Yang Zaixing hurriedly came to the temple, but he did not see the governor. He only saw a group of monks and soldiers standing in front of a side door in the atrium.
"Zhuang Quan, where is Du Tong?" Yang Zaixing walked forward quickly and asked.
"Reporting to General Yang, we are all going to the backyard with an old Zen master. Please don't disturb us."
"How long have you been there?"
"It's been almost an hour."
"It's been so long and you're still standing here?"
Yang Zaixing said angrily: "Go and invite the generals out. Tell General Zhao that he has important information."
At this time, the soldiers shouted: "Everyone is here!"
I saw Chen Qing slowly walking out from inside holding a bamboo stick. There were tears on his face and he looked very depressed.
Everyone secretly thought something was wrong, and the situation was probably not good.
Chen Qing walked out and handed the bamboo stick to the abbot, Zen Master Yonglin, "He passed away without saying a word from beginning to end."
Zen Master Yonglin took the bamboo stick. If he felt a little embarrassed, he immediately sat down cross-legged and recited sutras with a solemn expression. Behind him, hundreds of monks sat down cross-legged, put their palms together and chanted sutras, and passed away the old Zen master.
"let's go!"
Chen Qing sighed softly, turned around and walked outside the temple.
Yang Zaixing had already received some news from Zhuang Quan, and he was quite surprised. An old monk who had been in seclusion for twenty years would actually know about the arrival of the governor in advance.
"Du Tong, what did the old monk tell you?" Yang Zaixing couldn't help but ask.
"He told me where I came from and where I should go? Everything was already predestined."
Yang Zaixing scratched his head and said, "Dutong, I am totally confused."
Chen Qing smiled bitterly, "Actually, I was also confused. I had too many questions but he didn't answer them, but he got rid of them himself."
Chen Qing turned back to Zhuang Quan and said, "Donate one thousand guan to Baolun Temple for me later. From now on, I will donate 1,000 guan every year."
"I humbly obey orders!"
Chen Qing turned his eyes to the sky, still recalling in his mind the last words the old monk wrote on the table with water, "Buddha said, the past life is this life, everything is destined by cause and effect, come and see me again in twenty years!"
At this moment, Chen Qing's eyes became even more confused.
...........
Back at the resting place, it was almost dusk, and Zhao Xiaoyi was still waiting anxiously.
"Tell me! What's going on?"
Chen Qing has returned to normal, and his mood has quickly adjusted back from the loneliness in the temple.
Zhao Xiaoyi said quickly: "The eight thousand puppet Qi troops in Yiling have begun to evacuate, but they don't seem to be evacuating to Xiangyang."
"Why do you know it's not Xiangyang?"
"To go to Xiangyang, they should take the official road to the north, but they took the official road to the east, probably to Changlin County."
Chen Qing spread out the map on a big stone and found the official road from Yiling to Changlin County. The distance was about three hundred miles. The cavalry could arrive in one day and one night, but the infantry would have to walk at least two days and two nights.
"When did they set off?"
"We'll start setting off after lunch."
Chen Qing put away the map and said to Yang Zaixing: "Send my order, the whole army packs up their belongings and prepares to set off!"
The exchange with the old Zen master did not bring much compassion to Chen Qing. On the contrary, the murderous intention in his heart became even stronger.
This puppet Qi army that attacked Yiling also participated in the encirclement and suppression of Wang Yan's army.
.........
On the official road east of Yiling County, a Puppet Qi force of 8,000 people was marching hard. The 8,000 people were infantry. Each of them was carrying at least more than 40 kilograms of luggage, including dry food, water hyacinth, military blankets, and shields.
, bows and arrows, swords and spears.
The heaviest among them is the spear, which also has a sheath, otherwise the sharp spear will easily hurt other soldiers. The spear alone with the sheath weighs twenty kilograms, the shield weighs eight kilograms, and the sword with the sheath weighs six
The bow and arrows and arrow pot also weigh six or seven kilograms.
In addition to the dry food and extremely heavy armor that must be carried, how can the soldiers not have difficulty marching?
Chen Qing made special reforms last year for this purpose. Except for the spear infantry, the spears in other armies were all changed to short spears, from one foot and three feet to eight feet, and the spear scabbard was also cancelled, which greatly reduced the soldiers' fatigue.
burden.
