My younger brother Zhuge Liang

Chapter 607: It doesn’t matter whether Liu Zhang believes it or not, Fa Zheng believes it anyway

After listening to Huang Quan's analysis, Liu Zhang couldn't help but feel worried.

In the following days, he was worried every day whether the civil and military officials at the front would be bewitched by Zhuge Jin's manifesto and easily surrender to the enemy when the battle situation was unfavorable.

Unfortunately, Liu Zhang's worries could not change anything.

Because as the war on the front line progresses, Fucheng and Jiangzhou will soon be completely surrounded by Liu Bei's army.

Even if there are still some small openings that can theoretically communicate with the outside world, anyone with a discerning eye can see that they are deliberately left by Liu Bei's army in order to encircle three sides and lack one person, and they are also baits to lure Liu Zhang's army in the rear to come to the rescue. Whoever steps on them will die.

Liu Zhang could only watch as Fa Zheng led Ling Bao and Deng Xian, and Zhang Song led Yan Yan, fighting to the death with their own fighting power.

……

That day was the seventh day of November.

It was also the seventh day that Liu Bei's western army marched south and the fifth day of the attack on Fucheng.

In five days, Zhang Fei and Wei Yan had built a very solid siege camp, blocking all the gates of Fucheng except the south gate. If the defenders dared to open the gates to fight, they would directly run into the siege camp of the attackers.

The nearest part of the camp to the city gate was only three to five hundred steps away, which not only ensured that the powerful crossbows on the top of the city could not shoot into Liu Bei's camp, but also had enough pressure to prevent even a flying bird from sneaking out of the city.

During the same five days, Zhang Fei also unloaded countless Ge Gong buses and ladder parts that had been pre-processed before the war from the ships that continued to arrive on the Fu River.

Then they quickly assembled assault equipment outside Fucheng, including seven or eight catapults. Other facilities such as rattan shields, flying ladders, trench bridges, etc. were also readily available.

The magnificent momentum and rapid preparation speed created tremendous pressure on the defenders.

However, Fa Zheng was only serving as a guest military supervisor in Fucheng. His previous identity was mainly the chief envoy of the negotiation delegation, so it was not easy for Fa Zheng to surrender without fighting.

Moreover, even if he expressed his position, Ling Bao and Deng Xian might not necessarily listen to him and surrender directly, because the military power was still in the hands of the military generals.

Therefore, it is still necessary to perform.

Ling Bao and Deng Xian had never fought against Liu Bei's army or Cao's army before. If they were not given a taste of their own medicine and made aware of how bloody and cruel wars were in the outside world, they would not be afraid at all.

This is nothing strange. More than two years ago, when Liu Zhang sent Wu Yi to lead Yang Huai and Gao Pei to fight against Cao's army, Yang Huai and Gao Pei were ignorant at first. Only after being beaten down by Cao's army did they change their usual softness.

The mentality of Ling Bao and Deng Xian today is exactly the same as that of Yang Huai and Gao Pei two and a half years ago.

……

Inside the siege camp outside Fucheng, Zhang Fei heard from his subordinates that all preparations for the assault had been made.

He had been waiting for several days. Now that he realized that a strong attack was inevitable, he felt a little depressed and could not help but complain to Wei Yan:
"Alas, it was only before I went to the battle that Shi Yuan told me that Fa Xiaozhi was actually one of ours. I was expecting to take Fucheng without a fight, but I didn't expect that we would still have to attack it in the end!"

Wei Yan comforted him: "Don't worry, Generals. This is inevitable. We just expected too much at the beginning. Fa Xiaozhi is only a military supervisor, not a commander. We should make a concerted effort and show the defenders some strength. They will naturally surrender. It won't be too late to use both kindness and force when the time comes."

Zhang Fei nodded heavily and waved his hand: "Then leave it to you to deploy. The offensive in the next few days should focus on psychological pressure and minimize casualties."

Wei Yan received the order and made some minor adjustments to the tactical deployment. At noon that day, he launched the siege.

The time Wei Yan chose for the attack was very clever.

