Just decided to give up the time-consuming siege tactics, change the siege to the city to the tunnel siege, the Taiping army soldiers who were specifically responsible for digging the tunnel were immediately busy, exploring the leylines, digging the tunnel, and supporting the tunnel with two pillars and one beam, skillfully and quickly advancing from the underground to the east gate city wall of Jiangyin.

In order to cover the construction of the tunnel, the Taiping army specially opened the entrance of the tunnel behind a dirt mountain, and built a fortress around the mountain, built a fort on the high ground, and disguised it to build a large fortification base, but it really deceived the Qing army, including Wu Chaoyue and Zhao Liewen, and once thought that the construction here was part of the Taiping army's siege fortifications.

At the same time, in order to consume the ammunition of the Wu army and reduce the pressure of the siege in the future, Lin Fengxiang and Wu Ruxiao racked their brains to arrange a series of feints, specially sending a small force of troops to the city of Jiangyin at night to beat gongs and drums, and at the same time arranged a large number of straw dummies within the range of muskets to lure the Qing army to shoot. But it's a pity that this trick only works for ordinary Qing soldiers, but it has no effect on Wu Junlianyong, who was formed with the old pawns of the Jiangning War as the backbone core, and the dummy was quickly recognized by Wu Junlianyong, and the Qing soldiers bravely switched to rocket shooting, completely crushing the Taiping Army's feint attack plan.

When the plan failed, Lin Fengxiang had another plan, concentrated the civilian boats to secretly go south to the upper reaches of the Jiangyin Canal at night, loaded with earth and stones, and put some grain bags on the soil and stones, disguised as a fleet carrying grain and grass, and ordered 500 old and weak soldiers to operate the boat to the north, deliberately passing under the west gate of Jiangyin, and ordered 2,000 soldiers to the mouth of the canal to disguise and respond, in a vain attempt to lure Wu Chaoyue to go out of the city to rob the grain, and also took the opportunity to test the grain and grass situation in Jiangyin City again.

Lin Fengxiang once again deceived the Qing army in Jiangyin City, including Yang Wending, who thought that this was a great opportunity to seize food supplies, and asked Wu Chaoyue to send troops out of the city to rob grain. It's a pity that Wu Chaoyue was not fooled, worried that the grain and grass were fake, and even more afraid that this was the Taiping Army testing the grain and grass reserves in Jiangyin City. resolutely refused to go out of the city, and strongly persuaded Yang Wending, Tai Wenying and others not to send troops to rob grain, continue to slap their swollen faces and become fat, and watched the grain team of the Taiping Army pass smoothly from under Jiangyin City.

Failed to deceive Wu Jun Lianyong to shoot twice, and was reluctant to exchange his life for Wu Chaoyue's bullets, Lin Fengxiang had to temporarily dispel the idea of inducing Wu Jun Lianyong to waste bullets in advance. Honestly and with all his might, he arranged the siege plan, urging the soldiers of the earth battalion to speed up the construction, and at the same time ordering the soldiers to cut down timber and build siege weapons such as flying ladders and trench bridge vehicles. As a result, Wu Chaoyue, who had been looking forward to the Taiping army's change of tactics, finally became suspicious, and after receiving a report of the Taiping army's large amount of timber, Wu Chaoyue didn't even wear a hat, and rushed to the east gate city wall with Zhao Liewen in a smoke, and raised his binoculars to look in the direction of the Taiping army's camp.