At nightfall, the soldiers really couldn't stand it anymore, so the commander-in-chief Jing Chao ordered the whole army to rest where they were.
The exhausted soldiers took off all their burdens. Many soldiers even took off their armor, put their leather armor underneath, used their helmets as pillows, wrapped them in blankets and fell asleep.
The commander-in-chief Jing Chao was a little unable to sleep. Jing Chao was originally a Du Yuhou in the Xiang Army of the Song Dynasty. He was a civilian general in charge of material transportation in Hebei. He later surrendered to Liu Yu and was appointed as the governor of the capital. However, he was unlucky, and Yue Fei
After fighting, he was defeated in a row and was demoted to commander.
This time he followed Dong Xian in the battle and was assigned to attack Yiling and be responsible for opening up the Xiazhou Passage. However, Jing Chao's ability was indeed mediocre. Facing the tall and strong city wall of Yiling City, he did not bring siege weapons and was at a loss to do anything.
He was waiting for the logistics to transport siege weapons, but he did not consider cutting down the wood to make a siege ladder himself.
Fortunately, Wan Yanchang came and canceled the plan to attack Yiling, which made Jing Chao breathe a long sigh of relief.
Dong Xian's transfer order to him clearly required him to arrange defenses at night to prevent enemy forces from sneak attacks at night.
What Dong Xian meant was that he was required to set up the camp at night, surround the camp with fences, build sentinel towers, set up tents, and send out patrols. Everything must be done in a regular manner. This is called defense arrangement.
But it is easy to say, but not so easy to do. The soldiers marched for more than 40 miles in one breath, carrying forty or fifty kilograms of luggage. They were so tired that they couldn't bear it. They fell down and couldn't move. They didn't even have the strength to eat.
, where do you still have the energy to set up camp and set up camp? It’s just standing and talking without back pain.
However, Jing Chao still sent more than 100 patrols to look around.
At the second watch, all the soldiers entered a deep sleep state, and even the commander-in-chief Jing Chao fell asleep.
At this time, a few miles away to the south, a cavalry army was moving here silently. As long as the soldiers slowed down and moved slowly, basically the ground would not shake, and there would be no thunder-like noise, but there would be
The cacophony of war horses could be heard for about a hundred or two hundred steps at most.
There were more than twenty sentry posts in the south. At this time, they were all killed one by one by the Song army's scouts. The puppet Qi army had lost its peripheral vigilance.
The cavalry was getting closer and closer to the camp. The distance was only 200 steps. Chen Qing had even seen the enemy soldiers covering the ground 200 steps away.
He slowly straightened his waist and suddenly shouted: "Kill me!"
The 10,000 cavalrymen suddenly launched into action and charged towards the Puppet Qi Army's camp 200 meters away. With thousands of horses galloping and murderous intent, the 10,000 cavalrymen were like a sandstorm appearing from the sky, overwhelmingly sweeping towards the Puppet Qi Army that was just a short distance away.
The spear pierced the chest, the sword broke the neck, and the iron hoof crushed the bones. There were screams everywhere in the wilderness. The sleeping soldiers were finally awakened. They were so frightened that they got up and ran. At this moment, no matter how exhausted they were,
I can't resist the fear of death.
The wilderness was full of fleeing Puppet Qi soldiers. They were shouting in fear and running desperately. The cavalry chased and killed them behind them without mercy, sending their bodies and fear into the hell of death.
If you are afraid of death, don't become a soldier. Death on the battlefield has always been the fate of soldiers.
This is a life-and-death battlefield. There is only killing. Mercy and tolerance basically do not exist. Just like they slaughtered Wang Yan's army before, they also killed them all without mercy, but now it is their turn.
Screams and cries resounded all night, and by daybreak, most of the eight thousand puppet Qi troops had disappeared. Only a few smart people escaped into the northwest forest and escaped with their lives.
The Song army cleaned up the battlefield, burned the corpses and baggage, and seized the enemy's supplies. After resting for half a day and one night, in the early morning of the third day, 10,000 Song army cavalry rushed toward Changlin County.