In Xiazhou City, after the first month, the ice and snow melted, and the offensive and defensive battle of Xiazhou, which had been silent for more than a month, continued.
However, this time the siege was not like the slow and steady attack in the past few months.
After more than five months of siege, the army in Xiazhou West City was almost on the verge of collapse.
The patience of the Guiyi Army was almost exhausted, and they were all thinking about capturing Xiazhou City so that they could return home in glory.
Zhang Zhao also saw that the morale of the army was available, so he personally urged the army to start an offensive.
At this time, the two mounds outside the west gate of Xicheng had been piled as high as the city wall, and seven trebuchets kept dropping black clay pots into Xiazhou City.
These clay pots contain an asphalt-like viscous substance made from stone paint (original petroleum), tung oil, charcoal and other substances.
After this thing is attached to something and ignites, it is basically impossible to extinguish it with water, and it must be covered with a large amount of soil.
The ancient Chinese trebuchets actually had a major flaw, that is, they were basically drag-and-drop.
That is to say, people are used to pull the trebuchet to throw stones, which is essentially the same principle as the crossbow.
You can think of this trebuchet as a giant bow, or a projectile crossbow.
The advantage is that the accuracy of this trebuchet is very high because manpower can be used to actively control the trajectory.
Historically, in the first year of the Great Harmony of Emperor Wenzong of the Tang Dynasty, when Wang Zhixing, the military governor of Wuning Army, was attacking Li Tongjie, the son of Li Quanlue, the military governor of Henghai, Li Tongjie asked his Ya soldiers who were good at swearing to insult Wang Zhixing at the top of the city.
Wang Zhixing asked his tooth soldier who was good at operating a trebuchet to fly ten kilograms of rocks from a distance of more than 200 steps and smash the head of this tooth soldier who was good at swearing with one shot. The accuracy was evident.
But there are also big problems. First of all, to achieve such accuracy, ordinary people cannot do it. Elite talents are required.
Second, pull-type trebuchets generally throw relatively small stones, with ten to twelve kilograms being basically the limit.
It requires throwing huge rocks, is expensive to make, is difficult to move, and can basically only be used once.
As for the powerful and long-range counterweight trebuchet, Zhang Zhao had already sent an envoy to inform Hamid, the emir of Saman Persia.
Ask him to recruit craftsmen who can build counterweight trebuchets for Zhang Zhao in the Abbasid Caliphate or the Eastern Roman Empire.
Zhang Zhao was shocked by the news that came back. He searched around and found that none of the trebuchet craftsmen he brought back knew anything about a counterweight trebuchet.
Emotions haven’t been invented yet!
Although Zhang Zhao knew a little bit about the counterweight trebuchet, which seemed to be launched using the lever principle, he didn't know the details at all.
So I could only give a general direction for the model lake and let Liu Di continue the research and development.
Therefore, in the first few months of siege warfare, Zhang Zhao did not use trebuchets much.
First, there are only a few of them, and they can only fire about ten kilograms of rocks. It can only be said that they are quite scary, but they are really not very useful.
In addition, the rain and snow were relatively heavy, and the effect of throwing fire oil cans was not good, so Zhang Zhao did not use it.
But by this time, it had been almost ten days since there had been any rain or snow, just in time for the soldiers and civilians of the Pingxia Department in the inner west city of Xiazhou to feel the 'warmth of spring.'
Fifty or sixty cans of whistling fire oil were thrown out in succession. Some stupid guys even reached out to touch it, put a little on it and smelled it, and some even tasted it.
But the next second, the kerosene tank was ignited by rockets fired from the Guiyi Army's Fangzi Crossbow at an angle.
In an instant, the violent fire caused a sea of fire in the inner west city. In the past few months, the fire that the residents of the inner west city have longed for most appeared in front of everyone in this way.
A war horse screamed and ran around. The poor horse just fell down on the road that was wet by a fire oil can, and what was even more unlucky was that at that moment, a rocket happened to fall.
This fiery war horse burst out at extreme speed amidst the intense roasting, scurrying around amid the bursts of barbecue aroma, igniting residential buildings one after another.
Fortunately, the furniture in these houses had already been burned by themselves, otherwise the fire would have been difficult to control.
At the north gate of the inner west city, a total of ten Lu Gong chariots were pushed over by hundreds of soldiers.
This kind of Lugong car is more than ten meters high, basically parallel to the city wall of Xiazhou City, and even a little higher in some places.
There is a wide platform on the top of Lu Gong's car, and there are five to eight divine arm archers squatting on the platform.
