Chapter Eighty-Seven: The Battlefield Situation Changes in an Instant

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  Yang Kai arranged all the defenses and ignored Chen Xuanyu and other newly arrived generals, going up to the city gate tower by himself. Feeling cold-shouldered but unable to complain, Chen Xuanyu and his subordinate generals hesitated for a moment before following Yang Kai up to the tower.

  A great war is approaching, and at this critical moment they dare not make any trouble or speak out of turn. If they say or do anything against Yang Hui, the holder of the "Shangfangbaojian" will behead them in public without being punished by the emperor.

  Before that, Huo Bao and Bian Lingcheng had already been beheaded by Yang Hui, they did not want to become the third high-ranking general to be beheaded in public.

  Just as Chen Xuanli and others were about to follow Yang Gui up the gate tower, the rebel army had already charged to the east bank of the Forbidden Ditch, with countless bamboo and wooden rafts coming with the impact of the rebels, even blocking the line of sight for a while, unable to see how many horses and men were charging behind the bamboo and wooden rafts. Also at this time when the dust brought by the rebel army was rolling in on the east bank of the Forbidden Ditch, the various generals commanding on the city wall had ordered the soldiers to start rotating shooting.

  But the effect of shooting was far from what Tang army generals had expected, because when the arrows flew to the east bank of Jin Gou, they were already nearly "strong crossbow's end", losing more than half of their force, and while falling down, several rebel soldiers holding bamboo and wooden boards became very good "shields", which were super-large shields, many arrows were blocked by the bamboo and wooden boards, the shooting effect was far from being as good as yesterday when the rebels started attacking the city.

  Yesterday, the rebels' shooting effect was almost like cutting grass when they attacked the city. The rebel attack was very difficult, but today's situation has completely changed. Only a small number of rebels were shot down to the ground, and a large number of rebels rushed to the edge of the moat, throwing countless bamboo and wooden rafts into the moat, quickly filling it up. The charging rebels were only shot dead or injured in large numbers after they threw down the bamboo and wooden rafts.

  However, the soldiers carrying bamboo and wooden shields soon rushed up again. When the rebel army carried out the bamboo and wooden shields to start charging, their formation was not dense at first, and their initial goal was to fill in the forbidden ditch and pave the way for the subsequent dense charge.

  In general, four to five soldiers holding a bamboo or wooden raft charge forward. They rush to the moat and throw the raft into it before immediately retreating or directly charging down into the moat, clearing the way for the next group of soldiers carrying rafts to charge forward again.

  Such an attack method is quite effective, a large number of bamboo and wooden rafts are thrown into the ditch, filling up the forbidden ditch, but the damage to itself is not high.

  This shocked Chen Xuanyi and others, who did not expect the rebels to start building bamboo and wooden rafts to pave roads and fill in trenches when they began attacking the city.

  The rebels filled the moat with large bamboo rafts, and what to do next was anyone's guess. As long as the moat was filled, the battle behind would be extremely cruel, and Tongguan City would become a bloody slaughterhouse. The final outcome was unpredictable.

  But at this time, Yang Jie was still standing calmly on the city gate tower, and he didn't have any fear or tension towards the rebels' attack. He had a confident look on his face, which made Chen Xuanli even more surprised. When did Yang Jie, the 17-year-old son of Yang Guozhong, become so calm and determined? It was as if he were a seasoned general who had commanded countless battles. The generals under him, Wang Silie and Pang Zhong, actually listened to his commands, which was hard to understand, considering that not long ago, Wang Silie and Pang Zhong had suggested that Geshu Han kill Yang Guozhong!

  However, the battles outside the city became more and more intense, causing Chen Xuanyu and others to focus their attention on the battles outside the city.

  More bamboo and wood rafts were thrown into the moat, and a long section of the moat was gradually raised, eventually almost level with the eastern ridge.

  In this process, the Tang army on the city wall was shooting in shifts, but the arrow's hitting effect was not good, and the number of rebel soldiers who were shot to death was not many. Thousands of bamboo and wooden boards were thrown into the forbidden ditch.

  "A cruel and bloody battle is about to begin!" This was Chen Xuanli's comment after seeing the Jin Gou being slowly filled up.

  He also wanted to see what Yang Gui would take as countermeasures after the rebels' large-scale attack on the city.

  But Yang Jie did not give any new orders, and the arrows shot from the city head did not increase, nor was the interval between each round of shooting shortened.

  Cui Qianyou, who was directing the siege, saw that the moat had been filled in so easily and couldn't help but feel great joy.

  But in his heart, he also felt a pang of regret, why didn't they adopt this strategy when attacking the city yesterday!

  If yesterday's actions were like today's, perhaps Tongguan would have been captured and the lives of over 10,000 soldiers would not have been lost in vain.

  After receiving the report from the soldiers, saying that the moat within a mile had been basically filled up and the soldiers could directly cross the moat to attack the city, Cui Qianyou also immediately ordered an all-out attack on the city.

  With Cui Gan's order, the nearly 20,000 soldiers who had been lined up charged forward with a deafening roar, like a tidal wave, in the direction of the Jin Gou. The front row of charging soldiers still held bamboo and wooden shields to come, which could block the Tang army's arrow shooting to some extent, avoiding being shot down by arrows from the city head.

  Soldiers holding bamboo and wooden shields charged forward to the east bank of the moat, threw the held bamboo and wooden shields into the moat onto other bamboo and wooden shields, filled some uneven places, then held up their shields, crossed over each other, and rushed towards the city wall. Behind them, soldiers carrying cloud ladders accelerated their charge, trying to make a concerted effort to return the cloud ladders to the top of the city wall.

  Very soon, the bamboo and wooden rafts inside the moat were piled up with rebel soldiers. At this time, the arrows shot from the city head by the Tang army began to become dense, tens of thousands of arrows were shot at the rebels' heads in rotation, and the rebels who were shot down one after another became the padding on the bamboo and wooden rafts.

  Those who were lucky enough not to be shot and continued to charge forward also stepped on the bodies of their comrades.

  After the first wave of 20,000 rebels' dense charge, the subsequent rebel soldiers did not stop and followed with a stronger impact.

  When the rebels rushed into the Jin Gou and began to climb the west bank of the Jin Gou, preparing to put the cloud ladder back on the Tongguan city wall, Yang Gui issued a new order from the gate tower.

  As Yang Kai's new order was given, the hay that had been piled up on the gate tower was thrown into the moat under the joint efforts of the catapults and soldiers. The hot oil was also poured out in large quantities by the catapults. After a certain amount of hay and hot oil were thrown out, countless fire arrows shot at the hay that fell densely on the rebels' heads in the moat.

  As the rocket fell down, the haystack was set on fire immediately.

  Thereafter, the hay and hot oil continued to be thrown out, and soon a raging fire broke out in the trench, quickly igniting the bamboo and wooden boards used by the rebels to pave the trench. The rebel soldiers who had charged into the trench were instantly engulfed in a sea of flames.

  The scene left Chen Xuanli and other generals who had just arrived with reinforcements on the city gate tower staring in shock.

  No one had expected that the situation on the battlefield would change like this, yesterday's raging flood in Jingou turned into a "fire ditch", the raging flames were scorching the Tang army soldiers on the city wall while devouring the lives of many rebel soldiers.

  Just as the rebel soldiers on the east bank of the Jin River were thrown into chaos by the increasingly fierce fire, and the situation was approaching a loss of control, the drawbridge in the south gate direction quickly fell, and the Tongguan South Gate, which had been tightly closed, opened. Wang Silie led three thousand elite soldiers to shout and kill their way out!