Cheng Wuting is in his early fifties, extremely tall and strong, and he is awe-inspiring and not angry. Seeing him, Xue Shao instinctively thought of two words - Tiger General!

When he was still in the 21st century, Xue Shao was no stranger to Cheng Wuting. Because he is one of the few people in this era who can be worthy of the word "general".

Cheng Wuting is the son of Cheng Mingzhen, a famous general in the Tang Dynasty, and a veritable "Jiangmen Huzi". At the age of seventeen, he joined the army and followed his father to fight on the battlefield, and the first battle was to follow Emperor Taizong Li Shimin to conquer Goguryeo.

In that battle, the Tang Dynasty did not completely pacify Goguryeo, but there was a Gaishi Tiger General who got up as an ordinary pawn, that is, Xue Rengui, who was dressed in white and took the head of the enemy general in the army. At that time, Li Shimin recruited Xue Rengui to reward him, and Xue Rengui immediately moved the three armies.

But there is one person who is very unconvinced, and this person is Cheng Wuting. Because in that battle, Cheng Wuting, who was only seventeen years old and went into battle for the first time, killed no less than Xue Rengui, but because he was working under his father Cheng Mingzhen, Cheng Mingzhen was cautious and modest, and concealed many of Cheng Wuting's achievements in order to avoid "nepotism".

Just when the whole army was worshipping and praising Xue Rengui, Cheng Wuting ran to challenge Xue Rengui. Xue Rengui, who was in his thirties at the time, of course would not accept the challenge of a seventeen-year-old Jiangmen Huzi, and it was no good to win or lose. The young and vigorous Cheng Wu was quite unrelenting, but as a result, even Li Shimin knew about it. Although Li Shimin would not be so confused as to let the two of them really fight, he checked Cheng Wuting's outstanding achievements clearly.

At this time, the seventeen-year-old Cheng Wuting became famous. Li Shimin personally praised him as "the tiger of the gate and the champion of the three armies".

Since then, Cheng Wuting has been following his father Cheng Mingzhen to fight in the south and the north, and then guarded the eastern Liaodong frontier for more than ten years, fighting against Goguryeo, Khitan and Turkic aliens all year round. After his father's death, Cheng Wuting's son inherited his father's business and continued to guard the northeast of the Tang Dynasty.

More than 30 years have passed since Taizong's expedition to Goryeo, and Cheng Wuting, the seventeen-year-old boy who challenged Xue Rengui back then, is now a general. Due to fighting in the northern frontier for many years and dealing with cavalry of different races all year round, Cheng Wuting spent more than 30 years to practice extremely excellent cavalry combat techniques, and he was out of the blue.

The Turkic, Xi and Khitan people of Northern Dihu changed color when they heard the name of Cheng Wuting, saying that the cavalry under his command seemed to be "unstoppable by fire" and "the evil of the ancients".

Cheng Wuting's name of "evil" was called out by the enemy. It would not be an exaggeration to say that he was a "national hero".

……

This encounter was basically over, Cheng Wuting ordered the sergeants to clean up the battlefield to help the people and wounded soldiers, and dismounted and personally invited Xue Shao to the side to talk.

The combat effectiveness of this group of Tang troops was so strong that Xue Shao was amazed.

There were more than 1,000 Turkic soldiers and close to 2,000, and the Tang army was only 3,000 men. Although it was a flanking attack before and after the encirclement and Xue Shao, a "man and horse" with little combat effectiveness, it was too exaggerated to kill the enemy in one or two hours!

Xue Shao remembered that his brother in the Third Brigade had told him that the fighting power of the Turkic soldiers had always been very strong, and a team of fifty people dared to compete against the Tang army, which was ten times his size.

"The evil of the ancients came, and it really wasn't in vain." Xue Shao exclaimed, "If the cavalry under General Cheng is called the second in the world, no one dares to call it the first in the world!" ”

"Xue Gongzi has an overreputation." Cheng Wuting, who was born with the posture of a tiger general, was quite humble in front of Xue Shao at this time, and said with a lovely smile, "I am just a general under Marshal Pei, and Gongzi Xue is Marshal Pei's protégé." When it comes to using soldiers, I'm definitely far inferior to my son! ”

"I'm purely in vain, and I'm not qualified to talk about it on paper." Xue Shao smiled, after all, Cheng Wuting is an upright martial artist and has lived in the border for more than thirty years, unlike those court politicians who like to beat around the bush and are not good at compliments. The meaning of "flattering" in his words is quite obvious.

