On May 11, 957, Zhao Kuangyin was transferred from Tongzhou to the Jiedushi Governor of Yicheng Army of Huazhou. On October 16, Wang Pu was left as the leader of Tokyo. On the 19th, Chai Rong left Daliang City and embarked on the journey of three expeditions to Huainan. On the night of November 4, he crossed the Huai River and came to the city of Haozhou on the 5th.

Shouzhou was defeated and Liu Renzhan was dead. Who else could resist Chai Rong's army in the Southern Tang Dynasty? It should be said that there were still two. Guo Tingwei, the governor of Haozhou, was one of them. Just half a year ago, Guo Tingwei won two consecutive victories. The floating bridge at the vortex was burned by him, and another sneak attack in Dingyuan. The Zhou army was wiped out, and Wu Xingde was saved only. On July 2, Chai Rong, who was in Daliang City at that time, dealt with two defeated generals and deprived their governors. Wu Xingde was the general of the left guard, and Li Jixun (a general who was defeated by Liu Renzhan in the south of Shouzhou City) was the general of the right guard.

On November 6, 957, Chai Rong came to meet Guo Ting himself. Haozhou City was hardly set up for defense, and it was not so easy to break. In addition to the main city, there were two villages outside the city that supported each other and echoed each other. The pioneer Kang Baoyi and hundreds of Zhou soldiers were probably going to be monsters by the Tang soldiers: they actually waded by camels (can the Desert Boat really be a water boat envoy? Seeing this record in Tongjian, I can only say: Chai Rong, you are a monster), and captured a corner in the northeast of Haozhou City. On the 11th

Wang Shenqi broke through another corner in the north of Haozhou City. Now Haozhou has become an isolated city. Guo Tingwei's half a year of hard work was gone. At this time, Guo Tingwei thought of the last plan. On the 14th, he wrote a letter to Chai Rong, expressing his willingness to surrender. He only proposed a condition for Chai Rong, saying that his family members were all in Jiangnan, and asked Chai Rong to let him take out his family first and then open the city to surrender. Chai Rong understood. This is not to take over the family, but to ask for reinforcements, right? Very good! Then treat your Haozhou as the second Shouzhou, see how many reinforcements you have in Li Jing?

Chai Rong ordered the envoy of Haozhou to go back to Jinling. He stopped attacking him. He just ordered Li Chongjin to surround Haozhou and go east along the Huai River to fight for reinforcements. On the 21st, at the battle at the cave entrance, five thousand soldiers died and two thousand surrendered, and three hundred warships returned to Zhouying. All the reinforcements were annihilated.

On November 23, Chai Rong came to the city of Sizhou, and Zhao Kuangyin led the way. The gate of Sizhou was burned, and the water camp and Yuecheng were both destroyed. On December 3, the Sizhou garrison Fan Zaihui surrendered. Chai Rong won 1 state.

After taking Sizhou, Chai Rong and Zhao Kuangyin started a competition to divide the shore and attack the enemy. He was on the north bank of the Huai River, and Zhao was on the south bank of the Huai River, and the navy went down the Huai River, chasing all the way. On the 9th, he chased to the northwest of Chuzhou and met Chen Chengzhao, the last reinforcement of Tang. OK! You are the support envoy of Haosi Chuhai. Now that Sizhou has been sent, you don’t have to go to support. But your main force should be the one who helped Hao! What’s the reason for you to stop fighting in Chuzhou? Chen Chengzhao, who did not go to support, immediately tasted the taste of no one coming to support. In the last battle, all the reinforcements of the Southern Tang Dynasty were annihilated, but Chai Rong still seized more than 300 warships and more than 7,000 surrendered troops. Chen Chengzhao had such a strong force and did not dare to fight Chai Rong head-on. It is really a pity.

Guo Tingwei, in Haozhou City, had hopes destroyed, so he had to order Li Yan and Zou Cao to surrender. "A real man will never let down the country and make surrender for the traitor" was Li Yanzou's last sentence before being killed by Guo Tingwei. On December 9, Guo Tingwei surrendered, and Chai Rong won two states! On the 18th, Chai Rong summoned Guo Tingwei in the Chuzhou Palace and enlightened him, "Since my southern expedition, you can only break my Wokou floating bridge and break my Dingyuan Army Camp. You are enough to repay Li Jing. Moreover, the small city of Haozhou has been exhausted. Even if Li Jing comes to guard it personally, it will not be so." (Chai Rong could not predict that 395 years later will be the time when Haozhou is truly prosperous. That year, another Haozhou man named Guo will raise an army here. A son-in-law of Haozhou, a surname of Zhu, will write a legend in Chinese history from a cattle herding kid, a monk, a beggar to a founding emperor)

On December 10, Chai Rong personally went to Chuzhou. Chai Rong would not have expected that the garrison of Chuzhou Zhang Yanqing would be two nightmares that he was tied with Liu Renshan, Shouzhou among his three expeditions in Huainan... Chai Rong confronted Zhang Yanqing in Chuzhou and sent other Zhou generals to siege the land everywhere. On December 21, Wu Shouqi came to report to obtain Yangzhou and conquered Taizhou on the 25th. On the 5th of the first lunar month of the following year (958), Wang Hanzhang captured Haizhou. Chai Rong had already won 5 states!

In the late first month of the fifth year of Zhou Xiande (958), Chai Rong had been surrounded outside Chuzhou City for 40 days. On this day, Zhang Yanqing led the generals to the tower to observe the situation. One of them advised him that it was nothing more than that Zhou soldiers were strong and Tang soldiers were weak. There was no help from the lonely city, so it was better to surrender early. Zhang Yanqing turned around and said to the generals: Look at me. The generals were puzzled, and the generals had no flowers on their faces. What was there to look good? Immediately, a blood flower splashed out!

