After entering the seventh month of the old calendar, it was rare for the whole capital and neighboring areas to rain for seven consecutive days, although the rain curtain was not very large, but the misty light rain was intermittent. The Ming army, who were preparing to besiege the city, felt that such a rainy day could be tried in the case of unfavorable firearms, especially when it was difficult for the firelight to illuminate the entire city defense. Thus, despite heavy casualties and losses in the fierce assault of the previous three days, several attacks were attempted from day to night in several directions.

However, the attacking Ming army found that because the defensive position dozens of steps away from the inner side of the city wall had already prepared a cloth puff that could be deployed at any time relying on a carriage. The defenders' artillery firepower during defense was not greatly affected, and even the single bows during defense were not affected much. However, not only is it inconvenient for the attacking side to carry gunpowder for rapid blasting, but it also seems that carrying firearms and bows and arrows to attack on such a rainy day seems to be a problem.

The Ming army also tried to build fortifications to protect from the rain at a short distance from the city, but for some reason, when the fortifications were carried out not far from the city wall, the defenders who did not seem to have many people to investigate were always watching, and they quickly attacked with accurate bullets. After several battles, the Ming army finally gave up attacking on such a rainy day.

That is, in this short period of about seven days, Xiao Xuan did not hesitate to pay millions of taels of silver, and organized 150,000 Ding Zhuang out of a population of more than 500,000 people in the city from "within the system" to "outside the system" to work in the rain to complete a simple project with a volume of more than 1 million earthworks, and in just seven days, the inner wall that stretched for more than 40 miles was turned into a very solid embankment with a certain slope.

After the heavy rain, the Ming army outside the city continued to attack, and carried out seven blasts of at least 1,000 catties of black powder in a row in a not wide place, but it only blew the entire earthen wall back slightly tilted, and the width of the breakthrough was still easily closed by the defenders. At this point, it seems that too much energy was consumed in the previous offensive battle, and the wartime has gradually subsided.

At this time, Sun Chengzong and others also found that not only was there a temporary shortage of gunpowder, but also that the reserve labor, financial resources, and even special tools specially prepared by the entire team were far inferior to the defenders in the city. After all, at this time, there were more than 100,000 manpower and even tens of thousands of defenders in the capital, and compared with some other situations in history, although the defending side was at a disadvantage in terms of artillery and even armor, it was not obviously at a disadvantage in terms of manpower.

It is necessary to mobilize more food and material resources from the south and organize a larger manpower before the canal encounters problems during the opening period. Only in this way can the defenders be overwhelmed in terms of engineering capabilities, etc., and the situation can be reversed by means such as artificial heights and dirt hills outside the city.

However, after learning some news of the siege of Shuntianfu, Zhu Changxuan, the king of Nanjing, stopped distributing money and grain to the north. Obviously, at this time, the Liaodong Army, led by Sun Chengzong, Yuan Keli and others, who were not restrained by foreign captives, had become a warlord group that was stronger than Wu Sangui and others after many defeats such as the Battle of Songjin in history. Many courtiers in the south also believed that Emperor Chongzhen, the capital at this time, had become a dry bone in the urn. If it is taken by the besieging northern group in a short period of time, perhaps the Jingjing incident will be repeated. And the difference compared with the Jingnan in history is that Sun Chengzong does not have the same identity as Zhu Di, but he can completely support the Fu King of Henan to ascend the throne, and the army and hole cards in his hand are much stronger than when Zhu Di raised the army. At this time, it is obvious that it is better to keep Chongzhen in the capital to contain and consume the strength of those northern warlords, at least in this way, it can also win a little respite and a chance to build an army and even consolidate the strength of the entire south.

Sun Chengzong couldn't help but feel a trace of helplessness after receiving the clichés from Nanjing, such as don't be greedy for merit and rush forward, and the rebel army besieging the city can win safely.

Mao Wenlong and others persuaded disapprovingly: "Lord Jingluo doesn't have to worry too much. The south does not give us support, and we have enough strength at hand to beg for food on our own, and mobilize the forces of Shandong, Henan, and other places to raise manpower and material resources, but the process is a little slower. In two or three months at the latest, after the autumn harvest in the north this year, perhaps our army will have enough material resources and resources to launch a decisive attack, without having to wait to compete with the defenders in the city for food. At that time, we can support the king of blessing to ascend the throne, and at least half of the world will be owned... ”

Sun Chengzong dismisses these unscrupulous rebellious words, but as a northerner, he does not want to end up in this era of unprecedented changes. In this way, the climax of the city defense battle around Beijing City, which lasted for many days, gradually passed, and the two warring sides also turned into a confrontation. From the Guards and Guards brigades to the Teaching Brigade to other mobilized forces in the city, there was also more free time.

In fact, there are many literate people among the people of Beijing and even the immigrants from Shandong, but even "literate people" can often only occasionally remember 100 to a few hundred words after not attending private school for many years. The so-called "Dou Da doesn't know a basket of words" probably comes from this. Even if the capital of literacy education is in the capital, Xiao Xuan does not have it at this time. However, the learning of Chinese pinyin is not so difficult, and it is only required to be able to speak official dialect. Of course, some officers and soldiers from Shandong even felt very awkward in the official dialect with a Liaodong accent, so many temporarily organized teams temporarily arranged for "cultural instructors" who were blindly improvised to make amends, and this made it very difficult for the Chinese pinyin education to be implemented.

It's just that at this time, some people who were able to read and write completely suddenly discovered that what these Chinese pinyin "textbooks" taught and told was not the book of sages, and they couldn't even talk about the hundred schools of thought. It is a number of unheard of ideas and theories, although some of them are deafening and refreshing to the principles of social discourse, but their core ideas are subversive to some basic ethical principles, and even to the entire imperial power. If it weren't for the fact that the original officials in the capital had completely stepped aside and been placed under house arrest at this time, the entire ruling group that Xiao Xuan relied on had already begun to change, and it would have caused an uproar in the entire capital.

It's just that even so, Zhou Yufeng, who knew about this matter, felt that he should try his best to persuade his official family to not let this kind of thing, which is very likely to cause chaos and even harm the world, continue.

(End of chapter)