Thieves in the mountains! Wang De thought about it slightly in his heart, he naturally knew that there was a Qingfeng Village nearly seventy miles away, and the thieves in the village were quite prosperous, and they were the largest among the surrounding bandits. This thief is rampant, and the court has been unable to win several conquests, but in the past year, the bandit has been relatively calm, and the officials and thieves have nothing to do. However, it was the first time that a bandit dared to rob the official grain.

"Have you ever encountered a scout or courier that would have been sent?" Wang De asked with a frown.

"The scout has never encountered it, but he has encountered a messenger who is said to be from the big battalion, and he has verified that the waist card is indeed from our camp. Yan Qianhu personally received him, and then ordered us to strengthen our guard and speed up the march. But not long after, a large number of thieves suddenly came out from behind the mountain, wanting to surround us and others, and Lord Yan was worried about the great strength of the thieves, so he sent this messenger and a few brothers to return to the camp first to ask for support. It's just that a few of our brothers were intercepted by many thieves who suddenly appeared on both sides on the way, and the messenger and several brothers were in trouble, and the little horse quickly saw that the thieves were unprepared, and escaped by taking advantage of the gap! Yang Le said intermittently.

Wang De was a little suspicious in his heart, the incident happened suddenly, he always felt that something was wrong, and then asked Yang Le a few questions about the baggage team and Yan Shun, etc., although Yang Le is a small brand, he knows quite much about the formation of the baggage team and the commanders at all levels who escort the army, including the description of the marching route and the stations along the way, but he knows very little about Yan Shun's own situation. Thinking about it, this Yang Le is just a soldier, and it is normal to know little about the net worth of a big official like Qianhu.

Wang De turned his eyes to look at a general in the camp again, and the man understood what Wang De thought, and came out to proclaim: "Today's scouts to the south have not turned back, presumably they have been poisoned by thieves, otherwise such a big thing will definitely be rewarded!" ”

Wang De snorted, back to Mapo according to this is only twenty miles, riding a fast horse only takes an hour to arrive, if it is really a thief who goes down the mountain to rob the grain, Wang De has to deal with it, once the grain is lost, Wang De as the master will inevitably be questioned by the local and even the Privy Council.

"Well, I think you're a thief's spy! It's delusional to want to beat this general! Wang De suddenly changed color, slapped the table and shouted. If it is really a thief, how can you escape so easily? How can you know so much about military secrets, and if you are not a caring person, who will pay attention to these details? If you haven't recruited it from the truth, what is your surname? ”

Yang Le was stunned for a moment, speechless for a while, and the generals in the tent were all colored, and they took out their sabers and were about to behead Yang Le. Several pro-soldiers had already snatched out and stood behind Yang Le, vigorously holding down his arms, and just waiting for Wang De to give an order, Yang Le was taken down, and Yang Le's waist knife was quickly taken off by a pro-soldier.

Seeing Yang Le open his mouth, Wang De was proud in his heart. With a wave of his hand, he ordered his subordinates to take down Yang Le, exit the tent and behead him.

Yang Le was in a hurry, and struggled to bow down again: "Don't dare to hide from adults, there is actually a small identity!" ”

"Oh, speak!"

"My lord, my other identity is under the rule of the Yidu Road Intelligence Division. The small prefect is Liu Gancheng, a hundred households in Yishui. "Liu Baihu and Liu Gancheng are the hundred households of the Han army who leaked secrets to Yu Zhilong in the baggage team.

Wang De and the others didn't expect what Yang Le said to be this result, and they were stunned for a while. Yang Le broke away, took out a tooth tag from his arms, and handed it over with both hands.

A personal soldier took it and handed it to Wang De. Wang De looked carefully, the front of the tooth plate was engraved with the big characters and vermilion lacquer seal of the Yidu Road Intelligence Division, and when he looked at it again, it was engraved with the name and origin of Yang Le, the Han Army of Yishui County, Yidu Road.

This tooth card is true, Wang De judged at a glance that the Intelligence Department is relatively special in the Mengyuan army, in charge of military reconnaissance in various places, and even monitors the generals of the Han army in various places, so the Intelligence Department is not welcome in the eyes of most Han army generals. Since this person is a member of the Intelligence Division, it is natural to explain the fact that he is concerned about changes in the military situation and the baggage team.

