Li Zhao on the side looked at the depressed Ma Tingyun and couldn't help but let out a long sigh.
"Sir, no one could have expected that Lu Ci led his troops to defect, so you should stop blaming yourself. Right now, you should focus on defending the city."
Ma Tingyun couldn't help but shook his head and smiled bitterly: "What I regret is not that Lu Ci led the crowd to defect, but that I was thinking of Pao Ze's feelings and was soft-hearted, and actually took in Lu Ci and other stragglers. If I had been ruthless and banned Lu Ci from entering the city, it would have been reasonable and legal. How can the morale of the defenders in this city be ruined?"
Li Zhao was also in an extremely heavy mood. He originally thought that one more person would give him more strength. With these eight thousand defenders, Eagle Ridge is in an invincible position.
Who would have thought that a field army and a city-defending army are not the same thing at all.
Lu Ci and other wandering warriors spent their days running around in the wilderness, fighting hand-to-hand with the enemy. Not only did they develop extraordinary courage, but they also became arrogant.
In Lu Ci's opinion, this kind of strategy of holding on to the city was just a fool's errand. The so-called frustration in his heart actually led to catastrophe.
The two thousand cavalrymen that Lu Ci took away were nothing. What really caused a fatal impact on the defenders was "morale" in the final analysis.
Looking at the catapults rising from the ground outside the city, Li Zhao couldn't help but shake his head: "Sir, look, with so many catapults, even if they attack the royal capital, it is nothing more than that."
"Since Qin Feng arrived on the frontline battlefield, he has never sent any troops to take the initiative to attack the city. However, the long-range offensive against the city is extremely intensive. This Qin Feng is indeed the richest warlord in the Liang Kingdom. This kind of attack does not count the cost. Even the Liang Kingdom’s commander-in-chief may not be able to afford such a strategy that consumes materials.”
These words were said into Ma Tingyun's heart.
If Qin Feng sent troops to attack, Ma Tingyun was absolutely confident that as many Liang soldiers as they came would die, but... Qin Feng did not follow the conventional siege tactics at all. The frontline troops all took a defensive posture to guard against a sudden attack by the defenders in the city.
And the real troops that attack the city are actually... craftsmen!
Those Tianji camp craftsmen are all skilled craftsmen comparable to those employed by the royal family. They are very skilled in craftsmanship. The time to build a catapult is measured in hours.
Moreover, the "ammunition" made for catapults is even more diverse and overwhelming.
The gravel in the net bag can be scattered into more than a dozen pieces of gravel in one shot, causing intensive damage to the city.
There are also stones carved into standard round balls. After being thrown in, they roll along the ground and hit the wall, destroying the house and killing people. There is no way to stop it.
In the early stage, some defenders who were not afraid of death tried to block the rolling stones. As a result... the huge kinetic energy generated by the rolling stones could directly crush people into pulp.
Of course, these two kinds of projectiles can also be avoided by relying on fortification bunkers.
Qin Feng, in order to capture the city, can use any damaging move. The most deadly weapon is the "stink bomb"!
Thousands of soldiers under Qin Feng produced large amounts of feces every day, and Qin Feng actually ordered people to collect these feces. The feces and urine were mixed together and frozen into a large lump of ice at night. At dawn and when the temperature was still low, they were thrown into the fortress with a catapult.
As time went by and the temperature rose at noon, these ice lumps began to melt, feces and urine flowed freely, and the entire fortress stunk.
Compared with stones that can directly kill people, these filthy and dirty things are more terrifying in terms of mental torture to the defenders.
Now there is a saying circulating in the city...
If you continue to defend like this, you might as well just die...
"asshole!"
Ma Tingyun punched the city wall, ignoring the bloody finger bones, staring at Qin Feng's forward battalion, gritting his teeth in anger.
"If we continue to consume like this, even if we have strength, we will have nowhere to use it. Compared with the body, the spirit will definitely collapse first."
"When will the reinforcements arrive?"
Seeing Ma Tingyun who was about to collapse, Li Chou was at his wits' end. Taking the initiative to attack would mean death, while huddled in the city would face Qin Feng's endless and tireless torture.
Moreover... there are simply too many catapults, and they are surrounded by ravines to protect them from horses.
Even if the cavalry is sent out to wreak havoc, it will have little effect.
If this continues, Eagle Ridge Fortress will be the first defender in history to lose to a group of craftsmen.
At this moment, four more carts of projectiles were delivered to the front line.
Because they were far away, Ma Tingyun and Li Zhao couldn't see clearly what it was, but their hearts were full of bad premonitions.
Qin Feng's nose was wrapped several layers of cloth, and he was still dizzy from the filth in the carriage.
Ning Hu on the side couldn't stop retching.
"Qin...Brother Qin, your move is too damaging!"
"In these days, the internal organs and blood of the cattle and sheep consumed by the army are all stored in large iron pots and simmered over slow fire to accelerate the rot of the internal organs..."
"This smell is even worse than the rotting corpses before!"
Qin Feng didn't dare to laugh, because if he smiled, he would most likely be fainted on the spot.
In order to speed up the decay of these things, Qin Feng also added a lot of ingredients, including but not limited to, feces, rotten eggs...
After a night of freezing, although the rotten matter could not be completely frozen into an ice lump, it had solidified, at least it no longer leaked juice.
Qin Feng quickly ordered the craftsmen to put the rotten objects into sacks and use catapults to throw all the carefully prepared gravy stink bombs into the fortress.
"I want to see when these defenders will be completely driven crazy!"
As the sacks filled with rotting materials were smashed on the ground of the fortress, the defenders, who had almost compromised, had no intention of stepping forward to clean up.
Because after days of harassment, the entire fortress was almost covered with all kinds of feces and filth.
In addition, water resources are precious and cannot be flushed, so that the smell of the entire fortress is comparable to that of a latrine.
However, as Qin Feng carefully prepared the stink bomb and threw it in, the powerful and pungent rotten smell still refreshed the defenders' understanding of "stinky".
And as temperatures rise, the odor becomes more intense.
A young defender collapsed on the spot and shouted hysterically: "I've had enough. I would rather die on the battlefield than be smoked to death like this."
"Qin Feng, I'm your uncle!"
"If you have the ability to send troops to attack the city, what kind of ability do you have to throw these smelly rotten things into the city!"
A defender next to him was directly tortured and went crazy. He collapsed on the ground and cried loudly.
Ma Tingyun, who was standing on the city wall, held his breath and looked at the unsightly fortress, also wanting to cry without tears.
"Li Zhao... prepare his troops and horses to fight Qin Feng to the death!"
Ma Tingyun knew that leaving the city was a dead end, but he could only fight to the death!
