Qingmo said: "Sweater Chong can really cross the river, how can Zhu Jiu not know?" If the Pei brothers are ready to fight, how can the two generals, Li and Chen, cross the river? The pawn said: "Zhu Jiu is just a fisherman, what kind of military do you know, the Pei family brothers are foreigners, how do you know that you can cross the river there?" Even if he knew that the main general was here, he couldn't spare his forces to intercept it. ”

Shi Kong said: "The Pei family brothers claim to have 3,000 men and horses, how can they not divide the troops, you don't want to talk nonsense." The pawn said: "The way of using soldiers, false and real, he really has 3,000 men and horses in hand, will he delay until today to send troops, I have seen their formation, and they have killed 1,500 people, of which at least 30% are temporarily captured to strengthen the momentum." ”

Mo Qi suddenly asked, "How did you know that the sweater rushed to this place, and how did you know that you could cross the river here?" ”

This question is also what Li Mao wanted to ask, the march must first be familiar with geography, this is Li Mao's understanding when he read the military book, so as early as before he swore to the Northern Expedition to suppress bandits, he arranged for the military academy to send a large number of scouts to carefully investigate the geography and people's conditions along the way, and arranged for the Wangbai to go to the villages and households to collect intelligence, and finally drew a detailed map after a comprehensive analysis of the collected information, compiled a "Field Intelligence Manual" and sent it to the senior generals of the army for reference.

The sweater chong is marked on the map and manual, but the feature of being able to cross the river is hidden, which is Li Mao's intention. When the scouts reported to Li Mao that the sweater was flushed with a smooth water and could cross the river, Li Mao had specially brought a magic power to the scene to inspect in person in the name of hunting, and after verifying that this place could indeed cross the river, Li Mao strictly ordered to block the news, and only marked his name on the map and manual, but did not make a note under his name, and ordered the captor Huang Renfan to be surrounded by secret sentry posts to closely monitor the approach of idle people.

The secret of the sweater chong didn't even know about the generals in the army, Li Yu, Chen Wanchun, and even the pro-Wei Qingmo, where did this pawn know?

The pawn seemed to be able to see through people's hearts, and explained unhurriedly: "That day, I went out hunting with Inspector Qin, chased a group of wild donkeys to the river, and saw the donkeys crossing the river, so I knew that the river could be crossed here. ”

Qingmo's original surname is Qin, he was sold to Baoding Xue's family as a slave when he was young, named Qingmo, and he forgot his real name when he was getting older, Xue Rong left Chengwu County when he released him as a citizen, and he was named Qin Mo when he registered his household registration, and Shi Xiong said that the Qin inspector was Qingmo.

Qingmo thought about it, before besieging Ye Shuodu Nanzhuang, he had indeed been ordered to go out to reconnoiter the enemy's situation, and met a group of wild donkeys on the way, and chased after them when he saw that they were fat and strong. Qingmo took a closer look at the pawn and exclaimed: "Damn, it turned out to be you again, I remember that the **** said in the sweater, 'You can cross the river here, Zhu Jiu didn't set up a soldier to defend, it's really mediocre." The pawn smiled: "The inspector really has a good memory, the kid admires it." Qingmo suddenly became angry, jumped to his feet and scolded: "I admire your grandmother, since you know, why didn't you report to the general earlier?" ”

The pawn shrunk his neck and muttered, "I think the inspector of such a major event will inevitably report it, so why not let me do it on my behalf." ”

Qingmo seemed to be choked by a chicken, and he couldn't speak. Li Mao wants to attack Nanzhuang head-on, the purpose is to deter thieves, Zhu Jiu controls the vast majority of the boats on the Ye River, come and go freely, the sweater chong ferry is worthless to him, and the value to Li Mao is not high, so he left this matter behind, but after the Pei family brothers sent troops, the value of the sweater chong increased sharply, but at this time he forgot all about the situation that the sweater chong could cross the river, which was a major dereliction of duty.

This pawn mentioned this matter to his face, as if he was revealing his scars, and Qingmo didn't have a good temper.

Li Mao saw that this little pawn had clear thinking, eloquent speech, and accurate reasoning and judgment, so he liked it a little in his heart, so he asked: "I see that your judgment of affairs is reasonable, have you read the book of soldiers, how do you see that there are only 1,500 brothers in the Pei family?" The pawn touched his head, a little embarrassed. Shi Kong hurriedly replied on his behalf: "He raised horses in Xuzhou for Mr. Chen, the guest of Zhang Shangshu, Mr. Chen is a military staff officer, often reads military books at night, he cooks tea and serves, listens to a word and a half, he is a little self-righteous, I don't know how capable he is, he doesn't do a good errand and doesn't come to join the army, he is blind like me, how can he know what art of war?" It's a good hand to play with knives and guns. ”

The pawn's cheeks flushed when he heard this, and he just scratched his head. "This guy's name is Shi Xiong, a native of Xuzhou, who has practiced martial arts since childhood, has a good body of martial arts, and is especially good at shooting arrows. I saw that he could do something, so I stayed by my side as a personal soldier, but I didn't expect this white-eyed wolf to sell me. Qingmo kicked Shi Xiong and scolded affectionately.

