Approaching dusk, all activities in the camp of the Yuan army at the fork of the three forks were still rigorous, and most of the soldiers who had no tasks rested in the camp tents. Since receiving a letter from the police, Wang De, the commander of the battalion, has been a little puzzled, and the military communication with Yidu has become difficult in the past few days, and the latest military information transmission is often two days late.

Because Juxian took Yishui, the passage to Linqu was cut off by the Shuntian army, and the messenger had to change to the mountain road in the eastern part of the mountain, which was at least nearly 100 miles more than a hundred miles of mountain road. And according to the messenger's report, even this mountain road is not safe, and there will be robbers from time to time these days.

The Military Intelligence Messenger has a special status, and when passing messages along the way, each station is given priority to provide them with a change of horses and food. Messengers often wear special military uniforms, not only in the lace and tassels of the hat and cloth jackets, but also in the courier will tie a small flag to his back to show his identity more prominently. In this way, vehicles and pedestrians along the road can easily identify these specially identified messengers and must give way to the road.

Because of the special costumes, it is naturally much easier for those who are interested to make any action against the messenger.

After Wang De learned twice that the military intelligence messengers who traveled back and forth had accidents, he even ordered the messengers to wear civilian clothes, but he still disappeared several times. Wang De couldn't help but raise his vigilance. The people who dare to attack the military envoys are definitely not ordinary people.

In fact, after Yu Zhilong made the decision to go south, he sent several groups of scouts to the south in batches, and set up ambushes between the official roads from the Yishui camp to Yidu, the purpose was to cut off the military intelligence between the two, and the specific date of blocking the exchange of information was two days after Zhilong entered the mountain.

However, because of the limited number of scouts that could be dispatched, and because he was not familiar with the local geography and roads in a short period of time, it was impossible to hijack all the roads and all the messengers who traveled back and forth for a while, but for Yu Zhilong, the most critical three days, he still completely intercepted all the Yuan military envoys traveling between the north and the south.

This delayed the news of the first dispatch of warnings to the south, at least two days later. So much so that the warning news that the main general Wang De got was only from Yanming.

Yan Ming couldn't win Wang De's trust because of his identity, and in fact, he didn't know how many people the Shuntian army could participate in the attack on the Yuan army's camp.

However, Wang De was suspicious, but he still increased the vigilance intensity of the battalion that day. And sent messengers to the rear to inform them of the possible attack on the camp by thieves. It happened that Yan Shun led the team to deliver the supplies, and happened to meet the messenger halfway, so Yan Shun received the news.

However, when Yan Shun learned about it, it was too late, and Ma Rulong, Pang Biao and others had just completely wrapped his baggage team with dumplings, so that even the messenger sent by Wang De died in the encirclement.

Yan Shun was originally a man who slipped around and shot horses, he opened the way with silver, and became a thousand households in the army, this time he listened to the other party's tone after being caught in the hands of the enemy, and wanted to make himself lead the way and deceive the Yuan camp, so he also wanted to deliberately hide the news that the camp had been attacked, and imagined that when Yu Zhilong and others attacked the camp, they were killed by the prepared Yuan army, and they could take advantage of the situation to be rescued. However, no matter how calculating he was, he did not expect that one of his subordinates, for fear of reprisals, told the news that the battalion had learned of an enemy attack.

Wang De has been camping here for about 20 days. Compared with the strong soldiers of the Yuan army in Yidu City, there are mostly miscellaneous Han troops in Yishui and Juxian, and the number of local rebels is not much. Therefore, he took off the southern expedition and transferred troops and horses from all over the belly, but Yishui and Juxian did not consider it at all. When Yu Zhilong occupied Linqu, he first ordered Yishui and Juxian to gather most of the Han army to go north, and camped here, taking advantage of the geographical advantage to block the Shuntian army from going south.

Under this consideration, Wang De, who was in charge of the army, led his troops to camp here in accordance with the military order of Yidu Road. The mountains here are dense, and the camping place is a three-way crossing, north to Yidu, south to Juxian, and west to Tai'an.

