Chapter 66 Bow Maker
What surprised Li Hao a little was that the Eight Banners garrison in Hetuala was mainly composed of the Plain White Banner, rather than the Two Yellow Banners as he had imagined.

According to his own feeling, among the Eight Banners, the full-number Niulu of the Two Yellow Banners were the most brave. Once the battle started, even if twenty or thirty bannermen were killed or injured, the army could still keep its formation in order. Only when more than half of the soldiers were killed or injured would they begin to fear fighting.

The other six flags were much weaker. Whenever Li Hao killed a dozen of them, no armored Tatars would rush forward. They would either drive their bondservants forward to die or hide on the periphery and shoot arrows at them.

The similar characteristic of the Eight Banners is that once the Niulu Ezhen, who was supervising the battle, rode away on his horse, no matter how many remaining bannermen there were, they all rushed to grab the horse. Only a very small number of minor officials such as Bashiku and Daizi were able to organize a small-scale defense, but they were of no use in the face of the entire Niulu's rout.

However, the garrison in Hetuala was obviously the elite of the Plain White Banner. After General Li chopped down the flag soldiers near the city gate, dozens of flag soldiers in white dark armor who heard the news actually formed a formation, and the so-called dead soldiers pushed over two shield carts.

"Don't panic. No one broke in seven years ago, and it's even less likely this time. Change all the arrows of the flag soldiers to plum needle arrows and Qi plum needle arrows. Shoot three arrows and retreat two rows to prepare for the next shot."

The city's defender, Dulehun, made clear arrangements for the defense.

Although he didn't know why such a small army composed of Sauron soldiers and the guard Bayala would fight with his own side, he still had to prepare for the battle.

The city gate of Hetuala was different from the city gate with a urn like the one in the Ming Dynasty. It only had a main gate and a doorway two meters deep. After the first round of arrow rain, seven or eight of General Li's Jurchen soldiers fell. The survivors used their horses' bodies as cover and quickly retreated out of the doorway.

"Gou Quanzhong, are you okay?"

In the doorway, Li Hao lay behind a horse corpse and questioned his servants.

He vaguely remembered that Baru and Gou Quanzhong were at the front, and the possibility of them being hit by arrows was not low.

"General, I'm fine. They probably thought I was a Tartar officer who was coerced, so they didn't shoot a single arrow at me."

The fox fur hat on his head was a great help. It was a fur hat seized from Turushi and looked valuable.

"I'm glad you're okay. When Cao leads his troops over, have them wait at the corner. These Tartar arrows are very strange. They are very effective in penetrating armor. They are not the long beryllium arrows used by hunters that I brought out from the mountains. I felt a little pain when I was hit by an arrow."

The beryllium arrows equipped by the Eight Banners were basically improved upon the wide beryllium arrows used with the Jianzhou Jurchen hunting bows. They were also in the shape of sheets, and their arrowheads were thinner and longer than those of hunting bow beryllium arrows, making them easier to penetrate armor.

The arrows shot from this round of rain of arrows were much more powerful in penetrating armor. One arrow took away 7.2 points of Li Hao's health.

[HP: 1097.6|1138]

Seeing that his health bar was only over a thousand left, General Li was so scared that he immediately picked up a meat shield and rushed into the Tatar army.

If you don't kill people anymore, your health will be gone.

Seeing that someone actually dared to charge at the flag soldiers in formation, Du Lehun's mouth curled up wildly.

With the plum needle arrows made with folding forging technology, even if you wear three layers of armor, you will fall if you are hit by one or two arrows.

After gently releasing the flare in his hand, Du Lehun smiled and shook his head.

He couldn't even imagine what this person would look like after being shot.

Maybe a porcupine?
Ding~Bing~
The whistling arrows made a sharp sound in the air, reminding the soldiers of the Zhengbai Banner that it was time to shoot.

The flag soldiers who had been prepared long ago took aim and shot arrows. In the second round of arrow rain, nearly forty plum needle arrows were shot.

Dulehun suddenly felt that it was a bit of a waste. There was only one person rushing towards him from the opposite side, so it was really inappropriate to use so many arrows.

You should know that plum needle arrows are special arrowheads that have only been developed in recent years. The effort a blacksmith spends on making one plum needle arrowhead is equivalent to that of making two or three beryllium arrowheads.

"Why is he still running?"

Dulehun's smile froze on his face. The man who rushed towards him had indeed turned into a porcupine, but his momentum remained unabated, and it seemed that the arrows all over his body had no effect on him.

