As a neighbor of Hangzhou Prefecture, Huizhou Prefecture is not as rich as Hangzhou Prefecture, but it is also a city with a population of more than 200,000. Its city walls are about two feet (7 meters) high. Although they are not as high as 12 meters above the height of Beijing and Jinling, they are already considered a relatively tall and sturdy city in this era.

However, this city that looked tall and sturdy in the past is no longer as spectacular as before. The exterior walls, which were originally wrapped in blue bricks, were filled with big pits, like an ugly monster with a pockmarked face. From time to time, you can see blood without drying on the ground of the city wall.

Li Yan stood behind a battlement with a long sword, looking at the busy Jiangning army artillery hundreds of meters away, and a desperate feeling surged into his heart.

Li Yan is a chivalrous man, but also a conceited person, which can be seen from his past actions.

He was born into a family of officials in Henan, and was naturally a landlord class and was in opposition to those farmers who dig food from the ground. But not only did he not exploit the people, he tried every means to speak for the people. For this reason, he did not hesitate to have a quarrel with the landlords and gentry who were in the same class as him, and even joined Li Zicheng's bandits.

The reason why he joined Li Zicheng's bandits was because he believed that the Ming Dynasty had been corrupt after nearly three hundred years. The vast land of the Ming Dynasty had long been divided up by landlords and gentry from all over the country, and less than 10% of the people occupied 90% of the land. However, the taxes of the Ming Dynasty were suppressed on the farmers who only had 10% of the land. It would be unreasonable if such a Ming Dynasty did not collapse.

Objectively speaking, Li Yan's idea is not wrong. Historical clearness actually lies in land annexation, and Li Zicheng, whom he assisted, did conquer the capital of the Ming Dynasty and destroyed the Ming Dynasty with his own hands.

In his opinion, Zhu Yuanzhang was able to get from a beggar to a founding emperor, but there was no reason why Li Zicheng, who was a postman, could not do it.

But he miscalculated one thing, that is, Li Zicheng may be able to compare with Zhu Yuanzhang in terms of tenacity, but if he had a look, courage and the level of governing the country, Li Zicheng was more than 18 streets worse than Zhu Yuanzhang, otherwise there would be no situation in another historical time and space where he was clearly holding a good hand but was beaten to pieces.

More importantly, due to the variable Yang Feng appeared in this time and space, Li Yan's original fate also had a major turn.

Today is the second day of the Jiangning Army's siege. Although it was only a short day, Li Yan and the bandits on the city wall felt as if a year had passed.

From yesterday to now, the Jiangning Army has only done one thing, which is to concentrate nearly two hundred artillery guns to continuously bombard the city walls of Huizhou Prefecture. Under the attack of the artillery, the northern city wall where Li Yan is located has been covered with scars. Most of the battlements that were originally used to protect the soldiers guarding the city were also blown away by artillery fire. The bandits who lost the protection of the battlements could only grit their teeth to support them.

Although Li Yan wanted to remove the soldiers on the city wall and only left a small number of observation posts, seeing the step-by-step ladder, shield cart, and countless soldiers holding muskets, Li Yan could only run this tempting idea behind his mind.

It’s not that he doesn’t feel sorry for his soldiers, but that he knows very well that as long as he dares to pull down the soldiers on the city wall, the Jiangning army opposite will immediately turn into a general attack, and the thousands of soldiers who are staring at him will pounce on him like hungry wolves. With a small number of observation posts, it’s a dream to resist the Jiangning army that is like a wolf and tiger. It only takes a minute to fall the city wall.

"Military advisor, we can't fight like this anymore. If we continue like this, we can't hold on for a few days." A man with dark smoke on his face trotted to Li Yan and said anxiously: "Military advisor, from yesterday to now, we have broken more than a thousand men on this city wall. These are not cannon fodders from the dead barracks, but brothers from our old barracks. This battle cannot be fought like this anymore."

This man was no one else, but Hao Yaoqi, who volunteered to stay and guard the city with Li Yan.

Although all the people who died were Li Yan's people, even Hao Yaoqi was shocked when he saw this loss. He was also worried that Li Yan would bring his people here after the loss was too great. At that time, he wanted to cry without tears.

Li Yan asked back: "Then do you have any good ideas?"

Hao Yaoqi shook his head and said, "I don't know, but I understand that if we continue like this, our people will collapse without fighting within two days."

Li Yan was silent. He could only be beaten but not fight back. No matter how strong a person was, he couldn't stand it.

Although the people guarding the city are elite soldiers of the rebel army he trained, after being bombarded for more than a day, their morale showed signs of unstableness. If this continues, he is not sure how long he can hold on.

"Military advisors, the most powerful thing about the Jiangning Army is their firearms. If we fight with them like this, we can only use our own shortcomings to compete with their strengths. It is only a matter of time before we lose. According to this style of fighting, Huizhou Prefecture will last for ten days, and it will probably be difficult for three days.

So in my opinion, we might as well withdraw from Huizhou Prefecture and use our strengths to break it into pieces to harass the Jiangning Army. Although this will also cost a lot of losses, it is at least better than just being beaten here."

“Huh…”

After hearing these words, Li Yan couldn't help but feel a little moved.

Although he had guessed some of Hao Yaoqi's thoughts, he had to say that his thinking was still right. Judging from the current situation, he could only wait for death to guard Huizhou Prefecture, and could not complete the trust of the King of Chuang. Instead of doing this, it would be better to jump out and fight with the Jiangning Army, and maybe he could still find a way out.

"Swoosh..."

A dull whistling suddenly came from the sky, followed by a violent explosion sounded more than 100 meters away from them. Accompanied by huge air waves and thick black smoke, countless gravels and debris flew everywhere under the shock wave, and then another scream rang out.

When he saw seven or eight bandits lying in a pool of blood, one of them always cursed with a red scarf tied to his head: "Your mother, you know how to bully people with cannons. If you have sex, come up and have a real sword and gun fight with grandpa. He only knows how to use firearms to hit us. What a good man!"

Li Yan and Hao Yaoqi looked at each other and smiled bitterly. Jiang Ningjun had such a sharp firearm. If he didn't have to play hand-to-hand combat with them, his brain would be broken.

"It's another flowering bullet. Jiangning Army is really rich!" Looking at the smoke that had not yet completely dissipated, Li Yan shook his head with emotion: "It is said that a flowering bullet cannot be bought without ten taels of silver. This shot just now was equivalent to shooting half a cow, but we..."
Chapter completed!