Royal Road Chapter 129

Published at 16th of August 2022 12:24:21 PM

Early the next morning, a messenger hollered at their walls. Liang Feng nearly laughed in anger at the excuses he spewed. Reinforce the Prince of Chengdu? These cavalry could clearly detour along the Yellow River, why take Bai Pass? He'd be insane to open the pass and let enemy troops through!

Soon, Liang Feng could no longer laugh. 

He gazed down from upon the walls, his expression severe. A dark cloud of cavalries galloped towards them from the distance, around three thousand in number, and, completely disregarding the city's defenses, set up camp less than two kilometers from the walls. Horses neighed, weapons gleamed; they certainly looked menacing enough.

Anyone with a shred of common sense knew that cavalry wasn't meant to be thrown against city walls; not even the Xiongnu could afford to use elite cavalry like that. But it wasn't just cavalry that had come. Far away, they could see cavalry squads herding crowds of people towards their camp. Those staggering, sobbing people were not soldiers, but bedraggled farmers!

“My lord, they've been raiding nearby villages. There are many Xiongnu amongst them as well!” Having keen eyesight, Yi Yan immediately distinguished them from the masses by their clothing. 

Though they'd sent out orders to every city to go on high alert, not every village was able to defend itself. Not to mention that they could easily conscript people from the nearby Xiongnu villages. 

Clearly, they were about to be used as the vanguard of their attack.

Liang Feng unconsciously clenched his fists. He was absolutely sure that he could hold Lu City, but how were the civilians outside to defend themselves? Was he just supposed to watch as the Xiongnu used the people under his governance against the commandery city?!

Yi Yan detected his lord's fury, of course; he too was pent up with anger. If only he had a thousand cavalry, he could sally out from the city and take them by surprise. With less than five hundred soldiers garrisoned in Lu City, however, all they could do was guard the city.

Taking a deep breath, he said gently, “My lord, why don't you leave the wall. They'll begin their attack soon.”

Considering that they'd traveled light and rounded up so many peasants, the enemy forces wouldn't waste any time testing their defenses. Yi Yan didn't want his lord to be on the walls then, when he might be injured by a stray weapon.

According to reason, he should've stayed on the walls to boost morale at a time like this, though Liang Feng only glanced beyond the walls once more and said, “I will recruit able-bodied men to guard the walls. As for you, no need to put up too fierce a resistance, both to deceive the enemy and preserve your own fighting strength!”

The orders seemed unsound, but with how familiar Yi Yan was with his lord, he knew he had a plan in mind, and said at once, “Rest assured, my lord!”

Without further delay, Liang Feng descended from the wall with long strides. He mounted a horse, not so much as looking at the carriage, and shouted, “To the western quarter!” 

※

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He swished his whip and said, “In an hour, we'll begin the siege!”

Lacking a supply line and rear detachment, they couldn't last very many days even if they looted provisions. It was best to launch an attack as soon as possible.

An hour later, the captured commoners, burdened by heavy loads of gravel and dirt, were driven by fiendish bow-wielding horsemen towards the city.

Building a ramp was a stupidly simple idea, plus, the dirt-porting commoners were completely exposed to the soldiers atop the wall; casualty rates were extremely high. But it was different this time. The men on the walls couldn't bear to shoot. After all, the people at the very front were all villagers from around Lu City, some of them familiar. Was there anyone who could coldly kill under these circumstances?  

What's more, there were horse-riding enemies behind the swarm of commoners.

The Xiongnu cavalry split into several companies, attacking in waves. They galloped swiftly towards the wall, and at over a hundred paces from the wall, loosed projectiles on high arching trajectories. Being the elite of the elite, their horseback archery was nothing to scoff at. Their arrows descended from the sky like a swarm of locusts upon the parapets. Many of the men on the wall were only commoners who'd never seen anything like this before, although luckily, Yi Yan reacted quickly and yelled, “Shields up!”

A line of Liang household troops raised their shields, managing to block the rain of arrows. But before the first wave was over, the second was already coming at them!

Under the cavalry's cover fire, the commoners neared the city wall, hurriedly dropped their sandbags, then turned around and ran. Behind them, the second wave of commoners was also approaching the wall. Hundreds of commoners had been captured as manual laborers; they couldn't be allowed to keep adding to the pile because regardless of whether they could successfully build a ramp, it would break the city defenders' morale! 

It'd take more to deceive the enemy than avoiding battle entirely. In a gap between rains of arrows, “Get the logs ready! Heed my orders!”

Yi Yan briskly strode over to one of the six already cocked and loaded, as of yet unused, ballistas, took aim at the advancing cavalry, and yelled, “Throw the logs!”

As he gave the command, he forcefully pulled the trigger.

With a whoosh, the bolt soared forth. Shot from a ballista with a range of four-hundred paces, it landed amidst the throng of cavalry, skewering two horses into a bloody shish kebab. In the brief moment of confusion, the men on the walls prepared the logs and threw them down.  

