Chapter 280 – Guangzhou In Peril
Guangzhou In Peril
“Shoot! Shoot!” Hao Shao does not even really need to give orders. The soldiers also knew enough to shoot the soldiers pushing the ram. At that moment, Liu Pi’s soldiers that were pushing the ram only totaled up to about a few hundred and were standing in a dispersed manner. That was why Hao Shao’s army was barely able to shoot them with arrows. At most the arrows would hit the shadows and at worst, the arrows would fall before it could even reach the shadows. This was the Liu Pi’s army giving Hao Shao’s soldiers to practice archer. If Hao Shao’s subordinate could survive, they would become elites.
A rain of arrows fell and almost all of the soldiers that ran to the sides were killed. The enemy’s second wave was stopped. Although the second wave was stopped, only a few hundred were killed. Hao Shao felt uneasy. Could it be so easy? When the rams first came out, Hao Shao could barely speak. The middle road that was used to bring harm to the enemy has now been used by the enemy to bring harm to them. But these things had two natures. The road simply made it good for the rams to move. As long as the three rams do not take too much time, the owner of Guangzhou would change.
Hao Shao could not understand what the retreating Liu Bei’s army was thinking.
While Hao Shao was confused, his uneasiness became a reality. Two lines of soldiers appeared amongst Liu Pi’s army. One line wore heavy armor while the other line carried shields. Both lines in total had no less than one thousand men. Two rows of shield soldiers formed the front line with those wearing heavy armors at the backlines pushing the three rams.
Without Hao Shao’s command, the more skilled archers fired their arrows. A rain of arrows fell onto the soldiers. They originally thought that they would obtain kills but never expected the enemy to come out uninjured even after the arrows fell on them.
The enemy soldiers all continued to push the three rams without a single one missing. Only two unfortunate ones were shot in the leg and limped towards the rams.
“Heavily armored soldiers!” Hao Shao shouted. He finally knew what the enemy used to counter his arrows. The battle at Guangzhong was now like two people playing mahjong.
“Haha. Today is the day you die!” Liu Pi watched his soldiers from atop his horse. He had two groups of soldiers. One group wore heavy armor while the other were his bodyguards. Liu Pi was also clever. He split the White Eared heavy armor into two. The outer armor was given to the sturdy soldiers while the inner one was given to his bodyguards. His bodyguards were then given shields so that the shields can be used to defend the soldiers from the arrows coming from above.
Hao Shao’s first move was to split the archer groups to both ends of the walls and rain down arrows in a cross-fire. This caused Liu Pi to become careless.
Thousands of soldiers perished. Now, Liu Pi found had found a weak point in the cards played by Hao Shao.
As the moat was difficult to cross, I will just use the rams to smash right through the gates. The arrows can be dealt with by the heavy armor and shields. Although there are injuries, it is just like drizzle for the army. But once we break through Guangzhou, you, Hao Shao, will die!
“Shoot! Shoot!” At the side, there were still commanders ordering the archers to shoot. However, the result remained the same. The enemy did not show any response and there were no casualties.
Although the arrows went over the shields, the soldiers were heavily armored and the arrows did not have enough power.
“Stop!” Hao Shao took a deep breath and raised his hand to stop the arrows. This is because Guangzhou does not have many arrows and he did not want to waste it.
With a loud smash, the rams hit the city gates. Guangzhou was originally small. After Yuan Shu had proclaimed himself Emperor, the gate was smashed and became battered thanks to Cao Cao. The common people had ran. The ones that remained were those that were motionless or were not able to run away. The city wall was also in disrepair. Hao Shao had dispatched people for repairs but it was difficult as the land was very muddy.
Hao Shao staggered and almost fell to the ground. The entire city wall seemed to move. Hao Shao smiled wryly. This is caused by the ram. The walls would probably break before the door breaks.
Hao Shao quickly stood up and gritted his teeth. “Come! Throw down rocks and wood! Prepare boiling water!” Right now, he needed to stop the three rams. Hao Shao could no longer think of a good method.
