On July 14th, shortly after Zhang Liao's vanguard had arrived outside Duan City, Zhang Ren finally received the military order sent back by Guan Yu.

At that time, the vanguard of cavalry that Zhang Liao had arrived was not large enough to surround the city and kill all sides. Therefore, he only gave priority to occupying the valley entrance on the south side and blocked the road leading to the Qinshui under the south gate of Duanshi City. He did not allow the people sent by Guan Yu to contact the city, nor did Zhang Ren continue to ask Guan Yu for help on his own initiative.

As for the city gates on both sides of the east and west, they all face the Taihang Mountains, so they can not surround them for the time being. We will talk about it when all the rear troops arrive at the army.

The North Gate was the one that Zhang Liao didn't want to surround him. He wanted Zhang Ren to panic and follow Xu Huang, Wu Yi and other generals in Linfen, the source of the upstream. If they really care, it would be in chaos. Because they were worried that Guan Yu would be killed and rescued, they would give Lu Bu, who had been on standby at the source of the upstream of the Fen River.

Zhang Liao also knew that such a blocking might not be effective. During the marching period, his troops had been exposed, but they could block them for eleven days.

Fortunately, Guan Yu's messenger was not stupid. He found that an enemy was blocking the river valley from afar. This messenger was originally a grassroots officer from Banyan, Brazil. He was good at climbing mountains. He abandoned his horse and climbed the mountain more than 20 miles away from the city. He circled more than 30 miles from the steep slope of Taihang Mountain. When it was getting darker, he walked around the east gate of Duanshi County.

After confirming that there were no soldiers from Zhang Liao there, he took an opportunity to rush to the city on foot, indicating his identity, he wanted to open the city gate, but was finally thrown away by the guards at the top of the city to pull the people up to the city.

The situation is not clear in the dark, and the gatekeeper must also worry whether Zhang Liao sent someone to cheat the door. Once the door is opened and released, a large number of cavalry immediately rushed over to grab the door while the chaos is being snatched. So be careful not to make a big mistake, and using a hanging basket is at least absolutely safe.

The messenger and the letter were delivered to Zhang Ren at the first time, but Zhang Ren looked disbelief.

"The Grand Marshal said that Yuan Shao's offensive in Shimenxing was fierce. He could not draw reinforcements to rescue us in a hurry. Moreover, from the Duan clan 200 miles, his troops would forcefully march for at least three days. Now it will take at least five days to be held back by Yuan Shao?"

"Although it's a little slower, it's not going to be a big deal after five days. Is the Taiwei not confident in us to hold on for five days? How could he say in the order, "If you can't defend, you can abandon the city and break through the siege and move south to the siege, but if you break through, you must burn all the remaining grains of Duan's family to avoid investing in the enemy'?

Or do you think that the situation in other places will worsen in five days. Even if he returns to the aid, he will encounter the enemy's division of troops and will not be able to return to Duan's family?"

Zhang Ren's first reaction was that "Guan Yu looked down on him."

With his ability to defend the city, although Duan's city is a dilapidated small county town, the city wall is less than two feet long of rammed earth and has no adhesive, and the soil is compacted by simple ramming.

But even though the original defense facilities were so poor, Zhang Ren felt that it was too easy to guard for five days. Zhang Liao crossed the mountains and came along Guanglang Valley. It might be impossible for the catapult car to cross the empty warehouse in the form of a whole vehicle, and at most some half-finished parts are brought.

It takes Zhang Liao two or three days to assemble a catapult cart and a ladder, and it is absolutely possible to keep it for five days.

There will be evil when something abnormal happens. Zhang Ren continued to ponder Guan Yu's orders with a serious expression, and finally focused on Guan Yu's extra care for him "retreatment method".

In the entire order, Guan Yu did not explain the reason, but he was very clear about what he should do and what he could not do. The most severe wording here and the highest priority was "If you retreat, you must burn all the remaining grain and all possible supplies that may be used to the enemy."

