As the time entered May, as the minds of the prisoners of war were unified, the progress of Ji Han's trench excavation work was sharply accelerated. By 15 May, the numerous feeder trenches connecting from the outer ring (500 meters from the city wall) to the inner ring (300 meters from the city wall) had been excavated. Li Xiang, who was very satisfied with the progress of the project, directly added meat to the food of the prisoners of war. And made it clear that as long as the quality of the work continues to be guaranteed as before, then the meat added to each meal will not be canceled until the end of the war.

Then, the morale of the POWs was once again high, and they began to quickly dig into the inner ring of the plan.

Three hundred meters has entered the effective range of the trebuchet set up on the upper floor of the tall city of Luoyang. Therefore, from the beginning of the excavation work in the inner ring, the defenders of Luoyang, who had been in a wait-and-see state, began to attack the Han prisoners who were digging trenches with trebuchets under the command of the prince in charge of each section.

It's just that, under the protection of a layer of earth wall protection, the effect of such an attack is very poor.

"Huh? Brother Wang, why are you here? Little brother is not attacked here. ”

"Hmph, if Brother Wei doesn't come, I don't know how you will lose!"

"Well, Brother Wang, what do you mean by that? The younger brother doesn't understand very well. ”

On 16 May, Sima Lun, who was guarding the south gate, learned that the enemy's engineering team had entered the range of his trebuchet, and he excitedly ordered nearly 100 trebuchets to be fired at the same time. In just one hour, thousands of stone bullets were fired. And as a well-educated son of a family, Sima Lun also asked the defenders to ignite the stone bullets before firing them. As a result, half of the sky was covered with long tails of flames drawn by burning stone projectiles, and it looked spectacular for a while.

After these stone bombs landed, they did cause a certain amount of trouble to the prisoners of war who were under construction: Lao Tzu had just dug up, and the stacked soil was blown back into the pit by your stone bombs. Lao Tzu was digging a pit in the trench, but suddenly a large pile of earth chips almost buried Lao Tzu alive......

That's the result. Of the thousands of stone projectiles, only one of them exploded, and after being thrown from the city wall, its parabola was extremely perfect, and it had just landed in the trench impartially, and was not blocked by the earthen wall above the trench.

However, there was no one in that section of the trench at that time!

Therefore, the casualties caused by a thousand stone bullets to the Han army are zero!

"Wen Ju, who is in charge of the materials for defending the city today, came to report to Brother Wei, saying that King Zhao asked him for a thousand stone bullets around noon today?"

"It is true. Brother Wang, the Han army faced by the younger brother in this defensive line has already entered the firing range. The younger brother ordered someone to throw a thousand stone bullets this morning. Then in the afternoon, I naturally have to find Wen Ju to make up for it. That's fine, right? ”

Before the outcome of the Battle of Continental Ze was decided, Sima Gui, the king of Taiyuan, who had been serving as the nominal commander of the Bingzhou Front, was no longer a military novice at this time. Hearing Sima Lun's words, of course, he was angry: "No problem, it's a big problem!" For my brother, I will ask you, how long does it take for a craftsman to polish a thousand stone bullets? What is the effect of these thousand stone bullets? ”

"Eh, why is it that Brother Wang is like those laymen? How can we calculate these little things? The enemy is approaching, and they are going to launch a thunderbolt to break their guts! ”

"Hey!" Hearing this, Sima Gui couldn't wait to give this guy a slap, and finally remembered that this guy's father was called Sima Yi, and his father was just Sima Fu, so he still held back: "Ziyi, do you know how long a stone bullet needs to be polished by a craftsman?" Luoyang is now a lonely city, and the materials in the city are a little less. Today, the stone bullet you shoot in an hour will take ten craftsmen to polish it for a month. It is one percent of the total number of stone bullets in Luoyang's defense inventory. Our plan is to hold on for at least half a year! For his brother to bear the heavy trust of His Majesty, of course, he must pay baht. ”

