The Wu army's detailed work was quite impressive. In the evening, Nie Shicheng and Shao Yanyang had already received news that the Qing army reinforcements were crossing the river in Mengjin. Nie Shicheng and Shao Yanyang, who were already under tremendous pressure, also felt that the pressure on their shoulders was even greater, and they believed that Luoyang City was solid and difficult to fight. ? ?

There was also something unexpected to Nie Shicheng and Shao Yanxuan. The genius was just getting dark. Just as they were discussing how to deal with the Qing reinforcements that would come from Mengjin tomorrow, the Wu army, who was located on a high place outside the city, suddenly came to report that it was that when it was about to dark, they saw an army with white crowns appear in Luoyang City with a telescope and headed north to the direction of Anxi Gate, the north gate of Luoyang.

"Did you see clearly? Are you really wearing a white hat?"

Shao Yanxuan asked the Wu army sentry. After confirming, Shao Yanxuan's face began to be serious and turned to Nie Shicheng and said, "Mongting, there will be some movement tonight, and the rebellious army may have the idea of ​​robbing the camp."

Nie Shicheng also fell into Zhang Zhidong's trap. After nodding, Nie Shizhen immediately ordered: "Send double scouts and secret whistles to Anxi Gate, prepare more drums and gongs, and call the police immediately if there is any abnormality. In addition, send an order to Li Yong's night-time army that the enemy may dress up as we do tonight and sneak attack our army camp. When the enemy situation appears, only guard the camp and not go out to fight, so as not to rush into the camp."

After Zhang Zhidong found out that the Qing army in Luoyang might have been out of the city to attack, Nie Shicheng and Shao Yanxian did not dare to attack the city overnight. They honestly stood firm and kept guarding the camp and prepared for it. In order to further confuse and mislead the Wu army's judgment, at the third update, a Qing army soldier pretending to be the Wu army actually took out the Anxi Gate to pretend to attack the Wu army camp. At the same time, they deliberately alarmed the Wu army scout on the road, lured the Wu army to ring the drum gong and call the police, and then pretended to have failed the sneak attack, and naturally retreated to Luoyang City.

"The Wu thief can be dizzy." Zhang Zhidong said proudly: "Now that we are really out of the city to attack. Even if Wu thief breaks his head, he will never think that this is just our bluff. He will only think that we are really strong in our army, not only to defend the city, but also to launch a sneak attack. Tonight, we can rest assured."

Looking at the pocket watch, it was already past two o'clock in the morning. It was almost impossible for the Wu army to send troops to attack Luoyang at this time. Zhang Zhiwan nodded and recognized his cousin's judgment that he had safe tonight. Then Zhang Zhiwan asked: "What about tomorrow? What if the Wu thieves get up to attack the city tomorrow morning? The Wu thieves' army has not gone up the mountain to cut down trees these days. They must have prepared a large number of siege weapons. You can start siege with a little preparation."

"Brother, if you are the commander of the Wu thief, how dare you come to attack the city tomorrow?" Zhang Zhidong asked strangely: "There are our ambushers in Longmen Mountain. The reinforcements from Mengjin south may arrive in Luoyang for reinforcements at any time tomorrow. The defenders in our city not only have sufficient troops, but they even dare to go out of the city to sneak attack the Wu thief's camp, and design to lure the Wu thief's army to attack Luoyang City. If you were the commander of the Wu thief, in the face of such a severe situation, how dare you attack Luoyang City at all costs?"

After careful consideration, Zhang Zhiwan laughed in silence and said, "I forgot to think about it from the position of Wu Zhe. If I were that thief Nie Shicheng, if you kid put forward this ** formation, unless I am sure that I can conquer Luoyang City in one battle while dealing with ambush and reinforcements at the same time, I will never dare to take this risk."

Zhang Zhiwan and Luoyang defenders were even more ecstatic. When it was dawn, a Qing army messenger disguised as an ordinary citizen stumbled into the city of Luoyang, bringing great news to the Qing army that Kaifeng reinforcements had arrived in Gong County yesterday. Zhang Zhiwan, Yang Feixiong and others liked to shout, but Zhang Zhidong asked the messenger calmly: "A few messengers have come, have they been captured by the Wu thieves' army?"

