Flying iron bullets slammed into the tall walls of Vilno, splattering shards of masonry and stone, and from time to time there were scattered unlucky defenders at the head of the city, screaming and clutching a bleeding part of their bodies.

These tiles, which scatter irregularly, are like deadly blades, and even iron armor can penetrate and cut into the human body.

The main force of the Taiping army led by Hong Tiancheng mobilized all the artillery and captured shells that could be used in the occupied area of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, and lined up outside the city to bombard the fortress artillery at the head of Vilno.

The Vilno city wall, which stretches for several miles, is not comparable to the infantry formation, the huge size, the huge target that cannot be moved, makes the Vilno city wall a good target, even with the amateur artillery of the Taiping army, one or two shots in the right direction, hit the Vilno city wall.

Of course, all the Taiping artillery could do was to hit the city walls, and for most of the day, not a single shell had fallen on the really valuable targets, such as towers and batteries......

Therefore, the results of the Taiping artillery lined up were more of a psychological deterrent to the soldiers defending the city of Vilno, rather than actual lethality......

A few miles away from the effective firing range of the Vilno City Head Battery, Hong Tiancheng's sedan chair was on the wheel, and Xue Taishen, the commander of the Jinyi Guard, was reporting to him the latest enemy intelligence in a serious manner.

"Your Majesty, according to the confessions of the Lithuanians we captured on the outskirts of Vilno, less than half of the tens of thousands of 'great troops' in Vilno are actually soldiers, and more than eighty percent of the less than 5,000 soldiers defending the city are militia forces and small-scale mercenaries and bounty hunters who have been mobilized from all over the world.

In order to keep the foundation of his family, Grand Duke Janusz Rajvir, the capital city of Vilno, can be said to have exhausted all his strength, but he himself knew that it was useless to temporarily pull up strong men without military training, and he would waste the grain and grass in Vilno, and only the 'elite' of them were transferred to defend the city.

The real knights and combat-ready private soldiers in Vilno were only a few hundred men, and they were also the most morale-raising men, because their interests and families were already closely linked to the victory or defeat of the battle led by Archduke Janusz Rajvir. ”

"Hundreds of elites plus thousands of militia forces that have been fooled, this is still the strength that Grand Duke Janusz Rajvir, known as the uncrowned king of Lithuania, has gathered with all his might, it seems that the aristocratic power of Lithuania is even weaker than we imagined."

Hong Tiancheng rubbed his chin with his right hand and whispered.

"Your Majesty, the decisive battle of Moziri and the decisive battle of Black Rus has exhausted the private army of all the nobles in Lithuania, and they can't take out much strength at all, which has been thoroughly verified after our army entered the Lithuanian region, and many small and medium-sized Lithuanian nobles even lost their self-protection power after the decisive battle of Black Rus' because of the death of their private soldiers, resulting in the oppressed serfs under their command fleeing and even robbing all their family wealth.

Before our army entered the Lithuanian region, except for those Lithuanian nobles and Lithuanian nobles who were not deeply involved in the decisive battle, the other territories were already in chaos, and the fugitive serfs and bandits colluded together, and became a place where hordes of marauders poisoned.

The great Lithuanian nobles with the ability to suppress were powerless to suppress under the approach of our army, leaving nearly one-third of the entire Lithuanian region in a state of anarchy! ”

Xue Taishen said with the intelligence information gathered in his mind.

"Well, it's a good thing for us that Lithuania is in chaos on its own, let's let those places be chaotic for a while, so that Lithuanians and other local indigenous people will die more, and it will be more convenient for us to move in.

Zhao Chuan sent someone to convey the order, so that those Lithuanian people who did not obey the control were captured along the way to fill the moat ravines, and those who survived the task could be fed, and their families could be safed for a certain time.

When the moat is filled, and let the private soldiers provided by the Lithuanian nobles who surrendered to the city clear the obstacles such as the rejection of horses under the city of Vilno, I only give them three days, and after three days, I ask the troops of our army to rush to the city without obstacles and put the ladder on the head of Vilno! ”

Hong Tiancheng's three-day period seems to be generous, but it is indeed a very difficult task for the Vilno city defense system, which has a complete city defense.

As the capital of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, the defense of Vilno was naturally a top priority, and in the following centuries, successive Lithuanian rulers and lords of Vilno City did not hesitate to spend a lot of money to build its defense.

In the era of firearms, the Vilno city defense system was more deeply rooted in the ground, and used to prevent the enemy from burying gunpowder to blow up the city wall, it is not impossible to blow up the Vilno city wall by means of black powder blasting, but it is no longer possible to dig tunnels unknowingly, but it is necessary to use manpower to storm the situation, and the explosives of black powder are piled up under the city wall to blast.

The spacious and thick walls of Vilno are not a large earthen enclosure that can be blown up at once, and if you want to really blow it up, you don't know how many times you have to blast it with a huge amount of black powder!

Therefore, the Taiping army's offensive method was to carry out the traditional siege and blasting at the same time, anyway, the Vilno city wall was wide and ruthless, and some places attacked and blasted at the same time.

It's just that if you fight like this, the strength and losses of the besieging side will be tantamount to a geometric increase, Hong Tiancheng has naturally thought of the tragedy of the siege war, and ordinary urban offensive and defensive battles will suffer heavy losses under the sworn resistance of the defenders, not to mention the capital city of Vilno, which has a history of several hundred years?

Therefore, when the Taiping army swept through the Lithuanian region, it not only demanded that the Lithuanian nobles who surrendered to Cheng surrender a sufficient share of the 'Surrender Certificate' private army cannon fodder, but also plundered a large number of young and strong people from the towns and villages of the Lithuanians with a sense of resistance.

The weak Lithuanian people were powerless to confront the huge Taiping army, so they could only accept to be cattle and horses for the Taiping army for a bite to eat and a cheap life.

With Hong Tiancheng's order, the tragic battle of ditch filling officially began, and the Lithuanian young man with a numb and sluggish look carried sandbags and other fillers, and under the pressure of muskets, he rushed to the death zone under the city of Vilno, paving a way for the Taiping army's attack with his life and blood!

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