Chapter 637: Troubles after the War (Please vote and subscribe)
The battle was basically over at around seven in the morning. Only some herdsmen who were unwilling to leave easily or stayed in the distance to monitor the Huben Guards were still wandering around. They also wanted to know what the purpose of the Han tribe's sudden attack on this grazing land was. Was it for long-term occupation? Or was it the same as the rules of the grassland, grabbing a wave and running away?
Xue Tu ignored them. The Huben Guards now had no professional cavalry and could not do anything to them. He had to let the temporary cavalry who had just been responsible for robbing corpses patrol the periphery, and then let the other infantry hurry up to clean up the battlefield, clear the captured and the damage.
Wei Sima Xue Dongliang had organized the sailors on the ship to start working. The Huben Guards used more than 30 two-masted sailing boats for this expedition, each with two landing boats, totaling more than 70 boats. In addition to landing, these more than 70 boats can also be used to build temporary floating bridges or piers, which is exactly the case at this time.
More than 70 small boats were divided into three groups, each group of more than 20 boats were tightly lined up, connected with ropes, and covered with wooden boards. Two wooden stakes were driven into the end close to the lake shore, and the other end was directly connected to the cargo ship parked in the deep water.
The clerks accompanying the army were standing at the bridgehead at this moment, counting the number of prisoners while forcing them onto the big ship.
After a while, Xue Dongliang, who was in charge of the logistics of the entire Tiger Guard, found Xue Tu and said with some embarrassment.
"Old butcher, this time we seized more than 100,000 heads of livestock, captured more than 3,000 people, and more than 1,000 dead livestock. What do you think we should do now?"
Xue Tu was shocked and his eyes widened, "So many?!"
"Yes, it's a lot, but not too many. After coming to the grassland, I also studied the lifestyles of the grassland people. A herdsman household has six or seven people. To feed such a large family, the required livestock, cattle, horses, and sheep, add up to at least 100 heads. Of course, the proportion of sheep is relatively large, and large livestock such as cattle and horses does not exceed two or three tenths.
There are more than 6,000 young and strong households in this grazing area. If each household has 100 heads of livestock, that means more than 600,000. We have only seized 100,000, which is only one-sixth. Most of them were let go by the enemies, and we could not stop them. The result can only be said to be mediocre." Xue Dongliang spread his hands helplessly and said.
However, after hearing this explanation, Xue Tu was still amazed. He felt that the Tiger Guards did not fully exert their advantages in this battle, and even fought a bit cowardly. How could there be such a large amount of spoils? He still couldn't believe it.
"I say, Old Xue, you didn't count wrong, right? There are really so many. Why do I feel that the battle is not going well?" Xue Tu frowned and asked.
Xue Dongliang also sank his face, sighed and spread his hands again and said, "Your feeling is right. The battle was indeed not very good this time, but the leader chose a good time. We picked up a big bargain."
Xue Tu thought about it for a while and immediately came to his senses.
"You mean, all these spoils we seized were picked up for free?"
"Yes, you can say that." Xue Dongliang nodded and confirmed, and then he explained again.
"This is Maodun's lair, but he is not here now. He also took away most of the young and strong men in the camp to rob our caravan, but these young and strong women, children and most of the livestock were not taken away, and they are still in this camp.
When we were fighting just now, the families with male owners left at home almost immediately released all the livestock, and then let their women and children retreat first. They came over to block for a while, and then immediately withdrew.
So in the end, the ones who did not escape and were stopped by us were basically those families whose young and strong men followed Maodun out. Those herdsmen women had to take care of the children and drive the livestock, and some even wanted to pack up their things at home. They had no time to run and were caught by our soldiers. Don't you think this is like picking up something for nothing? ?
The same is true for those livestock. Most of them were left unattended and then captured by us. Some were even placed in pens waiting for us to take them. The enemy was in such a hurry that they could not even take care of their own women, children and livestock, so how could they have time to take care of other people's livestock? But even so, they still took away a lot of them.
