The rebels' attacks were like a tidal wave, coming and going. Pen @ fun @ pavilion wWw. ｂｉｑUｇE。 Seven or eight thousand corpses strewn under the city and declared the first round of their attack unsuccessful. At the head of Tongzhou City, there was a sound of jubilation, and the casualties of the Shence Army in this battle were few, and the total number of dead and wounded was less than 1,000. In the face of such a ferocious attack, such a result is exciting.

The soldiers cheered, but Wang Yuan poured cold water on them with a calm face: "This is the beginning, the enemy's army of 150,000, seven or eight thousand casualties is not a heavy blow for them." There will be several fierce battles today, so you should save some mental and physical strength for the fierce battles. It's too early to celebrate. ”

When all the soldiers heard this, they restrained their smiles, rested and drank water, checked their precautions, and prepared for the next round of rebel attacks. From a distance, the rebels under the city are reorganizing their formations and are busy, it seems that the words of the commander are right, and the next round of attacks is about to begin.

Gao Xiuyan got permission to attack the city in his own way, so he personally arranged the siege. The first was to quickly assemble tens of thousands of straw bales, fill them with sand, gravel and earth, and fill them with hundreds of carts transferred from the rear camp. After these bales of mud and straw were ready, the remaining 400 or so catapults were put to use again, and Rumble was pushed down the city. As a result, the scene of stone bullets flying sideways and enveloping the head of Tongzhou City two hours ago reappeared. However, in order to strengthen the effect of suppression and make up for the lack of suppression effect caused by the lack of catapults, 10,000 cavalry archers rushed to within 100 paces of the city and shot arrows at the head of the city with strong bows to suppress them, making up for the gap in the suppression ability of catapults.

Under the suppression of strong firepower, the Tang army had to withdraw from the city again. Hundreds of carts loaded with mud, sand, rocks and straw bales were able to advance to the moat and fill the moat.

Each back and forth of hundreds of carts pushed the temporary embankment on the moat more than ten feet. It only takes three trips to build a mud and stone embankment over the moat. Although the Tang Army's Shenwei artillery continued to bombard in order to stop during this period, it also caused many casualties and damage to vehicles. But Gao Xiuyan was unmoved, and gave a death order for the soldiers to dump truckloads of mud and sand into the moat.

Half an hour later, the siege catapults were heavily damaged, and the suppressive force was seriously insufficient. By the time the Tang army had been able to begin to show its head at the head of the city and fight back with bows and arrows, twenty mud and stone dikes about a hundred zhang wide had been brought together to form a wide road more than twenty or thirty zhang wide across the moat.

In this way, the road is unimpeded and there is no bombardment of thunderbolts. Thunder bombs that fall on them will blow up some potholes at most, but it is absolutely impossible to destroy them. Moreover, such a wide passage, to put it mildly, is the charge of soldiers, and even the rushing cars can pass through a dozen cars side by side and go straight to the city. In order to build this road, the rebels paid the price of several hundred casualties and more than a hundred carts and hundreds of livestock. But both Gao Xiuyan and Shi Siming believe that it is worth it.

After the construction of the passage was completed, the catapults were basically scrapped, and the rest were all withdrawn from the battlefield. 10,000 cavalry archers also retreated out of the range of the Don army. Suddenly, the city was eerily quiet.

It was already early afternoon, and the sun was shining brightly overhead, and although it was only late April, the temperature of the sun was already scorching. The air was filled with the smell of dust and blood, as well as the stench of dead corpses and the smell of gunpowder bursting with thunder bullets.

Several vultures hovered high in the air, and the two bold ones could not resist the temptation of the corpses under the city, and actually swooped down and fell to the ground, intending to peck at the flesh and blood. However, before they could enjoy the taste of meat, they were startled by the sound of a horn that broke the silence.

A long horn sounded in the front line of the rebels, which was the signal for Gao Xiuyan to attack. But seeing that more than 40,000 siege soldiers of the rebel army began to move forward slowly, lined up in a phalanx one by one, their footsteps were neat, and there was a sound of stomping on the ground.

Gao Xiuyan's attack method was completely different from Shi Siming's method just now, Shi Siming just waved his hand, and the soldiers rushed forward in a straggler formation, while Gao Xiuyan was one board and one eye, and even the formation of the attack had to be kept neat.

"Knock knock." Rows of soldiers neatly walked hundreds of steps to approach the city, compared to the rush of a swarm, this kind of calm phalanx march has a more oppressive and shocking force, the soldiers in the city are holding their breath and concentrating on their expressions.

"Archer prepare!" Song Jiangong shouted in a low voice.

Tens of thousands of arrows and arrows protruded from the notches of the battlements, facing the ranks of rebel siege soldiers advancing in unison below, and once they reached range, they would fire a volley of arrows into a hornet's nest.

"Are the rebels stupid? Isn't such a dense formation a self-defeating one? A single shot of a bow and arrow can destroy a phalanx of them. I don't know who whispered.

