Lin'an Never Night

Chapter 790: A Teacher is a Teacher After All
It is only more than 20 kilometers from Dasanguan to Baoji.

If Tangkuo Wuye wanted to withdraw his troops, he didn't even need to retreat in turns and deploy his troops in an orderly manner.

He only needed to issue an order, and within half a day, the entire army had retreated into Baoji City.

When Shi Han discovered that the Jin army's flags were withdrawing, this was already the last armed force of the Jin army, the army that was attacking the city.

However, Shi Han was not in a hurry to chase after the remnants of Tang Kuo Wuye's troops.

If we leave the pass at this time, the army will not be able to move around, and by the time we reach the flat land, it will be too late to chase us.

Because Baoji City is too close.

Therefore, Shi Han ignored the Jin army's retreat and proceeded step by step.

He moved out the heavy siege equipment that had been built during his garrison at Dasan Pass one by one, and then slowly escorted them to the city of Baoji.

Therefore, with only a road of more than 20 miles, Shi Han and Guo Di's army did not arrive in Baoji City until the next morning and set up camp and garrison.

Jianxunling on Yang Yuan's side is only more than 30 kilometers away from Baoji City. If they march quickly, it will only take half a day.

However, because they had to transport the cannons, they did not set up camp at the foot of Baoji City until the next day, at about the same time as Shi Han's troops.

Generals such as Shi Han and Guo Di immediately came to pay homage to the commander-in-chief.

When they arrived, Yang Yuan was on the arrow tower observing the situation in Baoji City.

Next to Yang Yuan stood two beautiful girls, one was sweet and petite, the other was tall and pretty.

Although the Song army had long since banned high-ranking generals from bringing their wives and concubines with them, it was still very rare for them to be brought to the battlefield so openly.

However, they soon realized that these two were meritorious officials who persuaded Pucha Alibu, the commander of Jianxu Pass, and not Yang Yuan's wives or concubines.

However, Yang Yuan did not introduce their true identities, only saying that they were secret spies of the New Jinyi Luansi.

Otherwise, once the news of a little princess and a little princess of the Jin Kingdom reached Lin'an, Yang Yuan was not sure whether the little emperor would be wary of him.

The young emperor succeeded to the throne when he was serving as the governor and pacification commissioner of Tongchuan.

Because he was in charge of the important affairs planned by the previous emperor in Sichuan and Shaanxi, he was unable to return to Lin'an to report to the new emperor.

Before the young emperor ascended the throne, he had little contact with the young prince, who was then King Deng.

This is actually a very serious problem for a provincial governor.

However, he was a minister relied upon by the late emperor, and was obviously the team left by the late emperor for his son.

In the court, he still has the Prince of Jin as his pillar of support.

So, there is no need to worry for the time being.

However, Yang Yuan also planned to return to Lin'an after solving the problems in Shaanxi, Sichuan and Gansu.

It is a big taboo for a high-ranking official who holds a large army and acts like a local lord to have little contact with the emperor.

"General Fu, let me take charge of the attack on Baoji!"

Shi Han stood on the arrow tower, beside Yang Yuan, watching the hasty preparations made by the Jin soldiers in Baoji City, and said confidently:

"It only takes me three days to capture Baoji City!"

Although Guo Di and Shi Han were competing with each other in private, they were now leading the same army, so naturally they had to advance and retreat together at this time.

Guo Di said: "General Shi is right. When we were stationed at Dasan Pass, we built many siege weapons. We built fifty stone cannons alone. If we attack them for a day, we can knock them down."

Yang Yuan looked down at the entire battlefield and did not respond.

Baoji City is located in a strategic location and is a city that military strategists must capture. In order to cope with the needs of war, it was built to be very strong and solid.

The top of the city wall is wide enough for nine horses to run side by side.

For a city wall like this, the endless bombardment of stone cannons could indeed cause significant damage, but it was not enough to become the key to breaking the city.

Moreover, looking at the top of the city wall, the Jin army also has long-range heavy weapons such as stone cannons and crossbows.

Yang Yuan believed that Shi Han and Guo Di could capture Baoji City, so he could wait for three days.

However, many people will die in this process. They are all elite soldiers that he has trained step by step in the past three years in Tongchuan.

There will be casualties in a war, and Yang Yuan understands that a kind-hearted person cannot command an army.

But Yang Yuan was as stingy as a miser when it came to avoiding unnecessary deaths and injuries.

Yang Yuan shook his head and said, "I have my own arrangements. Go back to your tent."

He looked again at the majestic city in front of him. The city walls were high and thick, with many gate towers, corner towers, watchtowers, arrow towers and parapets standing on top of them.

