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Duoduo coughed twice and asked Zuo Menggeng, "Most of Jin Shenghuan and the Huai'an garrison were your former subordinates. Do you have any way to persuade them to surrender?"
Zuo Menggeng replied with an embarrassed look: "I will send someone to try it right away."
Duoduo nodded. Perhaps because he was sick, or perhaps because the situation was unfavorable to the Qing Dynasty and they urgently needed the Green Camp soldiers to strengthen their own strength, Duoduo became a lot more tolerant.
Compared with Ajige, he has a much stronger sense of the overall situation and is better at grasping the timing of advance and retreat.
"So, everyone thinks that attacking Chuzhou is the best strategy?" Duoduo asked calmly.
Aobai suddenly said, "Your Majesty, I think it would be better to attack Luzhou."
Duoduo glanced at Aobai, who was as strong as a bull, without any expression.
Aobai and Tulai were both Hauge's men. Hauge was recalled to Beijing because he had to use Aobai and Tulai. If he used these people, Hauge would not be allowed to rule alone, otherwise the consequences would be unpredictable.
Ning Wanwo said, "Luzhou has Meng Ke's 30,000 troops, and Huoshan has Li Guo's 20,000 troops, forming a pincer attack with Meng Ke. It is not easy to attack Luzhou. Moreover, Luzhou is located in the southwest. If our army presses towards Luzhou and is held back, the gates of Henan and Shandong will be wide open. The Qin army's land and water forces on the eastern front can advance along the Yellow River or the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal to Henan or Shandong. In this way, not only Fengyang and Shouzhou in Huainan will be in danger, but Henan and Shandong will also be in danger."
Aobai sneered, "When Emperor Taizong was in power, every time our Great Qing entered the pass, it was like entering an empty land. We could attack wherever we wanted, and we were never afraid of anyone. But Emperor Taizong passed away, and our Great Qing cavalry was like rats crossing the street, afraid of this and that. We might as well just hide in our nest outside the pass."
"How dare you!" Duoduo put his hand on the hilt of the knife and shouted in a deep voice, with a sharp light flashing in his tiger eyes.
If a tiger doesn't show its power, would you think it is a sick cat
Of course, Aobai was not afraid of being scared. But as a soldier, Aobai did not want to challenge Duoduo's authority too much, because that would be courting death.
"No need to discuss further. After the army reaches Guide Prefecture, it will turn to Yongcheng, Suqian, and then go to Fengyang."
Under Duoduo's command, the 80,000 Qing troops suddenly accelerated and rushed towards Fengyang Prefecture.
When everyone thought Duoduo would rush to Chuzhou from Fengyang, he suddenly led his troops eastward and quickly attacked Sizhou and Xuyi along the Huai River.
Sizhou is located on the west bank of Hongze Lake, facing the Huai River and Xushan Mountain, with a circumference of nine li and thirty steps. The city wall is 25 feet high and has five city gates.
There is Huilong Bridge at the east gate, Yongning Bridge at the west gate and the south gate is modeled after Yueyang Tower, which is majestic and spectacular.
There is a gate called Xianghua Gate between the South Gate and the West Gate, and the North Gate is called Chaoque Tower.
There is the Ming Dynasty Mausoleum 13 miles north of Sizhou City. After Duoduo's army arrived in Sizhou, they camped not far from the Ming Dynasty Mausoleum.
Although Sizhou City is low-lying and has long been known as a water country, it has developed water and land transportation and is the throat of the Central Plains and the key point between the north and the south. Its political, economic, cultural and military status is very important.
Xuyi is located on the south bank of the Huai River, and the Huai River flows into Hongze Lake between the two cities. Xuyi and Sizhou are sandwiched between the Huai River, one in the south and one in the north, like two gates of the Huai River. Once these two cities are controlled, the waterway from Hongze Lake into the Huai River can be controlled. With the Huai River waterway in hand, the Qing army will have no worries about its retreat.
Aobai was sent by Duoduo with an army of 10,000 to attack Xuyi on the south bank.
On the surface of the Huai River where it flows into the lake between the two cities, hundreds of large and small warships led by Zheng Sihai were anchored on the river, with their sails like clouds and their oars like walls.
The cold muzzles of the guns on the ship pointed at the two banks, ensuring that the South Gate of Sizhou and the North Gate of Xuyi could communicate with the outside world by water. If necessary, the garrison in Huai'an could come by boat and provide continuous reinforcements to the two cities.
The Sizhou garrison commander was none other than Yan Yingyuan, who had caused great suffering to the Qing army in Jiangyin. There were originally 4,000 troops in the city. When Duoze rushed to Sizhou from Fengyang, Huai'an on the east bank of Hongze Lake sent another 6,000 emergency reinforcements. Now Yan Yingyuan had a total of 10,000 troops.
His big flag with the word "Yan" on it was flying in the wind on the top of Sizhou City. When the Qing army that had arrived at the foot of Sizhou City saw the big flag with the word "Yan" on it, they immediately thought of King Yama.
