Chapter 229 Forced recruitment of private soldiers, the morale of the army is shattered
When Man Chong received Mi Yang's reply, he knew that Mi Yang had seen through his plot, and Mi Yang's army would definitely attack the city in a big way soon.
After realizing this, unless Man Chong really opened the city gate and surrendered, the only thing left was to prepare for war.
So Human Chong immediately walked down from the city wall and returned to the county government.
After returning to the county government, Manchong ordered people to summon the officials, generals, and people in Wudang City.
And the common people gathered by Man Chong were just powerful families in Wudang City.
Under Man Chong's call, and because of his prestige, all the officials, generals, and powerful people in Wudang City who could come now quickly arrived at the lobby of the county government.
After watching everyone arrive, Manchong stood high in the crowded county hall and said to the people below:
"I have never been kind. Now the thieves and thieves have arrived in large numbers. The people are frightened and the soldiers have abandoned their swords."
"This is the time when all the ministers are rich and noble."
"I am a general of the country and a member of the marquis. I am supposed to defend the country and the territory for the emperor. I must die for my righteousness.
Now, for the sake of wealth and wealth, all the ministers can take my head and offer it as a thief's ear."
When Man Chong's words came out, the generals and officials who had been following Man Chong for a long time all had sad faces, and some even burst into tears.
They all said: "Death and life should be the same as those of the general. There is no difference of heart."
After hearing Man Chong's words, the faces of those wealthy families showed surprise and suspicion, but there was also a trace of emotion underneath the strong look of surprise.
But those wealthy families looked at the officials and generals present, and they were all loyal to Man Chong.
Moreover, there was the sound of armor outside the county government, so they, who knew how to assess the situation, soon began to cry bitterly like others.
Seeing that everyone in the lobby couldn't bear to take his head to claim credit from Mi Yang, Man Chong began to feel calm in his heart.
Defending the city means guarding the hearts of the people. As long as everyone in the city can be of one heart and one mind with him, he will be able to fight against the powerful Mi army.
After knowing that people's hearts can be used, Manchong once again looked at the people in the hall and said: "If you are willing to live and die with me, then I am willing to make a plan for you."
"The troops in the city are weak now, but there is no shortage of food, grass, ordnance in the city. Your Majesty and I can hold on together."
"If the national reinforcements arrive, the thieves will lead the army away. At that time, the emperor will feel that we have done a good job in defending the city, and everyone will be favored by nobles."
"If the national reinforcements never arrive and the bandits' attack becomes more urgent, it will not be too late for you to take my head by then!"
After Man Chong said this, everyone in the county hall bowed to Man Chong one after another, expressing their obedience to Man Chong's plan.
Seeing that the opinions of various factions in the city had been initially unified, Man Chong immediately began to issue orders in an orderly manner.
It is true that there are only three thousand Wei troops in the city at present, but Manchong can recruit private soldiers from the big families in the city.
It is not difficult to recruit one or two thousand private soldiers from those wealthy families.
Compared to the tens of thousands of civilians in the city, these private soldiers have a certain fighting capacity.
And if it really comes to a last resort, it would be a good idea to use thousands of trained soldiers to lead the tens of thousands of civilians in the city to defend the city.
Man Chong knew that all the officials, generals and commanders in the city were his old subordinates, so he would obey his orders unconditionally.
But creatures like the rich and powerful have always been just like grass on the wall.
However, the influence of these wealthy families is deeply rooted in the local area. Without their support, Manchong will not be able to successfully mobilize tens of thousands of people in the city.
The most important thing is that if we don't get the support of these wealthy families, then there is no guarantee that these wallflowers will not cause unrest in the city once the war starts.
In that case, Wudang County will undoubtedly be plunged into a desperate situation.
That's why Man Chong specially summoned the wealthy families in the city. Maybe he couldn't get the sincere support of the wealthy families in the city, but as long as they could obey superficially, it would be fine.
When Man Chong issued the order to recruit private soldiers from the wealthy families in the city, most of the wealthy families frowned.
Their private soldiers are their darlings and an important guarantee for protecting their property.
Now Man Chong wants to take advantage of them, which will definitely make these wealthy families dissatisfied.
But no one wants to be the first, and Man Chong is indeed very majestic in Wudang County.
Therefore, even if they are dissatisfied in their hearts, the wealthy families in the lobby can only accept Man Chong's arrangement honestly.
After the wealthy families in the city expressed their acceptance of Man Chong's arrangement, Man Chong asked them to go home quickly and recruit private soldiers.
Under Man Chong's order, all the wealthy families in the hall left one after another.