Because it is already early November, it is winter. If it is in the northern battlefield, this season is not suitable for large-scale deployment of troops, let alone a strong attack.

However, the climate in the Sichuan Basin is still warm and humid, and it is not too cold in early November.

Because the Qinling Mountains block cold air, the winter temperature in central and southern Sichuan is warmer than that in areas of the same latitude in the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River.

According to meteorological data from later times, the coldest temperature around Chengdu can be as low as 5 to 8 degrees. Even though Fucheng is more than 300 miles north of Chengdu, it is only November now, so the temperature is estimated to be around 10 degrees.

In such weather, it was reasonable for Liu Bei's army to use the excuse of "taking advantage of the warm midday to attack", which could also save time. When it got darker and colder in the afternoon, they could withdraw their troops without being interpreted by the defenders as "running away because they couldn't win".

It’s not that we can’t win, it’s just that the weather is bad so we only fight for two hours every day.

As the assault began, Wei Yan raised the momentum from the beginning. Thousands of archers, under the cover of wooden formations and large rattan shields, approached within 70 or 80 steps of the city wall and frantically fired a rain of arrows at the top of the city wall, trying to suppress the defenders.

The eight catapults also opened fire at full power, smashing the city walls with a rain of gravel.

The firepower preparation lasted for a full quarter of an hour, and no one knew how many arrows were fired. All we knew was that the endless rain of arrows and gravel made the defenders on the city wall unable to raise their heads, and their morale was also quite depressed.

While suppressing the arrows, the soldiers of Liu Bei's army pushed carts that were similar in shape to the wooden ox and horse, but obviously two times larger. They were carrying carts full of soil. When they reached the edge of the moat, they flipped over the baffle of the cart and piled the tilted soil into the moat.

That efficiency is many times faster than the traditional method of carrying sacks or bamboo baskets to carry soil. A casual estimate is that one cart pusher is at least equivalent to a dozen civilians carrying bags of soil. Where have Liu Zhang's second-line troops seen this kind of river-filling weapon? Although this weapon appeared on the battlefield of Cao and Liu in Guandong three years ago, the news in Shu was blocked, and Liu Zhang's army had not fought life-and-death battles with the princes outside for many years, so his technical advice had long been behind the times.

Ling Bao and Deng Xian were responsible for guarding the East City and the West City respectively. When they saw Zhang Fei and Wei Yan's posture of filling the river, they were so scared that they broke out in cold sweats and hurriedly urged their archers to suppress them at all costs.

However, this river-filling cart, which had been repeatedly improved by the Zhuge brothers, had an arc-shaped shield behind the body to block arrows. The shield was two or three feet taller than the height of the person pushing the cart and several times wider than the human body.

Ordinary arrows could not hurt the people pushing the carts and transporting soil. Instead, they caused the defending archers to be more exposed to the attacking side's fire suppression, and casualties rose from time to time.

Zhang Fei and Wei Yan worked steadily for an entire afternoon, filling in several gaps in the trench, then using a bridge car to bridge the two banks and filling them with mud and sand to compact them.

Then the armored soldiers of the attacking side launched the assault. Groups of soldiers pushed Ge Gong carts and ladders across the trench bridge.

Before Ge Gongche, there were countless soldiers wielding shields and shovels, destroying the sheep and horse wall, as well as the pits and deer horns near the base of the city wall, to open a path for Ge Gongche.

The defenders kept firing arrows, but with little effect. It was not until the attackers were within a dozen steps of the city wall that the defenders began to throw rolling logs, stones, ash bottles and gold juice.

The lethality of the gray bottle of gold juice was indeed trustworthy. As the defenders used their final killing move, the shield soldiers who destroyed the sheep and horse wall finally had to retreat.

But the attack path had been almost cleared, and Ge Gongche quickly reached the city wall with the ash bottle and gold juice, and dropped the planks with a bang. Then the armored soldiers followed the planks and started a bloody fight with the defenders.

Ling Bao's blood rushed to his head when he saw this. He had not expected that Wei Yan's ability to attack the city was so strong that he could break through the moat and the sheep and horse wall on the first day and push Ge Gongche to the base of the city wall in one go.

