The Governor's Office of the Five Armies had long formulated a strategy to capture Pujin Pass, threaten Taiyuan, and put pressure on the Qing court.

The focus of the Ming and Qing dynasties was Lianghuai and Shandong, while the focus of the Wei army and the Qing army was actually in Shanxi.

Although Henan is Zhongzhou, even if the Wei army captures it, the pressure on the Manchu Qing is still not large, and the Qing army still dominates Hebei, but if the Wei army captures Shanxi, the Manchu Qing will immediately have trouble sleeping, and will even consider withdrawing to Guannei.

In history, when Jiang Xiang was anyway, he restrained most of the energy of the Qing army, and even Dolgon, who had not gone out for many years, also briefly took command of the expedition.

Shanxi's topography is closed, with the Great Wall in the north, Zhongtiao Mountain in the south, Taihang Mountain in the east, and Luliang Mountain in the west.

This is not only a province less affected by the war at the end of the Ming Dynasty, but also the main source of taxes and money and grain for the Qing court, and at the same time, he directly threatens Yanyun geographically.

If the Manchus lost Shanxi, the Wei army could directly attack Beijing, and the Qing court would not be able to gain a foothold in Guannai.

Therefore, the land of Shanxi will be the focus of contention between Wei and Qing. In fact, Gao Yihuan had long been aware of this, but because the Qing army controlled the Hetao and the grassland, the Qing army could threaten Guanzhong from the north, so the Wei army was pinned down in Guanzhong.

If the Wei army sent troops to attack Shanxi, the Guanzhong army would be empty, so that the Hetao Qing army would have a chance, and Guanzhong would become unsafe, so after the Wei army occupied Guanzhong, for a year and a half, it never considered attacking Pujin Pass.

This time, in order to put pressure on the Qing army, the Wei army decided to attack Pujin Pass, but how to attack Pujin Pass was a big problem.

First of all, to attack Pujin Pass, it is necessary to cross the Yellow River, and to take a pontoon bridge to attack, even if it is 100,000 horses, it may not be able to defeat it.

As long as the Qing army erected a few cannons on the bridgehead and lowered the muzzle of the guns, it could knock down a string of Wei troops crowded on the bridge with one shot, and it would be difficult for the Wei army to rush across the pontoon bridge even if it was in the elite.

Moreover, after the pontoon bridge, there is the Guancheng, and the defenders will get reinforcements after a day, and the Wei army only has a chance to be bombarded on the beachhead.

For this reason, Xiwei thought hard about the strategy of breaking the barrier and felt that it was still necessary to outwit.

The pontoon bridge was burned only to reduce the attention of the Qing army in Shanxi, making them think that the Wei army was going to deal with the Qing army that had entered Longxi with all its might, and the bridge was burned to reduce the pressure from Shanxi.

Today, after two months of preparation, the Wei army finally launched a surprise attack on Pujin Pass.

Within two months, the Wei army collected a lot of boats on the Luoshui River, and even transported the boats of the Wei River system to Tongzhou for concealment by boating on dry land.

At this time, Huang Bingzhong saw the elite soldiers of the Xuanfeng battalion on the boat, turned his head and said to the generals beside him: "Let's go, let's rush back to the pontoon bridge immediately!" ”

After finishing speaking, Huang Bingzhong pulled out the reins of his horse, and the war horse shot out like an arrow, and dozens of horses galloped towards Pujin Ferry.

At the ferry, the elite of the 7,000 Wei army was ready, all the siege mortars were in place, and the thick wooden planks used to lay the pontoon bridge had also been piled up at the ferry.

All the Wei army burned was the wooden planks on the pontoon bridge, and the iron chains pulled by the four iron oxen still connected the two banks.

At the beginning of June, a crescent moon bent in the sky, and the night was very dark, covering the approach of the Wei fleet to the east coast.

The boat flowed down the Luoshui River into the Yellow River, and the fleet crossed the center of the river with the impact of the current, and then swept the boat to get rid of the southward flow of the river from the center, and washed the boat to the east bank and ran aground.

Three thousand well-equipped soldiers jumped off the boat, waded ashore, and not far from the Pujin Pass and the torch on the bridgehead flashed, pointing out the direction for the Wei army.

Compared with before the burning of the bridge, there were many fewer torches in both places, indicating that the defenders were lax.

At this time, 3,000 Wei troops were crowded on the river beach, and the soldiers were lying on the ground, silent.

Yi Daosan's eyes glanced at the Guancheng and the bridgehead in the distance, and then as soon as he waved, several military academies surrounded him.

At this time, Yi Daosan spoke: "The two divisions A and B of the first department, you pull out the bridgehead from behind, and take Huang Dudu and the siege equipment to cross the river. The three divisions of the C department, plus the Ding division of the A department, ambushed the Tartars who came out of the gate, and the remaining brothers followed the general to seize the city. The order of the hands is the order in which Ben will command. ”

"Do you understand?" Yi Daosan's sharp eyes glanced at the many generals, and when he saw that they all nodded, he said, "Okay, you repeat your tasks one by one." ”

At the moment, several military academies of the Selective Battalion whispered their tasks again.

