Bang...... Bang!

Every time the huge siege cone hit, there was an earth-shattering sound, and the sound waves reverberated back and forth in the valley area, shaking the attack and defense on the battlefield all dizzy, and even the transmission of the drum and horn command was greatly blocked.

Near the city wall is the area where the fighting is most intense, countless Hu pawns try hard to build the ladder against the city wall, and every time they succeed, there is a steady stream of Hu pawns climbing up along the cloud ladder, fighting for a first place without fear of death.

However, it is not easy to make it to the top of the city, and the defenders of the city will not be left to die. Some of them spread their wide leather shields to shield themselves and their robes from the loss of the projectiles from outside the city, some drew their bows and shot downwards to shoot the eye-catching targets of the thieves, and some used hooks and forks to destroy the ladders or directly hang the thieves who climbed up the city walls.

When the offensive of the thief army is too fierce on some regional battlefields, the various counterattacks of the defenders are limited, so some extraordinary means need to be used.

The fire burned under several large stoves on the castle tower, of course, not to add food to the defenders who were fighting at the head of the city, but to process a steady stream of boiling water, and when the juice boiled, it would be poured by the defenders with clay pots, wooden barrels and other utensils directly on the thieves who climbed on the ladders, and the heart-rending screams could be heard from under the castle head.

The first offensive and defensive battle lasted for most of the hour, and the intensity of the offensive of the bandit army outside the city gradually decreased, and all kinds of siege equipment and wounded soldiers were sent back to the rear one after another, leaving only some traces of destruction outside the city walls and hundreds of corpses of flesh and blood, but they failed to cause any substantial damage to the city.

As the thieves withdrew, the defenders on the city walls began to clean up the battlefield, repair the damaged walls, replenish the consumed supplies, and have a fresh army to replace the robes that were too draining.

This battle can only be regarded as a small test and a test of each other. Although the thief army failed to make any substantial breakthroughs, the discipline shown in the siege process also made Li Mu pay more attention to these enemies.

Lishihu is not a nomadic Hu people, they live in the Luliang Mountains of the steep and changeable terrain than the Qingshui River Valley, three steps and one ditch, five steps and one danger, accustomed to the life of the village and dock, for offensive and defensive operations are no stranger.

In the siege battle just now, the number of various siege equipment invested by these thieves made Li Mu staggered, and he realized that the next battle would inevitably become more and more fierce and the situation became more and more severe.

"It's okay, it's okay, at least there are Li Boshan's reinforcements nearby."

Although his mood became a little heavy, Li Mucai secretly breathed a sigh of relief when he thought that he was not fighting alone.

Although he didn't know what Li Tai did to contain the thief army after he arrived, seeing that the thief army reversed the previous confrontation and directly attacked the city, it was somewhat related to Li Tai's reinforcements.

The thieves didn't have much respite for the defenders, and soon launched a second round of attacks.

In addition to the previous siege methods, the thief army also invested elite men and horses to transport two tall nest carts to a location not far from the city wall and set them up, so as to wait and see the situation in the city and the dispatch of men and horses.

With the insight and guidance of the sentinels on the nest car, the thief army's attack on the city has become more aggressive and targeted, no longer aimlessly attacking the entire city wall, but consciously focusing on it.

With the change of the fighting mode of the thief army, the defenders at the head of the city suddenly felt the pressure, especially in some loopholes in the city defense, such as the northeast corner tower of the city, because of the construction of the structure of the corner tower and the city wall cracks, so there are not too many men and equipment for defense.

After the enemy sentries on the nest car outside the city noticed this hole in the city defense, even if they passed it down with the flag, Liu Aqi, the commander of the thief army who was in charge of commanding the operation, immediately adjusted the direction of the attack, and went straight to the other side to increase thousands of troops, and more equipment such as ladders and rushing cars were also put into battle.

Li Mu knew the hidden dangers at this section of the city wall, and saw that the thief army was attacking at a key point, but he did not dare to directly increase his troops to resist the enemy, so he could only arrange strong bows and heavy armor near the perimeter for defense.

Encountering no decent resistance, the enemy soon climbed the walls from the tower, and the first enemy soldiers to enter the city let out a cheerful cheer, but they were greeted by a rush of arrows.

Under the siege and slaughter of the soldiers defending the city, the first group of thieves to reach the top of the city were quickly killed and wounded. But this did not stop the thieves from swarming in the rear, who used the corpses of their comrades in front as cover, and poured into the city, and began to engage the defenders in hand-to-hand combat.

When the battle was raging at the head of the city, suddenly there was a loud sound of the city wall, and then the corner tower, which had been completely occupied by the enemy soldiers, was separated from the city wall and collapsed rapidly.