Zhang Ren naturally followed this line and realized a possibility: Could it be that the Taiwei was planning to "surround each other and see who can hold on for a long time"?

Similar to those who play Go, both sides are strangled together in a mess. You have me and I have you, and you need to rob. But the chess that are surrounded by one side have a much longer vital eye than the other, so you can break the other's eyes and eat them to death.

Zhang Ren couldn't guess how Guan Yu would do this, but Zhang Ren had at least seen clearly that Guan Yu was planning in this direction.

Therefore, he should first believe in the Taiwei, and everything is to serve this layout.

"It may be fine to defend Duan's family, but if Zhang Liao surrounded me and then eroded Wuze County to the south and seized the stored grain there, it may cause disaster for the Taiwei's plan. My personal life and death are small, and I cannot completely strengthen my walls and clear the country before losing my land."

After understanding this, Zhang Ren no longer dared to hold on to the end easily.

On the same day, he recruited several deputy generals from his subordinates, the army Sima, and ordered the key points of the city to defend the battle, and explained some situations:

"In a few days, if Zhang Liao's offensive is urgent, we must be mentally prepared to divide our troops and break through. Anyone who wants to stay or who is willing to break through can tell me that I will try my best to satisfy the path we choose.

If you follow me, we must break through to Wuze County to ensure that when Wuze is also besieged by Zhang Liao in the future, we can set up villages in layers to the south, and set up sluggish areas in the narrow Kaqinshui Valley to slow down the pace of Zhang Liao's attack on the Taiwei.

At the same time, if Wuze County wants to give up, we have to be responsible for burning Wuze without leaving a grain of food to help the enemy. Now there are no old and weak people in the two counties, and those who refuse to leave have all scattered into the mountains. Those who are left behind are all civil servants, so whether they give up or break through the siege, they must take them away. Let them carry as much food as they can, and don’t starve to death, but there is absolutely no food left in the city.

If the main road in the Qinshui River Valley in the Nanmen Gate is blocked by Zhang Liao, we will take advantage of the complete tight encirclement and find relatively weak spots from the east and west sides, and take a detour to the Taihang steep slope to retreat south.

As for the people who choose to stay, there is no other requirement. If the city cannot be guarded, you must set fire to all the remaining things. Then, I allow you to surrender and save your life. I believe that the Taiwei can destroy Zhang Liao after freeing up his hands, and you will be able to restore your freedom.

The Grand Marshal also promises that this surrender will not affect your future merits and promotions in the army. As long as you delay the death battle and resist, even if you surrender, you will be a meritorious person."

After talking about this, the officers under Zhang Ren hesitated and discussed, they made their own choices one after another. There were a total of three or four thousand regular soldiers in the city, as well as more than two thousand boatmen and boatmen who transported grain.

The remaining food in the city was basically equivalent to the amount of food that the five or six thousand people had for two months. Considering how many days the defenders would eat, and each soldier could carry at least half a month of food transfer.

As for the people who don’t have to carry weapons, if you hear that “when you leave, you only need to open a warehouse and release grain, the better you can get. As much as you can, you will be able to carry it to you.” Those poor people may be able to carry two hundred pounds of men and women, so if you count it like this, burning a small amount of grain will be enough to strengthen the wall and clear the wilderness.

After some screening, the number of those who were willing to stay in Duan's family and those who wanted to break through the field was basically the same, so Zhang Ren followed his choice.

...

In the evening of that day, although Zhang Liao's vanguard did not launch an attack immediately, he had already begun to arrange the construction of siege equipment in full swing, and then any parts of the catapult cart were transported to the front line and assembled immediately.

The next morning, the scale of Zhang Liao's troops gathered outside the city exceeded 17,800,000, and it is estimated that the entire army will be in place one day. Zhang Liao immediately launched a fierce attack on Duanshi County.