"Of course," Sima Gui said this, his tone became more excited: "If your stone bullet can have a good effect, I don't have anything to say for my brother." But you see, what was played out this morning, did you get any results? Have you ever slowed down the enemy's progress? Have you ever panicked the other party? How many enemy troops could be killed? ”

"Hmm...... Hum! As Sima Yi's youngest son, Sima Lun has received the most favor from his father and brother since he was a child. At this time, he has been trained by Sima Gui for so long, and he is already very self-contained. After Sima Gui directly pointed out the fact that he had no results and wasted materials. The guy jumped up all at once: "The enemy army is getting closer and closer to the city wall!" If there is no stone bullet, just stare and watch, but when the enemy digs into the wall, you will not know what to do! Isn't this king throwing stones to ask for directions? Yes! King of Taiyuan! What qualifications do you have to shout at this king here, if you don't lose Taiyuan County, Guan Zifeng can come here to confront this king? Well?! ”

"You...... You, you, you....... good! The world of Zhongda's family, what does it matter to our Shuda's family? I don't care! No matter! Come on, prepare the car, I want to enter the palace to meet Your Majesty, beggar bones! ”

……

Let's not talk about a bunch of bad things inside the Sima family. On the day of May 30, there was a burst of cheers from the city of Luoyang: several sections of trenches had been opened, which meant that the inner ring 300 meters away from the Luoyang city wall had also been completed.

"Hehe, Mountain Chief, this month's progress is not bad, right?"

"Well, that's good. It's nice to be able to maintain such speed even when you're being harassed by enemy forces. ”

"So, mountain chief, did the student pull the trebuchet into the trench?"

"But, let's try it at 300 meters first. If it doesn't work well, dig further ahead. ”

"Whoa!"

The captives of the Han army worked desperately to dig trenches for these two months, and the craftsmen of the Han army did not rest during this time.

In the past two months, the big trees on many mountains near Luoyang, such as Yushan, Pishan, Qingyao Mountain, Jingzi Mountain, etc., have fallen into bad luck and have been cut down by the craftsmen of the Han army. Then it was pulled to the rear army barracks and cut into various parts.

With Guan Yi's permission, the prisoners of war, under the orders of the Han army, quickly moved various parts along the trench in the direction of the city wall. After obtaining the inner ring trench, they dug some specific and relatively wide sections of the trench in advance under the command of various craftsmen, and quickly began to assemble them.

"The king, the king, the big thing is not good, please go to the city quickly and take a look!"

Some time ago, the lawsuit of King Taiyuan and King Zhao reached Sima Yan's royal front. Sima Yan had no choice but to play fifty boards each: this is definitely biased in favor of Sima Lun.

But that's it, Sima Lun is not happy. Brother Gongzi completely lost the passion he had just been ordered during this time, and he ate, drank and had fun in a private house under the city wall every day.

On this day, he was called by his subordinates, and after reluctantly climbing to the top of the city, he watched the city for a long time under the guidance of his subordinates' fingers......

"What do you want this king to see?"

"King, the Han army is assembling trebuchets in the trenches outside the city."

"Huh? What does the Han army want to do? The trebuchets that our troops set up on the tower of the city had a hard time trying to throw stone projectiles at them. They set up trebuchets so far above the ground that they couldn't hit us! ”

"King, the trebuchets of the Han army don't need to hit us, as long as they can hit the city wall."

"What's the use of hitting the walls?"

"Ouch, my king, although the walls of this Luoyang City are extremely thick, they are only rammed earth walls in the end. As long as the trebuchets of the Han army can hit our city wall, they can use hundreds of trebuchets to target a certain section of the city wall and carry out thousands or tens of thousands of fixed-point bombardments. No matter how strong the Luoyang city wall is, it won't last long. ”

"Huh? Then you still don't fight back? ”

"Your Majesty, your subordinates understand what the trenches dug by the Han military first do...... In short, the enemy is now protected by trenches, and it is difficult for us to reach them, and they can easily bombard our walls! ”