Although the mission was not completed, after a night of rest in Shouchun, Sun Sheng still made a request to return to Jinling to restore his life to Li Jing, but Liu Chengyou refused. Then, Sun Sheng found that he was already under house arrest, but on the surface, he became a guest of the Han Emperor and went south to Hefei with the imperial car.

As for how Jinling's side replied, they released an accompanying official, and let him go back and return to Li Jing. So, two days later, Li Jing learned in Jinling that Sun Sheng was angry in front of the Han Emperor, and his words were disrespectful, which angered the Han Emperor, but provoked his anger and anger, and completely went south.

In the past two days, the areas along the river in the Southern Tang Dynasty can be said to be full of warnings, Yang, Tai, Chu, He, Shu, Huang, there is no place without the Han army's conquest. Other places are not listed for the time being, Yang, Chu, and Sanzhou, almost directly pointed to Jinling, especially after the Han army increased its troops to the south, the river fort and military town in the Southern Tang Dynasty lost a lot.

"I used people unladylikely, and sent Sun Sheng north to negotiate peace, but I never thought that his temperament would be strong, anger the Han Emperor, and provoke his army to go south." In the main hall of the Tang Palace, Li Jing sighed and swept the ministers in the hall: "Only Murong Yanzhao and other generals have made the defense along the river urgent, and now the Northern Han army is going south, how can it be stopped?" How did I deal with it? ”

At this time, there are not too many people in the temple, but the current political demands are the same, the Lord and the Lord. Han Xizai and others, in the past few days, have been clamoring again and again, asking Li Jing for his life, hoping that he can be determined to resist the Han, persevere to the end, and do not make peace with words. annoyed Li Jing and simply closed it off.

"Your Majesty, in the opinion of the ministers, for the sake of today's plan, I can only send an envoy to the north again to face the Han Emperor, to express his anger, and respect the sincerity of my peace and discussion." Counselor Wei Cen got up and replied.

After his words fell, Feng Yansi got up and said cautiously: "Your Majesty, judging from the ministers, the anger of the Han Emperor is only afraid that it is not all angered by Sun Gong. The Han Emperor was ambitious and greedy, and if he could not satisfy his gluttony, he was afraid that he would be unable to withdraw his army. If I want to make peace, I must think about it, and what price should be paid before I can move the heart of the Han Emperor! ”

Feng Yansi's words are straightforward, but they are also vague, and there are some things that can only be done by Li Jing himself. Li Jing, obviously also understood what he meant, glanced at Feng Yansi, and his old face sank greatly.

After a long time, he sighed and said: "Send envoys again, go north with generous gifts, and say that I am willing to pay tribute to the ministers, and cut off the six states of Guang, Shou, Hao, Si, Chu, Hai and Han, hoping that they can stop the army!" ”

Saying this edict, not only Li Jing, but even the lords and ministers present subconsciously breathed a sigh of relief. Feng Yansi and others, in fact, have a similar meaning, as a weak party, take the initiative to negotiate peace, of course, they have to pay a big price, but the specific price has to be considered by the emperor himself. If it is endorsed by the courtiers, the country is humiliated on another day, and the emperor regrets it, then there will be no good fruit to eat.

After making a "difficult" decision, the question came again, who would be willing to do it, Li Jing asked it. The ministers were silent, they all subconsciously lowered their heads, no one was willing to send an envoy, this was not a good errand, not to mention anything else, Sun Shengke was also detained in the north by the Han Emperor.

Seeing the reaction of this minister, Li Jing couldn't help but be angry: "If you wait for the monarch to eat and receive the grace of the country, don't you want to share the worries of the monarch?" Do you want me to go north in person and beg for peace with the Han Emperor? Do I have to bear the humiliation of this covenant of mourning alone? ”

Li Jing's words fell, and as soon as the courtiers were killed, they remained silent and pretended to be dead. Li Jing's expression became more and more anxious, and at this time, Zhong Mo, a bachelor of Hanlin and a servant of the household department, stood up, bowed down for a long time, with tears in his eyes, and said in a choked tone: "The minister is willing to go to Jiangbei for Your Majesty!" ”

Someone took the initiative, and the tense nerves of the courtiers present finally relaxed, Li Jing saw this, his eyes were also red, and he lowered his rank to personally help Zhong Mo: "Zhong Qing has the experience of making a Han Dynasty, and he will achieve his mission when he goes north, and he is tired!" ”

Zhong Mo sighed, gritted his teeth and said: "The king has a life, the minister will relieve his worries, please rest assured, Your Majesty!" ”

"I am willing to go with Zhong Shilang!" At this time, another minister stood up, but it was Li Deming, a bachelor of the Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Seeing his solemn face, Li Jing was moved by this, and he felt a sense of "the wind knows the strength of the grass, and the board knows the loyal ministers". Without saying more, he immediately took Zhong Mo and Li Deming as the second envoy and quickly went north with gifts.

After Zhong and Li sent north, Li Jing received two good news. A letter from Ezhou, Wuchang Jiedu made Liu Renzhen report, defeated the Hunan thief army in Changshanzhai, the thief Wang Kui was defeated, and the enemy was annihilated by 3,000 soldiers.

