"Your Majesty, in the first battle of Gaoyi, the first emperor ordered Wang Yanzhang to lead the troops, but he was defeated by the Jin army, losing tens of thousands of elites, and since then the first emperor has no longer used him as his commander, why is this? Because the first emperor knew that this person could be a general, but he had no ability to be a handsome. If Your Majesty takes him as his commander, the army will be defeated! Zhang Hanjie hurriedly dissuaded.

Zhao Yan said in a cold voice: "Your Majesty, I heard that Wang Yanzhang is deeply resentful of His Majesty not taking him as the commander all these years, and often says that His Majesty is stupid and can't recognize people, which has led to successive defeats in recent years. Your Majesty, how can such an arrogant man be allowed to have a heavy army in his hands? ”

The two were anxious, and immediately tried to stop Zhu Youzhen with all kinds of slander.

When they said this, Zhu Youzhen also became a little hesitant: "Did this Wang Yanzhang really say that?" ”

"Yes, Your Majesty. Not only that, but Wang Yanzhang also claimed that if he was the main general, he would bring troops into Beijing to Qingjun's side! Zhang Hanjie hurriedly replied.

Zhu Youzhen's face was suddenly displeased, and he said, "Qingjun's side? Wang Yanzhang: Is this treating me as a faint king? ”

Li Zhen and Jing Xiang below immediately became anxious when they saw it, now this is really a moment of crisis, if Zhang Hanjie and the two really succeed and let Duan Ning lead the army to rescue Songzhou, then the last elite of the Liang army will be over.

Jing Xiang didn't care about anything else at this time, he stood up and shouted: "Your Majesty, please listen to me!" ”

Zhu Youzhen was stunned for a moment, turned to look at Jing Xiang, and saw this old minister standing in front of the ministers with an extremely serious expression at this time and said: "When the first emperor seized the world, he never thought that I Jing Xiang had no talent, and let the old minister participate in the planning no matter how big or small. Now the country is in danger, but His Majesty has always ignored the words of the old minister, the old minister is useless, it is better to die. ”

After speaking, Jing Xiang turned around and touched the pillar of the main hall, wanting to crash to death on the pillar of the court; Fortunately, Li Zhen on the side was quick and pulled him down, so there was no blood splashing five steps.

But the ministers of the court and the central government were still taken aback by his actions, and the momentum of Zhang Hanjie and Zhao Yan was also suppressed, so they had to shrink aside and remain silent.

Zhu Youzhen hurriedly persuaded: "Mr. Jing is an old minister of the first emperor and has made outstanding achievements, how dare I not listen to Mr. Jing." If you have any ideas, sir, you may wish to speak up. ”

In any case, Zhu Youzhen still has great respect for Jing Xiang, an old minister in the Zhu Wen era, and even if he doesn't listen to his opinions, he doesn't dare to snub him in the slightest; Now that Jing Xiang has admonished each other to death, Zhu Youzhen naturally does not dare to ignore his opinion anymore.

Jing Xiang said loudly: "Now the situation is very urgent, Duan Ning has no ability to command the army, if His Majesty uses him as a general, the army will be defeated!" Only by using Wang Yanzhang as a general can the imperial court be saved. ”

"What Mr. Jing said is very true, I use Wang Yanzhang as the main general." Zhu Youzhen had no choice but to nod and agree, and ordered on the spot, with Wang Yanzhang as the southern envoy and Huo Yanwei as the deputy envoy, to lead an army of 50,000 to the south to rescue Songzhou.

At this point, the court discussion, which had been arguing for two or three days, finally had a result, and the old minister Jingxiang stood up at a critical time and admonished each other with death, and finally forced Zhu Youzhen to take Wang Yanzhang as the commander.

After retiring from the dynasty, when he walked out of the main hall, Li Zhen secretly gave a thumbs up and said: "At the critical time, Mr. Jing turned the tide, and he was ashamed of himself." ”

Jing Xiang was worried: "I'm afraid the situation is not as good as you think, although Your Majesty agreed to take Wang Yanzhang as the commander, but he is more inclined to Duan Ning in his heart, and now he is just reluctantly agreeing, if the situation changes in the future, His Majesty will inevitably replace Wang Yanzhang with Duan Ning, and then the major events will be suspended." Speaking of this, he couldn't help but shake his head.

He knew that since Yang Shihou's death, Zhu Youzhen has been very jealous of those meritorious veterans in the past few years, and he often thinks about how to guard against them when appointing those generals.

Therefore, whether it is Liu Jun, He Gui, Huo Yanwei, Kou Yanqing, or Niu Cunjie, although they have successively served as envoys to the north, as long as the battle situation is not smooth, Zhu Youzhen will issue an order to remove them and replace them with new commanders.

Although Wang Yanzhang was reluctantly appointed as the commander-in-chief, Jing Xiang was very skeptical that Zhu Youzhen's trust would last long, and he would be dismissed if the war situation was a little unsmooth.

