Lord of the House: Chapter 118 waiting for help

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When the Huaidong Army put the bed crossbows, scorpion crossbows and other weapons into the defense, the reinforcements who entered the iron pile wharf with the northward crossing of Azige completely suppressed the low-lying river beach, and attacked several times. Under the blockade of the bed crossbow and the scorpion crossbow, the heavy casualties were repelled, which could not shake the Huaidong Army's position outside the iron pile wharf in the slightest.

The night was getting darker, and the starry sky had passed midnight, and the killings in Fancheng were gradually disappearing, indicating that Fancheng had almost been captured by the Huaidong Army, and Xilei had also fallen, and a dozen people broke through and fled to the river beach to break away from the Huaidong Army. 's pursuit.

The scarlet battle flag of the Huaidong Army had been erected at the head of Fancheng City, and Azige was in a state of impatience. According to the scouts who pierced into Fancheng, the five thousand soldiers and horses that attacked Fancheng were the elites of the two brigades under the jurisdiction of the Huaidong Chongcheng Army. How they sneaked in, and how they approached Fancheng as Chaishan to **** food and soldiers, whether or not someone from Luo Xiancheng's side had already taken refuge in Huaidong, I can't be sure...

For now, the intention of this Huaidong army is obvious, that is to control Fancheng and the Qiaodu District in the south of the city, and cut off the grain route from Fancheng to the south-the tens of thousands of stone grains accumulated in Fancheng are destroyed. After all, Fancheng It's just a relay storage station for the grain road. Thanks to Fan Lan's method of transporting grain in sections, the grains in the northern section of the Hanshui River were actually stored in sections in Ruyang, Fangcheng, Nanyang, Xinye and other cities. If hundreds of thousands of stone grains were stored in Fancheng and the Huaidong Army succeeded in a sneak attack, even if Fancheng was recaptured afterward, the entire Jingxiang battle would be difficult to restore.

However, Fancheng was lost and the food supply was cut off. If Fancheng could not be recaptured as soon as possible, the supply of troops and horses in Jingzhou and Eastern Hubei would be unsustainable, and it would be a major disaster...

At this time, Azige was still the military horse that raided Fancheng before, and it was here to cut off the food supply to relieve the siege of Jingzhou.

Although Azhige led Xiangfan's defenders to still occupy the iron pile wharf and the pontoon bridge of Feiyu Cape on the north bank, but they could not fight it out. If the battle formation was unfolded, they would encounter a fierce counterattack from the Huaidong Army, and the casualties were heavy. Coming back - the hard laborers who had enslaved and transported grain, but at this time were willing to be driven by the Huaidong Army, digging long trenches outside the east base - these made Azige feel restless in his heart.

Shen Haobo, the prefect of Xiangyang, and his lieutenant Tong Ruilin crossed the river to join Ajige at this time. Shen Haobo followed him across the river, not because of his courage, but because Ajige died in battle on the north bank. Shen Haobo knew that even if he defended Xiangyang, he would be in Beiyan There will be no good days either.

Shen Haobo once served as the deputy envoy of the Qingzhou system and establishment department, and was very trusted by Gu Wuchen. However, after the Qingzhou war, he failed to maintain his integrity. In Yangxin, he chose to surrender to Yan to save his life. After that, he spared no effort to clear the Qingzhou army in eastern Shandong for Beiyan. Beiyan trusts the remnants of his forces, but he is also called Huaidong hated to the bone and listed as a must-kill target.

Shen Haobo looked at the bed crossbows, scorpion crossbows and other weapons in the Huaidong army's defense formation, and his heart was cold: this Huaidong army sneaked to attack the Jingxiang grain road, so be prepared!

Deputy General Tong Ruilin said: "If you don't want to affect the war on the southern front, those outside Xiangfan can transfer troops to retake Fancheng, one is Shicheng, the other is Jingmen, and the third is Nanyang, but it is not enough to just draw troops from one of these three places. To retake Fancheng, we should abandon the entanglement of the iron pile wharf, go east to the Baihekou to land on the shore, stand firm in the southeast of Fancheng, and wait for the reinforcements from Shicheng, Nanyang and Jingzhou to arrive, and then move forward together under the Fancheng city..."

"What General Tong said is very true," Shen Haobo also persuaded Azige, who looked like a red-eyed killer, and said, "You should also immediately send someone to ask Ruzhou King Chen Zhihu for help. If the Ruzhou King can come and retake Fancheng, it will be even more difficult. confident……"

In addition to Xiangyang, the closest to Fancheng is the soldiers and horses stationed in Nanyang. But on the Nanyang side, the main force of Tu'an's troops had to guard Biyang, to prevent Huaixi troops from passing through Tongbai Mountain to attack Nanyang Basin City.

The cities of Nanyang, Xinye, Xichuan, Zaoyang, and Wuguan in the west within 150 miles of Fancheng have very limited troops. Except for the core city of Xiangyang, the total number of troops stationed in other cities is only 6,000 or 7,000. people.