"Three people came to us." The messenger replied truthfully: "In order not to give Wu Zhe a single pot, we were in three ways. I was on the south bank of Luoshui, and the other two brothers were on the north bank."

"Okay!" Zhang Zhidong applauded and said happily: "Although I'm sorry for the brothers who took the risk of sending us a letter, I still hope that they were caught by the Wu thief scouts, so that Wu thief also knows that our brigade of reinforcements will be able to kill them tomorrow."

After saying that, Zhang Zhidong quickly suggested that Zhang Zhiwan quickly make the good news that Kaifeng reinforcements had arrived in Gong County to public, so as to encourage the morale of the soldiers and civilians guarding the city. Zhang Zhiwan promised that just when he was about to be afraid of someone's orders, he never thought that another scout stumbled into the door and shouted with panting: "Mr. Zhang, the Wu thieves have sent troops! The Wu thieves have sent troops to attack the city!"

The Qing army command center, which was still very jubilant just now, suddenly was silent. Only the tea bowl in the hands of Li Xiqi, a magistrate of Luoyang who was drinking tea, fell to the ground, and a cracking sound came out. While talking, Zhang Zhiwan quickly came to his senses and asked quickly: "Do you see clearly? Are you really here to attack the city?"

"I can see clearly that the Wu thief army not only dispatched dozens of artillery pieces, but also carried a large number of siege equipment."

The scout's gasping answer made Zhang Zhiwan completely stunned, and made Zhang Zhidong, a super smart man, dizzy, and screamed: "How is it possible? I absolutely cannot have any flaws in my empty city plan?"

No one could answer the questions raised by Zhang Zhidong. All of them were hurriedly following Zhang Zhiwan to the city. While visiting the scene to learn about the situation, he hurriedly organized troops to climb the city to fight. As a result, after reaching the Jianchun Gate Tower, which had been opened as a battlefield for siege by the Wu army yesterday, there was no need to raise the telescope. The Zhang brothers, Li Xiqi, Yang Feixiong and others could clearly see that in the direction of the Wu army camp in the distance, there was indeed a large Wu army rushing towards the Jianchun Gate. The white hat was as snow as snow, like a majestic white dragon.

"It can only be done to implement backup tactics." Zhang Zhiwan's face was gloomy, and he quickly wrote a document in person, ordering Huaiqing's reinforcements Dai Ying's troops to give up the original plan to station in Anlezhai and rushed directly to Luoyang for reinforcements.

It was when the Wu army was deploying troops, but Zhang Zhidong realized that his empty city plan should have not been discovered by the Wu army. In order to prevent the Qing army ambush that suddenly broke out from Longmen Mountain, the Wu army specially distributed 1,000 troops to guard the Luoshui Bridge, without giving the Qing army ambush the opportunity to directly hit the Wu army's flanks. At the same time, more than 1,000 cavalry of the Wu army were also drawn out and arranged in the northeast corner of Luoyang City to prevent Qing army reinforcements that might come at any time.

However, the more this happens, the more confused Zhang Zhidong becomes. The more he can't figure out a problem he has been fooled. He may even know that the main reinforcements of his own army are about to arrive. Why did Nie Shicheng dare to attack Luoyang City, which he thinks should have a good defense? Is Nie Shicheng really so strong? In addition to the army that guards the Qing army outside the city, there are also the artillery battalions that are left behind and guard artillery battalions, and not counting the Ruzhou regiment training that is not very useful at all, Nie Shicheng can only use the Wu army that can be used to attack the city, at most, there are only 4,000 people?

"Is it because of the force of testing?" Zhang Zhidong's thought flashed through his mind and prayed in his heart: "God blesses me, I hope I will just come for testing. In this way, as long as we fight tenaciously and show toughness, we may force the Wu thief to withdraw on his own initiative."

