Helan Ying could not afford to let himself fall into Yuan Chen’s hands, for if he was killed by him, it would indeed be a futile death.
He also knew that Yuan Chen would not dare to attack him forcefully. At present, Daliang had captured six cities, and if Dawei’s own troops were to fight against each other, Dawei would surely fall.
Yuan Chen was not that foolish. While he was indeed ambitious, always harboring intentions to replace Yuan Zhao, he could not afford to let Dawei sink into ruin.
Helan Ying didn’t have many soldiers, although seventy thousand, but indeed they were his lifeline.
Looking at Helan Ying, Yuan Chen, despite his anger, suppressed it and taunted coldly, "If so, then I will wait. Even if I spare your life today, I want to see whether you, having lost six cities, will be spared by the Crown Prince."
"Your Highness need not to worry about that," Helan Ying said, putting away his sword.
Dawei had three hundred seventy thousand soldiers, plus two siege cannons. Yuan Chen discussed with his generals whether to defend Qiangli City or to actively recover Changhe City.
After some discussions, some people were for active combat, and some were for defense.
Yuan Chen asked Helan Ying, "What do you think, Helan Ying?"
Helan Ying said, "The old Duke is a military genius, and furthermore, Daliang’s reinforcements are coming. I have sent people to investigate and they will arrive today. Does Your Highness know the strength of Daliang’s reinforcements? There are two hundred thousand men. They are led by the Crown Prince of Daliang, Yan Huisheng. This means that there are currently four hundred thousand Daliang soldiers stationed in Changhe City. And we have less than four hundred thousand."
"But we have two siege cannons," said one of the men. "These siege cannons alone are enough to counter a vast number of soldiers."
Helan Ying, of course, knew the power of siege cannons. "But in Daliang, there’s the old Duke and Prince Yan Huisheng. They have captured six cities and the morale is strong. Our army has recently lost six cities and the morale is low. As long as we hold our ground before the Crown Prince captures Nanchu and sends reinforcements, it would be enough."
Yuan Chen remained silent.
Helan Ying looked at Yuan Chen. "Your Highness, if you are eager to take risks, it could lead to a precarious situation. That’s why I tried to preserve strength and delay reinforcements. Do you think I am afraid of death? If I am to die, I should die a worthy death."
Yuan Chen glanced at Helan Ying and then at everyone else and finally concluded, "We defend the city."
Helan Ying sighed a sigh of relief, thinking that although Yuan Chen was ambitious, he did not gamble with the lands of Dawei.
After Yan Huisheng and the old Duke met and stood their ground in Changhe City, while sending men to investigate the situation of Dawei. The spies reported that Yuan Chen brought three hundred thousand soldiers, and two siege cannons that had been in development for years. It was said that they were so powerful that they could breach an ordinary city gate in half an hour, and a strong gate in at most an hour. Of course, this was under conditions where no one was resisting. 𝘧𝓇𝑒𝑒𝑤ℯ𝑏𝓃𝘰𝑣ℯ𝘭.𝘤ℴ𝘮
All the generals of Dawei were shocked. Has Dawei actually developed siege cannons?
The old Duke had a serious look on his face and sighed deeply, "It’s not surprising. A dozen years ago, I heard from a spy that Dawei reformed its armament supervision and established the Military Armament Camp. I had suggested to the Emperor that Daliang should pay more attention to it and could not relax its military because of the peace treaty we had just signed with Dawei. But the Emperor dismissed it, saying that Daliang was hollow from the inside, and that the recovery of livelihoods after the war, among other issues, all required exhaustive manpower, energy, and resources. He said that he would do it two years later. I knew that it was impossible to rush, so I gave up, and then... Ah, it was postponed again and again, and Dawei’s national treasury was always unable to allocate the funds for the transformation of weapons, so the military equipment of Daliang, for the past dozen years, has not made much progress."
Initially, Daliang was indeed exhausted from its national treasury and weary from the recovery of national strength. For three to four years, even the Emperor had to economize. But as national strength recovered, and the Emperor firmly secured his position, he tasted the benefits of being atop the hierarchy and saw that Dawei had really settled down after signing the treaty and stopped making trouble. He then began to have interests in balancing the political situation, so he felt at ease to interfere in politics. Once the Emperor cast his eyes on the political arena, the Duke Residence with its great prestige, was the first to be on alert, which naturally would not be supported in the military, so as not to increase the influence of the Duke Residence. As the Crown Prince has grown up with intelligence and has drawn increasing attention, even if the Emperor later supported the military, he did not support the Armament Supervision or the Duke Residence, but Zhang Ping who had ambitions for power.
Yan Huisheng thought about the past and then at the current situation with the Emperor completely giving him power, and for a moment, he couldn’t figure out how he felt. After a long silence, he said, "We have to find a way to destroy those two cannons."
"We certainly should. However, we may have to spend a lot of manpower", said the old Duke. "Dawei has been researching this for a dozen years, and they must attach great importance to these cannons, and they are bound to heavily defend it. At present, there are only two cannons, yet we don’t know how many Dawei has internally."
What Yan Huisheng was more worried about was Nanchu. "The Crown Prince of Dawei, Yuan Zhao, is leading eight hundred thousand troops to attack Nanchu. I suspect most of the cannons have been taken to Nanchu by him."
The old Duke took a deep breath, his face changed completely.
Yan Huisheng calmly said, "Therefore, old Duke, we need to fight and fight quickly. We must make Dawei retreat consistently, forcing Yuan Zhao to give up on Nanchu and withdraw his troops to save Dawei."
The old Duke nodded and said through gritted teeth, "In that case, we must act quickly. We will rest for the day and dispatch troops to Qiangli City tomorrow."
Yan Huisheng nodded.
So, everyone was studying the campaign map, starting to consider how to capture Qiangli City and how to deal with those two known siege cannons.
After studying for half a day and forming strategies, the troops of Daliang set out to attack Qiangli City.
When the Daliang troops arrived to attack, Dawei defended the city. Seeing the fervent attack of Dawei on the city, Yuan Chen, the second prince, ordered for Qiangli City’s city gate to be opened.
As soon as the city gate opened, there were tremendous noises. Numerous soldiers attacking the city gate with battering rams were blown to pieces.
Yan Huisheng, who was behind them, abruptly stood up from his vehicle.
The old Duke said, "Indeed, what a powerful siege cannon."
Xie Lin was scared silly, "Such...such a powerful siege cannon? Our soldiers can’t get near them at all."
Yan Huisheng gave an order, "Yun An, you take all assassins and go, do whatever it takes to destroy that siege cannon."
"Yes." Yun An responded and immediately went there with his men.
The old Duke also signaled one of the men beside him, "Zhi Yan, you also take your men and go, assist Yun An."
Zhi Yan responded and also went there with his men.
Su Xingze looked towards the sides. Without him having to order, Ran Qing immediately went there with his men.
Xie Lin saw it too, and ordered his guards, "Quick, you guys go too."
Regular soldiers could not get near, and faced with the two cannons, they hurriedly fled. However, they were still being bombarded by the two cannons that were being pushed out by countless Dawei men, leaving behind flying bodies of Daliang soldiers.
This situation continued until Yun An from the Eastern Palace, Zhi Yan from the Duke Residence, Ran Qing who was by the side of Su Xingze, and Fei Xu who was beside Xie Lin rushed to the front. The group of nimble experts and assassins quickly fought with Dawei’s experts who were defending the cannon, temporarily ceasing the attack on Daliang’s soldiers by the cannons.
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