In Hukou, Wu Chaoyue could not know the specific situation. However, based on his intuition alone, Wu Chaoyue understood that the situation in Shanghai would never be better, and he was in urgent need of his own rescue and help. Therefore, even though Lin Qirong, the Hukou general who admired the Taiping Army from the bottom of his heart, after failing to recruit surrender, Wu Chaoyue ordered an attack on Hukou without hesitation, and went to the front line to personally direct the war to attack Hukou, intending to put pressure on the Taiping Army's western front, forcing the Taiping Army to draw troops from the eastern front to return to the western front, and besieged Wei to rescue Zhao and share the pressure on the Wu army in Shanghai.

However, Wu Chaoyue soon discovered that he had underestimated the tenacity and determination to resist Lin Qirong and the Taiping Army in Hukou. In the face of the absolute weapon advantage of the Wu army, Lin Qirong led the Taiping Army soldiers to fight bravely. With city defense fortifications as a support, he used courage, wisdom and steel-like will to repel the Wu army's attacks again and again. Not only did he cause huge casualties to the Wu army's soldiers, but he also completely shattered Wu Chaoyue's dream of taking Hukou as soon as possible.

"Boom! Boom! Boom!"

The Wu army's artillery roared one after another, and blasted one after another of light and heavy artillery shells at the head of Hukou City, knocking the Hukou City Wall into a flood of earth and rocks, dust and smoke, sand and soil falling continuously. The shells continued to cross the city wall and flew directly into the city, knocking the city's houses and streets to the top of the city, and the fire broke out, making the sound of shocking.

However, it was just amazing. After many years of confrontation with the main force of the Wu army, Lin Qirong and the Hukou Taiping Army were really well aware of the Wu army's combat habits and tactical styles. They had made sufficient responses to the Wu army's advantageous weapons early on. The Wu army's artillery fire had just begun to rage, and most of the Taiping Army soldiers guarding the city wall had been transferred to the anti-artillery bunker bunker under the city wall, leaving only a few soldiers to monitor the movements of the Wu army on the city wall. Unless the character of the Wu army's artillery shells broke into the Taiping Army's bunker shooting hole, even if the flowering artillery shells hit the bunker, it would be difficult to hurt the Taiping Army soldiers hiding in the bunker. At the same time, the Taiping Army soldiers who were left above the city wall also hid behind the arrow bush as much as possible, and used debris to protect their bodies and block the shrapnel. Therefore, the Wu army's artillery fire was also difficult to hurt the Taiping Army soldiers at the top of the city wall.

Wu Chaoyue, who had suffered losses, did not waste too many artillery shells and did useless work. He had just used artillery fire to destroy the long-range firepower relocated by the Taiping Army. Wu Chaoyue immediately ordered an attack. A battalion of Wu soldiers also immediately carried various siege weapons to charge at the Taiping Army's under the sunset, preparing to use bitter and sour grenades to blow up the Taiping Army's under the city bunker fortifications and open up the road before seeing the road so that after the night fell, the blasting tactics that Wu's army had good hands exploded and exploded the Hukou city wall.

Ping-pong, as soon as the Wu army soldiers entered the range, the gunshots on the city and under the city were already sounding like a mess. Although the Wu army soldiers were mentally prepared for this, they were still killed and injured in a blink of an eye, and the charge momentum was blocked. At the same time, judging by the density of gunfire and the number of firelights, Wu Chaoyue was shocked to find that the enemy bunkers that the army had destroyed had been mostly repaired by the Taiping Army. In addition, there were some fireworks of musket shooting at some locations that should have been on the ground. It was obvious that the Taiping Army had built a new defensive bunker in those places.

Just like the last failed attack, the Wu army was still stubbornly blocked by the Taiping Army next to the moat. On the city wall, the Taiping Army, who was hiding in the bunker and behind the broken sheep and horse wall, kept firing fire, killing and injuring a Wu army soldier who tried to cross the river directly on the bridge and repair temporary fortifications, and was so pressed that he could not look up at all. Although the Wu army soldiers also hid behind thick wooden boards and kept firing, they were unable to suppress the firepower of the Taiping Army on the city and were suppressed very strongly by the Taiping Army's firepower.

"Boom! Boom!"

The Taiping Army's cannons suddenly sounded on the city wall. The Taiping Army in Hukou urgently transported the four field artillery pieces from the upper city were all obtained from the Tsarist Russian fleet. Although the caliber was not large, it was light and flexible and had the advantages of low recoil. It was most suitable for temporary arrangement of enhanced firepower. Once the shells hit the target, they could easily tear the thick door panels used by the Wu army soldiers to resist the bullets. Two particularly unlucky Wu soldiers were hit directly by the shells, and they didn't even have time to scream and were buried in the battlefield.

