Illumine Lingao (English Translation)
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Chapter 2122 - Breaching the City

By first light, the garrison inside Wuzhou had lost all will to fight.

The city had descended into chaos during the night's first half. The expulsion of women, children, and the elderly had triggered riots throughout the streets. Flames erupted and died in scattered pockets across the city—desperate militia managed to contain each outbreak before it could spread into a general conflagration. The thousand-odd Wolf Soldiers left behind to set fires and loot met resistance at every turn from supposedly "friendly" troops and militia alike. Most of their attempts at arson failed. In the night's second half, loudspeakers outside the walls began broadcasting, publicly exposing the scorched-earth plot. This stiffened civilian and militia resolve within the city. Some of the would-be arsonists considered fleeing; others, not yet ready to admit defeat, planned to mass at dawn and set coordinated fires upwind throughout the city.

With defenders and populace alike torn by conflicting fears and loyalties, morale shattered completely. The soldiers manning the northern walls existed in a state of paralyzed dread, uncertain what would happen next.

The previous day, militia had received orders from "higher authority" to clear the blocked gates—ostensibly to allow civilians to evacuate. But no civilians had departed through those gates that night. Now the gates stood open, with no orders issued to reseal them.

The barbican and main gate at Dayun Gate had been reduced to rubble in the preceding days' bombardments. With the gate unblocked, the entrance gaped like an open mouth. The defending commander ordered it re-blocked, but the militia who had so eagerly dug it open now played deaf and dumb, ignoring all orders. When threatened with violence, they looked ready to draw weapons on the spot. In the end, the gap could only be partially obstructed with knife-carts and improvised barricades.

The Hair-Bandits across the killing ground showed no signs of activity—no neighing horses, no shouted commands. Perhaps they wouldn't attack just yet.

Fearing Australian snipers, the walls remained dark save for a few minimal lanterns—no torches, no braziers. A deathly stillness hung over everything.


At that moment, Zhu Quanxing's force, assigned the main assault on the northern wall outside Dayun Gate, had completed combat preparations. The designated assault companies had consumed emergency rations and formed into columns in attack order. Scaling ladders, rope sections, and demolition charges were all distributed and ready.

His 2nd Battalion's forward position lay a mere two hundred meters from the fortifications shielding Dayun Gate. The Red Barbarian cannons on the walls had long since been silenced by counter-battery fire. Even in daylight, soldiers in the trenches need not fear Ming artillery—rather, it was sniper fire that prevented defenders from even showing their heads above the parapets.

Now the guns positioned along the forward line sat silent, artillerymen watching the dark silhouette of the walls with taut anticipation. They awaited the order to fire.

Under cover of the hour before dawn—the darkest time—the vanguard of the 2nd Battalion's light infantry company had crept to within thirty meters of the Ming fortifications on Wuzhou's northeastern flank. The riflemen moved in threes, three teams to a squad, each team in triangular formation. Squads advanced by bounds—one moved forward while the other went prone to provide suppressive fire; once the lead squad halted and dropped flat, the trailing squad rose and advanced under their cover.

The light infantry company's mission was straightforward: eliminate the fortifications covering the gate approach, ensuring the combat engineers could deliver their demolition charges.

The fortifications outside Dayun Gate had suffered catastrophic damage in the bombardments. Trenches had collapsed in multiple sections; rampart walls had caved in at numerous points. Sniper fire from light infantry had inflicted heavy casualties on any militia or soldiers sent to repair them. In the end, defenders had managed only to hastily plug the gaps with knife-carts and earth-filled wicker baskets.

A sentry on the rampart wall suddenly stiffened, sensing something amiss. He could see nothing in the pitch darkness—they dared not light torches for fear of Fubo snipers—but he could hear rustling sounds, growing louder, drawing closer.

His hair stood on end. He spun and opened his mouth: "Enemy att—"

Before he could finish, a red signal rocket suddenly arced up from the Australian lines. The eastern sky was beginning to pale. Dawn!

The attack had begun.

The officers and soldiers jolted awake by the sentry's cry peered into the gloom and saw dozens of Australians already crossing the collapsed trenches, some already scaling the rampart walls.

"Grab your weapons! They're on us!"

Amid panicked screams, the entire garrison roused. Commanders bellowed themselves hoarse, leading their personal retainers in driving soldiers up onto the ramparts.

At precisely that moment, artillerymen who had been waiting hours for this instant shoved friction primers into touchholes, hooked lanyards to the igniters, and with a sharp yank their guns roared, hurling red-hot shells in high arcs toward Dayun Gate.

The opening salvo plunged into the fortifications, shredding officers and soldiers just scrambling to their feet—bones splintered, limbs torn free. The encampment dissolved into screaming chaos.

To avoid friendly casualties, covering fire was limited to a single volley. Originally, Zhang Dapao had intended to bombard targets atop Dayun Gate's walls, but there was nothing left to hit—the gate tower had been collapsed and burned, and in places even the crenellations had been blown away. With no viable targets remaining, the guns fell silent.

