The Sun and the Lion

Shamakhi City, Gulustan Castle

A can of kerosene hit a red head who was climbing up the ladder. With a scream, a flaming human body fell down. Then another red head was added, and the red head was stabbed by the defender again.

The small number of archers under the city fired another round of arrows, but this round of arrows did not cause many casualties to the defenders. On the contrary, a round of shooting from the crossbowmen on the city walls and towers knocked down many Qizilbash who were climbing hard.

A lot of shots were fired, but more were added. Under the cover of the archers under the city, a red head had already climbed up the wall, but was killed before he could stand firm.

Due to battlefield terrain restrictions and time constraints, the religious group's siege equipment for this storm only had a few ladders - the siege tower could not be climbed, and the trebuchet was time-consuming. (Refer to the shape of Rome 2 Total War)

After more than three hours of fighting, the other ladders were burned down, leaving only one still struggling to hold on. As the width of the battlefield was greatly reduced, for the religious order, this storming attack became a dead end, and it continued to only consume the lives of the soldiers.

The storm finally came to an end. Like a warehouse clearance, a lethal amount of fire oil cans were thrown down. The flames quickly spread among the crowd and the ladder. Amidst a burst of crackling sounds and human screams, the ladder was thrown down. They were engulfed in flames at a speed visible to the naked eye - even though most siege equipment would have some fire protection treatment.

The red heads on the ladder saw this and quickly got off the ladder. You can imagine the consequences of being slow. Those who had not climbed up the ladder also took a few steps back, fearing that the flames would catch them.

"Escape first." Ustaji looked at several burned ladders, the corpses under the city and the castle still standing on the mountain, feeling helpless and unwilling.

As the bodies of the Qizilbas abandoned their comrades and gradually disappeared from the sight of the defenders, the emir who was supervising the battle at the top of the city breathed a sigh of relief - the religious group's attack was declared a failure.

"These Turkmen heretics are crazy." Emil recalled the tragic situation of the city defense battle just now, and cursed in the direction of the enemy's retreat. Feeling uneasy with his hatred, he picked up a crossbow and fired a round in the direction of the red heads' retreat.

After returning to the camp, Ustaji went straight to the big tent, and the soldiers guarding the door did not stop him.

"Dear Sheikh, I failed to fulfill your order. Farouk's fortress still stands on the hill. I shed the blood of the brothers of the Order in vain." Ustaji lowered his head slightly, not daring to speak directly. View Ibrahim.

"Muhammad Beg, raise your head. I will not punish you for the failure of this siege. The blood of the brothers in the cult is the sin that the heretics should bear in hell." Ibrahim He replied, at this moment he realized how painful it was to have no artillery.

Gulustan Castle is built on a ridge running from northwest to southeast, facing the river. On the side facing the river bed, the mountain and the city wall formed a cliff. The other directions of the mountain were very steep, with large and small protruding rocks. Only the southern slope was gentler, leading to the city below the mountain.

The castle was Shirvanshah's summer residence and refuge, and the city fortifications were strengthened during the Seljuk period. It occupies a favorable location and has strong city defenses.

If you want to break the city, you must either besiege it for a long time, or use artillery to fire a general to destroy the city fortifications.

However, the castle was eventually destroyed in the Ottoman-Safavid War, and only a few parts remained.

"Sheikh" Ustaji raised his head and looked at Ibrahim. He seemed to want to say something more, but was interrupted.

"Muhammad Beg, you are still the siege commander, go back and count the casualties first. Huh? Mustafa Beg, what is the new news from the scouts?"

Just as Muhammad was about to go out, he saw Beg Mustafa of Romulu coming in, so he had to give up his position first and then go out of the tent.

"Sheikh, news from the scouts, Farooq is here." Mustafa got straight to the point.

"Where?" Ibrahim motioned Mustafa to the table. There was a simple map of the area on the table. It was not precise, but it was not very abstract.

"They camped in the village of Sabir on the other side of the river. Judging from the size of the camp, the number of people is at least twice as many as ours." Mustafa pointed on the map.

It was a bit troublesome. Although there was a bridge, the narrow bridge was not conducive to the deployment of cavalry. Faruk set up camp in the village, and there must be someone monitoring the bridge. This is a great disadvantage for Ibrahim, who intends to take the initiative to attack.

