On the road from Xiongxian to Zhending, there is an endless stream of refugees.
Although the king of Yan attaches great importance to the back of the people's hearts, the military discipline is strict, and the people are not allowed to invade, but everyone knows that the city occupied by the king of Yan will soon have the imperial army to attack, the war together, God knows whether it will suffer the disaster of the pond fish, I heard that in addition to the original local garrison, plus the soldiers and horses of the Marquis of Changxing have 100,000 people, it is expected to be as stable as Mount Tai, so the refugees are invariably and go straight to Zhending.
Suddenly, the sound of hooves sounded in the distance, and the refugees who were flocking on the way were like frightened birds, and when they looked closely, they saw dust flying, and a team of officers and soldiers came in the wilderness, those soldiers and horses had crooked armor, their bodies were stained with blood, and the banners were rolled upside down, about 100 or so people, all of them were gray-faced, and it was obvious that they were defeated soldiers of the imperial court.
"Stop, stop" Suddenly two people sprang out from among the fleeing civilians on the side of the road, stopping in front of the cavalry and waving their hands desperately.
"Phew" A general who rushed in front hurriedly reined in his horse and shouted angrily: "Boldly Diao Min, why block the way of this general, Xiongxian and Mozhou have fallen, Gu Cheng rebelled against Yan, Ben will immediately report this news to Changxinghou, and wait for Diao Min to dare to block the road, if you delay the military aircraft, can you afford to bear the offense?"
"We are not the people, we are not the people" The weak man ripped off the sweat towel on his head, took out a big seal from his arms to shine to the general on the horse, and cried with joy: "The official Zhuozhou prefect Wei Chunbing, Xiongxian was lost, General Yang Song died in battle, the official and the Xiongxian county order promised Lord Xu to pretend to be a common man, and then he escaped, and we were about to go to see General Geng, I don't know which way the general is, please take us for a ride, I am both weak scholars, I really can't go far." ” "Ah, it turned out to be Lord Wei of Zhuozhou Governor and Lord Xu of Xiongxian County" The general hurriedly dismounted, hugged his fists and said: "The last general is Zhang Bao, the deputy general under the command of Gu Cheng, the governor of the rear army, Gu Cheng defected to Yan Shun, and the last general was lonely and unable to resist, and he was unwilling to turn his back on the court and obey Yan Shun, so he had to take advantage of the chaos to sneak away, I didn't expect to meet two adults here, but I don't have any extra horses here, so I can only entrust the two adults to ride a horse with my personal entourage for the time being." ” The prefect of Wei and the county order of Xu only wanted to get out of danger quickly, where to worry a lot, nodded again and again, and a knight on a horse next to him bent down and smiled at the prefect of Wei: "Lord Prefect, please put away your big seal, and ride with you." ” Wei Zhifu looked up, immediately this person is not very old, but there is a beard under the chin, handsome eyes and thick eyebrows, heroic spirit, if in normal times, Wei Zhifu which put a deputy general's personal soldiers in his eyes, at this time he was quite flattered, and quickly put away the big seal, stretched out his hand, the knight on the horse stretched out his ape arm and only mentioned it, and then lifted Wei Zhifu to go immediately, and smiled at him: "My lord, please sit tight." ” Wei Zhifu grabbed the saddle bridge with both hands, and said gratefully: "I haven't asked for advice yet, so I will respect my surname." ” The man behind him held the reins and shook it, and said with a smile in his ear: "Under the mark is General Zhang's personal lieutenant, surnamed Xia Mingxu, just call me Xiao Xia."
How did these two adults escape here, it turns out that the nine thousand soldiers and horses guarding Xiongxian are the elite of the southern soldiers, and Yang Song's ability to lead troops is indeed not uncommon, but his reinforcements have been exhausted, and King Yan has concentrated superior forces and can attack Xiongxian without scruples.
At the same time, Yang Song took the initiative to give up a city gate in order to lead Zhu Di Zhongfu, from beginning to end, Zhu Di never gave up this city gate, and has been firmly controlling it in his own hands, in the end, it was this city gate that played a big role, at dawn, Zhu Di's army attacked Xiongxian.
