Chapter 3: The Final Battle - Tian Shui City in Peril

  Last time, Zhang Fei was called the champion of solo battles against three generals, with great momentum and a crushing defeat of the Western Liang army! Yan Xing was stabbed in the shoulder by Li Yu's heavenly-painted halberd and fled in disarray! Li Yu seized the opportunity to order the abandonment of the siege of the Western Liang army, ordering the 130,000 Yizhou cavalry to abandon heavy supplies and infantry! Immediately, at all costs, he pursued Dong Zhuo's army! He ordered that they not fear dispersing their formation, not fear dispersing their troops, not fear sacrifice, not fear hardship, and at all costs pursue Dong Zhuo! To eliminate the enemy for the country! On the other hand, Li Yu ordered Deng Mao and Zou Dan to cooperate with Military Advisor Guo Jia and his wife Wang Xue to annihilate the Western Liang army!

  Guo Jia, this is a beautiful victory! The Western Liang army has no ability to resist at all. Three main generals, two dead and one injured. Now they only have the intention of escaping, being ordered by Guo Jia, Deng Mao and Zou Dan launched a pincer attack on both sides. Guo Jia and Wang Xue led the main force to cover up and kill from behind! In less than half a day's work, the Western Liang army flowed with blood, and the dead bodies piled up like mountains! Guo Jia captured countless horses and military supplies, and captured more than 30,000 Western Liang prisoners of war!

  Two flowers bloom, each representing a branch. At this time, Dong Zhuo's army had also arrived at the foot of Tianshui City. The 300,000-strong Dong Zhuo army arrived at Tianshui City without resting for a moment. Li Ru immediately issued an order to launch a strong attack on the city! Tianshui City was built by Dong Zhuo himself, with high and majestic walls! The city gate's thousand-pound lock was perfectly coordinated, seamless like heaven-made! It can be said that at this time, Dong Zhuo is lifting a stone to hit his own foot! He had previously lost the lower Bian city, and then forcibly recruited more than 30 million civilians to build Tianshui City! Dong Zhuo wanted to make Tianshui City a majestic fortress, blocking Liu Bei's army from entering Yizhou via the road! However, at this time, Dong Zhuo, Li Ru, Lü Bu, and others looked at the towering Tianshui City with gritted teeth and stamping feet in anger!

  Guo Si, as the former commander-in-chief, was now truly anxious, with sweat dripping from his forehead! At this moment, Guo Si was like a different person from the one at the foot of Mount Qi. Back then, during the siege, he would let Zhang Liao and Song Xian take the lead, while he himself conserved his strength in the rear. But today, Guo Si was reckless, determined to capture the city! He personally beheaded over a hundred soldiers who retreated. In the rear, he prepared a supervisory team of 10,000 soldiers, ready to execute anyone who retreated without pardon! This was also one of the reasons why Dong Zhuo's army had a sudden surge in strength in this battle! At this moment, Guo Si glared furiously at Tianshui City, where thousands of his soldiers' corpses lay beneath the city walls. The walls were stained with blood everywhere! Yet, the commander-in-chief of Tianshui City remained steadfast, unwavering in the face of the wind!

  At this time, Tian Feng and Guan Yu, Zhang Liao, Zhang Ren, and Cheng Yuanzhi climbed the city tower to boost the morale of the soldiers guarding Tianshui City. They told the Shu army that they were with them, but unlike the Shu army, they didn't need supervision. Every single one of them was fighting to defend Tianshui City.

  Tian Feng looked at the current situation from the city tower and saw that Dong Zhuo's army was overwhelming, like a vast sea of soldiers. The common saying "people and horses passing by without end" was indeed true. With an army of 300,000, their momentum was immense! Li Ru had ordered Guo Si to take the city at all costs, no matter what strategy or experience was needed.

  Tian Feng knew that Dong Zhuo's army was strong, but he also knew that they were exhausted from traveling far and would immediately launch an attack. However, Tian Feng was helpless against the sheer number of soldiers. He slapped his forehead and said, "Alas, it's too late! That traitor Li Su must have escaped under our crossbow fire and told Dong Zhuo that Tianshui City had fallen! Dong Zhuo knew that his retreat route was cut off, so he abandoned the siege of Xiangyang and came to retake Tianshui City!"

  Guan Yu said, "General Tian, why worry? It's just a matter of time before our reinforcements arrive." Zhang Liao suggested, "Why don't we lead a cavalry charge and break through Dong Zhuo's army?" Zhang Ren advised, "We have crossbows and catapults in hand, what are we afraid of? Why not order the soldiers to bring them up to the city wall and coordinate with the defense?"

  Tian Feng nodded in agreement with Zhang Ren's suggestion.

