At the end of April, Murong Nobunaga commanded seven thousand fine cavalry and entered Yangzhou, the eastern capital of the Southern Tang Dynasty.
As a result, the Zhou army in the city reached the size of 10,000 people, and they were the 10,000 most elite people in the Zhou Kingdom.
In addition to the five thousand people around Zhang Zhao, the six armies of Zhou's personal guards and the elites from the seven towns in all directions are here.
Therefore, Murong Nobunaga was very cautious. Thanks to Li Cunhui's stabilization of the situation in Yangzhou, Murong Nobunaga directly divided the ten thousand people into three parts.
The left and right armies were stationed outside Yangzhou City, and the Chinese army was stationed in the north of Yangzhou City.
As for the security of Yangzhou City, Murong Nobunaga simply put Yangzhou's original Nantang Prefecture County soldiers in charge, but most of the officers of these prefecture and county soldiers were replaced by Zhou Kingdom's own soldiers.
Moreover, they are only responsible for public security and not city defense, which also reduces the possibility of betrayal.
As for the specific arrangements for city defense, well! Murong Nobunaga made no arrangements at all. With these 10,000 cavalry in Yangzhou, do they still need to defend the city?
Soldiers are here to fight in the field!
Not long after Murong Nobunaga entered Yangzhou City, Bai Congxin also led his rear army of 5,000 cavalry to capture the Jianwu Army of the Southern Tang Dynasty.
The army at this time was still different from the military states in the Song Dynasty. The army at this time could be regarded as the reserve of the Jiezhen, or the Jiedushi with less power.
Originally, the Jianwu Army had a Tianchang envoy here, and the Jianwu Army had thousands of people who could defend the place.
But the tragedy is that after the Jianwu Army defected to the Southern Tang Dynasty in Hushile, they were transferred to Xuzhou, and then followed Liu Yanzhen, and they all folded beside Meng Zhuze.
Therefore, the Jianwu Army at this time was basically an empty shell, unable to withstand Bai Congxin's attack.
The fall of the Jianwu Army was very fatal to the Southern Tang Dynasty.
Because this military state located in Tianchang, Anhui Province in later generations, had the last hilly area north of Yangzhou. Once the enemy crossed Tianchang, it would immediately be a smooth river.
What's even more terrible is that Gaoyou Lake at this time was just a small pool and could not block the northern cavalry. Therefore, the Jianwu Army was currently an important barrier from Huainan to Jiangnan.
Together with Chuzhou in the southwest, it is the north gate of Yangzhou, the eastern capital, and the north gate of Jiangning, the western capital.
Bai Congxin's occupation of the Jianwu Army was equivalent to cutting off the connection between Yangzhou and Haozhou and Sizhou in Huainan. The only force that could assist Yangzhou was Jiangning from the south of the Yangtze River.
And when Murong Nobunaga finished doing this, the loyal ministers from Chuzhou and other places in the Southern Tang Dynasty, who were actually the beneficiaries of Juntian and Bo Zheng, arrived outside Yangzhou City in tears.
This is really not because they were slow in action, but because the Zhou army, which was born out of the Guiyi Army, mobilized and assembled too quickly.
The Zhou army that entered Chuzhou completed the battle plan, mobilization and selection of elites in just one day.
They still have enough tall horses, and they can attack Yangzhou at the speed of one person, two horses or three horses.
On the other hand, the 'loyal ministers' of the Southern Tang Dynasty in Chuzhou and other places did not dare to take the main road, and secondly they did not have good horses. They arrived one day later than Murong Nobunaga, and they were faster than them.
Pity these guys, they came from Chuzhou to Yangzhou to report the news, cried and begged, but when the gate was opened, good guys, Yangzhou also belongs to the Zhou Kingdom!
For such people, Murong Nobunaga went up to him and greeted him with swords and guns. Almost all of the dozens of people were killed, leaving only a few to go to Yangzhou and specifically asked him to report the news to Li Jing.
