The Ming Dynasty began from Sarhu

Chapter 52: Unmoving as a mountain
"Wolf soldiers? Didn't Liao Zhen see that right? Didn't the Guangxi Wolf Soldiers go to Kuandian to rescue us? It's been half a month, why are they still here?"

Zhang Mazi shook his head in confusion. Even the lieutenant general didn't know the reason, so how could he know?

Liu Zhaosun didn't know much about the Guangxi Wolf Soldiers in his previous life. He only knew that this army was composed of descendants of the local Han people in Guangxi. They were fierce in battle, fearless of death, and no worse than the Southern Soldiers in armed fights.

The Wolf Soldiers once helped the imperial court suppress Yang Yinglong's rebellion, although they were only auxiliary.

The Wolf Soldiers never fought against the Jiannu in history, so it is unknown how powerful they were.

Liu Zhaosun was shocked by the elusive army and suspected that the Liaozhen scouts were wrong.

In this era, it is hard to imagine that an army lacking logistics can persist in the freezing wilderness for half a month.

Aren’t these Guangxi barbarians afraid of the cold?
Liu Zhaosun shook his head, but now was not the time to worry about the wolf soldiers. The fate of Liao Town in the south of the city was worrying and it was probably not far from destruction.

"Commander Yu fought with the Mongols?"

Zhang Mazi wiped the sweat from his forehead and quickly replied:

"Sir, the Liaozhen army is not only fighting against the Mongolian cavalry, but also the Zhenghong Banner cavalry and many Bayala. When I came here, they were still fighting against the Jiannu. All the servants around Lieutenant General Yu were killed. I am afraid that the two Liaozhen generals are in great danger."

Zhang Mazi looked worried. He was the most powerful Yebushou under Liu Jing's command. He had witnessed the heroic charge of the Liaozhen cavalry, and this Yebushou leader still felt a lingering fear.

"Sir, send the soldiers to the South Gate to support Lieutenant General Yu. The White Banner has gone south. Huang Taiji wants to encircle Liaozhen. Their cavalry won't hold out for long."

"What about the infantry? Don't they have five or six thousand infantry?"

"Daishan brought dozens of Portuguese cannons and blocked the south gate. The Bayalas of the Zhenghong Banner were all in action, and there were also Zhenyi armored soldiers shooting arrows in the front. The Liaozhen soldiers were very few in armor, and the two thousand who rushed out were surrounded. The moat was littered with dead bodies."

When we first built the fortifications at Kaiyuan, we didn't take into account the possibility of a counterattack from our own side. Now, Liaozhen has suffered heavy casualties. I'm afraid the South Gate can't be defended. After a long while, Liu Zhaosun shook his head and said:

"Even if we can't hold on, we must persist! The cavalry can break through. The north gate is the main attack direction of the Jiannu. The dead Tartar soldiers have already crossed the river, and there are 6,000 Zhenyi behind them. Amin is here to fight to the death. He will not stop the attack until all the Bordered Blue Banners are dead. The White Spear Soldiers can't stop so many Jiannu. There are not enough troops at the north gate. How can we support Liaozhen?"

"Go tell Lieutenant General Yu that I don't have any extra troops to give him. I'll give him fifty retainers, all veterans of hundreds of battles. Each one can easily take on three or five Jiannu. Didn't Lieutenant General Yu always say he wanted to restore Liaozhen's reputation? He wanted to tell the world that there are heroes in Liaodong too! Now is his chance to redeem himself! Hold the south and don't let a single Tartar into the city. See you on the road to the underworld!"

The lieutenant general is even sending his own servants into battle, so there will be no one to protect him. Zhang Mazi was about to say something to persuade him, but Liu Zhaosun interrupted him with a wave of his hand.

"Go ahead, you can ride a horse, go to the South Gate and fight, don't come back."

Zhang Mazi knew Liu Zhaosun's character, so he stopped talking, bowed to his superior, and took dozens of servants with him, riding his horse along the north-south street, galloping quickly towards the south gate.

Liu Zhaosun watched the backs of Zhang Mazi and others disappear at the street corner, then turned and walked towards the north gate.

Hearing the shouts and cries of the Jurchens in the distance, he quickly quickened his pace and arrived at the north gate, where he discovered that another group of baoyi soldiers had emerged from the Later Jin formation.

They quickly built two pontoon bridges across the moat. Some fierce baoyi soldiers shot at the Ming troops on the earthen wall with bows and arrows, and the Portuguese cannons behind the earthen wall stopped firing.

Some dead soldiers holding heavy shields pushed the front-line soldiers forward, like heavily armored tanks, passing through the pontoon bridge and appearing in front of the earth wall on the opposite bank.

Liu Zhaosun cried out in his heart, "Oh no!" The baoyi soldiers were fine, but if all these dead soldiers rushed over, the Ming army's earth wall defense line would be in danger.

He was still wondering why the Portuguese guns behind the earth wall had not fired yet, when he suddenly heard a dull explosion. Under the high-load artillery battle, a Portuguese gun near the east suddenly exploded.

The wooden gun carriage used to support and fix the falconet was shattered by explosives, and countless pieces of wood chips were blown dozens of steps around. The power was like a landmine filled with wood chips and iron blocks. Amidst the shrill screams, seven or eight gunners were killed or injured. Two gunners were covered in wood chips, blood splattered, and they fell to the ground and rolled for a while before their bodies became motionless.

Seeing this, the surviving Portuguese gunners did not dare to stay where they were, let alone continue shelling.

