The grain on the side of the Great Song Dynasty is sufficient, especially the output of potatoes is too large, and it can't be eaten every year, so it can only be used to make wine or feed livestock, and the Song army is on the defensive side, behind which is the entire Yanyun and Hebei, naturally not to worry about the problem of food, let alone eat human flesh, but the Liao army on the opposite side is completely different.

The camp of the Liao army, this is the station of Yelu Zongzhen, all surrounded by layers of camp tents, in addition to Yelu Zongzhen, some important ministers who followed him on the expedition also live in this camp, and in the corner of the camp, there is a separate tent here, which is equivalent to a distance from the other tents around, and this tent lives in Yelu Renxian, who was demoted to a civilian.

At this time, it was already dusk, Yelu Renxian sat alone in the tent, covered with a heavy bear skin, and the tent was also lit with charcoals, which made the whole tent very warm, speaking of which the bear skin on his body was still rewarded to him by the other party when he rescued Yelu Zongzhen, it is said that the bear skin was taken by Yelu Zongzhen from a bear he killed, and it can be said that this glory is almost unattainable.

Although Yelu Renxian was demoted and placed under house arrest in this independent tent, he was not abused, all his personal belongings were sent over, and the food and clothing in the tent were also provided, and there were special people to take care of him in normal times, but he was not allowed to contact people in the army.

Fortunately, Yelu Renxian usually likes to read, even when he goes out on the expedition, he carries a lot of books with him, and now after being placed under house arrest here, he takes books as his companion every day, and he does not seem lonely, but some people are born to work hard, for example, Yelu Renxian seems to be getting more and more irritable during this time, and he can't even read books anymore.

"Phew!" Yeluren, who was reading a book, suddenly threw the book in his hand to the ground, and then walked back and forth a few times in a very irritable manner, and then quickly came to the tent and shouted to the guards outside: "I want to see Your Majesty!" ”

"No, Your Majesty has an order, and you can't go anywhere without his permission!" The guards replied very bluntly, since the last time Yeluren disobeyed the military order and let the Liao army besieging the city retreat without authorization, Yeluzong was really angry and demoted him to a commoner, and he had never seen him again during this time.

Seeing that the guards were not at ease, Yelu Ren was also angry and anxious at first, but he also knew that the guards were ordered by Yelu Zongzhen, and he couldn't go anywhere unless Yelu Zongzhen agreed, so he could only turn around and return to the tent angrily.

However, not long after Yelu Renxian returned to the tent, he suddenly heard a sound of footsteps outside, and then saw Yelu Zhirang come over with a food box, and when he saw him, he immediately smiled: "Brother Renxian, today is the best lamb, and there are two pots of good wine, let's not get drunk and not return!" ”

Seeing Yelu Zhirang, Yelu Renxian did not show an expression of surprise, because during the period of house arrest, only Yelu Zhirang was able to visit him from time to time, as for what he was carrying, it was his own dinner, and during this time, Yelu Zhirang often came to rub his food to eat.

"Brother Zhirang, I want to see Your Majesty, can you speak for me?" How could Yeluren have the heart to eat at this time? Immediately asked very anxiously.

"This ......" Yelu Zhirang also showed an embarrassed expression when he heard this, and after a while, he smiled bitterly and said, "Brother Renxian, why haven't you given up yet, Your Majesty doesn't want to see you now, and I don't want to hear you say things that he doesn't like to hear, if you anger Your Majesty again, maybe you won't even be able to save your head." ”

"I know that Your Majesty refuses to see me, but I know that time is too late, if we don't retreat, I'm afraid that our 80,000 people will all be thrown outside the Gubei Pass!" At this time, Yelu Renxian walked quickly to Yelu Zhirang and said loudly, his eyes were red when he spoke, he really didn't want to wait any longer.

"Brother Renxian, I know that you are loyal to our Da Liao, but you don't know Your Majesty's temperament, even if you let you go to see Your Majesty, I'm afraid it won't have any effect, but will only cause trouble for yourself!" Yelu Zhirang also persuaded sincerely at this time.

