Chapter 496: First to Ascend the Wall

For a single instant, Liu Chengzong truly believed the city was about to fall.

Although the reward for first to ascend the wall was offered to only three hundred-man squads, that reward was enough to rouse the fighting spirit of the entire Suzhou army — with every man charging valiantly, what city could possibly hold out?

Liu Chengzong had put real thought into the reward. When a man has money, money holds little temptation for him. Even when a man has no money, if everyone around him is equally poor, then money may mean far less to him than personal loyalty.

Only when a man has no money, yet everyone around him does, does money matter to him above all else.

The same held true for horses. The Suzhou army was a newly surrendered force, short of horses and donkeys, while every battalion of the surrounding Marshal's Army — if not mounted on tall, sturdy steeds — could at least count on one mule per man.

In an army like this, awarding every man in a full hundred-man squad a fine Hequ horse would give an individual an immense boost in confidence.

And in a siege, once three hundred-man squads gained the wall and held their footing, the follow-up troops would surge up, and the city would fall as quickly as that.

One could say that the moment Liu Chengzong announced the reward to the Suzhou Battalion, he was firmly convinced the Suzhou troops could take Gaotai City with ease.

But the flames spewing from several fierce-fire oil tanks and dozens of fire tubes and fire pots atop the wall doused Liu Chengzong's fond hopes. The fire oil sprayed from the wall onto the lower and middle sections of the towering assault carts; the flames caught the wind and surged upward, turning the front edge of the battlefield into a living hell in an instant.

The soldiers climbing the assault carts had no idea what was happening. The tension of storming the wall under fire left every man deaf to the chaotic shouts and screams outside; they simply fought each other for footholds on the ladders, scrambling upward. Halfway up, they realized the cart was growing hotter and hotter. Some tried to retreat, others to push higher.

Then the fire caught, and they had no choice left — they could only race the flames, climbing upward in a frenzy. Some had just poked their heads out from the top of an assault cart when a roaring cannonball from a concealed swarming-bead cannon in the gate tower twenty paces away blew their skulls to pieces.

【112】 The squad leaders on the four assault carts pushed to the wall all rushed to the top deck, their reactions nearly identical — one after another, they shouted through the thick smoke for men to cut the ropes.

The squad leaders on the four siege towers pushed up to the city wall rushed to the top level, their reactions almost identical — one after another, they shouted through the thick smoke for someone to cut the ropes.

Some of the suspension ropes on the four assault carts were cut; others, soaked in fire oil, burned through. Three carts released their gangplanks one after another, but only one plank landed squarely on the wall. The planks from the other two carts still fell a pace or two short of the battlements.

The gangplank of the last cart had its ropes burned through just as the cart neared destruction. This cart was too close to the wall — its top deck was within range of the fierce-fire oil tanks. The entire squad on the top deck was sprayed with fire oil in the first instant and perished in the flames along with the cart.

The soldiers on the other three assault carts fared no better. Cannonballs above, raging flames below — charging across the gangplank against the wall through a thousand perils was nothing but a suicide attack. Some, their vision blinded by the dense smoke on the carts, plunged from the assault carts trailing fire.

Liu Chengzong, peering through his telescope, narrowed his eyes in anguish. He watched with his own eyes as a soldier, wreathed in flames, leaped from an assault cart, tackled a Ming soldier, and charged toward a fierce-fire oil tank — perishing together with his foe in an exploding ball of fire.

Meanwhile, below the wall, the poison-smoke bombs hurled by the defenders under Yang Jiamo also played a huge role. When they threw the smoke bombs, they shouted "poison smoke," and the Suzhou Guard soldiers below the wall believed it was poison smoke — but in truth, it was not poisonous.

Fast-acting poison smoke required large quantities of realgar. Gaotai City's hasty defenders lacked sufficient supplies, so they could only rush to make smoke bombs from gunpowder, dried wormwood, straw, pitch, tung oil, hemp rope, and the like. The smoke itself was not very toxic, and in the open field, the smoke density was not especially high.

Yet the smoke blanketing the ground still choked men until tears and snot streamed down their faces. Most critically, the smoke obscured the vision of the assaulting troops below the wall, preventing them from protecting the soldiers in the scaling tubes. Several three-eyed guns fired in volley from the other end of the tubes, and the soldiers inside the ladders tumbled down one after another.

The troops at the base also withdrew squad by squad, trying to escape the smoke-shrouded zone — which instead gave the defenders on the wall an opening, and they poured concentrated fire at the smoke's periphery with bows, firearms, and small cannons.

