Thirteen days after the rebellion of the King of Min, which historians call the Kaigong Rebellion, the banner of the Great Min once again swept the vast fields and plains on the outskirts of the southern city of Constantinople.

The big ship could not move into the shallow water, and there were countless vehicles and boats, and small sailing boats of more than 20 meters rushed up and ran aground on the beach like sturgeon going upstream, and then countless Fujian soldiers rushed onto the beach with shouts.

This time is different from the last time, the Min army on the beach has taken an enclave, there is no obstruction at all, the rolling tide of the Min reinforcements converged with the left and right Qianniuwei who had been preparing for a long time, recaptured the outside of the city that had retreated because of insufficient strength a few days ago, and once again planted the flag under the city of Constantinople.

Li Yexu is indeed a talent, after being defeated by the plot, he stuck alone on the tidal flats, and in the face of the loneliness of the enemy who did not know how vast the territory of the whole of Europe, he not only did not panic, but became more and more calm, but calmly restrained the team, stuck to the previous formula of the tidal flats, and sent light cavalry to break through the Roman cavalry on the beach, to gather the defeated soldiers who were scattered, and in more than ten days, he gathered more than 40,000 Arab light cavalry and 18,000 Caucasian soldiers.

Although most of the remaining Arab tribes and the defeated troops of the Caucasus have been scattered around the Balkan Peninsula, it is estimated that it will be very difficult to recall them again, which is basically a loss, but it has recovered a lot of losses, and the welcome of more than 70,000 troops has also boosted the morale of the landing army in Fujian.

In the morning, the large military camp covering the western walls of Constantinople was built again, busy arranging defense with reinforcements and exchanging information, until noon, Li Yexu took time to meet the general Li Ji.

In the center of the barracks, in the tent of the Crusaders, Li Yexu and Sheng Lianshan hurriedly walked in, and faced the old Li Ji, who was solemnly instructing the military plane, and the two knelt on the ground at the same time.

"Sin general Li Yexu, Sheng Lianshan, meet the general!"

Lao Li Ji, who was busy instructing a few lieutenant generals around him, couldn't help but smile, and actually walked out of the seat to help the two of them up, and persuaded with laughter: "Get up quickly, get up quickly!" What are the two generals guilty of? Before coming, His Majesty King Min also mentioned your two generals, so that the old man must rely on the two generals. ”

In the flattery of the two generals, Li Ji's words were a little closer, and he smiled more kindly: "And the king of Min also asked the old man to tell the virtuous nephew, his promise is absolutely unchanged, once the virtuous nephew has special merits in the attack on Constantinople, he will be promoted to the virtuous nephew as the Duke of Wei, and in front of the Grand Palace in the city of Constantinople for the colossus of Li Weigong, with the righteousness of the Duke of Wei, Yongzhen Europe!"

However, after a sweet jujube was lost, Li Ji slashed a big stick to the head of Sheng Lianshan, who was smirking in relief.

"However, Sheng Xian's nephew made His Majesty a little dissatisfied this time, I heard that you acted recklessly, and actually took dozens of personal soldiers to fight in the chaos, and completely forgot his responsibility as General Zuo Qianniuwei, and next time, King Min will let General Sheng go back to his hometown to raise a baby!"

This is called the art of employing people, Li Yexu and Sheng Lianshan are both promoted by Li Jie from the last position, loyalty is not to worry, but Li Yexu is cautious, it is inevitable to be timid after defeat, so he needs to be motivated, and Sheng Lianshan is a fierce general, reckless and overbearing, and needs to be knocked down, sure enough, after some words, Li Yexu is grateful for a kind of sharpness, as for Sheng Lianshan, he was a little unconvinced, but he drooped his head listlessly, and thanked Li Yexu together: "The last general thanked His Majesty for his generous grace."

Very satisfied, stroked his white beard, looked at the appearance of the second general, Li Ji bent down slightly, helped the two up, and immediately asked heartily: "The two generals have been stationed in Constantinople for a long time, the old man has just arrived, and he doesn't know the specific situation, and he asked the two generals to explain one or two to the old man, what are the strategies for attacking the city?"

At the mention of this, Li Yexu and Sheng Lianshan's brows tightened again.

