Fan Zhong drowned on the Song-Liao border, took the strong wall to clear the wilderness, and moved the border people to the south, mainly to hold on to the city.

The Liao's strategy of feeding the war with war was completely ineffective.

So Liao Xingzong ordered Xiao Xiaoyou to be a backup in Nanjing, Yelu Chongyuan led 20,000 cavalry to feint to attack Wangdu, and personally led 80,000 cavalry to besiege Gaoyang.

But the real purpose of the Liao State was actually to protect the fortress in the middle, so that Xiao Hui led an army of 50,000 and killed the fortress.

To the north of Baosai is Suicheng and Ansu, to the east is Rongcheng and Xiongzhou, to the west is Beiping and Wangdu, which is the center of the border front, according to the spy investigation of the Liao State, most of the materials, grain, grass and ordnance of the Song front line are stored here.

In fact, because of its location, Baosai has to radiate the side roads, and the resources prepared are also the most except for the rear center daimyo's mansion, which can naturally be regarded as the frontline of the Song army.

If the Liao State attacked other places, the army supplies of Baosai would be able to rush to the aid immediately. But in the same way, if the Liao State takes Baosai, then the Song front line will be in an embarrassment.

Therefore, Fan Zhongyan asked the general Wang De to lead 20,000 troops to guard this place, and he personally led 30,000 people to Yongning in the rear as backup.

In this way, with the addition of the surrounding Song troops, the Song army on the front line alone has about 100,000 people. There are still more than 100,000 troops in the rear, and it can be said that a pocket array has been carefully arranged for the Liao army, and it depends on whether the Liao army will rush over.

Obviously, Fan Zhongyan's policy of clearing the wilderness has made the Liao State unbearable, and the internal consumption is serious, Yelu Zongzhen decided that he could not delay it any longer, and he had to rush to a wave no matter what.

For a time, the border was full of war.

Groups of Liao army squads scattered, some went deep into the Song realm, wanting to attack the border villages in the hinterland of Kouluo, some attacked the outer fortresses to eliminate hidden dangers, and some gathered the main force to attack the Great Song City.

Anyang Kouzhai is located in the north of Beiping County, probably in the area of Shunping County, Hebei Province in later generations, where 3,000 Song troops were stationed.

If you want to attack Wangdu first through Beiping, if you want to pass Beiping, you must first pass through more than ten fortresses such as Anyangkou Village, Beiping Village, Yutaikou Village, etc., almost when the soldiers and horses of Yelu Chongyuan arrived, the soldiers of the small fortresses on the periphery gave up resistance and retreated to Anyangkou, Beiping Village and Yutaikou three big villages.

After all, there are only a few hundred Song troops in that kind of small fortress, although they can rely on the walled wall for defense, but first, there are not many firearms on hand, and secondly, they are outnumbered, and in the face of the surprise attack of the 20,000 troops of the Liao State, not retreating will only cause unnecessary casualties.

It is better to concentrate on defense.

Xue Xiang was very clear about this point, and he sent his general Zhang Ying to command the troops outside the city, and personally supervised the battle in the city.

On December 12, the bleak north wind howled, and the land was as desolate as the desert north. The Song-Liao border has thousands of miles of fertile fields, but the two sides guard against each other, except for the opening of mutual markets, agricultural cultivation has basically stopped, so that even though there are thousands of acres of fertile land, no one works.

The young Yelu Chongyuan rode on horseback, overlooking the Song army village in the south, the outer wall has several circles, the outermost is the rammed earth wall, and then there are rows of wooden houses, towers, towers, corner towers, densely packed above, and countless figures appear.

"Kill!"

Yelu Chongyuan raised the spear in his hand.

Iron is produced in the Northeast, and there are a large number of Han craftsmen under the rule, so that the smelting technology is very developed, and the weapons and equipment are naturally very sophisticated, except for the firearms are not as good as the Song Dynasty, the rest of the equipment is comparable to the Song Dynasty army.

The cavalry of the Liao State is also mainly based on spears, with a ring-headed scimitar around the waist, wearing battle armor, and even the horses have heavy armor, which can be said to be armed to the teeth and very strong.

Under Yelu Chongyuan's shouting order, the army behind him surged towards the Anyang Kouzhai in the distance like a torrent.

The Liao soldiers at the front were not Liao, but Han and Bohai, and even Jurchens and Mughus, who did not ride horses, but foot soldiers, holding shields and scimitars in their hands, covering the charge of the troops against the ladder.

The Liao cavalry in the rear supervised the battle, and once the foot soldiers broke through the wall, they would immediately launch a fierce attack towards the gap like bloodthirsty sharks, and directly rush into the wall to kill wantonly.

