The sky was dim, and the twilight clouds were low.
The king's army advanced like a tidal wave, and in a blink of an eye, the city of Nanping County was encircled into an isolated island.
The trees outside the city were completely cut down by the Jingzhou army, and the ground was also destroyed by thousands of ravines, like unsightly scars, and like reefs protruding from the sea, barely visible in the overwhelming waves, and disappeared in an instant. trace.
The rebels pushed the wheelbarrow full of sand into the trap trench, and laid wooden boards for people to pass through.
They brought all these things from Hua County, which is only half a day away from Fucheng, so it was not troublesome to transport all the way.
The defenders in the city were shocked and angry when they saw that the first line of defense they had built so hard was gone.
"That's outrageous!" General Ma, who was sitting at the head of the city, was so angry that he almost went to Jingzhou to settle accounts.
It was said before that it was God-given Wang Dajun, a mud-legged refugee whose eyes were red from hunger. He looked unstoppable, but in fact, as long as he held on to the first few waves of offensive, the refugees would have no food in their stomachs and panic, and naturally they would go elsewhere.
The city wall is high and the city is deep, the city has no shortage of food, grass and troops, and with the full support of King Jing and many aristocratic families, General Han's brain is hot, thinking about wealth and danger, and family revitalization is on his shoulders, so he took over. This errand.
In the end, there was no fight, just this one face-to-face, General Han wanted to curse.
"The hellish mob, this obvious military rule of law, look at this queue, is it led by generals who don't understand the art of war?"
He had already prepared to bring sand and wooden boards to fill the trenches. He did not step on them, and he could still work together as one.
The guards of the city were already nervous, but when they heard this movement, they panicked.
A few lieutenants reluctantly said: "...It should be the flags of those evil sects and crooked ways, and the fools are blind believers, just follow, there is no art of war."
"That's right, no matter how quickly you can build bridges and build a road, you can't prove that you are an elite soldier. The rebel army is a mud-legged man from Yizhou. The mountain road there is steep, and you may have been used to this kind of thing."
At this point, they are about to convince themselves.
That's right, it must be like this, otherwise how can you explain that a group of refugees who can't get enough to eat swept the entire Jingzhou.
They must have underestimated their combat power first, and then saw that the lineup of the rebels overestimated their abilities, so they avoided the battle or even ran away.
General Han spat fiercely, his face improved, and he issued a series of orders, all the bows and arrows were ready.
He thought that this was the evening, and the first wave of the rebel army's offensive would certainly not last long, and it would not be difficult to hold on.
- The poor people have not eaten the last meal, and can't see clearly at night, and what kind of war are they fighting.
Not to mention refugees, except for some elite soldiers and horses, most of the Jingzhou army also suffers from night blindness, and they cannot fight at night. This has to do with the Qi army in the north, and General Han may still be worried. He doesn't know how the Qi army's soldiers are treated, and whether the army's food and salaries are severely deducted. What if one's eyes are good at night! But here comes a group of rebels, so what's there to worry about
General Han waved his hand and ordered the arrows to be fired.
Seeing the rebel army swooping down like wheat under the city, he immediately laughed.
"Go ahead and shoot these bastards to death." General Han strode to the edge of the city wall and cursed happily.
The rebel front line began to be chaotic, but this chaos didn't last long, because it was easier to rush forward than to turn around and run backwards. If you ran out of the range of the bow and arrow, you would naturally not be attacked by the cold arrow.
"boom."
As the first soldier against the army slashed heavily on the city gate with an axe, the frantic attack began.
The city head threw rolling stones, logs, and even boiling water.
The flesh and blood suddenly became the soil to be trampled on. Most of the people who fell were not mortally wounded, but could not stand up for a while, but soon they died. No one paid attention to how they died, the people behind kept rushing up, and the people on the wall kept throwing stones.
Soon, the rocks and logs that fell before and even the accumulated corpses became a protective barrier.
No matter what you throw, you can't get out of the way like before, sweeping down a large area at a time.
"Stop! Stop!"
General Han was surprised that something was wrong, and he quickly ordered.
After the houses were demolished in Nanping County, there was no shortage of stones or wood. Seeing the maddened appearance of the army of the God-given King, the guards of the city were also panicked. The stones and wood below were also piled together.
This was supposed to be a dilemma that would only appear after an hour of fierce battle, but the counter army rushed too hard, the defenders were too panicked, and the city head couldn't be dispatched in time.
Although General Han woke up in time, the opportunity was lost.
The gongs and drums are loud and the horns are blaring.
A group of elites wearing armor and holding shields suddenly appeared in the Heavenly Granted King's army.
They held their shields over their heads and marched slowly against the rain of arrows.
The protector of the holy lotus altar kept shouting bewitching words, and her ears were filled with musical instruments of various kinds of gongs, drums, and conch shells. In addition, the smoke and dust in front of the city wall were flying, and the logs and stones were piled up in mountains, making it difficult for the soldiers behind the rebels to know the front line. of casualties.
After slowly approaching and seeing corpses everywhere, chaos suddenly appeared in the array.
"The demon has been tracked down. If we can't take the city today and use the city god temple of the county government to gain the power of the heavenly soldiers, we will all die!"
The shrill voice of the saint reverberated in the ears of the soldiers against the army. This time they were not wearing veils, and there were a lot of followers and guardians around them.
