The five hundred and fortieth chapters take advantage of the chaos
The puppet Qi army was busy building a large camp. They wanted to build a board-walled military camp. If it wanted to accommodate 100,000 troops, the scale would have to be larger than a Zhongxian. Such a huge project would take five to six days at the fastest to complete.
As night falls, the construction site is brightly lit, and thousands of soldiers are still working around the clock.
While the 100,000-strong army was resting three miles to the east, Li Cheng deployed three defensive patrols on the outside. Three thousand spies were responsible for guarding the outside, including the first batch of grain and grass supplies accompanying the army, which were also extremely tightly protected.
Li Chengcheng was worried about the logistics and supplies of the Song army's night attack, so he ordered that no tents be set up until the camp was completed to prevent it from being destroyed by the Song army's fire kites.
But in addition to the temporary camps of 100,000 troops, there are also more than 30 3,000-stone ships moored on the banks of the Wei River. These ships just arrived in the evening, and they are also fully loaded with military supplies. Basically, kerosene and gunpowder are on the big ships.
Inside the ship, it hasn't been unloaded yet.
To this end, Li Cheng ordered 10,000 troops to be stationed on both sides of the Wei River to carry out key defense against the fleet.
But the Song Army is the home field. No matter how tight Li Cheng's defense is, there are still flaws in the eyes of the Song Army who are familiar with the terrain and rivers.
The flaw is on the water surface of the Wei River. The water surface of the Wei River is about a hundred feet wide. At night, a soldier standing on the shore can see the river surface thirty feet away at most. If there is no starlight and moonlight, he can only see a dozen feet.
As a result, the water in the middle part of the Wei River became a blind spot for soldiers on both sides of the strait. Li Cheng was not aware of this, but the Song army scouts knew it clearly.
At the third watch, the moon is looming in the thin clouds, and the water surface of the Weihe River is sometimes bright and sometimes dark. There are three Puppet Qi Army patrol teams on each side of the bank patrolling the shore to monitor every move on the water.
But in the middle of the Wei River, a group of sampans came silently. These sampans were actually pieces of wood with the front ends slightly tilted. Five bags of fire oil were placed on each sampan, weighing a hundred kilograms. The soldiers were in the water.
Swim and control the board.
The sampan traveled close to the water, passing through the blind spots of the patrolling soldiers on both sides, and slowly moved closer to the Weihe River fleet under the cover of darkness.
There are seventy soldiers in total, and each two soldiers are in charge of a large ship. The soldiers are close to the inside of the large ship, and the patrol soldiers on the shore cannot see them.
Every large ship is covered with an oilcloth. Under the oilcloth are various military supplies. Basically, they are kerosene, gunpowder, battle flags, war drums, tents, medicines, copper coins and other supplies. These are all shipped from Fengxiang Mansion.
Materials, grain, grass, soldiers and armor, siege weapons, etc. were transported from Jingzhao in large trucks.
The soldiers of the Song Army did not need to climb onto the ship. They directly unscrewed the skin bag and threw ten bags of 200 kilograms of strong kerosene onto the ship. A large amount of kerosene flowed out of the skin bag, covering the deck and leaking through various gaps.
flows into the hull.
Then torches were thrown onto the big ship, and there was a roar on the ship. The flames spread quickly, and the soldiers dived into the water and swam to the west.
"Fire!"
The patrol soldiers on the shore shouted.
‘Dang! Dang! Dang!’ The rapid alarm bell rang, and countless soldiers woke up from their dreams, got up and ran towards the Weihe River.
Many soldiers carried buckets of water and poured it on the big ships, but it was useless. The thirty-five big ships became more and more violent, thick smoke billowed, the kerosene in the ships was also ignited, and dozens of big ships were engulfed in flames.
At this moment, the two burning ships suddenly exploded violently. The ground shook, and the huge shock wave overturned hundreds of soldiers on the shore. The two ships were blown to pieces, and sawdust scattered in all directions.
The huge explosion woke up the 100,000 puppet Qi troops ten miles away. The soldiers stood up one after another, looked at the fire spot in the distance, and talked about it.
Even the people in Chengji County were awakened by the huge explosion in their sleep. Many people were terrified and didn't know what was happening.
Chen Qing stood on the top of the city and looked at the firelight more than ten miles away. The sound of booming explosions came and the city shook slightly.
Yang Zaixing was surprised and asked: "Is gunpowder so powerful?"
Chen Qing nodded, "If you use a huge wooden box filled with thousands of kilograms of gunpowder to blow up the city, you will definitely be able to blow down the city wall. But we don't have such strong capital. If we use thousands of kilograms of gunpowder to squander it, we will only be able to blow up the city wall in a year."
It’s just a few thousand kilograms.”
"But if you encounter a particularly difficult city, such as Pingliang City, can you afford to be extravagant once in a while?"
Chen Qing smiled and said: "That's okay. In fact, I wanted to create an iron shell fire thunder, which must be very powerful, but it has never been successful. Fortunately, we have fierce fire oil. If used properly, it will be extremely powerful, just like when we captured Pingliang City.
, the armies cooperated with each other tacitly, didn’t they achieve the same success?”
Yang Zaixing nodded, "You are right, the key is to be practical. I also think it is more practical to use powder barrels to shoot poisonous nails to deal with Jurchen war horses."
Chen Qing said with a smile: "Anyway, after destroying thirty-five large ships, Li Cheng's idea of using ships to attack the city came to nothing. I guess he will also organize the transportation of kerosene and gunpowder. The next step depends on Liu Qiong."
