It took another two days before the earth wall was completely built. After completion, the earthen wall is about three meters high and two meters thick, parallel to the south side of Hengyuan Fort, with a distance of only 200 meters. Just as the Perak troops in Hengyuan Fort were discussing why the earth wall was used, the new auxiliary army drove a large number of civilians and wood towards the earth wall. This made Cao Ergou, who was standing on the wall of Yokoyuan Fort, urgently order to fire. He knew that the wood had only one purpose - to erect siege weapons. Although the walls of Yokohara Castle were strong, they could not withstand the day-long bombardment of trebuchets.
Several artillery shells landed among the crowd in the open area, blowing up a large area of the new auxiliary troops and civilians who were heading towards the earth wall. The rest of the people saw that the situation was not going well and dispersed in panic. The impact point of the artillery shell was half a mile farther than the earthen wall and nearly a mile away from Hengyuan Fort. They obviously did not expect the artillery to hit such a distance. In fact, the artillery this time was still aimed at the new auxiliary army walking behind, and the casualties suffered by the old civilian husband were only a fraction of the new auxiliary army. This bombardment really cast a psychological shadow on the newly attached troops. The Pili Army artillery can actually shoot so far and be so powerful. Does this have a chance of winning? How can we fight this battle? But it doesn't matter what they say. In the eyes of the Mongols, they are just cannon fodder.
Several more heads were raised on the flagpole at the entrance of the newly attached military camp. Under the watchful eyes of the Mongolian cavalry, the newly attached soldiers escorted the civilians towards the earth wall. But as expected, they were violently bombarded again, and then fled. Then the leading new auxiliary army was beheaded by the Mongols. After repeating this process several times, very little wood was delivered to the earthen wall. However, hundreds of new auxiliary soldiers were killed and injured, and more than a hundred migrant workers were also killed and injured. The Mongols behind the formation also saw that the civilians were not the focus of the artillery strikes, but the new annexed troops were. At this time, the Mongolian army commander Mi Zhe Huoli also knew that if the threat of artillery was not resolved, more and more newly attached troops would die, and their morale would collapse sooner or later. If all these cannon fodder are dead and flee, we can't let our cavalry attack the city. As for giving up the attack and trying to persuade them to surrender? To say that this was still possible before the Perak Army and Navy attacked Chengdu City, now not only the arrogant Mongolians like Mi Zhe Huoli would never agree, but even Liu Heima, who advocated simultaneous suppression and appeasement, did not dare to agree. The current consensus among the Mongols is that they must attack the mountains and kill all the people under the rule of the Perak Army before they can vent their hatred of Chengdu being attacked.
Looking at the dead and wounded on the ground, Jia Gulong, the general in charge of the siege of the Mongolian army, fell into deep thought. The deep-rooted concepts formed by years of siege experience have been broken by the bloody reality. Like Yelümaizhu, he was a Khitan, and he was also a rare siege expert among the Mongols. Liu Heima built a new Chengdu city on the ruins of the old city in just seven days after his raid on Chengdu, which is his contribution. After arriving at Yokoyuan Fort, he kept looking closely, trying to find out the defensive weaknesses and ways to crack the artillery. He used earth walls to protect the artillery. But he didn't expect that the range of the artillery could reach one mile. He had also heard that the Thunderbolt weaponry was extremely powerful, but he didn't take it to heart. He only talked about the random words of those defeated soldiers who were routed. As a general who has been besieging cities all year round, the most powerful defensive weapons he has ever seen are still trebuchets and ballistae. As for the artillery, whether it was the artillery in the Mongolian army or the artillery in the Song army, it was just powerful. The flames and smoke it spewed were terrifying, but in terms of power, it was not as powerful as the trebuchet.
