Chapter 668

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“Grand General, barbarian cavalry and barbarian slave soldiers have appeared on the grassland.”

As Niu Ben and the other generals were observing Prince Zhao’s army, a general suddenly came from the north city of Juyong Pass.

“This time, Prince Zhao and Zheng Chengwen are indeed planning to attack Juyong Pass simultaneously from both inside and outside.” Niu Ben frowned. He said to Lu Fei, “Let’s go to the North Gate and see. What’s arrived of Prince Zhao’s forces is merely the vanguard. They won’t attack the city for now; they will surely wait until the rest of the soldiers and provisions arrive.”

Lu Fei nodded. This time, he was responsible for the North Gate.

Leaving Ye Qingyun to watch Prince Zhao’s forces, Niu Ben and his group arrived at the north wall of Juyong Pass. At this moment, dense swarms of barbarian troops on the grassland were approaching the pass.

At 500 meters outside the city, the barbarian army stopped. At this time, the slave soldiers held up their shields in front. They had learned from their battles with Prince Qi’s army and dared not rashly approach the city wall this time, lest they be bombarded by cannons again.

Soon after the barbarian army halted, a cavalryman suddenly galloped forward and shouted to the defenders on the city wall, “You audacious madmen! How dare you occupy Juyong Pass? Wuzhu Gu Taiji said that if you hand over Juyong Pass, he will spare your lives. If you refuse, after the city falls, you will surely be slaughtered!” Niu Ben’s expression was stern. Prince Zhao and the barbarians attacking Juyong Pass simultaneously showed how important Juyong Pass was. Otherwise, the barbarians would have to detour 800 li to invade the Great Yu Empire from Prince Zhao’s fiefdom.

And if that were the case, the barbarian supply lines would become even longer and constantly face the danger of being intercepted.

So, for Niu Ben, this battle was a must for both sides.

“Fighting a war with so much nonsense.” Lu Fei was not in the mood for a war of words with the barbarians. He patted an artilleryman’s shoulder, pointed at Zheng Chengwen, who was surrounded by barbarian soldiers, and said, “Give that traitor who recognizes a thief as his father a shot.”

“Yes.” The artilleryman nodded, and the soldier responsible for that cannon immediately began to load.

For Lu Fei, he wasn’t worried about this battle. As before, the hope for victory against the barbarians this time lay in their unfamiliarity with hot weapons. They would never have imagined that the things set up on the city wall now had an effective range of three to four li, and that firearms were more powerful than before.

The cavalry yelled provocatively in front of the city gate for a while and then returned.

Seeing that the cavalry’s words received no response, Zheng Chengwen showed an impatient expression. He said to the barbarian general beside him, “General Duolong, according to our agreement with Prince Zhao’s army, today is the day to attack the city.”

“Understood.” Duolong revealed a sinister smile. He had a cavalryman blow the horn of attack. At this moment, the barbarian cavalry quickly cleared a path, and barbarian slave soldiers, carrying scaling ladders, immediately charged towards the city wall.

At the same time, Niu Ben saw the barbarian cannons hidden among the slave soldiers. While these slave soldiers attacked the city, these cannons took the opportunity to move forward.

The sudden barbarian attack caught Niu Ben and Lu Fei off guard. Coming to their senses, they immediately had their soldiers prepare for defense.

“Immediately have the artillery bombard the barbarian cannons! They must not be allowed to breach the city wall!” Niu Ben’s expression was grim. If the city gate were breached, 100,000 men pouring into the city would be a disaster.

At this moment, Niu Ben suddenly felt an unprecedented pressure.

“Kill!”

The slave soldiers shouted, braving the cannon fire. Densely packed slave soldiers charged towards Juyong Pass.

“Bang, bang, bang…” Facing the barbarian slave soldiers surging forward like army ants, the musketeers began to spray fire relentlessly. The barbarian slave soldiers in the front ranks fell like cut rice, one after another. But even so, the slave soldiers behind them charged desperately towards Juyong Pass.

At this moment, the barbarians once again displayed their fearlessness of death.

For this battle, Niu Ben had deployed most of his soldiers to other city gates, because the north wall of Juyong Pass was the most treacherous and difficult to attack.

However, the south city wall of Juyong Pass was very weak. They had initially taken Shanhai pass from the inside, so they were very familiar with this weakness.

So, with this deployment, the number of soldiers in the north city was only about six thousand, but these six thousand men were all armed with rifled guns.

Barbarian slave soldiers who charged from a great distance would be shot dead.

Duolong also clearly noticed this point: Prince Qi’s soldiers could kill their slave soldiers from a great distance.

But even so, they still couldn’t stop the over 70,000 slave soldiers from climbing the city wall.

Soon, some slave soldiers who climbed up the scaling ladders engaged in hand-to-hand combat with the defending soldiers.

Lu Fei, holding a long sword, continuously cut down the charging slave soldiers, while other soldiers formed a protective circle around the artillerymen to prevent them from being killed by the slave soldiers.

Niu Ben watched all this with them. At this moment, everyone’s expression was grim. War was never an easy thing.

As the slave soldiers surged onto the city wall, Duolong ordered the slave soldiers to push the cannons towards the Juyong Pass city gate.

“Prepare to fire on the cannons!” Niu Ben’s voice held a hint of anxiety.

The artillerymen, one by one, looked solemn but were not flustered. More than a year of war had enabled them to remain calm in battle. They aimed at the barbarian cannons and quickly fired. If they couldn’t stop the barbarian cannons from breaching the city gate, they would very likely lose this war.

Once firearms lost their long-range advantage, numbers would become the barbarians’ advantage, and even if they fought ten to one, they would not win.

Cannonballs continuously flew towards the barbarian artillery. Some shells accurately hit the barbarian artillery, causing panic among the barbarian artillerymen. Some artillerymen even scattered in all directions, fleeing to avoid the cannon attacks. Many barbarian artillerymen were tragically killed by cannon fire in the chaos.

More and more barbarian slave soldiers appeared on the city wall. Niu Ben, while commanding the artillery, also felt anxious. He also drew his saber and joined the battle for the city wall, leaving behind the command to “continue hitting the barbarian artillery.”

Lu Fei’s body was almost soaked with the blood of slave soldiers. After throwing another slave soldier off the city wall, he looked at the situation outside the city.

At this time, the barbarian artillery, startled by the bombardment, fell into disarray. However, the cannons’ focused bombardment on the barbarian artillery allowed even more slave soldiers to ascend the city wall. More and more soldiers now abandoned firing and engaged in close combat with the slave soldiers using bayonets.

“General, we need reinforcements here, otherwise we won’t be able to hold out!” The situation was growing increasingly grim. Only now did Lu Fei realize that he had greatly overestimated the combat power of firearms. Compared to the armies of Prince Yan and Prince Liang, the barbarians were clearly much harder to deal with.

As his voice fell, a faint drumming sound suddenly came from the South City. Niu Ben’s face changed. He said, “Oh no! Prince Zhao’s army is attacking! This Deng Yuan indeed never fights by the rules! Fortunately, this general left most of my forces to defend the South City, otherwise it would have been over.”