In front of the camp gate, a Mongolian soldier crawled hard on the ground. His helmet and armor were covered with feather arrows. Just now, he was raising a shield to cover his companion, and he was hit by a musket on his waist. The seriously injured Mongolian spitted blood in small mouths, gasped for difficulty, carrying the heavy armor on his body, used his strength to climb back, dragging blood on the ground behind him.

While trying hard to climb out of the imperial camp, the Mongolian soldier could still hear the sound of whizzing through the air from behind, and a new feather arrow was inserted beside him, and the back was hit hard. The Mongolian knew that he had another arrow.

"Why do you still attack me?" The seriously injured Mongolian felt that his eyes began to turn white, and his head was so dizzy that he seemed to be able to fall asleep at any time. He tried his best to stay awake, and while continuing to crawl slowly with his hands and feet, he thought unwillingly: "I have no combat power anymore."

On the wall behind the camp, an imperial guard was carefully aiming at the target, pulling the bow in his hand full of it. While slapping the strings, he also shouted full of hatred: "Where to escape!"

The feather arrow shot out from the ground and thrust hard on the calves of the Mongolian soldier who was climbing far away, nailing him to the ground. The hit Mongolian roared in pain. He rolled and wanted to reach out to pull out the bow and arrow on his calves, but he couldn't reach it.

"Bah, die, traitor, Mongolian Tartar!" The guards spat out a sputum in anger. If a Han man dared to use the word "Tartar" in front of him, the guards soldier would definitely draw his sword to kill without hesitation, but this did not prevent him from calling the Mongols. As a bannerman who grew up in Beijing after entering the pass, he had accepted this disdain for the Mongols.

A rocket descended from the sky and shot into the helmet and neck armor of the Imperial Guard. The hunter turned into prey in a blink of an eye. The Imperial Guard fell to the ground with his eyes rolled.

The battle in less than an hour has cost hundreds of Mongolian soldiers who acted as suicide squads. Even if the seriously injured people want to struggle to climb off the battlefield, they will be attacked by the resentful Imperial Guards; during this period, 300 people have been killed or seriously injured in the Imperial Guards.

"The combat effectiveness of the Man Eight Banners cannot be underestimated." The commander of the Ming army commented to the left and right at the far end of the battlefield: "We have a fifteen-fold advantage in military strength, as well as cannons and catapults, and attack such a small camp, but in one hour, we have not broken the camp gate and did not destroy the enemy's fighting spirit."

Seeing that the Mongolian soldiers at the camp gate became sparse again, Deng Ming ordered two more teams to come forward: "One team will help hit the door, and the other team can help their injured companions retreat first."

"If you save them, you have to support them for the rest of your life." Zhou Kaihuang muttered.

"It's better than they cringe and let our people go up." Nin Tang agreed with the order, but he opposed the use of suicide squads to do the job: "Admiral, I thought it would be better to ask the Mongolians who didn't have to go to battle, and see if they were willing to save their injured companions, and if they were willing to go, they would also give them armor."

"Okay." Deng Ming nodded. The officers were able to agree to treat the Mongolian soldiers equally, and he knew it would be difficult to do this.

More and more black smoke rose above the imperial camp in the distance. In an hour, the Ming army had replaced seven or eight rounds of archers and poured tens of thousands of rockets into the Qing army. Most of the rockets were extinguished quickly after landing, but some also ignited the surrounding things. The walls and towers of the imperial camp were all made of wooden structures, and only simple mud-coated fire protection was carried out during construction. Although the fire protection layer was not very thick and not very thorough, the imperial officers had no worries about it when inspecting it. After all, in their minds, this was just a temporary camp, with countless pairs of vigilant eyes and two thousand armed guards within a small range. No fire could spread or could not be extinguished in time.

"The well in the camp should be in this direction, right?" Deng Ming raised his horse whip and pointed at the imperial camp: "Two hundred archers are divided to cover the shooting wells."

"Affect the order."

...

His face was covered with mud and blood, Soetu retreated behind the camp wall and gasped hard. He had been commanding the battle at the gate since the war started. Several senior guard officers were killed by his side, all of whom were hit by a rock or a rock bullet. Soetu survived not because he was more agile or quicker than the senior officers who died, but just had better luck.

For the Imperial Guards in a tough battle, resting is a luxury, and only officers like Soetu have the chance to get it. Ordinary Imperial Guard soldiers have no chance to retreat from high-intensity battles. Now there is manpower everywhere in the imperial camp, and more and more rockets have triggered more and more fires. The Imperial Guards who are injured and have to retreat from the walls have been mobilized to put out the flames in the camp.

In addition to putting out the fire, the Imperial Guard also needed to collect the wood at hand to repair the damaged battalion wall. Several battalion walls broke due to the continuous shelling of the Ming army and began to shatter. The pillars of the Imperial Guard tent had been removed and sent to the battalion wall for later use. Only the stables were still intact. The Imperial Guard always left a large number of men there to ensure its safety.

Soetu sat in the corner of the wall, gasping for breath. He saw another group of guards running towards the well with shields. Just now, there were a lot of rockets falling near the well, and more stone bombs also came to join in the fun. Several guards who were busy carrying water were caught off guard and failed to avoid the sudden increase in enemy firepower and were shot near the well.

