Outlaws of the Marsh

Chapter 124 Offense and Defense ([-])

...

Summer goes and autumn comes, and winter will come again in a blink of an eye.

It has been three and a half months since Hu Yanzhuo led the troops to Shuibo Liangshan.

In these three and a half months, Hu Yanzhuo didn't even see a shadow of a Liangshan hero, let alone submit to the battle.

The point is, Hu Yanzhuo didn't dare to slack off for a moment, for fear that one day Li Yan would bring someone to touch his camp.

Therefore, one can imagine how miserable Hu Yanzhuo has been in these three and a half months.

Ok!

All of this is coming to an end!

The Dengzhou Navy (500 battalions with [-] people) and the large and small ships of the Dengzhou Navy have all been in place, and the [-] large ships supervised by the Jeju Government have also been in place.

Total: Ten large ships with a load of [-] shi (can carry [-] people), these ten large ships were all brought by the Dengzhou Navy, although their speed is not as fast as the three-masted ships built by Meng Kang and Ye Chun, But in terms of load, it is not inferior to the three-masted big ships built by Meng Kang and Ye Chun.There are [-] large ships with a load of [-] shi (can carry [-] people), [-] of which were brought by the Dengzhou Navy, and the other [-] were built by the Governor of Jeju Prefecture. This kind of ship is A big ship on a river.There are a number of ships with a load of less than [-] shi. Most of these ships were recruited by the Governor of Jeju for Hu Yanzhuo to help Hu Yanzhuo transport grain and grass to attack the city.

In addition, the governor of Jeju Prefecture recruited another [-] brave civilian husbands, and all of them were handed over to Hu Yanzhuo's command.

Today, Hu Yanzhuo has a total of 500 Mabu Shui soldiers and civilians, and [-] to [-] ships.

Hu Yanzhuo ordered that the Dengzhou navy put all the ships into Kuo Harbor and make iron locks. Every five large ships with a load of [-] shi were nailed together, with boards on the top and iron rings on the stern. All boarded to adapt, and a wide springboard was built and placed on ten large ships with a load of [-] shi to transport the horse army.

After more than half a month of training, all horses and horses can get on and off the boat quickly, and the conditions for attacking Shuibo Liangshan are finally fully mature.

Hu Yanzhuo's movement is so big, how could it be possible to hide it from Li Yan?
Knowing that Hu Yanzhuo was about to launch a general offensive, Li Yan, who had already made preparations, stopped the Ruan Xiaowu Water Battalion going back and forth between Shuibo Liangshan and Jeju Island. The thousand-horse-step water army, with a total of 7000 troops, is preparing for a decisive battle with Hu Yanzhuo.

……

this day.

The direction of the wind is directed at Liangshan Dazhai.

Hu Yanzhuo, who couldn't wait for a long time, dressed properly, and then ordered people to beat drums and gather troops.

Three drums were played in a row.

Fifteen thousand and five hundred people have all their harnesses.

Kill pigs and sheep and bury pots to make rice.

After a full meal, 500 men and horses boarded the boat in an orderly manner, and loaded all the utensils and grain and grass that should be captured from the city into the boat.

In just one stick of incense time, all 500 of Hu Yanzhuo's troops boarded the boat.

It can be seen from this that Hu Yanzhuo's men and horses have been trained well, at least in the matter of getting on and off the ship.

Standing still on the bow of the main ship, Hu Yanzhuo waved the iron whip in his hand, and four or five hundred ships of all sizes rushed towards Wanzi City in Liangshan!

With continuous poles and golden drums beating, they went all the way into the depths of Liangshan Moor. Hu Yanzhuo and others didn't even see a single boat.

This situation was never expected by Hu Yanzhuo and others before the expedition.

Han Tao frowned and said, "It's weird, didn't those thieves abandon this puddle and escape?"

A dark man said: "I think that Li Yan is going to take advantage of Liangshan's natural danger to fight us directly."

Hu Yanzhuo said: "Uncle's words are correct, and I also see it in the same way. I'm afraid this battle will be a tough one. Everyone must be prepared."

Do you know who this dark man is?

