On September 7, when Henry and his party finished smoking the wild boar they had hunted and buried the remaining materials in the forest to hide their traces and go deeper into the uninhabited land, a total of more than 110,000 troops from the domain arrived. Wanzhou's border city and launched an attack without hesitation.
The reinforcements from Xinjing have not arrived yet, and there is no news that they have set off. Even the neighboring Yanzhou is pretending to be sweeping away the snow. A dead Taoist friend is not a poor Taoist. Due to the conservative behavior of Yanzhou and Wanzhou, the vassal territory got some breathing time. After instigating rebellion and forcibly recruiting expansion troops in Jeju, the total number of vassal armies on paper has now exceeded that of Yanzhou and Wanzhou. The sum of Wanzhou.
Even if this number includes country men with average combat effectiveness and a large number of logistical supply personnel, it is still a number that looks extremely terrifying on paper.
Among those who were frightened by the numbers reported by the scouts was the governor of Yanzhou. He was afraid that even if he sent reinforcements to support Wanzhou, he might not be able to win. "The other party can outflank him from behind", and he decided to keep it all the way to the end.
This typical thinking of not seeking merit but seeking no fault is quite common among the Chinese people in the states directly under the control of the Moon Country, because nominally they are only helping the royal family manage the troops and cities. Defeat is tragic enough. If the troops lost belong to superiors and you have to be punished, people will inevitably become worried about gains and losses.
In addition, if the troops go out to help defend Wanzhou, they will not have the strength to defend themselves later. There are some rumors that there is a mysterious power hidden in the vassal territory. Yanzhou is closer to the coastline than Wanzhou. Once the troops are divided to help defend, its own defense force will be weaker.
With so many factors constraining one's efforts and the focus being on "preserving one's career," the decision made by Yanzhou's state pastor is not surprising at all in today's Moon Country.
Even if Wanzhou is lost, the strength of the feudal army can be weakened in the deadly battle, which may allow them to attack Yanzhou relatively slowly. Maybe Yanzhou can hold out until reinforcements from Xinjing arrive.
In just a few days, Wanzhou became an isolated and helpless territory.
Coupled with the regular mob activities, the domain army with an overwhelming numerical advantage should have been overwhelming.
But it was blocked here.
What happened in Taiju was unknown due to the distance and information blockade. The war in Jeju was a success because of the clever timing and the large-scale activities of the mob to defeat the superiors.
So perhaps in Wanzhou, this is the first time that the vassal territory has encountered real decent resistance.
110,000 people versus about 30,000 people. On paper, the overwhelming military strength encountered obstacles for multiple reasons: First, the mob activities and lack of rations in Wanzhou were not serious enough to completely weaken the combat effectiveness. On the contrary, Somewhat ironically, suppressing a mob of this size gave the Wanzhou warriors some practical experience.
Second, the troops in Wanzhou have been under martial law for a long time, and they are well prepared for the arrival of the feudal army. Unlike Jeju, which was completely unprepared at the beginning and only formed scattered small-scale troops in the end.
Third, it lies in the terrain near Wanzhou.
We have already mentioned that the Crescent Island continent suddenly increased in depth after arriving in the Jeju area, but this wider land has many mountains and dense forests. Although Wanzhou is not a true military town in name, its vast depth alone is enough for an army of 110,000 people to encounter many difficulties and obstacles during its march.
The depth of the land route cannot rely on the rapid transportation of large vehicles such as ships, so most people except horseback warriors can only trek on foot.
The Wanzhou side was well prepared, but the vassal army misjudged the weakening of their strength by the riots in Wanzhou and ordered the troops to take a forced march.
If our sage could know all this from a certain perspective, he would definitely judge that the top brass of the feudal army had developed a sense of pride because of Lien Chan and Lianjie. This mentality was combined with the fear of Xinjing's strength and worries that reinforcements far more powerful than themselves would arrive, so they wanted to achieve a quick victory through a strong attack.
In fact, the Wanzhou side, which had not been weakened much by the mob activities, was ready. After receiving the reply from the Yanzhou state pastor that "there was nothing they could do to help", they understood the fact that they were the only ones left.
Although Wanzhou's Zhou Mu was a bit crude and crude in handling some issues, he knew how to incite his subordinates.
Zhou Mu, who appeared on the front line in full military uniform, loudly announced to his subordinates:
"You are guarding your own land. The sacrifice of the villagers the day before yesterday was out of necessity. In the current situation, there is really no room for extraneous matters."
"Then we will protect this land with the part of the deceased."
"Let those ignorant people who dare to resist the Great Moon God see what a true Kazuto warrior is."
Judging from the perspective of later generations, their simple and crude suppression behavior that was mistaken at the beginning turned out to be a correct decision - because the contradiction between the peasants and the nobles had already existed, and the lower-level movement that took place in Jeju was in their hearts. The seeds were definitely planted.