How to intercept."
...........
At this time, Li Cheng and Guan Shigu rushed to the dock. Li Cheng looked at the ship that was almost burned to a skeleton, and his eyes burst out with anger. He raised his whip and whipped a general, "Why didn't you unload the cargo last night?"
The general knelt on the ground and cried: "I am worried that the enemy will sneak attack me if I unload the cargo on the dock. It is safer to put it inside the ship."
"You idiot! Is it safe now?"
Li Cheng's teeth were itching with hatred, and he struck the general with the whip in his hand.
Guan Shigu quickly stopped Li Cheng, "Du Tong, the matter has come to this, there is no use blaming him, we can only try to find ways to recover!"
Li Cheng said angrily: "How do you think we can save it? All our kerosene and gunpowder have been burned, and our warships are gone. I still want to use warships to assist in siege, but it's impossible now. What should I do?"
"I can only ask for help from Wan Yanchang and ask him to continue to allocate kerosene and gunpowder. There are still some in the spare warehouse of Jingzhao City, and they can all be sent out. I remember that there are twenty large ships on the Wei River, so I will use them to transport them.
The goods just need to be strictly protected by the army and cannot be attacked by the Song army again."
Although Li Cheng didn't want to beg Wan Yanchang anymore, he was helpless and could only nod, "This is the only way, let Luo Ying lead the army to protect us!"
.........
At dawn, the Song Army's southern city began to fire fire kites. Dozens of burning fire kites, covered in kerosene, were ejected out of the city and flew towards the huge observation deck two miles away.
The fire kite is the longest-range weapon of the Song Army. The maximum range can reach three miles. It is not a problem to deal with the observation tower of only two miles. The large-scale fire kite of the Song Army is already very stable. It is divided into two types, one is kerosene.
Kites, one kind is gunpowder kites.
What was shot today was the kerosene kite. The belly of the fire kite was filled with kerosene sludge. Each of the fire kites hit the observation deck head-on with precision. Some hit the wooden board and fell, but there were still more than a dozen of them got in and watched.
On the back and belly of the platform, fire oil sludge was scattered and began to burn inside.
Not long after, thick smoke came out from inside the observation platform, getting bigger and bigger, and flames appeared. Dozens of soldiers on the observation platform were terrified and scrambled to flee downwards.
A quarter of an hour later, the flames grew bigger and bigger, and thick smoke billowed, engulfing the entire observation deck.
Half an hour later, the blazing observation tower collapsed suddenly, and the defenders on the top of the city cheered.
Overnight, the puppet Qi army suffered two setbacks in a row, and its morale was somewhat damaged. The soldiers were especially worried about another sneak attack at night.
For this reason, Li Cheng had to change his plan and abandon the construction of a plank-type military camp and change it to a fence-type military camp. In this way, within one day, the military camp was successfully set up. The circumference of the military camp was twenty miles, and five people were stationed in the military camp.
A thousand-top tent and all the food and supplies were carried into the camp.
Craftsmen began to assemble large siege weapons, including large trebuchets, heavy siege ladders, and hive carts.
In the northwest corner of the military camp, hundreds of torches were burned on wooden piles, illuminating the operating workshop covering an area of dozens of acres like daylight. Hundreds of craftsmen were busy assembling, and the blacksmith swung his hammer to make iron chains, making a clanging sound.
.
In another corner, dozens of craftsmen are assembling a heavy trebuchet. The principle is similar to the heavy trebuchet of the Song Army. However, the puppet Qi Army uses a traditional trebuchet, that is, a soft rod. It relies on toughness to increase the throwing distance and can throw
A boulder weighing a hundred kilograms was thrown 350 steps away.
The projection ability of the hard rod is weaker, but the accuracy is very high. It is especially suitable for siege. It is a patented invention of Xihe Road craftsmen.
At that time, Jingzhao City was the base camp for the battle between the Song Army and the Xixia Army. A large amount of military supplies were stationed in the city. After the Jin soldiers occupied Jingzhao City, these heavy weapons that were difficult to transport all became the spoils of war for the Jin soldiers.
But these years have been basically exhausted by various wars. The large siege weapons shipped by the puppet Qi army this time are the last batch of inventory in Jingzhao City, a total of twenty heavy trebuchets.
"When will these heavy trebuchets be assembled?" Li Cheng asked the lead craftsman.
The leading craftsman quickly bowed and said: "General, we will assemble the siege ladder and trebuchet simultaneously according to the general's requirements. It will take about three days to complete the assembly."
"It actually takes three days to build twenty trebuchets. I thought you could complete it in one night!" Li Cheng said with some dissatisfaction.
"No! No! No!"
The leading craftsman quickly explained: "Not only are there trebuchets, but there are also heavy siege ladders, and there are also pontoons. There are a huge number of them. We have to work overnight to complete them in three days."
Li Cheng walked to the pontoon bridge. They had to use the pontoon bridge to cross the wide moat. The pontoon bridge was made of large wooden boxes, fastened together with iron chains, and covered with wooden boards.
Li Cheng originally planned to fill the river, but the project volume was relatively large, so he considered filling the river later and using a pontoon to cross the river first.
When Li Cheng saw that each large wooden box had been completed, his expression softened a lot and he nodded, "Then I'll give you three days. If you finish the work, you'll be rewarded heavily, and if you delay, you'll be punished heavily!"
The leading craftsman said with a bitter look on his face: "We will definitely finish it on time!"