In the hunting river wind at the end of the month, Zhu Shuren was wearing a mink fur, standing on the tower of the 800-material warship, and looked at Chongqing City in the distance with binoculars.

This is the first time he came to Bashu at the end of the Ming Dynasty, and the first time he witnessed the Jiancheng that ranked in the forefront of Bashu at the end of the Ming Dynasty.

Chongqing's first impression of Chongqing was that the city walls were not tall and strong, and they looked a bit in disrepair - of course, it could also be because it had just been breached by Zhang Xianzhong less than a month ago, and the smashed and damaged places had not yet been repaired, so it looked even more miserable.

However, Zhu Shuren's second impression soon shifted to the terrain of Chongqing, and he had to admit that with the terrain of Chongqing, in fact, even if the city wall was broken and shorter, it was also difficult to attack.

Because the city wall here was originally built on the mountain,

Even if there is no wall at all, just build a few checkpoints on the main road on the mountain, and the siege troops climb the mountain with crossfire on the high side of the hillside, they have to lose half their lives.

In fact, you only need to look at the Baidu map of later generations to know. The Yangtze River and the Jialing River, before reaching Chaotianmen, are fifteen miles long and flow almost parallel to the east.

In the area of the Erling Park in the later generations, there is only one kilometer wide land between the Yangtze River and the Jialing River, but the river water just can't merge here, and it has to flow fifteen miles downstream.

It can be seen that all along the fifteen-mile road are high mountains. But if there is a little low and flat gap, which can be broken through by tens of millions of years of erosion, the two rivers will have merged in advance.

If the official army wants to attack Chongqing by land, it can only follow the mountain road from Erling to Qixinggang, and finally choose one or several places to attack from the Dingyuan Gate, Tongyuan Gate, and Jintang Gate on the west side, and each gate is separated by hundreds of steps, and the defenders only need to hold the front of the peninsula that is just more than two miles wide.

If you don't want to attack from both sides of this narrow mountain range, then you can only directly cross the Yangtze River or the Jialing River to fight a landing battle.

Of course, when they were in Wanxian, the official army had already fought a landing battle and it was successful, so the landing battle was not completely impossible to consider.

It's just that Zhu Shu is cautious, so he carefully observed the banks of the Yangtze River and the Jialing River.

Winter is the dry season, and the water levels of both rivers have dropped.

However, after all, the main stream of the Yangtze River has abundant water from the upper reaches of the Yangtze River, and no matter how little rainfall falls in Sichuan, the water level cannot drop too much, and the shore is only exposed dozens of feet wide muddy flats, and it is quite troublesome for soldiers to land, and it is easy to fall into the silt.

The water from the upper reaches of the Jialing River depends on the precipitation of southern Hanzhong and Brazil, so it can dry up more than half in winter, and the areas where the Jialing River flows through are densely wooded and mountainous, and there is very little sediment entrained, and after the water level recedes, there is not much silt left, but there are a lot of rocks and pebbles exposed at the bottom of the river.

This point, even if the officials in 2022 are not familiar with the geography of Chongqing, they should be no strangers to it - the Jialing River in later generations, but in the summer heat, it is almost half dry, leaving only a narrow main channel in the center of the river with a little water.

In fact, summer should be a period of abundant water, and winter is the time when the Jialing River is at its least.

"It seems that the terrain on both sides is not very good for landing, and it is flat after going ashore at Chaotianmen, but it will soon be climbed to attack the city, and the silt on the side of the Yangtze River is easy for people to sink into.

If you want to carry siege weapons ashore, you can only sacrifice some flat-bottomed boats, run aground on the beach, wade through most of the silt sections, and then remove the bow baffle and retreat the siege vehicles.

On this side of the Jialing River, it is no problem for infantry to land, and it can be overcome at all if it is rough on foot, but there are so many rocks and pebbles that it is completely impossible for siege vehicles to land. Even if you are willing to sacrifice a flat-bottomed boat to rush to the beach, I am afraid that you will hit the reef and leak in advance.

