Chapter 1358: The Cannon

In the distance, the banners of the Jianzhou main camp shifted and drums began to beat. Several units could be seen charging forward, attempting to intercept and annihilate this small detachment outside the city walls. Ever since those men from Dongjiang Town had arrived by ship, the battle had become a grinding stalemate. From Jianzhou all the way to Guangning, they had never encountered Ming troops this tenacious.

The distance between the two sides was great, further obstructed by shield carts and the like, making a rapid charge difficult. Seizing this opportunity, the nearly one thousand Ming soldiers retreated back into the city. The Jianzhou Jurchens did not bother probing the city gate; they knew the gate tunnel was packed with three full layers of fortifications, ready to be filled in at any moment. Attacking there was no different from assaulting the walls.

"If we had just a few dozen more suits of this armor, we might actually stand a chance!" Zhang Pan exclaimed with emotion from the top of the wall. He was also from Dongjiang Town and naturally understood its foundations and tactics. He knew this armor was not from Dongjiang Town, and these tactics were not from Dongjiang Town either.

Yet as he spoke these words, there was no excitement to be seen on Zhang Pan's face. On the faces of the others, even those who had just returned to the city, there was no joy to be found. They had once again thwarted the Jianzhou Jurchen offensive, but doing so was becoming increasingly difficult. Just moments ago, one man had been shot in the leg and had to be dragged directly back into the city. That armor was not invulnerable to blades and arrows.

Everyone now understood one thing: their time was running out. It was hard to say how many more times they could fight them off like this. So far, the Jianzhou Jurchens had been steadily increasing the pressure, but they had yet to commit their true strength, still expending Han Chinese captives and newly surrendered Han troops.

"It all depends on when the ships return," someone muttered under their breath. No one answered.

They had barely caught their breath after the fierce battle when the sound of drums from the opposing Jianzhou Jurchens rang out again. The soldier on watch atop the wall shouted a warning: "The Tartars are coming!"

This time, it truly was the main Tartar force advancing. Each unit slowly pressed forward. In the front, there were still the wretched captives and Han troops, but the main force advancing slowly did not rush to attack the city. Instead, they began clearing away the shield carts and the wreckage of various siege engines in front of the city. This action involuntarily made everyone even more tense.

They were clearing the battlefield in preparation for a major assault. What came next would likely not be those cowardly, pitiful, and hateful captives and newly surrendered Han troops, but the well-rested Jianzhou Eight Banners, who had been waiting for the Jinzhou defenders to be worn down. The coming fight would certainly be brutal.

"Why are they sending out the main force now?" Both Chen Jisheng and Zhang Pan shared this doubt. As seasoned veterans, they possessed an instinct for the rhythm of war, knowing when to attack and when to withdraw. In their view, the time for the main Tartar force to move had not yet come. The Jinzhou defenders' fighting spirit was still sharp; though the main force had suffered losses, its foundation was not yet broken. They should continue to wear them down, then take the city in one decisive push. Why move now? It was baffling.

But they did not dwell on it deeply. With the Jianzhou Jurchens advancing now, a bitter fight was certain to follow. Yet, to kill a few more Tartars while they still could was no loss. No one was thinking about how long they might live anymore; the only thought was that killing one meant breaking even, and killing two was pure profit.

By this point in the fighting, the sky was nearly dark. The Jianzhou Jurchen troops were still clearing the battlefield. Could they be planning a night assault? That would be very difficult here in Jinzhou, because a thick fog rolled in from the sea at night. In that fog, it was hard to see anything beyond five paces. The defenders held a much greater advantage over the attackers in such conditions.

Though they thought this, the Jinzhou defenders dared not slacken in the slightest. They remained taut, solemnly awaiting battle, bracing for the slaughter to descend. However, after the Jianzhou Jurchens finished clearing the battlefield, they did not advance with their siege engines. Instead, they pulled back.

What trick were the Tartars up to now? Just as confusion set in, a sudden stir came from within the Jianzhou Jurchen ranks. At first, it was thought to be battle cries, but listening closely, it was cheering. In the current situation, there seemed nothing worth cheering about. What exactly were they so happy about?

"Cannon... a cannon..." A bowman on the city wall cried out hoarsely, his voice trembling.

By the light of the setting sun, they could see each other clearly, and an object like a cannon was impossible to hide. They could see cannons gleaming with a metallic luster being pushed forward—two cannons in total.

A dead silence fell upon the Jinzhou city wall. Every man stared at the cannons before the Jianzhou Jurchen lines. Since invading Liaodong, the Jianzhou Jurchens had captured vast quantities of Ming equipment, including many firearms. Ming troops who used firearms and were willing to surrender received decent treatment. But Liaodong had been at peace for too long, and cannons were mainly used for defending cities. Thus, the number of cannons here was small, and all had been allocated to the Liaoxi direction, which was more critical to the Jianzhou Jurchens. Moreover, the overland route from Liaoyang and Shenyang to Jinzhou was inconvenient, and the Jianzhou Jurchens lacked suitable sea or river transport. Moving cannons was extremely difficult.

Therefore, for the Ming remnants at Jinzhou and Pi Island, firearms were their advantage, and they never had to worry about the Tartars possessing any. The men who had transferred from Dongjiang Town confirmed this. The Jianzhou army that attacked Dongjiang Town was clearly a main force, yet even a force of that size had not brought cannons. This force here was obviously a secondary army, so the possibility was even more remote.

