Li Qianqiu and the empress were waiting with a group of winged cavalry warriors. Looking at the guard who was holding the box behind Ren Baqian, they were all guessing what was inside.
Ren Baqian ordered the bodyguard to open up the box, which revealed numerous rows of black tubes.
They were quite small, about the length of a palm, and had a diameter of about 2.5 centimeters.
"Principal Ren, what are these?" Li Qianqiu asked in curiosity as he fiddled around with one of the tubes in his hand.
"Explosives!" Ren Baqian giggled.
He had received this bunch of explosives back on Earth from the same supplier who had sold him the guns in the past. It was categorized into two layers, internal and external. In the core, there were 300 grams of TNT explosives, whereas the external portion was filled with gunpowder. Once ignited with fire, the pressure caused by the explosion of the gunpowder would then detonate the TNT.
These things was originally intended for mining use, and 300 of them had been prepared. This box comprised half of the total. They ended up not being utilized and were brought along on this trip from Lan City. At this moment, they could be put to good use.
"Explosives?" Li Qianqiu had some doubts.
The empress had a little knowledge about what explosives were, but she also had no idea how to use them.
"You will find out in a while." After Ren Baqian finished talking, everyone started going up the city wall again.
Ren Baqian squatted down, tied the explosives to a few long arrows, and cut short the fuse at the back of them. He then lifted his head and said to Li Qianqiu, "Sir Li, in a while, I'll have to trouble you to find someone to fire this arrow to the bottom of the enemy's catapult."
"I'll do it!" Li Qianqiu was unwilling to pass on the task.
In fact, for a distance of over 200 meters, almost every aboriginal who grew up hunting in the mountains was able to shoot this far.
However, he very much wanted to see what tricks Ren Baqian had up his sleeves this time.
Ren Baqian had prepared a total of 22 arrows, and the enemies had 20 catapults scattered around Liao City.
After the preparation was done, Ren Baqian handed the bow and arrow over to Li Qianqiu. Before Ren Baqian could even speak, the bone arrow transformed into a streaky white line and screeched through the sky, landing on a catapult.
Ren Baqian, "..."
Li Qianqiu was filled with anticipation and after waiting for 10 seconds, he asked, "Why isn't there any reaction?"
"The fuse wasn't lit..." Ren Baqian was speechless.
"I forgot, I forgot!" Li Qianqiu laughed,picked up another bone arrow, and mounted it on the bow again.
Ren Baqian sent for another person to bring a torch to light the fuse before hurriedly saying, "Done. Fire!"
The fuse had 10 centimeters remaining and, by right, should have no problem lasting over 10 seconds. However, he was afraid that there might be problems with the fuse. If the fuse burned too fast, there might be huge trouble at that time.
Li Qianqiu released his finger as soon as Ren Baqian's words sounded. The bone arrow once again screeched over 200 meters through the skies and landed on a catapult.
Following which, Li Qianqiu looked at Ren Baqian and gave him a questioning look.
"Wait!" Ren Baqian looked in that direction with a pair of binoculars, but couldn't see clearly whether the fuse was still burning.
After a short while, however, a thunderous boom sounded from the location of the Great Xia army. All of a sudden, a blaze erupted toward the sky, and in an instant, the catapult was reduced to a fragmented mess. The fragments shot everywhere, colliding against the metal shields at the front of the battle formation and giving off loud clangs.
The few soldiers who were reloading the ammunition around the catapult had all been flung away by the shockwave of the explosion. Two of them, who had been closer to the catapult, were blasted into pieces with their body parts scattered all over.
Boom! Even before the Great Xia army could recover from the shock, another explosion occurred within their lines. This was from the first tube of explosives which had been shot before lighting up its fuse. It got blown away, landed within their battle formation, and exploded. Soldiers who were within its blast radius all had been flung away by the explosion. Those who were within a five meter radius immediately got blasted to smithereens.
