Chapter 461: The Stockade Is Open — Help Yourselves, Everyone!

Dust and smoke billowed, but from the outside you couldn't see any steam rising. Inside, they kept adding water to these iron cauldrons, because the water had long since been boiling furiously.

Noon was fast approaching. The southern face of the new refugee stockade had been completely leveled, and the diggers from all around had been gathered together.

Li Dajin set aside his earlier caution and calm, replacing it with a warm, heroic swagger. He climbed onto a cart and shouted, "My grand master and my master have already posted a reward: the heroes who first enter this stockade get one thousand taels of silver! And on the salt routes and in the salt trade, my family will give you plenty of support going forward."

A roar erupted from below. A thousand taels of silver, plus the Feng family's support in the salt trade — that was a huge fortune. But then they looked again at the Feng family's formidable, well-armed forces, and thought, what's that got to do with us? Just watching was enough.

"I've got another piece of news. There are five hundred women in this stockade. Can't say if they're pretty or not, but they're all in their twenties."

There are women inside too? The expressions on everyone's faces shifted again. Li Dajin kept shouting: "I've also asked the grand master and the master for discretionary authority. As long as these women aren't killed, for the first two days, you can do whatever you want with them!"

A burst of raucous laughter rose from below, every face twisted with lewd intent. Everyone understood exactly what Li Dajin meant. But after the excitement passed, it was the same as with the silver earlier — no matter how many perks there were, they'd never fall to the likes of us.

Li Dajin raised his voice even louder and bellowed: "You've all done the Feng family a favor by coming here to lend your strength. The Feng family will never treat you poorly! Old Li here gives you his word — I've filled in the trench for you. You go first! Open the stockade, grab the women — you all go first! The Feng family's troops will cover your rear and absolutely won't steal this prize from you."

A stir of commotion below, and everyone grew excited again. Li Dajin continued: "The people inside this stockade are all huddled behind the walls, too scared to move. One charge and you'll take it! Old Li asks just one thing of you all: once you're inside, take whatever you want, but if you can avoid killing people, don't kill them. You can trade live captives to the Feng family for silver — keep that in mind!"

At this, a thunderous roar of agreement erupted from below. Go in first, collect reward silver, play with women, loot riches — this was a fantastic deal. Li Dajin was even urging everyone to kill less, which just showed how easy taking this stockade would be. Quite a few who couldn't hold themselves back were already hollering and shouting wildly.

"Whatever equipment you need to open the stockade, come and take it freely! We of the Feng family are holding the line — our archers will be right behind you, covering you!" Li Dajin said with a grin.

The carts had brought quite a lot of gear — ladders, wooden rafts, and the like. A roar of agreement came from below as the crowd surged over to sort through and grab things. Li Dajin laughed heartily, cracking jokes now and then. Everyone seemed in good spirits. With archers backing them up from behind, their confidence swelled even more. The Feng family really was generous!

Over on the other side, several of the Feng family's headmen were gathered around Feng Bao, complaining. Feng Bao's expression was also grim. Once the men assembled from all around had moved to the front to prepare, Feng Bao, flanked by a few followers, sought out Li Dajin. He snarled viciously, "You traitorous dog who turns your elbow outward — why didn't you save such a good opportunity for our own men? You want to chill the hearts of our own brothers?"

Li Dajin swept his gaze over them. The headmen behind Feng Bao all instinctively lowered their heads. Li Dajin suddenly seized Feng Bao by the front of his jacket, yanked him close, and said through gritted teeth: "Is your brain clogged with something? I'm sending others in first to probe and die for us! If you want to die, take those idiot underlings of yours to the front. Don't cause trouble in front of me. Get lost!"

With that, he shoved forward, sending Feng Bao sprawling onto the ground. The other headmen all retreated a step. Li Dajin jabbed a finger at them and roared: "If you stir up trouble again, I'll chop you to pieces! Do you really think having the surname Feng makes you part of the Feng family? Who even knows what surname your fathers and grandfathers had? Get lost!"

The group hastily helped Feng Bao up and scattered in a hurry. The various bands of mounted brigands and outlaws from the greenwood had already surged to the front. Li Dajin climbed back onto the cart and stood there, gazing toward the stockade. At some point, Li He had ridden up beside him. He sneered, "You're worse off than you were in the army. At least there you didn't have to take grief from trash like this."

"In the army I took grief too. Here with the Feng family, at least I can give my wife and children a full belly and warm clothes. Maybe in the future I can even win a future for myself, so I don't have to live with my blade lapping blood every day." Li Dajin sighed.

Even a rabble like mounted brigands and bandits knew they had to form ranks before an attack. Li Dajin's speech just now had stirred them into a restless, impatient frenzy. There was considerable squabbling over who would go first and who last. Since the stockade was about to fall any moment, whoever was in front would reap the greatest rewards. As for casualties — a few dead was just a few dead. In bands of dozens or even a hundred, they couldn't all be that unlucky. The headmen, naturally, would stay at the rear.

At some unknown person's shout, several hundred men began advancing. With nearly two hundred paces to cover, everyone feared being left behind and ran faster and faster. The entire force surged forward recklessly, heedless of anything else. The archers, however, followed at a leisurely pace. Some archers from the brigand bands wanted to quicken their step and keep up, but seeing the main body moving so slowly, they slowed down too. After all, those who could shoot a bow or ride a horse always got an extra share or two when the spoils were divided.

