The people in the river were desperately swimming to the east bank, and the people on the other side were crying and fleeing in all directions.

Chen Hu realized that the bandits were coming, and clenched his gun and shouted, "Brothers, don't stare at one person for a while. Platoon guns and guns, do you know if you hit a platoon? I'll run to the middle of the bridge, and you will shoot on both sides, and you will have to knock down three or five of them if you shoot past a row of guns! ”

"You know, we listen to you!"

As soon as Jiang Ming's words fell, a villager from the Qutang regiment couldn't help but ask: "Brother Hu, we are separated from the bandits by a river, and if the bandits can't get over, we can't get by, even if the bandits are killed by us, they can't cut off their guys who eat. ”

Chen Hu suddenly remembered that the battalion counted the merits of the war according to the head, and no matter how many bandits were killed, there was no basis for his words, and he said with remorse: "It's all my fault, how did you forget this." You too, why didn't you say it earlier, I wouldn't have let Master Wu go, if Master Wu was here, he could at least help us testify! ”

"That's what I just remembered."

Jiang Ming also felt that this battle could not be fought in vain, so he couldn't help but turn around and ask, "What now?" ”

Chen Hu was having a headache because of this, and a villager who was ambushed on the side suddenly shouted: "Brother Tiger, old Jiang, the bandits are here!" ”

Everyone looked at it and was taken aback.

I saw that the official road on the other side of the river was densely packed with people wearing red turbans, lined up in several groups and drove towards this side violently with flags. They were in a neat formation, unhurried, and methodical, in the words of the storyteller, there was really such a overwhelming momentum, and their formation was especially overwhelming.

Chen Hu's heart was pounding nervously, and his palms were sticky with sweat. Jiang Ming and the other villagers were also nervous to death, and for a while they forgot to remind Chen Hu that the vanguard of the bandits had entered the range of shotguns.

This is the second time Wu Sizhu has seen the bandits, thinking of so many relatives dying tragically in the hands of the bandits, it is really the enemy who is very red when he sees him, holding the boat gang and gritting his teeth and saying: "Chen Shichang, fight, kill these people who killed a thousand knives!" ”

Chen Hu relieved himself, quickly let go of the gun and wiped the sweat in his palms, and then immediately held the gun tightly and shouted while aiming: "Brothers, we will fight in the middle, and you will fight on both sides, give me all the aiming points, and listen to my orders when you aim well." ”

"Take aim, let's shoot, those bastards have shotguns too!"

At the same time, the Taiping Army forwards who rushed to the bridgehead not only found that the bridge was gone, but also found the Xiangyong guarding the bridgehead, and dispersed very tacitly. Some raised their shotguns to aim, some rushed to the front to use the brothers who carried the guns as supports, and then they met Chen Hu and other villagers who had been waiting for a long time, and they heard a burst of gunfire as soon as they set up their positions.

"Ah......h

The foreigner's firebird gun is not only far, but also sharp.

Lead bullets struck like a torrential rain, and the Taiping soldiers who rushed to the front, especially those who were carrying guns as supports, were overturned with a scream, while the opposite bank was filled with smoke with a burst of gunfire, and the bridgehead on the opposite bank was completely shrouded in white gunsmoke, and nothing could be seen clearly.

Chen Hu clearly saw that he had knocked down a few just now, and then thought that the thieves would not be able to pass for a while, not only was he not as nervous as he was just now, but his blood was boiling with excitement, and he put down the gun and urged: "Hurry up and load the lead bullets, load them quickly, and give those bastards a few more shots!" ”

"It's coming!"

Wu Sizhu reacted, hurriedly took out the cylindrical paper bullet case from the ammunition box, bit the end of the bullet case, put the lead bullet in his mouth, hurriedly erected the shotgun hammer, poured a little gunpowder into the medicine pool, and then closed the fire sickle, and poured all the remaining gunpowder in the bullet case into the gun chamber.

