After Qian Laoer's baggage horse team transporting ammunition arrived, the Perak Army began to take action. This trip was still ten miles away from Mingshan City, so Ouyang Xuan still chose to take the path on the mountain.
Although after Zhou Jianshen brought the Reformation Camp, the number of Perak Army personnel had reached 1,300. After these days of fighting, the Mongols lost 200 cavalry and 250 new auxiliary troops, and their available combat strength was only 300 cavalry and 500 new auxiliary troops.
After capturing Mingshan, Cheri surrendered some new auxiliary troops. Therefore, although the new auxiliary troops lost a lot of people, the total number of troops was not reduced much.
Comparing the strength of the two sides, the core combat strength of the Mongolian army is 300 elite cavalry, while the Perak army has 600 field battalion soldiers. As for the new auxiliary armies under both sides, they can only fight against the wind with great momentum, and they are not reliable combat forces at all.
Although the number of soldiers exceeded the Mongolian army, Ouyang Xuan knew that if they fought in the open area, the field camp still had no chance of winning against the Mongolian cavalry, not to mention that the Perak Army had to divide 300 troops to protect the horses in the ravine.
In order to protect these treasures, Ouyang Xuan asked Zhou Jianshen to lead the navy company escorting the baggage and the two companies of the Guizheng camp to stay in the ravine.
Before dawn, Ouyang Xuan and his people took advantage of the cool morning to head to Mingshan City. At three o'clock in the morning, they arrived at a low mountain two miles away from the city.
Mingshan City is located in a small basin in the mountains. The basin is surrounded by hills and low mountains. The place where Ouyang Xuan and others arrived is the short mountain closest to the city.
It's just that the light Tiger Crouching Cannon brought by the Perak Army on this trip has a short range, and the shelling from the low mountains cannot reach the famous mountain city.
To attack the Mongols in the city, the position must be set up half a mile away from the city. But this would require marching for more than a mile on the open flat land in front of Mingshan City, which would obviously lead to a surprise attack by the Mongolian cavalry.
Even though the field battalion is the most elite combat force of the Perak Army, it will never be able to withstand the impact of the cavalry during the march.
In fact, the Mongols also knew this, and they would not be stupid enough to attack the Thunderbolt Army on the mountain. Although the mountain is short, it is not something that cavalry can charge up.
Cherry's idea was to launch a surprise attack when the Perak Army came to attack, and defeat the Perak Army in one fell swoop. The specific tactic was for the new annexed troops to attack the front, while the Mongolian cavalry attacked from both wings.
Even if the Perak Army can set up and fire artillery in a hurry, as long as they rush in despite casualties, the gunners and musketeers who are close to them will be lambs to be slaughtered.
As for the Perak Army not attacking? That’s easy to handle! They stayed in the wilderness, not only exposed to the wind and sun, but also bitten by mosquitoes, and the supply line was far away in Qiongzhou - hundreds of feet were burned to the ground, but the famous mountain city had food and drink. Let's see who can outlast whom?
However, Cheri's wishful thinking was shattered. How could the Pili Army not understand the risks of going down the mountain blindly?
As soon as Ouyang Xuan saw the famous mountain city in the broad basin, he had an idea in his mind. His plan was to set up artillery on the mountain, and then send people to the foot of the mountain to dig trenches, build earthen walls, and build simple fortifications within the range of the artillery.
After the fortifications are constructed, first send people to guard the fortifications and then move the artillery into the fortifications. After the artillery was set up, people were sent to dig trenches and build earth walls toward the city.
By repeating this process, it can gradually extend to the bottom of the city. The reason why Mingshan is the most fertile county in Yazhou is because there are many small basins in the mountains, and the county seat is the largest one.
These small basins have flat terrain and abundant water resources, allowing wheat and rice to be harvested in summer and autumn respectively.
During this season, there were also rice fields outside Mingshan City, but Cherri led his troops to occupy the area outside the city. In order to prevent horses from being trapped in the soft mud, he ordered people to drain all the water in the rice fields, and turned the rice fields outside the city into horse ranches.
In less than ten days, the thousands of acres of rice fields that were about to be harvested turned into a mess. However, this move by the Mongolian army unintentionally helped the Perak army.
Under the continuous scorching sun, the moist ground became solid. After digging out the surface, there was a soft soil layer underneath, which was very useful for the Perak Army to dig trenches and build earthen walls.
Therefore, by noon on the second day, the trenches and earthen walls were built less than a mile away from the city. It is difficult for artillery to deal with civil engineering work, not to mention the siege weapons and Mongolian cavalry bows and arrows on Mingshan City.
