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Twenty strong men with naked bodies waved their muscular arms and struck a one-man high war drum, and the low sound of war drums suddenly sounded, one after another, although the rhythm was not fast, but it was beating in people's hearts, and the heartbeat responded to the drum sound, becoming more powerful, pushing the blood to the limbs and hundreds of bones. Pen × fun × Pavilion www. ｂｉｑｕｇｅ。 ｉｎｆｏ

Listening to the majestic drumming, Sun Feng felt that his temples were pounding, his scalp felt numb, his hands and feet were a little swollen, and a stream of true qi was slowly flowing between the meridians, gurgling sound. This was the first time he had read to command a battle, and although the overall plan had been discussed with his father and uncle countless times, and his experienced uncle would be his deputy to guide him, he was still a little nervous. The first time you command an operation, you can command an army of 200,000, and I don't think there are many people in the world who can have such an opportunity.

Sun Feng clearly knew that if he could win this battle, his future would be bright, and all of this was paved for him by his father.

Sun Feng couldn't help but think of his uncle Sun Deng, he was also helped on the war horse by his father step by step, and he began to fight on the battlefield from a dozen steps, but now he is nesting in Yuzhang to burn porcelain, it is said that because he is too focused on burning porcelain, his health is very bad, and he coughs up blood at a young age. Sun Feng knew very well that it was not tired at all, it was angry.

I was lucky that I didn't meet a father like Sun Quan, on the contrary, my father did everything he could to establish his prestige here in order for him to gain a firm foothold here. And all of this was originally his glory, but he gave it to himself without reservation.

No matter what, I'm going to win this battle. Sun Feng clenched his fists, suppressed his excitement, and shouted: "Order, the two wings will start attacking!" ”

Du Yu turned around in a "whoosh", walked to the side of the stage, stood facing east, waved the command flag, and issued an order to the Romans on the left. Quintus received the news, returned to the flag, and immediately gave the order to attack. Du Yu turned around again, walked to the side of the platform on the west side, and gave the order to attack the Kushan people on the right. Bo Tuo received the order and also gave the order to attack.

The phalanx of two Roman legions marched in orderly steps, and in the front row were warriors with large one-man shields, their shields so heavy that they could only take two steps to the beat of the drum and then stop. Behind them was a row of spear-wielding warriors, who pointed their spears flat and pointed forward, forming a forest of spears in front of the shield-wielding warriors. Immediately behind were two rows of Han crossbowmen, holding a clear style of crossbows, the arrows on the crossbows pointed diagonally forward and upward, and their fingers resting on the crossbow machine, ready to fire at any time.

Behind these four rows of warriors were siege engines propelled by slaves. The siege vehicle was huge, and the front and left sides were covered with thick wooden planks, and the thick wood protruded at least two feet out of the plank, so as to prevent the enemy from bombarding the planks with ballistas, and protect the warriors hiding inside as much as possible. There are many holes in the planks so that the archers can shoot inside without having to open the planks. The siege engines were divided into four cities, the top floor was a passage for the warriors who climbed the city, the lower two layers were filled with two hundred archers, and the bottom layer was empty for the slaves who pushed the siege to hide, and each siege vehicle was equipped with eight huge wheels, which were also hidden inside the body to avoid being attacked by the enemy.

Sixty siege engines were spread out on the battlefield less than two miles, and the two siege engines were about twenty paces apart, maintaining the same pace forward, although the speed was not fast, but the pressure brought by it was very small. Looking at the siege vehicles slowly approaching like moving city walls, the Sassanids in the city couldn't help but gasp.

Ardashir frowned, could it be that their artillery was so short that they actually wanted to forcibly attack the city directly with siege engines?

Soon, Ardashir saw the ballista. Behind the siege vehicles, a row of ballistas was launched. They hid behind the siege engines, and only the long cannon poles could be seen. Ardashir frowned, he understood the other party's intentions, the siege vehicles were just cover, and they used this fortified siege vehicle as a cover for the ballista to offset the defect of the attacker's ballista cannon was not enough to conceal the surname.

Both sides of the siege have ballistae, because the power of the ballista is huge, so as soon as a battle starts, both sides will destroy the opponent's ballista first. The city's ballista has an inherent advantage in this regard, it can be placed inside the city from the enemy's view, and the wall's observer can see the effect of the blow, and adjust the counterweight and angle according to this effect. The other party can only estimate the position of these ballista cannons according to the flight path of the cannons and implement them, which is not a small gap from seeing it with their own eyes. The attacker's ballista cannons were not covered, so they could only be exposed to the opponent's blows, and the probability of loss was far greater than that of the defending side. Now Sun Bong is using the super anti-strike siege vehicle as a movable cover, which can largely make up for this disadvantage, giving the ballista more safety and allowing them to work with confidence.

