cite Han

Chapter 209 Siege

"Sun Tzu's Art of War" talks about the preparations before the siege, and there is a saying: "It will take three months to repair the sculls and equipment, and it will be three months to build the distance."

That is, it takes three months to build the siege equipment, and then it takes three months to pile up the earth hills.

However, it is no longer the Spring and Autumn Period 700 years ago. It only took one month for the Jingzhou army to arrive at the city of Linxiang to complete all the preparations before the siege.

This is because Linxiang is a strong city, otherwise the preparation period will be greatly shortened.

Linxiang at the end of September can be said to be the best time of the year. The weather is no longer cloudy and rainy, and the autumn is crisp and comfortable.

Kuai Yue stood on a cloud cart nearly ten feet high, overlooking the city of Linxiang from a high position.The cloud car is the building car. Because the car is hung with a watchtower, it is like a bird's nest, also known as the nest car. It is a lookout car specially used to observe the enemy's situation.

On the cloud cart, apart from Kuai Yue, there is also a young man standing in his twenties, with a tall and slender figure, a face with Chinese characters, and outstanding facial features.

His name is Kuai Qi, and his style name is Zishou. He is Kuai Yue's concubine, and he is also a leader among the younger generation of the Kuai clan in Zhonglu, Xiangyang. Kuai Yue attaches great importance to him. on the left and right.

Kuai Yue gazed at Linxiang City for a long time, and ordered: "Zishou, pass on my general order to attack the city."

"Promise." Kuai Qi replied, and then waved the flag in his hand towards the bottom.

"Boom..."

The sound of war drums sounded like muffled thunder, and instantly spread to every corner of the battlefield.

"Boom, boom, boom..."

With the sound of drums, tens of thousands of infantry phalanxes of the Jingzhou Army began to approach Linxiang City in an orderly manner in the east and south directions of Linxiang City.

At the forefront of the Jingzhou Army's phalanx are thousands of crossbowmen, many of whom wear armor. Their main task is to suppress the long-range shots of the Linxiang defenders, and try to create a favorable environment for their colleagues who will attack the city later. .

Chu Fang was standing on the city wall in the east of Linxiang, leaning sideways on the female wall, observing the enemy formation. He was wearing an iron pocket on his head, and he was wearing a fish-scale robe and armor that extended to his knees and covered his whole body. Mighty temperament.

As the Jingzhou army phalanx approached step by step, Chu Fang ordered the defenders on the city to string their bows and crossbows. He himself also took down the two-stone heavy bow, put on long arrows quietly, and silently calculated the distance.

"Shoot..." As soon as the Jingzhou army entered the shooting range, Chu Fang immediately leaned forward and shot the arrow in his hand. He arrived in dozens of steps in an instant, and accurately hit the person holding the flag walking at the front of the square formation.

Chu Fang's shooting was just the beginning, followed by hundreds of crossbow arrows, which rained into the Jingzhou Army's phalanx, making gaps in the dense crowd of phalanxes.

Because the Linxiang defenders are condescending, the range of the crossbow is longer, and the crossbow phalanx of the Jingzhou army has no power to fight back in a short time.

However, the width of the Linxiang city wall is limited, and the defenders cannot place too many crossbowmen. The same is true for the Loulou. The Jingzhou army's bow and crossbow phalanx withstands the arrow rain of the Linxiang defenders, and quickly advances to the range. Under the command of the flag, he began to prepare to fight back.

Bow and crossbow array shooting has an extremely strict procedure, that is, the three steps of nocking the arrow, pulling the string, and releasing the arrow. Everyone must act in a unified way. military discipline.

Thousands of crossbowmen of the Jingzhou Army, under the command of Lingqi, after tense and fast loading, aimed at the top of the city and shot in unison.

With a "bang", thousands of bow and crossbow arrows shot out, covering the entire sky in an instant, almost covering the sky.

The Linxiang garrison at the front immediately hid under the battlements of the female wall, while the garrison at the rear could only curl their bodies as much as possible, holding up their large poles to shield them from the arrow rain.

Together, the sheds in a row were filled with arrows in a blink of an eye. During this period, arrows flew in through the gaps and shot the defenders.

Just before the defenders recovered from the first round of blows, the second round of arrow rain from the Jingzhou crossbow came one after another.

The density of the Jingzhou Army's bow and crossbow phalanx is far from that of the Linxiang defenders on the city walls and in the towers. From the moment they launched an attack, they suppressed the Linxiang defenders in one fell swoop.

The Linxiang defenders were unable to start a battle with the Jingzhou army, so they could only rely on the cover of the Loulou and the female wall to find a gap to fight back against the enemy.

After the Jingzhou army's bow and crossbow phalanx successfully suppressed the Linxiang defenders, the siege equipment such as wells, ladders, and rushing cars began to slowly drive out of the phalanx, heading straight for the city of Linxiang.

Dozens of wells that are as high as the Linxiang city wall can be described as the vanguard of the siege equipment. A large number of crossbowmen wearing jackets stand on it, and cooperate with the bow and crossbow phalanx on the ground to face the defenders on Linxiang city. Launch a violent attack.

