Warrior in Turbulent Han Dynasty

Jinju, the land of long battles. Shi Yanchao had also fought a bloody battle here, and now Xiang Gong stands at the head of the city.

Xiang Gong held his head high, pressed his sword with his left hand, and took a deep breath in the wind. There seemed to be a breath of war on the wind, but at the moment nothing was seen or heard.

"Will Murong Yanzhao quietly open the city and surrender? The Jinzhou Army is in his hands." Zhang Jianxiong said softly.

The atmosphere was already very tense, Li Jixun's forward troops were less than two hundred miles away from Jinzhou; Xiang Gong had military power, and he was granted "deployment at the frontiers of both Hedong and Hebei", and restrained all frontier troops from Hedong to Hebei, but he only had 2,000 troops from the Zhen'an Army.

After a long time, Xiang Gong turned his head and said, "No, I believe anyone Murong Yanzhao surrenders to; but he just doesn't want to surrender to Li Jixun... because Zhao Kuangyin may be in Li Jixun's army."

Zhang Jianxiong may not know much about the messy things in the general's circle, but Xiang Gong does. Xiang Gong had never been in the Forbidden Army, and he was the local governor at the highest level, but since Wang Pu recommended him to participate in the Battle of Shu, he entered the power circle in Tokyo and learned a lot about it.

After Zhao Kuangyin came to power, his attitude towards Gao Huaide and Murong Yanzhao was similar. Gao Huaide was kicked from the Dianqian Division to the Guard Division, and Murong Yanzhao was transferred from the Dianqian Division to the local Jiedushi. Xiang Gong is not very clear about the specific gap in the middle, but the process can be guessed from the actual results.

Zhang Jianxiong said again worriedly: "This battle is difficult! My lord only has two thousand cavalry, and Murong Yanzhao may only have seven or eight thousand soldiers. I don't know what he is thinking... Li Jixun is approaching the city recently, and Li Chongjin is also in the Northern Han Dynasty. They must be targeting us. The total number of troops attacking Jinzhou must be 60,000?"

Xiang Gongdao: "Although Li Jixun has three cities, all the soldiers and horses add up to 20,000 at most. He may temporarily coerce some random people in such a big battle; Li Chongjin has only seven to eight thousand soldiers in his hands, mainly because of the German army that was recruited by the Huainan troops. The Huainan army is not bad in combat strength, but slightly less loyal. Li Chongjin's strength is slightly stronger than Li Jixun's."

"No matter what, it's five or six times our strength." Zhang Jianxiong sighed.

Xiang Gong said in a very sure tone: "Guo Shao will come to save me."

"It's possible, but Guo Du has just taken the spot check, and Tokyo is too busy to take care of himself, but he doesn't know when to come." Zhang Jianxiong said.

"No! You don't understand him, and Guo Shao will definitely reinforce him in time." Xiang Gong shook his head and said thoughtfully, "Guo Du inspector is a person who is very good at seizing the opportunity. Xinkou rescued Shi Yanchao and I am very impressed. He is also a person who is very good at cooperating with his companions... At that time, Xinkou was in danger and surrounded by enemies. His brother was unstoppable, but without Guo Shao, he would have died a thousand times already!"

Xiang Gong seemed to be convincing himself, and murmured: "I believe he can see the situation in Jinzhou and will cooperate with me tacitly!"

Zhang Jianxiong still stubbornly said: "If the Guodu inspection does not come, we will be completely finished."

... A few days later, Li Jixun's troops came to the city. Xiang Gong and Murong Yanzhao stayed behind closed doors and couldn't hold out. Li Jixun camped and deployed ten miles west of the city, neither approaching nor besieging the city, and the siege troops were slightly insufficient.

Except for the occasional skirmishes between scouts in the field, the two armies have not yet shown signs of fighting.

At this time, Zhao Kuangyin had already arrived at Li Jixun's Chinese army. The two sighed and sighed, only thinking about the vicissitudes of the world.

After a while, Zhao Kuangyin stopped gossiping and asked quickly: "Brother Li, I gave you the prescription to prepare gunpowder, is it ready?"

Li Jixun said: "It's been set up and filled with twelve coffins. Charcoal is easy, but sulfur is a bit more difficult to get. The worst thing to get is saltpeter. Fortunately, it's not too far from Guanzhong. I sent people to Guanzhong to contact dealers and spend a lot of money to buy them. The dealers transported some from Hanzhong and Longyou one after another. After several trips, they finally weighed enough."

"In the battle of Shouzhou, Guo Shaoli issued a military order to destroy the city within one month. It all depends on this thing." Zhao Kuangyin said, "The city of Jinzhou is fortified, and Brother Li's strength is insufficient, so besieging is the worst strategy. You can try to send agents in to contact Murong Yanzhao to try to separate, and at the same time prepare to use gunpowder to blow up the city. If you blow up the troops and rush into Brother Li, you will have more than twice the advantage."

Li Jixun said: "If we can't break through, we have to wait for Li Chongjin to arrive."

Zhao Kuangyin nodded and said: "That's right. If Li Chongjin joins forces, you can occupy Jinzhou with one half and think you can retreat; if Brother Li captures Jinzhou alone, you occupy Jinzhou and ask Li Chong to go to Jiangzhou in the south... But it is best to quickly capture Jinzhou to avoid Tokyo's aid; after capturing Jinzhou, immediately divide the troops to the southeast to strengthen the defense of Zezhou. The place relies on Taiyue. If it is properly defended, it will take a few months."

