The attack and defense of Wuguan officially began in the early morning of June 15th.
The first to launch the attack were more than a dozen "flying stones" more than 200 steps outside the city. This siege equipment said to be made by Fan Li was more than ten feet tall. Operated by several people, it could throw stones as big as a human head.
, although the hit rate is extremely impressive, as long as the number is large enough, it is enough to hit the city defenders without raising their heads.
What's more, after Mo Zhe made some modifications, the range of the rebels' flying rocks was much farther than that of the official army. The dozens of flying rocks of the Northern Army behind the city could not pose a threat to them.
But they were enough to prevent the enemy from gathering a large number of troops close to the city wall. Flying stones could not damage the thick rammed earth wall, but they were enough to smash the heads of the heavily armed soldiers with blood.
Fortunately, the hit rate of flying rocks is really too low. Both sides come and go, but most of the flying rocks unfortunately miss the target, and very few people die. Only the truly unlucky ones will have their heads blown off by a stone.
Another type of siege weapon is much more accurate. It is a huge crossbow machine made by Mo Zhe. Originally, Heifu wanted to call it the "Big Yellow Crossbow", but the army sergeants often called it the "Big Black Crossbow".
", which means "made by the Mohist and used by the Black Lord", so it became a common name.
This type of crossbow is huge and requires two people to operate it. It uses a spear as an arrow and can hit the city gate almost directly from a hundred and fifty paces away. It is accompanied by a huge tremor, and the spear tip seems to penetrate through the wood...
Obviously, the city gate was the enemy's main attack target. From morning to noon, they launched one round of offensives. Under the cover of arrows and charging cars, the brave men approached the city gate.
Wang Li was behind the city and could hear the roar of the wood being struck. It was undoubtedly the battering ram hidden under the assault vehicle being used in the battle. Although the wooden door was thick, it creaked like the groan of a dying giant.
Fortunately, he had people completely block the city gate with stone strips and bricks, and it was so tight that even if the wooden gate was completely destroyed, it would still be impossible to pass through, thus preventing thieves from breaking into the most vulnerable area of Wuguan.
Throughout the whole day of the 15th, despite testing the city gates several times, the rebels still failed to attack the city with ladder ants. They probably realized that the success rate was not high. The Northern Army defended against the wall, which gave them a huge advantage.
.The attacker often makes great sacrifices but cannot achieve the goal.
So in order to break through the city, the attacker must use all his ingenuity!
After Gongshuyu stood on the watchtower more than ten feet above the city wall and observed for a period of time, he came down and told Wang Li: "General Wang, all this is an illusion made by Hei Fu in order to trick our army into going all out to defend the city gate."
"The real battle in this battle is underground!"
Wang Li was very alert: "Did the acupoint master hear the noise?"
"That's not the case yet."
Gongshu reported: "But what I saw on the watchtower was that the enemy was covered by a tent hundreds of steps away, more than a hundred steps long. There were many figures behind him, and there were inexplicably more earth and rocks, piled up into mountains, and there was muddy water.
It often flows out. In my opinion, this is a sign that the enemy is digging a burrow..."
He said firmly: "They want to attack the city in caves!"
…
War forced people to use their brains. In order to overcome the obstacles of the city, as early as the Spring and Autumn Period, fire and water attacks were used in sequence. The enemies Mozi and Lu Ban even thought of making wooden kites from the air.
Since your imagination has reached to the sky, the thick earth under your feet will naturally not be ignored.
In this way, the "hole siege" method emerged.
It is said that more than 300 years ago, Zheng Zizhan and Zichan of Zheng State drove 700 handsome chariots to attack Chen. They dug tunnels into Chen City at night and fell into it. From then on, the method of digging tunnels to attack the city began. By the Warring States Period, this
This method has become relatively common, and Mozi wrote a special article "Preparing Acupoints" for this technique.
