Cao Zhen slowly moved forward all the way, and the progress went smoothly, and after a few days, he arrived safely outside the city, and immediately surrounded the county seat, preparing to attack the city.

In the past few days, he has received news that some of the enemy troops who had challenged him under Linwei City have retreated to Jicheng since that defeat, and now in Shangcheng, there are 7,000 men and horses led by Wang Ping and Chen Yin.

Cao Zhen decided to concentrate his forces first and send people to urge Sima Yi to march into Jicheng and hold back the army of the enemy leader Zhuge Liang to prevent them from coming to the rescue or fleeing to other areas.

After the siege was settled, he first led the generals to inspect the terrain and choose a suitable siege site.

Touring the city, they were pleasantly surprised.

In the southeast corner of the upper city, there was a small mound of earth, which was about seventy to eighty paces away from the city wall, which was an excellent distance for a catapult to attack the city.

The mound was more than a foot above the ground, about a quarter the height of the city wall, and the top was flat and steep on three sides, but the remaining side was a long, straight slope just enough to push the catapult up.

What a great place, isn't this a great location from heaven for a stone-throwing siege? It can save the sergeant the fatigue of piling up dirt mountains.

Cao Zhen, who was full of smiles, immediately called the two soldiers to him and asked them to compare and compare.

Two soldiers stepped forward, half-crouched, thumbs and forefingers straightened, eyes squinted.

"Slow!" Cao Zhen suddenly remembered something, first led everyone down the mound, and continued to inspect slowly, leaving only three sergeants and the two who joined the army.

Don't let the enemy find out that he has taken a fancy to this mound.

The two soldiers hid behind the three sergeants, posed again, squinted and stretched out their fingers, and gestured towards the city.

After comparing several times, the two turned their faces, nodded to each other, and called the three sergeants with satisfaction to chase Cao Zhen and his party.

"How's that, how's that?" Cao Zhen asked anxiously.

The two soldiers nodded excitedly: "Yes, very good, not bad, set up a catapult there, you can hit the city wall and hit the city, and this is located in the middle of nowhere, far away from the city gate, just to prevent the enemy from suddenly rushing out of the city and destroying our catapult." ”

Cao Zhen's eyes lit up: "Great, then launch a surprise attack from here." ”

After inspecting everything around, the next day, Cao Zhen first sent his soldiers to launch several rounds of crazy attacks around several other directions in Shangcheng.

The Shu army held the city, desperately resisting, bricks and arrows flying wildly, spears and short knives out together.

The Wei army attacked the whole day, dead and wounded, and suffered heavy losses, and the siege did not achieve any results.

In the evening, Cao Zhen summoned the generals to the Chinese military tent and inquired about the attack on each gate.

All the generals said that the enemy was well-trained and had a tacit understanding in defense, and that once a weak point in the defense appeared, someone would immediately come to strengthen it, and it would be difficult to break through it in the short term.

Cao Zhen nodded, after Cao Xiu was defeated and retreated, he attached absolute importance to these enemies.

Since Cao Xiu's 50,000-strong army was defeated by the 30,000-strong horses of the people in the field battle, and now that the people have occupied the fortified city, it is not easy to defeat them.

Today's daytime offensive is only to attract the enemy's attention, and I hope that they will focus their forces on those directions.

In the evening, he was about to carry out his plan of night raid.

After only an hour's rest, he changed his men and horses and continued to launch a fierce offensive against Shangcheng.

At the same time, he sent his soldiers to take advantage of the darkness of the night to quietly push the catapult to the high platform, and sent five thousand sergeants to follow the ambush there.

The siege went on for another half of the night, and the sergeants who were replaced were again suffering heavy casualties, but still no results were achieved, and Cao Zhen withdrew his men and horses again.

At the time of the third watch, it was estimated that the defenders in the city were also tired, and when he saw that the enemy troops who came to attack the city at night had been quietly withdrawn for so long, and saw that the lights in the Wei camp were scarce, he should have fallen asleep, and he should rest at ease, Cao Zhen quietly came to the mound in the southeast corner.

