The 250,000 Turkic army set up a camp on the grassland north of Zihe River. The endless tent stretched for dozens of miles. Chuluo Khan originally planned to straverse the Zihe Great Wall in one go, but the losses of the vanguard cavalry made him calm down a little. Since the Sui army was fully prepared for defense, he could not act too rush and needed to fight steadily.

On the one hand, he ordered the army to rest for a day, and on the other hand, he ordered Kang Shuolli to continue to lead 30,000 troops to crack the Sui army's thorn formation and horse trap. The solution was very simple. The nomadic people of the grassland fought against the Central Plains army since the Han Dynasty. The thorns of the Central Plains army caused them huge losses, but they finally thought of a solution.

Every summer and autumn, the grassland people have to start preparing for winter. They harvest a lot of grass, dry it, and then tie it up and store it. In winter, they can spend the winter for cattle and sheep. Almost every tribe has a large amount of hay. These hays are tied up in bunches, but spread them out enough to cover a radius of more than ten miles. This southern Turkic expedition also brought a large amount of hay. They were worried that the war horses lacked fodder after entering the Central Plains.

That night, tens of thousands of troops started to lay a hay mat four miles long and two miles wide on the north bank of Zihe River, so that it could break the thorn formation and horse traps of the Northern Sui army.

In the night, people were shaking on the north bank of the Zihe River. I don’t know how many people were busy. At this time, a Sui army scout rushed to the city and climbed the ladder to the city. Zhang Zhenqiu asked, “What’s the situation?”

"Report to General, the enemy is paving the ground with the hay he carried, and it has almost paved a large area of ​​grass, which is very spectacular."

Zhang Zhenqiu couldn't help but sneer and asked again: "Have they sprinkled water?"

"Not yet, I guess it will start sprinkling water when I reach the river."

Sprinkling water on the hay mat is an indispensable part of it, to prevent the opponent from igniting the hay mat, which will cause serious consequences to the attacking soldiers.

Zhang Zhenqiu immediately ordered: "Bring ten soldiers who have fallen into the formation!"

The army of the army is a suicide squad, usually composed of death row prisoners, giving them a chance to survive. Currently, there are 500 soldiers of the army of the army of the Northern Sui army, all selected from the death row prisoners of each county. Currently, there are ten soldiers of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of the army of

After a moment, ten men in shackles were brought up. Zhang Zhenqiu said to them: "Now is your chance to survive. Tens of thousands of Turkic soldiers are laying straw mats on the other side of the Zihe River. I don't care what you use. As long as you light the straw mat, I will pardon your death sentence and let you go home!"

Most of the thirty death row prisoners were guilty of serious crimes and were preparing to be sentenced to death last fall. However, because the war with the Turks was about to begin, they were able to get a glimmer of hope. When everyone received the task, they were excited and bowed to agree together, "I am willing to serve the general!"

The leading death row prisoner was a Jiangyang thief in Xuzhou, named Han Qianhui. He led five subordinates to steal the official warehouses of four counties in a row, causing the official warehouse to lose thousands of taels of gold. Last summer, when he was preparing to steal the official government in Pengcheng County at night, he was betrayed by his subordinates and fell into the hands of the government. He was sentenced to death and was sentenced to death. After escorting Zhongdu Qiu, he was executed.

Just as the army was recruiting the camp, he signed up. Although the camp was extremely likely to die, there was a glimmer of hope, so death row prisoners were willing to try it, but not everyone could successfully apply for the recruitment. Only those with strong and flexible minds would be selected. Han Qianhui was selected with the skills of a great thief.

He had strong leadership skills, so he was appointed as the leader of ten death row prisoners by Zhang Zhenqiu. At this time, Han Qianhui stepped forward and said, "Can the general change us to the Turkic army so that we can get close to the attack."

Zhang Zhenqiu nodded. This idea was good. He immediately ordered the soldiers to get ten Turkic soldiers, and gave them a pot of wine and a piece of mutton sauce to each of them, and ordered people to unshackle them.

Han Qianhui and ten people were full and drunk, and replaced them with Turkic soldiers. They wrapped the items that led to the fire in layers with oil cloth, tied them to their bodies with meat, and then climbed down the ladder.

Zhang Zhenqiu kept watching their figures disappear into the night. Niu Jun, the deputy general next to him, said worriedly: "Actually, we can just go to our own scouts. These people are unreliable. What should we do if we take the opportunity to escape?"

"Don't worry! This is their chance to eliminate sins. If they escape, they will never be able to be human in their lifetime."

Zhang Zhenqiu smiled and said, "This death row prisoner named Han is a capable person. If he is really successful, I would like to use him."

"I hope they can succeed!"

Everyone looked towards Zihe, but I wonder if these death row prisoners would disappoint them.

