In the early morning of 2 March, the main force of the Mengwu Forward Army passed through the remnants of snow in the wilderness east of Dingzhou City, and Wang Yuankui, the envoy of the Chengde Army, personally led more than 10,000 horses and infantry of the Chengde Army one day in advance, and marched south as the forward battalion of the Forward Army.

During this period, 3,000 Mughal cavalry were stationed in Dingzhou City.

Three thousand men and horses may not seem like much, but the Mughal cavalry is a combination of one man and three horses.

3,000 people and 9,000 war horses were stationed in Dingzhou City, which suddenly caused the city to be chaotic and chaotic, and also disrupted the deployment of the defenders and the Guanjianglou city to search for Liang Guo's secrets.

The defenders wanted to vacate camp in the city for the part of the Mughal cavalry stationed there, and they drove some of the households out of their houses overnight, and the streets and alleys were even more mixed.

Han Bao, Wang Zhe, and Huo Li took advantage of the chaos to escape from the city.

The post road and even the fields on both sides were trampled by thousands of cavalry and muddy, Han Leopard They had no horses, and the muddy post road after the snow melted restricted them from going south quickly, plus there were cavalry scouts of the Mughal people everywhere along the way, and after they met Shi Ruhai and others, they found a deserted hunting shed in the mountains east of the city to hide.

The first batch of soldiers and horses marched south on 2 March, and by 6 March, a large force of cavalry passed through the east of Dingzhou and advanced south like a tide.

At this time, Wang Mao, the son of Wang Yuankui, who stayed in Dingzhou and stayed behind, built a large official shed in the muddy snowmelt next to the post road, and specially arranged officials to be responsible for liaison and labor affairs.

There were also hundreds of people who were driven over by the post roads on both sides of the official shed, showing the momentum of greeting each other.

Twilight was approaching, and a group of Mengwu cavalry, like muddy and brown sè muddy tides, were not stopped by the upcoming night sè, and continued to advance south, Han Bao, Wang Zhe, and Huo Li were mixed in the crowd, and their faces were very unsightly......

It soon got dark, and Han Bao and they took advantage of the night to take the path back to their hiding place.

"How many cavalry of the Mughal people passed through Dingzhou today?" Shen Peng saw Han Bao and them coming back, struggled to move, and moved his hands and feet that were tied up and paralyzed slightly, he was still most concerned about the situation of the Mengwu cavalry, and asked a little impatiently.

Han Bao walked over and helped him and Zhao Ci and Yun and Princess Zhu Xi untie the ropes on their feet - before he went out with Wang Zhe and Huo Li to reconnoiter the enemy's situation, worried that Shi Ruhai, Zhang Shigui and others would not be able to look at them, in addition to tying their hands behind their backs, they would also deliberately tie their feet.

Shen Peng stood up and motioned for Han Bao to untie their hands that were tied behind their backs.

Han Bao hesitated for a while, and finally untied his and Zhao Ci's hands, but still tied Yun and Princess Zhu Xi's hands behind his back.

Han Bao did this to make Shen Peng and Zhao Ci understand that if everyone wanted to get out of the south safely, they couldn't do without the full assistance of the two of them, but what tricks they wanted to do, they had to first consider whether it was possible for Yun and Princess Yun to follow them to get out quickly.

Regardless of the follow-up soldiers and horses, in the past five days, the Menggu people have had about 50,000 soldiers and 12 to 150,000 war horses from the wilderness on both flanks of Dingzhou City to the south.

In addition to the old impression that the Mughal soldiers have always been fierce and warlike, the armor and equipment of the Mughal cavalry that marched south this time were much better than they had imagined, and even a large number of war horses were wearing armor.

The traditional iron armor has to achieve a considerable degree of defense and is quite cumbersome, and for a long time, only the Central Plains region has been able to build lighter and more defensive armor and scale armor with more advanced armor casting technology, and it has the ability to arm a small number of heavy armored cavalry.

Although the soldiers and horses of the steppe are fierce and good at fighting, the cavalry is large

It is even larger, but even if there is a part of the heavy cavalry, the number is very small.