After Ye Jiluorong led his troops southward, these places were regarded as absolutely safe hinterlands, and they were not key cities.

Within 250 kilometers from Fancheng, the cities with large-scale garrison are mainly Wuyang (Chen Zhihu's general Leng Zilin led 10,000 elite garrison), Shicheng (Su Tingzhan led more than 15,000 cavalry troops to garrison) ), Jingmen (where Ye Jiluorong had 10,000 cavalry to protect Jingzhou's back road), and Suizhou.

The reinforcements from Suizhou are already very unreliable. If you want to get enough reinforcements to retake Fancheng within two days, you can only count on the troops stationed in Wuyang, Shicheng and Jingzhou to return.

It is impossible for these three city defenders to send all the reinforcements in their hands to fight Fancheng, and it is likely to send half or even one-third of their troops back to Fancheng.

The most sensible thing is that, as Tong Ruilin said, Azige chose an open place to stand on the periphery of Fancheng, and after joining the three-way reinforcements, he would enter Fancheng to retake Fancheng, instead of blindly attacking Fancheng and giving Huai who occupied Fancheng. The Eastern Army has a chance to attack each other, and each has a chance to defeat...

Although Azige was not reconciled, he was still able to maintain his senses: although he still had five or six thousand elites in Xiangyang, he fought for a long time, and he was suppressed in the bridgehead and the iron pile wharf. This Huaidong Army will control Fancheng and Qiaodu District more and more tightly, especially the large amount of war weapons added to the defense line and the hard labor of Fancheng are willing to be used by the Huaidong Army. He only relies on the five or six thousand battles in Xiangyang Bing wants to retake Fancheng, it is undoubtedly a delusion...

Tong Ruilin was born in Tong Jia's family and changed his Han surname to Tong. He was a veteran of Beiyan. Azige had to admit that what he offered was indeed a prudent policy, and he was more stable than himself in the key points.

Neither the iron pile wharf nor the pontoon bridge head is a place where reinforcements can be gathered.

The Tiezhuan Wharf and Feiyu Cape were too narrow, and no matter how many troops they had, they would not be able to deploy them. They would only make the Huaidong Army, which had a large number of heavy crossbow weapons in the defense, take advantage of it.

It's not that Beiyan did not pay attention to craftsmanship and war weapons. Although many princes and ministers who fought on horseback and fought for military exploits paid attention to these things, Emperor Tianming paid attention to craftsmanship such as smelting and forging as early as when he ruled Liaodong.

When he obtained Yanji, Emperor Tianming even sent the elites of the king account to protect the Zunhua Iron Factory to ensure that it would not be destroyed by the chaotic army; Ironstone's annual production of iron materials increased to four million catties in two years.

After occupying Yanjing, Emperor Tianming first included tens of thousands of craftsmen in Yanjing City into the military households for protection, and in the army also produced and used war weapons such as bed crossbows and stone throwing crossbows on a large scale, and even used them. The craftsmen imitated Huaidong's warships, scorpion crossbows, and the heavy catapults that were fired with heavy objects at the end of the cannon...

It's a pity that Huaidong's heavy crossbow weapon benefits from its overall level of craftsmanship and cannot be easily imitated by others.

The counterweight catapult is simple to say. It lifts a heavy object weighing more than several thousand kilograms or even tens of thousands of kilograms at the end of the tip rod. However, it suddenly falls, and uses the principle of leverage to hit a large stone bomb with a tip that weighs more than one hundred kilograms. Going out, the rest are not much different from ordinary catapults - the key is the creation of heavy objects at the tip and tail.

The Huaidong Army directly built large iron balls, hemispherical iron **** weighing four or five thousand catties, and merged into two on the battlefield, weighing more than eight thousand catties to about 12,000, forming the tail weight of the heavy catapult.

Not to mention that the price of iron and copper in the world is the same, the value of 8,000 catties of iron is astonishing. In a siege battle, fifty heavy catapults are lined up, and only 40,000 to 500,000 catties of iron will be used for the heavy objects on the tail. It is expected that which force can easily play around?

In addition, how to easily and quickly transport each hemispherical iron ball weighing more than four or five thousand pounds into the battlefield is also a heart-wrenching problem...

The combination of various factors makes it impossible for others to use it on a large scale even if they can imitate Huaidong's heavy catapult!

There are some crossbows in the Beiyan army, but everything must be prioritized to protect the troops and horses attacking Jingzhou. Xiangyang is the rear, as the hub of the grain road, how can the defenders have how many heavy crossbow weapons?

He didn't even have a crossbow on hand, and he was suppressed in a narrow area that was not easy to deploy. What would he do with the Huaidong Army, who was equally heroic but had placed dozens of heavy crossbows in the defense? If they fight again, it will only make the Huaidong Army wear away the elite of Xiangyang's defenders in vain.

