Li Ruo was agitated and strode forward and said: "Wang Jiedu, why don't you spare your life, I am willing to live and die with the soldiers of Hebei!" He had put life and death aside, and his tone was full of swear and determination. Even Qin Hui was slightly surprised, and said secretly: "I didn't see that this offspring kid is so strong!" He couldn't help but think of Li Ruoxu's brother, he also had a teacher-student friendship with Li Ruobing when he was teaching at Taixue, these two brothers seemed to be gentle and peaceful, but they were actually stubborn people.

After Wang Yan was silent for a moment, he ignored Li Ruoxu and said to Zhang Yi, the commander of the Jingsai Army, "Escort Lord Qin and Master Li back to Bianliang." Zhang Yi was about to speak, but was swept by Wang Yan's tiger eyes, and suddenly felt a chill all over his body, and involuntarily said in a deep voice: "Obey the order!" "With four or five of his subordinates, he stepped forward and brought Qin Hui, Li Ruoxu, Meng Yuan and other civil officials who had passed the decree back to the cavalry of the Jingsai army, waiting for the opportunity to break through.

At this time, the war drums sounded more violently, and countless Hebei soldiers in the melee listened to the drums and saw the handsome flag held high, and their morale was greatly boosted. Although the defeat is decided, the festival is still there. will be the courage of the army. The Song army had been a little scattered by the cavalry of the Liao army, and at this time they all moved closer to the place where the banner was located. Wang Yan also sent his own soldiers to gather and sort out the various departments, and there were still tens of thousands of people. Because the artillery posed a great threat to the Song army's strong position, Wang Yan changed the strategy of the whole army's slow advance, and instead used the heavy cavalry of the Jingsai army as the vanguard, and the whole army moved to the southwest as fast as possible. The so-called battle to the death, under the desperate killing of the Song army at the expense of casualties, the overlapping array of the Xi army and the Jurchen army was once again broken through by the Song army. As soon as the main force of the Song army left the range of the Liao army's heavy artillery, it was heavily surrounded by the pursuing Liao cavalry and fell into a bitter battle again, while the Han artillery battalion moved and adjusted the position of the iron barrel guns and bombarded the Song army's strong position. In this way, three times and twice, the Song soldiers were seriously wounded, and after breaking through the Liao army's defense line again and again, more than 10,000 Hebei soldiers and horses broke through. The final resistance of the Hebei army was much more fierce than expected, even to the point that the Liao army might be defeated by the Song army if it was not careful. In order to deal with the main force of the Song army that was still fighting with the trapped beasts, Yelu Dashi could only divide a small number of soldiers and horses to chase the Song army that broke through.

This "small number" of Liao soldiers and horses is also nearly 10,000 Khitan cavalry. Qin Hui, the Hebei envoy who broke through the siege surrounded by hundreds of cavalry of the Jingsai army, was closely followed by a group of Khitan cavalry, and Zhang Yi, the commander of the Jingsai army, did not appear again after a battle to block the Khitan cavalry. The Jingsai army rode a good horse from Hexi, which was much better than the war horse of the Liao army, but the horsepower had reached the end of the strong crossbow, and the horses were constantly tired to death in the wild galloping all the way. Many of the cavalry of the Jingsai army simply stopped and fired arrows in place to intercept the Liao army. The Liao army recognized that this large group of Song cavalry must escort important people, and was not in a hurry, but patiently like a wolf pack, slowly grinding away the gradually exhausted Song cavalry little by little. In the end, there were only two or three cavalry escorts left by Qin Hui's side, and the cavalry of the Liao army sped up urging the horses, and went to the front from the north and south, surrounding Qin Hui and others.

