Desert Eagle Suletan Khan

The most important days in a siege war in this era were the first few days. If the attackers could not capture the city in the first few days, it would most likely turn into a protracted war of attrition. The five-day attack was repelled. Even though the Qing army chose the Yinghui Gate, the weakest point in Taiyuan City, as the main attack direction, they still gained nothing in front of the defenders who were ready to fight, leaving behind corpses everywhere. Gradually, morale began to decline.

The violent attack was ineffective and the army had only two months' worth of food left. Shang Shan could not help but become anxious and sent people into the city to issue a declaration of war to the commander of the Wei army, King Melas of Qi, saying: "Shang Shan bows to His Highness the King of Qi of Wei: I am unfortunate to be in two countries on the same level as Your Highness, and am not tolerated by the wise. I feel ashamed and cannot help myself. I will meet Your Highness for hunting at 30 miles north of Yangqu City at the beginning of the morning on November 13th. We are like mountains and rivers, and I only ask for a meeting. Shang Shan bows to His Highness."

"Hahaha~" Seeing this letter of war, Melas laughed happily and said to the envoy, "I'm afraid this letter of war was not written by Shangshan. If I'm right, it should be written by Bai Rumei, the governor of Shanxi Province of your country, right?"

The messenger was shocked. "It was written by Lord Beile at the order of Bai Fuyuan. How did Your Highness know about this?"

"Haha," Melas shook his head gently, "Know yourself and know your enemy, and you will never be defeated in a hundred battles. I have already ordered people to investigate the situation of your generals. Shangshan is 45 years old this year. When he was young, he fought outside the Great Wall. After entering the Great Wall, he began to learn Han culture. How could he write such a beautiful letter of war? This must be the handwriting of Bai Rumei. Bai Rumei is also a talented person, but it's a pity that I can't use her!"

"I have come here on orders. Your Highness, please let me know whether to fight or not," the envoy said with some courage, unafraid of the pressure from the King of Qi.

"Hmph! Go back and tell Shangshan that if he wants to fight, then fight him. I agree." After saying that, Melas replied with a line of words behind the letter of challenge: "Uncouth people do not know the beauty of mountains and flowing waters, they only listen to the music and follow the elegant intentions."

After the Qing envoy left, the generals discussed it. "My dear nephew, our army has far fewer casualties than the Qing army because of the danger of occupying the city, and we have sufficient food and grass. Why do we have to go out of the city to fight the enemy in the field?" Liao Wang Su Muer asked puzzledly. "Yes, didn't we agree to occupy the city and wait for the enemy to run out of food before attacking them? Why did the prince agree to go out of the city to fight with them?" Chahar Admiral Alinbao also didn't understand. Ji Jike, Ada, Zheng Guoyin and other generals all disagreed.

"Take a look, everyone. This is a letter from my father, the Khan, to me. It was just sent to me urgently from eight hundred miles away," Melas handed a letter to the generals.

The generals saw that the Great Khan Lianhua wrote in the letter: "My son must guard against the Qing army in Shaanxi coming to Shanxi to help. The battle of Taiyuan should be fought sooner rather than later." The king's order is as heavy as a mountain. Who dares to disobey? They immediately changed their words and cheered, and they couldn't wait to leave the city and fight the enemy.

"Since ancient times, all is fair in war. Since Your Highness wants to have a decisive battle with the Qing army, there is no need to wait three days. You can launch a surprise attack on the Qing army from the north city tomorrow. Since Shangshan has asked you to have a decisive battle in the north of the city, I predict that he will concentrate his troops in the north of the city in the next few days," Chen Hongzhu suggested.

"This~" Melas was a little hesitant. Mongolian men always keep their promises. How could he go back on his word?

"That's right. Shangshan is a brave general. Your Highness must not give him enough time to prepare. Moreover, in your reply to Shangshan, you only said 'I will follow your imperial will when I hear the music', but you didn't say when you will follow your imperial will. Attacking in advance does not count as breaking the agreement," Xue Chenwei saw what he was thinking and advised.