However, when he was escorting his father's coffin back to his hometown for burial, he saw Zhang Zhidong, who had seen the Wu army camp from afar, soon appeared. Even if the Wu army had only tried force, the Luoyang defenders could not resist it. After arranging the attack formation, more than 60 Wu army's light and heavy artillery fired immediately and roared. The first round of artillery easily collapsed the Jianchun Gate Tower built during the Hongwu period of the Ming Dynasty. The city tower collapsed loudly. Luoyang Qing army and Tuanlian, who had only fought a few small battles with the Nian Army, all began to look pale, and they did not dare to imagine the tragic situation of being directly hit by the Wu army's artillery shells.

What's even more terrifying is the Wu army's picy blossoming fire shells and the Kangriff rocket carrying picy acid bombs. The explosion was so powerful that the Qing army could not believe it. After the explosion, it immediately became a sea of ​​fire. The Qing generals who were ignited by the flames made the Qing army cry and howl and rolled around, which quickly ignited many houses and courtyards in the city. The smoke soared into the sky and the fire rose everywhere.

Zhang Zhidong and the Qing army commander Yang Feixiong were pressed by Qing soldiers and squatted behind the arrow bush. Because not only were there shells coming in the sky at any time, but Wu army snipers were constantly shooting the enemy coldly on the ground. As long as the Qing army soldiers who were guarding the city dared to reveal their heads, they could be hit by a sudden Minnie bomb at any time. What's worse is that the artillery used by the Qing army to defend the city did not fire a few cannons, and the artillery position was just exposed. In less than a long time, they were killed by the Wu army's artillery and grenade launchers, and they completely became unable to fight back.

The loud explosion was deafening. Zhang Zhidong squatted behind the pile of arrows and looked blue. He was not afraid, but he was blaming himself. He regretted that he had not been able to carefully understand the situation of the Wu army when he was passing Hubei, and even scolded his frog in the well. He thought that he had helped his father with military affairs for several years and had led his army to fight some battles to suppress the Uprising in the Miao people in Guizhou. He thought that he was familiar with military affairs and wrote so much experience in military tactics. He didn't even know that there was such fierce firepower and such terrible foreign guns and cannons in the world.

In order to deal with the subsequent battle, the Wu army only prepared artillery fire for half an hour before siegeing the city. Seeing that the Wu army's artillery fire stopped, Zhang Zhidong also rekindled some hope in his heart, suggesting that Yang Feixiong act according to the plan immediately and continue to bluff and intimidate the Wu army. As a result, because the eardrum was almost broken by the explosion, Zhang Zhidong yelled several times before Yang Feixiong heard what he meant and immediately ordered people to light wolf smoke at the designated location in the city to send a signal to the fake ambush outside the city.

Out of Zhang Zhidong's expectation, his move did not receive any effect. After seeing the signal in the city, although the Qing army ambushed in Longmen Mountain responded immediately, and made loud noises with drums and cannons, pretending to show the illusion of a surprise attack. However, the Wu army's siege soldiers kept walking and rushed towards the old Luoyang city wall without any impact. They built one trench after another on the trenches under Luoyang city, pushing pointed wooden donkeys and stroking across the trench with flying ladders.

Fortunately, Zhang Zhidong's second move played a certain role. When the Wu army soldiers' ladders were on the top of the city, and the Wu army soldiers under the pointed wooden donkey also worked hard to excavate, the Qing army suddenly lit the mines buried under the city wall. As the black gunpowder mines exploded one after another, the Wu army soldiers screamed and fell to the ground, and their offensive suddenly decreased.

"good!"

First, he slapped the arrows with heavy palms and shouted "Hello". When Zhang Zhidong quickly looked into the distance through the arrows, he saw in disappointment that the Wu army, who suffered a loss, not only did not show any sign of retreat, but also threw a battalion of troops into the city wall positions to strengthen the offensive. At the same time, after the sudden panic period of attack by the Wu army, the soldiers under the city wall soon came to their senses. While rescuing the injured, they started digging again. Many injured Wu soldiers refused to retreat and still gritted their teeth and started fighting again.

The fake ambush failed to deceive the Wu army, and the real landmines could not shake the Wu army's determination to attack the city. Under helplessness, the Qing army in Luoyang had to fight with the Wu army with real swords and guns. As a result, at this time, the true face of the Qing army and the regiment training in Luoyang was soon exposed, and it could not stop the impact of the elite soldiers of the Wu army like wolves and tigers. Gradually, the Wu army soldiers rushed up to the city wall and launched a bloody hand-to-hand battle with the Qing soldiers.

