Under the city, under the three gates to the west, a large number of rebels appeared at the same time, and there were at least 50,000 rebels in each place. Pen × fun × Pavilion www. ｂｉｑｕｇｅ。 info Li Wei is using the advantage of military strength to make a gamble that costs his life, and he is gambling that he didn't bring so many people at all.

The walls of Jinguangmen were suppressed by red-clothed ballistas, but the other two city gates were not, so the rebels who attacked first were not Li Dao's troops, but the two rebels who attacked Yanpingmen and Kaiyuanmen separately. The sound of shouting and killing came clearly from both sides, and Yuan Qi knew that the rebels had begun to attack the city in a big way.

Stretching out his hand to pull Dian Wei, Yuan Qi pointed at him and said to Yuan Xie: "Your task is to fight with him." "Yuan Xie is the Son of Heaven after all, no matter how you say it, you can't treat him as a real warrior, Yuan Qi nominally let Yuan Xie fight with Dian Wei, but in fact, he asked Dian Wei to protect Yuan Xie. With Dian Wei's all-round protection, Yuan Qi doesn't have to be distracted to take care of Yuan Xie, and he can devote all his mind to the battle.

Without waiting for Yuan Xie to answer, Yuan Qi turned his head and said to Dian Wei: "Lao Hei, take this group of rookies to move the Heavenly Maiden Scattered Flowers to the city wall." In Yuan Qi's eyes, a group of "sergeants" led by Yuan Xie can be regarded as authentic rookies, most of them have not gone through the real battlefield fighting, and their combat effectiveness is worrying, only a few people such as Huangfu Chu and Zhu Huan are real warriors, but after all, the years are not forgiving, and the veterans of Huangfu are already old, and it is impossible for Yuan Qi to let them really charge into battle, so let Dian Wei take the new army composed of Yuan Xie and other generals to carry combat equipment.

After arranging the actions of Yuan Xie and others, Li Dao's men and horses also began to attack the city. Because of the presence of the red-coated ballista. Therefore, the men and horses under Li Dao changed the method of attacking the city this time. The rebels in the first echelon were no longer carrying ladders and rams, but in groups of ten, holding a huge crossbow shield. In order to reduce the damage of the red-clothed ballista, Li Dao just now specially ordered his subordinate sergeants to cut down a big tree from nearby, chop it into thick wooden blocks, and then assemble these wooden blocks together. Tied with cow tendon. This shield wall, which is more than a foot long and wide and three feet thick, was improvized.

The heavy shield wall is lifted in an inclined plane to minimize the stress area, and hundreds of huge shield walls are underneath. is the real first echelon of the rebels. They were under the cover of the shield wall. Bowing down, the cat walked forward with his waist bent, carrying the ladders and other equipment necessary for siege in his hands.

Behind the shield wall. It is a neatly arranged phalanx of two sword and shield hands, the sword and shield hands raise the round shield in their hands above their heads, and then stand together intensively, covering their bodies with the round shield over the top, looking down from a high altitude, they can only see a shield wave composed of round shields, and they can't see where the person holding the shield is. There were originally 10,000 sword and shield men under Li Dao, but he only sent 5,000 people to form two phalanxes this time, because the sword and shield men sent by Li Dao, each of them held two round shields in their hands to resist the powerful red-clothed ballistas, and the 5,000 sword and shield men who lost the round shield were left in his large array by Li Dao.

Behind the sword and shield hands, there were two teams of Xiliang cavalry, each with 5,000 cavalry, who roamed on both sides of the sword and shield hands, ready to use the cavalry bows in their hands to accurately kill the defenders rising on the walls of the capital. Don't doubt the archery skills of the Xiliang cavalry, live together with the Qiang people all the year round, the Han people and the Qiang people in Xiliang intermarry with each other, there is no distinction between the pure Han and the simple Qiang people, the blood of the Xiliang people, more or less with some Qiang blood, therefore, the physical fitness of the Xiliang people is particularly outstanding, and the arm strength is far beyond ordinary people, and they have also practiced a good ability in the battle with the Qiang people in peacetime, and shooting arrows on the city wall is not a difficult thing for them at all.

When Zhang Long saw the rebels gradually approaching, the anger in his eyes had already burned vigorously, and he immediately ordered the two thousand returning troops who controlled the red-coated ballistas to collectively fire a salvo. In an instant, thousands of crossbows left the cannon chamber with a whistling again, and shot towards the Xiliang rebels.

This time, however, the red-coated ballista did not work as well as it should. Under Li Dao's multiple protection, nearly half of the crossbows fired by the red-clothed ballista were weakened after penetrating the three-foot-thick shield wall, although they still caused damage to the rebels behind the shield wall after breaking through the shield wall, but there was no longer the scene of killing more than a dozen people one after another, and after barely piercing the bodies of two or three rebels, they lost their lethality. Even so, the powerful crossbows fired by the red-coated ballistas still caused considerable chaos for the rebels, and a volley took the lives of five or six hundred rebels.

"Quick! speed up, rush to the bottom of the city, and render the enemy's ballistas useless!" Li Dao shouted hoarsely behind the siege troops. Any ballista is not without shortcomings, long reloading time and long time between launches are common to all ballistas, and red-clothed ballistas are naturally no exception.

Nearly 20,000 siege rebels, under the shouts of Li Dao, exerted their strength, threw off their legs and rushed to the city of the capital, and soon entered the range of bows and crossbows. At this moment, Li Wei's eyes widened, he wanted to see how many arrows and crossbows would be shot down in the capital this time, and whether Yuan Qi had brought a large number of men and horses, which would soon be revealed.

