Black Corporation: Joseon

Though Zhao Bingde’s orders hadn’t yet been delivered, the Liaodong troops were moving exactly as Lee Jing-ok had hoped.

The Liaodong army’s movements were guided by two traps laid by Hyang and the Joseon army.

The first trap was the iron wire nets.

The Joseon army had laid five layers of iron wire nets. While the front three layers stretched along the Yalu River bank in front of Insan Fortress, the rear two layers extended left and right with the Insan garrison at their center.

After breaking through the three layers of wire nets, the Liaodong troops instinctively moved toward areas without nets, becoming concentrated in front of the Insan garrison.

Fortunately or unfortunately, there were structures that appeared suitable for cover scattered in front of the Insan garrison. This led the Liaodong troops to surge toward the garrison.

And this was Hyang’s second trap.

***

The second trap was the moat installed in front of the Insan garrison.

“Usually, moats involve digging into the ground…”

When first seeing Hyang’s design, all involved parties wore perplexed expressions. Until then, a moat had meant digging a wide, deep ditch around fortress walls, sometimes filled with water.

But Hyang’s moat was different. While it did follow the fortress walls, instead of digging down, it involved building stone fortifications (석축(石築, shí zhú = stone construction)) above ground.

“It serves the function of a moat perfectly.”

Hyang explained in detail to those involved.

-While stone fortifications would be built along the walls, they wouldn’t completely encircle them, instead creating intermittent passages. Additionally, they would be built in at least two layers.

This would force enemies to use these passages, preventing them from rushing the walls en masse. In other words, it would limit enemy numbers to manageable amounts for the defenders.

-The stone fortifications weren’t simply built high. Viewed from the side, they formed an almost vertical triangular cross-section only on the side facing the fortress walls.

This would prevent attackers from using the moat as cover.

-Even if attackers tried to set up artillery in the moat to assault the walls, the slope would cause shells to miss the walls and fly over them. If they forcibly lowered the angle, the gun carriages (포가(砲架, pào jià = gun carriage)) might overturn from the recoil.

-Aligning gun ports with these moats and passages would create the worst possible killing zones.

“Hmm…”

The involved parties tried to imagine it after hearing Hyang’s explanation.

Before the eyes of enemies flooding in like a tsunami would stretch maze-like structures. The confused enemies would eventually be stretched out along the maze.

Some enemies would try climbing up the sloped stone fortifications, only to be reduced to bloody pulp by showers of bird egg rounds.

The moment they emerged through the twisted passages before the fortress walls, they would face the waiting artillery and rifles spewing fire.

Everyone involved shuddered as they imagined this far.

“It would be hell on earth…”

But while that was from the attacker’s perspective, for the defenders it was the perfect strategy.

Eventually, all flatland fortresses, unlike mountain fortresses, were either newly constructed or renovated according to Hyang’s designs.

And as the involved parties had predicted, hell on earth was now unfolding before the Insan garrison.

***

“Charge!”

“Charge!”

“Uwaaaah!”

Following their commanders’ orders, the Liaodong troops charged toward the Insan garrison’s main gate with battle cries.

Viewed from above, the Insan garrison’s shape resembled two rectangles overlapped at angles.

With 2-jang (approximately 6m) high outer walls and 3-jang (approximately 9m) high inner walls overlapping, the octagonal fortress walls created eight sharp corners, with the main gate positioned on the front left side.

The fortress entrance and the garrison’s main gate were positioned across from each other with the moat area between them.

Normally, a drawbridge would connect the fortress entrance and garrison gate, serving as a passage. However, now in wartime, the drawbridge was raised and firmly secured.

Consequently, the Liaodong troops rushed into the moat area carrying traditional siege equipment like ladders and ropes.

And here, just as Hyang had predicted, the Liaodong troops became stalled.

“Move! Move!”

“Don’t push! Don’t push!”

“You! Which unit are you from?”

“Where the hell am I?”

As Liaodong troops pressed in from all directions, the moat area instantly became chaos. It became a crucible of confusion, mixing soldiers who had lost their units and were running around in confusion, soldiers trying to force their way in regardless, and soldiers hesitating out of fear of potential traps.

The Joseon army didn’t miss this moment to begin their attack.

The The cannons struck first.

Bang! Kaboom!

“Argh!”

“Guh!”

Fired at areas where soldiers were densely packed, the cannons once again lived up to its notorious reputation. With each explosion, dozens of Liaodong soldiers fell dead or wounded.

“Fall back! Fall back!”

“We can’t fall back!”

“Stop pushing!”

Liaodong soldiers who witnessed their comrades dying tried to hastily retreat, but were blocked by soldiers pressing forward from behind.

As those trying to retreat and those trying to advance became entangled, unable to move either way, another barrage of The cannons followed.

Bang! Kaboom!

Finally, the lower-ranking officers and soldiers on scene had no choice but to rush toward the fortress walls.

“Hell! There’s only one way! Charge!”

“Charge!”

At the officers’ charge orders, the soldiers unconsciously spat out curses in Korean.

