Under the strong persuasion of Guo Chongtao and others, in the end, Yang Wu decided to deal with Liang Guo first according to the original plan.

As for the envoy sent by Zhenzhou, he decided to agree to accept the surrender of Zhenzhou, appointed Zhang Chujin as the queen of the Chengde Army, and at the same time decided to send an envoy to the Jin State, hoping that the King of Jin could reconcile with Zhenzhou, "Jin and Wu both countries take the elimination of the pseudo-Liang and the revival of the Tang Dynasty as the first thing, and they cannot kill each other."

Of course, it is enough to send a messenger to persuade Li Cunmiao, and it is enough to do his best verbally, Yang Wu will not send a single soldier to help Zhenzhou, and the defense of Zhenzhou will ultimately depend on Zhang Chujin himself; And the purpose of this was naturally to create a pretext for a future war with the Jin Kingdom.

In any case, both the state of Wu and the state of Jin used to be close allies under the slogan of reviving the Tang Dynasty, although the relationship is not as close as it was at the beginning, but it seems a little tense, but after all, it has not broken down, so in order to start a war in the future so that the division will not be nameless, it is necessary to make some excuses now.

As for whether it can play a role, he doesn't care, what he has to do at present is to pacify Shandong as soon as possible, and then concentrate his forces to eliminate the Liang State.

Therefore, on the one hand, he ordered Chang Mengxi to be transferred as the new governor of Shandong, responsible for coordinating the affairs of Shandong, and on the other hand, he ordered to summon the assassins and generals who surrendered in various parts of Shandong, and personally appeased and appointed them.

Those Liang troops who surrendered, except for some of them who were incorporated into the Xiaoyi Army, most of the others were reorganized into the Xiang Army and used to maintain local law and order.

Of course, for these officers of the Xiang Army, Wu Guo must make many adjustments to ensure that he has enough control over them.

In addition, in addition to leaving some troops in Qingzhou, Qizhou and Yunzhou, Yang Wu ordered all other forbidden troops and naval fleets to be mobilized to Yunzhou, and after a period of rest, he would march westward in a big way.

In the face of the large-scale assembly of the Wu army, both Li Siyuan of Yangliu Ferry and Zhu Youzhen in Luoyang felt deep pressure.

On Yang Liudu's side, after the envoy of Wu crossed the river from here, Li Siyuan got the news and knew that Yang Wu had planned to dry up the battle situation in Zhenzhou; After he received the news of the large-scale assembly of Wu's army in Yuncheng, Li Siyuan was even more worried about whether the purpose of Yang Wu's assembly of troops would be to attack Yang Liudu.

Therefore, he personally crossed the river in the starry night to meet Li Zhou, the guard of Yang Liudu's southern city, and asked him to strengthen his precautions and prepare to defend the city; At the same time, he hurriedly sent people to go north with the envoys of Wu to Zhenzhou to explain the situation in the Central Plains to Li Cunqiao.

Compared with the measures taken by Li Siyuan, Zhu Youzhen was much more panicked after getting the news.

The army led by Duan Ning has been fighting for so long, although there is constantly news of "victory", but it has never been able to make a major breakthrough, and the battle situation is still deadlocked.

In the face of the Wu army's imminent attack, Zhu Youwen almost made a decision in panic to let Dai Siyuan and the Puzhou defenders stationed in Huazhou all go south to garrison Caozhou, and at the same time ordered that once the Wu army advanced westward, the Yellow River would be dug and the flood water would be diverted to the east to pour into the three cities of Cao, Pu and Yunzhou to isolate the Wu army.

Fortunately, at the critical time, he finally listened to Jing Xiang's persuasion and realized that the Wu army had many naval warships, and even if the Yellow River was dug up, it would be difficult to stop the Wu army, but it would make it difficult for his own army to move, so Zhu Youzhen had to give up in the end.

In the spring of the fifteenth year of Wuyi, after nearly a month of rest, the East Route Army was ready to go out again; At the same time, the news from Songzhou, Xuzhou and other places also became extremely favorable to Wu.

First of all, there was good news from Li Chengding, Kang Yanxiao, the general of the Liang army, secretly sent people to ask for surrender.

This person was originally a Shatuo from the Jinyang area, because he committed a serious crime, so he fled to the Liang State, because of his courage in battle, his official position has been continuously promoted over the years, and now he is serving as the commander of the right vanguard under Duan Ning.

In the past few months, Duan Ning has led the army, although it seems that he has attacked from all sides and captured a lot of Wu territory, but in fact, those territories are insignificant areas, and they will not affect the overall situation at all; It is precisely because there are so many "victories", and Duan Ning has always reported good news and not bad news, so Zhu Youzhen will continue to trust him.

