C39 King's Banner of Liu Cheng(1)

Noon, outside the west gate of Liucheng.

Two three meter wide wooden bridges appeared on top of the moat. The wooden bridges had broken down and were still fresh. The ground at both ends of the bridge was littered with arrows, black and brown with mottled blood. There were many corpses floating in the moat, turning white and green under the freezing water.

One could see traces of it being smashed on the city wall. Below the city wall, there were piles of huge stones, some of which had already been broken into pieces. Only a small part of the wooden tower was left, there were a dozen or so broken arrows nailed to it, tottering in the cold wind.

Dong! Dong, dong, dong!

The sudden sound of a drum outside the city alarmed Nan Lou, who was resting behind the city wall. He rolled over and got up, then went close to the city's crenellated entrance and looked outside. In the army camp outside the city, a few armored generals were rushing to the camp. The ten stone-throwing cart s and a large group of archers who had been protecting the bridge appeared again and quickly lined up.

"Hurry and report to the King that the enemy is about to invade the city!"

Inside the big tent in White Horse Camp, Gongsun Xu was seated at the head of the table. Kurna was seated on the first seat on his left, while Zhao Yun, Yan Rou, Yang Hong, Wang Wei and Liu Tie were seated on either side of him.

Gongsun Xu did not give the order to attack the city, but instead talked about something that he did not want to do: "The White Horse Camp has just been established, and has not even completed the drills and brought them to the battlefield, it seems to be a little too hasty, Master Hou did not agree to let the White Horse Camp go out to battle, but this general insisted on doing so, do you know what it is?"

Other than Uncle Kurna, who looked at each other in confusion, the rest of them knew the reason, and it was difficult for them to say it out loud.

However, Gongsun Xu directly called out, "Wang Wei, speak!"

"Here!" Wang Wei saluted and replied with a bitter face, "Reporting to General, there are a lot of people who do not trust us!"

Gongsun Xu immediately asked: "Why not?"

"This …" Wang Wei hesitated. Even though he had a straightforward personality, he knew he couldn't easily answer this question.

"Speak!"

"Here!" Wang Wei clenched his teeth and replied: "White Horse Camp is a part of the Changli army, and previously attacked the Ji County together with Envoy Liu."

Ji County was like an iron bucket that was being operated by Gongsun Zan, even though the Changli Army had been integrated into Gongsun Xu's direct army, Wei Dun, Wang Wei and the rest still felt the rejection. There were people pointing at them from time to time, especially Gongsun Zan's direct line of descent. They were even more displeased with them since they had heard the term 'traitor' countless times.

"That's right!" That's right! " Gongsun Xu nodded his head, and said loudly: "If it were not for the fact that this general is in charge of White Horse Camp, these tens of thousands of people would have already become slaves.

Everyone fell silent when they heard this. Gongsun Zan never forgave the rebellion, and this would have definitely happened if Gongsun Xu had not taken over the White Horse Camp.

"Before this expedition, this general heard some rumors. Some people felt that the White Horse Camp did not have a battle formation, and was not trustworthy at all, or else they would have run away! This general did not care about these rumors and never tried to explain himself. If you want to retort against these rumors, you can only prove yourself on the battlefield! "

Wang Wei suddenly stood up, cupped his fist and said, "General, please grant me the permission to be the vanguard. I am willing to put down the military order. If I cannot take over the city, I am willing to go through with the military law!"

"This lowly general is also willing to issue a military order!" Yan Rou and Yang Hong followed closely behind.

Zhao Yun was a step slower, but he quickly stood up as well. Seeing everyone stand up, Ku Le also stood up and shouted for battle.

Kurna stroked his beard without saying anything, while his eyes flickered a little.

Gongsun Xu's gaze swept across them one by one and finally stopped on Yang Hong. He shouted, "Yang Hong!"

"This lowly general is here!" Yang Hong replied loudly, his eyes filled with excitement.

"You will lead your men to attack the city in turns. You do not seek to win the battle, but you do want to display your own bravery. Do not let our fellow brothers watch a joke!"

"Here!" Please rest assured General, this lowly general will be the first to rush up! "

"Go and prepare!" Gongsun Xu took out a token from a bamboo tube on the table and handed it over. Yang Hong took it over, saluted, and walked out with big steps.

Gongsun Xu picked up another command arrow and shouted: "Wang Wei, Ku Le!"

"This lowly general is here!"

"The two of you lead the archers to protect the city and attack it. As for Ku Le, he is temporarily under Wang Wei's command!"

"Here!" Wang Wei took the command arrow and walked out of the tent with a depressed Ku Le.

"Zhao Yun!"

"This lowly general is here!"

"Pass the order, raise the flag, prepare to attack!"

"Here!"

"I'm not here to spectate. The young duke can't be so biased!" Kurna said with a smile after Zhao Yun left.

"Your Majesty, don't be in such a hurry!" Gongsun Xu shook his head and said, "The King saw the situation when we were building the bridge. The enemy archery in the city is very accurate and the arrows are very concentrated. I'm afraid the team that attacked first would suffer a lot of casualties. The King did not have many subordinates, so if the losses were too great, I would feel bad! When the battle is clear, the King will lead his troops to attack. "

If there were no Xianbei People eyeing them covetously, Gongsun Xu would not hesitate to order Kurna's troops to attack the city first, even if it meant death. It was just that currently, he had not decided on the north yet. The Youzhou needed a relatively strong, obedient fighter to block his path to the east.