The sudden change occurred, and the enemy soldiers, whether they had climbed the corner tower or were still trying to climb up, were overwhelmed with fright for a while, and in an instant, hundreds of thieves and soldiers were smashed and buried by the sand and gravel that collapsed and rolled down.

"Give it to me! Rush out and kill all the thieves on the left! ”

Li Mu, who had already led his own soldiers to wait here, saw the corner tower collapse, and even if he waved his sword to give the order, he himself was wearing heavy armor and taking the lead in rushing out of the city along the gap exposed by the city wall, and rushed straight to the thieves and soldiers who were panicked and confused by the collapse of the corner tower.

Hundreds of heavily armed, wolf-like elite soldiers followed behind Li Mu, rushing out from the gap in the city wall, as if a sharp knife stabbed straight at the siege thieves outside the city, wielding knives and spears and lances continued to harvest human lives, and blood flowed everywhere they passed.

The soldiers in the enemy formation were originally rejoicing at the successful attack on the city wall, but they didn't expect that it was the situation in front of them, seeing that the defenders who rushed out of the battle continued to slaughter the soldiers under the city wall, and the generals of Chief Hu who supervised the battle in the rear were also busy mobilizing elite people to immediately come to the rescue and reinforcements.

After Li Mu led the crowd to kill several bandit troops under the city wall, he was going to continue to move forward and destroy the large siege equipment such as the nest car on the battlefield in one fell swoop, but soon the sound of horses' hooves sounded in the enemy formation, and at the same time, the horn of warning also sounded on the city wall.

After Li Mu and the others withdrew, the defenders of the city began to quickly set up a fence here, and then filled the gap here with miscellaneous materials such as wood and stones.

Because of the heavy casualties caused by this unexpected situation, the attack came to an end for the time being. For both warring sides, there are also gains and losses.

The thief army successfully broke through a corner tower, so that the city defense in front of them is no longer a complete one, and then you can not only expand the destruction for this gap, but also choose to break through here and choose to break through elsewhere, and there are more tactical options, which is undoubtedly a great encouragement.

The defenders took advantage of the variable of the collapse of the corner tower to go out unexpectedly and charge for a while, not only repelling the second round of enemy attacks, but also causing heavy losses to the thief army, at least one or two thousand soldiers were killed.

"Wu Angong's counterattack is also wonderful, but unfortunately it is still a little conservative. If you can cooperate with the infantry and cavalry to impact the thief army front, even if you can't break the thief formation in one fell swoop, you can destroy most of the equipment on the field, and the next city defense can also be greatly alleviated. ”

Li Tai saw that people were not struggling to carry the burden, standing on the top of the hill far away from the battlefield while watching the battle, commenting on Li Mu's performance against the enemy, and felt pity that Li Mu failed to take advantage of the opportunity to the extreme.

"Ah Lang, it's getting late, should we continue to watch the battle, or do we have another plan?"

Li Yantou looked up at the sun in the sky that had gradually set westward, and asked Li Tai for instructions. In winter, the days in Japan are short, and it will not be far after dark in the afternoon, and they always need to prepare early for thousands of men and horses.

"It's cold and freezing, and it's hard for the soldiers to lie in the snow and drink ice, so if you solve the thieves one step earlier, you can go back to the division a day earlier to recuperate."

After thinking about it, Li Tai said: "The main force is on standby in the camp for the time being, and a team of 1,000 light cavalry and 100 people will be dispatched to sneak into the valley in front of them first, and the road will be cleared first, so as to ensure that the army can enter the valley at any time to attack the enemy." ”

He stood on the top of the hill and blew the cold wind for a long time, of course, not just to watch the excitement, through the strength invested by the thief army in the two attacks and the scale of the opponent's formation on the battlefield, it can be roughly estimated that the total number of troops that the thief army can put into battle should be about 30,000, at most no more than 40,000.

Although the size of such a force is several times that of its own side, it is not powerful and invincible. Moreover, the advance and retreat coordination between the positions in the thief army is obviously a little disjointed and jerky, obviously these horses belong to multiple departments, and the quality of the soldiers is uneven.

Therefore, what Li Tai needs to consider at the moment is that he has to take advantage of the special terrain of the Qingshui River Valley, which is not limited to the advance and retreat of the army, and leave as many thief troops as possible, so that the thief army can disperse at a touch and then flow poison in all directions.

The geographical situation in northern Shaanxi is too tricky, and he was able to take tens of thousands of black water dogs in hundreds of parts before, if the elite forces of the thief army were formed, the harm caused would be large or small, and immeasurable.

On the battlefield, although the thief army was attacking Guangwu City with all its might, they did not relax their vigilance in the surrounding area.

Hu Chief Liu Aqi placed the thousands of men and horses left for contingency near Fenglin City, which had not yet been conquered, in order to collect and monitor the effect of shocking the defenders of Fenglin City, and at the same time dispersed scouts to patrol and guard between the passes near the mountain pass, so as to avoid being bullied by the enemy army that had not yet glimpsed the reality.