They stood on Lu Gong's car and kept shooting at the soldiers of the Dingjun Army on the city wall, covering the large troops to fill in the trenches. As for the water in the moat, it had long been drained.
At the south gate, Zhang Zhao built three large rams, and in order to increase the force of the rams hitting the door, he also built a small slope outside the south gate.
The iron-wrapped ram swooped down the slope and continued to hit the south gate of the Inner West City mercilessly. Every time it hit, the soldiers of the Dingban Army on the city wall would scream in terror.
While using weapons to attack the north, west, and south gates, when facing the east gate of Xiazhou City where the Guiyi Army was stationed, Zhang Zhao adopted the ant attack method at the east gate of the inner west city.
More than 3,000 non-Pingxia party members who were kidnapped from various places and forced to seek refuge were each given an iron knife, and then they were driven ruthlessly and began to climb up the city using simple siege ladders.
And behind them, there were also crossbowmen without armor.
These crossbowmen were basically the slaves of the Jingtieshan mines. They were originally established by Zhu Quanzhong to help the Uighurs to deal with the heavy armored soldiers of the Guiyi Army.
After the city of Ganzhou was broken, the Zuo Zhang Crossbowman, who had a deep hatred for the Guiyi Army, was in bad luck. Almost all the officers above the fire chief were killed, and the rest were thrown into the mines.
More than 800 people went there, and after half a year, less than 600 were still alive, and only more than 300 were still usable.
These more than 300 people had lost all their pride and just wanted to leave the mine and live a life like human beings for a few days, so Zhang Zhao gathered them up again and used them as death soldiers.
He also promised that as long as they survived three battles, they would be pardoned, and those who died would also be pardoned for their wives, children, parents.
As a result, these formidable enemies who originally belonged to the rebel army became the most desperate cannon fodder on the battlefield.
This brutal siege continued for two days, and Xiazhou began to be in danger.
Compared with the violent attack by the Guiyi Army, what made Li Yiyin even more desperate was that there was no response from the imperial court.
The Guiyi Army has been besieging the city for more than five months. If the imperial court really wanted troops to come, they would have to crawl there.
There is only one reason why it hasn't happened yet, and that is that the imperial court simply doesn't want to, or can't, control Zhang Zhao.
Li Yiyin's eyes were full of despair, and he found it hard to accept in his heart that the Li family of the Pingxia tribe of the Pingxia tribe, which had been in Xiazhou for almost two hundred years, would be finished so soon?
At this moment, a loud cry came from outside, and Li Yiyin's younger brother Li Yijie rushed in from outside, his expression almost collapsed.
"Jie Commander, a troop of soldiers and horses appeared outside the city, bearing the banner of the Yanzhou Zhangwu Army's Military Envoy. The imperial court appointed Gao Yunquan as the Zhangwu Army's Military Envoy, and he came with his troops."
Li Yiyin's spirit was shaken. Yanzhou Zhangwu's army was coming. Could it be that the imperial court sent people to drive away the rebels? Could the crying sound be the people weeping for joy?
But before Li Yiyin could ask, Li Yijie had already continued to cry out, "When Gao Yunquan arrived, he immediately ordered the Zhangwu Army to attack the city without stopping!"
"Winter!" There was a crisp sound, and the fat Li Yi spun around and fell directly to the ground.
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Outside Xiazhou City, Gao Yunquan not only brought more than a thousand Zhangwu troops to submit certificates of surrender, but also brought thousands of civilians and 10,000 stones of grain and grass.
If you want to ask why he is so obedient? Then you have to start with Ding Shenqi.
Ding Shenqi was sent to attack Suizhou together with Barbarian Xiong. The original plan was to have the military academy He Zhengyi be caught and kill him with a cold arrow on the battlefield.
As a result, before Chief He could take action, Suizhou surrendered without a fight, and there was no chance to kill Ding Shenqi.
But in the end, Ding Shenqi "lived up to expectations" and entered Suizhou City. Ding Shenqi did not place any soldiers under his command, probably because he believed that Zhang Zhao had the whole story anyway.
He alone took possession of Li Guangli's wife, daughter and all property who had surrendered. The soldiers were blowing the cold wind outside, while he was holding the beauty in his arms and drinking wine in the city. He was very happy.
At this time, Ding Shenqi's tribe, who had seen the relationship between Guiyi army soldiers and generals, were not convinced. Instigated by Li Guangli and He Zhengyi, they directly started a military riot in Suizhou City.
