Of the 30,000 carts of grain, less than 3,000 carts were left, and the other more than 20,000 carts of grain were all packed up in sacks filled with coarse sand.
Zhao Quan was so furious that he fainted on the spot.
All the 40,000 soldiers were furious, and many men were so anxious that they squatted on the ground and cried loudly.
They had never shed a tear on the battlefield, but now their eyes were filled with tears.
Because they know very well that this is life-saving food.
Even if it's just one drop, they don't dare to turn a blind eye.
They would pinch it carefully with their rough fingers, put it to their mouths and blow off the dust on it, put it back into the bag, or throw it into their mouths to eat.
Only those who have truly been hungry and are afraid of hunger will understand the preciousness of food.
And they are exactly such a group of people.
They shouldered a heavy responsibility on this trip, because the hungry people in Yancheng and Yannan were all eagerly waiting for them to transport food back to save their lives, but they lost the food.
What's annoying is that they don't know how or where the food was lost.
They put each sack of food into the sack by themselves. After filling it, they tied the mouth of the bag tightly and then painted the mouth of the bag with red paint. This was both a mark and a seal, so as to avoid being stolen and replaced.
However, it was the red paint seal that made them careless. They only checked the red paint seal along the way, but did not check the grain in the sacks.
For a moment everyone felt helpless and desperate.
Zhao Quan was rescued by soldiers.
He suppressed the anger and anger in his heart, calmed himself down, and then summoned all generals for an emergency meeting.
They quickly located the location where the food was lost.
When the grain team passed through the Tuozhou boundary of Shaoshan City, they encountered heavy fog on a section of the official road.
The fog was extremely heavy at that time, the visibility was less than ten steps, and the coverage was very wide. And because it was a sudden heavy fog, it caused quite a disturbance to the grain team.
This section of the official road is close to a large lake called Wangyuan Lake.
It was around eight o'clock in the morning. It had just rained heavily the night before. It was normal for water mist to curl up on the lake and float onto the road.
In addition, there was no danger, the grain team passed through the fog area smoothly, and not a single vehicle was lost. Therefore, Zhao Quan and the other soldiers simply marveled at the spectacle and did not think about the danger.
But now that the food has been lost, when I think back to that heavy fog, I can't help but feel strange and weird.
And this is the only place along the way where food may be lost.
Because the soldiers regard food as more important than their own lives, when they camp at night, even if Zhao Quan does not order them, they will consciously patrol and guard, every five steps and one sentry and ten steps. They value more than gold, silver and jewels.
Strict.
Under such tight surveillance, even Daluo Jinxian would find it difficult to subcontract more than 20,000 carts of grain without anyone noticing.
The most important piece of information is that there are water thieves on Wangyuan Lake.
When the grain team passed through Tuozhou, Guang Jingshuo, the military envoy of Tuozhou, told Zhao Quan about the water thieves on Wangyuan Lake and led 3,000 officers and soldiers to escort the grain team, but Zhao Quan politely refused.
Zhao Quan felt that it was not necessary, because the grain team itself was escorted by 10,000 cavalry, and the drivers driving each cart were also talented soldiers from the battlefield. There were a total of 40,000 brave warriors. How could they be afraid of mere water thieves.
Looking back now, Zhao Quan feels regretful.
I feel that if I hadn't asked Da to accept Guang Jingshuo's escort at that time, maybe Guang Jingshuo's understanding of water thieves could have avoided this disaster.
"General, this was a premeditated theft." A captain in silver armor said with a gloomy expression.
"How do you say that?" Zhao Quan asked.
"There are more than 27,000 carts of grain, and we load ten sacks into each cart, which makes a total of more than 270,000 sacks. If they hadn't planned ahead, how could any water thief have such sacks? Not to mention the style of sacks and the ones we use.
It's exactly the same, even the hemp rope used to tie the mouth and the red paint used to seal it are the same."
"If the general dares to use the head on his neck as a guarantee, he must have planned it in advance." The silver-armored captain gritted his steel teeth and said decisively.