The Sabir village section is the narrowest point of the Pirsat River. There are no shoals where you can directly cross the river in other sections. You can only cross the river by boat or pontoon bridge.

"Sheikh." Mustafa took out a bloody letter, "Farooq caught one of our scouts in Sabir Village. This is the letter Farooq asked the scout to bring back." From the blood stains on the letter, Look, this scout has been tortured a lot. The amount of bleeding was quite large.

Ibrahim took the envelope, opened it, and after reading it, he found that it was an insulting letter. In it, Farouk insulted the Order, boasted about his achievements in defeating the Order last time, and said that he was a true knight. , and Ibrahim is a beggar, not doing his job properly, and warns Ibrahim that he will repeat Haidar's fate, and your beggar gang is not worth mentioning in front of the Shah's army.

After reading it, Ibrahim crumpled the letter into a ball of paper and threw it out. "It's meaningless garbage. This is how I treat garbage."

"Sheikh, what are you going to do next?" Mustafa asked.

Ibrahim walked out of the tent, and Mustafa followed, looking at the castle standing on the hill in the distance.

"It seems that the goal of capturing the castle has been abandoned. Now of course we have to defeat Farouk."

With that said, Ibrahim returned to the tent and asked the guards to call all the leaders of the ministries over.

After a while, the leaders entered the tent and faced Ibrahim across the table.

"Everyone, Farouk is here. I have decided to give up the siege and attack Farouk instead to solve the Shirwan problem once and for all." After Ibrahim finished speaking, he put his hand on the map and pointed at Sabir. Village, "Here, the village of Sabir on the other side of the river, is the camp of those regular visitors to the Hell, and the bridge is also guarded, so it is impossible to break through."

"Then do you want...a night attack? Or do you want to lure Farouk out?" Mustafa asked.

"Then let's lure Faruk out. Isn't he going to rescue the castle? And the property in the camp is also a good bait."

"Property? I don't think Farouk would attack rashly because of these properties, my dear Sheikh."

"Farooq and his Janissaries won't, but what about the local troops? And this is just an immature idea and may not be used."

"Sheikh has thought carefully about it, I have no objection." Seeing that Ibrahim had already thought of a plan, Mustafa simply ended the topic.

"Muhammad Beg, I will leave five hundred men for you. Don't let the defenders in the castle rush out and interfere with the decisive battle between me and Faruk."

"Yes." Ustaji accepted the order.

Ibrahim then discussed the details of the plan with the leaders of each ministry, and also inquired about the situation of each ministry to arrange tasks.

Watching the last leader walk out of the tent and facing the upcoming battle, Ibrahim was nervous and excited, and his mood could not be calmed for a long time.

During the day the next day, Sabir Village

Farooq still hesitated. Although the contemptuous and insulting letter has been sent, although he has a numerical advantage, and although Gulustan Castle has not been captured yet, he can contain some of the troops of the Order.

But Farooq still did not make up his mind to take the initiative to attack. Instead, he guarded the bridge to see if the red heads would be stupid enough to crash to death here.

Suddenly, Farooq heard the commotion outside. Just as he was about to go out, the soldiers came in and reported: "Shah, enemy attack!"

Farouk was a little surprised when he heard the enemy attack. These red heads are really here to seek death. Can't they even see such an obvious arrangement on the bridge?

After a while, the large number of red heads began to "retreat" under the counterattack of the Shirvan army. Bahram, who was directing the battle on the bridge, led his troops to entangle them, but the Qizilbas were like slippery loaches. , I can’t wrap up these dumplings no matter what. After leading Bahram off the bridge, the cavalry retreated toward the camp.

Seeing this, Bahram pursued them with a small number of cavalry and fought with the red heads. Bahram's messenger reported to Faruk: "His Royal Highness Bahram is convinced that this force is the main force of the enemy. He believes that he has insufficient troops and requests that you personally lead the main force to support and annihilate the enemy in front of him."

Farouk always felt that this was a trap, but after not seeing each other for a few years, the order's combat effectiveness has dropped like this?

But his eldest son has already become entangled with the enemy. The consequences of his forced withdrawal are unpredictable, so he might as well lead his troops to attack.

