? At the top of Xiangyang City, the marshal Wang Yi looked at the Anzhou army camping outside the city and was worried. The governor of Xiangzhou Yuanwei was still calm: "Empress, General Cui will soon lead the Jingzhou army to retreat to support, and Xiangyang will definitely be fine."

Xiangyang City has a strong defense and wide moat to the east, south and west, and Han River to the north. Anzhou rebels without naval forces were urgently impossible to capture. Although the Xiangzhou army in the southern expedition was defeated and the entire army was wiped out, the people in the city are now mobilized to defend the city, and the original defending troops and reinforcements from the opposite Fancheng River must be defended for a month.

The messenger had crossed the river four days ago to the other side and went east to Suizhou, which sent a commander of the marching army, Cui Yanmu, to withdraw from Xiangyang. Cui Yanmu now led the Jingzhou army to attack Suicheng more than 200 miles away, even if the enemy retreated for half a month, he could cross the river and retreat to Xiangyang.

Wang Yi was not worried about this. What he cared about was a series of recent performances of the Anzhou army. There was nothing to say about the defeat outside Changshou City. Later, the thousands of cavalry who were chasing him at the end of his head exaggeratedly and admitted it.

The pursuers rushed into Hannan and took the opportunity to seize the city, which was considered unlucky. But what happened that they dragged fishing boats on both sides of the Han River on the same day? Could it be that they were preparing to rush to seize Hannan day and night?

There are naval troops in Xiangyang that can destroy the floating bridge. They should be preparing to build the bridge again. Otherwise, it will take time to rush to work on the spot without a ship. So they decided to make plans before the decisive battle?

Where does their confidence come from?

Looking back on Changshou City, which was captured in one day, the huge crossbow with an astonishing range during the decisive battle, and the howling sound that caused the entire East-wing cavalry to be wiped out, could the Anzhou army have created very powerful weapons?

Wang Yi twisted his beard and thought for a while, and gradually his thoughts came to his mind: The Anzhou army had a powerful weapon to attack the city, so he dared to go out to attack the west and quickly seize the city before the army arrived. You must know that it would take ten days and half a month to capture a city like Changshou with complete city defense.

They have the advantage of winning and are sure to win, so they dare to fight head-on. The facts also tell the whole story, that is, the giant crossbow and the strange howling sound.

The Anzhou army was sure to quickly capture Xiangyang City, so before the decisive battle, they arranged for pursuing cavalry to rush to capture Hannan City day and night. They knew that the Xiangyang navy would destroy the floating bridge and saved the fishing boats first to quickly build the floating bridge and let the army cross the river.

South of Hannan is the boundary of Liang Kingdom. If they besieged Xiangyang for too long, they will change sooner or later. Not to mention the loss of Changshou, even if Hannan is blocked by the Liang army, the morale of the besieged army will collapse.

The Great Zhou set up Jiangling General Manager in Liang State as the military supervisor. Although the Left Prime Minister scared Liang State and asked them to be honest, if the Anzhou army really showed two obvious flaws in front of Liang State, Jiangling General Manager would definitely not sit idly by. At that time, urging Liang State to send troops would be really a defeat in one blow.

Everything is aimed at quickly capturing Xiangyang. Since the Anzhou army should be confident of taking such a risk, there is only one possibility: they have powerful siege equipment that can quickly capturing Xiangyang.

What exactly is that thing?

Changshou's defeated soldiers said that the Anzhou army used a very tall catapult to attack the city, so it should be a catapult that was pulled by dozens or even hundreds of people. It is hard to imagine how many catapults that were pulled by hundreds of people would have to be invested to quickly capture Xiangyang?

Ten divisions require one thousand people. There are land outside the moat east, south, and west of Xiangyang. According to the ten divisions of catapults on each side, at least thirty divisions and three thousand people are counted. The three shifts rotated by nearly ten thousand people. The catapults will be scrapped for two consecutive days, so the number of people will be doubled.

There are 20,000 people, and the number of people in Anzhou is too large to give 20,000 people to pull the catapult? Now the maximum number of people siege the city is only 60,000 to 70,000!

How powerful are their siege equipment so powerful that they can be so confident?

......

Following the city, the marching chief Cui Yanmu looked at the city in front of him helplessly.

He has been attacking for several days, but his army still failed to break through the city. The warriors never stayed at the city for long every time they braved arrows and rains and rocks. The stones in the city seemed to be endless. The catapult cart tirelessly threw a large number of stones every day, grinding away their morale bit by bit.

There is a moat outside the city. Although it is not wide or deep, the soil is damp due to the river water. There is no need to think about digging tunnels to attack the city for a short time.

With countless rushing vehicles, the moat outside the city had been filled up and several earthen mountains were set up to shoot against the defenders, but the fierce arrow stones of the city were killed and killed thousands of people were unable to gain the upper hand.

I also thought about using a trick, pretending that the camp was attacked at night, and wanted to lead the defenders to send troops out of the city to support the "reinforcements", but no matter how they performed, the defenders were unmoved.

The generals of this city like an iron turtle tried their best to eat it but couldn't eat it. It seemed that they were anxious and could not take it down and could only be surrounded for a long time.

There was a moment when Cui Yanmu thought he had returned to Yubi City more than 30 years ago.

That year, the Prime Minister of the Eastern Wei, Gao Huan (founder of the Northern Qi Dynasty), led an army of more than 100,000 to besiege Yubi City. The general of the Western Wei Dynasty, Wei Xiaokuan, was ordered to hold on, and the young Cui Yanmu followed the commander Wei Xiaokuan to defend the city.

