Chapter 972: Artillery Barrage

"We cannot take this lightly; the lesson of Tiemuta is right before our eyes," Mule Hongzhen looked ahead. "We shall also dig trenches and, relying on our numerical superiority, slowly wear them down."

Under the guidance of Ross officers, they had mastered many tactics.

The current Northern Di army no longer fought as they had before, but had learned to fight like Westerners.

Coupled with the Westerners' muskets and artillery, the Northern Di had been reborn.

"Yes, Khan." Upon receiving the order, the kings of the royal tents returned to their respective armies and ordered the soldiers to dig trenches on the spot.

At this moment, they were approximately five li away from the trenches of the Da Song army.

From here, they would continue to dig trenches forward until they reached the enemy's trenches.

Ultimately, they would repeatedly launch charges to defeat the Da Song army in Lingwu County.

Meanwhile.

While Mule Hongzhen was observing the trench fortifications in front of Lingwu County.

Bai Shang was also observing the Northern Di army.

This time, in order to block the Northern Di army, he had dug trenches from the side of the Jin River, extending all the way to Zhutou.

The trench fortifications spanned five kilometers and were over six hundred meters deep.

The soldiers were distributed throughout the vast trench fortifications, and the equipped Breech-loading Howitzers and Rifled Cannons were deployed throughout the trench works.

"They are digging trenches; the Northern Di have learned quite a bit from Ross," Bai Shang put down his Telescope and said to Huo An at his side.

Now, the four armies of the Central Army all listened to his orders, and Huo An was serving as his temporary Vice General.

"Can we still let them dig trenches at their leisure? Why not let them taste the flavor of the new-style Howitzers first?" Huo An chuckled twice.

The Northern Di were digging trenches five li away, naturally out of fear of their artillery.

But they would never have imagined that their artillery had been upgraded, with a range capable of reaching ten li.

"That is for certain," Bai Shang licked his lips.

In this freezing weather, he and his soldiers were frozen quite badly, and this was all the fault of the Northern Di.

If he didn't give them a taste of their own medicine, how could the soldiers be satisfied?

Thus, he immediately relayed the order.

This time, the artillery of all four armies of the Central Army had been sent to the battlefield.

This brought their number of Howitzers to four hundred and eighty, and Rifled Cannons to two hundred and forty.

The numbers of the two types of artillery were quite disparate.

This was because on the battlefield, the Howitzers had become an important force for inflicting casualties on enemy soldiers.

Whereas the Rifled Cannons were used more for destroying the enemy's artillery positions, so there was no need to equip too many.

Soon, Bai Shang's order spread among the artillerymen.

The artillerymen, who had long been frozen stiff, finally got a chance to move.

The artillerymen responsible for observation used Telescopes to determine the distance, and had the artillerymen responsible for correction adjust the angle of the muzzles.

Afterward, the loaders immediately pried open the ammunition crates, unscrewed the breechblocks, inserted the Howitzer Shells, and screwed the breechblocks back on.

"Fire!"

Everything was ready, and the artilleryman to the right of the cannon waved a flag from top to bottom.

The artilleryman holding the firing lanyard pulled the rope sharply.

The firing pin struck the Percussion Cap in the ammunition, detonating the propellant.

With a "Boom," the snow around the cannons was shaken up, a flash of fire passed from the muzzle, and the shells flew toward the Northern Di army five li away.

After the first Howitzer, the remaining Howitzers rang out one after another.

The shells, like raindrops, traced huge parabolas in the sky, emitting a "whoosh-whoosh" sound of tearing through the air.

The Northern Di soldiers who were gathered together with tools to dig trenches suddenly heard the "whoosh-whoosh" whistling sound.

When they looked up at the sky, it was already too late.

The heavy shells slammed obliquely into the soil beneath their feet, then exploded violently.

A collective scream rang out, and dozens of Northern Di soldiers around the shells were blown away.

Other shells exploded in mid-air, and shrapnel fell into the Northern Di army like scattered flowers, killing and wounding a large swath of soldiers.

"Boom, boom, boom..."

For a time, the sound of explosions rang out continuously, and clusters of Flame rose up within the Northern Di army.

Mule Hongzhen was also within the bombardment range of the Howitzer Shells at this moment.

When a shell exploded, his spine could not help but turn cold.

Bamu-tuo and the other kings immediately rushed to his side and surrounded Mule Hongzhen to prevent him from being harmed by shrapnel.

Yet they also knew clearly that they could not stop a shell from landing right on top of them.

So Bamu-tuo said, "Khan, mount your horse and leave here immediately; it is too dangerous here."

Having said that, the group pushed Mule Hongzhen onto his horse, and they also mounted their horses, escorting Mule Hongzhen to retreat further north.

As they fled the bombardment, the shells seemed to have grown eyes, exploding continuously around them.

The further they ran, the more terrified they became; they could not imagine that the Da Song artillery could strike from such a distance.

Just as Mule Hongzhen was fleeing in a sorry state.

In the Central Army's trench fortifications in Lingwu County, Bai Shang and Huo An wore satisfied expressions.

This satisfaction was naturally for the new-style Howitzers.

On the battlefield, this model of Howitzer not only occupied an advantage in range.

It also possessed a significant advantage in rate of fire.

In one minute, a Howitzer could fire six shells, whereas before, firing two in a minute would have been considered good.

It is precisely for this reason that the rain of shells from this bombardment was extremely dense, one could say it was continuous and unending.

He believed that during the time it took for the Northern Di soldiers to retreat beyond the range of the Artillery, they would suffer significant casualties.

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