Chapter 69 City Gate
So far, the overall progress of the battle is pretty much what Gao Tengzu expected, including the destruction of a siege tower, which is all expected.
Although Gu Baihua beat his chest loudly and insisted that his method was guaranteed to work, all the generals were still mentally prepared to "lose two or three cities before taking over the city": it was the first time to build this thing, even without the threat of crossbows , I couldn’t guarantee that I would fall apart halfway! Having said that, as long as Shaanzhou can be conquered, their mission will be completed. It is a disposable tool. A stupid, clumsy guy cannot push it thousands of miles. It must be burned when you leave. It can be built whenever needed in the future.
In this round of exploratory attack, in addition to all the archers, Gao Tengdou only sent one flying leopard battalion to participate in the battle, mixed with 3,000 civilians and the same number of auxiliary soldiers. In this era, not only all the generals, but also the soldiers knew very well that unless there was internal support, siege battles were almost never carried out in one go. No matter how small a city was, it would often last four to five days, or even longer. Shaanzhou Prefecture is an important military location with one city connected to three provinces. If it takes a few months to capture it, that would be normal. The past few days were mainly about exploring the reality, using cannon fodder to test the strength of the defenders and the resilience of the defenders, and to consume their physical strength and supplies. As long as you don't get defeated by the opponent as soon as you come up and lose your spirit, and firmly grasp the rhythm and initiative of the attack, you can achieve the tactical goal.
Among the three flying beast battalions, most of the flying tiger battalions are veterans with rich fighting... oh, well, rich robbery experience. This is their main battalion, and they must stay at the critical moment to launch the fatal blow. The proportion of new recruits in the Flying Bear Battalion is a bit large, and the fighting will can only be tempered by following friendly forces to take advantage of the fire several times. It is too early to be alone now. The first few battles of forming an army are very important: if you win all the way, the army will soon gain confidence and become a strong army. On the contrary, even a few small setbacks will leave a permanent psychological shadow on the soldiers, and most of them will be useless. It can be broken up and mixed into other camps. Even if it is reorganized in the future, the original name cannot be used again, and everyone will think it is unlucky. The most obvious example is Liaodong in the future: Li Chengliang has been in Liaodong for decades and beat the Jurchen tribes to pieces. However, such a group of rabble-rousers with insufficient supplies, food, grass, weapons, and even numbers of people encountered one after another. The more dishonest opponents sent to the battlefield by the Ming Dynasty soon gained confidence, and finally became a bloodthirsty force that makes people laugh... The Flying Leopard Battalion is a mix of old and new, with veterans accounting for more than 60%, plus archers. The protection should be able to stabilize the attack rhythm.
No matter at home or abroad, the daily training of ancient armies did not include the content of strengthening consciousness and identity (the European Crusaders barely had some content). The soldiers' fighting will mainly relied on two methods to maintain: either they escaped and were killed by the supervising team, or they were unscrupulous after victory. Robbery rewards. Therefore, the casualty tolerance is generally very poor - if it exceeds 10% and has not collapsed, it is definitely considered a first-class strong army. Modern people who are accustomed to the God's perspective in movies, TV series or games find it strange, but in fact it is easy to understand: soldiers have no overall perspective, and all they can see on the battlefield is their own side. Even if the friendly forces fifty meters away are in full swing - you can't see it! What you see may be the comrades around you being chopped down one by one! So naturally I wanted to run. When people behind you see you turning back and running for your life, they will instinctively run with you... In this way, if you move your whole body, a corner of the front line will collapse. If the general does not stop it in time at this time, it is very likely that the victory that was within easy reach will turn into a huge defeat inexplicably! The list goes on. In ancient books, we often see reports of "the general was killed by Sanchuang Du and his soldiers, and then defeated the general".
Regarding battle casualties, Gao Tengdou had his own little calculation in mind: the Flying Leopard Battalion should not exceed 15% - in the siege battle, the main force would supervise the formation behind, and there would be nowhere to run. The veterans would definitely force the new recruits to take the lead, so this part The main loss will be the new soldiers, who will be replaced after the war. Don’t feel bad, the loss of the auxiliary soldiers will be about 30%. Haha, they are just cannon fodder, so take advantage of it. According to the generals’ estimation, when all the battles are over, then More than 50% to 60% of the 3,000 people will permanently fall under the walls of Shaanzhou City!