Jiangning is rich. The degree of land development is extremely high, the slightly flat land has been transformed into farmland, the Taiping army wants to cut timber of course can only go to the mountain to find, the result is naturally convenient for Wu Chaoyue's observation, standing on the city wall with a telescope to look at the head ants of the Taiping army in the Xiangshan forest area, you can see everywhere the Taiping soldiers who are struggling to cut down, the big trees that have taken root and bundles of moso bamboo continue to be transported down the mountain. Glance. Seeing this scene, Wu Chaoyue was of course happy. Zhao Liewen next to him was also overjoyed, and hurriedly said to Wu Chaoyue: "Weiting, it seems that your bluff plan has succeeded, Changmao doesn't want to besiege the city and fight against it, and wants to launch a frontal attack." ”

"Possibly." Wu Chaoyue nodded, but still said uneasily: "But you can't be careless." To prevent the mammoth from being like me, he also bluffed and pretended to attack the city, deceiving us to take it lightly, but in fact he continued to adhere to the siege tactics and competed with us for the consumption of food and grass materials. ”

"Is there a way to find out?" Zhao Liewen hurriedly asked.

Wu Chaoyue pondered for a moment. Then he replied: "There is a way, pay a lot of money to recruit dead soldiers to disguise themselves as civilians to go out of the city, pretend to volunteer to work for Changmao, and take the opportunity to spy on Changmao's military intelligence." ”

Zhao Liewen heard the applause, urging Wu Chaoyue to act quickly, Wu Chaoyue was not even bothered to greet Yang Wending and others, and recruited the Xiangyong who dared to disguise himself to go out of the city to reconnoitre, and the result was that there must be a brave man under the heavy reward, hearing Wu Chaoyue's twenty-two silver heavy reward, many Xiangyong immediately ran out to apply, Wu Chaoyue selected two local Xiangyong from Jiangyin, arranged for them to go out of the city at night, and handed them a lot of reconnaissance skills. Let them go all out to find clues about whether the Taiping army really wants to attack the city.

Wu Chaoyue's dream is also too good, he sent Xiang Yong out of the city to investigate the enemy's situation, but he didn't know that the Taiping army was trying its best to find information on the situation of grain and grass in Jiangyin, and he was sparing no effort to scratch his tongue and ask for a confession. So when it was dark, after the two Xiangyong went out of the city separately, they had not touched the side of the Taiping Army camp, and they had been found by the secret post of the Taiping Army ambush, one Xiangyong was captured alive, and the other Xiangyong was chased and beaten by the Taiping Army soldiers, and was almost caught several times, and finally it was completely by luck that he escaped back to Jiangyin City with injuries, and escaped back to the city with a rope with the help of his companions.

After receiving the report in the early morning of the next day, despite the great disappointment, Wu Chaoyue personally went to visit the Xiangyong who returned to the city with an injury, comforted him with kind words and personally fed him medicine, and also rewarded him with five taels of silver in public, and moved the Xiangyong who failed to complete the task to cry, struggled to get up and kowtow to Wu Chaoyue, and cried and said: "Master Xie Wu, Master Xie Wu, the little one is useless, I can't mix into the long-haired camp, you still treat the villain like this, the villain is just a cow and a horse, and I can't repay your great kindness." ”

Purely to buy people's hearts and let other Jiangyin Township Yong die for himself, Wu Chaoyue of course didn't surprise that Xiangyong thanked him from the bottom of his heart, picked him up with his own hands and pretended to comfort him a few words, and then was about to leave. And Na Xiangyong was even more grateful and moved, and suddenly remembered something, and hurriedly said: "Master Wu, please wait." ”

"What's the matter?" Wu Chaoyue stopped and turned around and asked.

"Master Wu, it's not that there was nothing abnormal at all last night, but I don't know if it's useful to you." Na Xiang Yong replied truthfully: "Last night, when the villain was chased by Long Hair, he ran the wrong way and passed behind the Long Hair Battery, and saw that there were many Long Hair pushing something, but they didn't light the torches, and the little ones didn't dare to stop, so the little ones didn't see clearly what they were transporting." ”

Wu Chaoyue's face changed. Then Wu Chaoyue didn't hesitate, and immediately shouted: "Go, follow me up to the city wall, and show me, where did you see Long Mao secretly transporting things!" ”