"As a courtier, you should be loyal to the country, I can't watch Your Majesty make mistakes and do nothing!" Yeluren said again with great righteousness.

"You ......" Yelu Zhirang felt a little uncomfortable when he heard this, although Yelu Renxian didn't mean it, but he vaguely scolded himself, after all, he was also a close minister by Yelu Zongzhen's side, but in the face of Yelu Zongzhen's brutality, he didn't dare to dissuade him, which was far inferior to Yelu Renxian.

"Brother Renxian, in fact, the situation is so bad as you said, now that the weather is cold, although we are uncomfortable, but the Song army in the city is also uncomfortable, maybe one day we will be able to take down Gubeikou, occupy here, it is equivalent to opening the door of Yanyun, in the future, we can kill when we want to kill the past!" However, Yelu Zhirang did not get angry, but spoke again to persuade.

Yelu Zhirang is indeed inferior to Yelu Renxian in terms of talent, but he knows the truth of Mingzhe's self-preservation, speaking of which is still taught to him by Li Zhang, it was Li Zhang's reminder that allowed him to preserve the family in Xiao Yunjin's purge, and now he follows Yelu Zongzhen, and he takes Mingzhe's self-preservation principle to the extreme, and rarely disobeys Yelu Zongzhen's meaning.

"The weather is so cold, we don't have enough clothes to prepare for the cold, now someone must have frozen to death, and the grain and grass should have been eaten, and the soldiers below are already hungry, don't you say this situation is bad?" Yeluren said again eagerly.

"You...... How do you know if you're running out of food? Yelu Zhirang couldn't help but widen his eyes when he heard Yelu Renxian's words and asked, although Yelu Renxian was in charge of power before, but it was actually Yelu Zhirang who really managed the logistics, and during this time, Yelu Renxian was under house arrest and had no access to outside news at all, so he shouldn't know about food, right?

"Hmph, don't think I don't know, my three meals have become more and more exquisite in the past few days, just to paralyze me and make me think that there is enough food in the army, but in the past few days, even you, the person who manages logistics, have come to me to eat, but you can imagine that you can't even eat these things!" Yeluren immediately pointed to the dinner that Yeluren had brought first.

Hearing that Yelu Renxian suddenly saw through the small means of three meals, and pointed out that it was his own reason, this made Yelu Zhirang couldn't help but blush, but Yelu Renxian did guess well, the Liao army had run out of food three days ago, and the rear could not be recruited, so Yelu Zongzhen was also furious, and even reprimanded him, but it couldn't solve the problem at all.

"It's all like this, why hasn't Your Majesty withdrawn from the army, don't you have anyone to persuade Your Majesty?" Yelu Renxian also said a little sadly at this time, the matter of withdrawing from the army is related to the national fortune of Daliao in the future, so he also blamed Yelu Zhi at this time for letting these people not dissuade Yelu Zongzhen.

"Why didn't I persuade you, in fact, during this time, some people have been asking Your Majesty to withdraw from the army, but Your Majesty's temperament is very stubborn, and he can't listen to it at all, but he scolded the people who persuaded him, and I was also scolded because of the grain and grass, and now the camp has begun to kill horses for food!" Yelu Zhirang finally stopped hiding it at this time, and said with a wry smile on his face.

"Confused, our Khitans are missing horses, just like missing two legs, how can we cook and eat our own legs?" Yeluren was also surprised again when he heard Yeluzhirang's words, although he had already guessed that the food in the camp had run out, but he didn't expect it to be so bad that he wanted to eat the war horse, you must know that the war horse is the life of the cavalry!

"Of course I know the importance of war horses, but no matter how important the war horses are, they are not as important as the stomachs of the soldiers, and I won't tell you, some time ago, there was a cannibalism in the camp, and there was even a rebellion in some of the army, which was all about food, and your three meals a day during this time were actually His Majesty's imperial food." Yelu Zhirang smiled bitterly again and explained that if there was another way, they would not kill the war horses for food.

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