The Rise of the Song People of the Three Kingdoms

Chapter 823 Marshal Xuanwu
Li Jiqian's ready-to-movement heart once again marched south hoping to win the entire Liangzhou, but Marshal Xuanwu of the Northern Song Dynasty first came to encircle Wei and save Zhao.

Unwillingly, Li Jiqian sent Li Jichong, Xingxing Luohai and others to attack Zhuge Liang's army, but they were ambushed by the enemy's general's impatience.

In desperation, Li Jiqian summoned a large number of troops to send troops to Zhuge Liang's army again. The reason is very simple. The Xihetao area and the Bingzhou Dasong territory are both grassland terrain.

This allowed the Song Army to attack the hinterland of Xixia from Xihetao through the vast grassland, and the Xixia cavalry could cut off the back road, food and grass in a detour.

But the construction of a military fortress is different. It is equivalent to building a front-line base, which can store a large amount of food and grass on the front line. Although the strategy of cutting out food can still be used, the effect will be greatly reduced.

What's more, once this fortified city is built, the geographical location of Gander Mountain is already very close to Xiliang. It can be attacked, retreated and defended. It is completely blocked at the entrance.

Fortunately, the city has not been built yet, so Li Jiqian must not allow the city to be completed. It can be said that the necessary left-behind troops have left their nests. Coincidentally, Xixia and Zhao Song also had a crucial battle for the city in history' Battle of Yongle City' is very similar.

When Li Jiqian brought Li Yuanhao, Li Jichong, Yeli Yuqi, Yeli Wangrong, Zan Tianwang, Xingxing Luohai and others to lead an army of 30 cavalry, [-] infantry, and [-] auxiliary soldiers, claiming [-] to declare war on the Song Dynasty, they arrived in Gansu. At the time of Delshan, Zhuge Liang had already withdrawn from this place. Just when Li Jiqian thought that Zhuge Liang was afraid that his army's sharpness had achieved its goal, he planned to retreat and return to Xiliang after a demonstration.

It was at this time that Li Jiqian received a bad news that Zhuge Liang had established a strong city beside the Dustu River (Otok Banner in later generations), and Zhuge Liang named it 'Polu City'!
This place is only a few hundred miles away from Gandel Mountain. In other words, this time, instead of building a military fortress at the front door, there is a brick hanging above the head that will fall down at any time.

Li Jiqian wondered why Song Dynasty built another strong city so quickly?
In fact, this is Zhuge Liang's "false and real" plan. Originally, Zhuge Liang had no plan to build a city on Gander Mountain in front of Xixia.

However, when I was on the way to the Stu River, I found that the water system here is rich, the land, and the aquatic plants are fertile, and it is very suitable for grazing or farming. The junction of the two water systems is an excellent place to build a city, and it is also a A place that is easy to defend but difficult to attack depending on the water.

Zhuge Liang directly left Yun Tianbiao, Fang Qiong, and An Shirong to build the fortress with the latest scientific research weapon 'cement', thus the first fortress 'Polu City' to counterattack the grassland was born.

Can Li Jiqian bear it now?Immediately the goal of the army to pull out the camp is to 'break the city'.

Li Jiqian's actions almost caused the all-out war between the Song Dynasty and Xixia to interrupt the pace of recuperation. When Lu Hengyuan was thousands of miles away, he once wanted to send an army to fight Xixia, but Zhuge Liang ensured that the city would be safe and persuaded by everyone in the cabinet. Personal conquest, because it was already a critical moment for reform and it was not appropriate to go to war.

But even so, Lu Heng still sent Murong Yanzhao and Shi Bao two legions to rush north to rescue!
Although Li Jiqian claims that the 30 army actually has only 15 troops, of which the cavalry is useless for the siege, and only [-] infantry are the main force to break the captive city this time.

However, Zhuge Liang's army had only [-] troops, plus another [-] cavalry from the Puinan Huns for a total of [-]. Although Lu Heng sent two armies, Murong Yanzhao and Shi Bao, they traveled thousands of miles, and the raw water could not save the nearby fire.

It took Li Jiqian and his army ten days to arrive at Polu City. The city was three feet high and built of green bricks. The city was at the corner between the Dustu River and the Chilaotu River, and the Ximen Dustu River was the moat. The south gate is the Chilaotu River, the water is dangerous and the geography is very tricky.

Li Jiqian's army was besieging the city. At this time, Zhuge Liang was on the city wall with fluttering white clothes. There was a guqin on one side of the sandalwood table, and three times of light smoke was lit on the incense burner in the side. Zhuge Liang ignored the 10,000+ troops below the city. Surrounding the fluttering notes came out bursts of sudden killing.

This time Zhuge Liang is not laying out some empty city plan. On the city wall, there are many elite soldiers of the Song Dynasty, eight ox crossbows, stone throwing machines, fire dragon cabinets and other city defense weapons. Liannu is always ready to harvest the life of the enemy.

Generals Yue Sheng, Yun Tianbiao, Yang Qin, Chen Xizhen, Shan Shiqi, Chen Liqing and other generals were waiting in full formation, but the amazing thing was that the one who was about to give the order was not Zhuge Liang, the Xuanwu Marshal of the Northern Song Dynasty, nor Zhuge Liang's favorite general Yue Sheng.

It is a big man with a height of nine feet, a majestic figure and a resolute face. This man's surname is Wang Mingfen, who was the one who defended Bingzhou for a year under the iron cavalry of Wanyan Zonghan. In this life, he became the younger brother of Wang Gui (the fierce general) and stood out in the imperial examination. Known for his good deeds, he won the first rank in the imperial examination policy theory.

In addition to Wang Teng, Luo Yanqing, Yang Si, Yang Yanping, Yang Yansi, Guo Jin, Xiang Leidu and Ma Lin, the 'Iron Flute Immortal' who was killed by Xingxing Luohai before, were sent to Zhuge Liang's department.

"Kill!" Following Li Jiqian's order, the party's auxiliary soldiers began to move forward to transport the built pontoon bridge to the river.

The special terrain made it impossible for the Xixia people to attack down-to-earth. To break through the capital, they had to cross the Stu River. This river, a tributary of the Yellow River, was more than ten meters wide in later generations, and it was much wider in this era.

The Xixia people are not good at sailors and can only build pontoon bridges to cross the wide river. The Song army in Polu City watched these people build the pontoon bridge. After half an hour, seeing that the pontoon bridge had taken shape, Wang Ting roared: "Lieutenant Gunner, let the catapult fire the giant fire bomb!"

I saw that the loader tied the huge stone bomb with hemp rope and put it on the firing position, and then someone painted a layer of black kerosene, and the torch was ignited to form a huge stone bomb.

"Huh! Bang!" Huge fireballs were fired one after another, directly hitting the built wooden pontoon bridges, because the pontoon bridges were ignited one after another because of the combustion-supporting fire oil, and the impact of the stone bombs directly ran over the auxiliary bridges all the way. Soldiers caused more casualties.

Li Jiqian looked at this scene with an ugly face. He tried to attack for the first time but encountered a more serious counterattack, which inevitably frustrated his morale, but he had to continue to attack the city.

At the beginning of such a fierce siege battle, the Xixia people tried every means to cross the Dustu River. They tried floating bridges and bamboo rafts with little success, but they had no choice but to withdraw their troops and think of a way.

(End of this chapter)