The soldiers rushed up the city-hitting hammer, and dozens of soldiers were carrying it forward to hit the door. The Duan's city walls and gates looked neither strong. Such consumption could also gradually destroy the city defense, exhaust the defenders and gradually consume it.

However, Zhang Ren still took out his usual Zhuge crossbow and focused on setting up crossfire on several city towers. The only two or three hundred god arm crossbows are also used in a focused manner, precise coordination and dispatch. They go to the defense line wherever they are most dangerous to put out the fire. They will also organize the snipers of Zhang Liao's side to supervise the siege officers, which makes Zhang Liao's side's siege rhythm very uncomfortable.

In this way, even if Zhang Liao currently invests five or six times the troops he has invested, the entire army may reach him ten times the future arrival. But now, the flaw of Zhang Ren's insufficient number has not been transformed into "insufficient firepower output".

Three or four thousand people fought with great success, like a long-range firepower density that only other troops had at least seven or eight thousand troops. The city was full of arrows and stones.

After more than a day of hard work, Zhang Liao launched a more fierce attack until July 16th. In the new day, Zhang Liao's army had urgently concentrated its forces and assembled two medium-sized leverage thrust machines that could only throw 70 kilograms of stone bullets.

Although there are not many catapults, the threat to cities like Duan's family is already very obvious. By the afternoon of the day, some walls had already appeared in danger, and Zhang Ren had to lead the suicide squad to block the door.

Only then did he realize that the enemy had also fully popularized heavy trenchers, it would be too difficult for him to not occupy the natural terrain of the mountains and the narrow passes and only rely on the city walls and towers to defend.

Times have changed. The siege weapon invented by Li Sikong has been invented for eight years and can be used by all the princes in the world.

Considering that Zhang Liao had gathered more than 20,000 people outside the city, the difficulty of breaking through would only increase. After fighting the battle of defending the city head-on for two days, Zhang Ren decisively chose to break through.

He knew that he could do it if he held on his own for a few more days, but the tasks assigned by the Taiwei were more important.

He also changed his mind temporarily and ordered the officers who remained:

"After I break through, you can set the fire before dawn tomorrow. Then you can carry some food and try to run as much as possible. It is better than being a prisoner for one more day. Zhang Liao's determination to attack is not afraid of casualties. As long as I leave, you can stay for one more day, which is meaningless."

The number of troops who decided to break through the siege has become more temporary adjustments than the initial plan.

On the second day of the night, Zhang Ren personally led hundreds of his most direct soldiers, all of whom were good at climbing mountains and were not afraid of walking at night. He walked the other way and fell from the city with ropes outside the east wall of the city. These soldiers were treated well and usually ate animal offal, so the problem of night blindness was relatively mild.

Zhang Ren knew that although the east and west gates were not strictly defending because they were facing Taihang Mountain and were not as dense as the south gate, in comparison, the east gate was definitely more relaxed than the west gate's enemies.

There is no other reason: the west is the direction of Liu Bei's territory. As long as you can cross the mountains, you will at least return to the hinterland of the Liu Bei's ruled area. The east is the direction of Zhang Liao.

Who would have thought that Zhang Ren would make a fuss and deliberately break into Guanglang Valley when he first left the city? Wouldn't that have bumped into Zhang Liao's rear army who rushed to the front line?

It is precisely because Zhang Ren's direct guards were the first to break through the siege that they had to choose the direction that the enemy could not imagine. At the same time, after they walked out half a second, as long as they passed through the Guanglang Valley, they could deliberately reveal some of their whereabouts.

For example, some torches were exposed on the mountain and then destroyed, allowing Zhang Liao's army to find flaws in that direction, report them step by step, disrupting Zhang Liao's attention and encirclement.

Then, at the third or fourth, other troops who want to break through can choose to take advantage of the opportunity of "the enemy encirclement troops to search the east side by maneuver" to open the west gate and walk on a relatively safe and easier mountain road to break through.

