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Early the next morning, Xiao Tianjian did not wait for the defenders in the city to react, and immediately ordered an artillery bombardment of the city, and sent troops to start attacking the city. *..!。 *

For a time, the cannons sounded in all directions of Wuchang City, the rumbling cannons shook the ground, and all kinds of cannonballs flew into the city with a roar, or fell on the city wall, and the defenders on the city wall cried and shouted their mothers in all directions, and fled down the city wall to avoid the artillery, and even some of the troops left themselves as soldiers and ran under the city wall, not to mention those who were soldiers.

The angry Song Yihe trembled all over his body and ordered to fire back with artillery, so some officers and soldiers in the city had to start firing back under the orders of the officers.

Speaking of the solidity of Wuchang City, it is definitely not worse than Kaifeng City or Jingzhou City, relying on the Yangtze River, the water source is sufficient, the moat is wide, it is definitely a deep moat, and the geography is very similar to Jingzhou, if the more than 10,000 defenders in the city have firm beliefs, with the strength of the Xingtian Army gathered here, if you want to conquer Wuchang City, it cannot be said that it will definitely be no fun, but at least it will create huge casualties for the Xingtian Army, and it is precisely that the Xingtian Army is afraid of too many casualties, which will affect the next action. Therefore, there is a great possibility that the defenders can hold this Wuchang City.

But what the defenders in the city can't do is to stick to this, because at this time, the hearts of the officials and people in the city have long been scattered, and the soldiers don't want to fight, they will be more afraid of war, and the officials want to escape from here, or simply surrender, the soldiers and people in the city can't form an idea at all, only a few people think about holding the city, so if they can prevent the Xingtian Army from breaking through Wuchang City, it will really be hell.

Not only will the Xingtian Army not miss when it comes to attack Wuchang City, but even Zhang Xianzhong came to attack Wuchang City in the sixteenth year of Chongzhen in the original history, and the result was the same.

Although the imperial court and local government officials have seen the Xingtian Army sitting big, they are always still under illusions, thinking that they can curb the development of the Xingtian Army, and Zhang Xianzhong and other thieves who have been in trouble in the Huguang area are also not capable of attacking important Jianghan towns like Wuchang, plus they all think that there is a Yangtze River moat here, and it is impossible for the thief army to attack Wuchang, so they became ostriches from top to bottom, stuck their heads in the sand and pretended not to see, and never really paid attention to the defense of Wuchang. No one thought that the Xingtian Army would move so fast, and in just a few months, it connected Xiangyang, Chengtianfu, Jingzhou, De'anfu, Yuezhou, Changsha and other important towns, and captured a large number of warships, so that the Yangtze River, which was originally regarded as a moat by the government, lost its role as a barrier so quickly, and watched the Xingtian Army pounce on Wuchang with several people.

On the second day of the Xingtian army's artillery attack on the city, the people in the city could not hold on, several officials took the lead in bribing the people guarding the city gate, opened the city gate overnight and tried to escape from the city of Wuchang by fishing in troubled waters at night, as a result, it was even more chaotic in the city, the first to surrender was not only not the Wuchang defenders, but a group of soldiers in the new army of the king of Chu who was regarded as the king of Chu to rely on, on the morning of September 16, suddenly made a difficult move to take down their generals and tied them up, and opened the security gate in the east of the city. A group of soldiers and horses who had been waiting here for a long time were welcomed into the city.

The entire city defense system of Wuchang immediately collapsed, Song Yihe heard the news in the west of the city, Yang Tian cried, drew his sword and led dozens of family members to gather three or four hundred die-hard soldiers, and immediately passed through the city and went straight to the east of the city, trying to fight to the death to repel the soldiers and horses of the Xingtian army that had entered the city, and recapture the security gate.

After Shi Xu Xueyan, the governor of the Chu Palace, and Cui Wenrong, the deputy general, got the news, they also hurriedly organized the soldiers of the Chu Wangfu to rush to the east of the city to try to intercept the Xingtian Army and recapture the security gate, and the two armies immediately started a big battle in the city gate.

After he led the troops into the city gate, he first seized the city gate with the cooperation of the rebels, firmly controlled the area around the city gate, and personally carried a knife to block the road in the city gate, leading his troops to fight to the death with the officers and soldiers who came to intercept them.

Feng Xitong began to enter the city with few troops, and the officers and soldiers still occupied the advantage of troops, and these officers and soldiers who came to counterattack and the new army of Chu Wangfu were all determined to resist to the end, knowing that the city gate could not be taken back, and there was only one way to break the city in Wuchang Mansion, under the leadership of Xu Xueyan and Song Yihe and other officials, the counterattack was very fierce, many people climbed on the roof and fired arrows at the Xingtian army, and some people went forward to attack the city gate one after another.

Feng Xitong's subordinate of less than 500 men who entered the city in the early stage guarded the area around the city gate, and kept fighting back with bird guns to prevent the counterattack of the officers and soldiers.

