Li Zhihe, Guo Liang, Zheng Hui, and Zhou Yi were each responsible for the defense of a city wall, among which the defense of the eastern city guarded by Li Zhihe was the heaviest; Zheng Hui and Zhou Yi defended the north and south cities separately, which was also the main point for the Liang army to choose to attack the city, and the burden was not light.

Guo Liang guarded the west city near the Xichuan River, the gap left from the river bank to the root of the city wall was narrow, and the defense task was the lightest, and the Xuzhou battalion and the guard battalion led by the three princes assumed the responsibility of the general reserve.

Han Qian took Tian Cheng, Gao Shao, and Xi Chang to the east city, and saw that Shen He and Yang En were also invited by the three princes, and they were looking at the enemy camp in the east by the moonlight.

Although it was a clear night and the moon was bright and the stars were scarce, the enemy camp ten miles away was so dark that even with a lookout glass, there was no movement.

It was confirmed that a new army of soldiers and horses had entered the Liang army camp in the east, and that the scouts who had sneaked out of the city had just returned to report it, and at this time they only faintly saw that there were torches stretching for hundreds of paces on the east side of the enemy camp like dragons and snakes moving slowly, which can corroborate this.

"In this camp in the east, how many soldiers and horses are stationed in the Liang army?" Shen He asked, pointing to the blackened successive enemy camps outside the city.

"In the enemy camp in the east, there are currently less than 30,000 elite Liang troops. In addition, the Liang army also built a camp in the upper reaches of the Xichuan River, with almost five or six thousand soldiers and horses, and more than 5,000 troops stationed in the inner countryside city in the east. If the Liang army that entered tonight had been transferred from the area east of Neixiang, the garrison of the Liang army on the periphery of Xichuan City would have exceeded 45,000 men; The Liang army also has more than 20,000 strong men captured from Suizhou and Yingzhou,"

Shen Yang patiently introduced the current dangerous situation facing Xichuan to Shen He, and said,

"Although we repelled several waves of attacks of the Liang army before, the focus of the Liang army in the early stage was not in Xichuan, but in Fancheng, including a large number of craftsmen who could build siege equipment, they were mainly concentrated in Fancheng in the early stage, and then we will meet the real test!"

When Shen He and Yang En entered the city from the west, they did not see the deployment of the Liang army in the east and north, he saw the defenders in the city and the army in the city, and saw that the walls of Xichuan City and the houses in the city were mostly intact, and thought that the situation was more optimistic than expected, but he did not expect that the main goal of the main force of the Liang army in the Nanyang Basin in the early stage was to capture Fancheng, which was to open up the passage between the north and the south to attack Xiangzhou City.

The Liang army's previous military operations on Xichuan's side were mainly to besiege and restrict the access of the defenders, and large-scale siege warfare had not yet begun.

Thinking that the soldiers and horses that the Liang army had gathered on the periphery of Xichuan City at this time were already five or six times the number of defenders, and there was the possibility of further gathering troops in the later period, Shen He's cheerful expression of relief after entering the city suddenly became solemn again.

"The Liang army is building siege equipment, thinking that Fancheng has not been able to withstand the bombardment of the Liang army with forty or fifty trebuchets for more than ten days, and the city wall has collapsed in large areas. Otherwise, Xichuan will definitely not be able to defend the arrival of Jinling reinforcements! Han Qian said with a slight frown.

When Zheng Hui entered Xichuan City, it was even more dilapidated than Fancheng, and the previous city walls had collapsed in large areas, and there were gaps everywhere.

Zheng Hui forcibly captured seven or eight hundred old and weak people from all around to repair the city, and it was impossible to completely demolish the previous remnants of the wall and rebuild it, so he could only repair the gap.

Han Qian and the others surrounded the three princes and stationed in Xichuan City, with soldiers and horses plus people, there were 12,000 or 3,000 people, but in such a short time, they could only strengthen the remnant wall on the basis of the previous one.

In fact, the structure of the city wall of Xichuan City is still quite fragile.

According to the observation of the Zuo Si scouts on the battlefield of Fancheng, the towed trebuchet built by the Liang army was placed three or four hundred steps away in front of the battle, and more than 100 people worked together to smash two or three hundred pounds of stone bullets directly onto the city wall.

