Volume 10 Chapter 373

Chapter 373: The Hundred Battles Army, led by Nie Ze, did not move after occupying Changdu. First, they firmly controlled the center of Zeping County, making the Feng Army in Zeping County active. Second, they also ensured the supply of the entire army. Changdu was a county town with sufficient granary reserves. Even if they could not support the hundreds of thousands of troops of the Hundred Battles Army, they would not starve to death with the plundering ability of the Zhen people. At most, the people of the Mo Kingdom inside and outside Changdu would suffer.

The Hundred Battles Army stopped to make repairs, and the main force of the Mo Army stationed in Panling could only be left to the Pingyuan Army and the Feilong Army to deal with. Originally, according to Tang Yin's intention, the Hundred Battles Army was the vanguard army, and the task of confronting the main force of the Mo Army naturally fell on the Hundred Battles Army. In this way, the main force of the Mo Army in Zeping County could be eliminated, and the strength of the Hundred Battles Army could be greatly weakened, killing two birds with one stone. However, by chance, the Hundred Battles Army passed by the main force of the Mo Army, and the Pingyuan Army and the Feilong Army had to gnaw on this hard bone.

Although it was easy for the Baizhan Army to open Panling, now it is the turn of the Pingyuan Army and the Feilong Army, and the situation is different. When the Baizhan Army attacked Panling, the Mo Army deliberately let it go and did not make a decent defense. But now, Panling has become the only lifeline of the Mo Army. Only by defending Panling can they block the reinforcements of the Baizhan Army and have the hope of victory. Once Panling is lost, their battle in Zeping County will be completely defeated. At that time, they will have only one way to die.

So at this time, for the Mo Army, the battle of Panling can only be won, not lost. It is a last-ditch effort.

Before the Pingyuan Army and the Feilong Army launched an attack on Panling, the two army commanders Xiao Muqing and Zuo Shuang had already felt that this battle would be very difficult.

Zuo Shuang had made a detailed analysis of the current situation of the Mo army and concluded that the 400,000 Mo troops stationed in Panling would definitely defend Panling to the death, and the 16 camps set up in Panling were all uniquely positioned, easy to defend and difficult to attack. As long as the Mo army was tenacious, even if the Pingyuan Army and the Feilong Army joined forces to attack, it would be difficult to break through.

Xiao Muqing disagreed with Zuo Shuang's conclusion. He also admitted that Panling was not easy to fight, but he couldn't just stop fighting because Panling was difficult, right?

He said to Zuo Shuang: "No matter how much you say, it's better to put yourself in their shoes and take a look."

Zuo Shuang smiled bitterly and said: "I'm afraid that after seeing it, General Xiao will lose even the attack."

"That may not be the case!" Xiao Muqing smiled, and led a group of generals with Zuo Shuang to go out of the camp to the first camp set up by the Mo army in Panling.

This camp was built on a gentle slope. To attack, one had to attack from the bottom up. The terrain alone put the attackers at a three-point disadvantage.

Xiao Muqing and Zuo Shuang and others did not dare to get too close. They looked at the enemy from a distance of 100 meters away. After watching for a while, Zuo Shuang turned to look at Xiao Muqing and asked, "What do you think, General Xiao?"

"It's not easy to attack!" Xiao Muqing said this after a long while. He frowned, put his hands on the awning, looked up at the sky, and muttered, "Why is it so hot!"

It was midsummer, and there was no place to shade the sun around. In addition, the temperature in Mo Country was higher than that in Feng Country, so Xiao Muqing was extremely uncomfortable. After standing in the direct sunlight for a while, a layer of fine sweat appeared on his forehead.

Zuo Shuang glanced at him and said nothing. How can it not be hot in September? At this time, the generals behind urged their horses forward and whispered, "General, the sun is too strong now, let's go back to the camp first!"

"Don't worry!" Xiao Muqing waved his hand and looked around again, trying to find a place to take shelter and cool down. Suddenly, he found that the trees on the hillsides on both sides were tall and strong, straight up to the sky. He asked Zuo Shuang, "General Zuo, what kind of trees are growing on the mountain?"

What trees? Zuo Shuang looked at him strangely, and couldn't help but underestimate in his heart: Could it be that Xiao Muqing was confused by the sun and didn't even recognize the pine trees? He took a deep breath and said, "They are all pine trees."

"Pine trees!" Xiao Muqing nodded, turned his horse's head, and walked to the shade of the nearby trees. When he arrived under the tree, he turned over and dismounted, touched the trunk, and looked up at the Mo army camp opposite. The corners of his mouth raised, and he laughed, and said to the people behind him, "Tonight, we will sneak attack the enemy camp!"

Sneak attack at night? Zuo Shuang and all the generals were stunned. The enemy camp was heavily guarded. It was not easy to attack during the day, but it could be taken down by a surprise attack at night? Zuo Shuang rolled his eyes and asked, "General Xiao, have you thought of a good plan to defeat the enemy?"

Xiao Muqing smiled calmly and said, "I dare not say it is a good plan, but if it goes well, it will be no problem to take down three or four camps in a row tonight."