Zhang Yanqing cut off the head of the persuasion with just one sword. Then he looked around the generals, "This is my son Zhang Guangzuo, who advised me to surrender to Zhou. I will never surrender if I receive the favor of the Li family! Chuzhou City is there, people will be destroyed, I will die! Whoever wants to persuade me will end up like my son." All the generals cried. But they didn't know whether it was for the young master of the Zhang family who lost his head or for his dark future.

The last moment finally came. On the 25th of the first lunar month, the city of Chuzhou was broken. The commander Zhang Yanqing and the military supervisor Zheng Zhaoye fought a street battle in Chuzhou with the last thousand people. In the end, Zhang Yanqing, who had used up all the weapons and bows, actually raised the rope bed (I don’t understand what it was, probably similar to today’s folding bench), and died in vain. More than a thousand people were killed in battle, and none of them surrendered!

Chai Rong was angry! The "Five Generations' No. 1 Heroes" made the most unforgivable mistake in his life: he issued a city slaughter order! For a moment, the whole city cried and howled, all the residents in the city were slaughtered, and all the houses were put to ashes...

Although in the long history of China, examples of slaughtering the city after siege are not new. Xiang Yu and Cao Cao have done it. Genghis Khan must slaughter every city. Later Qing soldiers did it a lot. But this happened to Chai Rong, which still makes people feel extremely regretful... After all, Chai Rong has established military disciplines that do not disturb the people or plunder the people since the beginning of the conquest of Huainan. After all, Chai Rong, we are called the wise ruler...

Okay! Let the Battle of Huainan end at this tragic peak. If you continue to fight, your heroes will be happy and our people will suffer.

On February 6, 958, the fifth year of Zhou Xiande (958), Chai Rong left Chuzhou and came to Yangzhou on the 15th. On the 23rd, he received a war report from Si Chao, saying that he would attack Shuzhou with Wang Shenqi and capture Shuzhou Governor Shi Renwang. On the first day of March, Chai Rong came to Taizhou. Finally, he took a look at the results of Chai Rong's third personal expedition in four months: he obtained the six prefectures of Si, Hao, Yang, Tai, Hai, and Chu. In addition, Guangzhou obtained during the first expedition, Shouzhou obtained during the second expedition, and Chu, and the two prefectures were also the results of the same expedition, and were later recovered by the Tang army (I can't find out when these two prefectures fell into the hands of the Zhou Dynasty in history). Chai Rong now has 10 prefectures in Huainan, so it is time to have a good talk with Li Jing.

But Li Jing thought he had the Yangtze River in his hand and was unwilling to give in. But as early as the early month of the first lunar month, Chai Rong personally surveyed and drew pictures, digging a stork water northwest of Chuzhou (fortunately before the massacre of the city in Chuzhou, otherwise Chai Rong would have to dig the river in person. However, Chai Rong came here a bit like destroying bridges and unloading donkeys, and dug into a canal in the shortest ten days. It showed the strengths of Chai Rong's engineering design (he had previously been in charge of the expansion of Kaifeng City), so hundreds of warships were moored on the north bank of the Yangtze River. The Tang people were shocked and thought they were gods. On March 13, the last straw that crushed Li Jing's psychological defense line finally came. Murong Yanzhao and Song Yanwo advanced together in land and land, and defeated the Tang soldiers in Dongbuzhou at the mouth of the Yangtze River, and the Yangtze River defense line was in danger.

Li Jing was completely convinced and did not want to sit on the throne anymore. He wanted to pass on the crown prince Li Jingsui. Li Jingsui was not a fool. He knew that Li Jing wanted to put the hat of the king of the devastated country on his head, and hurriedly said, "Brother, you should give me a vassal state. If I don't become the emperor, I won't be the crown prince." Li Jing had no choice but to make Li Jingsui the King of Jin, and let him go with the defeated King of Qi Li Jingda of Liuhe, and then make his eldest son, Yan King Li Hongji, the crown prince.

Settling down his family, on March 15, Li Jing sent Chen Jue, the assistant minister of the Ministry of War, to Yingluan Town to meet Chai Rong, and was willing to offer the remaining Lu, Shu, Qi, Huang and Hanyang and Yiyang counties in Ezhou, and donate 100,000 taels of silver, 100,000 pieces of silk, 100,000 jin of tea, 200,000 shi of rice and wheat. He left the emperor's title and changed it to the lord of Jiangnan. He also avoided the taboo of the late emperor Guo Weigao's grandfather Guo Jing, changed his name to Li Jing, and used the Xiande period of the Later Zhou Dynasty. He also requested to be sent to the prince. Chai Rong stopped when he saw it and agreed readily. He just let Li Jing not pass the throne to the crown prince (or Li Yu would have no chance.

Meet. Haha) I got 14 prefectures and 60 counties in Huainan, and let Qian Chu of Wu Yue, Gao Baorong of Jingnan, and Zhou Xing of Hunan pay his respects to the three families. Chai Rong, who was proud of himself, returned to Yangzhou from Yingluan Town on March 21. On April 4, the army returned north and returned to Daliang City on the 21st. The two and a half years of battle in Huainan officially came to an end! On May 11, Zhao Kuangyin was transferred from the Yicheng Army of Huazhou to the governor of the Zhongwu Army of Xuzhou. However, Zhao Kuangyin probably couldn't be happy. Because of his wife, Zhao Dezhao's mother, Miss He Jinchan, passed away this year. (To be continued)
Chapter completed!