The fierce battle lasted for a whole day, until it was close to dusk, and the west, south, and east walls of Liangcheng still showed no signs of collapse.

"Is that the end of it......

Listening to the latest battle situation sent by a famous herald, the commander of the righteous division, Chen Miao, sighed faintly, and a little unwillingness and confusion flashed in his eyes.

The seventy or eighty ladder carts that he spent more than ten days building were all destroyed by the Jin army defending the city an hour ago, and in the following hour, more than 100,000 soldiers of his righteous division all relied on the siege ladder to continue the siege, but the results were not ideal.

Xue Ao at the South City Gate, Zhou Hu at the West City Gate, and Li Meng at the East City Gate, the Jin army had three generals who were good at using soldiers to sit at the three city gates, and they did not give him the opportunity to take advantage of the righteous division.

With the help of the city wall, the 70,000 Jin army finally blocked his 160,000 righteous divisions.

“……”

Chen Miao turned his head to take a look, and happened to meet Cheng Zhou's gaze, and the two looked at each other speechlessly.

After a long time, Chen Miao said in a deep voice: "Pass the order, and the whole army will retreat." ”

Hearing this, Cheng Zhou opened his mouth slightly, as if he wanted to say something, but in the end, he didn't say a word.

In fact, Chen Miao could guess what Cheng Zhou wanted to say, Cheng Zhou wanted to remind him that if he retreated today, I was afraid that his righteous teacher would be demoralized, and when he came to attack Liangcheng next time, he might not be as fierce as today.

But there is no way, today's dusk is approaching on the one hand, and the casualties of his righteous teacher are on the other.

The high casualties made it necessary for his righteous division to carry out a reorganization in order to regain its combat effectiveness.

"Withdraw."

Chen Miao closed his eyelids slightly.

Ding Ding Ding –

Ding Ding Ding –

The sound of gold sounded on the battlefield, and after hearing this movement, the rebel soldiers who were still struggling to attack the city with the help of the siege ladder slowly retreated as if the tide was receding.

However, at low tide, the reef and sand are exposed, but here there are corpses piled up at the root of the entire wall.

"General, the rebels seem to have retreated."

Noticing the movement of the rebels outside the city, Xue Ao's guards immediately said happily to their general.

"Hmm."

Xue Ao replied casually, his face was extremely calm, as if it should be so.

I have to say that Xue Ao never thought that Liangcheng would fall into the hands of the rebels, after all, Liangcheng also had 70,000 Jin troops, and with him to defend Liangcheng, there were Zhou Hu, Li Meng, and Tong Yan - Tong Yan didn't care for the time being, but Zhou Hu and Li Meng, Xue Ao was very optimistic about them.

According to the report of the heralds he sent to both sides of the west and east city walls, Zhou Hu and Li Meng did not let the rebels take advantage of the opportunity once, and defended the city wall in an orderly manner.

In this case, the defeat of the rebels was a matter of time in Xue Ao's opinion.

It's just that Xue Ao is still not very happy in his heart, after all, he wants to hit the rebels and defeat the rebels, and passive defense is not in line with his character.

Different from Xue Ao's mood, the Jin troops on the southern city wall were very happy, and when they saw that the rebels began to retreat, they cheered one after another.

"The rebels have retreated!"

"Victory! Our army has won! ”

"Hooray! Banzai! ”

I saw that on the entire southern city wall, countless Jin troops raised their arms and cheered, celebrating this hard-won victory.

At the same time, the three generals Xiang Xuan, Zhou Gong, and Zhu Yu in the southern suburbs of Liangcheng also slowly withdrew with the remaining troops under their command.

Immediately, the Liangcheng army and the Yingchuan soldiers on the west city wall also began to cheer.

In the cheers like a wave, Zhao Yu looked at the rebels who were slowly withdrawing outside the city with mixed feelings.

As he expected, today's rebel offensive is not ferocious, quite a kind of desperate meaning, so that at the beginning, even Zhao Yu misestimated the combat effectiveness of the rebels, so that the defense line almost collapsed, until he sent the Yingchuan army under his command, which regained dominance.

It is precisely because the rebels' offensive is so fierce that for a moment, Zhao Yu deliberately put the rebels into the city - after all, because of the relationship between the Jiangdong Yishi, in fact, Zhao Yu's evaluation of the Yishi is higher than that of the Jin Kingdom, and besides, if the rebels occupy Liangcheng, he can also take advantage of the chaos to catch Tong Yan.