On the far bank of the moat, Feng Weizhen, commanding the Crouching Lion cannon battery, watched with mounting anxiety, but the Suzhou army's scaling tubes, assault carts, and shielded personnel carriers were all pushed right up to the base of the wall. The artillerymen, fearing they would hit their own men, dared not provide fire support.

"Damn it! Climb up and blast them with the wall guns! Aim for the fire-oil tanks — we can't let the whole army be buried here!"

With his cannons useless, Feng Weizhen immediately ordered his two hundred-commanders to lead their men up the four remaining assault carts. Those four carts were positioned in the middle of the filled-in moat, still forty or fifty paces from the wall.

Earlier, he had grumbled that these four carts were moving too slowly. Now he had no complaints — they were perfectly positioned as firing platforms to suppress the defenders. If they had all been pushed to the base of the wall in one wave, given the defenders' density of fire oil, these four carts would not have survived either.

Feng Weizhen's original intent was for the assault carts to provide support, allowing as many Suzhou soldiers as possible to pull back from the base of the wall. Once they retreated to the far bank of the moat, they would be safe.

But the Suzhou soldiers did not retreat.

Not only did they not retreat — Assistant Regional Commander Hu Zhishen, who wanted to withdraw, was nearly cut down by his subordinate Ding Guodong, who drew his blade. Hu shrank back, neck turtled, and was berated like a scolded grandson.

There was no helping it. Although Hu Zhishen was an Assistant Regional Commander personally appointed by the Grand Marshal, the Suzhou Battalion had never been formally reorganized by the Marshal's headquarters. Apart from the one elite brigade under Feng Weizhen's direct command, the remaining surrendered Ming troops were divided into three factions.

Hu Zhishen's Suzhou Guard banner troops were the weakest. They had numbers, and with land distributed to their families, their morale was high — but their foundation was poor, their training lacking, and their equipment shoddy.

As the saying goes, the general is the courage of his soldiers, but conversely, the soldiers are the source of a general's prestige. A useless little pastry leading a bunch of weaklings — fearing wolves ahead and tigers behind — what prestige could he possibly have?

Battalion Commander Mi Layin was a veteran soldier. In the past, he had been the top combat officer under Zhao Zhirui in the Suzhou Battalion, but now, newly surrendered, his men had been besieged at the post station until they were gaunt and famished. Now that they had submitted to the Marshal's headquarters, he was eager to prove himself to Liu Chengzong and feared being looked down upon — so he had become a silent, amiable man who offended no one.

Only the former Ming Mobile Corps Commander Ding Guodong held the highest rank and was forthright by nature. His men were all veteran border troops from the Jiayu Pass and Suzhou region, well-trained.

Their only shortcoming was the hardship and supply shortages of recent years, but they had been besieged at Jiayu Pass for three months and had eaten half a year's worth of grain. Well-fed and well-rested, they had grown stout and strong, and their confidence was more than ample.

The thing was, Ding Guodong had originally harbored thoughts of defecting to the righteous side. He had brought his troops over, and Liu Chengzong had paid them and issued rewards. Attacking Gaotai had thus become an irresistible tide. His subordinate hundred-commanders were all howling to claim the honor of first to ascend the wall, and Ding Guodong could not stop them.

All he could do was make an agreement with his hundred-commanders who sought that honor: capture officers like Yang Jiamo alive if possible, and take prisoner any soldiers who laid down their arms... Ding Guodong was from Ganzhou himself. The men inside the city were all Ganzhou troops, and he knew their officers personally.

The men riding the four assault carts to provide suppressive fire and attempt to storm the wall — apart from four firearms instructors sent by the Tiger Guard Battalion — were all Ding Guodong's own soldiers, men he had lived with day and night.

The fire oil blazed fiercely below Gaotai's walls, and fury burned just as fiercely in Ding Guodong's heart.

At Jiayu Pass, he had not had the heart to use fire oil to burn the rebels, yet up on the wall, Yang Jiamo had deployed it without hesitation. There was no need for further words about this siege — either Yang Jiamo or he would have to die.

Just when his rage was at its peak, he heard Hu Zhishen propose a retreat. Unable to contain his emotions, Ding Guodong personally stepped into the role of battle overseer. He drew his blade and carved a line in the ground, confronting Hu Zhishen: "Anyone who crosses this line dies!"

In truth, their position, though on the south bank of the moat, was still only two hundred paces from the wall — still very dangerous. But Ding Guodong could not care about that now. Drawing his blade, he pointed at the Suzhou soldiers around them who had arrows nocked to protect Hu Zhishen and shouted, "If we cannot take the wall in one charge now, then the brothers who fell before us will have died in vain!"