Seeing that the saintess whom he believed in on weekdays were all rushing into the formation, the rebellion was barely stabilized.
Ever since the demon attacked Huaxian at night the day before yesterday, causing many congregants and generals who rebelled against the army to be injured, they were as frightened as they heard the word demon.
As the saying goes, seeing is true and hearing is false. Master Luo blocked the blood shadow demon, but he did not expect that there was another demon hiding in the dark. When the attack suddenly broke out, they didn't even see the appearance of the demon. Some people felt that things under the firelight were twisted instantly. Some people saw that the flame was absorbed into a vortex by an inexplicable force. , I couldn't tell the difference between east, west, north and west, and when I came back to my senses, I found myself lying on the ground, bleeding from my nose and mouth.
Isn't that what a monster is
I heard that the King of Heaven was seriously injured.
I heard that Master Luo fought back the demon.
If the sacrifice to heaven fails, the blood will stain the universe, and there will be a catastrophe.
Some people are timid and want to run away. Anyway, they have already arrived at the treasure land in the south of the Yangtze River, grab something, and then find a village to farm and hunt, and they should be able to survive. However, the people who ran out at night were all hanged on the Huaxian city tower the next day, and their bodies were all over the place. Bloodstains, very strange.
In the army, it was rumored that the demon was not far away, and without the protection of the saint, there was no way to go out.
The ceremony of offering sacrifices to heaven was held again. The burning spices made people feel dizzy, and the blessings of the scriptures that they were used to lingered in their ears. The holy lotus altar cultists recited that they had no food and clothing and suffered from hunger and cold. The panic in the hearts of the rebel soldiers.
Yes, what is there to cultivate in the field, if God does not rain, or there is a flood, the harvest of the whole year will be lost.
Even if you can escape the demons and run away in the chaos, the tax collectors and yamen can drive the whole family to death.
—Having killed someone and stained his hands with blood, he felt that there was no difficulty in this matter.
Everyone held their weapons tightly, roaring in a low voice, and there were words of bewitching and blessings in their ears.
"kill!"
"Zi Wei Heng Zhao!"
The only way to survive is to follow the God-given King. They did not starve to death, and they went all the way to Jiangnan.
"kill!"
"Destiny comes to the world!"
The shouting under the city slowly changed from messy to neat, and then the gongs and drums suddenly stopped, and tens of thousands of people shouted the word "kill" at the same time.
The oncoming sound waves shook the spears and halberds resting on the city wall, and the sand and dust rolled down.
The Jingzhou army stationed on the top of the city was pale, and some people's feet were weak.
The second cry that followed, as if a dull thunder rolled across the horizon.
The light of the sky will end, and the lonely city is destined.
From a distance, it looks like a reef in the desert that is about to be submerged by the black tide. The afterglow of the sunset cannot see through the thick clouds, only looming in the crevices and gradually sinking. The darkness is an invisible monster, and the shadow slowly climbs up the city wall, about to engulf everything.
***
"Oops."
Meng Qi's expression changed suddenly, and his breath was uneven.
Seeing that Hua County had become an empty city, he knew something was wrong, so he grabbed the ink carp and rushed forward.
It didn't take a moment to meet someone from Fengxing Pavilion on the side of the road.
"Where is the King's Army of Heaven?"
"Two hours ago, it may have arrived in Nanping County."
It was Shanshanhu who was speaking, and he breathed heavily, "Flying Pigeon Chuanshu has already gone to Jiangxia, and at the order of the pavilion master, I am going to ask Hengshan to send a few seniors to contain the guardians of the Holy Lotus Altar and the thunderbolts. Hall, the longer the Nanping Prefecture City is defended, the more beneficial it will be."
"George Qiu is right, the premise is... you can keep it."
Meng Qi felt troubled when he saw the deployment and forage of the King Tianshou in Huaxian's garrison.
The rebel army seems to be disorderly, but it restrains the foolish people through the holy lotus altar, and can temporarily turn them into a forbidden army.
That's all, many details show that there are a large number of soldiers in the Heavenly Granted King Array who are used to the army. Meng Qi looked at the camp with a certain accuracy, knowing that no matter how farsighted the general is, it is useless.
Also occupying the houses of Hua County, the rebel army is divided into two completely different groups. Some people just look for a big house and want to raise their beds and warm pillows. .
"There are not only refugees and ordinary people, but also elite soldiers." Meng Qi suddenly woke up, flicked his sleeves fiercely, and the sand was flying by his feet. The imperial court not only has troops stationed at Xuanchuan Pass, but where are the soldiers from the counties in Yizhou?"
It is impossible for them all to be killed by the refugees, or to escape and disappear.
"Qi Chao didn't control these troops at all, and couldn't get them back."
Meng Qi gritted his teeth and said word by word, "The government is incompetent. After being defeated by the holy lotus altar or the king of heaven, these soldiers may have fallen into trouble and become bandits, and then the king of heaven has brought them back."
This time and again, despite the sharp drop in the number of soldiers, they escaped the eyes and ears of outsiders, thinking that the rebels were all homeless mountain bandits who couldn't eat.
"Lu Zhang this rubbish!"
Meng Qi was furious and reached out to support his forehead.
During the more than ten years of Chu Li in the Qi Dynasty, until he met Moli, Meng Qi did not fully understand what happened outside Shangyun Mountain, especially in remote places such as Yizhou, Pingzhou, Yanzhou and other places.