It's just that the trouble of doing so is too great, because the Jin State has not completely lost the power to counterattack, on the contrary, the main force that the Jin State really used to counterattack, that is, the army led by Chen Taishi Chen Zhongqin, has not yet arrived on the battlefield, if Zhao Yu deliberately loses today, although it can temporarily boost the momentum of the rebels, but when the rebels are defeated by that Chen Taishi in the coming days, he will inevitably be implicated.

It was this trade-off of pros and cons that made Zhao Yu only on the side of the Jin State – or more simply, on the side of the victors.

"After all, there are two less righteous teachers......

Zhao Yu secretly sighed.

In his opinion, if it was really Jingchu, Changsha, Jiangxia, Yuzhang, and Jiangdong Wulu Righteous Teachers who would be in Liangjun, then Liangcheng would probably not be able to keep it.

No, it certainly won't be saved.

But it's a pity that Jingchu Yishi was dragged in Nanyang County by Wang Shangde, the general of the Jin State, and Changsha Yishi was severely injured by him in Kunyang, and even Jiangdong Yishi only took care of the face of friendly troops and sent an army led by Wu Yi, instead of sending the real main force, which made Yishi's 'division fight', and finally failed to capture Liangcheng in a battle.

Zhao Yu had no doubt that the rebels had failed to capture Liangcheng despite all their strength today, which would be a heavy blow to the morale of the rebels.

In fact, it proved that Zhao Yu guessed correctly, today, all the 160,000 troops of the righteous division were dispatched but failed to capture Liangcheng, which really dealt a heavy blow to the righteous division.

When most of the righteous soldiers retreated back to the camp, their heads drooped, and almost no one spoke from beginning to end.

Coupled with the fact that seriously wounded soldiers fell to the ground along the way, the morale of the army continued to decline.

Seeing this, Chen Miao was full of worries.

After returning to the camp, Chen Miao summoned the generals to the Chinese military tent, preparing to discuss today's siege and discuss the strategy for the next siege.

Due to the defeat, the atmosphere in the barracks was very solemn, and almost everyone was preoccupied, including Zhao Yin.

Seeing this, Chen Miao clapped his hands twice and forcibly boosted his morale: "Today's defeat is not unexpected. …… Liangcheng is finally guarded by 70,000 Jin troops, and Xue Ao, Zhou Hu, and Li Meng are in charge. Then how could Zhou Hu force my righteous teacher to be forced to withdraw from Yingchuan? In my opinion, today we at least made clear to the Jin army the decision to take Liangcheng, and dealt a heavy blow to the Jin army defending the city. ”

Hearing these words, although the generals present nodded slightly in agreement, the expressions on their faces were still solemn.

It's no wonder that although in today's siege battle, the Jin army defending the city did suffer a lot of losses, but the problem is that the casualties on their righteous side are heavier.

Seeing that his words failed to boost morale, Chen Miao sighed secretly, and could only skip the opening remarks and abruptly enter the discussion session.

He asked Xiang Xuan, Zhou Gong, and Zhu Yuan: "How is the battle situation in the West City Wall?" ”

"Not optimistic." Xiang Xuan shook his head and said: "At first, whether Zhou Hu underestimated the enemy or had a private message, he did not send the Yingchuan army under his command to the city wall, which made our army occupy the advantage at the beginning, but Zhou Hu quickly realized the problem and sent his Yingchuan army to fight in coordination with the Liangcheng army, although most of the time the Liangcheng army was still the main force to defend the city, but once the Liangcheng army was exposed, the Yingchuan army would immediately make up for the defense line. ”

Chen Miao listened carefully to Xiang Xuan's narration, and the more he listened, the more familiar he felt.

He suddenly remembered that when he was in Kunyang, Zhou Hu used this trick to mix the weaker Kunyang County Army with the stronger Nanyang Army and the Black Turban Pawn, and blocked Guan Shuo's attacks again and again.

"Zhou Hu is very good at deploying strong and weak pawns." He nodded.

Immediately, he turned his head to look at Wu Yi, the general of the Jiangdong Volunteer Division, and asked, "General Wu, how is the battle situation on the East City Wall today?" ”

Wu Yi said in a deep voice: "Today's battle with our army on the east city wall is Li Meng's Henan army, not elite, but not weak, plus Li Meng's vision is very accurate, every time he sees the right time to rotate the soldiers guarding the city, our army ...... In the end, I didn't take advantage of anything. ”

"Hmm."