This Chongqing City, it is not advisable to attack it directly, and we still have to find a way to outwit it. ”

After reading it, Zhu Shuren told Zhang Huangyan and Qin Liangyu to the bottom.

Zhang Huangyan didn't know much about the local situation, so he thought so.

Qin Liangyu has fought all her life, and it is not so easy to get around, but she also has to admit that the surname of the country still has a very clear understanding of difficulties.

So, she was holding a white-pole gun and asked worriedly: "The surname of the country said that he wanted to outwit, that is, to temporarily besiege but not attack, wait for the soldiers and horses of the Tan family brothers on the road in Hezhou to arrive, and then lure the enemy by deception?" ”

Zhu Shuren was stunned for a moment, and then smiled, he knew that this was Qin Liangyu who was still worried about him talking on paper.

So he also replied heartily: "Soldiers are impermanent, water is impermanent, how can this official say that if you use a strategy, you must use deception to surrender?" At first, I just mentioned it casually in private.

At the moment, although it is difficult to break through the strong attack, you can't wait, you still have to fight, and you can try to persuade you to surrender before fighting. In this way, Bai Wenxuan can not be fooled. Especially for some common sense siege methods that are unlikely to succeed, let's hide them step by step, and the other party will be even more paralyzed. ”

Qin Liangyu was relieved to hear him say so cautiously, and he was willing to carry out all the specific commands of Zhu Shuren.

After inspecting the enemy's defense on the river that day, the troops crossed the Jialing River in separate forces, simply sandwiched the two banks of the Jialing River, established advance camps, and then invested in the construction of siege weapons.

No matter how urgent it is, it is impossible to launch a strong attack in the first day or two, and it is always necessary to allow time for siege engines.

So in the afternoon of the same day, after Zhu Shuren learned a little about the development of the relevant work, he took some elite soldiers from the direction of the land route from the western peninsula of Chongqing to Qixinggang outside Tongyuan Gate.

The officers and troops set up a number of lookout points and an improvised camp on Qixinggang, and set up muskets and franc machines. Then he sent cavalry and scolding men to the city to try to persuade the attackers to surrender.

As for the Hongyi cannon, it is impossible to get the Qixinggang camp for the time being, because it is too heavy, and it is impossible to pull thousands of catties of things up the mountain at all, and there are only three or five hundred catties of Franc machine guns, which can be deployed on the mountain more flexibly. The purpose of the Franc machine was not to use it to attack the city, but to prevent the defenders from going out of the city at night to attack the lookout point.

……

Bai Wenxuan was in the city, and he was also busy all day, nervously deploying various defenses.

His judgment on the possible direction of attack of the official army was similar to Zhu Shuren's assumption, and he felt that the official army was most likely to climb the slope from the west to attack the city, and the danger of Tongyuanmen being attacked was the greatest.

Because the flat and open terrain outside the city gate is relatively largest, it is suitable for deploying formations and heavy siege weapons.

As for the south and north of the city, although Bai Wenxuan was not familiar with the geography of Chongqing, in the past 20 days, he could be regarded as grinding guns in battle, doing homework every day, and also noticed the silt and craggy rocks exposed by the Yangtze River and Jialing River after the water level dropped in winter.

Under such a unanimous opinion, when Zhu Shuren sent people to persuade him to surrender, Bai Wenxuan also happened to inspect the defense at the head of the city, and there was no need for people to spread the word.

In the rumbling of war drums, the front team of the official army under the protection of the cavalry, approached to a distance of 300 steps outside the city wall, and some of the heavy armored soldiers carried iron shields and approached more than 100 steps forward.

"Bai Wenxuan! You can recognize the banner of my family's Futai! Zhang Xianzhong was so rampant at the beginning, he was still shot off his ear and beaten into a pockmarked face, and he was busy like a lost dog!

If you hide in the deep mountains of Guizhou, my family Futai is limited to the constraints of the imperial court, and it is not good to kill and pursue! Now that he dares to go out of the mountains and into the river, sooner or later the whole army will be wiped out!

