Mixed with salted fish in Hongwudang

Chapter 658: Can I finally start a family?

Hamadan is a small city that is not very spacious.

Because Timur fled again, the small town suddenly became lively.

Groups of soldiers in military uniforms walked through the streets, and occasionally nobles in gorgeous silks hurriedly walked down the streets.

All of this makes the natives of Hamadan City feel particularly strange.

It’s just that this novelty is not interesting, and even a little annoying.

Because of the arrival of these people, prices in Hamadan City have skyrocketed.

Originally, only one silver coin could buy hundreds of kilograms of grain, but now it takes three or more.

These noble men also ran out of salt, and all the livestock were bought by them at high prices.

Although these aristocratic gentlemen were very arrogant and would just throw away a bag of money and take advantage of them, but fortunately they gave a lot of money, so no trouble was caused.

Therefore, the residents of the city also have very mixed feelings about these uninvited guests.I hope they leave quickly and make the city of Hamadan clean as soon as possible.He also hoped that they would stay a little longer and exchange the last bits of rags at home into money.

Compared with the embarrassment of other noble gentlemen, the life of Timur, the sultan, was not easy either.

Even if he requisitioned the city lord's house, he would still have a hard time living there.

Fortunately, he was not a person who cared about food and housing. After escaping to Hamadan City, he had been paying close attention to the battle in Isfahan.

In fact, he had made thorough preparations before escaping this time. Even if he could not deliver a fatal blow to Ming Dynasty, he could at least delay Ming Dynasty for ten and a half days.

First of all, they predicted the Ming Dynasty's garrison camp and sent people in advance to dig a secret tunnel directly outside the city, intending to let the defenders go out from the tunnel to attack the city at night.

Secondly, he also ambushed a surprise force in the mountains near Isfahan, intending to wait for the Ming Dynasty to attack the city and suddenly attack, catching the Ming Dynasty off guard.

Finally, he also upgraded Isfahan's defense system and placed a large number of artillery on the city.

Although the quality of his artillery cannot be compared with that of the Ming Dynasty, it is still something that can be discharged by loading gunpowder and iron sand.

If the soldiers of the Ming Dynasty attacked the city, they would definitely be killed and injured.

However, Timur predicted everything, except that Ming Dynasty changed its general this time to someone who had never fought against him.

Chang Sheng has no other characteristics in fighting, he just wants stability.

This character of his is something that Lan Yu looks down upon, and she always laughs at him for fighting like a girl, dawdling and grinding.

However, no matter how Lan Yu mocks her, Lan Yu still goes her own way.

Zhu Yunxi determined how long it would take for the artillery to fire a round of artillery, and he would not let go even for a second.

Zhu Yunxi said that he would use artillery to clear the way and knock down the opponent's defense facilities before sending infantry to attack the city. He firmly cut the opponent's battlements to flat ground until no one could be seen, and then sent his own infantry to attack the city.

In short, this is a stupid general who does not seek merit, but seeks no faults.

However, it was such a fool who somehow escaped the many traps set by Timur.

Chang Sheng arrived in the Isfahan area and set up camp when he was still more than ten miles away from Isfahan.

This made the defenders in the city so angry that their teeth almost broke!
Because the place where Chang Sheng set up camp was six miles away from the tunnel exit they had prepared in advance!

Originally, according to His Majesty Timur's idea, they could suddenly appear behind Chang Sheng's army and launch a surprise attack on them.

Good thing now, if they want to make a sneak attack, they can only appear in front of them and fight them head-on...

What a slap in the face, as long as they dare to show their heads, the fire cannons from the opposite side can beat them into sieves!
The surprise troops that Timur arranged in the mountains were of no use, because the battle they expected did not appear, and the defenders in the city did not even move at all.

On the next day, Chang Sheng's troops had enough to eat and drink, and took an hour to walk the remaining ten miles. Before morning, they arrived at the gates of Isfahan.

Chang Sheng, who was cautious, still let his artillery regiment fire two rounds of artillery before dinner.

The defenders in the city finally withstood these two rounds of artillery. They thought they would be able to relax in the afternoon, but it turned out that Chang Sheng's troops did not want to have lunch. The artillery fire did not stop throughout the afternoon and kept chipping away the soil at the top of the city. It doesn't stop until it's one foot high.

At night, the defenders in the city planned to implement His Majesty Tamerlane's top tactics and find their way out of the tunnels in the city to catch Chang Sheng's army by surprise and attack them unprepared.

Unexpectedly, after an afternoon of cannon fire, the city head and the houses on both sides were blown into ruins, and the entrance to the tunnel was under the ruins...

Now it was impossible to steal the camp in the middle of the night. The defenders in the city could only watch the dawn eagerly, and then when Chang Sheng's army attacked the city, they launched the artillery prepared in advance and fired a few shots at the enemy troops who rushed in first.

Seeing that the opponent still had such firearms, Chang Sheng ordered the siege to be stopped on the spot, and once again brought in the artillery regiment to blast the city.

