While the soldiers of the Song Army were forced to become death squads, the observers' calculations about the bombardment of Fancheng opened Zhang Yuejing's eyes.
When he relied on his clairvoyance to discover that the third round of artillery shells had caused large-scale and precise strikes on the floors of Fancheng City, he was greatly impressed.
"These gunners did a great job! They shot so accurately! Haha! If this goes on for a long time, these bastards who are defending the city will not dare to defend the city on the towers! Hahahahahaha!"
He Feihu smiled proudly and said: "That's natural. Our gunners are all masters who have been trained for many years, especially the observers. I don't think they know how to direct artillery strikes. Just leave everything to them."
Zhang Yuejing nodded with a smile.
"In this case, we should wait for them to collapse... By the way, the enemy army should be defeated soon, right? Once the enemy army arrives, they will be able to surround Xiangyang City. When the time comes, Commander He, you can directly How about deploying some artillery to help them clear out the military stronghold outside Xiangyang City?"
“There is no shirking responsibility.”
He Feihu did not hesitate.
At the stall where the two were discussing, the enemy general Chen Qiaoshan led the enemy's 30,000 soldiers to break through the cabinet gate and were galloping towards Xiangyang City.
Some time ago, they captured Zaoyang, followed the water flow to Cabinet Gate, easily captured Cabinet Gate in a surprise attack, and the entire army advanced towards Xiangyang.
On the afternoon of April 8th, Chen Qiaoshan led the main force to defeat the enemy and arrived in the southeast of Xiangyang City, and quickly surrounded the south, east, and west sides of Xiangyang City.
Like Fancheng, Xiangyang City was surrounded by enemy troops, facing Zhang Yuejing's troops attacking Fancheng across the Han River.
He quickly sent someone to contact Zhang Yuejing and informed him of the news that he had successfully arrived.
After Zhang Yuejing received the news, he immediately arranged for He Feihu to dispatch five general artillery batteries, fifteen general cavalry artillery batteries, and a 1,000-man musket phalanx to break up the enemy's army and begin to help break up the enemy's army and demolish the stronghold.
Take it apart bit by bit, don't rush, just grind it slowly.
At present, the Ming army mainly takes Fancheng as the first target to attack. Xiangyang City is slightly stronger and more difficult to deal with than Fancheng, so it falls back slightly.
And even if Xiangyang City could be breached, Zhang Yuejing did not intend to breach Xiangyang until the main force of the Song army arrived for support.
He wanted to save a glimmer of hope for Xiangyang, encircle the area for reinforcements, and eliminate the main force of the Song army. With this impressive military exploit, he might be able to make an emergency landing in Xiangyang, and he would be able to obtain this solid city without using too much effort to destroy Xiangyang.
Chen Qiaoshan took the order, received the Shenji Battalion artillery team, and then started to attack the Song Army's military camp outside Xiangyang City according to the established plan.
Take your time, little by little, don't rush.
If you don't send troops to attack, I will slowly grind it out.
If you take the initiative to send troops to attack, I will fight against you.
The soldiers in the Song Army's stronghold outside Xiangyang City have not yet begun to retreat at this moment, because Wang Yan still has doubts about whether to fully reduce his troops.
It's just that Zhou Benyuan couldn't bear the huge losses, so he forcibly withdrew his troops. Wang Yan did not support or object to this.
He thought that Xiangyang was still safe now, so was it too cowardly to simply abandon the outer defense line of the military camp?
Are there any other ways to break the situation?
He thought about it and couldn't think of a way, but he couldn't make up his mind to completely abandon the defense line of the army camp that he had worked so hard to manage.
After hesitating and hesitating, Chen Qiaoshan led the enemy troops to defeat the defenders at Kemenguan, went directly to Xiangyang City, surrounded Xiangyang City, and quickly introduced the Shenji Battalion artillery team to bombard the military strongholds around Xiangyang.
By the time Wang Yan realized that something was wrong, Chen Qiaoshan had already led his army to attack the two Song army strongholds.
At this point, there was nothing more to say. Wang Yan finally realized that it was foolish to defend outside the city, so he ordered the Song army in the military camp outside the city to withdraw completely.
The military strongholds on the outer line stayed behind (si), while the military strongholds on the inner line began to retreat. They could withdraw as much as they could, leaving the green hills behind and not worrying about running out of firewood.
So when Chen Qiaoshan demolished the military stronghold outside Xiangyang City, he unexpectedly found that the military stronghold inside Xiangyang City was empty.
They all withdrew.
After a brief surprise, Chen Qiaoshan did not order a further attack on Xiangyang City. He calmly led his men to dismantle the military stronghold outside and collect the spoils of war. Because of the hasty retreat, many ordnance and food were not taken away by the Song army. Chen Qiaoshan’s loot.
It's easy to understand why Chen Qiaoshan didn't order a quick attack.
Xiangyang City is not a city that can be captured by a quick attack, and the purpose of the Ming army is not to capture Xiangyang City by a quick attack, but to encircle and mobilize reinforcements.
In fact, according to Chen Qiaoshan's opinion, if Xiangyang City did not have artillery, it would probably take two or three years to break through. Even if it had artillery, it would not be easy.
Among other things, the moat of Xiangyang City is the longest in China. It is 180 meters at its narrowest point and 250 meters at its longest point.