There is a defensive moat outside the city. I think Fengxiang City is also like this, and Chang'an City is even worse.

Yang Yuan smiled and looked at the camp he had set up.

A large-scale field camp was fully equipped with trenches, stakes, chevaux de frise, walls, and chariot arrays.

In front of the camp, there were deep trenches and high ramparts for deep defense. If the defenders in Baoji City wanted to open the city gates and launch a surprise attack at night, they would probably end up in trouble.

Yang Yuan's army has two civil engineering masters and geological experts, Wang Changsheng and Han Qianchen, to train them. Now the entire army has mastered a lot of engineering knowledge.

This greatly improved the scientific nature of their site selection, material selection, and construction when building their camps, and both the quality and efficiency were unprecedented.

Yang Yuan looked at the artillery position that was being built two or three miles in front of the camp, smiled slightly, and walked down the arrow tower.

After a military meeting before the battle, in the afternoon, Shi Han and Guo Di led the generals from Dasan Pass back to their camp.

Then they began a hasty transfer.

Since the Song army besieging the city camped five miles away from the city, the troop movements in the rear could not be observed no matter how high the arrow towers in the enemy camp were, just like when the Jin army besieged Dasan Pass before.

The catapult of this era could throw a fifty-jin stone projectile nearly seventy feet away.

A boulder weighing two hundred kilograms can be thrown more than twenty feet away.

However, the defenders are on high ground, so the projectile distance can be farther.

This is also one of the reasons why Tangku Wuye has confidence.

He placed all the heavy long-range weapons on the city walls, waiting for the Song army to rush to the city with stone cannons, battering rams, ladders, etc., and then used the height advantage to destroy the Song army's siege equipment.

This kind of damage would cause serious trouble to the Song army's siege.

Tang Kuo Wuye believed that it wouldn't take long for Fengxiang to know the actual military situation here.

By then, General Tushan will spare no effort to retake Jianxu Ridge.

By then, the Song army would be in a passive position.

Therefore, he issued an order to defend Baoji City to the death, and personally went up to the city wall, never taking off his armor, and guarding the city in person.

However, until sunset, he still did not wait for the Song army to leave the camp and enter the siege position.

Just as he was confused, he heard a loud explosion.

The sound should come from far away, but if it is far away, why can it be heard so clearly?
Tang Kuo Wuye was just wondering when he saw a commotion among the soldiers guarding the city.

He followed the soldiers' gaze and saw a place in the city where a cloud of dust was rising. It was particularly obvious in the setting sun. The houses there were arranged one after another like fish scales.

The overall color is gray-green roof tiles.

But now it was as if someone had plucked a piece of fish scale off, and smoke and dust were rising from there.

Tang Kuo Wuye still didn't understand what was happening. He could see the huge rocks thrown into the air, but with his naked eyes, he couldn't see the shells flying in the air.

In the artillery camp that the Song army had just built, the observer standing on the arrow tower loudly reported the situation of the impact point.

The artillerymen below quickly fixed the cannon's mounting position, adjusted the angle of elevation, and adjusted the amount of explosives.

Then, there was another huge roar.

In the distance, there was a cloud of dust rising from the top of Baoji City. This time, the place where the dust rose was only an alley away from the city wall.

The observers continued to report their observations loudly, while the artillerymen continued to adjust the cannons.

When the shells impacted, they landed on the thick city wall that was wide enough for nine horses to run side by side. The other fourteen cannons that had just been placed on the turrets were adjusted in unison according to the firing parameters of the test guns.

On the arrow tower behind, Li Qinglu and Wanyan Ping, who were invited by Yang Yuan to watch the battle, were stunned.

Even Li Qinglu, who was always elegant and somewhat cold, opened her mouth slightly, too shocked to speak.

Wanyan Ping was even more miserable, with such a small cherry mouth that an egg could fit inside.

"Teacher, what...what is this?"

Before Yang Yuan could say anything, Qingtang explained proudly, "This is a heavy cannon developed by my master. It can shoot as far as three miles, break huge trees, penetrate strong cities, and is invincible."

That proud and charming look is like a charming cat licking its tail lazily.

Yang Yuan said: "Tang Kuo Wuye wants to defend the city, but he can only take the beating and can't fight back. In this case, how long can he defend it?"

Yang Yuan looked outside the camp in front of him, where more artillery batteries were being urgently built by engineers.

……

The artillery battle lasted all night long.

Because dozens of cannons were firing, although it took a long time to load the shells, the sound of cannons continued all night long.

The gunfire stopped at daybreak.

