Facts have proved that Zhang An is not bragging, he has a lot of experience in the enemy, under his arrangement, the Lingzhou military and civilians performed their duties, the pre-war preparations were well organized, the city was full of stones and wood, and all the bows and arrows in the armory that could be taken out to defend against the enemy, and even the rusty firearms were used; The Ming army, which was under the unified order, also carried out his requirements one by one like an arm.

However, the facts have proved another thing, Shibei three days should be impressed, the Tatar soldiers and horses are no longer the former field cavalry team that can only roar and plunder and leave, and it is no longer the army that saw the Ming army defending the city in the past and had nothing to do. From the introduction and manufacture of various equipment, and even the siege skills of soldiers, a lot of training has been done, and the Tatar soldiers and horses are no longer the ones that Zhang An fought a few years ago.

Moreover, although soft power is a kind of strength, the effect of hard power is more intuitive. Zhang An could arrange more than 10,000 Ming troops in an orderly manner without chaos, but it was far from making up for the disadvantage in troops. What is even more difficult to make up for in a short time is the weakness of Lingzhou's city defense; This state capital, which has Ningxia Town as a strong shield, has not worked city defense and military strength, but as the state capital of Ningxia Town's transit supply, it is the strategic rear of Ningxia Town.

Even in the pattern of the city, Lingzhou has broken the convention of not setting up the north gate near the border town, in order to facilitate the access to Ningxia Town, Lingzhou actually has the north city gate, it can be seen that for Lingzhou, his positioning is not to defend as a strong fortress at all, but to become a vassal of Ningxia Town in front.

The two city walls in the southeast collapsed once for some reason in the thirteenth year of Hongzhi, but even so, the imperial court did not agree to the proposal of the Lingzhou prefect at that time to renovate, but hastily allocated 30,000 taels of silver for repair. Thirty thousand taels of silver in two sections of the collapsed city wall can only be reduced to a mixture of rocks and mud, grass and branches, and in the future generations, it will be a tofu dregs project. Generally speaking, the city defense of the city is to be tamped in the splint with strong triple soil mixed with glutinous rice juice, and it is said that when it is completed, it cannot be cut into half an inch with a steel knife, and it is as hard as steel.

Moreover, Zhang An also underestimated the confidence that the bald man could take Lingzhou, this time the bald man would have to take this city at any cost, and once Lingzhou was broken, not only his soldiers and horses could get a large amount of supplies, but also cut off the connection between Ningxia Town and the outside world, which was extremely beneficial to the follow-up attack on Ningxia Town.

38,000 soldiers and horses charged in a fan-shape, and the bald and fierce could eat the lack of troops in the city, so he launched a fierce attack on the southeast and west sides at the same time, each side has more than 12,000 soldiers and horses, and the guards and horses at the head of the city may only have three or four thousand people, in the case of further dispersing the opponent's forces, the advantage will be magnified, as long as one of the three sides of the attack breaks through the city wall, then the other two sides have to go to reinforcements, and Lingzhou is basically broken.

Zhang An soon realized the crisis, in the face of the tide of Tartar cavalry, the only means of striking can only be archery, after shooting hundreds of Tartar soldiers, their advantage of riding and charging was reflected, while the heavy archers shot arrows at the head of the city to counterattack, thousands of cavalry had come to the other side of the moat, staggeringly, they did not even get off the horses, and directly drove the horses into the moat.

Horses can swim!

Cold sweat flowed down Zhang An's back, the matter of attacking the city on horseback was ridiculous in itself, when the Tartar soldiers rushed to attack the city, Zhang An even had time to joke with his subordinates: "Charging on horseback, can the horse's head be hard over the city wall?" When they got to the moat, didn't they want to dismount and build a bridge? At that time, these war horses will be live targets, and running wild after being frightened will make the Tartar formation chaotic, and I don't know what the pig brains of the Tartars think. ”

His subordinates thought so and laughed and scolded repeatedly, but now, none of them could laugh. The Tartars swam across the moat with their horses, and even bridges were spared, although there were thorns and spikes at the bottom of the river, but they were useless.

"Shoot the arrows, release the arrows!" Zhang An yelled out of frustration. The soldiers at the head of the city gritted their teeth and sent a dense rain of arrows at the dense horses and human heads on the moat, and the moat was suddenly filled with blood, and hundreds of Tartars died under this round of dense shooting. But at the same time, the heavily armed archers by the moat also launched a round of arrow rain towards the city, shooting dozens of Ming soldiers who leaned out and shot arrows downward, and their bodies lost their center of gravity and fell to the bottom of the city.

Zhang An was almost hit by an arrow, and if it weren't for a general behind him who quickly pulled him, a carved arrow would have hit his angry face.

