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Compared to Fei Qian's soldiers, the White Wave Bandits' rice balls were much more pitiful. They were basically made of mixed grains, a lump of dark, blackish stuff. Probably less than half was actual millet, with the rest being an amalgamation of some unknown leaves and roots.
A White Wave soldier stretched out his grimy, dust-covered hands to receive one, hurriedly stuffed it into his mouth, and tightly closed his lips while chewing, as if opening even a tiny gap might let grains of rice fall out.
The other soldiers were mostly in a similar state.
Such rice balls weren't available to everyone. Only those soldiers immediately preparing for battle could have them, hence they were also called head-count rice balls. After eating them, one would go fight. Naturally, it would either be oneself getting beheaded by the enemy, or oneself beheading the enemy.
Of course, if one could bring back an enemy's head, they could exchange it for several more such rice balls.
Although the White Wave Bandits had captured Yong'an city, their provisions were still too scarce. After eating their fill for a couple of days, most of the provisions were again taken under control by the various commanders, and they returned to a state of tightened belts. The immense contrast between having been full and returning to hunger was almost enough to drive a normal person mad.
After distributing the head-count rice, the personal guards brought out waterskins, giving each man a single sip. No one got a second drink. As they administered the water, they shouted, "Once inside the city, you'll get flatbreads! Pure white, snow-white flatbreads! And dried meat! Big chunks of dried meat! And it's salted dried meat!"
The White Wave soldiers at the front swallowed the water, some even licking the fingers that had held the rice ball, while staring fixedly at the dilapidated Pingyang county town, as if Pingyang had already transformed into a giant flatbread…
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Although the city walls were in ruins, climbing up the earthen slope from below wasn't that easy. Fei Qian's soldiers hadn't been idle these past few days. While the walls were old and had many collapsed sections, they had used bricks, stones, and yellow earth cleared from within the city to fill in and patch up quite a few areas.
Of course, if the White Wave forces slowly besieged and assaulted the city, these originally collapsed and hastily repaired wall sections would actually be very fragile, unable to withstand intense fighting. They would inevitably get damaged again. But the White Wave forces clearly didn't want to lay siege; they wanted to storm the city in one go.
This was a relatively good thing for Fei Qian.
Fei Qian knew full well that a war of attrition was something he couldn't afford. Therefore, he could only rely on some methods to resolve the battle quickly, in order to minimize his own losses…
Fei Qian walked along the main road roughly cleared over the past two days into the city center. Looking at the thirty personal guards waiting in readiness, these burly, broad-shouldered men were one of his trump cards this time.
"In a moment, it will be up to all of you!" Fei Qian gave a collective salute with cupped hands.
"We dare to serve our lord unto death!"
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The Yellow Turban-style frontline mobilization ended. Hu Cai's personal guards, carrying the half-empty food bags and waterskins, retreated to the rear. The White Wave soldiers tasked with the first wave of attack let out a series of bestial howls, like a pack of scavenging hyenas spotting a bleeding wound on Pingyang county town. They swarmed, charging towards the city's breach!
The slope formed by the collapsed wall was only relatively gentle at this breach, making it somewhat climbable. Other places required using both hands and feet to climb, making it basically impossible to defend against spears thrusting down from above. Therefore, after some attempts and losses at other breaches, the White Wave forces, without needing Hu Cai's orders, naturally began converging at this breach, launching a fierce assault upward.
Hu Cai, overseeing the battle, watched the fierce fighting at the breach. He glanced left and right, frowning at the congestion of soldiers piled up below the gap. He grabbed a personal guard and whispered a few instructions. The guard immediately nodded, turned, and ran toward the rear…
Soon, a group of about a hundred archers emerged from the White Wave ranks. Taking advantage of the intense battle at the wall breach, they crept close to the walls and suddenly launched a surprise arrow attack on Fei Qian's soldiers atop the wall!
"Raise shields! Raise shields!" someone shouted atop the wall, but it was already too late. Soldiers on the wall were immediately felled in large numbers. The White Wave forces cheered, seizing this gap to scramble upward!
In these times, maintaining archers was truly difficult. Most of these men were hunters from the Lüliang Mountains, painstakingly gathered by Hu Cai as his ace in the hole. Now deployed, their effect was indeed remarkable.
Before Hu Cai could revel in his success for long, suddenly, on the other side of the wall breach, many archers stood up with a rustle. Surprisingly, they didn't aim at the White Wave soldiers about to climb over, but instead directed their sharp arrows at the White Wave archers who had just launched an attack…
Ambushes were always the most effective means of inflicting casualties. The White Wave archers, who had been feeling triumphant just moments before, now tasted the flavor of arrows themselves. With no defenses prepared, over twenty were shot dead in the blink of an eye. Immediately, they were greeted by a second wave of arrow rain…
"Damn your mothers!" Hu Cai wailed miserably, his eyes almost spewing fire. He hurriedly ordered men to rush forward to cover the heavily damaged archers' retreat. These archers were treasures he had painstakingly accumulated. Losing so many in one go made his heart ache as if cut in half!
Originally, Hu Cai had only seen spearmen atop the wall and hadn't seen any archers appear, assuming there probably weren't any. He had been a bit careless, never expecting a sudden counter-attack. Archers basically had no armor or protection. In an instant, many were killed on the spot. Especially one fellow who looked like a commander—while other archers shot maybe two or three arrows, that guy shot at least seven or eight!
The archers on the wall repelled the White Wave archers, then turned to deal with the White Wave soldiers climbing the breach. Meanwhile, a fresh wave of troops from within the city reinforced the position, immediately recapturing the breach from the White Wave forces.
"Forward! Charge! Take that wall! I'll cut off the heads of these damned bastards and use them as piss-pots!" Hu Cai, enraged, ordered the second wave of soldiers to launch a fierce assault!
Since they couldn't suppress with arrows anymore, they'd take the wall by filling it with men! How many arrows could those twenty or thirty archers possibly have?
Just as Hu Cai predicted, after the archers behind the wall fired several more volleys, they gradually stopped. Seeing this, Hu Cai's White Wave soldiers, as if injected with chicken blood, suddenly regained their courage and surged upward desperately…