According to the agreement reached between the Sui and Tang dynasties in Chang'an, the Northern Sui would acquiesce to the Tang army attacking Xiao Mi's army, and in fact, the Tang Dynasty had been preparing for this for a year, besieging the southern county from three directions: Yiling County, Jingling County, and Chuyang County. Pen ~ fun ~ pavilion www.biquge.info

At the beginning of February, when the Northern Sui naval army withdrew from Nanjun, the Tang army, under the leadership of the commander Li Xiaogong, launched a fierce attack on Nanjun from three directions at the same time.

Jiangxia governor Qu Tutong took the lead in capturing Baling County, Jin King Dong Jingzhen offered Baling City to surrender Qu Tutong, Qu Tutong immediately went west along the Yangtze River into Nanjun, and defeated the Liang army's big tent Lei Changying and Zhou Faming's army, Lei Changying died in the chaos, and Zhou Faming surrendered to the Tang army.

The Western Route Army was personally led by Li Xiaogong, and the Liang army general Wen Shihong fought at the mouth of the Qingjiang River, Li Xiaogong defeated his army, captured hundreds of large and small warships, captured Yichang, Dangyang, Zhijiang, Songzi and other counties, Xiao Milling's Jiangzhou governor Gai Yan surrendered in Zhijiang County.

The first route of Jingling County was led by Wang Renshou, the general of the Tang Army, and successively conquered Zilin and Anxing counties, and in late February, the three roads of 100,000 Tang troops joined the Jiangling City and surrounded the Jiangling City.

At this time, Xiao Mo only had less than 10,000 troops left, and he forced Jiangling Qingzhuang to join the army, and he had 30,000 elite soldiers to defend Jiangling City, and at the same time sent envoys to Luoyang and Zhongdu for help.

The time gradually came to the end of April, the Tang army besieged the city for two months, the food in the city gradually cut off, Xiao Milling concentrated all the grain, implemented the rationing system, each person only had one rice per day to live, the hungry people wailed, the morale collapsed, and there were constantly soldiers fleeing, only Xiao Mill caught and beheaded the soldiers to show the public amounted to 3,000 people.

By the end of April, all the 30,000 elite soldiers recruited had fled, and only 8,000 troops loyal to Xiao Mo remained.

Although the city was completely breachable, the Tang army still did not move because the commander Li Xiaogong received a holy decree ordering Li Xiaogong to recover the other counties, and the task of attacking Jiangling City was transferred to Li Shimin, the king of Qin.

At the beginning of May, Li Shimin and his brother Li Yuanba rushed from Chang'an to Jiangling City, and handed over to Li Xiaogong, and Li Shimin officially became the commander of the attack on Nanjun.

Regarding the change of commanders, the generals of the Tang Army remained silent, and even the ordinary soldiers could see that this was the Son of Heaven who wanted to give the credit for breaking Jiangling to the King of Qin, seeing that the destruction of Jiangling was imminent, this credit was handed over to the King of Qin, but in the army besieging Jiangling on three roads, Qu Tutong and Wang Renshou were both Li Shimin's factions, and Li Xiaogong led the army to clear the remnants of Xiao Milling in various counties, leaving these two armies to attack Jiangling, and it was natural for Li Shimin to be in command, so it was not too strange.

At dusk, Li Shimin accompanied by Qu Tutong came to the north city, which was guarded by Lei Shimeng and was also an important part of the Tang army's attack, and the moat outside the north city had been filled with mud by the Tang army, and the army could directly rush under the drawbridge.

Li Shimin looked at it for a while, and found that there seemed to be important generals observing him at the head of the city, so he turned back to the two personal soldiers and said: "Go to the head of the city, just say that the final decisive battle is imminent, I, Li Shimin, personally lead the battle, let the city head guard surrender, I will promote him as the general of the Eight Guards, and be knighted as the county duke, otherwise he will not live tomorrow night!" ”

The two soldiers urged the horses to go, bypassed a mound of earth, and rushed to the city in a moment, dozens of steps away, a soldier shouted: "The lord of the city will listen, His Royal Highness the King of Qin personally led the troops to come, ordered you to lay down your arms and surrender, the King of Qin will promote you as the general of the Eight Guards, the prince of the county, if you are obsessed, you will not live tomorrow night!" ”

The defenders of the city were in an uproar, it turned out to be Li Shimin, the king of Qin, who personally led the troops, many people showed fear in their eyes, the army at the head of the city was Lei Shimeng, he was loyal to Xiao Miao, and there was no idea of surrendering, he sneered, turned around and shouted: "Release the arrow!" Shoot them. ”

The city was chaotic with arrows, two soldiers hurriedly raised their shields to meet each other, quickly retreated, both horses were unfortunately shot, neighed to the ground, and the two soldiers were overturned to the ground, two soldiers turned around and fled, one of them suddenly had a weak leg, knelt on the ground, was shot by more than a dozen arrows, and was killed immediately, the other person was also hit, he limped and fled back to the position, "Your Highness, the defenders are rude!" ”

Li Shimin was furious, a small guard dared to bully him, he gritted his teeth and said: "This person must be Lei Shimeng, break through the city, I have to cut him with a thousand knives." ”

Qu Tutong checked the soles of the soldiers' feet and said to Li Shimin: "Your Highness, they sprinkled thistle terrestris outside the city!" ”

"What a little thistle terrestris is, let's see how I break it tomorrow!"

