In the inner city of Yanling City, Hailing Town suppressed the high tyrants, and they were already looking at the city in a hurry and in vain, and the army of grass thieves who surrounded themselves were like forest banners. There were also bursts of chills in my heart.

As one of the leading figures in response to the call of Zhou Bao, the envoy of Zhenhai Festival, who came to beg for thieves; The general convener of the 23 towns and regiments in Taizhou. He still didn't quite understand how his men and horses had suddenly collapsed and been defeated in this city.

Dong Chang, who is anxious to exterminate thieves and cares about the countryside; or Zhang Quan, who is bent on winning the great merit of rushing to help Zhenhai, he belongs to the kind of compromise and trade-off who has both; Because the quality under his command is more mixed than these two, and the corresponding demands and thoughts are also more.

Therefore, after dividing his troops in Changtang Hubei, he immediately went north to attack the fallen Yanling City; But after he wanted to take this stronghold, he would use this to echo Zhang Quan's department, who rushed to the aid of the Dantu, and more or less waited for the opportunity to mix in the merit of a subordinate to break the siege.

However, this journey became the beginning of his disasters and nightmares. At first, they were harassed and attacked day and night, sometimes by a burst of arrows suddenly shot from the river, sometimes by an ambush against a small group of baggage, and at night by throwing arson oil bottles and constant noise of harassment.

However, in the face of such restless stop-and-go, a lot of time is always spent on vigilance and the enemy's march. Although there are many troops and a huge lineup under his command, he has never been able to catch the traces of the other party's coming and going like the wind or advancing and retreating, and he cannot effectively contain and counteract.

Although he quickly found a way to set up an ambush, and used the baggage team as bait, trying to gather and annihilate some of the thieves who sneaked up; But these thieves did not care about killing or seizing at all, nor did they skimp on the consumption of arrows and weapons, and they also had enough mules, horses, and boats to travel for them.

Although it successfully repelled several times, it made the other party more cunning and hidden; even ambushed and attacked the town guards who had been rushing to pursue in disregard of orders; Hundreds of human heads were piled up on the side of the road. Soon this annoying force quickly became mentally exhausted and slowed down in a short time.

But then more bad news spread. Because under the unscrupulous cruelty and ravages of these thieves, most of the powerful families and squires and officials in the places along the way died and fled, but they could no longer provide them with any cooperation and help.

Although he then indulged his men in the places along the way, and laid down and slaughtered the mud-legged men who took advantage of the opportunity to occupy the farms; For these unfortunate deaths of the rural pillars and the family of goodness, I am very avenging and angry. But it still failed to improve the troublesome situation in which he now had nowhere to raise money, but could only divide his troops and plunder to fund the army.

Later, he had to decisively abandon those troops whose morale and fighting spirit were already unusable; And let it rely on those Zhuangzi step by step, set up garrisons and police posts along the way, and suppressed those restless mud legs.

At this time, he finally did not become completely blind and deaf, and it could be regarded as improving the march process under his command, and gradually compressing and eliminating the spare space for the continuous and continuous activities of those thieves. It's just that after he arrived at the city of Yanling with a somewhat tired and sloppy army, he was less than half of the original men.

Despite this, he still divided a well-organized new force from the more than 10,000 men under his command to attack the city gate with temporary wooden platoons and long ladders. As a result, he did not see the hard fighting and perseverance he expected; The thieves at the head of the city only hurriedly fired a few rounds of arrows, and abandoned their defenses and fled before engaging the official army.

So, with great morale, they went through the gate that they had taken down unexpectedly; However, they found discarded grain, grass, and heavy wealth all over the ground, scattered along the streets and scattered overturned vehicles.

So at this moment, Gao Ba could no longer restrain and contain it, and these town soldiers and the leaders of the Tu Regiment, who entered the city first, personally led their subordinates to compete with each other for what they had gained, and even spread to the city for wanton plunder.

He could only send his cronies to live at this city gate, and personally led the team to forcibly expel and open a way for the Lian Dai to beat them out of these chaotic soldiers; And went straight to the relatively narrow inner city of Yanling City.

However, when he easily captured and occupied the empty inner city, only to feel that something was wrong, the gate that was originally guarded by his cronies suddenly rose into the sky. At the other city gates, there was a sound of killing, as if there were thousands of troops and horses killing together, and he was immediately shocked by his subordinates on the left and right, looking at each other and shocked.

And the other town soldiers and Tutuan soldiers who were scattered in the city to loot goods were even more unbearable. With the dragons leaderless and fighting on their own, they were driven out of the city almost one by one. Everyone was disheveled or carrying large bags and small bags, and like a flock of pigs and sheep in a panic, they were scattered and slashed on the streets.