If the Liang army built thirty or forty such heavy trebuchets, the strongest eastern wall of Xichuan would probably not be able to support ten days before it collapsed in large areas.

After the collapse of the city wall, how long could the Chu army, which had no city wall to defend it, support it in the face of the elite Liang army that came in like a wolf and a tiger and was five or six times its size?

"Han Qian, I know that you have always been resourceful, is there any way to thwart the enemy's spirit?" Shen He grabbed a straw as if he was drowning, stared at Han Qian and asked.

Han Qian had seen Shen He a few times before, but he had only seen it, and he really couldn't talk about how deep the contact was, seeing that Shen He looked like he knew him very well, Han Qian thought that Emperor Tianyou should indeed have extra eyeliner to keep an eye on him and Zuo Si's every move.

But this is not the time to think deeply about this problem, in the face of Shen He's question, Han Qian only bowed slightly, even if he had any plans, it was impossible for him to stand at the head of the city and discuss it openly.

"The enemy general Han Yuanqi is the nephew of Han Jian, the envoy of Xuzhou Jiedu, who is quite reused by Emperor Liang, and he is steady with his troops, I am afraid that it will be difficult to expose any flaws and be caught." Shen Yang said worriedly.

The history of Qice's victory over the enemy is endless, but the vast majority of successful cases are based on the arrogance of the enemy generals or the fact that the enemy army itself has great hidden dangers and flaws.

In addition to the initial storming of Canglang City and the setback of Tie Crocodile Ridge, after the strategic intentions of the Liang army in the Jingxiang area were completely exposed, Han Yuanqi, who personally went to the inner countryside to sit in the town, has been extremely steady on the western front for more than a month, and only launched several tentative attacks on Xichuan City.

Seeing that the defenders were determined to fight, Han Yuanqi stopped the offensive, and on the gentle slope less than ten miles east of Xichuan City, the gorge mouth of the southern foot of Funiu Mountain upstream of the Xichuan River, and the mouth of the Xichuan River flowing into the Danjiang River, he drove the people to build a camp, or used the remnants abandoned by his predecessors to build a dock fort, first stabilized his own roots, and limited the Dragon Bird Army to the maximum extent in Xichuan City, making it difficult to move on a large scale.

Now that the Liang army has captured Fancheng, Han Yuanqi has transferred a large number of craftsmen from Fancheng to build siege weapons.

In addition, the Liang army did its best to gather ships along the Han River, including Liang's troops and horses in Wuguan, and also intended to quickly build a number of warships, so that they could have a larger water battalion combat power in the Han River and Danjiang.

Before the most elite Lou boat army in Jinling advanced westward, the Xuzhou boat gang only had 300 sailors and six warships, which was too weak, and when the Liang army camp moved westward, they would be forced to withdraw from the Xichuan River and need to hide in the branch streams in the upper reaches of the Danjiang River.

At that time, Xichuan City will be faced with enemies on all sides, and the passage to retreat into the deep mountains on the west bank will also be cut off.

At present, according to the scouts' reconnaissance of the enemy's movements in the vicinity of Xiangzhou City, it is very likely that the Liang army will also besiege Xiangzhou City first, and shift the focus of the next battle to the strong attack on Xichuan City.

In the end, the strategy must be built on the basis of considerable strength, the Liang army occupies an absolute advantage, and they are still in this camp step by step, how can they use strange strategies to win?

…………

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At the end of February, the Liang army formed a water battalion on the basis of the surrender of the army, and divided 3,000 soldiers into the Danjiang River in more than 100 warships, Yang Qin and Feng Xuan led the Xuzhou boat gang to withdraw from the Xichuan River, marking that the main force of the Longque Army was completely besieged in the city of Xichuan.

On March 6, the Liang army built a dock fort camp on the periphery of Xichuan City, facing the side of Xichuan City after the gate was all opened, and after removing obstacles such as antlers and horses, a team of Liang troops in neat clothes and armor surrounded a simple and practical side van and cave house car that could block arrows and stones in the city, and advanced towards Xichuan City.

This also shows that the stalemate between the two armies of Liang and Chu in Xichuan lasted until this moment and was completely broken.

In the array of the Liang army, hundreds of sturdy people pushed more than a dozen nest cars slowly forward.

