The soldiers on both sides of the attack and defense showed a very serious war-weariness, everyone wanted to live well, and no one wanted to fight, let alone die.

The soldiers in the city have nowhere to escape, and if they don't want to fight, they must defend the city, and it is difficult for the soldiers and horses outside the city to escape from the battlefield, because behind the siege soldiers and horses there are soldiers and horses who supervise the battle, and if a soldier deserts, the soldiers and horses who supervise the war will choose to annihilate them.

Therefore, the best way to escape is to be injured, as long as you are injured, you have the opportunity to be carried down, so as to save your life, however, this is also a gamble, in case self-injury is discovered, the consequences are quite serious, in addition, the battlefield environment is quite complicated, in case of self-injury, there are no comrades to help you, it is easy to be attacked by the defenders on the city wall, which greatly increases the probability of death, so, self-injury may not be able to save your life, sometimes, but may lose your life.

The more fierce and brutal the battle, the more serious the soldier's war-weariness will be, especially in the stage of fierce battle, when there is little hope of victory, which is the most test of a soldier's ability to endure, and a soldier with insufficient mental endurance is likely to have a mental breakdown, and even self-harm is possible.

People will be tired, and the soldiers of the army will also be tired, there is a good saying, one drum and then three times and exhaustion, when the attack is first launched, the morale of the army is very strong, but the morale of the army will be weakened, and eventually the morale will be completely lost, or even sluggish.

After attacking for many days, the soldiers of the besieging army have dropped a lot, when more soldiers and horses were put into the attack, the soldiers of the army were boosted suddenly, but after a whole day of casualties and defeats, the morale of the army was rapidly reduced, and when the attack was launched on the second day, the intensity was greatly reduced, and on the first day of the attack, it was the Khorasan soldiers who climbed to the city wall, and the battle on the morning of the second day, none of the soldiers could climb to the city wall, which shows the reduction of the soldiers.

Of course, there is another important reason, that is, Artik has stationed the last 6,000 elites under his command in the direction of the city gate, and there are only a small number of scattered men and horses stationed in the city, and in this way, the defense force of each city gate has been greatly enhanced, which is also the main reason why the attacking soldiers and horses have never been able to attack the city.

The progress of the offensive was frustrated, which made Ziyad, who was supervising the battle in the rear, very dissatisfied, and wanted to break through the city in one go and solve the huge crisis in front of him, but he did not expect that after a day of attack, the troops under his command not only did not make the slightest progress, but also regressed a lot, and the results of the offensive were not as good as yesterday, and the casualties increased a lot.

"What's going on, it's been a morning attack, none of our soldiers can climb the city wall, the attack is not as good as yesterday, what's going on, find out."

Qi Yad was very angry, if the soldiers did not work hard, the army would run out of food, if it really ran out of food, the consequences would be extremely serious, so he had to figure out the situation and see what caused this to happen.

"General, the enemy's soldiers and horses defending the city have suddenly increased in large numbers, and they are all soldiers and horses with strong combat effectiveness, and our army has suffered very heavy casualties in the hard battle."

Soon the subordinates came to report.

Qi Yade frowned, and said: "A few days ago, the various armies reported that they had annihilated a large number of soldiers defending the city, and now there are thirty or forty thousand people, and all the strength of the enemy army is only so much, why can the enemy still have a large number of elite soldiers and horses, what is going on, are our soldiers lying about their achievements?" ”

"General, could it be that our intelligence is wrong, the number of enemy soldiers and horses is much larger than we thought, and in this way, the pressure on our army to attack the city will be greatly increased."

The subordinate said.

Qi Yad shook his head and said: "Our scouts have already figured out the situation, there are only 30,000 soldiers and horses in the city, there will not be too many soldiers, it is our soldiers who lie about their achievements, they have not annihilated so many enemy troops at all." ”

"General, the soldiers have tried their best to attack the city, if they can't break through the city, then shouldn't we think about how to retreat, so as not to be unprepared and make it difficult for the army to retreat."

The subordinate said.

Qi Yade also hesitated, if he retreated now, maybe it would be too late, if it was later, there might really be no chance, because there was so much grain and grass, once the grain and grass were consumed, even if he wanted to retreat, there was no way to retreat, and he might fall into a situation where he was slaughtered by others.