Hearing this, Chen Miao nodded slightly: "The situation described by General Wu is similar to the southern city wall that our army attacked. ”

Generally speaking, today's Jin army's defense of the city is decent, whether it is Xue Ao, or Zhou Hu, Li Meng, there is nothing too outstanding, the key is that there are too many Jin troops defending the city, a full 70,000 people, plus the city wall to help, this is the reason why the righteous division was unable to capture the city in the end.

After some muttering, Chen Miao Zhengse said: "Tomorrow, suspend the siege of the city, rest for a day, and take this opportunity to reorganize the three armies." ”

The so-called rectification, that is, wartime rectification, to put it bluntly, is to remove the seriously wounded soldiers from the establishment and replenish the number of people, or simply integrate the two defeated divisions and integrate them into a division that can fight a war.

In addition, if necessary, as much as possible, the soldiers and strong soldiers should be organized into a single unit, so that they can be used as spears for the whole army.

However, just after Chen Miao finished speaking, Cheng Zhou frowned and said: "I'm afraid that just one day of recuperation is not enough to restore morale, and besides, almost all the ladder vehicles built so far have been destroyed today, if you want to attack Liangcheng again, I'm afraid it will take a while to rebuild the siege equipment......"

In all fairness, there is nothing wrong with Cheng Zhou's opinion, but the problem is that what he lacks is time, how can it take more than 20 days to rebuild dozens or hundreds of ladder trucks?

Shaking his head, Chen Miao said in a deep voice: "I'm afraid that my righteous master has no time to rebuild the siege equipment...... It's mid-February, the snow is about to melt, and I suspect that the Jin Kingdom is about to launch a counterattack......"

Hearing this, everyone present looked up at Chen Miao.

Seeing that everyone's eyes were looking at him, Chen Miao glanced around at everyone and said in a deep voice: "Do you think that the counterattack of the Jin State may only be Xue Ao and his 10,000 Taiyuan army?" If I had not guessed wrong, in the next few months, the Jin State would probably send reinforcements to Liangcheng one after another, and if our army could not capture Liangcheng before these reinforcements arrived, we would be able to block the Jin army with great rivers and natural dangers......"

He didn't say anything, but anyone knew what he wanted to say.

After the meeting, Zhao Yin called out to Wu Yi.

Wu Yi understood, so he took Zhao Yin to his barracks.

After coming to Wu Yi's barracks, Zhao Yin asked Wu Yi, "Are our army's casualties serious today?" ”

It turned out that he was following Chen Miao and Cheng Zhou today, watching the attack of Yuzhang Yishi on the southern city wall of Liangcheng, so he did not know the casualties of his Jiangdong Yishi.

Facing Zhao Yin's question, Wu Yi said truthfully: "It's not serious, but it's not a lot." …… The exact numbers have not yet been calculated, but according to my estimates, the casualties are probably close to 20,000. ”

"So much?" Zhao Yin's color changed slightly, but immediately, he realized that his words were suspected of questioning Wu Yi's ability to command troops, and hurriedly apologized: "I'm sorry." ”

Wu Yi shook his head to show that he didn't mind, and then sighed and explained: "After all, it's a siege." ”

Indeed, as far as siege warfare is concerned, nearly 20,000 casualties a day is not too much, and it can only be said that the siege is too fierce.

As for why the attack is fierce, it is nothing more than because the situation of the righteous master is becoming less and less optimistic, whether it is Chen Miao, Cheng Zhou, or Wu Yi, they all hope to capture Liangcheng as soon as possible.

Zhao Yin nodded slightly, and then frowned and said: "If I follow this offensive and come twice, I am afraid that my 60,000 Jiangdong righteous divisions will be killed and wounded......"

Hearing this, Wu Yi shook his head with a wry smile and said, "It's impossible to 'have two more times'...... Today is the first battle, and our righteous division has repeatedly repelled the Jin army during this time, the morale of the army is high, it is the soldiers who can bear such high casualties, but it is a pity that today can not be overcome in a battle, and the next time to attack Liangcheng, the casualties are close to 10,000, and the morale of our soldiers is probably about to collapse......"

Speaking of this, he deliberately walked to the door of the barracks, glanced outside the house twice, and then turned his head and asked Zhao Yin, "What does Childe think?" ”

"What?" Zhao Yin was slightly stunned.

