On July 30th, Dong Zhuo led his army back to Luoyang. The officials left behind in Luoyang went out to welcome the Prime Minister as usual, but the scene in front of them made them particularly uneasy.
Before leaving the army, the Liang army was said to have gathered elites and fierce generals. They had raised horses in Shanglinyuan and Xianyangyuan for decades, and the Luoyang arsenal had stocked all the armored soldiers from all over the world. All of them were emptied out for them. When traveling, almost everyone in the Liang army brought a horse. Horses with good legs were used as slave horses for transfer. Various variegated pack horses and mares carried miscellaneous items for them: douchi, full-body armor, and long pigeons. , knives, armor-piercing, crossbows, horn-end bows, etc., as well as a load of rice, millet, dry food, fine wine, and a change of clothes that make the packhorse tremble, etc. are all available.
But when the troops returned, everyone was injured, hungry, thirsty, scarred and physically and mentally exhausted, the baggage was almost empty, and a large number of horses died, so much so that these Liang knights had to take turns riding one. horse.
When the officials came to the front to greet Prime Minister Dong Zhuo from the car, they saw that Prime Minister Dong Zhuo's shoulders were also wrapped in linen with large dark brown blood stains on them. He was obviously seriously injured. Almost everyone turned pale with sadness at this time. It was just that those who flattered Dong Zhuo were worried about the future, and those who hated Dong Zhuo were just pretending to be hypocritical.
Dong Zhuo had no intention of quarreling with them, and just snorted coldly: "It's just a minor injury, it won't kill anyone." He then dismissed the Luoyang officials and asked each general to lead his troops back to Xianyang Garden to rest and resupply, and ordered the nearest secrets to be moved. After arriving at the mansion, he finally sent envoys to Beimang Mountain to summon Dong Yue and Jia Xu to the mansion to discuss matters.
When Dong Yue and Jia Xu arrived, Dong Zhuo was lying on the couch. A concubine was massaging his head and acupuncture points. Two concubines were boiling the concoction in the room, so that the house was filled with a bitter smell. the smell. Dong Zhuo heard the sound and saw that it was the two of them. He asked straight to the point: "What has happened to Mengjin these days? Has anyone done anything?"
Dong Yue answered honestly: "The Prime Minister ordered me to go to the river bank every day to observe Mengjin from a distance. However, from a distance, I can see that the men are still building the city on the sandbank these days, and there is no sign of crossing the river to attack the city."
At this time, the maid boiled the concoction and poured the black and green concoction into the jade bowl. She boasted for a while and then fed it into the mouth of the Prime Minister. Dong Zhuo swallowed the concoction with difficulty, then opened his eyes and signaled the maid to continue the massage. Dong Yue then continued to talk.
"But there are indeed changes on the north shore, and there are quite a few."
Dong Zhuo raised his voice and said "hmm" to show that he was very concerned about this matter.
"A large number of ships are being searched and built on the north bank, far exceeding the number needed to cross the river. According to the scouts' inquiries, there are no less than 500 ships gathered in Guangmengjin on the north bank. There are even more ships built on the north bank. According to me It is estimated that the number of ships in hand is probably more than 700."
After saying these words, Dong Zhuo stood up immediately. He accidentally pulled the wound, so that his face became quite ferocious. It took a long time to calm down. The Prime Minister asked the maids to retreat to the side compartment. He picked up the medicine bowl, drank the medicine in one gulp, and then asked: "Why does he want so many ships? Could it be that Liu Bei's reinforcements are coming?"
Dong Yue shook his head and said: "I had the same guess at first, so I sent scouts to the north bank every day to investigate the illegal crossing, but found nothing. No matter how I inquired, there was no sign of reinforcements arriving, and no baggage was transported from Tianjing Pass."
Weird. Dong Zhuo and Dong Yue both thought so.
