On August 22, the sky was overcast, as if it would rain at any time.

On the west wall of the city, Li Hui, Le Bao, and Yang Wu, three pawns of the merchant and water army, were leaning on the city wall boredly, and from time to time they glanced outside the city through the peep hole on the wall, to see if the army of Qianjiao had come to the city.

"It's boring......"

After a long time, Yang Wu sighed and complained, and sat down against the wall.

I have to say that because Zhao Hongrun, as the supreme commander in recent days, has changed his tactics and adopted the initiative to harass the Kajiao army, the method used each time is very monotonous, which is nothing more than using the long-range strike ability of the crossbow chariot and the horse archers of the Qiang tribe, and gradually causing casualties among the slave soldiers of the Kakkaku.

And whenever the Qiangjiao cavalry dispatched a large number of men and horses to pursue the harassing team of the Wei army due to anger, Wu Ji, who had begun to command this team in place of Zhao Hongrun since the second time, decisively made the whole army retreat, and learned the tactics of Zhao Hongrun a few days ago, while retreating, while taking advantage of the long-range advantage, he shot those Qiangjiao cavalry with a crossbow.

In fact, it is not impossible to crack Zhao Hongrun's rogue tactics.

The method is very simple, as long as those Horned cavalry are dispatched with their whole army, and attack this Wei army's harassing team from both sides at the beginning, at all costs, although they will inevitably have to pay a considerable price for casualties after the battle, but there is a great chance that they can encircle and kill this team.

With good luck, he even captured the repeater chariot that the Wei army had no time to destroy, which was definitely a sure thing.

Taking a step back, even if the harassing army of the Wei army destroyed all the repeater chariots before being besieged, it was nothing, after all, once the repeater chariots were lost, Zhao Hongrun naturally had no way to rely on this method to weaken the Jiaojiao people.

No matter how you think about it, this is an extremely beneficial thing for the people of the Horn.

But unfortunately, I don't know if I was worried about casualties, Bitattu did not make this correct decision for a long time, so that in the face of the harassment of the Wei army's 4,000 people, more than 200,000 Qianjiao people were harassed and retreated back for five miles, giving up the high slope with a fairly good view in the western suburbs of Yucheng to the Wei people.

Now, the henchman of Lu Balon, the patriarch of the Lun clan of the Lun clan, a leader named Tan Dan, sent a team of about 20 sentinels to stand on the hillside, climb high and watch every move of the Qiangjiao people, and report the movements of the Qiangjiao people to Zhao Hongrun at any time.

This made Zhao Hongrun's side finally recapture an insignificant piece of suburb, which slightly improved the situation of "blind eyes".

Of course, it was only a slight improvement, because the sentinels of the Lun tribe did not dare to go too far from the city, and God knows if those Qiangjiao cavalry, who had nothing to do in recent days and were dizzy from being harassed by the Wei army, were wandering around the outskirts of the city, always ready to hunt and kill the sentry cavalry of the Wei army, so as to vent the resentment in their hearts?

But then again, because the army of Qianjiao took the initiative to retreat five miles, which made the distance between them and the city farther away, in this case, the harassment team of the Wei army would not dare to leave the city to harass the people of Qianjiao, after all, in the case of increasing the distance of five miles, if the Wei army still dared to harass, it was very likely that they would not be able to come back alive.

As a result, this siege battle, which was originally captured by the Kajiao people and their patriarch Bitatu, gradually evolved into a situation of confrontation between the two armies as it is now, and the Kajiao people, who had gradually realized that the city was not easy to capture, had to start building camps and tents honestly on the fifth day of their arrival in the city.

If you don't set up a tent that can shelter from the wind and rain, in case more than 200,000 horses are drenched in the torrential rain, and then blown by the night breeze that gradually turns autumn at night, these 200,000 horses will definitely have a headache and brain fever wind and cold disease, which will affect the battle at least and endanger their lives at worst.

Because of this, all day yesterday, the soldiers and soldiers of Shangshui guarding the west wall of the city waited for a day, and they did not see the people of the Jiaojiao coming to attack the city, so they were so panicked.

On the contrary, there was a cavalry of the Horned Horns, perhaps out of revenge for the harassment of the Wei people a few days ago, or simply to vent the resentment in their hearts, and came to the outside of the city to shoot a few arrows at the Shangshui soldiers on the city wall.

It's a pity that in front of the well-prepared defense facilities of the Shang Shui Army, that kind of long-range shooting is actually no different from wasting arrows, anyway, the Shang Shui soldiers who were guarding the city wall at that time have not heard of any unlucky ghosts being shot dead or wounded.

In this situation, the Wei army once again changed the tactics of "attacking instead of defending" that took the initiative a few days ago, and changed to a seemingly passive defense.

In many cases, this kind of passive defensive tactics that keep the soldiers out of the city will indeed affect the morale of the sergeants, but due to the small victory of the Shang Shui army during the first siege war, and the harassment of the Qiang people in the following days, all of which have good successes, this makes the morale of the Shang Shui soldiers generally high at the moment, and there is almost no negative impact.

"Ah, it's raining......"

A few drops of rain fell on Li Hui's face, making him subconsciously raise his head and take a look.

