Under the pressure of the soldiers, although the people in Tongyuan City were inevitably panicked, but because of the exemption of taxes for two years, coupled with the long-term prestige of the court officers and soldiers in the city were taken, the city showed a prosperous atmosphere, the people were rejoicing, heard that the court was coming, all of them were filled with righteous indignation, and all the strong men were vying to enlist in the army, willing to protect Tongyuan, swear to fight to the death. The old, the young, the women and the children also worked together to help the officers and soldiers fortify the city overnight.

According to the drawings provided by Tianci, the skilled craftsmen in the city rushed to make them overnight, and the next morning, one hundred and twenty instruments made in the same way were placed on the top of the city.

Tianci then invited General Chu to go to the city to watch, and he demonstrated the wonderful use of this instrument to everyone.

General Chu came up to the city tower and looked at it closely, only to see that this thing was composed of a row of ten wooden planks the size of a human figure, and each plank had a bow and crossbow in front of it, five of which were standing upward, and the other five planks were placed upside down on the ground during the interval. These things were lined up on top of the tower, as if they were a row of soldiers with arrows.

Tianci stepped forward to demonstrate the operation, only to see him step on a pedal under the wooden frame with his foot, and the five levers lying on the ground began to operate in a chain, and immediately the strings of the bow and crossbow were full.

The soldiers were ordered to take arrows and insert them into the slots of the crossbows, each with five slots, and a full twenty-five arrows.

Tianci stepped on the second pedal again, and the five planks lying on the ground supported the bow and crossbow full of arrows, and immediately bounced up from the ground, while the five planks that had been erected before fell backwards and lay on the ground.

I saw Tianci stepping on the third pedal again, but I saw five bows and crossbows firing in a volley, and twenty-five arrows flew out of the city at the same time, and they were all planted on the ground at a distance of about fifty zhang from the city wall.

"The device is called 'Row of Arrows', and it works in a loop, requiring only two or three people, one person to trigger the pedal, and two to load the arrows on the downed bow and crossbow. It's simple. At that time, the general only needs to send two or three hundred women and children with me to protect the city enough, so you can rest assured. ”

General Chu shouted "Wonderful!", and said: "However, this method of firing, I am afraid that the arrows in the city are not enough." ”

Tianci said: "Don't worry about this, it will be solved then." ”

General Chu was overjoyed, and immediately ordered the craftsmen to build another 80 units, and put 200 units in the city.

At this time, General Chu suddenly thought of something, and couldn't help but say worriedly: "It's just that the enemy army will use catapults to attack the city from a long distance when the time comes, and I am afraid that these archery equipment in the city will not survive at that time." ”

"The general is worried, but I have been prepared for it. When the time comes, I will try to sacrifice to the heavens, so that auspicious clouds will fall from the sky to protect my city from being injured by enemy guns. Tianci said.

"Please order someone to find thirty cauldrons, and place a pot every three zhang outside the city wall eighty zhang away, and arrange them in a line. Tianci said to General Chu, who was suspicious:

"Fill the pot with water, prepare a charcoal fire under the pot, and then put a packet of my special powder in each pot. ”

No matter what kind of mystery Tianci makes, General Chu can only obey Tianci at this time, so he orders people to act according to the plan.

At this time, the spies from the front came to report, saying that the army led by Fang Dingchao, the general of the auxiliary state, had reached 50 miles away, and found that the grain and grass troops were not waiting in place, so they urgently sent Chai Yu to lead the vanguard of 50,000 people to Tongyuan under the commander, and it was expected to arrive tomorrow morning.

After General Chu heard the report, he couldn't help frowning, and said with a heavy heart: "There are less than 10,000 troops in my city, how can I resist the pressure of strong troops, it is really heaven and I will die." ”

Seeing this, Tianci comforted and said: "There are few people to be afraid, don't forget that I am a master of the Tao, and when the time comes, I will scatter beans into soldiers to help you defend the city-state, although rest assured." ”

"Is this true?" General Chu was also in a hurry to go to the hospital, and hurriedly asked God.

"Hehe, scattering beans into soldiers, that may not be, but I can send heavenly soldiers and generals to help you. Tianci said with a smile, took out a picture from his arms, and handed it to General Chu.

