Liu Chengzong's siege of Jiayuguan has entered the third day, and the preparations outside the pass have reached the final stage.
Under the protection of thirty-six thousand-pound artillery, the Tianshan Army carried out large-scale soil work six hundred steps outside the pass, built a trench ten miles long, and piled up ten four-foot-long earth mountains at key nodes.
With the advantage, the lookout hand waving the flag has a panoramic view of the defenders' dispatch.
At the same time, thirty interlaced trenches on the ground spread toward the Guancheng and hanging walls of Jiayuguan.
This is because the defenders are equipped with large-caliber Fran cannons with rapid-fire capabilities. This thing is slightly weaker than the red barbarian cannon when firing solid iron bullets, but firing loose bullets can bring a huge blow to the siege soldiers who have advanced to 200 steps.
Disaster.
Digging tunnels is not easy to use in this place. On the one hand, the city of Jiayuguan itself has a high terrain, and there is an inverted triangular trench outside that is 10 feet deep. The sides and bottom of the ditch are full of pebbles. It is difficult to dig tunnels underneath.
If you don't have a few, you'll lose your life. If you have more soldiers, the soil work will be too difficult.
However, filling the city wall with gunpowder and blowing it up would not work in Jiayuguan. Guancheng is just a small city with a circumference of more than 700 steps, but it has three walls surrounded by fortifications and military camps. If the outer wall is blown open, there are still two walls inside.
It doesn’t make much sense.
If the inner wall is blown up, there will be two walls inside and outside, which is meaningless.
As for blasting three city walls at the same time, Liu Chengzong believed that it was a job for himself. Firstly, he didn't have the skills, and secondly, he didn't have the inclination. If he blew it up, he would have to repair it himself.
He just wanted to create the appearance of storming Jiayuguan City. In fact, his real idea lay in the thirty trenches. Five trenches on the right wing were wider than the others and could accommodate carts.
As for this impregnable Guancheng, Liu Chengzong did not plan to attack it by force. Attacking the city was a high-risk and high-yield matter. The wealth of this small Jiayuguan City was pitiful and it was not worth attacking by force.
So I just asked Gao Ying to attack a few times to put some pressure on the defenders. The real purpose was to tear down a hole in the southern hanging wall and let the army pass through Jiayuguan.
After all, the city gate and the hanging wall were poorly built, and the oases and lakes were on the other side. Only a small number of troops would be left to besiege them until they surrendered... Anyway, Liu Chengzong also noticed it, and the defenders used kerosene jars in the city if they had nothing to do
The idea of setting fire to the lower level is particularly obvious, that is, to give him eye drops.
I just want to tell him, don't attack by force. If you attack us by force, we will set people on fire.
During the three days of artillery fire, the Marshal's Mansion fired more than 3,000 artillery shells, knocking down many battlements in Guancheng and the hanging wall, and destroying eight defensive cannons.
The price was that one of the thirty-six heavy field guns was damaged by a direct hit from the shell, and three of them were deformed. At this time, all the guns were shut down and misfired, and the remaining guns were hidden. Presumably, they were intended to be used as a weapon in hand-to-hand combat.
.
Of course, it is also possible that he did not want to return the cannonball to Liu Chengzong.
After all, artillery shells are consumables. The marshal's army has come from afar. If such consumables that take up baggage are gone, subsequent replenishment is theoretically very problematic.
But everything has a but.
A little west of Jiayuguan is the former Yumen Pass, which is now the pastureland of the Mongolian Chijin Tribe. There is a city in the area called gelding city. Before the border was reduced, it was a place designated by the imperial court for tea and horse trading.
When the leader of the Red Gold Department passed by Guitutaiji, he was taken by Suzhou Counselor Zhao Zhirui to Ganzhou to report to the commander-in-chief Yang Jiamo.
