After entrusting the Fu of fighting at home, Xizuo had just confirmed that the Wu army Cao Yanzhong's corps was coming to Moling Pass. Li Xiucheng's younger brother Li Mingcheng, who was guarding Moling Pass, received the news in less than three hours. More than 30,000 Moling Pass defenders immediately entered a state of full alert. All artillery loaded and all the troops on duty entered the defensive position. All the troops on duty received weapons and were waiting for dispatch at any time. The generals of each battalion rushed to the command center in Moling Pass, waiting for Li Mingcheng's dispatch.

Unlike the middle and grassroots soldiers who were nervously preparing for the war, Li Mingcheng, who was ordered to guard Moling Pass, seemed quite relaxed. Not only did he show up until all the generals arrived, but he also joked with the generals under his command as soon as he met, and said with a smile: "The demon soldiers are here, are there anyone afraid? If you are afraid, you can speak first. This Wang Zong can let him join the reserve team and go to the final battle, but you have to invite all of us to drink, and we have to order our own dishes."

The generals laughed, and the previous tense atmosphere was suddenly wiped out. Then Li Mingchengcai smiled and said, "Okay, let's talk about serious matters. My brother Wang was aware of it. The demon soldiers took the risk of splitting the troops. The Lu army came to fight our Moling Pass alone, trying to cut off our connection with the rear of Suhang. This is definitely a good thing for us. At least we don't have to worry about the fiercest time with the demon soldiers and the land division. The demon soldiers' navy suddenly ran out to fire at our position. The pressure could be much less. But we cannot underestimate the enemy. We must defend Moling Pass, and we must also try more trouble for the demon soldiers to start a good start for this battle to defend Tianjing!"

The generals agreed, and then the general Lin Zhengyang quickly asked: "Wang Zong, how can we fight this battle? Will King Zhong Qiansui send reinforcements to us?"

"Of course there are reinforcements, but they will not be sent immediately." Li Mingcheng replied: "In this battle, we will first use favorable terrain and fortifications to attack Cao Yanzhong's demon soldiers head-on. First, we will drag the demon soldiers to exhaust the old man in the camp guard battle. Then when Brother Wang sends reinforcements to help us, we will launch a counterattack and fight back the demon soldiers."

The generals nodded one after another to show that they understood the combat policy arranged by Li Mingcheng. Then Li Mingcheng dispatched troops and arranged generals to lead the generals to guard various positions, and also arrange reserves to rescue and put out the fire at any time. As a result, just when Li Mingcheng was making arrangements in an orderly manner, an emergency report suddenly came from outside the door, saying that after the garrison of the Wu army gave up the position and retreated to Jiangning Town, the Wu army Cao Yanzhong's army directly crossed the garrison without any delay. They quickly approached Moling Pass with a large number of heavy weapons, leaving only a small number of troops to guard the garrison.

"It's coming so quickly? I'm going to catch us off guard? I think so beautiful?" He guessed the intention of Wu's army to advance quickly, and Li Mingcheng no longer delayed. He quickly arranged the long-planned defense plan, and then immediately ordered the generals to return to their camps to prepare for the battle. He personally led the general reserve team to sit in Moling Pass City, waiting confidently and patiently for the Wu army to attack.

Strictly speaking, the terrain in the area of ​​Moling Pass is not particularly beneficial for defensive warfare, especially the lack of highlands to garrison troops. The only large river, Qinhuai River, is also located in the east of Moling Pass, and cannot play a role in blocking the Wu army's advance. However, these are not a big problem for Li Mingcheng and his Taiping Army. With sufficient manpower to use, Li Mingcheng's army has built four solid camps with complete fortifications on the battlefield of Moling Pass.

There are more than 200 artillery pieces to be used in Guancheng, and there are ammunition sufficient. More than 80 of them are the flowering bombs bought from foreigners at high prices. The firepower is so fierce that they are still on the Jiujiuzhou, another military fortress on the Nanjing battlefield. Therefore, even though they know that the strength of the enemy is still above the enemy of Yuhuatai, Li Mingcheng has absolute confidence to let Cao Yanzhong meet a bloody head at Moling Pass, making the Wu army that dared to launch a frontal attack on Moling Pass suffer heavy casualties!