“Drop the stones!” The soldiers dropped their bows and started to pick up stones and logs. These all came from the demolished and dismantled things in the city. The current Guangzhou was no longer the same. The place was spacious and devoid of people. Many homes were also empty. So, Hao Shao could make use of the pillars and other things that were taken.
Liu Pi’s soldiers did not fear the arrows as they wore heavy armors. The arrows only felt itchy. Heavy armors were meant to ward off sharp weapons.
However, the current situation was different. The things that fell were rocks and wood. They were all blunt weapons. They could deal with one or two hits but could no longer endure it by the third hit. On the surface, they looked unharmed but they were unable to continue taking it internally.
And so, the falling rocks and wood caused casualties. However, these were the lucky ones. The unfortunate ones were the ones who had boiling water poured over them. These soldiers from the Liu Pi’s Army were truly tragic. There were no waterproof helmets.
Those with heavy armor and shields could still somewhat protect themselves. However, those that got splashed at were soaked from top to bottom with hot water. The scalded soldiers mourned painfully as they climbed up from the ground. The smell of meat rose to the city walls.
“Hmph!” Liu Pi’s eyes turned murderously sharp. The wounded soldiers, were his elites. In fact, the ones holding shields were his bodyguards. He trained them personally. It could be said that he had deep feelings with them. Now that there were a dozen casualties, Liu Pi would naturally be angry.
“Struggle to your last! In a short time, your small Guangzhou would be mine! At that time, I want you, the bandit to become unable to seek survival or death.”
“This cannot go on!” Hao Shao was also feeling anxious on the wall. Although he could resist by dropping rocks, wood and boiling water, he would really be doomed after some time. This was the second time the ram attacked the gates. Very soon there would be no walls to defend. Hao Shao would be helpless even if he was a superhuman as it was impossible for him to fight against an army of twenty thousand with his garrison of two thousand.
Although the Yuzhou Army were once Yellow Turbans, that turmoil had lasted for over ten years. Zhang Jiao and his brothers had been executed. The other rebel leaders had also died from their injuries. There were also those that received meritorious rewards. It could be said that the Yellow Turban’s purpose was to strike fear in the Han. That was because the Yellow Turbans were full of elite soldiers at that time. The Yellow Turban’s strength were not much different from the elites of the Han. They could also suppress the government troops as they had numbers. Just like Dong Zhuo who has the Xiliang Cavalry. When he took Lu Zhi’s government position, he took the Xiliang Heavy Cavalry. It was just like Zhang Xiu’s heavy cavalry that was on standby. In fact, they were more of an elite compared to Zhang Xiu’s cavalry. It was because there was the Xiliang Cavalry that the heavy cavalry has a role to play. It was because of this he had the origin of Han and Qiang. At Xiliang, Dong Zhuo was a tyrant. All the people of Qiang felt bitter but there were also those that were beaten into submission. All of those that were beaten into submission were the elites. They formed the Xiliang Cavalry along with the Hans that were good at horse riding and shooting. The Xiliang Cavalry has the bloodthirstiness of a foreigner. It also has the tactical skills of the Han. This was why the Xiliang Cavalry was terrifying. Zhang Xiu’s Xiliang Cavalry still had a few veterans from that time. They could have worked in concert with the Wolf Cavalry. This was why Dong Zhuo and Dingyuan waged wars excessively. The current Xiliang Cavalry was maintained by Zhang Ji after the death of Dong Zhuo and the riot of Li Jue and Guo Si. Right now, it only have half its original strength.
However, Dong Zhuo’s Xiliang Cavalry had originally lost to the Yellow Turbans. It could be said that the Yellow Turbans should not be underestimated.
When Zhang Jiao and his brothers died, the Yellow Turbans scrambled away to their last. This were because of the meritorious people in stopping the Yellow Turbans. Many talented people like Cao Cao, Yuan Shao, Liu Bei, Tao Qian and more appeared.