Behind the well, there are a large number of ladders, and groups of elite soldiers holding swords and spears line up in columns and follow closely behind the ladders.The reason why the siege is to be lined up in columns is not only to have a higher utilization rate, but also to reduce the attack surface of the enemy troops on the city.

Under the cover of the crossbow phalanx and Jinglan, dozens of ladders arrived at Linxiang City one after another.

"Fire the rocket, quickly fire the rocket, shoot the well..." Chu Fang waved his halberd and shouted.Since the height of the well fence was as high as the city wall, the crossbowmen above could attack the defenders without hindrance. The closer the distance, the greater the threat to them. The well fence must be destroyed before the battle.

Jing Lan has big targets, moves slowly, and is most afraid of fire.The Linxiang garrison prepared cloth soaked in oil in advance, wrapped it around the body of the arrow, ignited it and shot it at the well fence, and within a short time more than ten well fences were ignited. Whether it was burned alive or jumped to death, it was too horrible to look at.

At the same time, the Jingzhou army was not idle. Teams of soldiers climbed up the built ladders and attacked the Linxiang city wall.

Since ancient times, among the military, it is the most dangerous to be the first to enter the battle. The so-called first climb means to climb ahead of the others. Non-warriors cannot take on this important task. Sometimes they even need to be recruited in the army with a lot of money.The Xiandeng of the Jingzhou Army is no exception, they are all carefully selected athletes in the army.

Wearing heavy armor, armed with knives and spears, and braved the dense rain of arrows and stones, they rushed to the top of the city with the thought of dying, and fought fiercely with the Linxiang defenders.

Chu Fang did not rely on his own bravery, but ended up fighting the Jingzhou army first. He is no longer the general of the first battalion in the past. He is now the commander of the Linxiang garrison who supervises the battalions, and he has more than [-] troops at his disposal. People, personal bravery is already insignificant.

He is superb in martial arts, and he is the champion of the three armies, but even if he is allowed to let go of desperate killing, after a battle, he can decapitate at most ten and eight ranks, which is of no help to the battle situation, and there is a risk of injury or even death in battle.And if he sits in command of the central army, the effect he will achieve will be countless times that of personally charging into battle.

Of course, there are no absolutes in the world. This refers to the initial stage of the war. Once the defense line of the Linxiang City Wall is unable to support and is crumbling, he must stand up and take the lead. This can greatly improve the morale of his side and make the defense line become stronger again stable.

The battlefield in the east is in full swing, and the south is not giving way too much. On the top of the city, soldiers from both sides are intertwined, and there are screams, roars, and howls everywhere, hovering in the sky for a long time.

Sima Huodu of the other department was in the Jingzhou infantry phalanx, watching the battle at the head of Linxiang City in the distance.He is a native of Zhijiang, South County, and he was born in a wealthy local family. He was famous as a knight-errant when he was young.

Liu Biao rode into Jingzhou, issued a large number of seals, and recruited heroes. Huo Du was also appointed as the Sima of the other department, and led his troops to stay in Zhijiang.

This time when Liu Biao raised troops in Jingnan, due to the lack of troops, almost all local forces received orders to recruit, and Huo Du was no exception.

Liu Biao's move can be said to kill two birds with one stone. It not only increased his own forces, but also weakened the local forces. Huo Du and other tycoons knew what Liu Biao had in mind, but no one dared to resist.

Now that Liu Biao has become a major force, Zhang Xian is the only one in Jingzhou who dares to resist him.

Huo Du turned his head and sighed to a young man with a similar appearance beside him: "Brother, it seems that it will be difficult for us to return to our hometown in a short time."

The young man is his brother, named Huo Jun. Although he is a weakling, he is calm and courageous.

Huo Jun frowned slightly on his young face, and said: "Isn't this obvious? It's been a whole month, and the Beijin Water City outside Linxiang has not been taken down. It is tantamount to dreaming to conquer Linxiang in a short time. "

Huo Duyin worriedly said: "In the beginning, Kuai Changshi would not send us to attack Linxiang in order to stabilize us, but it will be hard to say after a long time."

Huo Jun was silent for a while, his brother's worry was not unreasonable, they all belonged to local private groups, and there were very few armored men, if they were driven to the front by Kuai Yue, and the ants attached to attack the city, with the small number of troops under their command, I am afraid that they would die within a few days. There will be casualties.

The Jingzhou army launched an attack from sunrise and continued until dusk, without stopping for a whole day, and the price paid was extremely astonishing. More than 500 people died in the battle, and there were not a few wounded.

If it continues at this intensity, within ten days, Huo Du's worries will come true, and all local tyrants will be forcibly dragged into the battlefield by Kuai Yue because the strength of the Jingzhou Army has become stretched.

Fortunately, after three days of onslaught, Kuai Yue finally accepted the reality that Linxiang was difficult to kill, slowed down the pace of the attack, and even as time went by, the intensity of the battle continued to decline.

When the time entered December and the weather gradually became bad, Kuai Yue completely gave up the siege and focused on siege instead.

The only good news for the Jingzhou Army is that after three months of unremitting efforts, Cai Mao led his troops to capture Beijin Water City in the northwest of Linxiang, and finally cleared the periphery of Linxiang, turning it into an isolated city.

For this reason, Cai Mao was quite complacent in front of Kuai Yue, and had the intention of going south.

(End of this chapter)