With the support of his companions, Na Xiangyong struggled to follow Wu Chaoyue up to the Jiangyin city wall. He also immediately pointed out the location where he had accidentally seen the Taiping army secretly transporting supplies - it was behind the earthen mountain that Wu Chaoyue mistook for the Taiping army's siege fortifications! After confirming this, Wu Chaoyue finally suddenly realized, and a big stone in his heart suddenly fell to the ground, and under great joy, Wu Chaoyue instructed Wu Dadao: "Competition, immediately take twenty taels of silver and reward this brother!" ”

Wu Dadao obediently paid the money, but Na Xiangyong was so surprised that he couldn't believe it at all, and said, "Master Wu." The small ones didn't do the errand you explained, so I didn't dare to accept it. ”

"Who says you didn't do it?" Wu Chaoyue smiled happily: "You not only did it, but also overfulfilled it, take it, this is what you deserve." ”

After that, Wu Chaoyue, who was expected to have begun to dig the tunnels in the Taiping army, did not hesitate, and immediately ordered Jiangyin Xiangyong to dig a deep pit of about three and a half zhang every hundred steps along the city wall in accordance with the ground listening method taught to him by Zhang Jigeng. And he found a great number of large water tanks, and buried them in deep pits. Select soldiers with sensitive ear sounds to go down to the pit for listening.

Although according to the rules, Wu Chaoyue has no right to directly command Jiangyin Xiangyong, but there is an example in front of him, Wu Chaoyue's order was immediately strictly implemented by Jiangyin Xiangyong, and after the fortification was completed and the water tank was also placed, the Qing soldiers who went down to the pit to listen quickly screamed. "There's a voice, there's a sound! It's the sound of digging in the earth, and it doesn't seem to be far away! ”

After confirming this point, and roughly confirming the location of the Taiping Army's tunnels, the next thing is much easier. Not to mention that Zhao Liewen immediately put forward several vicious ideas to clean up the tunnels of the Taiping Army, and even the general Tai Wenying, who had ordinary combat skills, proposed: "Lord Wu, we will bury gunpowder to blow us up, we will also bury gunpowder to blow them up, bury gunpowder on the top of their tunnels, and when they dig up, they will detonate the gunpowder and bury these longhairs alive in the tunnels!" ”

"Buried gunpowder can't kill many long hairs, it's best to smoke with poisonous smoke!" Yang Wending was even more ruthless, and said with a fierce look in his eyes: "Prepare firewood and grass, croton, arsenic, sulfur and fire oil, dig a tunnel to connect the long-haired tunnel, light a fire and smoke it!" Smoke all the long hair in the tunnels! ”

"Futai-sama's clever plan!" Sycophants were everywhere, except for Wu Chaoyue, none of the Qing army civil and military forces present were not sycophants, and praised Yang Wending's compassion and compassion in unison, Bodhisattva's heart, Jiangyin County Ling Mo Zai couldn't wait to collect arsenic croton and other highly poisonous medicinal materials.

Wu Chaoyue stopped Mo Zai very calmly, and then said to Yang Wending: "Grandfather, in the opinion of my grandson-in-law, we should not destroy the tunnel of Changmao, we should let Changmao dig the tunnel, bury gunpowder to blow up the city wall, and then launch a counterattack." ”

"Why?" Yang Wending, Tai Wenying and others were dumbfounded.

"Because at the same time that the long-haired blast the city wall, it will definitely launch a surprise attack and ant-attached siege to the city." Wu Chaoyue replied: "If we destroy the long-haired tunnel in advance, no matter what method we use to launch a counterattack, we will only kill hundreds of long-haired soldiers at most, but we will only hurt the long-haired fur, but we will not be able to hurt the muscles and bones of the main force of long-haired, and we will not be able to change the situation that the enemy is strong and we are weak." ”

