With the issuance of Zhou Dongnan's paper conscription order, coupled with the spread of the news of the defeat of the front-line siege army before, all of a sudden, in the territory of the Great Zhou, the people in all the cities were also in danger, and the soldiers in the army were arresting people everywhere, not to mention some young and strong young people, even if they were forty or fifty years old, as long as their limbs were sound, they were all taken away, which is enough to see that Zhou Dongnan was really forced to be in a hurry this time.

In comparison, on the contrary, the people of the three cities of Dongjing City, Songshan City and Songhe City, which fell into Luo Ji's hands, lived a more stable life.

Because for the people of these three cities, after Luo Ji captured the city, the only thing he did was to block the city gates on both sides, and in doing so, of course, it would have an impact on them, but compared with their soldiers of the Great Zhou Dynasty who were a round of burning and looting once they captured the city, and they usually bullied men and women on their own land, the two groups of people can be said to be superior to each other.

In this way, after the first few days of worry, the people who have realized this are simply living in peace.

For example, because of the closure of the city gates, many people have no surplus food at home because they cannot go out of the city to work on the farmland.

Regarding this matter, Luo Ji behaved simply, directly waved his hand, and asked people to set up a few cauldrons of porridge in the center of the city, not because his heart was overflowing, but because once there was a famine in the city, something more troublesome would definitely happen at that time.

Let's take the history of their Celestial Empire as an example, at the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty, how did the Yellow Turban Rebellion come about? It's not that there is a famine, the peasants have no land to plant, no food to eat, and at this time, if a leading brother who jumps to do things comes out, won't it be a peasant uprising? It was from that moment that the Han Dynasty began to come to an end.

Of course, the situation here is not so exaggerated, but in case a gang of Diao people is extremely hungry, it will be very troublesome to do something for him, Luo Ji doesn't plan to deal with that kind of bad thing, the grain that Ye Qingxuan traded to him before directly filled all his city granaries and barracks warehouses, and he was not short of food at this time, so why should he be stingy with that bit of rice?

At the same time, Luo Ji's move also unexpectedly gave him a good reputation in these three cities, obviously occupying other people's cities, but inexplicably there is a feeling of popular affection, even with Zhou Yi, who had just returned to him, and the soldiers under his command also shouted 'Leader Renyi', and the loyalty began to rise, I don't know if Zhou Dongnan saw the scene here, he would be so angry that he vomited a mouthful of blood.

To get back to the point, after that battle, after four days of rest, all the seriously wounded soldiers have been sent back to Xiyuan City to recuperate, and the troops that replaced them were the sword and shield troops led by Liu Meng!

Before the war, Luo Ji ordered sixty percent of the craftsmen of the Ordnance Forging Department to forge bronze swords with all their might, and now more than half a month has passed, and the bronze swords that came out of this all-out rush, coupled with the previous inventory, also allowed Liu Meng to make a sword and shield army of more than 700 people in a short period of time!

Liu Meng, who had recovered from his injuries, went to the front line this time, obviously saving up enough energy, and it was completely a posture of wanting to take the new troops to a shameful and make great contributions.

But at present, Luo Ji has encountered a little troublesome thing, that is, the three-bow bed crossbow has no crossbow arrows......

In fact, it's a bit wrong to say this, the heavy crossbow arrows that were shot out before will undoubtedly be picked up when the battlefield is cleaned up after the war, after all, each heavy crossbow arrow can be said to be expensive, how can it really be used as a disposable? Not to mention heavy crossbow arrows, even arrows fired by archers and stone bullets thrown by slingers are all recoverable, so try to recover them as much as possible.

However, ordnance equipment like this is not something that can be reused all the time as long as it is picked up, because the bronze arrowhead will wear out, and the heavy crossbow arrows of the three-bow bed crossbow are generally used three to five times, and they should be sent back to the ordnance forging department to be rebuilt.

In the previous battle, all the heavy crossbow arrows were shot at the siege tower covered with bronze armor plates! It is already conceivable what the bronze arrow, when it hits such a thick bronze armor plate, it is already conceivable, the arrow part is seriously damaged, although it can still be used, but the destructive power of the city wall and the city gate has been greatly reduced.

Li Kuo, the general of Shangyuan City, who was aware of this, decisively chose to defend to the death, the opponent had a lot of troops defending the city, and there was a city wall as a support, for a while, this Shangyuan City really couldn't be attacked, so angry that Luo Yong, Liu Meng and Guo Zhen, the three big men took turns to call out outside the city every day.

On the contrary, Luo Ji is relatively calm, mainly because it is useless to be in a hurry, two rounds of siege battles have been fought, this Li Kuo is also a general who is good at defending the city, the entire city wall is guarded by him impermeable, without the premise of destroying the city wall and city gate with a three-bow bed crossbow, the difficulty of relying on those ladders to capture this Shangyuan City is obviously too high.

However, Luo Ji had already given an order to the Ordnance Forging Department in the rear to make every effort to make a batch of heavy crossbow arrows for three-bow bed crossbows, calculate the time, and it should be delivered in a few days......

He was waiting for heavy crossbow arrows to attack the city, and Li Kuo on the other side was obviously waiting for reinforcements from Zhou Dongnan, which Luo Ji could say knew well, but he didn't panic at all, counting the 5,000 troops that were completely wiped out by him during the previous invasion, this series of battles was defeated, and the strength of Zhou Dongnan in his hands was estimated to have reached more than 8,000 people.

And counting the more than 2,000 troops defending the city in Shangyuan City, how many troops can Zhou Dongnan come up with? Luo Ji can almost say with certainty that the total strength of the regular army in Zhou Dongnan's hands is now no more than 4,000! Maybe even about three thousand.

After the defeat of the siege army of Shangyuan City, Zhou Dongnan, who realized that the situation was not good, was probably forcibly recruiting troops everywhere at this time, right? However, these miscellaneous soldiers who have not been trained, and after being forcibly recruited, they are directly thrown into the battlefield, what use can they be except to send them to death?

But Luo Ji is different, his biggest advantage now is that he swallowed Wang Lucong's civilization before and provided him with a large number of surrendered troops!

At the beginning, in order to facilitate management, Luo Ji dispersed these surrendered troops and distributed them to the various cities under his command, and now, he only needs to re-recruit these surrendered troops, Luo Ji does not know what degree of military training these surrendered troops have received, but how can it be better than the farmers who were still farming and herding cattle before!

(End of chapter)