Chapter 30 Changes (Part 2)
Like the Ming army, the Qing army defending also used rotation methods to guard the defense line. After Hu Wenke saw two Niulu's reinforcements arrive, he planned to let one of Niulu enter the city to participate in the war, and the other Niulu and the green camp of the reserve team prepare for the war behind the wall. At this critical moment, the Han Eight Banners did not intend to bargain and joined the battle group without saying a word. When he saw the central army such as the Eight Banners arrived to assist in the war, Hu Wenke's subordinates cheered.
However, at this time, Li Guoying's messenger arrived again. After repeated consideration, the governor of Sichuan and Shaanxi still ordered to delay the time when the Han Eight Banners entered the battlefield as much as possible. The defense line of the Ming army attacked was about two thousand meters long, and tens of thousands of Qing troops took turns to defend. Li Guoying felt that the Eight Banners soldiers were not needed for the time being. While ordering Hu Wenke to use the Eight Banners troops carefully, Li Guoying also asked the generals from other areas to send some people to Hu Wenke. The governor of Sichuan and Shaanxi was: As long as the Green Camp still has spare strength, the Han Eight Banners should not be consumed in the defensive battle. These Han Eight Banners were just in case. Only when the Green Camp could no longer stop the Ming army from advancing along the city walls could the Han Eight Banners enter the battle.
Under Li Guoying's coach, he was explaining his deployment to Sun Sick: "Thieves will be tired and may reveal flaws at any time. This flaw can be big or small. Perhaps one thousand people can seize the opportunity and win, or maybe three thousand people are not enough. Therefore, we must accumulate as large an army as possible in our hands, so that we can easily find more opportunities to defeat the enemy and rescue the enemy."
Li Guoying said this because Sun Sike had misunderstood just now. Sun Sike thought that after the Battle of Zhongxian, Li Guoying would be worried that the Eight Banners of the Han Dynasty would be left at a critical moment. After listening to Li Guoying's explanation, Sun Sike retreated aside without saying anything, and the Governor of Sichuan and Shaanxi continued to observe the battlefield.
Li Guoying did not doubt the fighting spirit of the Han Eight Banners. In addition to Sun Sike and his group, Chongqing also had 400 Manchu garrisons of the Eight Banners. These Manchu and Han Eight Banners troops were the Qing Dynasty central troops with the best nutrition, the most training funding, and the highest loyalty. As long as they were related to their own life and death, Li Guoying felt that their combat effectiveness should be above the Green Camp. In addition to these Eight Banners troops, Li Guoying also had 600 Governors Biao Battalion guards. After escaping from Qijiang, Li Guoying once had only more than 200 people left in Li Guoying's Biao Battalion, and some of them were restored in two years. Like the Manchu Eight Banners, they were heavily armored cavalry. The last thousand people in the reserve team were carefully selected by Li Guoying, and were commanded by several old subordinates such as Wang Mingde.
After receiving Li Guoying's order, Hu Wenke had to adjust his deployment and resist He Zhen with the troops at hand.
...
"The thief is filling the trench!"
A Qing soldier poked his head out and observed that Li Laiheng's troops were also approaching the city.
"Prepare to throw a stone." The Qing army officer issued an order. Li Guoying supervised the battle on the city tower not far away. The Qing army officers here must perform well and must not allow the strong men to cheat and be sloppy.
Because he faced the commander of the Kuidong Army, the Qing army also deployed a large number of elite soldiers. While the Qing soldiers were stocking more wood and stones by the wall, a large number of archers were also neatly on standby in the back row. Song Liang was one of them. He saw scouts poking their heads out of the chassis from time to time, observing the progress of the Ming army in front of the city, most of them quickly poking their heads out, looking around and retracting them back to report. But there were also some unlucky ones. Just beside Song Liang, a scout just poked his head out when he was shot towards him by a crossbow arrow. Song Liang even heard the dull sound of the cold metal shooting into the flesh of a person's cheek.
Almost at the same time as the crossbow was in the cheek, the scout's helmet was also shot by another arrow. The Qing soldiers who were hit fell to the sky, twitched for a few times and then stopped moving.
Immediately, two unarmed soldiers walked over, dragged the dead scout to the inner wall, and pushed down the city wall.
Song Liang saw one of the armorless soldiers taking off the scout's helmet with one hand, pulling off the hat from his head with the other hand, and putting on the helmet with the other.
"This helmet can not only save you, but sometimes it can also save you. This scout just now is probably because of this..." Song Liang thought silently in his heart. At this moment, the officer's order came, interrupting Song Liang's speculation on the cause of the scout's death.
"Arrow, come forward!"
"Zhe." The soldiers of the Green Camp responded and leaned up to the wall. Song Liang's lips moved and he also agreed softly.
The officers had just explained that the Qing army's bows and arrows were not very harmful to the slowly advancing Ming army's shield wall, so the officers asked the Qing army to target the Ming army's armorless soldiers who carried soil bunkers or ladders. Although these targets were farther away, it was easier to achieve results when attacking them.