How to detect that the enemy is digging a tunnel? In addition to building a watchtower to carefully observe the enemy's situation, you must also use your ears:
Dig a deep pit by the wall, place a large urn in the pit, cover the urn with leather, and then send people to listen carefully. If the enemy digs a tunnel, they will be able to detect the movement.
Sure enough, the next day, the "acupoint master" lying in a large urn of cold water reported the situation:
"Mr. Gongshu, the rebels dug several tunnels, leading to the city wall, and then stopped again..."
Now the public transportation is basically confirmed.
"They are using the method of burning holes in the ground and burning tunnels! They are tying pillars and setting fire to destroy our city!"
The cave city technique can be subdivided into two categories: one is relatively primitive, digging a tunnel through the city wall and leading directly into the city. Soldiers enter the city from the tunnel to eliminate the enemy. However, this method can only be used when the attackers are outnumbered and the defenders are outnumbered, and cannot be guarded.
Discovered, otherwise sending a few people in through the narrow tunnel will simply give the other party heads.
Another method is more commonly used: setting fire to the pillars in the tunnel, causing the tunnel roof to collapse, destroying the foundation of the city wall, and thus collapsing the city wall!
The one used by the rebels should obviously be the latter.
"Preparing Points" makes it very clear that if the enemy digs tunnels to attack the city, the defenders should also go straight to meet the enemy, dig tunnels in the direction of the enemy's points, attack the points with holes, and eliminate the enemy underground!
So the defenders also responded tit-for-tat, and began to dig horizontal tunnels based on the positions determined by the cave masters.
Most of the people sent by the Northern Expedition to dig tunnels were miners from Tonglu Mountain. They were sent to the front line by Wei Jing. They were promised that as long as they completed this task, everyone would be knighted. Heifu provided them with the best
shovel and the so-called "sapper's shovel".
Everyone is like a group of moles in the dark, digging with iron tools in the dark underground. Sometimes they are unlucky and encounter rock masses. It's okay to just go back. Sometimes they dig underground veins and pour muddy water back.
There is a risk of death.
The worst scenario is to dig a well dug hole, but suddenly the front becomes empty, and the enemy comes, armed with a weapon, and then they meet on a narrow road, the brave one wins.
A tunnel battle started like this five feet underground. It was cruel but no one recorded the process. After all, in those closed places, a fight to the death with red faces and holding the opponent's weapon, even using teeth and nails, has no heroic atmosphere. Warriors
Passion.
There is only suffocating tension and discomfort, and cruelty.
The place is narrow, and the tunnels are often blocked by those who died in battle. As their whereabouts are discovered by the enemy, a long tunnel dug with great effort is abandoned. If the attackers do not retreat in time, smoke may still be waiting for them.
Drowning in smoke...
In this way, after blocking the three tunnels like a rat's hole, the cave master reported that the enemy seemed to have suspended the excavation of the tunnels.
It seems that the attack has been repelled, but it is impossible to say when the enemy will come again. This is the method that the Mohists came up with themselves: sending dogs on duty at the entrance of each well to "judge the location of the hole and dig the hole to welcome it."
They are very vigilant and will bark whenever they detect any movement.
"Why isn't there a black dog?"
Gongshu glanced at the dog sent from the rear and asked casually that the people who defended the city were often superstitious and needed to use black dog blood to break the evil barrier.
"Your Majesty ordered that all the black dogs in Guanzhong be slaughtered."
The Shaofu officials who came from Xianyang shook their heads. A wizard said that "there is an emperor's spirit in the southeast." The second emperor was afraid that he was referring to Heifu. He believed that this would greatly dampen Heifu's luck, and called the operation
It's called "sweeping out crime."
The Shaofu official muttered: "It's unclear whether the gangster spirit has been taken away, but the price of dog meat in Xianyang has plummeted recently..."
"Absurd." Gongshu shook his head: "It's really ridiculous." He began to doubt whether his choice was correct.
However, the enemy seemed to have given up digging holes in the ground to attack the city. Instead, they blatantly used rawhide-covered oar curtains to reach the city wall. Under the cover of its heavy wooden roof, they sent people to start digging holes at the foot of the city wall, every few feet deep.
