Xu Wei, the captain of light vehicles, was one of the core members of the Western Army.
The right-hand man of General Song Hui.
Some time ago, after Song Hui left Shule Town, Xu Wei became the garrison general of Shule Town, leading the 7,000 Western Expeditionary Army to guard the important border town.
In early June, the Huns' patrol horses frequently appeared around Shule Town again.
Xu Wei knew that the next big battle was coming.
The fortifications outside Shule Town have been urgently reinforced and repaired, and have become relatively complete, which can play a role in delaying the enemy's attack in city defense warfare.
But this only applies to situations where both sides have similar military strength.
The Xiongnu attacked Shule Town this time and actually dispatched an army of 200,000!
General Song Hui immediately sensed something was wrong and sent reinforcements of 10,000 troops to Shule Town.
However, the reinforcements encountered the Huns not far from the city.
It turned out that in order to prevent rescue from Gumo Prefecture and Qiuci, the Xiongnu also sent 50,000 harassing troops to these two important towns.
The reinforcements would not be able to reach Shule Town for a while, so Xu Wei could only hold on to the city on his own.
On the seventh day of June, the Huns began to attack.
The initial attack only used slave soldiers to charge and destroy the fortifications outside the city.
These are not the main force of the Huns, but they cannot be watched to destroy the fortifications.
The crossbows and flying stones in the city began to attack the slave soldiers.
This kind of battle was not fierce. The slave soldiers were just clearing obstacles, and the main force of the Huns did not attack.
On June 11, after the slave soldiers consumed one or two thousand people, the blocking fortifications outside the city were completely destroyed.
The Xiongnu army can already reach the city.
On June 12, the Huns launched a high-intensity siege.
The catapults never stopped from morning to night.
Countless stones flew across the sky towards Shule City, seeming to pile up a stone staircase under the city wall.
"General! The Huns have so many catapults that they can't even lift their heads!"
"Don't worry! Let's wait until their catapults stop before we stand up! Just hide and don't show up!"
Although catapults attack intensively, they cannot replace manpower to climb the city.
To mobilize manpower, the catapult must be stopped.
Sure enough, half an hour after the catapult hit, the Huns' horn sounded.
"Get ready to fight!" Xu Wei knew that the real battle had just begun.
The wave of rocks just now was just an appetizer.
"Rolling stone! Quick! Rolling stone!"
"Hold the javelin securely, then throw it after twenty steps!"
"Archers, don't stop! Keep shooting!"
The Huns soldiers shouted and rushed forward, and Xu Wei calmly directed the defenders' counterattack.
For today's battle, Xu Wei prepared a large number of thunder stones and rolling wood.
The Huns charged for a while, but were pushed back by the counterattack from the city head.
Then there was another catapult attack.
The catapult stopped and the men charged again.
The Xiongnu's method of attack was mainly to destroy the defenders' will to fight.
Wave after wave of stone rain and impact, if you don't have a firm will to fight, you will be defeated quickly.
But the Zhengxi Army was all elite troops from Daqian, and they were very familiar with the Huns' tactics.
Even the city head of Shule City has been specially reconstructed.
Behind the crenellations at the top of the city, a row of sloping roofs was installed.
As soon as the catapult is launched, the soldiers will hide under the sloping roof.
In this way, the damage caused by the catapult to the defenders is very small.
If you avoid the damage from the catapult, it will be much easier to defend the city again.
At night, after a day of fighting, the soldiers were exhausted, but they did not dare to relax at all.
The Huns' attack did not stop. There were so many of them that they divided into three shifts and attacked continuously.
There were only 7,000 defenders, and the defense of Shule Town could only be divided into two shifts.
As a result, the rest time is far less than that of the Huns.
The first day's battle was fine, but as time went on, the Iron Man would also collapse.
"General. Big and small Bolu's men will attack the Huns tonight. Should we take advantage of the darkness to counterattack?" General Pi suggested.
The last time the Huns attacked, the nearby tribes harassed the Huns, which greatly helped the city defense battle.
"I'm afraid the results won't be very good this time! The Huns are not fools. They were not prepared last time and we were caught off guard. If they come back this time, they won't make the same mistake again!"
Xu Wei said with a heavy expression.
"Woooooo~"
As he was talking, a horn sounded in the distance, and it was the men of Big and Little Bolu who took action.
Xu Wei climbed up on a wheel and lay on the crenel looking into the distance.
It was late at night and it was impossible to see what was happening in the distance.