When the Khitan cavalry rode forward from all directions unhurriedly, Qin Hui only felt a coldness rising from his lower abdomen, spreading out in his chest, and his whole body was frozen, his face was pale, and one hand was held on the hilt of Shang Fang's sword, but he couldn't draw the sword. Several cavalrymen of the Jingsai army were back to back, bending their bows and arrows, and they pointed and looked at the surrounding Hu cavalry in horror. The long period of flight has exhausted the last trace of strength and bravery. Dozens of Khitan cavalrymen, also bent bows and arrows, and two of them seemed to be leaders, and discussed for a while, one of them in half-baked Chinese: "Great officials of the Southern Dynasty, put down your bows and arrows, we will not kill you, and take you to the emperor." ”

Qin Hui hesitated for a moment, "Wow-" and pulled out the Shang Fang sword given by the official family.

The faces of the surrounding Khitan cavalry changed greatly, and if they hadn't seen that he was a civilian official and had no courage, they would almost have to shoot arrows. Several cavalrymen of the Jingsai army were also shocked, and everyone had heard the drama of the defeat of the overlord of Chu and the self-killing of the horizontal sword. Qin Hui held the sword in his hand, only to see that his face was blue and white for a while, the heavens and men fought for a long time, and finally sighed, the only death through the ages, the sword forged by a hundred steels fell weakly under the horse.

............

In the western sky, the burning clouds are stacked on top of each other, as if endless blood is flowing. The wind gently blew through the corpses all over the field, and on this day, there were tens of thousands of heroic souls of the Great Song Dynasty in the land of Hebei. And the cavalry of the Liao army was still chasing the Song army that was lucky enough to break out of the encirclement.

"Whoosh" "whoosh" a few wolf tooth arrows, grazed the top of the head and flew out, and finally "snapped" in the back of the heart, Song Jun fell weakly on the horse, the war horse lost the master's control, and the speed began to slow down slowly. This Song army's horse was good, and the Khitan cavalry chased him for a long time before catching up, and happily urged the horse forward, thinking that the Song army would free itself from the stirrups, scavenge and loot the belongings they carried, and peel off their leather boots and armor. However, when the Khitan cavalry reached out to drag the corpse of the Song army, suddenly, there was a "boom-" sound, like a thunderbolt sounding out of thin air, and the Khitan soldiers only "snorted" and fell to the ground, their faces bubbling into the mud with blood.

Li Ruoxu breathed a sigh of relief, the tap fire gun was still emitting green smoke, the sleeve of his robe was burned through a big hole by the flames of the gun, his strength had been overdrawn to the extreme, just now the last arrow of the Liao army hit the back of the heart, although there was a wire chain mail stuck in the arrow, but the force of the arrow body hit the back hard, and there was a burst of pain in the back, as if it was about to crack. He still held on to his spirit, let the war horse walk to the corpse of the Liao army in small steps, and stepped on the iron hooves a few more times, confirming that the Khitan cavalry who had been chasing him was completely dead.

Li Ruoxu gently patted the neck of the spiritual war horse, took the water and bow and arrow scimitar from the Khitan cavalry, and then tied the reins of his mount behind his saddle, gently urging the horses, and the two horses ran slowly towards the southwest one after the other.

............

The cooperation between Chunyu Iron Works and Gao Cheong Hong was decided. In the evening of that day, Chun Yuyue and Xie Ximin came to visit. Xie Ximin smiled when he saw Zhao Xingde: "Captain Zhao has been very busy recently. "Zhao Xingde was busy lobbying the lieutenants to attack Liao, and he didn't care about Chunyu Iron Works and Gao Changxing and the exchange of silver shares. Although Zhang Shanfu has decided to transfer Zhao Xingde from the Dragon Tooth Army, it has not yet been announced, and even Zhao Xingde himself does not know this news, so Xie Ximin is still commensurate with the captain.