After all the wealthy families in the lobby left, Manchong's chief clerk came up to him and reminded him that the wealthy families in the city should not be trusted.
Man Chong is well aware of this reminder from the main book.
But now that the situation is critical, Man Chong has no choice but to drink poison to quench his thirst.
Moreover, after the wealthy families surrender their private soldiers one after another, Man Chong will disperse and disperse those private soldiers to various city walls in Wudang, which can also reduce the risk.
After all, rather than leaving these private soldiers in the hands of the wealthy families on both sides, it is better to let them join the defense battle to guard Wudang.
At least in this case, those private soldiers are still in a situation that is clearly controllable.
What Man Chong really wanted was not to just rely on thousands of soldiers and horses to defend Wudang City. What he wanted to do was to delay as much time as possible and wait for the arrival of reinforcements.
A few days later, under Mi Yang's order, the fleet that returned to Xicheng to transport siege equipment had arrived outside Wudang City.
Previously, Mi Yang's army was in a hurry to rush outside Wudang County, so the initial Han army camp did not have a large number of siege equipment.
If you want to siege a city, you can't do it without siege equipment.
It took a long time to build siege equipment on the spot, so Mi Yang had previously ordered Guan Xing to lead a part of the warships to return to the West City to transport the siege equipment.
Originally, there were not many siege equipment in Hanxing County.
Because the Shen brothers have always wanted to defend themselves behind closed doors, under such circumstances they would not even think about building siege equipment.
Therefore, most of the siege equipment currently transported to the Han army's camp under the escort of Guan Xing originally belonged to the Wei army.
When Cao Ren's army went on an expedition before, he considered that there would be a siege battle, so he brought a large number of siege equipment.
Many of those siege equipment were burned in the fire, but many were harvested by the Han army after the war.
This is the benefit of knowing how to clean the battlefield.
When Guan Xing returned with many siege equipment, it meant that the day for the Han army to attack the city on a large scale had arrived.
First, a tall chariot began to be erected outside the city. On top of the several-meter-high chariot, Mi Yang was already standing on the observation deck of the chariot, observing the situation in Wudang City.
Then, underneath the nest car, many siege equipment began to appear.
The siege equipment below is mainly divided into two types, namely anemone and haoqiao.
Trench bridge is also called flying bridge. As the name suggests, it is a siege equipment specially designed for enclosing trenches, trenches and moats.
A simple trench bridge only uses two long logs, with wooden boards nailed on top, and two wooden wheels underneath for easy transportation.
For more complex trench bridges, mechanical devices such as switches and windlass need to be installed to fold the bridge plates so that they can pass through wider trenches.
There are records of trench bridges being used as early as the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period.
According to "Six Tao·Military Use":
"The flying bridge crossing the ditch is one foot and five feet wide and more than two feet long. It has eight windlass and windlass, and it is stretched by loops and cables."
From this record, we can know that as early as hundreds of years ago, the ancients could use mechanical devices such as pins, winches, and chain iron cables to connect eight trench bridges in parallel to provide a trench bridge up to 12 feet wide for large troops to pass.
After hundreds of years of improvement, the length of today's trench bridges can reach up to about 10 meters.
Although the moat outside Wudang City is not too narrow, it is definitely not comparable to that outside the Public Security City, so it is suitable for siege equipment such as trench bridges.
Because the main strength of the Han army was in the North Camp, Mi Yang used the North Gate as the main breakthrough point to attack the city.
When the Han army outside the north gate began to gather in large numbers and many siege equipment began to appear, the Wei army at the north gate of Wudang City quickly reported the incident to Man Chong.
After Man Chong learned the news, he immediately came to the north gate of Wudang City.
When Man Chong saw the siege equipment of the Han army, Man Chong couldn't help but punched the wall in front of him.
Because a large number of the Han army's siege equipment originally belonged to the Wei army, many of those siege equipment still had khaki Wei flags on them.
After Mi Yang captured these siege equipment, he could have changed the Wei flag to the Han flag, but he deliberately did not do that.
Because he wanted to further damage the morale of the Wei army in Wudang City.
Sure enough, when he saw the khaki Wei flags on the siege equipment, Man Chong felt angry, while the Wei soldiers on the north gate felt panicked.
Using Wei's spear to attack Wei's shield is a kind of irony, but also a reminder.
All the siege equipment of Cao Ren's army is here, so you can imagine the fate of those tens of thousands of troops.
The Wei soldiers at the north gate began to feel restless.
Although there had been rumors in the city speculating about the fate of Cao Ren's army, there was no definite news after all.
Therefore, people in Wudang City still hold on to the idea of lucky.