Then he pointed behind them at the Marshal's Army Tiger Guard cavalry squadron rushing toward the front line and said to Hu Zhishen, "Wolves ahead, tigers behind — pick how you want to die!"

He thought the cavalry squadron racing up from the rear was a battle-overseer unit sent by Liu Chengzong to drive them forward. But in truth... it was the Tiger Guard Battalion's medical officers.

Though in this situation, even the medical officers could do little — the men were all burned to a crisp, damn it — but they were still his own soldiers. For Liu Chengzong, it was a matter of saving whoever could be saved.

The general had lost face, and the soldiers felt the shame too. For a moment, the front lines bristled with tension, an internal feud about to erupt — yet Hu Zhishen simply smiled, utterly unruffled, and even gave Ding Guodong a bow.

What kind of man was he? He had never learned any of the skills a general ought to know. From childhood, he had cultivated a vast array of hobbies devoted to the enjoyment of life, specializing in coasting on the merits of his ancestors and waiting to die.

What does it mean to coast and wait for death? It requires an exceptionally good state of mind. An ordinary man, when trouble comes, endures for a moment but grows angrier the more he thinks about it, or steps back but feels more cheated the more he dwells on it — he simply cannot stomach the indignity of coasting.

But Hu Zhishen was a true slacker. The essence of "coasting" is that, to achieve one's goal, one can play it clean or dirty — whatever it takes to get by.

Facing Ding Guodong's fierce glare, he folded his hands and gave a deep bow: "Elder brother, your words are most correct. I nearly ruined a great matter. Tell me — what should I do?"

To be honest, Ding Guodong had looked down on Hu Zhishen from the start. Never mind the matter of surrender — a Suzhou Guard commander famous for admiring flowers and planting trees had climbed above him, a Mobile Corps Commander? Wasn't this Liu Chengzong just disgustingly messing with him?

But after Hu Zhishen's bow, Ding Guodong instead felt that having such a cowardly man beside him might not be a bad thing. If his direct superior were Liu Chengzong, the moment he dared draw his blade, he would probably have been dragged out and shot by now, his brains splattered a full zhang across the ground.

With Hu Zhishen, he had no such worry. Hu thought to himself: The men on the front line are all yours. The only reason I wanted to pull them back was fear that if too many died, you'd turn around and kill me. If you want to storm the city, even better — even if every last one of your soldiers dies, as long as we take Gaotai City, won't the credit just fall into my lap?

Compared to the credit for capturing a city, what was a scolding?

Hu Zhishen immediately transferred frontline command to Ding Guodong on the spot. Ding Guodong did not stand on ceremony and at once organized a second assault with Battalion Commander Mi Layin's unit.

His reorganization of the assault was not reckless. Rather, he saw that the only way to take the city now was to press the attack in one furious burst, exploiting a time gap against the defenders.

As a Gansu officer stationed at Jiayu Pass, Ding Guodong understood petroleum. In fact, the fire oil at Gaotai had most likely been sent over by Ding Guodong's own men in the past.

Fierce-fire oil was precious in some places. In Yanchang and Yanchuan, for instance, where petroleum was abundant, many villages had oil wells. Since the Yuan dynasty, they had paid annual taxes ranging from a hundred jin to several hundred jin of petroleum.

But at Jiayu Pass, near Yumen, petroleum was nothing new. They did not call them oil fields here, because unlike Sichuan and Shaanxi, which had oil wells, Yumen's oil was called "rock-fat water" — it flowed directly out of the river.

Soldiers would collect it, separate the oil from the water, load it into barrels and carts, and transport it to the cities and passes of the interior. The oil was light and could be used directly in fire-oil tanks.

It was rather amusing, actually. Gansu had seen roughly two generations without war. The fire oil stored in the various cities was not originally intended for battle — rather, it was meant for taking a few barrels along during field exercises and marches outside the city, so that on rainy days, they could easily start fires for cooking.

For daily storage, they would dig several large pools a zhang square inside the city, pour the fire oil in, and after a month, when the earth around the pool turned a reddish yellow, they would have to dig a new pit and transfer it — otherwise, it could easily start a fire.

But Gansu had been at peace for years; inside Gaotai City no one had dug large reservoirs — they all stored water in wooden barrels, and never kept much on hand.

Ding Guodong knew very well that Gaotai City had little fire oil — use one batch, lose one batch — and Yang Jiamo would not move it all to the wall. By now their first batch of fire oil was nearly spent. Watching the Suzhou Army pull back from the wall, the assault carts, and the tube ladders, the Ming troops knew all too well that another round of cannon bombardment was coming.

The Ming troops would likely withdraw to the horse paths and footways on the inner side of the wall. To climb the wall at this moment offered the best chance of victory.

