There was indeed no soldier in the Xicheng Tower, Yang Xuanying led the soldiers to rush to the city gate, the surroundings were as deserted, and there was still not a single soldier in sight.

Yang Xuanying immediately ordered: "Pull him over!" ”

Several soldiers rushed over, and in a moment, they arrested the man just now, the man was a bartender, he had never been in such a position since he was a child, he was so frightened that he shivered all over, and urine flowed down his trousers.

Yang Xuanying waved his hand to let the soldiers let go of him, and asked, "Why are there no defenders at the city gate, where are the defenders gone?" ”

"They..... They all left in the afternoon. The bartender stammered with his teeth.

"Where have you been?"

"No.... I don't know, out.... Out of town.... Let's go. ”

Yang Xuanying immediately ordered: "Light the torch and open the city gate!" ”

The soldiers lit torches and waved them at the top of the city, the city gates opened, and the drawbridge was slowly lowered.

"General Yang, what's going on?" Pei Xin turned over and dismounted, stepped forward and asked.

"The situation is unknown for the time being, I didn't see a single enemy soldier in the entire West City Gate, just now the guy said that they withdrew in the afternoon."

At this time, Hu Tong stepped forward and said: "They should have received the news of the pass, they only have a thousand soldiers, and they knew that they could not hold the city, so they abandoned the city and fled." ”

Hu Tong's judgment was correct, and the next day they searched the whole city, and indeed did not find a single soldier, and the officials of Huaizhou also confirmed that the defenders had all fled.

Pei Xin immediately sent an eagle letter to Shangdang County, Luzhou.........

Guo Song was in Shangdang County at this time, this small-scale eastward expedition, he used 50,000 troops, the time for the eastward expedition is not yet ripe, but it is also necessary to use the opportunity of Zhaozhou to drive a wedge in Hebei.

As for the occupation of Huaizhou, it is also due to two considerations, one is to form a kind of containment of Weizhou and Xiangzhou, so that Tian Yue does not dare to easily attack Huaizhou from the south, to a certain extent, it is to force Tian Yue to adopt neutrality, after all, Zhaozhou is not his territory, and it has nothing to do with him.

And another purpose of capturing Huaizhou is to form an oppression on Luoyang, Zhu Zhu has unified the north bank of the Yangtze River, but Guo Song wants to prevent him from marching into Jiangnan, the best way is to encircle Wei to save Zhao, Zhu Zhu dares to fight Jiangnan, he will attack Luoyang, do not have to wait until the winter freezes, he already has enough ships to transport troops across the Yellow River.

The strategic location of Huaizhou is extremely important, a bit like Youzhou, backed by mountains, facing the plains, to the south can enter the Central Plains, to the east can attack Hebei, to seize Huaizhou is Guo Song has been planning for a long time, and he took the opportunity of this attack on Zhaozhou to make a move.

The army camp is in the north of Shangdang County, here is about 80 miles away from Huguan, the sky is not yet bright, 30,000 troops have been assembled, Fukou is a little better than Taihang Cheng, it is a historical tea and horse business road, although it is not good to walk the cart, but the mule and horse can walk smoothly, if you want to take the cart, then you can only go to the well.

This time, the 30,000 army brought a logistics team, which was 5,000 camels loaded with food and military supplies.

At this time, Pei Xin led an army of 10,000 people who had just occupied Hanoi County, and had not yet had time to send the eagle message.

Guo Song walked out of the big tent, turned over and asked, "Are you ready?" ”

Yao Jin nodded, "It's all ready, ready to go." ”

"What time is it?"

"Back to Your Highness, the hour has just arrived."

Guo Song looked at the blue and white sky in the distance, then nodded and said, "It's almost, let's go!" ”

'Woo-' A low trumpet sounded, and the 30,000-strong army and 5,000 camel caravans left the camp in turn, heading northeast to Huguan.......

This time, Guo Song did not use cavalry in his expedition to Zhaozhou, all of them were infantry, and the infantry did not ride horses, their intelligence was already very sufficient, and Zhaozhou could not even support 3,000 cavalry, let alone 30,000 cavalry.

The fundamental reason for the capture of Zhaozhou this time is that I hope to get a springboard in Hebei, get a heavy place for material hoarding, and then gradually hoard materials after occupying Zhaozhou, and when the material hoarding is sufficient, the cavalry will naturally pass, and the time will be ripe to launch the Hebei Campaign.

