In the Song Dynasty, there was no law or order.

In mid-August, on the vast northern grasslands.

Countless knights marched towards the Helan Mountains like streams converging into rivers.

The king of the Dangxiang people gathered his brave soldiers together again to attack their enemies.

From the time when Li Yuanhao was defeated in the first year of Baoyuan to the time when he signed a contract with the Song Dynasty in the Kangding year, Li Yuanhao summoned troops many times.

However, he did not fight with the Song Dynasty, but with the Xizhou Uighurs who occupied half of the Western Regions, as well as the Huangtou Uighurs and Caotou Tatars in the Haixi Corridor.

Li Yuanhao controlled the Hexi Corridor. If he wanted to compete with the Hehuang Corridor occupied by Qingtang for business, he had to fight the source.

Therefore, he attacked the Western Regions many times in order to seize the source of merchants and prevent them from going to Qingtang through the Hehuang Corridor.

The effect was significant. A large number of Western Region merchants returned to the Hexi Corridor, and Xixia prospered as a result.

After several attacks, many small tribes of Uighurs, Huihe and Tatars on the auxiliary roads of the Haixi Corridor were annexed by Xixia, and Li Yuanhao's strength increased again.

This time, Li Yuanhao declared to many tribes that he would attack Qingtang to avenge the past. After hearing this, many tribal Dangxiang noble leaders did not hesitate and immediately led their troops here.

As long as they did not attack the Song Dynasty, the Dangxiang nobles would understand the wise decision of their King of Daxia.

Even though there were a few smart nobles who were somewhat worried that the relationship between Qingtang and the Song Dynasty was so good, if they attacked Qingtang, it would attract the army of the Song Dynasty.

But Qingtang and Xixia were feuds, and hatred had blinded most people's eyes, and they did not consider so much at all.

From day to dusk, I don't know how many Xixia knights came, until August 24, Li Yuanhao finally gathered about 80,000 cavalry, and under his personal leadership, they marched towards Qingtang.

It took about half a month to gather 80,000 people, which was a fast speed.

The soldiers of nomadic peoples come from the vast grasslands, and they often need to go to various tribes for temporary notice, but a tribe may be scattered over hundreds of square kilometers.

Therefore, Li Yuanhao can now gather nearly half of the country's forces in a short period of time, which can be said to be a reflection of the improvement of Xixia's comprehensive national strength.

After a few years, some Dangxiang teenagers have grown up to the age of fighting.

In addition, Li Yuanhao also recruited some small tribes of Uighurs, Uighurs, and Tatars, and gathered about 60,000 Dangxiang soldiers and more than 10,000 other small tribes. The strength should not be underestimated.

A few days later, Xixia Xiliang Prefecture, Qingtang and Xixia border, Zhuolao City.

This place is Guangwu County in the Tang Dynasty, located in the area from Datong Town to Hongcheng Town south of Yongdeng County, Gansu Province in the future. It is the station of Zhuolao and Nanjunsi set up by Yuanhao at the beginning of the founding of the country.

In this way, with the 20,000 local garrisons, Yuanhao gathered 100,000 troops to attack Qingtang.

In fact, Zhuolao City is closer to the territory of the Song Army.

Because this place is north of Lanzhou City in the future, and southeast of Lanzhou City controlled by Qingtang is the border between Song State, Qingtang and Xixia. There is a military camp of the Song army there, called Guweizhai.

As the name suggests, it is Tongwei County in Gansu Province in the future, located between Lanzhou City and Tianshui City, and is also an important transportation hub for trade between Qingtang and Song State.

If Li Yuanhao attacked Qingtang directly from Liangzhou, he would not only have to cross the Qilian Mountains, but also be careful of being attacked by the Song army when he crossed the mountains, which was obviously a loss.

Although in the second year of Jingyou, Li Yuanhao crossed the Qilian Mountains once and raided Qingtang's Maoniu City, which is the later Qinghai Datong Hui and Tu Autonomous County.

But the price is that it is difficult to keep up with the logistics supply. When he finished eating the seized supplies and was about to withdraw his troops, he was caught by Zuo Siluo and was defeated by Zuo Siluo in Huangshui.

So in order to prevent the logistics from not keeping up again, Li Yuanhao had to bypass the Qilian Mountains and attack from the border of Songxia Qingtang.

At this moment, it was the end of the Yin hour and the beginning of the Mao hour, at five o'clock in the morning, and it was not yet bright.

The gate of Zhuo Luo City opened.

Countless densely packed horses slowly walked out and headed south.