Zuo Shuang was puzzled when he heard this. He was frowning just now and had no confidence in whether he could break through the enemy camp. How could he become so confident in the blink of an eye? And he had to take down three or four enemy camps in a row. How could this be possible? Zuo Shuang was puzzled, but he did not ask any more questions. Anyway, when he returned to the camp to make tactical arrangements, Xiao Muqing would naturally tell him the "good plan" he thought of.

After inspecting the camp of the Mo army, on the way back to his own camp, Xiao Muqing asked the generals around him: "How many Mo equipments are left in our army?"

A general of the Pingyuan Army replied: "Not many, we only seized some when capturing Mo army prisoners, no more than 10,000 sets."

The Hundred Battles Army basically killed all the Mo people wherever they went, and the prisoners captured by the Pingyuan Army and the Flying Dragon Army were just some stragglers, pitifully few.

Xiao Muqing pondered for a while and said: "Although there are fewer, it is almost enough."

The weather in the mountains is unpredictable. During the day, the sky is clear and cloudless, but at night, it is overcast and pitch dark.

Such weather is of course very favorable for the party that wants to attack at night, but Xiao Muqing's face is gloomy and he is a little undecided about whether to take action tonight.

After repeated consideration, he decided to act tonight and try his luck.

Under the cover of night, the Feng Army quietly pushed out all the catapults and city-breaking crossbows in the army and transported them to the front of the Mo Army camp quietly.

The range of the catapults and city-breaking crossbows is two or three hundred steps away, but the Feng Army has been pushing the catapults and city-breaking crossbows until they are only one hundred and fifty steps away from the Mo Army camp.

At such a close distance, the Feng Army soldiers who transported the catapults and city-breaking crossbows can clearly see the swaying torches on the walls of the enemy camp. People subconsciously held their breath, half squatted on the ground, and dared not move.

In fact, if the Mo army could really see them, it would be useless for them to stay still. After all, the catapults and the crossbows were too huge to hide. But the visibility tonight was too low. The Mo army soldiers on the wall could only see about 20 steps at best, and could not see them at all.

Just when the Feng army soldiers were all worried, Xiao Muqing's direct order suddenly came from the rear, asking them to launch an attack immediately.

Several Feng army soldiers walked out of the crowd with oil barrels and poured the kerosene in them into the trench that had been dug in advance. Then, they blew the fire stick and ignited the kerosene in the trench.

In an instant, it seemed as if a fire snake had drilled out of the ground, and the long trench was burning. The Feng army soldiers who had been prepared for a long time used the fire in the trench to light torches, and then used torches to burn the stone bullets of the catapults and the crossbow arrows of the crossbows.

The stone bullets and crossbow arrows had been specially processed by the Feng Army. The crossbow arrows were directly soaked in kerosene, and the stone bullets were made up of several pieces of broken stones, which were also soaked in kerosene and then tied together with hemp ropes. The stone bullets and crossbow arrows caught fire, and for a while, the Feng Army's catapults and city-breaking crossbows were on fire.

If there was no fire on their side, the Mo Army soldiers on the wall would not be able to see this place. At this time, there was a fire on their side, so how could the Mo Army soldiers not notice it?

"What's going on over there? Why did it suddenly catch fire?" A sharp-eyed Mo soldier was the first to discover the abnormality outside the camp and screamed loudly.

Other Mo soldiers also looked out and said in unison: "Could it be a forest fire?" "No, there was no thunder or lightning just now, so how could there be a forest fire!" "Could it be... an enemy night attack?"

Just when the Mo soldiers were still guessing what the fire outside the camp was about, suddenly, the little bit of fire in the black curtain flew up rapidly, shot into the air, and then drew a series of semicircular arcs and fell on their heads.

"No! It's an enemy attack! The enemy took advantage of the night to sneak into the camp--" It was not until then that the Mo soldiers realized that the fire outside the camp was not a forest fire, but was ignited by the Feng army.

But it was too late to react. The burning stone bullets that fell from the sky seemed like fire from heaven, hitting the wall of the village, making a crisp sound. The impact force damaged the wall and broke the hemp ropes that bound the stone bullets. The scattered stones were splashed everywhere. The fatal thing was that the stones were all attached to the flames, and the wall of the village would catch fire, and it was impossible to put out the fire.

The camps set up by the Mo army in Panling were all built with local materials and pine trees in Panling. Doing so, first, it saves time and effort, and second, pine wood is hard, tall and strong. Pine wood with a height of more than 30 meters is very common, and it is just right to use it to build defenses. But it has a fatal weakness, which is fear of fire, especially in the hot summer. Pine wood will produce pine oil under the scorching sun, and once the pine oil is on fire, it is difficult to put out.

During the day, when Xiao Muqing came to inspect, he saw the pine trees all over Panling and suddenly realized that the camp of the Mo army was probably built of pine wood. In addition, it was midsummer and the temperature was hot, which was a good opportunity to use fire attack.

In fact, he really predicted it correctly. The only thing that worried him was that it was cloudy tonight. Once it rained, the fire attack plan would definitely fail, and it would also arouse the vigilance of the Mo army, and it would be difficult to work in the future. But speed is of the essence in war, so he could only take a gamble and try his luck. ! !

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