Yi Daosan bowed slightly, looked at two of the brigades, and said in a deep voice: "The capture of the bridgehead is related to whether the reinforcements on the other side can successfully cross the river to reinforce, and it is the key to the success or failure of this battle, and the two of you must understand!" ”

"Humble duty understands!" The two leaders bowed their heads and clenched their fists.

"Action!" When Yi Dao heard this, he immediately waved his hand, and all the departments of the Wei army bent their waists and touched towards the city and the fortress.

In the dark night, the Wei troops of all departments quickly touched the designated position under the cover of night.

More than 600 people from the Wei army of the two divisions touched the back of the bridgehead, and the Wei army of the four divisions, about 1,200 people, were lying on the road connecting the bridgehead from Guancheng, and the rest of the people were slowly approaching the wall.

Because the Wei army burned the pontoon bridge, the defense of the bridgehead was obviously relaxed a lot, and there were only a few torches swaying in the wind on the fortress wall, and Zhou Laosi and others did not have to patrol the bridge, but dozed off against the fortress wall.

With a muffled snort, a Qing soldier patrolling with a torch was hit by an arrow in the neck, covered his throat and fell down, fell on the sand of the river beach, and the soldier who was dozing off on the wall turned over and continued to nap.

At this time, more than 100 black shadows, touching the corner of the wall, saw a group of four soldiers, holding a long bamboo pole, one of them holding the head of the pole, three holding the tail of the pole, rushing to the wall, holding the head of the pole, with the support of the end of the pole, stepped on the fort wall, and rushed up the fort wall quickly.

The soldiers who bit the back of the knife in their mouths jumped on the fortress wall one after another, they touched it from the back of the fortress, the defense was not tight, only the sound came from the fortress, and a figure shook on the window paper, as if gambling money.

Outside the fort, several Qing soldiers leaned against the wall, were dozing, Wei soldiers took out the war knife in their mouths, lightly touched the side of the Qing army, led by the commander of the brigade waved his hand, Wei soldiers moved at the same time, covering the mouth of the Qing soldiers with one hand, riding on their legs, the knife was quickly pulled on the neck, blood shot out, and then quickly stabbed a few times in the heart, without any superfluous movements.

The Qing sergeant was covered with his mouth, his eyes were round, and his face was terrified, but his throat could only make a gurgling sound of blood, and he soon died silently.

Killing the Qing soldiers outside the east fort wall, as soon as the Wei army commander waved his hand, a black shadow poured down the wall to open the fort gate, and the remaining few people stood on both sides of the fort with knives.

At this time, the brigade made a gesture, and suddenly kicked the door open, the Qing army inside was slightly stunned, and a few crossbow arrows shot in from the outside, shooting the Qing army facing the door, and then more than a dozen Wei troops swarmed in, slashing with swords, and the screams immediately pierced the night sky.

Almost at the same moment, the gate of the fort was opened, and the Wei army wearing black armor poured into the fortress, and the castle instantly burst into the sound of killing, and the flames soared into the sky.

On the west bank of the pontoon bridge, Huang Bingzhong, who was standing on the edge of the pontoon bridge, looked at the fortress on the east bank, and suddenly saw an arrow shooting into the sky, which exploded suddenly, and immediately rejoiced, "Quick, repair the pontoon bridge, and the army will cross the river!" ”

The Wei soldiers, who were resisting the thick planks on the shore, immediately rushed onto the pontoon bridge, laying it while moving forward.

The sound of killing in the bridgehead also alarmed the Qing army in the Pujin Pass, and the gate was opened, and a thousand Qing cavalry, carrying torches, rushed out of the pass and rushed to the bridgehead at a gallop.

When the cavalry reached the halfway point, there was a series of loud noises on the official road, the orange flame flashed, and a cloud of white smoke was raised, and the cavalry was overturned by the bombers, and the people on the road howled and neighed, and the cavalry of the Qing army was instantly confused.

"Kill!" The Wei troops on both sides of the ambush instantly shouted, fired firearms, and then grabbed their weapons and rushed out from both sides, killing the panicked Qing army.

At this time, under the closed wall, Yi Daosan also roared angrily, "Seize the gate!" ”

The soldiers who ambushed the city began to charge, and the soldiers took advantage of the fact that the Qing army had not yet completed the deployment, supported them with wooden poles, grabbed the city wall with flying hooks, and quickly climbed up the city to fight with the Qing troops who rushed to the wall.

In an instant, the entire Pujin crossing on both sides of the river, the flames soared into the sky, the explosions were repeated, and the Qing army was killed by the Wei army, and they were not in a hurry, so they could only resist passively.

On the bridgehead, more than a dozen Eight Banner soldiers and more than 100 Green Battalion soldiers defended the West Fort Wall, that is, a fort wall facing this pontoon bridge.

At this time, under the fort wall, on the artillery array facing the pontoon bridge, the Qing army's Hongyi cannon roared, and with a "boom" sound, the cannonballs were aimed directly at the pontoon bridge, and an iron bullet killed more than ten Wei soldiers in a row, making a straight line of flesh and blood on the bridge.

The Wei army on the bridge, suppressed by artillery arrays and bows and arrows, suffered heavy casualties and could not rush through.

(Thank you for your support, ask for a monthly pass, recommend, subscribe.) ）

(End of chapter)