The time left for the Liang army was actually very limited, on the one hand, the fourth capital of the Longque Army was approaching this side step by step, and on the other hand, the Xiangzhou army on the south bank also began to have hundreds of generals out of the city at this time, gathered in front of the river beach, and prepared to cross the river by boat to help.

Liang Jun noticed that there were many reserves of tung oil in the city, and it was not beneficial for them to disperse the siege ants, so they all moved outside the southern city.

More than a dozen skilled and courageous cavalrymen, drawing swords and stabbing horses, stimulated the straddled war horses to madness, and then the royal horses crashed straight into the seemingly fragile city gate, in front of the city gate, these cavalry jumped off their horses, and then quickly retreated, retreating to the protection of other foot soldiers who dismounted and fought, no matter how fast Zhao Wuji's hands and feet were, he only had time to shoot two people.

At this time, Canglang City, can only be regarded as a rammed earth wall, the city gate is made of thick wood, and there is no iron and copper, it was hit by more than a dozen crazy war horses successively, the door shaft was broken and fell down obliquely, but the door hole five or six feet deep was filled with sand and gravel, and in a short period of time, he was not afraid that the Liang army could dig these sand and gravel from the city gate hole.

What is really difficult is the extraordinary courage of the Liang army, after they have been psychologically prepared, on such a cold day, they still use river water to pour their clothes and armor, and then use a big shield to cover their heads and faces, and concentrate on attacking from the south gate......

The Liang army did not prepare too many ladders in a hurry, fearing that the tung oil would burn, and finally mixed the horse corpses and mud to the south gate of Canglang City, forming a simple ramp, and could directly attack the wall without climbing the ladder.

This is mainly because the parapet wall of Canglang City is too short, except for the outer circle of sewage ditches, it is only eight feet high, more than 20 horse corpses are piled up under the wall, and then thousands of bags of soil are dumped with marching tents, forming a ramp six or seven steps wide and twelve or thirteen steps long, which is almost connected to the wall, and at this time the Liang army can even directly rush to the wall.

In the city, a short wood with a single hug and a length of more than a foot was inserted and rolled down the ramp with thistles, and the whole barrel of tung oil was thrown into the fire near the ramp at any cost to fuel the fire and suppress the charge of the Liang army.

One hundred and sixty or seventy strong men took the initiative to participate in the battle, especially the leaders of each village almost all stood up, and the troops in Han Qian's hands seemed to be much more abundant-looking at the Liang army outside the city, Han Qian also secretly sneered, thinking that these Liang troops might think that there were only forty or fifty elite scouts of Zuo Si in the city to defend, but they didn't have a deep understanding of the situation of more than 100 cottages on both sides of the Hanshui and Danjiang rivers, or they didn't have a full understanding of what they were doing in the ancient city of Junxian during this time!

Han Qian drove the rest of the people to the house in the middle of the city, let them take shields and spears to defend themselves, and saw that the Liang army was attacking too fiercely, and even let go of the roof directly opposite the ramp, and organized troops from both wings to attack the Liang army that rushed over to protect the wall.

After this battle reached the treetops of the sun, hundreds of generals of the Xiangzhou army on the south bank entered with three warships, and the Liang army left more than 100 corpses and was forced to bypass Canglang City, retreating north from the remnants of the road between the west side of Heilongshan and the Danjiang River.

At this time, the offensive of the Liang army in the north against Iron Crocodile Mountain had just begun.

Han Qian was also unable to reinforce Iron Crocodile Mountain at this time, and the elite of the two battalions transferred by Li Zhihe from Jingzikou should also arrive at Iron Crocodile Mountain at this time.

For the Xiangzhou army that came from the south bank, it was only said that the city was a mess and could not welcome them into the city, so he sent more than 100 catties of meat and wine as a reward.

Ten elite scouts were killed in the battle, 20 slaves were killed in the battle, and more than 30 people were killed and more than 100 were wounded.

What made Han Qian's heart ache even more was the loss of the war and the post-war pension.

The newly built Canglang town was beaten like this, not to mention that it took ten days and eight days to clean up before it could be restored to its original appearance.

