On March 3, in Guguan City, the auxiliaries of the Ma Youshui Department were busy and trained for another day, and now in the entire Guguan, the auxiliaries of these ten hundred households are most looking forward to.

They were divided into two groups, each of which participated in an "effective battle", and as long as there was another such opportunity, they would automatically be promoted to soldiers, and from then on they would officially become the main force of the Mandate of Heaven Army, enjoying all the rights of the Mandate of Heaven Army.

Li Zicheng often went to the training ground to see, from time to time to encourage them a few words, and even personally went down to remind them a few words, seeing that it was close to the time of the exercise, he took the lead in leaving the training ground and preparing dinner, but saw his own soldiers coming over, "Governor, a message from the Red Deer Station!" ”

"Red Deer Station?" Li Zicheng immediately felt that this was a message from Li Guo, and Li Guo was guarding the northern line of the Guanshan Pass, which had a great stake.

He took the message, skimmed it quickly, and said to He Xiaomi: "Go to dinner first, and then send someone to notify the chief officials of several thousand households, and hold a military meeting after dinner." ”

"Yes, Grand Duke!" He Xiaomi didn't see much information from Li Zicheng's face, but he didn't dare to slack off on the orders of the Metropolitan Governor, and hurriedly ordered his soldiers to inform each chief officer one by one.

During the war, the supervisors did not dare to slack off, and after a hurried dinner, they all gathered in Li Zicheng's camp.

"Everyone, there is a message from the Red Deer Station that the 2,000th household has defeated the Ming army that sneaked up on the attack, killing more than 1,000 enemies!" Li Zicheng took out the message, handed it over, and let several chief officials circulate it.

Liu Yunshui was overjoyed, "Metropolitan Governor, the Ming army's plan to sneak attack the northern line and cut off the supply of Guguan has gone bankrupt. ”

Ma Youshui still didn't know about Hong Chengchou's taking the northern line, and secretly shouted in his heart, "God bless", if Hong Chengchou's sneak attack on the northern line was successful, and Guguan was surrounded into a lonely city, it would be dangerous.

Zhou Bin frowned lightly, glanced at everyone, and said leisurely: "Metropolitan Governor, everyone, Hong Chengchou was defeated on the northern front, I am afraid that he still has to return to Guguan, and the intensity of the attack will increase." ”

Li Zicheng laughed and said: "Zhou Bin is worried that the valley road on the northern line is difficult and difficult to travel, and it is not suitable for large-scale troops, Hong Chengchou will definitely return to Guguan, his camp is still on the bank of Huangshui, and he will definitely not give up Guguan." ”

"The soldiers are coming, Hong Chengchou has already lost 20,000 soldiers in Guguan, and if we want to lose another 10,000 soldiers, we can attack Guguan, and the battle can be decided!" Liu Yunshui danced wildly, he had long been looking forward to using cavalry to crush Hong Chengchou's infantry, the cavalry formed by the Heavenly Mandate Army was basically not needed when defending the city, and it could only come in handy in the wild.

Ma Youshui expressed his concern, "Hong Chengchou is the governor of the three sides, in charge of the entire Shaanxi army, how do you know that he will not increase his troops?" Wang Anping's department must watch them carefully! ”

"Youshui is right, but also to guard against Hong Chengchou's increase in troops," Li Zicheng nodded, "The Ming army has suffered such a big loss in Guguan, and it is very likely that it will temporarily abandon northern Shaanxi and concentrate on dealing with Guguan." ”

In addition to letting Wang Anping's troops and horses monitor the movement of troops and horses in northern Shaanxi, they can only do a good job in the garrison work of Guguan, especially the training of Ma Youshui's auxiliary troops, as well as the installation and commissioning of howitzers.

Two days later, the ranger flew the pigeon to pass the book, and Hong Chengchou really transferred 10,000 soldiers from northern Shaanxi to Guguan.

However, counting his losses of soldiers and horses, there were less than 20,000 left, and with this 10,000, it was less than 30,000, which was still less than before.

At this time, in addition to the addition of four howitzers, the auxiliary troops of the Ma Youshui Department have all been issued with rifles, and with the addition of soldiers and Zhou Bin, the number of gunners has reached 2,500, which is more than the original.

What Li Zicheng didn't expect was that when Hong Chengchou attacked Guguan on another day, except for 5,000 soldiers who stayed in the camp and 5,000 soldiers who responded to the dense forests on both sides of the valley road, the rest of the nearly 20,000 soldiers were thrown to Guguan at one time.

10,000 of them were used to attack the front of Guguan, that is, the east gate, while 8,000 soldiers entered the valley road north of Guguan and began to attack the city from the north.

The pressure on Guguan increased sharply, this was the first time Guguan was attacked from two sides, although the soldiers of the Mandate of Heaven blocked with bullets, but the Ming army hid behind the shield wall, and forced into the valley road north of Guguan.

Ma Youshui was also nervous, "Governor, what should I do?" Do you want to divide the troops and garrison them? ”

The division of troops is inevitable, is it allowed for the Ming army to ascend the city from the north? However, there were only more than 2,500 gunmen in Guguan, and more than 1,000 of them had been in contact with rifles for less than a month, and they were still auxiliary soldiers.

If the troops were divided, the 2,500 soldiers would all have to climb the city on both sides, and in case of danger somewhere, there would be no mobile forces in their hands.