Fancheng's moat is thirty or forty meters wide, which is already very intimidating, but compared with the huge moat in Xiangyang, it is the difference between urine and high-pressure water cannon.
As long as the only land passage is cut off by the Song army, Xiangyang City will be a giant water city. It is almost unimaginable to break through Xiangyang.
Therefore, both Su Yonglin and Zhang Yuejing came up with a simple strategy of encircling the point and recruiting reinforcements, using Xiangyang City as bait to attract the main force of the Song Army to come for reinforcements, thereby achieving the goal of wiping out the main force of the Song Army.
As for Xiangyang City, there is no need to storm it.
Attacking Fancheng was already adding psychological pressure to the defenders of Xiangyang City, otherwise Zhang Yuejing would not have wanted to conquer Fancheng so much.
However, Wang Yan and Zhou Benyuan did not know the true purpose of the Ming army. Faced with the roar of the Ming army's artillery and the huge deterrent brought by the artillery, Zhou Benyuan no longer dared to take the lead. After Wang Yan witnessed the terrifying attack power of the artillery, he directly ordered the army to Evacuate and don't make unnecessary sacrifices.
They still have to fight hard to defend the city!
The night attack failed and the active attack failed, then only Gucheng was left to defend this road.
In the next few days, the trapped troops bombarded Fancheng with a certain intensity, constantly causing huge damage and deterrence to the Fancheng defenders.
The bombardment of the city wall was the second priority. The solid city wall, which was several meters thick, was not destroyed so quickly, but the general's cannon could be used to bombard the city by raising its muzzle.
The bombardment of the city by the general's artillery made the defenders of Fancheng very uncomfortable. After all, no one knew when a big iron ball would fall from the sky and crash to the ground. The scorching hot air could completely burn a person, let alone the shelling damage to the buildings in the city. blow.
In particular, the buildings that store ordnance and grain were severely bombarded, causing a lot of ordnance and a large amount of grain to lose a good storage environment.
In order to avoid damage and waste, Zhou Benyuan urgently dispatched cannon fodder men to dig cellars to store food and hide people.
It looks like we can't stand it any longer on the ground, so there is another way underground.
The Ming army's attack on Fancheng was so harsh, compared with this, the attack on Xiangyang seemed affectionate.
Chen Qiaoshan just demolished all the military strongholds, collected all the trophies, and then slowly built an artillery position outside the city, allowing the observers to calculate and choose the best shooting angle and shooting direction.
Take your time and take your time.
The Ming army's food supply was absolutely abundant and they could afford it.
At the same time, the Xiangfan Song Army fell into an unprecedented low and panic. The huge threat of the Ming Army's artillery hung over the Xiangfan Song Army's head like a sharp sword, and it was not known when it would fall.
If the moat in Xiangyang was not too wide and there was no way to go, the Song army would probably have deserted on a large scale.
Despite this, some people tried to escape from Xiangyang along the Han River from the pier in the north of the city. After being discovered, they were tortured and punished——
The remaining forty-six soldiers in the team where the four deserters belonged were forced to stab the four deserters one by one. They were not allowed to stab the vital points, but could only stab them in non-vital places such as the legs and arms.
As a result, the four deserters bled profusely and eventually died of miserable bleeding. Then their bodies were chopped into pieces, put into a pot and boiled, and the forty-six people in the same team were forced to eat one piece of meat each.
Can't do it?
You will die together.
Can't keep your mouth shut?
You will die together.
The Song army was so vicious and cruel in its treatment of deserters.
Of course, such high pressure will cause serious psychological problems for soldiers, so the senior generals of the Song Army will not only use this method.
In order to boost morale and maintain military morale, in addition to severe punishment, Wang Yan and Zhou Benyuan, especially Zhou Benyuan, also set up corresponding incentives.
In addition to cash rewards and extra meals, there are also "special reward terms."
For example, if he dares to go to the city to fight for half an hour, he will be rewarded with a woman to play with.
If he dares to go to the city and fight for an hour, he will be rewarded with two women to play with.
If he goes to the city twice to fight for an hour, reward him with a relatively beautiful woman to play with once.
If he went to the city three times to fight for an hour, he would be rewarded with a carefully selected beauty that the big-headed soldier could never touch in his life and let him play with her once.
The carefully selected beauties were dressed up and paraded out. They were heavily made up and extremely seductive, and were forced to show off to the soldiers.
Zhou Benyuan told the big-headed soldiers that as long as they fought bravely, they could get such beauties.
The eyes of the big-headed soldiers who have long lacked the means to solve physiological problems are green.
The lower body quickly dominates the upper body and even dominates brain thinking.
In this way, coupled with the brutal execution methods of Zhou Benyuan's personal guards, the Song soldiers in Fan City always maintained a certain degree of counterattack capability, and the soldiers in the city did not lose control under the extremely high-pressure environment.
Although this kind of counterattack did not bring any losses to the Ming army, and this way of maintaining the sanity of the soldiers may not be sustainable.
But as long as it can be maintained, that's enough.
Zhou Benyuan didn't care that much, let alone the sorrow of those women.
Like Wang Yan, what he cares about most now is when the Lin'an court can send troops to support. If they don't send troops to support quickly, they really won't be able to bear it.
Who knows when those terrifying artillery pieces will bring down the city wall?
They were so panicked that they were about to collapse, but the Southern Song Dynasty court would only be more panicked than them.
