"Hurry! Push the catapults back and get out of here! Don't let them all be destroyed! "
An Arab officer quickly reacted and began to push the catapults away from the battlefield. Although the Arab catapults were large and heavy, each one had seven or eight large wheels attached to it, allowing it to move smoothly. But how could Chen Burang allow them to successfully withdraw at a time like this?
Boomboomboom! A dense rain of stones rained down from the sky. In just a few waves of attacks, eighty percent of the catapult formation that the Arabs had built up with great difficulty had been destroyed. Those steel balls that had been placed next to the catapults to make them easier to throw had now become the Arabs' most fatal flaw.
The entire catapult formation was aflame.
"Damn it!"
In the blink of an eye, the large metal balls shot toward the first defense line of the Tang people vanished, the sea of fire and smoke vanishing, leaving behind only a few embers. In the rear of the army, Abu Muslim and Ziyad both grimaced at this sight.
The advantage they had built up earlier had been instantly obliterated.
"Fahata, kill that Tang people general on the walls!"
Abu Muslim's eyes darkened as he suddenly ordered.
The Arab catapult squads had destroyed many sturdy cities in the past, but they had never been destroyed by enemy catapults and burned by their own kerosene. Abu Muslim could tell at a glance that the crux of the problem lay with that young Tang people general on the walls of Talas.
"Yes!"
A fully-armored Arab general strode out from behind Abu Muslim, his voice loud and clear. Creakcreak! With the twang of a bowstring, the Arab commander called Fahata gripped an ivory bow that was half a man's height in his left hand and a metal arrow more than five feet long in his right. The arrowhead was as red as blood, like a shining ruby, and he aimed it at Chen Burang.
The moment the bowstring was drawn, all the light in a radius of one hundred feet began to twist and gather on the arrow in Fahata's hand. The ruby arrowhead exuded an extremely dangerous light.
Boom!
There was a massive boom, and it was like a clap of thunder had exploded in the sky. Before anyone could react, the arrow in the hand of the famed Arab archer, Fahata, had shot through the air like a lightning bolt toward the top of the city walls. This arrow moved with incredible speed. At the start, it was still in Fahatta's hand, but a moment later, it was already on the walls of Talas, only a few zhang from Chen Burang, who was commanding the army.
"Buzz!"
Seeing the sudden appearance of this arrow, Chen Burang's expression changed. Although his ears had already heard the arrow, his body could not keep up.
His opponent was much, much stronger than him!
"A Saint Martial archer!"
This thought flashed through Chen Burang's mind, and his face turned as white as paper. He was a member of the Kunwu Training Camp's Deflecting Blade Manor and had extremely high attainments in the art of war and archery. In his hands, the catapults could display a terrifying might that no other officer could hope to match.
Even though Chen Burang was skilled in battle tactics, his cultivation wasn't as high as it seemed. If the Arabs sent a Saint Martial expert to deal with him, someone of Chen Burang's cultivation level would be doomed.
"It's over!"
This was the only thought left in Chen Burang's mind.
Bang!
As Chen Burang closed his eyes to await death, there was a flash of light, and an invisible barrier of energy erupted from behind Chen Burang and engulfed him. There was an earth-shattering explosion as Faihatta's destructive arrow hit the Qi Shield. It was as if it had hit a layer of hard steel. Clang! The steel clanged and the shockwave spread in all directions. The ruby-like arrowhead and the arrow shaft smashed into the Qi Shield and turned to dust.
"Protector-General!"
Hearing the commotion behind him, Chen Burang opened his eyes and saw Anxi Protector-General Gao Xianzhi slowly walking toward him. He gave a long sigh of relief.
"Continue to command! With me here, there's no need to worry. "
Gao Xianzhi's voice resounded in his ear as he casually took a few steps forward and placed Chen Burang behind him. In the fierce winds, Gao Xianzhi's eyes exploded with a sharp light as he looked past the void to Abu Muslim and the famous Arab archer behind him.
Abu Muslim also seemed to sense something, and his body slightly leaned forward as he looked at Gao Xianzhi on the walls. These two foes who had been fighting at Talas for more than two months were now exuding an intense desire to fight.
"Milord, should we bring a few more generals …"
Ziyad took two steps forward at an appropriate time and said.
"There's no need. With Gao Xianzhi here, we can't kill him."
Abu Muslim waved his hand and rejected Ziyad's suggestion.