At noon, the Wu army vanguard first appeared in the sight of the defenders of Moling Pass. What made Li Mingcheng sneer was that the three battalions of Wu army that came first did not dare to approach Moling Pass too close. They stopped just about ten miles away from the Taiping Army, and immediately sent a large number of scouts to explore the surrounding situation. They were afraid to guard against the Taiping Army hiding ambush around Moling Pass. They were also trembling in the scout outpost battle. Once the scattered scouts encountered a large number of Taiping Army patrols, they would retreat immediately and dare not take the risk of fighting. So after seeing this in the city of Guan, Li Mingcheng said contemptuously, "But that's it."

More than an hour later, the main force of Cao Yanzhong's army of Wu army also drove to ten miles west of Moling Pass, meeting with the front team, and then immediately set out to build a camp under Li Mingcheng's sarcastic gaze, and did not dare to launch a frontal attack on Moling Pass directly with enough time. However, just as Li Mingcheng was mocking Cao Yanzhong for being too cautious, an accident occurred. The Wu army of six battalions actually came out, protecting a group of artillery of different sizes and came directly towards Moling Pass alone. The remaining Wu army brigade continued to build the camp, but did not see any reserve teams gathering Hou Ming.

"The demon general Cao Yanzhong wanted to directly attack Moling Pass with three thousand troops?" Li Mingcheng could hardly believe his analysis, and quickly asked the scout who came to report the enemy situation: "Who is the demon general coming? What are the equipment?"

"Returning to Wang Zong, the demon general who came was under the banner of yellow, and it might be Huang Yuanbao, the demon soldier general." The scout truthfully returned and said: "The demon soldiers are equipped with very good equipment. At least four battalions are all equipped with fast-firing foreign guns. The number of artillery carried should be about 80. It is unclear what kind of artillery is, but most of them are not large, and it may be mountain-splitting cannons."

"Climbing the mountain cannon?" Confidence returned to Li Mingcheng, and made Li Mingcheng laugh contemptuously, "Come on, wait and see how my King's sect's fireworks deal with you."

Soon, the Wu army of six battalions quickly approached the near to the Taiping Army's Shilongshan Camp. Li Wancai, the general of the Taiping Army who was in charge of Shilongshan, immediately ordered artillery firing without hesitation. Lin Zhengyang's troops of the Taiping Army garrison in Getang Village to the south also opened fire with long-range artillery, and cooperated with friendly forces to cover the Wu army with cross fire. More than 30 artillery artillery sounds rumbling, and the sound was shocking. The first round of volleys caused casualties to the Wu army.

The Wu army of the five battalions only opened up space to reduce the possibility of being hit by the Taiping Army artillery. The Wu army camp in the center quickly placed artillery formations to surprise the Taiping Army, and then immediately loaded the bullets and medicines. After waving the flag, they fired together with neat movements that the Taiping Army could not imagine at all, and blasted more than 60 artillery shells to the Taiping Army's Shilongshan Camp. The even more earth-shaking sound of artillery fire quickly echoed in the Taiping Army's camp.

The truth is revealed. The Wu army shells that all exploded on the ground told Li Mingcheng a cruel fact. The small cannons brought by Wu army with him were not the original shotgun mountain-splitting cannon, but the three-pound caliber rear-mounted rifled cannon. The shells were filled with picric gunpowder!

What made Li Mingcheng and the soldiers of the Taiping Army even more frightened were the precise hit rate of the Wu army artillery. In the first round of volleys, the more than 60 bitter acid shells fired by the Wu army actually hit the gun position near the Taiping Army Shilongshan Camp. The flames burst out during the explosion of the bitter acid shells, igniting four Taiping Army artillery loadings to cause death, and the four unlucky Taiping Army artillery pieces were scrapped on the spot. At the same time, the flying shrapnel quickly dropped and several Taiping Army gunners. The Taiping Army artillery positions continued to scream. Li Mingcheng and Li Wancai and other Taiping Army generals also screamed in shock, "How is it possible? The demon soldiers' shells have eyes, how can they shoot so accurately?!"

