But after Zhu Hunyuan returned to Jinyong City, he had no time to enter the city to rest. Instead, he cheered up and personally inspected the soldiers and horses who had fled back. Only then did the soldiers believe that he was not dead in the battle, and he was in a panic.
Only then did he gradually calm down.
But when he tried to arrange for the various troops to return to their respective garrison positions, the generals all had excuses and refused to accept the order.
After all, the army has been defeated and suffered heavy casualties. It is difficult to foresee what kind of bad situation will happen if we break away from the large group and act alone at this time. Under such circumstances, of course, it is safest to stay together as a group for warmth.
But when Zhu Hunyuan saw the mood of the people, he felt helpless for a moment. He could only put the matter aside for now, ordered them to lead their troops into the camp, and then took stock of the losses of the camps.
After taking stock, Zhu Hunyuan was heartbroken. But in addition to the losses in the battle at White Horse Temple, he had to face an even worse situation, that is, Baiting City was besieged by barbarians.
It should be noted that there are nearly 20,000 horses stationed in Yiyang with Jiuqu City as the center, and the daily consumption of 20,000 horses is very alarming. Once Baiting City is trapped or robbed, the damage to Yiyang's defense line will be
Almost devastating.
But Zhu Hunyuan's original plan was to capture the thieves first and capture the king first. As long as Li Boshan who was trapped in the White Horse Temple was captured and killed, the barbarians surrounding Baiting City would naturally collapse. But now, instead of being able to capture Li Boshan, his own troops were defeated.
Lose money and suffer heavy losses.
After the barbarians heard the news, they would become even more arrogant and eager to be used by the Western thieves. This would also make the situation in Baiting City more critical, and they must find a way to solve it.
Soon the news came that the troops of the Western Wei Dynasty were raiding along the river, which inevitably made Zhu Hunyuan's already numb heart even more bitter. At this point, his intention to besiege and capture Li Boshan here was considered complete.
Failed.
Without any obstacles, Zhu Hunyuan subconsciously thought that Li Boshan would definitely leave here, go to Baiting City to join the barbarians, and then preside over the attack on Baiting City.
After all, Baiting City stores a large amount of supplies and is the hub of the Heluo defense line. Once it is captured, the harvest will be huge. This is also a choice that normal people would make.
Considering that after the new defeat, the soldiers generally had no fighting spirit, but the danger faced by Baiting City had to be saved. So Zhu Hunyuan summoned his close officers at night and ordered them not to participate in the White Horse Temple incident in the city.
Select the elite from the defenders and prepare to pursue Li Boshan after he leads his troops away from the White Horse Temple.
The next day, Zhu Hunyuan did not wait for the news that Li Boshan led his troops to leave. Instead, he learned that his troops were building a fort at the ruins of Qianjincang City. He felt extremely embarrassed and said, "Shuzi is going too far! Do you really think that I can't control him?"
?”
As he spoke, he thought he was going to gather his troops again and go out of the city to fight.
But at this time, even several of his confidants urged him not to be impulsive and to send scouts to Baiting City to investigate the movements of the barbarians before making a decision.
If Li Boshan still pretends to be arrogant and uses his body as a bait to lure them to attack, the result will be to set up a killing array and attract the barbarians to attack and kill them. If they are caught off guard, they may repeat yesterday's defeat.
Although Zhu Hunyuan was filled with anger, he had to admit that his men could no longer withstand another unexpected blow, so he could only suppress his anger for the time being and sent several teams of scouts south to explore the surrounding areas of Baiting City. situation.
When the scouts inquired about the latest situation near Baiting City and reported back, the camp of the Western Wei Dynasty had also been closed and it was almost over.
In addition to the fence and the tents inside, the most eye-catching feature of this camp is the trebuchet several feet high that stands in the center of the camp. It is obvious that this is the Heyang cannon that Li Boshan relied on to attack the enemy and perform extraordinary feats. , it looks scary.
In fact, the trebuchet gun carriage is by no means a new thing, the Northern Qi army also has similar equipment, but the key to the reason why the Heyang cannon is so feared is its super long range and super power.
When they saw that the troops of the Western Wei Dynasty directly set up the Heyang Cannon in the camp, the soldiers of the Northern Qi Dynasty who were already in shock lost even more fighting spirit.
If the two sides just laid out their formations and fought with real swords and guns, they would not be afraid of no matter how ferocious the opponent was. However, the enemy had a sharp weapon like the Heyang Cannon, which was already beyond the range that flesh and blood could deal with. If If you go forward to attack and kill him again, it will be the same as sending him to death.
Instead of leading his troops to leave, Li Tai directly advanced the battle line to the Luoshui line, posing as if he wanted to target the defenders of Jin Yong City. Although the Qi soldiers and horses in Jin Yong City still outnumbered his troops several times, they failed in the first battle. In addition, Li Tai directly exposed the deadly weapon of Heyang Cannon, which also made the Qi army timid to fight.
As a result, all the pressure was placed on Ke Zhu Hunyuan.
If he wanted to lead his army south and massively reinforce Baiting City, he would definitely be intercepted and blocked by Li Boshan's troops. However, if he only sent a small number of troops, it would be difficult to reverse the current crisis of Baiting City.