But it was obvious that the Song army's defense was at its peak, and the distance between the two sides was still a mile away, and the loud tom sound from more than ten bed crossbow bowstrings exploded. The iron-headed crossbow arrows with the thickness and length of the trunk of a tree fell into the Liao army's formation with a howling sound like a ghost crying wolf, splashing tragic blood flowers.

It's just that the attack of the bed crossbow only made the Liao army's offensive temporary, and then under the supervision of the Liao cavalry, the infantry continued to grit their teeth and charge forward, and the distance between the two sides was about 100 paces, and the dense arrow rain of the Song army came head-on.

Suddenly, the screams continued to sound, and even caused a commotion, some foot soldiers were afraid and wanted to escape, and dozens of Liao cavalry squads came out of the formation, galloped towards the deserters, and killed them one by one.

Those real Liao soldiers looked at all this indifferently, when the Liao State fought the Western Xia, they often used fewer soldiers, because the Western Xia was relatively far away, unless the Mengwu people were requisitioned, the strength of the army was often maintained between more than 100,000 and 200,000, and the strength of the whole country was not raised.

But it's different when it comes to fighting the Song Kingdom.

The centers of the two sides are close, and the Liao people gather soldiers and horses everywhere, although the number of their cavalry is only more than 100,000, but there are still more than 100,000 recruited foot soldiers, so the total strength of the Liao State may have reached 300,000.

On the Song side, two or three hundred thousand troops were originally stationed on Hebei Road, and 50,000 elites were transferred from the northwest, and another 100,000 troops were sent to Bianliang, with a total strength of more than 400,000.

It can be said that if we count the more than 200,000 troops currently deployed on the Shaanxi Road, the Great Song Dynasty has dispatched nearly two-thirds of the 800,000 forbidden troops for the war between Western Xia and Liao, except for the 400,000 Xiang troops deployed in various parts of the south.

Now Bianliang only has tens of thousands of troops, and it is almost an empty shell.

If it weren't for Zhao Jun's two years of walking around the place, punishing traitors and eliminating evil, he could barely maintain local stability for the time being, I am afraid that the war will start, and the rear uprising can only be suppressed by sending an army.

After the riot, the Liao infantry pressed again, Zhang Ying on the wall looked down expressionlessly, and the archers above were still shooting, but in fact, the troops in Anyang Kouzhai were still too small, compared with at least forty or fifty thousand Liao troops in front, it was far from the same.

In an instant, a large number of Liao infantry soldiers have rushed to the outside of the wall, and after getting closer, the Liao army fought a lot, they used a shield array to resist the archers of the Song army outside, and then the Liao army fired a bow and crossbow in unison, counterattacking towards the wall.

After all, the fortresses and camps of the Song army were not cities, their height and defense were limited, and coupled with the small number of people and their outnumbered, the crossbowmen above were either shot or could only hide under the female walls to hide.

Without long-range suppressive power, the Liao infantry rushed to the wall and set up a ladder. A strong man at least seven feet tall swung a sledgehammer, his knotted muscles bulging high, and with a roar, he smashed the sledgehammer into the wall, and the rumbling sound was like heaven and earth shaking.

Zhang Ying saw this scene and knew that he couldn't hold it, compared with the Liao army, the Song Dynasty may only have a city that can defend it.

Even if there were no newly made grenades, the city would not necessarily be safe, just as before the Battle of Lanzhou, the Liao State conquered Baosai, Yongbian, Qizhou, Zhaozhou, Beiping, Wangdu and many other places.

"Withdraw!"

Zhang Ying waved his hand, and the Song army on the walled wall had no reservations, pulled all the grenades and threw them out, and then got off the walled wall and ran to the rear.

"Bang bang!"

A large number of grenades roared, almost blasting a vacuum outside the wall, and even the wall collapsed.

Yelu Chongyuan didn't have time to feel sorry for the dead foot soldiers, he just wanted to annihilate this Song army now, and with an order, all the cavalry went out to level the Song army.

It's just that I didn't expect that there is a reason why there are few people in Anyang Kouzhai, all the elites of the Northwest Army are stationed here, and all of them are good at horseback riding.

The soldiers ran all the way to Houzhai, and took each battalion as a unit, and got on their own horses, and more than 2,000 people rushed out of the back door, and fled directly to the south according to the route marked by their Song army.

Yelu Chongyuan didn't want to surround the entire Anyang Kouzhai, but the Song army not only dug trenches, but also dug a lot of horse traps, and all kinds of iron nails and broken iron pieces were also scattered on the ground.

And Song Jun naturally knew the location of the trapped horse pit he dug and the iron nails and pieces he lost, found a safe route, and successfully escaped.

Jintaiyi, located in the northeast of Baosai, is an important place to stay between Zhenzhou and Liaoyouzhou in the Northern Song Dynasty, outside the Dongguan of Baoding City, Hebei Province in later generations. "Continuation of the Governance of Tongjian": In the fourth year of the Taiping Rejuvenation of the Northern Song Dynasty (979), Taizong took advantage of the trend of destroying the Northern Han Dynasty and moved to conquer Liao, passing through here on the way back and forth.