…………

Under the command of a team of elite guards, Li Ji and Li Yexu, Sheng Lianshan, as well as the hussar general Crossbow lost Bi Yao Geluo, the chariot cavalry general Su Lie, the general of the Zuo Xiaowei was transferred to Ge Shuna Mucuo, and the partial general Li Zhong and other major generals put on the clothes and armor of ordinary soldiers and patrolled the western city wall of Constantinople.

After walking around for a while, Li Ji was shocked, no wonder Li Yexu and Sheng Lianshan had been showing off their might under the city wall for so long, but they had an army of nearly 200,000 but did not attack the city once.

Li Ji is also considered to have experienced a hundred battles, from Pushan Gong Li Mi to Xingluocang, followed the Qin King Li Shimin to break Wang Shichong, attacked Luoyang, and in the war of pacifying Fu Gongyou, along the rugged Yangtze River along the banks of countless fortresses, directly to take Danyang, and finally in the desert to fight the Turks, Goguryeo beat the stick, it can be said that the well-known big city in his hands is not a hundred but eighty, but he also encountered such a complex city as Constantinople for the first time.

First of all, the Golden Horn deep into the interior and the Mediterranean Sea south of Constantinople perfectly shield the two sides of the triangle of Constantinople, even if the Great Min Navy blocked Constantinople's sea supply line from the Mediterranean, relying on the Rhine, the Roman Thracian military district in the Golden Horn could still supply the city continuously.

This city cannot be surrounded on all sides, and it cannot be cut off from its supplies! If it was a siege battle, the Great Min, which supplied hundreds of thousands of troops for the expedition, would definitely not be able to consume the nearest supply of Constantinople, and only the western city wall could be attacked.

But this western city wall is also very difficult, and it is difficult to be captured.

The city wall facing Damin is not the wall of Constantine built by Emperor Constantine the Great when he built the city, but the new city wall built by the Roman Emperor Theodosius II in 408 AD 1,500 meters west of the old city wall.

Why was this wall built? Because at that time, it was the most terrifying whip of God in Western history, Attila, who led the Huns to build the Xiongnu Empire.

Other cities in the Balkan Peninsula were in the hands of the Huns, Thrace, the defense line of the Rhine River on which the empire depended, and the Rhine defense line was almost like paper paste under the hooves of the Huns.

The Roman engineers poured all their fears and curses on the Hun Emperor into this city wall, which is a double-layer structure, with an outer low city wall of about eight meters, an inner city of 12 meters high and five meters thick, a wide city wall that can be walked, and every few tens of meters, Theodosius City Wall has 96 towers made of stones of 18 to 20 meters, plus moats and sharp trees, which can be said to be armed to the teeth.

This defense is even more perverted than the walls of Jingshi and Chang'an, and it is no wonder that after the completion of this wall, except for the Crusaders who relied on the inner ghosts to accidentally capture a layer, and the citizens of Constantinople opened the city gate once during the civil war, for more than a thousand years, it stood firmly in the easternmost part of Europe, resisting countless waves of invasion without collapsing.

One can imagine how much the loss would have been if the soldiers had to brave the Romans' rain of arrows to capture the first wall, then the second wall in an even more intense battle, and risk their lives to fight the enemy in the tower to the death in a narrow spot.

Even a thousand years later, the Ottoman Turks, who possessed the terrible weapon of the urban cannon and hundreds of thousands of horses, had to divide their forces and force their way into the Golden Horn to weaken the Romans' defenses, and then they still happened to crash into the city through the city gates, and then captured Constantinople, which was guarded by a mere 9,000 defenders.

In the past thousand years, the Huns, Persians, Bedouins, Crusaders, and countless enemies have met under the city of Constantinople and shed blood.

It is even more difficult to wonder that more than ten years ago, the fledgling rookie Anna relied on a group of equally rookie citizens of Constantinople to contain Muawiyah's Syrian elite attack.

After looking at it for a long time, Lao Li Ji spit out a sentence quite helplessly.

"It's going to besiege the city!"

If he could choose, he would rather spend two to three years turning the Balkan Peninsula into scorched earth, so as to cut off foreign aid from Constantinople and force it to fall, but unfortunately, Li Ji had no choice, and Min urgently needed to capture this city to maintain the dignity of Damin, and the king of Min also needed the Roman throne, so he couldn't wait that long!

In the end, it was Li Ji, his expression was awe-inspiring, and after finally glancing at the walls of Constantinople, he shouted with majesty on his face.

"Spread all the generals to the Chinese army and discuss the strategy of breaking the city!"