Pingjin captain Jia Xu was silent for a long time, and now he said: "It's probably not the arrival of reinforcements." He told what he had seen in the past few days, "I also followed General Zhonglang to inspect the situation, and I thought so at first. But when I went to the river bank again in the past few days, I saw people floating in boats in the river and knocking things on the waves. I felt the cattails and looked closer, only to find that they were all wooden piles."
"Those piles one foot each were put into the river, but they did not fall down when encountering waves. As of yesterday, they had laid more than thirty piles. According to my subordinates, the people probably planned to build a bridge, a pontoon bridge on the river." Jia Xu said. At this point, his tone paused, and he himself felt it was ridiculous, but in the end he affirmed: "There is nothing else to think about."
Hearing this, Dong Zhuo was silent for a moment, and he pondered: "If so, it can be discussed. No one has been able to build the Mengjin River Bridge since ancient times. Chen Tingjian relied on his talent and despised the ancients, so he was indeed able to do such a thing. But if he can't do it, he can't do it." Well, if he builds it..."
Thinking of the military situation around Luoyang after the army on the north bank crossed the bridge, Dong Zhuo shuddered. He stood up and quickly gave an order to Dong Yue: "Abolish the Nanguan Pass! As soon as possible! Now our main force is greatly damaged. If Chen Chong is allowed to build the river bridge, the passes on the north bank will be useless. Where will Luoyang be defended?"
Late that night, Dong Yue camped at the foot of Mang Mountain, cut down trees, and gathered craftsmen and warriors to make siege equipment such as wooden poles, ladders, rams, lead vehicles, and leaking vehicles. On the first day of August, Dong Yue personally supervised the battle and ordered his subordinates to Mengjin Nanguan was besieged on three sides, but before they led their troops to Nanguan, they couldn't help but said in shock: "How can such a strong city be easily lost to the northern captives?"
When General He Jin established the Mengjin and Xiaopingjin passes, he thought that the river defense was not as good as the mountain passes. After all, the river was thousands of miles away and it was difficult to take care of it everywhere, so he focused on repairing the riverside passes.
Tianxia Chengguan was mainly repaired with rammed earth, and a few imperfections were covered with bricks and stones. However, the two forts in Mengjin and Xiaopingjin are particularly different. After setting up rammed earth as the foundation, He Jin covered the entire city with bricks and stones, glued with rice paste, and erected the city wall three feet high, with the shape of a line. It is so concave and curved that people want to be surrounded by ants, but they don’t know where to start.
When Dong Zhuo led his army southward, the Nanguan soldiers did not relax. They dug waterways on the riverside day and night to lead the river water to the bottom of the city pass. Shazhou New City could send reinforcements by floating boats directly to Nanguan City. The excavated mud is used to create barriers on the tidal flats to cover the ferries. If the Liang people want to conquer Nanguan, they must first remove these barriers one by one.
On the day of the siege, it was raining in autumn. The Liang people surrounded Nanguan from the east, south and west. The surging river could not surround it from the north, so they floated pine trees from the upper reaches in an attempt to block the water channel dug out of Nanguan. However, when a new city was built on the sandbank, people soon entered the river by boat and used long hooks to open the pine trees. The layers of pine trees rolled repeatedly under the impact of the river water, as if countless pieces of silk thread had been cut off, and tiny needles were used to separate them. The lead was straightened out one by one, and it was quickly washed further downstream.
Liang Ren knew that this was not the solution, so he could only attack the barrier on the other side of the river first. They collectively pushed the lead cart forward. Both sides of the lead cart were covered with wooden walls to block arrows coming from the barrier and the city. Although the effect was good, the lead cart was too heavy and it fell apart when it was pushed dozens of steps away from the barrier. Deeply stuck in the mud of the river beach, the soldiers pushing the cart couldn't use their strength, so they had to go out to fight, but were quickly beaten back by the guards.
Only the lead train from the south successfully reached the gate, but the other people had already filled the gate with mud and rocks. They were unable to climb the wall, and there was nothing they could do with the brick wall. In the end, they used the lead train as a barrier and blocked their way. He piled mountains of earth under the corners of the city, tried to use the mountains to connect the city walls, and then attacked the city.