But there were faint shouts of death and horn sounds, and some firelight could be seen flickering on the horizon.
"General! Are you leaving the city?" General Pi looked at Xu Wei.
Xu Wei paused for a moment with solemn brows and then said only four words:
"Hold the city!"
In the distance, behind the Huns' flanks, a battle was breaking out.
The cavalry of Big and Little Bulu launched a sneak attack on the Huns with rockets.
However, the Huns were well prepared, and the cavalry quickly attacked and got mixed up with the men and horses of Big and Little Bulu.
The sneak attack turned into an encounter. Of course, Big and Little Bolu were no match for the Huns, and they were quickly killed and fled in all directions.
"What should we do? The Huns have learned a lot now. If they fail today, they may not succeed tomorrow."
"The order given by my king is to harass the Huns, not to fight to the death with them. Since the harassment fails, it is better to withdraw the troops and go back."
"This... maybe there will be results tomorrow? How about staying another day?"
"Then...then stay for one more day!"
The two generals, Big and Little Bolu, got together to discuss whether to stay or leave.
Some people suggested leaving, others suggested staying one more day.
Finally decided to stay one more day to see the results.
Late at night, the shouts of killing from the Huns' rear gradually disappeared.
Not long after, the Huns' front army launched another siege.
"The Huns were indeed prepared, and Big and Little Bolu were defeated." Xu Wei said calmly.
"Will they withdraw?" General Pi asked, looking at the Huns attacking below the city.
"Stay one more day at most. If the attack fails tomorrow, they will definitely withdraw." Xu Wei seemed to have heard the conversation between the big and small generals.
In fact, he was very familiar with the people of Big and Little Bolu.
They will help, but they won't fight to the death. This is the current situation.
"We have to rely on ourselves to defend the city! Tell our brothers, the Western Region is Daqian's Western Region, and we can no longer retreat!"
"Behind us are Gumo Prefecture and Shule Town! If we retreat further, these two places will become the front line."
"Once these three towns are lost, the entire Western Region will be lost!"
"Since we have become an army to conquer the West, we must be with the Western Regions!"
"I will defend Shule Town to the death!"
Xu Wei's words became more and more calm, and his eyes were full of perseverance.
General Pi clasped his fists and went to convey Xu Wei's order.
"Swear to defend Shule Town to the death!"
"Swear to defend Shule Town to the death!"
"Swear to defend Shule Town to the death!"
Soon a continuous shouting sounded from the top of the city.
The morale of the defenders was boosted and they quickly repelled the Huns' attack.
At dawn on June 13, the Huns' attack temporarily stopped.
A man who looked like a general walked out of the military formation.
"Listen to the defenders of Shule Town, you are now surrounded, and there is only one way to die if you continue to hold on! Surrender immediately, and the king can save your lives!"
It turned out that this person was here to persuade him to surrender.
The Shule garrison fought very tenaciously and repelled four Huns attacks in one day.
There were two to three thousand corpses lying under the city.
The Huns found that the city was difficult to fight, so they came to persuade them to surrender with the attitude of giving it a try.
"Are you a Dagan person?" Xu Wei looked at the man and shouted.
"Yes! I am from Longyou Road..."
"Fire the arrow!"
Before the man finished speaking, Xu Wei ordered the archers to shoot in succession.
Although the man was not shot, he was so frightened that he fled back to the military formation.
"What a bastard! As a Dagan man, but you went to work for the Huns, your conscience was eaten by a dog!"
"If you dare to come out again, you will be killed!"
Xu Wei yelled and cursed.
He lived on the border for many years and fought with the Huns for half his life.
Many of his colleagues around him died at the hands of the Huns.
This contradiction is almost impossible to alleviate.
Xu Wei felt contempt and hatred for those traitors who had taken refuge with the Huns.
If this person dares to come out to persuade him to surrender, Xu Wei will of course give him a severe blow.
"Uuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu"
When the Huns saw that they could not persuade them to surrender, they immediately started a new round of attack.
The arduous offensive and defensive battle continued for another day.
During the night, the Huns' attack did not stop.
Even when Big and Little Bulu sneak attacked the flank again, the Huns' attack did not stop.
Yesterday, during the sneak attack of Big and Little Bolu, the Huns' attack also temporarily stopped.
Although they were prepared, they did not take the risk of fighting on both sides.
After yesterday's battle, the Huns knew that the fighting power of Big and Little Bolu was insufficient, and they did not take them seriously at all.