Moreover, even if he uses most of his troops to bypass the Wei army's garrison and use other routes to reinforce Baiting City, not to mention the increase in consumption this time, the reduction of Jinyong City's defenders alone will trigger an attack by Li Boshan, who is eyeing him. At that time, it will be a rescue. What’s the point of going to Baiting City, only to lose the more important Jinyong City?
The situation here became stalemate and dull, but the atmosphere outside Baiting City, which was surrounded by barbarians, was in full swing.
Baiting City is located at the southern foot of Zhoushan Mountain and on the north bank of Luoshui River. It is surrounded by mountains and rivers and has an excellent location, so it was chosen by the Northern Qi Dynasty to build the city. However, the geographical pattern of mountains in front and rivers in the back also caused that once both sides were blocked, Then it can be said that the defenders in the city are unable to escape.
But generally speaking, this situation will not happen. After all, Baiting City is located between Yiyang and Jinyong City, and both places are stationed with strong soldiers. Once Baiting City is attacked, they will definitely come to rescue as soon as possible.
But now Fufeng King Ke Zhu Hunyuan in Jinyong City is being stared at by Li Tai's troops and cannot move. Yiyang, in order to prepare for the Western Wei army that may arrive at any time, does not dare to relax and has no time to divide its troops to come for reinforcements.
As for Baiting City, it was besieged by barbarian tribes and was in danger.
There are currently more than 3,000 troops stationed in Baiting City, but most of them are money, food and materials. Especially the Northern Qi Dynasty also followed the Eastern Wei Dynasty's fan army system, or it was not changed in the short time since the founding of the country. Each fan soldier has ten soldiers near his town.
Five bolts of silk for military service meals.
Because Yiyang was on the front line of the battle, all the money and silk from Yiyang's men and horses were stored in Baiting City at the rear. This amounted to more than 200,000 pieces of silk. The storage of grain, grass and other materials was also very impressive.
At the beginning, there was no fear in Baiting City. There were 3,000 defenders in the city, which was by no means small in number. At the same time, they had sufficient money and food, not to mention that there were strong friendly forces on both sides who could come to reinforce at any time. Therefore, these barbarian soldiers actually dared to come here to attack.
Damn it, you are just looking for death!
But gradually the defenders discovered that the situation was not good. Not only were more and more barbarian troops gathering outside the city, but the reinforcements that should have appeared long ago were still missing. When these barbarians completely blocked Baiting City's external communication,
When they reached the passage, the defenders in the city panicked.
Although the supplies stored in the city were enough for them to last for two or three years, such an unusual situation was obviously not something that could be caused by the barbarians in front of them.
When I thought that there might be more powerful and fierce enemies behind these barbarians, panic spread in the city, and all kinds of rumors and speculations made the city noisy for a while.
Faced with this situation, the soldiers in the city did not dare to sit in the trapped city anymore, but began to actively rescue themselves, trying to break out of the siege and rescue themselves.
In front of the east gate of Baiting City, a fighting had just ended. The soldiers of the Qi army who were leaving the city to fight saw more and more enemy troops gathering here. It was difficult for them to break through, so they had no choice but to retreat.
"Brother is so powerful! Brother Bodhidharma is so powerful. I saw with my own eyes that you picked and killed a thief!"
When the Qi army, which had failed to break through, retreated to the city, the Wei soldiers who had entered to intercept them also retreated in response. Li Ya, who had been standing in front of the camp gate to watch the battle, greeted the soldiers who were accompanying the army with a smile on their faces, and clapped and cheered for them.
"Keep your voice down, keep your voice down..."
After Shuofeng heard this, his face suddenly turned red with embarrassment, and he scolded Li Ya in a low voice.
He did pick and kill an enemy soldier in the formation just now, but it was just a coincidence. When he turned around, his horse was cut off by the enemy general with a sword. To this day, the tiger's mouth still feels numb and painful. If it were not for the protection of several Zhang and other generals, I am afraid that he would have died.
It was difficult for him to retreat safely from the battlefield, so he was extremely embarrassed to hear Li Ya praise him.
The other young confidants were often assigned to fight in the battle for training. Because the general's order was to only encircle but not attack, their combat tasks were not heavy. Preventing the enemy from breaking through was treated as a training exercise.
The siege had been going on for ten days, and these barbarian soldiers were already quite out of control. A long and boring siege would inevitably increase the number of variables. But the general had already anticipated this and had made arrangements to deal with it.
In the evening, trumpets were blown again outside the camp, and hundreds of elite cavalry reinforcements marched in from the camp gate, and among their ranks were escorted hundreds of disgraced Northern Qi soldiers.
"General Li sent his elite cavalry to help again, and sniped and killed a bandit division reinforcements on the way!"
Soon the news spread throughout the camps, and the prisoners of the Qi army were also taken to Baiting City to show off, announcing to the defenders in the city that they were isolated and helpless, and all the troops who came to help were killed and captured.
After all this was done, the hundreds of fine cavalry reinforcements disbanded their armor and entered the camp to rest and recuperate. Another group of Jingzhou soldiers took the armor out of the camp at night, and then waited until tomorrow to return as reinforcements.
As for those prisoners of the Qi army, they were detained in the military camp. After all, more than 2,000 prisoners were captured at White Horse Temple in the First Battle, and a hundred of them were sent outside Baiting City every day to boost the morale of the army, and the remaining ones could last for more than ten days.