Upon witnessing this sight from atop the city wall, Li Qianqiu immediately exclaimed in exultation, "Good stuff!"
"We shall use this box of explosives sparingly and mainly to tackle the weapons that they have been using to besiege our city. Without their siege weapons, they probably won't have any other methods besides surrounding the walls. By wasting time here, they will probably have to consume a huge amount of rations as well," Ren Baqian warned, afraid that Li Qianqiu would extravagantly use these explosives.
"With this thing, regardless of how many men they send our way, they will only be able to watch from below." Li Qianqiu laughed heartily as he pat on Ren Baqian's shoulders.
Following which, he handed the bone arrows to a few guards so that they could do what he just did.
After witnessing the explosion within the Great Xia battle formation, those guards carefully lit up the fuses and immediately fired the bone arrows across because they were afraid that the explosives might detonate in their own hands.
A fiery blaze and thunderous explosion could be witnessed from the Great Xia battle formation around every minute or so.
After just a short while, six catapults from the east side of Lan City had crumbled into piles of fragmented wood. After that, explosions could also be heard coming from far north of the city followed by blasts from the east.
After a brief period of time, all of Great Xia's catapults had been reduced to fragmented wood. Hundreds of soldiers had also either been blasted to death by the explosives or injured by the flying wooden shrapnel.
"Keep a close watch on this box and keep it safe. You will be responsible if anything happens," Li Qianqiu warned the guards standing behind him.
"Don't worry, Protector General."
"Don't ever let it come close to an open fire or bump against it. Be sure to keep it safely away. Keep it somewhere dry and cool. Also, remember not to let it come into contact with fire at all costs," Ren Baqian warned and urged repeatedly. The people on Earth knew how dangerous these things were. They must never be exposed to fire. However, the people of Dayao somehow made him feel a little uneasy.
If this thing were to explode, a quarter of Liao City would probably turn into scrap.
"Rest assured, Sir." The bodyguard behind him cupped his hands.
Since those catapults had been destroyed, it seemed like Great Xia wouldn't be launching any more attacks today. While Li Qianqiu continued with his investigation from the city wall, Ren Baqian followed the empress back to the city commander's residence.
"Your Majesty appears to have lost weight," Ren Baqian uttered gibberish on the journey back. The empress wasn't an ordinary person, so she naturally wouldn't gain or lose weight when she ate more or less.
The empress actually enjoyed the compliment and took a quick glance at him.
All the guards behind them looked up at the sky and acted as if they didn't hear a thing.
...
To the north of Liao City, there was a huge tent at the rear of the camp of the thousands of Great Xia soldiers. A 50 year old high ranking military officer with long hair and a beard stood in front of a long table. He was looking at a map on the table while making a few gestures with his fingers occasionally.
"Great general!" A middle aged person with the looks of a scholar entered the tent with his hands cupped.
In the tent was the commander of the 70,000 soldiers who were attacking south. He was called Wu Shenghou, the champion general.
His reputation in Great Xia was a far cry from Hong Wu's in Dayao, but that was because in the south, Great Xia hadn't been attacked for 70 years. In reality, he was very well known in the imperial court and was also in the top three of the military.
Within the short time span of a few decades, he had been promoted from a commoner to a standard class, rank 3 general. Given the status of Wu Shenghou, he could oversee almost everything.
After defending the borders and preparing for over 20 years, so much so that he even dreamt about attacking Dayao, he could now finally fulfill his lifelong wish. Currently, the situation of the battle was still as he had expected. What happened next would have to depend on which party was the smarter one.
"How is the condition of Lu Pinghai's injury?" Wu Shenghou asked without even lifting his head.
"Great general, Lu Pinghai has recovered a little, and his condition will be back to normal in about a month's time." The scholar cupped his hands.
"Still in time," Wu Shenghou replied softly.
"Li Yuanzhu has responded, but she still hasn't agreed," the scholar added.
"As expected." Wu Shenghou wasn't surprised.
"Has Lu Zijian been located?"