Seeing the trenches and earthen walls getting closer and closer, Cheri became really panicked and had to send troops to charge to stop the civil engineering work outside the city, but this played into the mind of the Perak Army.
The Mongolian troops that came in like a tide were bombarded by artillery and muskets, and after leaving dozens of corpses behind, they receded like a tide.
Contrary to Cheri's panic, Ouyang Xuan was not in a hurry. By extending it again, the earthen walls and trenches can be built to within half a mile of the city wall, and then the Mongols can once again taste what it's like to be in Qiongzhou.
And he is still waiting for reinforcements from Yazhou - he has sent Qian Laoer to deliver a message to Yazhou, asking Yazhou to send troops to fight the Mongols.
Ouyang Xuan believed that Yazhou was unwilling to send troops to Qiongzhou because these bureaucrats
The mentality of "I don't care if there is snow in front of my door, I don't care if there is frost on someone else's house", but Baizhang and Mingshan are counties of Yazhou, so they should send troops.
The reason why we sent Qian Laoer was not only because he was familiar with the trails, but also gave him an important task - to go to Lizhou to inform the caravan to come back. It was said that Qian Laoer and the others set out in mid-April, and now it is mid-August. It’s been four months since I’ve been home.
But to Ouyang Xuan's surprise, Qian Laoer ran into another wall in Yazhou. Cao Zhizhou of Yazhou said that such important military affairs should not be tampered with without permission, and that troops could only be raised with the order of Master Yu Xing.
Ouyang Xuan knew that Cao Zhizhou had no intention of raising an army, so he stepped up his attack on Mingshan City. Seeing that the scene in Qiongzhou City was about to happen again, Cheri decided to retreat to Hongya County in Jiading Prefecture and Pengshan County in Meizhou as originally planned.
The terrain along this road is composed of hills, low mountains and basins, so it is not difficult for the cavalry to pass through. When he easily captured Baizhang and Mingshan City, Cherry changed his mind and prepared to hold on for a long time and wait for the arrival of reinforcements.
Although the general trend is inevitable, losing Qiongzhou City is not a glorious thing after all. With these two cities, we have the capital to regain Qiongzhou.
Moreover, after conquering the two cities of Baizhang and Mingshan, Yazhou sent people over to negotiate the terms of surrender, and also sent him a lot of money to prevent him from burning Mingshan City.
It's just that the governor of Yazhou is too greedy, and the condition for his surrender is the position of the governor of Jiading, which makes Cheri very angry.
Although he agreed verbally, in his heart he secretly thought that he would make plans after winning Yazhou. However, the war was not going well in the past few days, and the Yazhou side went back on its word. Not only did it have a bad look on the envoy sent by Cheli, but it even asked the Mongolian army to withdraw from the Yazhou boundary immediately.
Cao Zhizhou's ups and downs made Cheri very angry, but there was nothing he could do. Now he has less than 300 cavalry to fight, and only more than 400 new auxiliary troops. This is not a time for grudges.
Taking action is the best strategy for the present. Taking advantage of the darkness, Cherry led his cavalry to sneak out of the city and headed southeast.
In addition to the Mongolian cavalry, he only brought a dozen new auxiliary troops with superb riding skills on this trip. Because there are only 700 horses left, it is necessary to ensure that in addition to one person and two horses of the combat cavalry, the Mongolians who have had their fingers cut off must also be taken with them.
Although these wastes were a drag, Cheri had to take them with him because he was a native Mongolian. In addition to the lack of horses, Cherry also had to leave new auxiliary troops to defend the city, holding back the Perak Army before he could escape easily.
Of course, those new annexed troops were not easy to deal with. They obviously would not defend the city obediently after the Mongols escaped. Therefore, Cheri told them that he was leading the cavalry to attack Yazhou City.
The day after Cherry left with his men, the Perak Army built trenches and earthen walls to the edge of the city and began shelling the city.
It was not until the fourth day that the new auxiliary troops in the city opened the city gate and surrendered. On the one hand, it was because the Mongols had not returned for a long time, and on the other hand, the bombardment by the Perak Army was getting tighter every day, and they could no longer hold on.
It can be said that these new auxiliary troops are really stupid. They surrendered only to find out that Cheri had fled to Hongya. Now that I think about it, why did Cheri bring sick and injured horses with him to attack Yazhou City, why did he bring Mongolians who were no longer capable of fighting, and why did he bring large and small bags of property?