Fields near the west bank of the Pilsat River

"Whoosh", an arrow shot from Ibrahim's bow. This arrow was supposed to knock Bahram off his horse, but there were too many cavalry in the middle.

Missing, Ibrahim bent his bow and nocked an arrow, shooting a cavalryman who was fighting with the red head to the ground, and the red head saw the opportunity and killed the cavalryman.

Ibrahim, who was protected by his soldiers, was looking for the next target. At this time, a scout came to report: "Sheikh, Farooq has crossed the bridge."

"Wait first, wait until the main force joins the battle, and then we will withdraw."

Farouk was still commanding the large army to cross the bridge. It took more than half an hour for Farouk's 17,000 cavalry and 4,000 infantry to join the battle.

As soon as Ibrahim saw that his numerical superiority turned into a disadvantage, he knew that Farouk had joined the battle. Ibrahim then ordered his troops to retreat, pretending that they would soon be defeated.

Farouk couldn't believe his glasses at first. After realizing that this was not a dream, Farouk ordered the entire army to press on and not let anyone go.

After more than an hour of fighting, the front moved westward a lot.

"Calculate the time, Mustafa should have blocked the bridge." Ibrahim calculated. "It's almost time to turn to the attack." Ibrahim ordered the bugler next to him, and the bugler immediately took out his horn.

Accompanied by a deep sound of trumpets, the Qizilbashi stopped performing, and the heavy cavalry fighting with the enemy and the light cavalry harassing the two wings no longer preserved their strength. Under the protection of his own soldiers, Ibrahim took the lead and personally beheaded an enemy flag officer.

Um? Farouk slowly typed a question mark. But he had no time to wonder. The troops were already entangled with the enemy, and their retreat immediately turned into a rout. Besides, my 24,000 points beat the opponent's less than 10,000 points. If he could defeat my 24,000 points in seconds, I would eat the horse and the armor on my body on the spot.

However, Ibrahim's more than 8,000 red-head offensive was fierce. The fanatical red-heads shouted that the prophet is above. Their outstanding personal bravery and organization forced Farouk to ignore the defense in other directions and use all the troops. Used to deal with red head attacks.

At this moment, Mustafa attacked from the bridge with a thousand cavalry.

This partial division far away from the battlefield took some effort after the close contact between Ibrahim and Faruk, made a big circle, defeated the defenders on the bridge, rushed into Faruk's camp, and left the camp behind. The two thousand weak soldiers were beaten to pieces and scattered, and the camp personnel were captured.

Faruk was shocked and looked for Shuyuan www. zhaoshuyuan.com But he couldn't spare the troops to stop him. They could only watch the incoming red heads cooperate with their comrades who were fighting bloody battles to focus on attacking their right flank.

In just ten minutes, Farooq's right wing turned white, and the fear of red heads shocked everyone. After the red heads on the left wing defeated the enemy's right wing, they gathered strength and began to attack the enemy's center.

Faruk looked pale, "Withdraw, withdraw!" A voice kept echoing in his heart.

Then he made a suffocating move - abandoning his troops and running away.

The last ton of straw that broke the camel's back fell. After discovering that Shah was trying to abandon them and escape, the morale of the Shirvan army dropped to a low point. Bahram, who was fighting at the front of the army, tried to gather the troops, but no one was willing. Heeded the military order.

Bahram had no choice but to resist with his own soldiers who were still willing to follow him, and eventually died in the rebel army, and his body was difficult to identify.

Like the tide, Shirvan's army fled eastward, and Farouk was also swept into the torrent - it seemed that the chariot god of the Pirsat River could no longer be used - but Mustafa left troops to guard the bridge, and lost The organized troops were unable to exert their numerical superiority on the narrow bridge. Behind them, Ibrahim with his red head was chasing after them.

In the panic, many defeated soldiers simply fell into the river, or knelt down and surrendered. After less than three hours of fighting, the Sylvan army was completely defeated.

Farouk was captured, and two soldiers dragged him to Ibrahim like a dead pig.

Ibrahim didn't say much, just glanced at him, and then ordered his soldiers to escort him back to the camp. And he was waiting here for Mustafa to finish cleaning the battlefield and report the losses and seizures to him.

The midday sun shines on the land covered with blood and corpses, which also announces the beginning of the end of the Shirwanshah Kingdom.