"What the marshal has to do now, the first thing is to personally go to King Wu's army to ask for surrender, and it is best to offer to stay in the Wu army to appease King Wu's heart." Liang Zhen nodded.

Gao Jichang nodded, although there may be a danger of throwing himself into the net if he goes to the Wu army to surrender in person, but now it is useless for him to hide even if he hides, so it is better to take the initiative to surrender.

"In addition to taking the initiative to go to the Wu army camp to ask for surrender, Jie Shuai has another thing to do, that is, to persuade Lu Siduo to surrender."

"Persuade General Lu to surrender? Let him go with Ben Shuai to surrender to the Wu army? ”

"Yes, at this time, Lu Siduo must have also received the news of the defeat of the Xiangling army, and he must be hesitating, if the Jieshuai can successfully persuade him to surrender to the Wu army with the Jieshuai, this will be a great achievement." Liang Zhen opposed the use of force to eliminate Lu Siduo with the Wu army, because that would attract the disgust of King Wu, but if Lu Siduo was persuaded to surrender, it would only be merit and not disgust.

"As for how to deal with it after the surrender of Wu, then we can only take one step at a time. In general, as a party envoy, as long as he takes the initiative to surrender, King Wu will inevitably show courtesy to the festival commander at the beginning; If the marshal can keep to himself in the future and don't do anything that is easy to attract suspicion, especially if he doesn't have the slightest involvement with Ni Jiangjun and other old subordinates, after a long time, maybe King Wu's suspicion will gradually fade away. ”

Gao Jichang nodded again and again after hearing this, he knew that what Liang Zhen said was right, if he often contacted those old departments after surrendering to Wu, he was afraid that no one would tolerate such a person.

After making up his mind, he immediately took a few of his cronies and guards out of the city to Lu Siduo's military camp and persuaded him to surrender to Wu together.

……

Outside Kaifeng, it was already the third day after the Xiangling War, and the second day after the Wu army arrived in Kaifeng.

In the tent of the Chinese military camp, Yang Wu looked at the latest news sent from all over the place recently, and asked Fan Yu casually: "Haven't the envoys who went to Huo Yanwei, Lu Siduo and others come back yet?" ”

"Back to the king, there is no news from Lu Siduo's side yet, but the messenger who persuaded Huo Yanwei to surrender has returned."

"What did the messenger say? Is Huo Yanwei ready to surrender? ”

"King, then Huo Yanwei asked his henchmen to come forward to meet the envoy, but he himself did not meet the envoy on the grounds that he was busy with something."

"Huh?" Yang Wu was a little surprised, no matter how busy Huo Yanwei was, he would not really be so busy that he didn't have time to meet the envoy of Wu State, unless he didn't want to see it at all.

"It seems that this person has refused to surrender? Lone didn't expect that Huo Yanwei would not surrender at this time, did he think that Liang Guo still had hope to hold on? ”

"The minister was also a little puzzled, according to the envoy's report, although Huo Yanwei did not receive him, many generals under Huo Yanwei's command entertained the envoy very warmly, and Huo Yanwei's staff was always with the envoy, and he also responded to the envoy's requests." Fan Yu said.

"Hahaha...... Lone understood, it turned out that this person was planning to do this. Yang Wu suddenly came to his senses after hearing this, and said, "Since this is the case, then Gu will ignore him for the time being." ”

Fan Yu was still a little puzzled, seeing this, Yang Wu explained: "Have you forgotten that Liu Zunzhi of Qizhou is not successful? Huo Yanwei's plan should be similar to Liu Zunzhi's, it is nothing more than a plan to surrender after the fall of the Liang State. ”

"I see, thank you for your advice."

"What about the rest of the world, is there any new news? Especially in Hebei, is there anything new in the Jin army? Yang Wu then asked.

With the elimination of the main force of the Liang State, the fall of the Liang State has become inevitable, and the situation in the world will enter a new stage of Jin and Wu fighting for hegemony.

Compared with the Liang State, the enemy of the Jin State is much stronger in terms of military strength, but the overall national strength is inferior.

In addition, the Liang State was attacked from both the north and south of the Wu State and the Jin State, and the Jin State was also widely harassed by the Khitans in the north, in contrast, only the Wu State had no enemies in the south at all, and was able to concentrate all its efforts to go north, which was a major advantage of the Wu State.

In addition to this advantage, Wu's comprehensive national strength will inevitably reach new heights after unifying the old land of Liang, and the ability to fight a protracted war will be stronger than that of Liang, plus the core area of Wu is south of the Huai River, as long as the area south of the Huai River is not destroyed, Wu will be able to let go and compete with Jin for hegemony.

The core areas of the Jin State, such as Weizhou and other places, are not far from the Yellow River, coupled with the Jin State's perennial conquest, Hebei is dilapidated, and it is difficult to fight for a long time.

