Wanxian County, at the end of the Ming Dynasty, belonged to Kuizhou Prefecture, and there were still 400 miles away from Zhiba County, Chongqing Prefecture.

The distance seems to be quite far, but even if the officials of later generations do not understand geography at all, most of them know that Wanxian County belongs to Chongqing - because the famous Chongqing grilled fish in the 21st century originated from there. Later, people from other parts of Chongqing saw that there was a drama in this business, and they all came to do it, and the locals made another signboard of "Wanzhou Grilled Fish".

And a place that can be famous for grilled fish, the terrain is of course near the river and water.

At the end of the Ming Dynasty, the city of Wanxian was located at a corner of the Yangtze River, relying on the wharf to build, the Yangtze River was on three sides in the north, south and east, and only the west was land.

Since ancient times, it has been an important port city before the Yangtze River left Sichuan. If the ship is too large, or the seaworthiness of the bottom of the ship is not suitable to pass through the Three Gorges of the Yangtze River, it will change a ship here, replace it with one that is convenient for passing through the Qutang Gorge, and then continue the subsequent voyage.

Therefore, the strongest of the city's defense facilities is the west of the city, followed by the south and north of the city, and the weakest is the east of the city.

Outside the east gate of the county seat, there is a port area one or two miles deep, the terrain is flat, but the city wall is not high. Because the north and south sides were sandwiched by the Yangtze River, the city walls in the south and north of the city were built all the way to the Yangtze River, and the enemy who attacked by land was not afraid to return to the flat area east of the city to attack the city.

Anyone who dared to bypass the south or north of the city from the west of the city and return to the east to attack the city again would have been shot and killed by the defenders on the north and south walls on the way to the north and south.

Qin Liangyu is well versed in the geography of various provinces in central Sichuan, and of course he is also well aware of this, so as soon as he arrived in Wanxian, he suggested that Zhu Shuren arrange the men and horses of Wang Guangchang and Wang Guangxing, who were responsible for the first wave of the main attack, to the west of the city, assemble siege equipment, and prepare for a strong attack.

But Zhu Shuren also sat on the boat and went around Wanxian to observe carefully for a long time, and finally made a decision that was diametrically opposed to the locals.

Zhu Shuren pointed to the city wall with a jade fracture fan, and said proudly:

"Deploy the men and horses of the two kings to the fleet on the river east of the city, and don't rush to get on it. Qin Zongzhen, but you have to bring 10,000 white pole soldiers first, set up a position in the west of the city, prepare siege equipment, and first clamor to fight the morale of the thieves and defenders, and persuade them to surrender if they can, and then attack if they can't persuade them to surrender.

After you make a move on the other side, here in the east, I will let the two kings land on the pier outside the water gate in the east of the city, and then attack from this side. I see that the eastern wall of the city is low, and it seems that it is still in disrepair, and it should be easier to break. ”

Qin Liangyu was stunned: "Attack from the east of the city? The surname of the country, the old body knows that you have won a lot of battles, but you may not know the geography of my Sichuan!

Outside the eastern city wall of the city, there seem to be wharves and neighborhoods more than a mile deep, which can allow soldiers to calmly line up after going ashore, so as not to be rushed out by the defenders and driven down the Yangtze River.

But have you ever thought about it, if it is a hasty landing and a direct siege after the formation, what will happen to the siege weapons? It is impossible for ladders, rushing cars, and trench cars to be unloaded directly onto the dock by ship, and it is impossible to build siege equipment after the foot soldiers land.

This meant that the foot soldiers who came ashore from the dock could only attack the city with the simplest weapons such as flying ladders and striking wood. Such a rudimentary equipment is enough to offset the disadvantages brought by the low and dilapidated city wall in the east of the city to the defenders! ”

Zhu Shuren didn't care at all, he just smiled coldly: "The city wall in the east is so low and broken, and it is enough to temporarily cut a few bamboos to tie them into a flying ladder, and you don't need a ladder to rush the car!" I'll have other heavy siege weapons to reinforce the siege troops directly from the river! ”

Qin Liangyu saw that he was so confident and told him the truth, so he didn't refute it again, but just shook his head sadly in his heart, but still carried out the order.

Qin Liangyu also knew that she was old, she was just a military general, and she had no power to resist the superintendent's chaotic life.

