New Soldiers

Meng for his contribution to the battle was promoted to a 4,000 man commander, and thanks to a recommendation by Mou Gou was once again promoted to a 5,000 man commander. He received an increase in his nobility rank and was also rewarded with a decent amount of money and a bit of land near his home.

After having lost so many of his troops in the battle, Meng decided to give most of the money he received as a reward to the family members of his deceased men, Dai Chao back at home was doing a great job managing the farm in his absence, she sent him a letter asking him for permission to spend a large sum of money to expand the restaurant, Meng responded and informed her that she didn't need to ask for permission and could act as she saw fit.

Since the farm and restaurant were doing so well, Meng offered the family members of his deceased men jobs working at his restaurants and farm. Having received more land, he was able to expand his farm. He spent a few weeks heading home and inspecting the progress of the farm and restaurant.

He was surprised to discover how massive the chicken farm had become, he remembered that he never gave Dai any restriction on breading the chickens, so she just kept allowing them to breed, now they had a few thousand chicks running around. He quickly went and met with a few craftsmen and ordered the construction of a few large chicken coups on the new land he had just received, he was originally planning on growing food but with how large the chicken farm has become, they desperately needed the land to for their chicken farm.

Thinking about the manga in his past life he remembered that a huge war would soon break out, he met with a few craftsmen and hunters and hired men to produce arrows for him using his chicken feathers.

Sadly, he couldn't stay too long, serving in the military he now had to spend time training the new soldiers, returning to the military camp, he discovered that all the new troops he had received were all fresh recruits! they had to learn to ride and shoot! he expected to have to train a few recruits but he wasn't expecting to have to train all the new soldiers from scratch.

It was a few days after he got back to military camp that he received a summons from Sei, returning to the capital he was shocked to discover that around 60,000 new recruits were there as well, quietly waiting outside the palace. Having talked to Sei and received his orders to train the 60,000 new recruits in mounted archery.

While Meng was serving under Mou Gou, Sei had constructed a large military camp near the capital to serve as a training ground, Meng was instructed to train the new recruits there.

Meng watched thousand of troops practice their archery and riding, the new recruits were horrible! many of them had never ridden a horse or held a bow before! it took around 2,000 hours for a person to become proficient in learning a new skill, then spend the rest of their life constantly mastering it and improving.

Even if he trained the men eight hours a day, it would still take around 36 weeks to train them until they reach 2,000 hours of training, but he needed to train them in ridding and shooting, Meng figured it would take over a year to train the men.

*241 B.C*

Meng over the last few months has been training the troops, the new recruits have gone from being worthless, to being almost not worthless! they are practiced riding and shooting but they still need a lot of work, right now if they tried to enter a battle as mounted archers, they would likely just end up getting themselves killed.

Meng has been training his 5,000 troops and 60,000 new recruits, thankfully the survivors from the Sanyou campaign have been a big help. Qian Wuying, Long Hui, and Yin Xiuying have been promoted to 2,000 man commanders and are no longer serving under him and now command their own independent units. (Mob 2, 3, and 4)

Watching his men shoot, he realizes that right now they can barely shoot, and would best serve as stationary archers. As he walks around the military camp observing the troops train, he notices that a large commotion has broken out.

As he made his way back to his headquarters, once he arrived he was updated on the situation, Yan (120,000), Wei (100,000), Han (50,000), Chu (150,000), and Zhao armies (120,000) have invaded Qin! together the enemy armies number 540,000!

Meng isn't too surprised hearing the situation having been expecting it, right now Qin has around 300,000 troops spread out around the borders. As Meng is thinking about the situation, a messenger runs up to him with orders! he is to lead the men here and march them to Kankoku Pass.

From what Meng remembers Kankoku Pass is a strategic location protecting the capital, it defends a vital choke point in the mountain range near the capital, it's a huge gate with walls higher than twice the height of the capitals. Unfortunately, it's not the only pass through the mountains, to the left and right of it are several smaller paths that smaller armies can march through, right now Meng was sure that Qin forces from all over were pulling back to defend the Kankoku Pass.