From this point of view, Wu obviously has more advantages than Jin, as long as Yang Wu does not make big mistakes and concentrates his forces calmly, the superior side of Jin and Wu's hegemony will be on Wu's side.

"Back to the king, the news from Hebei is still a few days ago, the five thousand elite cavalry led by the King of Jin himself has defeated the Khitans, and they are still pursuing the enemy, and it is said that they have arrived in Youzhou. However, the minister felt that after the news of the battle of Xiangling reached Hebei, the king of Jin would definitely rush back to Weizhou as soon as possible. Fan Yu replied.

At this time, the guards outside came in and reported: "My lord, the messenger sent into the city to persuade him to surrender has returned, and he is now waiting outside the camp for the king to summon him." ”

"Let him in." Yang Wu nodded.

After the Wu army arrived in Kaifeng yesterday, Yang Wu sent people into the city to try to persuade Dai Siyuan to surrender, and now the envoy came back after a day.

"King, although Dai Siyuan politely received the minister, he clearly refused the minister's persuasion." After a while, the envoy came in, saluted Yang Wu, and directly reported the results of the envoy.

"Refused?" Yang Wu didn't care, there were only 10,000 guards in Kaifeng City, and this number of troops was not enough to block the attack of the Wu army, and even if Yang Wu was interested, he could bypass Kaifeng and go straight to Luoyang.

As long as Luoyang is defeated, there is nothing to care about at all for a mere Dai Siyuan.

After sending the envoy to surrender, Yang Wu began to consider whether to make a detour to attack Luoyang directly, after all, the news obtained from all over the place indicated that there were not many defenders in Luoyang, as long as the large army was in the city, the possibility of Luoyang Kaicheng surrendering was still very high.

The only thing to worry about is that once the main force of the Wu army goes to Luoyang, after the complete destruction of the Liang State, will the Huazhou, Puzhou and other places currently controlled by Dai Siyuan directly surrender to the Jin State and lead the Jin army south to confront the Wu State.

Yang Wu pondered for a moment, but he couldn't make up his mind, and immediately ordered: "Come here, go and invite Guo Shumi, General Liu, General Li, General Mi and other generals to come and discuss the military situation." ”

It didn't take long for the generals to arrive.

"Lone plans to lead the main army to bypass Kaifeng and attack Luoyang directly, but Lone is worried that Huazhou and Puzhou will surrender to the Jin State after the fall of the Liang State and lead the Jin army south, do you have any good way to deal with it?"

The generals were silent for a while, and the policy of the Wu State was obviously much more restrictive to the military generals than that of the Jin State.

In the Jin Kingdom, those major generals were basically one-sided envoys.

For example, Li Sizhao, the envoy of the Zhaoyi Festival, commanded Luzhou and Zezhou under his command, such as Li Cunzhang, the envoy of the Datong Festival, he commanded Yunzhou, Ulzhou, and Yingzhou, in addition to the Henghai Festival Envoy, Tianxiong Jie Envoy, etc., all of which were served by the generals of the Jin Army; There are also some generals such as Yan Bao, although he does not have an actual territory, but he has the title of envoy of the balance festival.

In short, the military generals had a very high status of power in the Jin State and had great autonomy; In the state of Wu, the generals were subject to various restrictions.

Yang believed that many generals would have preferred to surrender to Jin rather than Wu if they had a choice.

At the beginning, Yang Wu insisted on using troops to capture all the states in Shandong, rather than waiting for the fall of the Liang State to receive them, because he was worried that they would fall to the Jin State in the future.

Now if Yang Wu bypasses Kaifeng and attacks Luoyang directly, leaving Huazhou and Puzhou behind, if these two places directly surrender to the Jin State in the future and lead the Jin army to cross the river to the south, Yang Wu must think about this problem in advance.

"King, if you don't open the seal, you will ignore it first, and send troops to attack Huazhou and Puzhou first? There are also not many defenders in these two places, and it should not be long before they divide their forces to attack. After a moment of silence, Kang Yanxiao spoke.

The Jin State is not so easy to deal with, especially Kang Yanxiao and other Liang army generals, they have deeply understood the power of the Jin army, and they don't want to give up the Yellow River.

Although there are not many defenders in Huazhou and Puzhou, the cities in both places are very strong, and it is not so easy to capture them, in case it is delayed for a long time, it is easy to be taken advantage of by the enemy." Some generals came forward to raise objections.

Yang Wu looked at the man, but saw that the person who objected was Liu Renzhen, and immediately asked, "Then in your opinion, what should our army do?" ”

"The king, in the opinion of the last general, we don't actually need to manage Huazhou and Puzhou, even if they surrender to the Jin State, it won't be a big deal to lead the Jin army south, and the king doesn't need to care." Liu Renzhen said.