After all, Kang Yanxiao is a Shatuohu person, with a straightforward temperament, and he is extremely dissatisfied with these deceptive methods, and once he couldn't help but complain a little and was heard by Duan Ning, and since then he has been suppressed in the army, so he has a plan to surrender to Wu.

Although the army led by Kang Yanxiao is not much, only a few thousand, if it strikes back at a critical time, it will definitely play a decisive role.

With Kang Yanxiao as the internal response, the certainty of Wu Jun's victory has greatly increased.

In addition, although Duan Ning has nothing outstanding in the use of troops, but under Zhu Youzhen's continuous urging, the Liang army has also launched many siege battles in recent months, and has fought a lot of tough battles.

It can be said that now is the time to launch a counterattack and establish a victory in one fell swoop.

On the nineteenth day of the first month, Yang Wu ordered Shi Hongyi to be the vanguard, personally commanding the army, advancing by land and water, marching west along Jishui, aiming directly at Caozhou.

In the face of the large-scale attack of the Wu army, the defenders of Caozhou fled, and the Wu army occupied it without blood on the morning of the 21st.

On the previous 20th, Dai Siyuan led the army to abandon Huazhou and Puzhou, and retreated to Kaifeng; At the same time, Zhu Youzhen hurriedly sent an edict ordering Duan Ning to lead the army back to Kaifeng.

In Ningling City, in the camp of the Liang army, the atmosphere was extremely tense.

In the various tents, the soldiers sat silently together, their eyes glazed, and they could not see the slightest look, obviously they were all confused about the future and pessimistic about the next big battle.

In the main camp of the Chinese army, Duan Ning and other high-level generals were also not very optimistic about the battle situation, and in the face of Zhu Youzhen's urgent edict, the generals argued endlessly for a while.

Because Duan Ning had previously scattered his forces in Songzhou, Bozhou, Chenzhou, Xuzhou and other vast areas, and launched attacks on the Wu army from all over the place, it seemed that he had seized a lot of Wu's territory, but it also caused the Liang army to disperse.

Now in a hurry, Duan Ning was able to assemble an army of only 70,000 people; Moreover, these 70,000 troops still need to be restrained by Li Chengding in Songzhou City.

If the army had not taken any precautions, the day when they hastily withdrew might have been the day when the army was destroyed; Therefore, if you want to retreat back to Kaifeng unharmed, someone must stay behind and be responsible for blocking Li Chengding's pursuers.

What the generals are deferring about is the choice of this left-behind general.

After a few months of conquest, the generals have long been desperate for the war situation, and now they have finally withdrawn their troops back to Kaifeng.

"Generals, when is this, don't you have the courage to fight? Not to mention that when Taizu founded the country, our army fought in the east and west, conquered everything, and was invincible, what kind of majesty was that? In recent years, our army and the Jin army have fought on the river, and the performance of the generals is also extremely outstanding, and there are not a few generals who have taken the lead. ”

In the tent, Duan Ning reprimanded loudly with anger on his face, but unfortunately the generals were reluctant to stay, so after several disputes, Duan Ning never came up with a plan.

Facing the silence of the generals, Duan Ning also regretted it a little in his heart.

"I knew that this trick was so difficult, why did Ben fight to come to this position?"

Although Duan Ning relied on bribery and currying favor with Zhao Yan and the others to get the important position of the envoy, this does not mean that he is completely useless.

Since taking office, he has been very conscientious, after all, as a recruiter, if he can achieve military exploits, his position will be stable in the future, and he will be promoted to a knighthood; If the Liang army is defeated, his interests will also be damaged by this trick.

Therefore, in the past few months of using troops, Duan Ning has worked hard all day to deploy the battle situation, and at the same time has painstakingly encouraged the generals to let the generals of all departments fight bravely.

Unfortunately, his abilities are really mediocre, and the order to divide his troops to attack from all sides is enough to show that he does not know the art of war; In addition, he climbed to the position of envoy by any means unscrupulous, which made him lack prestige in the army and could not make the generals obey, such as the problem he is facing now is enough to explain his lack of majesty.

With these two problems, no matter how hard he tried, he couldn't turn the tide of the battle, and now he was in a dangerous situation where he couldn't advance or retreat.