Meng quickly led the 65,000 mounted archers, Meng watching the soldiers formation as they rode once again confirmed to him that the men weren't ready for battle yet, some of the men as they rode looked like they were still struggling to not fall off their horse, Meng was sure that if these troops were forced to charge into the enemy they would quickly die, they needed at least a half a year more of training.

Arriving at Kankoku Pass, Meng was pleasantly surprised to find General Mou Gou there. He quickly released command of the 60,000 mounted archer recruits to Mou Gou, but he couldn't help apologizing to Mou Gou! he confessed that right now the 65,000 mounted archers were not fit for battle and that it was best if they were used as foot archers instead of mounted archers.

Meng was glad to learn that soon Generals Kanki and Chou Tou would be arriving with their forces and that Meng 65,000 were just a lucky coincidence and Mou Gou despite knowing that they weren't fully trained was still glad to have thousands of more archers to help defend the walls with.

Mou Gou mentioned how now the only thing he was worried about was supplying enough arrows for soldiers. Meng hearing this was glad that he owned a large chicken farm, he told Mou Gou about it and how he would be able to help supply the soldiers with arrows. He quickly sent a message to his home and sent a few hundred of his men to go escort the arrows.

Mou Gou and Meng standing atop the wall quietly stood staring out far off into the distance. Eventually, Mou Gou mentioned that in a week or two, it was likely that over half a million troops would be attacking Kankoku Pass, with the many paths through the mountain, Qin would be forced to spread out their troops to guard them.

Mou Gou mentioned that right now Ou Sen (70,000) would guard their left flank of Kankoku Pass, Tou (30,000) and his son Mou Bu (60,000) would defend their right flank, Duke Hyou ( 40,000) would defend the far-right side of the mountains, and he, Kanki, and Chou Tou (100,000) would defend Kankoku Pass gate. Mou Gou was glad that Meng brought another 65,000 soldiers, even if they are recruits, their force defending the gate will now be 165,000.

As Meng stood listening to Mou Gou, he couldn't help staring at the steep cliffs around them, he suddenly had an idea, the area had a large number of decent size boulders and trees for lumber, right now they had 65,000 extra troops not doing anything and had at least a week or two to prepare for battle. Taking a chance he decided to tell Mou Gou his idea.

Over the next few days, thousands of troops gathered large boulders from the local area, enough to properly block the gate, they cut down a large number of trees and now construction could be seen happening on their side of the gate and around 150 meters behind the gate as well.

*a week later*

Kankoku Pass now had a hundred thousand men under Mou Gou, Kanki, and Chou Tou guarding it. Meng standing by his men a few hundred meters behind the gate watched as the Qin soldiers bravely fought off the Wei (100,000) and Han (50,000) armies. For hours the battle raged, Meng and the troops near him could only patiently wait until it was their turn to fight.

(while Meng is waiting patiently with his men, Shin is fighting bravely with Duke Hyou)

Meng standing with his men suddenly could hear a large cheer from the enemy forces! he then notices that troops on the walls were fighting! from the looks of it, the enemy had managed to latch two giant siege towers onto the wall, for the next few minutes the battle on top of the walls was chaotic and bloody.

Meng looking up at the top of the walls suddenly saw a large column of smoke rise into the air! then he heard the Qin troops cheer! a short while later the rumor that General Kanki had managed to destroy one of the siege towers spread amongst the men.

Eventually, Meng received a signal from Mou Gou for his troops to prepare themselves! Meng watched as the Kankoku Pass gates slowly opened! and thousand of enemy soldiers rushed in! it wasn't long until around 50,000 soldiers had made their way inside!

Mou Gou (POV)

Watching the enemy troops storm in from atop the walls, he eventually decided that enough had charged in, any more and it would be too difficult to deal with them!

He signaled some soldiers near him, and watched as they ran off and started cutting the support beams and ropes, that were holding up a large number of rocks above the gate! soon the support beams and structure holding up the heavy boulders couldn't support the weight any longer and suddenly collapsed! large boulders on the Qin side of the gate suddenly fell down and blocked the gate completely blocking it! it would take a few hours for the soldier to clear that out!