Seeing this, Wu Chaoyue could only send a grenade launcher team to forward and use grenade launcher artillery shells to suppress the Taiping Army's field artillery fire. As a result, after wasting a lot of grenade launcher artillery shells, although the Taiping Army's field artillery shells finally fell silent, more than a dozen Wu army's grenade launcher rangefinder gunners who needed technical training to take up their posts were all hit by the Taiping Army's Lizhi rifle. The Taiping Army is not a fool. Thanks to the Wu army's sniper, he seized a large number of Lizhi rifles with higher technical content than the Minnie gun, and naturally formed his own sharpshooter troops.

The only thing that made Wu Chaoyue happy during this period was that the construction of temporary fortifications of his own army was quite rapid. With the efforts of the Wu army soldiers to sacrifice their lives, before dark, the Wu army soldiers finally dug out a large number of individual bunkers on the moat, providing fire cover for night attacks. At the same time, after it was completely dark, the Taiping Army's shooting accuracy continued to decline rapidly, and the firelight at the muzzle could also immediately expose their positions, providing an opportunity for the Wu army to shoot accurately after the individual bunkers. The strength of the firepower between the two armies was reduced. Wu Chaoyue also took the opportunity to join the second attack team and began to try to remove the Taiping Army's underworld defensive fortifications.

The progress was still not smooth. The second team of the Wu army launched four charges and was repelled by the Taiping Army. They failed to seize the position opposite the moat. Although the Taiping Army had a dense firepower, another reason was that the Wu army soldiers who fought were the Wu army in Hunan and Guizhou, and their combat effectiveness was relatively poor. Wu Chaoyue also became ruthless after discovering this. He had just built two temporary floating bridges and immediately drew a battalion from his direct corps to fight directly with the elite main force.

After the elite troops came into battle, the Wu army's offensive finally improved. With the rapid firepower of the firing gun, a Wu army commando rushed across the moat one after another and began to remove the Taiping Army bunker with bitter and sour grenades, and achieved many results. However, just when Wu Chaoyue was relieved, the south gate of Hukou City, which was being taken seriously by the Wu army, suddenly opened. More than a hundred Taiping Army warriors rushed out with short weapons and rushed directly to the Wu army commando to fight in close combat. Although the Wu army commando was pulling out the enemy bunker, they were elite, but they were at a disadvantage. They had to be careful of enemy bullets that might be shot from their waists at any time. They suffered a considerable loss and were forced to give priority to the grenades to deal with the enemy out of the city. The elite Wu army battalion behind could only quickly invest troops in the front. The attack rhythm was completely disrupted, and casualties quickly increased.

"How dare you send a suicide squad out of the city to fight back? Lin Qirong has really understood our tactical habits, and I really underestimated him."

After muttering helplessly, Wu Chaoyue frowned a little, and he was inevitably worried that taking Hukou would cause too much loss and casualties would exceed his pre-war expectations. At the same time, Dai Wenjie, who was watching the battle, also reminded: "King Zhennan, Changmao's move is obviously prepared for us to blow up the bunker. If you can come up with this method to stop us from blowing up the bunker, maybe there will be a way to crack our tactics of using pointed wooden donkeys to dig up the city wall and bury explosives. Our battle is probably much harder than expected."

Wu Chaoyue didn't say anything, but subconsciously remembered Lin Qirong's performance in the Jiujiang War in history and was surrounded by the Hunan Army for more than a year and refused to surrender. His soldiers were almost starved to death without any wavering. Almost all chose to live and die with Lin Qirong. So Wu Chaoyue couldn't help but feel a little upset and said to himself: "What if I encounter such a situation? How much price do I have to pay to take Hukou?"

That night, after spending a lot of time and ammunition, he paid the casualties of more than 100 elite soldiers. The Wu army finally used grenades to basically clear the underground castle outside the south gate of Hukou. However, the sky was approaching dawn. If you want to use the night to dig the city wall to carry out blasting, it would be too late in time. Wu Chaoyue had no choice but to let the blasting team try to attack the city gate in Hukou, try to seize the last chance of this siege, and also test the Taiping Army's response to the Wu army's blasting tactics.