There were not many people left in the tribe. As the Mongolian tribe that had moved inland, they had no fighting ability and no desire to fight. When they saw the mighty army of the Marshal's Mansion approaching, they took it for granted that it was a fight between Han people. A few highly respected people
Commander Chijin thought, this is none of our business, just pay tribute.
A commander came from the Red Gold Division. His surname was Kang, and his name was Kang Liangfu. He claimed to be from Kuaiji, and said he was a commander. In fact, he had about 200 men, women, and children plus one person under his command. He was considered a big landowner who herded horses and sheep, and paid tribute.
The tribute is six finely crafted iron pots, the bottoms of which are all stamped with the seal of the Marshal's Mansion Industrial Bureau.
Liu Shizi almost vomited with laughter in the camp. This man from Kuaiji actually gave him the iron pot he rewarded as tribute.
After careful questioning, I found out that the Kuaiji mentioned by Kang Liangfu was not the Kuaiji from Jiangnan.
In the Jin Dynasty, Yumen was divided into two counties: Luma and Kuaiji. The Xiliang regime changed Kuaiji County to Kuaiji County. In the Tang Dynasty, they were collectively called Hu people. In order to avoid the name Hu people, they changed their surnames to Han and called themselves Kuaiji people, Mongolians.
When people come, everyone will be lustful again.
At that time, they were the descendants of Chubo. Chubo's line was originally the kings of Chagatai. During the Haidu Rebellion, he led an army of 10,000 to defect to Kublai Khan. Later, his family was in Hexi for generations. In the Ming Dynasty, the seven guards outside Guanwai except Handong
In addition to the guards, the six guards are all related to the Chagatai kings of the Yuan Dynasty.
When Tarini, the ancestor of Chijin Guard, surrendered to the Ming Dynasty, he claimed to be the son of King Bin and Prime Minister Ku Shu.
They had made great contributions to the Ming Dynasty, but later suffered heavy losses from Turpan and requested to move to Suzhou and regain their Han surnames.
This is when Kang Liangfu wanted to say something nice and bring the two sides closer, because he was afraid of Liu Chengzong, especially afraid.
For Kang Liangfu, who has lived outside the country for a long time, the name Liu Chengzong is not unfamiliar, and is very familiar.
The area from Hami to Suzhou has always been an unclaimed land in the middle of the Ming Dynasty. Especially after the Ming Dynasty shrunk, it became a buffer zone.
Most people living here have an awkward cultural status. The men in the east think they are Tatars, and the Tatars in the west think they are men.
In the Borderless Land, there are few people in this place, and there is a big monster guarding the side. It is difficult to divide oneself, which results in the result that whoever comes is the master. Chok Tutai Ji, who has never won a victory in his military life, was the master here.
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At the time when Taiji was in charge, Kang Liangfu's uncle took Chuoktu Taiji to Jiayuguan to ask for the reward from the Gansu General Armed Forces.
Later, Xu Jiashou, the commander-in-chief of Gansu Province, patted his cannon, and Taiji no longer dared to make the decision here.
In the uncle's sad sigh, Kang Liangfu heard Liu Chengzong's name for the first time.
He hunched over and raised his head slightly, looked at Liu Chengzong who was sitting on the throne outside the commander's tent, and said carefully: "The uncle said that the rebel leader of the Ming Dynasty entered Qinghai, occupied Qinghai, and led the army to Uzang to burn incense and worship Buddha. Taiwan
If Ji wants to visit us, we need someone in our family."
"Forty, let my uncle lead him away with Taiji." As he said, he raised a finger: "Just one will come back."
"Oh." Liu Chengzong suddenly understood, clapped his hands and sat up straight: "So, your Red Gold Department has a grudge against me?"
"No grudge!"
Kang Liangfu shook his head and answered categorically: "Just...the King Khan was so hospitable that he left them there, good luck!"
Liu Chengzong was very happy when he heard that he was wrong. He even selectively ignored the second half of the sentence that he was too flattering to offend him, and said with a smile: "King of Han, you are very good at talking... How many households are there in the entire Red Gold Department?"
