While Xu Xiao succeeded in beheading the commanders and easily halted the Imperial Army's attack, the other three palace gates were still engulfed in battle.
At Donghua Gate, the soldiers led by Gao Heng were also launching a fierce assault.
The Gao Family had been training private soldiers for a long time. Of course, this was not for rebellion; every great clan in this era had them.
No one had expected them to be used to attack the imperial city today.
At Donghua Gate, some Palace Front Army soldiers and palace eunuchs were resisting with all their might. Everyone knew that if the gate fell, they would lose their lives, so they fought back fiercely.
Since ancient times, regardless of the dynasty, others could survive a usurpation or rebellion.
Only the soldiers, eunuchs, and palace maids serving within the palace could not be allowed to live, in case any of them remained attached to their former master and did something irrational later.
Since the assault was being carried out by the family's private soldiers together with some Prefectural Army troops, there was none of the spectacle at Xuande Gate, where arrows had flown in volleys and soldiers had swarmed up the walls like ants.
A quarter of an hour had passed since the assault began, yet the rebels had only just reached the gate. The sight made Gao Heng anxious.
"Pass on my orders!"
"Tell them to put every last ounce of strength into it. Whoever takes the gate tower first will be rewarded with a hundred gold and a hundred mu of land."
To break into the imperial palace and stabilize the situation sooner, Gao Heng had resolved to pay dearly.
As the saying went, a handsome reward would always bring forth brave men.
At Gao Heng's command, three tall men in armor stepped forward.
"Lord Gao, let us brothers handle this. Your soldiers are a little lacking in agility."
"Very well. Since you Wang brothers are willing to act, sorry for the trouble today."
"Once it's done, besides the reward I just promised, I'll give you more."
Gao Heng wore a smile. These three men were neither soldiers nor men with a military background, but people of the jianghu through and through.
The Gao Family had spent a great deal to keep them in their household as retainers. Ordinarily, they only protected important members of the family.
It was quite good that they were willing to act today.
After all, a battlefield filled with thousands upon thousands of troops was nothing like a fight in the jianghu. No matter how formidable an expert was, one careless moment could cost him his life on the battlefield.
"Don't worry, Lord Gao. Have the soldiers fire arrows to cover us brothers. We'll charge in, scale the wall, then come back to collect your reward."
The man in the middle smiled and cupped his hands, then strode forward with his two brothers.
They had chosen their moment well. The Wang Clan's private soldiers and the Prefectural Army troops had already probed the general situation atop the gate tower and weakened its firepower in the process.
Striking now, with arrows from the army behind them providing cover, they could seize the credit for being the first to scale the wall.
Once the gate fell, tonight's great undertaking would be as good as nailed down. With that achievement to their names, the three brothers might even be able to trade it for official posts.
Then they would no longer be notorious fiends of the jianghu, but could openly and honorably serve as officials. Wouldn't that be wonderful?
With their dreams in their hearts, the three brothers summoned all their internal energy and charged toward the gate tower as swiftly as galloping horses.
A whistling sound came from the sky behind them: the promised long-range support had arrived.
As long as that dense rain of arrows kept the defenders on the wall from striking back, they could quickly reach the wall and climb the gate tower.
Once there, the martial skills of the three brothers would be enough to hold off more than half the soldiers on the tower, buying time for the assault.
But Wang Laoda, who was running in front, twitched an ear. Why was that whistling sound getting closer and closer?
Before he could think, a brother beside him shoved him aside, and an arrow landed where he had just been.
"Big brother, the arrows are falling short!"
The two brothers beside him drew the weapons they carried and channeled their internal energy, swinging continuously and barely fending off the rain of arrows for a few seconds.
Wang Laoda turned and saw that the rain of arrows filling the sky seemed to have fallen short. Instead of landing on the gate tower ahead, it was falling in the path of their charge.
What was Old Man Gao doing?
Wang Laoda was about to say something when he heard an even more piercing whistle.
Long shafts as thick as a man's arm slammed down around him, plunging straight into the earth.
"Something's wrong! Those are eight-ox crossbows! This isn't Lord Gao's army!"
Wang Laoda suddenly realized that the arm-thick shafts around him came from a deadly weapon: a siege crossbow.
Neither the Gao Family's private soldiers nor the Prefectural Army had such a weapon. In all the Northern Song, only the Imperial Army was equipped with them.
But before he could think further, he heard whistles coming ever more densely.
Then he saw crossbow bolts filling the entire sky, blotting out the heavens and the sun. There was nowhere to escape.
"No..."
At the same time, when the first rain of arrows suddenly fell on the battlefield at Donghua Gate, a cavalry unit charged in from the south.
Judging by the style of their armor, they were the Pangri and Tianwu, two Imperial Army units.
Th-this is? What did Qin Jingzhong mean by this?
Gao Heng, at the head of the army, had yet to grasp what was happening when an arrow fell from the sky and plunged straight into his shoulder.
In agony, Old Man Gao suddenly fell from his horse. Then he heard a furious shout:
"By order of the Military Command Commissioner, execute the rebels! Anyone who resists dies!!"
Before Old Man Gao could understand what had happened, the entire force fell into panic.
The rain of arrows filling the sky had already fallen among the troops, and the wolfish, tiger-fierce Imperial Army had burst into their ranks and begun slaughtering them.
"Wait, help me up! Ow..."
Old Man Gao still wanted his trusted aides beside him to help him up, but what greeted him instead was a horse's hoof trampling him.
Chaos. Everything was in chaos. The sounds of men hacking and killing and begging for mercy came from everywhere.
How could the combined private soldiers and Prefectural Army troops withstand an Imperial Army cavalry charge, much less when their enemy also had archers providing cover and deadly weapons like the eight-ox crossbows?
A dense rain of arrows fell among the troops. The Imperial Army cavalry charged to open a path, followed by infantry advancing behind a wall of shields and killing everyone they saw.
They had said only those who resisted would die, but what place did such words have on a real battlefield?
They swept through first, hacking down everyone in their path. Only those lucky enough to survive had a chance to surrender.
It was no wonder the Imperial Army soldiers fought so hard. Xu Xiao had truly terrified them.
After killing the commanders of the Pangri and Tianwu armies, Xu Xiao had given the surrendering soldiers an absolute order.
If they did not want to be held accountable afterward, they had to show their sincerity tonight.
And that sincerity naturally meant switching sides and slaughtering the other rebels.
It was not only at Donghua Gate that Imperial Army troops counterattacked. At the other two gates, Imperial Army soldiers also switched sides and charged.
Xu Xiao simply chose a unit at random and joined it, hastening the pace of the slaughter.
Stopping killing with killing, a rebellion that could have changed the dynasty was dismantled just like that.