At this moment, Zhang Zhidong stayed on the city wall and was a purely drag. After sending someone to force Zhang Zhidong down the city wall, Yang Feixiong was not only forced to join the reserve team immediately, but also immediately took his own personal troops to take on the heavy responsibility of fire fighting and leaking, and personally launched a bloody battle with the Wu army soldiers.

He was forcibly carried through the streets of Luoyang City, which had already been chaotic, and came to the Qing army command center to meet his cousin Zhang Zhiwan. Zhang Zhidong immediately came to Zhang Zhiwan to apologize, admitted frankly that he had made a mistake of underestimating the enemy and too contempt the true combat power of the Wu army. However, Zhang Zhiwan said calmly: "It's not your fault, it's the Wu thief's military strength that is too strong. If you hadn't used a trick to stabilize the Wu thief for three days, Luoyang City would have been defeated by the Wu thief."

The cousin's comfort did not touch Zhang Zhidong easily, and Zhang Zhidong had always broken his head and didn't understand. The Wu army had obviously been deceived, and the Qing army's reinforcements had arrived. Why did Nie Shicheng have to use only half of his military strength to attack Luoyang City?

The arrival of Huaiqing reinforcements in time has become the only hope of the Qing army in Luoyang. It is also with this slim hope that Yang Feixiong and Liu Dingfu can inspire their soldiers to continue to join the Jianchun Gate position and fight against the Wu army's invasion to fight the beasts. Unfortunately, the huge gap in weapons and equipment destined to make the Qing army's dying struggle in vain. With the continuous explosion of bitter and sour grenades, the Wu army soldiers did not even need to continue digging the city wall to carry out blasting. They could directly rush up the city wall on a large number of stairs, seized a large area of ​​city head positions, and gradually established the victory of the city.

Yang Feixiong, who had a very bad temper but a very tenacious personality, refused to give up. He used the third move arranged by Zhang Zhidong in advance, deliberately letting the Wu army soldiers use a wooden to break open the Yuecheng gate of Jianchun Gate, luring the Wu army soldiers into the Yuecheng city of Jianchun Gate, and then ignited the mines buried in Yuecheng before, killing and injuring many Wu army soldiers. Unfortunately, the Qing army's move not only failed to force the Wu army to retreat, but also completely angered the Wu army soldiers, and forced Nie Shicheng to invest a battalion of troops forward and strengthen the offensive again.

The bad news about the destruction of Jianchun Gate's defense reached Zhang Zhiwan one by one. Zhang Zhiwan's face turned pale, but he could only prepare for the street fighting with the Wu army in advance. At the same time, Zhang Zhiwan ordered Zhang Zhidong: "Xiaoda, change into clothes that are convenient for movement, prepare horses, dry food and travel expenses. If the situation is wrong, I will go out to the west gate with my Wu Ben to Mianchi. There is no Wu thief army there."

"Let's go together!"

Zhang Zhidong heard the implicit sound of Zhang Zhiwan trying to leave a life and death with Luoyang. However, Zhang Zhiwan shook his head helplessly and said with a wry smile: "I am the imperial envoy. After I take off the head of the Luoyang prefect Ren Gui, I will have to take on the responsibility of defending Luoyang. If I abandon the city and leave, even if I can survive, I will be the least likely to be worthy of Xinjiang. I can't stand such insults."

"Then I will stay, and I will live and die with Luoyang with you!" Zhang Zhidong roared.

"Nonsense!" Zhang Zhiwan scolded: "You have a wife and children, and you don't have to bear any guilt. Why do you have to accompany me to die for nothing!"

"I don't care! You are my brother, I can't leave you alone and run away!"

When the Zhang brothers were quarreling, the Wu army's blasting team had already used picric acid explosives to directly explode the inner city gate of Jianchun Gate. Wu army soldiers flocked into the city. The Qing army resisted with the special fortifications, but still could not stop the Wu army's grenade attack tactics, and the strongholds were removed one by one by one by the Wu army. What's worse is that the Qing army's deputy general Yang Feixiong was killed by stray bullets in the fierce battle. Only Liu Dingfu temporarily took on the heavy responsibility of command. As a result, many smart Qing army green camp soldiers took the opportunity to escape, seriously shaking the morale of the defenders.