"Back to the king, there are more than five hundred households."
Liu Chengzong raised his hand to summon the guards to get paper and pen, wrote a few sentences with his pen, and asked without raising his head: "What is your name Kang?"
"The villain Kang Ryousuke."
He nodded, wrote a letter of appointment, ordered the craftsmen accompanying the army to engrave a copper seal, raised his hand and handed it out: "Kang Liangfu, I appoint you as the commander of the Chijin Guards of the Marshal's Mansion, with jurisdiction over Yumen, Guazhou and Dunhuang.
Do you dare to gather the troops and recruit the barbarians outside the pass to support the guards and the baggage?"
Kang Liangfu never dreamed that Liu Chengzong would make him the commander of the Chijin Guard so easily.
Although he is now the Chijin Commander awarded by the Emperor of Heaven, under the same title, it is obvious that what Liu Chengzong meant is that he is not only given the title of Commander, but also the real title.
Give him the power to command.
Moreover, the power in Yumen, Guazhou and Dunhuang is almost the combined territory of Chijin Guard and Shazhou Guard in the early Ming Dynasty.
The Chijin Guards had already existed in name only when they moved inland to Suzhou. These commanders and even governors had neither force nor power. They were just a group of nomads raising camels on the Gobi Desert.
Although these three places are indeed not good places, there are settlements along the way from Yumen to Guazhou. At best they are called small oases, at worst they are just a few big villages and villages that are barely surviving.
Basically, there are more sand than fields, more fields than horse bandits, more horse bandits than people, more people than lambs, more lambs than horses, more horses than noble lords, more noble lords than rivers, and more rivers than caravans.
A state.
Dunhuang, Dunhuang must be singled out. This place was very glorious in ancient times. It was an important strategic location and trade town from the Central Plains to the Western Regions. However, after the Anshi Rebellion, natural and man-made disasters and great environmental changes caused Dunhuang's status to plummet.
Yangguan is in the southwest of Dunhuang. Wang Wei said that there are no old friends outside Yangguan in the west. By this time, going west from Yangguan is no longer a question of whether you can meet old friends, but no one at all.
There are no people, no livestock, no roads, no rivers... Leaving Yangguan in the west, there is a vast desert that stretches for a thousand miles.
It is no longer an important transportation hub. The Central Plains leads to the Western Regions from Yumen through Guazhou to the northwest, passing through Hami and Turpan. Dunhuang, forgotten in the corner, is just a desolate place with lush grass and ruins.
Kang Liangfu had never been to Dunhuang. He had only heard about Dunhuang from the mouths of lucky tribesmen who had escaped from Qinghai. There were lush grasses, big trees growing in the wasteland, and water channels that were washed into rivers by the melted water from the snowy mountains and then dried up again.
, trees fell down, houses collapsed and the buildings turned into bustling ruins. There were desolate scenes everywhere that had not been populated for hundreds of years.
The environment in Dunhuang is not bad. There are water plants and wastelands, but there are no people. It is too dilapidated and there is no point in having people there.
If you put all the people in these three places together, none of them has as many people as Hami, and Hami only has more than 10,000 people.
Power is a good thing, although it itself cannot bring people happiness. On the contrary, the process of obtaining power often makes people unhappy, but as long as they have power, many people will try their best to make them happy.
Kang Liangfu quickly knelt down to thank him and accepted the letter of appointment. He had already begun to dream of cutting off the Silk Road and collecting business taxes.
Suddenly, a person in front of the commander's tent woke him up with a strange accent that even among Mongolians would have a southern accent and a northern accent: "Great Khan, let him move his headquarters to Dunhuang."