Wei Zhifu and Xu Xian Ling didn't see reinforcements arrive for a long time, and they already noticed that something was wrong, and when the north city gate was lost at dawn, the two of them hurriedly slipped away.
These two men did not fight unprepared battles, and in the middle of the night there were no reinforcements coming, so the two of them had quietly gone back to change into civilian clothes, and carried all the important things on their bodies.
At this time, as soon as the official clothes were taken off, they fled south among the people, and the soldiers and horses of the king of Yan entered the city, because they were busy controlling the whole city, and the king of Yan issued a strict order not to harm the people, so no one chased after them, and the two escaped smoothly.
Halfway through, some of the guerrillas under the command of Yang Song came one after another, and they heard from the two adults that after the loss of General Yang Song in Xiong County, he wanted to lead his troops to break through and rush to Mozhou, but unfortunately under the city gate, he met Zhu Neng, a general under the command of King Yan, and was picked up by him with a shot under the horse, and died in the country.
Zhang Bao talked about Gu Cheng leading the army to the king of Yan, and assisted the general Zhang Yu of the king of Yan to attack Mozhou and capture the governor of Pan Zhongdu, only this one night, the king of Yan got the grain and grass in Xiongxian and Mozhou, and recruited more than 20,000 people to surrender the army.
Geng Bingwen first received the news that Yang Song sent someone at the beginning of the war, knowing that Yang Song had been in contact with Zhu Di in Xiong County, only two hours later, and received the news that Pan Zhong of Mozhou sent troops to aid Xiong County, and he was relieved, although Gu Cheng had not sent information from his side, according to his expectations, it should only be the messenger who had gone wrong on the road, Gu Cheng should have sent troops to help at this time, if the three-way army can successfully contain King Yan, he will have the opportunity to complete the battle.
Geng Bingwen's headquarters of soldiers and horses were originally entrenched on the north and south banks of the Hutuo River, he lit the north bank of the soldiers and horses, and then rushed to Xiongxian, but just after walking for two hours, Pan Zhong's defeated troops fled in panic, bringing a series of bad news: Xiongxian has been lost, Pan Zhong is ambushed and life and death is unknown, Gu Cheng rebelled and surrendered to King Yan.
Geng Bingwen, a battle-hardened veteran, was stunned by a series of bad news: "King Yan is so powerful, and the Northern Army is so powerful."
Geng Bingwen was born to be an old general, suddenly heard such news, where did he dare to move forward, he was on both sides of the Hutuo River but worked hard for a long time, the trench wall was like a copper wall, at this time knew that the Yan King Zhu Di was unstoppable, Geng Bingwen immediately made a decision, immediately ordered the retreat, retreated to the Hutuo River bank, set up a position in his original camp, and waited for the arrival of the Yan King.
As a result, in the future of King Yan, the deputy general Zhang Bao under the command of the rebel general Gu Cheng took more than 100 personal soldiers, protecting the two treasures of Wei Zhifu and Xu Zhixian like a lost dog, in Zhang Bao's mouth, the generals under the command of King Yan are simply like wolves and tigers, enough to be a hundred, Xiongxian held on for less than an hour, the north city gate was broken, Pan Zhong led an army of 20,000 troops, and it collapsed with only one move, bluffing the southern generals under the command of Changxing Marquis was stunned.
Wei Zhifu and Xu Xian Ling did deserters, how can they say that the Yan army is weak, they can't wait to say that the Yan army is a heavenly soldier and a heavenly general, to cover up for the fact that they fled without a fight, naturally they echoed loudly next to them, adding fuel and vinegar to supplement, they are literati, adjectives are much richer than Zhang Bao's general, under their description, Yan Wang Zhu Di is simply a peerless general with a height of eight feet and a waist circumference of eight feet, and the city wall of Xiongxian County collapsed with a roar, and Pan Zhong's army was defeated with a wave of the knife, saying that Yan Wang is an enemy of 10,000 people is considered an insult.