At the beginning, Shao Jiechun blindly commanded and asked her to concentrate her forces to defend Fengjie and the Three Gorges of the Yangtze River, which led to other dangerous trails into the Sichuan Mountains full of loopholes, Qin Liangyu still had no way to disobey the order, and he could only carry it out knowing that there was a risk.

The military generals at the end of the Ming Dynasty were in such an embarrassing situation.

"The Art of War" says: "The one who can but the king does not win wins", but this sentence was never done in the late Ming Dynasty.

……

Qin Liangyu first personally supervised the white pole soldiers of about 10,000 people, landed more than ten miles away from the city of Wanxian downstream, and then detoured back to the open ground in the west of the city, set up a posture, and assembled siege equipment.

Zhang Mingzhi, the thief general at the head of the city, saw Qin Liangyu's banner, and he was also like a great enemy, and transferred at least two-thirds of the main force of thousands of thieves and veterans in the city to the west city wall and city tower.

This army of thieves lacked muskets and franc machines, so they had to rely on bows and crossbows to make up the numbers, and most of the bows and crossbows were also gathered in the west, and a small number were distributed to the north and south to prevent the white pole soldiers from making a detour. The rest mainly relies on rolling wood and stones and strong recruits to be on guard.

Qin Liangyu, a white-pole soldier, although he suffered heavy losses in Hebei as early as the seventh year of Chongzhen, was also damaged twice later, and it would be good if a small half of the veterans survived and returned to the team each time.

Therefore, the combat effectiveness is completely incomparable with Chongzhen's white pole soldiers seven years ago and in his heyday.

But no matter what, with the name of the white pole soldier there, Qin Liangyu's troops can be regarded as a strong army on the second line in the world.

Now among the various departments of the Ming army, the combat power is second only to the Guanning Army and the Shanxi Army, and compared with Sun Chuanting's Shaanxi Army, it should be between the best.

Qin Liangyu himself is sixty-eight years old, of course, it is impossible to be on the front line in person, just to supervise the battle in the back.

The white pole soldiers usually use ash pole spears with hooks and sickles in the field, but they are obviously not suitable for siege, so they have replaced the spare rattan cards and sabers, as well as a certain bow and crossbow musket.

The troops advanced one by one under the cover of the rattan brand, and the musket team reinforced by the Zhu Shuren also took the opportunity to follow the rattan player and fired at the head of the city.

Zhang Mingzhi lacked muskets, and his soldiers were suddenly hit by shotguns and couldn't raise their heads.

Xinla's strong man was even more frightened by the gunfire and flying gravel and did not dare to show his head and throw the wooden stones out, but dared to hide behind the battlements, and used a posture similar to the Sakuragi flower road to shoot the basket from the toilet bowl, and blindly threw the wood and stones out of the top.

A very small number of recruits even threw stones behind them with their backs against the battlements in a panic, but they did not succeed in climbing over the battlements with insufficient strength, and the stones fell down again and killed themselves.

All kinds of chaos, and so on.

Zhang Mingzhi didn't expect that the strong men he had just pulled under his command were so unbearable, so he had to temporarily urgently dispatch thieves and veterans from other directions to plug the mouth.

As several ladders and trench carts approached the city wall one by one, Qin Liangyu's troops soon launched a fierce bloody battle with Zhang Mingzhi's army.

Although the soldiers of the white pole soldiers were brave, they could not stand the terrain disadvantage of the besieging side was too obvious, and soon there were bloody casualties, and the rogue army on the opposite side was also uncomfortable.

The number of people killed in battle could increase by dozens every other cup of tea, and the blood gradually splattered and smeared on the city walls, and kept flowing downward.

……

After the containment siege in the west of the city lasted for about half a burnt incense, Zhu Shuren repeatedly observed with binoculars on the surface of the Yangtze River.

Confirming that there seemed to be reinforcements from several other directions in the direction of Qin Liangyu's attack, he finally gave the order for the Wang brothers to attack immediately.

Over there, Qin Liangyu resolutely carried out the order at the expense of casualties, and here Wang Guangchang and Wang Guangxing brothers made another mistake in their hearts, so they had to prepare hard.

Fortunately, before they attacked, Zhu Shuren also gave them full encouragement, completely unraveling the mystery, so that they don't have to worry about "what to do if they directly enter the siege after the temporary landing, and lack of heavy siege weapons".