Kang Liangfu raised his head and saw beside Liu Chengzong a Mongolian nobleman wearing a plain satin robe. He had a flintlock gun on his right waist and a silver-leather-handled wild goose feather knife on his left. He crossed his chest with both hands and held a big mink hat, revealing
The bald head and Tianling were covered with a six- or seven-inch long single braid, and they were looking at him with a scrutinizing gaze.
If I had to say something, Kang Liangfu felt that this man was actually more like a Khan than Liu Chengzong, but that was just the taller one among the shorter ones. In fact, neither of them looked like a Khan.
Liu Chengzong, who was dressed in red cotton armor, was sitting there with a murderous look on his face. He was also playing with a meteor hammer in his hand. He looked like a rebel leader who was replenishing his strength between battles. The Mongolian clothes and decorations were a bit noble, but his posture
Looks like a fucking tiger.
Asking these two people to stare at him, Kang Liangfu will stop shaking all the time in his life.
It's not that he has never seen Han generals or Mongolian nobles, but those people have a sense of alienation from being aloof from the world. These two are different. They are full of people who want to kill people without batting an eye.
Before he could wonder who this person was, Liu Chengzong had already introduced him: "Earl of the Marshal's Mansion, Batu of Junggar."
Batur Hutaiji put his right hand on his chest and bowed slightly: "Choros Heduoheqin."
Kang Liangfu hurriedly returned the gift, thinking that no wonder, no wonder the Mongolian leader standing next to Liu Chengzong was full of murderous intent. This guy's surname is not Bo'er, but Jin.
The last time I heard this name, Junggar Huitaiji was one of the leaders who led troops to invade Qinghai. Now the two of them seem to be wearing a pair of pants.
He explained: "Your Majesty, move to Dunhuang. There is no one in Dunhuang. This sandbank and Guazhou are not self-sufficient places. There are no caravans and no one will go there except wandering herdsmen."
"I know that I led the army from there, but he is right. Chijin Guards should go to Dunhuang to revive it. From now on, there will be caravans passing by every year, very large caravans."<
/p>
As Liu Chengzong spoke, he pointed towards Batur Huitaiji with his thumb and said: "He is the major shareholder of the caravan, and your duty is to protect the safety along the route."
Kang Liangfu's eyes almost fell out, he thought, "I, protect him?"
Junggar Hutaiji can mobilize tens of thousands of Tatars. Even if I take over the entire Chijin Mongolia, I can only manage to assemble 800 herdsmen and 300 war horses, and barely ride on donkeys and mules, but I will not have any weapons.
What can you do to protect him?
If Dunhuang, Guazhou, and Shazhou could have thousands of soldiers who were good at fighting, the country would have been established in Kansai long ago. How could anyone who came here have been bullied for hundreds of years?
Liu Chengzong saw the embarrassment on his face and said with a smile: "It's not difficult for you. Everything is a matter later. There is something that needs to be handled by you, the commander of the Chijin Guard. If you can handle it well, I will call you."
Three hundred men and horses will help you recruit Hu Zhuangzhuang from outside the Pass."
Kang Liangfu's eyes lit up when he heard this, and he quickly said: "Your Majesty, please tell me, I will definitely do it."
"My army needs copper ore and iron ore, where can I find it?"
The army of the Marshal's Mansion needs to cast artillery shells. If the war situation inside the pass leads to a confrontation, they may need to cast a few more cannons at Jiayuguan to supplement their military supplies.
"Red Gold, there are copper mines, iron mines, and gold mines in the headquarters of the Red Gold Department."
Liu Chengzong frowned. He felt that Kang Liangfu might have misunderstood the amount needed by the army: "You guard the iron mines, but even the iron pots are scarce?"
"The imperial court only allows us to lend money and collect rents, but not to open mountains and mines. Suzhou is a place like heaven and earth. No one wants to be driven out of the customs for some petty profits."
Snap.
Liu Chengzong clapped his hands, and the problem of military supplies was solved. He smiled happily: "Very good, from now on, you don't need to listen to what the east says... I am the imperial court."