When the wild bears outside the city saw it, they were immediately overjoyed and immediately sent their troops into the city to quell the chaos. They killed He Zhengyi, Li Guangli and the soldiers who started the trouble, and pardoned the rest.
Then he arrested Ding Shenqi and sent him to Xiazhou for charges of treating soldiers harshly, provoking military rebellion, accepting bribes, and having evil intentions.
Zhang Zhao immediately seized this opportunity to publicly interrogate Ding Shenqi, and once again strengthened the military discipline of the Guiyi Army to the officers.
However, he only announced that Ding Shenqi would be expelled because he was not a general in the rebel army.
Ding Shenqi thought she had escaped with her life, but as soon as she left Xiazhou, she was captured by Gao Yunquan and his men who had been waiting for a long time.
Gao Yunquan took Ding Shenqi back to Yanzhou and chopped him with a knife, giving an explanation to the people of Yanzhou who had been separated from their wives and children by Ding Shenqi.
Then a secret report was sent to the court to report that Ding Shenqi, the governor of Yanzhou Zhangwu Army, had defected to the rebel army.
Not only did he send people to participate in the siege of Xiazhou, he also wanted to dedicate Yanzhou to Zhang Zhao. Fortunately, Gao Yunquan made a quick decision and captured and killed the thief.
This coupled with the operation of the Gao family's eldest house in Tokyo, Shi Chonggui, who had no idea of killing many people, was afraid that Shi Jingtang would pursue him because Ding Shenqi followed his path and went to Yanzhou Zhangwu Army to serve as a military governor.
So he quickly agreed to Gao Yunquan's request and appointed him as the governor of Yanzhou Zhangwu Army and the governor of Yanzhou.
At this time, Gao Yunquan took back the Yanzhou controlled by his ancestors, and of course he was very grateful to Zhang Zhao.
I must shed tears of gratitude, because there are only a few thousand Yanzhou Zhangwu troops, how can they dare to offend Zhang Zhao?
At the same time, Gao Yunquan also felt that Zhang Zhao was someone he could secretly seek refuge with, so he simply led the Yanzhou Zhangwu Army to besiege Xiazhou, which became the last straw that broke Li Yiyin's mind.
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In the early morning, in a small house near the Dingnan Military Administration Office in Xiazhou, more than twenty soldiers from the Rebel Army gathered together.
In front of them were hundreds of Xiazhou people and their relatives who had been released by the rebel army.
Each of these people held sharp blades and wore scattered armors. They were silent in the flickering lights.
Suddenly! The clepsydra made a soft sound, and the time came to Mao hour.
"Do it!" The general of the Guiyi Army who was brought into the city by Tuoba Chongmin shouted in a low voice. Hundreds of people rushed out of the room and went straight to the Dingnan Army Jiedu Office. They made noises and prevented fires.
In an instant, cries and fire shot into the sky.
In the Dingnan Military Administrative Office, Li Yiyin was frightened awake by the sound of crying and the light of the fire. He cried nervously several times, put on his armor and held a knife, trying to rush out.
But after taking a few steps, he seemed to have lost all his strength.
Because outside the door, his subordinate brothers Li Yijie, Li Yirong, Yajiang Tuoba Chongbin, Xifeng Xili and others were standing outside the door holding sharp swords, but they were obviously not here to fight with him.
Li Yiyin yelled and ran back to the bedroom. Just as everyone was about to give chase, screams rang out.
Li Yiyin held a sword and killed dozens of his wife, concubines and children, and finally set a fire in his bedroom.
Seeing the fire gradually getting bigger, Tuoba Chongbin shouted, rushed in, dragged out Li Yiyin's body, and then chopped off his head.
The people around them understood in seconds, and rushed in one after another, cutting off the heads of Li Yiyin and the fourth son with one knife and putting them on a plate. Then they opened the door of the office and knelt in a row.
At the end of the Mao period, the four gates of the inner west city of Xiazhou were opened wide. All the generals of the Pingxia Division of the Dingnan Army and more than 40,000 soldiers and civilians in the city were naked and kowtowed to Zhang Zhao to surrender.
Since the Pingxia tribe moved to Yinxia Yousui in AD 764, the second year of Zong Guangde's reign in the Tang Dynasty, this group of party members, which has existed for more than a hundred years and moved to the mainland for more than two hundred years, will change its name.
The descendants of Tuoba Sigong, who had controlled the Pingxia tribe for more than two hundred years and made their fortune by suppressing the Huang Chao uprising, made the Li family a thing of the past, and the Xixia Kingdom would never appear again in this time and space.