This was Li Yuanhao's vanguard, composed of soldiers from the Western State Uighurs, Yellow-headed Uighurs, and Caotou Tatar tribes who surrendered to him.

His main force is currently located in Gaizhu City in the northwest.

Waiting until the third quarter of the Mao hour, after the pioneer army of the exploration set off, Li Yuanhao led the main force to start southward.

In fact, it is irrational to let these people be the vanguard cannon fodder, because the surrendered and surrendered people often have low combat effectiveness. If they are defeated by the enemy, it is easy to roll back and affect the entire army.

However, since there were often slave armies, death row armies, and surrendered armies as vanguards in ancient times, there were naturally means.

For example, threatening their families.

After these tribes surrendered, the life and death of the tribes were controlled by Li Yuanhao, so he could use these people so boldly.

The mighty vanguard army went all the way south, followed by Li Yuanhao's front army, central army and rear army.

The army stretched for dozens of miles and went to Lanzhou along the Zhuanglang River.

In fact, in the third year of Jingyou, Li Yuanhao defeated Zuosiluo and occupied Lanzhou.

But wasn't he beaten up by Lao Fan later?

At that time, Lao Fan joined Zuosiluo to launch a general attack on Xixia, beating Li Yuanhao to a pulp.

Although Zuosiluo hit a hard nail and was defeated by Yeli Wangrong.

However, when Yeli Wangrong returned to Xingqing Prefecture, he made a comeback and took Lanzhou back.

Therefore, Qingtang was probably a regime that occupied the area from Xining, Qinghai to Lanzhou, Gansu, and was located at the easternmost end of the Hehuang Corridor.

At this moment, Lanzhou was located at the border between Qingtang and the Song Dynasty. With the development of Zhao Jun's five-way trade policy, it prospered. The Tibetans here spoke Chinese, used Chinese characters, wore Chinese clothes, and traded with Song Dynasty copper coins.

The entire economy was almost entirely controlled by the Han people. The Song Dynasty even stationed an army of about 2,000 people outside Lanzhou City to maintain security and trade on the border.

Early in the morning, An Ziluo, a general of the Tibetan Zuosilo tribe in Lanzhou City, got up from his mansion, put on a silk robe from the Song Dynasty, and put on the official hat and jade belt given to him by the Song Dynasty. He walked out of the mansion like a seventh-rank county magistrate of the Song Dynasty.

Not only was he rewarded by the Song Dynasty, but Zuo Silu was also granted the title of Shanzhou Governor, Baoshun Hexi Army Jiedushi, and Shan, He, Huang, Kuo, Lan and other five states to observe and deal with the barbarians.

With the defeat of the Liao Dynasty by the Song Dynasty, it seemed that there was a trend of regaining the top position in Asia, and the surrounding countries began to re-establish diplomatic relations with the Song Dynasty. Before the Song Dynasty defeated the Liao Dynasty, the extremely pro-Song regime of Zuo Silu naturally got the first benefit.

At this moment, An Ziluo put on silk and satin, and planned to patrol the city as usual. Then find a restaurant opened by the Song people to eat hot pot and stir-fry, and then go to the teahouse opened by the Song people to drink hot tea and listen to the storyteller from Bianliang this year. Finally, go to the brothel and enjoy the arrangement of those blonde and blue-eyed beauties in the Western Regions.

However, just as he was about to leave the house, the sound of the "woo woo woo" horn suddenly sounded on the top of the west city.

Several riders galloped in, shouting anxiously as they entered the city: "The Xixia people are coming, the Xixia people are coming!"

As the voice spread, Lanzhou City, which was originally full of Hu and Han people, was suddenly in an uproar, and the crowd was in chaos and ran around.

Although An Ziluo had been a little lazy in the past two years, it was he who, as the vanguard general of Zuo Silu, raided Li Yuanhao's army and caused Li Yuanhao to suffer a great defeat at the Zongge River.

Therefore, he was still calm. After learning about this, he hurriedly asked his men to bring the horses and immediately sent people to the Song army camp for help.

Less than a quarter of an hour later, An Ziluo had already put on his armor and climbed the city wall.

At this moment, all the gates of Lanzhou City had been closed. When the scouts passed the news to the city, more than an hour had passed. First, they saw a cloud of dust coming from the northwest, and then at the end of the road, there were dense black spots.

The only good news is that the ancient Lanzhou city is located on the south bank of the Huangshui River. In Luoluochuan, that is, there is a pass called Dongyuguan between the Zhuanglang River and the Yellow River, which is stuck at the Yellow River ferry.

The Xixia army obviously did not dare to try to cross the river easily, but chose to go east along the north bank of the Yellow River to Lanzhou and cross the river from the west of Lanzhou.

