Yuan Tao's appearance was completely unexpected for Zhao Dangshi. The situation in northern Sichuan changed treacherously, and the tide of fate finally pushed Yuan and Zhao together. Zhao Dangshi, who was anxious to get out of Sichuan, did not have the heart to destroy Yuan, but the sky was not as good as the people, and Yuan Tao's army, which forced the official army to Yingshan County, happened to be stuck on the side of the Zhao Ying's road out of Sichuan.

In addition, Zhao Ying's entry into Sichuan was originally the banner of "sharing the righteousness" with the heroes of Sichuan, if Yuan Tao was finally left in Sichuan, the first Kou in Sichuan, but he ran away with his tail between his legs, wouldn't he see people laughing? Moreover, along the way, many forces that were originally dependent on Yuan Tao have joined the gang one after another. Because of Yuan Tao's tyranny and oppression at the beginning, almost all of them had a shallow or deep enmity with him, and destroying Yuan Tao was also the wish of everyone.

The new feud was added to the old grudge, and Zhao Dangshi couldn't help but think about eradicating Yuan Tao who came to the door in one fell swoop.

At the beginning of February of the eleventh year of Chongzhen, although all the soldiers and horses had not yet been assembled, the major generals in the battalion had taken the lead and gathered in Phoenix Mountain, Pengzhou.

Before the start of the formal meeting, Zhao Dangshi first commended Xu Hui. Since leading troops to support the Tsing Yi Army in Pengxi, Xu Hui has independently led the army to deal with the official army. Although it has experienced a series of battles, it has effectively preserved its strength, successfully completed the task of covering the main force, and finally led nearly 5,000 people to Pengzhou intact to join the division. This credit cannot be written down in black and white. If it is said that killing the enemy and attacking the city are all due to the tactical level, then Xu Hui's overall planning this time has undoubtedly risen to a higher level. The congregations will all know this and will obey it.

Xu Hui himself pursed his lips and was silent throughout the whole process. Everyone knows that he is calm and steady, and he doesn't think he's hiding it, but secretly admires his personality that doesn't like things.

Generally speaking, with the exception of the right battalion of the first army, which was completely annihilated, and the left battalion of the old army, which basically lost its combat effectiveness, all units were able to maintain a certain combat effectiveness despite more or less casualties.

The details are as follows: on the side of the old army, a total of 5,500 people. Among them, there are 2,000 in the front battalion, 500 in the left battalion, 2,000 in the right battalion, and 1,000 in the rear battalion; On the side of the first army, there were 5,000 men, including 3,000 in the front battalion and 2,000 in the left battalion; In addition, there are 1,200 cavalry members of the Feijie Battalion, 2,000 members of the Tsing Yi Army, and a total of 300 people from the Family Care Department and the Special Service Division. The Zhao battalion, which was about to join forces at Phoenix Mountain, had a total of 14,000 horses.

Although it was not explicitly said at the meeting, everyone has a rod and scale in their hearts, and the current Zhao Yingming has 10,000 troops on his face, but he actually has the ability to go back and forth with the officers and soldiers, but first ask Guo Ruke's front battalion in the army, although Qin Jinxiao's left battalion can also fight, but because of the disadvantage of not being good at handling firearms, it is really a little worse in comparison.

The 14,000-strong troops, with only 3,000 backbones, sounds unbelievable, but Zhao Dangshi and other generals who have been in the rivers and lakes for many years know that this kind of scale can already be called a "behemoth-like" existence in the group of rogues who are full of fish belly.

Even if there is the key care of Zhao Dangshi and Xu Hui, but these 3,000 people can live up to their expectations and become the leading strong army in the battalion, and the generals who command them are also indispensable. How to maintain a balance between the two ends, and at the same time keep the casualty rate as low as possible despite many vicious battles in the middle of the month, these are not things that ordinary people can do. But obviously, as the general manager of the former battalion of the army, Guo Ruke is still very qualified for this job.

As early as when he was the only battalion commander of 3,000 people in the whole battalion, sensitive people could sense Guo Ruke's rise in status in the battalion. In the past few months, Jianzhou has fought fiercely, as the main force to behead Hou Liangzhu, the chief soldier of Sichuan; Defending the flood alone, and single-handedly blocking the attempt of Zhang Ling, a famous general in Sichuan, to go south, etc., have added a lot to Guo Ruke's resume. In addition, following Xu Hui this time, he achieved the "complete return to Zhao" of the 5,000-strong troops, and in the case of Hao Shaoqi's unfortunate death, many people believe that Guo Ruke will definitely be the next "ticket commander" in the battalion.

