Under the gloomy sky, the cavalry's advance surged like a tidal wave. Nearly six thousand horsemen, viewed from above, formed a dense formation. The heavily armored vanguard resembled gigantic waves rising and crashing on the plain, possessing the power to flatten hills and crush everything in their path.

As the ironclad heavy cavalry roared forward, the rear half gradually detached, veering to the sides for an outflanking maneuver. These were the light cavalry split off from the armored ranks—the Iron Falcons. Although categorized as heavy cavalry, they were frequently deployed as the main force in the Western Xia campaigns, excelling in rapid assaults and swift maneuvers. During long-range raids, they were accompanied by an equal or doubled number of packhorses carrying their heavy armor. While these packhorses were not as elite as warhorses, the accompanying auxiliary soldiers could still use them as mounts once the heavy armor was unloaded, forming a light cavalry force.

Western Xia was inherently a tribal system with a rigid hierarchy. The Iron Falcons, as the elite among the elite, were typically assigned three auxiliary soldiers each. These auxiliaries were usually the knights' household servants or personal guards, chosen for their courage and loyalty, truly one in a hundred. Even with inferior steeds, they remained a formidable force.

This time, the Black Flag Army's demonstrated strength in breaking through Yanzhou was formidable. To quickly eliminate this renegade force emerging from the rear, Meileh led two thousand seven hundred Iron Falcons in a rapid advance, accompanied by over two thousand seven hundred light cavalry on packhorses. From the moment the battle preparations began, the auxiliary soldiers' leader, Changda, received orders to harass from the flanks and seize any opportunity. He led nearly three thousand light cavalry, circling to the side. The opposing formation appeared organized and fierce, but based on past experience, this arrogant army would still be swiftly broken apart by the heavy cavalry vanguard at a favorable exchange rate. His primary concern was the one or two thousand light cavalry already lined up on the enemy's rear flank.

The enemy rode steeds bred specifically for war, while his own mounts were slightly inferior. However, he had unwavering confidence that his knights' bravery would be second to none. Should the enemy show any weakness, his cavalry would not hesitate to charge.

He focused on the unfolding battle, inhaling and exhaling. The heavy cavalry, with their churning hooves, reached peak speed, closing within arrow-shot range. According to past experience, arrows would be flying, but they would have little effect on the Iron Falcons. Even knowing this, arrows would still come, and sometimes a few unfortunate heavy cavalry would fall.

But there were no arrows.

The next moment, the attack came like an avalanche!

With little warning, as the first fiery explosion erupted, countless blasts tore through the front line of the ironclad cavalry's advance. The deafening roar swept outwards, the waves of explosions silently rising and crashing against the Iron Falcons' tide. For a moment, they clashed, then both forces were engulfed in the maelstrom.

"Waaaaaah—"

Bang!

Boom—

Boom boom boom boom boom boom boom boom—

Squad Leader Nagu charged into the smoky, chaotic tide, then was violently thrown out the other side. The fallen armored warhorse pinned his body. Amid the pain and numbness, he looked up. On this side of the cataclysm, countless blossoms were blooming!

Gray-black barriers, smoke, surging shockwaves, a choking, arid smell—everything was rising and expanding. Projectiles fired from the front crashed into this barrier. Yellow light exploded in the black smoke and dust, accompanied by roaring crimson flames. Splintered debris flew everywhere, and the surging air currents rampaged wildly.

In Nagu's vision, the nearby explosions were earth-shattering. To an individual, the heavily armored Iron Falcons were like mobile mountains. Their stumbling and falling within this barrier were like avalanches. The impact on the enemy formation compressed the cavalry's front lines, making the spacing between warhorses tighter than usual. The rising black smoke and dust obscured the cavalry's vision. Many cavalrymen remained intact, but at high speed, they were either tripped by the corpses of warhorses or collided with panicked comrades, flying to the ground amidst the thunderous din.

The Loess Plateau had sparse vegetation to begin with, and although it was not yet as barren as it would become in later years, the power of the explosions stirred up billowing clouds of dust.

Amid such chaos, some of the warhorses panicked.

Vision blurred, and the chaotic, ominous air was suffocating. Comrades charged out of this black barrier, some running, some collapsing, and a few still accelerating forward. Nagu saw a heavy cavalryman emerge from the smoke, the knight appearing unharmed. The next moment, a projectile fired from the other side struck the charging knight with a thud. The warhorse continued to charge, but the armored half of the rider's body was blasted to pieces.

This is sorcery! A wave of fear washed over him. He tried to crawl out from under the horse, straining with all his might, when a runaway Iron Falcon emerged from behind, its hooves losing purchase, engulfing his vision like a small mountain...