There is no way. In the last battle in the south of the Yangtze River, the area under Jiangyin city was undoubtedly the largest graveyard of the Qing army, and Yan Yingyuan had become the nightmare of the Qing army.
Sizhou City is not big, about four miles long from east to west and two miles wide from north to south. The whole city is oval in shape and has five city gates. Since each gate has a protruding moon city, the shape of Sizhou City is very much like a turtle with one leg missing.
There is an outer city wall outside the city, with an outer circle of varying lengths from 30 to 200 steps. It is built with stone slabs and uses lime and glutinous rice juice as adhesive. It is very strong and played a great role in flood prevention and resistance against Japanese pirates.
Duoduo is facing a Yama King. It is not easy for him to bite open the turtle shell of Sizhou City!
He also made sufficient preparations for this. Because the South Gate faced the Huai River, the artillery on Zheng Sihai's ship could attack the city from both inside and outside with the artillery on the city wall. Therefore, it was impossible for the South Gate to deploy a large army to attack the city.
Duoduo deployed 70,000 troops at the north and west gates, with hundreds of cannons of various sizes concentrated outside the north gate. On the afternoon of the day the Qing army arrived, the cannons began to roar, fiercely bombarding the outer city walls in an attempt to quickly blast a breach.
Lord Yama, dressed in black armor and holding a broadsword, stood on the outer city wall on the north side, commanding the Qin army's twenty artillery pieces to fight back. Before the siege troops were dispatched, there were already roars of artillery fire on and off the city, the air was filled with smoke, and the whistling shells fell with astonishing momentum, deafening the ears.
The commander of the Qing army's artillery bombardment was Zu Dale, the cousin of Zu Dashou. The Zu family was a large family in Liaodong. After Zu Dashou surrendered to the Qing, Zu Dale, Zu Kefa, Zu Dabi, Zu Zeyuan and Zu Zepei from the Zu family all became important generals of the Qing army.
Zu Dale was very good at defending and attacking cities. In view of the fact that the Qin army's artillery was particularly accurate, he ordered the Qing army to pile up earth to build fortifications to cover the artillery and bombard them at close range.
This tactic was very effective. If the Qin army's artillery shells were a little lower, they would hit the earthen rampart in front. If they were a little higher, they would fly over the artillery formation, making it difficult to cause damage to the Qing army's artillery.
The outer wall of Sizhou City was made of stone strips, which looked very solid. However, it was not as good as the red brick and rammed earth wall in such bombardment.
Because those huge solid bullets hit the stone walls, hard against hard, not only would the stone walls be easily cracked, but the flying debris would pose a serious threat to the defenders on the city.
After half an hour of artillery battle, not many Qin soldiers on the city were killed or injured by artillery shells, but many were killed or injured by broken stones.
Wu Dakai, a lieutenant under Yan Yingyuan, had his arm injured. He rushed to Yan Yingyuan with blood all over his body and said, "General Yan, this won't do. If we continue to attack like this, we will suffer huge losses."
Yan Yingyuan also knew that it would be very disadvantageous to continue the bombardment like this, but he had no choice. If he did not fight back, the Qing army would continue to pile up earthen mounds under the cover of artillery and bring the artillery closer and closer.
Every failure makes one wiser. The Qing army did not know this trick when they were at the gates of Jiangyin, but now they have mastered it and are becoming increasingly difficult to deal with.
Yan Yingyuan confidently ordered: "Let everyone retreat to the city to avoid the artillery fire, and leave a few people to look out."
"Yes, General Yan."
After the Qin army gave up fighting back, the Qing army indeed advanced forward. They were so arrogant that they even piled up earthen ramparts one mile away from the city wall, and then moved their artillery up to bombard it.
Duoduo, who was watching the battle from a distance, relaxed his brows a lot. He had never fought against the Qin army, but now it seemed that the Qin army was not as difficult to deal with as rumored.
"Master Ning, what do you think?" Duoduo asked in a relaxed manner.
Ning Wanwo still frowned, thought for a moment and replied: "Your Highness, I don't know if you noticed that the Qin army's previous artillery fire was very sparse, it was just a show. Now there is no return fire at all, which is obviously unreasonable."
Duoduo said disapprovingly: "He just wants to consume more of our ammunition and fight back when our army attacks the city. I'm afraid Yan Yingyuan's wish will not come true this time. I have prepared enough ammunition this time... ... ... Hahaha... ... Wait until I blow up the city directly, and then I'll see how he fights back."
"My Lord, I'm afraid it's not that simple."
It is indeed not that simple. All gates of Sizhou City have water barriers, including the King Kong Ferry at the west gate and iron window lattices at the north gate. To prevent floods, six moon gates were built outside the city. The moon gates were like double gates within a gate. When there was a flood outside the city, the moon gates were blocked first, and pedestrians entered and exited from the moon gate embankment.
This type of ancient city is rare in China. It is not only flood-proof, but also extremely useful in military terms. In fact, under the attack of the Qing army's superior forces, the King of Hell did not intend to fight the Qing army to the death in the outer city wall.
************(To be continued...)
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