At the head of the city, Yuan Qi sighed helplessly, it seems that Li Wei has seen through his plan, and the number of soldiers and horses he brought will not be able to confuse him. However, with the strength of the 20,000 Heavenly Return Army and the Earth Return Army, plus the Imperial Forest Army of Yuan Xie, Yuan Qi was still confident that he could keep the rebels out of the capital!

"All crossbowmen, release the arrows!" Yuan Qi looked at the 20,000 rebels rushing under the city, and gave the order to shoot.

Nearly 10,000 crossbows were shot into the sky and shot down in the direction of the rebels. However, like the crossbows of the red-coated ballistas, these arrows did not play much role, many of them were blocked by the rebels' shield walls and round shields, and only a few arrows shot into the gaps pierced by the red-coated ballistas, killing the rebels hiding under the shield walls.

Yuan Qi smiled mysteriously, and then continued to give the order: "The Heavenly Return Army and the Earth Return Army stop firing, leaving the last crossbow arrows." The Guards continued to shoot. The two elite troops strictly carried out Yuan Qi's order, retreated three steps neatly, and gave a better shooting angle to Yuan Xie's Imperial Forest Army, and the archers of more than 3,000 Royal Forest Army quickly filled the empty space they left, and then bent their bows and arrows again, throwing them at the rebels under the city. Without the help of the Xizi crossbow of the Heavenly Return Army and the Earth Return Army, the arrows fired by the Royal Forest Army had little effect, and the 3,000 arrows only injured more than 200 rebels.

Seeing this scene, Li Wei also smiled, and smiled very comfortably: "Hahaha, Yuan Qi is really bluffing, he didn't bring so many people here at all! General Yan Xing guessed correctly, Yuan Qi just used a triple crossbow to scare people." "Just now, Yan Xing seized the time and briefly introduced the characteristics of the Xizi repeater, this kind of hand crossbow that can carry out three consecutive shots, only the four elite troops under the command of Yuan Qi can be equipped, and the regular equipment of each elite is a crossbow plus nine crossbow arrows. Through the sparse rain of arrows just now, Li Dao deduced that the elites under Yuan Qi's command had no spare crossbow arrows after two rounds of bluff volleys, and the number of crossbow arrows embodied by the defenders of the capital at this time was real! From this, it can be inferred that the soldiers and horses brought by Yuan Qi were guessed by Yan Xing, and there were no more than 20,000 people at most!

After laughing, Li Dao turned around and shouted at the other 30,000 rebels who were waiting behind him: "Charge! All of them rush up! Yuan Qi has no spare crossbow arrows, everyone will attack the capital in one go!"

The 30,000 rebels shouted in unison, raised their swords and guns one after another, and rushed towards the capital city frantically. In their eyes, the capital is a good place for money, food and women, as long as the capital city is broken, everything in the city will be theirs. The great temptation in the city made them forget about life and death, until the crossbow of the red-coated ballista struck.

The 30,000 rebels who pounced on them followed, but they did not have any shields to protect their bodies, and the power of the red-clothed ballistas was vividly displayed. Under the control of Zhang Long and others, thousands of powerful crossbows pierced the space and instantly came to the eyes of these rebels, bringing a burst of bloody wind and rain! More than 2,000 rebels fell under the tremendous power of the red-clothed ballistas, and they could no longer expect money, food, and women in the capital, and they were greeted only by boundless darkness.

"Don't be afraid! Speed up, rush to the ballista to shoot at the dead end is victory! After breaking the city, everyone can plunder for three days! No, five days!" Li Wei shouted hoarsely in the back, he threw out a huge temptation at the critical moment, encouraging his subordinates to move the rebels forward.

Dozens of Li Dao's personal guards spread Li Dao's words to all directions, and the morale of the rebels was immediately boosted, and all of them rushed to the capital city with a howl and death as if they had been beaten with chicken blood. After withstanding the two salvos of the red-coated ballistas, the rebels finally rushed within a hundred paces of the capital, a distance that was no longer suitable for the red-coated ballistas to continue firing. Expensive crossbows don't get the most out of their power at this distance, and it's a bit of a waste to continue firing.

The red-clothed ballista is useless, but this does not mean that Yuan Qi has no way to take the rebels under the city. "The army of heaven and earth come forward and shoot your last crossbow arrows. Yuan Qi turned around and called the two retreating elites again.

In the next moment, tens of thousands of crossbow arrows mixed with the arrows of the Imperial Forest Army poured down from the top of the capital again, aiming directly at the follow-up troops of the rebels who had entered the firing range. Having just dodged the crossbows of the red-coated ballista, the mood of these rebels was at a time of great relaxation, and their psychological laxity made them pay a huge price. Nearly 5,000 rebels were shot by the hedgehogs with men and horses, and those who died could not die again.

Seeing this scene, Li Dao's face turned the color of iron blue, and he felt like a little mouse, being beaten by Yuan Qi, a strong tiger. What kind of arrows and crossbows are exhausted, it is simply that Yuan Qi deliberately stayed, waiting to explode at this moment!

"Yuan Qi, you and you are incompatible!" Li Dao let out an angry roar, and then, he also threw his own personal guard troops into the battlefield, he didn't believe that Yuan Qi's arrows were endless, and the moment Yuan Qi's arrows were exhausted, it was Yuan Qi's death!