Murong Nobunaga, who had killed several people, quickly began to discuss with Li Cunhui, Yao Yuanfu and others on how to lure the Southern Tang Army to cross the river as soon as possible.
After all, their current rule is not stable. The sooner they defeat the Southern Tang Army, the sooner they will be safe.
At this time, the plans of the heads of the Han family and the Chen family were reported to them by the Jinyi guards.
Among them, the head of the Han family had been bribed by the Jinyi guards long ago, and the entire Han family and the fishermen from several nearby villages had been persuaded to follow Emperor Zhou to the death.
The background of the head of the Chen family has also been investigated clearly.
His son was hit and killed by a large boat owned by Li Jing's son, King Li Hongji of Nanchang, and his daughter-in-law also threw herself into the water.
This was the only son among the six daughters of Patriarch Chen, but he died without even leaving a queen for him.
The head of the Chen family is extremely sad, has lost all motivation to live, and dreams of revenge. He is very believable.
Li Cunhui nodded with satisfaction and said: "Taizhou is only 140 miles away from Yangzhou. The cavalry can arrive in a day and night. As long as someone opens the door, it will be easy to capture.
Moreover, Yang Wu’s clan is all in Yongning Palace, Hailing, Taizhou. I don’t believe that we took Taizhou, so Li Jing dare not be nervous.”
The corners of Murong Xinchang's lips curled up into a smile. Yang Xingmi's descendants were actually of little use to the Zhou Kingdom.
Because Zhang Zhao founded the country as a loyal minister of the Tang Dynasty, and he had two great righteousnesses: returning to the country with loyalty and expelling the northern invaders, there was no need to know Yang Xingmi's descendants to obtain the name.
And although the people in the south of the Yangtze River were indeed grateful for the peace that Yang Xingmi, the Wu Kingdom, had brought to them, they did not reach the point where they would risk their lives as soon as they heard about Yang Xingmi.
Therefore, neither Zhang Zhao nor the generals below had any intention of taking advantage of the Yang Wu clan in Taizhou.
But now that things have reached this point, Murong Nobunaga has discovered that although he does not need the weak legal authority and appeal of Yang Xingmi's descendants, he can use this to severely damage the reputation of Li Jing and even the Southern Tang royal family.
The reason is that what Li Min, Li Jing and his son did was really disgusting.
Let alone Li Min treating the Yang and Wu lineage as puppets, any normal king would do this, and it would make sense to poison Yang Pu, the last emperor of Wu who had never had any power.
But after moving all the Yang and Wu clans to Yongning Palace in Taizhou, what the Li family and his son did was extremely immoral.
You can either ruthlessly kill them all, or dismantle and place them apart, and then select a few honest nobles to raise and raise them to weaken their will and let them slowly accept their fate.
However, it would be too much to lock up hundreds of members of their family in a small palace, not allowing them to go out, not allowing them to have normal marriages, and trying to raise them as livestock.
In the past few decades, the Yang Wu clan, unable to communicate with the outside world, has begun to reproduce itself in Yongning Palace. First, cousins matched cousins, cousins matched cousins, and later even brothers and sisters.
So far, there have been a lot of deformed and demented children.
This kind of thing that completely exceeds the limits of human civilization, challenges the bottom line of human morality, and makes any normal person feel sick is all caused by Li Min, Li Jing and his son.
Even the people and officials of the Southern Tang Dynasty sympathized with the fate of the descendants of the Yang family, and felt that Li Ming, Li Jing and his son had gone too far.
But now, only a small number of officials and some local people in Taizhou know that if it is exposed, the entire Southern Tang Li family will be killed, and even the Southern Tang court will be killed.
Historically, as soon as Li Jing heard that Zhou Shizong Guo Rong had the idea of moving the Yang family, he immediately asked Yin Yanfan to kill them all, and then cut Yin Yanfan in half to hide his identity.
It was the same at this time. Although Murong Nobunaga didn't know what Li Jing did in history, he knew very well that as long as he held Yang Xingmi's descendants, Li Jing would have no choice but to cross the river and grab them.
