ps: Thanks to denzi and psyker for their monthly passes
In May, when the river was full of water, Li Chengzhong stood on the second deck of a large boat, looking at the endless river and the waves rolling eastward, and felt the heroic feeling in his heart.
There was no "Yellow River" in ancient times. At that time, people called this water that gave birth to the Chinese civilization a "big river." Li Chengzhong didn't know when the big river became the Yellow River, but he roughly knew that it was related to
The prosperity of Guanzhong and Longyou is directly related. Especially after the Qin and Han Dynasties, the construction of Xianyang, Chang'an and even Luoyang had a very obvious destructive effect on the vegetation in the middle reaches of the Yellow River, gradually staining this clear river with the sediment of history.
But even so, many people around Li Chengzhong still call it a big river, and the water quality of the big river is not as bad as that of later generations. On the contrary, from the perspective of Li Chengzhong, a traveler, it is quite clear, at least clearer than the Yangtze River of later generations.
Ten times! Li Chengzhong also roughly knew that the fundamental "corruption" of the Yellow River should actually occur in the later Song Dynasty. In order to resist the Xixia attack, the most elite Western Army Group in the Song Dynasty fought bravely for more than a hundred years.
The two armies built endless forts, built countless weapons and equipment, and set off countless fires on this land to prevent the other side from making the same thing...
Now, Li Chengzhong is looking at the Yellow River water that is countless times clearer than later generations, and he is extremely happy. At least, he is confident that he will no longer destroy the vegetation of the Yellow River in a hundred years. The Song Dynasty is unlikely to appear again. As for the Party members, as long as they dare
Li Chengzhong's strategy has only two words - strike hard!
Yanci was already close to the mouth of the Yellow River. The river here was very wide, reaching more than ten miles. The boat sailed for a long time, but still could not see the other side. After looking at the wide river for a long time, Li Chengzhong felt a little dizzy and had to retreat to the cabin.
He took a break. When the boat finally reached the shore, he rushed down quickly and stepped on the thick soil. Only then did he slowly regain his strength.
The Khitan man was dissociated and followed closely behind him, but he collapsed directly on the soil and violently vomited.
At least 30% of the more than 1,000 people who got off the more than 70 large and small boats were vomiting, and the remaining complexions were not much better. The officers shouted feebly "whole team" while bending down and kneeling on the ground, on the river beach.
A mess.
The senior officers and soldiers of Li Chengzhong's Dizhou camp, Cangzhou Army, Huaiyue Allied Army, and Weizhou Army all came from Youzhou, Pingzhou, Guizhou, and Yingzhou. There were also a large number of Hu people from various ethnic groups outside the Pass, who were typical northerners.
As the army marched south, they were immediately hit by a sap on the Yellow River. They could not advance any further that day and had to rest on the river bank to survive. Fortunately, there were a thousand Weibo soldiers from the Weizhou Army who had crossed the river earlier to help.
Otherwise, they wouldn't even be able to get a hot meal. After all, Weizhou is close to the Yellow River, and many of these Weizhou soldiers are more or less familiar with water, so they won't be as miserable as others.
Yanci was captured seven days ago. On the first day after the city was broken, Liu Chongba gathered the elites in the city and made a second effort. He launched a counterattack outside the city. This time Liu Chongba chose the west gate. What he encountered was
The Cangzhou Army commanded by Zhong Shao faced the most powerful ace army of the Lu Long Army. Liu Chongba did not take advantage at all. Instead, Zhong Shao gathered the two cavalry battalions on the left and right and launched a roundabout cavalry flank charge. Liu Chongba
The headquarters collapsed on the spot, and of the 3,000 people who came out, less than 1,000 fled back.
That night, Liu Chongba and his Ya soldiers fled Yanci by boat, causing huge chaos in the city. Lulong's army entered the city at night and blocked most of Yanci's navy in Shuiguan before they could escape.
