Chapter 1358 Strategies to Destroy the City
Chapter 1358 Strategies to Destroy the City
On the sixth day of August, the weather was getting a little colder, but it was not yet necessary to wear cotton clothes.
Zhongli Ke boarded the ship and took one last look at the mountain city of Marudu.
The mountains rise and fall between the willows and pines.
The city wall was built along the mountain ridge, and the overall shape is round and square. The east, west and north sides are higher, but the south side is very low, almost a hundred feet low.
Because of this, a barbican was built outside a city gate on the southeast side to strengthen defense.
According to the interrogation of the captives, this mountain city was like an iron pot with a sunken interior. It had everything including pools, palaces, government offices, military camps, workshops, etc. This surprised Zhonglike a little, as he had thought that the Goguryeo city would not be very good.
At this moment, the sound of drums rumbled in the mountains.
On the southeast mountain road, flags were waving and roars were like thunder. The soldiers watched from afar as their own soldiers attacked the city wall and cheered loudly.
Everyone knew that after conquering the city, all the wealth accumulated by the Goguryeo people over generations would fall into their hands. Even if they had to hand over a portion of it, there would still be a lot left as rewards.
Isn’t this what the long journey is all about?
This city has not been defended for long. Zhong Li Ke withdrew his gaze and ordered to raise the anchor and set sail.
There was no other factor that led him to this judgment except this: the city was too big to be defended.
The bigger the city, the more defenders are needed. I heard that Goguryeo only had 3,000 defenders, and some of them were lost a while ago, so now there are probably only more than 2,000. And they need to defend a city wall that is nearly 16 miles long and as many as seven city gates.
There are two gates each in the south, east and north of the city, and one in the west. Initially, Maruto Mountain City had only five gates, and at most there were nine. The number of gates varied in different eras.
The main attack point of the royal army was the city gate on the southeast side, because its terrain was the flattest and the road was the widest, making it convenient to attack and even use siege equipment.
The two city gates in the south were not far apart, located on both sides of a mountain. Since the gates were open, there must be a road, but it was just a winding path, barely wide enough for one car to pass through, and very narrow.
There were also royal troops attacking this side, but they were outnumbered, only a few hundred soldiers each, and they didn't have any siege equipment, so they couldn't transport it up, so they were just attacking like ants.
The enemy troops on the top of the city were still in fairly good order, but they were still shouting and yelling. It was obvious that they were not a strong army, but they were just taking advantage of the terrain and barely holding on - I heard that the two times they stood on the top of the city were both here.
The Goguryeo people were startled and sent troops from other places. It was a place that was not easy to deploy troops and was not easy to attack, but the troops there were almost the same as those in the southeastern city. I don't know how to evaluate it.
If the battle continues like this, it will only be a matter of time before the city is breached. The other four gates have not yet begun to be attacked. Once a serious attack is launched, the Goguryeo people's combat troops will have to be dispersed.
"Ding ding..." The crisp sound of bells rang out, and one ship after another left Marudu, went downstream, and began to return.
In addition to the wounded and sick, the ship also carried more than 3,000 Goguryeo people, returning to Qingzhou together.
They were serious about weakening Goguryeo's war potential.
******
Outside the city of Marundu, there were sounds of horse hooves.
The cavalrymen rode away and headed for the north bank of Yannan River, under the command of Zheng Long, the left Sima of the Chanyu's palace.
The reason for their withdrawal was simple: the cavalry intercepted a Goguryeo messenger and found a document on him.
After being tortured, they learned that Goguryeo had separated a part of its troops and was heading towards Heseunggu City, which seemed to be an unusual move.
Zheng Long originally had 2,000 light cavalry from the Yuwen clan, 2,000 cavalry from Bingzhou, more than 4,000 garrison troops from Shanyu Mansion, and 4,000 garrison troops from Hebei. But now he left almost all the garrison troops to Shao Yu, and led 4,000 cavalry to be on full alert.
Shao Yu allocated nearly 3,000 cavalrymen of the Yuwen family to Zheng Long, bringing the number of cavalrymen under his command to 7,000.
He only retained more than 2,000 cavalrymen from the Prince of Yan's Palace to station at the foot of Maru City to be on the safe side. The rest of the troops, such as the Left Flying Dragon Guards with more than 7,000 people, the garrison troops with more than 8,000 people and nearly 16,000 infantrymen, besieged Maru City.
The remaining scattered soldiers and horses escorted the looted property and people back to Xiangping along the same route they came.
Each department performs its duties and the work is busy but not chaotic.
On the seventh day of August, another day of offensive began.
Shao Yu sat cross-legged on a hillside, writing and drawing.
This almost became a habit of his, different from his father's habit of fighting, which was to write down various elements on the battlefield on paper and then think about them.
Officials came and went, constantly reporting on various situations.
"The enemy still has about 400 men on the southeast gate. A group of men are taking turns with them, flying the general flag with the character 'Yu' on it." The attendant Guo Shi came over and reported, "In the past ten days, there have been fewer and fewer men who are well-organized and dare to fight. Now there are many young men among these hundreds of men."
Just as he finished speaking, there was a commotion outside the southeast gate. The two looked in the direction of the sound and saw soldiers from Shangbai Town in Hebei firing their bows and crossbows, shooting and killing a group of Goguryeo civilians who were fleeing backwards in a disorderly manner.
The two of them withdrew their gazes and no longer paid attention.
Maru City is located on a mountain, and there are not that many people. I heard that there are less than 10,000 people in the city, maybe only 7,000 or 8,000. Guonei City is located on the plain at the foot of the mountain. Although it has been destroyed, people are still there and it is densely populated.