Zhao Quan and the other generals all nodded in agreement with solemn expressions.
Another general frowned and said: "It took us about an hour before and after passing through the foggy area. We wanted to move more than 270,000 sacks of grain in one hour, and we also had to replace them with sacks filled with coarse sand. This group of water
The scale of thieves is not small."
"The question is how did they do it? They moved more than 270,000 bags of grain. What a big movement. And our 40,000 soldiers all had their eyes open and were driving the carriages, but there was no one in the whole process.
I noticed a strange situation. It's really weird." One person frowned and couldn't figure out the explanation.
"Poison, the mist is poisonous."
Zhao Quan said in a deep voice: "The fog is heavy and the vision is extremely limited. Five steps away is a vast expanse of white. Although there are 40,000 of us, everyone is as if they are blind.
The water thieves only need to use the mist to poison us on a certain section of the road, such as some drugs that make people sleepy or absent-minded. From the poisoning to the detoxification, we may only feel that we are stunned for a moment, because the surroundings are always white.
, so even if you take a nap, you won’t feel like you’ve traveled very far.
But in fact we have come a long way, and the water thieves used this time to change our food without anyone noticing."
"Hearing what the general said, in retrospect, I did take a nap when passing through the foggy area, and almost fell off the horse. At that time, I just squinted my eyes and nodded, and then patted my face to let myself go.
After I woke up, I didn't take it seriously." One person said with an ugly expression.
"If you say that, I seem to have lost my mind."
"Me too."
…
Everyone couldn't help but look sad. Apparently Zhao Quan's conclusion was correct. They had really been poisoned by the water thief while passing through the foggy area.
"General, I think this matter is not simple."
"Sufficient preparation, sophisticated planning, clever means, organized, disciplined and powerful. It's not like - it's not like what a water thief can do."
"If it was really done by water thieves, then this group of water thieves would be terrible."
"The general recommends that you send a letter back to Yancheng immediately and report the details of the matter to the Lord of the City."
A major said with a solemn expression that he suspected that the food thief was someone else, but he was so frightened that he stopped thinking as soon as he became suspicious.
In Tuozhou territory, the only people who are more powerful than water thieves are the government officials.
Thinking of this, how dare he continue to speculate.
Zhao Quan nodded and said: "We need to send people, but we also have to desperately look for food. Aren't they just a group of water thieves who destroyed Gou Ri? Send the order, the rear team becomes the front team, turn around and go back."
…
Wangyuan Lake is so big that it has almost no borders.
Waterways extend in all directions, providing escape routes for water thieves.
The Tuozhou government sent troops to clear out the enemy every year, but the water thieves were extremely slippery. When you came, I dispersed, and when you dispersed, I gathered together, causing the officers and soldiers to play around.
The officers and soldiers lost their temper after fighting. Now every year after receiving the task of suppressing water thieves, they would symbolically sail around Wangyuan Lake and then go to various small islands in the lake to stay for ten and a half days.
month, and finally headed home.
There are a total of eighteen water thieves on Wangyuan Lake.
Water thieves from all walks of life are both partners and competitors.
The water thieves have been extremely abnormal during the past half month. They all hide in the water village and never come out, as if there is a plague god outside the door and they will be infected as soon as they step out.
This made the caravans who were passing by very uncomfortable. They couldn't find anyone to pay the toll. If they didn't pay the toll, they would feel uneasy, for fear that the water thieves would settle the accounts later.
The water thieves are very quiet, but some people don't want to be quiet.
Zhao Quan came back with 40,000 soldiers.
He borrowed a boat from the Tuozhou government to clear out the water thieves and regain the lost grain.
However, Zhao Quan was not careless and asked Tuozhou Jiedushi to send a team of 3,000 naval troops to conduct emergency training for 40,000 soldiers.
Fortunately, they are all soldiers from the south. There is a lot of water in the south and there are not many landlubbers, so they have a good foundation for training.