The subsequent breakthrough soldiers' elite level decreased, and the problem of night blindness increased. If they were to climb the mountain at night during the second day of the second day, they would probably die in Taihang Mountains after three consecutive climbs.

So let them go a little later and let the front army attract attention, so that the time for walking in the mountains at night will be shortened. As long as you go deeper into the mountains before dawn the next day, Zhang Liao will no longer be able to find it.

Zhang Ren's wave was a omnipotent breakthrough in the dark. Except for him who had a clear destination, he was all aimless. Even if he went to the deep mountains, he could live for half a month and a month before returning to the team.

It is these goalless running around, covering up the real movements of the generals with missions, and a drop of water flows into the sea and can never be picked out again.

...

Zhang Ren's breakthrough failed to remain confidential for a long time. It was not even their turn to "take the initiative to expose his whereabouts and tempt the enemy after passing through Guanglang Valley."

Because just when Zhang Ren's troops crossed Guanglang Valley from north to south, they realized how rigorous Zhang Liao was in charge of the military. In the middle of the night, there were cavalry troops on guard against the torches on Guanglang Valley, which really made Zhang Ren miscalculated.

Zhang Ren has tried his best to use the gaps between enemy patrols to avoid the patrol team, which is like playing an Allied suicide squad.

Unfortunately, when climbing over the steep slope on the south side of Guanglang Valley, the troops were moving too slowly and the number was several hundred. They were still hit by the cavalry patrol team returning from Zhang Liaozhe at the end.

A fierce battle broke out between the two sides, and Zhang Ren wanted to organize the rear end, but he was also shot. Fortunately, he was wearing crocodile armor, which was not seriously injured.

In the end, more than a hundred soldiers blocked the tail of Guanglang Valley were all killed in the battle, and dozens of Zhang Liao cavalry patrol team opposite were also killed. Although the total number of casualties in small-scale battles was not large, they were extremely tragic.

After being caught in the arrow, Zhang Ren decisively gave up these soldiers and used the time they had obtained to take the front army to drill into the depths of the Taihang Mountains.

After the third update, Zhang Liao was woken up in his sleep and reported that he immediately organized a cavalry to search and kill, and the army intercepted it. As a result, a considerable number of soldiers in the west of the city took the opportunity to break through.

When the sky was about to increase again, Zhang Liao was about to reorganize the siege, and the money and grain treasury and other buildings in the city had already ignited a raging fire. Zhang Liao was shocked and realized that the defenders knew that they could not defend and were engaged in scorched earth defense.

Zhang Liaoxin's more than a dozen trenchers had just been assembled on the day, but the enemy actually fell down. He was furious and attacked immediately, but this time he took it down in a quarter of an hour.

However, there are only some wounded soldiers with limited mobility, a few officers who carry out scorched earth orders, as well as some soldiers and civilians who are unable to leave their hometowns. They will be captured and won't be defeated.

"Zhang Ren is so-called good at defense. After seeing our army equipped with leverage catapults, he was indeed vulnerable. Without Wang Ping helping him defend the steep and narrow passes of the Kongcangling Mountains, he was so arrogant that he wanted to block our army with such a dirt wall." No matter what, Zhang Liao was a little relieved after taking down the city.

He wiped out the fire in the city, and saw that there was no food left, and was very angry. He tortured and plundered the people who refused to leave, trying to squeeze out some food. At the same time, Wen Chou quickly transferred more food and transported the food from Guanglang City to Duanshi County, so that he could not panic when he had food in his hands and had greater confidence when blocking the road to return to Guanyu.

While Wen Chou was transporting grain, Zhang Liao continued to expand his occupied area south along the Qinshui River Valley, and asked Wen Chou to gradually fill it with the rear army to deal with Guan Yu's counterattack. At the same time, he also hoped that Wen Chou would help him temporarily block the rescue of Xu Huang from Fen, facing Fen.
Chapter completed!