Amid the panic, the Exorcising the Dragon Gang's core members did not follow their orders promptly or completely. Some immediately spurred their horses forward, while others plainly hesitated for a moment before cautiously mounting amid the noisy shouts and the movement of the enormous column, following the red banner along its flank.
They had little choice. Beside them, Zhang Xing's personal guards, Xu Shiying's core troops, and the disciplinary squads hastily organized by Wei Xuanding and Guan Xu had all formed up, rendering whatever other thoughts they might harbor superfluous.
Meanwhile, there were not enough horses. There were sufficient mounts for these core members of the Exorcising the Dragon Gang, but it was impossible to provide one each for Zhang Xing's two hundred personal guards. The latter had merely served to force the former onto their horses and after him; most then remained where they were, with only a few riding after their leader Jia Yue to escort the banner.
In fact, Zhang Xing had urged his horse forward slowly precisely because he had already anticipated possible hesitation and confusion, leaving everyone room to adjust.
Whatever the case, as the banner rose, the guards assembled, and some veteran gang members followed their habitual obedience, a so-called white-clad contingent, the vast majority of whom had had no time to put on armor, barely managed to gather. Led by the great red banner bearing the character "Chu," they pushed past the crowd and thrust ahead into the confused, unsuspecting masses before them.
They numbered roughly seventy or eighty. More than half had no cultivation, the vast majority wore no armor, and all were so-called white-clad cavalry.
On the chaotic plain, this conspicuously different force stood out so clearly that it produced immediate results.
Large numbers of routed Meng Clan Righteous Army soldiers