Mid-October, Shouzhou. Pen? Interesting? Pavilion wWw. ｂiquge。 ｉｎfo

It's early winter, but it's still hot, and the sun is shining on it, and people feel like they're in a steamer.

On the city wall, various officials and generals in Shouzhou climbed the city wall one after another to watch the movements of the enemy army outside the city.

"It seems that the enemy army does not intend to force the siege! Also, the city of Shouzhou is strong, and with Zhu Quanzhong's 100,000 army, if you want to break through the city, it will take at least half a year, and then pay the loss of tens of thousands of troops. As long as he hasn't gone crazy, he won't attack directly. Seeing that the Liang army outside the city had neither completely surrounded the city nor had any intention of building siege equipment, Tao Ya said with a relaxed face.

When Yang Wu asked him to take the position of governor of Huaibei, Tao Ya was still a little reluctant in his heart, after all, the position of governor seemed to be high and powerful, but in fact, he was subject to various checks and balances, and he could not do his own thing like when he was in Shezhou before.

However, during this time, especially after eliminating Qian Biao, he gradually accepted this reality and began to fulfill his new position.

This time, when Zhu Quanzhong went south, he immediately issued an order to clear the wilderness, and all counties in Shouzhou must transfer the people and finances in the shortest possible time after receiving the order.

And the reason why Li Chengsi set up a defensive line on the side of the Huai River to block the Liang army was because the task of clearing the field had not been completed at that time.

"Don't be careless, Zhu Quanzhong has always been cunning, and the Liang army has a lot of soldiers, so our army still has to be careful and guarded." Li Chengsi said in a deep voice.

In terms of defending the city, Li Chengsi is not worried, the city wall of Shouzhou is only fourteen miles long, and it is protected by a moat, and there are 30,000 defenders in the city, which is enough to defend the city.

In addition, the Huainan Army also learned from Qian Biao's practice in Hangzhou and built a Shangzhou cannon mount on the city wall.

Under such precautions, it is impossible for Zhu Quanzhong to break through in a short period of time.

"Your Highness's plan is to go to Haozhou to deal with Kang Huaizhen first or come to Shouzhou first?" Lee Seung-hee then asked.

"There is no news yet, but in the opinion of this official, His Royal Highness the Prince will definitely choose to go to Haozhou this time, what does General Li think?" Tao Ya's tone seemed affirmative.

In his opinion, Zhu Quanzhong's trip south this time was not to eliminate Huainan in one fell swoop, but to take advantage of the fire to rob. That is to say, if there is a fighter, Zhu Quanzhong will naturally not let it go, saying that if there is no fighter, he will not forcibly attack the city, at most, he will loot and leave.

In this case, if Yang Wu directly led the army to Shouzhou to join Li Chengsi, Zhu Quanzhong saw that the Huainan army was strong and had no chance to take advantage of it, so he would definitely retreat after looting.

In that case, it would not make much sense for Yang Wu Xingshi to mobilize more than 100,000 troops, which obviously did not conform to Yang Wu's thoughts.

Although he didn't know much about Yang Wu, he could guess that Yang Wu had adopted a proactive offensive strategy every time he fought in the past few years, and he almost didn't have any time when he was focused on defense; Even if the enemy is strong and I am weak now, Tao Ya feels that Yang Wu will definitely choose the more offensive Eastern Front plan.

Lee Seung-hei had a similar opinion to him, and at this time, the scout who had gone to inquire about the news outside the city returned and brought the latest news.

"Generals, according to the news found by the villain, the Liang army is now looting everywhere, and many people who have hidden in the mountains have been found by them. And it is said that the soldiers of the Liang army have reached as far as Luzhou. The scout gasped.

Li Chengsi was not surprised at all by this news, and he hurriedly asked. And what about the movements of our army? Is there any news of His Royal Highness? ”

"His Royal Highness's army is now rushing towards Shouzhou, and it is said that the vanguard of our army has already engaged the Liang army, and our army has won a victory, destroying more than three hundred enemy troops."

"What? His Royal Highness the Prince came directly to Shouzhou for reinforcements? Li Chengsi and Tao Ya were surprised, which was a little different from their judgments.

"Could it be that His Highness finally gave up the chance to win a big victory, and chose a more secure strategy to meet the enemy?" Both of them had some doubts in their hearts.

When Tao Ya and the others were puzzled, Zhu Quanzhong, who was outside the city, was also a little puzzled when he heard that the Huainan Army reinforcements were coming straight towards him.

However, what he was wondering about was not why Yang Wu came to Shouzhou, but how many people from the Huainan Army came.

The advance led by Kou Yanqing, the training envoy of the Bozhou regiment, had indeed advanced to Luzhou, because Shouzhou implemented the strategy of clearing the wilderness with strong walls, and the people of all counties were evacuated in advance, which made his army unable to even plunder the population.

If the army goes south this time and there is no result in the end, where will he put his face? Therefore, Zhu Quanzhong ordered Kou Yanqing to lead the forward to attack Luzhou.

However, what he didn't expect was that Kou Yanqing sent someone to report today, saying that he had encountered a reinforcement from the Huainan Army, and lost hundreds of people after a battle, but also captured a few prisoners.