All the archers in the first row were approaching the battlements. Song Liang was very nervous, but hesitated to walk forward without hesitation. If there was any hesitation at this time, the officer supervising the battle would definitely raise the steel knife instead of the whip without hesitation.
As a veteran who has participated in several urban offensive and defensive battles, Song Liang knew that when they first appeared on the wall, they would be attacked by the enemy's fierce arrow rain. In front of them was the wall. Song Liang took a deep breath and took the last step. He had already stood on a battlement, and immediately saw the situation outside the city. The familiar large shield array was like a huge beetle-like creature, slowly squirming at the edge of the trench. Behind were the endless stream of Ming army's armorless soldiers. They transported earthblocks like ants, and then used these to fill the trench and piled up the city walls, allowing the Ming army to rush into Chongqing on the earthy mountain, killing Song Liang and the others.
Song Liang steadily opened his bow and aimed at an enemy within a range of range, behind the Ming army's shield formation. At the position where Song Liang aimed, there was a busy Ming army stream. If he accidentally missed the shot, he would have a chance to hit others.
...
Not far from Song Liang, Lao Qingyan was lifting his crossbow machine to point at the head of Chongqing city. Deng Ming assigned these individual crossbows made by Hanyang to his Zhejiang soldiers, and Li Laiheng also handed them over to the best archers in the Jingzhou army. The crossbowmen were the first Ming army to approach Chongqing city. Under the cover of the shield soldiers, they first shot against the archers on the city. Both sides were under the protection of the shield soldiers, so neither side achieved a worthy result. However, through this counter-shooting, both sides found some of the other's background. The Qing army considered the equipment of the Ming army, and the cover of the Ming army's crossbowmen ensured that the large group of people could get closer to the city wall faster and safer.
When the Ming army's infantry approached the Chongqing city wall, Lao Qingyan saw that the enemy shooters on the city wall disappeared. The recruits might be surprised by this, but it was a normal thing in the eyes of veterans like Lao Qingyan. When the Qing army found that the long-range attack was not effective, they would naturally hide behind the walls, hiding their strength and avoiding damage from the ravine.
On the way before the Ming army formed a shield formation and approached the trench carefully, Lao Qingyan aimed at the head of Chongqing city from beginning to end. His past experience told him that when the Ming army began to fill the trench and clear the plum blossom stake, a large number of enemy archers would appear and launch fierce attacks. All the crossbowmen and archers of the Ming army were invisible in the infantry shield formation, and were fully vigilant, ready to give a head-on attack when the Qing army archers appeared.
Crossbowmen need to react very quickly. Compared with archers, crossbows have undoubtedly more advantages, because they can always maintain a full string state, and archers obviously cannot do it. However, even so, crossbows need to keep a high concentration of energy at all times to seize that fleeting opportunity.
However, Lao Qingyan was unable to launch the moment the Qing army appeared, because he was busy rolling his crossbow. Although the head of Chongqing was calm just now, from time to time, a mole-like Qing army scout poked out to observe the movements of the Ming army under the city - hiding behind the battlements, observing, the shooting field was very narrow, and the Qing army could not accurately grasp the overall movements.
Lao Qingyan generally did not attack the Qing army's scouts. Because most of the scouts were experienced veterans and were agile. If Lao Qingyan saw the target appear and then turned the crossbow arrow to aim, then the scout had already seen everything in front of him and quickly retracted back to the wall.
But just now, an enemy behind the wall directly in front made a mistake. His body was not low enough, so that Lao Qingyan saw a helmet's spire poking out from the edge of the wall. So Lao Qingyan raised the crossbow machine and locked it at the position where the helmet's spire was. A Ming army archer bent his bow in that direction after Lao Qingyan's prompt.
Seeing the helmet's spire for a while, when he was about to come out, Lao Qingyan pulled the crossbow machine and the iron arrow shot out. When it flew to the Chongqing city wall, the Qing army scout who was hiding behind the wall just poked his head out and caught Lao Qingyan's crossbow arrow with his cheek. Another Ming army archer's movement was a little slow. After seeing Lao Qingyan's arrow shot out, he followed the bow. Lao Qingyan saw that the arrow seemed to hit the target. The new recruit was a new recruit. Lao Qingyan knew that if he had not himself, the archer would probably have to see the head clearly before he could arch. Then when the feather arrow flew, the other party would have disappeared behind the wall.
When Lao Qingyan raised the crossbow arrow again, the Qing army behind the wall had completed a round of shooting and retreated.
Many Ming troops were shot by the enemy, and they were quickly supported by their companions around them. These people also tried their best to endure the pain and waited until they were far away from the combat troops before they began to scream out the pain.
The Qing army's archers appeared in batches behind the battlements. They attacked the Ming army engaged in transportation and the Ming army crossbowmen who were threatening hugely. The Ming army also retaliated and kept fighting back on the city.
Chapter completed!