The siege continued, and it didn't take long for the soldiers at the head of the city to smash the available stones, and it was already the third day of the siege of the city. Due to the large number of thieves, the officers and soldiers did not dare to leave their hands when defending the city, and they always had to desperately smash down as many materials as they could, and the two consecutive days of defending the city had made their supplies insufficient.

The thieves under the city are still shouting and screaming to climb the city, but there is no stone at hand, how should this be?

Just when the situation was precarious, the leaders suddenly saw a surprising scene, only to see that the people of the city began to pour into the city wall in large numbers, each holding a stone in their hands, and they risked being injured by stray arrows, and handed the stones in their hands to the soldiers and villagers by the wall.

The soldiers and villagers hurriedly approached the stones in the hands of the villagers and threw them under the city...... "Where did the villagers get the stones?" It stands to reason that the officers and soldiers should have moved all the stones available in the city to the city walls a long time ago, right? Xu Renjie was quite strange.

"Demolish people's houses!" Zhu Yuanzhang only said three words, and the leaders suddenly realized.

In these years, most of the houses were made of mud and stone, plus wooden beams and other things, as long as a house was demolished, a large number of stones and wood could be obtained, and the higher-grade houses were even built with bricks, and the enemy troops who smashed and climbed the city after dismantling it were very useful. In most cases, when an enemy attacked the city outside the city, the officers and soldiers did not dare to forcibly requisition and demolish the houses in the city, because it was easy to cause a riot among the residents of the city, and the enemy outside the city would cooperate with the outside of the city, and eventually lead to the destruction of the city.

But...... It is the people themselves who do the demolition of the houses, then there is no problem! Such a move will not only not cause turmoil in the city, but will make the soldiers and civilians in the city work together and desperately resist the enemy, so it will be very difficult to break through the city!

I don't know how many people went up to the city wall, some helped hand over stones, some helped roll logs, some helped carry away the wounded, and even some brave people used themselves as village warriors, and went directly to fight the thieves who climbed up the city with hoes. Some people carried their own soup pots and poured boiling water at the city, so hot that the thieves who climbed the city howled miserably.

The precarious city suddenly burst out with a huge amount of positive energy! Even the leaders of Zhu Yuanzhang's army, who were standing on the slopes of a distant hill watching the battle, could feel that spirit was spreading wildly...... It infects everyone who defends the city.

The thieves who attacked the city were stunned, the evil consequences of burning and looting in the past were undoubtedly revealed at this moment, and the desperate momentum of every citizen seemed to tell these thieves: Come on! Let you know what it means to break the net of a dead fish!

"This scene ......" Zhu Yuanzhang shook his head, when the peasants revolted at the end of the Yuan Dynasty, he vaguely seemed to have seen such a scene, when the people of the Han nationality and the rebel army in the ascendant at that time united to deal with the rulers of the Yuan Dynasty, it was such and such a momentum, the momentum was like a wild wave, and it swept the world in an instant, and easily swept the Mongols who dominated Eurasia, drove back to the steppe, and then buried in the dust of history.

"Those who win the hearts of the people win the world, it is not an empty word!" Xu Renjie sighed and shook his head.

"Look...... The army of King Chuang began to retreat. Xue Hongqi shouted.

Sure enough, the army of Chuang Wang fell into a bitter battle, and soon announced that it was not supported, and the bandits who attacked the city were besieged by the officers and soldiers, the townspeople, and the common people, and they could not stand firm at all, and they either died or fell down the city, and the follow-up troops who climbed up the ladder were defeated by countless people with the bricks and stones from demolishing the houses and boiling boiling water...... The thieves looked up at the city wall, only to see that it was densely packed, all the heads of the city guards, and they couldn't tell which were the officers and soldiers, which were the village braves, and which were the people, but they only knew that the number was surprisingly large, so much that they lost the courage to continue to attack upward.

As soon as courage is lost, the army will be defeated! The people in front began to stop and did not dare to move forward, and the people in the back quietly smeared oil and retreated...... Then the army was like a landslide, and all of them retreated in an uproar.

"Today, King Chuang has no way to reorganize his army, and the battle for this city gate has come to an end." Zhu Yuanzhang said lightly.

As Zhu Yuanzhang said, King Gao Yingxiang was also sweating profusely at this time, watching the defeated and retreating thieves helpless, once the morale of the army collapsed, it could not be solved by saying a few exciting words, and it could only be left for time to calm the emotions of the soldiers, usually more than one day, so that the soldiers could sleep well and rest full, and then it was possible to organize the next attack.

He reluctantly ordered the troops to be collected and returned to the camp, and then remembered that Baishui Zhuba and Yulin Xue Hongqi had already arrived and were watching the battle in the rear, so he might as well use this free time to meet them. So Gao Yingxiang took a few henchmen and brothers, rode a tall horse, and walked up the hill behind.