The Intelligence Department has its own line in the Han army, and the specific details of the operation are not known except for the commander-in-chief, and the rest of the people do not know.

Wang De waved his hand, the soldiers retreated, and the generals in the tent also put their swords back into their sheaths and returned to their positions.

"Since you are your own people, arise and speak." Wang De gestured. The head of the intelligence department is a Mongolian man, and the army often thinks very highly of himself, although Wang De does not like it, but he still does not want to deal with it.

"Thank you, sir!" Yang Le bowed deeply, got up and leaned over to reply. "The little one hurried all the way back, just begging the adults to send someone to support quickly, Lord Yan had already ordered the whole army to rush here before the small one left, but the thieves were powerful, and the escort army alone could not protect the baggage and comprehensiveness! The thieves who surrounded the villain on the way, their swords are clearly the standard of our army, and the accent is similar to that of the northerners, and the small suspicion may be that the thieves of Linqu have infiltrated the rear of our army, and please be careful! ”

Yang Le recounted them one by one, the organization was clear, and the analysis was well-founded, Wang De and others felt that it was a pity that this person was just an ordinary cadre of the Intelligence Department!

There are many bandits around Yishui and Juxian, but most of them are small group activities, and they do not challenge the strength of large groups of officers and soldiers. Only the largest Qingfeng Village claimed to have thousands of men, but the officers and soldiers also knew that although they were outnumbered, they lacked weapons, and most of them were homeless and bankrupt farmers, with little training, and the battle was based on a bloody nature. If you want to sneak attack a small group of officers and troops to win, you can only flee in the face of a large number of officers and troops! Otherwise, on several occasions when the official army entered the mountains to encircle and suppress them, Shi Zebo and others would not have abandoned the village and fled, and fought guerrilla warfare in the mountains with the official army.

Although the Yidu Road Governance Office has long given Yishui a military intelligence espionage document, which shows that the combat strength of the Shuntian army cannot be ignored, and the officers and troops in various places should deal with it cautiously, these Han troops in the south still have some contempt.

There have been many civil unrest in Shandong over the years, and there are many people who openly gather to resist the imperial court, and there are far away from the salt disciple Guo Huo, who is in chaos, and the region is as close as Yidu, as far as Cangzhou, even if it is the flow of the sea, there are many escapes in recent years. The anti-Yuan flow in Shandong is not like Guanshan, Heluo, Jianghuai and other places, where the eyes are dense, far away from the abdomen, and they can gather more than 100,000 people in a short time, becoming a prairie fire. Except for Qingfeng Village, which is still a little troublesome, the rest of the bandits are just grass bandits. Before the officers and soldiers arrived, Kou had already heard the wind and fled.

"If it's really the Linqu thief infiltrating, it's a little difficult to deal with." Wang De lowered his head and thought secretly. First of all, he was embarrassed to be frank about his experience with the local military and political leaders at all levels, and he only said a few words like a dragonfly in the official letters, such as the officers and soldiers were not aware for a while, and were taken advantage of by the thieves, or the incident happened suddenly, and the officers and troops could not cope with it, and then they were defeated. In the official letter, all localities were strictly urged to vigorously train troops, strictly guard against road checkpoints, and advocate that the righteous gentry gather the righteous army to assist in defense.

Wang De and others concluded from the official documents that the strength of the Linqu thief army was indeed not weak, but it was only not weak.

A member of Qianhu stood up proudly and said: "I would like to ask for a military order, and the last general is willing to lead the headquarters to rescue Yan Shun Qianhu and his party!" ”

In everyone's eyes, this is the only cavalry in the army, Thousand Households Dewey. There is only one cavalry army in the entire battalion, and there are only two hundred men and horses, so if you want to send troops to rescue, it is naturally the most suitable cavalry.

It is only thirty miles back to Mapo, and it can be reached in an hour by horse.

"Do you know how many thieves there are?" Wang De asked Yang Le.

"At that time, there were no less than six or seven hundred people in a certain place, and it is unknown whether the thieves still have a rear team."

Wang De secretly thought that Yan Shun's escort detachment was around 200 people, and if he wanted to rob the grain, there should be at least nearly a thousand thieves, and if the Linqu thieves also infiltrated, he was afraid that the thieves would be even stronger. But with Dewey's cavalry, I am afraid that it will not be able to catch it.

Could it be Liu, Yu and other Linqu thieves' siege and reinforcement plan?