Ticket commander, rogue slang, no designated position, usually used to refer to the senior general at the decision-making level in the battalion. Take Zhao Ying as an example, although there are many generals in various armies and departments, only a handful can participate in major military intelligence meetings. Previously, in addition to Zhao Dangshi himself, as well as Chang Zeyu, Qin Qigong, and Mu Gongchun, the generals who could participate in decision-making were only Hou Dagui, Xu Hui, and Hao Shaoqi, the three earliest "ticket commanders".

Now, with the death of Hao Shaoqi and the decentralization of Qin Qigong, there has been a vacuum in Zhao Ying's decision-making level for a short time. There can't be too many people involved in decision-making, and there can't be too few, so it is reasonable for Zhao Dangshi to choose another general who can be relied on to fill in. He is in the prime of life, has read books, knows how to advance and retreat, and has his own ideas about combat, Guo Ruke is undoubtedly the best candidate.

It was not explicitly stated at the meeting, but everyone knew that Guo Ruke's rise was a foregone conclusion. The current situation is urgent, and it is difficult to adjust, once Zhao Ying can breathe in the future, he will definitely jump to one of the main generals who can compete with Hou and Xu.

Hou and Xu are both clear-eyed people, and this was already clear from Zhao Dangshi's attitude at the meeting. However, their moods are diametrically opposite: Xu Hui is indifferent, and Guo Ruke is considered to have been picked up by himself, so he doesn't say he's happy or resists; Hou Dagui was quite restless. Previously, he had always regarded Xu Hui as his main competitor, and seeing that the limelight of this person had been suppressing him for several months, he was helpless, and Guo Ruke, this kid, came out again. If the two of them become one, then their future life will not be easy.

Under the anxiety, Hou Dagui calmed down and smiled, in fact, he had already begun to think about how to deal with this tricky situation next.

Not to mention these, at the moment of military affairs, Zhao Dangshi immediately threw out a plan to deal with Yuan Tao. According to the old rules, the main generals first expressed their positions.

Xu Hui didn't speak, and looked at Guo Ruke, Guo Ruke knew that this was the "old superior" who deliberately gave up the opportunity to establish his position in front of the generals, and he was not humble, and bluntly said that Yuan Tao must be killed.

His voice fell, and without waiting for Xu Hui to speak, Hou Dagui took the lead in expressing his position. Only this time, he did not oppose the proposal of the "Xu Hui faction" generals as usual, but strongly agreed with Guo Ruke. On the one hand, he really felt that Yuan Tao should fight, and on the other hand, he was also driven by his own danger, thinking that before establishing his own advantages, he would pretend to be his grandson and follow the "Xu Hui faction", so as not to attract the crusade of the popular fried chicken.

Beat Yuan Tao, in fact, everyone has no objections, except for Guo and Hou, the rest of the high-level people also think that Yuan Tao can't help fighting. The generals saw that Zhao Dangshi himself was also inclined to fight, and no one had a head show to amuse him so much that he jumped out and sang the opposite.

So the focus of the discussion naturally shifted to how to beat Yuan Tao. According to the information provided by Pang Jinming, the Yuan Taojun currently stationed in Yingshan County still has a scale of several thousand people, occupying more than ten cottages in the surrounding mountains of Yingshan County. Yuan Tao's headquarters army was about 4,000 people, and his two generals, Li Xiaoshan and Yang Kexin, each had a strength of about 2,000 people.

Pang Jinming later secretly investigated, and found that the cottages occupied by Yuan Tao's army were all steep and abnormal, and no matter what the combat effectiveness of his army was, fighting in that difficult terrain was a huge challenge for the attacker. In addition, the three divisions of Yuan, Li, and Yang each based on the walled city, each other as horns, attacking one place, and saving two places, adding to the difficulties. This may also be the reason why the official army did not wipe out Yuan Tao's army in one fell swoop after forcing it into Yingshan County, but instead rested on its laurels.

The jealousy of the officials and the army does not mean that Zhao Dangshi is jealous. If Yuan Tao is not beaten, Zhao Ying will not be able to continue to advance eastward, and this nail will have to be pulled out of everything. He looked around at the generals who were thinking about him, and finally stopped his eyes on Guo Ruke, and asked, "Old Guo, how many people do you want to fight Yuan Tao?" ”

Guo Ruke hesitated for a moment and said honestly: "Rough estimates, at least five thousand people." ”

"What are the odds?" When Zhao Dangshi heard this, he was a little unhappy. I intend to promote Guo Ruke, but the other party should be just when he is sharp, how can he be conservative.

Guo Ruke shook his head and said, "Five-five." Although this is a good opportunity for his performance, Guo Ruke is still a calm person, and he is never willing to boast about Haikou because of a moment of excitement. Based on comprehensive intelligence and map analysis, he believes that Yuan Taojun is not easy to fight, and if he is too full of words and finally defeated, he will definitely suffer losses more than 100 times that he now admits to cowardly.