On the other side, Zhang Hanjie and Zhao Yan were also discussing quietly after retreating from the dynasty.

"Don't worry, although Wang Yanzhang has become a recruiter, Wu Jun is not so easy to deal with, as long as he makes a mistake, we will naturally have a way to deal with him at that time."

"Yes, in the past, he was the deputy envoy, and even if the war was unfavorable, the responsibility was shifted to the main general; Now that he has become a recruiter, as long as the war goes wrong, it will be even more difficult for him to escape as the main general. ”

Speaking of this, the hearts of the two of them became relaxed.

……

At the end of August, the Liang court ordered that 40,000 Liang troops from along the Yellow River, plus 10,000 troops from Luoyang, a total of 50,000 people went south to Ningling, where more than 10,000 Liang troops were brought together, led by Wang Yanzhang, responsible for relieving the siege of Songzhou.

When the news came, Wang Yanzhang in Ningling City couldn't help but be overjoyed and said: "Your Majesty has always used mediocre people as generals, and this time it is finally the right person." ”

Huo Yanwei smiled bitterly: "I don't know when the reinforcements from the imperial court will arrive in Ningling, the situation in Songzhou is not very good." ”

The situation in Songzhou is not bad, it is simply critical.

Just before the Liang court made a decision, after capturing Dangshan, the Wu army of the Eastern Route turned north to attack Huizhou, while sending part of its troops to support Li Chengding and help him attack Songzhou.

For the strategic location of Songzhou, Wu Jun is determined to win.

Although because of the small size of the city in Songzhou, the Wu army could not invest too many troops; And because Songzhou City is surrounded by water on all sides, the moat is deep and wide, and it is difficult to cut it off for a while, but the Wu army threw a large number of grenades with Suzhou artillery to put great pressure on the defenders.

Now it is not as good as back then, although grenades were also used when Wu attacked the city, but at that time, the Wu army not only had to attack the city, but also had to train troops, so grenades were rarely used, and under normal circumstances, they attacked the city by normal means.

But now it's different, after so many years of preparation, it's naturally impossible to leave the best weapons unused.

The successive grenade bombardment made the defenders, whose morale was not very high, very bad, bitter, and many soldiers took advantage of the night to flee outside the city and surrender to the Wu army, but the defender Quan Yan could not stop it.

In this case, Jeonhiko kept sending people to ask for reinforcements, and it was clear that the situation in the city was very critical.

"Imperial reinforcements?" Wang Yanzhang shook his head when he heard this: "The soldiers are very fast, if you wait for the arrival of the imperial court reinforcements before sending troops to rescue Songzhou, I am afraid that it will be too late." And in that case, Wu Jun will also be prepared. ”

"What does General Wang mean, do you want to lead the army to rescue Songzhou now?" Huo Yanwei hesitated.

"Yes, the soldiers are very fast, the general will send troops now, the Wu army will definitely not think that our army's actions are so fast, and they will definitely be able to catch them off guard."

"This ......" Huo Yanwei said dumbly: "General Wang, our army has just experienced a major defeat, and its morale is currently low, is it a bit risky to use them to take the initiative to attack?" ”

Although he knew that the situation in Songzhou was critical, he also admitted that Wang Yanzhang's statement had some truth, and if he waited until the imperial court reinforcements arrived before sending troops, he was afraid that it would be really late.

However, from his own heart, he still felt that Wang Yanzhang's decision was a bit hasty.

On the same day, thirty miles west of Songzhou City, it was raided by the Wu army, and Huo Yanwei's 20,000 troops were defeated, although because it was dark, the pursuit of the Wu army failed to achieve great results, but in the end the losses of the Liang army were still amazing.

When Huo Yanwei gathered the remnants in Ningling, he found that his original army of 20,000 had less than 10,000 people left.

This is not to say that the other nearly 10,000 people were wiped out by the Wu army.

In fact, no more than 5,000 people were actually wiped out or captured by the Wu army, and the rest of the soldiers actually took advantage of the chaos to become deserters.

The morale of the Liang army on the southern front was originally not high, and coupled with the new defeat, everyone had no hope of defeating the Wu army, and there were naturally many deserters.

Later, when Wang Yanzhang led the reinforcements to arrive, although it once boosted the morale of the Liang army and repelled the attack of the Wu army, when everyone found that Wang Yanzhang's reinforcements were only 5,000 people, the morale of the army suddenly fell again, and many people felt that the imperial court had given up on them.

If such an army composed of remnants and defeated soldiers is put into the battlefield without rectification, let alone using them to attack, it is difficult to use them to defend against the attack of the Wu army.

