After the reception banquet, Meng Jiucheng led his personal guards back to the camp, and Peng Yibin also wanted to go back, but he kept seeing him off and talked with Meng Jiucheng for a long time.

After Peng Yibin got the help of Meng Jiucheng, he captured Yizhou (now Linyi), he used this place as his base camp. Later, he joined forces with other rebels and Red Turban Army to defeat Pizhou and plunder Suzhou, and his strength increased greatly.

But Peng Yibin also faces the common difficulties of the rebel army, which is the problem of money and food. If money and food cannot be self-sufficient, the foundation will be unstable and the potential will be insufficient.

Although the Red Turban Army has supported some, it is not free. After all, the Red Turban Army also needs to develop, and the people under their rule also need to be fed and fed.

Peng Yibin has no complaints about this. He belongs to two families, so he can't treat everyone equally.

But in the last joint battle, Peng Yibin also learned that the Red Turban Army had a relationship with the Southern Song Dynasty and obtained more money and food.

It's not bad to say that it's envy. But the more factors are Peng Yibin's loyalty and righteousness. He has long been interested in Song, but there is no way to go.

Among the leaders of the rebel army in Shandong and Hebei at the end of the Jin Dynasty, Peng Yibin was considered an alternative. Although Meng Jiucheng first came into contact with the Southern Song Dynasty, he had to judge from the heart that Peng Yibin was much more loyal and righteous than him.

Peng Yibin did not realize that Meng Jiucheng would not be a loyal minister of Song, and thought that Meng Jiucheng was a loyal hero who was a loyal and righteous hero who was attached to Song to fight against Jin.

Since then, Peng Yibin has a good impression of Meng Jiucheng and often has letters, revealing his intention to join the Song Dynasty, hoping that Meng Jiucheng can recommend it.

Meng Jiucheng felt that the Shandong rebel army was in the general trend of joining the Song Dynasty, but the most appropriate time was after the war between the Song and Jin Dynasties next year. Now even if they want to join, the Song court will not accept it publicly.

Therefore, on the one hand, he analyzed the situation to Peng Yibin in the letter and told him to be calm; on the other hand, Meng Jiucheng also transferred the part from the assistance from the Southern Song Dynasty to Peng Yibin, and asked Ji Xian to contact Peng Yibin on his behalf.

After this operation, Peng Yibin was naturally satisfied and regarded Meng Jiu as a similar person, with a closer attitude and more active cooperation.

"Pizhou can be abandoned, Yizhou can protect it, and our army can be a supporter." Meng Jiucheng made his own suggestions to Peng Yibin, "Now, fighting with the main force of the Jin army, there is little chance of victory, so it is better to try to avoid it."

Peng Yibin smiled bitterly and said, "The strength is indeed inferior to the Jin army, but wouldn't it be that avoiding war to hand over the occupied land?"

Meng Jiucheng shook his head and said, "Brother Peng misunderstood what I mean. He avoided the formation and then fought, and avoided the large corps fighting, but it was not without fighting. He relied on solid defense, formed camps and fought one after another, mainly to consume the enemy. The Jin army lacked the momentum and could not last long. Grasping this weakness, even if there was no big victory, there was no big defeat."

Peng Yibin thought about it and although he didn't agree very much, he also felt that it made some sense, but he was not familiar with this tactic.

Meng Jiucheng continued: "For example, strengthening the city defense, hoarding food and grass, and guarding heavily. This is necessary. If there is a city to rely on, even if the troops have a slightly weak combat power, they can rely on the advantage of the number of people to give major damage to the Jin army in the siege."

After pausing, Meng Jiucheng continued: "If the Jin army is besieged, the short force will be restrained. Our army and other rebels can plunder other places. How can the Jin army last?"

Peng Yibin understood this clearly. Isn’t the Red Turban Army doing this? Every time the main force of the Jin army took the opportunity to attack its weak areas. Relying on its strength to attack, it almost occupied the entire Shandong East Road.

"Once Yizhou is surrounded, I don't expect other rebels. Meng Shuai is the only savior of our army." Peng Yibin also saw that other rebels were not reliable, so he made it difficult for Meng Jiuzheng to reject them.

"It is the right thing to do to watch and help each other, Brother Peng doesn't have to be polite." Meng Jiucheng pondered for a moment and said, "I will send someone to Yizhou to help Brother Peng strengthen the city and bring some weapons and equipment."

"The Red Turban Army's defense is indestructible. Meng Shuai must have many tricks. Peng thanked me here." Peng Yibin smiled and bowed.

Meng Jiucheng bowed and said, "After Tai'an capture, our army will return to Laiwu, and may attack Zibozhou with Li Quan's troops. Brother Peng, where will we go?"

Peng Yibin said: "Men Meng has captured Laiwu, so our army will take Xintai, Mengyin and return to Yizhou."