He is Huyan Zan's great-grandson, Hu Yanshouyong's son, Hu Yanzhuo's uncle Huyanqing - Hu Yanqing is only in his early thirties at this time, two years younger than Huyanzhuo, but he can't stand his seniority.

(Some sources say that Hu Yanqing is the sixth generation Hu family general, Hu Yanzhuo is the tenth generation Hu family general, Hu Yanqing is the ancestor of Hu Yanzhuo, and some sources say that Hu Yanqing is the sixth generation Hu family general, and Hu Yanzhuo is the sixth generation Hu family general. Zhuo is the eighth-generation Hu family general, and Hu Yanqing is Hu Yanzhuo’s uncle. I can’t judge which one is true, and the latter is more conducive to the shaping of the novel, so I chose the latter.)
This Hu Yanqing originally served as the commander of the Ping Navy, but because of his good foreign languages, he was asked to go to Dengzhou to serve as the commander of the Dengzhou Navy because he was good at foreign languages.

This time Gao Qiu dispatched the Dengzhou Navy to help Hu Yanzhuo destroy Shuibo Liangshan. Hu Yanqing and four other commanders of the Dengzhou Navy came to take orders from Hu Yanzhuo.

Because Hu Yanqing's immediate superior, the Commander of the Dengzhou Navy, suddenly "disturbed his stomach" when the army was about to leave, Hu Yanzhuo appointed Hu Yanqing as the temporary commander of the Dengzhou Navy to command the Dengzhou Navy to assist. He wiped out Shuibo Liangshan.

Qiu Yue said: "It's better than not being able to see anyone at all. These water thieves are all bastards. They huddled in this puddle and couldn't come out. I waited at the edge of this puddle for three or four months. , still worrying all day long!"

Cheng Ziming said: "That's right, a decisive battle is the best. We can rest in Wanzi City tonight. I heard that there are many female relatives in this group of female thieves."

Hu Chun was a little hesitant, and said: "If... if we can't take down that Liangshanbo today, what should we do?"

As soon as Hu Chun's words came out, everyone's expressions became solemn!
They are all veterans, how could they not know that they would be in trouble if they couldn't make it to Liangshan today?

Some people may not understand that if they can't be beaten, they can't be beaten. How can they be in trouble?
Very simple, their trouble is the location of this battle.

If they can't hit Liangshan today, they may be caught in a dilemma.

In, needless to say, if they can't beat them, where will they go?

Back, behind them is Liangshanpo, where there may be an ambush by Liang Shanshui's army.

Then rest in place?

It is even more impossible, how could the heroes of Liangshan let the invaders like them have a good rest?
All in all, the decisive battle is in Liangshan, which is surrounded by Liangshanbo. For Hu Yanzhuo's side, there will be a hundred harms but no benefits!
Faced with this unfavorable situation, all the people were frowning!
At this moment, the golden sand beach of the Liangshan River appeared in the sight of Hu Yanzhuo and others.

I saw that there was not a single boat in the lotus pond, which was extremely abnormal!
Looking farther away, both sides are full of trails and forests, cobblestones piled up like mountains, bitter bamboo guns like rain, behind are cliffs that are difficult for apes to climb, and there is only a wide road up the mountain in the middle.

Zhou Ang said: "These thieves really abandoned this place and ran away?"

Hu Yanzhuo said: "Where are they running away? They are clearly waiting for me to wait for a decisive battle." Speaking of this, Hu Yanzhuo pointed at the first pass at the end of the road with the iron whip in his hand.

Everyone looked in the direction pointed by Hu Yanzhuo's iron whip, and they saw five to seven hundred people standing vaguely on the pass, with wooden cannons, lime bottles, hard crossbows and strong bows, and densely packed bitter bamboo spears stuck on the wall. .

The fleet of officers and soldiers marched a little further and approached the golden sand beach. When everyone looked again, they saw that the leader above the pass was a walker with two iron swords in his hand. On his left was an eight-foot-tall man. There was a broad-waisted, round-haired man with yellow hair, and on his right was a tall man with thick eyebrows and a seven-foot-five-six build.

The three of them calmly waited for the arrival of the officers and soldiers.

...