Zhao Dangshi couldn't do anything about him, so he asked Xu Hui: "Old Xu, what about you?" ”

Xu Hui thought for a while and said, "Guo Qian's words are reasonable. Then he added, "Even if you win, I'm afraid you will have to pay a considerable price." ”

By "considerable cost", he did not mean just the number of casualties. Zhao Dangshi understood that Xu Hui and Guo Ruke thought that the 5,000 people to be dispatched must include the elite of the battalion in the front camp and the left battalion. Zhao Dangshi, the other battalion leader, was not distressed, but if he wanted to let these elites suffer under Yuan Tao, the gains would outweigh the losses.

His gaze turned to Hou Dagui's direction, but Zhao Dangshi immediately tilted his head to the side. It's not that he doesn't trust Hou Dagui, but he has a clear heart, and Hou Dagui is not a tough material at all. Moreover, this person is easy to be emotional, and he does things without thinking about the consequences, if you ask him, he will pat his chest nine times out of ten and immediately take the attack on Yuan Tao on himself, and how much he will pay at that time is not within his consideration.

Calming down, Zhao Dangshi also found that attacking Yuan Tao was not so simple. was able to drive Yuan Tao's army from Bazhou to Yingshan, and the officers and soldiers were not stupid, and the reason why they did not attack further was that they must have seen the difficult road ahead. Thinking that his family background is not as good as the official army, is it appropriate to focus time and energy on attacking Yuan Taojun?

Thinking about it like this, it seems that Yuan Taojun shouldn't fight again.

Just when the issue of attacking Yuan Tao was unresolved, a weak voice suddenly said: "Lord, lord, the little one doesn't know whether to say it or not." ”

Zhao Dangshi turned his eyes and saw a corner in the corner, Jing Keqin squeezed to the front with a worried look.

Zhao Yingcao Chuang, Zhao Dangshi treats everyone equally. But this does not mean that there is no distinction between dignity and inferiority in the camp. It is customary to say that the status of the old team of Zhao Ying is much higher than that of those who joined later. Everyone doesn't say it openly, but secretly or in this kind of open military discussion, the difference in status is reflected. Among the various departments of the Zhao camp, the Tsing Yi Army was the latest to be merged, and Zhao Dangshi never completely reorganized and absorbed it. The overall strength is weak and he considers himself an "outsider", and the generals of the Tsing Yi Army seem to be incompatible with the generals of other departments. Except for the temporary general soldier Mao'an's position slightly in the east, most of the other generals of the Tsing Yi Army watched the excitement on the periphery, and no one could enter the inner circle to speak. And Jing Keqin only joined the Tsing Yi Army later, and he has not even been personally recognized by Zhao Dangshi, so his psychological disadvantages can be imagined.

If it weren't for the fact that he really had some thoughts in his heart to say, Jing Keqin was actually reluctant to come forward. Zhao Dangshi didn't have much impression of him, and even after being reminded by others, he suddenly realized that he recognized the person, and stepped forward to hold Jing Keqin's hand.

Under the burning eyes of everyone, Jing Keqin was a little embarrassed, and his rough face was stunned and the little daughter-in-law who spent candles in the cave room also seemed to be the color of pig liver. Zhao Dangshi saw that he was very cramped, and comforted him, but said: "Fighting for the name of the king of food, the name of Sichuan and Chongqing, who doesn't know?" Mr. Jing Qian just stepped forward to speak, and I waited to listen. ”

There are two meanings in these words, one is to praise Jing Keqin first, introduce it to the generals, and increase confidence for him; The second is on the "Jing Qian Zong". Like Mao Andong, the thousand presidents of the Tsing Yi Army, Jing Keqin are also temporary, and their names are actually not very tenable, but Zhao Dangshi is saying this now, which is equivalent to recognizing his status in disguise. Although the Tsing Yi Army is weak, Mr. Qian is also a high-ranking general in the battalion after all, giving him a name, and his waist is straight when he speaks.

Jing Keqin was respected by Zhao Dangshi, so he was so excited, he nodded and had no shape. This is actually the sequelae of being in the wandering circles for a long time. The fact that there are not so many respectful and humble etiquette in Zhao Yingzhong does not mean that there are no other places. Just said that under Yuan Tao, don't mention the confrontation, you have no intention of saying the wrong word, and if you meet Yuan Tao, who loves to be suspicious, it is enough to drink a pot. When the generals saw him behave like this, they laughed, but they could understand it.

"I don't know what Mr. Qian's opinion is?" The military was urgent, and Zhao Dangshi didn't have so much leisure to greet him, so he went straight to the point.

After Jing Keqin was excited, he remembered that he should do the right thing, eased his emotions, and opened his mouth to say something. After he said this, most of the generals, including Zhao Dangshi, did not react. Zhengzi was a little embarrassed, but unexpectedly, the first person suddenly said: "With this statement, Yuan Tao can be broken." ”