Yang Rui had seen Dong Zhuo's men using siege weapons like ladders and chariots in the Battle of Guang Zong in the Yellow Turban Uprising plot. It wasn't surprising that Dong Zhuo's men could make them again.
Yang Rui wouldn't let Dong Zhuo's men succeed so easily. After patrolling around Heyang City, Yang Rui turned back to the bank of the Yellow River.
Only the forest on the southwest side of Heyang City was producing siege weapons. It seemed like Dong Zhuo's men had gathered all the craftsmen there. Yang Rui was going back to the campsite to summon the 3,500 Iron Guards that he had just transported here. He was going to destroy all the siege weapons, and it would be best if he could control the craftsmen as well!
Because it was nighttime, and Dong Zhuo's men didn't expect Yang Rui's men to be outside of Heyang City, they were a little careless. When Yang Rui came with his men in the middle of the night, it didn't take him much effort to destroy all the siege weapons that Dong Zhuo's men worked overtime to build.
"Kill!"
At this moment, Dong Zhuo's camp had naturally noticed Yang Rui's sneak attack. In the beginning, they were in a state of panic, but after a while, they relied on their numerical advantage to stabilize their footing and engage in a fierce battle with Yang Rui's over 3,500 personal guards. As the inner layer of Dong Zhuo's camp soldiers continuously replenished the outer layer, the pressure on Yang Rui also increased.
At the same time, Yang Rui was also worried that the enemy's general would come. Yang Rui was not a match for him for the time being. Therefore, after charging for a while, Yang Rui led the Steel Guards and retreated in time. Although the entire process didn't take long, only an hour or so, the effective damage inflicted was significant. Just the Merit Points and Contribution Points awarded exceeded 200,000. It was clear that quite a number of people had been killed.
Other than that, Yang Rui also gained a lot of skill books, equipment and other items. Yang Rui didn't count the other items but Yang Rui paid special attention to two of the blueprints.
"Scaling Ladder Blueprints (Basic): Blueprints for making Basic Scaling Ladders. Requirement: Carpenters above Special Rank can use the blueprints to make it on the battlefield without being restricted by a carpenter's shop. "
"Siege Ladder Blueprints (Basic): Blueprints for making Basic Siege Ladders. Requirement: Carpenters above Special Rank can use the blueprints to make it on the battlefield without being restricted by a carpenter's shop. "
Although these two recipes were only Basic Recipes, and the requirements to learn and use them were not too high, Yang Rui knew how rare they were. Only the Emperor or a large NPC faction could have similar recipes, and it was very difficult to obtain such items from other places.
The reason why Yang Rui obtained the blueprints by killing the relevant craftsmen was because they already had the skill to make the blueprints. To a large extent, these craftsmen or blueprints came from the Royal Family. Dong Zhuo was located in the Northwest. It was very difficult for him to obtain such items out of thin air.
With the help of Jiao Wen, a high-level carpenter, Yang Rui would soon be able to use the two blueprints. Whether it was the scaling ladder or the battering ram, although they were only at the beginner level, they were still powerful siege weapons. Compared to ordinary battering rams and wooden ladders, they were much more powerful!
At the same time, with the help of the Steel Guards, who were very good at city walls, Yang Rui's siege would be much easier in the future. Yang Rui decided that he would look for Jiao Wen when he was free. He would ask him to make some scaling ladders and siege ladders as soon as possible to fulfill the requirements of the siege.
After attacking the siege weapons, Yang Rui had been killing Dong Zhuo's men outside of Heyang City. He was accumulating achievement points, contribution points, equipment, skill books and other items. Especially when it came to contribution points. Yang Rui still owed a few million contribution points from reviving soldiers. He needed to accumulate as much as possible.
Due to the fact that the army that was besieging the city had lost most of their men, they couldn't make any more siege weapons. They could only use wooden ladders to attack the city during the day, which meant that they couldn't increase their efficiency. Therefore, the threat to Heyang City wasn't that great.
After 4 to 5 days, Dong Zhuo's men didn't succeed in attacking the city. Instead, they had lost more than 100,000 soldiers. On average, they were losing 20,000 to 30,000 soldiers every day. Among them, Yang Rui had killed quite a number of Dong Zhuo's men outside of the city walls.
Dong Zhuo's men seemed to have sensed something was wrong. Therefore, they sent out a letter to Dong Zhuo in Luoyang City. However, the letter was intercepted by Yang Rui's fleet. It was then passed to Yang Rui.
During the 4 to 5 days when Yang Rui was killing people outside of the city walls, his fleet didn't stay idle either. They had already cleared a large area of the Yellow River around Meng Jin. Therefore, they were able to intercept the letter from Dong Zhuo's men.
The current situation was that although Dong Zhuo's men had spent a lot of effort to cross to the north bank of the Yellow River, it wouldn't be easy for them to return to the south bank of the Yellow River without a suitable ship.
