"Whew!"

Standing in the remnant snow of the alley, listening to the dull screams coming from the inside of the courtyard wall, Han Duan felt a thigh-like twitch for a moment, thinking that Han Jun had never thought that it would not be easy to escape back to Jinling City.

After a long while, Han Duan looked at Feng Yu and asked, "We should go in and see for ourselves......

It is a matter of countless people's lives, in order to prevent others from playing tricks to hide the world, Feng Yi also has to see it with his own eyes before he can put his mind at ease, lift his robe, and signal Han Duan to go first.

There were only three adobe houses in the empty courtyard, and the windows were covered with thick cloth.

Feng Yu and Han Duan pushed the door into the house, and a new fire pit was built in the house, which was emitting a hot flow, so that people would not catch a cold when they were naked in the house.

The two people who were responsible for the torture of Han Jun were put aside, and Han Duan looked over, only to see that Han Jun had passed out, and wondered how he walked into the courtyard and didn't hear him screaming.

Han Jun was lying there bare-chested, and the debridement of his crotch had not yet begun, only to see that there was a blur of flesh and blood, and Han Duan's scalp was tightened, and he didn't know how so many people were willing to enter the palace every year to seek a career.

In the twenty years since the founding of the Great Chu, there were only more than 300 eunuchs in the palace at the beginning, most of whom were old people brought by the Xu family from the Guangling Jiedu Embassy, and the number surged to more than 7,000 in just a dozen rooms.

Emperor Yanyou conquered Jinling City, almost dismissed the previous eunuchs and palace maids, and in less than two years, the eunuchs and palace maids waiting in the palace recovered to more than 2,000 people, half of whom were pure eunuchs.

It's really hard to imagine that there are so many people who will ruthlessly send their heirs to the palace to cleanse themselves in order to make a send.

Seeing that Feng Jun had also confirmed, Han Duan walked out of the house with him, stood in front of the porch and asked in a low voice, "If Han Jun doesn't survive......

In the past few years, there are many people who have died due to trauma and sores, and they have not been able to survive the rotten punishment sent to the palace and the prison every year, and the corpses dragged out and buried in the mass graves are unknown, who knows if Han Jun can survive it?

"That can only claim to the outside world that he has died, it is better than leaving the hidden danger of being alive." Feng Yi said coldly.

"Yes!" Han Duan agreed.

Han Duan still had to stay, at least until Han Jun's lower body injuries had eased a little after five or six days, and then he could take Han Jun to cross the river and return to Jinling City with him, and Feng Yu would take a boat from the Yangtze River waterway in the afternoon to detour and rush back to Tingshan Dongnanzhai to meet Han Qian.

Just in time for Yin Peng, he rushed from Yangzhou to Tingzi Mountain by boat at dusk to see Han Qian.

In the face of the strong pressure of the Liang army, Huaidong was forced to abandon the city on the north bank of the Huai River and fully shrink to the south bank, but it still could not prevent a large force of Liang cavalry from directly interspersing between the cities on the south bank, plundering grain, livestock, Ding Zhuang, and burning houses.

The ice and snow, the Huai River is frozen on the whole line, and the Huaidong territory is a flat river, which can be said to be completely barrier-free for the cavalry of the Liang army.

Huaidong can only clear the wilderness with a comprehensive fortified wall, and withdraw more people and Zhuang into the city nearby.

The Huaidong cavalry only had more than 5,000 people, and they simply did not have the ability to entangle with the cavalry of the Liang army, which was several times their size, in the field.

Even Yang Yuanyan, the king of letters, was extremely worried that Han Qian would not be able to support him in Tangyi at this time, so he chose to withdraw to the south bank.

In that case, Li Zhihe would be blocked in Shuzhou, and the Shouzhou army would be able to free up 50,000 or 60,000 soldiers and horses to attack Yangzhou, Dongyang and other places from the west.

Even Han Qian led his troops to retreat in the lonely city of Tangyi and did nothing, which would make Yangzhou feel pressure.