"Huh? Tell us your reasoning? ”

"The king forgot, our army is different from the Liang army, although the Liang army's water army is a little stronger than the Jin army, but the advantage is not obvious, and the strength of our army's water army is far from being comparable to the Liang army, let alone the Jin army. The Liang army needed to defend along the Yellow River, but our army did not have this need at all. ”

"As long as our army's navy enters the Yellow River and completely blocks the waterway of the Yellow River, then the Jin army that crosses the river to the south loses rear support, and even if there are more troops, it is bound to be captured by our army. Therefore, the last general asserted that even if Huazhou and Puzhou surrendered to the Jin State, the Jin army would not dare to go south from these two places. Liu Renzhen replied solemnly.

Kang Yanxiao frowned and retorted: "Then according to General Liu's meaning, wouldn't our army not need to guard against the Jin army, but could let the Jin army go south, and then block its rear with a naval army, and encircle and eliminate the Jin army going south?" ”

If this is the case, it can be used to set a trap and trap the Jin army.

Liu Renzhen shook his head and said: "That's not what I mean, I just say that the Jin army may not dare to go south." If the Jin army can build a pontoon bridge over the Yellow River and block the river with iron cables to prevent our navy from attacking the pontoon bridge, then it will not be a problem for the Jin army to move south. ”

"Yunzhou? Is General Liu worried about Yunzhou? Li Chengding understood what he meant, and immediately asked.

"Exactly, it takes a certain amount of time to build pontoon bridges and iron cables, if the Jin army crosses the river from Huazhou and Puzhou, it will not have time to build it, and our army's naval army will be able to kill it and block the Yellow River; However, the Jin army on Yang Liudu's side had already built a pontoon bridge and blocked the Yellow River waterway with iron cables, so it was difficult for our navy to hit the pontoon bridge in a short time. ”

"As long as the pontoon bridge is safe, then the Jin army can let go south. Therefore, the last general felt that if the Jin army wanted to cross the river to the south, it would inevitably choose to cross the river in Yang Liudu, rather than risk crossing the river in Huazhou and Puzhou. ”

After listening to Liu Renzhen's analysis, the generals immediately looked at him with admiration, and felt that this person was worthy of being the most outstanding one among the young generation of generals, and this insight alone was far beyond the ability of ordinary people.

Yang Wu was even more deeply gratified in his heart, Liu Renzhen in history was similar to Wang Yanzhang, more famous for his loyalty, and in terms of military ability, because there were not enough combat examples, it was not enough to see how good his ability to lead troops was.

However, now it seems that Liu Renzhen still has his superiority in leading troops to fight.

He turned his head to look at Liu Xindao: "Who is currently guarding Yunzhou?" What is this person's abilities? ”

"Back to the king, the current person in charge of guarding Yunzhou is the commander Wang Chuancheng, this person has a family history, and has experienced the test of war many times, and has made a lot of contributions, which is enough to guard Yunzhou." Liu Xin thought for a moment and replied.

After the main force of the army marched westward, Yang Wu ordered Liu Xin to leave 5,000 troops to defend Yunzhou.

"Family history, who is this person?" Yang Wu's heart moved and asked.

"My Majesty, this man is the son of the king's privy council."

"It turned out to be a child of his family, and that lonely person was relieved." Yang Wu nodded when he heard this.

The deputy privy envoy Wang Juan has a calm and sophisticated personality, meticulous in his work, although there is nothing outstanding, but he is steady; If Wang Chuancheng really inherited his father's character and ability, not to mention anything else, it would be no problem to guard Yunzhou.

Therefore, Yang Wu originally planned to send more troops back to Yunzhou, but after listening to Liu Xin's words, he let go of this idea.

"Although it is indeed unlikely that the Jin army will cross the river from Huazhou and Puzhou, it is always unreassuring if these two places are not collected as soon as possible." Yang Wu continued: "General Mi, you will lead the army to collect the two places, persuade them to surrender first, if they can't persuade them to surrender, besiege them, and wait for the news of the fall of Luoyang to come and deal with it." ”

"The last general commands."

Yang Wu said to Liu Xin again: "General Liu led the army to stay and collect Kaifeng, like General Mi, don't attack rashly, and wait for Luoyang to be captured before dealing with it." ”

"The last will understand."

Yang Wu then looked at the other generals and said: "The other generals will attack Luoyang with Gu, and within half a month, they will definitely destroy the pseudo-Liang and avenge the Tang Dynasty!" ”

"The last general will be ordered!" The general's face was excited, and he replied loudly.

Although Mi Zhicheng and Liu Xin could not lead the troops to attack Luoyang, they were not disappointed, as long as the Liang State perished, would they be without their credit?