This is also a plain area, which is almost the area from Xigu District to Qilihe District of Lanzhou City in later generations.

At least the Xixia army did not cross the river from the upper reaches and then suddenly appeared in Xicheng.

Otherwise, there would be no time for An Ziluo to prepare calmly.

But even so, the situation is not optimistic.

An Ziluo looked at the dense and countless cavalrymen in the distance slowly approaching along the plain area in the northwest, and couldn't help showing a worried look.

The total population of the Tubo tribe under Zuo Siluo was 200,000 to 300,000, and the number of young and strong soldiers was about 60,000.

But it was impossible to gather so many troops after several years of peace and sudden attack.

There are only more than 5,000 soldiers in the entire Lanzhou city, and with the Song army, there are only more than 7,000 soldiers in total. And the enemy's vanguard alone is probably 10,000 or 20,000.

What should we do?

"General, Deputy Chief Wang is here."

A soldier reported to him.

"Please come in."

An Ziluo said hurriedly.

After a while, Wang Shiyun, Deputy Chief of Guwei Village, came in a hurry.

As a general of the Song army stationed in the local area to protect trade, he naturally knew An Ziluo, so he asked directly: "General An, what's the situation?"

"General Wang, you came at the right time, the Xia army is coming."

An Ziluo pointed outside and said: "Our scouts reported that their vanguard alone has 10,000 or 20,000 people. I'm afraid their main force is behind."

"I have sent someone to Guwei Village to report the news. General Liu will soon bring people to help. We must repel them first!"

Wang Shiyun looked at the situation outside and quickly analyzed it.

If the enemy is allowed to attack the city immediately, they will definitely not be able to withstand the attack. Once Lanzhou is broken, Xixia will rely on the city, and even if the Song army reinforcements come, they may not be able to capture it.

At that time, the main force of Xixia will immediately head west to Qingtang, and the Zuosiluo regime that the Song Dynasty has always supported will be in danger.

So they must buy time.

At least they must defeat the enemy's vanguard and stop them outside Lanzhou.

"Is there any way?"

An Ziluo asked: "We have too few people, otherwise we will immediately recruit soldiers in the city?"

"No, there are not so many weapons and equipment for recruiting soldiers now."

Wang Shiyun thought about it, looked around, and noticed the high mountain Gaolan Mountain in the south of Lanzhou City. He pointed to the mountain behind and said: "You must defend the city first. Before Yuan Hao's main force arrives, you must not be defeated by the enemy. Wait for me for two hours."

"What are you going to do?"

"Go up the mountain to set up the cannon!"

Wang Shiyun said this, and didn't say anything else. He turned around and left, leaving An Ziluo confused.

This is a military secret. Although Qingtang has a good relationship with them, it cannot be told.

In fact, the artillery technology of the Song Dynasty is changing with each passing day.

Thanks to Zhao Jun's establishment of a steel plant in Wu'an, the steel production has been greatly increased through two steelmaking technologies of later generations, achieving overtaking on the curve and directly making steel cannons.

In the Ming and Qing Dynasties, red-coated cannons and muskets were easy to explode, because the guns and cannons at that time were all made of wrought iron, which was far less hard than steel.

Now that we have steel, we can directly make steel guns and cannons, and the stability is greatly improved.

So it's not just the super cannons of more than 2,000 pounds that can hit more than ten miles. The Song army now also makes small cannons.

Among them is a kind called Weiyuan Cannon, which is two feet and eight inches high, five inches high from the bottom to the fire gate, three inches and two points high from the fire gate to the belly, and the caliber of the cannon is more than two inches and two points, weighing 120 pounds.

120 pounds in the Song Dynasty is equivalent to 150 pounds in later generations. In other words, the total weight of this cannon is as big as one person, and two or three people can carry it.

Guwei Village was not a new army and was not qualified to be equipped with super-powerful artillery.

However, as a frontier army that could fight with Xixia at any time at close range, the court gave priority to supplying a large number of small cannons similar to mortars. Guwei Village had thirty cannons, ten of which were in Wang Shiyun's hands.

However, the power of this cannon could not be compared with that of a cannon, and the range was only about three or four miles, unlike the cannons of more than 2,000 kilograms today, which could be fired more than ten miles away.

Therefore, Wang Shiyun planned to seize the commanding heights, and by having a wide field of vision at a high altitude and increasing the range, he would give Xixia a big surprise.

Soon, Wang Shiyun immediately returned to the Song army camp outside the east city, and asked more than 2,000 soldiers of the army to start climbing up the mountain with ten small steel cannons and hundreds of large and small ammunition.