They had never imagined that the enemy would actually produce two cannons here!

"

General Cannons... they're General Cannons..."

The so-called General Cannon roughly corresponded to the caliber of a nine-pounder among Western cannons. In the Ming army, this was already a weapon of immense power, a cannon said to be capable of "devastating several li and causing countless casualties" with a single shot.

"They've transported those few cannons from the walls of Liaoyang..." Chen Jisheng murmured. Everyone had a rough idea of Liaodong's foundations, and they could naturally deduce the origin of such a crucial weapon of war.

Suddenly, someone on the Jinzhou city wall burst into loud wailing, a piercing, frantic cry. After only a few sobs, those nearby clamped a hand over his mouth and knocked him down. Chen Jisheng and Zhang Pan could not even be bothered to order military discipline. Seeing these two cannons, everyone indeed felt as if death had descended upon them. This battle was going to be impossibly difficult.

"Generals, we must block the city gates immediately, or it will be over once they're blasted open!" In the silence, a young voice suddenly shouted, startling the dazed crowd awake. They looked over and saw it was Kong Youde yelling.

Jinzhou City had never been held in a desperate, static defense. A static defense certainly could not last long. Therefore, two of the city gates had not been sealed shut, kept ready for sorties at any moment. One gate faced the Jianzhou Jurchens directly for battle, and the other was used to link up with support from the port and docks. This tactic had proven quite effective, but now that the enemy had cannons, the gates had to be sealed. Otherwise, they would become weak points in the city's defenses. Once blasted open by cannon fire, the enemy could easily pour in.

Setting up a General Cannon like this required an extremely tedious process. An earthen platform had to be built on the ground, then wooden crates were buried, and the heavy cannon barrel was fixed on top. After calibration, it could be loaded and fired. Hundreds of men on the Jianzhou Jurchen side were busy with this, even employing many oxen and horses.

"Hurry and block the city gates! Seal both gates completely!"

"... It all depends on whether the ships can return..." someone muttered, but no one responded.

"The Tartars are about to fire! Take cover!" someone shouted. They were watching very closely. The signs of an impending cannon shot were always quite dramatic: a flash of fire around the cannon, the busy crew suddenly scattering, and so on. The Jinzhou defenders had heard from the men of Pi Island about how the Xuzhou men's cannons could fire rapidly, but no one here believed it.

No one remained exposed on the city wall or anywhere facing the enemy. With two thunderous booms, the defenders in hiding heard the shriek of the cannonballs, and then the city wall itself trembled—it had been struck.

After the two cannon shots, men immediately rushed back onto the wall, lighting lamps to inspect the damage the cannonballs had done to the fortifications. They were not particularly worried about a second volley. Experienced government troops knew that reloading after firing took a very long time. As long as they kept a sharp watch, there was no danger.

The General Cannon was said to be able to split mountains and shatter rock, but in reality, it did not cause that much damage to a city wall with a brick-and-stone exterior and a rammed-earth core. It had merely blasted two craters. However, since they had cannons, they certainly would not only bombard the front. For a small city like Jinzhou, if they aimed at a corner of the wall, the possibility of two cannons collapsing it was very high. Even blasting a slope into the front face of the wall would be a colossal disaster.

No matter how tenacious the Jinzhou defenders were, they had no chance of victory against the Jianzhou Jurchens' superior numbers. If the Jianzhou Eight Banners troops were given just a single foothold to scale the wall, turning a siege defense into open-field combat, it would be a catastrophe.

Though utterly exhausted from the day's fighting, no one spoke of rest now. The carefully rationed food was brought out and consumed freely. At this moment, though no one voiced it, everyone understood in their hearts that their days defending Jinzhou were numbered...

On the section of the wall facing the Jianzhou Jurchen cannons, men were watching their every move, terrified the cannons would fire again. But they waited until dark, until the opposing Jianzhou Jurchen troops settled in for the night, and the second volley never came.

But this brought no relief whatsoever to the Jinzhou defenders. Night battles were too perilous in the dark, so they would simply wait for dawn to resume. Once the cannons blasted a breach in Jinzhou City, everything would be over. Even if the wall held for a time, the thunderous roar alone would likely shatter their morale beyond repair.

The night deepened. Morale was soaring in the Jianzhou Jurchen camp opposite; sounds of singing and laughter could even be heard. Inside Jinzhou City, however, there was only deathly silence. No matter how heavy their worries, the accumulated exhaustion of these past days, combined with the strange sense of release that came with confirmed despair, caused many to sink into a deep sleep. Yet some could not sleep.

Chen Jisheng and Zhang Pan were considered older men within the Dongjiang Town system, though by the standards of the military families inside the Pass, they were still typical young men. The two sat together before a fire, eating dried fish and drinking hot water. Dried fish was the one resource Jinzhou did not lack. Using it as a snack, drinking water in place of tea, it was a rare moment of leisure.

"Commander Mao was a scholar. He could have had a peaceful, comfortable life, yet he came to this perilous Liaodong to endure hardship. He held great righteousness in his heart, but he was also seeking great wealth and glory!" Chen Jisheng and Zhang Pan were both trusted confidants of Mao Wenlong, so naturally they could speak with such clarity. And with the situation having reached this point, there was nothing left that could not be said.