Of course, because the Qiyad army has always been a cavalry team, in the case of insufficient supply of grain and grass, the interests of the horses can be sacrificed, and part of the black bean grain that should be allocated to the military horses is used as the rations of the soldiers, as for the military horses, they can be slaughtered, so it is impossible to starve the army to death, and the worst case is to consume the elite cavalry into infantry.

In fact, at this moment, there are a lot more military horses in the Qiyad battalion, because there are large casualties when the soldiers attack the city, and the war horses are placed in the main camp, and the casualties are relatively much less, so the military horses themselves have a large surplus, and when necessary, there is nothing wrong with slaughtering these military horses, it is better than starving the soldiers to death.

Of course, this is the worst plan, as long as there is a slight possibility, Qi Yade will not fight the idea of military horses, because it is not easy for these military horses to be trained into war horses, every war horse is the wealth of the army, but also the comrade-in-arms of the cavalry, no soldier is willing to eat horse meat until the last resort.

The strength of the siege of the city was weakening, which made Ziyad very anxious, and it was impossible to continue to increase the troops, because the reserves were almost exhausted, and the large battalion had to keep enough men and horses to avoid the appearance of enemy reinforcements.

Through the continuous attack for many days, the casualties of the besieging soldiers and horses have exceeded half, and the number of soldiers killed and the captured civilians has reached 10,000, which can be said to be a very large loss.

The most critical problem is that the morale of the army has been greatly reduced, and the casualties are also very heavy, which is the most fatal problem, which shows that the combat effectiveness of his soldiers and horses has declined, and the decline is very serious, and he, as the main general, has no ability to change anything, after all, there are only half of the soldiers left who can fight, and after the morale is lost, it is difficult to get up again.

Whether to continue the onslaught on the city or withdraw to Khorasan, Ziyad fell into deeper thought, and he did not know what to do.

At this time, even worse news came, the enemy reinforcements from the east, west and south directions had already driven not too far away, and had already found an advantageous geographical location that was convenient for defense and set up camp, forming a great threat to the Qiyad army.

"General, enemy reinforcements suddenly appeared, it seems that they were dispatched last night, but these reinforcements did not attack our army, but set up camp ten miles away, and I don't know what to do."

"General, the enemy's battalion is very strong, giving people a feeling of being defended for a long time, not like it is going to attack, the last general is strange, since he didn't attack, why did he come all the way to see the excitement?"

Several of his subordinates spoke.

They are right, these three reinforcements are indeed here to see the excitement, because their strength is very weak, and they can't see the excitement if they don't want to, if they are allowed to attack the Qiyad army, even if they attack the tired division of Qiyad with new forces, there is no possibility of victory, and they are all infantry, only a very small number of cavalry, and they do not have the ability to raid the Qiyad army, so they can only choose a safe position to camp and wait.

Although these armies do not attack for the time being, as long as they exist, they will have a deterrent effect on Ziyad's army, and once Ziyad's army has exhausted all its strength, these armies will have the value of attacking.

Therefore, the reinforcements of the soldiers and horses seem to be watching from the wall, in fact, they also have the value of their existence, that is, the role of deterrence, to deter the army of Ziyad, so that Qiyad does not dare to use all his strength on the siege, so that the soldiers and horses used for the siege will inevitably be reduced, and the pressure on defending the city will be reduced a lot.

Qi Yad obviously understood this problem, looked at his subordinates with a worried face, and said: "Immediately send someone to carefully investigate the situation of the enemy's reinforcement camp, if it can be breached, you might as well gather troops and horses to destroy these reinforcements first, so that at least we can give the caliph a better explanation." ”

"Yes, City Lord."

The subordinate answered.

It can be seen that Qiyad has changed his thinking, and the reason why he did this is that it is difficult to break through the city in a short period of time with the soldiers and horses under his command, and if he can't break through the city, he must return to Khorasan in a gray manner.

