On the sixth day of June in the first year of Qianning of the Tang Dynasty, Zheng Congyan led 70,000 forbidden troops to recover Junzhou and defeated 30,000 puppet Qi rebels.

After recovering Junzhou, Zheng Congyan left 5,000 soldiers to defend Junzhou to ensure the safety of the grain route, and then personally led the remaining army along the south bank of the Han River towards Xiangzhou.

The right Shence army is the forward, the left Tiance army is the middle army, and the left Longwu army is behind.

Previously, because of Zhang Jun's face and Zheng Congyan's order, Liu Kui became a green leaf. Since the Left Longwu Army had taken Junzhou, and the Right Shence Army was the vanguard, after learning that the Puppet Qi rebels had reinforcements coming to reinforce them, they ordered the Right Shence Army to speed up the march.

In Gucheng, he caught up with the rebels' fleeing troops and reinforcements, a total of 30,000 troops, and Liu Kui personally led 5,000 cavalry from his headquarters to attack the rebel army formation.

Later, the cavalry of Zuo Tiance's army, which was the Chinese army, arrived and broke 40,000 pseudo-Qi rebels on the west bank of Hanshui, killing Hanshui and dying red with blood.

Less than 5,000 rebels fled to Xiangzhou in disarray.

In this battle, the rebels lost 25,000 men, while the Left Tiance Army and the Right Shence Army only lost 9,000 men.

In ten days, two victories caused the rebels to lose nearly 50,000 soldiers, which was more than one-third of the entire rebel army.

When Zhao Kuangning fled back to Xiangzhou with thousands of remnants of the defeated army, the entire Xiangzhou was shaken.

In ten days, nearly 50,000 troops were lost, even if it was 50,000 pigs, it would take a few days to catch them.

There are only a few troops in the entire Shannan East Province, counting those rabble, a total of 130,000 people.

If these 130,000 people have the level of Zhu Wen or Li Keyong's army, it is estimated that Qin Zongquan has already overthrown the Tang Dynasty.

Qin Zongquan gathered hundreds of thousands of troops to attack Zhu Wen, but he didn't destroy Zhu Wen, you must know that Zhu Wen was only about 100,000 troops.

It can be seen how big Qin Zongquan's army is, at least it is a large number of people, but the combat effectiveness is really worrying.

There are many people, so you can only bully the feudal towns that don't have much strength. For example, Jing Nan was tossed half dead by Zhao Dexu.

The 130,000 troops of Shannan Dongdao are not all in Xiangzhou, you must know that Shannan Dongdao has eight prefectures, and it is impossible for them to be stationed in Xiangzhou.

Originally, there were only 30,000 troops stationed in Xiangzhou, but because of the imperial court's conquest, some of the surrounding troops were transferred to strengthen Xiangzhou's strength.

Junzhou originally had 30,000 troops, and later sent 20,000 reinforcements, which was 50,000 troops.

There are also 30,000 troops commanded by Wang Jianzhao to keep an eye on the Jingnan Army in Changlin County (now Jingmen City), and there are 30,000 troops in other states and counties in Shannan East Province, so there are only 20,000 troops in Xiangzhou at this time.

The imperial army has more than 50,000 people, and the gap has narrowed suddenly, and it has even been overtaken.

So when he saw his eldest son fleeing back with thousands of remnants, Zhao Delu had an urge to tear the other party apart.

He sent an army of 50,000 before and after, and he came back with these thousands.

However, this eldest son has always reassured him that this inheritance will be inherited by the other party sooner or later, but he didn't expect it to bring such a scene now.

"Rubbish!"

Zhao Dexu is not a good-tempered person, otherwise the people of Shannan Dongdao and Jingnan will not be sharply reduced, although they are not as brutal as Qin Zongquan, but the slaughter of the city or something happens from time to time, you can imagine his character.

Rao is Zhao Delu attaches great importance to this eldest son, but the huge loss also made him very angry, and directly kicked Zhao Kuangning to the ground without mercy.

He did this, but also because he was dissatisfied with his eldest son, and more for others to see. These subordinates of his are not monolithic, and there are many ambitious people, if they don't give an explanation to the soldiers, how can they serve the public.

"Father, it's the child's incompetence. But the Tang army is too strong, well-equipped, and there are tens of thousands of cavalry, and our soldiers are not opponents at all.

There is also a kind of trebuchet they have, which has a very long range and great power, and Junzhou City was broken by this trebuchet to break the city wall。。。。。 ”

Zhao Kuangning also knew how big his sin was, so after he was kicked over by his father, he did not fight against it, but knelt down and crawled in front of his father and kowtowed and begged for mercy.

Seeing the blood stains and messy hair on his forehead, the generals next to him were also a little unbearable.

Zhao Kuangning also has some prestige in the army, although this time he suffered two defeats in a row, but he can't blame all the blame.

"Waste will make excuses, 50,000 troops, it's gone, what are you doing when you come back?" Looking at the eldest son crying and begging for mercy, Zhao Dexuan was a little unbearable, but thinking of his mistakes, he could only kick the other party away ruthlessly.

A young general next to him who looked a little similar to Zhao Kuangning couldn't stand it anymore, and stood up and said, "Father, the top priority is not to hold accountable, but how to hold Xiangzhou."

Now the Tang Army, known as a 100,000-strong army, is attacking our Xiangzhou, and it is menacing. At present, Xiangzhou has less than 30,000 troops, and the strength is weak.

Although the city of Xiangzhou is high and thick, the eldest brother said that the Tang army has a sharp weapon to attack the city and has to defend it! ”

"Jie Shuai, I think that we should unite at the moment to deal with the menacing Tang Army." Someone next to him also stood up and persuaded him.