"—Second volley of Elm Cannons, reload!"

"Faster, faster, faster—"

"Don't let them catch their breath—"

On the Black Flag Army's lines, the officers of the Special Operations Regiment were shouting hysterically. Behind them, two thousand cavalrymen began to move out. The atmosphere in the infantry ranks was grim. Hou Wu, Mao Yishan, and others awaited the moment to charge. Around them, soldiers from the Special Operations Regiment were rapidly assembling portable chevaux de frise. These defenses used a cast-iron rod as the central axis, with iron pikes inserted crosswise and then secured. Six pikes and a cast-iron rod formed a unit, which, once secured, were almost impossible to move on the ground. Even if flipped over, it retained the same shape. Once assembled, they were quickly pushed forward.

The great battle on the Dongzhiyuan Plateau had only just begun, but this opening strike was like a dream, a sight almost unprecedented in this era.

The first round of cannon fire directly crippled or stunned only about a hundred armored heavy cavalry, but the truly spectacular sight was the rising screen of smoke and dust. It obscured the Iron Falcons' charge, and the fallen cavalrymen became obstacles. The number of fallen cavalrymen continued to rise. The nearly one thousand cavalrymen engulfed in the front ranks were all affected to some degree. Some warhorses panicked, running wildly in the wrong direction—in this era, cavalry were trained to acclimate to the sounds of battle, including firecrackers and other noises, but never to this extent.

Some cavalrymen had their eardrums ruptured by the blasts, and the swirling smoke and dust blinded them. The warhorses' balance was also affected. For a time, the charging heavy cavalry either tripped over their fallen comrades, breaking their necks, or collided with other cavalrymen, throwing the riders to the ground with a crash. The remaining cavalry continued to charge after making minor adjustments, while the cannons continued to fire.

Many cavalrymen were continuously filtered out.

In the artillery positions, soldiers rapidly cleared the cannons, loading either hollow or solid cannonballs into the elm cannons. Iron cannons accounted for twenty or so, and they were loaded mostly with hollow cannonballs. These iron cannons varied in size and caliber. Some were monolithic, while others were divided into two sections, like the later-era breech-loading swivel guns. After a shot, the breech was removed, and another was rapidly loaded.

Lin Jingwei, the head of the Crafts and Technology Department in Xiaocang River, and Gongsun Sheng stood near the iron cannon battery, frowning as they watched the stray heavy cavalrymen wandering aimlessly, or struggling to get up. The area was filled with the deafening noise of shouts and cannon fire. Lin Jingwei watched and shouted to the side, "Do it like you practice, like you practice! Over there, what are you doing! Be careful with that cannonball, or you'll blow yourself to hell—"

Amidst the bangs, explosive packs flew into the sky, some exploding in the midst of the horse herd, others detonating later. Gongsun Sheng carefully observed the power of the explosions.

Since Ning Yi came to the Wu Dynasty, nearly nine years had passed. Ning Yi had consciously been making improvements to gunpowder almost from the beginning. In a sense, the ancient Chinese black powder and modern high explosives were two different concepts. Black powder had limited room for improvement, and to develop modern explosives, nitroglycerin required a strong foundation in chemistry.

There were bottlenecks, but there were also compromises. The three basic compounds for making nitroglycerin - sulfuric acid, had already been discovered by alchemists in ancient times. Nitric acid was temporarily unavailable, but its raw materials were abundant in the Wu Dynasty. In this era, saltpeter was mainly used by wealthy families to make ice in the summer. Dry distillation of saltpeter, or reaction with sulfuric acid and hydrolysis, could produce nitric acid. As for glycerin, it could be separated by reacting sulfuric acid with animal and vegetable oils, then reacting with soda or lime. Soap could even be made as a byproduct.

For Ning Yi, these principles were not unfamiliar, but finding suitable proportions and manufacturing methods in this era was a huge challenge. Fortunately, his expertise was in personnel management and operations, not chemistry. After providing his craftsmen with basic chemical knowledge, these tasks could be delegated. As Gongsun Sheng and others joined, and the number of craftsmen increased, his initial chemical knowledge could no longer keep up with the progress of the workshops.

In the later stages of the explosives workshop's development, practical results far exceeded theoretical knowledge. The craftsmen, armed with basic chemical knowledge, might not become Mendeleevs, but under the modern research system that emphasized efficiency, record-keeping, and comparison, the quality of the gunpowder they produced became increasingly refined. After sulfuric acid and nitric acid could be prepared, materials such as nitrocellulose began to appear in the workshops. After Gongsun Sheng and others mixed various messy things, the explosive power of the gunpowder became quite considerable, enough to be decisively used on the battlefield.