After the Liang army arrived, they surrounded those who had not yet escaped, and then drove them in batches to attack the city, with the agreement that each strong man would be spared if he charged twice.
Honestly speaking, only a few people could make it through two charges to the battlefield. Most of them died in the ant siege. Their bodies were thrown into the nearby ravine, piled up in layers, and it looked very scary.
There was even a riot in the inner city of the country the day before yesterday, which was brutally suppressed by the Liang army that was guarding them, and many people were slaughtered.
After Guo Shi left, Wang You Pei Man came again and reported: "Your Majesty, the bandits at the southwest gate are only replaced once every three days. It seems that the bandits are very short of manpower."
Shao Yu nodded and wrote it down on the paper.
The rebel leader at the southwest gate was named Zhou. He had a thousand soldiers under his command. They were well-equipped and had good armor, and they also had certain rules for fighting.
He divided his troops into two groups. When one group was tired, they would go down the city wall and be replaced by the other group.
According to Liang Jun's observation, there was a gap in the combat effectiveness of the two groups of people. After they were rotated once before, they were soon attacked by Zuo Feilong's guards on the top of the city wall. As a last resort, the people who had been rotated out to rest were sent up again.
Shao Yu and his subordinates judged that this enemy general named Zhou must have conscripted some able-bodied men in the city, and the fighting capacity of the able-bodied men was very unstable, so he was almost captured by the veteran soldiers of Zuo Feilong Guard.
So later on, these capable bandits simply slept on the wall and did not go down to the city for rotation for three consecutive days.
Shao Yu discussed it with Pei Man again until Lieutenant Sima Lu Han came to report.
"Your Majesty!" Lu Han whispered, "Scouts reported that the enemy army secretly withdrew some of the soldiers from the north city."
"Oh?" Shao Yu's eyes lit up and asked, "How did you figure that out?"
"Armor." Lu Han said, "Perhaps because Guanqiu Jian attacked from the north and broke into the city, the enemy has deployed a large number of troops here. The scouts have been observing for many days and found that 41% of the people patrolling the city walls are wearing iron armor, and another 41% are wearing leather armor. Now, most of the people on the city walls are wearing linen clothes, and we even saw people wearing seaweed clothes."
Shao Yu was startled: "Water algae clothes?"
"In the past, when Jumong, the founding king of Goguryeo, was traveling to Maotun Valley, he encountered people wearing algae clothes. They must be the Dongwoju people transferred from the left bank of the Aplu River." Lu Han said, "Goguryeo used a policy of restraining Dongwoju and did not trust them very much. Now even these people have climbed the city walls, which shows that they are short of troops."
Pei Man was about to leave when he heard this and said, "Your Majesty, the enemy's elite soldiers must have suffered more than a thousand casualties by now, so we have no choice but to conscript a large number of strong and weak soldiers to go up to the city."
Shao Yu hummed and said, "The scouts who were spying in the forest west of the city mentioned that there were fewer soldiers patrolling the walls."
Normally, to defend a section of a city wall, there are soldiers lined up along the battlements first, and then there are reinforcements at the bottom of the wall ready to come up at any time - usually those who are taking turns to rest.
In addition, there are people patrolling along fixed routes, which are mobile reinforcements.
If there are fewer of these people, they will definitely be used in other places.
Shao Yu chuckled.
My father often said that everything has its pros and cons. The Wandu Mountain City enclosed almost all the dangerous places. Of course, it made the attackers very uncomfortable. They could not deploy their troops and could only grind them down bit by bit. But what was the price? Of course, the city was too big.
Many county towns in the Central Plains were less than sixteen miles in circumference. If you were to build something this big, you would naturally need more troops to defend it. In the Tang Dynasty, most prefecture towns (equivalent to county towns in the Wei and Jin dynasties) had a circumference of more than twenty miles, as productivity had improved.
"Don't be impatient." Shao Yu held out his hand to stop Pei and Lu from talking, and said, "Now that we have enough food and grass, we should attack for a few days and ask Goguryeo to transfer more elite troops to the East City and South City."
The two of them understood and praised in unison: "Your Highness is wise."
This is a sincere intention. The battle of attacking Wandu is difficult, but it is also simple. But the King of Yan slowly found a way to deal with the enemy, and it sounded quite feasible, which was not easy.
During this expedition to Liao, his growth was obvious to all.
Starting from the eighth day of August, for five consecutive days, the Liang army launched a fierce offensive in East City and South City, day and night, and was extremely fierce.
After three days of attack, the able-bodied men and women in the inner city were dragged over and the corpses piled up like mountains. They could not bear it anymore and started a riot again. They were killed by the cavalry of Prince Yan's Palace and the soldiers of Zuo Feilong's Palace, and blood flowed like a river.
In the last two days, even the garrison troops were called in and launched a fierce attack.
The casualties on both sides increased sharply. Not only did the Liang army suffer heavy casualties, but even the Goguryeo people on the city walls were replaced one after another.
At the same time, Li soldiers from other directions were transferred here in batches, and they were replaced by young men from the city who had incomplete equipment, poor skills, and pale faces.
On August 13, news came from the north of Yannan River that several thousand enemy troops were marching eastward from the direction of Heshenggu City and were surrounded and shot by the cavalry of Zheng Sima. The enemy troops retreated to the hills, and the cavalry could not pursue them, so the Li troops retreated slowly.
After receiving this news, Shao Yu no longer hesitated.
That night, Zhang Chong, the military commander of Gaoliu Town, led more than 1,100 people to the north of Maru City, camped in the dense forest on the hillside, and quietly waited for the order to attack.
(End of this chapter)