As Dai Wenjie guessed, the Taiping Army had indeed had a tactic of blasting against the Wu army. When the Wu army's blasting hand tried to bury explosives at the city gate, a large number of straw bundles and torches poured over tinders were suddenly thrown down on the city wall. The fire was raging, and quickly swallowed the Wu army's blasting hand, and directly ignited the Dana explosives carried by the Wu army's blasting hand. The explosive pack exploded violently, which immediately blew the three Wu army's blasting hands to pieces, and completely shattered the last chance of Wu army breaking the city tonight.

Seeing this in the telescope, Wu Chaoyue's face was so ugly, because Wu Chaoyue could see that the Taiping Army's move was not only effective for the Wu army's blasting hands without any protection, but also for the Wu army engineers who were protected by pointed wooden donkeys. If you want to dig a cave directly on the city wall to bury explosives, you may not be sure of success!

It was useless to worry in my heart. It was already dawn. To launch a blasting siege, it would be a waste of time to die. At the same time, the soldiers participating in the war were obviously tired. Therefore, Wu Chaoyue could only order the retreat and learn from the lessons and arrange a new force to monitor the south gate of Hukou, and not give the Taiping Army the chance to rebuild the bunker. He took the main force of the combat to retreat to the camp for rest. He had to consider alternative siege tactics to prevent it.

After rummaging over and over in the bed for a long time, Wu Chaoyue found that he was actually just two spare siege tactics. The first was to siege the city, burying explosives under the city wall, and the second was to attack the front, using siege ladders and other siege weapons directly. Neither tactics were absolutely sure, and both tactics could cost greater casualties. So, as he had no choice, Wu Chaoyue had to consider whether he would follow the example of the Hunan Army in history and use the long-term siege to fight against the tenacious and tenacious Lin Qirong and the Taiping Army in Hukou?

"It took too much time. Doing this will not only consume a lot of my food and military supplies, but also hurt the morale and spirit of the army. We still have to find another way to break the city as soon as possible."

Wu Chaoyue, who never recognized the tactics of building a tough village to fight a stupid war, gave up the idea of ​​learning from Teacher Zeng, and the curtain of the bed tent swayed. The captain of the personal soldiers, Wu Dasai sneaked into his vulgar head. Seeing that Wu Chaoyue was still not asleep with his eyes open, Wu Dasai then opened the curtain and came in, bowing and saying, "Report to the King of Zhennan, our army came to report carefully. Rao Zhu Changmao sent troops from Zhangtiandu and came to Hukou through the Tutang. He has now arrived at Xujiafu. Judging from the route and the speed of advance, this long-haired team is likely to be here to reinforce Changmao in Hukou."

"How many troops are there? Who is the main general? How good is the equipment?" Wu Chaoyue asked casually.

"The army has a force of about 3,000, and the main general is Ji Rongxian, the general manager of the long-haired general." Wu Dasai answered a name that Wu Chaoyue had never heard of before, and said: "The equipment is very poor. Our army only saw the old-fashioned mesh gun and lifting gun, but did not see the foreign gun."

"Come to die?" Wu Chaoyue laughed silently, but he didn't dare to take it lightly, so he ordered: "Let our careful work strengthen surveillance to prevent this long-haired team from pretending to be a pig and eating tiger, and also to prevent me from Shi Zhenji and Raozhou's long-haired main force following him."

Wu Dasai agreed to his promise and immediately sent a bill to pass the order. Wu Chaoyue, who had only slept intermittently for two or three hours last night, yawned and could no longer resist sleep. He closed his eyes and snored and fell asleep, and he slept until lunch time before he woke up. As a result, Wu Chaoyue was a little surprised that just as he made some noise, the voice of Zhang Dejian, the chief of the army's spy, came from outside the tent. Wu Chaoyue guessed that Zhang Dejian must have been waiting for him for a while, so he immediately ordered the summons.

As expected, after Zhang Dejian bowed the bill, he asked carefully: "Zhen Nan, King, Bei Zhi did not disturb you to rest? I heard that you didn't sleep much last night. Is it important?"

"It's okay, I'm not a tofu, sleeping for a few hours is nothing." Wu Chaoyue smiled and complained: "Shipeng, wake me up directly if you have something to do. Why have to wait for me to wake up?"

"It's not an urgent matter, so Beizhi did not dare to disturb the rest of King Zhennan." Zhang Dejian explained, and said: "Beizhi came to the reinforcements sent by the Changmao of Hukou by Rao Prefecture. I wonder if King Zhennan had ever known it. A long-haired army came from Raozhou Prefecture. It might be to reinforce Changmao of Hukou. The thief general was named Ji Rongxian."