For a time, the terrible screams, angry scolding, and begging for mercy were endless, rippling in this small city; The corpses that fell and rolled to the ground, the blood that flowed from the ground, and the goods that had been scattered again were intertwined; But no one stoops down to examine and pay attention;

These thieves, who suddenly came out and gathered in the streets, lined up in an array of swords and spears and bows and crossbows, and stepped through without hesitation; Like a rolling stream of iron, it converged from all directions, and the inner city had the last resistance to it.

At this time, Gao Ba realized that everything was wrong in the inner city; Not only were the deadbolts and rollers destroyed, but even the canals and wellheads in the inner city were filled in. This is clearly the place of death where the rest of the arrangement is made, please enter the urn.

However, he did not show any discouragement, and instead pretended to be happy with his subordinates:

"These grass thieves were stumped by us, but where did Dong (Chang) Badu get the letter of approval, that is, when their generation fell."

Seeing his sworn attitude like this, coupled with the promised reward in front of him, he finally settled down the hearts of the people who were a little fluctuating under his command for the time being.

It's just that when he drove his subordinates to use all their strength to block the doorway of the inner city with temporary earth and stones, and temporarily block the enemy from the outside. When he began to make efforts to defend the low and cramped city.

"Nope. No. No.. Okay, the town general. Yanai. Ya Nei Du. ”

Another subordinate in charge of searching the state government rushed over and stammered and shouted.

"What's wrong with Yanei, didn't I ask you to bring someone to remove some materials to use."

Gao Ba couldn't help but shout with some anger:

"The edges of the house and the beams and pillars of the inner government are stuffed with firewood and grass, and a lot of grease has been handed in."

"What,"

Gao Ba couldn't help but grab the other party and said sharply, but his heart sank like falling into an ice cellar.

However, it was the clamours outside the inner city that calmed down and fell into a disturbing brief silence; Then there was a dull clattering sound. And on the sentry post that was watching from the high side, they couldn't help shouting one after another.

"Heavenly..."

"There's something in the sky."

"Be careful, grass thief's stone cannon."

Then Gao Ba saw many things with burning smoke trails, arcing over their heads, and crashing into the buildings of the inner city, shattering and splashing large sparks, which then turned into steaming flames and smoke.

And in the outer Guo City, special catapults and crossbows are on the side. Su Wuming, the general of Lang from the Second Army and the chief secretary of Gaozhou, also sighed with great relief, turned his head to the two leaders of the volunteer army standing beside him, and said:

"It's so good, the big picture is decided."

As his words fell, there was a bang in the inner city gate. But it was the doorway that was originally blocked, which was pushed down and overturned from the inside out, and many figures holding up group signs and baffles rushed out; and with all their might, they rushed towards the array and defensive line where the rebels were standing.

"Just in time."

Su Wuming couldn't help but shout.

"Except for the Pattern Team and the Throwers, the brothers will kill the enemy with me."

As his voice swirled, it turned into a fierce whistle. Suddenly, on the roof of the house near the inner gate, and at the head of the wall, there stood many righteous soldiers with crossbows and bows; At the moment when the whistle stopped abruptly, waves of arrows and arrows covered and drowned the officers and soldiers who rushed out of the city gates.

Moments later, this vain and desperate counterattack and breakthrough was declared a complete failure with corpses piled on the ground and crawling figures with a few groans of pain.

However, at the other end of the inner city, the only one without a gate is the north side closest to the outer wall. The disguised Gaoba, along with a dozen die-hard soldiers, used the smoke constantly wafting from the city as a cover; Everyone covered their mouths and noses with wet wipes, cautiously and undaringly, and slowly roped down from the battlements at the top of the wall.

"We deserve to have such a credit."

And the escort team who was lying on his whole body with knives, guns and bows and crossbows, crouching not far away, waited for Li Bao'er, and replied to his follower Wang Yan.

"I'm afraid I didn't hit a big fish. Get ready to blow the whistle. ”

。。。。。。。

Under the city of Dantu, the preliminary preparations and engineering arrangements for the siege of the city have been completed to the extent of seventy-seven eighty-eight;

In front of the five gates facing the west, southwest, south, southeast, and east, a number of earthen platforms and watchtowers that were almost close to the city walls, and the moats and fences that criss-crossed and connected together appeared in front of the defenders.

And in some of them exposed in the pits and in front of the fortifications, some of the corpses that had not yet been cleaned were scattered; Some were small groups of scouts and messengers from the city who wanted to rush out, while others were fugitives who had been deliberately released.

Of course, for Zhou Huai'an, who sat in the middle of the besieged camp and came out with the flag from time to time to show his face, sometimes his subordinates showed unexpected ability, which was also a rare trouble and annoyance.

For example, because of the unplanned transitional performance and results, the expected enemy was beaten away; As a result, the intention to lure the enemy deep and drag down its momentum, and then gather and annihilate it or break it separately is frustrated.

(End of chapter)