Bai Wenxuan walked into the camp of the Chinese army, and the soldiers who followed shouted: "King Gongchang has arrived!" ”

Only then did Wang Xinyu know that the person who came was King Gongchang, so he hurriedly walked down from the watchtower and stepped forward to greet him.

"The lowly Wang Yu has seen the prince!" Wang Xinyu stepped forward and arched his hand.

Bai Wenxuan was very surprised to see that the young man in his early twenties in front of him was Wang Yu, the world-famous Governor of Qiongzhou, and hurriedly said: "I heard that General Wang was a hero, but when I saw it today, I didn't expect to be so young!" Impressive! ”

"The prince has won the prize!" Wang Xinyu invited Bai Wen to be elected to the big tent of the Chinese army, "The prince came down all the way from the upstream, the road is far away, it must be very hard!" Please sit inside! ”

The two walked into the camp of the Chinese army, and Bai Wenxuan told Wang Xinyu: "After crossing the Xibo River, we will repel the thief army." After that, enter the mountain forest path and go south along the river road. When they arrived near the city of Yawa, they saw that the king's division had not yet arrived, and they heard that the king was going north along the river, so they continued to walk downstream to the west, and sure enough, they met your army here. When I first came, I saw that the thief army was attacking your army, and this king wanted to lead the army to attack the back of the thieves to help your army, but when he saw that the thieves had been defeated, he killed it and took the opportunity to gain some military exploits! ”

"The prince is very relieved at this point. Our naval division is strong, but there is no cavalry, and every time a thief escapes, our army cannot pursue. The only way to destroy the enemy is to besiege. Now that the prince is here, as long as the last general captures the earthen city in front, the prince can take the opportunity to chase and kill the thieves, so that none of them can escape! Wang Xinyu arched his hand.

Bai Wenxuan stroked his beard and smiled: "General Wang has a good plan to break the city?" ”

"As long as our army's trenches are dug in front of the enemy's position, and the dirt hills behind are built, the city can be broken! Our army has siege mortars to break the city! ”

"Siege mortars? What is it? Bai Wenxuan was stunned.

After Wang Xinyu explained, Bai Wenxuan smiled and said, "Isn't that a cupola?" How powerful can it be? ”

"Please come and see with the last general!" Wang Xinyu invited Bai Wenxuan to visit his camp.

After seeing the 24-pounder mortar cannon, Bai Wenxuan was taken aback, only to see that the caliber of this cannon was particularly large. It is larger than the caliber of the redcoat cannon, but the walls of the tube are not thick, and the barrel is very short. In the past, the caliber of the Ming army's cupola was not so large. But Wang Xinyu told Bai Wenxuan: "We have bigger mortars, 32-pound and 64-pound, and those cannons are too big." You can't use that kind of cannon to attack such an earthen city in front of you. ”

"God, sixty-four pounds, what a cannon!" Bai Wenxuan sighed.

"That kind of cannon can break through a fortified city like Nanjing and Beijing."

"The range of the mortar cannon should not be as long as the direct fire of the thief, right?"

Wang Xinyu told Bai Wenxuan: "The mortar cannon has a short range, but the mortar is a curved attack weapon, and we have set up a dirt slope in front of the mortar and piled up sandbags, so that the shells fired by the Burmese army from the earth city cannot destroy our mortar position." ”

"That's a wonderful way! Then the thieves won't be able to beat us! ”

"The prince must be tired and thirsty after such a long journey, right? There is some herbal tea here at the end of the general, which can be drunk by the prince. Herbal tea has been used first. Dinner again. Wang Xinyu greeted.

Bai Wenxuan followed Wang Xinyu to the front of the camp of the leader of the Ming army, the camp of the leader of this group was in the middle of the camp of the Ming army, in front of which was a large camp surrounded by a wooden fence, and there was a gate outside, and there were Ming soldiers standing guard at the door. Bai Wenxuan walked into the camp of the gang leader soldiers, and saw bags of grain inside, as well as pigsties, sheep pens, cattle pens, and chicken and duck cages. Further on, there are wooden basins on the ground. Bean sprouts and sprouts are planted inside, and a basket of fresh vegetables is placed on the ground.

"What is this?" Bai Wenxuan asked, pointing to the red pepper on a sieve.

"It's chili. The last will be brought from the Spaniards in Luzon to stir-fry not only to enhance the flavor, but also to drive away moisture and prevent the soldiers from adapting to the hot and humid areas. Wang Xinyu replied.

Bai Wenxuan grabbed a chili pepper, put it in his mouth and took a bite, and suddenly his face changed so spicy. The mouth opened widely: "It's so spicy!" It's really spicy! This is much spicier than the dogwood used by the Sichuan people! But the taste is also much more fragrant. ”

When the sky was dark, lanterns were hung in the camp of the Ming army, and bonfires were lit everywhere, illuminating the camp brilliantly.

Bai Wenxuan followed Wang Xinyu to the gate of Dayingzhai, only to see that the auxiliary soldiers outside had only started to work at this time. They slept in the camp during the day. As night fell, the sun went down, and the weather was not so hot, the auxiliaries carried their tools into the trenches and dug forward in the light of the fire.

"Although the auxiliaries are not soldiers, these auxiliaries are all transferred from long distances, and if there are casualties, it is not easy to replenish them. The sun is so poisonous during the day that digging at night is the best way to do it. Wang Xinyu pointed to the busy auxiliary soldiers in front of him and said.