"Hurry up, don't bother." Chen Hu thought he was pretending to be slow, and turned around and yelled.

Wu Sizhu was so nervous that he swallowed the lead bullet in his mouth. At this time, the shotguns of Jiang Ming and the others had already been loaded with the help of the Wu family's children, and they were about to raise their guns to aim, when they heard a loud thunderous sound, followed by white smoke on the opposite bank.

Chen Hu didn't care about urging Wu Sizhu to reload again, subconsciously touched his face, and then turned around and asked, "The bandits have released their guns, are you okay?" ”

"It's okay, Lao Tzu's life is big, they didn't fight."

"I'm fine, too."

"I'm fine, their guns aren't as accurate as ours, hahahaha!"

At this time, Wu Sizhu had already taken out a paper bullet shell again, bit off the paper outside and poured out all the gunpowder, spit the lead bullet into the chamber, crumpled the paper shell into a ball and stuffed it into the chamber as a bullet plug, pushed the lead bullet to the end with a bullet pusher, raised the gun and shouted: "Chen Shichang, it's loaded, it's loaded!" ”

"Okay, brethren, give them some more color!"

Chen Biao, who had just caught two people who had just swam over, ran over and said, "Brother, their shotguns are not inaccurate, they can't hit as far as our shotguns." Their shotguns can't hit us, they can hit with their guns, you aim and shoot with guns first! ”

Chen Hu then remembered that Liang Jiu had said that the shotgun of the Green Camp could only shoot twenty or thirty steps, while the foreigner's firebird gun could hit two hundred steps, and then thought that as long as the gun on the other side was knocked out, then the bandits on the other side would only be beaten, and he couldn't help laughing: "Brothers, do you hear, aim at the one who carries the gun!" ”

"It's all smoke on the other side, how can you see clearly!"

"Brother Tiger, the guns are loaded, let's fight quickly!"

As soon as Jiang Ming's voice fell, the gun was released on the other side again, this time it was not as uniform as just now, one after another like thunder, and the bridgehead on the other side was shrouded in gunpowder smoke again, and he couldn't see anything clearly.

Chen Hu didn't care about aiming at anything else with a gun, and immediately shouted: "Let's go!" ”

Bang......!

A row of guns was released, and this side was also shrouded in gunpowder smoke, and I couldn't see anything clearly, I only heard the bandits roaring on the other side, and I couldn't understand what they said, and they didn't need to ask to know that all the old thieves from Guangxi were coming.

The more Chen Hu beats, the more excited he becomes, and he yells: "Come again, pretend to be fast for Lao Tzu, and beat Lao Tzu hard." ”

Chen Biao clearly saw that there were already thieves running to both sides, and grabbed his arm: "Brother, take it when you see it, you can't fight, otherwise they will make dumplings!" ”

"They can't come, what are they afraid of?"

As soon as Chen Hu finished speaking, he heard Youxiang Yong shouting: "Brother Hu, the bandits jumped into the river, they want to swim over!" ”

"Which side?"

"North, this is my side!"

"Brother Tiger, there are also in the south, and the dogs here are really not afraid of death!"

Chen Hu didn't expect that the thieves wouldn't be able to find the boat for a while, so they wanted to swim over and attack, so he immediately turned around and said, "Old Jiang, you take four of you to the north." Old Five, let's go to the south, give them another shot and leave! ”

"Okay!"

……

At the same time, the spies recruited by Zhou Xingyuan had already found out the news that the bandits had divided their troops out of the city to sweep the bridge, the fairy temple and other Zhuang towns, and asked the big head to wake up Zhang Guangcheng and Li Changjing, who had only slept all morning, and climbed the arrow tower together, while observing the movement on the opposite shore with clairvoyance, and discussing how to deal with it.

"There are about two or three thousand bandits coming to our side, and there are also two or three thousand bandits going to Wantou and Fairy Temple.

"Brother Li, this is not necessarily."