"How can I accept this?" Kurna laughed in embarrassment, but his heart calmed down. His subordinates had never attacked the city before, so if they went up recklessly, they would definitely suffer heavy casualties.

"Your Majesty is loyal to my father, how can I let Your Majesty suffer a loss? Great King, please follow me and watch the battle! " Gongsun Xu tidied up his helmet and walked out of the account.

"We obey the young duke's orders!" Kurna quickly followed.

Amidst the battle drums, a red flag with a black character 'Gongsun' written on the bottom rose up. Gongsun Xu rode his horse out of the camp along with the flag, slowly advancing towards the city wall.

There were three groups of people in front of the banner, and at the very front were the auxiliary force troops carrying the stone-throwing cart and the ladders. Right now, they were stopping two hundred steps away from the city wall, and they were using their torches to roast the strings of the stone-throwing cart.

The one in the middle was Yang Hong's thousand-step army, all of them were unarmored. Each of them held a saber and shield in hand as they followed the "Yang" sign.

At the end, there was a phalanx of archers. Wang Wei and Ku Le divided the two thousand archers into ten teams, preparing to alternate between shooting arrows and protecting themselves during the siege.

Gongsun Xu looked at the top of the city and saw that it had already collapsed. There were a few armored guards looking out of the city, presumably, there was collapse among them.

Gongsun Xu's banner stopped three miles away from the city wall. At this moment, a person on horseback ran over and shouted from afar: "Reporting to General, the stone-throwing cart is ready!"

"Attack!" Gongsun Xu suppressed the excitement in his heart, turned around and ordered Gongsun Jia, who was holding the flag.

The flag in Gongsun Jia's hand tilted forward as he shouted, "General commands! Attack!"

"Attack!"

"Attack!"

"Attack!"

The surrounding soldiers heavily knocked their weapons on the ground and shouted three times.

"Fire!" With Wei Dun's order, the stone-throwing cart was the first to attack.

A dull and obscure buzzing sound could be heard as one after another millstone-sized rocks whizzed towards the top of the city. With the early morning projection experience, the stone-throwing cart's aim was much larger. Other than seven or eight stones falling into the moat, the other dozens of big stones had all flown onto the city walls.

The garrison soldiers of the city had seen the power of the stone-throwing cart, and as they saw the situation, they scattered and dodged. Most of the stones missed, and with a 'pu tong' sound, they smashed a hole in the hard ground. A few unlucky fellows who could not dodge in time were hit by the rocks, turning into a pile of meat paste without even making a sound. The stone-throwing cart s needed more than 10 men to control each time, but they only killed a few enemies at a time. This proved that their ability to kill enemies was not very good, but this thing mainly gave the enemies a psychological shock.

"Charge!" With Yang Hong's order, the four of them formed groups, taking over the long ladders with iron hooks at the front from the auxiliary force s, they charged towards the wall while shouting.

"Follow and shoot!" With a wave of the flag in his hand, the two hundred archers quickly followed Yang Hong's lead and started to shoot at a distance of one hundred steps from the city wall.

"Release the arrows!" Nan Lou, who was on the city wall, also gave the order.

At this moment, more than three thousand Wu Huan men were guarding the city wall. They were all carefully chosen archers. Upon hearing the commotion, they all drew their bows and shot arrows at the group of people rushing towards them.

Suddenly, arrows rained down from the sky. Huge rocks whistled past and miserable cries sounded one after another.

Yang Hong, with his shield in his left hand and ring head knife in his right, shot forward while firing arrows. People around him fell to the ground from arrows from time to time, but he didn't even bother to look at them. Yang Hong was the first to rush over the wooden bridge. Over a dozen of his personal guards carried a ladder and followed him over the wooden bridge towards the city wall.

Pata! The iron hook at the top of the first ladder was firmly hooked onto the top of the city wall. Yang Hong held the shield in his left hand and the ring head knife bit into his mouth.

"Follow quickly!"

Staircase after ladder was placed on the wall, the soldiers quickly climbed up with their arrows aimed at their heads. Almost every breath of time, people would be hit by the arrows and fall to the ground screaming before being stepped on by countless of big feet.

"Bang!" When Yang Hong and the others were halfway up, Nan Lou suddenly gave the order.

Countless heavy logs and rocks fell from the sky. The people on the ladders had nowhere to run to, so they were instantly killed and wounded close to a hundred people, along with several other ladders that were smashed to smithereens.

Yang Hong stomped on the ground and blocked with his shield at an angle. A five-foot-long log hit the shield with a bang and slid down the edge of the ladder. He had not even let out a breath of relief when he heard a cracking sound. The pole under his feet suddenly broke, the ladder suddenly shook, and his body suddenly plummeted.

"General!" The personal guards were shocked.

Yang Hong suddenly shouted and exerted strength in his legs. After breaking three of the horizontal bars in a row, he finally stabilized his body. He grabbed the edge of the ladder and slid to the ground, changing the ladder to climb up again.

'The reason why we're attacking the city right now is actually to waste energy! ' Gongsun Xu, who was watching the fight from afar, could not help but understand a little bit of what was going on.