But it was a while ago, Wang Kui, who was appointed by Liu Chengyou as the envoy of the Wuping Army, was ordered to assist the Northern Han Dynasty in the Tang Dynasty, and led 6,000 Langzhou soldiers into the territory of Ezhou. After attacking the Changzhai of the Tang Dynasty, after Liu Renzhen led the attack, he was defeated, more than half of his troops were broken, and he fled back to Hunan in embarrassment. Since then, the two friendly armies from the Southern Tang Dynasty, Wu Yue and Hunan, have been defeated by the Tang army, and it has been proved that the "friendly army" is not enough.

The second letter came from Li Hongji, the king of Yan, and the general Yan Lin Renzhao led the boat division of 2,000 to raid the Liyang Han Village, destroy its village, and kill more than 1,000 enemies. There was no mention of battle damage, and the record seemed to be relatively stumbling, but this was the best record that Tang Ting had received in the recent past against the Han army.

A little green among the thousands of flowers is particularly eye-catching. Of course, if you want to say that the person with the best record against the Han Dynasty has to belong to Guo Tingwei of Xuyi, even He Jingzhu, who guarded Shouchun, also caused a lot of casualties to the Han army, and no one said anything, and the news was difficult to pass on.

Knowing that the imperial court was promoting peace, Li Hongji, the Yan King of the Southern Tang Dynasty, who was still unwilling, sued the imperial court about this matter, just to boost Li Jing and the Southern Tang court. Tell them that relying on Jiang Fang, they can still wrestle with the Han army.

The effect is naturally there, but the weight of such a victory is too slight. In fact, when he heard the good news from both sides, Li Jing was happy for a while, and it was only for a while, after all, the general trend is difficult to reverse. Even, Li Jing was still worried about whether Lin Renzhao would anger the Han army and affect the peace negotiations if he fought this battle.

However, despite the ups and downs of emotions, Li Jing still praised Liu Renzhen and Lin Renzhao, especially Lin Renzhao, who directly promoted him as the defense envoy of Hezhou and the envoy of Jiangbei Yingtun.

Hefei, Liu Chengyou drove here, and the Huainan camp moved here, urging the Han army from all walks of life to attack the counties along the river. At the same time, Liu Chengyou sent out the iron cavalry, Fengguo, and Xiaodi armies, and the strength of the Han army was somewhat insufficient in the land of Chuyangtai and Taizhou, and only more than 8,000 guards were left in front of the Fengchen camp and the two compartments of the saint.

Hunan's report and the defeat of Liyang were also presented to Liu Chengyou's desk almost at the same time. is also a Liyang battle report, the Han army is more detailed and more real. Raided by Lin Renzhao, the Han soldiers were killed 372, the village was destroyed, 1,500 stones of grain were burned in the meantime, and more than 400 Tang soldiers were killed before and after.

Zhang Yongde presented himself to Liu Chengyou, saying that he was negligent and lax, so he was taken advantage of by the Tang army and asked Liu Chengyou to confess. In this regard, Liu Chengyou ordered someone to apply for punishment, and at the same time told him that there was no obstacle to a small defeat, and it was enough to be vigilant. He also issued an edict and told the Han army of Huainan Zhulu that the Tang army still had more courage and should not be careless than the enemy.

As for Wang Kui's defeat to Liu Renzhen, Liu Chengyou ordered Wang Kui to be rewarded with 100 horses of fire-fighting silk, and at the same time, he only said that there would be changes in Hunan.

The current situation in Hunan is basically that Wang Kui and Zhou Xingfeng divided power and controlled the military and government, with Wang Kui being the strongest and Zhou Xingfeng second. Now that Wang Kui's army is defeated, with 3,000 troops broken, and under the great loss of strength, it is inevitable that the "brother wall" will be unavoidable.

Of course, how the situation in Hunan develops, Liu Chengyou at this time can't care about it. Or, there is no intention to take care of it, such as chicken ribs, which are tasteless to eat, and it is not so a pity to discard them temporarily......

"1,000 taels of gold, 2,000 horses of Jinqi Ayaluo, royal clothes, rhino belts, tea, medicine, 500 head of army cattle, and 2,000 stones of wine!" In Hefei City, Li Fang read the gift list to Liu Chengyou who came north with the Tang envoy.

"This is the sincerity of seeking peace! It can be seen from this gift list that the pseudo-Tang is still rich, and his handwriting is not small! Liu Chengyou took the gift list and glanced at it twice, and said lightly: "The cattle will be escorted to Huaibei and handed over to Wang Pu for disposal, and the rest of the gifts will be given to the generals and colonies of the army, and the wine and meat and the two thousand stone wine will be sent to reward the soldiers!" ”

"Yes!" Li Fang responded, and then asked Liu Chengyou for instructions: "Tang envoy Zhong Mo and Li Deming, when will Your Majesty meet?" ”

His eyes rolled, and Liu Chengyou raised his finger and said, "Hang them for one night first, take them to the barracks tomorrow morning, and let them watch our Han military exercises." Tell Li Chongjin to let him give me a good life to practice, entertain the Tang envoy, and don't fall into the majesty of our Han army in front of the foreign envoy! ”

Almost immediately understood Liu Chengyou's intentions, Li Fang chuckled and responded: "Obey!" ”