"What do you mean by that?" Li Changjing asked subconsciously.

Han Xiufeng put down his "clairvoyance" and said with a wry smile: "There are a lot of two or three thousand soldiers, this is prepared by Taizhou, what if you are not prepared?" Think about it, they killed from Guangxi to Hunan, then to Hubei, then to Jiangxi, Anhui and even Jiangning, how many counties and prefectures have really guarded along the way? How many of those county prefects who are responsible for defending the land and abandoning the city to flee for their lives? ”

"Yes, yes, what Zhixing said is extremely true, even Yangzhou City is so easy, how can the bandits take Taizhou in their eyes. In their opinion, two or three thousand soldiers were enough to attack Taizhou. Zhang Guangcheng paused, and then said: "Fortunately, we are prepared, it is not so easy for them to occupy Taizhou like Zhan Yizhen and Yangzhou!" ”

Zhou Xingyuan muttered: "We defend according to the danger, and the two or three thousand soldiers who come here are not worried, even if the south side easily takes the fairy temple and attacks from the south and the west bank, we can defend it, but there are still a large number of bandits in Yangzhou City, and it will be troublesome if they increase their troops." ”

Li Changjing muttered: "Mr. Zhou, you said that the bandits who went to attack the Fairy Temple, will they go straight to Taizhou along the Yunyan River after taking the Fairy Temple?" ”

"It's possible, after all, the fairy temple is not close to here, and the news between the two bandits is not well-informed."

"It's a pity that we have too few soldiers, otherwise we can really copy their back road and let them have no return!" Zhang Guangcheng clenched his fists and said.

Han Xiufeng handed the "clairvoyance" to Zhang Guangcheng, held on to the guardrail and said: "The news between the two bandits is definitely not so well-informed today, but the bandit leader who is sitting in Yangzhou tomorrow will definitely receive the news that we are at Wanfu Qiaotou, and he will definitely be worried that the bandits on the South Road who are alone in the south will probably be copied by us." In short, whether they want to attack Taizhou or Shao Bo, they have to pull out our nail first. ”

"So the bandits will definitely increase their troops?"

"Definitely!" Han Xiufeng thought for a while, pointed to the river bank and said: "Brother Zhou, I bother you to send someone to spread the news on the other side, just say that we have gathered green battalion soldiers and young men from Taizhou, Xinghua, Dongtai, Rugao and other prefectures and counties, and there are more than 2,000 green battalion soldiers and five or six thousand township soldiers stationed there. ”

"It's easy to bluff, but wouldn't that lead all the thieves over?"

"Well, but the army has not moved the grain and grass first, and the bandits have to make some preparations if they want to come, and it takes time to prepare."

Li Changjing reacted, and couldn't help but turn around and said: "This is a good idea, don't say that we only have one thousand Xiangyong now, even if there are really five or six thousand bandits who can't stop them, the reason why they came here to camp is to delay time." As long as the army dragged to Qishan arrives in Yangzhou, we have nothing to worry about. ”

"Okay, I'll send someone to spread the word." Now it was a grasshopper on a rope, Zhou Xingyuan didn't dare to delay the fighter, and immediately climbed down the ladder.

Han Xiufeng took a deep breath and continued: "Brother Li, we have nothing to worry about on the river, mainly on the shore, you hurry up and go to the local gentry to gather the young men and ask them to transport more straw to pile on the river bank, block the view of the bandits, and make them unable to figure out the reality of our side." If the bandits recruit civilian boats to come from the river, they can set fire to their boats and burn them down. ”

"Okay, I'll take care of that."

"Second young master, Wu Wenming, they are going to be with the bandits on the west bank until tonight at most, maybe they can only go around until the afternoon, the bandits will be able to drink Maliaojiagou tomorrow morning at the latest, there is not much time left for us, the matter of camping depends on you, we must hurry."

"Don't worry, the camp will be handed over to me, even if it stays all night, I will set up the camp before dawn tomorrow!"

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