Under cover of that barrage, the light infantry's lead platoon surged into the fortification in seconds. Combat engineers attached to the assault wielded axes and grappling hooks, swiftly hacking apart or dragging aside the knife-carts and baskets blocking the breaches, clearing multiple entry points. An artillery section manhandled two 12-pound mountain howitzers across the gap via planks laid down by the engineers.

Behind them, the remaining light infantry, covered by the vanguard, crossed the Ming trenches in under a minute and poured into the fortifications. Apart from a handful of sentries, most Ming soldiers garrisoning the position had been asleep. Caught utterly unprepared, many fell to bullets or bayonets before they could even reach for weapons.

The commander defending Wuzhou's northern wall had also been awakened by the thunderous gunfire. Realizing the Australians were attacking in force, he steadied himself and began organizing a counterattack.

This commander was an old adversary of the Fubo Army: Li Modao, formerly the Firearms Battalion garrison commander who had fought at Chengmai. After his flight back to the mainland, Li Modao had lacked the political acumen to advance his career. Through connections, he had managed only to secure a company-grade position in a firearms battalion under the Dongshan anti-Yao Regional Commander, barely scraping by. When the Dongshan Regional Commander's forces withdrew to Wuzhou, fate had smiled on him—he was suddenly promoted and placed in command of the newly formed "Wuzhou Firearms Battalion."

Yet this "Wuzhou Firearms Battalion" had occupied, from its inception, the most exposed position: the fortifications outside the city gate. After days of relentless bombardment, half the fortifications lay in ruins, and between casualties and desertion, he had lost half his men.

Li Modao was no paragon of loyalty, but he at least understood whose rice bowl he ate from and for whom he should fight. He had no intention of fleeing, and he kept his men from joining the looting spree—not from love of the common people, but because allowing soldiers to pillage would rapidly dissolve unit cohesion.

From the sparse gunfire, Li Modao judged that the Australians who had penetrated the fortifications couldn't be numerous. But if he didn't drive them out immediately, once the Australian main force arrived, his men would be slaughtered like sheep.

He immediately rallied his personal retainers and a group of able-bodied soldiers—roughly a hundred men, armed with swords, spears, and rattan shields. Pushing several Frankish cannons already loaded with powder and shot, they charged through the opened gap at Dayun Gate. Without hesitation they fired the cannons, then surged forward with a battle cry.

The Frankish volley dropped several Fubo Army soldiers. But by now the artillery had already dragged two 12-pound mountain howitzers through the breach. Li Modao's hundred-odd counterattacking troops ran straight into the muzzles. The howitzers erupted. Canister shot scythed through the gateway. Through smoke and screaming, the counterattack shattered instantly. Li Modao himself took a ball through the right arm, blood fountaining. He collapsed unconscious on the spot.

After the light infantry company secured the gate, the combat engineers discovered their services were unnecessary. The earth blocking the gateway had already been excavated; the gate itself had long since been demolished by gunfire. They contented themselves with using axes to clear away knife-carts and barricades.

The light infantry used bayonets to disperse defenders clustered in the sally ports and atop the walls. Fierce hand-to-hand fighting erupted in some locations, but in most cases the garrison either scattered or dropped to their knees in surrender. The militia at the north gate had displayed white flags from the outset, every man sporting a white cloth strip tied around his left arm.

"Dayun Gate is taken!" When the news reached Zhu Quanxing, he immediately ordered: "All companies proceed as planned—maximum speed!"


Inside the Rice Guild hall, Luo Yangming—who hadn't slept all night—perched atop the roof ridge, eyes bloodshot, gazing toward the booming northern quarter of the city. He hadn't known from which direction the Fubo Army would strike, but the thunder of guns from Dayun Gate told him the chiefs had launched their assault. It brought a measure of relief: once the Fubo Army attacked, the officials and their soldiers would prove nothing but clay chickens and pottery dogs.

Yet worry gnawed at him. Would the rampaging soldiers inside the city descend into complete madness? Last night had been harrowing. Rioters had looted and torched buildings everywhere. Even the Rice Guild compound had been attacked by a mob of soldiers. Fortunately, local garrison troops had been present, and the guild's masters had been willing to spend silver lavishly. After a vicious battle that left dozens of corpses and blood pooling on the ground, the masters and their families had narrowly avoided being trussed up as "fat pigs" for ransom.

But few places possessed such armed protection. The local troops' strength was finite, sufficient only to guard key installations. Many neighborhoods had held off rioters with militia formations and street barricades, managing to extinguish fires. But many other areas had been ravaged—murder, rape, robbery running unchecked. Some districts had burned before help could arrive, consuming hundreds of households. From his rooftop vantage at the Rice Guild, Luo Yangming watched flames flickering across the cityscape, heard the weeping and cursing echoing through the streets, and his heart ached as though pierced by knives. When would this man-made catastrophe finally end?

(End of Chapter)

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