Seeing this, Wu Yi asked honestly: "What does the last general mean, what does Gongzi think about Chen Miao's decision to continue attacking Liangcheng?" ”

“……”

Zhao Yin looked at Wu Yi meaningfully: "What does the general mean?" ”

Wu Yi naturally had no reason to hide it in front of Zhao Yin, and said truthfully: "Chen Miao is right, the counterattack of the Jin State is by no means only the 10,000 Taiyuan army of Xue Ao, according to my estimate, the Jin State can at least collect hundreds of thousands of troops from the counties north of the Great River, if we are unable to capture Liangcheng and control the banks of the Great River, these hundreds of thousands of Jin troops will eventually cross the river and wipe out our three righteous divisions......"

After a pause, he continued: "Although I also support the capture of Liangcheng and severely demoralize the Jin Kingdom, if the righteous master is unable to capture Liangcheng for a long time, I think we should also consider a way out......

"You mean retreat to Shandong?" Zhao Yin asked with a slight frown.

He knows very well that at this moment, the main force of his Jiangdong righteous division is attacking Jibei, Taishan, Shandong and other places, and with his teacher Mr. Ram, his main force of Jiangdong righteous division can finally occupy the rich land of Shandong, and then rely on natural barriers such as Jishui and Taishan to demarcate the territory with the Jin State.

According to his teacher, Mr. Ram, if the Jin State has insight, he will not attack Shandong as soon as he comes up, after all, he Jiangdong Yishi can rely on Taishan and Jishui to defend for a long time, if the Jin State uses all its energy to deal with them, then it will indulge Jingchu, Changsha, Jiangxia, Yuzhang and other righteous teachers in disguise.

Therefore, it is most likely that the Jin State will first deal with Jing Chu and several other righteous divisions, and only after these righteous divisions are pacified, it is possible to turn the gun and attack Shandong.

And this, in disguise, bought him a year or two of time to recuperate and recuperate.

It is for this reason that in fact, his teacher, Mr. Ram, never thought of 'meeting Liang Jun' with several other righteous teachers from the beginning, and initially only planned to symbolically send an army of 10,000 people, but Zhao Yin was thinking about catching that Tong Yan in Liangcheng, and then considering the attitude of the other righteous teachers, he finally sent 60,000 troops over.

But these 60,000 troops were not sent here for nothing, and it is not difficult to infer from Wu Yi's words that if the situation changes, Wu Yi is afraid that he will leave the rest of the righteous divisions at any time and lead the remnants of his command to withdraw to Shandong.

In the final analysis, Jiangdong Yishi is a little different from other volunteers.

Sure enough, after Zhao Yin asked, Wu Yi nodded solemnly.

Seeing this, Zhao Yin pondered for a moment and said, "Let's take a look at the situation again." …… If Chen Miao can occupy Liangcheng and resist the counterattack of the Jin army with the danger of the river, wouldn't this be more beneficial to my Jiangdong? ”

"Hmm." Wu Yi nodded and did not refute.

After all, before the time came when he had to make a decision immediately, he still had a chance to capture Liangcheng.

The next day, the righteous division postponed the attack on Liangcheng, and the whole army was reorganized.

At this time in Liangcheng, Xue Ao, Zhao Yu, Li Meng, and Tong Yan were also doing the same thing, that is, rectifying the army, comforting the wounded, and boosting morale.

At this time, Qin Yu, Jia Shu, and Le Gui had already counted the casualties of his Yingchuan army yesterday, with more than 3,000 killed and more than 2,000 seriously wounded, and the rest were lightly wounded.

Seeing this casualty figure, Zhao Yuzhi felt his heart sink.

Although he also understands the reason why Ci is not in charge of the army, but because of his personality, he can't see all the soldiers under his command as a cold number, even those soldiers who have surrendered to the rebels.

After all, these soldiers had expressed their loyalty to him, and they were his soldiers, and if he could, he hoped that none of his soldiers would be lost, even if it cost a lot of money for it.

For this reason, he summoned Qin Yu and Jia Shu and asked them about the pension.

During this period, Zhao Yu asked Qin Yu and Jia Shu: "Most of the soldiers under your command were born in Changsha County, and they have almost no relatives in Yingchuan, how should they be paid?" ”

Hearing these words, Qin Yu and Jia Shu were greatly shocked, and immediately looked at Zhao Yu with a moving expression.

The two of them thought that Zhao Yu was just acting casually, but they didn't expect that this Lord Du Lieutenant was so thoughtful.

Facing the suspicions of Qin Yu and Jia Shu, Zhao Yu said with a smile: "Since you have defected to me Zhou Hu, entrusted with your life, and driven by me, how can Zhou be stingy with money?" ”

Listening to Zhao Yu's natural tone, Qin Yu and Jia Shu were greatly moved, and Rao is cold Qin Yu couldn't help but praise a few words, not to mention Jia Shu.

