He was halfway through his words when he saw Lin Shuhan running over in a panic. He nodded to him as a greeting and continued, "The blasting siege method is a killer move for both the enemy and us. Once used, there is a sure win. The King of Lingnan is an experienced military commander and must have a trick up his sleeve. Don't underestimate him."
Lin Shuhan agreed with every word Qiu Yizi said, so he nodded and said, "It's useless for us to talk nonsense here, why don't we lead the army over to take a look first."
So Qiu Yizi ordered Zhao Chengxiao to gather troops and go to Wuding Gate immediately.
The more than 200 elite soldiers under Qiu Yi's command have rich combat experience. When they heard the noise in the city from afar, they knew that something must have happened outside the city. Before hearing the order from above, they had already dressed in armor and lined up on the open space of Lin Shuhan's manor.
Seeing these people in high spirits and full of fighting spirit, Qiu Yizhi felt a little more confident, so he mounted his horse and shouted, "Let's go and take a look!"
Before she walked out of the manor gate, she saw Yuchi Jiming catching up with her from behind. When she heard that the Lingnan army was coming to attack the city, she immediately changed into men's clothes, wanting to move together with everyone.
Seeing this, Qiu Yizi said to Yuchi Jiming, "Jiming, go back quickly to protect your sisters. Nothing can happen. These two hundred people are more than enough for me. Can't they protect me?" After saying that, without waiting for Yuchi Jiming's consent, he immediately mounted his Ferghana horse and galloped out of the manor.
Ever since Qiu Yizi led his troops to raid Mingzhou Port and seized a large number of Lingnan Army's horses, each of his personal soldiers was assigned a war horse. Although they often still had to dismount to fight the enemy in actual combat, their movement speed was much faster.
Now was the critical moment of the enemy's siege on the city. Qiu Yizi ignored the ban on riding horses in Jinling City and led his troops to gallop along the road towards Wuding Gate.
Along the way, the closer we got to Wuding Gate, the more pungent the smell of sulfur in the air became, and the thicker the smoke and dust became. On both sides of the road, there were already many soldiers and civilians, carrying wood, bricks, sandbags, etc. in their hands, shoulders, and backs, walking forward in groups, all with expressions of surprise and confusion on their faces.
These people were sent to repair and block the Wuding Gate. It was the first time for them to see the earth-shaking scene of the city gate being blown up. Naturally, they were shocked and scared. It was a rare achievement for them to be able to deliver supplies to the gate.
After walking a few more steps, more and more soldiers were waiting in formation. Seeing that Qiu Yizhi's team was not wearing the uniforms of regular Jiedu Army or Imperial Guards, several leading officers stepped forward to stop them and said, "The front is the combat area, no one is allowed to enter without permission!"
Qiu Yizi took out the golden medal and arrow he carried with him, which scared them away and continued to move forward to the Wuding Gate.
But the Jiedushi Liu Qing was indeed directing the troops in front of Wuding Gate. Although he was a little flustered, his plan was not chaotic. He had blocked up half of the Wuding Gate that had been blown into pieces with various building materials. He also gathered two to three thousand soldiers and horses around the incomplete gate, and set up a temporary position around the gate. Although these soldiers were still able to stand in formation, they were clearly terrified and panicked.
When Liu Qing saw Qiu Yizhi coming over, he seemed to be relieved. He hurried forward a few steps, helped Qiu Yizhi off the horse, and whispered in his ear: "Your Highness Yi, what's going on?"
Qiu Yizhi remembered that Liu Qing had also fought in the "Anti-Rebellion Campaign" with Emperor Zheng Rong. How could he be so surprised when seeing such a scene? He couldn't help but feel a little disdainful: "When the emperor personally led the army to attack the capital Luoyang, you were not there, wasn't it like today?"
Liu Qing whispered, "At that time, it was not because of the thunderbolt that collapsed the walls of Luoyang, but because of the great fortune of the emperor. Now it is thunderbolt again, does it mean that the Prince of Lingnan is also blessed by heaven?" When he said the last few words, his voice was so low that even he could not hear it clearly.
Qiu Yizi knew the reason behind this.
When the emperor breached the Luoyang city wall, it was not because of a thunderbolt from heaven, but because he used the siege method brought from the Western Regions by the Tianzun Sect, digging tunnels first and then burying explosives, which brought down the Luoyang city wall in one fell swoop. Today, the King of Lingnan breached the Wuding Gate using the same method, except that the one who came up with the idea was changed to the Tianzun Sect leader Wen Honghui.
However, the method of attacking the city with explosives was a secret among secrets, and Qiu Yizi was unwilling to tell Liu Qing clearly, so he just said, "Don't talk nonsense. The emperor was a divine power sent from heaven, and the fate was decided by heaven. The King of Lingnan is at most a local leader, and what he did was just a sorcerer. Let me ask you, before the explosion, did anyone do anything under the city?"
Liu Qing thought for a moment and said, "Your Highness Yi, it is true. It seems that in the early morning of this morning, someone piled a few jars under the city wall and the city gate in the dark. I didn't think there was much noise, and the Lingnan Army didn't provide follow-up support, so I didn't pay any attention to it..."
Qiu Yizhi immediately took over the conversation, deliberately raised his voice, and said: "So, this must be a demonic method. Tianzun Sect Leader Wen Honghui, who was lingering on, ran to the King of Lingnan to help the tyrant, this is his evil. Pass the order down, these are all devilish tricks, they will not amount to anything great. If anyone talks nonsense about the will of heaven and shakes the morale of the army, he will be killed immediately!"