"Sanlang, why don't you go to Taizhou?"
Murong Nobunaga looked at Li Cunhui and asked. This was the first time he addressed Li Cunhui in the order of Zhang Zhaoyi's son.
Li Cunhui was stunned for a moment. As he got older, the competitive spirit he had when he was young seemed to have been extinguished a lot.
Many painful memories of being 'bullied' by Murong Nobunaga in the past seem somewhat funny now.
"Then please brother, please give me two thousand troops! When I take Taizhou, I will move all the treasures in the treasury and the Yang Wu clan."
Murong Nobunaga nodded, and the two looked at each other and smiled.
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Li Jing felt numb now. A second ago, he was still discussing with the courtiers to move the Tianchang system of the Jianwu Army to Chuzhou, and then open a festival town in Chuzhou as a stronghold to resist the Zhou army's southward march.
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Immediately afterwards, they received news that Yangzhou, the eastern capital, had been captured. As a result, everyone in the Southern Tang Dynasty was at a loss. Where did this enemy come from and captured Yangzhou so quickly?
But now, the mystery has been solved, because the wailing Haizhou governor and other Huainan officials appeared in front of everyone.
In an instant, the news of the fall of Chuzhou spread throughout the Southern Tang Dynasty, and everyone was shocked beyond words.
Only now did they know that it turned out that Xuzhou was captured without bloodshed, the northern capital was left behind, the military governor of Wuning Army, and Xu Guogong Hu Cile died after drinking poisonous wine as a couple.
They also learned that the Emperor of Zhou actually led a large army. After only three days of repairs in Xuzhou, he suddenly attacked the city of Chuzhou. He also successfully abolished the Bo Zheng and military fields and captured Chuzhou.
At this time, many officials in the Southern Tang Dynasty had pale faces. Without military fields and Bo Zheng, this was killing them!
Moreover, the outrageous news that the Eastern Capital was captured turned out to be the worst possible outcome of the speculation. The Zhou Kingdom's cavalry really attacked the Eastern Capital.
The frightened atmosphere did not last long. Prime Minister Feng Yanji suddenly jumped up. He ran to Li Jing regardless of etiquette and whispered a reminder.
"Sage, Chuzhou has fallen, the eastern capital Yangzhou has been captured, and the most important thing on the north bank of the Yangtze River is Taizhou."
Li Jing suddenly felt a dull pain between his legs, and immediately understood why Feng Yanji jumped up.
Alas! If I had known earlier, I should have listened to the advice of the people below and moved the Yang family to Jiangning to manage it, or let go of their restrictions while they were almost all fools. This would be troublesome.
Bian Hao, who had just been transferred back from Xinzhou and assumed the post of commander of the Imperial Guards, reached out to grab the officials who had fled across the river and asked: "How many people are there in the Zhou army in Yangzhou?"
The official quickly replied: "The vanguard of our unit is no more than three or four thousand, and the total number of soldiers is no more than ten thousand."
Bian Hao immediately reported to Li Jing, "The Zhou army was so rampant that they attacked our city with tens of thousands of people for 400 miles. Although there were many warriors in fine armor, their momentum was blunted and they became a tired and exhausted army.
Moreover, the people in the north of the Yangtze River are in our favor, and there are elite soldiers in the Western Capital, Runzhou Town, Haijun Jiedushi, Jiangyin Army, Jinghai Zhiyuan (Nantong) and other places.
I ask your majesty to mobilize your elite troops and cross the river quickly to prevent the Zhou army from gaining a foothold. If the emperor of Zhou comes to Yangzhou with his whole country, the imperial court will be in danger."
Bian Hao had already begun to rise to prominence at this time, and he had made great achievements in the battle to destroy the king of Fujian. Because he was loyal and honest, he was regarded as a famous general by the Southern Tang court.
In the past, Li Jing would not have dared to use his last few troops, but now that he was about to die, he could not care so much.
He decided to send troops across the river, right in front of his home, to show his strength.