The battle between the two armies was extremely fierce, Feng Xitong, a young general, led his troops to repel several counterattacks by the officers and soldiers in a row, and all the guards around him were killed, and he himself was also heavily wounded in several places, covered in blood but still led the troops to fight to the death, so that the follow-up Xingtian soldiers and horses were able to enter the city safely, consolidate the area around the city gate, and began to counterattack the officers and troops in the city.

When Feng Xitong saw that a large number of his own soldiers had entered the city and the city gate was no longer in danger, he fell to the ground, and without waiting for his subordinates to carry him down to the medical officer for treatment, he closed his eyes, and swallowed his last breath in the arms of his subordinates without leaving a word, only crying his subordinates, and even Liu Yaoben cried loudly after learning about it, and vowed to avenge Feng Xi.

With a large number of Xingtian army into the city, the official army was unable to continue the counterattack, and the army was immediately in chaos, taking advantage of Xu Xueyan and Cui Wenrong to lead the main force to kill the east of the city, the south of the city by the Chu Wangfu soldiers guarded by the Wenchang Gate suddenly also had a group of soldiers rebelled, opened the Wenchang Gate, and welcomed the Xingtian army outside the city into the city.

Song Yihe, as the governor, rushed forward with his sword and made the last resistance, and was finally killed on the spot by the Xingtian soldiers who rushed over because he was outnumbered.

The governor of the palace, Shi Xu Xueyan, was killed in the city almost at the same time, and the deputy general Cui Wenrong led a small number of soldiers who only had a little fighting spirit left, and continued to fight with the Xingtian army in the city, and after noon, he was also killed by the Xingtian army.

So far, Wuchang City was completely captured by the Xingtian Army, and the King of Chu in the city surrendered, hundreds of Huguang officials and officials and relatives of the emperor were captured by the Xingtian Army, and at the same time more than 100 families fled into Wuchang City from all over Huguang, these gentry almost without exception arranged for the clansmen to join the Chu Wangfu soldiers, trying to resist the Xingtian Army, and as a result, after the Xingtian Army entered the city, they were unceremoniously given a big purge, all the ones who should be copied were confiscated, and those who should be arrested were arrested. They were all taken into a compound.

When the battle of Wuchang came to an end, basically Huguang was controlled by the Xingtian Army, and at this time, news also came from the south of Huguang that Li Xin led his troops to capture Hengzhou almost at the same time, so it was only a matter of time before the next step swept the entire Huguang.

In this battle, only a small number of people escaped from Wuchang City in advance, and the rest can be said to have been put to the end of the Xingtian Army, and the entire Huguang official system was completely destroyed.

When counting losses and gains after the war, Xiao Tianjian learned the news of Feng Xitong's death, Xiao Tianjian is no stranger to Feng Xitong, a young general, Xiao Tianjian is no stranger to him, in his impression, Feng Xitong is a slightly wooden person, usually not smiling, always with a straight face, as if someone owes him money, so many people in the army don't like to deal with him very much, think he is too boring, and he has just been promoted to a battalion general, and he has not had too many previous military exploits, so Xiao Tianjian rarely pays attention to him on weekdays, But I didn't expect that this time to attack Wuchang, Feng Xitong actually made such a feat, thinking about how he didn't care much about him on weekdays, but now he shed the last drop of blood for his own career, Xiao Tianjian was quite sad about it.

But compared to the loss of the Xingtian Army, because there were officers and soldiers in the city who defected, the overall loss of the Xingtian Army was very small, and the entire attack on Wuchang City resulted in only a few hundred casualties, of which less than 200 were killed.

This time they not only captured the whole family of Zhu Huakui, the king of Chu in the city, but also captured hundreds of officials, completely dismantled the management system of Huguang, and the confiscated silver even exceeded the amount in the Kaifeng War, and chased the number of seizures in Luoyang City, only in the palace of the king of Chu, more than one million taels of silver and nearly 10,000 taels of gold were seized, and the rest of the antiques and pearls were countless. But with so much money, he insisted on learning from King Fu and refused to use it, but now it's good, it's cheaper for him to punish the heavenly army.

In addition, Wuchang Mansion City, as the capital of Huguang Province, lives in the city of a large number of official gentry, these people have also hoarded a lot of money for generations, and now Xiao Tianjian is spending money, he will never be polite to them, and all the gentry who should be copied have been copied, as well as those officials and gentry who fled to Wuchang for refuge, also brought a large number of soft to live in Wuchang City, so these people will not be polite, and they will copy it as usual.

In this way, the Xingtian Army "looted" more than 3 million taels of silver and more than 20,000 taels of gold in Wuchang Mansion City alone, and this money alone was enough for the Xingtian Army to recruit and train another 100,000 troops!

(Thanks to the zzpiggy brothers for their tipping today!) Your support is what motivates me! ）