Ardashir sighed, he wanted to use the negotiation to stall for time, but now it seems that the goal has not been achieved, and the other party has also used the negotiation time to do a lot of preparation. He waved his hand and gave the order to attack.

The trumpets sounded, and with a shout, the ballistas hidden in the city began to roar, and the stones flew over the walls and pounced on the enemies outside the city.

"Stand shield—" Menoluffis raised his sword, the herald standing beside him waved the colored flag in his hand, and the drummer beat the war drum, bringing the order to the ears of the warriors in the phalanx. The shield that walked in front immediately stopped, stood the huge shield on the ground, propped up the pole, and then hid his whole body in the shield, and the spear-wielding warriors behind stepped forward and half-crouched, and the crossbowmen also rushed forward, hiding themselves under the shield as much as possible.

"Boom-" Most of the heavy cannons fell in front of the phalanx, and the earth trembled, transmitting the power of the cannonstone blows through the earth to everyone's psyche.

The Roman warrior gritted his teeth and looked at the smoke and dust stirred up by the artillery stones in front of the battle, although nervous, he did not panic.

A piece of artillery flew over the head of the phalanx and struck the front side of the siege engine, but it was blocked by two huge wooden pillars, making a loud noise, and the entire siege vehicle was shaken. However, although the protruding bark trees were hit hard, they did not break, and the whole siege vehicle quickly regained its calm after shaking a little, and the imposing artillery stones were bounced out and fell weakly to the ground.

"Forward!" In the interval after the ballista attack, the Romans picked up speed and galloped forward. Run three or five steps before the next wave of ballistas arrive, and as soon as you hear the drum sound, stop and hide yourself. Unhurried, they took advantage of the apparent gap between the bolts to push forward, eventually pushing the siege engine within a hundred and fifty paces of the walls. Having reached the position, they did not move forward, but retreated behind the siege engines. The ballistaemen immediately pushed the ballista into place and began to return fire, while others went to pick up the Sassanid stones they had just shot and reassembled them with the prepared bales.

They were in good order, and although the Sassanid ballistas began to wield their might, the stones flew in the air, and from time to time someone was struck and let out a terrible scream, they still kept their heads buried in their own business, and only tried to protect themselves from injury.

The ballista began to roar, throwing bricks or mud balls wrapped in straw bales into the sky and striking at the city of Tessie. With the siege vehicles in front of them as cover, the safety of the ballista crews has been greatly improved, and they can calmly do their job and shoot in an orderly manner.

At the same time as the Romans attacked, the Kushans also attacked, and the two sides went back and forth, fighting very lively, and the space was intertwined with artillery and stones, like flying locusts.

While the warriors in front were fighting, a group of soldiers ran out from the battle formations of the Romans and Kushans, who did not take weapons, but in groups of two, carrying stretchers composed of two pieces of wood and one cloth, braving the artillery stones that could kill at any moment, and galloped among the wounded warriors, skillfully carrying the wounded warriors onto the stretchers, and then running back in a puff of smoke. Behind the command station was a makeshift ambulance hospital, in which wounded fighters were carried for emergency treatment.

This was also proposed by Lu Xun and Sun Feng, the wounded soldiers wailing on the battlefield will not only interfere with the attention of others, but also affect morale, carry them down for treatment, let the military craftsmen, military records and people take care of them, so that the soldiers have less screams in their ears, and at the same time, they feel that even if they are injured, they will not wait for death, but can enjoy the care of those military soldiers, which is very effective in calming people's hearts.

Both flanks fought, except for the Han Chinese position facing the city gate in the middle, which was silent. The Han warriors lined up in a phalanx stood silently outside the range of the Sassanid ballistas, although they did not make any moves, but the silence brought great psychological pressure to the Sassanids at the head of the city. A fiery red ram rattled in the air, reminding the Sassanids of the miracle they had seen last night.

Did Ahura, the god of light, really abandon Ardashir? Quite a few people have this thought swirling in their minds.

The Sassanids sent out a few cannons, but unfortunately the range was not enough, except for a few puffs of smoke and dust, they did not give the other party any touch, and the cannons that rolled themselves over the position had a taste of ridicule, like a person singing and dancing, but no one responded, and everyone was as bored as if he did not exist. Ardashir stopped this uselessness in time, and treated it with the same silence.

The attack on both sides became more and more intense, and after a hundred and fifty paces, the Sassanid bows and arrows were disabled, and both sides were left to attack with ballistae, both wanting to gain an advantage with ballistae before the siege hand-to-hand combat. To some extent, the attackers even had a certain advantage, because the arrows fired from more than sixty siege engines actually crossed a distance of one hundred and fifty paces and went directly to the head of the city. This far exceeded the expectations of the Sassanids, and in the first wave of arrows, many of the Sassanians who were looking at the city were severely defeated.