They started running at a hundred and fifty paces. Their momentum was strong at first, but after a few dozen paces, their legs grew heavy and their breath came in ragged gasps. By the time they'd covered a hundred-odd paces, their drive had already weakened considerably. But the charge was already underway. Those at the rear had started slower and were now desperately shoving to get to the front, while those in front didn't dare slow down. Just like that, they surged forward in a chaotic mob.

"Don't shoot!" Zhang Hubin shouted hoarsely from the top of the wall. These several hundred men before him were perfect targets. Some archers had already stood up, unable to restrain themselves, but Zhang Hubin kept shouting and sent his men to relay the order. The archers all wondered why. After crouching back down, one after another they felt they had overestimated this young company commander earlier.

The parapet walkway on the stockade wall was too narrow to set up stoves and boil water, so the boiling water was carried up bucket by bucket. The shouts of slaughter outside drew closer and closer — they were almost upon them!

"Pour!" Zhang Hubin shouted, rising and hurling a bucket of boiling water outward. Everyone followed suit.

His timing was excellent. The charging enemy had just stepped onto the filled-in trench when the boiling water came splashing down!

Piercing shrieks of agony rang out at once. Some men's heads and faces instantly flushed red, half-scalded, as they clawed at themselves and thrashed about in a frenzy. And the weather was still chilly — everyone was dressed in thick layers. The boiling water soaked into their clothes, and they couldn't strip them off in time. The pain was truly excruciating.

The men in front collapsed, and those behind couldn't stop in time, piling forward one after another. The boiling water had long been prepared in abundance. Wooden buckets and basins tipped and poured straight down. Screams rose in an unbroken chain, steam searing painfully. Only after several dozen men had been scalded or scalded to death did the main force finally manage to halt its advance.

A cheer erupted from the stockade wall. Everyone had been holding it in since the trench-filling began, and now they could finally vent their frustration.

"Get down, everyone get down!" Zhang Hubin shouted again.

Hearing the cheers from inside the stockade and seeing their comrades writhing and screaming in agony, the outlaws and brigands outside were beside themselves with rage. Someone bellowed, "Have the archers pin down the wall! We're charging in!"

Only then did the nearly one hundred archers at the rear saunter forward at a leisurely pace. They formed ranks, calculated the distance, and together drew their bows and nocked arrows.

With so many archers firing in volley, the faces of everyone on the stockade wall changed color. Zhang Hubin shouted for those in the line of fire to take cover. The straw bundles from when they'd built the shelters were all put to use, fashioned into straw shields to block the rain of arrows.

Before the people inside the stockade could even scatter, the shriek of arrows tearing through the air sounded from outside. The arrow storm came pelting down. Everyone on the stockade wall had wooden rafts and cover, and with the angle and position just right, only two or three were wounded. But those inside the stockade who couldn't dodge in time were out of luck.

The protection offered by those straw-shields — bundles of straw bound to bamboo poles — was limited after all. If the angle was wrong, arrows punched straight through and struck the people behind them. Fortunately, they had already spread out quite a bit beforehand. Even so, piercing screams of agony rang out everywhere.

The Xuzhou martial men were already starting to panic. Quite a few turned their heads nervously. To their surprise, the refugees inside the stockade weren't that chaotic. People were carrying the wounded away, and the carts parked inside the stockade were all packed with people hiding underneath.

Zhang Hubin turned his head to look, then focused his attention back outside. His heart was full of admiration for Zhao Jin. Everything required a contingency plan. Before coming here, the refugees had drilled many times. They'd built a wooden stockade on flat ground at the Cloud Mountain Temple estate and practiced how to handle bandit attacks. Though the refugees were still frightened, at least they knew what to do, and that kept chaos from piling onto chaos.

Hearing the screams and turmoil inside the stockade, the mounted brigands and bandits — who had just been dealt a heavy blow by the boiling water and whose morale had plummeted — immediately grew excited again.

The archers once more drew bows and nocked arrows. Many of them had been trained in the army and could shoot very far. After loosing the first arrow, everyone hurriedly prepared to shoot a second. At a shout, another volley of arrows arced out.

This time, everyone on the stockade wall had sufficient cover. They pressed themselves tightly against the wall, not daring to lift their heads. The men beside Zhang Hubin even said, "Chief Zhang, if this keeps up, we'll collapse without even fighting!"

"Nonsense! If all they do is shoot arrows, that's even better. We'll just hide more carefully, and we'll have extra arrows to use!" Zhang Hubin shot back.

The shelters inside the stockade had been built with a purpose. The digging had been done with this in mind — crouch inside and you didn't need to worry about arrows from outside. If it really came to an endless defense against arrows, it would even let them replenish the stockade's already meager arrow reserves.

But Zhang Hubin knew this was wishful thinking. In the end, it would definitely come to cold steel and real bloodshed. Before that, however, they'd at least get three more volleys off.

Zhang Hubin wasn't the only one thinking this — the archers outside thought so too. A second volley of arrows was loosed, and once more they drew bows and nocked. This time, before they could release, someone came running from the main force. Riding up on horseback, he shouted directly: "The wall's already pinned down! Let the brothers charge! If we kill and wound too many inside, won't there be no money to earn and no fun to be had?"

Hearing this, the archers all relaxed their strings and lowered their arrows. The suppressing volley of arrows just now had lifted the spirits of the frustrated bandits and outlaws again. The man who'd come from the main force to shout the order had a loud voice, and those in front heard him clearly. No one knew who yelled it: "Fight our way in! Let's take out every bit of rage we've got!"