Geng Bingwen of course has seen Yan Wang Zhu Di, he doesn't think that no matter how powerful Yan Wang is, he can really have the courage of ten thousand people, but the facts in front of him are clear, the combat effectiveness of the Yan army is indeed more than one level higher than the imperial court's soldiers and horses, this is an indisputable fact, listen to Zhang Bao said, Yan Wang came south, recruited troops all the way, the total strength has actually reached 50,000 people, after Gu Cheng surrendered, the Mozhou defenders who were summoned by Yan Wang again, now the total strength is 70,000, Geng Bingwen can't help but be secretly shocked in his heart.
Geng Bingwen divided his troops on both sides of the Hutuo River, which was originally to attack and retreat, and to echo each other from afar, and to advance and retreat freely, at this time I heard that the army of King Yan was so good, it was obviously better to divide the troops than to join the army, Geng Bingwen first appeased the Wei prefect and Xu County Order, and greatly commended Zhang Bao's loyalty to the rebellion of the main general, and immediately ordered that the army stationed on the south bank of the Hutuo River should immediately cross the river north and join forces to defend against the attack of the Yan army.
Why didn't Geng Bingwen retreat, but instead dropped all the troops on the south bank to the north bank Because he is not a local garrison, but the imperial court sent to encircle and suppress the rebellion of King Yan, he commanded more than 100,000 troops to Zhending, the former army was swallowed by someone, and then retreated into the city of Zhending, how he explained to the court how to explain to the world this first battle, for King Yan is not to fight, for Geng Bingwen, why not not to fight, originally did not want to fight the King of Yan, but now it is the host and guest change of power, replaced by Changxing Marquis Geng Bingwen.
Exploring the horses is like shuttling.
King Yan really came, King Yan's army was stationed in Wuji City, Wuji City was only dozens of miles away from Zhending, and it was even more imminent from Geng Bingwen's camp stationed on the north bank of the Hutuo River, Geng Bingwen did not dare to slack off, patrolled the camp arrangement, and made every effort, under the careful construction of the first good guard of the Ming Dynasty, this already impeccable military camp was supplemented with 50,000 soldiers and horses on the south bank of the Hutuo River, reaching 100,000 people.
An army of 100,000 troops, a ten-mile company camp, mighty and mighty, like an iron wall, Geng Bingwen, a 66-year-old veteran, was covered in iron armor, his hand pressed on the hilt of his sword, and he stood majestically on the top of the high watchtower, and the scarlet cloak on his shoulders was hunting and trembling in the wind.
The old general's white hair fluttered, overlooking the camp that had been impregnated under his careful deployment for a long time, and his heroic spirit spontaneously appeared: "King Yan, come on, when the old man was ordered by Taizu to guard Changxing, the old man guarded Changxing City for ten years, Zhang Shicheng attacked me for ten years, ten years of hard work, he has always been difficult to advance, now the old man wants to see, how you Yan King is better than that Cheng King" In the southwest corner of the rebellious army barracks, in the Dizi camp, Zhang Bao and his own soldiers were arranged, and the Wei prefect and Xu Xianling originally wanted to ask the Marquis of Changxing to send troops to escort them to Zhending City, but Geng Bingwen was busy deploying troops and deploying defense, and the two were really embarrassed to speak, so they were also temporarily arranged here.
In front of the camp tent, the idle Wei Governor and Xu County Commander were lazily basking in the sun, and Zhang Bao's personal soldier Captain Xia Xuxia was smiling and saying to Wei Governor's Mansion: "My lord just left Xiongxian County, and the army is in chaos, and my lord leaves the lady of Xinna in Xiongxian alone, I'm afraid it's not very appropriate." ” Wei Zhifu Zhengse said: "The national disaster is at the head, and the personal honor and disgrace are worth what is the loss In the past, Zhang patrolled Suiyang, could kill the concubine, cooked and ate it to the soldiers, Wei Chunbing was favored by the king, how could he be greedy for women, and it was a big deal to be captured by Yan Rebellious, after exterminating Yan Rebellious, the official would buy another concubine." ” To be continued: