stubborn thief

Chapter 314 Attack on Octagon City

The army of the Marshal's Mansion occupied the flat land, hills, and terraces outside the Bajiao City, and flags of all sizes were flying everywhere in the west and south of the city.

Liu Chengzong and the guards assembled on the tall earthen hill surrounded by terraced fields in the west of the city. The guide of the monks from Baishiya Xifan sent by Li Wanqing said that the princess of Xixia might be buried under this earthen mountain.

The defensive facilities of this city are very special. It has eight outer corners smoothed to become sixteen outer corners, twenty inner faces, and four inner right angles. There are horse-faced walls and city piers on each side of the city wall to eliminate dead shooting angles.

There are moats and moats outside the city walls, and there is a low wall of sheep and horses inside the moat, which not only does not block the archery of the city wall against the siege army, but also serves as a means of defense after the moat freezes in winter.

Just this thing is enough for the defenders to hide behind the wall of sheep and horses, and shoot the civilian men who filled the trench to death like shooting rabbits.

Although the city's construction area is not as dangerous as those mountain cities in northern Shaanxi, it has better defenses thanks to its special structure.

Especially at this moment, the defenders are compressed within the wall of sheep and horses, and tens of thousands of defenders gather in a not-so-large city, which can be described as impenetrable.

Flying the handsome flag, Liu Chengzong was condescending, using binoculars to observe the buildings and defenses in the city.

The city can be regarded as five squares put together, and two city gates are not on the front, one is in the northwest corner and the other is in the southeast corner.

This kind of inner corner will bring great difficulties to his siege army. If you want to enter from the west gate, the west north wall and the north west wall and two horse-facing walls will form a structure similar to an urn, and shoot at his army in all directions.

Liu Chengzong put down the binoculars, turned his head and took a deep breath, and said, "Start."

The city has sufficient defenders, and the siege army does not have an advantage in terms of strength. It cannot attack hard like Zhenyuan County. If you want to break the city from the west gate, you must first clear the defenders on the two walls and the horse wall. .

On the hillside not far away, the artillery had corrected the mountain to form a position suitable for placing artillery. A heavy artillery was loaded on a brand-new artillery carriage, which was dragged forward and backward by the soldiers and transported into the position with difficulty. .

There are a total of twelve newly cast heavy cannons in this batch. Liu Chengzong prepared copper materials capable of casting thirty guns. He planned to cast a total of twenty guns successively, allowing him to bear the loss of ten defective products.

However, it is much easier for Shi Cheng and me to cast a heavy cannon of this specification than a small cannon. He has experience in casting a thousand catty red cannon in Sanyuan, and he knows the modulus of the cannon made by Wang Zheng fluently, and the success rate of casting is very high. .

The guards with small flags on their backs ran quickly along the repaired mountain road. When they arrived at the artillery position, the artillery was leading mules to unload boxes of artillery ammunition to the position.

After all preparations were completed, Huang Shengxiao took over the command flag and waved the flag in the direction of Tushan as a signal.

Following Liu Chengzong's nod, Tushan ordered the flag to be unfurled, and the gun troops of the Marshal's Mansion began their attack on Bajiao City.

The lion cannons were the first to attack. On the 36-step-wide front on the west bank of the moat, [-] lion cannons were used intensively across the moat and bombarded the sheep and horse wall with the command.

The artillerymen on the side of the gun body bent sideways and covered their ears one after another. The lion guns burst into flames from north to south one after another. The loess in front of the battle waved like ripples one after another. , Iron bullets drew parabolas in mid-air, hitting the defenders behind the sheep and horse wall.

Accompanied by the sound of landslides and ground cracks, iron bullets with the sound of whizzing wind embedded in the six-foot-thick wall of sheep and horses, knocked the loess flying on the five-foot low wall with the parapet wall, and more shells fell into the sheep and horses. Behind the wall, the defenders holding bows and preparing to shoot were smashed to pieces in an instant, and they hid behind the wall of sheep and horses crying.

The shells flew and hit a corner of the female wall, and the broken rammed earth was stuffed on the head of the defender wearing a red tasseled leather cap. His eyes were darkened and he was dizzy, and he fell on the battlefield in all directions.

More defenders jumped over the fallen comrades, holding bows and arrows and squatting behind the sheep and horse wall. Every vibration of the earth wall made them feel the fear of being out of their bodies. People have not recovered from the first bombardment. Come on, the second bombardment has come.

In front of the army formation of the Marshal's Mansion, the artillery team holding the flag was hoarse on the battlefield filled with gunpowder and dust.

The barrel of the Lion Cannon was skillfully cleaned by the artillerymen, and the cylindrical blooming bullets were lit by the artillerymen and stuffed into the barrel, followed by continuous cannon sounds.

boom!
The ignited shells dragged the fuses and flew out of the barrel, circling over the moat and landed on the front and back of the sheep and horse walls, but this time the shooting power was quite different.

Some cannonballs hit people, and the hit person seemed to be punched hard, without the effect of piercing the body, and the cannonballs that hit the wall of sheep and horses were only lightly inlaid, and then issued a light puff. There was a muffled sound, but instead the shell was pushed out and fell to the ground, emitting a large amount of choking smoke.

The Mongolian soldiers in the defenders who had battle experience with the Ming army suddenly panicked. They were not so afraid when they were bombarded by iron bullets, but at this moment, they didn't even care about the bows and arrows in their hands, and dropped their weapons and opened their mouths to shout: " Poisonous smoke, poisonous smoke, cover your mouth and nose!"

The defenders were terrified for a while, and people no longer dared to hide behind the sheep and horse walls, and instead fled towards the city gate.

Poisonous smoke is a weapon commonly used by the Ming army. It is a smoking shell made of arsenic, realgar, wolf dung, soap powder, ginger powder, etc. It is poisonous to eyes and nose.

Although it seems that Liu Chengzong's pods are similar to the poisonous smoke of the Ming army, he does not know the origin of the arsenic, so the pods can only emit smoke, which is non-toxic and harmless. Both have the purpose of covering the battlefield, but the methods to achieve the purpose are different.

Toxic smoke is fundamentally blinding people's eyes, while smoke bombs can only be visually shielded. No matter what kind, the duration of smoke in an exposed environment is not long.

The Mongolian soldiers also soon discovered that the smoke bombs in the Marshal's Mansion had no poisonous gas. Anyway, Chuoke Tutaiji closed the city gate and refused to let them in. They had no choice but to regroup under the leadership of the nobles and throw arrows raining everywhere outside the smoke.

Taking advantage of the smog, the two centurions moved forward slowly with the two building cars, advancing 250 steps outside the city.

The height of the building car is usually not customized, the bottom is wide and the top is narrow, and the height is related to the height of the attacking city wall.

Liu Chengzong's building car has four floors, driven by the human power of [-] soldiers on the bottom floor, fifteen heavy gunners on the second floor are responsible for suppressing the sheep and horse walls, the third floor is as high as the city wall, and there are nine heavy gunners. Eight soldiers used strong bows to throw and suppress the defenders on the city wall.

The main purpose of this thing is to serve as the first echelon in the siege to suppress the defenders and provide a safer environment for the soldiers filling the trenches.

The same is true for the two centurions under the building car, they are a hundred gun-carrying teams called from various ministries

Carrying half a stool and a long card, the soldiers galloped forward, and the smoke bombs fired from the lion cannon flew over the battlefield above their heads, covering their rush to the dangerous area, and placed the gun racks made of half stools in a line, Afterwards, the coordinated spearmen raised the heavy guns and set them up, and held up the long cards.

The arrows shot by the defenders through the smog lined up in front of the formation. The Mongolian generals on the city wall used loud arrows to guide the defenders whose sight was obscured outside the city. Sweeping across the top of the city, the generals who defended the city did not dare to look up.

Liu Chengzong was very satisfied with the first echelon of attack. Under the mediocre attack, he calculated the range of various weapons. The line of the gunmen was just able to suppress the city wall, and the defenders and catapults on the city wall could not hit them. .

The gunner is only within the maximum range of the archer behind the sheep and horse wall.

He turned his head and ordered Fan Sanlang to wave the command flag, ordering the siege troops of the second echelon to press forward.

The siege force of the second echelon is mainly composed of Basang soldiers, divided into two parts, a total of 35 centurions.

The five centurions advanced forward with a large number of vehicles to 150 steps outside the city, unloaded the wooden parts of the catapults and trench filling vehicles under the noses of the defenders, and slowly assembled them.

Catapults and other siege equipment did not have to be assembled within the sight of the defenders. In the final analysis, what Liu Chengzong wanted to hit was morale. He just wanted the defenders to watch him assemble the siege equipment and enjoy the frustration of being helpless.

Four trench filling trucks were assembled. This thing is actually a square frame with thick wooden boards covering the front, top, left and right sides. It can accommodate several people in parallel. It looks like a large wooden container with eight wooden wheels.

Soldiers covered the top of the trench-filling vehicle with loess to prevent fire, and then pushed it towards the trench. The front of the vehicle was suspended by the side of the trench to protect the interior space. Dozens of soldiers were not disturbed by the rain of arrows and could concentrate on filling the trench.

The remaining [-] Centuries dug trenches three hundred paces away from the city. The excavated earth and rocks were filled with Lele carts seized from Ahai Daiqing and transported to the front line to fill the trenches.

Although Shi Cheng and I cast twelve cannons weighing [-] jin for Liu Chengzong, it is just an unrealistic fantasy to use cannons to blow down such a two-foot-thick city wall.

