Facing the enthusiasm of the people, Li Yuan was also very encouraged and grateful, but Li Yuan also knew that defending the city was not as simple as relying on the enthusiasm of the people. This defense is very different from Beicheng's water defense. Defense on the water can use various extraordinary means, but sieges on land often have few variables.
In addition to the tall and solid hardware of the city wall, sufficient city defense forces and sophisticated city defense equipment are needed, both of which are currently not available.
Suzhou City has not experienced war for a long time. The prosperity of this city has nothing to do with city defense. It relies on its unique geographical location and convenient water and land transportation to achieve its current prosperity.
But these advantages cannot cover up its weaknesses in city defense. Just like a naturally beautiful woman, although her status is noble and her temperament is superior, these cannot allow her to maintain her chastity when encountering a strong man, because she is not wearing armor and holding a handheld weapon. A sharp blade, and no martial arts skills to defend against enemies.
Although the people have invested great enthusiasm and manpower to strengthen the city wall, Suzhou City is too big. The wall of a large city with a radius of more than ten miles cannot be raised to such a low height in half a day. Degree.
In view of this, Li Yuanzhi was able to do the next best thing. He asked the people to strengthen the low parts of the west city wall, focusing on the defenses on both sides of the city gate. In addition, just like the north city gate, Li Yuan asked the people to build something like an arrow tower platform on each section of the city wall that can be condescending. These platforms, which are a few feet higher than the city wall, can be used as fortresses when defending the city, playing a certain role. A powerful blocking effect.
It's not that the city defense is not strong enough, but the manpower of the defenders is even more stretched. There were originally only more than 10,000 Suzhou garrison scrapped together. After yesterday's battle, more than 4,000 people were reduced, leaving only 6,000 usable garrison troops.
Of these 6,000 people, at least 3,000 must be left to defend the North City, because there are more than 10,000 Jin troops there who are eyeing the city. In order to prevent the Jin army from rushing to the North City and launching another attack, the most basic manpower must be available to ensure that there is no problem in the North City. Then only 3,000 men can be transferred to the west city for defense, which is of course not enough.
The good news is that the 5,000 reinforcements invited by the Gu family from Huzhou finally arrived at noon. Together with the more than 3,000 temporarily recruited strong men, they barely formed a defensive force of more than 10,000 people. But even with the more than 10,000 troops defending the city, they only had less than 3,000 bows and arrows necessary to defend the city. This also greatly weakened the defensive capabilities of the defenders.
Li Yuan had no choice but to have people transport more rocks and rolling logs to the top of the city. Although in Li Yuan's mind, he had long disdained the use of these primitive methods of defending the city, at this time, he had to use them. .
It was getting dark, but the lights inside and outside the west city of Suzhou were brightly lit and people were buzzing. The soldiers and civilians of Suzhou were still using their last moments to build fortifications and transport supplies to defend the city, but the Jin army under the city had already arrived and arranged their formations, and they were about to attack the city overnight.
The drums and trumpets sounded, and the siege officially began. The more than 20,000 infantrymen of the Jin Army's front army began to advance neatly in a formation of more than ten square formations. The neat formation, uniform footsteps, and neat shouts all added to the calmness of the advancing formation. Power.
The formation advanced to two hundred steps away, and the Jin troops on the periphery of the square formation all raised their shields to form a shield wall. The Jin soldiers in the rear raised the ladders above their heads, let out loud shouts, and began to march into the defenders. The bow attack range.
Li Yuan closed his lips and stood motionless on the city tower. He could feel the rapid breathing of the soldiers defending the city around him. Facing this large-scale and large-scale siege, the soldiers defending the city had no confidence at all. of. At this time, you cannot show any timidity, otherwise it will cause them great panic.
"Pull close, aim and shoot. Wait until they reach the moat and start building the bamboo raft and pontoon. Don't waste your energy." Li Yuan shouted in a deep voice.
The order was quickly conveyed on the city wall, and all the defenders choked and stared, watching the wall-like Jin troops under the city gradually advancing.