The siege of the city continued.
"General! Go and rest! You haven't slept for two days!" General Pi persuaded Xu Wei.
Xu Wei's eyes were red and bloodshot.
The previous wave of attacks was repulsed, and the defenders took advantage of a short gap to complete the change of defense.
Xu Wei still wanted to resist, but the moment he stood up, he fell into a trance and almost fell down.
"Come here! Help the general down to the city!" General Pi greeted.
Xu Wei was sent off to the top of the city by his guards, who forced him to rest.
That night, Xu Wei had a dream, dreaming of his hometown.
A hometown with beautiful mountains and clear waters.
There are the laughter of relatives and friends, and the simple and rich local accent.
"Woooooo!" A horn sounded, breaking Xu Wei's dream.
"General! The Huns are coming to the city!"
"what happened!"
"The Huns attack regardless of casualties, brothers really can't handle it anymore!"
There were too many Huns soldiers.
Seven thousand versus two hundred thousand, one to twenty, Shule Town is a lonely boat in the sea and is in danger of capsizing at any time.
In the early morning of June 14th, the Huns finally rushed onto the city wall by the light of dawn.
Xu Wei led the defenders in the city to rush towards the lost city wall.
It took a whole morning and hundreds of elites were lost before the city was finally recaptured.
But this time the city fell, it became the beginning of a curse.
The city walls of Shule Town began to collapse one after another.
Xu Wei could only put out fires everywhere.
But the fatigue of the soldiers was already written on their faces.
High-intensity combat has made people exhausted.
Today, the men of Big and Little Bolu did not attack the Huns. Just as Xu Wei said, they withdrew.
The Shule and Loulan tribes also basically stopped harassing the Huns.
Because the Huns sent several soldiers and horses to block them all at the outside.
The fighting in Gumo Prefecture did not stop, but it was an encounter outside the city.
In order to rescue Shule Town, Song Hui sent multiple reinforcements, but they were all intercepted by the Huns.
"General. Huns also appeared in the direction of Dashi City!"
"Gushi Mountain was also occupied by the Huns!"
There are Huns in two important places near Gumo Prefecture.
Their attitude was very resolute, that is, to stop the reinforcements from Gumo Prefecture and Qiucizhen from rescuing Shule Town.
Song Hui's face looked ugly.
The lack of troops made him very angry.
The war has reached this point and we are completely passive.
"General! Shule Town can't be saved, let them break out!" Wang Xiao said with a sad face.
He was originally the guard of Broken Leaf. After Broken Leaf was lost, Wang Xiao led his men to break out of the encirclement and returned to the rear with Song Hui's support.
Zhang Zhou shook his head and said: "We can't notify Xu Wei at all! There are so many Huns in Gumo Prefecture and Qiuci, and there are more enemy troops on his side, so there is no way to deliver the message! Now we can only hope that he will withdraw early."
Come out!"
Song Hui stood up and said with a gloomy face: "Xu Wei will not withdraw. He will definitely defend Shule Town."
Zhang Zhou and others all looked gloomy. They knew that Song Hui was right, and Xu Wei's character would definitely stick to it.
"If Shule Town cannot be defended, the Huns' next target will be Gumo Prefecture!"
"It is true that Shule Town cannot be saved at this point, but we cannot sit still and wait for death!"
"Even if Xu Wei died for the country, we still have to find someone to bury him with!"
The wrinkles on Song Hui's face twitched slightly, and his eyes were filled with murderous intent.
Since Shule Town cannot be saved, then the 100,000 Huns soldiers who have penetrated deep into Gumo Prefecture and Qiuci will be eaten!
Burying Xu Wei with 100,000 people is all the old leader can do now.
After giving up the idea of rescuing Shule Town, the battle in Gumo Prefecture was easier to fight.
Although the Huns still had the numerical advantage, their equipment was not as good as that of the Western Army.
Moreover, among the 100,000 Huns sent to block the attack, there were not many elites. Their task was only to delay the reinforcements of the Western Expeditionary Army, and they did not intend to attack the city.
With room for maneuver, Song Hui immediately began to mobilize his troops and generals.
Soon they won a victory at Kucha and annihilated 7,000 Xiongnu front troops.
Immediately afterwards, Gumozhou also began to fight back.
First, they sent a group of troops to pretend to support Shule Town, and then rode westward to lure the Huns to intercept the pursuit.