You don't know yet, my family Futai let you go for the time being, but His Majesty asked him to rescue Kaifeng and deal with Li Zicheng first! Now Li Zicheng's 300,000 army has been completely wiped out by my family, and Li Zicheng himself has been beaten into a one-eyed dragon, abandoned the army and fled back to Shaanxi! The thief Zhang Reverse, a one-eyed dragon with one ear, is a perfect match! Sooner or later, there will be no corpses!

You let Zhang Mingzhi guard Wanxian, he has been wiped out! It was broken in a day without a day! This Chongqing city opened early, and you can still spare you from dying, if you break the city, then there will be no chickens and dogs! ”

The words of the Ming army scolding the battlemen seem to be a bit lengthy, but they really can't be deleted, because each one is a real achievement. These soldiers under Zhang Xianzhong's command have been trapped in the mountains for a long time, and they don't know the news of the outside world, so it is not easy to be in awe.

It is necessary to forcibly pull their ears and open their eyelids, forcing them to know what is going on in the outside world, so as to be afraid.

Sure enough, under the repeated flaunting of military power by the officers and soldiers, the morale of the defenders at the head of the city really wavered. So much so that when Bai Wenxuan saw this, he had to take the henchmen of the war, go to the city tower to suppress, and try to refute the rumors.

After a while, Bai Wenxuan, who was in a hurry, had to come forward in person, so that his subordinates could also scold and clarify:

"Shen Shuren, you are a lackey for the faint king, and the remnants of the people will succeed, it is impossible to succeed! Chongzhen is stubborn and self-serving, abusing corrupt officials and corrupt officials, the people of the world are not happy, and the people can't be killed! But if we have a breath, we will kill the corrupt officials and faint kings......"

I have to say that Bai Wenxuan's scolding opponent has collapsed a little bit of the theoretical system, and Zhang Xianzhong has no program of action.

Therefore, as long as the military does not have the upper hand, the war of words is completely only left to scold the ancestors of the eighteen generations, and it is impossible to sow discord and shake the morale of the army.

Bai Wenxuan can make people say this, and he has already thought of it after studying with Sun Kewang and Li Dingguo - under Zhang Xianzhong, the most politically far-sighted person is actually Sun Kewang, and Li Dingguo is still a little political novice. When Zhang Xianzhong broke through Chongqing and decided to slaughter the city, it was Sun Kewang who mainly dissuaded him from slaughtering the city.

Of course, this is not to say that Sun Kewang's conscience is better than Li Dingguo's, but Sun Kewang is more politically minded and knows how to establish a base area and win over people's hearts and capital. And Zhang Xianzhong currently has no such tendon in his mind at all.

Historically, after the summer of the sixteenth year of Chongzhen, Li Zicheng and Zhang Xianzhong both briefly grew the germ of political thinking in their minds, but then because of the unfavorable war, they were also snuffed out by themselves.

In this life, because of the butterfly effect, Zhang Xianzhong estimated that he would not have a chance to grow this thing in his mind, and there was not much growth cycle left for him.

As a result, at this moment, the two armies were scolding, and the defenders could not tell any facts that shook the hearts of the enemy's troops except for a handful of swearing.

The only gain was that when the official and military side heard Bai Wenxuan mention Zhu Shuren's name, they loudly ridiculed Bai Wenxuan for not knowing and the news was blocked, and they didn't know that Lord Futai had been given a national surname and named Krupp by His Majesty because of the destruction of the 300,000 army of thieves.

When the officials and soldiers scolded the soldiers to reveal the news, of course, there was also evidence, directly with the banner of Zhu Shuren as evidence, as well as the earl's guard of honor.

However, this revelation by the officers and soldiers made the defenders panic.

Wanxian was lost in one day, Li Zicheng's army of 300,000 was completely wiped out, and Zhu Shuren was given the surname of Earl for this......

If he really freed his hands and entered the middle of the river so quickly, could the Eight Kings be his opponents?

