Chapter 343 Entering the city easily
At midnight three days later, figures were floating on the bank of Hangou, led by Dong Xi and Gan Ning.
In Liu Feng's plan, Dong Xi and Gan Ning will enter the city as the vanguard.
Once they enter Shuimen, the division of labor between the two is clear. Dong is in charge and Gan Ning is in charge. The first task is to keep Shuimen under the control of the Southern Army.
For this mission, not only did he mobilize all the ships, Liu Feng also specially assigned 500 armored soldiers to Gan Ning and placed them among the first batch of ships entering the city.
The most important task for Gan Ning and others is to control the entrance and exit of Shuimen. The goal of the second batch of conquering southern troops who entered the city will be the north of the city. Their task is to open the north gate and welcome the main force of the southern conquering army from the north to enter the city.
When the time was almost up, Dong Xi and Gan Ning got on two boats and began to quietly approach the water gate of Wu County.
At this time, Dong Xi got on a stern and was among the fleet, which was convenient for him to command the front army. Gan Ning, on the other hand, was sitting on a boat, leading the way and serving as the spearhead of the entire army.
Checking the time, Gan Ning arrived outside the water gate at midnight.
Gan Ning was loose on the outside and tight on the inside. He seemed very relaxed, but in fact he was quite nervous inside. You could see it from his wandering eyes.
While Gan Ning was waiting nervously, a torch suddenly appeared on the top of the city in Wu County.
Then someone held a torch and stretched out from the top of the city, shaking it three times toward the water below.
Gan Ning was immediately overjoyed. He quickly lit a torch towards the city and drew three circles in the air.
Immediately, the torches at the top of the city were extinguished, and Gan Ning quickly put out the torches on hand.
After about a cup of tea, the water gate made a slight, somewhat harsh sound, and the iron gate in the water gate began to rise slowly.
When Gan Ning saw this scene, he immediately waved his hand, and two stern boats came out in response to the order, docked on both sides of the water gate, and dropped huge rocks to position themselves.
If the iron fence is lowered again at this time, it will be held up by these two sterns, allowing the boats and soldiers to withdraw outside the city.
After this step was completed, Gan Ning immediately took the lead and drove towards the city.
After entering the city, there were more than a dozen people standing on the pier. The first one, who was slightly thin, was Lu Yi himself.
There is another tall, thin man with slender arms and a weathered face standing behind Lu Yi. He is the secret hand of the Lu family among the Zhenze water thieves.
Soon, the first batch of boats came ashore quietly, and Gan Ning jumped ashore with a group of soldiers.
This group of more than two hundred people are all wearing leather armor and holding short weapons and sharp blades. Their goal is to control the safety of Watergate.
After putting down Gan Ning and others, the boat immediately left the shore, turned around and galloped out of the city. A group of twelve boats were waiting to enter the city, all of them were armored soldiers.
"General Gao's name?"
As soon as Gan Ning landed, Lu Yi came to greet him.
Regarding Liu Fengjun's generals, Wu County's surnames have collected a lot of information, including Gan Ning's.
There are many rivers and lakes in Wudi, so it is natural that naval generals attach great importance to them.
Gan Ning had a good attitude towards Lu Yi because the other party gave him the opportunity to win first.
Immediately he handed over his hand and replied: "The last general, Gan Ning, has met Mr. Lu Xiao."
Lu Yi did not say much and hurriedly introduced to Gan Ning: "There is a gate at Shuimen. , just inside the gate tower on the right, I have already taken it. The gate tower on the left is connected to the tower on the water gate. There are also two hundred people who are responsible for patrolling the tower and gate every half an hour. "
Gan Ning nodded and said with a smile: "There are only two hundred people, I can kill them with my backhand."
Immediately, Gan Ning arranged for a hundred people to go to the turnstile room to defend to the death. The leader was Gan Ning's warriors. The son of the clan is Gan Mao. Gan Ning himself walked to the left gate tower in person, intending to kill the two hundred defenders first.
When Lu Yi heard this, his heart sank and he wanted to persuade Gan Ning.
But how could Gan Ning listen to Lu Yi's persuasion? He just laughed and led the team away, leaving fifty people behind to defend the dock.
On the surface, the differences between Gan Ning and Lu Yi were correct. Gan Ning felt that it would not take much time to wipe out these two hundred people. In this way, there would be no gate room at all. Threatened.
Lu Yi hoped that Gan Ning would be more cautious. Anyway, he had not been discovered yet and could wait for the second batch of troops to enter the city before taking action.
If Gan Ning could not quickly defeat Sun Ce's army, then naturally Gan Ning was wrong.
On the contrary, Lu Yi was wrong.
After Lu Yi pondered for a moment, he immediately said to the water bandit Gao Han: "Today's plan may be for wealth or for the destruction of the clan. If you advance, you will live, if you retreat, you will die. General Gan is fierce and brave, and we should be his It clears away worries. "
Lu Yi's meaning is simple. Now that Gan Ning has taken the initiative, we must help him guard the dock.