The bombardment lasted for three days. There was a round of artillery fire every hour for three days, which hit the defenders in the city without any effect.

On the fourth day, the defenders in the city couldn't stand it anymore and had no choice but to raise the white flag and surrender.

When Timur saw the battle report brought back by the escaped soldiers, he was so angry that he vomited blood on the spot.

So annoying!

Daming is so annoying!
I don't dare to fight with myself with real swords and guns, I will only fire cannons from a distance...

As everyone knows, if Zhu Yunxi hadn't been afraid of killing all the strong laborers in the Western Regions, he would have pushed across the Western Regions long ago.

Now that the Sultan Timur is still alive, it can only be said that he has benefited from the tens of millions of people in the Western Regions.

Timur saw that Ming Dynasty's firearms were so sharp that he did not leave any way for himself to survive. He continued to withdraw with his large troops the next day.

This time he withdrew very simply, all the way to Baghdad.

Originally, Timur thought he was leaving in disgrace, but as soon as he established a foothold in Baghdad, he received military reports from the rear.

It turned out that Chang Sheng's troops had reached Hamadan within two days of his departure.

It can be said that as long as he leaves a day or two late, he will be captured by the Ming Dynasty!

While Timur was glad that he had survived the disaster, he also considered how much wealth he had left and whether he still had the strength to fight against the Ming Dynasty.

Now he no longer dares to expect to drive the Ming Dynasty out of his own land. He just wants to defeat the Ming Dynasty once and for all, even if the cost is to risk the entire empire!

In order to lure Ming to attack, he ordered people to spread his news everywhere.Sometimes he said he was in Baghdad, and sometimes he said he was in Qazvin or Tabriz.

In short, it was all about setting up doubts and making Ming confused about where he was.

After he laid out his suspicions, Daming chose to divide his troops into three groups and attack the three cities respectively, as he expected.

Timur was so happy when he heard the news that he almost exploded on the spot. He only prayed for one thing now, and that was that the one who attacked him would not be that fool Chang Sheng.

I don't know if Pearl heard his prayer, or if Timur's childhood had some luck, the general who attacked Baghdad was really not Chang Sheng, but an unknown general of the Ming Dynasty, Li Yan.

In fact, it cannot be said that Timur was not familiar with Li Yan at all. The first Ming general he faced was this guy.

But at that time, he didn't want to get too serious with Daming, so he faced off with Li Yan across the river for more than a month.

This time when he learned that Li Yan was coming to attack him, Timur laughed like a night owl.

"Pearl bless!"

"I finally have the chance to defeat Daming, hahaha!"

Faced with Timur's maniacal laughter, Timur's remaining generals were stunned.

They haven't won against Ming Dynasty since then. I really don't know where your majesty got the confidence.

Ali Muad looked at Timur worriedly, thinking that his majesty must have been driven crazy by the Ming Dynasty, right?

"Your Majesty, do you have another clever trick to deal with Ming Dynasty?"

"Yes!"

"I have thought of a way to deal with Daming!"

"The order!"

"Dig trenches!" As a rising general of the Ming Dynasty, Li Yan had a brilliant record of defending an isolated city for a month, so he was naturally trained by the Ming Dynasty military.

Both Lao Zhu and Lan Yu thought highly of this new general and specially arranged for him to be the chief general in the three-way army of the Western Expedition.

Li Yan was also very up to date. After taking over as the commander-in-chief, he was very strict in everything he did and no longer had the frivolousness and indulgence of the past.

However, when he led the army into the Baghdad area, he was instantly stunned by the scene in front of him.

When we were still thirty miles away from Baghdad, all the roads along the way were dug into trenches one after another.

The soil dug out from the trenches was laid on the ground to form earth walls.

"what's the situation?"

The scout flew to report.

"Report!"

"General, for some reason, the enemy dug dozens of trenches in front of us."

"Is there an ambush?"

"Back to General, I didn't find anything along the way, but I don't know anything further away!"

"Explore again!"

"promise!"

While Li Yan was waiting to continue his exploration, he also ordered his soldiers to dismount and repair the road.

Otherwise, even if the men and horses can pass, the heavy artillery they bring cannot.

Just after Li Yan filled in a trench, the scouts from the front flew back again.

"Report!"

"No enemy troops found ahead!"

When Li Yan learned that there were no enemy troops, he suddenly became bolder and ordered all the soldiers to dismount and fill the road to clear obstacles for the following artillery units.

It took them three full days to reach the gates of Baghdad, a short distance of thirty miles.

Li Yan looked at the nearby Baghdad city wall, scolding Timur's soldiers as a group of groundhogs who only know how to dig holes, and felt sorry for his men.

The whole journey has exhausted them. Without a good rest for two days, even walking would be a problem, let alone fighting.

Li Yan immediately ordered his soldiers to set up camp. After arranging warning measures, Li Yan ordered the soldiers to rest where they were.

While they were resting, Timur was not idle.

The trenches that Li Yan had filled in after three days of hard work were dug up one after another after they left, and were advanced layer by layer around Li Yan's camp.