After hearing this, Mylas nodded slowly, "You are right. I only agreed to a decisive battle with the Qing army, but I did not specify the time of the decisive battle in my reply, which means I have broken my promise. There has been heavy fog in the early morning these few days. It must be that Changshengtian is helping our army, so that we can go out of the city and fight in the thick fog at the beginning of the morning (five o'clock in the morning) tomorrow. Hahaha~"
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At 1664: a.m. on November , , the Wei army secretly opened the gate of Gongji Gate under the cover of thick fog. They first sent elite scouts to sneak out of the city to kill the Qing scouts, and then went out of the city to form a battle array. Knowing that the Qing army camp was three miles outside the town's north gate, Mailas led his troops to secretly bypass Gongji Gate and go to a place not far from the Qing army camp.

Thick fog obscured the army's whereabouts, and the Qing troops in the camp were unaware of it. Melas was overjoyed and shouted in a low voice: "The scouts spread out to eliminate the enemy's scouts, the artillery camp deploys the artillery, and the other units prepare for battle."

After receiving the military order, the guards' scouts began to clear out the Qing army sentries outside the camp. The artillery battalion quickly fixed and installed eighty tube-mounted cannons. The cavalry and infantry silently prepared for battle. The baggage battalion unloaded the cloth bags from the carts to the bucket carts. In order to fill the trench in front of the Qing army camp, the guards prepared three hundred carts filled with sand bags and five hundred bucket carts overnight.

At the beginning of the morning (7 o'clock), the thick fog began to thin, and by breakfast time, wisps of smoke gradually rose from the Qing army camp. Seeing that the Qing army had not yet noticed that he was so close, Melas decisively ordered an attack.

"Boom~Boom~Boom~" The sudden fierce artillery fire blew gaps in the Qing army camp, and the various fortifications inside the camp were also blown to pieces.

The sound of the cannon was the order. Under the cover of the cannon fire, the baggage battalion of the guard army pushed the bucket carts filled with sand bags to the trench in front of the Qing army camp and dumped them, quickly filling up a large section of the trench. "Haorui~Haorui~Haorui~" Alinbao, the Chahar admiral of the guard army, and Ada, the chief of the thousand households, led 10,000 cavalrymen to rush through the gap created by the cannons to the Qing army camp, hacking and killing everywhere, throwing torches, followed by more than 40,000 troops of Qi Wang Mailas. The attack came so suddenly that the Qing army in the camp was caught off guard. As soon as Cai Yuan, the lieutenant general of Zezhou, ran out of the military tent, he was hacked to death by Alinbao who rode his horse to the front; Liu Jingshan, the lieutenant general of Lu'an Camp, was even more miserable. The military tent was directly set on fire by the guards and burned to death in the tent.

"The fake king is shameless and has no integrity." Beile Shangshan knew he had fallen into a trap when he heard the shouting and killing, and was filled with resentment.

"Second brother, now is not the time to be angry. Follow me and retreat!" Gushan Beizi Fulata ran over wearing armor to protect his brother.

"Retreat? No! Once we retreat, the whole army will be finished ~ Shanxi will be finished too! Blow the horn quickly to gather the troops and fight to the death with the guards!" In the critical moment, Shang Shan showed the bravery in the bones of the Aisin-Gioro family and ordered the troops to gather for resistance.

Seeing that he could not persuade his brother, Fulata had to gather his men and horses to form a battle array to resist. However, at this time, the guards had already penetrated deep into the camp. Seeing the Qing army forming a battle array, they used cavalry to disperse them and deliberately ignored the Qing army that was defeated and fled, causing the surrounding Qing troops to be scattered and difficult to gather. After blowing the rally horn for a long time, only 5,000 people were gathered. They barely formed a battle array and were surrounded by the main force of the guards.

"Your Highness, this is the flag of the pseudo-Qing prince Shangshan. Shangshan must be among them!" Qianhu Chang'an Bahai recognized the flag of the Qing army and said to Melas in surprise.

"Shangshan, Shangshan, I didn't expect you to be such a man that you still refuse to run away even after such a defeat~" Melas laughed and ordered: "First, use fire guns and arrows to disrupt the enemy's formation, and then rush up to annihilate them." He knew very well that the Qing army that was still resisting at this time must be the enemy's elite, and he didn't want to attack with force and cause too many casualties.