No, it still has an effect. At least after being hit by the arrow, the man ran faster.

After taking out the second whistle arrow from the secondary quiver, Dulehun gave the order again.

Although he often ordered the flag bearers to replace new arrows, he still maintained the tradition in the way of giving orders.

It was obviously too late to listen to the signal arrow before drawing the bow. Li Hao had already bypassed two useless shield carts and killed his way into the army formation.

The heavy sword collided with the armor plates of the cloth armor, making a teeth-grinding sound. Basically, no Tartar could stand after being hit by a sword.

After reining in his horse and getting away from Bayala, Dulehun gave orders: "The second and third rows retreat thirty steps and shoot arrows at will until the man is killed. Each Bashiku drives the dead soldiers to approach and hold him back."

He released the restrictions on the flag bearers' archery so that they could use their best archery skills. "Shoot me again?"

After killing twelve or thirteen flag soldiers, Li Hao found that the fully armed Zhengbai Banner Tatars retreated a little distance, and then they shot at each other.

The soldiers surrounding him were basically Tatar soldiers wearing only armor, and they were obviously dead soldiers.

It was not a pleasant feeling to be hit by arrows while chopping people, so General Li ran two steps and went around behind a shield cart. Although the dead soldiers holding spears and swords still surrounded him, at least he didn't have to worry about being hit by a large number of arrows.

General Li killed one soldier with one sword. After he had killed twenty-five of them, the remaining thirty or fifty soldiers no longer cared about the officer who was supervising the battle and fled to nearby houses.

The archers were still moving around, trying to find an angle to shoot at the enemies hiding behind the shield carts.

"My arrows are not inaccurate."

Li Hao simply picked up a Qing bow from the ground, pulled out an arrow from his body, leaned forward, drew the bow and shot.

After seven or eight flagmen were shot dead, this group of Zhengbai Bannermen began to stick to both sides of the street and fight back again relying on the walls.

Unfortunately, their endurance was far inferior to that of General Li, who only had more than 700 health points left. Clearing the bow was too tiring. After shooting five or six times, the soldiers of the Plain White Banner needed to take a break, while Li Hao kept leaning forward to aim and shoot arrows.

Until he touched his body and confirmed that there were no arrows in his body.

This is not difficult to do. Just a few steps forward, there are many corpses of flag soldiers, and there are still many arrows in their quivers.

Li Hao, who was fighting alone, could only push the shield cart forward. After looting a few quivers, he began to shoot arrows continuously, but he soon discovered that most of the Tatars seemed to have run away.

"Where did this enemy come from? How could he kill my Niulu alone?"

With too many casualties, Dulehun could no longer suppress his bannermen and had to retreat in frustration. He planned to go to the vicinity of the inner city and gather all the defenders together for another battle.

Unfortunately, he only had four or five personal guards around him, and it was difficult to gather the flag soldiers who had just dispersed.

"Come in, pick a good horse, and I'll rush over and kill the guard."

After confirming that all the nearby Tatars had fled, Li Hao ordered all the Ming troops outside the city gate to come in.

"General, why don't we charge together and quickly eliminate the Tartars before they can gather together?"

"The other Tartars in the city have never seen the general's bravery, and their fighting spirit is very high. Once they are commanded, even if it is a general, it will take more than half an hour to kill them."

Zu Kuan, Cao Bianjiao and others proposed.

After traveling for five full days through an old forest covered with snow, they also wanted to kill some Tartars.

"That's fine. These few days, we need to seize the initiative first. We can't waste any time. If we encounter a large group of Tartars in the future, I will charge into the battle alone."

After mounting his horse, General Li led a large group of troops and charged towards the city.

It was obvious that the defenders of Hetuala had not fought a serious battle for several years. Only the first Niulu was fully armed and formed a formation to defend for a while. Not many of the flagmen of the remaining two Niulu were even fully dressed in armor. It was not until the enemy approached them that they realized that they were not flagmen.

Although there was an inner city, it was not able to function properly. The main areas defended by the armored Tatars were the four outer city gates.

After several major garrisons were breached, most of the armored Tatars in Hetuala fled, and the rest knelt down and surrendered without caring who led the troops.

"Godfather, Godfather, we found some good prisoners."

When General Li was selecting new armor, Wu Sangui excitedly brought over four or five middle-aged men, who looked skinny and a bit cowardly.

"What's so good about these people?"

Li Hao asked.

"They are all bowsmiths, specializing in making Jiannu bows."

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(End of this chapter)