Near noon, Guan Shengyun, Luo's father and son, and the Gu brothers came to the battle, chatting and laughing all the way, and climbed up to the lookout to watch the battle with Gao Tengdou.
Gao Tengdou deliberately showed off in front of everyone and gave the order to "accelerate the attack".
Tom, tom, tom.
The war drums sounded unhurriedly. In conjunction with this, soldiers from Feihu Camp and Feixiong Camp beat their shields with their weapons. Under the command of the officers, they shouted in unison rhythmically during the intervals between drum beats: "Kill", " "Kill", "kill"!
On top of the city, the stench filled the air.
Asphalt is a great weapon. However, you should use it carefully, and it takes a long time to boil the solid asphalt block into a rolling and boiling liquid state; the boiling water will disperse when you pour it, and the temperature will drop quickly, so the killing effect is not very high; the effect of boiling oil It's quite good, but the cost is a bit high... Therefore, the defenders also prepared another similar weapon - golden soup.
It's just shit juice.
In addition to being disgusting, people of that era generally had a simple understanding of feces: "poisonous".
Although people in the Ming Dynasty did not know the existence of viruses and bacteria, drinking boiled water, washing hands before meals and after using the toilet, and other principles that today's kindergarten children understand, were unheard of by almost everyone at that time.
So, disease is rampant.
The most severe of these was dysentery.
The so-called "big plague will follow a major disaster" and "plague is rampant" in ancient books often refer to viral dysentery. Before the advent of antibiotics, the body's own resistance was the only barrier against this vicious digestive disease - and ordinary people who seriously lacked high-quality protein intake had limited resistance. This situation is aggravated by the false truth that "the body needs porridge when the body is weak": the immune system needs protein, and carbohydrates have almost no effect.
Faced with the cruel reality, the ancients came to the simple conclusion that "feces are poisonous". As a result, dipping arrow clusters, smearing weapons with weapons, and adding gunpowder... have become routine methods in war. When defending a city, boiling dung juice in a long cauldron on the city wall is the most common standard operation in all offensive and defensive battles - in fact, except for mixing it with gunpowder, which will greatly affect the original effect, most of the time, this thing does indeed Can aggravate wound infection.
Although the battle was fierce, looking around, Wang Jian briefly calmed down: Including himself, most of the defenders who were facing the battle for the first time in their lives had gradually recovered from the initial fear. The battle on the wall was stalemate, and for a while, There should be no surprises. So he quickly ran to the top of the city gate and took the opportunity to look down at the threat of the ramming car.
The crash was already hitting the city gate.
Although it has been blocked with big stones, relying on animal power and manpower to transport and unload it, it is impossible to block it tightly. There is still a large gap between the city gate and the stone. The city gate creaks and creaks under the continuous heavy impact. The sound - at least that's how it sounded to Wang Jian's ears.
No, we need to strengthen the defense here!
Wang Jian thought to himself and looked around again: Except for the reserve team, everyone was fighting bloody battles - Pan Ding directed Ding Zhuang to carry the dead and wounded soldiers and civilians down to the city, and then brought up the masonry and wood. He also helped from time to time. His face was covered with blood and sweat, and his official hat was tilted to one side without realizing it; Jing Xiangshan's official hat was long gone, and the iron helmet that should have been taken off from the head of the dead and wounded was buckled on, and his official robe was also taken off, and in one breath In front of the boiling dung pot, a long-handled ladle was used to ladle out and curse, and the gold juice dripped from the trousers on the body; the armored sergeants used their knives and guns to poke and stab down crazily through the walls, most of them without A common people were throwing stones, and there were some, holding a strange weapon in their hands, sweating profusely like digging into the ground with hoes, shouting and digging... Every section of the city wall was full of busy figures - there really weren't many people on the wall. Got it!