With such rapid progress, if any other army were to come to fight, it would take at least several days to complete, right?

But things had come to this point, and Ling Bao had no choice. Relying entirely on his courage, he immediately urged the spearmen and sword and shield soldiers on the city wall to rush up and block the entrance.

The endless stream of Liu Zhang's troops relied on their absolute numerical advantage to desperately block the hole. The two sides fought cruelly, and corpses and wounded soldiers kept falling from the city walls. Even so, the attacking Liu Bei's army still achieved an absolute advantage in the casualty exchange ratio.

The armor wearing rate of Liu Zhang's army was really low. Even with the advantage of weapon length, it was difficult to suppress Liu Bei's army. Instead, the attacking side tore the gap bigger and bigger.

The morale of Liu Zhang's army was generally low. They were able to advance bravely at the beginning because they had more people and everyone thought they could take advantage of the smaller number. Once they found that the enemy was small but elite and brave, and would fight to the death, Liu Zhang's soldiers gradually became timid.

If it was a field battle, this level of fighting might have made Liu Zhang's army loosen their stance and consider retreating. But fortunately, this was a battle to defend the city, and they relied on the strong city after all, so they could still hold on with the psychological advantage, and that's why they didn't retreat.

Seeing this, Ling Bao knew that it was meaningless to supervise the battle any further. He could only lead the city's most elite guards to fight and block the entrance.

With the direct joining of military officers in the battle, the originally low morale of Liu Zhang's army was finally boosted again, and the soldiers summoned up their remaining courage and fought desperately.

As for the Liu Bei army on the opposite side, because Wei Yan did not charge in person, they were impacted by Ling Bao's personal fighting, and the offensive was gradually curbed.

Wei Yan is now in a high position, so it is impossible for him to take the risk of going first in a feint attack.

But even so, Ling Bao couldn't help but feel frightened and a lot of self-doubt arose in his heart during the bloody battle with the powerful enemy.

Because he clearly heard that many of those elite armored soldiers who were attacking were shouting with the accent of Shu, and they were obviously locals!

This may not have much impact when the bloody battle is in full swing, but once the battle is over and both sides calm down, it will definitely make the defenders panic.

Because they saw so many of their former comrades and fellow countrymen actually standing on Liu Bei's side and turning their guns against their lord!
Moreover, the originally weak troops became stronger and more courageous after being transformed by Liu Bei!

"Are these soldiers Wu Yi's former subordinates? In today's battle, did Wei Yan let Wu Yi's former subordinates lead the charge to consume our army? Why? Why did Wu Yi fight so hard? Why did he let Yizhou people fight Yizhou people?"

When Ling Bao thought of this, he almost felt shaky.

Fortunately, Wei Yan started the battle quite late today, at noon. It took more than an hour to fill the trench, and then he had to destroy the sheep and horse wall, deer horns and the Tui Ge bus.

The actual time of the bloody battle after Ge Gongche arrived at the city was actually not much. By this moment of fighting, the sky had gradually darkened.

It gets dark early in winter, and Wei Yan had exerted enough pressure, so he just sounded the horn and retreated.

The troops that climbed the city wall via Ge Gongche were able to retreat smoothly under the cover of the darkness of night, giving Liu Zhang's army basically no chance to pursue and attack them. It was a very clean and neat retreat.

As Wei Yan and Zhang Fei retreated one after another, the defenders and generals of Fucheng, who had just breathed a sigh of relief, began to doubt their lives.

The psychological trauma brought about by the fight with other soldiers with Shu accents just now, as well as the righteous reasons advocated in Liu Bei's army's previous war declaration, made them waver and doubt whether continuing to persevere was the most loyal choice.

As usual, Fa Zheng went to visit Ling Bao and Deng Xian as soon as the battle was over and asked about their combat situation.

Seeing that Ling Bao was slightly injured in the fight, with a long bloody wound cut by the horse-slaying sword, Fa Zheng naturally couldn't help but ask about his well-being.

After chatting for a while, Fa Zheng understood the change in their mentality and knew it was time to show his true colors.

(End of this chapter)