weaving

Chapter 1253 Bai Minghe's Ambition

At the critical moment on the northern battlefield, Jin Yong had been fighting with great restraint and it was also very difficult!

The North Camp is equipped with a cavalry thousand headquarters and a baggage thousand headquarters. Although they also have more than 2,000 brave soldiers, they excel in mobility and are better at attacking and assaulting rather than defending.

Therefore, Jin Yong could only order the black man Qiu Yingquan to lead the cavalry in the front to dismount and fight on foot, and defend with bows and arrows. After all, the cavalry were only equipped with short-handed guns and could not reach far.

Among the 1,000 charioteers of Huo Yuanshan's Second Baggage Unit, there were only 400 musketeers. The rest, including the pistol-bearers, deputy pistol-bearers, gunners, and deputy gunners, were only equipped with swords but not muskets.

As a result, Jin Yong's defensive battle became very difficult. Under the repeated fierce attacks of Bai Minghe and Xie Junyou, he had to retreat and continuously shrink his defense line.

Until this morning...

Jin Yong received an order from the commander Wei Zhice, who ordered "Huo Yuanshan's two carts to immediately unload the artillery on the carts and have the other cart soldiers carry them to support the defense of the West Camp..."

  He was annoyed at first. After the chariot soldiers were withdrawn, his side lost their firepower advantage. How should he defend?

But the military order given to him by Commander Wei Zhice also had the second half of the sentence: "After the Chuang army launches the attack, the North Camp must hold out for an hour, and then retreat back to the camp to wait for military orders!"

"Only one hour?" Jin Yong felt the pressure in his heart relieved suddenly. After a quick calculation, he knew that the rebel army would surely drive the enemy to fill the trenches, while his own army would fire bows and crossbows at the same time. This would take almost an hour.

…………

As expected, the rebel army was indeed driving the slaves to fill the trenches. Although they were holding pieces of wood, the cavalry in the front of the Tengshe Camp were mostly veteran soldiers. Although they were equipped with short-handed guns, they did not abandon their archery skills.

Facing the unarmored starving civilians, bows and arrows at a distance of seventy or eighty steps already had a certain killing power. Although the more than one thousand elite knights in the front were not all masters of archery, archery was also their basic skill.

However, the siege here had been going on for several days in a row, and even the servants had learned to be obedient. Two of them held wooden boards in front, and the others followed closely behind, slowly approaching the trench, instead of rushing in all at once like they did in the beginning.

But even so, there were always times when their arms or legs were exposed, and they could hardly escape the fate of being shot by the Tengshe Camp knights' cold arrows. Most of them would just lose the ability to continue filling the trenches, but most of them would not lose their lives.

But only knights with superb archery skills could do this. Most of the knights in the front of the Tengshe Camp used the upward shooting method. They shot a large number of arrows into the sky...

Although there were servants in the front holding wooden boards for protection, their task was to fill the third trench, so the people behind were either carrying earth baskets or earth bags, and naturally they had no hands free to lift the wooden boards.

Moreover, the rebel army would need a lot of wooden planks to build shield carts, battering rams, bridge-building carts, etc., so naturally they would not be able to allocate too many to these servants.

Arrows shot upwards in front of two armies were originally a great deterrent but often caused very little casualties. But now they are facing unarmed and unarmored starving civilians, which is a completely different scene.

But even so, under the threat of the rebel soldiers behind them, they gradually approached the trench under the rain of arrows. After roaring, the dust flew all over the sky, and baskets and bags of sand were dumped into the trench...

Then another wave of starving people slowly approached, and this happened several times. Finally, after hundreds of casualties, the trenches were filled up by the rebels, leaving several not very flat passages.

This time, the servants rushed forward pushing shield carts and holding wooden boards. It was obvious that they wanted to lay the wooden boards on the newly filled trench to make it easier for the rebels to rush through.

Seeing that the time was almost up, Jin Yong did not want to tangle with the Chuang soldiers any longer, so he shouted and led his front soldiers to retreat quickly into the camp, completely abandoning the last line of defense of the trench and low wall. This move surprised the Chuang soldiers so much that they were stunned for a moment.

Bai Minghe was overjoyed. In the previous few days of fighting, the government troops had been on the defensive, and their artillery fire was not as fierce and sharp as the legend said. There was no sign of attacking at all, which made him think that the government troops were just so-so.

Seeing that the government troops on the opposite side had retreated into the camp, he hurriedly issued an order: "Push all the shield carts up to the trench in front of the camp wall, and then push out the bridge-laying carts, battering rams, siege ladders, long ladders and other equipment, and prepare to launch a general attack to break into the camp in one fell swoop."

For this reason, Bai Minghe also found Xie Junyou and said to him: "Old Xie, I see that the government troops are also at the end of their strength. How about we make a concerted effort to capture them?"

Xie Junyou touched his chin, thought for a moment, and said, "I'm afraid the government troops are cunning, so it's better to be cautious."

"What's there to be afraid of..."

Bai Minghe said confidently: "We have been fighting for a few days, and the government troops are just like this. They are getting weaker and weaker. I think we should not miss this opportunity again!"

He turned his head and looked towards the critical point, his face full of unwillingness, and suddenly said in a firm tone: "How about this. Old Xie, you gather all the troops first. If I break through the critical point, you can command the troops to catch up, and we can defeat him together."

Finally, Bai Minghe asked with expectation in his eyes: "Do you think this will work?"

Seeing him like this, Xie Junyou could only reply, "Okay. I'll gather the troops first. If you can really open a gap over there, I will definitely lead my troops to press forward, and we will work together to break through the critical moment!"

Bai Minghe immediately smiled happily and said, "Okay. It's settled."

As he climbed onto his horse, he turned back and shouted, "Old Xie, just watch!"

After Bai Minghe finished speaking, he whipped his horse and galloped straight to the battlefield ahead...

Looking at his gradually receding back, a trace of worry flashed in Xie Junyou's eyes. He had a different opinion from Bai Minghe about the government troops in the critical moment, but seeing that Bai Minghe didn't care much, he didn't say it to his face.

In Xie Junyou's opinion, he had never encountered a government army that could build such strict fortifications before. Even if, as Bai Minghe said, the government troops at the critical moment only knew how to defend and dared not attack, their defense was very tight and their strategy was appropriate, and there was nothing wrong with it.

"This is the first time I've seen such government troops..."

Xie Junyou said to himself in his heart: "Why do I always feel like something is wrong?"

Although he was full of worries, he still gathered all the men in his camp according to the agreement with Bai Minghe, ready to take action when the opportunity arises.

"I really hope everything goes well and nothing goes wrong!"