These days, although there have been no major battles, sporadic battles have occurred from time to time, mostly contact battles between the sentinels of the two armies in the Ming and Western regions.

Zhang Xianzhong changed the style of rogue in the past, adopted a steady and steady strategy, and commanded hundreds of thousands of troops to threaten Jiujiang. The Ming army dispatched infantry and sailors to block several times, but they were all repelled by the Western army, and then retreated to Jiujiang City and never came out again.

Zhang Xianzhong had already moved the Chinese army from Nanchang Fucheng to De'an County, which was only 100 miles away from Jiujiang, while the forward army was already 20 miles away from Jiujiang City and surrounded Jiujiang City from both sides of the south and east.

On the other side, an army of 200,000 under the command of Dingbei general Ai Nengqi approached the mouth of the lake from the east side of Poyang Lake, and the defenders of Minghukou did not dare to move in the city.

Seeing that the army was pressing towards Jiujiang step by step like a thunderbolt, the Ming army was already in a panic, and Zhang Xianzhong, the emperor of the Great Western Kingdom, was full of ambition, thinking that the destruction of the main force of the Ming army in one fell swoop was just around the corner. Just when he was about to lead the Chinese army to the city of Jiujiang, something discordant suddenly happened, and Wang Zhaolin, the prime minister of the left, reported something that annoyed him.

"According to Weichen's inventory of military rations, there are only 582,100 quintals of military rations in the army, which is only enough for the army for one month." Wang Zhaolin said worriedly.

As the prime minister, Wang Zhaolin has always been responsible for the logistics and supply of the army, which is equivalent to the chief steward of hundreds of thousands of troops.

"Isn't there still a granary in Lutan?" Zhang Xianzhong frowned and asked.

In order to facilitate the transit of grain to supply the army, Zhang Xianzhong ordered the establishment of a huge granary in Lutan Town, on the west side of Poyang Lake in Nankang Prefecture, and transported the grain and grass collected from various places to Lutan through Poyang Lake through the waterway. After all, Lutan is closer to Jiujiang than Nanchang, and it is easy for the front-line army to take it. The 500,000-strong army consumes a lot of food and horses, and tens of thousands of loads of grain are consumed every day, which requires special logistics troops to transport them to the front.

"I've already counted the grain in Lutan, and it's all added up to that." Wang Zhaolin said with a bitter face. The army cannot be without food for a day, and the war with the Ming army cannot be ended in a short time, don't look at the Western army has as many as 500,000, if there is a shortage of food, it will collapse in an instant.

The current grain stock is only enough for the army to eat for a month, but there are still two months before the summer harvest!

"What are you afraid of, I will send an order to order officials from all over the country to continue to collect food and send it to the army." Zhang Xianzhong said disapprovingly. Now that he occupies most of Jiangxi, and there are hundreds of thousands of troops, why worry about not having military rations?

"Your Majesty think twice, it's March, it's the time when the green and yellow are not harvested, we have already collected the grain before, if we collect it again, it will definitely make the people's grievances boil, and the defense is unstable. Now there is Yan Yingyuan with tens of thousands of troops out of nowhere, if we force the ordinary people again, we are afraid that we will be at risk of being attacked by the enemy! Wang Zhaolin persuaded.

When he entered Jiangxi before, Zhang Xianzhong led a large army to capture all the prefectures, and he had already searched them, except for the remote mountainous areas, the rich squires in the main prefectures and counties had been looted. If they loot again, they can only use knives against ordinary people. And the ordinary people don't have much food in the first place, and now it is a time when there is no harvest, if they take the few rations they have left, it will inevitably make the people's resentment boil, and it is inevitable to take risks and rise up to resist!

Zhang Xianzhong was originally born as a peasant, and most of the soldiers under him were peasants who couldn't survive, so he naturally knew what it was like to be hungry, and he would do anything if he was hungry for three days!