General Chu took the drawing and looked at it, and saw that there was a lantern painted on it, and there were three threads under the lantern, and a tray was tied to the three threads, and an oil lamp was placed on the tray.

"Little brother Mo is joking at me, isn't this just a Kong Ming lantern?" General Chu said with interest.

"Exactly, the general can order people to make 5,000 Kong Ming lanterns, and when the time comes to release them into the sky, I will turn them into heavenly soldiers and generals to help our army. ”

General Chu had no choice but to order someone to go down and make it the same way.

The next day almost noon, Chai Yu's army of 50,000 people has come to the city, only to see the black pressure of the soldiers, overwhelming, rolling up the dust, stopped two miles away from the city, after lining up, Chai Commander ordered people to set up a catapult, ready to attack the city.

Here, Tianci has ordered dozens of soldiers to make charcoal fires in thirty cauldrons outside the city, boil the water in the pots, and put in the prepared medicinal powder.

Suddenly, a layer of mist rose from outside the city wall, slowly enveloping the city, and when I looked at Kirihara Castle through this layer of fog from afar, it looked a little ethereal, as if it was really covered in a glass cover.

At this time, a cannon sounded outside the city, and the enemy's catapults fired in unison, and in an instant, flying stones rushed towards Kirihara Castle, intending to destroy the castle tower.

After the dust settled, the enemy commander saw that the misty Kirihara Castle looked even more ethereal, but it was intact. At the moment, he was very angry, and after ordering the catapult to adjust the firing range, there was another wild bombardment.

When the boss here looked again, he saw that the stones in front of Kirihara Castle had been piled up into a row of stone walls, and the smoke and dust were filled, and he couldn't see the scene in the city clearly.

In fact, the enemy's catapult did not hurt Kirihara Castle at all, only because the steaming mist in the thirty cauldrons laid by God changed the real distance of Kirihara Castle in the enemy's field of vision under the refraction of the sun, and pulled the Kirihara Castle in the eyes of the enemy closer by more than ten zhang, and the enemy's slinging siege vehicle naturally could not hit the target.

As soon as the catapults stopped attacking, the commander of Chai ordered 10,000 archers and pikemen to attack the city. The siege soldiers followed.

The archers came to the city sixty feet away and stood still, and saw that there were only more than a thousand soldiers guarding the city.

It turned out that the craftsmen in the city had slightly modified the heaven-sent equipment, placed the soldiers' helmets on the top of the wooden planks, and put their battle robes on the wooden boards, which looked no different from the soldiers from a distance.

Seeing a pile of rocks in front of him, the commander ordered the pikemen to go up and move the stones out of the way so that the siege soldiers behind could come forward to attack the city.

He also ordered the archers to fire arrows to cover. The archers listened to the order, took a few steps forward, opened their bows and arrows, and fired thousands of arrows towards the top of the city tower, wanting to wipe out the more than 1,000 soldiers defending the city immediately.

After the rain of arrows, the soldiers in the city were unscathed, but they saw two waves of arrows pouring in the city at this time, and 10,000 arrows only stuck in the enemy camp.

Unexpectedly, the more than 1,000 soldiers on the city wall could shoot so many arrows, and the soldiers under the city were caught off guard for a while, with countless casualties.

I saw that above and below the city, bows and arrows flew back and forth, shooting at each other, but the arrows shot under the city were less and less, but the arrows on the city were always as dense as rain.

When the young men, women, and children of the city saw that they could easily kill the enemy, they became more and more vigorous, and were worried that there were no arrows, but when they saw that the enemy's arrows were coming again, and they filled the planks with them, they immediately took them down, put them on top of the rows of arrows, and shot them back.

After a few rounds, almost half of the archers under the city had lost, and it was already difficult to resist and could not cope with it.

The pikemen held their shields in one hand to shield them from the rain of arrows, and in the other hand they had to carry stones, so they had to throw their spears aside and carry them with their bare hands. After some hard work, it was clear that the stone pile was about to be leveled.

At this time, the sound of trumpets and cannons was suddenly heard, but I saw a group of fast horse cavalry from both sides outside the city, and there were 20,000 people.