  Lord Guan and Lord Guan Er immediately ordered Cheng Yuanzhi to take charge of this matter. Cheng Yuanzhi did not dare to slack off and immediately led a large team of people to set up the ballistae: 20 five-row, 50 four-row, 100 three-row, 150 double-row, and 200 single-row scorpion crossbows were placed on top of the city wall of Tianshui City. Another 500 stone-throwing machines were also installed at the highest point of the city wall! Everything was ready! The Dong Zhuo army attacking the city was still fighting to the death! The two armies clashed extremely fiercely, and the Dong Zhuo army also knew that if this road could not be opened, they would not be able to return home. It can be said that they were in a desperate situation! Tian Feng gave an order, commanding Zhang Ren to lead his troops to cut down trees and dig up stones to make rolling logs and stone mills to defend the city wall. Lord Guan ordered Zhang Liao to open the armory of Tianshui City, take out all the bows and arrows in the treasury, and prepare to defend Tianshui City to the death! Lord Guan also ordered his soldiers to boil water and pour it down on the Dong Zhuo army when they attacked the city, scalding the Dong Zhuo army's soldiers! What kind of war is the most brutal? It is a siege war. Both sides fight to the death for the city, with heavy casualties accumulating. Although Tianshui City was high and grand, Lord Guan Er's Yizhou army had a strong fighting force, but as the saying goes, "one man sacrifices himself, and a hundred men cannot be defeated." At this time, the Dong Zhuo army soldiers all understood that they had no way to retreat and could only fight to the death!

  Not long after, Cheng Yu returned to report to Guan Yu and said: "Report to the Second General, I have now set up and prepared all the crossbows and catapults, ready to strike Dong Zhuo's army at any time! Please instruct the Second General!"

  "General Guan gazed at the situation and spoke, "How many crossbow arrows do our troops have left?" Cheng Yuanzhi replied, "Reporting to General Guan, in the last battle with Li Su, we used 19,000 crossbow arrows. We recovered 8,355 arrows afterwards. Adding the stored arrows, we still have a total of 53,271 arrows!"

  "General Guan stroked his beard, narrowed his phoenix eyes and pondered for a moment before saying: 'At this critical juncture of the two armies' decisive battle, it's either you die or I perish. We mustn't show any mercy! Order 10,000 infantrymen to immediately switch to deploying crossbow catapults and bows! From now on, our army doesn't care how many crossbow arrows are left - shoot them all off! Shoot fiercely for me! Also, please ask the blacksmiths inside Tian Shui City to provide a few sample crossbow arrows. Ask them to urgently manufacture as many as we need, no matter how many!'"

  Cheng Yuanshi opened his mouth and said: "Your order! The arrangement has been made!"

  Guan Er Ye personally held the flag commanding the crossbow cannon, Tian Feng stood beside him holding the flag of the stone-throwing machine. The two were determined to work together well in this battle! They looked at each other simultaneously, as if telling each other that they were ready and could start fighting at any time!

  The Second Master Guan held the banner of command, lightly raised it above his head, and swung it down with all his might!

  Military advisor Tian Feng also raised the flag commanding the catapults over his head and waved it downwards with all his might!

  The two men nodded, and all the catapults and trebuchets in the army began to fire!

  "Number one ready, number two ready, number three ready, number four ready...!" shouted the soldiers near the catapults and ballistae.

  Cheng Yu saw the command flags of General Guan and Military Advisor Tian Feng, and loudly shouted: "Launch all crossbow bolts! Launch all stone-throwing machines!"