Just when the generals remained silent all the time, and Duan Ning's face became more and more ugly, Huo Yanwei, who had been sitting with his hands closed and his eyes closed, suddenly spoke: "General Duan, since all the generals don't want to stay and break the rear, then the generals should stay and break the rear, and the army can't be allowed to retreat defenselessly." ”

"Huh?" All the generals looked at Huo Yanwei with some surprise, obviously not expecting him to stand up and speak.

"General Huo is well aware of the righteousness, and he is deeply admired!" Duan Ning was overjoyed, and hurriedly stood up and bowed solemnly.

The other generals also reacted at this time, and stood up one after another and said: "General Huo understands the righteousness, and he will admire it!" ”

Although these generals themselves did not want to stay and break the rear, they knew that someone had to stay at this time, otherwise the army would retreat back to Kaifeng unsuspectingly, which would easily be raided by Li Chengding's pursuers, resulting in the rout of the whole army.

Since Huo Yanwei was willing to stand up and take on this task, they naturally wanted to do so.

"Since General Huo is willing to stay and break the queen, the general will not dare to let the general bear too much danger, there are at least 40,000 Wu troops in Songzhou City, and the general will leave 10,000 troops for the general to break the queen, be sure to ensure the safety of my back road, and please act cautiously!" Duan Ning's face was full of joy.

"General rest assured, since the general stays behind, he will definitely work hard to complete the task." Huo Yanwei's voice was calm, and he replied with a flat face.

……

After the military discussion, the generals said goodbye one after another, and Huo Yanwei returned to the camp with his staff.

"Sir, in the opinion of the general, staying at this time is no different from sending him to death; Just now, in the military discussion, all the generals were unwilling to stay, why did Mr. suddenly let the generals stay? ”

It turned out that in the middle of the military discussion just now, Huo Yanwei had originally made up his mind not to speak, but Chun Yuyan, a confidant and staff member sitting behind him, suddenly whispered to persuade him to take the initiative to stay and break off.

Huo Yanwei has always been obedient to Chun Yuyan's staff, although he didn't have time to ask in detail at that time, he still chose to follow the advice and took the initiative to stand up and ask to stay.

"Doesn't the general still see the situation clearly? King Wu's army has arrived in Caozhou, and the Great Liang is almost finished, doesn't the general have a little idea at this time? ”

"Sir, do you mean to surrender to the state of Wu?" Huo Yanwei's face changed slightly.

Last year, Chun Yuyan proposed to him to surrender, but the situation was not as critical as it is now, and Huo Yanwei had tens of thousands of troops at that time, and he was not willing to surrender to Wu without fighting, so he finally rejected Chun Yuyan's proposal.

Now that Chun Yuyan has brought up the old matter again, Huo Yanwei is still a little reluctant, after all, he has served Liang Guo for decades, and he still has some feelings; In addition, although the current situation is critical, after all, there is no country to lose, and he does not want to surrender at this time, so as not to bear the notoriety of betraying the master.

"There is no need to say much about the current situation, presumably the military also understands; The meaning of the following is not to let the general surrender to the Wu army directly, but does the general really think that 10,000 troops can block the pursuit of the Wu army? Chun Yuyan asked with a smile.

10,000 troops seems to be a lot, but the problem is that there is a flat river near Ningling, and there is no danger to defend; If Huo Yanwei concentrated his army in Ningling City, the Wu army could choose to leave part of the army to contain Huo Yanwei and pursue the main force by a detour.

If Huo Yanwei distributed his troops around Ningling, this would certainly be able to stop the Wu army from pursuing, but now that the time is in a hurry, there is no time to build a strong camp, and the consequence of dividing troops to intercept the Wu army will inevitably be quickly defeated by the Wu army.

"No matter how the general chooses, it will be difficult for our army to stop the pursuit of the Wu army. Therefore, the best way for the general is to concentrate his forces in Ningling City and hold on. Chun Yuyan asserted.

"What does Mr. mean is that our army is holding on to Ningling and allowing the Wu army to make a detour to pursue the main force of our army?" Huo Yanwei was a little puzzled.

"Yes, the general does what he can and does what he can, and as for the rest, it has nothing to do with the general. The general held on to Ningling, and with the money and food savings in Ningling City, even if he held on for a few months, it was enough. In this way, the general does not have to fight against His Majesty, and does not have to fight hard with the Wu army, wouldn't it be the best of both worlds? If the court is overthrown in the future, the general will surrender with Ningling, which is a perfect strategy! Chun Yuyan persuaded him.

Huo Yanwei nodded thoughtfully.

On the 22nd, Duan Ning ordered Huo Yanwei to lead 10,000 troops to block Li Chengding's pursuers after the break in Ningling, and he himself led the remaining troops back to Kaifeng.