After thinking about it, Wang De felt that he was too worried, there are mountains and mountains here, except for this mountain fork, there are no mountain roads around to pass, not to mention that the camp has long been widely scattered and scouted thirty miles away, if there is really a large number of enemies sneaking in, how can they still send wireless reports now? Presumably, it was the local bandits behind the mountain who came to grab grain for the winter.

The local bandits have little combat power, and Wang De is confident that one will be five.

Wang De finally agreed, and ordered Dewey and a group of 500 foot soldiers to rush to support. The camp was immediately on alert, ready to continue to support at any time, and at the same time to guard against thieves attacking the camp.

Dewey is considered a close confidant of Wang De, and such military exploits are still reserved for his own people.

The attack on the baggage was a major event in the army, and with the mobilization of the infantry and cavalry to help out of the camp, soon the soldiers in the camp knew about it. Looking at the team that was gradually moving away, many of the soldiers left behind in the camp couldn't help but feel some regrets in their hearts.

These days, Wang Deke vigorously urged his subordinates to strengthen the camp, most of the troops were already tired of it, and today they finally knew that there were thieves on the back road, and some soldiers who were good at gambling immediately secretly opened the handicap and pressed the bet, or bet on Dewey's victory, or bet on the rescue officers and soldiers to lose their troops and lose their troops to have a geometric return, counting, most of them are optimistic about Dewey, after all, they have encircled and suppressed the local bandits many times, and most of these Han troops despise each other.

Ju County, Yizhou mountains, poor land, not abundant, since ancient times is not the focus of the princes to fight for hegemony, the most out here is the servant rather than the elite soldiers, as for the grass for the Kou is mostly the untouchables who can't survive in the troubled times, drive the mouth, etc., with the family with a small lot of no combat power, although the local Yuan court Han army is not strong, to deal with them or more victories and defeats.

Wang De then sent scouts to investigate everywhere, and increased the scope of exploration, especially the double number of lookout posts on several hills near the camp.

After about half an hour, twilight began to fall. Suddenly, there was an arrow on the mountain, which was a warning from the observation post on the mountain! Soon, wolf smoke began to rise from the mountain, and black fireworks rose in the setting sun.

There is an enemy! There was an uproar in the camp. Wang De and the others looked at the wolf smoke and found that there were only two streams, and they were a little relieved in their hearts. The two puffs of wolf smoke represent the number of invading enemies of about 1,000 people, and Wang De's battalion has more than 2,000 troops, in addition to the 500 soldiers who have just been discharged to support, there are about 2,000 men and horses in the battalion, relying on the strong camp to resist the attack of the thief army. Looking at the direction of the wolf smoke rising, there is an enemy trail on the back road!

I wonder what happened to Dewey?

I don't have time to think about it. Wang De ordered that all the tribes urgently assemble, either on the chest wall of the camp, or prepare bows and crossbows. After Wang De climbed the chest wall of the camp, he was about to send people to investigate the back road, when he suddenly saw several horsemen galloping from a distance. The officers and men in the battalion quickly recognized that this was their own soldier who had set off not long ago.

The soldiers galloped all the way, and the wind galloped to the camp, and Wang De motioned for the cavalry to enter the camp to pay respects. It turned out that Dewey led the army to the rear to support, and after traveling more than ten miles, he encountered Yan Shun's baggage team, with men and cars, who were chasing a large army of thieves and fled.

Although Yan Shun's department was escorted by about 200 officers and soldiers, there were at least 500 or 600 thieves in pursuit. When the mountain road was attacked, the officers and soldiers could not resist it, so they had to retreat to Wang De's camp in a hurry.

Dewey gave an order, and the troops lined up to meet them, ready to meet Yan Shun's subordinates. Looking at the sight, Yan Shun's subordinates left more than a dozen officers and soldiers from time to time to break off and block the pursuing thieves, and the rest of the officers and soldiers used their strength to push the baggage vehicles and rushed to this side as soon as possible under the traction of mules and horses.

In the early stage, there were nearly 100 carts for each baggage transportation, but this time, Dewey only saw about 50 vehicles as far as he could see, and presumably some of the vehicles must have fallen into the hands of thieves. Dewey stood up on his horse and looked into the distance, and sure enough, in the distance of the mountain road, the silhouettes of several abandoned vehicles appeared dimly behind a large group of bandits.