It can be said that this place is one of the outer barriers of Baosai.

At this time, the Jintaiyi Song army camp, Wang De used the troops to station 5,000 soldiers in Wang Huaixin on the Hebei Road, and Baosai City was a horn and was introduced as reinforcements.

Xiao Hui, the general of the Liao State, sent the vanguard Yelu enemy Lugu to also launch a fierce attack on this place.

Almost the same as the attack method of Anyang Kouzhai, the Liao cavalry supervised the battle in the rear, and attacked with infantry composed of other ethnic groups. After killing outside the wall, climb the wall through the ladder, break through the wall, and then finish up by the Liao cavalry.

In just half a day under such an offensive, the Song army of Jintaiyi was already unable to resist, and Wang Huaixin was forced to throw the last grenade, abandon the camp, and retreat to the city of Baosai.

If it weren't for the fact that the main force of the Liao State was still in the rear, and Wang Deyong sent people to help in Baosai City, I am afraid that this group of Song troops would be in danger.

And situations like this are everywhere on the Liao-Song border.

Qijikou, Zhengzhen, Hongcheng Village, Horse Catching Village, Changfeng Village and other border military villages were attacked.

These military villages were basically evacuated by the Song army in the nearby fortress before the Liao army attacked, and there were basically two or three thousand people.

The fortress was okay to defend against small-scale Liao attacks, but in the face of a large Liao army, there was really no chance of victory, so in the days after the battle, almost all of the hundreds of border fortresses that the Song army was proud of were lost.

A large number of medium-sized camps were also raided, and at least seven or eight military camps were breached, and the Song army lost at least seven or eight thousand men almost as soon as it was seen.

However, the actual proportion of battle losses, the Song army was less than that of the Liao army.

Because the Liao army wants to break through the military village, it must take human lives to fill, in this layer of progression, although the cavalry of the Liao army has no losses, but the foot soldiers have suffered great casualties, if it is not pressed by the Liao army, I am afraid that those Han, Bohai, Jurchen, and Mengwu people have all run away.

At the same time, Fan Zhongyan learned that the Liao State was coming, so he personally led the army to Baicheng in the rear. The current situation of the war is very complicated, many places have been raided by the Liao army, and many peripheral fortresses and military villages with few garrisons have basically been breached.

However, the main cities of the Song army are basically intact, which is very different from the Liao army's successive attacks on several important towns of the Song army before the Battle of Lanzhou.

Outside Gaoyang City, this is already the hinterland of the Song army, and Baosai, where the Liao army mainly attacked, is still located in the northwest of Gaoyang City, while Baicheng, where Fan Zhongyan is located, is west of Gaoyang City, and the distance between the two sides is only forty or fifty kilometers.

In the camp of the main general of the Liao army, Yeluzong was really looking at the battle reports sent from all over the country.

He led the main force deep into the hinterland of the Song State, in order to contain the main force of the Song army, including Fan Zhongyan, so that coupled with the feint attack on Yelu Chongyuan's side, he created a fighter plane for Xiao Hui's side to take Baosai.

However, at this time, in the face of the news that a large number of Song army camps were being broken one after another from all over the country, Yelu Zongzhen was not happy at all.

Their foot casualties were also very heavy.

If this continues, it is very likely that the soldiers of other nationalities under his command will be overwhelmed and set off a rebellion, and then the problem will be serious.

Therefore, Yelu Zongzhen put down the battle report in his hand with a heavy face, looked around, looked at Xiao Ying, Xiao Xiaomu, Zhang Jian, Liu Liufu, Yelu Renxian and others below and said: "Song Guo's grenades are indeed powerful, and the casualties of our infantry are too great. ”

Through the spy in the Song Kingdom, he now also knows the name of this thing.

Zhang Jian smiled bitterly and said: "The power of this thing to defend the city is indeed strong, otherwise the minister would not persuade His Majesty not to act rashly." ”

"But no matter what, we must defeat Song again."

Yelu Zongzhen said in a deep voice: "If the Song Kingdom thinks that it can rely on this thing to resist the Great Liao, then where is the majesty of the Great Liao? ”

Liu Liufu said: "Your Majesty, the minister thinks that in fact, our purpose is only to continue to subdue the Song State, ask for the ten counties of Nanguan, and force them to hand over the gunpowder formula. ”

He paused and continued: "This is not a battle to destroy the country after all, the Great Song Dynasty is not weaker than the Liao State, if it is a war to destroy the country, even if the Great Liao wins, I am afraid that it will be two tigers fighting, and one will be killed and one injured." ”

"Oh?"