  All the soldiers did not dare to slack off, and immediately pulled the trigger! The sky was filled with crossbow arrows and stones, and the attack on Dong Zhuo's army began! The speed of the crossbow arrows was much faster than that of the stones! The crossbow arrows came in waves, blocking out the sun, like a solar eclipse, allowing very little sunlight to shine on the faces of the soldiers led by Guo Si! The sky above the city seemed to have suddenly turned dark! The crossbow arrows were generally about two to three meters long! At this time, Tian Feng simultaneously coordinated with General Guan Yu's orders, and all the crossbows and catapults fired at the same time. What a concept! Five rows of crossbow cannons had 100 arrows each, four rows had 80 arrows each, three rows had 60 arrows each, two rows had 40 arrows each, and single-row crossbow cannons had 20 arrows each! At this time, Tian Feng's five-row crossbows had 20 bases, four-row crossbows had 50 bases, three-row crossbows had 100 bases, double-row crossbows had 150 bases, and single-row crossbows had 200 bases. Others thought that the crossbow arrows blocking out the sunlight was an exaggeration, but let's calculate how many arrows were fired at the same time - 19,000 arrows! Guo Si's army of 100,000 soldiers suffered a loss of about 10,000 men at this time. At this time, Guo Si also realized that he had encountered Liu Bei's secret weapon, as Li Su had said! But Guo Si's reaction was faster than Li Su's. When he saw the small black dots quickly moving towards him, he immediately retreated on horseback and ordered all his soldiers to hold up their shields to block the crossbow arrows! However, Dong Zhuo's army was caught off guard by the sudden change, and many people were stunned, watching this spectacular scene in a daze! They did not realize the danger that had arrived! The speed of the crossbow arrows was too fast, whizzing through the air with a loud whoosh! A soldier on horseback heard a "thud" sound, and an arrow pierced his body, shooting into the back of another soldier, without slowing down, piercing three or four people at once, and pinning them together. The 19,000 crossbow arrows whizzed through the air, and some soldiers in Dong Zhuo's army were lucky enough to crawl on the ground and escape this disaster! But it can be said that the scene was like a field of corpses, because Guo Si retreated quickly on horseback and escaped this disaster. However, many shield-bearing soldiers in front did not have such good luck. Guo Si personally witnessed several arrows piercing through shields and into their bodies. It can be said that at this time, Guo Si had a deep impression, which was also the shadow in his heart from then on. From then on, whenever Guo Si and Li Su saw crossbow arrows, they would be frightened to the point of trembling! At this time, the ground below the city wall was filled with blood, and corpses piled up like mountains! In just an instant, Guo Si realized that the first batch of soldiers he had assigned to attack the city might have been almost wiped out. Indeed, at this time, Guo Si's first batch of attacking soldiers had fewer than 3,000 men left. However, Guo Si understood that he could not stop now, so he did not stop at all. Many soldiers began to retreat after seeing Liu Bei's crossbow cannons, but Guo Si was even more ruthless, ordering his 10,000-strong supervisory team to shoot arrows and force them to return! But because of Guo Si's ruthlessness, the stones shot from the catapults that followed soon after caused a disaster for the already heavily damaged first batch of attacking soldiers! At this time, the stones whizzed through the air! Some soldiers who were far away and had escaped the crossbow arrows by hiding on the ground were lucky enough to have survived. But they did not realize that death was not yet over. The 500 catapults shot large stones from the sky, raining down on them! Some Dong Zhuo soldiers who had crawled on the ground and escaped this disaster did not even have time to celebrate before being hit by stones - some were crushed on their bodies, others on their heads, and some lost arms or legs. The scene was extremely bloody! Now it can be said that the area below the city wall had become a hellish place, a slaughterhouse that harvested lives! This was a massacre, a one-sided massacre! The cruelty was unimaginable!

  This time the attack, let Guo Si's first batch of troops attack the city, leaving less than 2,000 people. At this time, Guo Si immediately drew his sword and ordered the second batch of 20,000 soldiers to start a strong attack on Tianshui City in coordination with the first batch! However, something unexpected happened, because Liu Bei's army didn't stop at all! Tian Feng and Guan Yu had already discussed and coordinated an attack with scorpions and catapults! Ordered "Two Zhang" Zhang Liao and Zhang Ren to lead 20,000 cavalrymen to charge and kill Dong Zhuo's army, and when Dong Zhuo's army was about to approach, they retreated back to Tianshui City to expand the battle results!

  Guo Si did not expect that at this time, Zhang Ren and Zhang Liao would lead 20,000 cavalrymen to charge out. Guo Si looked at Zhang Liao again! He was wearing a black gold armor, with a black battle robe outside! Wearing a black gold helmet! Holding his own precious horse, holding a steel knife! Personally led the sword to charge over! And Zhang Ren was even more handsome, wearing white armor and white helmet, holding a steel spear, charging in a goose formation! Guo Si smiled at this time, thinking that the two of them were ignorant of life and death. It's really Yan Wang calling you three times dead, and the water people leaving you until five times! How dare you come to kill with so many horses! At this time, Guo Si did not hesitate to wave his hand immediately, ordering the whole army to attack and wipe out Zhang Liao and Zhang Ren's 40,000 cavalrymen! And he informed Li Ru in the rear array, requesting that Lord Lv Bu come to assist in the battle! Guo Si was very clear about Zhang Liao's ability, absolutely not something he could handle. Moreover, Zhang Ren was also a famous general of Yizhou at that time! Guo Si's greatest advantage is his cowardice! He felt that if there was no guarantee, he would never do it! So because of this one advantage, Guo Si can live longer than his master Dong Zhuo!

  Tian Feng's eyes were fixed intently on the changing situation of the two armies clashing, as he thought about how to drag out until the arrival of Li Yu's army!