This was a good idea. Dong Yue commanded his men and horses to take turns digging the soil and transporting it to the corner of the city with arrows carried on the lead cart. However, the lead cart was too slow to transport the soil. After two days, although not many men and horses were lost, the mountain of earth was still piled up. Two feet, they piled earth, and the guards piled wood on the wall to make a frame, raising the wall more than ten feet. When the Liang people saw this, they complained to their superiors: When can the city be broken if this continues? Dong Yue comforted him at the military meeting and said: The enemy is defending the city like this, obviously because they are afraid of our army like a tiger. If they can build up the wall as high as they want, it will only be a matter of time before they break the city.
That same night, a cavalry force of more than 300 people was smuggled from Beiguan, walked up the mountains and forests from the lower reaches, and suddenly broke into Dong Yue's front camp. The guards were caught off guard and were set ablaze in the camp by this cavalry force.
In the front camp, there are various kinds of ladders, carriages, and carriages piled up. There are also ropes and mulberry trees in the corners, which are all necessary equipment for attacking the city. It stands to reason that we encountered the autumn rain, and the front camp was adjacent to the river bank, so the air was humid, so it would be difficult to set fire to it. However, there were wood chips planed by carpenters scattered on the land. The cavalrymen threw down their torches, and the wood chips were stained with sparks. In an instant, a fire broke out, and half of the fire was ignited. Within hours, the fire burned from the front camp all the way to the middle army. Black smoke billowed like a tide, and even the city of Luoyang could be vaguely seen.
Fortunately, the cavalry knew that they were outnumbered and left immediately after setting the fire. The Liang people were fleeing, putting out fires, and reporting. The camp was buzzing with chaos, which soon spread to the entire army. There was a constant flow of people. In the bright firelight of Beimang Mountain, the figures looked extremely dim, but Fortunately, there was no camp roar. After one night, Dong Yue sent someone to count the number of people. Only more than fifty people in the army died in the fire, which made Dong Yue breathe a sigh of relief.
But looking back at Nanguan, the Nanguan guards took advantage of the Liang people to put out the fire and went out of the city to bulldoze earth and dig trenches. They put the soil ash into bamboo baskets, sealed them with basket lids, and then rolled the bamboo baskets down the slope into the river. The soldiers on the riverside dumped the bamboo baskets and cleaned them, and then moved them back to fill them with soil. Repeatedly, overnight, the Liang army The four mountains of earth that had been erected in three days were all bulldozed for the guards.
As for the various equipment in Liangren's former camp, only ashes were left on the ground. After several days of hard work, even Dong Yue was quite discouraged. When Dong Zhuo came to inspect the next day, he directly reported to him: "Dong Yue's campaigns in the north and south mostly involved high mountains and plains. After all, he was not good at water attack. Why don't you ask me?" The prime minister sent another general."
Prime Minister Dong Zhuo saw that the morale of the army was low, but he had no other choice. The rest of the generals will fight bloody battles for the rest of their lives, and it will be difficult for them to fight again in a short time. Moreover, his subordinates are either Liang people or Bing people. How can there be any generals who are good at water warfare?
He could only comfort Dong Yue and said: "Victory and defeat are commonplace. Is there anyone in the world who is born knowing how to fight? Yesterday there was a fortune teller in the city who predicted the victory or defeat. The fortune-teller predicted the victory and defeat. He made a prediction on the Sunda Mountain and got a Yi hexagram, saying that our army is in great danger. Go forward and cross the great river. I can see that the sun is shining on me, and I will eventually win. This is just a small setback."
The sergeants and soldiers in the army were superstitious. After hearing this, they all became excited again. They discussed with each other, saying that Mengjin has not built a river bridge since ancient times, which shows that even the saints cannot do it. No matter how good Chen Chong is in fighting, how can he surpass the saints?