In the afternoon, the army passed through the Hukou Pass and officially entered the Fukou Pass, where they had to walk for two days before they could reach the Fukou Pass at the other end.

Guo Song had already sent the fierce general Gan Xin to lead 3,000 elites as the vanguard, and set off a day in advance, and their task was to capture the Fukou Pass.

At the beginning of nightfall, an army of 3,000 people rested in an open space about two miles away from Fukou Pass, here is a rare open space in the canyon, in the shape of a gourd, about the size of three basketball courts, the soldiers sit on the ground, drink water and eat dry food, the weather is hot, the soldiers are forced to march for a day, they are really a little tired and exhausted, they are resting, while waiting for the opportunity to attack Fukou Pass.

There was also a wooden house next to the clearing, which was supposed to be a grocery store, but it is now closed and the store is nowhere to be found.

The main general Gan Xin stood on a big stone and looked in the direction of the pass, Gan Xin was 1.9 meters tall, looked burly, and stood on the big stone like an iron tower, which was particularly majestic.

Gan Xin is also a senior general, a native of Tongzhou in Guanzhong, who followed Guo Song to envoy Anxi, and was one of the seventy-three people who survived and returned.

I need to say a little more here, there are currently four levels of generals in the Jin Army, the first is the title, not everyone has it, the title represents the degree of meritorious contribution, and it is more difficult to obtain, such as the county duke, to obtain this title, it is generally the main general of an important battle to have hope, the current highest title is Yao Jin and Luo Daxiao, both of whom are county dukes.

Li Bing, Liang Wu, Ma Weijiang, Kang Bao and others are only county dukes, but this time Pei Xin led the army to capture Huaizhou, and he was also able to accumulate merit and be crowned county dukes.

The second is the official rank, which mainly depends on the time from the years, does not consider military merits, only involves seniority, and salary, welfare, just stay up every year, but if a person is a low-level and high-level, he will often be despised.

Then followed by the military rank and military rank, the promotion of military rank and military rank mainly depends on merit and ability, the military rank is the fire commander, the team leader, the brigade commander, the captain, the general, the general, the general, the general and the general, divided into nine and twenty-seven levels, very fine, each level has three levels.

For example, Zhonglang will be divided into three levels: Eagle Strike General, Eagle Yang Lang General and Tiger Benlang General, and then the general will be divided into three levels: General Wei, General Che Cavalry and General Hussar.

Military positions are specific positions, and there are many names, such as the commander of the border army, the town general, the capital army, the governor, the festival envoy, etc., as well as the regimental training and the captain in the local state soldiers, these are the military positions of various systems.

There is also the direct military system of the Jin King Guo Song, in which the military positions are called commander, commander and commander, which currently mainly includes three military branches: pro-soldier guard, internal guard and Jin guard.

In the regular army, the names of military positions and ranks are basically the same, but if it is a single party and leads more than 10,000 troops to fight a battle alone, the king of Jin will grant tiger talismans, military swords and arrows, and grant temporary titles.

It's a bit far-fetched, let's talk about Gan Xin, his current military position is General Wei, and his title is county uncle, but he has never served as a soldier and horse envoy, and Pei Xin and Xiao Lingfeng, who were at the same time as him, have both served as soldiers and horses, and his military rank is also a chariot and cavalry general, one level higher than him.

The fundamental reason for this is that Gan Xin is illiterate and does not want to study, Xiao Lingfeng was also illiterate at the beginning, but now he can read military books well.

Guo Song severely criticized him more than once, Gan Xin was also ashamed and brave, and last year he entered the martial arts hall and began to read and write, but he only studied for a year, and he was already a little behind.

Obviously, if you are illiterate, you can't even read military newspapers and intelligence, and you don't know the map, so how can you stand alone?

If you can't stand alone, of course, you are not qualified to serve as a soldier and horse envoy and commander, and there is no opportunity to make a meritorious service in the battle, and the title and military rank will not be too high, which is interlocking, which forces the generals to study hard.

Gan Xin watched for a long time, and saw that the lights in the Fukou Pass were bright, and there were soldiers patrolling back and forth, as if he were facing a great enemy, he immediately realized that the enemy had discovered them, but how the enemy found himself really puzzled him.

He jumped off the boulder and ordered everyone: "Have a good rest, we will attack the Fukou Pass at the third watch." ”

.........