The next day, Li Jie was going to attack again, but Yu Dayou and Li Yanzhi disagreed. Yu Dayou said: "The enemy has fortifications, and I must have equipment. This will reduce casualties and achieve twice the result with half the effort. To break this watchtower, you must first build equipment."

Li Jie said: "How long will it take? Why not do that? I heard from the prisoners that there is probably a road behind the watchtower to the old nest in their mountains. We might as well go into the mountain and pick up the old nest in their mountains first, so that the watchtower will be broken without attacking!"

Yu Dayou shook his head and said, "I'm afraid it won't work. We are not familiar with mountain roads. If we go around in the mountains, we're afraid it will be even more dangerous."

Li Jie said: "You can ask the prisoners to lead the way!"

Yu Dayou said: "That's not right. Since they knew that someone had been captured by us, they would definitely be on guard! There must be ambush on the road that the prisoners knew!"

Li Jie said: "This is not OK, that is not OK. What are you doing? I think you are just afraid!"

"Second brother, don't worry!" Li Yan said straight: "We are soldiers, they are thieves, and there are also government merchants supporting us behind us, so we are not afraid of a protracted war! I thought about it in the middle of the night last night and felt that if they dare not leave the building, we can occupy the road first. Let's open the trade route first."

"Escape from the road?" Li Jie said: "How to occupy the road?"

Li Yanzhi took out a picture, but it was a brief map he drew, and said, "This is the river. The riverside is the official road, and this watchtower is blocked at the critical moment of this watchtower. So this section of the road cannot pass!" He pointed to the half-fan-shaped circle outside the watchtower and said, "But outside this circle, there is a place where the watchtower is beyond the range. We can pick up mud and build a wall of earth here and here one by one to circle the watchtower."

According to Li Yanzhi's statement, it is actually not difficult to enclose the watchtower, because the north is the mountain and the south is the river. As long as two north-south earth walls are built on the road between the mountains and rivers outside the range of the watchtower, the length of these two walls is probably only several meters. If it is only built six or seven feet high, hundreds of people will be able to build up the earth and rocks in one or two days.

Li Yan said straight: "With these two earth walls, Brother Yu and Second Brother, you will be alone in guarding one side, and these bandits will not be able to get out!"

But Li Jie laughed as soon as he heard this and said, "You did this to circle the watchtowers, but you also cut off the road. The watchtowers are on the side of the road, cutting the road in half. Is the cut off road still a road? Even if we can trap them in the watchtowers and not come out, the road will be broken when the trader comes here! It is still useless!"

"Why is it useless?" Li Yan said straight: "We have a boat! During the cut-off journey, we used boats to carry the merchants over, but we set up a temporary dock next to the two earthen walls between the east and west. The business travelers came from Yanping to the west. When we arrived at the west earthen wall, we used a boat raft to transport them east of the east earthen wall. Wouldn't this smoothly cross the area controlled by this watchtower? The same is true for business travelers from Fuzhou."

After hearing this for a while, Li Jie felt that this would work, but he always felt something was wrong and said, "Third brother, I always feel awkward in your idea!" It took him a long time to figure it out and said, "Yes! You seem to have been thinking wrong from the beginning. We are here to fight bandits! We are not going to come here to stay for a long time! Using hundreds of people to protect such a short distance is not worth it! Unless we charge passers-by merchants a lot of money to buy roads-but what is the difference between us and those bandits? Those merchants will not buy our account--if they have to pay a large amount of money to buy roads, they might as well pay the money to Wang Ban and the others directly!"

"We don't charge a lot of money for buying roads!" Li Yan said straight: "At most, charge some shipping costs and subsidize military spending. Our family background should be enough for us to last for two or three months."

Li Jie smiled bitterly and said, "Isn't this a waste of time with the other party? They dare not come out and we can't get in. What's the difference between us now? Two or three months later, what should we do if we are emptied?"

"I think this idea is very good, and things will never be delayed until two or three months later." Yu Dayou pointed to the direction of the watchtower on the map and said, "This group of bandits also has hundreds of people, and they also have to eat! And their income is mainly based on this business road. When we block the watchtower, we will cut off their food road! So they will be more anxious than us! As long as there are business travelers constantly passing by their noses, why do you need two or three months? As long as there are a few days, they will be unable to bear it! At that time, they will be unable to help but run out to counterattack us! The offensive and defensive momentum reverses, and all the facilities of this watchtower will become useless! Once they attack my strength with their short-term attacks, then this group of bandits will perish forever!"

Li Jie still felt that it was too troublesome to do this, but if he wanted to attack the watchtower like this, he was afraid that there would be great casualties, and he was not sure, so he had to say, "Then let's try it."

The troops were divided into two groups, Yu Dayou was in the west and Li Jie was in the east. Each of them divided a hundred strong men to pick up the soil, and Jia Langzhong and Wu Niu led the walls to build the earth. They did not want to build the walls so strongly, but they just picked up the soil to pile them into an obstacle, and then set up a row of fences on both sides of the obstacles. Because the fortifications were simple, the progress was very fast. Yu Dayou and Li Jie each brought 180 people to guard them. If the bandits in the watchtower dared to come out, they would fight with them on this official road!

Li Yanzhi sent people back to his hometown and transferred workers from the iron factory to prepare for the construction of siege equipment on the riverside. This siege equipment was designed by Yu Dayou. It was made of local materials and used mountain-promoted wheelbarrows. Four wooden boards were used to make a sedan-shaped wooden house. The bottom and the back were empty. The wheelbarrow was covered with cowhide and animal skins. After it was made, the Min Zhuang, who was pushing the cart, could avoid arrows and rocks below, and prepare to make sixteen two cars, so that fifty to sixty people could approach the watchtower at one time. A few bags of lime were prepared. If a sneak attack cave emerged from the ground, the lime would be sprinkled inside. A few more wooden boards were prepared, which were sprinkled on the crypt and then spread on the crypt so that the people below would not close their eyes and continue to poke. A few more big woods were prepared to hit the door. Axes and shovels were prepared for other emergency purposes.

Although these things are original, they are both cheap and practical. Li Yan couldn't help but think: "If I had a few cannons in my hand at this time, then there would be no need to make such trouble, just fire the cannons."

However, he also knew that things had to be processed. Now he was leading a group of civilians and soldiers to attack a group of bandits, and it would be almost the same with these local equipment.
Chapter completed!