Therefore, when Li Tai ordered the light cavalry scouts to approach the valley where Guangwu City was located, the relevant situation was quickly reported to Liu Aqi.

After Liu Aqi learned of this, he immediately cheered up, luring out this erratic enemy army was also part of his tactical concept, carefully inquiring about the location of the scout's enemy traces, and quickly sketched it in his mind, and quickly determined the enemy's or offensive route, and then ordered several powerful chieftains to lead their troops to the relevant location to fortify.

At the same time, he also ordered to stop the direct attack on the city of Guangwu City, and instead threw many carts carrying soldiers into the battlefield, stopping not far from the walls of Guangwu City, and the curtains on the cars were used to resist the enemy's loss of attack on the city, while the soldiers dug ravines under the chariots.

And the thousands of elite men and horses who had never participated in the battle before were also mobilized by Liu Aqi from the east side of the battlefield to the frontal battlefield, and the Hu pawns who dug trenches on the battlefield lined up on the side to prevent the defenders in the city from jumping over the wall to sabotage the labor.

As the sound of fighting on the frontal battlefield stopped, the young man in the thief camp with a white wolf skin and a big fur couldn't help but be curious and irritable, and when the soldiers entered the battle and recalled Liu Aqi back to the camp.

Before he could ask questions after seeing Liu Aqi, the young man had already whipped his head and face with a horsewhip, and scolded angrily while whipping: "Didn't I confess that you were not allowed to return to the camp before the city was broken?" ”

Liu Aqi just gritted his teeth and endured the whipping, and did not explain that he was recalled, otherwise according to the logic of this young master, he would scold him for not taking the city for so long, and he was tired of his self-reflexive preface. Although he is the confidant of Liu Tuo, the king of Zuoxian, he has not changed his status as a house slave, but the young man is the beloved son of the king of Zuoxian, named Liu Kuzhen, and Liu Aqi does not dare to disobey the other party.

Fortunately, this young man, Liu Kuzhen, was deeply drunk, and he didn't have too strong physical strength to inflict corporal punishment on Liu Aqi for a long time, and after venting, he asked angrily: "Why did you stop the siege?" ”

Liu Aqi told the situation of the enemy's reinforcements bullying with a bitter face, and said that fighting on two fronts is the next strategy, and only by encircling the point to send reinforcements and killing the enemy's reinforcements can we continue to attack the city with all our might.

After Liu Kuzhen heard these words, he didn't comment on whether Liu Aqi's decision was right, but said in a trembling voice with a sudden change in his face: "The situation here is so sinister, the evil slave didn't report it, but welcomed me into the camp!" If I am persecuted here, your life will be enough to make amends! Hurry up and arrange someone to escort me back to the king's tent......"

"Young master, please rest assured, the tens of thousands of our army are far from being matched by the enemy army. There will not be many enemy troops hidden in the shadows, and once my whereabouts are revealed, I can send my men and horses to besiege and kill them. The young master only needs to wait in the camp, if he abandons the army at this moment, it will be more dangerous! ”

Liu Aqi's face changed in fright when he heard that the young master just heard the news, and he even had to leave immediately, and he was busy reassuring, not wanting to make any extraneous troubles on the eve of the war.

"Then hurry up, go and kill all the enemies! As long as you can keep me safe, I will reward you when I return! As long as I can return safely, I, I will accept the woman in your family and let you be my cronies! ”

After Liu Kuzhen heard this, he said again and again that he attached great importance to his own safety and could not afford to miss it, and made a promise that he felt sincere.

Although the young master's reaction was a little unbearable, Liu Aqi knew that he was deeply loved by the lord Zuo Xianwang, and some Xiangshi once said that this son could strengthen the Zuo Xianwang clan, so this Liu Kuzhen himself did not care about his own talent, and he enjoyed a very transcendent status in the clan.

Therefore, after hearing Liu Kuzhen's promise, Liu Aqi also nodded again and again, patted his chest and promised: "Young master, please rest assured, even if the slave gives up his life......"

"You can't die, who will protect me when you die? Come on, quickly put on my golden armor for General Liu! ”

When he knew that his own safety was in the hands of the generals of the unified army, Liu Kuzhen reversed his previous arrogance and arrogance, and turned to care for Liu Aqi, and even put his own armor on his body for the other party, which was also a living treasure.

Liu Aqi raised his hand and rubbed the gorgeous and glamorous armor stomach on his body, and for a while his heart was also moved by the death of the great student as a confidant, and repeatedly stated that he would do his best to protect the safety of the young master, so he returned to the battlefield to supervise the battle under Liu Kuzhen's repeated urging.