With this batch of ships, Li Chengzhong was able to lead his army across the river, so the army prepared various supplies, ordered all the troops and horses, and marched southward with the surrendered Yanci navy in the boats.
Unfortunately, although Li Chengzhong was worried about the war in Bochang, he could only wait where he was and was unable to rescue Bochang as expected.
The waiting time was even later than expected. It took more than 10,000 soldiers of the Cangzhou Army and the Weizhou Army three days to cross the Yellow River, and another two full days to transport grain and baggage. By the time the army could set off, it was already five days ago.
It's the end of the month. It took the army five days to cross the river, half of which was spent transporting war horses.
A group of Yuhou's staff members who were camped in Dizhou re-proposed the plan to fight south. In view of the difficulty of crossing the river and the depletion of food and grass, they suggested that the horse box of the Huaiyue coalition as the rear army should not go south and immediately return to Wuqing.
The main camp; the Waiyo Allied Forces Buxiang continued to cross the river, but the camp no longer waited. After crossing the river, the Buxiang marched directly to Bochang, striving to meet up with the camp as soon as possible.
Li Chengzhong agreed to this plan. He had previously had a dream of sweeping across Ziqing with a large cavalry group, but now it seems a bit unrealistic. Just transporting the thousands of cavalry from the Cangzhou Army, Weizhou Army and his own guard camp
We have already racked our brains to cross the river. If we need to transport the tens of thousands of war horses in the horse carriages of the Wyoming Alliance - at least the size of the Yanci naval force captured by the Lulong Army is far from affordable, let alone the tens of thousands of horses.
A war horse consumes fodder and bean cake every day.
After all, Henan is different from Hebei. There is no pasture suitable for raising horses in Henan, and it is located on the outside, and the logistics supply will definitely not be able to keep up. The original plan to go south seemed a bit whimsical. In this regard, Dizhou camp headed by Zhang Xingzhong Yu
Hou's staff members came collectively to apologize to Li Chengzhong, especially Cui He, the logistics director, who was most sincere and frightened - he had approved the logistics supply plan.
Li Chengzhong just waved his hand and reassured the generals, telling everyone that they would not follow suit again. In addition to the fact that none of the Lulong Army had any experience in crossing the river south, there was another more important reason: the law does not punish the masses.
On the first day of June, the army finally marched south under the urging of Pinglu Jiedu Deputy Envoy Li Siye. Li Siye was sent by Pinglu Jiedushi Wang Shifan, firstly to prevent Liu Chongba from going south, and secondly to coordinate Li Chengzhong's attack.
Arrival. To put it bluntly, his role is largely to lead the way.
Li Siye was very worried because the situation in Bochang was very critical. He came to pay a visit to Li Chengzhong on the day he crossed the river, and then immediately led his troops to rush to Bochang. When they arrived at the outskirts of Bochang, an army of the Xuanwu Army came to stop them. Li Siye did not fight rashly.
Instead, he waited for the Lu Long Army's brigade. But he waited and waited and did not see it. He simply left his troops where they were to confront the Xuanwu Army, and ran back to the bank of the Yellow River.
When Li Siye came back, he understood why Lu Long's army had been delayed for so long - there was too much baggage! All kinds of food, all kinds of military armor, and all kinds of equipment were piled up like mountains. Thinking about his own Pinglu army, it was shabby compared with others.
He was no different from a beggar. Just when he was drooling at the sight, he was deeply shocked by the scene in the horse camp again - there were too many war horses!
Li Siye had never seen so many war horses, thousands of horses gathered together. Just the joyful scene of horses neighing and stamping made him feel as if he was in another world. Li Siye's stunned expression fell in the eyes of the Lulong Army officer, and he was very surprised.
Naturally, he attracted a lot of disdainful looks, but instead of getting angry, he shamelessly asked how many war horses the Lu Long Army had.
When a cavalry officer told him that this was only a small part, and most of the horses could not cross the river, he was almost stupid. He was so envious that he was crazy with envy. This envy made him immediately start to make calculations in his mind, and his mind began to race.