The reason why the Wu army's artillery hit rate is so high is of course because of the gunners. The Wu army artillery battalion that fired the artillery was not affiliated with Cao Yanzhong's corps, nor was it from the Wu army's Daye Corps, but from Wu Chaoyue's direct corps! Every gunner has undergone almost cruel rigorous training, and every gunner has received rigorous training from British and French instructors. He is familiar with the most advanced positioning calculations in the world today. Even if he dares to be as good as the elite British and French artillery, the Taiping Army gunners who are born out of the wild path are more than eight streets!

The huge gap in technical levels certainly destined to defeat the Taiping Army in a long-range artillery battle. Amid the rumbling artillery sound, the Wu army's bitter sour shells seemed to have eyes, and quickly and accurately continued to bombard the Taiping Army's artillery positions, and bombarded the Taiping Army's artillery that was filling the medicine and loading the bullets so that they were crying and howling, and they were constantly killed and injured. The Taiping Army's artillery was silent like pulling nails, making the Taiping Army's artillery have no power to fight back and no ability to resist.

Then, something even more shocking happened again. As soon as the Taiping Army had basically suppressed the artillery of the Taiping Army, a battalion of Wu soldiers had already stepped forward and rushed directly to the main gate of the Taiping Army's Shilongshan Camp. The Taiping Army's mountain-splitting cannons arranged at the gate hurriedly launched bombardment. As a result, although it temporarily blocked the Wu army's charge and forced the Wu army soldiers to lie on the ground to avoid the artillery, they immediately brought themselves a disaster-stricken Wu army, who had actually set up thirty-two grenade tubes!

"How is it possible?! How could a battalion of demon soldiers have so many quick-firing small demon cannons?! Could it be that their team has a quick-firing small cannon?!"

Li Wancai, the general of the Taiping Army who led his army to guard the Shilongshan camp, screamed and discovered this cruel fact. The Wu army's grenade launcher shells had hit the mountain-splitting cannon position that had just been exposed by the Taiping Army, smashing the Taiping Army's soldiers who were extinguishing the fire of the artillery fire to the ground one after another. The bitter and sour flames ignited the Taiping Army's spare gunpowder that had not been kept, causing death. In a blink of an eye, the Taiping Army's mountain-splitting cannon position was turned into a sea of ​​fire.

The soldiers of the Wu army who were killed in the sky did not know how many grenade launchers could be swung. After knocking down the Taiping Army's mountain-splitting cannon positions, the Wu army's grenade launchers continued to fire, and blasted the bitter sour artillery shells behind the Taiping Army's sheep and horse walls and behind the battalion walls. The Taiping Army soldiers who were hiding behind the walls were shouting, killing and injured. At the same time, after basically killing the Taiping Army's long-range artillery, the Wu army's rear-mounted rifled cannons turned into the gun mouth and began to bombard the Taiping Army's camp. Although the hit rate no longer exists, the shells that fell from time to time still made the Taiping Army reserve team waiting in the camp frightened and their morale fell.

Not yet, there are even more ruthless ones. After completely suppressing the long-range firepower of the Taiping Army, fifteen thick and short Wu army cannons slowly stepped forward and gradually approached the main gate of the Taiping Army's camp. As a result, before the Wu army cannon was fired, just seeing the huge caliber of the Wu army cannon from afar, the Taiping Army soldiers in the camp were already scattered and frightened, and kept begging for the blessing of the Heavenly Father, not to let the terrifying cannons like the Wu army fire at their location.

The super-large-caliber Wu Jun mortar cannon directly collapsed the camp gate of Taiping Army Shilongshan with the first round of volleys. The blazing bitter and sour flames turned the Taiping Army into a sea of ​​fire, but the Wu Jun's mortar cannon still refused to give up and extended to shoot behind the camp walls on both wings of the Taiping Army's gate. Each shell was a sea of ​​fire. It collapsed the camp walls that the Taiping Army had worked hard to build, and exploded the Taiping Army soldiers hiding behind the walls, smashing countless Taiping Army soldiers to pieces, and also turned countless Taiping Army soldiers into firemen rolling and screaming in the sea of ​​fire. The blue and yellow poisonous smoke spread in the Taiping Army again. The Taiping Army soldiers coughed in pain and kept crying in the camp, as if they were in hell.