This worries Ardashir very much.

Whether it is the Kushan people or the Romans, their bows and arrows are similar to the Sassanids, mainly holding bows, and the range of riding bows is sixty or seventy steps, which is not used at all when attacking the city, while the range of the infantry is about 100 steps, which is the main force in the siege, and the range of torque crossbow arrows can reach more than 200 steps, and the accuracy is also high, but the rate of fire of torque crossbow arrows is slow, and it can only be used to hit key targets as a weapon of destruction, and cannot be used as a weapon to suppress the surname, and the important surname is not as good as a ballista.

Now, however, arrows with a range of more than 150 paces were fired from siege vehicles.

Ardashir knew that the Han people had a weapon called a crossbow, which could reach more than 150 paces by manpower, and the farthest could even be compared to a ballista, which he had seen under the city of Axum. However, this powerful weapon is usually not provided to others, and even the Allies may not be able to share it.

Well, there are only two explanations for the current situation, either the Han Chinese joined the camp of the Romans and Kushans and took on the task of shooting, or the Han Chinese taught the Romans and Kushans this sharp weapon. In any case, this is not a good thing for the Sassanids.

Ardashir was inexplicably a little irritable, did he really do something wrong? Sun Shao led the Four-Nation Alliance, did he really plan to be peaceful in the world and share wealth?

"King, there is no movement in the city." A centurion of the Immortals hurried up to the city wall and whispered in Ardashir's ear. Ardashir raised his eyebrows: "They didn't come to dig?" ”

"I don't know." The centurion frowned in confusion: "Could it be that they found out that we were waiting for them?" ”

"Discovery?" Ardashir sneered, thought for a while, and then said, "Impossible. Don't relax, I guess they're going to wait until the siege begins, to hide the movement. ”

"Yes." The centurion bowed and retreated.

Ardashir looked at the Han position in the distance and couldn't help sneering, it seems that you also know that digging tunnels can't hide people, and you want to rely on the sound of siege to cover up? You treat me as a fool, and you don't have any precautions.

Just when Ardashir was secretly proud, a drum beat suddenly remembered on the Han people's position, Ardashir sneered in his heart, and immediately gave the order to prepare for battle.

With the rumbling of drums, siege engines covered by shieldmen, spearmen, and crossbowmen were also introduced on the Han Chinese positions, and behind the siege vehicles were also ballistas, which were not much different from the positions of the Romans and Kushans, but the density was much larger and the number of people was much larger. Ardashir did not dare to slack off, and immediately ordered more ballistas to turn around and prepare to compete with the Han Chinese.

Cao Zhi was on the left, Li Yan was on the right, and nearly 20,000 soldiers were arranged on the battlefield with a width of 100 steps, and the black pressure was particularly terrifying. The Han people not only had more people, but the number of siege vehicles and ballistas was also significantly more than that of the Romans and Kushans, Sun Feng discharged forty siege vehicles and a hundred ballistas at once, and the siege vehicles painted with fiery red planks in front of them were almost crowded together, leaving only room for one person to walk, and pushed forward like a moving wall of fire, the kind of self-evident coercion made people a little breathless, and the beating pattern seemed to make people feel the heat of the flames.

The Han Chinese were particularly arrogant, and they pushed their position forward one hundred and fifty paces, another hundred paces, and then within eighty paces, and just when Ardashir thought they would stay, they pushed to within fifty paces in the city's dense ballista cannons.

Ardashir was taken aback, could it be that Sun Feng was going to attack the city directly like this? He immediately ordered the archers at the head of the city to start firing to prevent the enemy from approaching further, and at the same time dropped a large number of troops near the city gate to prevent the enemy from forcibly attacking the city.

It was here that the Han people stopped, the soldiers retreated behind the siege engines, and a hundred ballistas began to wield their might, hitting the walls one by one.

The two sides began to fight fiercely, at such a close distance, not only the ballistae began to attack, but even the archers were engaged in the battle, the archers in the city kept pulling their bows and firing arrows, and the crossbowmen hidden in the siege vehicles were not to be outdone, and poured urgent and dense arrows into the city, and the long arrows shot the wooden shields of the Sassanids, and from time to time arrows passed through the gaps between the shields and shot at the Sassanids. These arrows were so powerful that they could easily pierce the iron armor worn by the Sassanids, and the soldiers who wore only leather armor were even more miserable.

The strong arrow array of the Han people suppressed the Sassanids at the head of the city, and the situation at the head of the city immediately became tense, and Ardashir immediately called in more shieldmen and ordered them to form shields one after another to provide cover for the archers at the head of the city and save the decline. At the same time, the ballista in the order was transferred to the city gate to strengthen the defense of the city gate.

