During a period of relative calm, Jiangjiazhuang thickened its walls, especially in several indigenous villages near it. Because they knew that the Chinese had three-pounder cannons in their hands, and the natives were not short www.biquge.info of manpower, they did even better than Jiangjiazhuang in reinforcing the wall.

When the Chinese group practitioners arrived near the Vanu village, the natives who had already received the news had already retreated into the village and were ready to defend it. Prior to this, even if there was a certain numerical superiority, in the field battles, the natives suffered losses. So nowadays, unless they have a very large military advantage, they will try to avoid field battles with the Chinese.

"I knew that the natives only dared to hide in the village." Zeng Aniu said to the new group training, "Those natives still have some ability on a single person, but if they want to fight in a field battle with us, we can beat five of them alone!" ”

"Brother Niu, they are all hiding in the stockade, how can we fight?" A new member of the group asked.

"Of course, use the cannon to blast the wall open, and then kill it! Well, you all remember how the formation was laid out after you went in, right? Zeng Aniu asked.

Zeng Aniu is now the captain of the combat team, with four soldiers under his command, two of whom have just come from Daming's side not long ago, and they have not had time to learn to shoot well, but in the combat team, these two novices do not need to shoot, and even if they don't have guns in their hands at all. Their task in battle was simply to walk in front with large shields in hand, to shield those behind from possible poisoned arrows, or to temporarily block the indigenous samurai who pounced on them with scimitars. With these two large shields, the three people in the back can use the power of the musket relatively safely.

Of course, this large shield could not stop the muskets, whether it was the flintlock pistol in Zeng Aniu's hand or the arquebuses that the natives had obtained from the Spaniards, they could easily pierce these shields and kill and injure those who held them. However, both flintlock pistols and arquebuses are very slow to reload. After the natives shot and knocked out the shield bearers, Zeng Aniu and the others had the opportunity to shoot and kill the natives, or to deal with them with bayonets - the Spanish gave the natives arquebuses without bayonets.

By this time, the artillerymen had already set up the three-pounder gun, and the first round of test firing began.

Because of the lack of commanders and experienced gunners who knew how to use mathematical methods to measure the range in the artillery team of this sortie, the artillery of the regimental training was not accurate, and in the first round of shooting, a total of three guns fired, but not even a single shot was missed, and all the shells went over the wall, and I don't know where they hit.

The officers shouted and cursed, and the artillerymen began to hurriedly lower the elevation angle of the muzzle, and worked for a long time before they opened fire again, and as a result, the shells fell more than 20 steps away from the wall, and because the natives had been prepared for a long time, they turned over the land near the wall, so that the soil became very soft. Therefore, the cannonball that fell on the ground pierced into the soil and failed to form a ricochet.

The artillerymen hurriedly began to adjust the elevation angle of the artillery, and Zeng Aniu began to look boredly at the opposite wall. He found that the walls of Vanu Village seemed to be a bit special.

"Ah Long, you have good eyes, do you see if their wall doesn't seem to be too straight?" Zeng Aniu patted the shield hand under his hand.

The Aaron also looked in the direction of the wall, with wide eyes, and said, "It seems that their wall is really not straight, but has a big slope like the castle in Manila." ”

After the massive appearance of artillery on the battlefield, the vertical wall began to become obsolete, as it was prone to collapse in large sections when bombarded. In order to increase the resistance of the walls to shelling, the latest types of walls of this era have generally begun to lower in height and increase the slope and thickness.

"It's a good thing they haven't had time to add a few walls to the outside of the wall and turn it into a bastion." Zeng Aniu remembered what the instructor had told him about Manila, and couldn't help but come up with such a sentence.

At this time, the cannon rang out again, and then Zeng Aniu saw a little white dust rising up on the opposite wall. He knew that this meant that the shell had hit the wall.

According to previous experience, the walls of the Turen would soon collapse after being hit by shells. But this time, the situation was noticeably different, and after the cannonballs hit, the walls remained unmoved.

"It's just a small hole. In such a case, if you want to break the wall with shells, you really don't know how many shells will be needed. Artillery commander Li Bo put down the binoculars, shook his head and said. The artillery, which had always been irresistible before, was thwarted in front of the wall of Vanu Village.

"It's a pity that according to the treaty, we can't have more than three pounds of artillery." Another commander also sighed, "Otherwise, if we get a twenty-four-pounder cannon, I don't believe that this wall can still be built." ”

"We will concentrate all the artillery, bombard a position and see how it works." Li Bo said.

The shelling lasted for most of the hour, but the walls of Vanu still did not collapse in a large area.

It was already noon, and Li Boran's artillery stopped firing, apparently such shooting was just a waste of pig iron and gunpowder. If they want to take the stockade, they will need to come up with a new way.

At lunchtime, Li Changsheng (Boss Li's second son), who was in charge of the offensive operation, called several officers together and began to discuss how to conquer the stockade.

"The natives also have muskets, and they are protected by walls, and if we charge hard, I am afraid that our losses will be very large. Do you have any thoughts? Li Changsheng asked.

"Shao Dongjia, I heard the story that when they encountered a fortified city that could not be attacked, they would often dig up the river embankment and flood the city with water." Said an officer.

"It's a pity that the terrain of their village is not low, and the water level of the river next to it is much lower than the ground, where is there any embankment? How can it be possible to flood the city? Another officer retorted.

"Then if we build a fence and a ditch around their stockade, and completely surround them to death, in a few months, we will probably be able to go directly to the corpses of those natives."

"Build a long trench for a few months? Do you know how much that costs? And now that the natives are in a group, they will definitely send reinforcements. When the time comes, we will suffer a big loss. ”

Just when the discussion was intense, a herald suddenly entered the tent and reported to several officers: "Jiangjiazhuang has lit a beacon fire!" ”