"The two kings guerrilla rest assured, your troops only need to bring a wooden ladder, as soon as they go ashore, they will line up directly, and then charge to attack the city. As for the city gate and city wall, I will use the Hongyi cannon to bombard a round directly, even if it can't be blasted open, at least it can collapse in a few places. ”

Wang Guangchang and Wang Guangxing were stunned: "Can the Hongyi cannon hit so far?" This river is at least a mile away from the east wall of the East Gate! ”

These troops who were born as thieves and were appeased by the imperial court really haven't seen much of the world, they have only fought in the Yunyang and Xiangyang areas of Sichuan and Huguang.

Unlike Qin Liangyu, who went to King Qinwang in Beijing back then, he saw the Hongyi cannon that guarded the capital.

It can be said that most of today's Sichuan officials and soldiers, except for Qin Liangyu's headquarters, have not operated Hongyi cannons, but have only used relatively old-fashioned artillery such as the Franc machine, and even used old-fashioned and lighter tiger squat cannons.

They really couldn't imagine that "the cannon can hit two miles away", and even the generals of Zhang Xianzhong's division on the opposite side couldn't imagine it.

Who made Zhu Shuren's Hongyi cannon the best quality and the strongest performance parameters in Asia today - as early as more than a year ago, Zhu Shuren had three or four thousand pounds of Dutch original Hongyi cannons, that is, 18 and 24-pound naval guns corresponding to the Dutch, which were all obtained by Zheng Chenggong to honor this big brother.

In the past year, Zhu Shuren opened an iron mine in Daye and built a new type of blast furnace and preheated blast furnace for iron and steelmaking, and the metallurgical level has approached the late 18th century, at least more than 100 years higher than the most advanced level in the same period in the original history.

With better steel, the quality of the Hongyi cannon cast by Zhu Shuren's military heart is of course also improving imperceptibly and steadily.

Now on Song Yingxing's side, the heaviest Hongyi cannon that can be cast has broken through to the two ranks of 5,000 jin and 6,000 jin, which is more than half heavier than the original heaviest.

Of course, the heavier the cannon, the better, after all, versatility and mobility must also be considered. Zhu Shuren's development of the new Hongyi cannon was divided into two directions, not only to make it easier for horse-drawn carts to pull the light cannon, but also to use it for the heavy artillery of warships.

These heaviest six-thousand-pound guns, because the quality of steel is more than 100 years ahead of the Dutch in the same period, the actual combat effect has been close to the end of the 17th century, the Dutch Navy's 3.7-ton "42-pound gun", that is, can fire 42-pound large iron balls, which is equivalent to about 33 pounds in the Ming Dynasty.

The heaviest guns, on the heavy Galen ships of the Dutch, were still too heavy to be used as broadside guns, as the recoil could easily lead to instability in the hull.

Therefore, in the era of the Dutch sail battleship, the heaviest broadside gun, only to 32 pound shells, had to be deployed on the lowest gun deck of the sail battleship to prevent the ship's center of gravity from being too high and unstable. And the 42-pounder gun, which was used only as a bow and stern gun.

Of course, Zhu Shuren will not violate these physical laws.

Therefore, the 42-pounder cannon he built was also only used as the bow gun for the top Ming army warships above the 800 material level.

Each large ship has a maximum of one bow and can only fire forward, so as not to cause the recoil to capsize.

If this kind of cannon wants to be used in land field warfare, it is also very troublesome, because it cannot be moved at all.

In any era, in addition to the fortress artillery, the heaviest army artillery, the caliber and ammunition weight are certainly inferior to the naval main guns of the period, after all, the transportation capacity of land vehicles is certainly far inferior to the warships of the period.

Therefore, when attacking this kind of city that can be directly shot along the river and from the Yangtze River to the city gate, Zhu Shuren's trick can be used, which is actually a very big limitation.

The Wang brothers each brought a battalion of 2,000 men, adding up to 4,000 people, and soon landed in a large formation in the dock area east of Wanxian County.

When the defenders of the city saw it, they did not dare to try to "take advantage of the unstable foothold of the landing force to go out of the city and counterattack halfway".

Who let Zhang Mingzhi himself be pinned down by Qin Liangyu in the west of the city, almost all the troops here are strong men who have just been pulled, recruits, who can have the courage to open the city gate and rush out to fight in the field.

The 4,000 people of the Wang brothers lined up smoothly and carried the flying ladder.

