In the early morning, after breakfast, Mi Cang led his seventeen men and followed a large group of people towards the city of Yicheng.

Last night, the sound of firearms and shouts of death rang under the city all night long.

Although attacking the city day and night is what the rebels have been doing these days, Yonekang has become somewhat accustomed to it.

But last night, Mi Cang didn't sleep well.

Although it is impossible for a low-level citizen like Yonekura to struggle to survive in troubled times with a pretty girl, he has never seen blood in his hands, but Yonekura has never been in battle, and he is even more unfamiliar with sieges.

He was very uneasy.

Looking at Geng Hu, who was leading the team dejectedly at the front, Mi Cang was in a daze for a moment, as if many issues were no longer important in the face of life and death.

Geng Hu was obviously frightened. Despite his usual bluffing, this guy had done a lot of bad things. It was said that he was a ruffian in the countryside.

But when it comes to fighting, Geng Hu should also be a novice.

Otherwise, this guy wouldn't have to run away from Li Shengcai, who had the worst military discipline.

If it weren't for the tight security of the rebels and the fact that there was no way to escape, Mi Cang believed that Geng Hu would run away again.

Although Yicheng is small, it is a brick city.

The city has six gates, with a base width of 3 feet, a top width of 1 feet, and a height of 2 feet (approximately 32.7 centimeters, 1 foot 10 feet), with complete towers and stacked walls.

The most important thing is that the defenders are strong-willed and resist extremely tenaciously.

When they were about a few hundred steps away from the city, Geng Hu ordered everyone to follow the crowd and stop dozens of steps behind a long cavalry line. Then, they and several neighboring teams independently lined up into several groups of about 20 passengers each.

The horizontal lines of 4 merge into a line.

At this time, there were already two densely packed lines in front of them, connected by more than a hundred people.

However, the horizontal formations in these front lines are generally longer than those of Geng Hu and Micang, because there are many more child soldiers in these formations.

Because Geng Hu's team is newly built and basically all soldiers have surrendered to the official army, there are currently only a few boy soldiers in their teens.

That's right, today's military operation requires all regular soldiers and child soldiers to be mobilized.

But the strange thing is that none of them carry weapons.

Instead, everyone was holding various thick shields such as large wooden shields and large wooden boards. There were also a mess of things like iron vertebrae, hammers, and shovels in their arms or waists.

There are also many carrying various bamboo baskets, bamboo baskets or cloth bags.

Their mission today was obviously not to climb into the city and engage in hand-to-hand combat, but to carry out some kind of earthwork work.

This was an order issued by their old leader Yuan Zongdi, or a changed method of siege.

For six days, Yuan Zongdi underestimated Yicheng and suffered a huge setback.

Yuan Zongdi was one of the eighteen cavalry who broke out with Li Zicheng in the Battle of Tongguan Nanyuan in the 11th year of Chongzhen. He is also one of Li Zicheng's most trustworthy and capable generals at the moment.

He is currently 32 years old and in his prime.

Geng Hu and Mi Cang were able to directly join Yuan Zongdi's staff, so they had a huge backer. It's hard to say whether they were lucky or unlucky.

Originally, the conventional siege method of building a ladder to siege the city was not commonly used by Li Zicheng's troops. They were better at digging into the city or using gunpowder blasting to siege the city.

But Xiongguan Xiangyang was so easily captured, and Yicheng was so small, Yuan Zongdi seemed to have no reason not to despise it, even though Yicheng seemed determined to resist.

As a result, Yuan Zongdi's judgment was obviously wrong.

When six consecutive days of conventional strong attacks and even the use of child soldiers failed to work, Yuan Zongdi had to switch back to the city-drilling attack that he was best at but was very time-consuming and manpower-consuming.

Although Yonekura and the others had not participated in an attack before, they were a new force and should be at the forefront. But after all, they were novices in the city-cutting attack, so they were not placed on the first front.

"Once you have dug out one brick of the city, you can return it, compete with the sun to prevent it from attacking again, and change people to advance." This is the simplest requirement for attacking the city, which means that everyone only needs to take one risk every day.

The task doesn't seem difficult, if the rebels keep their word.

However, both Geng Hu and Mi Cang were somewhat skeptical about this. Geng Hu even rarely left Mi Cang alone after the discussion to explore his opinions and ideas.

This is why both of them are very nervous now.

Although it is not far from the city, there are two lines of friendly troops in front of Micang, and there is also such a long cavalry line blocking it, which makes it difficult for Micang to see the situation under the city wall. He can only see the situation under the city wall from the front lines.

From the huge gaps between the horizontal lines and the gaps between the cavalry, you can probably see something about the head of Yicheng City, which is not very tall.

After six days of bloody battles, the Yicheng city walls were in dilapidated condition.

The city tower had been burned long ago and only some bricks and stones were left to support it. Many of the walls were seriously damaged, but many broken and black flags still stood proudly on the city wall.

Then, there was an indescribable smell mixed in the air. There was the smell of blood, burnt smell, and stinky smell...