There are mountains on both sides of Zihe Great Wall Pass. The pass is located between two mountains and looks like a trumpet. Zihe flows out of the valley along the east mountain, and then turns to the west, just flowing across from the front of the trumpet, flowing to the west to the Yellow River in the west, becoming a natural barrier to the Zihe Great Wall.

There are no caltrops and horse pits on the south bank of Zishui. Zishui is about thirty feet wide, but it is much shallower than they expected, only reaching the thighs. Ten death row prisoners lie by the river to peek at the opposite bank. The water on the other side of the bank was full of Turkic soldiers. Each of them held a bow and arrow and spear in their hands, looking out to the city of Guancheng in the distance. These were a thousand Turkic soldiers responsible for warning. They took a detour from a distance and avoided the caltrops and horse pits on the shore that were unprepared for defense.

Han Qianhui is the leader of ten soldiers who were trapped in the formation. He looked at the other side for a moment and said to other subordinates: "There are too many people who go there and you will miss it. I will dive over by myself. You can run east to cover me later. Be careful not to be shot by the Turkic arrows."

The other nine people nodded silently. Although they felt a little disappointed, at the critical moment of life and death, no one was willing to follow Han Qian back and take the risk of his death.

Han Qianhui didn't even take off his clothes, so he quickly dived into the water. The water flowed rapidly, but the water flowed smoothly at the bottom of the water. He snorted silently towards the opposite shore like a crocodile. After a moment, he had approached the other shore, only a few steps away from the last Turkic soldier.

At this moment, nine companions suddenly stood up and ran quickly towards the mountains east. They were immediately discovered by Turkic soldiers on the other side. The Turkic soldiers were in a stir. More than a hundred soldiers jumped into the water and chased them. More soldiers shot arrows on the other side.

Han Qianhui is worthy of being a great thief in the Yangtze River. He took advantage of the attention of the last Turkic soldier being attracted by the situation in the east and climbed silently to the shore and crawled forward little by little.

Han Qianhui was under great pressure. On the one hand, he could not be discovered by Turkic soldiers, but on the other hand, he had to fumble forward carefully to avoid being stabbed by the caltrops on the ground. The Sui army sowed more than 100,000 poisoned caltrops on the grass on the north bank of the Zihe River. If he was not careful, he would be stabbed by the caltrops. How many pits he dug were buried in the horses, even the Sui army could not count.

After climbing out more than a hundred steps, Han Qianhui jumped into the thick hay mat just laid by Turkic soldiers. Thousands of Turkic soldiers were busy laying the last section of the straw mat. After laying the straw mat, they would sprinkle water on the straw mat to prevent Sui soldiers from shooting into the straw mat with rockets.

Han Qianhui was wearing the same Turkic military uniform. He could not tell that he was a hidden spy in the night. He also lowered his head and pretended to lay a bunch of straw, but he had already taken out the scythe densely wrapped in oil cloth from his arms and tore off the oil cloth. He did not hesitate to do it. With two clicks, a ball of flame appeared in his hands.

A ball of flame at night was particularly eye-catching. Someone shouted not far away from him immediately, and then several black shadows rushed towards him, but at this time, Han Qianhui had already lit the grass mat beside him and threw the burning scythe southward.

A Turkic soldier threw him down. The burning flames blocked the others from approaching. There were screams everywhere. Countless Turkic soldiers rushed towards this side, desperately slapping the rapidly spreading fire, but the flames burned too violently on the hay, especially where the scythe landed, the flames had swallowed up a large area of ​​hay, and only a dozen people were slapping it, and the fire began to lose control.

Han Qianhui pierced the heart of the Turkic soldiers on him with a dagger, turned over and ran to the river regardless of everything. He was a thief in the river and had always had the habit of leaving a way out for himself.

All the caltrops and trapped pits were cleared from the grass he crawled over. He kept bent down and running, arrows kept shooting past his head and beside him. Just as he jumped into the water, a severe pain in his left shoulder, and an arrow shot his shoulder.

‘Bang!’ Han Qianhui fell heavily into the water, stood unsteadily, was washed down by the water flow, and his body quickly disappeared into the turbulent river water.

At this time, the north bank of the purple water was filled with smoke and flames soaring into the sky. The newly laid grass mat had become a hell on earth. On the grass mat several miles long, countless Turkic soldiers were running north desperately, and people kept screaming and falling into the fire.

The fire caused more than 3,000 people to die in the sea of ​​fire, defeating the Turkic army's plan to destroy the thorny formation, and also seriously undermining the morale of the Turkic army.

After dawn, Han Qianhui covered his shoulders with an arrow wound and stumbled back to the Zihe Great Wall Pass.

...
Chapter completed!