The faces of each Imperial Guard appear very ferocious. The pressure of death, endless battles and busyness made every Imperial Guard officer and soldier tense up. Every moment someone fell down. Now the Imperial Guard officer and soldier have turned a blind eye to his companions who suddenly fell beside him. No one will throw his work down to pull those who fell to the ground. Many people have thrown their shields aside and run quickly in the camp, and no longer willing to spend time to observe whether there are arrows shot from the surrounding sky. Even when those powerful stone bullets fall by their side, many Imperial Guard officers and soldiers will just take a cold look at them and then continue their work.

This numbness to death temporarily improved the combat efficiency of the Imperial Guards, but also caused their casualties to continue to rise. The same is true for Soetu. When he was resting, several rockets flew towards the position where he was sitting, but Soetu was too lazy to get up and dodge, but he took it for granted that these rockets might not hit him - he was not wrong, and it was indeed not hit him, but two of them were very close to him.

The rocket closest to Soetu happened to hit a piece of exposed wood. The soil fireproof layer on it had been shaken off by the Ming army's shelling. The rocket was not extinguished, but baked the surrounding wood, gradually emitting a burnt smell.

Soetu raised his hand and waved a knife, knocking down the potential fire hazard to the ground: "Is the outer wall of the camp wall about to rise?" Soetu thought to himself, but he quickly threw this idea aside. Now even if the outer wall of the camp wall began to burn, the imperial guards could not extinguish it, so it was useless to think about it. It would be better to hurry up and take a rest.

"Summon, the Emperor." An imperial guard soldier suddenly appeared in front of Soetu and shouted at him.

"I understand." Soetu jumped up from the ground and followed the commander toward Shunzhi's position.

The current camp in Shunzhi is the best preserved building except for the stables. Dozens of imperial guards patrolled around with shields, clearing out each feather arrow that had fallen on it with fire in time. There was also a circle of buckets in the camp in case of emergency.

"What's the battle between the camp gate?" Shunzhi asked sternly as soon as he saw Soetu.

"Don't worry, the servants guarded it like iron barrels." Soetu replied respectfully. When the Mongolians bumped into the door, dozens of imperial guards were holding on inside. No matter how the Mongolians attacked again and again, the camp gate was still safe and sound.

"Have the King's Rescue not arrived yet?" Shunzhi knew very well that the King's Rescue did not even have a shadow, otherwise the Imperial Guard on the battalion wall would definitely come to report him immediately, but Shunzhi couldn't help asking.

"I think it's probably coming soon." Soetu's answer was exactly Shunzhi's wish.

"How long can the imperial court last?" Shunzhi hesitated for a moment and still spit out the problem.

"Your Majesty, don't worry, the thief is almost unable to support it." Before Soetu could speak, another officer of the Imperial Guard said loudly, he was a more experienced senior general.

"The heavy rain will not last." The general Zuo Keng said strongly: "Deng Zhe shot at least 100,000 arrows in this hour. Obviously, he also knew that the royal army could arrive at any time. This was his full-strength attack. How many arrows can he have? How much gunpowder? His catapult cart has been hit for so long, but it can't last long."

Not only did Shunzhi's eyes lit up when he heard this, Soetu and other imperial guards' officers and soldiers also suddenly lit up and immediately straightened their chests.

"That's right, the King's Army must be coming soon, and the Deng Zhe is at the end of the day." The emperor said happily: "I'll inform the entire army quickly, and make sure everyone understands it."

"Zhe!" Soetu and other Imperial Guard officers and soldiers responded loudly, and then ran out of the camp where Shunzhi was located, inspiring every Imperial Guard soldier he saw.

"Tei Deng is about to exhaust his strength!" After rushing to the wall next to the camp gate again, Soetu felt that his whole body seemed to be full of strength. Now the casualties of the Imperial Guards have exceeded 500, and the guards in front of the camp gate have obviously become sparse than before, but his words have made all the tired Imperial Guards officers and soldiers see hope.

Soetu pointed to the Ming army's position in the distance. The large carts used to transport feather arrows across there were indeed seven or eight cars empty. At the reminder of the leader just now, the officers and soldiers of the imperial guards at the camp gate indeed found that some of the Ming army's catapults had broken down and stopped attacking.

"Look!" A sharp-eyed guard soldier pointed to the Ming army position in the distance and shouted to his companions: "The thief has had any abnormal movement."

"Oh." Soetu and the officers and soldiers around him opened their eyes wide and looked at the Ming army carriages moving from afar.

They saw a group of Ming army's auxiliary soldiers surrounded these newly arrived carriages, cut off ropes from several of them, lifted the cloth, removed the things on them, and quickly assembled them, and a new catapult cart showed its outline.

More vehicles continued to move forward and drove behind the Ming army's archer front.

One curtain after another was pulled off the carriage, revealing the carriage full of goods - another 100,000 arrows were transported to the front line, and the auxiliary soldiers of the Ming army walked over and filled their empty quiver pots again.
Chapter completed!