But now that the Wei soldiers on the city wall saw the siege equipment that originally belonged to their own side and began to attack their own city, it was already self-evident what the truth was.
Man Chong clearly felt that the uneasiness of the soldiers on the city wall began to spread.
He could only use his own prestige to comfort the Wei army on the city wall with his constant words.
Under Man Chong's comfort, Wei Jun's mood, which had begun to become restless, gradually stabilized.
But just when Man Chong breathed a sigh of relief, more changes occurred outside the city.
Under Mi Yang's order, some Han soldiers brought out large carts from the Han army camp.
When the Han troops transported the vehicles out of the Han army camp, with the advantage of standing at a high place, the Wei troops on the city wall could clearly see what was on the vehicles.
The carts were loaded with propaganda and fine armor.
And these items cannot be owned by non-senior generals in the Wei army.
What's more, there are flags planted on the railings of each car.
"Xiahou", "Chang", "Zhuge", "Wang", "Niu", etc.
Those flags all belong to the generals of Cao Wei such as Xiahou Shang and Chang Diao.
Now that the general's flag is here and the generals are nowhere to be seen, their fate can be imagined.
This was done by Mi Yang in one fell swoop!
Those flags and numerous propaganda and fine armor caused the Wei army on the city wall to suffer a heavy blow in their hearts.
Cao Ren was mentally prepared for the defeat of his army, but what the Wei army on the city didn't expect was that this was no longer a defeat, but the entire army was annihilated!
The agitation in the Wei army that had just been calmed down by Manchu began to spread again.
Just when the restlessness of the Wei army on the city wall became more and more obvious, a conspicuous banner was slowly erected on the chariot where Mi Yang was sitting, which was level with the city wall.
On the expensive flag, dragons and phoenixes danced in large characters, which read: "Wei Cheqi General Cao."
This is Cao Ren’s encyclopedia!
The great banner is the symbol of the general of an army. Because of Cao Ren's prominent status, almost everyone in the Wei army did not recognize Cao Ren's great banner.
When Cao Ren's banner was blatantly placed on the chariot, most of the Wei troops on the city wall could no longer suppress the panic in their hearts after seeing this.
If Cao Ren's banner fell into the hands of the Han army, then Cao Ren was either dead or captured by the Han army.
This shocking scene instantly broke through the psychological defenses of most of the Wei troops on the city wall.
Who is Cao Ren?
The uncle of the Emperor of the Wei Dynasty and the highest commander of the army in the Wei Dynasty besides the Emperor.
What's more, Cao Ren's prestige among the army is very profound.
Such characters were captured or killed by Mi Yang, so are they Mi Yang's opponents?
A panic began to spread on the city walls and became more and more intense.
When Man Chong on the city wall saw Mi Yang erecting Cao Ren's banner, he almost broke his teeth in grief and anger.
Although she had some speculations before, when she really learned about Cao Ren's fate, Man Chong could hardly suppress the grief in her heart.
After the grief, Man Chong's anger towards Mi Yang had reached its peak.
Man Chong looked at the figure on the chao car opposite. If looks could kill, then Mi Yang would have been killed by Man Chong thousands of times.
Mi Yang had no time to deal with Man Chong's resentment towards him.
If it weren't for the fact that Cao Ren's head had been sent to Liu Bei, Mi Yang could have made Cao Ren's head circle around Wudang City.
After seeing that the morale of the Wei army on the city wall was close to collapse, he finally issued the order to attack.
Waves of exciting drumbeats rang out in the Han army camp, and thousands of Han soldiers who had been waiting impatiently immediately pushed a large number of siege equipment towards Wudang City not far away.
Standing on the city wall, Man Chong watched the thousands of Han troops under the city quickly approaching the moat. Man Chong immediately issued an order for the Wei troops on the wall to release fire arrows.
But now most of the Wei troops on the city wall are still on the verge of moral collapse.
So in the end, only a part of the Wei army obeyed Man Chong's order and began to release fire arrows.
Only a small amount of fire arrows would not cause much damage to the well-protected anemone and trench vehicles.
Produced by Dawei, it must be a high-quality product.
Soon after, hundreds of chariots, driven by Han soldiers, arrived at the moat.
After arriving at the moat, many Han soldiers emerged from the anemone, and then with the help of anemone's protection, they began to shoot arrows at the city wall.
They had only one purpose, to successfully build the trench car behind them.
Once the trench car can be successfully built, Wudang's moat will be in name only.
Without the protection of the moat, half of Wudang County's city defenses have been destroyed.
But just when the Han army launched its attack, a group of Wei army cavalry was rapidly approaching Wudang County dozens of miles away in the north of Wudang County.
(End of chapter)
This chapter has been completed!