Only three heroes could find a way to escape. The first was Zhang Yan who was originally known as Zhu Feiyan. He changed his name because of his talent. All the rebels like Chang Shan, Zhao Jun, Zhong Shan was brought by small commanders such as Sun Jing and Wang Dang to join up as Zhang Yan’s subordinates. Zhang Yan’s troops grew and approached a million people. They became known as the Black Mountain Army. Even after the three Yellow Turban leaders were dead, they were free. The government did not dispatch people to suppress them. He had fought against Yuan Shao for many years in Jizhou and has been a pain Yuan Shao could not get rid off.
The second one was the Yellow Turbans of Qingzhou. However, they were comparably even more miserable. They had surrounded Beihai under the leadership of the rebel leader Guan Hai. The Qingzhou Yellow Turbans had a million troops. However, Guan Hai was impulsive and got beheaded in a duel. Otherwise, they would have won. This was how Cao Cao obtained the thousands of elite Qingzhou Army. Their strength was obvious to all including Lu Bu, Liu Bei, Yuan Shao, Tao Qian and Zhang Xiu that have encountered it before.
When Cao Cao attacked Xuzhou, he used this army.
When Yuan Shu was driven out of Yangzhou, it was also because of this army.
Right now, Cao Cao was using this army to fight against Yuan Shao.
Liu Bei also currently have the Qingzhou’s Yellow Turban elites in his army, under Guan Yu and Zhang Fei.
If Zhang Xiu had not launched a surprise attack, Cao Cao would not have been defeated so badly.
These Yellow Turbans were the most elite troops in the world.
It has fought against various troops like Lu Bu’s Wolf Cavalry and Formation Breaker, Liu Bei’s White Eared Heavy Infantry, Yuzhou’s armored cavalry, Yuan Shao’s First Camp and more.
Zhang Xiu’s Xiliang cavalry, the Yellow Turbans from Qingzhou, was truly dominant in the Three Kingdoms.
A similar one would be the third group of the Yellow Turbans, which was Liu Pi. He was not strong and only second rate. He has no advisors and the leaders in the group were simply the better ones among all the others without quality. Such a person was able to occupy Runan for so long because of the Yellow Turban Army.
On the other hand, half of Hao Shao’s army are recruits. One thousand were recruited locally at Guangzhou by Hao Shao. The other one thousand were given by Liu Mang. It was impossible for Liu Mang to disassemble the other armies to give soldiers to him. He could only give those that went to Hebei to look for a future, those that have not seen blood before, to Hao Shao. Hao Shao was from the Wolf Cavalry and has once been trained by Zhang Liao. He has seen both Zhang Liao and Gao Shun train soldiers. Because of Zhang Liao’s recommendation, Gao Shun could not take over. They knew about Hao Shao’s talent. Hao Shao also has knowledge of himself. He trained his soldiers for more than a month. He knows that if the soldiers were to go out and fight, they would collapse. Right now, the opponent had ten times more troops than him.
If the walls collapse, it would no longer be field battles. He would really need to face an army that was ten times larger. That was why he needed to find a way to destroy the ram.
Liu Mang has did this before at Wancheng. Sun Ce had opened the gates with the rams but was not able to enter Wancheng. This was because Liu Mang had filled up the entrance with debris. Piles of rocks and wood blocked the entrance, making it impossible for Sun Ce to enter the city unless they took the offensive.
Hao Shao was currently unable to do it as the walls of Wancheng were made of piled up bricks covered with layers of clay and lime. It was originally an ancient city and was reinforced by Lu Kang as a precaution against the Yellow Turbans.
Lu Kang was defeated by Sun Ce. Yuan Shu then received Wancheng. Liu Xun became the prefect. Liu Xun was not an idiot. He also reinforced the city to defend it against Sun Ce. Sun Ce also repaired the city as he wanted to use the place. It could be said that the walls of Wancheng was very strong.
However, only a few places at the small Guangzhou was made with bricks. The rest was mostly clay. If the ram destroys the gates, the wall would collapse as well. If the gate collapsed, it could still be blocked. However, if the walls collapsed, it could not be blocked.