"But if we deliberately let the long-haired blast succeed, then it's a completely different story." Wu Chaoyue pointed out: "The long-haired blast is successful, in order to break the city, it is necessary to enter the city from the gap at any cost, and at the same time launch an ant-attached siege to increase the chances of victory, and also cover their commandos to enter the city." In this way, as long as we launch a counterattack immediately, we can kill a large number of long-haired elites, make the main force of long-haired muscles and bones, and also create fighters for our all-out counterattack! ”

Feeling that the words of his future son-in-law were reasonable, Yang Wending nodded first, and then said hesitantly: "Although Weiting is reasonable, but is it too dangerous to do this, if Long Hair takes the opportunity to really kill the city, even if we kill them, it will definitely be a lot of damage?" ”

"It's okay, we just need to prepare in advance." Wu Chaoyue replied: "Hurry up and build a fence, surround the entrance of the long-haired tunnel in a semicircle, build a sheep and horse wall inside the fence to prevent bulletproof, set up more antlers outside the fence to keep away horses, and dig a deep trench to protect the sheep and horse wall and fence." In this way, even if the longhair enters the city, we can use the advantage of fortifications to kill them as much as they want. ”

"Also, if we don't think it's safe, we can also follow the tactics of the official army defending the city during the Changsha War, and prepare a large number of sandbags on the city wall in advance to fill the gaps in the city wall if necessary. Don't give Longhair a chance to continue into the city. ”

If it weren't for the fact that they had seen Wu Junlian's strong combat effectiveness with their own eyes, Yang Wending, Tai Wenying and others would definitely accept Wu Chaoyue's relatively risky proposal, but it was because they knew that Wu Junlian could fight bravely, and they also considered the problem of food and grass in the city. Yang Wending pondered for a long time, and finally nodded and said, "Okay, just do it!" Kill as many long hairs as possible. Let Longhair know we're awesome! ”

After careful measurement and careful arrangement, under the personal command of Wu Chaoyue, the soldiers and civilians of Jiangyin quickly took action, first digging a long deep trench around the tunnel exit of the Taiping army, using the soil obtained from digging the trench to build a chest-high sheep and horse wall behind the trench, and then building a fence in front of the sheep and horse wall, the front of the fence is densely covered with horse antlers, to prevent the Taiping army from crossing the deep trench to impact the fence and the sheep and horse wall, and protect the Qing soldiers who are hiding behind the sheep and horse wall and shooting. At the same time, Wu Chaoyue used the excess soil to build several high platforms in several key places. So that the snipers of the Wu Army can hide on the high platform and shoot the Taiping soldiers to their heart's content.

In order not to let the Taiping army outside the city notice the abnormality, Wu Chaoyue preferred to slow down the construction progress at night than to light many torches and lanterns, and at the same time, Wu Chaoyue did not demolish the houses in the encirclement - he only demolished the bulletproof courtyard wall, and hid a lot of firewood, grass and fire oil pots sprinkled with sulfur on the beams or attics.

Not to mention, such a matter of labor and money really didn't make Yang Wending and Wu Chaoyue spend a lot of money. Because Wu Chaoyue had sent people to buy all the salt on the market before, the people of Jiangyin, who were extremely short of salt, all asked for salt instead of wages. The people whose houses were requisitioned were also willing to take salt in lieu of part of the compensation, and after Yang Wending and Wu Chaoyue, who were not short of salt at all, sprinkled a lot of salt, the construction progress was naturally fast, and it took less than a day for the fortifications in the city to be basically completed, and they were constantly being reinforced.

On the same night. The Qing soldiers who listened responsibly not only clearly heard the Taiping army's excavation under the city walls, but also faintly heard the slogans of the Taiping soldiers. After the news was reported to Wu Chaoyue, Zhang Jigeng instructed Wu Chaoyue, who was already very familiar with the habits of the Taiping army, and immediately concluded that if the Taiping army launched a feint attack the next day, then their real general attack. It must have been in the early morning of the third day, or it must have been the dawn of dawn!