"What do you think? Xiangzhou's troops were weak, while the Tang army was outnumbered. Zhao Dexuan's anger eased a little, and he didn't want to keep holding on to his eldest son.

"Marshal, the top priority is to transfer troops from all sides to strengthen the forces of Xiangzhou, and even ask Your Majesty for help."

The majesty in this person's mouth is naturally Qin Zongquan, Qin Zongquan is the emperor in Caizhou, and Zhao Delu is Qin Zongquan's subordinate, so the majesty in their mouth will naturally not be Li Ye.

"Your Majesty is concentrating forces to attack Zhuwen in Bianzhou, even if you are willing to send reinforcements, it will not be able to quench your thirst!" Zhao Dexuan said worriedly.

"The troops of other states and counties can be transferred first, and the 30,000 troops used to defend Jingnan can also be transferred back.

Then arm the strong men near Xiangzhou, so that the commander can also take out 100,000 troops, not to mention defeat the Tang army, and hold Xiangzhou without worry.

However, the first thing to do is to stabilize the Tang army and buy time for the movement of the army, and the best thing is to delay the surrender of the Tang army. ”

Zhao Deyu nodded, judging from the current situation, this strategy is undoubtedly the best way. So he sent his eldest son Zhao Kuangning to go with a handwritten letter and let him make meritorious contributions.

ァ新ヤ~(8)~1~Chinese 網ωωω.χ~8.~1zщ.còм

Although the imperial army had approached Xiangzhou, it did not really come to the city, but was stationed in Dengcheng County, more than ten miles west of Xiangzhou City. Although the siege has not yet begun, the scouts of the two armies have already engaged in battle, and each has its own losses, but the puppet Qi rebels will suffer some losses.

The reason is simple, on war horses.

At present, the war horses of the imperial court are much better than before, in addition to the merger of the towns of Guannai Province, Songzhou and Hexi are the main reasons.

So far alone, there are eleven pastures under the direct jurisdiction of the imperial court, of which two are upper pastors, three middle pastors, and the rest are lower pastors.

The standard for upper herding is more than 5,000 horses, more than 3,000 for middle herding, and less than 3,000 for lower herding.

Two shepherds, one in Songzhou and the other in Wenzhou, of which Songzhou has 10,000 horses of various kinds, and Wenzhou has 7,000. Two of them are around Chang'an and one is in Yangzhou.

These eleven large and small pastures have 40,000 large and small horses, and can provide about 8,000 excellent war horses every year. Although the quantity is not much, the quality can be guaranteed.

Of course, these ranches have just started, and they are small in scale and cannot meet the needs of the imperial army's war horses, but the Guiyi Army located in Hexi can provide a lot of war horses, and most of them are first-class war horses, which are more high-quality than the war horses produced in these pastures of the imperial court.

By the end of May, the imperial court had made three transactions with the Guiyi army, and the Guiyi army provided the imperial court with 10,000 first-class war horses and 15,000 second-class war horses, for a total of 25,000 war horses. The imperial court, on the other hand, provided weapons, armor, and other daily necessities to the Guiyi army.

In this way, the quality of the forbidden army's war horses has skyrocketed, and the combat effectiveness of the cavalry has also increased somewhat.

And the pseudo-Qi is not good, not to mention that Shannan Dongdao does not produce horses, even if there are war horses, they are inferior horses, don't look at Zhao Delu has more than 100,000 troops, but in fact, even 5,000 cavalry can't get together. How could such an army be the opponent of the forbidden army in the field, there were 5,000 cavalry in the Right Tiance Army alone, and there were even 10,000 cavalry in the Left Tiance Army.

In order to find out the true combat strength of the Tang army, Zhao Delu personally led a cavalry composed of 500 personal soldiers out of the city after Zhao Kuangning left the city, and at the cost of more than ten casualties, he eliminated a fire Tang army scout team.

Zhao Deyu's personal soldiers were fifty to twelve, but he let three of them run away, and he lost fifteen people.

Seeing the captured Tang army horses, weapons and armor, Zhao Dexuan looked solemn.

"Marshal, the young marshal is not wrong, the equipment of the Tang Army is indeed too good, and the gap is too big with what we expected. Just the scouts, all equipped with fine horses and iron armor, can imagine what their main army looks like.

If it is a field battle, perhaps the Tooth Army of the Commander may not be able to win with the same number. The staff next to him took a closer look at the captured Tang Army armor and said with some concern.

Zhao Delu picked up a horse lance, waved it twice, and found that the quality was good, and the horizontal knives next to him were even better. The already frowning brow has never stretched.

"Do you think we have any hope of winning this time?" Zhao Dexuan said in a deep voice.

"Marshal Jie, if there are no reinforcements on His Majesty's side, only relying on our current army, there may be hope only by sticking to Xiangzhou." This staff member is a person whom Zhao Delu trusts very much, and he has been with him for many years, and he has advised him on many things.

The staff's words cut off Zhao Dexu's idea of a decisive battle with the Tang army in the field.

And sticking to Xiangzhou is a bit like when they attacked Jingnan.

After they defeated the Jingnan army, Jingnan Jiedu made Zhang Gui directly stick to Jiangling Mansion, although Jingnan suffered heavy losses, they just failed to attack Jiangling Mansion.

Now it was the other way around, it was their turn to hold the city, and the Tang army became the attacking side.

There is no doubt that this makes Zhao Delu a little unacceptable, they were the attackers in the past, how can they be so aggrieved now.

"If we really surrender like Tang Ting, how will Tang Ting settle us?"

(End of chapter)