Ten days ago, Han Qian led his troops to march west along the Chu River, and fought with the Shouzhou army swept to the southeast on the north bank of the Chu River, which more or less relieved the generals guarding Yangzhou.

Whether it is Wang Wenqian or Zhao Zhen, at this time, they all expect the Tangyi soldiers to gain a foothold on the north bank of the Chuhe River.

In this case, Han Qian's defense on the north bank of the Yangtze River is to open a line, at least until the Shouzhou army suppresses Han Qian's troops back to Tangyi City, there is no spare strength to look east.

In this way, as long as Huaidong fully guards against the Liang army in the north, it will be able to support it more or less.

Yin Peng came here this time in the hope of forming closer cooperation with Tangyi and sharing resources to a certain extent.

In addition to the exchange of military intelligence in the area of 500 or 600 miles from Hongzepu and Fanliang Lake to Huaiyang Mountain, Xinwang Yang Yuanyan also hoped that the construction of Huaidong's western defense line would be better connected with Tangyi's northeast defense line, and at the same time hoped to purchase several large warships from Xuzhou.

Chuzhou had a water camp in the early days, but after the Jinling Incident, most of the large warships organized by the Chuzhou water camp were destroyed in the water battle with the Lou Boat Army.

Although Huaidong still had more than 15,000 sailors at this time, most of the warships were fishing boats and small and medium-sized merchant ships.

Although the main force of the Great Chu Naval Division was annihilated in Hongzepu, the direct reason was that the large warships equipped, especially the main warships based on the Yueyang Water Battalion, were mainly pointed bottom warships built in Xuzhou, and the draft was too deep and extremely unsuitable for navigation in shallow lakes, but those who really knew about the water battles knew in their hearts that the responsibility for the defeat could not be shirked to the warships built in Xuzhou.

The warships built by Xuzhou have fast speed and strong structure.

Gao Chengyuan's Yueyang naval army, which had no foundation, was able to fight with the most elite Louchuan army and naval division of Dachu in the Yangtze River waterway, and was not at a disadvantage, which shows the advantages of Xuzhou's warships.

At present, the Xuzhou Water Battalion has entered the Yangtze River waterway, and it is very likely that the Lou Boat Army and the Liang Army Naval Division will not be in a hurry to enter the Yangtze River and compete with the Xuzhou Water Battalion.

If the Huaidong Water Battalion cannot occupy an advantage in the lower reaches of the Huai River, it means that after the Huai River thaws, the cavalry of the Liang army will most likely not withdraw to the north bank.

At that time, the entire Huaidong region will become a buffer zone for the war with the Liang army, and the production system will also collapse, so what will the millions of soldiers and civilians take to feed?

The most pressing problem facing Huaidong is not whether it can hold the main city until the Huai River thaws, but whether it can control the lower reaches of the Huai River after the Huai River thaws, and whether it can control the way out after the lower reaches of the Huai River.

Yin Peng also brought back a very crucial information this time, that is, after the Liang army occupied Haizhou, they moved in a large number of soldiers and civilians from Xuzhou and built a camp in Peacock Lake in the southeast of Haizhou City.

Peacock Lake has a ditch that connects the Huai River to the south and the ocean to the east, and it does not freeze all year round, and Wang Wenqian suspects that the Liang army will most likely build a shipyard or a naval camp there, or both.

The rebels of Anning Palace fled north across the river, and among the nearly 200,000 soldiers and civilians, there were a large number of craftsmen and craftsmen.

In addition to tens of thousands of elite sailors, there are also hundreds of experienced shipwrights.