Even the Ruzhou regiments, which were not very useful, had already followed the Wu army and entered the city, and the slogans of surrendering and not killing began to echo in Luoyang City. Seeing that the situation was hopeless, the Qing soldiers and Luoyang regiments also began to surrender and escape one after another. The magistrate of Luoyang Li Xiqi was extremely unfaithful and immediately raised a white flag in front of the county government office, expressing his sincerity to surrender to the Wu army. He also sent people to lead the way to the Wu army after surrendering to the Wu army, and helped the Wu army directly attack Zhang Zhiwan's imperial envoy, allowing the Wu army to rush into the Qing army command while the street fighting was still ongoing, blocking the Zhang brothers and still arguing with them.

"Surrender and not kill! Surrender and not kill!"

Facing the Wu army soldiers who suddenly appeared in front of him like a divine weapon descending from the sky, Zhang Zhiwan's follower Wu Ben either fled or surrendered. Zhang Zhiwan was caught off guard and could only take out the poison he had been carrying on his body, trying to commit suicide by taking the poison. Zhang Zhidong was clear-headed, and grabbed Zhang Zhiwan's hand and shouted, "Brother, you can't do this!"

"Let go! Let me go!"

The Zhang brothers in the dispute were kicked over by Wu soldiers. After the thick-soled military shoes stepped on the Zhang brothers, Zhang Zhidong had no extra choice and could only shout, "Let's surrender!"

By the way, during the Eight-Nation Alliance, Zhang Zhidong, the old slip-on leader of the late Qing Dynasty, signed the Southeast Mutual Protection Treaty and agreed to publicly recommend Li Hongzhang as the president of China after Cixi and Guangxu were killed by foreigners; while giving Cen Chunxuan a large number of weapons produced in Hankou, he sent troops to help Cen Chunxuan go north to serve the king......

After being escorted to the Wu army commanders Nie Shicheng and Shao Yanxuan, Zhang Zhidong's first thing was to ask Nie Shicheng: "General Nie, how did you see through the empty city plan I set up for injustice?"

It was strange that I first asked Zhang Zhidong why he asked this question. After learning about it, Nie Shichengcai smiled and said, "It turns out that it was your kid who made me cheating me so badly that I didn't sleep all night the night before yesterday. What I was afraid of was that there were too many defenders in Luoyang City, and my brothers were not very good at risking and injured too many times!"

After cursing and swearing, Nie Shichengcai smiled and said, "But you are awesome. I'm going to tell you, in fact, until I entered Luoyang City, I was still worried that the street fighting would be unfavorable. I was blocked by your strong troops and never saw through your empty city plan."

"Then why do you insist on siegeing the city?" Zhang Zhidong asked quickly.

"If I don't have to afford to attack the city, how can I explain to my brother-in-law and the soldiers of the entire army?" Nie Shicheng replied: "My brother-in-law handed over such an important task to me with the pressure of being scolded and nepotism. So many soldiers followed me through a thousand miles to capture Luoyang City. If I don't do my best to capture Luoyang City, how can I explain to my brother-in-law? How can I explain to my soldiers under my command?"

Zhang Zhidong was speechless and murmured for a while: "It's not that my enemy is too cunning, it's not that my enemy is too cunning."

The one who hit Zhang Zhidong even more was still behind. Nie Shicheng added another sentence, "Also, your empty city plan has not been useful from the beginning. The reason why I delayed more than two days to attack the city was mainly because my soldiers were too tired. I had to let them take a break and try to make more preparations for the siege. Otherwise, don't say that you don't have ambush in Longmen Mountain, even if there are indeed, I will be on the first day of rushing to Luoyang!"

When Zhang Zhidong was even more speechless, Shao Yanying also ran out to attack Zhang Zhidong and smiled and said, "Do you know, we, Marshal Wu, once said this, the times are different. In the face of absolute strength, the thirty-six strategies can no longer play much role."
Chapter completed!