Fortunately it was winter, otherwise the smell would have been absolutely nauseating.

Amidst the sound of drums, a large group of infantry and archers armed with various firearms strolled from behind the rice warehouse. Some of them even held some small cannons.

They passed through the huge gaps between the lines, then passed through the cavalry line, and slowly walked towards the city wall.

Most of these people have numb expressions and cannot tell whether they are happy or sad.

Micang knew that most of these soldiers with firearms were the soldiers of the great master Xie Yinglong. They had been covering the siege during the day and night in the past few days. They were one of the few units in the peasant army that made good use of firearms.

Xie Yinglong was originally a servant of the Ming Dynasty general Luo Dai. He was proficient in firearms. When he was in Luoyang, he joined the peasant army together with Ren Jirong and Tian Hu.

In the Battle of Zhuxian Town, the peasant army captured a large number of official firearms, so Xie Yinglong's troops were not short of equipment and gunpowder.

Another drumbeat sounded, and Yonekura vaguely saw the men in the first front wearing iron helmets and mostly wearing thick armor starting to move forward, but the second front and Yonekura's group did not move.

.

Swarming forward will only increase unnecessary casualties, and Yonekura and the others don't have any armor.

As soon as all the soldiers in the first line wearing helmets and armor crossed the cavalry line, the sounds of various firearms began to crackle under the city walls of Yicheng.

Yonekura also immediately started to poke his head forward curiously.

However, with the crowd of heads looking around and the line of cavalry in front, Yonecang could not clearly see what was happening below the city. He could only vaguely see a large amount of fire and smoke that gradually appeared.

Then came the blood-curdling screams coming from everywhere in front.

Yonekura's heart was filled with a strange feeling. He couldn't tell whether it was fear, confusion, or something else.

After a long while, the first man wearing helmet and armor finally emerged from the cavalry line in front, and ran towards the original second line of troops with some excitement.

Then the second, the third...

These people quickly threw a piece of heavy armor in front of the second line, and easily walked to the rear from the huge gaps between the lines, while the scattered cavalry patrolling in these huge gaps kept a close eye on them.

With these people.

However, some people who took off their thick armor did not look relaxed, and some were obviously moaning.

When one of the people walked past the rice warehouse, the rice warehouse could clearly see a large area of ​​huge blisters on the man's face and hands.

Yonekura's heart began to sink again.

After an unknown amount of time, Yonekura's front finally became the frontmost infantry front, and two new fronts followed behind them.

…

Among the piles of armor, Mi Cang, who was already numb, chaotically and quickly picked and put it on his body. Some armors were too hot, some had too much blood on them, and some armors were covered with inexplicable yellow, green, white and white liquids.

Finally holding on to the wet and hot iron helmet on the armrest, Mi Cang took a deep breath and walked forward holding a spliced ​​wooden board in his hand and carrying a small bamboo basket.

It takes one brick and one basket of soil.

As he passed through the cavalry line and gradually approached the city wall, Yonekura's face became increasingly pale. The cruelty and bloodshed of the battlefield exceeded his imagination.

Fire and smoke covered almost every part of the section of wall they were attacking.

Under the city wall are all kinds of grotesque and tragic corpses, some are frozen solid, some are still soft, and some are charring.

Splashes of quicklime, choking smoke, rocks and debris everywhere, the disgusting smell of meat, and blazing fires make this place look like a Shura field.

The officers and soldiers guarding the city obviously adopted the most intense and targeted defensive measures.

Although the archers and firearmsmen dozens of meters away from the city wall were still firing intermittently and suppressed fire that could not be seen at all, this did not give any psychological help to those approaching the city wall.

Not far in front of the rice warehouse was a soldier who was looking relaxed and without any cover. The man moved very quickly past the raging fire and the bonds on the ground and approached the base of the city wall.

But just when he was about to get into the door-sized holes that had been made in the city wall, a piece of smoking yellow fluid fell from the sky and poured on the man's helmet.

Then instantly the man started screaming.

Mi Cang, who was holding the wooden board, stumbled a bit, but after hesitation, he decided to move forward along the trajectory of the man's movement.

Immediately afterwards, he clearly saw the soldier running back the same way, covering his neck and face, howling, and the two soon came face to face.

The unique stench of fecal juice rushed into Mi Cang's nasal cavity in an instant. Mi Cang knew that there was a high probability that this man could not be saved, and that he would die in pain.

Yonekura did not pause, he continued to move forward, trying his best not to pay attention to any scenery or changes that blocked his progress.

When he finally got close to the city root, Yonekura felt something hit the wooden board he was holding.

When he instinctively looked up in surprise, out of the corner of his eye, he saw a fireman not far away running around under the city wall.

Yonekang hurriedly ignored it, threw away the wooden board and got into a hole the size of the door in front of him.

After entering the cave entrance, Mi Cang noticed that the cave was not big yet.

It was only more than one meter deep inside. A soldier who had taken off his armor was pounding the hard rammed earth with an iron awl and a hammer in front. A thick layer of broken earth was already piled under the soldier's feet.
To be continued...