“Fuck!”

“Fine! Let’s die then!”

With half-resigned determination, the soldiers threw themselves into the maze created by the moat.

There was no luxury of carefully advancing while checking for traps – it was an all-out sprint.

***

As the soldiers began their desperate sprint, the bottleneck seemed to gradually clear.

However, iron wire nets were firmly stretched across the entrance of passages facing the fortress walls.

“Cut it! Cut it!”

Soldiers wielding axes found somewhere began striking at the connections between the wire nets and their supports.

While soldiers desperately hacked at the wire nets, the grape-shot cannons aimed at the passage entrances spewed fire.

Bang!

Soldiers caught in the shower of bird egg rounds fell as chunks of meat, unable to even scream. Only unidentifiable hands remained clutching the wire nets they had tried so desperately to cut.

As the front ranks fell to the grape-shot fire, soldiers behind rushed toward the wire nets. Grabbing blood-soaked axe handles from the ground, they hacked madly just as the dead soldiers had done.

“Aaaaargh!”

Toward the soldiers swinging axes while screaming death cries with bloody tears, the grape-shot cannons spewed fire once again.

Kaboom!

***

As passages became blocked, groups of soldiers began climbing the moat walls.

The moat’s height was roughly 1.5 jang (approximately 4.5m).

While recklessly jumping down would definitely cause injury, it was a height one could safely jump from with proper preparation.

Seeing a few soldiers successfully breach the moat after running up the slope with such thoughts, other soldiers began rushing up the stone fortifications en masse.

As soldiers swarmed up, the grape-shot cannons waiting above unleashed their bird egg rounds.

Bang! Kaboom!

The soldiers who had reached the top of the stone fortifications with no cover fell back in bloody heaps.

***

As time passed, the Liaodong soldiers began breaking through the moat area as blood-stained wire nets were cut one by one.

The same was true for soldiers who had climbed the stone fortifications.

While some soldiers descended using ropes with hooks anchored in the stonework, others pressed flat against the slope, crawling forward.

As the Liaodong forces adapted, the Joseon army also changed their response.

They shortened the firing distance of the cannons while greatly reducing the wraps of fuse around the wooden valley (목곡(木谷, mù gǔ = wooden valley)).

Pop! Pop-pop! Kaboom!

The fired The cannons exploded above the prone Liaodong soldiers. Having exposed their backs by lying down, the Liaodong soldiers suffered critical casualties.

***

After such desperate struggle, the Liaodong soldiers who breached the moat began rushing toward Insan Fortress’s walls.

As many Liaodong soldiers entered the killing field between the moat and walls, the Type-Eul war wagons, which had maintained silence until then, began spewing fire all at once.

Ratatatatatat!

Blood sprayed from soldiers’ bodies and dust rose from the ground as Liaodong soldiers rushing toward the walls collapsed in waves.

“Find the blind spots!”

“Find the blind spots!”

The surviving commanders desperately ordered soldiers to find blind spots, and the soldiers frantically searched in all directions.

However, there were no blind spots in Insan Fortress’s walls.

The walls rising steeply upward were smooth without a single protrusion. The gun platforms and embrasures were also built as inward indentations. This meant there was no shadow for attacking enemies to take shelter in.

The crowning achievement of these walls was the artillery towers at eight corners. Rather than simple points, the corners resembled rhombuses attached to the walls.

The advantage gained from this design was the elimination of blind spots. If the corners had been simply pointed or rounded, it would have been difficult to properly respond to enemies clinging to the walls, but this rhomboid design allowed them to deal with such enemies.

Defense capability increased significantly as crossfire became possible from at least two neighboring towers and walls.

And increased defense capability meant, conversely, tremendous casualties for the attacking side.

As a side note, when drawing the designs, Hyang had said:

“It’s a bit awkward to say this… but those Westerners certainly knew how to kill people on the battlefield.”

***

While fierce fighting continued in front of Insan Fortress’s walls, combat hadn’t stopped in other areas.

While reckless charging had ceased, intense firefights were taking place instead.

“Kid! Ammo box!”

“Here it is!”

Along with his response, Han Il-nam tore open the ammo box lid and handed ammunition bundles inside to the sergeant and other soldiers. The sergeant, hanging around his neck a sturdy cotton strip holding 20 bullets, loaded a new round into his rifle and aimed forward.

Bang!

“Kid, what are you doing! Hurry and get new ammo boxes!”

“Y-yes, sir!”

With his response, Han Il-nam hurriedly ran along the trench. By now, Liaodong gun troops who had crossed the river had joined the battle, and occasional bullets flew in, forcing Han Il-nam to run crouched in the communication trench.

The sergeant, glancing to confirm Han Il-nam’s safe passage, immediately loaded a new round and pulled the trigger.

Bang! Ping!

“Eek!”

Momentarily startled by an enemy bullet that grazed right past him as he pulled the trigger, the sergeant quickly reloaded, aimed at enemy lines, and spat out a curse.

“Shit! Damn trenches!”

Story Arcs