But all the soldiers guarding the city are most afraid of rain and snow weather, because of their duties, they must guard their posts, even if it is a torrential rain, ice and snow blocking the road, the person who should be on duty still has to be on duty, which is mandatory for all armies in the world: those who leave their posts without permission will be beheaded immediately!

Fortunately, Zhao Hongrun had already been prepared, and collected a lot of sheepskins in the form of credit from the hands of the tribes in the city, so that at present, Li Hui, Le Leopard, and Yang Wu tied the four corners of the sheepskin to the spear and built a simple pergola, so that they finally had something that could block the wind, so as not to let the rain like a bead curtain be poured directly on their heads.

"Captain Wu, you first?"

After setting up the pergola, Yang Wu turned and shouted to the two soldiers who were still standing in place and staring out of the city.

These two soldiers are brothers, born in Jiao Village, Xiang County, Chu State, the elder brother is called Jiao Meng, who is a veteran who participated in the battle of Chu and Wei like Yangwu, because he looks old, so he was promoted to captain, and he is actually twenty years old; and his younger brother Jiao Zhong was a recruit who only enlisted in Shangshui County, just like Li Hui and Le Bao.

And the reason why Yang Wu invited their brothers first was because although Jiao Meng looked honest, he was actually ruthless on the battlefield and was also a fierce pawn. Of course, the biggest reason is naturally the relationship between Jiao Meng and the captain of their army.

"You guys first." Jiao Meng waved his hand, then picked up two sheepskins from the ground and threw one to his younger brother, who covered their heads and bodies with sheepskins, still standing in the rain, watching the movement outside the city.

It is no wonder that after all, the military regulations of the Shang Shui Army are "punished and not punished", simply put, if a team makes a mistake, the first thing to cure is the crime of the army chief; And if a person commits a mistake, he will first ask the chief to blame. And so on.

Such a punishment system can effectively prevent people in positions from being lazy.

Therefore, during the vigil, those who still roamed and patrolled the city wall in the middle of the night with weapons were often not ordinary soldiers, but the chief soldiers, even chiefs, and uncles.

Seeing Jiao Meng's refusal, Yang Wu and the others were not polite, and the three of them shrank side by side in the pergola to hide from the rain.

Although the conditions are still difficult, it is obviously much more pleasant than being directly drenched in the rain on your head.

"I don't know how long this battle will take......"

Looking at the still rainy sky, Li Hui sighed slightly.

"Homesick?" Yang Wu and Le Bao turned their heads and asked, they knew that both parents in Li Hui's family had died, and the only brother who had been the only brother had also died on the battlefield of the Battle of Chu and Wei, leaving only a widowed sister-in-law.

This is also the reason why Li Hui was teased by Yang Wu and Le Bao from time to time, because generally speaking, after the death of the elder brother, the younger brother will be obliged to support his sister-in-law, and in many cases, the uncle and sister-in-law become husband and wife.

There is no way around it, because in many countries, women are also a scarce resource.

Don't think that everyone can have three wives and four concubines, in fact, if you want three wives and four concubines, you must at least be rich, and in ordinary poor families, some men even reach forty or fifty people and still play singles, which is not uncommon.

may have heard the meaning of ridicule from the words of Yang Wu and Le Leopard, Li Hui blushed slightly, and hurriedly defended: "I just want to know how long this battle will last." ”

"And who can say for sure?" Yang Wu shrugged his shoulders and said, "King Su has made it clear that he wants to fight a protracted war with the Jiaojiao people. ”

Hearing this, Le Leopard shook his head and corrected, "This battle won't take too long. …… Don't you know? The biggest reason why King Su started the war with the Qiang people was to take advantage of the road so that another army in the country could smoothly pass through the land of Sanchuan and support Longxi. Therefore, judging from this year's date surplus, King Su should be inclined to end the war around September, so that the other army can reach Longxi before winter. ”

"September?" Yang Wu blinked his eyes and reminded, "Today is already August 22......

"That is, half a month at most." Le Leopard glanced at Yang Wu, lowered his voice and added: "Actually, according to my estimate, this battle will probably end before the end of the month...... It has been a long time since the Dangshan army and the Chenggao army left the city, but there is no sign that these two armies have supported the city, and it is obvious that these two armies have attacked the hinterland of Sanchuan...... General Zhu Hai of the Chenggao Army is also counted, and General Sima An of the Dangshan Army is ...... You should know what that means, right? ”

Li Hui and Yang Wu glanced at each other and nodded in unison, secretly sympathizing with those Qiang people or tribes who were bumped into by the Dangshan Army.

"But before that, I'm afraid there will be one of the fiercest sieges yet."

Glancing at Li Hui, who looked a little gloomy after hearing this, Le Leopard lowered his voice and said, "Let's work together to survive!" …… Win this battle, get a good reward, and then let's go back to Shangshui County, and you, too, go home and marry that little sister-in-law......"

"Hahaha, it's extreme." Yang Wu said with a smile.

"I didn't ...... it," Li Hui defended with a red face, but in his heart, his gentle sister-in-law appeared for some reason.

"Although there is no ...... Well, it doesn't mean that, but ...... If I can return to Shangshui alive, I will hand over that rich reward to her...... She must be very happy, right? Hmm......

Li Hui clenched his fists and secretly cheered himself up. (To be continued.) )