Yelu Zongzhen hurriedly asked, "What is Qing's plan?" ”

Liu Liufu said: "The emperor of the Song State has always been timid, don't look at Zhao Zhen's toughness this time, in fact, it was only Fan Zhongyan who defeated Yuan Hao in the northwest, which made his ambition soar, but only one defeat can make him return to his original form, and he came to negotiate peace with Da Liao, so the minister felt that only one city was enough." ”

"Where?"

"It's still Baosai!"

Liu Liufu said: "Baosai is an important town on the border of Song and Liao, Baosai is broken, the front line of the Song State will collapse immediately, and we can only evacuate to the south, although the south is still a heavy city, and it is difficult for my army to move forward, but we only need the Song State to be afraid and involve peace talks, and our goal will be achieved." ”

"Hmm"

Yelu Zongzhen nodded with a deep groan, he initially wanted to break the Baosai first, and then attack Yongning, and then drove straight in, threatening the Daimyo's mansion, making the Song Kingdom feel terrified.

But apparently the power of the grenade on the battlefield has surprised him very much, the Liao State is now enough to fight some military villages, and if you attack those important cities and towns of the Song State, I am afraid that there is a danger of annihilation.

Therefore, concentrate firepower to break a city first, as long as Zhao Zhen is afraid, then everything will return to the negotiation table, and everything will be easy to say.

Thinking of this, Yelu Zongzhen immediately discussed tactics with everyone.

In the end, they decided to make a feint attack to encircle Gaoyang first, and make a tentative attack to put pressure on the defenders of Gaoyang, so that they could ask Fan Zhongyan's main force to come to the rescue.

When Fan Zhongyan was mobilized by him, the main force of the Liao State turned back and pounced on Baosai, joined up with Xiao Hui, and attacked Baosai together.

This is intended to take advantage of the mobility of their Liao cavalry to make a time difference.

So in the next few days, Yelu Zongzhen immediately dispatched troops and launched a siege of Gaoyang.

After all, there are only more than 10,000 people on the side of the Gaoyang defenders, and in the face of the strong attack of more than 100,000 Liao troops, even if there are grenades, it is still a little difficult.

The main thing is that although Gaoyang is an important town, it is not equipped with artillery.

At present, the Firearms Division has only made five cannons, and all of them are bronze cannons, and in the era when there is no data, it is too difficult to cast iron cannons, and the danger factor is very large.

So after Zhao Jun's suggestion, let's make a few safer copper cannons for the time being.

It's a pity that copper is too scarce.

This copper cannon costs more than 2,000 catties of copper, which is really unaffordable.

Today, two of the five cannons are in the front line town of Baosai, and the other three are in Yongning, the rear of the current Song army.

In addition to this, Goyang's grenade reserves are also limited.

After all, this is a national-level battle, even if the Song State has been preparing for two years, but this is not the afterlife of the industrial age, and the grenade is now completely hand-made, and the efficiency is not fast.

The Song State experienced the Song-Xia War again, which consumed a lot of reserves.

In the face of the Liao State, which was more powerful than the Western Xia, various fortresses, military villages, and cities had to divide up a large number of grenades as defensive weapons, and the reserves of the Great Song Dynasty were already quite tight.

So in this case, the defenders of Gaoyang had to ask Fan Zhongyan for help.

Fan Zhongyan led the main force of 50,000, and sent 70,000 or 80,000 reinforcements from nearby to support.

Yeluzong really saw that Fan Zhongyan was deceived, so he left tens of thousands of foot soldiers to delay the main force of the Song army, and led 50,000 cavalry himself, quickly counterattacked, and marched towards Baosai.

December 18th.

Early in the morning.

Outside the city of Baosai, there has already been a dense crowd of countless Liao soldiers.

With the convergence of Yelu Zongzhen, the lord of Liao, and Xiao Hui, at this time, there were already more than 100,000 Liao troops outside Baosai City, and in Baosai City, there were only about 20,000 Song troops.

Obviously, this is a great test for Song Jun.

By noon, the Liao army had been assembled, the city was surrounded on three sides, and the Liao soldiers were like a tide, standing in line outside the city, and there was no end in sight.

Wang Deyong saw such a battle, and knew that it would not work if he didn't take out the things at the bottom of the box, so with a wave of his big hand, dozens of soldiers, carrying two big guys, slowly pulled to the city wall, began to install the base, and the gunner debugged!

At this moment, the Liao army is in front of the battle, the vanguard general Yelu Lugu is more than seven feet tall, full of muscles, powerful and powerful, riding a war horse in front of the battle, waving the big knife in his hand, and howling like a wolf.

At this time, at the head of the city of Baosai in the distance, I don't know when, from the battlement of the female wall, two long copper pipes stretched out, and the well-trained gunners slowly adjusted the gun position.

The direction of aiming is none other than Jelu Rugu!

(End of chapter)