Li Zicheng was anxious in his heart, and couldn't help but frown, seeing that the Ming army outside the city was about to be deployed in place, he could only let it go, "There is a water department to defend the city, on the east and north sides, five hundred households of soldiers and auxiliaries are deployed on each side, and Zhou Binbu is a reserve, ready to be reinforced at any time, "Zhou Bin, your five auxiliary soldiers are one hundred households, three in the east city, and two in the north city, once there is a danger, be ready to dump fire oil under the city at any time!" ”

"Yes, Metropolitan Governor, my subordinates will go and prepare!" Zhou Bin saluted, and was about to leave when he suddenly remembered something, and hurriedly said: "Dadu Dudu, don't we have howitzers?" Do you want to fire a few shots? ”

"Howitzer?" Li Zicheng was overjoyed, he was nervous just now, and almost forgot about the howitzer, the last time the howitzer was transported to Guguan, because Dongchengtou was the most important battlefield, all four howitzers were deployed in Dongchengtou, and today's Ming army attacked in a big way, just let the howitzer show its might.

The terrain outside the eastern city is not open, even the rear team of Hong Chengchou supervising the battle is also within the range of the howitzer, Li Zicheng looked at Hong Chengchou, or resisted the urge to shell Hong Chengchou, the huge shield wall that moved outside the city was the biggest obstacle to the Mandate of Heaven Army, "Gunners prepare, the target is the shield wall outside the city!" ”

"Yes, Grand Duke!"

The gunners immediately went to the city to prepare, the howitzer was hidden behind the parapet wall, and the Ming army under the city could not see it at all, about a bag of cigarettes, the gunner came to report to Li Zicheng: "Governor, the howitzer is debugged!" ”

"Okay, launch now!" Li Zicheng's eyes were fixed on the slowly moving shield wall, and he said in his heart Once it is blown up by a howitzer, see how you can protect the Ming army.

"Boom...... Long ......"

Several cannon sounds, four howitzers fired almost at the same time, a huge sound, even the Mandate of Heaven at the head of the city was sluggish, fortunately this is our own artillery.

The Ming army outside the city was also stunned for a while, and temporarily stopped the pace of attack, how could there be artillery in Guguan? The last time you attacked the city, why didn't you see the Mandate of Heaven firing artillery?

The first launch, mainly for debugging, the gunner needs to gradually calibrate the position of the landing point of the flowering bullet according to the landing point of the flowering bomb, four flowering shells, none of them hit the shield wall, but the power of the flowering bomb is still there, within three meters around the landing point, suddenly people turn on their backs.

It's a pity that the Ming army is infantry, and there is no huge body of the war horse to hinder, the casualties of the soldiers are even more heavy, the center of the flowering bullet landing point, several Ming soldiers flew directly into the air, and when they fell back to the ground, there were only stumps and broken arms, and broken flesh and blood, the fingers of the hands and feet flew all over the sky, and the low altitude seemed to be a rain of flesh and blood......

The dead soldiers were lucky, at least they didn't have any pain, and the wounded soldiers were either missing arms and legs, or a certain part of the body was covered with blood, accompanied by a choking cry, panicking like the end of the world.

Hong Chengchou stroked the thick beard under his chin, squinted his eyes slightly, there are so many Heavenly Mandate troops on the head of the city, today he released almost all the soldiers, wanting to wait for a battle, watching the Ming army rush to the Guguan city wall like a tide, he was already thinking in his heart, once he won Guguan, the next step is to directly send troops to Longyou.

With a few cannon shots, followed by the soldiers' crying fathers and mothers, he was so frightened that he almost fell off his horse.

How could the Providential Army have artillery? Why didn't you do it last time?

Could it be that the Mandate of Heaven has always kept its hands behind?

Hong Chengchou already had a bad premonition, thinking of the last time he attacked the city, at a critical moment, the Heavenly Mandate Army only sacrificed fire oil, and the northern line of Guanshan Road was also garrisoned by the cavalry of the Heavenly Mandate Army......

He couldn't help but shudder, what else did the Heavenly Mandate Army have? Has Li Zicheng been luring himself into attacking the city and then consuming his own soldiers?

Although there were only a few shells, Hong Chengchou's heart had fallen deep into the valley, and since he had followed Yang He to raise troops to suppress bandits, he had never encountered such a cunning and powerful thief, daring to face the officers and soldiers.

In the past, when facing thieves, as long as the officers and soldiers appeared, the thieves all fled, and the biggest problem for the officers and soldiers was to chase and recover, and the thieves were often hidden among the people, as long as the officers with the troops gritted their teeth and wiped out the people together, any cunning thieves could not escape.

The officers and soldiers almost did not encounter the problem of siege, and when he went south with an army of 40,000, he felt a little aggrieved in his heart. If it weren't for Cao Wen's army defeated, he would never have gone south in person, the thieves in northern Shaanxi had not yet been cleared, and it was time to strike with all his might.

And today's Mandate Army...... Hong Chengchou's eyes were so gloomy that he could drip water, but the army had already begun to attack the city, and he must not be frightened by a few shells, but he had to see how many secret weapons the Heavenly Mandate Army had not used!

At this time, the herald rushed over, "Lord Governor, the Mandate of Heaven Army uses flowering shells, and after the flowering shells land, they will explode, our brother...... Mainly wounded by the explosion of the flowering shell ......"

"Ah......" Hong Chengchou couldn't help but be shocked, he had only heard of the flowering bomb, and had never seen it with his own eyes, the most advanced artillery of the Ming Dynasty was the "red-coated cannon" of the Liaodong front, but the red-coated cannon was only a solid bullet, and it seemed that the imperial court had not developed a flowering bullet...... This Mandate Army, how can there be a flowering bullet?

Just when Hong Chengchou was in doubt, the Ming army began to attack the city again after a short period of stagnation, but this time they learned to be obedient, not blindly rushing forward, but observing the city as they walked, and if they saw the cannonballs coming again, they should prepare early.

At the head of Guguan City, the gunners of the Mandate of Heaven Army have recalibrated the howitzers, have loaded the shells, and are preparing to ignite.