"Ishio?" Li Mao seemed to have heard this name somewhere, but he couldn't remember it in his eagerness, he looked at the pawn and said, "In your opinion, what should we do now?" ”

As soon as Shi Xiong was about to speak, Shi Kong coughed, Qingmo glared at him, and shouted, "Go!" Ishiku obediently stepped aside. In Li Mao's personal army, although Mo Qi is the leader of the team, he only has the right to command and train, and the right to deploy personnel and enforce military law is in Qingmo's hands. In a sense, Qingmo is the leader of the pro-soldier team.

Shi Xiong lowered his head, thought about it and thought about it, cleared his throat and said, "Hold on and wait for help." ”

……

From Ye Shuodu Nanzhuang to the west out of the eight miles of the sweater chong, the Ye River turned a bend here, the turbulent river became smooth here, Zhu Jiu had passed through this place countless times, and also knew that the water here was shallow, but he never thought that there was any military significance here. The Pei brothers are foreigners, and when they saw that the Ye River was wide and the water was turbulent, and that Li Mao had not been able to cross the river for a long time, they mistakenly thought that there was no place to cross the Ye River, and they were a little careless for a while.

After Ye Shuodu Beizhuang lined up, the Pei family brothers planned to send someone to survey the terrain along the river, but Pei Renjing was in a coma with an arrow, and the situation was very critical, Pei Renyong was worried about his brother's injury, and he had no intention of urging his subordinates to visit for a while.

Pei Renjing was in a coma for a day and a night before waking up, seeing that his injuries were stable, Pei Renyong's mind was also sober, so he sent someone to survey the terrain along the river, and when he learned that the sweater chong could wade across the river, Pei Renyong was suddenly shocked into a cold sweat, and hurriedly sent his brother Pei Renqu to lead a battalion of elites to deploy defense, Pei Renjing heard about this on the hospital bed, and while shouting about the danger, he breathed a sigh of relief and said: "The loss is Li Mao, if it is replaced by veterans such as Li Yu and Chen Wanchun, how can you and I still have the strength to speak here?" ”

He added: "The earthen fort must be taken down as soon as possible, and if you put this nail under your nose, sooner or later you will be pierced by him." ”

Pei Renyong twisted his beard and smiled: "If you want the fish to take the bait, you have to put some bait, the people in the fort have become the turtle in the urn, and they can take it sooner or later, go to this bait, how can the fish be hooked?" Pei Renjing said: "Brother's words are ignored, kill Li Mao, the official army will collapse without a fight, why bother with that." ”

Pei Renyong said: "Li Mao is just a puppet in Gushan Town, the backbone of Gushan Town is Li Yu and Chen Wanchun, the old Jiang of the Qing Navy, with Li Mao's constraints, Li and Chen are like horses that have been bridle on their heads, if there is no Li Mao, the two of them are tigers with wings, are you willing to deal with a tamed horse, or with a fierce tiger?" ”

Pei Renjing said: "The eldest brother is really far-sighted, but the younger brother is not as far-sighted. Pei Renyong said: "I expect that there will be a big battle tomorrow, you have to recuperate, and then you will rely on you to press for me." Pei Renjing said: "How can my brother conclude that the official army will have a decisive battle tomorrow?" Suddenly, he patted his head and said, "Yes, if there is no decisive battle, the earth fort will become Li Mao's cemetery." Pei Renyong said with a smile: "Li Mao is a celebrity in front of Li Shigu, he is trapped in prison, how dare Li Yu and Chen Wanchun not save him?" Tomorrow they will fight to the death, if tomorrow can break the official army, the people in this earthen coffin will be disposed of by you. ”

For a whole day, Pei's army beat gongs and drums outside the earthen fort, shouting and building momentum, and the harmful earthen fort defenders could not rest all day long. However, after this day and night of getting along, the relationship between everyone and Li Mao has become a lot closer, and the former high-minded, cold and stern commander turned out to be such a reasonable person.

On this day and night, the soldier Shi Xiong tried his best to talk and broke his heart in order to boost morale. Shi Xiong was not an officer, or even a member of the pro-soldier team, which was why his words were more convincing than Qingmo and Mo Qi's supernatural powers.

After a long night's work, by dawn on the 2nd, Li Mao counted the number of people, and there were only forty-three people left, and only forty people could fight, except for the three seriously wounded.

He divided these forty people into four teams, one team of Qingmo and Mao Taigong, one team of Mo Qi Shentong and Shi Kong, one team of himself and Shi Xiong, and the remaining team and three seriously injured people stayed behind in the earthen fort. At dawn, the drums sounded outside the earthen fort, and when he climbed to the top of the earthen fort and looked out, he saw that the smoke was billowing on the south bank of the Ye River, the sound of killing shook the sky, and there were hundreds of "boats" floating on the blue and white river.

As soon as the morning fog lifted, these 100 "boats" erected their "sails" and took advantage of the strong southeast wind to cross the Ye River and fight Pei's army to the death. The Pei family brothers were ready to fight, ordered all the men and horses, and lined up along the river.

Before the war, the drummers of the two sides first had a competition, the Pei brothers put out sixteen big drums along the river, the drums were earth-shattering, and the south bank put out twenty-eight war drums on the river beach, the sound was muffled like thunder, the earth shook the mountains, and the sound of the north bank was suddenly suppressed. Pei Renyong frowned, waved his hand, and thousands of soldiers shouted in unison, and the sound was so strong that it was transmitted more than ten miles away, and the frightened birds in the forest flew in bursts, migrating into the distance in the sky.