This bombardment, which was not supposed to belong to this era, lasted for three days and three nights.
During the past three days, both the five-man team and the two generals Qin Feng and Huo Zhi on the front line were always paying attention to the movements of the Zhuozhou city wall.
Unfortunately, things are not as simple as everyone expected.
Logically speaking, the city wall is composed of masonry and adhesive, and it should not be able to withstand such an intense shelling.
Casting city wall bricks is actually not difficult. The difficulty lies in how to perfectly fit the heavy wall bricks and adhesive together to achieve the strongest result.
Cement was invented by the British in the 18th century, but in ancient China, there was already lime mortar, a building material used for bonding. In order to improve the strength of lime mortar, the ancients would also mix yellow clay into it to increase its strength.
Going forward further in time, ancient people would choose to use shell ash as lime material, which is called "mirage ash". The main material of mirage ash is oysters and clams, which are burned into ash and used as building materials. The strength of this material It is much larger than lime. "Kaitian Gongwu" once said: "Any stone in Wen, Taiwan, Fujian, Guanghai and Haibin that cannot bear the lime will be replaced by natural oysters."
Dating back to the Northern and Southern Dynasties and the Sui and Tang Dynasties, the ancients generally used glutinous rice lime mortar as a material for building walls. Mixing the glutinous rice mortar into the lime mortar can greatly improve the strength of the lime mortar. This method even continued until the Ming and Qing Dynasties. During that period, many buildings were built with glutinous rice lime mortar. For example, the Great Wall in the Ming Dynasty was built with glutinous rice lime mortar.
During the Qin and Han Dynasties, rammed earth was generally used as building materials. The raw materials of rammed earth were red mud, coarse sand, and lime blocks. Red mud has strong toughness and can achieve good results when combined with coarse sand and lime. Rammed earth is also called three-color soil. Most buildings in the Qin and Han Dynasties were built with rammed earth. The building has a yellow surface. Before the Southern Song Dynasty, city walls in ancient China were generally built with rammed earth.
But whether it is cement or mirage ash, glutinous rice mortar or rammed earth, it should not be able to last for such a long time under such intensive artillery bombardment.
Huo Zhi was a little bored, scratched his head and looked at Qin Feng, and kept asking: "Damn it, did you see it just now? What's going on?"
Qin Feng nodded, with a look of disbelief on his face: "Don't ask me, I don't know why."
For the past two days, artillery fire continued to bombard the city wall. The huge smoke and dust obscured the sight, and the specific condition of the city wall could not be seen clearly. However, you could not see the top, but you could see clearly at the foot of the city wall.
Logically speaking, there should have been filled with gravel and rubble, but when the two of them took a closer look, the ground was completely clean. Not to mention the wall tiles, not even the rubble could be seen.
Is it possible that the city wall of Zhuozhou is so strong that even cannons cannot break it?
Just now, Huo Zhi and Qin Feng couldn't suppress the doubts and shock in their hearts. They rode towards the south gate. They couldn't give up without actually confirming the situation there.
It turned out that what they saw two miles away was indeed correct. The cannonball exploded after contacting the city wall. However, it was only the fire and smoke of the cannonball itself, but the city wall of Zhuozhou City seemed to be intact.
The two of them observed carefully for a long time, but Qin Feng's sharp eyes saw something unusual on the city wall.
Whenever the cannonball came into contact with the city wall, it actually did not come into contact with the city wall bricks. There seemed to be a faint film on the outside of the city wall, and the explosion was caused by the contact between the two.
It's just that the film is extremely light and exudes a light gray color. Those who didn't know it thought it was the smoke and dust produced by the explosion.
After seeing the situation clearly, the two returned to their own camp and had the conversation just now.
"I have never seen anything so evil." Huo Zhi sighed.
"Have we encountered this kind of thing rarely in our lives?" Qin Feng asked.
Huo Zhi stopped talking.
The two hurriedly sent people to report what they saw to Lin Zhu and the other two people at the rear. After a while, the order from the rear came back, just three words - "Boom."
Now that Lin Biao had spoken, the two of them naturally had nothing to say. Anyway, there were plenty of artillery shells now, so the two of them didn't care about the many, and continued to bombard them.
In the camp at the rear, the five members of the team were gathering together.
"If what Qin Feng and Huo Zhi saw is good, then I think what appears outside Zhuozhou City should be something similar to a barrier or a protective cover." Qi Zhen said.
"Do you know the power of this thing?" Lin Biao asked.
Qi Zhen glanced at Liang Sicheng and shook her head: "When we went together with Liang Sicheng, Tang Yi, and Liu Bei to invite Zhuge Liang and Huang Yueying out of the mountain, we once encountered a maze composed of eight gates. We also encountered a The headless general in golden armor, but that maze was obviously written by Huang Yueying. This is the first time I have seen this kind of defensive barrier, and I really don’t understand it well.”