Then they erected the top pillars and dug deeper and deeper.
How could Wang Li let them get what they wanted? He immediately ordered people to kill him with stones, and even let those who dared to die fall from ropes. Braving the flying rocks and arrows sent by the enemy formation, he repelled this wave of attacks, and the enemy suddenly came to dig under the city.
The small pits that were opened were blocked by bricks and rubble thrown down...
On the evening of the 16th, the rebels stopped attacking again. After the wounded soldiers tried to snatch the bodies back from the city to no avail, they withdrew to the camp. It seemed that their vigor was not as strong as it was at the beginning.
"The attack on the city in the cave is fruitless. Now the black thieves are at their wits' end. I'm afraid they will have to attack with all the ants tomorrow!"
Wang Li was afraid that Hei Fu would not attack head-on. He would defend and He would attack. In a head-to-head battle, Wang Li was confident enough to kill enough rebels.
Gong Shuyu was a little worried: "Although the dogs under the city did not bark loudly, it is possible that the thieves took advantage of the noise and chaos during the day and dug many tunnels, opened them under the city wall, and stopped moving. Therefore, the cave master has not heard of it.
, we must be on guard."
"So what if he secretly burned one or two places? How can it be so easy to collapse if the three-unit earth is used as a fortress?" Wang Li disagreed.
But at this moment, Hou Wang came to report that there were bunches of torches in the bandit camp, and they were marching in formation, and there were even soldiers shouting orders in front of them, as if they were really going to attack all night...
"Night attack?"
When Wang Li came to the city, he was not worried but happy: "The black bandit is really arrogant. He thinks that we are defenseless. Doesn't he know that a night attack is even more disadvantageous to the attacker? I think he is at his wits' end and makes repeated moves..."
However, before Wang Li finished speaking, he felt a flash before his eyes, and saw a blazing spark suddenly explode above his head, that is, over Wuguan City, along with a scream!
It is like the sparks that a blacksmith strikes when he hits the iron, which splashes out. It is also like the countless meteors that fell from the sky in the past thirty-seven years. They look hot and dazzling, but they are fleeting...
The incident happened suddenly, Wang Li opened his mouth wide, and everyone in the city looked at each other, and they all saw surprise in each other's eyes.
There are also blossoming lights that explode again.
The sparks came again, and this time the Wuguan guards saw them clearly. They took off from the rebel camp a hundred steps away, and with a burst of white smoke and pungent breath, they flew diagonally towards the head of Wuguan City, and again over it.
explode.
This time it was no longer a single number, but several, dozens, and even hundreds! First there was a weird scream, and then there was a crackling and piercing sound, which startled the dogs in Wuguan City to bark wildly.
In this bombardment of fire and rain, Wang Li was still standing. Thousands of defenders who had just rubbed their eyes and stood up to meet the enemy, and even the hundred thousand troops waiting behind Wuguan were all as stunned as chickens, and some people sat down.
On the ground, some people knelt down and kowtowed.
"It's Chu Yue witchcraft!"
In this unprecedented scorching spark, chaos and panic swept across the city. The soldiers on the city could not hold the spears in their hands. The civilians even ran away with their heads in their hands, trying to avoid it. Some people even loudly bowed their heads and begged for mercy, making horrified screams.
voice.
"Is it really a punishment from ghosts and gods? Was it borrowed by the Mohist?"
Wang Li lost his voice for a moment, and Gong Shuyu couldn't calm down, and retreated step by step. The poet often said "Ming Gui", could today's strange fireworks that ordinary people can't imagine have something to do with this?
He suddenly remembered something and shouted:
"Quickly, kill a few black dogs and splash their blood on the city to break the rebels' evil spell!"
"Mr. Gongshu!"
The official of the Shaofu next to him was anxious and frightened, with a mournful face: "Didn't I tell you that all the black dogs have been slaughtered by Your Majesty, let alone Wuguan, there is not even a single black dog in the hundreds of miles of the pass!"