"Wait, listen, the imperial army has arrived, quickly open the door to surrender, and let us wait for your life. If not, wait for us to attack, and we must kill you!"

Han Tao's voice was quite loud, and it reached Guanghui's ears clearly.

Guanghui held up the beads and twirled them, saying, "Don't talk nonsense, just attack, Sajia wants to see if you can break through the iron wall of Liangshanpo!"

Guanghui's voice fell.

"call out!"

"call out!"

"call out!"

……

A shower of arrows shot at Han Tao!

"God arm crossbow! Withdraw quickly!"

The people around Han Tao immediately raised their big shields to block Han Tao, and then protected Han Tao and retreated to a safe place!

Guanghui has already told the officers and soldiers that he and the Liangshan army will not surrender!
Han Tao came to Hu Yanzhuo and the others standing in front of the [-]-horse army, and said, "General, these bandits are stubborn, let's attack directly!"

Hu Yanzhuo also dismissed the last trace of luck, saying: "Prepare to attack!"

Han Tao and Peng Qi responded in unison: "Yes!"

Afterwards, under the command of Han Tao and Peng Qi, the officers and soldiers began to get busy—bowmen stepped forward one after another and lined up outside the mountain gate, and shield soldiers also stepped forward with shields to provide cover for these crossbowmen. Under the yelling of Han Tao, Peng Qi and others, the folk husband brought the siege equipment and siege tools such as catapults, bed crossbows, siege carts, ladder carts, wooden curtain carts, ladders, and wooden curtains. Moved to the place designated by Han Tao and Peng Qi.In addition, Peng Qi also asked the civilian husband to cut down a big tree and put it on the ram to serve as the ram of the ram.

And the pass seems to be very busy—Zhu Jing and Ou Peng are running around and shouting, Liangshan shield soldiers erected large shields to block the archery openings, Liangshan crossbowmen stringed the god arm crossbow and loaded crossbow arrows, and civilian men rolled logs and rocks and so on. Move the things to the place designated by Zhu Jing and Ou Peng, and light the dry firewood under the oil pan and golden juice pan that have been prepared.

Judging from Liang Shanjun's performance, they seemed to be ready to fight to the end.

After tossing for a while, the officers and soldiers were finally ready to attack.

At the same time, the Liangshan Army on the pass seemed to be ready.

Following Han Tao's order, the catapults and bed crossbows fired at each other!
In an instant, four boulders and more than twenty bed crossbow arrows smashed and shot at the pass!

The trebuchet is also called the trebuchet.Its structure is very simple. A horizontal shaft is made on a wooden frame, and a long rod is inserted between the shaft and the horizontal shaft. Hundreds of ropes.

When using it, put the stone into the leather case, and after an order, everyone pulls the rope, and the stone in the leather case is thrown like a fly.

During the Battle of Guandu, Cao Cao used a catapult to break through Yuan Shao's camp, thus winning a complete victory.

During the Han to Tang Dynasties, the use of trebuchets in combat gradually increased.

Nowadays, the trebuchets are getting bigger and bigger. The trebuchet brought by Hu Yanzhuo already requires hundreds of people to pull the rope to throw the boulders. Each stone can even kill several people. It is definitely a sharp weapon for siege.

Although the trebuchet is powerful, but because of its shortcomings such as being too bulky and requiring a large number of people, the bed crossbow is more practical in a comprehensive comparison.

The range of the bed crossbow can reach [-] steps, which is the longest range and the most powerful crossbow at this time.

The arrows fired by the bed crossbow use wood as the shaft, the iron spearhead as the arrowhead, and the iron feather as the tail. It is called "one spear with three swords and arrows", but it is actually a short spear with feathers, which has great destructive power. , the city fortress is endless, if you encounter an earthen city and a wooden village, it will be destroyed in the middle.

The bed crossbow can also launch "treading arrows", which are nailed in rows on the city wall of rammed earth, for the siege to climb the city, like a mobile ladder.

Or, put a pocket on the bowstring, hold dozens of arrows at a time, and at the same time send out like a storm, the name is "jackdaw arrow", it is a rare weapon.