After hearing these words, Liu Qing seemed to have gained some confidence. He quickly called a messenger and asked him to go down and pass on the message like a parrot.
Qiu Yizi added: "The magic of Tianzun Sect is all passed down from the Western Regions. It's nothing big. Compared with our authentic Taoism in the Central Plains, it's even inferior. Mr. Lin beside me has his own magic to defeat it!" As he said that, he turned his head and looked at Lin Shuhan.
Lin Shuhan almost wanted to curse in his heart - he was an upright master of Confucianism, and he believed most in "not speaking of supernatural beings, and not discussing things beyond the **". He was extremely disgusted by such eerie and mysterious things. Now Qiu Yizi wanted him to think of some vague way to solve the problem. How could he not be angry
But he changed his mind again. The folk operas always portrayed those wise and resourceful people—such as Zhang Liuhou, Zhuge Wuhou, and Liu Chengyi—as people who were well versed in Taoism and knew how to break the magic of the devil. This was also a foregone conclusion.
(Zhang Liuhou, Zhang Liang; Zhuge Wuhou, Zhuge Liang; Liu Chengyi, Liu Bowen.)
Therefore, although Lin Shuhan felt disgusted, he knew that the most important thing now was to boost morale. Besides, there was no point in talking to these illiterate soldiers, so he racked his brains and finally remembered that he had seen a few words in some unofficial history.
So Lin Shuhan said with difficulty: "Yes, yes. Go kill a few dogs, let their blood flow, and smear it on weapons and armor, and the magic will naturally be broken." Lin Shuhan was very resistant to these illusory magic techniques, so after saying these absurd words, he glared at Qiu Yi fiercely.
After hearing this suggestion, Liu Qing immediately smiled and said, "Okay, okay, I'll send someone to kill the dog and get its blood!"
Qiu Yizi nodded and said, "Okay, but these are all trivial matters. The most important thing right now is to guard Wuding Gate. Now that the gate has been blown open, the King of Lingnan will surely attack the city in a big way. Fortunately, the walls of Jinling are still solid. You should order the soldiers in the city to prepare for the battle immediately according to the countermeasures to resist the attack of the enemy's entire army!"
Liu Qing listened and took notes. When he heard Qiu Yizi talking, he called a few messengers and passed on the orders like a parrot.
As soon as Jiedushi Liu Qing gave the order, every household in Jinling City closed their windows and doors, and soldiers and civilians came out from their garrisons and moved quickly to their designated posts. The whole city of Jinling suddenly became noisy, like a busy market, as if the bustling scene of before had returned.
In order to command the battle nearby, Liu Qing temporarily requisitioned a restaurant facing the Wuding Gate, which was about a hundred steps away. Together with Qiu Yizi and others, he overlooked the city gate from a high floor and waited for the King of Lingnan's entire army to attack.
In just half an hour, the defenders in Jinling City were all in their positions. The city walls were well defended, flags were flying, and rolling logs and stones were ready. They were fully prepared to deal with the enemy's attack.
Qiu Yizi looked at it from afar and felt a little relieved.
He thought that although the King of Lingnan had broken through Wuding Gate and opened a gap in the thick and solid walls of Jinling, he only had tens of thousands of soldiers and horses, far less than the hundreds of thousands of defenders in the entire city of Jinling. With such a clear difference in strength, even if the King of Lingnan was good at fighting and the Lingnan army was brave, it would be difficult to break through Jinling, a solid city that had been defended for half a year.
However, no matter how many troops the defenders have, they can only passively wait for the enemy to attack.
Qiu Yizi was no exception. He could only sit in the temporary command post converted from a restaurant, chatting with Liu Qing intermittently. With a bit of nervousness and eagerness, he waited for the King of Lingnan to make a move.
King Zheng Gui of Lingnan did not let him wait too long. He only heard a few faint cannon shots outside the city, followed by the beating of war drums and shouts of killing that became louder, closer, and clearer.
This was a very common sound on the battlefield, but Qiu Yizhi felt inexplicably nervous today, which made him stand up from his seat involuntarily. He slowly walked to the railing, leaned on it and looked at the ruined Wuding Gate in front of him, muttering, "Is it finally starting?"
At this moment, there was a sound of hurried footsteps downstairs. It turned out that a messenger soldier under Liu Qing came upstairs to report the battle situation: "The Lingnan Army is mainly attacking Wuding Gate. More than 4,000 people are charging the city gate on foot, and more than 6,000 people are using more than 200 ladders to attack the city walls on both sides of Wuding Gate."
Qiu Yizi had expected such an action. Without waiting for Liu Qing to speak, he said to the messenger, "Don't panic. Our army is also guarding Wuding Gate. We have more than 20,000 soldiers and horses stored in the city and outside the city, which is more than twice the enemy's. The Lingnan army is also carrying a head on two shoulders. If you kill the enemy seriously, I will reward you handsomely."
The messenger felt strange. Qiu Yizi was just a county magistrate from a remote county. Now the governor of Jiangnan Road was upstairs. Why did he take the lead in issuing orders? But seeing that Liu Qing himself had no objection, he did not dare to ask in detail. After saluting, he hurried downstairs with a lot of questions in his mind.
The King of Lingnan seemed determined to win and used all his strength in the first attack.
Qiu Yizhi was on the top of the building, and soon saw countless ladders erected on the city wall. There were at least five or six hundred Lingnan soldiers climbing up the wall using the ladders. They were all brave and their martial arts were obviously better than those of the imperial army. In a short while, they had made a significant breakthrough on the top of the city wall. The defenders could only rely on their numerical advantage to try their best to prevent the city wall from being completely occupied.