It is good to say that the war dead have family heirs and those who are bravely wounded in battle, and it is logical to remove them and their families from slavery; The Zuo Si scouts have official military registration in the Dragon Bird Army, and they are uniformly rewarded according to their military merits, and even the Liang Jun's heads harvested this time can be counted on their heads, each of them is divided into two or three heads, which can almost solve the low-level rank of a large number of elite scouts.

For the people who died in battle, the people who were bravely injured in battle, and the fulfillment of his promise before the war, Han Qian almost gave a reward of nearly 400 cakes of gold.

Han Qian secretly felt that if he fought such a tragic battle, Zuo Si would go bankrupt directly, but he couldn't take care of these things now.

In addition to the uncertain rewards for military merits for the time being, the biggest gain was to strip more than 100 sets of tattered armor from the dead soldiers of the Liang army, and to push out more than 30 horse corpses from the mound, which could cut out five or six thousand catties of horse meat.

The fourth capital of 1,500 generals rushed through Canglang City by boat before noon, and almost the fourth general rushed to Canglang City before and after, as well as Yang Qin and Feng Xuan, the four surnamed fleets and the Xuzhou boat gang that set off from Xuzhou and went north again.

However, this time the fleet was twice as large as the previous two times, in addition to Yang Qin, Feng Xuan, Feng Zhang, Gao Bao and other ship gangs and the escort of the four surnamed fleets, Zhao Kuo led more than 500 people to Canglang City.

To be honest, seeing Zhao Kuo disembarking from the river beach with so many people, Tian Cheng, Xi Ying, Zhao Wuji and others were all shocked, and they didn't expect Yang Qin and Zhao Kuo to bring so many people from Xuzhou: "Why are there so many people, where can you get so much money and food, and ask Yang Qin to redeem so many village slaves?" ”

When Han Qian saw Zhao Kuo jumping off the boat, his mind was wide, and he knew in his heart that the letter he had asked Yang Qin to bring to his father had successfully persuaded his father.

Facing Tian Cheng's shock, Han Qian just smiled and said nothing.

In order to resist the offensive of the Liang army, the imperial court mainly recruited troops, horses, and food from 12 states such as Jianghuang, Hubei and Ying, and Jingtan to supplement the Dengxiang defense line in the northwest, while the southwestern border states such as Chenxu and Shaoheng were not within the scope of this requisition.

However, this does not mean that Chenxu and other prefectures and counties cannot actively support the war on the northern front.

In fact, although the prefectures and counties such as Huijiang and Jiangxi were not within the scope of this requisition, these places had been completely incorporated into the territory of Dachu, and the state and county officials were all sent by Jinling, more or less in the form of donations, in addition to the normal taxes, and also allocated an additional part of the money and grain to the front line to support the war.

The money and food controlled by Han Daoxun in Xuzhou were very limited, but Han Qian wrote to his father, requesting that all the prisoners in the Xuzhou Prefecture Prison be transferred to Xiangzhou to reinforce the war in the northwest in the form of prisoner soldiers, which was also a kind of support.

This time, Zhao Kuo escorted 500 Xuzhou prisoners to Xiangzhou and handed them over to Han Qian to take over.

For these convicts, being assigned to the convict can be reduced by one degree, and then depending on the military merit and the length of service, there is also the opportunity to reduce the crime or even receive a reward.

It's not much of a coincidence, among the 500 convicts in Xuzhou, more than 30 people are from the Xi clan, all of whom were sent to prison for confronting or injuring the old master, or stealing the old owner's property, in short, all kinds of restlessness.

Han Qian had thought of secretly taking these Xi clan people over before, but his father adhered to the laws of the imperial court and resolutely refused to allow it, but this time he was sent to Xiangzhou as a prisoner.

Although these convicts have not undergone much training, and they are not very strong in combat effectiveness for the time being, it is enough for people to feel at ease when so many people enter Canglang City.

Yang Qin and Zhao Kuo didn't expect them to hurry up, or miss the fierce battle that happened in Canglang City in the early morning, and after going ashore and seeing the wolves inside and outside Tucheng, it was hard to imagine that Han Qian and more than 100 of them, with such a simple walled city, could withstand the strong attack of more than 400 elite Liang troops.