The logs elicited pained screams from the several people they injured and hindered the commoners behind them. Nevertheless, they trudged on, for the Xiongnu were still behind them meant that fleeing was certain death while keeping up the attack afforded them some chance of survival. No one dared stop.

The cavalry formation temporarily disrupted by the ballista quickly regained order, for they were the Xiongnu's elite, and charged the walls again. Their task was to suss out the layout of the city defenses. The enemy's lack of counterattack actually left them with fewer options.

After several minutes of this back and forth exchange, a cavalryman reported, “General, there are six ballistas on the wall and there are about thirty archers.”

The numbers more or less matched his predictions. Liu Wei looked at the pitiful smattering of arrows falling from atop the walls and sneered, “Take note of the ballistas' rearming speed and time your charges accordingly. Use your arrows sparingly and have the peasants rush ahead.  After a full day of continuous battery, they'll be too tired to defend come tomorrow. They'll have to call for help from Huguan if they want to keep the city.” 

Liu Wei had never been counting on the peasants to build a ramp that would let them take the walls. It was more psychological warfare than anything. It was apparent that the city's defenders were too soft and unwilling to surrender. Guarding against them would wear them to exhaustion within the day, and once fear and fatigue set in, they'd expose weaknesses, ones he'd gladly take advantage of

Thinking he'd taken their measure, Liu Wei immediately ordered the cavalry to split into twelve companies, resting and attacking in turns. Killing intent flashed in Yi Yan's eyes when he saw the Xiongnu below dismount and take rest. So they were going to drag this out. Very well, he'd accompany them to the end!

“The cavalry has slacked off. They won't be able to take the walls for now. Buck up, everyone, and kill some more Xiongnu!”

The men slowly regained some morale following Yi Yan's shout and began carrying out almost decent-looking cohesive defensive measures. Each according to their own plans, they began the tug-of-war. 

※

“Your Excellency, why have you come?” Ge Hong startled when he saw Liang Feng riding up to him. Just what could have the grand administrator in such a rush?

“Elite Xiongnu cavalry are at the city walls, I need gunpowder to fend them off!” Liang Feng got straight to the point.

“How can gunpowder be used to fight enemies?” Ge Hong was shocked. He hadn't expected the Xiongnu to arrive so quickly, but how was gunpowder supposed to fend off cavalry troops? It had less killing capacity than bows and crossbows! 

While the cauldron explosion had certainly been frightening, a half kilo of the substance had only been enough to crack it open. Going off of that, burying a few hundred kilos of the stuff under a wall could possibly bring it down, however, unlike city walls, cavalry was mobile! Was he planning to dig under their camp? He didn't have that much gunpowder, even if they were able to tunnel over undetected!

“I'm not using it to kill enemies directly. I need something that makes a great deal of noise and light, something like exploding bamboo, but a hundred times stronger!” Although Liang Feng knew better than anyone how gunpowder was really supposed to be used, he was incapable of crafting firearms. The problem of craftsmanship aside, the gunpowder itself was far too weak, so in the end, it was best used for its original purpose. 

“Ah! Your Excellency plans to use deception!” Ge Hong, having fought in battle and read military treatises before, instantly caught on to his intention.

Liang Feng's smile was sharp, “Just so. Better yet if you could make the light emitted by the explosion change color, perhaps blue or white, Ge Hong.” 

“There are a few reagents I could try.” Ge Hong swiveled around and went back to his alchemy chamber right away. 

Liang Feng, on the other hand, said to his bodyguard, “Fetch two skilled craftsmen from the workshop for me, preferably ones familiar with making longbows, then bring some bamboo poles and hemp paper!”

Not caring whether he understood or not, Liang Feng followed Ge Hong into the small building; the bodyguard dutifully sprinted off to find people. Shortly, the tranquility of the small Daoist temple by the mountain was shattered.

※ 

Yi Yan stood on the wall, watching the Xiongnu soldiers make camp as the last rays of sunlight sank in the west, and exhaled deeply.

They'd killed less than a hundred horsemen that day. It'd taken the assistance of ballistas and crossbows to inflict even that minor loss to their cavalry. A few dozen of the commoners they'd corralled had died as well, mostly to the logs, and the rest of the casualties were Xiongnu foot soldiers he'd purposely shot down.

For all that, the enemy troops were hardly affected. In contrast, the men on the walls had been switched out twice already, with even the utterly inexperienced reserve force coming out in full force. Only the primary forces which Yi Yan had held back still retained their fighting strength.

This kind of battle was teeth-achingly frustrating. A more hotheaded general mightn't have been able to resist going on the offensive. Yi Yan, however, hadn't wavered for a second. It wasn't solely because of his lord's orders; he too knew full well that no counterattack, no matter how aggressive, would be useless against them. 

Irregular warfare was the only way to defeat the enemy!

But what method of attack could they use to breach their encampment? Their opponents were true veterans, as evidenced by how flawlessly they'd set up camp. It was doubtful that even a night attack would yield significant results.

“Commander Yi, His Excellency summons you,” said a soldier from behind him.

Yi Yan eyed the far-off encampment, then turned and headed down.

Chapter end