Ma Cheng stood at the head of Jubaomen and saw the Manchu retreat, and breathed a sigh of relief in his heart, although the battle was not fierce today, and the Qing army did not climb to the top of the city, but after all, it was Ma Cheng's first battle. Ma Cheng, as a second-year young man in later generations, is not bad if he is not frightened crazy by the corpses all over the ground.

Ma Cheng lay on the head of the city and looked at the city, now there are thousands of corpses of the Qing army under the city of Jubaomen, in addition to the corpses that were decomposed by the shotgun, there are also many wounded soldiers who have been cut off their hands and feet. These guys were lying under the city and crying, which had a great impact on the morale of the Ming army.

Ma Cheng frowned and asked, "Sixth Uncle, what about these guys?" ”

Ma Bao had experienced war with Ma Shiying before, but as a personal officer, he had not participated in this bloodiest siege battle. Now listening to Ma Cheng asking himself what to do with the wounded soldiers of the Qing army, Ma Bao was also stunned for a while.

Ma Bao thought for a long time and replied: "Lord Junmen, why don't you open the city gate and send someone out to clean them up?" Or set them on fire? ”

Ma Cheng scolded when he heard Ma Bao say this: "Nonsense, now that the city gate has been filled, how can you open the door?" It's not okay to set fire, it's too cruel for so many people to be burned to death! ”

Ma Bao listened to Ma Cheng's opposition to his opinion, and secretly scolded in his heart: A few days ago, I burned tens of thousands of Qing soldiers to death, and I didn't see you say cruel.

At this time, Wang Shuang, who was beside Ma Cheng, said with a smile: "Lord Junmen, this is simple, just drop the rope from the city and send hundreds of soldiers down to deal with them!" That's what the last general did when he was guarding the city in Guiyang, and he could make a small fortune when he went out! ”

Wang Shuang is one of the twelve King Kongs who followed Ma Cheng, and now that Ma Cheng's team has expanded, Wang Shuang has been sent to Ma Bao's men to mix sand, and now Wang Shuang is already a general, and he is one of the main generals under Ma Bao.

Ma Cheng nodded when he heard Wang Shuang say this, and asked Wang Shuang to organize two hundred veterans, and then go down from the city to stab all the injured Qing soldiers to death, and they were punished. Of course, the gold and silver carried by these Qing soldiers became the bounty for these veterans.

Ma Cheng stood at the head of the city, listening to the screams of the Qing army's wounded soldiers dying from the city, and looked at the bloody sunset, and silently thought in his heart: This is the first day, I don't know when I can break the siege of Nanjing.

Now that the sun is setting, it is time for the Ming army defending the city to have dinner. Ma Cheng has always been generous to his subordinates, and he has three dry meals in peacetime, and now he is even more open and welcoming in wartime. Today's staple food is big meat steamed buns, and each steamed bun has a finger thick of big fat meat sandwiched in it. The non-staple food is cabbage soup, but today's cabbage soup is not a clear soup with little water, but a soup with animal offal.

This kind of food was only available during festivals in the past, but today because there are thousands of dead bodies lying under the city, and many dead corpses have been broken into corpse parts, this bloody smell goes straight to the nose, where can you eat with this taste?

When many recruits saw the animal offal in the soup, they thought of the dead corpses outside the city, and they couldn't eat one by one, so they were lying on their stomachs at the head of the city retching.

Ma Cheng sighed when he saw this, and asked people to take away these meat dishes and give them to the people in the city to eat, and then re-steamed the steamed buns without meat, and made some light vegetarian dishes, which relieved the soldier's vomiting a lot.

However, Ma Cheng's personal soldiers do not have this phenomenon, most of these guys are from Guizhou, and some of them are still ethnic minorities such as Yi, Miao, and Zhuang.

Ma Cheng looked at Wang Shuang's happy eating, and stepped forward and asked, "Old Wang, aren't you disgusting?" ”

Wang Shuang smiled and said, "My lord, those guys are all recruits, and it will be fine after a few battles." I want to be old. When the last general followed the old commander to defend the city, there were rotting corpses around him, and he didn't eat to have the strength to defend the city? ”

Ma Cheng was right when he heard Wang Shuang say this, thinking that he would have to experience this kind of thing sooner or later, he picked up a meat steamed bun and took a bite, and it felt okay. But when you pick up the soup bowl and drink the soup, you can't stand the smell of the offal.

Just when Ma Cheng was hesitating whether to drink the soup, Gu Yong, the head of the pro-soldier, came back, and he was sent by Ma Cheng to Zhengyangmen just now to ask how the battle was going.

Gu Yong saw that there were steamed buns to eat, so he took one, and said while eating: "Lord Junmen, Mr. Zhang's town fought well, and the Qing army was repelled by artillery before they even rushed to the city!" ”

Ma Cheng frowned when he heard Gu Yong say this, the Qing army's performance today is very abnormal, this is purely to give himself a head, Duoduo is also an excellent battlefield commander, he should not have made such a serious mistake.

Ma Cheng handed the soup bowl to Gu Yong, stood up and came to Ma Bao's side and asked, "Sixth Uncle, didn't you notice that the Qing army was a little abnormal today?" ”

"Lord Junmen also found out? Just now, the last general felt that the Qing army seemed to be a feint attack today. After speaking, Ma Bao pointed to the Qing army in the distance and agreed, and then said: "My lord, you see, the lights of the Qing army camp are divided into two areas, and there is an obvious dark area in the middle, sir, guess what place it is?" "58 reading

Ma Cheng was not familiar with the terrain of Nanjing, thought for a while and asked, "Sixth Uncle, what kind of place do you say is that?" ”

Ma Bao smiled: "Hehe, that's Yuhuatai!" ”

After Ma Bao's reminder, Ma Cheng reacted, it was the Yuhuatai outside the south gate, but it was dark now that he couldn't see clearly. Ma Cheng still remembered that before the war, he sent people to clean up the temples around Yuhuatai to prevent those bald donkeys from dying under the knife of the Manchu Qing Dynasty, but Ma Cheng forgot too many things.