Gao Han naturally had no objections and immediately obeyed the order.
While Lu Yi was in a nervous mood, a group of swans sailed outside the water gate and slowly approached the dock.
The stern pulled up to the pier and put down the gangplank. Groups of armored men came ashore cautiously. After forming a team, they began to take over the defense of the pier.
Lu Yi made a rough count and concluded that there were as many as three hundred armored soldiers landing in this wave.
Just when Chairman Lu breathed a sigh of relief, Gan Ning appeared on the dock again.
At this time, Gan Ning was covered in blood, and the brocade robe covered with leather armor was almost dyed red. With the bright smile on his face, he looked like a murderous maniac.
After seeing Lu Yi, Gan Ning smiled and said: "The city tower has been cleared, and there is no need to worry about the future."
Although Lu Yi is small, he has a big heart.
Seeing Gan Ning covered in blood and smiling brightly in the middle of the night, he was still able to hold his own, which was really different. The tall man next to him had trembling arms and could hardly stand.
Gan Ning glanced at Gao Han, with a flash of disdain in his eyes. Then he looked at Lu Yi and couldn't help but praise: "Young gentleman is quite bold."
Lu Yi humbly said: "General, you are overly praised."
Gan Ning chuckled and continued to look at the dock.
Until this moment, Sun Jun was not alarmed.
It sounds incredible, but it is actually common sense.
When Xu Kun's troops were in Wuxi, they had already been demoralized by the Southern Army. In addition, Liu Feng went south to besiege Wuxian, which gave Xu Kun the illusion that the opponent would continue to attack. The Battle of Wuxi made Xu Kun's troops paralyzed and careless.
The sneak attack a while ago failed, and the Zhengnan Army had no idea of taking advantage of the situation to attack the city, which further worried Xu Kun's army.
For a time, Xu Kun's army was waiting up and down. A month later, Liu Feng's army used trebuchets to open the way to attack the city.
With the continuous departure of ships, batches of Southern Conquest troops landed on the pier, plus the five hundred troops of the four major surnames of Wu County commanded by Lu Yi on the shore, and more than two hundred troops of Gao Han. Bandits, the total strength of Watergate's Southern Conquest Army has exceeded three thousand.
When Gao Shun and Xu Chu landed with another group of armored soldiers, there were already 900 armored soldiers of the Southern Conquest Army in the city.
Gao Shun immediately took over the frontline command of the city. According to Liu Feng's order, he appointed Dong Xi to lead 500 people to guard the water gate and assist the follow-up troops to land.
Lu Yi was Dong Xi's deputy and led his troops to obey Dong Xi's orders. Gao Shun took Xu Chu and Gan Ning as the vanguard, commanded 900 armored soldiers and 1,600 troops, a total of 2,500 people, attacked the north of the city and opened the north gate.
At this time, the Southern Expedition Army was already a large force, and they were discovered by Sun Ce's army in the north of the city before they even approached the north of the city.
Facing the other party's inquiry, Gao Shun ordered to ignore it and rushed straight to the city gate.
In this way, no matter how careless Sun Cejun was, he noticed something was wrong.
While organizing defense, they sounded the alarm and asked for help from the city.
For a moment, the silence in the night was broken by the cry of killing.
Xu Kun was also woken up. When he heard his subordinates reporting that the Southern Army had entered the city, he was so shocked that he even forgot to put on his shoes, so he rushed to the courtyard to listen to the sounds in the distance.
Although Xu Kun was a little lax, there was still no big problem with the arrangement.
Except for the Water Gate, a thousand people were deployed at each city gate to protect the city towers and gates in three shifts.
At the same time, there are many patrol teams in the city, which conduct patrols once an hour. It is said that the arrangement is not a big problem.
No matter how good the arrangement is, someone has to implement it.
Almost all of Xu Kun's troops were evacuated from Wuxi, and they already had inertial thinking. In addition, there were insiders in Wu County, and they started from Shuimen, which was least valued.
In Xu Kun's opinion, it is almost impossible for Shuimen to be selected by the Southern Army.
Not only did Hangou completely divide the geographical environment, but there was also almost no large open space in the west of the city. This meant that even a slightly larger number of troops could not be deployed in the west of the city, let alone siege. Therefore, Xu Kun It was only a symbolic arrangement of 500 people, plus the remnants of the Zhenze water bandits, so I felt that I could sit back and relax.
"Where did the Southern Conquest Army enter the city?"
While changing his clothes and armor, Xu Kun asked the pro-army commander Xu Pang beside him.
Xu Pang quickly replied: "I don't know yet, I have sent someone to check."
Xu Kun listened for another moment, confirmed and asked: "Then what is this killing sound? Coming from the north, what's the situation in the north of the city?"