"Bang~bang~bang~" "Swoosh~swoosh~swoosh~" The guards' bullets and arrows seemed to never run out, and they knocked down the neatly arranged Qing troops one by one.

"Soldiers of the Eight Banners, follow me to kill the enemy!" Shang Shan's eyes were red with bloodshot eyes, and he urged the divine horse under his crotch, and charged at the guards with his sword. The general is the courage of the soldiers, and the Qing army was determined to fight to the death. They rushed to the guards and killed the front row of the guards, the Lan County guerrilla Hui Chongde. In a panic, Hui Chongde rode his horse to flee, but he couldn't keep up with Shang Shan's fast horse, so he chased him and chopped off his horse with a sword.

However, this was only a brief moment of glory. The collapse of Hui Chongde's troops did not affect the overall situation. Gradually, the surrounding guards increased in number, and the encirclement became smaller and smaller. The number of his personal guards was less than a hundred.

"Fourth brother, it seems that this is where you and I will be buried! We finally did not lose face for our ancestors!" Shang Shan said to Fulata behind him with difficulty, but he did not hear a reply. Looking back, he saw a deep feather arrow stuck in Fulata's forehead at some point.

"Fourth brother, wait for me. We will be reunited soon." Shang Shan, with tears streaming down his face, rode his horse and led the remaining dozens of guards to charge at the guards. Half an hour later, he and his guards all lay on the battlefield.
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"Your Highness, our army suffered only 3,000 casualties in this battle, beheaded 10,000 people, and captured 20,000 people. The remnants of the Qing army fled in two groups. Bai Rumei, the pseudo-Qing governor of Shanxi, and Chahatai, the Melezhang, led more than 10,000 remnants to escape to Linxian; Li Haoxian, the general of Taiyuan Town, and Xu Changchun, the deputy general of Puzhou, led more than 10,000 remnants to escape to Pingyang Prefecture," Zong Yi, who had just been promoted to the deputy envoy of Shanxi Province, reported excitedly. Because of his meritorious service in offering Taiyuan City and some friendship with Chen Hongzhu, a popular figure around the King of Qi, this person was quite trusted by the King of Qi and was allowed to be an advisor to the military affairs.

"Well, can you find out clearly how many Qing army generals above the rank of lieutenant colonel were killed by our army in this battle?" Melas asked calmly, as if he was asking about a trivial matter.

"Your Highness, in this battle our army killed Shangshan, the pseudo-Qing prince, Fulata, Gushan prince, and 19 generals above the rank of lieutenant general, and captured seven others," Zong Yi replied quickly.

"Well, pass the order down. Behead all seven enemy generals. Put the twenty-six heads in wooden boxes, and send them together with the letter of persuasion to the counties and cities in Shanxi that have not yet surrendered. You write the letter of persuasion for me. The tone must be stern. Tell the fake officials in various places that if they do not surrender, this will be their end!" Melas gloomily issued a cruel military order.

"Yes", Zong Yi felt a chill on his back and hurriedly passed on the order. In order to please the King of Qi, he quickly drafted a letter of persuasion with a stern tone, "King Melas of the Kingdom of David writes to the prefectures, counties and cities of the Three Jins: The battle of Taiyuan has been decided. Although you are only a stone's throw away, you must have heard of the great name of our army. If you have any doubts, don't you see the heads of these 26 generals? I am writing this letter to recruit you to serve the new dynasty. Those who agree will stay in their original positions, and those who disagree will also be asked to tell me their sincere wishes. November 12, the 21st year of Qianyuan".

As the heads of the 26 generals and the letter of surrender were sent to various places by the envoys of the Guard Army, the whole province of Shanxi was shaken. Some prefectures and counties that had previously resisted no longer dared to resist, and those that were originally hesitant immediately made up their minds and presented the people's register and various materials to the Guard Army. Fenzhou, Liaozhou, Qinzhou, Zezhou and Lu'an Prefecture all surrendered without a fight. In the whole territory of Shanxi, only Linxian County of Taiyuan Prefecture and Pingyang Prefecture were still in the hands of the Qing army. (End of this chapter)