"Sixth uncle, isn't there no one there in Yuhuatai? What is the use of the Qing army occupying there? ”

"My lord, Yuhuatai is two miles away from the south gate, which is within the range of the Hongyi cannon, and the last general estimates that the attack of the northern captives in the afternoon is a feint, covering for Yuhuatai, and wants to catch us off guard!"

Ma Cheng listened to Ma Bao say this and pondered, it should be like this. Although the Qing army's own artillery fired at these sieges, they were all fired at close range, and did not show the ultra-long-range range of the new artillery. According to the Qing army's estimation of the Ming army, they thought that the defenders of the city were only some Franc machines with a short range, so that they could take advantage of the mistakes of the Qing army's intelligence to destroy the Hongyi artillery with the greatest threat in one fell swoop.

"Sixth uncle, when do you expect the Qing army to be ready?"

Ma Bao sighed and said: "The last general has been in Xuanfu with the master before, and he has seen the five thousand catties of Hongyi cannon in the north, and the range is estimated to be between two miles and three miles, and now the Beiyu is preparing in Yuhuatai, probably five thousand catties of Hongyi cannon, if so, the preparation time is three days!" ”

Ma Cheng has never had a deep understanding of Ming Dynasty artillery, and when he heard Ma Bao say this, he asked: "Sixth uncle, what about the 10,000-pound Hongyi cannon?" ”

Ma Bao heard Ma Cheng say this and smiled: "The five thousand catties that can come with the army are the heaviest, and the kind of big guy with ten thousand catties is used to defend the city." Even if it's 5,000 catties, there are no more than 20 in the Northern Army, after all, it's all money! ”

Most of the artillery in the Ming Dynasty was cast with wrought iron, and Liaodong did not produce iron in the first place, and all raw materials had to be smuggled from the south. The ex-factory price of pig iron produced in Guangdong is 100 catties of one tael of silver, counting the freight, loss, and bribes to the government back and forth, the cost of transporting 100 catties of pig iron to Liaodong will be doubled, and in addition to the smugglers taking the opportunity to make a profit, 100 catties of pig iron will cost more than 20 taels of silver in the hands of the Manchu Qing Dynasty.

Pig iron also has to be smelted and matured before the cannon can be cast, so the cost price of a 5,000-pound cannon will cost more than 2,000 taels of silver, which is not counting the labor of craftsmen. In addition to 5,000 pounds of heavy artillery, there are thousands of large and small Franc machines in the Manchu army, thousands of various types of guns, guns, etc., so there is a saying that the cannon is fired and the gold is ten thousand taels.

Ma Cheng is engaged in technology, and I think it is true when I hear Ma Bao say this. Although the cost of the artillery he developed himself was kept to the minimum, each gun cost more than 100 taels of silver, which was still the cost price, plus the supporting shells, gunpowder, and gun carriages, and each artillery gun was 300 taels of silver.

Ma Cheng listened to Ma Bao and asked: "Does the sixth uncle mean to let the Beilu build the fort first, and when it is about to be completed, we will suddenly attack and destroy the heavy artillery of the Beiyu?" ”

"Yes, in this way, the northern captives will have no self-control, and can only honestly attack the city with flesh and blood! Then we can teach them how to behave! ”

Ma Cheng didn't expect this Ma Bao to look rude, but he still has this kind of delicate mind, and he is not like the kind of waste who uses Ma Shiying's relationship to become an official. In fact, Ma Cheng was wrong, Ma Bao could follow Ma Shiying for more than ten years, he must have some ability, or he would not have been appointed by Ma Shiying as the flag officer.

Ma Cheng patted Ma Bao's shoulder and said approvingly: "I didn't expect the sixth uncle to have good knowledge, so how about the sixth uncle command the city tomorrow?" ”

Today, Ma Cheng is completely in personal command, he is afraid that Ma Bao will be frightened by the Qing army's offensive, but now seeing Ma Bao's good performance, Ma Cheng decided to let Ma Bao do it, Ma Bao heard Ma Cheng say this and quickly surrendered his hand to express his luck.

After arranging this side of Nancheng, Ma Cheng went to Xicheng and Dongcheng to take a look, and Xicheng was guarded by Luo Bingran. Lao Luo is Ma Cheng's dog, and when he saw his boss coming, he hurriedly went down to the city to greet him.

The city wall here in the west city is the longest, and at the same time, the force in Luo Bingran's hands is also the weakest, in addition to 5,000 people, the long west city wall only has 20,000 guards to assist in the defense, and there are only more than 40 artillery here. However, outside the city of Xicheng is the Yangtze River waterway, the city wall is only more than 200 meters away from the waterway, and at the same time, the water network is dense, and the Qing army will never attack the city here until the last moment.

Ma Cheng looked at it here in Xicheng and went to Dongcheng, and the guard here in Dongcheng is Ma Xi, who is also Ma Cheng's third brother. Dongcheng has the shortest defense line, and the soldiers who are naturally guarding it are also the least. Ma Cheng transferred 2,000 of Ma Xi's 5,000 men to Zhengyangmen, and 20 artillery pieces were also transferred, so Ma Xi was unhappy when he saw Ma Cheng coming.

"Second brother, there are too few soldiers here at the end of the general, please send some more people to the second brother!"

Ma Cheng looked at the outside of the city and saw that there was no movement, and three miles away was the pitch-black Purple Mountain. Ma Cheng frowned and asked, "Can you arrange a night patrol soldier in the mountains?" ”