Zhu Yuanzhang and the others did not leave the small hill to watch the battle at this time, several leaders sat in a half circle around Zhu Yuanzhang, discussing some details of the battle just now, Zhu Yuanzhang casually said some of his own opinions, and added some common sense of siege warfare to his leaders, such as how the army throughout the ages dealt with the moat, how to climb the city wall, etc., and talked about some siege weapons before the appearance of artillery and the change of siege methods after the appearance of artillery, etc., Xu Renjie listened to the eyebrows fluttering, turning his brain and desperately remembering. Wang Er, Miao Mei, and Xue Hongqi listened to the excitement and briefly understood it.

While chatting, a subordinate came over to report: "Brother Chuang Wang is here!" ”

Zhu Yuanzhang heard this, and quickly stood up, Xue Hongqi, who was also a boss, also quickly got up, and the two went out to greet them together. It's also fun to say, although she got up and walked out at the same time, Xue Hongqi was half a step behind intentionally or unintentionally, it seemed that she had subconsciously understood that she and Baishui Zhuba were not in the same order of magnitude, and she didn't dare to walk side by side.

The two greeted them a few steps, and Gao Yingxiang had already arrived in front of them.

Zhu Yuanzhang looked carefully, this person is good, quite imposing. I saw that he was about forty years old, tall, with thick arms, and he was a very powerful person at first glance, although he was a little smaller than Wang Er, but no one would doubt that his martial arts were worse than Wang Er. What is particularly special is that Gao Yingxiang wears white all over his body, a white robe and a white turban, the whole is white, only a big bow on his back and a saber hanging from his waist are not white.

"Hahaha, Baishui Zhu's eighth brother, last time we passed through Huanglong Mountain in the thirty-sixth battalion, we didn't talk well, and now it can be regarded as the first real meeting." Gao Yingxiang has not arrived, but his voice has arrived, but he is quite bold and direct.

Zhu Yuanzhang also hugged his fists: "Brother Chuangwang is polite, I didn't even see you clearly last time, but now if you look closely, you are indeed a good man." ”

Gao Yingxiang and Zhu Yuanzhang met the ceremony first, and then turned their heads to Xue Hongqi, the etiquette was not very thorough, and said casually: "The daughter of the old Xue family, I saw you once when I was a child, you were still a runny little girl at that time, hugging the horse's neck and crying vigorously, now that you have grown so big, hahaha, I heard last year that you also pulled up a team to rebel......

It turns out that Gao Yingxiang is a generation older than Xue Hongqi, and he is Xue Hongqi's father's worship brother of the horse thief, and the elders speak to the juniors, of course, they don't need to hold their fists, salute, what a mess, and directly joke condescendingly. It's no wonder that the horse thieves under the two of them completely let down their guard after confronting the northern Shaanxi dialect.

Xue Hongqi took the gift of the junior: "Uncle Gao...... Cough...... Uncle Chuang, my father often mentions you, saying that you are the number one in the Northern Shaanxi Ma Gang, and ask me to learn more from you...... After you turned the rod back, you opened the eyes of our pony gang, and eight out of ten horse gangs in northern Shaanxi learned from you, and the niece and nephew naturally can't be left behind, so as not to fall into the father's prestige. ”

Gao Yingxiang has not announced his real name yet, Xue Hongqi mistakenly reported the surname "Uncle Gao", which startled the two of them, but fortunately, they were surrounded by henchmen or leaders of the rebels, but they didn't leak out, Rao is so, Gao Yingxiang still gave Xue Hongqi a dissatisfied look.

Then it was garbage time, and both sides said a lot of kind words, pulled some homely things, and asked "why did you come here", "what are your plans in the future", "have you eaten today" and other nonsense, in short, everyone didn't reveal what was in their hearts, so there was nothing to mention.

After finishing politely, before getting to the point, Gao Yingxiang sighed and said: "This Zezhou City is really difficult to fight!" It made Brother Zhu and the Xue family girl see my jokes. ”

Zhu Yuanzhang was expressionless, and said lightly: "The state city is difficult to fight, the world knows it, and there are no jokes to see, but I don't know how the other city gates are fighting?" ”

As soon as Zhu Yuanzhang said this, Gao Yingxiang was also a little interested: "It's still early today, and I can't attack the West Gate, so I might as well go together to see how the other city gates are attacking." ”

He left thousands of people outside the city to shout and demonstrate, forcing the defenders on the west city wall not to dare to withdraw to help the other gates, so together with Zhu Yuanzhang, Xue Hongqi and others, let the horses run south, bypassing the southwest corner of the city, to see the movement by the south city gate.

"The ones in charge of attacking the south gate are the eight kings of Xiying." Gao Yingxiang said: "His strength is the weakest of our four sects, I think his side should also be in a bitter battle." ”

The eight kings of Xiying, that is, Zhang Xianzhong, among the four rebel armies besieging Zezhou City, King Gao Yingxiang was the strongest, Lao Hui Ma Shouying ranked third, and Li Zicheng ranked third, and the one with the least number of troops was Zhang Xianzhong, the eight kings of Xiying. If there is one way that is the most unlikely to break the city, that is, Zhang Xianzhong's side, Gao Yingxiang is also most worried about this side, so there is no battle on his side, and the first thing that comes to mind is the south gate......

(To be continued)