You must know that since ancient times, there has been no military commander who is greedy for the salaries of his soldiers, and Zhao Yu is obviously a good treatment for his soldiers.

After a while, Jia Shu put forward a suggestion: "It is better to give a bereavement pension to the wounded soldiers first to stimulate morale, and as for the sacrificed soldiers whose families are far away in Changsha, the bereavement pension can be temporarily entrusted, and the news will be sent to Changsha in the future, and then distributed when their families move to Yingchuan." ”

"That's a way to do it." Zhao Yu nodded slightly.

He wasn't just doing it, he really intended to do it.

After all, he still has nearly 10,000 Toucheng soldiers under his hands, not to mention that after the defeat of the righteous division in Liangcheng this time, he doesn't know how many more can be recruited, these are all veterans who have fought in battles, no matter what, Zhao Yu has to find a way to hold them in his hands.

In order to ensure the loyalty of these people to him, he decided to send people to Changsha after the end of this battle, and asked the families of those soldiers to defect to him Yingchuan.

As long as the families of these soldiers defect to him Yingchuan, these soldiers will naturally be loyal to him.

As for those who don't have families, then use the old way to distribute their daughters-in-law, just like the Black Tigers in the past - now how many people in the Black Tiger Village are not loyal to him?

The Yingchuan Army cross-border reinforcement of Liang County, and Liang County was naturally responsible for the pension and bounty.

It stands to reason that Zhao Yu only needs to report the casualties of the Yingchuan army to the county guard, and the Liang county guard Gu will bear all the benefits and bounties of Yingchuan County.

But Zhao Yu did not do this, he found Tong Yan, the commander of Liang County, and said to the latter: "In yesterday's battle, my soldiers suffered heavy casualties, if Tong Du Lieutenant can persuade your county to issue a pension and bounty as soon as possible, so that my sergeants and soldiers have the money to go to the fireworks place in the city to relieve themselves, it may greatly improve morale." ”

Tong Yan understood as soon as he heard it, and immediately swore an oath: "Wrap it up on Tong." ”

It turned out that Tong Yan's movements were indeed fast, and soon the county guard of Liang County sent someone to transport a sum of money to Zhao Yu.

When Zhao Yu distributed the money to the Yingchuan soldiers under his command, the soldiers who were originally demoralized because of too many casualties immediately took the money and spent it on the fireworks willow lane and the place of Goolan in the city, and their morale was greatly improved.

Of course, the reason why Zhao Yu did this was not simply to win the hearts of the military, he was also to continue to contact Tong Yan.

In fact, from the moment he met Tong Yan, Zhao Yu deliberately befriended Tong Yan, even if he knew that Xue Ao would be unhappy because of this, all of this was to let Tong Yan relax his vigilance against him, so that he could attack Tong Yan in the future.

And Tong Yan was also happy to have a relationship with Zhao Yu, after all, Xue Ao didn't have a good look at him, and Li Meng also cared too much about Xue Ao's attitude, but Zhao Yu was willing to get close to him, so under Zhao Yu's deliberate friendship, he and Tong Yan soon became more and more familiar.

Zhao Yu's deliberate befriending of Tong Yan naturally couldn't hide it from Xue Ao, but after all, this was a private matter, and Xue Ao was not good at interfering too much, not to mention that Zhao Yu was a little unhappy except for befriending Tong Yan, and Xue Ao was quite satisfied with all other aspects of his talents.

On the fifteenth day of the first lunar month, the Lantern Festival, on this day that should have been a celebration, the rebels who had rested for two days launched an offensive against Liangcheng again.

Compared with the previous attack, the rebels' attack this time was much shabby, and the total number of rushing cars and ladder trucks did not exceed ten, and the rebels' soldiers almost all relied on siege ladders to attack the city.

It seems that this hasty siege of the city can have a good result.

Sure enough, the rebels paid a heavy price again that day, but the threat to the Jin army defending the city was far less than the day before.

As the so-called one drum, then decline, and three exhaustions, Zhao Yu felt that the momentum of the rebels was about to come to an end, just like the grain and grass in their army.

Obviously, Xue Ao was also aware of this matter, and summoned Zhao Yu, Li Meng, and Tong Yan to discuss the pursuit of victory in advance.

Looking at Xue Ao's energetic appearance, Zhao Yu quietly turned his gaze to Tong Yan on the side, watching the latter spare no effort to compliment Xue Ao.

"The righteous teacher is about to collapse, and it's almost time for me to do it......

He thought to himself.