You have to know that there are only 40% to 50% of the families with male owners at home, which is less than half of all the young and strong households. It stands to reason that we should at least capture half of the more than 600,000 livestock, but now there are only a little over 100,000, which is far from half. "
Xue Tu nodded after listening. This is similar to what he thought. This time it is not that the Tiger Guards fought so well, but they really picked up a big bargain for nothing. But he immediately asked again.
"What about the war losses? How many casualties did we suffer this time?"
"Casualties, nearly 300 people." Xue Dongliang heard the question and flipped through the small notebook in his hand and said.
Xue Tu was shocked again this time, "So many?!"
"Yes, so far in this battle, our army has suffered a total of 289 casualties, including 43 deaths, 29 serious injuries, and the rest are lightly injured." Xue Dongliang held the small notebook and read for a while, then turned his head and scanned the battlefield, and said again, "This number may increase."
"It will increase? How is it possible? The enemy has been driven away, how can it increase? Also, the soldiers' armor is so good, how can there be so many wounded?" Xue Tu asked angrily.
Xue Dongliang smiled bitterly, patted the notebook in his hand, and handed it to Xue Tu, "Look for yourself."
Xue Tu took it immediately, first looked at Xue Dongliang suspiciously, and found that the other party was still motioning for him to look for himself, so he opened the notebook and started reading.
I saw a clear and detailed record of the casualties on it, how many were dragged to death by the enemy's lasso, which unit they were from, what their names were, and there were only more than 20 people. He also knew this matter, which was still within his acceptance range, but the record below made him angry.
A soldier from a certain unit and a certain flag was gored to death by a cow while capturing livestock .
Another soldier was kicked in the head by a horse
and died on the spot. And there were not just one such case, but more than ten people in total, which made Xue Tu extremely upset.
The following minor injury records were even more ridiculous. Except for a few injuries in battle, most of the minor injury records were bites.
"What's the matter with these bites? You're not going to tell me that they were bitten by those herdsmen women?" Xue Tu slapped the notebook in his hand and questioned.
Xue Dongliang immediately shook his head helplessly, "They really don't have that ability, but the sheepdogs they raise can."
"Sheepdog?!" Xue Tu was shocked again.
"Yes, when we were receiving livestock and capturing prisoners, many of our soldiers were bitten by the sheepdogs raised by local herdsmen. Our soldiers' armor is indeed excellent, but there is no armor on their calves and elbows. Most of the bites were concentrated on the limbs. I just saw that there are more than 100 people so far, and the number may still be increasing.
The herdsmen have dogs in every household, and there are more than one. The number of dogs is very large. These animals cannot speak human language and are particularly protective of their owners. Their usual task is to help their owners graze. Now that we are going to receive livestock, we naturally become the target of these animals' attacks." Xue Dongliang explained again.
Xue Tu didn't say anything after listening, but just secretly sucked his teeth. What is this special brew called?
Xue Dongliang immediately said, "This is the situation now. I came to you to discuss with you how to deal with these captured and wounded people?"
How to deal with it was also a headache for Xue Tu. Apart from other things, the livestock alone was a big problem. That was 100,000 living creatures.
After turning back and forth a few times, Xue Tu suddenly asked, "You just said that large livestock such as cattle and horses only account for 20% to 30% of all livestock? Is that right?"
Xue Dongliang nodded, "That's right, among these livestock, only more than 20,000 are cattle and horses, and the remaining 80,000 are sheep. Although cattle and horses are more important, we can't just give up sheep. More than 80,000 sheep are not a small number."
Xue Tu frowned, held his chin with his hand and thought carefully, and after a while he put forward his own opinion.
"My suggestion is to leave these livestock behind. It would be a shame if so many cattle, horses and sheep were killed and thrown into the lake.
Otherwise, don't load the captives onto the boat. We pick out the women with children and use their children to threaten them to help us drive the livestock. The boat will be mainly used to carry the wounded, the dead animals, and a small number of captives. The rest of the uninjured infantry will be responsible for walking back to the camp by land with the livestock and captives. What do you think?"