In the Battle of Chanyuan in the first year of Jingde in the Song Dynasty, the Song army even shot and killed the Liao army leader Taran with a bed crossbow, which led to the Song-Liao peace talks.

It is not difficult to see from the fact that Hu Yanzhuo took out these two kinds of big killers to attack the city as soon as he came up, Hu Yanzhuo's reputation as a famous general is well-deserved, he is a person who understands soldiers, and it can also be seen that Huyan Zhuo is preparing to attack the city. Take the Shuibo Liangshan in one go!
Although Guanghui Battalion was the earliest battalion built in the Liangshan Army, when it comes to a real battle, it has never experienced it once. How can the opponents they encountered when they went out to borrow food compare with the regular army brought by Hu Yanzhuo? What's more, as soon as Hu Yanzhuo came up, he used the catapult and the bed crossbow, two big killers that the Liangshan Army had never touched!
Therefore, as soon as the battle was fought, more than a dozen soldiers of the Liangshan Army were killed by boulders or shot to death by bed crossbow arrows.

Most of these soldiers of the Liangshan Army still had large shields standing in front of them before they died. In the training they had received in the past, as long as they put the large shields in front of them, they would not die, but now... some were crushed by boulders, some The bed was pierced by crossbow arrows!
This will undoubtedly make the living Liangshan Army officers and soldiers doubt whether the training they have received before is reasonable?
And it is not the dead soldiers who hit the morale of the Liangshan army the most, but those who have not died after being hit by boulders and bed crossbow arrows. Their howls are the most damaging to morale-hear their miserable howls How can Liangshan Army soldiers who have never been on a real battlefield not be scared, how can they not be afraid?Some timid people even ran around like headless chickens, and then were crushed to death by flying boulders or shot to death by bed crossbow arrows, which increased the casualties of the Liangshan Army!

This is the biggest shortcoming of the Liangshan Army at present-the Liangshan Army has not been baptized on the battlefield, and it is not yet a real army.

This is also one of the reasons why Li Yan, Liu Huiniang, and Wen Huanzhang chose Liangshan as their battlefield.

Although Guanghui is good at martial arts, he was born in the green forest. He is not good at commanding, at least not in terms of experience. He doesn't know how to deal with such emergencies. The huge power of the crossbow shocked me!

At the critical moment, Ou Peng, who was still from a military family, reacted faster.

Ou Peng shouted: "Get out of the archery hole and hide behind the wall and don't run around! Their arrow stones can't destroy our city wall reinforced with concrete, don't be afraid of it!"

Guang Hui also reacted and shouted: "Hide behind the wall! Don't stand at the archery hole! Don't run around!"

Liangshan soldiers are very good at one thing, that is, they are extremely obedient!
After hearing Ou Peng and Guang Hui's shouting, except for a few who were completely frightened and continued to run for their lives, everyone else got out of the way of shooting arrows and hid behind the city wall!

In this way, there are almost no cases of being crushed to death by boulders or shot to death by bed crossbow arrows.

On the other side, Han Tao, who was in charge of commanding the siege, was overjoyed when he saw that the Liangshan Army had been beaten to the point of daring to show his face in just one attack, and he immediately said, "The siege team is ready!"

After listening to Han Tao's order, the officers and soldiers in charge of pushing the siege equipment such as rolling carts, ladder carts, wooden curtain carts, and other siege teams immediately took their positions, and even the officers and soldiers in charge of pushing the carts were on standby!

However, Han Tao did not directly let the siege team go, but first let the shield soldiers and crossbow soldiers rush to the range of the crossbow under the cover of the stone throwing machine and the bed crossbow, and then shot arrows, followed by the stone throwing The machine and the bed crossbow pressed the soldiers of the Liangshan Army together, making the soldiers of the Liangshan Army even more afraid to show their heads, so they ordered: "Siege team!"

Following Han Tao's order, the officers and soldiers pushed a few wooden curtain carts and formed a row to lead, followed by ten carts, in which two officers and soldiers were hiding, and after that were hiding behind the wooden curtain carts and The ladder car behind the car and the officers and soldiers resisting the ladder.

The battle to attack the first pass has now completely kicked off...

……

(End of this chapter)