The Song Dynasty on the Sand Table

Chapter 284 does not include the step of siege.
Seeing Sui Yi's expression, Wang Hong knew he had something on his mind, and couldn't help but chuckle: "General Sui, your Yan'an soldiers are very capable. They beat the Western Xia to a pulp back then, so you're very confident, right? You're a little unhappy about making me an auxiliary soldier?"

Sui Yi's spirits lifted, and his chest puffed out a bit: "That's right! We were just lacking in fighting spirit because of the pseudo-Qi. Once we returned to Song, we fought fiercely. Making us auxiliary soldiers would be a waste of our fighting strength."

Wang Hong: "You can only think like this for now. When we go to attack Yizhou City, you'll realize how naive you've been."

Sui Yi was a little resentful, but he didn't argue. After all, he had just surrendered and needed to keep a low profile for a while. He just thought to himself: When it comes time to attack Yizhou City, I will lead my thousand brothers to bravely charge forward and show you the might of the Yan'an border army.

The Northern Song army made only a brief stop in Yishui County, leaving no soldiers behind and allowing the local gentry to govern for the time being, before immediately leading the army to continue southwest towards Linyi County.

Linyi County was the seat of Yizhou, and Linyi County was also the seat of Yizhou Prefecture.

The capital city of a prefecture and the county seat are two different concepts!
During the Northern Song Dynasty, county towns typically had city walls that were only nine to twelve feet high, but the walls of prefecture cities could be built to be over twenty feet high.

Yizhou, a famous city in the Central Plains, was a large prefecture city with walls reaching a height of twenty-two feet.

When the Northern Song army arrived at the walls of Yizhou, the soldiers looked up at the 22-foot-high city wall and couldn't help but scratch their heads: "What an impressive city."

A head appeared on the city wall; it was the prefect of Yizhou from the puppet state of Qi.

Nobody knows him!
It is estimated that he was just like the prefects and magistrates of the Northern Song Dynasty. He was originally an unknown nobody, but suddenly he was promoted to a high-ranking official like a prefect, so he was not well-known.

This fake prefect was quite arrogant, lining up hundreds of trolls on the city wall to shout in unison: "Hmph! You are not from the Song Dynasty at all, just a bunch of bandits, imposters claiming the title of King He, your claim to the throne is illegitimate..."

Gong Erniangzi initially didn't want to pay him any attention, but remembering what Zhenjun had once said about the importance of having a legitimate cause, she also sent out hundreds of her cursing hands and shouted at the city wall: "Your Qi Kingdom is truly illegitimate, occupying the territory of the Great Song Dynasty, yet you are the emperor appointed by the Jin Kingdom, hahaha, it's truly laughable. An emperor of one country, actually appointed by another... hahahaha..."

This laugh made the prefect of Yizhou lose face.

Indeed, emperors were all appointed by other countries, isn't that absurd? How can they have the audacity to claim their titles are legitimate?
The prefect of Yizhou, unable to win the argument, had to change his approach: "Further words are useless. If you have the guts, come and attack the city."

With a city wall twenty-two feet high, how could a bunch of bandits possibly attack it?

Even when the Jin army marched south, they did not launch a full-scale attack on a large city like Yizhou. Instead, they adopted the "lockdown" strategy, taking over the surrounding villages and towns to make Yizhou an isolated city. In the end, the city's officials surrendered on their own.

The cost of forcibly attacking such a city would be too high.

Sui Yi, who had just surrendered, thought to himself: This is the time for us newly surrendered soldiers to show off. As long as we can bravely attack the city, we can make a great contribution, which is equivalent to giving a pledge of allegiance...

As he was thinking, Wang Hong waved to him: "Get ready to get to work!"

Sui Yi: "Ha, good!"

Wang Hong: "What are you so excited about? We're just doing odd jobs for the soldiers in front."

Sui Yi: "???"

Wang Hong began shouting and giving orders, and the bald auxiliary soldiers started to get busy. A large number of soldiers ran to a corner of the battlefield, where there was a small camp called the "Artillery Battalion". There weren't many people there... but there were a few strange iron pipes.

The auxiliary soldiers helped the artillerymen push the large iron pipes to the right place and set them up.

Then they helped move iron balls, very large iron balls, each weighing between five and ten pounds.

Wang Hong: "Don't just stand there, get started!"

Sui Yi: "What...what exactly is going on?"

Wang Hong: "Why ask so many questions? Get to work! You'll find out soon enough." The Yan'an soldiers at Suiyi had no choice but to do odd jobs, helping the artillerymen set up large iron pipes, moving iron balls, fetching water in buckets and placing them next to the cannon barrels, and even soaking cloths in the buckets...

Anyway, I'm making all sorts of random preparations.

Soon, the artillery battalion was ready, and the battalion commander loudly reported to his superiors: "The artillery battalion is ready and can open fire at any time."

The order was relayed up the chain of command by the messenger, until it reached Gong Erniangzi. Then, Gong Erniangzi's order was relayed back down the chain of command: "Fire a few cannon shots first to wake up the fake prefect in the city."

Then everyone in the artillery battalion burst into laughter, and the air was filled with a joyful atmosphere.

Sui Yi was completely bewildered, having no idea what they were doing.

"Fire!"

At the battalion commander's command, several red-coated cannons simultaneously lit their fuses. The auxiliary soldiers covered their ears. Although Sui Yi didn't understand, he wasn't stupid and followed the other auxiliary soldiers in covering his ears as well.

Several loud "booms" were heard, and those nearby could almost feel the ground tremble. Then, several more loud "booms" rang out from the distant city wall. A large iron ball that had just been in Sui Yi's hands was now smashing into the distant city wall.

Most city walls in the Song Dynasty were made of adobe, and very few were covered with bricks; Yizhou City was no exception.

The sight of a cannonball hitting an adobe wall is quite striking. Sand flies everywhere, a large section of the outer wall collapses and slides downwards, and yellow dust swirls up, giving the illusion that "this section of the wall has collapsed."

Sui Yi's mouth dropped open: "Huh?"

The soldiers in Yan'an were all dumbfounded: "Huh?"

They were just confused!
But the people in the city were not just bewildered, they were terrified.

The city wall shook, and the people standing on it were so frightened that they couldn't stand up and fell to the ground with a thud. In the dust, they couldn't see clearly what was happening to the city wall, and they didn't know who shouted, "The city wall has fallen!"

That shout was devastating; it spread like wildfire.

People were shouting across a large section of the city wall: "The city wall has fallen!"

When the prefect of Yizhou heard his subordinates shouting like that, he panicked and tried to run away.

What the superior likes, the subordinates will follow.

When the boss takes the lead in running away, how can the subordinates not follow suit?

In an instant, the pseudo-Qi state's garrison, who had just been standing on the city wall and seemed quite capable, scattered like birds and beasts, all running away.

The artillerymen laughed: "We knew it. One round of shelling would scare these guys to tears."

At this moment, the hundreds of cursing soldiers in the central army beside Gong Er Niangzi spoke up again: "Open the city gates and surrender, and you will be spared death. Those who have surrendered to the Jin or Qi dynasties will be forgiven as long as they have not killed their own people."

Upon hearing this, Yizhou surrendered within moments.

Sui Yi: "Huh?"

Yan'an soldiers: "Huh?"

They were waiting to make a name for themselves during the siege, but there was no siege at all!
(End of this chapter)