At the edge of the trenches, piles of bonfires were lit; Wooden pillars stood all around, on which lanterns were hung. Even if the Burmese army wants to take advantage of the night to sneak attack, there is no chance, because the surrounding area is very bright, as long as the Burmese army is close, it will be discovered.

"We have lit so many fires here, isn't it that the thieves are in the light, and the enemy is in the dark?" Bai Wenxuan asked.

"If the thieves are coming, we'll set the straw on fire with rockets, so that both sides will understand. We keep our own lights bright, there will be no roar, there will be no chaos in the event of an emergency, and the soldiers will have their weapons at their fingertips. And we sleep in three shifts, and everyone is on guard for four hours a day, and the rest of the time is resting, of course, on standby, and ready to fight as soon as there is a fight. Wang Xinyu explained.

Bai Wenxuan walked around the camp of the Ming army and found that the camp of the Ming army was arranged in an orderly manner, a circle of trenches was dug outside the wooden fence, there was a suspension bridge outside the gate of the wall, and a number of high platforms were arranged in the camp, so that the situation outside could be found in time from a high position. Walking out of the gate of the big camp, I saw that the auxiliaries outside were digging up the soil and building a fort.

The improvised fort outside the camp was set up on a three-foot-high earthen platform made of earth, and from the earthen platform to the main camp, there was a three-foot-high road connected to it, and there were trenches dug on both sides, making it difficult for the enemy to bypass and attack the back of the battery.

The Ming army's auxiliaries worked overnight, and Tutai advanced little by little towards the Burmese army's Tucheng. Before the completion of the project, which was also the most vulnerable to artillery fire from the Burmese army, the Ming army auxiliaries brought truckloads of sand and poured them on the slope in front of the earthen platform, forming a wall of sand that could be used to effectively resist the bombardment of the Burmese army.

Seeing that the earthen platform piled up by the Ming army was getting closer and closer to the Burmese army's earthen city, Bian Yayu felt extremely frightened. He ordered the Burmese artillery to open artillery fire on the Ming army, which was under construction.

The Burmese army at the head of the city opened artillery bombardment, and the shells fired flew in a whistling manner, smashing on the earthen platform and the sand slope, smashing the earth all over the place. However, the slope of the river sand effectively absorbed the kinetic energy of the Burmese artillery shells, and most of the shells smashed directly into the sand no longer bounced, and the thick sand layer completely absorbed the kinetic energy of the shells, so that the shells could not cause damage to the earth platform.

The next morning, on the morning of September 26, the Ming attack began.

"Let's bombard the city with mortars first! Solid shells are fired first, then flowering shells. When the walls are blown down, our infantry will march forward! Wang Xinyu arranged it.

Bai Wenxuan stepped forward and asked for an order: "This prince led the cavalry of his headquarters to ambush behind the Burmese!" Once the Burmese fled from the city, the king led his cavalry to chase and kill! Make sure to drive them all the way to the city of Yawa and not turn back! ”

"Good!" Wang Xinyu arched his hand, "Then there is you, Lord Lao!" ”

Bai Wenxuan retreated and went to lead the cavalry of his headquarters to set up an ambush behind the Burmese army. Wang Xinyu arranged it and assigned various units to prepare for the attack.

"Fire!" Gong Xiaoda yelled.

The mortar cannon erected behind the dirt slope spewed fire, and billowing white smoke rose from the earthen platform and rose into the air. Solid shells the size of watermelons rose into the air, arcing in the air and smashing down towards the Burmese army's earthen city.

"The thieves have bombarded the city!" The Burmese military general reported to the border in a panic.

Hearing the news, Bian Yayu immediately climbed to the high platform, only to see that shells kept falling from the sky and smashing on the earth. Twenty-four pounds of heavy shells fell on the earthen city, smashing the earth and flying everywhere, and the wooden fences on the head of the city broke like reed poles that could not resist the wind, and the head of the city was smashed into one pit after another. The cannonballs continued to fall, and each shell that landed on the city could stir up a large area of earth, and the city soon became potholes.

A cannonball hit the Burmese artillery at the head of the city, and the watermelon-sized iron cannonball smashed on the bronze barrel, smashing the barrel down, and the heavy cannon body flew up like a child's toy, sweeping over the two Burmese gunners who had no time to run away.

Suddenly, a shell fell on the powder keg, and the powerful collision force smashed the powder keg to pieces, and the heat generated by the friction and collision ignited the gunpowder, and the gunpowder flying from the barrel bloomed with dazzling light, and then ignited the surrounding powder keg, causing a violent explosion of the Burmese artillery position in the city. Only a loud "boom" was heard, and four cannons of the Burmese army flew up from the city, fell to the ground, and a large section of the city's fort was also blown up.

The Burmese army counterattacked with the longest-range 24-pounder and 18-pounder cannons, but the shells fired could not hit the Ming mortar positions hiding behind the soil slope, and they could only watch the Ming army continue to fire at them.

The bombardment by the Burmese army triggered an even more fierce retaliation by the Ming army. Dozens of mortar shells fell from the sky and landed on the position of the Burmese army's long-barreled cannon. An artillery shell hit the cannon of the Burmese army, and the steel collided with the steel, sparks flew everywhere, and the cannon weighing thousands of pounds was smashed and jumped and rolled off the gun carriage. The surrounding Burmese soldiers dropped their cannons, turned around and ran.

Later, the Ming army switched to flowering shells, and fired dozens of flowering shells at the already shattered city. These flowering shells were filled with black potions, but the power of the shells was enough to blow up the earthen city.

Cannonballs whizzed down on the city, and the flames rose and exploded, and soon a large section of the city wall was blown open. (To be continued.) )