In Jiagulong's ancient plan, suppressing the Pili Army's artillery was the key to this siege. His idea was to transport materials to an earthen wall and assemble them into siege weapons using the shelter of the wall. For this reason, the height of the earthen wall and the distance from Yokoyuan Castle were carefully calculated, so that the trebuchet could be protected by the earthen wall, and the stones shot in a curve could reach Yokoyuan Castle. But how to get materials and personnel to the earth wall is now a problem. When Jia Gulong was in trouble in ancient times, one of his subordinates solved the problem. This small school was originally a tunnel soldier of the Jin Army. His suggestion was to dig a trench diagonally leading to the earth wall from outside the range of the Pili Army's artillery. As long as the inclined trench is dug wider and deeper, people can walk on the bottom of the trench to transport materials to the earth wall. After Jiagu Longgu listened carefully, he loudly exclaimed, and immediately ordered someone to execute it. This method is actually the civil engineering work of later generations. The method is a bit clumsy, but except for the larger amount of work, it is actually not bad at dealing with firearms. As for the manpower needed to dig trenches, the Mongolian army is not lacking at all. Not to mention the tens of thousands of civilians, even the thousands of new attached troops are excellent labor.
Under the ancient order of Jiagulong, thousands of people dug dozens of trenches at the same time, and the scene was very spectacular. This scene obviously fell into the eyes of Cao Ergou in the city. At first, he did not know the Mongolians' intentions. When the trenches were completed a few days later, and the civilians and newly attached soldiers advanced from the trenches towards the earthen walls with materials, he understood the Mongolians' tactics. But the trench has been dug, and bombardment will be of no avail. In fact, Cao Ergou also ordered people to bombard the trenches, but the effect was not satisfactory. The cannonballs that fell on the ground could not cause any harm to the people in the trenches. Even if the shells occasionally fell into the trenches, they were blocked by the trench walls, and only one or two unlucky people suffered.
It took the Mongolian army another three days to assemble dozens of trebuchets. These trebuchets can launch stones the size of human heads and are also a great threat to Yokoyuan Castle. A stone of this size would not cause much damage to the iron and cement-reinforced front wall of Yokoyuan Fort, but the relatively weak defense of the fortress gate and the top of the city wall would pose a greater threat. In order to prevent bows and arrows and rainy weather from affecting the use of artillery, a roof and parapets were added to the walls of Hengyuan Fort. These two parts could not withstand the continuous blows of trebuchets. At present, the fortress guns of Yokoyuan Fort are all direct-fire ballistics and cannot threaten the trebuchets behind the earth wall. To deal with the targets behind the earth wall, the tiger squatting cannon needs to be fired in a curved direction. Just when Cao Ergou sent people back to Wanjiaping to get the Tiger Crouching Cannon, and was preparing to send people out of the fort to raid and destroy the trebuchet, the trebuchet opened fire. For a while, the rocks that came with the sound of wind made the head of Yokoyuan Castle make a loud banging sound. From time to time, there were screams of people being hit. Fortunately, the falling stones were only the size of fists. In addition to smashing many utensils, only Several people were killed and injured. In this regard, the sixth company commander Tang Xiangwei, who was familiar with siege equipment, explained to Cao Ergou that this trebuchet was actually a trebuchet commonly used by the Song army. Its main function was not to destroy city walls, but to kill people. Moreover, this distance has reached the limit of the trebuchet. If the stone is larger, the service life of the trebuchet will be greatly reduced, and it will be damaged after just a few shots. Judging from the stones that just fell, the Mongolian army just wanted to suppress the artillery of the Perak Army and provide fire support to the siege army.
Tang Xiangwei's words made Cao Ergou give up the idea of leaving the fort for a surprise attack. If you leave the city at this moment, you will inevitably have a hand-to-hand battle with the new auxiliary troops protecting the trebuchet. At this moment, there were hundreds of new auxiliary troops surrounding the city-throwing machine. Cao Ergou believed that he could defeat them with only 300 men, but he would also suffer heavy casualties. Compared with the 5,000 new auxiliary troops, the Perak Army in Hengyuan Fort only had 600 people. Even based on an exchange ratio of one to five, the Perak Army could not afford casualties. Moreover, the Mongolian cavalry is still watching from a distance. Although the communication ditch leading to the earth wall affects the mobility of the cavalry, they can walk to the earth wall and shoot with bows and arrows, which will cause a fatal blow to the Perak troops who destroy the trebuchets outside the fort. .