Han Bao and they saw that the southbound Mengwu cavalry was armed with a large number of heavily armored cavalry, which not only meant that the combat effectiveness of the Mengwu cavalry was stronger, but also that after the Mengwu people took control of Youyun and other states, with the assistance of the northern fugitive clan, the iron-smelting and casting technology had achieved unprecedented breakthroughs and development.

At this time, it was confirmed that Guanjianglou was a vassal of the Mengwu people, and it is conceivable that the double-furnace iron practice method had already passed through the hands of the late Red Mansion and spread to Youji and other states, right?

In the past few days, in addition to exchanging information with Shen Peng and them, Han Bao also tried his best to capture two lone Guanjianglou spies for interrogation, and learned that after Mengwu occupied Youyun and other states, he did not launch a large-scale offensive against Heshuo and other states for thirteen or fourteen years, not simply to recuperate, nor to abide by the peace agreement with the Jin army, but more importantly, to focus on the conquest and digestion of the Bohai State in the northeast of Youyun.

Youyun and other states occupy a vast area such as the north and south of Yanshan, but as a land of war and bitter cold, the reproduction of people has always been prosperous, and before being ceded by the Jin State, Youyun and other states have about 25.6 million Dingkou.

However, after the Mongol people occupied the Bohai Kingdom, they forcibly relocated millions of Haidong remnants from the more vast bitter cold area to settle in Youji and other places, and the population of Youji and other places expanded to nearly 4 million, and the scale of agriculture was nearly doubled compared with the past.

In addition to the traditional cavalry units, the Muguls even formed a new infantry army, mainly composed of Han Chinese and Haidong remnants, as a supplementary combat force for city defense and offensive operations.

After spring, the roads were muddy, and the Mengwu infantry army had limited military horses, so they were hesitant to move, but it was expected that in two to three days, there would be 40,000 to 60,000 soldiers of the Youji Han army and the Haidong army from Dingzhou to the south.

And today, Han Bao also knew that the Jin army in Qizhou, Zhaozhou and other places had tens of thousands of soldiers and horses choose to surrender after seeing the Mongol cavalry enter in a big way.

This means that not counting the Weizhou rebels led by Liang Hewang Zhu Rang and Liang Shixiong, the Mengwu people can mobilize as many as 150,000 soldiers and horses in Heshuo and other places in the spring and summer.

Although it can be expected that the main goal of the Mughal people in the early stage will be to occupy and digest the territory of the Jin State, and perhaps only send a part of the soldiers and horses to help the Weizhou rebels attack or pursue the main force of the Liang army, but the Liang army, which is cut off from the back road and cannot be supplied with grain and grass, is definitely uncomfortable.

This is still the case when Chen Kun and Han Yuanqi can expel Liang Shixiong from Bianjing in time and take control of Bianjing and the area west of Bianjing first.

"If we go south from the east of Bianjing, we will never cause you any trouble on the way, and we will honestly follow you all the way to Tangyi; I believe you should also want to know who is killing Bianjing at this moment......" Shen Peng rubbed his swollen wrist and negotiated with Han Bao.

Han Bao discussed with Huo Li and Wang Zhe for a while, and finally agreed to Shen Peng's conditions.

Although it was much safer for them to go south from the coastal states in the east, which had deviated from the core of the war, in view of the sudden chaos in Bianjing, the two internal officers arranged by the Military Intelligence Staff Department in Bianjing were not prepared in advance, and it was very likely that they would not be able to transmit accurate information in a timely manner, so they needed to go to Bianjing in person.

At the same time, they also need to make a preliminary assessment of the development of the situation in the areas controlled by the Mughurs and rebels in the south-central part of Heshuo, and these areas will become the core areas controlled by the Mughurs and rebels in the future, and they also need to arrange for people to stay in hiding for a long time, which is destined to take the more risky inland route near the eastern foothills of Taihang Mountain.

Of course, disguised along the way, Shen Peng and the others need their full cooperation, otherwise it will never be possible to withstand the search and investigation of the patrol scouts along the way.

Except for leaving one person to continue to lurk down and mix with the infusion

In addition to keeping in touch with the two servants in Jianglou, Han Bao and the others disguised themselves for seven days and set out on their way south.