Ding Guodong took over command and at once relayed the military situation to the Marshal's Manor central army and the Bee-Tail Needle unit. First, he informed Liu Chengzong that they would soon launch a new assault on the city, and told the thousand-catty cannons in the rear to raise their firing angle and send a few rounds into the city.

He also told Bee-Tail Needle, who commanded the forty crouching-tiger cannons, not to fire on the southern wall but to shift bombardment to the corner towers on the southeast and east sides, suppressing the hidden gunners inside.

After that, Hei Chengyin — formerly a battalion commander of the Suzhou Guard and now the commander of the Suzhou Battalion — personally led the troops, rallying the several company commanders who had just pulled back. They pre-loaded their three-eye guns, pulled the ramrods and stuck them in their belts, and while the smoke below the wall was thinning but not yet cleared, they hoisted scaling ladders and assembled beneath the wall.

On the other side, the brigade commander Mi Layin likewise readied his troops. He had the soldiers soak their cloth-faced armor and cotton armor in the small water pits left where the moat had been filled in. One by one, clad in dripping wet armor, they assembled beneath the tube ladders that had not yet been burned, preparing to join the new assault.

Just then, a li from the city, Liu Chengzong received word that Ding Guodong was preparing a second assault. He raised his eyebrows and mentally filed away the name Ding Guodong, then ordered the eighteen thousand-catty cannons to adjust their firing angle and open fire over the wall into the city.

Huang Shengxiao even came to complain to him, saying that Ding Guodong's eight hundred men inside Jiayu Pass had no skill at defending a city, but their appetites were enormous — they had eaten clean through half a year's worth of grain stored inside the pass.

Liu Chengzong thought that eating a lot was no problem. Never mind eating half a year's grain in three months — even if they ate a year's grain in three months, for sheer guts like this, still daring to lead the charge up the wall after taking a fire attack, he, Liu the Lion, could afford it!

"Beat the drums for me — give courage to the warriors!"

The roar of the eighteen thousand-catty cannons sounded again one li south of Gaotai City. At the same time, the sound of gongs ringing retreat rose from the wall. The defenders scrambled over one another, retreating like a tide, carrying oil cabinets down to the horse paths and footways behind the wall.

At that very moment, the drawbridge outside Gaotai City's west gate slammed down. The Ganzhou Guard commander Luo Junjie, astride his horse with blade raised, led six hundred soldiers filing out from the west gate barbican, charging straight at the Mongol troops under Mo Yujing who had just finished filling the trench outside the city.

Inside the city, Yang Jiamo had not yet grasped what was happening during the first cannon volley; the noise of soldiers filing down from the wall was chaotic. Only moments later, when the Marshal Army's eighteen thousand-catty cannons fired their second volley, did he frown and look up at the sky, wondering: why hadn't he heard the shells striking the wall?

He heard the booming war drums in the distance and watched the shells arc high over the wall. Yang Jiamo's beard and hair suddenly bristled as he shouted, "No! We've been tricked — the enemy is still assaulting the city!"

Outside the city, separated by a single wall, over a dozen soldiers flanked a long ladder, thrusting it forward like a great spear toward the wall.

Only, at the very front of this spear was not a spearhead, but Hei Chengyin, commander of the Suzhou Battalion, helmeted and armored. He had tucked a hand axe into his belt and held a saber between his teeth. Gripping the top of the ladder with both hands, he sprinted toward the wall.

When the ladder struck the base of the wall, he vaulted upward. The soldiers behind carrying the long ladder roared in unison and heaved, hoisting the ladder and Hei Chengyin up at an angle. Perpendicular to the wall, he ran up the brick face with the ladder. When his feet lost purchase, he pushed up with both hands, and when he landed again, he was already half-kneeling atop the Gaotai City wall.

Right behind him, several more long ladders on either side likewise pushed an armored soldier onto the wall.

Hei Chengyin took the saber from his mouth and drew the hand axe from his belt. Amid the black smoke billowing from the fire oil burning across the wall, he swept his gaze left and right and rose quickly. Seeing no defenders left on the wall, he waved his hand axe and rallied the few armored soldiers into formation.

Hearing the booming war drums sounding for them from the rear of the battlefield, Hei Chengyin's heavily bearded face broke into a grin. To hell with reading Romance of the Three Kingdoms in Jiayu Pass — what kind of bullshit battalion commander was that? This was soldiering!

Then he raised his blade and pointed straight at the Ming troops rushing up the horse paths and footways, and hurled himself at them like a cannonball.

"The first merit of scaling the city — I, Hei Chengyin, am taking it!"

Good evening!