Although the ladder built by Gao Tengzu was a simple ladder, it was impossible to push it away from the top of the city. A ladder used for siege, no matter how simplified it is, will have two basic features: a wheel at the front and a hook at the top. Just put the front end of the ladder onto the city wall, push it together, and the ladder wheels will roll, and you can quickly and effortlessly set up the ladder along the city wall. After the upper end passes over the wall stack, pull the bottom and the hook will securely fasten the stack. It can no longer be pushed away. Therefore, the scene in a costume drama in which a group of people shout the slogan "1, 2, 3" to erect a long ladder, and then the city defenders work together to overthrow it with a big log, and the people on the ladder fall down, is completely different in actual combat. Possible occurrence - ordinary long ladders are not unavailable, but they are only used in sneak attacks. No general is stupid enough to use them directly to attack the city.
To deal with this kind of ant clinging attack, there is a professional weapon: the file hand ax - it is this strange thing in the hands of the common people.
A normal ax kills by slashing, and the blade is vertical. Facing the enemies climbing up the ladder, the targeted special tool-the rasp hand ax is much more effective. As the name suggests, it is a "T" shaped ax with the head turned sideways, specially used to chop fingers! Any common people who help defend can use it freely without any training: just stick out a hand when you see it, and dig it down like a hoe!
Dozens of half-cut fingers can be seen scattered on the walls and the ground - this weapon is really useful!
The guard strength here in the city gate tower is the weakest, and it is necessary to find someone to strengthen it.
Wang Jian thought of Liu Shiting for a moment: There are six or seven hundred people! The city is in such a state of war, what the hell are these people doing? !
The battering ram was still hitting the city gate again and again, and each hit seemed to hit Wang Jian's heart. No, this thing must be dealt with first! Wang Jian poked his head in again and took a quick look: the top of the crash car with a few twisted arrows stuck in it was covered with a thick layer of wet mud, and some places were broken off by masonry. Due to the cover of the roof, the soldiers pushing the cart below could not be seen at all...
Whoosh, whoosh, whoosh.
Snap, snap.
The moment Wang Jian just retracted his head, more than a dozen feather arrows were either nailed to the wall or flew diagonally past his ears.
The thief specially arranged at least two archers to protect the car during the crash!
Ordinary throwing rocks can't deal with this guy!
Wang Jian quickly came to two conclusions.
He ran to Pan Ding and chatted for a few words. The latter temporarily put down the dead and wounded on the spot, and hurriedly brought a dozen civilians down to the city. Soon, a hundred men and women, led by Pan Ding, rolled up the city wall dragging two stone millstones.
There is a pool directly above the city gate, called the Seven Star Pool, which is used to extinguish fires. Now a gentle wooden slope has been laid out above the pool. While everyone was pushing the heavy millstone onto a flatbed cart and threading a few thick hemp ropes through the grinding holes, Wang Jian mobilized a dozen crossbowmen from adjacent crenels and strung their arrows side by side. Standing in two rows... watching the cart loaded with stone mills slowly pushing on the ramp, Wang Jian gave an order, the archers took a step forward, fired a volley from the front row, then squatted down, and the back row quickly leaned forward to fire!
The sudden rain of arrows temporarily suppressed the archers under the city. In this precious moment, the cart rushed to the end of the slope, hit the crenel, and stopped suddenly. Under the action of inertia, the huge stone mill flew away from the cart and hit directly below!
boom!
The siege engines were smashed to pieces.
A shrill howl sounded again...
Wang Jian waved his hand to stop the desire of the archers and slingers to retaliate: the battle has just begun, there is no need to waste precious arrows and stones. Let the thieves writhe and moan in pain, and let the thieves who come later take a good look!
When Guan Shengyun and others on the lookout saw this scene from a distance, they were shocked: The generals never thought that the defenders could actually use millstones as weapons!
Pulled by a thick rope, the millstone slowly rose towards the city. Finally, it was placed on the battlements, and its small part was hanging out of the city, as if to demonstrate to everyone: Come on, I will wait here!