Listening to Yin Peng's introduction to the latest development of the situation in the north of Chuzhou, Feng Yi couldn't help but gasp, and said with emotion: "Even if we didn't intervene in advance, Emperor Zhu Yu of Liang might not be in a hurry to lead the main force of the Liang army south to attack the Huaixi Forbidden Army, right?" ”

"If I were from Zhu Yu's standpoint, I wouldn't be in a hurry to attack south," Han Qian stood in the cold wind with his hands in his sleeves and said, "Even if the Huaixi Forbidden Army is completely annihilated, the Liang army will not have a chance to swallow the Great Chu, if it is unfortunate that it will be attacked by Huaixi and Huaidong soldiers and horses, and pay too much price, not to mention the enemy in the north of Liang State, I am afraid that its territory will not be peaceful......

After the Great Chu pacified Wu Yue, he made a count of the Dingkou in the area under his rule, which was less than 11 million in Dingkou at that time, including Zhejiang, Jiangdong, Jiangxi, Hunan, Huaidong, Huaixi, Jingxiang and other places.

In recent years, the population of Jingxiang, Huaidong, and Huaixi has not increased due to frequent wars, but has declined.

Although two large-scale wars broke out in the southern parts of the Yangtze River, the two wars calmed down very quickly, and did not form a protracted, cruel and bloody tug-of-war and military confrontation, so the two Zhejiang, Jiangdong, Jiangxi, Hunan and other places, counting the people who hid and fled, Han Qian estimated that there should be a significant increase compared with the statistics of Tianyou in the ninth year.

Taking the Hunan prefectures as an example, the population of Tianyou was more than 1.8 million in the ninth year, but after the war of cutting the feudal domain, the actual population of the five prefectures of Tanlangyue and Shaoheng alone was as high as more than 2.2 million.

The population of the four prefectures of Chenxu Siye is nearly 500,000, and the population of Yongzhou and Chenzhou, which were controlled by the rebels at this time, is also more than 200,000.

This means that the actual population of the eleven prefectures in Hunan is as high as 3 million.

Jiangxi's population is slightly smaller, but the former Jiangnan East Province, which includes the Liangzhejiang and Gyeonggi regions, is far better than Jiangxi and Hunan in terms of potential and scale.

Although there are no accurate statistics, Han Qian estimated that Da Chu controlled more than 40 prefectures in Jiangnan at this time, and the total population would not be less than 13 million.

Even if Great Chu discarded all the territories north of the Yangtze River, even if there was no more serious threat to the north of the Liang army, it would be extremely difficult to completely defeat Great Chu in one or two battles.

Not to mention, the northern part of the Liang State was facing a more serious threat, and the Liang Emperor Zhu Yu was not in the right position, and the previous Zhu Jue rebellion was far from completely solving its internal hidden dangers.

At present, the more than 60,000 cavalry of the Liang Emperor Zhu Yu in the southern front are the foundation for his rule over the Liang State and the orders of the generals and ministers to obey the orders.

Emperor Liang went south, after annexing Xu Mingzhen, he did not directly cross the river south from the west of Hongzepu, but turned his head to attack Chuzhou, Han Qian was blindly confident, it can be said that he personally guarded Tangyi, but from the analysis of the overall situation of Emperor Zhu Yu of Liang, Zhu Yu still had to take the opportunity of personally sitting in the southeast to change his lineage to control Xuzhou, and completely integrate the Sima Dan family into his control.

In this way, Emperor Zhu Yu of Liang can almost control the situation in the southern part of Liang in the palm of his hand, and then he can more calmly call the veteran generals in other regions to return to his heart and stabilize his rule.

After the Liang army captured Haizhou, there were signs of building a naval camp and a large shipyard in Haizhou, which showed that Emperor Zhu Yu of Liang had a deep plan for attacking Great Chu.

On the other hand, Emperor Liang conferred Xu Mingzhen Huo Guogong and allowed him to take Huaixi as a feudal town, and in exchange, most of them still asked Xu Mingzhen to hand over the Lou Ship Army.

Compared with Shouzhou, Haizhou, which has a non-ice port, is indeed more suitable for Liang as the foundation for Liang's large-scale development of the naval army, but the premise is that Bianjing must have strong control over the southeast region, including Xuzhou.