In addition, the soldiers were all so anxious that their eyes were bloodshot and they practiced risking their lives. The five days of high-intensity training were quite effective.
However, compared with the formal naval force, the water combat capability is still much lower, but there is no way. You can't train for a year and a half and then look for food. If that happens, let alone food, I'm afraid even the scum can't find it.
grain.
Zhao Quan ordered the soldiers who were exhausted from training to have a good rest for two days. At the same time, he issued a warning to the 18th water thieves, ordering them to return the stolen grain, otherwise they would be killed without mercy!
All the eighteen water thieves ignored Zhao Quan's warning.
There are many islands on Wangyuan Lake, and the eighteen largest islands are occupied by eighteen groups of water thieves, and they have been built into water fortresses that are easy to defend but difficult to attack, and serve as the thieves' nests.
A long time ago, there were no water fortresses on Wangyuan Lake, because building a water fortress was equivalent to giving the government a fixed target for eradication. However, the government had not done anything for more than ten years, and the water thieves became more and more courageous, so they occupied the island and built a water fortress.
.
Now it is convenient for Zhao Quan.
The eighteenth-grade water thieves showed disdain, but what awaited was Zhao Quan's ruthless killing.
The water thieves did not understand the importance of these grains in the hearts of the 40,000 soldiers. They were treasures that they risked their lives to get back.
In just one day, Zhao Quan led 40,000 soldiers to conquer two water strongholds one after another and annihilated more than 10,000 water thieves. However, the losses were equally heavy, as more than a thousand brave soldiers were lost.
Annihilating more than 10,000 people with more than 1,000 people may seem like a great victory, but it is not.
But you must know that these 40,000 soldiers are all talented killers who have just come off the battlefield and fought their way out from among the dead. They are all brave and good at fighting. If they fight on land where they are good at fighting, just with the weakness of these water thieves
Even if they don't need to dispatch 40,000 people to fight, they can easily kill more than 10,000 people by just dispatching a thousand cavalry, and the battle damage will definitely be minimal.
Therefore, the loss of more than a thousand soldiers made Zhao Quan red-eyed and sent an order not to accept surrender, not to take prisoners, and to kill them all without mercy!
During the two battles, more than 5,000 bags of grain were recovered, as well as grain supplies, gold, silver and jewelry accumulated by the two groups of water thieves.
Facts have proved that the food was indeed stolen by water thieves.
Of the eighteen water thieves, sixteen are left.
On the second day, three water fortresses were captured.
More than 20,000 water thieves were wiped out, and our own side suffered 2,500 losses.
More than 8,000 bags of food, as well as a large amount of supplies, gold, silver and jewelry were recovered.
Of the eighteen water thieves, thirteen are left.
On the third day, five water fortresses were captured.
More than 50,000 water thieves were wiped out, and our own side suffered 4,800 losses.
More than 16,000 bags of food, as well as a large amount of supplies, gold, silver and jewelry were recovered.
Eighteen water thieves are left.
Kill ten water thieves in three days, leaving no one alive.
The remaining eight water thieves seemed to be waking up from a dream, and then they realized the terror of Zhao Quan and his army.
The water thieves didn't understand what it meant to be trapped in a battle, but they knew that Zhao Quan and his army were here to kill them, and they would never stop fighting.
In the face of a formidable enemy, the eight remaining water thieves suddenly colluded and formed an alliance.
On the fourth day, Zhao Quan and 30,000 soldiers were besieged on the lake by more than 100,000 water thieves.
The water thieves were not stupid. They did not huddle in the stronghold and defend. Instead, they took the initiative and chose to fight on the water where they were good at preparing for a battle with Zhao Quan.
The pre-war negotiations broke up unhappily.
The water thieves actually asked Zhao Quan to hand over the cleared grain and all the wealth, which made Zhao Quan almost laugh out loud.
Zhao Quan asked the water thieves to hand over the stolen food, but the water thieves who felt they had the advantage would not agree.
