Red Mansion: Seizing Jiangdong, starting with pirates

Chapter 158: Datong City Falls

Long before that, Caoyuan had sent a large number of traitors to spy on Datong's defense intelligence.

Now that the troops were officially dispatched, Kah Khan allocated eight additional elite cavalry teams, each with 2,400 people, a total of 19,200 people, to attack the extended areas of the Datong defense line, such as Shilihe, Fengwei, Xinguanwei, etc.
At the same time, he sent some troops across the city to cut off the reinforcements from the rear of Datong and to surround Datong from all sides.

As for the main force of the grassland, they attacked Datong directly.

Kah Khan assembled a total of 150,000 troops this time, of which 30,000 were his own elite troops, and the rest were recruited troops from various tribes, who were much less elite than his own troops.

In fact, in terms of hard power, the current Kah Khan does not have the power to rule the Central Plains. However, the civil strife and natural disasters in Daxi are endless, and there is a godsend opportunity. Coupled with Li Hao's instigation, this has intensified Kah Khan's ambition.

With such a big movement on the grassland, Datong’s defender Deng Ren naturally got the news quickly.

Datong currently has 44,000 registered soldiers and 23,000 horses. The people of the grassland are not good at attacking cities, but if they use this number of soldiers and horses to defend the city, they will be no match for Kah Khan.

However, in reality, Datong’s troops were different from the records.

There were 26,000 soldiers and 8,000 horses, but they were short of armor and artillery, the soldiers were poorly trained, and many of them could not even ride horses!
Deng Ren knew his family's background and was naturally frightened.

He hurried to Xinjing City and Xuanfu to request reinforcements.

In order to ensure that the letter for help was delivered safely, Deng Ren dispatched sixteen messengers to send the letter from different directions.

However, a green falcon flew out of the city and quickly leaked the news.

The small force of the Wuchahe tribe that bypassed the city of Datong sent people to intercept and kill the messengers one by one according to the intelligence, and none of the sixteen messengers survived.

Cao Yuan soon officially began the siege.

After the two sides went to war, Datong's soldiers were obviously less experienced than the grassland soldiers who had been fighting for years, but fortunately the grassland people were not good at attacking cities, so the strengths and weaknesses of both sides remained equal.

Caoyuan attacked Datong day and night, and both sides left a thick layer of corpses under the city walls.

Deng Ren didn't know that there were traitors in the city, but he was very afraid of death.

He saw that the grassland's offensive was fierce and Datong could not hold out for long. He was afraid that something unexpected had happened to the messengers who had delivered the letters before, resulting in the reinforcements not arriving in time. So in the next few days, he sent more than a hundred messengers out to ask for help.

Sun Huaiyi, the assistant commander of the city, was completely paralyzed.

I have never seen anyone so afraid of death.

Because there were too many messengers, he had no way of knowing the routes of each one and could only watch them leave.

However, although he failed to completely prevent the news from spreading, fortunately the previous ambush was effective, and the news of the grassland's attack finally reached the capital a few days later.

On the fifth day of Caoyuan's attack on Datong, there was no substantial change in the situation.

The attack by the grassland was extremely fierce, with the casualties reaching two thousand. However, the city of Datong was extremely strong and was not so easy to capture.

Deng Ren’s military ability was not outstanding, but he was capable of basic city defense command.

He ordered people to block the city gates with heavy objects and sent special personnel to spy underground to prevent the grassland people from digging tunnels. Once, when the grassland people were withdrawing their troops, they pretended that their formation was not complete. Seeing this, the assistant commander Sun Huaiyi hurriedly requested to go out of the city to attack, but was rejected by Deng Ren without hesitation.

It wasn't that he saw through the grassland people's strategy, but he simply believed that even if the grassland people's formation was not complete, he might not be able to defeat them.

On the sixth day, Xinguanwei, located at the eastern corner of Datong, sent a letter asking for help, saying that they were surrounded by grassland people and requested the Datong defenders to go out of the city to help.

After reading the letter, Deng Ren was afraid that his troops would be ambushed.

But if he does not send troops, the imperial court will probably hold him accountable for not helping the victim in the future.

So after thinking it over, Deng Ren burned the letter, killed the messenger from Xinguanwei, sent all those who knew the situation to the most intense position of the city defense to die, and then pretended that he had never received the letter.

On the eighth day, Xinguanwei was breached, and about a thousand "remnant soldiers" rushed to Datong and asked to enter the city for recuperation.

Deng Ren refused, saying: "I am afraid you have already fled to the grassland. We are not here to rest, but to break the city!" The remaining soldiers under the city cried sadly:
"We fought to the death for the court, but we were outnumbered. The general did not save us, but instead tarnished our innocence! Now we have fought desperately to break through the siege, and are seriously injured. We want to go into the city to recuperate. Will the general not allow us to do so?"

Deng Ren remained unmoved when he heard this.

However, the cries of the remaining soldiers resonated with many soldiers on the city wall.

During these days of holding out, many soldiers had been injured or died, so when the soldiers saw these remaining soldiers under the city, they all felt sympathy.

At this time, the grassland attack came again.

From a distance, the grassland people shot arrows, killing the remaining soldiers under the city one by one.

The soldiers on the city wall could no longer bear it and persuaded Deng Rendao:

"General, let them in. If they continue like this, they will be killed by the grassland people. How could they be spies?"

Deng Ren was a little hesitant.

Looking at the grassland soldiers being shot one by one outside the city, he felt that these people were most likely not spies.

However, many times, we are better off just in case!

If it turns out to be a spy, the entire city could be overthrown.

The collapse of the city would be fine, but he had worked so hard to get to this position from a commoner. If he died because of this, he would lose everything.

Therefore, Deng Ren thought about it for a long time, and his cherishment for life overcame his sympathy for the soldiers below.

"Anyone who dares to advise me again will be beheaded!"

In the end, the remaining soldiers under the city were all killed one by one.

They are indeed spies.

Because Xinguanwei was breached, all their families were captured by the grassland people. They could only come here according to the orders of the grassland people and sell out their country for their relatives.

Deng Ren's choice saved the whole city.

However, the lower-level soldiers did not understand him.

Under the cover of night, the soldiers who had gone through a day of brutal fighting gathered together and complained. All the soldiers expressed their dissatisfaction with Deng Ren's cold-bloodedness.

Sun Huaiyi accidentally saw this scene and thought that the opportunity to break into the city had come.

He had long wanted to open the city from the inside and welcome the grassland army into the city.

However, since ancient times, the defense against barbarians has been deeply rooted in people's hearts. Sun Huaiyi was not confident enough that his men would betray the nation, so he did not take action for a long time.

The current situation gave Sun Huaiyi an opportunity.

Among this group of low-level soldiers, there was an old soldier named Zhou Dayou, who was kind and helpful, and had a high prestige among the low-level soldiers.

At the same time, Zhou Dayou was also one of the many people who were dissatisfied with Deng Ren.
So the next day, Sun Huaiyi deliberately executed Zhou Dayou on the grounds that he had criticized the general, in order to intensify the soldiers' dissatisfaction with Deng Ren.

To his subordinates, he said that this was an order from Deng Ren and he was forced to carry it out.

To his superiors, he slandered Zhou Dayou for inciting the soldiers, and he dealt with him according to military tactics.

Deng Ren didn't care about such a small matter as killing a soldier during the war.

But he didn't know that the soldiers' dissatisfaction with him was growing.

(End of this chapter)