神亭岭之战 / Shentingling Battle
神亭岭之战 / Shentingling Battle enters the wiki through Hanji 993 as the best-known field encounter inside 孙策’s early Jiangdong expansion. The source places it after 刘繇 has failed to appoint 太史慈 as a general and has instead sent him to scout.
The encounter is asymmetrical. Taishi Ci rides with one subordinate, while Sun Ce has thirteen riders, including 韩当 and 黄盖. Taishi Ci still fights Sun Ce directly. Sun Ce hits Taishi Ci’s horse and seizes Taishi Ci’s hand戟; Taishi Ci seizes Sun Ce’s headgear. The arrival of both sides’ troops ends the fight without turning it into a larger battle in this source.
The episode treats the scene less as a pure duel anecdote than as a talent-recognition signal. Taishi Ci’s courage appears clearly on the battlefield, but Liu Yao’s camp has not converted him into command capacity. That makes the battle a compact event page for 门第筛选式人才误判 and 以贤臣为宝.
The source also notes later narrative memory: Romance of the Three Kingdoms preserves the Shenting scene and describes a 光武帝庙 on the ridge. The wiki keeps that detail source-scoped because the episode uses it as a geography and reception note, not as an independent archaeological claim.