Another army of Tamerlane used straw as pillows and pushed catapults into the battlefield.

After everything was ready, Timur immediately ordered thirty catapults to be launched together.

There was a lit jar on the catapult, which was filled with burning oil.

As the rope restraining the catapults was loosened, the catapults accurately poured heavy fire oil into Li Yan's army.

Not long after, Li Yan's military camp was ablaze with gas and flames.

Li Yan knew immediately that he had been attacked by a sneak attack, but he did not panic and quickly ordered people to find sand and gravel to put out the fire.

However, just when he was about to put out the fire, thirty more burning jars fell from the sky, burning his military camp into a sea of ​​flames again.

Fortunately, the soldiers who had just participated in putting out the fire were not panicked by this thing. They knew that this thing could be extinguished with sand.

However, just as they were trying their best to extinguish the fire, they heard shouts of killing rising from all directions.

When Li Yan heard the sound, he didn't care about putting out the fire. He quickly ordered the soldiers to take up positions and violently designed towards the outside of the military camp.

However, what puzzled Li Yan was that after several rounds of fire cannons, the shouts of killing around him not only did not weaken, but became stronger and stronger, and they were getting closer and closer to him.

It turned out that Tamerlane had already figured out the details of the Ming gunfire and knew that they would have a short pause after firing a round.

His men took advantage of this interval to rush on their way, and they didn't have to go far, as long as they could run from one trench to the next.

As long as you run into the trenches, no matter how many muskets the opponent fires, they won't be able to hurt them.

Moreover, Heitian was blind, and the opponent's musket was not very accurate, so it was hard to say whether he could hit the target or not.

In this way, Timur's army crossed one trench after another, and when they were only twenty feet away from Li Yan, the weapons in their hands finally came into play.

For a moment, bows, arrows, muskets, hand cannons, etc. all came to greet the Ming army camp, and in a short time they defeated the surrounded Ming army.

Li Yan was also confused by the firepower outside. He didn't know how many people were outside, let alone what weapons the enemy troops outside were equipped with.

What troubled him even more was that it was too dark at this time and he could not accurately judge the enemy's position.

However, whenever he shoots or fires cannons from his side, the firelight can always accurately reveal his position.

After injuring tens of thousands of people, Li Yan could only order his soldiers to huddle inside the camp and use the shelter of the camp to engage in sporadic exchanges of fire with the enemy troops outside.

Now Li Yan just looks forward to surviving the night. As soon as it breaks, he can clearly see the enemy's military deployment. With the invincible cannon in his hand, he can naturally kill them all.

However, Timur did not want him to wait until dawn. Seeing that the firepower output of the Ming army camp could not keep up, he immediately ordered 30 soldiers to launch a general attack.

These people rushed towards Li Yan's barracks with shouts. Even in the face of fierce fire from Li Yan's army, they rushed forward without fear of death.

Although the Ming Dynasty army had been working very hard to kill, there were too many enemies around them. Even if their muskets smoked out, they could not kill all the overwhelming enemies.

After persisting for several rounds, Timur's soldiers finally broke through the defense line and rushed into Li Yan's military camp.

Once a war descends into hand-to-hand combat, advanced weapons will no longer be able to exert their advantages.

Sword versus sword, spear versus lance.

The two sides struggled and became entangled, fighting for their respective countries.

Fortunately, Zhu Yunxi equipped the soldiers in this Western Expedition with a lot of palm mines, giving them at least one more way to die together when fighting hand-to-hand.

But even if the soldiers of the Ming Dynasty bravely killed the enemy regardless of life and death, they could not withstand the enemies rushing up from all over the mountains and plains.

At dawn, the battlefield was in chaos.

Timur looked at the 10,000+ soldiers who died tragically on the battlefield and felt his heart bleeding.

This time, he took advantage of the right time, location, and people to lure Li Yan's tribe to the gates of Baghdad and implemented the technique of ambush from all sides.

However, after a great battle, he still paid the price of 10,000+ casualties!
Li Yan looked at the corpses of Pao Ze beside him, and then at the Timurid soldiers who were aiming firecrackers at him. He calmly loaded the firecrackers with ammunition, and then raised the firecrackers high.

"Li Yan!"

"His Majesty the Sultan has an order. As long as you are willing to surrender, our Majesty the Sultan will not only not kill you, but will also betroth the princess to you..."

Li Yan frowned when he heard this, and then turned the gun towards himself.

"Thank you Sultan for me, and tell him for me that I think your princess is ugly and I don't want to be your consort!"

After Li Yan said these words, he looked at the rising morning glow on the horizon, and suddenly thought of what His Majesty the Emperor had said to him when he was still the grandson of the Emperor.

If the Xiongnu were not destroyed, how could they have a family?
Now that the Huns have been destroyed, Beiyuan has been destroyed, and Chagatai has been destroyed, can I finally start a family?

Li Yan thought of this and silently pulled the trigger.

(End of this chapter)