Liang Jun's nest car was built by erecting two long pillars seven or eight feet high on a movable frame, and then using ropes to hang a wooden house several feet square to the top of the pillars.

The wooden house looks like a nest, with holes on all sides, and three or four generals can stand inside, and the generals can cross the shield of the city wall in the nest house, and look at the movement in Xichuan City, and at the same time, they can also shoot the defenders of the city head with bows and crossbows.

After all, the four walls of Xichuan City are only more than two zhang high, and even if the shacks built on the city wall with grid wood to block the arrow stones, they are not more than three zhang high.

In addition to the relatively simple nest car, Liang Jun also built a more sturdy and bulky building car.

The building car is slightly shorter than the nest car, but it is also nearly a foot higher than the city wall of Xichuan City.

Driven by hundreds of people, the building cars seem to be mobile arrow towers covered with raw cowhide on the outside.

At the top of each building car, nearly ten archers can stand at the same time to shoot arrows, and there is a ladder that can be put down at the top, close to the city wall in the siege battle, you can put the ladder with a hook directly to the wall, and the Liang saber and shield soldiers in the building car can swarm out and seize a foothold on the city wall.

For the building carts and nest carts that can approach the city wall, the defenders also prepared a large number of long rods with hooks and spears tied to their heads on the city wall, and more than 20 bed crossbows hidden in the barn, waiting for the enemy's building carts and nest cars to approach, they can collect thorns and shoot volleys.

Of course, the biggest headache is the trebuchets that are slowly pushing forward behind the enemy line.

Liang Jun did not intend to immediately forcibly annex the city for hand-to-hand combat, and first pushed dozens of cave house cars and partial vans outside the east city gate.

Obviously, the Liang army wanted to use these cave houses and side vans to prevent the defenders from going out of the city to counterattack.

Han Qian accompanied the three princes, Shen Yang, and Shen He to watch the battle in Dongcheng, but the specific battle was still presided over by Li Zhihe.

Li Zhihe sent his fierce general Deng Tai to lead his troops and horses to fight with shields, wanting to destroy these dozens of cave houses and side vans, so as not to block the passage of the defenders to go out of the city to counterattack.

Seeing the defenders kill out, and outside the range of the bow and crossbow at the head of the city, the Liang army of the brigade also formed a formation to kill from behind the cave house car and the side van car, and at the same time pushed several building cars forward, and seventy or eighty archers condescendingly shot at each other.

Deng Tai only had time to command his men to throw out dozens of canisters filled with tung oil, and then he retreated in a hurry. Although the advance and retreat were extremely fast, when they retreated to the city, they were still shot dead and wounded.

Han Qian looked at the fired oil canisters, in addition to burning more than a dozen cave house cars and side vans, he also burned and burned dozens of Liang soldiers and people, but the Liang army didn't care about this casualty, and pushed more cave house cars and side box cars forward from the rear, forming a car formation of two or three hundred steps.

The chariot array was almost 400 paces away from the city wall, and even if a bed crossbow with five or six stone power could shoot 400 paces away, it would be difficult to injure the Liang generals behind the chariot if it was blocked by the tall cave house car.

The Liang army not only shoveled soil to cover the fire on the car formation, but also piled more antlers and horses on the two wings of the car formation to form a barrier wall to prevent the defenders from directly attacking the Liang army's main formation.

After that, the Liang army drove hundreds of people forward, dug trenches against the chariot array and barrier walls, and used the soil from the trenches to build an earthen wall and tamp it.

Han Qian could see that the Liang army wanted to block them in the city first, and then use trebuchets to continuously bombard the city wall, and then organize troops and horses to attack after a large gap appeared.

This was also the tactic that the Liang army carried out in Fancheng.

It's just that in the bombardment that lasted for more than ten days, the defenders of Fancheng suffered heavy casualties, and Du Chongtao withdrew the defenders from Fancheng in advance without carrying the Liang army to organize a strong attack.

At this time, the Xichuan River in the west of Xichuan City was occupied by nearly 100 large and small warships in the Liang army's water camp, and the passage of the defenders to retreat west across the Xichuan River had been blocked, and it was impossible to withdraw from it, and the other three sides were the deep hinterland controlled by the Liang army, and there was nowhere to break through.

At this moment, Han Qian couldn't help but wonder, did he gamble too much?