"The catapult formation has already been destroyed. There's no need to worry about it. Inform the soldiers on the front line to increase the intensity of the attacks. Before sunset, I want them to completely tear apart the Tang people's western defense line and destroy it! No matter what, we must thoroughly defeat the Tang Dynasty! "
"Yes, Milord!"
Ziyad understood and quickly left to deliver Abu Muslim's order.
This battle was of the utmost importance, the decisive battle between Arabia and the Tang Dynasty. A messenger alone would not be able to convey Abu Muslim's will, which was why Ziyad had personally taken action.
… …
In front of the gates of Talas, between the two defense lines, with Chen Burang's steel catapults engaged, Dalun Ruozan and Abu Muslim's strategy swiftly crumbled. The catapults that Dalun Ruozan had hidden behind the hills and the catapults that Abu Muslim had hidden in the rear of the army had all been destroyed in a few short moments.
The flames and smoke on the battlefield vanished, and the situation of the more than one hundred thousand Qixi reinforcements was instantly reversed.
"Fire!"
Without the slightest hesitation, Chen Bin stood on his transport carriage and ordered the ballista teams around him to wildly fire at the Arab army. The first defense line was in a rather perilous situation. The kerosene attacks of the Arabs had rendered Chen Bin's ballista teams useless, allowing many of the Arab cavalry to reach the walls of the first defense line.
All the steel walls and infantry shields were being battered by a furious storm of attacks, the sounds of collisions filling the ears of the soldiers. All the Arab cavalry at the very front were doing their utmost to break through the defense line.
On the other side of the defense line, all the infantry were clenching their teeth and doing their utmost to hold on.
"Hold! Don't let them get close! "
"Stop them! This is a military order! "
All the infantry were bulging with muscles, the veins on their foreheads bulging, and even their faces were red from exertion. It was at this moment that the attack of Chen Bin's ballista army arrived …
Boom! Boom! Boom!
A dense barrage of ballista bolts once more appeared on the battlefield like the scythe of the grim reaper. Boom! An Arab horseman charging at the infantry shields was too slow to react, and just as he was about to charge at the shields again, a pitch-black ballista bolt pierced through his chest. The enormous force of the bolt lifted him off his horse and sent him crashing into a second Arab horseman, a third, a fourth …
A single ballista bolt had instantly killed seven or eight fully-armored Arab horsemen, and this was only the beginning.
Swishswishswish! One ballista bolt after another howled through the air, each one claiming at least six Arab horsemen. In just one volley, seven or eight thousand Arab cavalry had been killed. A second volley followed, a third volley, and so on and so forth.
The Arabs were dying at an astonishing rate, and the steel defense line was littered with corpses of men and horses, their blood flowing freely across the ground. But the Arabs had gone completely berserk, no longer caring about casualties. When the two sides clashed in close combat, the Arabs were said to be at their most ferocious, terrifying, and invincible. As long as they could kill their foes, they would use their ferocious assaults to crush them, and the Arabs would not care about casualties.
It was precisely this sort of courage and fearlessness that made the Arabs invincible from the Cong Mountains all the way to the Red Sea.
"Kill!"
Tens of thousands of Arab cavalry had savage expressions on their faces as they charged toward the first defense line. Squelch! An Arab horseman raised his spear and threw it. The spear flew past the heavy shields of the infantry and into the dense ranks of the Tang army.
Caught off guard, several Tang Dynasty infantry were impaled by the spear and nailed to the ground. Spear after spear was thrown, and the Tang Dynasty's Qixi reinforcements rapidly began to suffer casualties. Not only that, even under the dual assault of the beehives and ballistae, many Arabs were still able to use the corpses to scale the walls and fly over the tall shields.
Swishswishswish! Behind the infantry shields, the regular soldiers of Greater and Lesser Balur stabbed forward with their spears. These spears were like agile snakes, piercing through the chinks in the armor of the Arab soldiers and hanging onto their spears.
The power of the pikemen of Greater and Lesser Balur was on full display at this moment. In terms of penetrating armor, no one in the Western Regions could compare to them. But not even this could stop the Arabs.
"Fight! Kill them all! "
An Arab soldier stepped over the corpses and climbed over the steel wall, his scimitar in both hands as he began to slaughter the Tang soldiers. One, two, three … countless Arab soldiers rushed forward, heedless of their own lives as they charged at the first defense line.
One after another, neither the beehives nor the ballistae could stop them.
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