Xu Pang hesitated: "The exact news is not clear yet, but the southern army should not be able to open the north gate yet."
"Who is in charge of the night watch tonight?"
Xu Kun continued to ask patiently: "Why haven't you come to see me yet?"
Xu Pang breathed a sigh of relief and hurriedly replied: "Yes. During the night when General Zhu was on duty, after the sudden change in the north of the city, he had already led his remaining troops to the north gate to provide support. Before leaving, he told me that he would send someone to report the situation and asked me to forward it to you. "
Xu Kun's face was still ugly, but he nodded, confirming Zhu Chao's response.
“Go, call Yongle and Bohai to me quickly.”
Xu Yi, also known as Yongle, and Sun He, known as Bohai.
Both of them are Xu Kun's important generals at this time. At this critical moment, Xu Kun naturally wants to see them and assign tasks.
Xu Pang hurriedly ordered his personal soldiers to go out to find someone, while he squatted down and put on the greaves for Xu Kun.
Xu Kun's heart suddenly sank when he heard a burst of cheers suddenly burst out from the North City Gate.
At this time, he had already led his soldiers to find a ladder and climbed up to the roof to look at the situation in the north of the city.
But even so, Xu Kun still failed to see what happened in the north of the city.
Just when Xu Kun was extremely anxious, another burst of cheers broke out in the north of the city, making Xu Kun feel more and more nervous and uneasy.
Xu Kun's hunch was right. These two cheers were caused by the Southern Conquest Army entering the city.
The first round of cheers was when Gan Ning led his soldiers to charge into the formation and succeeded, killing the captain of the North Gate in one fell swoop and cutting down the captain's flag.
The second wave of shouts was that Xu Chu successfully killed the city gate defenders, opened the north gate of the city, and welcomed the southern troops entering the city outside the city.
Sun Ce's army in the city was actually constantly counterattacking, trying to reinforce the North Gate.
But the gap in strength between the two sides is really too big.
At this time, there were as many as 5,000 soldiers of the Southern Conquest Army entering the city, including 1,200 armored soldiers. In street fighting, the effect and power of the armored soldiers were even more powerful and useful than the cavalry.
The ministries under Xu Kun not only worked hard, but also fought bloody battles.
But it is because they fought so tenaciously that their morale dropped faster. There is nothing more destructive than trying hard but not seeing hope.
Seeing that his comrades were either dead or alive, he gritted his teeth and fought hard, but the front line was constantly forced back by the opponent, and even broke through.
It’s easy to force a retreat, but a breakthrough is really dangerous.
Every time he broke through, Sun Cejun had to pay a huge price to retreat and reorganize. Even though more than half of Xu Kun's troops were veterans, after being broken through two or three times, he was already a little overwhelmed.
Fortunately, there was a steady stream of additional troops arriving at this time. Several nearby patrol teams rushed over as quickly as possible and joined the ranks of the city gate defenders as new forces.
But they really didn't expect that the other side would suddenly exert force, and the two powerful generals led by Gan Ning and Xu Chu would actually lead their own troops to attack.
In other words, even if they thought about it, they really didn't have the energy to deal with it.
Gan Ning went straight towards the North Gate Captain and the battle flag, while Xu Chu rushed towards the city gate opening.
It’s just a cup of tea, and both sides are singing triumphant songs.
Gan Ning killed the generals and covered the flag, and Xu Chu cleared the city gates.
When Zhu Chao was still more than a hundred meters away from the city gate, what he saw was the defeated North Gate defenders.
Zhu Chao quickly ordered to stop, launch his troops, and set aside a passage to collect the defeated troops.
Gan Ning, on the other hand, was unreasonable and led three hundred armored soldiers as the vanguard, charging headlong into it.
The Zhengnan Army behind was divided into two groups. One group followed the Iron Armored Soldiers to provide close support for the former, while the other took out its bows and arrows to provide long-range firepower for Gan Ning and the Iron Armored Soldiers. .
After Xu Chu opened the city gate, he left 500 people to guard the gate. He took 100 armored soldiers and 200 soldiers and divided them into two teams. They attacked up along the left and right gate towers, intending to kill the enemies in the tower. Wipe them all out so as not to pose a threat to the Southern Conquest Army that will subsequently enter the city.
In fact, at this point in the battle, Xu Kun's troops no longer had any chance.
After Xu Chu cleared Sun Ce's army from the north gate tower, Zhao Fan and Yu Zi's tribes all began to enter the city from the north gate and join the battle sequence.
Under Gao Shun's order, Zhao Fan and Yu Zi were arranged to attack the east of the city, hoping to seize the east gate and let Xu Sheng enter the city.
Xu Kun also received the latest news at this time. When he heard that the west gate and the north gate had been breached, his expression turned extremely ugly.
(End of this chapter)