"I know, what's wrong? Ji Rong is a famous general in the long hair. He is very good at fighting?" Wu Chaoyue asked with some concern.

"When I return to the King of Zhennan, Bei Zhi will report to you about Ji Rongxian. It is not because Ji Rongxian is very good at fighting, but because Bei Zhi knows Ji Rongxian." Zhang Dejian replied respectfully, and explained: "Ji Rongxian is a native of Hubei Province. When Bei Zhi was appointed as the captain of Wuchang Prefecture, he was a gangster leader on the streets of Hubei Province. He specialized in cheating and stealing chickens and dogs to make a living. He was arrested by Bei Zhi more than once. He was very familiar with each other. Later, Ji Rongxian betrayed his accomplices and was taken over by Bei Zhi. He was forced to be a spy for more than half a year, and helped Bei Zhi arrest many criminals."

"At the end of the second year of the Emperor, Changmao broke through Hubei Province. Beizhi lost his job and broke off contact with Ji Rongxian." Zhang Dejian continued: "Later, when Beizhi accidentally learned about Ji Rongxian's whereabouts, he had become a thief under the command of Da Changmao Shi Zhenji, and he was doing quite well. At that time, Beizhi paid attention to him and secretly collected some information about him, just waiting for the opportunity to meet on the battlefield in the future, and tried to make him use it for us..."

"Then how is he like?" Wu Chaoyue asked curiously.

"A typical brave and fierce man, dares to fight and fight. He is a very good at forming cliques and is a natural gangster leader." Zhang Dejian did not have a high evaluation of his old acquaintance Ji Rongxian, and said with a smile: "But his character is very bad, he is lustful and greedy for money, and he is timid and timid at the bottom of his body. He is very greedy for life and death. At the beginning, he was forced to serve as a spy for the humble rank because he had not survived the punishment of humble rank and betrayed his accomplices and had to secretly do things for humble rank."

After defaming his old acquaintance, Zhang Dejian put the information about Ji Rongxian in front of Wu Chaoyue, and then expressed his real plan, saying: "King of Zhennan, Beizhi wants to try to instigate Ji Rongxian. If it succeeds, we may use him to lure the main force of Dachangmao Shi Zhenji of Raozhou to Hukou, and siege the city and attack the aid to kill Shi Zhenji's main force in Hukou. Then we want to restore Raozhou, so we will definitely be much easier."

Wu Chaoyue, who is also despicable, certainly would not refuse to buy the opportunity to rebel, and quickly asked: "Shi Peng, how sure are you to rebel against Ji Rongxian?"

"I dare not say that there is 100% sure, but at least 60% sure." Zhang Dejian replied confidently, saying: "Not to mention the relationship between Bei Zhi and Ji Rongxian before. Just in the current situation, Ji Rongxian is definitely in his heart. The long-haired thieves under his command are neither very elite, and their equipment is also very average. To reinforce Hukou is just to touch the stone with eggs. Ji Rongxian has also fought with Changmao for so many years. It is impossible not to understand this. Therefore, as long as we use both kindness and power, the possibility of inciting Ji Rongxian back is definitely very high."

Wu Chaoyue was very moved when he heard this, and almost wanted to blurt out his promise to try his luck. However, after careful calculation, Wu Chaoyue discovered another important problem and asked: "Wait, Shi Peng, do you know why Shi Zhenji deliberately sent Ji Rong to Hukou to touch the stone with eggs? Didn't Shi Zhenji know that sending such poor equipment to reinforce Hukou must fight with us in a field battle, which is no different from sending death in vain?"

"This..." Zhang Dejian hesitated for a while before shook his head and said, "I don't know the specific reason. Perhaps Shi Zhenji just wanted to go through a formality and give explanations to Hong Xiuquan and Shi Dakai, the big bosses of long-haired areas; perhaps Shi Dakai wanted to use the trick of luring snakes out of the hole to lure us into division of troops to fight or pursue Ji Rongxian, and share some pressure for long-haired areas at Hukou."

"This is very important." Wu Chaoyue said calmly: "If we can't understand Shi Zhenji's real intention, even if we instigate Ji Rongxian at all costs, it is likely that we will have a waste of effort and will not be able to win the opportunity to siege the city and fight aid to kill Shi Zhenji's main force in advance."

"Then I will send someone to investigate now. After the reason is found out, I will report to the King of Zhennan." Zhang Dejian replied quickly.
Chapter completed!