Among the soldiers under Bai Wen, those brothers in the old battalion who are the most close and confidants have also participated in the battle of Hengzhou. At the beginning, Zhang Xianzhong was beaten so badly that he fled from Xiangxi to Qianzhong Road in a hurry, and everyone remembered the suffering.

As a result, he was only a few months old, and his old enemy was chasing after him, which was simply suppressed by the bloodline.

If someone here understands English, I'm afraid they should ask madly, "Why are you all the time?" ”

Bai Wenxuan also forcibly stubbornly forced the scolding hand to shout back:

"Zhu Shuren, don't talk nonsense if you have a kind! If you want to attack the city, just attack it! So far, have you ever broken through any of the cities that the Eight Kings have sworn to defend to the death? It's not all our army that took the initiative to move in, so we gave you a chance, and today the governor will live and die with the city! ”

Of course, Zhu Shuren will not be excited, and the siege weapons have not been prepared today, so he just asked the musket team to secretly line up when he scolded the formation to attract the attention of the defenders, ready to step forward at any time, and pulled a few more Franc machines, ready to steal again.

Because it is stealing, the number of people used naturally cannot be too many, and there are only a few hundred musketeers and a few Franc machines.

Bai Wenxuan scolded and scolded, realizing that the atmosphere was wrong, thinking of Zhang Xianzhong being beaten into pockmarks, he also hurriedly retreated, and reminded the soldiers to beware.

But he was still attacked by a burst of guns and artillery by the official army, killing dozens of defenders, and Bai Wenxuan was so angry that he shouted that the other party was despicable and shameless.

The officers and soldiers prepared another firepower, and the battlements of the city collapsed, the surface fortifications were damaged in several places, and the soldiers were also killed and wounded dozens of people.

……

After being frustrated for the first time and having a demoralization hit, Bai Wenxuan was inevitably depressed after he went back, and the key was to be troubled by Zhang Xianzhong's advisers who left him to supervise the army.

That night, after Pan Dufu learned about what happened outside Tongyuan Gate, he didn't forget to accompany Bai Wenxuan with a smiling face to knock on the side and find out the news.

Of course, Bai Wenxuan knew that this was the possibility that the other party came to test whether he had betrayed the Eight Kings. So he could only bite the bullet and pick what the other party was willing to listen to, and also said that he would definitely deploy heavy troops near Tongyuan Gate in the future, and fortify it layer by layer, even if Zhu Shuren finished building heavy siege weapons, he would not be able to break through such a dangerous terrain.

However, Pan Duqiao had already planted a thorn in his heart, and the more Bai Wenxuan said that he was all-encompassing, the more worried he became, so he asked again:

"Right Governor, is this only the Tongyuan Gate and the west side of the city to be strictly guarded? The water of the Jialing River is not wide and deep now, there are ten miles to the north of the city, and the officers and soldiers are likely to cross the river everywhere, should you also be on guard? ”

Bai Wenxuan wanted to follow the other party's words, but he still had military common sense, and he couldn't ignore his conscience, so he showed off a sentence: "It's true that the Layue water of the Jialing River is shallow and slow, but the bottom of the river that can be exposed is rocky, and the officials and soldiers sneak attack from here, how to drive?" You can't even go up the ladder, so don't worry, Master Pan. ”

Pan Duqiao said suspiciously: "Zhuge is only cautious in using troops, now the enemy is strong and I am weak, the key is not to leave loopholes, since the Jialing River can be crossed, it should be tightly fortified, and the right governor will not be careful...... It's a fluke. ”

Pan Duqiao originally wanted to say "half-hearted", but he was not stupid, he knew that if Bai Wenxuan was really half-hearted, he would not be able to please good fruit to eat.

So, let's take chances.

Bai Wenxuan and him are also jealous of each other. He was left here by Zhang Xianzhong to lead the troops, but Zhang Xianzhong is not stupid, since he would think of leaving a military advisor to supervise the army, of course, he will also bring Bai Wenxuan's relatives and friends with him, and Bai Wenxuan used to be Li Dingguo's general, he also has to worry about implicating the past.