This sentence is also a doubt in the hearts of everyone in the city. Dense formations are very disadvantageous when besieging a city. Archers can fire with impunity, without even aiming. Even if the skirmish formation is concentrated by archers, the casualties caused in an area are actually very limited.

However, the rebel siege soldiers under the city soon answered their questions. After entering the range of the Tang army's bows and arrows within more than 100 steps, the formation of the rebels suddenly changed, from marching in unison to a phalanx of formations. And almost instantly, a black shield reflecting the light suddenly appeared above the phalanx of more than a thousand soldiers. The shields covered the soldiers' heads like sturdy scales. More than 1,000 soldiers and horses were covered by shields, and the entire team suddenly turned into a crawling turtle, slowly advancing towards the city.

"!" Song Jiangong scolded and tentatively ordered: "Release the arrow." ”

A dense rain of arrows poured down from the city walls, and the turtle formation at the front was shot by thousands of feathered arrows, but the sound of clanging beans was incessant, and the arrows bounced around the shield, and all but a few dozen arrows were bounced into the gaps in the shield. The shield array walked slowly, leaving only a dozen corpses behind them.

Everyone was dumbfounded, the shield formation is indeed the nemesis of archers, even a wooden shield can block the shot of the bow and arrow, not to mention that these soldiers are holding iron shields in their hands.

The first group of rebel shields reached the passage in the moat, and although the head of the city was raining arrows, it did not affect them much. However, when they crossed the moat, they suddenly stopped, and did not go straight under the walls. The shield shifts, and the personnel return to their positions. The ranks became long, and the shields above their heads became even more dense, one on top of the other, airtight.

"What are they doing here?" The people at the head of the city were stunned.

Wang Yuan frowned and looked at the city for a long time, suddenly raised his eyebrows, and sighed: "Good way, really good way." I didn't expect the shield to be so useful. I've learned a hand. ”

"Dashuai, what are they going to do. The end will be confused. The crowd hurriedly asked.

Wang Yuan nodded and said, "Just now I was still thinking, how expensive these iron shields are, even if An Lushan has abundant materials, it is still painful to cast these iron shields." It's almost impossible to have one hand. This thing is not very combat-effective, it is too heavy, who can slash and kill soldiers with a shield in one hand and another hand? Therefore, they could only get a few thousand soldiers to attack the city at most, because they could only forge a few thousand of these shields. What's the use of a few thousand men attacking a city? However, they used a clever trick, if I am not mistaken, the shield soldiers of the second team in the back will be connected to the shields in the first row, so that thousands of shield soldiers can form a long corridor to resist bows and arrows and reach the city under our Tongzhou City, and the siege soldiers who are not equipped with shields in the back can calmly pass through the passage and attack the city beyond the range of our arrows. ”

"Huh?" The generals were dumbfounded, what else could they do? Build an anti-arrow corridor with a shield? It's a real second move. In this way, the archers at the head of the city will not all be furnished, and they will no longer be able to slaughter them with bows and arrows.

As if to prove Wang Yuan's guess, several shield phalanxes under the city quickly began to change, and soon, as Wang Yuan guessed, a shield passage of more than 100 steps to the other side of the moat and beyond the range of the Tang army was built, like a black python winding under the city. The enemy army waved the flag, the drumbeat of the attack became dense and noisy, and the rebel soldiers entered the entrance of the python one after another, and more than a dozen at a time could enter at the same time, which showed that there were more than a dozen passages inside. Like an oolong swallowing water, thousands of soldiers soon entered the belly of the python, and soon they rushed out from the other side of the python, which was already twenty paces below the city wall. Once you rush out, you only need to count your breath and enter the dead end of the city wall.

In a short period of time, the rebels arrived under the city wall unscathed, and they quickly spread out along the wall to both sides, looking for a suitable location to take the ladder. All of a sudden, the situation became critical.

The defenders at the head of the city threw stones and arrows, after all, there were only a few feet of dead space under the city wall, and once there were too many people, there was nowhere to hide. But archery at the base of the city wall is a technical task, and you have to look beyond the battlements and aim down with a bow and arrow. In doing so, he would be exposing himself to the bows and arrows of the rebels below. Hundreds of archers of the Divine Strategy Army were shot by the bows and arrows below because they leaned out, and fell from the city screaming.

Moreover, as the siege ladders were erected one by one, the rebel soldiers had begun to climb the city walls, and bows and arrows were no longer useful at this time, after all, it took time to bend bows and shoot arrows, and the gap in the middle was enough for the siege rebels to climb to the top of the city. At this time, melee weapons are king, and spears are much more useful than bows and arrows. But in this way, they fell into a situation where they could not stop the rebels from attacking the city continuously. Although the city wall can be guaranteed to be not lost for the time being, when the rebels attack the city in large numbers, thousands of ladders are erected, and thousands of places need to be defended, then the rebels who have an absolute advantage in strength will almost have the chance to win.

What is urgent to do is to cut off the passage of the rebels' attack and use a large number of bows and arrows to prevent the rebels from rushing to the city, so that the more than 10,000 soldiers under the city will become a lone army again, without reinforcements from the rebels in the rear, they are not enough to pose a threat to the city.