At the same time, several of the largest warships on the Yangtze River have already laid stones and adjusted the direction of their bows, which is equivalent to anchoring and firing, which is very stable.

"Boom, boom, boom-" With a few loud noises that even the vast majority of the Ming army themselves had never had a physical examination, three or five large iron balls of thirty-three pounds each flew straight towards the east city wall, city tower, and city gate of Wanxian.

"This is the Hongyi Cannon? None of the ten Franc machines are moving as much as this one, right? The Wang brothers were dumbfounded, and after the first round of bombardment, they were so sluggish that they didn't react for a while.

Fortunately, they are still far from the city wall, and they will not suffer losses if they do not charge for a while.

The accuracy of the first round of shells is indeed not bad, and it is necessary to calibrate and adjust the firing and solve the error caused by the shaking of the hull. Only one shell hit the city wall, and hundreds of stones of rammed earth fell down, piling up a messy slope of earth inside and outside the wall, and also smashing the wall in that place at least a third of its height.

After fine-tuning, about five minutes later, these heavy guns started the second round of shooting - no way, the heavy artillery of this era, the firing speed is so slow, Zhu Shuren has just created this kind of big guy for a few months, and the soldiers have not many opportunities for live-fire training, so they can only shoot one shot in five minutes.

"Boom, boom—"

With a few loud bangs, this time the muzzle of the cannon was generally lowered, although it didn't hit the place where it was directly aimed, but at least there was no empty cannon.

There were two shots that were low, and after they were smashed on the ground, they ploughed out a soil ditch several zhang long, and then bounced off and ricochet, and smashed on the root of the city wall again, at least dozens of stones of rammed earth fell, and because it was the root of the wall, the rammed earth on it collapsed a lot because of its own weight.

And the remaining three shots directly hit the wall and the city tower, and the city tower at the east gate of Wanxian County was also directly hit with a big hole and collapsed a small half.

"Kill! The heavy artillery of the national surname can directly collapse the city wall! Fifty taels for each person who stormed the city! "The brothers of the Wang family were also completely aroused, with such a cheap pick-up, if they don't take the opportunity to brush up their military exploits, they will be so sorry for themselves.

What they didn't expect was that just when they rushed hundreds of steps and were about to approach the range of the crossbow of the city wall, the east gate of Wanxian County actually opened, and there were many rogue guards rushing out of it, as if they were preparing to counterattack the landing point of the besieging officers!

Wang Guangxing and Wang Guangchang were stupid, they couldn't imagine why there was such a stupid enemy.

But if you have a advantage, you don't take advantage of it, that's a fool! Who wouldn't want to be able to fight hand-to-hand combat in the field with these recruits!

The two sides soon launched a bloody melee under the city, swords and guns into the flesh, the officers and troops were more well-equipped, and there were cannons that fired at the parabola in the distance, hitting the thieves' rear army and the city, the thieves were even more chaotic for a while, and in less than a cup of tea, this counterattack attempt was completely defeated.

The Wang brothers took two or three thousand brothers who still had combat effectiveness, and chased the fleeing rout into the city, and after a bloody strangulation, they finally broke through Wanxian.

Zhang Mingzhi couldn't resist it at all, and with the fire in the city, the battlefield in the west of the city was also broken through by Qin Liangyu.

As the bloody battle gradually subsided, Wang Guangxing beheaded a few thieves and captured a brigade alive, so he had the opportunity to torture: "Dog thief, you are so daring, you still dare to open the door to counterattack, what do you think?" ”

The palm brigade trembled, kowtowing like pounding garlic: "We have never seen such a heavy artillery, we can't let the brothers be bombarded in vain, seeing that there are not many of you ashore, you want to rush over and destroy the cannon, otherwise you will die." ”

The Wang brothers couldn't help laughing when they heard this, this group of uninformed guys actually thought that the officers and soldiers were unloading and deploying heavy artillery to the dock to open fire, and they wanted to come over to seize the artillery and destroy the artillery!

These heavy artillery pieces were obviously fired directly at the warships docked at the berths, but they were only a mile or two apart, and the thieves didn't have good eyes and didn't see clearly.

It seems that this kind of weapon, which can make the enemy only take a beating and not fight back, and every shot can ensure that the city walls and gates are severely damaged, is still very effective in forcing the enemy in the city to come out for a field battle.

It only took half a day for the officers and soldiers to take Wanxian.