This habit of the Taiping army was indeed not corrected, the next morning, Lin Fengxiang and Wu Ruxiao really sent about 3,000 troops of troops to launch a number of feints to the east gate of Jiangyin, although the battle was not very violent, but it lasted from the morning until the sky was dark, the siege method was to fire the city gate with musket fire, build a temporary bridge with a trench bridge car, carry firewood and grass to the city gate to raise fire to the gate, and also caused some threats to the Jiangyin city gate.

Knowing for a long time that the Taiping army was feintting, Wu Chaoyue was naturally reluctant to waste a less shotgun bullet, and even a relatively sufficient carbine bullet was reluctant to consume, so he did not want to let Wu Jun practice bravely snatching the arquebus of the Qing army soldiers to meet the battle, and with the ammunition barely able to make his own Mini gun to return fire, at the same time commanding the Qing army to bravely splash underwater stones, delay and obstruct the Taiping army to burn the door, deal with it in a good way, and not give the Taiping army any opportunity to take advantage of.

Wu Chaoyue knew the combat habits of the Taiping Army, and the Taiping Army also summed up some experience when fighting with Wu Chaoyue, in fact, as early as when they found that the musket on the city wall fired slowly frequently, Lin Fengxiang and Wu Ruxiao had already understood that Wu Chaoyue was not doing his best at all, and was desperately trying to save the paper shell bullets he bought from foreigners. But it's useless to know this, Wu Chaoyue is unwilling to go all out, and it is impossible for Lin Fengxiang and Wu Ruxiao to deliberately send a large number of soldiers to the city to die in vain in order to consume Wu Chaoyue's bullets. Therefore, after scolding Wu Chaoyue for his cunning and shamelessness, Lin Fengxiang and Wu Ruxiao could only seize the time to transport gunpowder under the Jiangyin city wall, lay the fuse, and make every effort to prepare for a full-scale general attack launched tomorrow.

After it was dark, the Taiping army finally collected its troops and returned to the camp, but Wu Chaoyue, who had worked hard for a day, did not dare to rest at all, and hurriedly dispatched troops overnight to arrange defenses and prepare for the real fierce battle the next day. At the same time, Wu Chaoyue also asked the Qing army to get up and eat at the beginning of the fifth watch, bring enough dry food and drinking water, and rush to the preset position to prepare for war before the third day of the fifth watch.

In this regard, Yang Wending, Tai Wenying and others were somewhat worried, worried that Wu Chaoyue had misjudged the time of the Taiping army's general attack, and the Taiping army launched an attack in advance to kill the Jiangyin defenders by surprise. Wu Chaoyue grinned and said, "Don't worry, you can't be wrong." From Changsha to Wuchang, and from Wuchang to Jiangning, Changmao launched a blasting siege every time in the early morning, and they also needed time to prepare, especially when they also needed time to secretly transport artillery and adjust the gun position, bombard the city wall to enhance the explosion effect, and even more need low-light lighting when launching a surprise attack, so the total attack time of Longhair is definitely the time after the fifth watch, and there will be no mistake! ”

Just as the Taiping army was also commanded by Wu Chaoyue, the next morning, in the hazy dawn, the southern section of the east gate of Jiangyin, suddenly sounded an earth-shattering thunderous loud sound, and the roar of artillery sounded almost simultaneously outside the city, more than ten shells hit the shaking Jiangyin city wall successively, and the overwhelmed Jiangyin city wall collapsed in the loud noise, revealing a gap no less than five zhang wide!

"Got it!"

Lin Fengxiang, who had been looking forward to this moment for a long time, waved his hand heavily, and shouted at Wang Yizhong, the general who led the commando team in front: "Wang Yizhong, lead the army to raid!" Avenge the 6,000-year-old King of the North! Avenge all the heavenly brothers who died tragically under the spear beyond the little demon! ”

"Revenge!" The warriors of the Taiping Army Raid Team, composed of 600 elite soldiers, roared in unison, like spring thunder. (To be continued.) )

PS: The new book "The Romance of the Concubine" is a new book for those who like the harem.