Just as Wu Meng and Lulihua crossed Qingshui and recovered Qingshui and Qingyang counties, Fang Yuanheng did not launch an offensive against the Rong soldiers as he imagined.

Originally, he wanted Xia Zhong County to send 30,000 troops north to Qinlan County to take over the defense and recover the counties, so as to gather his scattered forces together again, and then try to annihilate the forces of the Rong army.

Fang Yuanheng estimated that this matter could be done in about a month at most, but what he didn't expect was that his plan was far from being as fast as the change.

When the 30,000 soldiers and horses of Xiazhong County went north out of Yushan, they smoothly took over the four counties of Haiwu, Zichuan, Ningdao, and Luoshui, and the 10,000 Fang Yuanheng soldiers who originally stayed in Xiazhong County also rushed north to Artemisia Lu with 16,000 soldiers defending the city, and the more than 40,000 soldiers left there by Fang Yuanheng were united.

Just as Fang Yuanheng's troops returned to 70,000 people, and he was also full of ambition to enter Lanlu County north, he suddenly got a news that shocked him very much:

At the same time, the two counties of Zichuan and Ningdao were besieged by the Rong army that left Yuanshan in the west.

Moreover, what made him even more unbelievable was that the Jin 20,000 army besieging the two counties turned out to be some Qin people.

Fang Yuanheng didn't expect that there would be a sudden change of Qin people joining the Rong army, which made him a little worried about the current complicated situation.

This has never been done before for Fang Yuanheng.

For the Rong people, the Qin State has always fought against them, no matter whether they win or lose, killing one Rong people will reduce one Rong people.

But now there are a large number of Qin people who have surrendered, so that the Rong people have a lot less worries when they fight with them again.

Moreover, once the people of the Qin State joined the Rong army that was sneaking up behind them, then those main cavalry of the Rong army could pull out their hands, and they could appear in the soft underbelly of Fang Yuanheng anytime and anywhere.

In the direction of Lingzhou, after hearing the return of the "swallow", Zhezhe, the general of the Rong people, had already led 30,000 soldiers and horses to the north to gather danger and garrison in the three counties of Bingyan, Fenggu and Surabaya, and the original remaining troops totaled 40,000 soldiers and horses, completely blocking his way out of Lingzhou in the west.

And the more than 30,000 cavalry of the Rong people who have been fleeing are also waiting for the opportunity somewhere in Qindong counties, waiting for the opportunity to bite themselves.

But obviously, the most important thing at present is to hurry south to support Zichuan and Ningdao counties, because it is the only place for the army to go north, and it is also the throat of the whole army's life and death.

Moreover, at this time, the beginning of winter had already passed, and the northern counties were already very cold, if the logistics were not smooth, and the whole army would have to starve again, even Fang Yuanheng would not dare to imagine the consequences.

As a last resort, Fang Yuanheng once again dismantled the army that had just been united, and ordered Zheng Lu to command 30,000 troops to go south to rescue Zichuan and Ningdao counties.

At the beginning, the 30,000 soldiers and horses in the north of the county in the middle of the summer, after the new army took over the defense, still stationed 10,000 in Haiwu County, while the four counties of Zichuan, Ningdao, Luoshui, and Tianyu each had 5,000 soldiers.

Therefore, in Fang Yuanheng's opinion, it is quite difficult for more than 10,000 Rong troops to attack Zichuan and Ningdao counties at the same time, so the purpose of attracting their own troops is really obvious.

But despite this, he had to divide his troops to rescue.

Fang Yuanheng understood that he was calculated by the Narong coach, but he was indeed a little helpless.

At this time, he also got the news that the soldiers and horses of Yuanzhou entered Xiaoguan to no avail, but the Northern Expedition to Lingzhou annihilated more than 10,000 Rong troops and recaptured Qingshui and Qingyang.

Hearing this letter, Fang Yuanheng could only smile bitterly, Zhao Zhihai had already done a good job, but he didn't expect that it was himself who had changed.

In the next half month, Fang Yuanheng continued to get news of Zheng Lu's victories one after another, but he also learned from those news that although the more than 10,000 rebels suffered a lot of losses in these battles, they never let Zheng Lu's army be completely wiped out or defeated.

After Zheng Lu sent troops to the two counties, the rebels retreated to the direction of Yuanshan, and in the subsequent continuous pursuit of Zheng Lu's army, although the rebels continued to retreat, they also always maintained a state of imminent departure.

But those rebels are not those Rong cavalry after all, and Zheng Lu is not an easy person, after all, he still grabbed the tail of the rebels several times and started a fierce battle with them.

But after every fierce battle, those rebels would always abandon the part of their forces that were bitten by Zheng Lu and disappear without a trace again.

If those rebels only care about running away, it's just that every time Zheng Lu can't find a trace of the rebels, those rebels will go back and appear near Zichuan or Ningdao County, killing and wounding the Qin army transporting grain and grass, and only at this time can Zheng Lu find and bite them and eat some of the rebels' strength, so that the two armies seem to have entered a dead cycle, you kill me and run, you lose me and attack.

Fang Yuanheng, who was far away in Haolu County, was not idle, he sat by the fire in his hall every day, constantly analyzing the military situation in the two counties and the rules of the rebel army's march all day long, and at the same time sent his suggestions to Zheng Lu.

Finally, the opportunity came.

A month after Zheng Lu's army went south, according to Fang Yuanheng's general order, after an attack, he ambushed most of his soldiers and horses in a small hill called Ghost Lin Mountain forty miles east of Ningdao City, and only sent a small number of soldiers to pretend to continue to pursue the rebels.

Sure enough, on the fourth day, the rebels appeared again in the east of Ningdao City.

And at this moment, they have just intercepted and killed a thousand-person grain transport team on the official road.

