choke element

Chapter 495 Black Army

"I'm exhausted, I'm almost done..."

In the evening, Liu Ran leaned against the battlements.

The wall brick on which his back was leaning against was dripping with blood, and the blood seeped into his military robe, sticking to the skin of his back, feeling sticky and cold.

But Liu Ran was so tired that he didn't want to change his position at all.

Beside Liu Ran were Liang Hu and Zhang Pingliang, both of whom were tired.

All three of them had arrows stuck in their bodies. Fortunately, they were not the heavy arrows that Mongols are used to. All three of them also had leather armors, so they were not seriously injured.Liang Hu's shoulder was slashed, the whole shoulder armor and a large piece of flesh were cut off, half of his chest and arm were stained red with blood, but he didn't care.

These three people are all veterans.The year before last, Linhuang Mansion changed hands, and more than 70 military forts along the boundary trench were all lost. Most of the more than 4 defenders died, and only a few escaped.

They joined the defeated soldiers from other places along the way and fled all the way to Zhongdu Road.Then he was recruited by Marshal Shuhu Gao Qi here in Pingzhou, and he made a living again.Later, he was transferred to the command of Wulin Daqi, the economic envoy in the east of the central capital.

These rout soldiers were very dissatisfied with the defeat at first. They all felt that although they lost the battle, the responsibility lies with the incompetence of the generals, so they made a fuss every day, hoping that the imperial court would regroup the troops and take them back to rescue their families who were trapped in the hands of the Mongols. Relatives.

This is of course wishful thinking, no general will respond to them.

Therefore, many defeated soldiers left one after another, or went to Zhongdu to join other generals, or went to Beijing Road to join Yan Chengyu, who was left behind in Beijing.

Now, what difference does it make where to go?

Liu Ran sighed, in the end, anyway, they were killed with their heads covered, or killed with their heads covered.

Beside the three of them, there are all the corpses of the defenders. Some were shot through the brain by arrows, some were smashed to death by stones, and some were hacked by the enemy who rushed to the top of the wall. dead.

And at Liu Ran's feet, there was the corpse of an enemy with a black helmet and black armor.

This man is a Han Chinese, and like Liu Ran, he is a broken soldier who fled back from Qingzhou in northern Xinjiang.When the two were fighting, they shouted with exactly the same accent, and their offensive and defensive moves were all the same.Thinking about it, when Liu Ran fled to Pingzhou, this man fled from Qingzhou to Jinzhou, took refuge in Jinzhou Dahao Zhang Jing, became an officer of the "Black Army", and now he became a subordinate of the Mongols.

This man is considered a warrior in the Black Army.He climbed up the city along the ladder, swung his big knife and hacked to death several defenders in succession.

Later, Liu Ran led his companions to encircle him, and Liang Hu went around and pierced his back with a long spear.The man roared several times, struggled to rush towards Liu Ran, and slashed wildly with his knife. Liu Ran resisted several times, his hands were almost numb, and the man fell limply on the ground, spitting blood from his mouth, and died.

At this time, a soldier of the defenders walked slowly over the wall, collecting discarded arrows and weapons along the way.When he saw the body of the officer in black helmet and black armor, he looked at Liu Ran first, and then rushed up to strip off the armor.

Just squatting down, Liu Ran said in a hoarse voice: "The armor and helmet are painted with black paint, which cannot be wiped off. If you are not afraid of being killed by your own family, you can wear it."

The soldier froze for a moment, let go of his hands hesitantly, and went to the other side of the city wall.

He walked too fast, Liang Hu wanted to ask him for some water, but at this moment he had to give up.

Liu Ran continued to stare at the body of the black helmet and armor.He felt that his heart was in a mess. The Dajin Kingdom was like this, with incompetent officials and cowardly and greedy generals. Seeing the Mongols come again, the people who were driven to be the pioneers were all old comrades.He didn't know what to do with himself, let alone what would happen in this world.

"Eat or not?"

Zheng Ke stood in front of the three of them and asked in a rough voice.

Although this person is Liu Ran's boss, Liu Ran has always disliked him, thinking that his character is too fierce and violent.

After the enemy army who attacked the city just retreated, this man walked up and down the top of the city, grabbing dry food and water from several people.Fearing the threat of the Mongols massacring the city, the common people demolished their houses and moved earth and rocks to the city to aid in the battle.But Zheng Ke held a knife in his hand, threatened to kill, and took away their last rations.

