Ten Catapults

The desert wormwood plants asked, "Do you have anything good to eat where you live?"

Zhou Wanwan said speechlessly:

"Yes, there will be orchards on the mountain in the future, and you can eat whatever you want."

And don't worry about it not being hot enough there. We have hot springs, and where there are hot springs, there must be sulfur.

It's perfect for your growth.

Desert Artemisia nodded quickly and said, "Okay, okay, I want to go! I want to go!"

The large trees carried all the ore directly up to their branches.

Then, slowly walking home, Zhou Wanwan was quite satisfied.

It took more than ten days of travel, with frequent stops along the way, to finally reach Black Wind Stronghold.

We ate and played along the way.

But as soon as they arrived at Black Wind Stronghold, Zhou Wanwan's expression changed.

The area beneath Black Wind Stronghold was pitch black; the entire forest was ablaze.

With Zhou Wanwan gone, some trees simply couldn't avoid her.

Hundreds of large trees were charred black. When they saw Zhou Wanwan return, they immediately hugged each other and cried, "Waaah... Wanwan, we were bullied!"

"My skin has been burned off! These bastards are trying to burn our entire village alive!"

"That's right! And a lot of people are shooting rockets at our mountain stronghold, boohoo..."

Zhou Wanwan asked anxiously, "So how is our mountain stronghold doing now?"

"Nothing much happened inside the stronghold, except... several houses in the stronghold burned down," a willow tree said.

Zhou Wanwan was furious, her face turning ashen. How tiring must it have been for her to move all these houses back?

These people actually dared to burn down her house.

That's outrageous!

Zhou Wanwan directly supplied energy to these trees, and soon all their black outer bark fell off, and new bark grew in their place.

Zhou Wanwan cured all the trees before returning to the mountain.

As soon as we entered the mountain stronghold, we saw Tie Niu burst into tears.

"These beasts! They burned down six houses in our mountain stronghold! And they were all the best, the very best ones, waaaaah..."

I'm so angry I haven't been able to sleep for the past two days.

Liu Su'e also came out of the house and looked at Zhou Wanwan, saying, "Wanwan, are you alright this time? You have no idea how worried your mother was at home."

Zhou Wanwan shook her head and said, "Nothing's wrong, the journey was smooth. Has anyone from Black Wind Stronghold been injured?"

Liu Su'e nodded and said:

"Indeed, two people were burned, but fortunately the burn area was not large. These beasts come every day, trying all sorts of ways to harm people."

I'm really worried right now, Wanwan. How about we try to move away?

This place is far too dangerous. Those people already know they live in Black Wind Stronghold Black Wind Stronghold and are trying every possible way to get there.

If the mountains of Black Wind Stronghold weren't so difficult to climb, these people would have rushed up long ago.

The ropes to Black Wind Stronghold have now been broken, making this place essentially isolated from the outside world.

But those people have already set their sights on them and won't let them go.

No sooner had Liu Su'e finished speaking than Liu Xiuyuan rushed in, saying, "Those people are here again, and this time they brought even more rockets."

These rockets weren't the kind you see, but rather flaming arrows.

The solution these people came up with was very simple, based on the same principle as borrowing arrows with straw boats.

Shoot arrows directly into their stronghold, and their stronghold will set on fire.

The prefect had many advisors under his command, and today they came up with an even more ingenious trick.

First, make dozens of large paper kites with sturdy frames, and then tie hollow bamboo tubes to the bottom of the kites.

The bamboo tube was filled with sulfur, saltpeter, and dried wolfsbane powder.

The wind would carry the kite directly above the village, at which point the soldiers would aim long arrows at the hemp cloth on the kite and shoot, igniting the hemp cloth with a single arrow.

When the flames are burned into the bamboo tube, the powder will ignite, and the smoke will drift into the village with the wind. The villagers who inhale it will feel dizzy, vomit, and weak all over.

That wasn't the end of it. Once the poisonous smoke had made the villagers dizzy and disoriented, the soldiers would use catapults to hurl lime powder and chili powder into the village.

The prefect's order was to kill everyone in Black Wind Stronghold.

This time, 3,000 elite soldiers were dispatched, completely surrounding Black Wind Stronghold.

It's impossible for these people to escape.

Zhou Wanwan was furious looking at the kites. Lingbao, hands on her hips, said, "You dare bully us? Let me show you what I'm capable of!"

Lingbao looked at the dozen or so pigeons on the windowsill and said, "Little pigeons, hurry up and throw the kites in the sky over there. These bad people are so annoying; they want to bully us."

Upon hearing this, the little pigeons huffed and puffed, "How can this be? We finally found a place to land!"

Other birds also took flight, and soon they carried the kites up to the heads of the group of people.

The group squinted and said, "Hey, I just saw the kite, how did it disappear in the blink of an eye?"

"Yes, I clearly saw it just now."

The strategist's expression changed drastically. "This is bad, there's danger!"

But as soon as he finished speaking, the powder beneath the kites exploded.

Bang bang bang...

Zhou Wanwan tilted her head back and said, "Isn't this just like fireworks?"

Those around her nodded in agreement, saying, "She is indeed quite beautiful."

The strategist choked and coughed repeatedly, cursing between coughs:

"You little beast, you're so cunning. You're only five years old, yet you're so treacherous."

I refuse to believe we can't take down a mountain stronghold.

The strategist suddenly covered his nose and said, "Oh no! You all quickly cover your noses, this smoke has..."

Before he could finish speaking, he collapsed to the ground.

He thought it was the powder they had put in there, but Zhou Wanwan had actually switched it long ago.

The group of tree-men formed a bridge, Zhou Wanwan led a dozen or so people across it.

She looked at these people and said:

"Wow! These are truly elite troops. Look at them, their attire is so different, and this catapult, it's clearly high-tech now."

People from Luban Village, hurry up and do some research. Can we make this kind of catapult?

But I think if we're going to do it, we should do it better.

Zhou Wanwan's eyes lit up and she said:

"I can make a lot of weapons. This kind of catapult is really too much of a waste for the people in our village, but we'll just have to make do with it!"

It's free anyway, there's no reason not to like something that's free.

Zhou Wanwan immediately pulled all ten catapults back.

The elite soldiers had all their armor stripped off.

Just kidding, in ancient times, these suits of armor were very valuable.

A suit of armor like this would cost at least 20 taels of silver.

There were 3,000 such suits of armor, which cost 60,000 taels of silver.

Who could withstand that?

Besides, Zhou Wanwan contributed to the attack, so shouldn't she gain something in return?

They took everything back to Black Wind Stronghold.