His thoughts started to change. When he appeared in front of Li Chengzhong again, he involuntarily shortened his stature and became more respectful towards Marshal Li.
"Li Shuai, I've heard that there are many horses in Hebei, but I didn't expect there to be so many. They are really the envy of all generals." Li Siye sighed.
Li Chengzhong laughed and walked out of the commander's tent. While talking to Li Siye, he checked the preparations of each army.
Li Siye hurriedly bent down and held Li Chengzhong's arm with both hands. He was the deputy envoy of Jiedushi in the town. Being able to assume such a low posture made Li Chengzhong very happy. In the late Tang Dynasty, there were so many Jiedushi in the world.
Alas, not to mention the deputy envoy of Jiedu. And Jiedu and Jiedu are different. The big Jiedu is in charge of one party and has overwhelming power. In comparison, the life of a small Jiedu is quite difficult.
Today's vassal towns in the world are headed by the seven major festivals: Zhu Quanzhong, the governor of Xuanwu Festival, Li Keyong, the governor of Hedong Festival, Wang Jian, the governor of Xichuan Festival, Li Maozhen, the governor of Fengxiang Festival, Yang Xingmi, the governor of Huainan Festival, Qian Hao, the governor of Zhenhai Festival.
Another natural one is Lulong Jiedushi Li Chengzhong. These seven Jiedushi are also recognized as powerful vassals in the world, and each one has the strength to compete for hegemony. In fact, their authority has far exceeded the position of Jiedushi.
The imperial court had already informed the king of the meaning it contained.
The power of the second-level Jiedushi is much smaller, far less than that of the seven major Jiedushi, such as those in Shannan and Jiangnan - Du Hong, the Jiedushi of the Wuchang Army, and Zhao Kuangning, the Jiedushi of the Zhongyi Army.
, Ma Yin, the military envoy of the Wu'an Army, Lei Yanwei, the military envoy of the Wuzhen Army, and Wang Shifan, the military envoy of the Pinglu Army, etc., had few soldiers and little land, and they were just trying to protect themselves. Of course, Wang Shifan was the second military envoy.
The toughest type among them, even daring to stroke the beard of the Xuanwu Army.
The third-level Jiedushi are the trusted generals who are subordinate to the larger Jiedushi. For example, there are more than ten Jiedushi within the Xuanwu Army's sphere of influence. Almost every general under Zhu Quanzhong can be named a Jiedushi.
There were even two names. Zhu Youning was both the Jiedushi of the Jianwu Army and the Jiedushi of the Ningyuan Army. He could be regarded as a small hill in the big mountain of Xuanwu. Similar situations were also very common among the Hedong Army.
There is also a type of Jiedushi that is even less valuable. They either have no soldiers or no power. They prefer one city to one place. The reason why they can survive on their own is just because the strong town does not have the energy to care. There are also companies
I can't live alone in a corner, and I can't go to work despite being appointed by the court. I go to greet the emperor every day and receive a meager salary to support my family.
Li Siye was a deputy envoy in the second-class vassal town, and he could be considered a respectable person. Now that he was being so servile and flattering to Li Chengzhong, Li Chengzhong was of course secretly happy. He immediately smiled and said: "General Li, just follow along.
I'll take a walk and let you know which horse I see and take it away."
Li Siye's excited mouth split into a flower, and he bent even lower: "The commander-in-chief is so flattering, I really feel ashamed of Li! How did this make, this... This is what the brothers of the Lulong family have seen.
, I can’t help but laugh at Li for not knowing etiquette.”
Li Chengzhong patted his deliberately bent shoulder and said: "What are you talking about? Lu Long and Pinglu are originally one family. They were all in Yingzhou a hundred years ago. If one family does not speak the same language, General Li should not see anyone outside! By the way, your subordinates
If you are in need of horses or not, I will give you ten more!"
Li Siye's eyes were red, and he choked with sobs: "Commander, the last general, the last general can't repay you, I can only die!" (To be continued.)