Once the imprisoned minds are liberated and once they have the choice of "we can still do this", it is only a matter of time before they make this choice.
It was extinguished without large-scale infiltration and incitement to a larger and more organized level, which laid the foundation for Wanzhou to preserve its strength to deal with the invasion of the vassal territory.
The flow of fate is always so wonderful. Obviously they were Wanzhou warriors who had no actual combat experience before; they were obviously rebels from the vassal territory who had won consecutive battles; obviously judging from the figures on paper, the military strength of the vassal territory far exceeded that of Wanzhou; but because of a series of impatience and pride on one side, While underestimating the opponent's decision-making, the other side made a mistake but was still prepared for this war that took place in autumn.
It showed an extremely bloody and cruel state.
On the first day alone, more than 6,000 people were killed or injured among the Jeju cannon fodder recruited by the feudal lord.
All died from bows and arrows.
The strategy of the vassal territory was very simple and crude. They wanted to carry out a forced march with overwhelming force and penetrate Wanzhou directly before the reinforcements from Yanzhou or Xinjing arrived.
Therefore, the first attack is very important. With an army of 110,000 people and no rivers or oceans for transportation and supplies, it is difficult to maintain combat effectiveness for a long time.
They must capture Wanzhou, and capture Wanzhou as soon as possible. After the battle, plunder Wanzhou's supplies for supplies, and then plan the next move.
And when this first wave of all-out general attack was blocked by Wanzhou's solid city wall and swarms of archers and city defense forces, and it took a whole day to fail to break through the city gate, it was natural.
This offensive and defensive battle has fallen into attrition mode.
First, there were the forcibly recruited strong men. They did not wear armor and held crude wooden hand cards to resist the rain of arrows. They were forced to the front line to fill in the moat.
The border town of Wanzhou where the battle took place is called "Jade", which is the name of a rare ore unique to Crescent Continent. The naming is naturally related to the presence of minerals nearby. A mining city will never lack masonry, and in a city with a large amount of masonry, the solidity of its city walls will naturally increase.
The 7-meter-thick and angled city wall at the bottom is a very reliable geographical advantage, and the 5-meter-wide moat in front, even if it dries up, is enough to cause great obstruction to the attacker when combined with the front parapet.
The drawbridge has long since been raised. The breast wall at the other end of the moat was originally the first line of inspection when entering the city. Due to the huge disparity in troops, Wanzhou Prefecture abandoned this line of defense and moved all personnel to the second city wall, and deployed a large number of walking archers. .
Kazuto's big bows are heavy arrows for close range shooting. They are not as good as Rigar's long bows in projecting, but they have a huge advantage when shooting at a downward angle because the arrows are heavier.
Therefore, this kind of city defense shooting takes advantage of the high ground.
It's like shooting target.
The abandoned simple parapet of stone and wood structure is only half a person high, like a fence. They seemed to provide cover for the attacking troops in the domain from arrows, but in fact they became obstacles that they had to climb over when advancing.
The high superior shooting angle of the second city wall meant that the vanguard of the feudal army would be fired upon by arrows as long as they looked over. Many of the strong men who were forcibly urged by the nobles to cross the parapet were climbing up the parapet. The moment he tried to climb over without protection, he was shot through the chest by an arrow.
The people who were scrapping the wall with one hand were holding up simple wooden hand cards to try to resist the arrows, but the small protective gear of only 40 centimeters square was not enough to cover the entire body - their subconscious mind was to protect the most important head. This makes the trunk, especially the abdomen and the thighs resting on the parapet when climbing over the wall, particularly vulnerable to attack.
People who were shot by arrows in the abdomen would not die directly. Some people were even shot through the thigh by a heavy Japanese style and nailed to the parapet. They held their bleeding thighs and cried loudly for a long time without dying. And some people just climbed up the wall and fell back with broken stomachs, clutching their bloody abdomens, struggling and screaming for help from others.
These strong men are all from Jeju common people, most of them are fellow villagers. No one would be shocked to see the lively neighbor boy they were familiar with struggling to his death. But they had no choice. The nobles of the vassal area behind them were no different from the samurai of the directly-governed states. When facing civilians, they would only use force to suppress others.
Black short guns were pointed behind them, and several people who were timid and tried to escape were stabbed to death with one shot.
To retreat is to die, and to move forward is death.
Some whimsical strong men even opened their hands and shouted that they were being forcibly conquered, hoping that the defenders of Wanzhou would open the city gates and let him escape. He wanted to surrender. But this naive idea obviously cannot be satisfied. Even if he is sincere, the moment Wanzhou opens the city gate, he will usher in the full attack of the vassal.
So this man naturally received an arrow through his heart.
The task of the strong men was to climb over the parapet and build a bunker in front of the moat using bamboo bundles erected from felled bamboo. Later, the moat was filled in in conjunction with the fortifications of Ashigaru. After completing all this, the main force will press under the city wall and use ladders to attack the city while hitting the gate.