Just as the rebels opened the grain cart full of hay and were stunned, they saw dense Qin troops in all directions, although those Qin troops were far away, but the rebel generals were still frightened, and immediately ordered 5,000 rebels to retreat eastward.

In the east, there is still a Qin army that is quickly approaching the rebels, but in the eyes of the rebel generals, as long as they can quickly intersperse, there is still a great hope that they can break out of the Qin army's encirclement.

As long as you can break through and enter Yuanshan, you no longer need to be afraid of the Qin army.

It was too late, and after a little discussion, several generals immediately divided their troops into two routes and retreated eastward at full speed.

The Qin army, who came quickly from the east, did not expect that the rebels would divide their troops at this moment, and they were also stunned, so they immediately bit the slightly larger number of men and horses along the way and rushed towards it.

Subsequently, the rebels on the other side saw that the friendly army had been bitten by the Qin army and did not return to help, but only broke through from the encirclement of the Qin army and escaped.

Half a day later, when this rebel army converged with another line of soldiers and horses, seeing that the Qin army was not pursuing him, he sent scouts to investigate the movements of the surrounded rebel army.

Who knows, after the scouts rushed to the location of the daytime battle overnight, they did not find any traces of the Qin army after the battle with the rebels.

It turned out that it had already snowed heavily on this day, and the first snow of this winter arrived as scheduled.

After scouting around the battlefield and finding nothing, the scouts were about to return to the large military camp in Wonsan.

But at this time, in the night, through the light reflected by the moonlight on the snow, they found that there were many figures on the official road in the distance, and they were quite neatly arranged.

After observing for a long time, these scouts were quite strange to see that most of the people on the official road were motionless.

The snow is still falling, and the temperature is already very low. These scouts don't understand, don't those people know that it's cold when they're standing on the official road?

Gradually, they discovered something unusual, no living person could stand up straight on such a cold night.

The scouts had the courage to touch Ning Dao's official road.

.......

In the following two months, the rebels gradually harassed more and more counties, and in addition to not harassing the people, these rebels also killed and injured the Qin army.

In the eyes of the Qin army, the rebels seemed to have suddenly become cannibalistic Rong people overnight, and at the same time, those rebels seemed to never be able to kill, exterminating one after another.

In the past, after the rebels attacked the small Qin army transporting grain and grass, they were not good at killing Qin soldiers except for snatching grain and grass and weapons and armor, but since Zheng Lu's army nailed 3,000 rebels to death on the official road under the snowy night that day, they often encountered rebel attacks in the wild, and unless they could fight to the death and retreat from the enemy, the Qin army would hardly survive.

Under the continuous harassment of the rebels, the grain and grass sent north from Wenshui and Yushan to the Qin army in Artemisia City gradually became less and less, and Fang Yuanheng also felt the horror of the situation for the first time.

Although after going north from Yushan, whether Fang Yuanheng personally led the troops or Zheng Lu and Edo led the troops, they still won one victory after more than 20 battles with the Rong army and the rebels, and did not taste a single defeat, but Fang Yuanheng suddenly found that the situation was developing in a direction that was becoming more and more unfavorable to him.

In the daily military newspapers, there were more and more hungry soldiers breaking into people's homes to seize food.

At first, Fang Yuanheng didn't care, but wrote a heavy word in the approval document, but gradually, this kind of thing became more and more, until Edo told him that if he continued to kill, then I was afraid that one day the army would all die under military law, Fang Yuanheng paid attention to this matter for the first time.

When he learned that more than 2,000 people had been executed by military law for stealing people's food without permission during this period, Fang Yuanheng felt a little helpless and bitter in his heart, and he couldn't help but miss the days when he didn't have to worry about grain and grass logistics and just charged in the big war.

On a snowy day, Fang Yuanheng finally made a decision to give up Artemisia Lu, Luoshui, and Tianyu counties, and return to Ningdao and Zichuan to defend them.

On that day, the soldiers who learned that they were going to retreat south no longer had any scruples, and not a single household of the people in the three counties was not plundered by the Qin army.

Fang Yuanheng, who went south a day earlier, didn't know about these things, but Zheng Lu and Jianghu, who led the troops south, were a little deaf to this matter.

It is no wonder that they connived at their soldiers Hu Lai, the two Japanese armies have been completely cut off from food and grass, and some large battalions have eaten starving horses. If you don't let your soldiers indulge once, there's no guarantee when they'll mutiny.

Although they sent their own soldiers to dissuade them from burning and killing the people, these soldiers scattered into the army of 30,000 or 40,000 and the three county towns, like a handful of sand thrown into the sea, and had no effect at all.

Half a month later, the soldiers and horses north of Ningdao completely retreated south.

Fang Yuanheng, who already knew what the soldiers had done, also knew that the matter had come to this point, and it would be useless no matter what, so he casually arrested hundreds of people who committed the most heinous crimes and beheaded them to show the public.

Although this move did deter the morale of the army, and also restored the scattered soldiers and horses to the elite division, everyone knew that everyone in this army was stained with the blood of the people, and the difference between those killed and alive was only fifty steps and a hundred steps.

At this time, the soldiers and horses of Ningdao, Zichuan, and Haiwu counties came to 90,000 again, and the number was far more than the number when Fang Yuanheng left Yushan in the north, but Fang Yuanheng knew that more than 20,000 elite Qin troops had been lost in these three months, which was not a loss that could be offset by a large number of people.

Standing outside the yamen of Zichuan, the second largest county in Qinlan County except Suibei City, Fang Yuanheng looked at the occasional scene of people saluting each other on the streets covered with thick snow, and only then did he realize that today was the first day of the 590th year of the Zhou calendar.

Today, it's the New Year.