The next day, Li Jixun and Zhao Kuangyin began to deploy siege fortifications in an orderly manner. There are more than 40,000 people in total, but only 20,000 of them are town soldiers; more than 10,000 are village warriors composed of strong men and prisoners drawn from various places. The rest are forced laborers, and even women, who transport food and work.

Li Jixun's department did not intend to surround them on all sides. They first divided the 20,000 main force into three battalions, and stationed one battalion on each side of the city; and stationed 3,000 cavalry five miles away from the city in the southeast.

Then drive the strong men and prisoners to start building fences and ditches on the front of the west gate, and advance to the bottom of the city one by one, with three layers of fortifications; heavy troops are placed on the west side. There are also some craftsmen who are busy working in the camp to make various tools such as catapults and ladders.

(A radius of tens of miles around Jinzhou has been looted; Li Jixun first plundered the three cities of Heyang, then occupied Jiangzhou, which was empty of troops, as a rear guard, and then robbed Jinzhou and the periphery of Jiangzhou, because they had no reliable source of supply.)

For a while, the open ground outside Jinzhou City seemed to be a construction site for the construction of the main hall. "Wow..." the sound of sawing wood, the sound of jingling beating, the sound of people carrying wooden hammers and ramming the earth...there was a scene of busy work.

On both sides, there are banners and flags like clouds, and a group of people and horses lined up, standing still. Looking at the city tower, several generals were walking around on the wall, and there were many soldiers standing on the wall, but the defenders did not shoot an arrow, because no matter what kind of weapon they were, they could not reach the "construction site" outside the city.

Behind the fence, eight tunnels have been dug quietly, using houses, tents and ditches as cover to prevent people in the city from seeing where the tunnels are.

Zhao Kuangyin rode his horse to a tunnel opening and looked around. Turning around and seeing Li Jixun, he rode forward and said, "When the front fence is dug, holes are drilled upwards. One is for ventilation, and the other is to determine the position. After digging to the bottom of the city, there are only more than a hundred steps, and a small hole is found in a hidden place in the middle, so that you don't have to worry about going too far. At night, I quietly asked someone to measure the distance of the city wall with a rope, and just dug the tunnel under the wall."

Li Jixun said: "Brother Zhao was in Yangzhou during the battle of Huainan, but he was so clear about the tactics of the battle of Shouzhou, which is really admirable."

"I don't know how Guo Shao dug it, but it should be similar." Zhao Kuangyin said, "Digging tunnels to hide gunpowder is the same as the previous method of 'cave attack'. The cave attack has to be dug into the city and dig farther... There are not a few generals in the army who understand cave attack.

Li Jixun said: "Brother Zhao has the full power to handle the bombing of the city."

"Then I will take the order." Zhao Kuangyin bowed.

... On a sunny afternoon, the autumn air is crisp and the sky is very clear, but the ground below the city is full of dust. Xiang Gong stood on the tower and carefully observed the fortifications below. He didn't plan to take the initiative to attack yet.

"The deployment is very rigorous, not like Li Jixun's style." Xiang Gongtou said without looking back, "When Li Jixun was in Huainan, he wanted to recruit Chai Kehong's reinforcements, but because of his carelessness, he countered the ambush of Chai Kehong's weak soldiers and was defeated; he is not a careful person at all... Zhao Kuangyin should have joined Li Jixun's army."

The big man with round cheeks and round eyes next to him was Jianxiong Army Jiedu Envoy Murong Yanzhao, Murong Yanzhao's expression changed slightly when he heard Zhao Kuangyin's name.

And Xiang Gong is much fairer, with flat cheeks, regular features, and a very light beard. Xiang Gong remained calm, he had already seen Murong Yanzhao's expression from the corner of his eye.

"Handsome Murong Jie, look over there..." Xiang Gongyao pointed forward.

Murong Yanzhao said: "The dust is too heavy, I can't see anything."

"Look carefully at the new soil behind the fence." Xiang Gong said, "Zhao Kuangyin is digging a burrow."

"Acupoint attack?" Murong Yanzhao frowned.

Xiang Gong said: "Acupoint attack is too difficult. I think Zhao Kuangyin wants to use gunpowder to blow up the city in the same way. In the famous Shouzhou Battle, Guo Du's check was to use gunpowder to blow up the city wall. Zhao Kuangyin may have got a solution... That's why Zhao Sanlang used gunpowder when he tried to assassinate Guo Du's check at the Datong Temple Inn."

"Eh, General Xiang knows quite a lot! I have heard about Saburo Zhao, but this is the first time I have heard about the assassination." Murong Yanzhao said.

Xiang Gong said: "My Zhen'an army of more than 2,000 riders will be deployed on the west road of the city. If a gap is blown, the Zhen'an army will take the lead in quickly closing the gap; then Commander Murong Jie will see the opportunity to reinforce me."

Murong Yanzhao bowed, "Follow the orders of the capital!"

Xiang Gong said again: "In this way, the defense of the city depends entirely on the Jianxiong army. Once the city is destroyed, the lives of the people will be destroyed, and you and I will die without a place to die! I hope Commander Murong Jie will not retreat."

"Decree!" Murong Yanzhao's expression froze, "The last general takes half a step back and comes to see you with his head up."

After Xiang Gong heard this, he turned back and said, "Zhang Jianxiong, immediately send someone to seal off the west side street and east-west main road, and issue a notice that these two roads will no longer pass, and those who block the troop route will be punished on the spot!"

Zhang Jianxiong clasped his fists and said, "The last general has orders!"

...

(Weak monthly ticket) r1058

the s