Mou Gou watched as the young commander Meng and his men fired a volley of fire arrows! soon the fire arrows landed amongst the 50,000 enemy soldiers, it inflicted few casualties but it did ignite the dry foliage and hay that was spread out around the area! it wasn't long until a thick and large amount of smoke covered the area as the foliage and hay burned!

The 50,000 enemy soldiers were coughing and finding it hard to breathe, the smoke made their eyes feel like they were burning and caused them to tear up, it was during this moment that a huge volley of arrows fell onto them! they suddenly realized that their escape route was blocked and now a large archer force was across from them and firing arrows into them!

The enemy commanders locked inside quickly organized the troops, and ordered some to charge the archers, they ordered others to climb the gate stairs and assault the top of the walls from behind! and finally, they then sent men to start clearing the large boulders blocking the gate!

Meng (POV)

He watched as thousand of soldiers slowly made their way through the smoke and charge towards them, he and the 65,000 mounted archers (now foot archers) managed to fire off a few more volleys before the enemy soldiers reached them!

As the enemy soldiers ran towards them, every so often a few of them would step into a hole causing them to trip and injuring their legs and slowing the troops behind them. Thanks to the smoke the charging enemy soldiers failed to notice the spiked barricades the archers were hiding behind until it was too late! hundred of soldiers empaled themselves upon the spikes!

Meng hiding behind the barricades safely fired volley after volley into the enemy! the first six rows focused fire on the enemy soldiers attempting to get past the barricades, while the rest fired volleys into the air and onto the enemy! eventually, the enemy troops started breaking through the barricades and forced the first few rows under the command of Side Mob (Ye Mu) to switch out their bows for swords.

Meng watched as Side Mob bravely fought alongside the men. Qian Wuying, Long Hui, and Yin Xiuying were further down on his right side commanding their sections of men and keeping them firing volley after volley into the enemy!

For the next thirty minutes, they battled before eventually, there were only a few hundred enemy soldiers left still attempting to charge them! Meng got up on his mount and observed the battlefield, the enemy soldiers were fleeing back towards the wall to regroup.

From the looks of it, the mounted archers had lost around 10,000 soldiers and around 25,000 enemy troops lay dead upon the ground in front of them. Thanks to the smoke and barricade slowing them down, they managed to fire volley after volley into the enemies slaughtering them.

Looking up at the top of the walls, they noticed Mou Gou was signaling for them to charge! Meng seeing the signal to charge quickly organized his 5,000 mounted heavy archers and ordered them to charge! behind him, he could hear the 50,000 recruits charging as well!

He led his men and charged into the backs of the enemy soldiers attempting to clear the gate of the boulders! having been mounted Meng and his men arrived before the others and soon found themselves outnumbered! bravely they fought their way forward and secured the bottom of the gate, they stubbornly held as the enemy troops tried to take it back from them! Meng sitting in the middle of his men was relieved when the recruits finally caught up and joined the battle!

Thanks to the 50,000 recruits they successfully cleared the area of enemies, Meng seeing that they had won, quickly made his way up the gate steps and climbed up to the top of the walls to report to Mou Gou.

The battle raged on for a few more hours before eventually, it became too dark and both armies stopped fighting for the day! The first day of battle at Kankoku Pass ended with Qin scoring a big win against the Wei and Han troops!

Wei and Han armies now numbered 80,000. Combined they had lost 70,000. Mou Gou, Kan Ki, and Chou Tou started the battle with 100,000 now they had 90,000. Meng and the recruits started the battle with 65,000 and now had 45,000.

*later that night*

As Meng walked around the camp he heard rumors from the other armies, it seemed that Qin was holding strong, both sides had lost a few 1,000 man commanders. Over on the Chu battlefield, it sounded like Tou had managed to kill the Chu General Rin Bu Kun! It also sounded like Duke Hyou also managed to cause havoc on his battlefield as well, with Shin and his unit racking up a large number of kills as well.

From the sounds of it, Qin was could safely declare themselves the victors for the first day of battle.