After preparations were made, the Mongols launched an attack. To be precise, the new vassal army launched an attack. A large number of civilians, driven by the newly attached sabers, chopped with sticks and beaten with sticks, rushed towards Yokohara Castle carrying earth and wood on their backs - they wanted to fill in the moat. Only the south and east sides of Yokoyuan Castle have moats. The distance between each side is only a few hundred meters long, only more than ten meters wide, and less than ten meters deep. In fact, according to the design, the moat of Yokoyuan Castle should be wider and deeper. However, due to the extremely tight construction period and the hard soil, it became more difficult to dig deeper, so it did not reach the expected depth of 20 meters wide and 15 meters. Although it was the rainy season at this time, there was no water in the moat. The main reason is that Yokoyuan Castle is located on a small mound, which is much higher than the surrounding terrain. And because the moat is not deep enough, the rainwater flows into the Wenjing River next to the castle. Therefore, this city moat should actually be called a city moat.
The soldiers of the newly affiliated army stood half a mile away from Yokoyuan Fort, driving civilians to fill the trenches. These peasants, a group of several hundred people, threw their things down the ditch and ran away, then drove them back with the earthworks. At this time, no fire was fired on the fortress wall, but a message was shouted: "Brothers, stop working for the Mongols, come to us to have food and clothing..." Cao Ergou really couldn't bear to attack these unarmed people. Civil servants started killing people. It is easy to escape. You only need to slip down to the bottom of the trench in the south and run along the trench to the mountain pass. As long as you enter the mountain pass, you can escape from the clutches of the Mongols. It was just that the Perak Army soldiers were shouting and their mouths were dry, but only a dozen of them fled to the mountain pass. It's not that these civilians don't want to join the Perak Army, but because many of them have family members. If they escape, their families will definitely not escape the murderous hands of the Mongols. More importantly, they feel that they have no chance of winning in the Perak Army, and they will be massacred by the Mongols if they surrender. This is also the confidence for the new attached troops to hide in the rear and supervise the battle.
Cao Ergou saw that the shouting was ineffective and the civilians were still coming in a steady stream. If they were allowed to fill in the trench, it would not be long before it was filled up, so he ordered an attack in desperation. However, he did not order the use of firearms, but ordered stones to be thrown down. The few bows and arrows also had iron arrowheads. The stones and headless arrows were not fatal, but they also panicked the civilians. The cries of injury and pain intensified their fear, and they became timid and stopped moving forward. When the soldiers of the new annexed army who oversaw the battle saw this, they beat the civilians with swords and sticks until they howled like ghosts. It should be said that these traitor soldiers were too cruel to their compatriots. They injured more civilians than the Perak soldiers, and even killed several civilians who were walking slowly. Under the threat of the bows and arrows of the war team, these poor civilians had no choice but to continue to carry earth and wood on their backs to fill the trenches. Cao Ergou was filled with indignation at the evil deeds of the newly annexed troops who supervised the war, and he immediately ordered the guns to be fired on these two ghosts. In order to avoid accidentally injuring civilians, he only used a few light cannons and aimed the muzzles at the rear of the supervising team. This bombardment was not intended to have the greatest lethality, but was intended to frighten these traitorous troops.
As soon as the cannon fired, a small group of the new auxiliary troops supervising the battle fell. Most of the dead and injured were the pseudo-officers hiding at the back, and the rest fled back one after another. Seeing that the supervising team had escaped, the civilians who were filling the ditch also dispersed. Some turned around and ran back, while more ran forward. They dropped their things and jumped down the ditch to run towards the mountain pass. For a moment, they actually ran away. More than a hundred people. The sound of artillery made these civilians suddenly realize that if they did not escape, they would either die unjustly under the artillery fire or die under the swords and arrows of the newly attached army supervising team. "The lesser of two evils", there is still a chance of escaping to the mountain pass. As for the safety of my family, I really can't care about it now. I have to save my life first, and then make the next step.
Cao Ergou, who was standing on the fortress wall, felt quite proud. It is not difficult to repel the new annexed army, nor is it difficult to bombard the camps of the new annexed army and the Mongolian army. It is not even difficult to even hit the supervising team half a mile away, as long as you aim carefully. But to accurately hit the enemy without hurting civilians, you need to have precise control of the timing of the bombardment. He easily defeated the enemy's first attack and gained more than a hundred civilians to defect to him, which made him feel very good.
After the newly attached army supervisory team retreated a distance, they all stopped when they saw that the Perak Army was no longer shelling. In their perception, new weapons like artillery are powerful but their range is always a bit short, and they are still inferior to the two weapons, trebuchets and ballistae. In fact, the firearms used by the Song Army and the Mongolian Army were indeed primitive, with weak range and power, and were only used as secondary siege weapons. It is also for this reason that Ouyang Xuan has always told Cao Ergou to use weapons carefully and strive to achieve maximum effect. In fact, among the dozens of fortress guns in Yokoyuan Fort, the light guns can shoot more than one mile, and the six heavy guns with the largest caliber can shoot more than three miles. If the amount of gunpowder is sufficient, the medium and heavy artillery of Hengyuan Fort can hit the Mongolian cavalry and the new annex camp. It's just that shelling the camp now will expose the strength of Yokoyuan Fort and make the Mongols retreat in fear. It was obviously not Ouyang Xuan's purpose to easily allow the Mongols to retreat and change tactics. His purpose was to turn Yokoyuan Fort into a flesh and blood mill for the Mongols and consume as much power as possible from the Sichuan Mongolian Army.
After a short period of formation, the new auxiliary army escorted the civilian husbands to the fortress. For fear of shelling, the new auxiliary army stopped one mile and stopped moving forward. Instead, they used bows and arrows to force the civilian husbands to continue moving forward. These traitorous troops believe that they should be safe a mile away. What they never expected was that as soon as the civilians were out of the range of bows and arrows, under the shouts of the thunderbolt troops on the wall, they threw away their belongings and fled to the ditch. Seeing that the civilians were about to escape, these new auxiliary troops hurriedly pursued them. Although the civilian husbands are just talking tools in their eyes and can be beaten and scolded at will, without these coolies who are like animals, the Mongols will definitely leave them vacant.
Speaking of which, the civilian husbands ran very fast when they fled for their lives. Seeing that hundreds of civilian husbands were about to flee to the ditch, the new auxiliary troops behind them pursued them even more urgently, even forgetting the artillery on the city wall. Just as the civilians slipped down into the trench, Cao Ergou ordered all the artillery except the heavy artillery to fire together. There were more than a dozen small and medium-sized artillery pieces on the south wall of the fortress. The shotguns fired formed a dense firepower net. In an instant, a large area of the new annex soldiers who rushed over fell to the ground. The rest were so frightened that they turned around and ran away. , fled directly back to the camp. This round of shelling really hit the new auxiliary army hard, leaving at least a quarter of the new annex army supervising the battle dead and wounded. There were more than a hundred dead and wounded soldiers lying in front of Yokoyuan Fort alone. More importantly, the defeated soldiers who fled back to the camp spread fear, making the camp noisy and chaotic. At this time, a group of cavalry rushed straight from the Mongolian camp to the chaotic newly attached military camp. After a while, the noisy new annexed army camp became quiet, and several heads were raised high on the flagpole at the entrance of the camp. Then a large group of newly attached soldiers carried dozens of giant shields and escorted the civilians towards Hengyuan Fort.