Obviously, Peng Yibin also felt that Hao would be defeated by the Jin army and did not want to return from Sishui and Pingyi again.

Meng Jiucheng nodded, and Peng's troops returned to the army, which was very beneficial to ensuring the safety of the southwest part of the base. Yizhou happened to be a buffering place, and he did not want the Jin army to occupy it.

…………………

There is a moat outside Tai'an City, but it looks more like a trench dug, and there are some newly nailed wooden stakes outside the city walls.

Obviously, the rebel army advanced too quickly, which made the Tai'an defenders not have enough time to strengthen the city defense, and even the dilapidated city walls were hastily repaired.

Because of the absolute advantage of military strength, Huo Yi ordered the rebels from all over the world to siege the city and prepare to wipe out the defending enemies. Although this might cause the defenders to fight to trap beasts, Huo Yi and others were not worried.

After observation, Meng Jiucheng found that the three city gates in Tai'an did not have a tall urn city structure, but simply built a simple city tower to enhance the defense capabilities of the city gate.

The east gate is even more dilapidated and there is not even a simple city tower. Therefore, he decided to choose this place as a breakthrough.

"Sir, the enemy began to dig trenches outside the city gate."

County Duke Wanyan Wulie waved his hand to indicate that he already knew. At this time, he was at the east gate because he also knew that this might be a defensive weakness, and the actions of the Red Turban Army under the city were clearly seen.

Wanyan Wulie was a little confused. Should this enemy attack or besieged? After watching for a long time, he was unable to get the idea, so he had to respond to the changes in the same way as he remained unchanged and ordered the soldiers guarding the city to be more vigilant and not relax.

For a strong city, let alone in ancient times, even in the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom period, whether it was made by Chinese copper cannons, iron cannons, or foreign iron cannons transported from abroad, they did not have enough ability to overcome the city. To conquer the city that the enemy defended, it seemed that only the only way to use the tunnel to attack the city.

The method of siege in the tunnel has existed in ancient times. Before using gunpowder, there were two purposes for siege attacks, one was to dig tunnels into the city, and the other was to destroy the city wall.

It is very difficult to attack the city from the tunnel. The tunnel must be very wide and can accommodate a large number of soldiers and quickly enter the city.

Therefore, usually, when attacking the hole, you do not always dig through the city wall, but hollow out the bottom of the city wall, and then use solid wooden stakes to support the wall foundation. After completely hollowing out a section of the city wall, you will evacuate the personnel and set fire to the wooden stakes supporting the wall foundation, causing the city wall to collapse.

In the Ming Dynasty, when the cave attack was attacked, it was not until the city walls were blasted with gunpowder. Li Zicheng attacked Luoyang, Zhang Xianzhong attacked Chongqing, and Chengdu, all of which used this method. However, the real and common use of tunnel blasting was still during the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom period.

Although he has mastered the technology of authentic blasting, Meng Jiucheng still believes that this tactic has great room for improvement and room for improvement.

Because he studied physics, he was half a military enthusiast. Meng Jiucheng has very advanced theoretical knowledge on how to increase the power of explosion and improve the blasting efficiency, such as sealing the medicine chamber more scientifically, better control the direction of explosion impact, concave loading and gathering energy, etc., but Meng Jiucheng has very advanced theoretical knowledge, but it only needs to be tested and improved in practice.

It is not impossible to carry out tunnel blasting now, but it takes a lot of time. Therefore, while Meng Jiucheng ordered the engineers to operate, he used cannon bombardment and external blasting to attack.

In principle, the flying thunder cannon is very similar to a large-caliber mortar. It has a large firing angle and a high ballistic arc. It can be used to bombard targets with a relatively close distance and an obstacle in the middle, so it cannot be shot horizontally.

The meteor cannon is similar to the giant mortar cannon used for siege, with greater power and a few times higher range than the thunder cannon.

About two hours later, the troops made all the preparations for siege. Not only did they establish artillery positions with protective functions outside the city gate, but they also tied dozens of ladders with bamboo and trees. For the Tai'an city wall, which was less than two feet long, even ladders used to climb the city were easier to manufacture.

The artillery behind the simple earth wall has been set up. Several artillery backbones have personally measured the distance and conducted two test-firing solid bombs. Another door has fine-tuned the elevation angle, loaded the bomb, and waited for a command to launch a bomb to bombard it.

The two wooden trucks behind the artillery position were also ready. The two large wooden boxes on it were thick and strong, filled with gunpowder that blasted the city gate and covered with oil cloth on the outside.

Dozens of heavily armored swords and shield soldiers were ready to go, covering their mouths and noses with wet cloths, ready to cover the two blasting vehicles and push into the city gate.