Li Shimin pulled out his sword and ordered loudly: "Quickly pass my order, attack the city at dawn tomorrow, take the city, double the reward, behead the guard first, the official will be promoted to two levels, and the reward will be five hundred taels!" ”

........

At dawn the next day, the drums in the Tang army camp were beating, and 60,000 troops were arrayed outside the south, north and east cities, and there were 30,000 troops outside the north city, which was the focus of the Tang army's attack.

Three thousand Tang soldiers were already waiting quietly three hundred paces away, and behind them were three battering rams five zhang long, each weighing 10,000 catties, and today these three battering rams will become the protagonists of the siege.

Li Shimin immediately looked at this big southern city and the capital of Xiao Milling on a mound, only to see that Jiangling City was about three zhang high, the huge city gate stood majestically, the one-zhang wide moat had been filled with mud, and only a high suspension bridge protected the city gate like a shield, and the gorgeous morning glow sprinkled on the city, dyeing the city gate and the suspension bridge into a golden color.

The city was full of dense soldiers, as many as five or six thousand people, and it could be seen that the other party was also focusing on guarding against the northern city.

Li Shimin glanced back at the dense forest around him, and with a wave of his sword, he ordered: "Cut down the pine forest to pave the road!" ”

The best way to deal with thistle terrestris is to pave a new road, such as paving with bags of earth, such as paving with wooden planks, if there are many trees around, paving with trees is also a simple and effective way, especially pine trees, if the canopy is tall and dense, dozens of large trees can pave a new road.

More than 1,000 soldiers started together, cut down more than 100 pine trees in a moment, the soldiers dragged the pine trees and rushed to the city, at this time the city was shot with arrows, the Tang army raised a huge shield to defend, and there were soldiers who fell to the ground with arrows, but the soldiers in front fell, and the soldiers in the back immediately responded to it, after killing and wounding hundreds of soldiers, the Tang army finally laid a pine road under the dense rain of arrows, and the pine trees were five in a row, and soon paved a wide pine road, and the thistles all over the ground lost their effect.

The soldiers who laid the pine road did not leave, and they formed a three-sided shield formation to create opportunities for the soldiers behind.

Hundreds of soldiers carrying oil drums rushed in, they held shields in one hand, braved the rain of arrows, ran along the pine road to the city gate, the oil drums were also filled with high slave oil, which was inspired by Li Shimin by the Sui army to fight the Turks, found hundreds of barrels of high slave oil from the official warehouse, and brought them to Jiangling City.

Barrels of high slave oil were poured on the moat, black oil flowed all over the place along the bridge board, and the soldiers rushed back, at this time, a rocket rose into the air, drew an arc in the air, shot in the black oil, and the fire suddenly burned brightly, and the flames quickly engulfed the moat.

The key to breaking through a city with a battering ram is to destroy the outer moat, and burning it with fire is a good way.

Smoke billowed from the moat, the fire was raging, and the defenders of the city were in disarray, and they were already aware of the Tang army's intentions, and poured basins of hot water from the city, but to no avail.

Li Shimin immediately stood on the mound, coldly watching the defenders of the city hurriedly extinguishing the fire, at this time he saw a soldier carrying bags of sand and soil on the head of the city, Li Shimin immediately ordered, "Suppress with a heavy crossbow!" ”

"Boom! Boom! Boom! "The rapid sound of drums sounded, and two thousand Tang troops rushed out of the ranks, they held huge heavy crossbows, which were a seven-stone rhubarb crossbow.

The big yellow crossbow was not invented by the Northern Sui Army, but is a traditional heavy crossbow since the Han Dynasty, with three types: five-stone crossbow, seven-stone crossbow and ten-stone crossbow.

Like the big yellow crossbow of the Northern Sui army, the big yellow crossbow of the Tang army also had to combine the strength of two strong soldiers to mount the crossbow, with a range of up to 300 paces and a length of 2 feet 4 inches, which could injure the enemy within 250 steps and pierce the enemy's shield within 150 steps.

Two thousand soldiers with a thousand heavy crossbows in their hands, two of them stood facing each other, stepped on the crossbow with both feet, and pulled the string with all four arms, the bowstring slowly opened and jammed the string buckle, one soldier carried the heavy crossbow on his shoulder, and the other soldier loaded the crossbow arrow.

The two thousand soldiers were Li Shimin's personal guards, well-trained, and their movements were skillful, and in just a moment, a thousand heavy arrows were aimed at the head of the city, and a lieutenant general shouted, "Shoot!" ”

Listen to only a click, a thousand long arrows out of the string, whistling towards the city, some arrows hit the battlements, sparks splashed, rubble flying, some arrows shot into the city head of the soldiers, the city head soldiers were caught off guard, by the strong long arrow pierced the head and body, erupted into a scream of shooting, and then the second round of arrows whistled again, and nearly a hundred people were shot down, the Tang army's powerful crossbow arrows made the city head defenders tremble, the defenders were so frightened that they squatted down one after another, not daring to show their heads again.

The moat burned for half an hour, and the charcoal moat could no longer bear its own weight, and broke with a bang, and some of it was hung on the wall with iron chains, while the other part was smashed into the dirt and cracked into five or six pieces.

"Heavy crossbow cover, drums to siege the city!" Li Shimin gave the order for a formal attack. (To be continued.) )