The artillerymen cleaned and maintained their treasure, and then happily walked down the battery to eat.

They didn't need any protection at all because the Jin army on the opposite side couldn't cause any damage to their artillery.

As the shelling stopped, the Jin army, which was forced to hide in the soldier hiding caves, climbed up the city wall tremblingly.

One of the reasons why Yang Yuan stopped the shelling was to allow them to come out and see the damage caused by the shelling all night.

Huge craters on the solid stone ground, collapsed city gate towers, broken parapets, bloody corpses...

Tang Kuo Wuye stood on the city wall, looking at the Song army camp in the distance. He could only stare at them fiercely but was completely powerless to do anything.

He had never fought a battle like this before. He was unable to make any contact with the enemy, but was constantly suffering from the enemy's attacks.

Tang Kuo Wuye was checking the battle damage everywhere in frustration. Before he finished, the familiar "roar" of artillery was heard again.

"Quick, hurry back to the soldier cave!"

The officers of the Jin army shouted helplessly and fearfully, picked up Tang Kuo and Wu Ye and ran away.

They already knew how terrible the power of the projectile was.

They, they had no way to resist.

They saw with their own eyes yesterday evening a fantastic shield soldier propping up a large shield that could defend against powerful crossbows on the ground.

Then, a cannonball that was obviously not that big, because of the destructive power generated by its terrible kinetic energy, instantly tore the shield soldier and his shield into pieces, and smashed the ground he was defending into pieces.

Tangkuo Wuye knew that he could not defend the city any longer, so he gathered his cavalry, opened the city gates, and wanted to launch an attack.

However, the Song army's artillery positions had already been heavily guarded.

The counterattack organized by Tangkuo Wuye did not even reach the trench in front of the artillery position.

Their retreat was almost cut off by the Song army, and they were all killed outside.

When they fled back to the city in a hurry, Tangkuo Wuye completely gave up the idea of ​​taking the initiative to fight.

But the artillery fire began again.

In the afternoon, the Song army's stone cannons, battering rams, ladders and other siege weapons were finally moved out and marched towards the city of Baoji under the cover of infantry.

At this time, almost all of the long-range heavy weapons on the Jin army city had been destroyed by artillery fire.

The few remaining equipment were also damaged by splashing and shock. Even if there were still a few that could be launched, they could no longer pose a threat to the approaching Song army.

Then, huge stones thrown by stone cannons smashed into the city wall.

They even threw out huge stones weighing two hundred kilograms, which means that they pushed the stone cannon to a place only twenty feet away from the city wall.

What a bully!
"Teacher, you are so amazing."

Wanyan Ping stood on the arrow tower, looking up at Yang Yuan with her big watery eyes.

If one were to say that Yang Yuan had left a deep impression on her before, it was that as a young girl at that time, she had never seen such an open-minded, elegant, handsome and intelligent young man.

Then, as he left, she continued to improve and beautify herself in the girl's heart, eventually reaching perfection.

Now, after seeing him again, the white moonlight in the girl's heart not only did not fade at all, but instead strengthened the impression of him being omnipotent and extremely powerful in the girl's heart.

"A teacher is a teacher after all." Li Qinglu said sweetly, smiling sweetly.

All that pure and aloof appearance disappeared in front of Yang Yuan.

If they were not on the top of the arrow tower with soldiers watching all around, Xiao Qingtang and A'man would have subconsciously stood in the middle. This usually reserved and beautiful girl would have probably wrapped herself around Yang Yuan like a beautiful snake.

"This is just the beginning! Just wait and see."

Yang Yuan smiled slightly. He felt really happy physically and mentally to be looked at with such admiration by two beautiful girls.

After the trebuchets had been venting their anger for a long time, with many of them even breaking down from overuse, the siege began.

The siege lasted until midnight. The heavy long-range attack weapons prepared on the city walls disappeared, as did the rolling logs and stones. The barrels of golden juice had long been smashed, and the soup spilled all over the city walls. As the Jin soldiers defending the city ran around, it was carried everywhere.

The Jin soldiers were completely defeated by this completely unequal fighting style.

Tang Kuo Wuye no longer believed that he could hold out until General Tushan led his troops to help.

At dawn, Tangkuo Wuye assembled his entire army, quietly left the city, broke through the siege, and fled to Heshangyuan.

Heshangyuan is surrounded by mountains on all sides, and the area below the mountains is thousands of acres, which is convenient for cavalry combat. If things get out of hand, they can hide in the vast Qinling Mountains.

Tangkuo Wuye now has no choice but to rely on this to preserve their strength.

(End of this chapter)