To the south for more than ten miles and then turn northeast to Wulian, Rizhao, and the east of Langya County in the Qin and Han dynasties. The mountain road is crooked, and the road is not very wide. There are many ravines between the two mountains. There is at least four arrows between the hills on the left and right of the three forks here, and the area conducive to camping or passage is only a stone's throw away. Relying on the direction of the mountain, Wang De arranged the camp in a long strip between the two mountains, and set up two camp gates in the north and south.

Wang De is a ten thousand households, his skills are mediocre, and the combat power of the troops he brings is also uneven, if it is a field battle, he himself is not absolutely sure that he can win, but relying on a strong camp, Wang De basically no longer has this worry.

A few days ago, he urged his troops to strengthen the wall, set up horses and traps, etc., and spent more than ten days of effort, and the entire periphery of the camp has been built by him. The two-person high log walled wall completely surrounds the periphery of the camp, and there are also watchtowers and female walls intermittently arranged on the wall, and there is a trench more than one person deep dug on the outside of the wall, and there are also scattered and scattered horses and other things between the ditch and the wall.

Wang De's heart finally settled down a little, the soldiers below were miserable, there was no joy in the camp, they were all looking forward to the regular delivery of supplies from the rear, so the meat and eggs transported by Yan Shun became a good day for celebration in the camp, and individual generals who were related to them would also receive the wine that Yan Shun secretly carried.

Fortunately, there are huge trees to cut down and large rocks to be mined on the surrounding mountains, and the thief army in Linqu has not moved south. This gave Wang De enough time to build this fortress carefully. Wang De also set up observation posts on several nearby hills, stationed them day and night to keep an eye on the enemy's situation, and sent scouts to expand the scope of reconnaissance. With these measures, Wang De's heart is much calmer.

After inspecting the camp again after the hour of this day, Wang De saw that the military discipline of his troops was a little lax, and he couldn't help but be furious, and whipped a dozen or so soldiers who were secretly drinking in the tent and the small colonel who gathered a crowd to gamble in public, and beat these people to tears and tears.

"Hit, hit me hard! A bunch of things that don't grow up know to have fun! Wang De sat on a high seat and splashed a bowl of Laoshan bamboo leaf tea on the ground. These people are not only frolicking in the camp, but the key is that they dare to be disrespectful to themselves, laughing that the way to strengthen the camp these days is to make a thick turtle shell for themselves.

When the soldiers saw that the lord was angry, they naturally lashed it harder. At first, the tortured soldiers were able to scream and beg for mercy, but gradually their voices weakened, and some of them were unconscious.

The soldiers who were called to watch the torture lined up on the sidelines, and no one dared to step forward to dissuade them. Wang De is angry, he is small-minded, and he is good at remembering personal grudges. The chief of the whipped soldiers, Baihu, was tightly tied into zongzi by Wang De's personal soldiers at this time, and was imprisoned aside, if it weren't for the bitter begging of his comrades before, this Baihu was afraid that Wang De would be beheaded on the spot to show the public.

These sergeants did not have to be punished so harshly for violating discipline, but Wang De's Han army was mostly miscellaneous, although the number was not very large, but there were many factions, and many officers were not very respectful to the main general Wang De. Because Wang De is not a native of Yishui, but he was also transferred from other places in Yishui first, and he lacks connections and roots in Yishui. After Wang De took office, his main energy was to accumulate wealth and bribe officials, and he despised the local military and political people, and the relationship between the military and the government was not harmonious.

In the past few years, Wang De has made a lot of gold and silver in this unified army, except for his own private part, the rest are mostly filial piety and first and Yiwang. He Yiwang is also satisfied with Wang De's performance, and in recent years, the evaluation has been excellent, and there are even rumors: Wanhu Wang De may also be promoted to Linzi, which is much stronger than the bitter cold Yishui!