The two sides had been fiercely attacking and defense for nearly 60 days, and in the end, Gao Huan lost more than 70,000 people and became ill. He died two months after retreating in shame. What happened more than 30 years ago is still vivid in my mind.

Suicheng is not qualified to be compared with Jade Bi, but the facts are obvious now: at least this month it cannot be broken. Our side has lost tens of thousands of siege equipment and is damaged. The headache is that the most consumed by the defenders are stones everywhere. They have sufficient arrows and strong morale.

And I can no longer hold on!

The Xiangzhou army led by the marching marshal Wang Yi failed to fight the main force of the rebels outside Changshou City. He only fled back to Xiangyang with a few people, and the cavalry that pursued him took the opportunity to capture Hannan less than a hundred miles south of Xiangyang.

The other party's next purpose is already very obvious: to attack Xiangyang! Wang Yi also sent someone to ask for help.

It's just a strange thing. To the west of Changshou and south of Han are the boundaries of Liang. If you are not careful, as long as one of them is captured by Liang, the main force besieging Xiangyang will have no way of retreat. At that time, the army will definitely be shaken. Where can the Anzhou army get the confidence to think that it can take Xiangyang before Liang's actions?

"General Manager, all matters have been arranged." A deputy reported near the front.

"Let's go." Cui Yanmu turned over and whipped away, and his army slowly retreated.

"Are they just making frauds and we left the city?" A general on the top of the city looked at the retreating army outside the city with confusion.

"It should be really withdrawn." The other generals muttered and said with great certainty.

"Is it possible that the South won?" Some generals showed joy.

"Absolutely, you'll wait for the good news." Yu Wenming nodded. Although he was surrounded for so many days, the news outside the city was cut off, since the other party withdrew, it means that the situation in the South Railway has changed. Besides, he has confidence in what his brother encouraged him to create.

"We have to be careful in the past two days to avoid failure." Sima, the general manager, was still worried.

Yu Wenming said that he would supervise and guard the police today. Tonight, the army in the city let the whole army relax, and the generals were overjoyed when they heard this.

"Thank you all to defend the city." He gave a gift to the generals present, "There will be a big battle in a few days, and I hope you can work together."

"You are polite, Prince." The generals returned the greeting, "We should fight to kill the enemy."

Seeing that the enemy really withdrew his troops, Suicheng burst into endless cheers. This time, he defended the city for nearly twenty days. The opponent continued to attack the city every day but suffered heavy losses. The loss of his own was beyond the expectation.

Now that the defenders are in high morale, sufficient manpower and sufficient supplies in the city can last for at least a few months, even if the enemy sieges for more than a month, they will not be afraid at all.

According to the plan discussed before the war, Yu Wenming knew that the retreat of the besieged army was mostly led by his father to defeat the Xiangzhou army going south. Then, according to the plan, he needed to try his best to attract the retreating Jingzhou army's troops step by step.

Although Yu Wenming had not received the news, he had already determined that his father would attack Xiangyang, which was also the content of the plan formulated before the war. Two days later, Suizhou was north of Shun, Tuzhou and Yingzhou in the east sent troops to Suicheng to meet Yu Wenming. He then led his troops step by step and slowly advanced westward.

Since seeing the armies produced by his younger brother Yuwen Wen, he and his father Yuwen Liang have a deep belief in the victory of the Anzhou Army in the next battle, so they have made plans one by one with confidence.

Now Yu Wenming does not need to add icing on the cake. With the first priority to ensure the safety of the city, he tried his best to move westward to put pressure on Xiangzhou, forcing Tang, Chang and Cai on the east side of Xiangzhou, making these three troops unable to divide their troops to support Xiangyang.

As the general manager of Anzhou, Yu Wenliang naturally had to lead the main force of the Anzhou army in field battles. Then, the same important defense mission to follow the city naturally had to be undertaken by the eldest son Yu Wenming, and the second son Yu Wenwen was full of ideas and thoughts, so he followed the army to fight and guided craftsmen to solve difficult problems in equipment.

As the base camp, Yuwen Liang's confidant, Du Shijun, the chief of the General Administration, was responsible for guarding Anlu. The main force of the General Administration of Huangzhou has been recruited to fight with Yuwen Liang. If the Southern Chen sends troops north to invade the rest of the cities except Huangcheng, they can only stand and wait for reinforcements.

"It's almost time to attack Xiangyang," Yu Wenming murmured to himself as he looked west.

At the end of June, the fourth day after the siege of the city, the Anzhou army under Xiangyang City was ready to attack the city.

Early in the morning, Wang Yi was called by the panicked generals and rushed to the south of the city. When he got panting, he couldn't help but take a breath of air conditioning when he climbed up to the city and looked out of the city:

Two or three hundred meters outside the city, tall catapults stood like forests. The catapults lined up like giant pillars standing on the ground. The catapults were no less than seven or eight meters in the rack. Each catapult was piled with many huge stones. What he cared about the most was that huge wooden baskets were hung at the bottom of the caps of the catapults.

"What is that?" Wang Yi saw a few Taoist priests dancing in a catapult cart, and then he vaguely saw someone holding something and looking at a huge wooden basket hanging on the bottom of the cannon.

"Is it really a magic trick?" Wang Yi's face turned pale when he thought of this.
Chapter completed!