"Where, where," Zhao Xingdedui said with a smile, since the Protectorate decided to send troops to Kanto, he was also a lot more leisurely, remembering that Xie Ximin and Chun Yuyue had no time to discuss with him several times before, he couldn't help but feel a little sorry, and raised his glass and said: "Today I apologize to the two of you." "This wine was brought by Xie Ximin, the best elixir jade dew in Gaochang Xing, known as the jade plate of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, drinking it can make people become immortals. Most of the wine in the Western Regions is a light peach wine, but this elixir jade dew is a strong liquor made from peach, and the jade bowl is served, which seems to be colorless and clear, and when you drink it, it seems that a line of fire burns from the throat to the belly.

The climate in the northwest is very cold, and the snow in the courtyard has not disappeared, but when someone visits, Zhao Xingde opens the doors and windows of the hall, and the distant mountains are faintly visible. The brilliant clouds are like crimson light veils. In the cold winter, the grass and trees withered, and the birds and birds were gone, but the Mingsha Mountain appeared clean and mellow. A layer of snow accumulates on the top of the mountain, and the sun sets, coating the snow with a faint layer of rouge. A gust of wind blew, and the soft smoke of the shadow veil fluttered gently, blending in with the distant scenery.

Although the scenery is good, but the cold wind runs straight in, just like the raging charcoal fire in the house, the three of them sit around the fireplace, the scene is like when the army is marching and fighting, but there are two beautiful maids next to Ji Yue and Caiyun to serve, it is enough to make the soldiers in the camp do not need food, but also drool.

After the three of them drank a full drink, Xie Ximin said with a smile: "It can be regarded as a good opening of the market, as soon as the two of us have decided to cooperate, the Protector Mansion has decided to set up a fire battalion in Guanzhong, and we will accumulate a large number of firearms and ammunition. Our Gaochang Xing's saltpeter is even more expensive, and the purified saltpeter sells for 300 wen per catty, which is also a good price. He saw that Zhao Xingde seemed to be worried, and said, "Don't worry about the war in Kanto, Brother Zhao, look at the preparations made by the five governments, it is only a matter of time before you send troops to Kanto to dominate the world." ”

Zhao Xingde smiled and nodded, but did not speak. The bloody war in the Liao and Song dynasties meant an opportunity to dominate the world for most of the captains of the Protectorate and even most of the sergeants, after all, the national policy of "provoking according to the soldiers, and winning two tigers with one blow" has been popular for many years. Soon the topic returned to the cooperation between Gao Changxing and Chun Yu Iron Factory, the three of them drank and discussed, Chun Yuyue briefly introduced the business expansion of some iron works, and said that the Ordnance Department increased a large number of orders for artillery, Chun Yu Iron Factory's four-inch and three-inch iron barrel guns were ordered at one time, and the deposit alone was 100,000 yuan, and the Ordnance Department had to order another five-inch iron barrel cannon.

The more Xie Ximin listened, the more excited he became, patting his thigh and sighing: "Brother Chunyu, your artillery has to be built, let the General's Mansion be used as much as possible." His grandmother's, a ten-pound shell, at least five pounds of gunpowder, of these five catties, nearly four catties have to use our saltpeter, as soon as the cannon goes off, it is the usual money. His eyes sparkled.

Chun Yuyue coughed lightly and said in a deep voice: "Brother Xie and I have also discussed, Gao Changxing will make saltpeter into high-grade gunpowder, and then combine the ammunition with the iron barrel cannon of our iron factory, and sell the iron barrel cannon, shell and gunpowder to the Ordnance Division, so that the Ordnance Department will not use other things, in case the cooperation is not good, it will ruin our reputation." He sighed and said, "It's a pity that the more this thing is sold, the more people it kills, and it creates evil." "He was a loyal man, and his words were filled with compassion.

"Brother Chunyu, you're not right," Xie Ximin shook his head and said, "To eliminate evil is to do good." This battle will be fought anyway, with knives and firearms, and it will kill people in the same way. Let's just push the boat along the river and carry it in the sky. He laughed as he spoke, filled the wine glasses in front of Zhao Xingde and Chun Yuyue, and persuaded the two to drink again.