Nitroglycerin also had a certain foundation for preparation at this time, but Ning Yi did not rashly develop it. Firstly, because resources were indeed scarce after the rebellion, raising pigs in later generations was all about fatty meat, but raising pigs in this era was all about lean meat. Using animal and vegetable fats to make glycerin was too extravagant and not cost-effective. Secondly, there was still a long way to go from the invention of nitroglycerin to its relatively safe use. Ning Yi did not dare to mess around until the craftsmen in the workshop understood diatomaceous earth. For this expedition, everything that could be mobilized in Xiaocang River had been used.

Several types of delay fuses made in the workshop, hand-made hollow shells, including the large-yield explosive packs that Ning Yi had been requesting from the beginning, and extremely extravagant iron launch tubes--these cylinders for launching explosive packs of extremely large caliber were called flying thunderbolts in later generations.

During the Liberation War period, explosive packs launched with oil drums were far more powerful than ordinary artillery shells. The modern explosives packed inside could sweep an area of ​​more than twenty meters, with people and animals wiped out. Because they were killed by the shock wave, there were no wounds on their bodies when they died, so they were also called "conscienceless cannons".

The explosive packs launched at this time would naturally not have such power, but after exploding on the ground, the shock wave expanded to a radius of three or four meters, and the momentum and air waves were amazing. In the billowing smoke and dust, warhorses nearby would be thrown away by the huge impact and crash into their companions.

"The world is changing..."

The clouds in the sky dispersed, and Gongsun Sheng looked at the small number of heavy cavalry charging over and said a word, then reached out and picked up the large iron hammer on the ground. He was dressed in a Taoist robe, looking ethereal, but he actually had a place in the Liangshan bandit gang, and he was quite powerful himself. At this time, he dragged the hammer and rushed forward. A heavy cavalryman was rushing towards him. The two met in the blink of an eye. The Taoist took advantage of the momentum and suddenly swung the heavy hammer, hitting the warhorse's head from bottom to top with a terrifying bang. The entire warhorse wailed and its four hooves flew up, smashing to the ground, blood and dust rolling.

He took the hammer and walked towards another cavalryman who was charging over. Some infantry also rushed over. After knocking the cavalryman to the ground, Gongsun Sheng shouted to the rear: "Hurry up—"

Of the heavy cavalry who had charged over from the opposite side, survived passing through the explosion zone, and successfully reached the front line, only one-third remained. Some of the heavy cavalry were still wandering confusedly in the smoke, trying to change horses because the knights or warhorses were damaged. More than twenty iron chevaux de frise were carried by soldiers and waited in front of them, followed by horse-chopping swords, spears and iron hammers. The soldiers waiting here were also greatly shocked in their ears. There was almost no sound in their ears. The iron cavalry lost some speed due to the fierce artillery fire, but still came over like a landslide. The iron-clad heavy cavalry crashed into the chevaux de frise, breaking the chevaux de frise or pushing it along the ground. More heavy cavalry came over, they waved horse-chopping swords and spears to meet them, and the hammer soldiers waved heavy sledgehammers and slammed them hard on the warhorses' or knights' armor. Blood flowed out from the gaps in the armor.

At this time, the middle formation of the Iron Falcons had also passed through the huge wall of smoke and dust. They were relatively cautious and slowed down a bit, and more of them detoured around the sides of the smoke and dust. As the artillery fire weakened, the rising black smoke cleared the view somewhat, and Meileh could roughly see the situation ahead.

In this era, ordinary armies would collapse with a loss of only 10%, but the Iron Falcons were not such weak chickens. In many cases, they did not hesitate to sacrifice in exchange for victory, but the important thing was that the sacrifice could be exchanged for victory.

At this time, the great battle had only just begun. In one charge, the front line passed through, and the middle formation hesitated slightly. At this time, they had already entered the range of arrow fire. They still wanted to charge forward, but further ahead, that army was like a giant beast, devouring one-third of the Iron Falcon army. Before this, no remote confrontation could threaten the Iron Falcons so much.

The middle formation was still charging. Things happened so fast that they didn't have time to collapse. The soldiers in the formation only felt confused. The more rational officers looked back at the huge flag. Meileh was also leading his troops in a mad dash—he originally wanted to rescue or support the front line that was caught in the explosion. At this time, even he, who had experienced many battles, had a blank mind.

The entire front line had almost completely lost its combat power—it was over.

But the morale was not lost, and it seemed that they could still fight if they charged over. To continue charging, or not to charge, that is the question.

In this moment...he thought of his mother...

************

Few people noticed that the entire artillery position had now fallen silent...