After Liu Aqi returned to the battlefield, he was even more energetic, and carefully inspected all parties on the battlefield to ensure that his plans and orders were fully implemented.

In addition to giving detailed instructions to the soldiers stationed here, he also set aside enough mobile forces to respond to all sides to ensure that no matter where the enemy appears, he can put in superior forces at the first time and give the opponent a head-on attack!

Just when Liu Aqi thought that he had made all the arrangements and was just waiting for the enemy to attack, the expected enemy army was nowhere to be seen. Not to mention the large-scale attack, even the few areas where the scouts had rubbed before were gone, as if they were only tentative for a moment and then retreated.

This kind of taste of being hung by someone is really not good, Liu Aqi also knows that the pressure exerted on the other party is not enough, and he still has not grasped the enemy's life, so the initiative of whether to fight or not is still in the hands of the other party.

The first day of the army leaving the camp to besiege Guangwu City ended in this atmosphere of anxious waiting. Although the thief army was the one who took the initiative to attack, as the next day came, the spirit of the thieves was visible to the naked eye, and it was even more sluggish than the defenders of Guangwu City.

After all, the thieves left the fixed camp and slept in the wilderness, and the rest environment itself was already very bad, and they had to watch out for enemy reinforcements who didn't know where to lurk or when they would kill all night, and the consumption of mental and physical strength was doubled, and the natural state was not good.

The Hao chiefs of the thieves who were guarding everywhere had nothing to do after a night of vigilance, and they couldn't help but question Liu Aqi's decision and arrangement, and even more Hao chiefs couldn't help but send people to complain to Liu Aqi that if the enemy army in the field did not appear again, they would lead their troops back to the camp to rest, and no longer stay here to suffer from the cold wind blowing through the valley and Tongtang.

Fortunately, because the young master Liu Kuzhen was worried about his own safety, he no longer exerted any pressure on Liu Aqi, but instead supported him, reprimanded and suppressed those Hu chiefs who questioned Liu Aqi.

But Liu Aqi also knew that such a state was bound to be difficult to maintain for a long time, and the people and horses under his command were not elite divisions with firm beliefs and full of loyalty, and the only factor that could unify and motivate them was to plunder the city and collect supplies after breaking through Guangwu City.

Now he has brought the army out of the camp and put on a vigorous posture to conquer Guangwu City in one fell swoop, but if the fire is stopped halfway and the troops are not attacked for a long time, the division is hanging outside and does not know what to do, and it will definitely fall into morale and exhaustion, and it may only fall apart in an instant.

So after a little weighing, seeing that the sun was gradually climbing into the hollow, he ordered to launch another attack on Guangwu City.

This time, there was no need for him to do any more encouragement and supervision, and the soldiers were more courageous than yesterday, because after a night of sleeping in the open, they knew more and more that if they wanted to end this pain, only by conquering Guangwu City in front of them could their situation be changed for the better.

As a result, the pressure on the soldiers defending the city has increased suddenly, and the gap in the corner tower, which could be used as a surprise soldier to secretly recruit the thief army, has become a huge hole in the city defense today, and has been attacked by the enemy.

Thousands of men and horses on both sides repeatedly fought and fought fiercely in the narrow area of the northeast corner of the city, and when the situation was at its worst, Li Mu even had to lead his own troops into battle to fight and fight hard to repel the thief army who were not afraid of death.

In addition to the gap in the corner tower, the rest of the city was also attacked by the enemy to varying degrees, the defenders of the city were tired of running on the city head like firefighters, and even the reserve troops and some of the strong men in the city were sent to the head of the city, although they have been able to hold the city wall defense line without losing, but the frequency of the enemy army landing the city is also getting higher and higher.

"Li Boshan, why don't you send troops?"

On the city wall, Li Mu slashed the thief soldiers who crossed the battlement wall, and even though he was panting with the blade of the knife, he turned his head to look at the river valley and mountains to the west, and muttered to himself.

Outside the city wall, seeing the rapid progress of the siege, the soldiers of the Hu tribe were also greatly encouraged. And on the periphery of this frontal battlefield, suddenly a flash of inspiration flashed in the mind of a Hu chief, and he said to himself in shock: "Is Liu Duhou placing my troops here to guard against enemy reinforcements, or to break away our troops and enter the city from his headquarters to sweep and plunder?" ”

There was not only one person who had this question, but also some of the soldiers of the Hu army who defended Gukou directly abandoned Tanikou and came to the battlefield to join the attack on the city without waiting for military orders.

"Order all directions, march at full speed, and after entering, go straight to the thief formation, only kill and not capture, you must kill the thief army in the shortest possible time, and don't make it coalesce!"

At this time, Li Tai also walked down the top of the hill, first ordered an attack on the men and horses that had been divided into various roads, and he also quickly put on his armor with the assistance of his own soldiers, turned over his horse and then led the army forward with a lance.