After waiting for a long time, Wu Dao seemed to be saying to Gao Jianli, or murmuring to himself: "What a plan! What a plan!"
Gao Jianli panicked when he heard this, and hurriedly made a summary to Martial Arts, and said with sincerity and fear, "I am a stupid official, please give me a clear explanation from the emperor."
Wu Dao opened his eyes, glanced at him, and said slowly: "How can Gao Aiqing always think about setting fire to himself? How good would it be if we led Chen Xiaomu's fire elsewhere?"
"Your Majesty, I'm afraid that this fire will become too big and it will be very detrimental to our Qin generals. After all, none of the emperors of those small countries has the talent and strategy of the Emperor!" Gao Jianli insisted on his opinion.
"What do you think Chen Xiaomu is like?" Wu Dao suddenly straightened up on the dragon chair and asked Gao Jianli.
"Above me" Gao Jianli said without hesitation.
"Well, I decided to marry my Princess Changxing to him. I don't believe that he can now attack the Chu State for a princess from a small country who broke off the engagement with him. In the end, he can still be with me, who treats her as my own father-in-law. Enemy?" Wu Dao smiled.
Gao Jianli looked at Wu Dao in surprise, "Your Majesty, didn't you say that you are not allowed to mention the matter of Princess Changxing going to Chen State to propose marriage?"
Wu Dao smiled and said, "This moment is not the other moment. Before, I thought that Chen Xiaomu was able to eliminate hundreds of thousands of Chu army's horses in Tianquan County just by luck. Now it seems that this man is indeed a man who is rare to meet in a thousand years." Handsome, I want to take him over and use him for my own use!"
"Where is the princess and the queen...?" Gao Jianli said helplessly.
"I will show great justice to them. In the face of the great cause of reunification, the love between children is a trivial matter that cannot be put on the table!"
"But, Your Majesty, please don't forget that Chen Xiaomu has another identity, that is, he is still the prince of the Chen Kingdom. Can the Emperor finally let the Chen Kingdom escape the unification?" Gao Jianli asked.
Chen Xiaomu is just an illegitimate son that Chen Ruchang himself does not recognize. Even if Chen Ruchang makes him the prince in the end, he will never let him inherit the throne. At most, he is just an unpopular prince in the Chen Kingdom, and he will never be allowed to inherit the throne. After he is recruited to our Qin State, I will make him the King of Yizi, one person below ten thousand people. In addition, when I send envoys to Chen State to propose marriage, you also secretly send a secret envoy with one million taels of silver. Visit Wu and Zhou countries and make it clear to them that going to Chen to propose marriage is only for the sake of their daughter's affection and will not affect any relationship between Qin and their two countries. During the war between Wu and Zhou against Chen, Qin We are on the side of Wu and Zhou, and we can secretly help them so that even if they cannot destroy Chen in the near future, we must let them compress the land of Chen to within thirty cities. "
"In the future, after the unification of the nine kingdoms, I will encourage the people of Qin and Chen to intermarry with each other, and gradually assimilate them all with the population of our nine kingdoms. By then, whether the two countries will be unified or not, I am afraid it will not be up to them. This is the emperor of Chen State!"
After Gao Jianli heard Wu Dao's idea again, he had to admire Wu Dao as one of the rare top power strategists in the world today. He immediately stopped trying to persuade Wu Dao to give up the marriage with Chen Guo, and directly discussed with him about going to Chen Guo to propose marriage. .
In Ye City, Pan Yi gathered 10,000 imperial troops and was about to leave the city to attack Chen Xiaomu's defense line of Zheng Army and Hubei Army. However, he was stopped by Shi Lei who rushed in. Shi Lei felt that Chen Xiaomu could easily break through the Chu State's 50,000 defenders. The Xinyang Pass pass would never be as simple as what they observed on the city. Moreover, he had never seen the besieging army camp so far away from the city. Maybe Chen Xiaomu had already arranged his pockets at the city. The purpose of letting them get inside is to consume some of the city's active forces before launching an siege.
Three days passed in a flash, and the four gates of Yecheng were still closed. Except for the occasional patrolling soldiers, it was as quiet as death. The two sides faced each other in silence, but Chen Xiaomu's heart became more and more uneasy. The more nervous he became, he used the blitzkrieg method of later generations to suddenly besiege the city. The daily consumption of more than 100,000 Chu troops and hundreds of thousands of ordinary people in the city was by no means a small amount! Rather than being trapped to death, the Chu army in the city would definitely give it a try.
On the night of the fifth day, Chen Xiaomu thought over and over again and decided to move all the soldiers besieging Yecheng to the main gate of Yecheng, leaving only a bamboo stick formation about five miles wide at the remaining three gates, and deliberately let the soldiers walk back and forth in front of the camp. .