Lin Zhu held his eyes on the bridge of his nose and said: "No matter what happens in Zhuozhou City now, I won't find it strange. On the contrary, the smoother our attack is, the more uneasy we will feel. I say this, no one Give me your opinion.”
Several people nodded.
"Let the mortars fire a few shots directly above Zhuozhou City to see the effect. If I am right, this barrier cannot only be placed on the south side of the city wall." Lin Biao said.
The intensive bombardment continued, and the 85mm mortar that had not been used was also brought up, and a simple test firing was conducted.
The target is directly above Zhuozhou City.
As a violent explosion sounded, just as Lin Biao expected, a semicircular protective cover vaguely enveloped the entire Zhuozhou City, and the shells could not fall into the city at all.
However, Lin Biao still had no intention of changing the combat policy. He said that he would use up all the artillery shells, and he had to keep his word.
After three full days and three nights since the bombardment began, a piece of good news and a piece of bad news came from the front line.
The good news is that the unknown protective cover finally could not withstand the test of the power of the artillery, and instantly lost its effectiveness. The artillery shells also came into close contact with the city wall for the first time, and the effect was gratifying.
The bad news is that we are running out of shells.
Not to mention using artillery to achieve greater results, it would be barely enough to blow down this city wall.
There were still half of the mortar shells left, but Lin Zhuang had already made rules with Huo Zhi when he attacked the three military towns in the west of the city.
At this time, these mortars were also used by Huo Zhi. Before the army attacked the city, it was necessary to blast a hole in the south of Zhuozhou City that was large enough for the army to pass!
The disappearance of the barrier has obviously and fully boosted the morale of our own soldiers.
The continuous sound of artillery fire became more intensive at this time, and the artillery finally showed its original power at this time.
In just a few minutes, the city tower was razed to ashes of bricks and rubble, and rubble began to fly immediately on the city wall. It was obvious that the buildings of this era could not withstand such a test and were constantly disintegrating under the gunfire.
The upper part of the city wall was gradually cut off layer by layer. The originally tall city wall seemed to have its legs chopped off and became shorter and shorter.
At the same time, the ground was gradually covered with gravel, getting higher and higher.
The front of the city wall was made thinner and thinner by artillery fire. Finally, at a certain moment, the thick layers of city wall bricks were finally blasted through by artillery shells, revealing the scene inside the city.
What fell from top to bottom were mortar shells, and what was bombarded from the front were ordinary artillery shells. This scene looked extremely spectacular, and the entire city wall was enveloped in violent explosions.
This time, in addition to the fire and black smoke of the explosion, there was more smoke and dust stirred up after the city wall was blown apart, which obscured people's sight to a greater extent.
At noon on the second day, Huo Zhi finally ran out of shells.
Although as time goes by, supplies from the rear will be transported here, but the number of those shells is nothing compared to the shells fired in the past few days. You must know the amount of money used to attack Zhuozhou in the past few days. The number of artillery shells was all Lin Biao's wealth had accumulated in the past few years.
Not long after the sound of artillery stopped, the order from the rear was transmitted to the frontline camp. It was said to be an order, but in fact it was not an order at all. It was just a notification to Huo Zhi and Qin Feng that this city could be attacked at will without asking the rear for instructions. , only saying that after killing or capturing the leader of the thief, he would celebrate the two of them.
Except for the barrier matter, Huo Zhi and Qin Feng never asked Lin Biao or the others for any advice on this war. In parallel, the team never gave them any advice. .
In fact, not only that, after giving Huo Zhi and Qin Feng the last message, the five of them sent the only team of soldiers who stayed with them to rush to the front line to report to Huo Zhi, without having to follow the five of them.
Then these five people quietly walked away, leaving the offensive front position and missing.
When Huo Zhi saw that the soldiers responsible for protecting his lord actually ran to him, he was furious and kicked one of them, and then told them to stay by Lin Bian's side no matter what to ensure the safety of the five people. If anything happened, Huo Zhi would Pocket.
But when these soldiers come and go, how can they still see the shadow of the five members of the team?
But these soldiers had no choice but to return to Huo Zhi again and accept the punishment aggrievedly.
Huo Zhi's nose was almost out of breath and crooked, and his roar was like a cannon that was spitting out ammunition just now.
"Damn it, are you all fools?! When I attack the city, you will be my vanguard! At the front!"
These pro-soldiers were happy to hear this. Is this a good thing? These days, there has been no fighting as a guard by the Lord's side, and these people have long been feeling uncomfortable.
A group of people shouted in agreement and turned around and ran away, not giving Huo Zhi a chance to regret it.
"Lao Huo, I feel that my lord and the others want to leave on purpose." Qin Feng advised from the side.
"I, Lao Huo, am not really stupid." Huo Zhi said with a look of helplessness, suppressing his angry expression.