"Lord Commander, what should I do? As soon as the Tartars crossed the river, bows and arrows were useless. ”

"What's the panic? Do tartars have wings? Can they fly up such a high wall? Tell me to go down, roll wood and stones, boil oil and boiling water, and smash it down mercilessly, but I want to see if these Tartars are afraid or not. ”

After paying more than 3,000 casualties, the bald and fierce swift siege plan finally worked, a steady stream of soldiers and horses poured into the city wall, high simple ladders set up the city wall, and temporarily assembled iron hooks were placed on the edge of the city wall, and nearly 400 cloud ladders on three walls were densely packed with soldiers and horses like ants climbing towards the city head. At the gate on three sides, dozens of strong Tartar men pushed the thick pointed giant wood towards the city gate, and the heavily armed archers below continued to shoot arrows at the city head to harass, and the multi-habitat attack made the Ming army's meager strength seem to be stretched.

The Ming army did not have much choice, they could only brave the feather arrows flying upwards to pour the rolling wood and stones into boiling oil and boiling water to the city, resisting the Tartar soldiers who climbed up was the first priority, fortunately, Zhang An was well prepared before the battle, the city wall was full of these materials to defend the city, and the Tartar soldiers paid a painful price after a frenzied smashing and throwing around, and they fell down like dumplings in the Lantern Festival, even if they were holding shields, they were useless, and a large section of wood could lift them from the ladder to the end.

But after all, there were only a few who fell to death, many Tartar soldiers were just smashed on the head and bleeding, and the shields were still more or less effective, and they climbed up again when they were smashed, because the short horn behind them was a signal for a desperate attack, and the eyes of the centurions and warlords around them were bright, and whoever didn't fight hard would be immediately stabbed.

Wave after wave of onslaught machinery was ongoing, and the city was already a mess, stones, trees, dead corpses, and horse corpses were mixed together, bright red blood pooled into a trickle and flowed into the moat not far away, the scorching temperature scorched the battlefield without a trace of wind, the steamer-like heat in all directions, the dull popping of stones on the shield, the heavy gasps like cattle, the screams before death, the whining of bows and arrows intertwined, and the air was as heavy as viscous blood, Tens of thousands of people seem to be wrapped in the quagmire of death, unable to escape, not knowing when this nightmare will end.

Finally, a news that Zhang An most unwilling to hear came, the east city wall was broken, the reason for the break is a little unbelievable, responsible for the east city wall to lead the troops to fight is Yan'an Zhongwei commander Wu Zhongxiao, when the war is tight, someone unconsciously threw the torch of boiling oil into the city, but did not expect to burn the hot oil poured on the city to cause a fire, burning more than 30 Tartar soldiers all burned to death; Wu Zhongxiao was greatly surprised, and in a flash of inspiration, he came up with a clever plan for defense, so he ordered people to quickly mobilize more than 50 stabbing oil from the rear to go up the city wall, and ordered people to pour it down along the outer extension of the city wall, and then lit a fire. Suddenly, the outside of the city wall was blazing into the sky, and the thick smoke was billowing out, and the Tartar soldiers who were climbing were caught off guard and quickly jumped down consciously, and the city wall of Xu Cheng suddenly became a fire dragon in a section.

Wu Zhongxiao laughed and said: "Climb, you are climbing, I don't believe that you can not be afraid of fire." Brothers, is this a good idea? After the city wall was on fire, it was so hot that for at least half an hour, these guys could only stare dryly. ”

The soldiers praised one after another, hiding on the other side of the city wall to rest and drink water, although the flames rushed up a little panicked, but at least it was certain that the Tartars would never be able to climb up from the burning city wall, and it was naturally impossible to get a precious respite. Some people even hurriedly informed Zhang Zongbing of this method, so that the other two city walls could also use this method to defend themselves against the enemy.

However, not long after they came happily, there was a panicked cry of soldiers from the north side, Wu Zhongxiao got up in shock to look, only to see several soldiers running from the city wall with their heads in their hands, Wu Zhongxiao shouted: "What's the matter?" ”

"Lord Wu, it's not good, the city wall over there is on fire."

"On fire? What's so strange about that? Let him burn it. ”

"No, my lord, it's not the shell of the city wall that we set on fire, it's the inside of the city wall that is on fire."

"What? What do you dream about in broad daylight? The walls are made of mud, so how can they catch fire? ”

"If you don't believe it, just take a look."

Wu Zhongxiao hurriedly followed a few soldiers to the north against the scorching heat, and was dumbfounded when he got closer, this section of the city wall of dozens of zhang was really on fire, and half of the place near the outside had been burned, and it was obvious that the inside of the city wall was burning with some branches and wood, and where was the mud and tamped Sanhe soil.

"What the fuck is going on?" Wu Zhongxiao is going crazy.

A Lingzhou veteran lamented: "The villain remembered that this section of the city wall had collapsed back then, and then it was hastily repaired, and the court did not allocate enough money, so there was only a thin layer of rammed earth on the outside and inside, and the inside was a mixture of mud branches and weeds. The lord ordered fire to repel the enemy, but the outer layer of rammed earth was burned off, and the debris inside was burned. ”

Wu Zhongxiao wanted to cry without tears, and shouted: "Hurry up and put out the fire, what are you doing in a daze?" If you don't put out the fire, a big city gate will be opened here. ”