Tiger Owl

Chapter 238 Burning Dragon
This time, Shi Xie didn't make a mistake. When he saw the raging fires and thick smoke everywhere, he immediately realized that this battle was doomed.

He immediately ordered: "Wang Kai's army, hold off the cavalry, and the rest of the troops, retreat to Longbian County immediately."

Shi Xie had to take advantage of the opportunity before the enemy launched a full-scale attack to immediately cut his losses and retreat back to the county town.

Longbian County was only three miles away. Tens of thousands of troops turned around and quickly retreated towards the county, leaving only Wang Kai's thousands of spearmen to desperately hold off the cavalry and prevent them from pursuing the main force.

The Jiaozhi army retreated very quickly; within the time it takes for an incense stick to burn, tens of thousands of troops had retreated back to Longbian County, leaving only a few thousand spearmen who could not return, as they were surrounded by the main force.

At this moment, the thousands of spearmen led by the veteran general Wang Kai were surrounded by the main force of the Western Chu army. The soldiers shouted: "Those who surrender will be spared, those who resist will be killed without mercy!"

Wang Kai roared, "No one is allowed to surrender! Fight to the death!"

Hearing his shout, Zhao Yun was enraged. He charged at him with his spear, and his warhorse galloped to Wang Kai's side. Without a word, he thrust his spear forward with incredible speed. Before Wang Kai could react, "Thud!" The spear pierced his throat.

Wang Kai fell from his horse and landed dead. Soldiers rushed forward and beheaded him, then impaled his head on a spear. Dozens of cavalrymen lifted Wang Kai's severed head and shouted, "Our commander is dead! Our commander is dead!"

Wang Kai's death became the final straw, and thousands of spearmen collapsed, kneeling down to surrender.

The battle outside the city was over, and the soldiers cleaned up the corpses.

Two miles outside the county town, Bu Zhi and the generals were observing Longbian County. All the generals laughed. In their eyes, the low city wall looked like a dwarf, less than two zhang tall.

Bu Zhi stroked his beard and laughed, "Now I know why Shi Xie wanted to bring his army out to fight in the field. This city wall is really ridiculous; it's too short."

Taishi Ci suggested, "We can use fire to attack Longbian County. We can start the fire attack at night and take Longbian County by dawn."

Bu Zhi nodded slightly, "Fire attack is a good strategy!"

All the generals unanimously agreed to use fire attack, and this fire attack referred to the burning of Longbian County.

Everyone knows that while ladders could easily breach the city walls, it would inevitably lead to street fighting. To avoid street fighting, fire was the best option.

Another important reason is that all the buildings and houses in Jiaozhi County are made of wood.

As night fell, ten thousand soldiers stood atop the city wall. Shi Xie stood before the city tower, his gaze fixed worriedly on the Western Chu army to the north.

"Pass on my order: everyone must be alert tonight, and sound the alarm immediately if any enemy activity occurs."

"Follow the order!"

Shi Xie went down, and the soldiers guarding the city patrolled back and forth, keeping a watchful eye on the Western Chu army below the city.

At the first watch of the night, a hundred medium-sized catapults gradually approached the city wall, with makeshift rough barriers in front of them. The alarm bells on the city wall rang loudly, and the soldiers of Jiaozhi County unleashed a volley of arrows at the catapults.

However, the catapults were mostly blocked by barriers, rendering the bows and arrows largely useless.

The alarm bells were still ringing on the city wall, but a hundred medium-sized catapults began to fire, and ignited incendiary bombs soared into the air, flying over the city wall and into the city.

Soon, a large fire broke out in the northern part of the county town, and the people in the town fled south in fear.

The houses in the city were all made of wood, which made them easy to ignite. The fire burned rapidly and spread quickly to the center of the city.

The south gate was opened, and the people desperately fled out of the city. There were also 6,000 troops in the south of the city, but the Western Chu army ignored the people and let them go as they pleased, focusing only on the army.

The catapults were moved to the west gate again, and once more, they were used to hurle a large number of incendiary bombs into the city. A fire also broke out in the north of the city. Shi Xie's official residence was located in the north of the city, and the fire quickly threatened the prefect's residence.

Shi Xie was carried out by the soldiers, and he shouted, "I want to go to the city wall to supervise the battle! I want to go to the city wall to supervise the battle!"

But the guards ignored him and changed him into civilian clothes.

Taking advantage of the current lax management and the disregard for the lives of ordinary people, they planned to disguise themselves as ordinary citizens and perhaps escape.

"My lord, let's go quickly! The whole city is on fire, and the county town will be burned to the ground sooner or later."

士燮
Shi Xie was terrified and had no choice but to temporarily flee out of the city with his son and brothers.

The catapult stopped firing after launching a thousand incendiary bombs.

The north gate suddenly opened, and a large number of people fled from the north of the city. Many soldiers followed the crowd of people out to surrender.

The fire raged on and on, spreading to almost the entire city. All four city gates were opened wide, and hundreds of thousands of civilians and tens of thousands of soldiers fled the inferno.

The common people could leave freely, but the soldiers would be stopped and forced to lay down their weapons and take off their armor to surrender. This resulted in a large number of soldiers taking off their armor, throwing away their weapons, and mingling with the common people to escape.

Almost all the people in the city had fled, and almost all the soldiers had also fled. The entire county was engulfed in flames and thick smoke.

The fire burned for two days and two nights before it was finally extinguished, leaving the entire county town a white wasteland.

After another day, the city grew cold, and the soldiers began to enter.

No complete buildings can be seen in the city anymore, only occasional ruins.

Even so, there are still treasures in the city, such as the underground vault of the Shi family mansion. After lifting more than a dozen stone slabs, a large amount of wealth was moved out of the underground vault.

Truckloads of gold and silver treasures were transported out, and 370 corpses were also collected. These were civilians who had not escaped, mostly elderly people.

A general strode up to Bu Zhi, bowed, and said, "Reporting to the commander, we have only found 370 sets of remains, all of whom should be civilians."

Zhao Yun, who was standing nearby, said, "The Shi family father and son, along with the officials, have all run away. They disguised themselves as commoners and mingled among the people, making them difficult to spot."

Bu Zhi nodded. That didn't really matter. The key issue was that they didn't have enough food to feed the civilians and prisoners of war. So they basically didn't care about the civilians, and as long as the prisoners of war took off their armor and laid down their weapons, they could be released.

The Battle of Longbian ended with only a dozen or so wounded soldiers in the Western Chu army, none of whom were seriously injured, and no soldiers were killed in action.

This is how they tasted the sweetness of war.

At the same time, five teams of soldiers, each with a thousand men, went to various surrounding counties to persuade them to surrender. The mission was generally successful, and the county magistrates surrendered one after another.

If we exclude Wangmei County, there are seven other counties surrounding Longbian County, which was burned to the ground.

In fact, once Longbian County was captured, the war to conquer Jiaozhou was essentially over.

Of course, to the south there are also Rinan County and Jiuzhen County. These two counties are sparsely populated and small in area, and a single army can sweep through them.

(End of this chapter)