One hundred and fifty steps, one hundred steps, eighty steps, fifty steps.
The phalanx of the Jin army arrived at the moat. Suzhou's moat was a channel dug to divert water from the canal. The water flow was rapid and more than ten feet wide, like a big rushing river.
.
For such a moat, it is not easy to build a pontoon bridge. The Jin army had tied up bamboo rafts and wanted to connect more than a dozen bamboo rafts with ropes to build a pontoon bridge on the water. This method is of course simple and practical, but the person building the bamboo raft needs to be out of the protection of the shield, and this is when he is most vulnerable to attack.
Sure enough, more than ten pontoon bridges began to be built. At each place, more than a hundred Jin soldiers carried bamboo rafts and left the phalanx to the river to connect ropes to build bridges. At this time, a clearly audible order "shoot arrows" came from the top of the city.
In an instant, a shower of arrows erupted from dozens of places on the wall. In just an instant, hundreds of Jin soldiers who were building a pontoon fell down, falling on the edge of the moat like leeks being cut.
Countless arrows fell into the river like raindrops, making a chirping sound. Obviously, the goal of the defenders at the top of the city was these Jin soldiers who were building the bridge, because they had no protection. Killing the enemies who were building the bridge was obviously the most effective way to prevent the Jin army from attacking the city.
"Fire arrows!" A military order also sounded in the Jin army formation.
In the middle of the phalanx were hundreds of archers. After hearing the military order, they immediately began to bend their bows and set arrows towards the city head to suppress them. More than ten archers in the phalanx fought back at the city head. The density of arrows exceeded the firepower of the city head. However, the archers at the city head were not suppressed, and they must not be suppressed.
At the risk of being shot and killed, the Wuyue archers at the top of Suzhou City fired arrows ferociously from a high position. For a time, arrows were flying all over the city. There was the sound of locusts piercing the air everywhere, the sound of bowstrings vibrating everywhere, the screams and cries of those who were hit by arrows, and the sounds of struggle and despair of the dying.
The number of casualties on both sides soared rapidly. The Suzhou defenders on top of the city continued to scream and fell to the ground, and the Jin army below the city suffered even greater losses. The defenders at the top of the city suffered between five and six hundred casualties in just a quarter of an hour, while the number of Jin soldiers who fell was three times that number.
What made the Jin army even more frightened was that the pontoon bridge on the moat had never been successfully built, because the defenders at the top of the city seemed to be crazy and shot arrows at the place where the pontoon bridge was built. As a result, almost all the Jin soldiers who built the pontoon bridge were killed. , other soldiers were simply unable to continue their mission.
The drums and horns of the Jin army sounded again, and Xu Ruchang, who could not bear the slow construction of the pontoon bridge, sent out all the remaining 5,000 archers. After these five thousand archers arrived, they immediately showed strong suppression power. The dense rain of arrows like a dark cloud can cover all areas above and below the city wall. Although it is a top-down projection, it can clear out all the defenders who are not in the blind spot.
The huge impact brought by the strong bow and iron clusters caused stone fragments to fly across every section of the city wall that was attacked, and dense craters were shot out on the oncoming city wall. On the newly built city wall fortifications, the sandbag door panels are covered with dense arrows. Almost all the defenders who dared to emerge from the fortifications and crenels were shot and killed. This is the power of intensive shooting.
Using the forced cover of these five thousand archers, and the separate cover of the pontoon bridges built everywhere, half an hour after the battle started, the three pontoon bridges were completed.
Three square formations of siege Jin soldiers rushed toward the city along the pontoon bridge. With the breakthrough of these three places, the other pontoon bridges were also built one after another. The natural chasm became a thoroughfare, and more than 17,000 infantrymen rushed across the moat in a short period of time. It seemed that they were deliberately trying to pull the battle line and dilute the strength of the defenders. The Jin army's siege troops and horses were set up under the several-mile-long city wall. Five or six hundred ladders were built and an all-out attack on the city began.
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