However, Wanzhou's arrow rain was so fierce that 6,000 strong men were sacrificed, and only a few bamboo beams were erected piecemeal.
When the attack continued on the second day, the feudal army encountered an expected scene - after witnessing the tragedy of the previous day, hundreds of strong men escaped overnight.
'It's just a small problem' was the thought of the top brass of the domain army who learned all this at the time.
Then on the second day there were more than 5,000 casualties.
Another person fled during the night.
On the third day, as more bamboo bunkers were built, the number of casualties gradually became smaller, but the number of escapees increased.
When the bamboo bundles were finally set up on the fourth day after paying a huge price, except for a few strong men who were too slow to even forget to escape, the entire domain army had dropped to 18,000 due to combat attrition and desertion.
The battlefield was littered with corpses and was filled with civilians. After there were no militia available, the domain army dispatched the Jeju Ashigaru who defected to them. These people cooperated with the archers and mixed the dead bodies with soil to fill the moat.
The shooting from Wanzhou's side continued.
Among the minerals mined in the Emerald City are not only gems, but also others.
On the night of the fifth day, the troops from the domain, wrapped in face towels sprinkled with mint water and braving the stench of corpses and filling in the moat all night, suddenly felt something sticky and greasy falling from their heads.
Then, on the city wall that had been quiet for several hours, little fires were erected one after another.
The moment the fire arrow soaked in fuel hit the ground, the Ashigaru who had been doused with cold oil were set ablaze one after another.
A raging fire broke out in the nearly half-filled moat, and more than a thousand ashigaru who worked at night lost their armor due to the heat and noise. Their oil-soaked clothes burned fiercely, and they screamed as they climbed up. Most of them died in the process, and those who successfully climbed up caused great panic to the friendly forces behind the bamboo bunkers.
The fire only burned for a few hours, but the panic caused by the bamboo bunkers that were hit and the people who fled out of fear caused the feudal attack to be frustrated one after another.
It took the domain a whole week just to get to the gates of Emerald City.
Although there are records of siege wars lasting more than a year in both Rigal and Crescent Continent in history, these records are usually in the form of pressure from the siege party building camps outside the city, not this kind of crazy consumption. A more proactive form of force.
They want to fight a quick attack and a quick victory. The reason is very simple. The longer it is delayed, the more disadvantageous it will be for them.
But the gap between ideal and reality is somewhat huge.
I thought that Wanzhou's territory had already been laxly guarded and undermanned due to the lower-level movement. I thought that these untrained warriors from the directly-governed prefectures would be timid and leave their posts as soon as they saw the huge number of people.
I thought the Emerald City's defenses wouldn't be so fierce and difficult to chew through.
But now that all the cannon fodder troops have been wiped out, the rebel Jeju nobles and Ashigaru have also had their military morale shaken considerably.
The moat has been filled in, but at great cost. The walls of the Emerald City are thick, and during this week-long battle in which they killed the feudal army as easily as if they were shooting at a target, I am afraid that the morale of the Wanzhou side will only get higher and higher.
They became the best sparring partners for these state soldiers who were well trained but lacked actual combat experience.
Decisions have to change.
On the seventh night of the siege of Emerald City, there was no movement from the feudal army. The defenders on the city wall were vigilant all night but failed to achieve any results. And when they gradually relaxed in the early morning, the domain dispatched a very small special force.
Their shapes resemble humans but not humans, walking on four legs and carrying some kind of package on their backs. He quietly touched the entrance to the Emerald City, and after a subtle and inaudible sound of sand and gravel rubbing against each other, only dark holes were left.
When the morning of the eighth day arrived, the sleepy night shift workers withdrew. The off-duty defenders on the city wall are counting arrows, fuel, falling rocks and other city defense weapon reserves in order to prepare for the attack on the city wall.
Unexpectedly, it was discovered that the feudal army had withdrawn.
"We won? No, there must be a fraud. Go and report it to your lord as soon as possible!" The warrior leader in charge of the north gate of Emerald City ordered the herald, and this was also his last order.
The morning sun was rising and the sleepy Zhou Mu was preparing to hear the emergency report.
A huge roar resounded throughout the Emerald City, like an earthquake.
Came from the direction of the city wall.
The soil under the base of the magnificent Emerald City's northern wall sank like a whirlpool, and then the thick wall that lost its support disintegrated like a sand castle under the tide.
The defenders above the city wall and those who had withdrawn but were still nearby were either killed or wounded.
People a little further away were shocked and dizzy.
When Zhou Mu and his guards hurriedly went out to check, the originally magnificent north wall of the Emerald City collapsed, leaving three huge gaps.
The sand and gravel filling the inside of the city wall overflowed and piled up small mounds on the ground.
When the smoke cleared, they could directly see the advancing vassal troops in the distance.
"Retreat, retreat!" Zhou Mu shouted loudly in a panic.
September 15, 4164 in the Great Lunar Calendar.
The Emerald City fell.