This change of the Zheng army outside the city was immediately reported to the ears of Shi Lei and Xiong Ze by the Chu army soldiers who were in charge of observation on the city. At this time, only Shi Lei, Xiong Ze and Pan Yi were left in the Gongcheng Hall. Xiong Ze stared at them. Shi Lei asked, "Prime Minister, Chen Xiaomu suddenly withdrew all the soldiers from the other three gates of Ye City to the main gate of Ye City. What does this mean? Does he want us to abandon the city? Or is it because of insufficient troops? Abandon the rest of the city gates?"
Shi Lei shook his head and said: "Your Majesty, please don't be fooled by the illusions set up by this son. It is true that his troops are insufficient, but he has taken in a large number of our Hubei rebels. I made a rough estimate. In addition to the 50,000 Zheng troops that this son brought from Tianquan County, there are at least 30,000 Hubei rebels who took us in along the way. Adding the two together, this son now has at least 80,000 soldiers. Horse, but he has another big killer weapon in his hand. This is the main reason why I stopped General Pan from rashly leading his troops out of the city to attack a few days ago. The soldiers who came back said that this kind of object looks like a small package, but the sound of it falling to the ground is earth-shattering, and it can cause hundreds of casualties in an instant. Every time we fight, this object flies towards us like raindrops from the sky. , if this son uses this thing to attack Yecheng, I'm afraid we won't be able to stop him for a while!"
Xiong Ze glared at Shi Lei, "Prime Minister Shi is so ambitious, is the only way for us to surrender?"
Shi Lei said with a smile: "Your Majesty, although Chen Xiaomu is extremely cunning, he should also know that there are more than 100,000 troops in our city of Ye, so he dare not launch an attack rashly. Now he wants to lure us out of the city to fight with him. When fighting, he used a strategy of suspicion and deliberately leaked loopholes to make us look like he was withdrawing or reducing the number of soldiers at these three gates, so that we could break through from these three gates. In fact, he had already been at these three gates. An ambush is set up in front of the city gate, waiting for us to take the bait!"
"Then what do you think we should do now? We can't die trapped in this city, right?" Xiong Ze asked with a frown.
"I want to use the trick. Tonight, General Pan will lead 30,000 troops to rush out from the main city gate, break through Chen Xiaomu's main city gate defense line, and unexpectedly go around the back of the Zheng army guarding the other three gates to attack. First, disrupt the enemy. After General Pan succeeds in their arrangement, I will personally lead 50,000 troops to go out, annihilate Chen Xiaomu's troops in one fell swoop, and capture Chen Xiaomu alive and hand him over to the emperor for disposal!"
"Okay, that's very good, Mr. Zaifu. It seems that ginger is still hotter than ever, haha!" Xiong Ze stroked his beard with his hand happily, nodded and smiled.
When Chen Xiaomu was observing the city walls of Yecheng in the evening, he seemed to feel that the intervals between soldier patrols on the city walls of Yecheng seemed to be much shorter than usual, and the number of patrolling soldiers had also increased. He couldn't help but murmur in his heart, I have a feeling that the Chu army may make some moves tonight.
After returning to the camp, he immediately found Zhang Yun and Zhang Jian and began to plan tonight's ambush. He knew that as long as the Chu army's cavalry took the lead, when the explosive pack went off, the war horses had never been trained to make explosion sounds. At that time, most people would be frightened and run around on the battlefield. Therefore, a dozen snagging ropes were set up in front of the camp. Behind the stumbling ropes, nearly a hundred trebuchets were lined up. More than 2,000 cavalry were ambushed on both sides of the city gate. Five or six miles away, prepare to kill the infantry who follow the cavalry and rush out of the city.
In the middle of the night, when the moon was in the sky, the suspension bridge on the moat in front of the main gate of Ye City was quietly lowered. The two huge gates behind the suspension bridge were also opened silently. Suddenly, there was a sound of horns. There was a muffled sound, and the sound of killing in the city gate was loud. The lights were bright, and groups of Chu army cavalry raised their swords and shouted loudly. They rushed out of the city gate and rushed towards the Zheng army's tent camped outside the city. For a moment, War drums were beating loudly, horns were blowing, and the iron hooves of thousands of war horses were treading on the ground, making the earth tremble.
Seeing the Chu army's cavalry getting closer and closer, it seemed as if he could see the sharp swords held by the Chu army on horseback. Chen Xiaomu shouted "let go". Hundreds of trebuchets threw out nearly a hundred trebuchets at once. Explosive packs, thousands of kilograms of explosives, suddenly blasted a wall of fire among the Chu army's cavalry. The huge noise and the soaring flames made the Chu horse's horses panic. They no longer accepted the command of the cavalry. Start running around on the battlefield.