At the same time, the Xixia army more than ten miles away was slowly getting closer and closer from the dense black dots.

About half an hour later, they finally walked slowly to the outside of Lanzhou City, and began to prepare for the siege under the command of the Xixia generals.

However, unexpectedly, they did not charge forward directly.

Instead, they began to line up four or five miles away.

Then, more than ten cannons were slowly pulled out from the Xixia army, and the black muzzles were aimed at the city wall!

Wang Shiyun, who was watching from the mountain, couldn't help but break out in a cold sweat.

The Xixia people quietly built cannons. What's going on?

Fortunately, they didn't install cannons on the top of the city. Other people's cannons can shoot more than ten miles, while their small cannons can only shoot three or four miles. The range is greatly disadvantaged. If he hadn't chosen to go up the mountain, he would probably be in danger.

In this moment of daze, the Xixia cannons suddenly began to fire.

"Bang bang bang bang!"

Flames suddenly burst out from the muzzles of more than ten cannons.

The black ammunition drew an arc in the sky and hit the gate of Lanzhou City heavily. Most of the shells were deflected and hit the city wall, which did not move at all.

However, a cannonball magically smashed into the city gate hole, and the city gate burst open.

"Damn it, the Western bandits also have cannons!"

Wang Shiyun cursed inwardly, and then shouted: "Are the cannons loaded?"

"Loaded."

The gunner shouted.

"Aim at their artillery formation and fire!"

"Yes!"

"Wait a minute, use shrapnel!"

Wang Shiyun shouted.

The Song army has developed shrapnel.

Although the actual lethality is not as good as real bullets, it is still very useful to hit this kind of artillery formation.

Even if the enemy's cannon cannot be damaged, it can kill the gunners around the cannon and prevent the enemy from shooting again.

At this moment, ten gunners immediately adjusted the muzzle, measured the crosshairs and height, and fired the small cannons based on their experience.

On the cliff halfway up Gaolan Mountain, at least ten miles away from the city, more than ten sounds suddenly erupted.

Immediately afterwards, ten black shadows also broke through the void and flew out of the city.

"Bang bang bang bang!"

Ten shrapnel exploded in an instant.

Some of them did not control the fuse time of the gunpowder well, and exploded in mid-air.

Some did not fall into the enemy camp at all, but exploded between the two armies. Others had their muzzles adjusted too high, and although they exploded the enemy, they did not explode the enemy artillery formation.

This kind of ultra-long-distance firing still requires too much precision from the gunners. Unless it is a blanket bombing, it is impossible to be so accurate.

Even so, the huge sound of the shrapnel still scared the Xixia people, and the entire army immediately caused chaos.

"Come again!"

Wang Shiyun saw that it was effective and immediately ordered to continue.

"Bang bang bang bang!"

It was the second round of small artillery firing. Taking advantage of the commanding heights, the range was greatly increased.

And the Song army's small artillery had a very fast firing rate, almost reaching ten rounds per minute, which was much faster than the cannons that could only fire three or four rounds per minute.

The Xixia army was still reloading over there, and then the second round of artillery fire from the Song army came again.

After a round of bombing, a shell happened to fall into the enemy artillery formation. Although it did not explode the opponent's cannon, it killed several gunners and reloaders around.

The Xixia army was completely panicked.

Then a few seconds later, the third round of artillery fire came.

The shrapnel exploded in the crowd, and the mud and dust flew everywhere, and some people were even blown up high.

This gave the Xixia people a great impact.

Especially those soldiers from other tribes who had never seen the power of firearms. Even though Li Yuanhao controlled their tribe, some of them could not resist and were even on the verge of defeat.

"Kill!"

After several rounds of bombardment, Li Yuanhao's vanguard army could not hold on and began to disintegrate.

An Ziluo in the city was overjoyed when he saw this and shouted, "Kill them!"

"Kill!"

The morale of more than 5,000 Tibetan soldiers in the city was also greatly boosted. They opened the city gates and rushed forward on horseback.

However, the Xixia people originally wanted to use long-range cannons to blow open their city gates before launching a surprise attack, so the distance was a bit far and they could not catch up for a while.

However, there were still more than ten cannons left on the battlefield, but they were seized by An Ziluo.

On the mountain, Wang Shiyun wiped the sweat from his forehead and laughed, saying, "The Western bandits are just like this. He has cannons, and I have small cannons, but they are not as good as us, hahahahahaha!"

He didn't have much shrapnel in stock, only a few dozen. Fortunately, the enemy collapsed, otherwise it would be difficult to destroy the enemy's cannons by relying on solid bullets.