Wang Yanzhang said with confidence: "It is because the morale of my army is low, so we need to take decisive measures now to launch an active attack on the Wu army; Otherwise, if it is a passive defense, the morale of the army will be even more low, and when the time comes, if the enemy does not attack, our army will be defeated without a fight. ”

Huo Yanwei nodded when he heard this, and said, "What General Wang said is very true, since this is the case, then General Wang will give an order." ”

"Ordering the various ministries, Ben General has been appointed by the imperial court as the envoy to the south, responsible for leading the army to relieve the siege of Songzhou. Ordered all the ministries to reorganize their armaments, boost morale, and wait for the arrival of reinforcements from the imperial court. Wang Yanzhang turned to the herald beside him.

Huo Yanwei's expression lit up when he heard this, and he said: "What does General Wang mean is to deliberately make the Wu army think that our army will wait for reinforcements to arrive before sending troops?" And then the general led the army to launch a sudden attack and take the enemy by surprise? ”

"Yes, if you attack head-on by normal means, it will be very difficult to break through the enemy's defenses; Therefore, he was going to use a strategy to confuse the Wu army, and he only hoped that the generals of the Wu army would not see through it. ”

……

At the same time, Gao Jichang, the envoy of Kuang Guojun in Xuzhou City, was also hesitating for the news of Wu's Northern Expedition.

When he heard the news of Wu's Northern Expedition, he was so shocked that he couldn't speak for a long time.

After a while, he asked the people around him incoherently: "The Wu army is on a northern expedition at this time?" How is this possible? How could they have gone on a northern expedition now? ”

Naturally, no one could answer him to these questions, because Liang Zhen, Ni Kefu and others were also stunned.

Now that a few days have passed, Gao Jichang still has not made a decision, whether he should resist the Wu army or surrender directly to the Wu army.

If he surrendered to the Wu army, the policy of the Wu State would have been placed there a long time ago, and he would definitely not be reused after he arrived in the Wu State; But if it is resisted, with the strength of Xuzhou, it is obviously impossible to block the attack of the Wu army, and defeat is inevitable.

Although even after the failure to resist the Wu army, he can still flee back to Luoyang, but after losing the territory, even if he escapes to Luoyang, what can he do, he is not Zhu Youzhen's cronies, and it is still difficult to be reused in Luoyang; What's more, now Liang Guo is completely in a situation where the building is about to collapse, and no one knows how long Liang Guo can hold on.

In the past two days, Gao Jichang and his many henchmen have repeatedly discussed this issue for a long time, but in the end they have not been able to make a decision.

Even Liang Zhen, a confidant and strategist, was a little at a loss.

The advice he gave at the beginning was to ask the imperial court to give up Xuzhou and move the town of Yanzhou, just like Wen Tao gave up Guanzhong and chose to move the town of Bozhou.

This plan originally went well, although Zhu Youzhen did not directly agree, but also made a promise, as long as Gao Jichang could assist the imperial court to eliminate Zhu Youneng's rebels within a month, he agreed to transfer Gao Jichang to Yanzhou.

So some time ago, he was still gearing up to send troops to cut off Zhu Youneng's back road, who knew that at that time, the news of Wu's Northern Expedition came, which disrupted all his plans at once.

Now that the Wu army is about to fight, he also has to face a difficult choice.

After a long time, Ni Kefu, who hadn't spoken for a long time, suddenly spoke: "Jieshuai, according to the information I have obtained so far, the Wu army on the Jingxiang side temporarily stayed in Dengzhou after capturing Dengzhou, Qinzhou and other places, and the Wu army on the Shouzhou side also did not rush to send troops north after capturing Yingzhou and Caizhou. All these show that the plan of the Wu army should be to fight step by step, steadily and steadily, and gradually swallow up the territory of Liang. ”

"Although this method seems to prepare our side, it also shows that Wu's ambition is not only to occupy territory, but more importantly, to govern, to completely unify these territories; In the end, he concentrated his forces to destroy the Liang State in one fell swoop. Ni Kefu analyzed.

"And what do you mean?" Gao Jichang was a little confused by his headless words.

"The last general means that the Wu army is not in a hurry to carry out all this, which will take a lot of time to capture the entire Central Plains; And now that the Jin army is eyeing the north bank of the Yellow River, they will definitely not sit idly by and watch the Wu army annex the Central Plains alone, and will inevitably send troops south at that time. ”

"And once the Jin army goes south, it is still unknown whether the Central Plains will belong to the Jin State or the Wu State. Why don't you wait and see for a while? Ni Kefu said.

Originally, according to their estimates, the Wu army would look for an opportunity for the Jin army to be completely dragged to the north, or choose to continue to wait and see, and wait until the Jin and Liang were completely defeated before the northern expedition.

But now although the Jin army has the Hebei rebellion to be pacified, it is still far from being completely dragged down, at least there are still many Jin troops along the Yellow River, if the Jin king Li Cunqiao chooses to lead the army to cross the river to the south, it may not be that there is no strength to fight with the Wu army.