The kidnapped hundred households are just small officers, but they are people in the local Han army who are not very respectful to Wang De, and Wang De takes this opportunity to stand up for himself. Although he made a gesture to behead him, it was just to show those who did not deal with him in the army, and now some people pleaded for mercy and borrowed the donkey from the slope, but announced that he would be dismissed.

At this disposal, Lieutenant Colonel Zuo Duo trembled, and seeing that the goal had been achieved, Wang De returned to his account satisfied. The officers of his subordinate departments looked at Wang De's back, and the dissatisfaction and anger in their hearts did not need to be expressed, the so-called officials crushed people to death at the first level, and this hundred households deserved to be punished for disrespecting military discipline, but this incident undoubtedly slapped their factions in the face once.

After the public execution was completed, some soldiers were able to step forward to carry down their tortured companions, and these unlucky guys were so seriously injured that it was estimated that they would not be able to get better if they did not lie in bed for half a month! Although the dismissed Baihu was not punished, he was dismissed as a soldier, if Wang De had been stationed in Yishui, his promotion in the army in this life was hopeless. A few good colleagues sympathetically came over to untie him, and hooked his shoulders and dragged him down together.

The whipping in the camp lasted only half an hour, but it played a dramatic role in Wang De's fate.

After the rain, the mountains are yellow-green, although it is close to winter, but the large and small trees on the mountain are lush and green, the leaves turn yellow, and they are gradually falling in the autumn wind, and a thick layer of fallen leaves has accumulated on the ground. After a few days of drizzle, not only is the air fresh in the mountains, but also the mountains are full of bright colors. If it's a peaceful season, it's a good time to hike in late autumn. However, since the night, there is a stream of mountain fog faintly shrouded in the high mountain, fortunately, the mountain fog is only shrouded in the mountain, with the mountain wind blowing, the clouds and mist slowly drift between the mountains, and the view under the mountain is still unobstructed.

Looking at the white clouds floating above, Wang De was always a little unhappy in his heart, the clouds and mist covered several towering mountains around, although the clouds and mist were not dense, the observation post could barely see the situation under the mountain at the top of the mountain, but after all, it was not as good as the observation results on a sunny day.

At the beginning of Shen Shichu, Wang De was talking to a few henchmen in the tent, when suddenly a personal guard ran in from outside the tent: "My lord, a heavy horse in the rear was attacked by thieves on the road, and a sergeant in the team broke out to ask for help!" ”

Wang De and others were shocked. The grain and straw in the army are not very sufficient, and generally every six or seven days, Yishui sends a batch of baggage, because the rear is relatively quiet, and there are no large bands of thieves, so everyone is more at ease about the back road. It was only because the Linqu thieves were getting bigger and bigger, and the government was worried that the surrounding mountain and wild thieves would be affected by it and plunder everywhere, so they sent at least two hundred households to escort them each time. If this batch of baggage is lost, the morale of the army will be greatly affected. "Summoning this person for a conversation!" Wang De commanded.

Suddenly, a soldier was sweating profusely, without a hat and helmet, only wearing leather armor, and the armor was covered with mud.

Entering the big tent, he caught a glimpse of one of the middle-aged generals sitting on the throne, and several generals were seated on either side. Knowing that it was Wang De, the main general, he hurriedly ran a few steps, knelt in front of Wang De, bowed his head and bowed, panting and saying loudly: "Small brand head Yang Le, meet your lord!" “

"How did you meet the enemy, and what is the current situation? Hurry up! Wang De lowered his voice and asked in a deep voice.

That Yang Le calmed down a little and said: "Back to the adult, the small one is to follow the thousand households Yan Shun all the way to escort the baggage from Yishui, today at noon after the swallow ridge, not twenty miles, to a place back to Mapo, the scouts in the team suddenly found that there was a large group of thieves, no less than thousands of people are rapidly approaching, looking at the direction is rushing to the baggage." Lord Yan judged that it was the thieves in the mountains who took the risk to rob the road in order to survive the winter. So I specially sent a small galloping horse to report for help! ”