The Sun and the Lion

The raiding Afghan horsemen were already at a disadvantage. The Shah's friends had excellent armor and it was difficult to break through the defenses. In terms of combat skills, the Safavid cavalry is not inferior to these tribal horsemen. Not to mention the quality gap of the war horse under the crotch.

Coupled with the spontaneous cooperation of the Safavid cavalry in combat, the already irreparable gap in combat power further widened. Many riders saw that the situation was not good and left the battlefield either actively or passively, dead or alive. The initiative on the battlefield no longer belongs to these Afghans.

Naturally, Ismail's conspicuous behavior of rushing left and right on the battlefield and defeating many troops could not escape the leader's sight. He suddenly felt that something was wrong: So brave, whose general is this?

He immediately commanded several archers to launch a sneak attack. Unfortunately, whether due to poor shooting skills or Huda's favor, the arrows failed to injure Ismail, but revealed his position to him.

Ismail looked at the direction where the arrows came from, locked the target, and the first arrow hit one of them in the abdomen. The archer who was shot dropped his bow, clutching his stomach in pain and fell off his horse.

He fired several more arrows and killed several more people. Before the leader could react, Ismail and several soldiers rushed in front of him. Soon, another Afghan's head was cut off.

The leader dodged this unexpected blow. He relied on his subordinates to block the knife. He reacted and tried to draw the knife to resist. However, with just one blow, he was forced to loosen his grip on the weapon and let it fall to the ground. The dull sound of collision with the earth.

However, Ismail discovered something special about the leader and did not kill him. He stabbed the leader's horse in the crotch with a knife. The sudden injury frightened the horse. The Afghan could not control it at all. After struggling for a few seconds, he was thrown down. Get off the horse.

Ahem... He struggled to get up, raised his head and looked around, only to find that he was surrounded. Two fully armed soldiers dismounted and walked towards him, without giving him any chance to resist, with his hands tied behind his back. Then he was pinned to the ground, and only his head was forcibly pulled up to look up at Ismail.

This group of officers and soldiers is not a small group of scouts at all, but the main force or vanguard of a large group of elite soldiers. It is most likely the reinforcements of the official army. At this time, the leader secretly cursed the person who provided the information: You are just talking nonsense without investigating clearly. , I thought I’d capture the scouts, but I didn’t expect to stab the reinforcements.”

What is your name? What level are you at? How many rebels are there? Where are your camps, troops and leaders? Ismail asked several questions in succession.

It wasn't until the captured leader kept repeating a sentence in Pashto that he realized the language barrier.

Take this prisoner back to the interrogator. Ismail looked around. The battle was over. The raid was resolved due to the large gap in combat power. The civilians hiding watched the officers and soldiers defeat them so easily. These rebellious tribesmen are even more fearful in their hearts.

In order to rush on their way, the Safavid army only cleaned the battlefield hastily. Apart from leaving all the work of disposing of the corpses to the villagers, they found not many trophies, including weapons and armors of varying quality and degree of damage. There were other miscellaneous items that made the soldier responsible for the search shake his head.

In the end, the Safavid army only took away weapons, armor and heads, and treated the rest as alms to the villagers. They thought that only beggars would take the scattered property seriously.

Returning to the road, Ismail continued to lead the team towards Kandahar.

…………

After nightfall, in the hidden area of ​​the camp near the camp tent, the interrogator prepared various instruments under the dim light. The tied prisoners could only watch numbly.

The interrogator first held the pliers and tapped the nails of the prisoner's left hand gently with the pliers: Next, you will answer whatever I ask, and remember it well - those who know the current affairs are heroes. If you cooperate well, you can still stay. Your life.

Seeing that the prisoner didn't respond, the interrogator clamped his left index finger with pliers. He didn't pull out the nail cap before asking the wailing prisoner, Do you understand?

After the translator repeated the interrogator's original words in Pashto, the prisoner nodded quickly to express understanding.

In less than an hour, the interrogator's assistant recorded everything the prisoner knew and sent it to Abdul as soon as possible.

According to the prisoners' accounts, the rebel tribal leaders gathered more than 10,000 young men as estimated by the governor. When they were gathered together at Shuyuan www.zhaoshuyuan.com, there were probably more than 20,000 and nearly 30,000 people. However, the equipment was poor and the quality was uneven. They could only rely on numbers to suppress the red heads stationed in the local area. They were also helpless with city defenses. They only plundered unprotected villages and business travelers before temporarily returning to the mountains.

After that, they did not assemble such an astonishing number of teams. They were all small teams who went down the mountain to plunder, or intercepted and killed messengers and scouts. They also threatened the governor of Kabul to demand compensation, stop intervening in the affairs of various tribes, and pay tribute regularly. gold.

Of course, Piri Bey rejected this unreasonable request and continued to huddle in Kabul, relying on the reserves in the city and the bold and lucky Indian caravans to maintain the daily consumption of the defenders and residents of the city.

After Abdul and Ismail reviewed and sorted out the known information together, they needed to make a decision.

Your Highness, the general still believes that we should continue to advance along the road to Kabul to meet the governor. Piri Bey can best provide the guide our army needs. Abdul suggested to Ismail.

The guide sent by Herat was not familiar with the interior of the mountainous area, and it was impossible for him to lead an army deep into the mountainous area to search for rebellion. In fact, the only people who can rely on this matter are tribes willing to cooperate with the Safavids, who can provide guides and warriors familiar with the terrain to help fight the rebels.

Ismail glanced at Abdul strangely, and then agreed: Yes, it is impossible for our army to enter these areas rashly without being familiar with it,

After the two decision-makers successfully reached an agreement, the Safavid army continued to march toward Kabul along the road. The scouts and the vanguard troops led by Ismail frequently encountered small groups of rebels on the road, and they were all crushed one by one without exception. There was no premeditated and sophisticated ambush, and there was no preset decisive battle with the main force. Everything during the march was unimaginable. So dangerous.