The 5,000 sergeants were already in full array, and the two soldiers and more than 100 sergeants waiting on the mound had already set up the catapult and loaded the stones into the throwing basket, waiting for Cao Zhen's order.

Cao Zhen decided to learn from the enemy according to the description of the sergeant who had fled back from Jicheng before, first sent the sergeant to secretly climb the city wall at night, and after they climbed the city wall, they launched an attack on the enemy.

He didn't have the kind of wine that could ignite when it caught a spark, and he didn't want the enemy to notice the location of the catapult in the dark, so he had to throw all the stones.

"General, there are few enemy lights here, and judging from the interval between the lights, the enemy's patrols are not frequent, it seems that your previous attack has played a role in paralyzing the enemy." The two soldiers rubbed their palms together excitedly and reported their observations to Cao Zhen.

Cao Zhen nodded, and asked the sergeant to go to the front and tell the soldiers that the siege had begun!

The 5,000 soldiers immediately advanced one after another. Those who ran in front quickly approached the city wall, put up the ladder, and began to climb.

Seeing that he was about to climb the battlements of the city wall and jump onto the wall, all of a sudden, countless torches lit up on the city, and many defenders came out of the city, stabbing and slashing with spears and short knives.

The sergeants who were ascending the city were suddenly attacked, and immediately fell into a panic, and one by one they scrambled to retreat.

However, when they arrived at the city, they were not spared, and the soldiers in the city held stones and bricks in their hands and smashed them down.

Cao Zhen was in the distance, and when he saw the sudden lights in the city, he couldn't help but shout: "It's not good, it's ...... again"

Suddenly realizing something, he quickly covered his mouth, and only the cheers of the enemy and the screams of his own sergeants could be heard in his ears.

Why did you wait so long during the day to be ambushed by the enemy?

Not reconciled, he ordered the sergeants to continue the desperate attack, and at the same time ordered the catapults to immediately fire at the city.

After the catapult fired two wheels, they found out that it was miserable.

In the dark night, I could only hear the sound of "tom tom", and many things flew from the darkness and smashed right on this mound.

Immediately afterwards, there was a scream around him, and at the same time, something smashed on his shoulder, causing him to crook his body and fall to the ground at once, only to feel that half of his body was numb.

Fortunately, he was heavily armored and didn't hit his head, otherwise, I was afraid that my life would be gone.

The uninjured guard next to him hurriedly ran over, picked him up and ran.

As soon as he left the mound, there was another "tom tom", and many things fell on the mound, and there was an even more terrible cry, and the sound of the wooden frame of the catapult shattering.

The two soldiers also escaped the blow by luck, and crawled away from the mound, holding their hands on the ground, as if they had touched something, and brought a piece with them.

Cao Zhen was completely stunned, where did these things come from, what smashed him so that his left hand couldn't move?

The army ran over, handed him an object, and cried: "General, we have been calculated by the enemy again. ”

Cao Zhen touched it, it was square, as if it was a brick, a standard brick.

I, Cao Zhen, almost got killed by a brick!

At this time in the city, Wang Ping was busy commanding four of the five catapults, hurriedly adjusting the weight of the heavy basket and the throwing basket, adjusting the throwing distance closer, and hitting the soldiers who were fleeing under the city.

He estimated that even if the catapults on the mound were not all destroyed, no sergeant would dare to stay there and launch them, and it would be impossible to remove them now, and the most urgent thing at the moment was to hit those enemy soldiers as much as possible.

Hahaha, the enemy actually launched a catapult from that mound, they must not have expected that it was specially reserved for him.

In order to ensure that the catapult can accurately hit the mound, the big Sima Geliang deliberately replaced the throwing object with a standard brick, and after many tests, under the same loading quantity and loading method, it can ensure that it can hit the mound almost exactly on it.

After Ge Liang settled the data in another location, he transferred all the catapults here, and only secretly launched them once at night, and after checking and confirming, the catapults were oiled and well maintained, and they were never used.

Then, Ge Liang asked them to give Cao Zhen four catapults......

Wang Ping remembered that Da Sima said: "The enemy must cherish this treasure, and when it is launched, there should be several officials there watching, maybe ......" (to be continued. )