Tibet

"Awoo--"

The elephants cried one after another, and finally rushed out of the woods. The overwhelming elephants were followed by 30,000 short, dark-skinned Linyi soldiers.

The elephants were getting closer and closer, less than three miles away from the Tang army. Zhang Boyi shouted: "Ignite! Shoot!"

The Tang army ignited the kerosene. Five hundred barrels of kerosene were ignited and immediately burned fiercely, with red flames rising and thick smoke billowing.

Then four thousand heavy crossbowmen fired together, and two thousand arrows were shot out, exploding in the wilderness. The Jiaozhou people also had experience in dealing with elephants, that is, beating gongs and drums to intimidate. Elephants are afraid of light and noise, especially strong noises.

Sure enough, in the fierce explosion in front, the elephants began to slow down, and the hundreds of elephants in front began to turn around, but the elephants behind continued to run forward.

Then, the second, third, and fourth rounds of arrows and thunder exploded violently. Tens of thousands of elephants that had already run to a mile away from the Tang army finally collapsed completely and rushed back.

Zhang Boyi shouted: "Cavalry attack!"

Five thousand cavalry rushed out and ran behind the elephants, constantly shooting at the elephants with explosive arrows. The explosion and pain of the explosive arrows drove the elephants to run more frantically.

Elephant warfare has always been a double-edged sword. If it is well controlled, it can defeat the enemy. For example, Lu Zhenla used 30,000 elephants to defeat Shui Zhenla. If it is not driven well, or if it is broken by the enemy, the elephants will turn around and come back, which will be a tragic backlash.

The 30,000 Linyi troops behind were caught off guard, and countless were trampled and hit to death by the crazy elephants rushing back.

The Tang cavalry and infantry chased and killed all the way behind, killing the soldiers of Linyi State, leaving corpses all over the ground, blood flowing like a river, and countless surrendered.

This time, the Tang army did not massacre the prisoners of war. These prisoners of war could be used to farm. The prisoners of war in the south were different from the northern nomads. The northern nomads were fierce and undisciplined. They would kill and retaliate as soon as they had the chance.

So the best way to deal with the northern nomads was to kill them all and leave no prisoners.

Although the southern prisoners of war did not remember the favor and did not understand education, they would still retaliate once you were weak, but they had an advantage, that is, they were more servile. Once you were stronger than them, they would be honest and obedient. As long as they were given a bite of food, they would never dare to rebel. Dozens of soldiers could manage thousands of people. It was best to use them to farm.

Five thousand cavalrymen cut off the retreat of the Linyi army, and all 30,000 troops surrendered. They were also frightened by the firearms of the Tang army.

The Tang army began to clean up the battlefield, and many elephants took the opportunity to escape into the primeval forest, but more than 4,000 elephants were left. They had lived with humans since childhood and were no longer used to the forest.

Thousands of bodies that were trampled to death were also cleared out, but the king of Linyi was gone.

Finally, two of the king of Linyi's personal soldiers led the Tang soldiers to a muddy ground, gently pushed away a layer of loose soil, and revealed a man who was trampled by an elephant. It turned out that this was the king of Linyi.

The soldiers found the golden crown and scepter that were also trampled and put them in a bag. The king's body was also transported away and piled up with other soldiers' bodies. They were poured with kerosene and burned to ashes.

The Tang army did not stay on the battlefield for long. Chen Boyi left two thousand people to guard the prisoners of war and led the army to attack Champa.

Champa had already heard the news and the city gates were closed. The one thousand soldiers who stayed behind looked at the Tang army in horror and fled back to the city.

There were still hundreds of Linyi soldiers who opened the city gates and surrendered to the Tang army.

The Tang army rushed into the city and occupied the capital of Linyi, but soon the Tang army discovered something unusual. The nobles in the city were gone and the treasury was empty.

A palace steward was dragged to Zhang Boyi, who knelt down and begged, "They all ran away, especially a dozen princes who divided up the wealth in the treasury and fled south."

"When did they run away?" Zhang Boyi asked.

"They ran away in the morning!"

Zhang Boyi calculated in his mind, it was only half a day.

He turned back and said to the general Wei Yulin, "General Wei can lead 5,000 cavalry to chase them. They can't run far. All noble men will be killed!"

"Yes!"

Five thousand cavalry rushed out of the south city and chased south.