Due to the dispersion of a large number of Mughal people to forcibly requisition Caogu and Minfu, a large number of households in Qizhou, Zhaozhou and other places went into hiding and escaped the war.

Such a chaotic situation is also the most conducive to Han Leopard, who fishes in troubled waters.

Even if they got a few mules and horses, they did not have to worry that their movements would be developed by the enemy's scouts, and they went out day and night all the way, and arrived in the territory of Lanzhou on the north bank of the Yellow River on the 11th.

They also knew exactly at this time that Zhu Rang, the king of Lianghe, led the Weizhou soldiers and horses to mutiny on the third day, and sent troops to seize the Guancheng fortress on the side of Weizhou and Baicheng, and by the night of the fourth day, the first batch of Mengwu forward cavalry had entered the territory of Weizhou, and until the seventh day, there were 20,000 Mengwu cavalry before and after, and the Weizhou rebels went to Weizhou, which is located on the north bank of the Yellow River, at the southern foot of Taihang Mountain, and across the river from Bianjing.

At the same time, on the 7th and 8th, about 20,000 Mengwu cavalry and 10,000 elite Chengde troops led by Wang Yuankui marched westward from Baicheng.

Although the narrow Baicheng Pass was completely controlled by the rebels and the Mengwu cavalry, it was impossible for any traders to bring news west of Taihang Mountain for the time being, but Han Bao and they could fully speculate that the main force of the Liang army may not know the news of Zhu Rang and Liang Shixiong's rebellion until the fourth or even the fifth day......

The ferries and boats on the north bank of the Yellow River were all controlled by the rebels, and Han Bao and his men had to find a fishing boat to cross the Yellow River from the east of Lanzhou, which was away from the core observation area of the rebels, and entered Caozhou east of Bianzhou (Bianjing) on the 13th.

Zhu Yu drove the expedition in person, led the army to besiege Luzhou, but in Bianjing still left Lei Jiuyuan, Jing Hao and other cronies and generals to guard, the Nanya forbidden army under the instigation of Liang Shixiong, and the lurking Weizhou rebels, more than 20,000 prisoners of war of the Jin army mutinied, and failed to capture the imperial city defended by the guards at the first time.

Han Yuanqi and Chen Kun rushed to Bianjing with 8,000 elite forwards on the 5th, and then nearly 30,000 foot soldiers successively went north along Bianshui, entered Bianjing, fought bloody battles for several days, and finally on the 11th, that is, the day they arrived on the north bank of the Yellow River, they drove the rebels out of Bianjing at a very tragic price.

At present, in addition to occupying the cities of Wanting and Qiliu east of Bianjing, the main force of the rebel army also took advantage of the emptiness of the Bianxi region to occupy the important towns of Rongyang, Yanshi, and Luoyang on the south bank of the Yellow River, while the cities of Mengjin and Qinyang on the north bank of the Yellow River were occupied by the Jin army that surrendered to Qi, Zhao and other places by the Chengde army, blocking the passage of the soldiers and horses in Guanzhong through the Hangu and the east of the Guandong.

The Mengwu people only had more than 10,000 cavalry to cross the Yellow River and cooperate with the rebels to fight, and there were almost 40,000 cavalry and 30,000 infantry before and after entering the two prefectures of Zelu west of the Taihang Mountains through Jingcheng, Fukou and Baicheng, and it was also the Shangdang area that "lived on the top of the Taihang Mountain and had the highest terrain for the party" thousands of years ago.

Shangdang peeked into the Central Plains in the south, Hedong (Fenshui River Valley in the south of Jin), Heshuo in the west, and Taiyuan in the north, which was the focus of the confrontation and contention between the two countries for many years in the former dynasties.

The main force of the Mengwu entered the two states of Zelu, in addition to attacking the main force of the Liang army, the more important thing is to value this strategic place, according to which it can take the remnants of Jin in the north, operate Heshuo, and also look south to the Central Plains.

Due to the extreme danger of the mountains and the cut off of the road, when Han Bao and the others returned to Tangyi again on the 16th, they did not know the development of the war in Zelu and Luzhou, let alone the fate of the main force of the Liang army......