"

At the mention of that comparison, even a low burst of laughter rose among the drivers. For a moment, the fear in their hearts eased considerably. But when a timid voice sounded out, terror reappeared on everyone’s faces, and they all turned to look at Ding Li.

"B-but those people outside are a-all soldiers..."

"Hmph!"

Ding Li let out a cold snort, glanced askance at the one who spoke, and corrected him in a flat tone.

"What we’ll be facing in a moment are not soldiers, nor even people at all. They’re nothing but a pack of beasts. In your eyes, they are all beasts, and beasts that kill without blinking. If you don’t snare them, they will slaughter you without restraint!"

With that, Ding Li had no desire to waste any more time on them. He snorted again, turned, and walked away, leaving the drivers with one last line.

"Whether you choose death or life, decide for yourselves."

No sooner had Ding Li left than the drivers, many of whom already knew one another, erupted into an uproar. In truth, there was no need for much deliberation. Once their nerves had settled, they were fully capable of judging the situation they were in. There was scarcely any discussion needed, and no objections at all arose. Everyone decided to do as Ding Li had said: snare the beasts.

Of course, all this could proceed so smoothly because the gold leaf Ding Li had promised played a tremendous part. Ding Li did not actually know whether there were any gold leaves among the cargo in the wagons, but at that moment he knew there had to be enough incentive to move them. Only then could those drivers, who usually lived honest, ordinary lives, break free from the shackles of old habits.

Very soon, everyone inside the wagon wall was assigned their respective duties according to Ding Li’s arrangement. Of the roughly twenty escort guards, eight were stationed at the original gap in the center of the wagon wall, led personally by Scarred Wei, whose lower leg had been wounded earlier. Ding Li and Miao Cuihua led six men to hold the left flank, while Boss Li Shan led six men to defend the right.

The people from Huo Family Ridge had suffered comparatively heavy casualties earlier, and fewer than twenty remained. Still, Huo Lang selected ten skilled riders and archers from among them, leading their horses to hide along both sides of the wagon wall, waiting only for the order that would let them shove aside the wagons blocking the way and leap onto their mounts to charge out of their own formation.

The remaining few were kept by Huo Lang at his side, each man staring fixedly at his horse, clutching a sabre tightly in hand, with every intention of meeting the cavalry outside in a brutal clash of blood and steel at any moment.

Boom, boom, boom...

Outside the wagon wall, the cavalry unit launched another attack. This time their formation had changed into three staggered ranks, about twenty riders in each row. When Ding Li leaned out to look, he saw that their cavalry bows were once again fully drawn. In particular, the first rank had already aimed the green gleam of their feathered arrows straight at the heads of the people inside.

Twang! Twang, twang, twang...

With the crisp snaps in their ears, everyone felt as though their nerves had been violently plucked. The whistling of arrows rose again and again. No one dared show their heads; all they could do was let sweat quickly bead on their brows, not even daring to blink freely, as they watched one feathered shaft after another streak overhead and bury itself fiercely into the ground behind them, the fletching at the tail swaying back and forth as if protesting that it had missed its mark.

Those present, whether from the Miao Escort Agency or Huo Family Ridge, mostly lived lives spent traversing the martial world and licking blood from the edge of a blade. Ever since choosing their paths, each of them had long since tied their own heads to their belts and prepared themselves for death at any time. And yet what they were about to face now filled them with deep shock, dread, and even a faint, barely contained excitement. After all, before them was a cavalry unit that had undergone proper training.

Whoosh, whoosh... whoosh, whoosh, whoosh...

From the moment the first rank of cavalry entered within one hundred paces of the wagon wall, the volleys had been unbroken. With the tacit coordination of the two ranks behind them, they brought their usual disciplined training into full play. Though their numbers were not large and each volley could send only twenty arrows into the air, they maintained a dense rain of arrows over the wagon wall until the distance closed to twenty paces, preventing any counterattack from emerging inside, not even a single hidden shot.

Even once the first rank of cavalry reached within twenty paces, Ding Li keenly sensed that the pressure from above had suddenly lessened. He quickly leaned out through the narrow gap to glance. Just as he had expected, the first rank of cavalry had already hung their bows on the sides of their saddles and begun one by one to switch to lances. The bright spearheads gleamed with a cold, eerie light that sent a shiver through Ding Li himself.

Even so, Ding Li, braced against the wagon, drew a deep breath and abruptly turned, thrusting the crossbow through the gap. His nerves taut, he locked onto a target almost instantly. After a crisp twang, Ding Li relaxed his hands, and in the same motion picked up another short crossbow placed on the wagon’s edge. In the blink of an eye, he fired again.

Twang!

A burst of neighing erupted outside the wagon wall. Ding Li realized that one of the arrows had missed its mark, but even hitting a horse was enough to doom the rider on its back. Though he was not as unlucky as the comrade who had just been shot through the throat, the sudden frenzy of his mount still meant he could not escape being thrown to the ground. The iron hooves that followed showed no mercy, pressing ever forward, while the cavalryman in the saddle paid no heed to the comrade who had fallen before him, trampling straight over the man’s body.

"Arrow counterattack!"

Ding Li had no time to reload the crossbow. Turning his stern face toward Huo Lang at the opposite end of the wagon wall, he nodded hard and barked the order.

"Loose!"

The brothers from Huo Family Ridge who had been waiting at both ends of the wagon wall were already eager with bows drawn and arrows notched. With Huo Lang’s bellow, ten arrows suddenly rose from both sides, striking from the flanks at the enemy who had concentrated their forces and were charging toward the center of the wagon wall.

Outside the wagon wall, the commander at the head of the column was still working his cavalry bow. He would not lead this kind of hard assault from the front lines. Positioned in the third rank, he calculated in his mind the ideal distance between the first rank of his men and the wagon wall, then clenched the fingers pulling the bowstring and shouted in a deep voice.

"Break through!"