Peng Yibin came with his personal guards, looking indignant and said, "Meng Shuai, I have sent someone to shout under the city. The Jin soldiers ignored it and even slandered and insulted."

"You can't live your own evil, teach them a lesson later." Meng Jiucheng smiled and comforted her, not convinced her. This battle has not been fought yet, and persuading surrender is just a preparation. How could it be so easy?

The sound of drums and horns sounded one after another, and then the drums and trumpets of the rebels in other directions responded. There were more Jin soldiers on the city walls, some holding bows and swaying knives, while others were placing rolling wood and beating stones, which seemed very nervous.

"Boom", a thunder sounded from afar, causing the Jin soldiers to look up at the sky. Although it was a little dark cloud, the thunder was a little strange.

"Boom", "Boom", thunder sounded one after another, and black smoke rose from the far direction of the Xicheng Gate, and the explosion trembled slightly.

Although the main attack was in the east, Meng Jiucheng still kept three cannons at the west gate and played a move to attack the east with a sound.

"Let's start!" Meng Jiucheng waved his hand and ordered.

Small green flags were raised from each gun position, indicating that the angle of the gun had been corrected and could be fired at any time.

The commander waved the yellow command flag and signaled the gunners to prepare for ignition and launch.

The red flag was raised and waved heavily in the air. In an instant, more than thirty artillery made a dull sound, spewing out flames and white smoke. The shells rose into the air, crossed the earth wall, and flew towards the enemy city.

More than ten seconds later, deafening explosions sounded one after another, bricks and stones flying around the city, and smoke and dust rose high, blocking people's sight.

The artillery was constantly adjusting and firing. Under the constant explosion tremor and shock wave, the fragile city gate tower was shaking.

Before the smoke of gunpowder was dissipated, Meng Jiucheng had already issued an order. Dozens of heavily armored soldiers either raised their shields or pushed carts to rush towards the city gate and soon disappeared in the smoke and dust.

Obviously, the defenders at the East Gate were bombarded and could not see the enemy's attack in the smoke and dust.

After more than ten minutes, dozens of armored soldiers had completed their mission, emerged from the thin smoke and dust, and rushed back to their original positions.

The smoke from the city wall slowly dissipated. I don’t know if it was boiling oil or the wood was ignited, and several balls of fire appeared on the city wall. Several guys who were protruding their heads showed up from behind the city wall and looked out.

Before the Jin soldiers on the city could adjust, a deafening explosion sounded again, and the smoke covered the city gates tightly and could not see anything.

As the wind blew away the smoke and dust, a large hole with broken bricks, rubble and wood appeared in front of the rebels. Through this hole, it seemed that the streets in the city and the swaying figures had been seen.

The city gate was indeed blocked, but unfortunately it was not blocked well. How could bricks and tiles work? It should be made of huge stones.

Meng Jiucheng sighed for a moment, suddenly came to his senses, and issued an order to attack the city.

"Run, kill!" Peng Yibin led his troops to rush forward.

He wanted to get more according to his military merit scores.

"Kill, rush!" Wang Xian and others reacted from their shock, shouted loudly, and led the team to attack.

That's it. The cooperation must be tight and the movements must be agitated, so as not to give the enemy a chance to adjust and breathe.

Meng Jiucheng narrowed his eyes slightly, feeling that his command art had improved a little. Suddenly, he glanced at a general who rushed past him and rushed towards the city.

"You guys, follow and protect Captain Han." Meng Jiucheng saw it clearly and immediately ordered a few personal guards to follow.

Han Changsheng swung the axe in his hand, swung a big circle in the air, and rushed into the city without looking back.

Is there no future to be with you?

Meng Jiucheng knew that Han Changsheng was an old man who followed him very early, but there were a few who had less qualifications than him who had become intermediate officers, but Han Changsheng was still his own personal guard captain.

Therefore, he understood Han Changsheng's impulse to make contributions and his enthusiasm to kill the enemy.

Perhaps, they should also be given some exercise; if they have another chance, they should be sent to the martial arts lecture hall for training and to go to the army for training.

The city gate was covered with gravel and rubble. The walls on both sides and above the head were black and severely damaged.

Many Jin soldiers in the city fell to the ground, and there was no obvious scars, but many people were still bleeding from their noses and ears, and their faces and bodies were covered with a layer of dust.

It was earth-shaking. The Red Turban Army's siege tactics were indeed extremely sharp. Huo Yi rushed over and urged his troops to enter the city sect department. The scene he saw made him confused and shocked.

"Marson." The captain of the guard glanced at the city wall and reminded: "With the flag, let us pass through the city and do not delay."

"I understand." Huo Yi nodded, withdrew his thoughts that were coiling around his heart, and led his troops to attack the west gate along the streets in the city.

The news that the city had been broken spread rapidly, and the Jin soldiers in the city were panicked and were already in chaos.
Chapter completed!