Ning Chen stood on the wall and watched the dark mass of the enemy with a calm face.
When they had come close enough, Ning Chen said sharply, “Loose!”
“Musket battalion, don’t spare the bullets. Hit them hard!”
Fft! Fft! Fft!!!
A rain of arrows went out at the enemy below the wall like a swarm of locusts.
Bang! Bang! Bang!!!
The noise was like a peal of thunder, and firelight spread out with the powder smoke.
The enemy were all badly shaken by the peal of thunder the muskets made.
Watching the men beside them go down one after another, they could not help being afraid.
For men who had never seen a musket, meeting one for the first time, the noise alone was enough to put fear into them.
And besides the muskets there was the rain of arrows.
One volley of arrows and the enemy went down in swathes, like wheat under the sickle.
In an age of cold steel, a battle is won by piling up heads.
Which is why there is a saying: one general’s fame, ten thousand bones.
“Any man who shrinks from the fight is cut down!”
“Any man who hangs back is cut down!”
“Charge, and take Mangzhou!”
The provost battalion saw the fear coming into the soldiers and shouted it in unison to put the heart back into them.
“Charge!!!”
“Kill!!!”
Screaming and shouting rang against the sky.
Fft! Fft! Fft!!!
The enemy’s arrows came in without a break, skimming past over their heads.
Ning Chen’s men had the wall to shelter behind, but nothing could make it safe.
Now and then a soldier took an arrow and went down.
The wounded were carried away at once and other archers stepped into their places.
Zhao Bokang listened to the thunderclap of the muskets, his face dark.
He knew what they were. The Left Chancellor had said so in his letters.
He had told the Left Chancellor to find a way to get hold of a few muskets… and in the end there were no muskets, and Ning Chen had killed the man instead.
Under the cover of the crossbow battalion, the enemy’s first wave had come up close under the wall.
Ning Chen made a cold sound in his nose. “Torch.”
Yuan Long lit a torch at once and handed it to him.
Ning Chen walked to the edge of the wall and dropped the torch over.
The moat was below.
The torch fell into the moat.
Whoomph!!!
A wave of fire rolled out.
The whole moat was alight.
Ning Chen had had the moat filled with tung oil days before.
In a moment the screaming rang against the sky.
Every man of the enemy who had come near the moat turned into a burning man, fire all over him, running blindly, rolling on the ground.
Ning Chen watched it coldly.
In war there is no such thing as a soft heart.
To talk about mercy at a moment like that is to fail yourself and fail your men.
Bang!!!
There was an explosion beside Ning Chen and then a scream.
Ning Chen turned his head, and his brows came down hard.
One of the musketeers had had his musket burst, and his hand was in ruins.
“Quick, take him down and get him treated.”
Ning Chen let out a breath.
The iron was not hard enough. A flintlock is simple to make but it will not take punishment, and after enough use there is a danger of the barrel bursting.
“General Ning, they’re bringing up catapults!”
Yuan Long shouted it.
Ning Chen looked hard and saw the enemy’s catapults standing ready.
Ning Chen made a cold sound in his nose. “Yuan Long, go by the plan. Let them find out the age has changed.”
“Yes!”
Yuan Long turned and went.
Catapults had been set up on the wall long since.
Satchel charge after satchel charge and powder keg after powder keg were carried up.
The fuses were lit.
Yuan Long gave the order. “Loose!”
Dozens of catapults let go at once, and the satchel charges and powder kegs went out at the enemy.
Boom! Boom! Boom!!!
The satchel charges and the powder kegs went off one after another, and the ground shook and the hills with it.
Standing on the wall, Ning Chen could feel the shudder of it.
The sound of it was a thunderbolt out of a clear sky, loud enough to make the deaf hear.
Fire rolled out and the powder smoke hung thick.
Ning Chen had covered his ears beforehand. He put his head out to look, and frowned slightly.
There was far too much about the satchel charges and the powder kegs that could not be controlled.