When the Huns' battle line stretched, Zhang Zhou suddenly rushed out from the flank and divided the Huns' troops into two sections.
The Xiongnu soldiers were ambushed and immediately went into chaos. More than 20,000 people were wiped out on Balmianpo, fifty miles south of Dashi City.
Such an operation actually opened up the situation, and the rescue channel to Shule Town was opened!
Song Hui immediately sent 20,000 cavalry troops straight to Shule Town.
However, it is already June 18th!
On the morning of the 19th, Xu Wei, dragging his exhausted body, once again repelled the Huns who came to the city.
But this time it took a whole night to repel the Huns.
"General! We have used up all the thunder stones and rolling wood, and every brother is injured. This city... I'm afraid we can't defend it." General Pi had a bandage on his arm, and there was a scar at the corner of his eye.
"How many brothers are there?" Xu Wei asked in a hoarse voice, leaning under the battlements.
"Less than four thousand!" Pi Jiang shook his head and said.
The high-intensity battle lasted for seven days, and the number of defenders in the city increased from 7,000 to more than 3,000!
Nearly half of the battle was lost, and this was still the side defending the city!
This shows how brutal the battle was.
The losses on the Xiongnu side have exceeded 15,000, but the Huns have so many people that they will die!
"The Huns are preparing for a bigger offensive. I'm afraid this city will really be lost next time."
"Kuang Jing! If this city is really lost, after I die, it will be up to you and your brothers to break out."
Xu Wei said calmly, already having a death wish in his heart.
"General! Brothers must die together!"
"Yes! Let's die together!"
General Pi Kuang Jing and the guards around him refused to leave at all.
Xu Wei looked at the resolute faces of everyone, smiled and said, "That's fine. Perhaps being shrouded in horse leather is our fate!"
Kuang Jing said with a ferocious expression: "General, the Huns are trying to kill me and destroy my home. We are determined to fight them to the death!"
"Yes! Fight to the end!" The guards all clenched their fists and vowed to fight to the death.
"Okay! Then let's fight them! Send the order and kill all the horses in the city! Reward the whole army! Fight to the death with the Huns!"
Xu Wei stood up and looked at the surging Huns below the city, and issued the order for a decisive battle.
To kill the horses is to destroy the boat.
The defenders no longer had any possibility of escape.
We can only fight to the death with the Huns!
Late at night on the 19th, it was another day of fighting.
The soldiers who defended the city had reached the point where they were exhausted.
At midnight, the Huns rushed to the city again.
"Put down your weapons! The king will spare your names!"
The man who had called for surrender before was also on the city wall under the protection of the Huns soldiers.
When Xu Wei saw him, he was furious and killed him with a big sword.
The Huns swarmed up and surrounded Xu Wei.
"Surrender quickly! Shule City can no longer be defended! As a general, if you surrender, you will definitely be reused!" The man was still persuading.
"Surrender! I will only die standing there!" Xu Wei shouted, and at the same time threw out a dagger.
He took the dagger and passed through the gap in the crowd, inserting it straight into the man's throat.
"Ahem!"
The man fell to the ground coughing up blood.
Although the traitors were killed, there were more and more Huns.
Looking at the Huns all over the city, Xu Wei knew that the end of Shule City had come.
I will also follow the path of my grandfather.
The Xu family is a family of generals, and his grandfather was the commander-in-chief of the Western Army of the former dynasty.
He died in the Western Regions when he was conquering the Huns.
He has been with Song Hui since he was in the army.
After going round and round, I actually came to the land of the Western Regions.
The hatred against the Huns was a feud for generations.
"kill!"
Seeing the Huns emerging from the city, Xu Wei burst out with his final strength.
"puff!"
A short spear was inserted into Xu Wei's chest, and his life stopped at this moment.
"General!" General Pi Kuang Jing shouted heartbreakingly.
"Kill! Revenge for the general!"
The remaining soldiers rose up to kill the enemy.
But they were still outnumbered, and each soldier had to face two or three enemies.
More and more defenders fell.
But no one surrendered. They were all working hard, risking their lives to defend the territory and risking their lives to fulfill their mission!
…
June 20, noon.
Twenty thousand reinforcements from Gumo Prefecture finally arrived in Shule Town.
But the king's flag was changed at the top of the city, and everything was settled.
Zhang Zhou looked at the city head of Shule Town silently for a long time without saying anything.
He knew that Xu Wei died in the battle, and he knew the character of his comrade Bao Ze, and he would not surrender just to survive.