Of course, the iron pestle was ground into a needle, and the trench that started to be dug was Liu Chengzong's preparation to completely collapse the city wall.

He will first attack the west, then the south, then the north, and then the east. The trenches on all sides will be connected, and the enemy will be completely surrounded in the city, so that no one can escape.

The Lion Army even brought farm tools. In a few days, he will harvest all the fields outside the city, plant some vegetables and some wheat, and wait until April next year to reap the joy of a bumper harvest.

As long as the heavy cannon keeps bombarding, the city wall will probably collapse by that time, but before the city wall collapses, Chuck Rabbit will probably have been pissed to death by him.

The trench filling trucks stopped beside the ditch, and the Lele trucks behind them were transported to the ditch. For the thousands of defenders on the city wall, it was very painful to see these things. They were only so close, but they Can't do anything about these weird looking things.

The generals shouted for battle, but no one could get Chuoke Tutaiji's permission. He found no flaws in Liu Chengzong's siege camp, only saw traps that lured him out of the city to fight in the field.

The generals were furious on the city wall, and A Haidaiqing risked his life and leaned on the crenel, stretching his arms and pointing to the other side of the moat: "Shoot them!"

A sudden fire erupted from the top of the mountain in the distance, and with a whoosh, the seven-pound shell passed over the moat with almost no arc, rubbed A Haidaiqing's helmet, and fell straight into the city.

When everyone's eyes followed the cannonball and looked into the city, and then turned their heads, A Haidaiqing was still standing on the battlements as if he had been immobilized, maintaining a posture of cursing outside the city.

A Haidaiqing's wide-eyed eyes became cross-eyed, the hair on the back of his neck stood up one by one, and the red tassels on the helmet spear that were blown up by the blast slowly fell down.

It lasted for several seconds before A Haidaiqing moved his legs with difficulty, his knees gave way, and he fell to the ground.

But no one noticed his embarrassment anymore, because on the hill a mile away, another jack-of-all-trades gun had already adjusted its angle and blasted towards the top of the city.

This time the shells were fired even lower. The solid iron bullets were stuck on the top of the city wall, firmly embedded in the rammed earth wall, creating cracks of more than ten inches around, and a large piece of soil fell from the wall with a clatter.

After a short pause, several cannonballs bombarded towards the top of the city like beads. Every cannonball that hit the city wall was heart-shattering. More cannonballs flew over the top of the city and fell into the city. Cattle, sheep, war horses and horses were everywhere. .

Another shell was bombarding the parapet of the battlement, smashing the foot-thick parapet to pieces, and the rolling shell still hit the soldier's feet, and the heart-wrenching cry resounded over the Bajiao City.

A Haidaiqing is still a little delirious. Liu Chengzong's cannon must contain sorcery. The cannonball rolled over his head, and his soul came out of his body to see someone else inherit his wife. Feel.

"witchcraft!"

Seeing the fierce shelling, A Haidaiqing bowed down the city wall, still talking to himself: "It must be a sorcery."

Ahai Daiqing, Hao Jigel of Khalkha, is it a waste of fame?Where is the hair on his head!

Twelve heavy cannons bombarded the top of the city continuously. A Haidaiqing stood in the shadow of the city and raised his face, listening to the panic and yelling from the top of the city, watching a shell fly from his head from time to time. The helmet and severed limbs that were occasionally blown away by shells fell into deep contemplation.

Things to contemplate have nothing to do with the war situation.

With this combination of large artillery shells, small artillery shells, large lead, and small lead, A Haidaiqing felt that he was no longer worthy of considering issues such as the war situation.

I thought that the long musket that could kill people at two hundred paces was already Liu Chengzong's secret weapon. With the help of the city wall and a hard bow, he could fight against it, and twelve catapults could be evenly matched.

This cannonball will fly from a mile away, and this thing is not a gap that tactics can make up for at all.

A Haidaiqing was very confused. Qinghai should be the place where people like them came from. Everyone was fighting with swords around the two questions of 'this is my grass' and 'why did you steal my grass'.

What the hell are a group of Han army masters bringing their guns over here for?

Tell me what you haven't eaten, and I'll give you something to eat, right, it's not worth using a knife or a gun to hurt your peace.

In all fairness, if the soldiers under Liu Chengzong's command originally intended to defect to A Haidaiqing, he would take care of one person's food, even give a horse, and match one, no, two women.

Just when A Haidaiqing was thinking about marrying Liu Chengzong a woman, the whistling wind finally ended with a bang, and the inner layer of the city wall was splashing dust, choking him to stop thinking.

A Haidaiqing was very familiar with this voice, the return cannon, it was his return cannon, which hit his city wall.

　good evening!

　　
　
(End of this chapter)