Some of them went off in midair.
But most fell into the enemy’s lines and burst there.
In a moment flesh and blood were flying and the screaming was one long sound.
The Grand Tutor’s men were frightened out of their minds.
What was this?
Satchel charge after satchel charge and powder keg after powder keg came down in the enemy’s lines and burst.
The enemy’s lines went down, men and horses together, in complete confusion.
Never mind the soldiers — even the Grand Tutor was struck stupid.
“Grand Tutor, look out!”
One of the officers shouted it, his voice tearing.
The Grand Tutor looked up, and a satchel charge was coming straight down at him.
The Grand Tutor was frightened out of his soul.
He ran for it as hard as he could, and then threw himself flat.
The satchel charge came down on his palanquin, and with a roar the whole palanquin blew apart, fire rolling out and splinters flying.
The Grand Tutor hit the ground hard. His vision went black, his ears were ringing, and it was a long time before he came back to himself.
Up on the wall Ning Chen roared, “Hit them hard! Don’t spare anything! Any man who disobeys is cut down!”
“Mu Anbang, Lei An, hear the order!”
“This officer is here!”
“The two of you muster your men and get ready to go out and kill!”
“Yes!”
Satchel charges and powder kegs beyond counting flew from the wall and came down in the enemy’s lines.
Boom! Boom! Boom!!!
The explosions went on without a break.
Every one of them came with flesh and blood flying.
Fire rolled out, the powder smoke hung thick, and black smoke went rolling up into the air.
The enemy was in utter disorder, men and horses down together, everything in confusion.
As far as the eye could see, the ground was full of holes, there were bodies everywhere, and the blood ran like a river.
“Hit them! Hit them hard! Any man who spares his ammunition or his arrows is cut down!”
“Yuan Long, tell them to get those catapults working faster.”
Ning Chen shouted it at the top of his voice.
“Hit them hard! This general will beat the drum for you himself!”
Ning Chen walked over, took the drumsticks and began to beat the drum.
Boom. Boom. Boom!!!
The war drums rang against the sky.
The men went at it like they had been dosed with something, howling and attacking like madmen.
The Grand Tutor was stunned out of all sense.
He had expected Ning Chen to use muskets.
But what was this thing that came flying down and burst and took out a whole swathe of men at once?
“Take my order. Steady, no panic… shield troops, get up there!”
The Grand Tutor’s eyes were red and he roared like a mad dog.
“Where are the banners? Where are the banners? Is every man in the banner guard dead?”
On a battlefield the soldiers move by the banners.
As long as the banners are up, the soldiers have something to fix on and know which way to charge.
Without the banners, with that many men, who on earth knows where to attack? They become flies with their heads off.
Of the four great services on a battlefield, taking a banner is one of them: cut down the enemy’s banner and the credit is a fortune out of the sky.
So an army sets up a banner guard whose only work is to protect the banners.
The Grand Tutor had one thing right. Every man in the banner guard was dead… and any who were not were close to it.
Ning Chen’s plan was that once the satchel charges and the powder kegs went into use, the banner guard was hit first.
The Grand Tutor’s banner guard had been killed and wounded to a man long since.
The banners had probably gone to ash already.
With the banners gone, and the men beside them suddenly blown apart, the whole army came to pieces.
Men and horses went down together and ran in every direction… a fair number were trampled to death by their own side.
A hundred thousand men, and they were broken past holding.
At a moment like that, never mind anyone else — the provost battalion ran faster than any of them.
“Grand Tutor, fall back… while the green hills last there is no want of firewood.”
The Grand Tutor’s eyes were red and the blood was up in his face, and he roared at the sky… and then his body jerked and he brought up a mouthful of old blood.
Rage had struck inward. He had been made to vomit blood with fury.
He had spent half his life at war, he had a hundred thousand men in his hands, and he had thought taking one green boy called Ning Chen would be no more trouble than blowing away ash. He had never expected to lose this badly.
(End of Chapter 258)