The order Zhang Boyi received was to destroy the country, to completely destroy the Linyi Kingdom, but Zhang Boyi also knew that it was not easy to destroy a country. It was easy to conquer the lower-class people, but it was difficult to conquer the middle and upper classes, and there was also the text and history of the Linyi Kingdom.

Zhang Boyi made up his mind. If it really didn't work, he would conquer them with knives and fire, kill their flesh, burn their texts, and he, Zhang Boyi, would be the evil man.

The next morning, the Tang cavalry returned, escorting long ox carts filled with wealth and dishevelled, crying women. Zhang Boyi sighed in his heart, there was nothing he could do, it was a blessing that the soldiers did not loot and massacre the city.

After a short three-day rest, the Tang army continued to move south. Zhang Boyi sent 2,000 cavalry to escort more than 20,000 prisoners of war back to Jiaozhou to reclaim paddy fields, and left 2,000 soldiers to guard Champa.

The army still divided into two groups and moved south, with the goal of the Zhenla River Delta.

The Zhenla River Delta is now the Mekong River Delta, where there are dense water networks, fertile land, and sufficient light and heat all year round. It is the most suitable place to grow rice.

Originally, this was the territory of Water Zhenla, but the land and sea confrontation between the two Zhenlas caused Water Zhenla to suffer heavy losses. Linyi and Chola jointly sent troops to fight against the Zhenla army, causing heavy casualties. A large number of Zhenla nobles were slaughtered before they could escape. Linyi plundered a large amount of wealth. The Queen of Water Zhenla fled to the old capital of Paratiba with a small number of troops for the final resistance.

The soldiers of Chola and Linyi looked very powerful, because they encountered weaker soldiers of Zhenla. However, once they came to the siege, the nature of the soldiers of Chola and Linyi was exposed.

Without siege weapons, they used big trees to hit the city gates, but when the boiling oil and huge rocks from the top of the city fell, the siege soldiers scattered in panic. After several times, the soldiers of Chola and Linyi did not want to attack the city anymore. They did not care about Paratiba. The soldiers began to plunder and enslave the people of Zhenla everywhere and began to enjoy the scenery of the occupiers.

At this time, the commander of the Linyi army, the eldest prince Hu Lin, received the news that the Tang army was coming from Jiaozhou and the Linyi Kingdom was in danger.

This news shocked Hu Lin and he immediately asked for help from the Chola Kingdom. As long as the Chola army was willing to follow him to the north to rescue Champa, Hu Lin was willing to donate the wealth of the national treasury to the Chola Kingdom.

With such a good thing, how could the commander Rajinder not agree? Rajinder did not take the Tang army seriously at all. He immediately led 10,000 naval forces and hundreds of large ships and marched northward.

In the morning, the Tang army's fleet was sailing on the sea. The biggest feature of the Linyi Kingdom is its narrowness and length. Although it is not large in area, it is really narrow and long. It is two thousand miles from Champa to the city of Bharati.

Although there was a southeast wind, the Tang army warships all had paddle wheels. Dozens of soldiers stepped on the paddle wheels to drive the ships south.

Suddenly, a lookout shouted on the mast: "There is a fleet ahead!"

Li Chengshi walked to the bow, holding a telescope and looking into the distance, and saw countless black spots dozens of miles away.

They were all very experienced. From the distance and the size of the black spots, they could judge the size of the enemy's ships. They were all large ships with a capacity of more than 3,000 stones, and there were dozens of them. There was no doubt that it must be the navy of the Chola Kingdom.

Li Chengshi felt a little excited. He hadn't fought a naval battle for a long time. He immediately ordered: "Order the whole army to prepare for battle!"

The commander-in-chief raised a big red battle flag on the ship, and the warships behind followed suit. This was a sign of battle, and all the soldiers were excited.

Li Chengshi ordered again: "Order the left army to go south and cut off the enemy's retreat!"

After the flag was hung, General Deng Feng led more than 30 battlefield ships to leave the fleet and head east. They were going south to cut off the enemy's retreat.

Then the fleet changed its formation from a long snake formation to a "品" formation, that is, a main and two wings formation.

Du Huan looked at the enemy's warships and said to Li Chengshi in a deep voice: "The enemy's warships are good at fire attacks. It is best not to get close. It is recommended to sink the enemy from a distance!"

This sentence reminded Li Chengshi, and he immediately ordered: "Fight at a long distance, use arrow mines and explosive arrows to deal with the enemy!"