Azige figured this out, and returned to the warship with Tong Ruilin and Shen Haobo. Azige also did not give up the bridge head and the iron pile wharf, but reduced the number of troops to prevent the troops from being too dense and causing large-scale damage to the Huaidong Army's war equipment, so as to ensure that the bridge head and iron pile wharf were not lost, and no longer delusionally think about these two narrow places. The area was opened, but taking advantage of the naval forces to control the Han River, he went to the downstream to find an open landing point. He planned to stand at the periphery of Fancheng and wait for reinforcements from all directions before attacking Fancheng.

Ajige, Shen Haobo, and Tong Ruilin never thought that the troops and horses lurking in the hinterland of Jingxiang from Huaidong were far less than those in front of them. , but wholeheartedly wanted to retake Fancheng.

The enemy generals slowed down their offensive, which was exactly what Huang Zuyu and Zhou Bin wished to do. Take the time to pull the carriages loaded with various supplies into the city, take the time to build the east and west defenses in the bridge crossing area, and dig long trenches outside the defenses to strengthen the defense. Some reliable young men and women directly issued military armor and incorporated them into the army to make up for the lack of troops defending Yufan City.

Even if the reinforcements led by Sun Zhuang were blocked in the middle of the road and could not come in time, Huang Zuyu and Zhou Bin were determined to lead 5,000 generals and 5,000 civilians to defend the moment when the main force of the Huaidong Army hit Fancheng City...

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On the 18th, Huang Zuyu and Zhou Bin led 5,000 elite soldiers and horses to attack Fancheng disguised as Chaishan.

The Xiangyang defender Azige was unfavorable to counterattack Fancheng, and he led the water infantry to retreat to the Baihekou, thirty miles east of Fancheng, to dig a long cut and wait for reinforcements to arrive. At the same time, Xiangyang Xinqi galloped to various places at night to show respect: to Jingmen in the south, Nanyang in the north, Wuguan in the west, Zaoyang in the east, and Suizhou in the east, to report the news of the attack on Fancheng in the shortest time. Spread to all over Jingxiang.

Considering that the soldiers and horses that attacked Fancheng came from the east, scouts may be left to explore the horses for a strict blockade in the area east of Fancheng. .

In the early morning of the 19th, four letter riders from Xiangyang and eight fast horses crossed the Han River from Zhongyibei by boat. They planned to go to Zaoyang and Suizhou after arriving at Heishigou.

The name of Heishigou is a ditch, but it is actually a mountain. The rocks form a beach, and there is no vegetation. The four believers rode to the sparse forest in front of Heishigou to rest their feet and tiptoe, eat some dry food indiscriminately, and plan to continue their journey after a short break.

The horse scouts and the letter cavalry who pass the letter are usually the elites of the Beiyan army. Other than that, just running fast in the wild without getting lost is what ordinary people can do. They still didn't know the news that Fancheng had fallen. They firmly believed that the Huaidong Army that had attacked Fancheng was only a small group~www.mtlnovel.com~ As long as all localities cooperated well, taking Fancheng back would not be a problem.

At this time, there was a little wildfire burning on the top of the mountain in Heishigou. Under the sunlight before noon, it was not so obvious. Only a faint blue smoke rose into the sky, and was blown away by the wind, leaving no trace.

On the east bank of the Han River to the east of Zhongyi, some people lived and farmed, but as the war unfolded, a large number of Ding Zhuang were pumped into the battlefield, and this area was completely deserted. The miserable people who deserted military service and some unrestrained hunters.

The wildfire on the top of the mountain did not arouse the suspicion of the four of them. After eating dry food, they changed horses and went north. There is a barren post road to the north of Heishigou, which connects Zaoyang in the north and Suizhou in the west. At the location, they rushed out dozens of horse riders from the sparse forest. Although the horse riders would only wear half-skin leather armor when they were wearing ordinary horse thieves, the four letter riders who had sent warnings to Zaoyang and Suizhou quickly understood that Fan Cheng had no idea what to do. The attacking enemy's blockade channel actually blocked this side, which shows that the ambition of the enemy soldiers is not just a city in Fancheng.

The blockade of the channel will only slow down the spread of news, but cannot completely prevent the spread of news, especially the incident of the five thousand soldiers attacking Fancheng will inevitably spread all over Jingxiang through word of mouth. A large number of people were dispatched to block it, but other places could not get the news in the first time and make the correct response.

The four letter riders don't know if the enemy is blocked on the road ahead, but their duties make them continue to rush forward even if they know that the enemy is blocked in front of them...

For the Huaidong Army, they didn't care about Shicheng, Jingmen or Nanyang enemy troops attacking Fancheng. The reason why they focused on blocking the passage to Suizhou was to delay Suizhou's vigilance as much as possible, so as to benefit the main force of Chaishan troops and horses. Attacking Suizhou by surprise... My QT room is open! More vulgar official QT room number [9167] Click to enter