According to the confessions of those prisoners, this time the Huainan Army was personally led by Yang Wu, with a strength of more than 60,000, and the goal was to come to Shouzhou to relieve the siege.

It is said that this news was announced by Yang Wu when he was parading the three armies before sending troops.

"King, I heard that after the restructuring of the Huainan Army, their army now has a new military number, and the soldiers captured are all soldiers of the Zhenguo Army stationed in Guangling, these soldiers are extremely brave, and the few who were caught were captured after being injured, and they are worthy of being the most elite soldiers in Huainan."

Thinking of the message sent by Kou Yanqing, Zhu Quanzhong was a little puzzled, because according to the news he had received before, the mobile strength of the Huainan Army, including Wang Maozhang's department in Xuanzhou, was only 60,000 people in total.

He didn't know that Yang Wu had recently reorganized an army, so there was no need to worry about the troops left behind in Guangling.

Doubts are doubts, but Zhu Quanzhong is not worried about the arrival of the Huainan army, after all, Yang Wu's troops are limited, and it is impossible to conjure up an army.

So in today's situation, Liang Jun still has an absolute numerical advantage.

"Send orders to all departments, start to gather the army, and prepare for battle with the Huainan army!" Zhu Quanzhong didn't think much about it, and began to order.

In today's troubled times, what the feudal towns lack most is population, and if they can't defeat the Huainan army in the south this time, it's not bad to loot more people and go back.

Therefore, after discovering that the Huainan army held Shouzhou and did not fight with him, he ordered his subordinates to search for the people who were hiding, and the harvest was not small in a few days.

But now that the main force of the Huainan Army has come, he naturally has to gather the army.

However, what he didn't expect was that when his army stayed in Huoqiu for three days, the Huainan army seemed to suddenly disappear, and there was no news at all.

Just as he was waiting impatiently, news suddenly came from Kou Yanqing's side, saying that they had fought another battle with the Huainan Army, and this time it was the soldiers of the Zhenwu Army who fought with them.

In the next few days, the Huainan army fought with Kou Yanqing's troops many times, and both sides suffered losses, but the main force of the Huainan army never appeared.

"King, what kind of trick is Yang Wu doing, will his main force not come to Shouzhou at all, but go to Haozhou to attack General Kang?" Seeing this scene, Li Zhen couldn't help but wonder.

If Yang Wu was playing tricks during this time to drag their main forces here, then Kang Huaizhen on the Haozhou side was a little dangerous.

"Impossible, the terrain in this area is flat, it is difficult to hide the army, let alone an army of 60,000, it is basically impossible to sneak attack. And Kang Huaizhen is a cautious person, and he will not leave a chance for the Huainan Army to sneak attack. Zhu Quanzhong said in a deep voice.

However, he still took some measures: "Send an order to Kou Yanqing, let him find out as soon as possible how many troops are fighting with him, whether it is the main force of the Huainan Army!" In addition, tell Kang Huaizhen again, let him be cautious and careful, and don't let the enemy attack him! ”

Where did the main force of the Huainan Army go, this point was not only Zhu Quanzhong was puzzled, but also Li Chengsi in Shouzhou City.

However, in fact, the main force of the Huainan Army is still in Guangling City and has not gone anywhere!

On that day, Li Shenfu supported to go to Haozhou to attack Kang Huaizhen's department first, Yang Wu thought that Li Shenfu had some high opinions, but who knew that Li Shenfu gave only one reason, that is, if he went to Haozhou, the Huainan army could control the initiative, and could choose to attack, and could choose to hold on when the situation was unfavorable.

And if you go to Shouzhou, in the face of the superior strength of more than 100,000 Liang troops, the Huainan Army has only one choice.

Of course, although Yang Wu agrees with this point of view, Zhu Jin, Yan Keqiu and others are not so persuasive.

So then, Li Shenfu proposed a method that could quickly defeat Kang Huaizhen's department, and this method quickly persuaded everyone.

It turned out that not long ago, Ning Zhonglai, the chief of firearms appointed by Yang Wu, reported that the key problem of using trebuchets to launch grenades had been solved.

The idea of using trebuchets to launch grenades was put forward by Yang Wu very early on, and it was put into practice very early, but the results achieved were very unsatisfactory.

The most critical problem is the control of the explosion time, if the lead is set too long, it will leave enough time for the enemy to react, if the enemy is bold enough, the fuse can even be cut off before the explosion; And if the fuse is too short, there is a risk that the grenade will explode in the air.

In addition, the fuse often self-extinguishes during the throwing process, with the result that instead of killing or injuring the enemy, the thrown grenade may give the enemy access to black powder.

In fact, the grenades used by the Huainan Army in the First Battle of Huzhou were captured by the two Zhejiang armies, but later the two Zhejiang armies that attacked Huzhou were all wiped out, and the black powder did not fall into the hands of Qian Biao.

Although he may not be able to configure it himself if Qian Biao gets the black powder, Yang Wu still doesn't want to take this risk.

Coupled with the shockingly high mute rate of grenades, Yang Wu has not used a grenade since the First World War in Huzhou.

This time, the problem of the grenade fuse was basically solved by Ning Zhong.