"Take the camp first, and then attack the south gate!"

"Then can you divide your troops to attack the rest of the gates and disperse the officers and soldiers?"

"No need, there are many rivers and lakes outside the city of Xiuzhou, if we divide our troops, the officers and soldiers will go out of the city to attack, our contact and rescue will remain unchanged, if there is a setback, I am afraid that the morale will be defeated!"

Fang Qifei nodded, and Demon King Zheng's words pointed out the advantages and disadvantages of Fang Lajun, the advantage was that there were many people, and the number was almost unlimited. The disadvantage is the lack of combat experience and weapons, poor organization, the will to fight is not resolute enough, once defeated, it is easy to have a rout, there are lakes and rivers outside the city of Xiuzhou, if the rebel army divides troops to surround the four gates, the defenders can take advantage of the mobility of the inner line, choose the weak and break through, while the Fang La army will be blocked by the river, it is difficult to support each other. Once they saw that their own side was defeated, Fang La's army was prone to low morale. It's better to honestly seize the camp first, and then attack the south gate, and fight with them to consume, anyway, there is no shortage of people on their side.

"What Brother Zheng said is very true!" Fang Qifei clapped his palms and ordered the herald on the side: "Give the order to go down, beat the drum, and let the first part of the left wing attack the camp first!" ”

With the rumbling drums, thousands of Manichaeans began to move forward slowly, these were Fang Qifei's direct subordinates, and they were much stronger than the other leaders in terms of training and weapons. The reason why he let his team take the lead is not only in the hope of getting off to a good start, but also because the other leaders have no excuse to retain their strength and refuse to fight. Whoever cowered next, he cut off his head and had nothing to say.

"The Mani thief is coming!" Chang Zongtian said in a low voice. Zhou Ping nodded silently, only to see in the morning fog that had gradually dissipated. A group of Manichae thieves wearing red scarves slowly pressed towards the camp, their equipment was very rudimentary, many of them only had short knives and bamboo guns in their hands, almost no one had armor, and the biggest defense was a wooden sign hanging on their chests or a makeshift rattan card. However, the number of attacking sides alone could put a lot of pressure on the defenders, and the sound of their recitations could be faintly heard in the wind. A poem suddenly flashed in Zhou Ping's mind: "For example, the morning dew, the days are bitter!" ”

"Ready!"

Seeing that the Manichaean army had entered the range of the crossbow, Chang Zongtian, who was the overseer, gave the order, and one of the archers took a few steps forward, drew the bow and shot a chirp diagonally upward. The arrows whistled sharply and flew forward. Fall three or four steps ahead of the Manichaean thief.

"Shooter hands up!" As the leader of the group shouted loudly, rows of archers stepped forward in a horizontal row, took arrows from their backs and stuck them in the ground, and every two or three men a step ahead of them had a clay pot and a torch stuck in the ground. The archers dipped their arrows twice in the clay pots. Light it on a torch. Rack up the arrows and wait for the order of the team.

"Put!"

A burst of rockets rained down on Fang Lajun's head. Immediately there was a scream from the crowd, and sharp arrows pierced the torso, tearing muscles, and those who were shot immediately fell to the ground, but some unfortunate people were nailed to the ground by the arrows falling from the air, unable to move. The flames even set fire to the clothes on many people's bodies, and they instinctively fluttered the flames, and the ranks of Fang Lajun's army suddenly became chaotic.

"Damn, let the officers and soldiers take the lead, hurry up the drums and wave the flag!" Fang Qifei scolded. It turns out that the general story, whether it is a cavalry attack on the enemy's formation, is never to run wildly at the beginning, which will not only waste the physical strength of soldiers and horses, but also make the formation chaotic. It is common to start charging at the edge of the range of the enemy crossbowman, which can reduce casualties and conserve more stamina. However, Fang Qifei used the range of bows and arrows of the southern official army he encountered before as a reference, but he didn't expect that most of the crossbowmen of Zhou Ping's army were the elite of the Western army, and they used a strong bow that was at least more than one stone, and its range was naturally not comparable to the soft bows used by the weak southern Song army.

Pressed by the rapid sound of drums and the leaders, the Manichaeans began to run briskly. The goal of the vast majority of the people is the gate between the two protruding sharp corners, the reason is very simple, and the protruding sharp corners on both sides are too narrow, and there are ditches and earthen walls to protect it, even if they take it, they will not be able to deploy enough troops to capture the wall, only the capture of the gate can allow the outside Manichaeans to pour into the wall, and give full play to their numerical advantage. Although the officers and soldiers rained down arrows, the Manichaeans were so numerous that they soon rushed to the trench and threw bundles of firewood and dirt bags into the trench, or simply built a simple bridge over the trench with a dozen spears, in an attempt to cross the trench to the gate of the village.

"Divine Arm Archer step forward!"