But Zheng Ke was not bad to his subordinates. He packed these rations in leather bags and distributed them along the way.

When he walked up to the three of them, Zhang Pingliang hesitated a little. Liu Ran thanked him, took the dry food for the three of them into his leather bag, and took the water from Zheng Ke's soldiers.

Liu Ran broke off a piece of cake and handed it to Zhang Pingliang.

Zhang Pingliang hesitated for a moment, swallowed, and grabbed it.

The three of them just swallowed a few mouthfuls, only to feel the world spinning, and their feet trembled again and again.

A few hundred steps away, someone hissed and shouted: "The black tartar broke the city wall!"

Pingzhou City has been abandoned for a long time. The current circle of city walls is still left from the Liao Dynasty. There are traces left on the walls when Dajin attacked the city.There are a few parts of the city wall that look nothing from the outside, but inside there are cracks nearly a foot wide that can slip through a child.

At this moment, this section of the cracked city wall finally collapsed after being thrown dozens of times by huge boulders.

The scope of the collapse is not very wide, about twenty steps.There was smoke and dust rising in the air, and the loose and broken clods on both sides were still falling down.Remnants of bricks and broken walls piled up on the ground.

The siege enemy army roared loudly, stepped on the rough ground, and tried to charge into the city.There were also soldiers climbing along the walls on both sides, trying to kill the defending archers standing on the top of the city and shooting.The defenders, including Liu Ran, shouted in unison and rushed to the gap for reinforcements.

Countless people jostled shoulder to shoulder in the gap, and everyone made a chaotic noise.The noisy people are flustered, and their ears are constantly buzzing.

The one who supervised the soldiers to attack this city wall was Shi Tianying, the new brave general under Genghis Khan's command.

At the same time, he was also the one who provided many siege equipment for the Mongolian army this time. With the acquiescence of Genghis Khan, he attacked and killed the two brothers Zhang Jing and Zhang Zhi, and seized control of the elite Han army "black army".

This operation, if it were someone else, would inevitably cause commotion.

But Shi Tianying himself was from the Black Army, and he became independent from the Black Army because of his bravery and skill in fighting and won the support of the people of Xingzhong Mansion.All the generals of the Black Army knew his prestige, and they generally felt that it was a good thing for everyone to have a leader who was trusted by the Mongolian Khan.

However, if Shi Tianying wanted to gain the continued trust of the Great Khan, he had to fight on the battlefield.After he attacked and killed the Zhang brothers, he took nothing of his belongings and rewarded the soldiers to encourage them to fight.After many siege equipment came into play, he put on heavy armor and went into battle in person.

Shi Tianying was born in a military family in northern Xinjiang, and he has outstanding martial arts handed down from his family, so he can become a big man in the Xingzhong Prefecture, where the folk customs are fierce.

Holding a long and heavy knife, he fought fiercely at the gap, and the defenders were almost invincible.The long knife waved like a whirlwind, wherever it went, severed limbs flew up, and heads rolled down; blood sprayed from the severed wounds, like waterfalls one after another.

Following Shi Tianying's charge, the soldiers in black helmets continued to advance, controlling more and more territory.

From this, it can be seen that Shi Tianying has another boldness: he arranged all his cronies in the rear to manipulate the trebuchet and other equipment, and those who followed him to the city to fight were all new subordinates from the Black Army.

The so-called black army, most of its members came from the defeated soldiers along the northern border trench of the imperial court.After Linhuangfu Road was lost, tens of thousands of routs brought their families to the south, and were recruited by local tyrants along the way. Zhang Jing recruited the largest group of them, with a total of 1 people. The flag is recognized, wearing black armor, wielding a long sword and a big halberd, brave and good at fighting.

As a local tyrant, Zhang Jing has the courage to call himself the king of Linhai County, relying on this elite army.This is not really arrogance, after all, the northern frontier trench was where the elite of Dajin was at its peak. Now Dinghai Guo Ning, who is walking sideways in Shandong, and Miao Daorun, Zhang Rou and others who control considerable power in Zhongdu, rely on It is also this force.

However, Zhang Jing's own talents are not enough to control this powerful army, and only stronger warriors can deter warriors.

At this time, the general of the Black Army first received a generous reward from Shi Tianying, and then he saw him march forward bravely, and they all followed him bravely, shouting and fighting fiercely.

(End of this chapter)