Xue Dongliang thought about it for a moment and nodded. "This is a good idea. I have no objection. But if we can't board the ship and evacuate as soon as possible, we must write a letter to the leader immediately to prevent our actions from disrupting the leader's plan."
"Of course, but you still have to write the letter, and I'll just sign and seal it." When Xue Tu heard that he had to write, he quickly declined.
"Okay, okay, I'll write it. You can arrange the following things. It's late spring and early summer now. The temperature is high during the day. If you still need those dead horses and dogs, you should deal with them as soon as possible. Leave some as rations and load the rest on the ship. If you can't take them away, dig a pit on the spot and bury them." Xue Dongliang reminded.
"Yes, how can you not want to? That's all meat. The soldiers can't eat much even if they want to eat." Xue Tu said nervously. There was no way. He had to go through the hard times. It was the first time he saw so much meat. It was right in front of his mouth. He couldn't throw it away.
Soon, according to Xue Tu's latest order, the entire Huben Guard took action. All the captives and livestock were gathered by the lake, and then handed over to Xue Dongliang to register the captives, pick out the women with children, and then detain their children. These women were forced to look after the herds for the Han tribe, and their children were pressed onto the boat by the Huben Guard soldiers.
The women cried, but faced with the ferocious Han tribal soldiers, they had no intention of resisting, because anyone who dared to resist would not be caught here at all, and would have died when they were captured.
The thousands of tents in the grazing area had all been burned to ashes, the livestock had run away, and the captives had been almost screened. Most of the
more than 3,000 captives were women and children. There were only 500 to 600 men who surrendered and were captured, and most of them were old and weak. The real young and strong either died in battle or ran away, and there were very few who were actually captured.
Xue Dongliang selected 1,000 women with children to temporarily manage 100,000 livestock, with an average of about 100 heads per person, which was basically the same as the number they grazed daily. Xue Tu sent an archer warrior to each woman to watch them, so as to achieve one-on-one surveillance and one-man-hundred grazing. In addition, with the cooperation of these women, the surviving sheepdogs also became much more honest, and unwillingly became the spoils of the Tiger Guards.
The archers were responsible for monitoring the captives and livestock, and the remaining warriors were not idle either. They first moved the remains of the warriors and the wounded onto the boat, and the logistics soldiers treated their wounds. Then they took the killed horses and a small number of livestock, as well as a large number of sheepdogs, to the lakeside and began the open-air slaughter.
Fortunately, these warriors had long-term hunting experience before joining the army, and they were very good at dealing with the corpses of wild animals. There were many people who could do this job, so they took turns to do it. Some were responsible for standing guard to prevent the enemy from suddenly coming back, and the other part was slaughtering by the lake. Because they were in the enemy's lair, they did not dare to stay for long, so they worked very quickly, but even so, they were busy until noon to finish all the cleaning.
All the skins that were peeled off were moved to the boat and first salted for preservation. Some of the remaining meat was sent to the boat and taken away, and some was left to the warriors of the Tiger Guard as a side dish for the next few days.
At about two o'clock in the afternoon, the fleet transported these things to the grassland new city of the Han tribe. However, under the command of Xue Tu, fifteen two-masted sailboats were left to sail slowly along the lakeshore, following the pace of the Huben Guards along the way, mainly responsible for monitoring the front and back. In addition, the Huben Guards did not have vehicles for this expedition, and the various supplies accompanying the army could only be transported by these ships.
On the other side of Maodun's old nest, the herdsmen who had escaped were also hesitating whether to go back. The army of the Han tribe left, but their homes were gone. All the yurts and tents were burned down. Except for their families and livestock, they had almost nothing, which meant that from today on, they would have to live the most difficult life again.
Without tents, they could only sleep in the open air. Without cooking utensils and containers, they had to give up cheese and live on barbecue every day. They didn't dare to eat too much. More importantly, they didn't know whether the leader had grabbed the white salt. If there was no salt, they would really have to take risks.
That's right, hard times are impossible. If they lose their things, they can just go find some other small tribes to rob. Although they were defeated by the Han tribe this time, they still have horses and warriors. The most important thing now is to find their leader and join the leader's army.
(End of this chapter)
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