Seeing that the situation was not good, Li Wancai, who was guarding Shilongshan, could only act with courage to send troops out of the camp, and surround the Wu army's mortar cannon position from both wings, in an attempt to prevent the powerful Wu army's mortar cannon from continuing to bombard and destroy his battalion defense facilities. However, Li Wancai soon found that he had done something stupid that he could not do stupid things, and he dared to send troops to the elite Wu army equipped with firing guns to fight in the field!

Amid the continuous shooting of the "bang bang bang bang bang" firing guns, Taiping soldiers who came from the two wings fell to the ground in rows. At the same time, the Taiping soldiers who were out of the battalion were crying and crying, the Wu soldiers who protected the wings of the mortar cannon actually shot in a crawling posture! Even if the Taiping soldiers' muskets were fired in a hurry, it would be difficult to hit the Wu soldiers. Basically, they could not fight back by just being beaten.

If it were the veterans of Guangdong and Guangxi from the Taiping Army who were in battle, then the Taiping Army might have a chance to rush nearby to fight with the Wu army soldiers. Unfortunately, the Taiping Army on Moling Pass was all Li Xiucheng's troops, and they were more afraid of close combat than the Wu army soldiers! So soon, as the Taiping Army soldiers who fell under the gun of the Wu army gradually increased, the remaining Taiping Army gradually lost the courage to continue fighting. In the end, I don't know who took the lead and shouted, the Taiping Army soldiers on the left wing retreated first, and the Taiping Army soldiers on the right wing also collapsed, and the speed of escape was faster than that on the left wing.

It was also coincidental that after the Taiping Army that had been running into the two wings collapsed, the flames at the Taiping Military Camp gate gradually extinguished. Huang Yuanbao, who had been impatient, gave the order, and the Wu soldiers of the two battalions immediately charged and shouted to directly kill the Taiping Military Camp gate that had been directly blown up by the mortar cannon. The Taiping Army in the camp hurriedly lined up to prepare for shooting, but was directly blown up by the Wu Army Camp that had approached their camp with grenade launchers, with heavy casualties.

The pure tigers entered the flock of sheep, and the Wu army soldiers who rushed directly into the Shilongshan camp of Taiping Army bounced open the way with grenades and rushed around the Taiping Army camp, as if they were entering a deserted place. Li Wancai tried several times to organize troops to intercept the army, but they were directly blown up by the Wu army soldiers with grenades and grenade launchers. The soldiers of Taiping Army in Jiangsu and Zhejiang who were not good at fighting hard wars were screaming and people kept escaping from the camp and fleeing to Moling Pass. There were also many grassroots generals. It was only half an hour after the Wu army entered the Shilongshan camp, and the Taiping Army in Shilongshan had already shown signs of complete collapse, and the loss of the camp was a foregone conclusion.

During this period, Lin Zhengyang, the general of the Taiping Army, who led the army to establish a battalion, wanted to send troops to rescue Shilongshan several times, but he saw that there were still two battalions of reserve troops to attack the Wu army, and the main force of the Cao Yanzhong Corps, who set up a battalion calmly in the west. However, Lin Zhengyang gave up this idea every time and just prayed to the sky, "Blessing the Heavenly Father, after the demon soldiers have captured Shilongshan, don't attack Getang Temple again immediately. At least let me survive this night and wait for King Zhong Qiansui to send troops to save me."

Lin Zhengyang prayed in the Getang Temple camp in a terrified manner, but his boss Li Mingcheng was trembling with a pale face on Moling Pass City. After putting down his telescope with trembling, Li Mingcheng also grabbed his relatives and captains and shouted to him: "Go to Shangfangqiao to find my brother Wang, tell him that I have met the absolute elite of the demon soldiers! Please send reinforcements to me immediately, otherwise I would not be sure to defend Moling Pass!"
Chapter completed!