Since the massacre of the city in Chongqing, Zhang Xianzhong was fiercely advised by Sun Kewang, and he has become more and more suspicious, and he always feels that the people around him are unreliable. After all, if Sun Kewang and Li Dingguo are both suspicious, then who else can he trust?

Therefore, at this moment, Bai Wenxuan was beaten, so he had to rely on Pan Dufu for the time being, and chose to readjust the deployment, and strengthen the west and north sides equally with the already small number of troops, just like sprinkling pepper noodles.

The next day, the officers and troops did not come to attack the city, but only scolded the formation and prepared firepower, and they should still be building equipment.

But by the early hours of the third day, things had finally changed.

At about the end of the Yin period, dozens of medium-sized troop carriers quietly came to the Jialing River, each with nearly 100 people, and a total of thousands of soldiers.

The defenders of the city were lit only by torches, and of course they could not see the distance, so they did not know anything until the boats on the river had laid down most of their soldiers and lined up to prepare for a sneak attack.

In the end, the officers and soldiers who still landed carried the flying ladder and began to charge, and the warships on the river also began to support with Franc machines and musket fire, and the defenders at the head of the city reacted and quickly organized resistance, and the two sides engaged in a short and bloody battle.

Unfortunately, due to the lack of siege weapons and the official army's Franc machine guns from the remaining channel of the Jialing River, the range was not enough to bombard the city wall. After most of the bloody battle, the officers and troops still resolutely retreated.

The defenders won a small victory, and immediately cheered.

They were on guard until dawn, and the defenders saw that at the mouth of the Jialing River, there were several warships that had been hit by the bottom of the boats, which seemed to be larger than the troop transport ships that the officers and troops had attacked in the Jialing River last night.

The soldiers on board were apparently rescued by other small and medium-sized warships.

Seeing this scene, the defenders became more and more elated, and the soldiers in Beicheng all had some feelings of contempt for the enemy.

After learning about the battle in Beicheng at dawn, Tianliang Bai Wenxuan and Pan Duqiao also rushed here to check the situation as soon as possible.

However, the two obviously disagreed again on the interpretation of the battle situation.

Pan Dufu feather fan scarf, shaking the fan gently, talking and laughing there, saying that if it weren't for his "Zhuge is only cautious in his life", he reminded Bai Wenxuan that the north of the city should also focus on defense, and I am afraid that he will be attacked by the official army last night! In the future, the right governor will listen to the teachings of his reincarnation!

Bai Wenxuan rolled his eyes when he heard this, and he could only endure it, saying in his heart that last night, the officers and soldiers carried the flying ladder and stole the way they played, and they didn't need to strengthen their troops to defend it!

But Pan Duqiao looked like an afterthought, so he couldn't assume at all, so he had to admit it and continue to deploy troops here evenly.

It was precisely because the defenders insisted on dividing their troops like pepper noodles on the front of more than ten miles north of the city, that daytime, the official army that broke out in the west of the city attacked the city for the first time, but it made the thieves defend it extremely hard.

Bai Wenxuan's troops in Tongyuanmen and Dingyuanmen were completely insufficient, but Zhu Shuren spread out in an all-round way, and even went to Hongyi to bombard the city, which made Bai Wenxuan's troops overstretched, and the ratio of casualties was not lower than that of the attacker at all. As a defender of the city, such a number is really embarrassing enough.

Bai Wenxuan repeatedly asked Pan Duqiu to be honest and repelled a sneak attack in the north of the city, so that the officials and soldiers should know the difficulties and retreat, and change the old camp brothers to the two gates in the west of the city to guard against death.

Pan Duqiao always doubted Bai Wenxuan's intentions, and insisted that he was only allowed to increase the recruitment of strong men and recruits in the city, and went to the west of the city to fight consumption and fill the pit, Bai Wenxuan had no choice but to do so.

In this case, the Northern Route Army of the Sichuan Army, which Zhu Shuren had been waiting for, finally arrived belatedly.

The troops of the Tan Wen brothers passed through Hezhou in a roundabout way, went down the Jialing River, and joined forces in the west of Chongqing.