With the sound of the order, the long-recuperated God Arm Archers boarded the earthen ramparts on both sides, and began to shoot at the Manichaeans crowded near the walled gate, and the powerful crossbow arrows were shot on people's heads, and many crossbow arrows even penetrated two or even three people, in order to make up for the lack of numbers and save the physical strength of the archers, Zhou Ping selected hundreds of strong men from the city to specialize in crossbows. The crossbow bolts rained down without stopping, and the guards also threw the torches and fireballs on the heads of the enemy, and the disciples could no longer bear such blows, so they dropped their weapons and turned to flee.

"Stop!" Zhou Ping issued an order, ordering the shooters to retreat and rest and wait for the second attack of the enemy.

"Second Formation!" Fang Qifei's face was a little ugly, but he still immediately issued the order to attack,

With the rumbling drums, the second wave of Fang La's army began to move forward slowly, this time Fang Qifei learned his lesson, he gave the order at the right time, and after a few more minutes of the second wave of attacks, it broke down again.

"The third formation!"

……

"Sixth Formation!"

Fang Qifei's face was already iron-blue, the time was already in the afternoon, and it could be seen that the corpses in front of the village had accumulated a thick layer, but the only result was only to fill in a trench in front of the wall. This was completely different from what he had expected. Without turning his head, he could also see that the big and small leaders on both sides were pale and uneasy, obviously these guys were no longer willing to pay the price for this small camp.

"Sixth Formation!" Fang Qifei raised his voice, but no one responded loudly, his eyes widened, and he shouted to a lean man next to him: "Yang Batong, why don't you take the order!" ”

The thin man sneered and said, "Lao Tzu brought people here to kill officials and rebel, and lead the sons and daughters to make a fortune, but he didn't come to be a target for officers and soldiers!" You drive people into the gate, and shoot them with crossbows on both sides, no matter how many people you are, there are not enough people for you to fill! ”

Seeing that the other party was like this, Fang Qifei didn't get angry but laughed: "So you are going to disobey!" ”

"Don't scare me with this thing!" Yang Batong whistled, and immediately dozens of men surrounded him, obviously all of them were his henchmen: "At most, one shot or two will be scattered, and Lao Tzu will have thousands of people under him, so that the court will recruit at least one charger!" ”

"You-" Fang Qifei was furious when he heard this, and he was about to draw his knife with his backhand, and Yang Batong also drew his sword when he saw it, and the high ground suddenly became tense, looking like he was about to fight.

"Put down your knives!" Demon King Zheng walked between the two groups of people with his arms folded and shouted: "They are all disciples of Mingzun, what does this mean!" ”

Seeing that there were few people on his side, Yang Batong snorted coldly and put the knife into the sheath. Demon King Zheng's gaze turned to Fang Qifei, Fang Qifei snorted coldly, and motioned for his subordinates to put down their weapons. Demon King Zheng nodded slightly: "Rank, it's not early today, so let's call here." Prepare more equipment and attack the village again! ”

"Finally retreated!" Seeing that the enemy's banner began to slowly move backwards, Zhou Ping finally breathed a sigh of relief. As far as the eye could see, the open space was stacked with corpses, and the goose feathers at the tail of the arrows were connected together, as if it had fallen heavily as if it had snowed, especially the one in front of the camp gate, where the corpses were almost piled up into a hill.

"Yes! If you continue to use arrows like this, even if you have enough arrows, you won't have the strength to draw a bow! Chang Zongtian sighed, as he said, although Zhou Pingcheng requisitioned more than 1,000 people to wind the crossbowmen and the divine arm archers, but the archers had to rely on their own physical strength, and in the later waves, the trench in front of the walled gate had already been filled, and the Manichaeans rushed directly to the walled gate. If they come two or three more times, I'm afraid Zhou Ping and the others will have to abandon the camp and retreat to the city.

"Let the soldiers all retreat and rest, as for the arrows, let the people come out and collect them, and by the way, clean up the corpses." Zhou Ping looked at the corpses everywhere outside the gate and sighed: "Fortunately, it's winter, if you come down at night in summer, you have to have an epidemic!" ”

"Seeing the scenes of life and death in his poverty, rich, and rich, he knows that all things in Maha are empty, and there is no permanent birth, and he is willing to get rid of this shell and go away......"

According to Zhou Ping's order, two hundred people carefully came out of the side door, collected the arrows, and piled up the corpses, the corpses on the ground made these people who lived in peace not long ago very frightened, several monks in the city followed behind the people, stood in front of the corpses, poured clear oil and lit them, stood aside and chanted Buddhist scriptures to pray for the blessings of these dead people, all around the soldiers or people, all bowed to it devoutly, and there was a faint mourning from afar, It was the Manichaeans doing the rituals for their dead robes. Seeing this bleak scene, listening to the Buddhist scriptures and the mourning in the distance, and smelling the disgusting smell of corpses, Zhou Ping couldn't help but sigh, and then closed his eyes and prayed: "No matter who you were in life, I just hope that you can be reborn in a peaceful era after death and be able to live a happy life, instead of being like now, like a morning dew mayfly, you will be wiped out in a moment!" (To be continued......)