However, the situation of the subordinates' reconnaissance made Ziyad very disappointed, the enemy reinforcements from the three routes were obviously prepared, and their camp tents were built very strongly, although it was not difficult to break, but if you want to break through such a camp, you have to pay a great price, at least 3,000 soldiers and horses must be lost to break through the camp with 10,000 horses, maybe you need more.

In particular, two of the soldiers and horses built the camp on top of a small hill, condescendingly built a large number of arrow towers, and even heavy weapons such as catapults, and the defensive power was still very considerable.

However, no matter how strong the camp is, it can't be compared with the city of Maia, Ziyad has built so many siege equipment, it is not bad to be able to capture the city of Maia, but that is because the defense of the city of Maia is too tight, and if it is used to attack these camps that are not too tightly defended, it is still very certain.

Therefore, Qi Yade quickly adjusted his thinking, and prepared to transfer the main troops and horses in the direction of the north gate to attack the three camps, and one by one, he believed that with the elite soldiers and horses under his command, he could completely gnaw these three bones, this is the task he must complete, and it is also the earliest means to make some military merit for himself after the failure of the siege.

"City Lord, the enemy troops in the direction of the North Gate have retreated, and the enemy troops in the direction of the North Gate have retreated."

One of his subordinates shouted excitedly.

Qi Yade was also very happy, and hurriedly confirmed: "The troops have withdrawn, the enemy troops have withdrawn, it seems that our reinforcements have arrived." ”

The young general of the Tang Dynasty smiled and said: "Congratulations to the city lord, the reinforcements have finally arrived, and it will be even more difficult for the enemy to break the city." ”

Artik hurriedly asked, "Have all the enemy troops withdrawn?" How many enemy troops are there in the direction of the North Gate? ”

"City Lord, there are not many left, only five hundred cavalry, and a large number of equipment have all left, marching in the southwest direction."

The subordinate said.

"To the southwest, it seems that they are going to attack the soldiers and horses reinforced from Jiaofu City, the Qiyad army is quite elite, and the soldiers and horses of Jiaofu City are afraid that they will not be able to resist."

Artik spoke.

The Tang junior general said with a smile: "The soldiers and horses in the city have suffered heavy losses, I am afraid that they will not be able to reinforce, so they can only let the reinforced soldiers and horses face danger by themselves, but this is a good opportunity, since Qi Yad sent the main force to attack the reinforcements of Jiaofu City, the city lord can send someone to send an order, so that the soldiers and horses reinforced from Lafha City will give up all the grain, grass and baggage, and quickly enter the city from the north gate to increase the strength of the soldiers and horses defending the city, as long as Maia City is not lost, the loss of 10,000 soldiers and horses in Jiaofu City is nothing." ”

Artik very much recognized the words of the Tang general, nodded and said: "This is the truth, as long as Maia City is not lost, the loss of some soldiers and horses is nothing, the soldiers and horses of Jubai City are camped in the south, I am afraid it is not easy to enter the city, only 10,000 reinforcements and horses in the west can quickly enter the city, and the soldiers and horses defending the city are increased by 10,000, and the city should be able to hold the city." ”

Soon, the order was passed on to the carrier pigeons, and after receiving the order from the reinforcements of Rafha, all the baggage and grain and grass were immediately burned, and all the soldiers marched quickly, reaching the north gate as fast as possible, and entering the city of Maia directly through the city gate, because the main force of the enemy army in the direction of the north gate had retreated, so that no force could prevent the ten thousand men from entering the city.

All 10,000 reinforcements entered the city, which greatly strengthened the city's defense and greatly increased Altic's confidence, but at the same time, the 10,000 troops reinforced from the east were surrounded by Ziyad and faced extremely heavy annihilation.

After dealing with the 10,000 soldiers and horses in the east, Ziyad sighed loudly, but when he heard that all the 10,000 reinforcements from the west had entered the city, he was speechless in anger, and the attack on Maia City was already extremely stressful, and now, the enemy army was actually replenished by 10,000 fresh troops, which was very bad news for him, and seriously diluted the excitement of annihilating 10,000 enemy troops.

Now that Artik had received 10,000 fresh troops, Ziyad had no hope of attacking the city of Maia, and he only wanted to destroy another group of 10,000 enemy reinforcements as soon as possible, and then return to Khorasan without the order.