Yang Qin and Zhao Kuo came over, and Han Qian fulfilled his promise to the cottage people before the war, and took out sixty stones of salt to calculate the reward.

The cottage is in urgent need of salt and iron, and it is more willing to use salt to calculate the reward, which is exactly what Han Qian is most happy about.

On the one hand, this batch of salt is Du Chongtao's civilian military funds allocated to the Dragon Bird Army, and there is no need for Han Qian to pay an additional reward line from Zuo Si's private account.

On the other hand, when Emperor Tianyou sent an edict to Xiangzhou this time, he also officially agreed that the Longque Army should use cheap things and specialize in salt affairs in the old Junzhou west of Xiangzhou to raise military funds.

Han Qian now receives salt from the Xiangzhou Salt and Iron Courtyard, and the price is 1,000 yuan per stone, and he is now converting it to the cottage at a high price of 6,700 yuan per stone as a bounty, no matter how he calculates, he will not lose.

After that, Han Qian immediately arranged a ship to send more than 200 people across the Danjiang River and Hanshui by boat, and allowed them to return to the cottage to show their promise.

The vast majority of cottagers are reluctant to participate in the war.

Besides, Han Qian gave a very generous reward this time, and most of the people could live a good life for two or three years when they returned to the cottage.

This kind of money earned by taking one's life, if it is not a last resort, for the vast majority of people, earning it once is enough. Even if Han Qian showed full sincerity, even if they really wanted to get out of the cottage and move to the flat land, it would depend on how the war developed.

However, in the end, there are more than 20 strong people, who are helpless in the cottage, and have nothing to worry about, thinking that they will go back to the cottage to continue to live the hard life before, it is better to stay, at least before they die in the war, they can be mixed with food and clothing for every meal, and there is a supply of wine and meat every other day.

Among the cottage people, these people are precisely the strongest in combat, and most of them are veterans who have fled into the mountains after defeat. They didn't need to get any farmhouses in Canglang City, they just wanted to have armor, sophisticated weapons, and a part of the bounty.

Han Qian sent a group of scouts to the north to keep an eye on the development of the war in the Iron Crocodile Ridge in the north, and at the same time, at the same time, he arranged Yang Qin and Zhao Kuo with this group of men and horses as quickly as possible.

The Xuzhou convicts are naturally also divided into local and guest nationality.

There were about 200 local prisoners with the four surnames, and Han Qian assigned these manpower to the old engineer Zheng Tong, and organized them into the artisan household battalion, and after the cottage people left, they took over cleaning up the battlefield, repairing the walled city, and moving the materials shipped from Xuzhou off the ship.

If it is possible, Han Qian also wants to continue to expand Canglang City to the north on the existing basis, and build several trebuchets at the same time.

As for the other local and guest prisoners, Han Qian decided to mix them with the slave soldiers led by Xi Chang into a temporary Xuzhou camp.

After the war, these prisoner soldiers had to be repatriated to their hometowns, and the slave soldiers led by Xi Chang were not officially established in the Dragon Bird Army.

Han Qian couldn't let Zhao Kuo go back to Xuzhou immediately, and temporarily appointed him as the commander of the Xuzhou battalion, with Xi Chang and Guo Nuer as his deputies, and transferred more than a dozen veterans from the Zuo Si barracks to serve as team leaders and commanders, and set up the framework of the Xuzhou battalion first.

In addition, Han Qian organized these more than 20 cottage men who were willing to defect to Zuo Si into the military room and used them as elite scouts to supplement the lack of manpower.

In this way, Han Qian had a 300-person artisan battalion, a 400-person Xuzhou battalion, and a 50-person elite scout's barn in Canglang City.

Of course, Yang Qin, Feng Xuan, Feng Zhang and others still had more than 200 guards, sailors and eighteen ships, and after unloading the goods, Han Qian didn't want to let them go back to Xuzhou for the time being.

The war on the Western Front suddenly became tighter, and the transportation of materials and personnel in the upper reaches of the Han River by water will also become increasingly heavy, and the ships of the Xiangzhou Army are also limited, and the reinforcements from the south bank today will not cross the river until the last moment, and Han Qian also knows that he cannot place too high expectations on friendly forces.

The Xuzhou fleet stayed for the time being, and he could feel more at ease.