Compared with the Red Cannon, the explosion of the Portuguese cannon barrel is a low-probability event. However, due to the crude production of gunpowder by the Ming army and the craftsmen's cutting corners, various accidents still occurred frequently.

The chaos behind the earth wall caused cheers from the baoyi soldiers in front of the moat. They had just been badly hit by the Ming army's artillery on the pontoon bridge. Now seeing the Ming army being killed by their own artillery, the baoyi slaves were naturally overjoyed.

They immediately quickened their pace, charging toward the Ming army's earthen wall. Behind it, the clatter of musketry could be heard again. Standing on the wall, Liu Zhaosun could clearly see that almost all of the Baoyi Aha charging ahead had been hit by bullets. The Baoyi attack, so powerful, quickly collapsed, their formation disrupted. Most fled in panic, while others hid behind the corpses, firing arrows at the Ming troops behind the earthen wall. The Baoyi on this side of the moat knew this was the best time to cross the river. The Ming artillerymen, still recovering from the shock of their explosive barrels, had stopped firing their remaining Portuguese cannons, and some were already trying to turn and flee.

Taking advantage of the gaps in the Ming army's artillery bombardment, the surviving baoyi soldiers quickly crossed the pontoon bridge and approached the north bank. Some of the dead soldiers following them had already set foot on the land on the opposite bank.

In an instant, the number of enemy troops in front of the earth wall reached two or three thousand. The dead soldiers took out their heavy arrows and shot at the Ming army musketeers on the earth wall.

The baoyi soldiers who had already crossed the river tied the shield carts and ladders on the pontoon bridge with ropes and pulled them towards the shore with all their might. As soon as the ladders were dragged over, the baoyi soldiers used all their strength to push the shield carts towards the Ming army's earthen wall.

"Let the white-pole soldiers attack! Attack them halfway across the river, and don't let the dead soldiers take over!"

Liu Zhaosun had no other choice. The White Spear Soldiers were as fearless as the Jiannu, and they might be able to restrain the Later Jin Army.

The north gate of Kaiyuan was slowly opened from the inside, and the auxiliary soldiers vigorously lifted a chain as thick as a child's arm.

Qin Jianxun, dressed in a white robe, led a thousand white-pole soldiers and quickly climbed the slope behind the earth wall. They stood behind the musketeers. The musketeers, who had fought hard for an hour, made way for them. The white-pole soldiers quickly gathered in front of various passages, waiting for Qin Jianxun to issue the final order.

A heavy arrow whizzed past the protruding part of the earth wall. The gunners next to Franji were the ones that Bayara paid special attention to. Most of these gunners were not wearing armor, and they were quickly killed or injured after being hit by arrows.

The surviving gunners did not dare to stay where they were or continue firing. If they stayed, they would be shot to death by Bayala's heavy arrows, and if they continued firing, the barrel would most likely explode.

Liu Zhaosun waved his hand, and a team of musketeers came up to replace the gunners. They immediately aimed at the dead soldiers and fired back.

The Jurchen dead soldiers finally stopped more than a hundred steps away from the city wall and began to shoot bows and arrows at any Ming soldiers who appeared on the city wall!

Liu Zhaosun looked at the dead Jurchen soldiers rushing forward. Some of the Liao soldiers in the front wanted to escape, but three of them were hacked to death by the servants, which slightly stabilized the situation.

The scene of the Zhejiang soldiers' defeat in the Shajianzi camp appeared in front of his eyes. The scene was so similar to the one in front of him. Although the Liao soldiers and the White Spear soldiers were powerful, they were not modern armies after all. It was very difficult to defeat them without collapsing.

Suddenly, there was an explosion behind the earth wall. Looking up, I saw a lone French cannon firing at the moat pontoon bridge not far behind the earth wall.

Behind the French cannon, the two gunners cooperated perfectly, which attracted Liu Zhaosun's attention.

The two gunners ignored the approaching arrows and were busy firing cannonballs.

One of them squatted behind the cannon, looking at the shield car on the opposite pontoon bridge from between the two guard plates, while the other added the sealed gunpowder into the barrel, found the gunpowder fuse, and ignited it with an ignition fork.

There was a muffled rumbling sound, and after the smoke around the earth wall gradually dissipated, a gap was found on the bridge deck near the north bank. A dozen or so soldiers who were preparing to go ashore were hit by the oncoming artillery shells and immediately turned into pieces of meat.

After firing a shot, the two gunners immediately got busy again without stopping.

"Who are these two people?"

"My Lord, the tall one is called Han Zhenyi, and the short one is called Wang Changzhi. They are both from Jizhou."

Han Zhenyi replaced the French machine submachine gun that had just been fired, not caring about the heavy arrows whizzing past his head. He quickly walked to the front of the gun body and cleaned the barrel of the mother gun with a duck feather brush dipped in water as if no one was around. After the water inside dried up a little, he replaced it with the submachine gun prepared next to it.

The falconet crew consisted of five people: a gunner, two gunners, a loader, and a barrel cleaner.

Now there are only two people left in the running group. The others have either escaped or become corpses on the ground.

From Liu Zhaosun's position, the two gunners seemed to be almost facing the increasingly approaching formation of dead soldiers, which was a bit like a mantis trying to stop a chariot.

Liu Zhaosun was quite interested in the two gunners. He felt that they had an unshakable temperament. He had rarely felt this temperament since the death of his adoptive father Liu Jing.

"Wang Changzhi, Han Zhenyi."

Liu Zhaosun repeated the two names several times in his mind and memorized them.

(End of this chapter)