"There still isn't any news of him yet," the scholar answered. Lu Zijian, ranked second strongest in the world, had always been very secretive regarding his whereabouts.
As for the world's strongest, Lin Xian, it had already been many years since he last appeared. Many people suspected that he was already dead or that he had made a breakthrough to the legendary realm.
"Do you think that Qi Zixiao will leave Liao City?" Wu Shenghou asked casually.
"Definitely not! If she leaves Liao City, she will be abandoning the thousands of soldiers and commoners there. Qi Zixiao will never do something like that unless she was faced with a life and death situation. Based on the current situation she is facing, it is impossible for her to leave," the scholar replied firmly.
Wu Shenghou nodded because he had the same thoughts as the scholar.
It would probably be too late by the time she wanted to leave.
Wu Shenghou moved his finger from one point on the map to another before eventually pressing on one of the points. That was his target.
Not only was this the singular path that the people from Lan City and the Protector General of the North had to travel on, but this was also the only path that the reinforcement troops from the Protector General of the East and North could take.
By occupying this location, even if Qi Zixiao could flee, she would also be abandoning the entire piece of fertile land in the north.
"Is there any news from the Yun Nation?"
"Their court is still in a state of unrest," the scholar gently replied.
"Have they forgotten how their nation was almost destroyed by that bunch of barbarians?" Wu Shenghou sneered in disdain. "That bunch of fellows who pass off as merchants..."
"Even without them, the great general has already been preparing for so long. Taking down Dayao isn't exactly impossible." The scholar immediately added, "Lan City's wall is merely six meters thick. These catapults will already be able to shatter Liao City."
One had to know that the city walls of Tiesuo Pass, Shun City, and Ziyue City in the north were all at least 20 meters thick. The walls of Tiesuo Pass even reached up to 30 meters thick, whereas the walls of Lan City were only six meters thick. A couple of shots from a catapult would already shatter a hole in it.
"We can't enter even if the wall is shattered!" Wu Shenghou said in a dull tone.
In a place such as a city, the aboriginals were able to display their immaculate strength. Wu Shenghou would rather let the aboriginals starve to death inside the city than let his soldiers enter and fight with them. He was afraid that even the aboriginal commoners would be able to inflict quite a lot of damage.
Needless to say, the winged cavalry was in the city as well.
However, if they were able to shatter the walls, the cannons that they had manufactured could probably be put to use.
At the thought of having another weapon at his disposal, such as the artillery shell called the Thousand Flower Bomb, Wu Shenghou felt that the imperial court needed to generously reward those smiths.
Just while the both of them were chatting, they heard a loud sound coming from afar, something that was different from the noise of giant rocks smashing into the walls.
"Which bastard used the Thunder Cannon?" Upon hearing such an explosion, Wu Shenghou immediately thought of the Godly Fire Cannon and the so-called Thunder Fire Powder which was kept in the army.
Soon after, Wu Shenghou overruled that thought. Without his order, who would dare to use the Thunder Cannon?
Just as he walked out of the tent, he heard another thunderous sound coming from the front of the battle formation.
Boom!
Wu Shenghou frowned. What on earth was going on? This was clearly the sound that was made when the Thunder Cannon was fired. However, it was still very loud even though it was so far away. It also sounded much louder when compared to the Thunder Cannon.
Before he could even figure it out, a few more thunderous sounds could again be heard from ahead.
"Someone go and take a look to see what's happening," Wu Shenghu said with a heavy voice.
After 15 minutes, a commander wearing metal armor entered the tent and knelt on one knee. "Great general, I'm not sure what happened, but the catapults suddenly exploded into balls of flames without any reason. The impacts were very strong, and the catapults have completely been destroyed."
Another 15 minutes later, people rushed in from the east and west to report their situations as well. The catapults from both of these sides had also been destroyed.
"What kind of methods are those barbarians using?" Wu Shenghou's face turned black. He never thought that those barbarians were actually capable of these unknown methods.