The second row of explosive packets flew over like raindrops again. The thousands of Chu army cavalry running in front were almost all left. Those who were on horseback and were lucky enough not to be killed by the explosion also fell off their horses and were stabbed by the bamboo sticks buried by Zheng Jun on the ground. He was heartbroken. The Chu army who was injured by the explosion was even worse. The wound caused by the explosive was larger and more painful than the wound made by the knife. In addition, being trampled by the frightened horse, some human figures were shocked. It doesn't come out anymore, it's completely turned into a puddle of meat.
Standing downstairs at the city gate to watch the battle, Emperor Chu Huang Wu Dao and Prime Minister Shi Lei were stunned by the scene in front of them. They had only heard that the object called dynamite was very powerful, but they did not expect that the scene of the dynamite explosion they saw exceeded It was hundreds of times more powerful than they originally imagined.
The cavalry in front were in panic, and the infantry following the cavalry were blocked in the city gate and could not rush out. From time to time, Chu horses were tripped by the more than ten stumbling ropes in front of the trebuchet, and at the same time, there was a sound and the cavalry fell off their horses. The scream of being stabbed with a bamboo stick.
Occasionally, a few Chu cavalry who managed to rush to the trebuchet were immediately shot into hedgehogs by Zheng's archers.
"Your Majesty, Ming Jin withdraws his troops. It seems that the Zheng army outside the city has been prepared for a long time. We are only making a tentative attack. Now that we have found out the strength of the Zheng army outside the city, if we don't withdraw our troops and close the city gate, they will rush into the city. That would be troublesome!" Shi Lei bowed and suggested to Xiong Ze who was standing below the city gate watching the battle.
Wu Dao has also seen the power of this legendary explosive, and knows that if the fight continues like this, not only will there be no results, but his losses will be huge, because he observed on the city that not a single soldier of the Zheng army has appeared on the battlefield. On the other hand, the elite soldiers who rushed out of the city were on their backs, with numerous casualties and casualties. Shi Lei's proposal was exactly what he wanted, so he immediately nodded and said, "Retract the troops and fight them another day."
The gong for withdrawing soldiers at the top of the city "dang!" As soon as the gong sounded, the battered Chu soldiers at the city gate immediately retreated towards the city gate like a tide. The middlemen trampled on their horses and killed many people. Chen Xiaomu ambushed on both sides of the city gate. More than two thousand cavalry immediately rushed over, chasing the Chu army with another round of slashing and killing, which dyed the water of the moat outside Ye City red. Chen Xiaomu took advantage of the opportunity when the Chu army did not dare to shoot arrows at the city, carrying five The trebuchet arrived at the city gate of Yecheng, pointed at a row of people watching the battle below the city gate, and said to the trebuchet shooter, "No matter if you can hit the top, just shoot at it." "
As a result, four of the five explosive packets fired for the first time fell into the moat. There were several muffled "boom, boom" sounds, several water columns rushed out of the river, the suspension bridge was blown up in half, and one explosive packet hit the city wall halfway. , after a loud noise, a big hole was blown in the city wall. The Chu soldiers who had not rushed back to the city from the suspension bridge jumped into the moat like dumplings in a hurry.
As the capital of the Chu State, the city walls of Yecheng are much thicker than the walls of Xinyangguan, the major pass of the Chu State. Although a bomb blast made a big hole in the city wall, the city wall is as stable as Mount Tai and will not move at all. I believe that there will be another ten or eight There was no problem at all when an explosive pack hit it, but it frightened Wu Dao and Shi Lei who were watching the battle downstairs at the city gate. They saw a loud bang in the middle of the city wall, and a puff of pungent smoke flew up. At the top of the city, Shi Lei's voice changed with fright, "Quick, quick, escort, escort!" Several palace guards standing around Xiong Ze couldn't tell the difference, they picked up Xiong Ze and ran down the city.
One of the five trebuchets outside the city was called Liu Sanduo. He was usually very courageous. When he saw that none of the five explosive bags had hit the city, he felt quite dissatisfied. He gritted his teeth and threw his trebuchet. The stone machine pushed forward dozens of steps, grabbed the last explosive package, lit it, and then suddenly released the winch of the stone machine. With a "whoosh", the explosive package flew up to the city gate with the sound of wind. There was only a bang, a plume of black smoke came out of the city gate tower, and half of the city gate tower collapsed.
The sky was slightly bright, and there were large craters created by explosive charges everywhere in front of the main city gate of Yecheng. The soil blown up in the craters was black, and some even had wisps of smoke coming out. There were corpses of people and horses everywhere on the ground. , most of the corpses were beyond recognition, and there was also a corpse floating on the river of the moat. The river water turned scarlet color, and if you got a little closer, you could smell the pungent smell of blood.