"A month!" Zhang Xianzhong muttered to himself, his expression became solemn, if the military rations can only be eaten for a month, it means that the war must be ended within this month and the Ming army will be defeated within this month. Otherwise, there is a risk that the army will be defeated.

"I will order the army to attack Jiujiang soon, and strive to take Jiujiang and fight Jiangxi as soon as possible. Prime Minister, you also have to work hard, urge the brothers in all prefectures and counties to get more food, as long as there is no big public resentment, and some untouchables don't have to worry about resisting, our hundreds of thousands of troops are not given in vain! Zhang Xianzhong commanded at Wang Zhaolin.

"Wechen obeys." Wang Zhaolin agreed and left.

Zhang Xianzhong immediately ordered the whole army to continue to approach Jiujiang, and went down to the village ten miles from Jiujiang City, preparing to launch a strong attack on Jiujiang.

The army attacking Jiujiang was as many as 300,000 people, and the commanders in charge of the front line were Wang Dingguo, the former military governor, Ma Yuanli, the left army governor, and Zhang Hualong, the right army governor.

There are more than 10,000 people, not to mention 300,000 troops, and the Western Army battalion is more than 20 miles, spreading from outside Jiujiang City to the foot of Lushan Mountain.

According to Zhang Xianzhong's order, Wang Dingguo's department was responsible for attacking Jiujiang's west city, Ma Yuanli was responsible for attacking Nancheng, and Zhang Hualong led the army to be responsible for attacking Dongcheng.

Zhang Xianzhong has been in the army for more than ten years, and has had countless battles of siege and defense, Wang Dingguo, Ma Yuanli, and Zhang Hualong are also fierce generals in the army with rich combat experience.

The Western Army has been preparing for the siege of the city a few days ago, and there are everything from ladders to crash cars, crossbow rushing cars, and trench cars. Knowing that the Ming army had sharp firearms, Zhang Xianzhong even gathered all the artillery of the whole army and transported it to the city of Jiujiang, with as many as 300 artillery pieces of all kinds, but there was no siege heavy artillery such as the red-coated cannon.

All show that the firearms are sharp, and when the city is really attacked, the Western Army really realizes how fierce the firearms of the Ming army are.

On March 13, the 19th year of Chongzhen, Zhang Xianzhong, the emperor of the Great Western Kingdom, came to the front line of Jiujiang to command, and the Western Army officially launched an attack on Jiujiang.

The Ming army had already prepared for the attack on the Western Army, and Chen Yue had already ordered half of the cannons to be transported from the Galen battleship to the city, of which 100 cannons were transported on Jiujiang City, and as many as 50 cannons were installed at the head of Hukou City.

The cannons captured from the Dutch were similar to the redcoat cannons of the Ming army, both of which were heavy guns used in fortresses and could be equipped on battleships, and they could also be installed at the head of the city for defense, and the shooting rate at the head of the city was much higher than that on turbulent warships.

When the western army set off from the camp and approached Jiujiang City, the cannons on the city walls fired one after another, and hundreds of artillery pieces were fired one after another, the sound was like a thunderbolt and the nine heavens were shocked, and the huge cannonballs smashed straight into the western army formation, and the flesh and blood flew everywhere and the bones were broken.

The shells smashed into the array of the Western Army, bounced off the ground and rolled again, and did not stop until the momentum was completely lost, and as long as the shells were touched by the shells, they were either killed on the spot or seriously injured.

In fact, the shells of this cannon are only solid shells, although the momentum is huge, in fact, the damage caused is insignificant to hundreds of thousands of people in the Western Army, but the problem is that the momentum is too harmful, hundreds of artillery pieces are fired at the same time, the power is earth-shattering, and watching the tragic situation of the shells raging in their own phalanx, it makes the Western sergeants even more colorless.

Just one round of artillery bombardment had already caused the morale of the soldiers of the Western Army who had not yet reached Jiujiang City to plummet.