Under the command of Ardashir, the Sassanids formed a dense defensive formation at the head of the city, and they either relied on the city walls or shields, and fired arrows as fast as possible, counterattacking with dense arrow formations, and finally saved a little bit of the situation.

Cao Zhi saw that the two sides were stale, regardless of the obstruction of the guards, rushed to the top layer of the front siege vehicle, pushed open the top cover, and suddenly appeared on top of the siege vehicle. Before the siege began, the top floor of the modified siege vehicle was unmanned, and it was covered with thick wooden planks to avoid being broken by enemy artillery, and it was not until it approached the city wall that the roof was opened, and the warriors rushed up to the city through the closed staircase to fight hand-to-hand. Now Cao Zhi suddenly pushed open the top cover and jumped up, and no one on either side thought of it.

The Sassanid archers at the head of the city were the first to spot the Han general, and after a few words, they immediately shot long arrows.

The long arrow roared, and Cao Zhi's personal guards were so frightened that they immediately rushed in front of Cao Zhi and set up their shields.

"Pounce!" "Pounce!" "Pounce!"

Almost instantly, dozens of long arrows shot at the shield, and the two guards only cared about guarding Cao Zhi, but they exposed themselves to the enemy's arrow rain, snorted one after another, and fell to the ground. The guards who rushed up from behind didn't bother to say much, several people raised their shields to block the front, and two people grabbed Cao Zhi and prepared to stuff him back into the siege vehicle. Cao Zhi was furious and struggled desperately, the two guards looked up and saw a black dot flying out of the city, flying in this direction, knowing that the enemy's ballista had already discovered them, they didn't have time to think about it, they lifted Cao Zhi and stuffed it into the exit and threw it directly.

With a loud roar, a huge arrow hit first, easily splitting a huge shield, and the long arrow continued to gain momentum, and then shot through the body of the guard. The guard didn't even have time to open his mouth, and another huge shield was shot, and the spear-like arrow cut his neck at once, and shot the roof of the siege vehicle, making a loud "bang". In a few moments, another cannon flew in, smashing the three guards who were scrambling to flee back to the siege vehicle.

Cao Zhi was overwhelmed by the defense, and was suddenly dizzy, he jumped up, but did not scold, nor did he look at the guards who were heavily damaged by the enemy above, he rushed to the back of the siege vehicle, stretched out his head, and shouted at the ballista men hidden behind the siege vehicle: "Change the oil bomb!" ”

When the ballista men heard this, they immediately threw down the bales in their hands and replaced them with oil cans that were next to them. Cao Zhi then yelled at the ballista men next to him, and passed the orders one by one, and it didn't take long for even the ballista crewmen on Li Yan's side to get the order, and all of them removed the straw bales and replaced them with oil cans.

The Sassanids at the head of the city were not aware of the danger, and when several oil cans fell on the city walls and shattered, they laughed disdainfully, saying that the Han people were bluffing and filling the cannons with this kind of thing, until the black, viscous oil flowed everywhere in the city, and they realized that something was wrong. The Sassanids are no strangers to this viscous oil, which can often be seen in the desert, and many people even use this oil for lighting, knowing that this oil is difficult to extinguish when burned, and the smoke is particularly large.

As soon as Ardashir saw the oil on the ground, he immediately felt his scalp tingle, and a cool air rushed down his spine to the back of his head, and he raised his head to see the dense crowd at the head of the city, he opened his mouth and let out a hissing roar:

"Spread out - beware of enemy fire—"

It's a pity he shouted too late.

In fact, there was no need for Ardashir to shout, the Sassanid soldiers at the head of the city had already realized what was going to happen, and they wanted to evacuate very much, but it was not so easy. The oil canisters that fell from the sky smashed one after another on the city wall, and the black and viscous oil flowed everywhere, and the city walls and people were covered with this oil. The Sassanids were so frightened that they threw down their weapons and fled, and the Judge Advocate Corps could not stop this defeat from killing dozens of men. It's just that the chaos not only does not help to evacuate, but increases the difficulty of escaping, countless Sassanians huddle together, pushing each other, crying, not only to guard against the oil cans that are constantly flying from the world, but also to guard against the feet, if you are not careful, you will slip, as long as you slip, you will never have a chance to get up, you can only be trampled to death by the crowd of supporters. In order to escape, many people simply jumped from the five-zhang high city.

As a batch of rockets rained down from the sky, igniting the black oil everywhere, the city was on fire. The fire burned more and more fiercely, and quickly spread to the bottom of the city, and the entire city gate soon became a sea of fire.

Ardashir was dumbfounded.

(To be continued)