The letter sent by Dong Zhuo's men was asking for reinforcements. In the letter, Dong Zhuo's men were in a difficult situation in Heyang City. They hoped that Dong Zhuo could send more men to help and rescue Liu Bian and his mother who were still in Heyang City.
Through the letter's signature, Yang Rui knew the identity of the commander of Dong Zhuo's men in Hebei. This man was Dong Zhuo's general, Li Jue. There were 3 other generals that Yang Rui couldn't identify. Yang Rui had only seen the corresponding flags during the day. They were Zhang, Dong, and Duan.
Based on the information of Dong Zhuo's generals, although Yang Rui had a rough guess, he couldn't confirm the identities of the other 3 generals. However, there was one thing that Yang Rui was very sure of. Dong Zhuo must have attached great importance to the rescue of Young Emperor Liu Bian and Empress Dowager He. Otherwise, he wouldn't have sent so many generals to chase after Yang Rui when there were so many battles going on.
The letter also revealed that due to the heavy losses caused by the continuous siege, Li Jue had decided to wait for Dong Zhuo's reinforcements to arrive before launching another siege. He wanted to take down Heyang City in one fell swoop with the overwhelming number of troops.
After learning of this news, Yang Rui decided to take the opportunity to send another fleet downstream to pick up the last batch of over 2000 Iron Guard soldiers, in case they encountered any trouble downstream. At this time, Ding Yuan had already led his troops to the East County to deal with the Black Mountain Army. The rest of Yang Rui's soldiers were led by some beginner and intermediate generals. Of course, Yang Rui didn't feel assured.
Yang Rui ordered the fleet to depart first. Before they left, Yang Rui observed for a while. As expected, Dong Zhuo's troops had surrounded Heyang City and stopped attacking the city. Yang Rui then led the fleet downstream to deploy more troops.
Of course, even if Dong Zhuo's camp didn't stop attacking the city, Yang Rui could still leave for two days without a problem. Yang Yang City wouldn't be in much danger in the short term either. The previous few days of siege had proven this point.
The only thing Yang Rui was worried about was the rations in the city. Before this, Yang Rui had used ships to transport some rations. However, when he rescued Young Emperor Liu Bian, he left a lot of rations in Spirit Condensation Mountain Village. Most of the rations in Heyang City were carried by the soldiers and looted from Heyang City. At most, they could last for ten to twenty days.
Therefore, Yang Rui also needed to increase the intensity of the attacks on the periphery. He was in a hurry to mobilize the troops because of this consideration. One more soldier meant one more attack power, and the sooner the soldiers were mobilized, the more effective they would be.
It was worth mentioning that in the past four to five days, Dong Zhuo's troops had lost Gong County, a medium-sized city that they had previously conquered. This showed the strength of Dong Zhuo's troops!
However, this wasn't the only reason they lost Gong County. Gong County's geographical location and the strength of Dragon Soul's troops were also very important factors. However, these factors couldn't completely cover the strength of Dong Zhuo's troops!
What Yang Rui didn't know was that one of the main reasons Dragon Soul lost Gong County was because of Dong Zhuo's siege weapons. Compared to Heyang City that Yang Rui occupied, Gong County was located in a location that didn't have a natural barrier like the Yellow River. Dong Zhuo's troops could easily transport the siege weapons from Luoyang City to Gong County. There was no need for them to be built on the spot.
In reality, that was exactly what Dong Zhuo's faction was trying to do. In order to obtain the necessary blueprints, Tracer Dragon Soul had even sacrificed a lot of players, risking their lives to destroy ladders, assault vehicles, and other siege weapons.
However, it was a pity that he didn't achieve his goal of tracing the dragon soul. The siege weapons he attacked didn't drop the relevant blueprints, and the blueprints Yang Rui obtained weren't dropped by the weapons themselves. Instead, they were dropped by the craftsmen who mastered the relevant skills.
Yang Rui headed downstream to the east of Hulao Pass. In less than two days, he brought all the remaining Steel Guards upstream. After joining up with the previous 3,000 plus soldiers, Yang Rui once again led these soldiers on a killing spree.
This batch of Steel Guards numbered more than 5,000. Although they still couldn't fight Dong Zhuo's troops head-on, they were enough to cause a lot of trouble for the enemy. Dong Zhuo's 300,000 troops were divided into roughly 70,000 to 80,000 soldiers in each direction. If they were evenly distributed to the various sections of the wall, the density of the soldiers wasn't very high.
It wasn't until Yang Rui ruthlessly slaughtered the enemy a few times that Dong Zhuo's troops seemed to have realized that they couldn't stop Yang Rui's troops from moving behind them. As a result, Dong Zhuo's troops began to concentrate their troops in order to prevent themselves from falling into a disadvantage when attacked by Yang Rui.
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