"Childe doesn't have to be modest." Cheng Wuting laughed twice, "Dog Qizhi and Xue Gongzi are colleagues, but he praised Xue Gongzi in front of me!" ”

Obviously, Cheng Wuting is still trying his best to please and set up, and he has used his son's relationship. Xue Shao was even more sure in his heart that Cheng Wuting's desire to return to the dynasty as an official was extremely urgent. Otherwise, with the natural pride of a martial artist, how could he bow down and take the initiative to curry favor with a royal relative from the capital? In the final analysis, don't you want to show loyalty to the queen of heaven through the relationship of "donkey"?

"Well, what about Ling Lang?" Xue Shao followed his words and asked, "Just now, I seem to have seen him rushing forward with Cheng Boxian, Xue Chuyu and others." ”

"Oh, I've ordered them to clear the battlefield, and they'll all come to meet Childe later." Cheng Wuting personally took a sheepskin bag and handed it to Xue Shao with a smile, "Childe, why don't you take a break for a while and taste the wine I made myself!" ”

"Okay, thank you General Cheng!" Stretching out his hand without smiling on his face, Xue Shao did not refuse.

There is one thing that outsiders don't know, Xue Shao has already been secretly taught by Wu Zetian, so he knows it in his heart - Cheng Wuting is the upstart in the army that Wu Zetian wants to support to replace Pei Xingjian.

Cheng Wuting is extremely famous for his military exploits and is only in his early fifties in the prime of life, plus he has been a general in the northeast border pass, there are not too many intertwined forces in the court, and the foundation is quite clean. If Wu Zetian wants to cultivate and win over a military spokesperson and strong supporter, Cheng Wuting is really a suitable candidate.

Xue Shao thought to himself, if you think about it from Cheng Wuting's point of view, he has made so many military exploits in the bitter cold land of the border for more than 30 years, and now he is still just a fourth-rank right leader Wei Zhonglang will be the governor of Fengzhou, and the desire to return to the dynasty to be a big official must be quite urgent. To be able to get the favor and cultivation of the queen of heaven, of course, is unwanted.

Wu Zetian and Cheng Wuting hit it off.

Judging from Wu Zetian's orders earlier and Cheng Wuting's performance now, the two of them still regard me as a "medium" in the middle. It is estimated that the queen of heaven must have also explained to Cheng Wuting's son Cheng Qizhi.

……

Cleaning and clearing the battlefield is not a one-and-a-half effort. Xue Shao and Cheng Wuting chatted about many topics other than court politics. From his mouth, Xue Shao learned that Pei Xingjian's main army was still being allocated and prepared, and had not yet arrived in the state.

The conscription and deployment of an army of 300,000 is not so easy. Half of the troops set out from Guanzhong, and many of these soldiers had to be recruited temporarily, and the raising and transportation of grain and grass was also a huge project, which could not be completed in ten days or eight days.

The other half of the Northern Expedition came from the Metropolitan Governor's Office in Hebei and the Youzhou Metropolitan Governor's Office in the northeast. In the same way, there are some ready-made troops, and some need to be recruited on an ad hoc basis.

Cheng Wuting's elite men and horses were originally a battle-filled division under the rule of the Youzhou Metropolitan Governor's Mansion under Fengzhou, and this time they came as a vanguard to fight the outpost. Cheng Benqi himself was appointed as Pei Xingjian's deputy, and he was the deputy chief of the Dao Marching Army.

Xue Chuyu, Cheng Boxian, and Cheng Qizhi were the vanguard troops of the family who followed Pei Xingjian's henchmen Dugu Yizhi and Sha Zha Zhongyi to escort the second batch of grain and grass to Bingzhou after Li Duozuo. It was heard that the two states of Shuodai had fallen and Pei Xingjian's main army had not yet arrived, and the governor Shi Li Chongyi urgently recruited the soldiers and horses of Cheng Wuting of Fengzhou to recover the city.

Cheng Qizhi naturally took on the mission of giving orders to his father, and took Cheng Boxian and Xue Chuyu and a small group of people from the Right Guard Mansion to join the army of Fengzhou and participated in this battle.

One is tempering, and the other is military merit.

As a result, when the Turks heard that Cheng Wuting was coming, they immediately abandoned the city and fled from the Great Wall and hid in the desert, and the two states of Shuodai recovered without a fight. Then Cheng Wuting ordered the lieutenant general to defend the city and personally came to kill a Turkic army that had no time to withdraw.

This is a group of robbers who are so greedy that they get carried away and go deep into the countryside to rob alone, and they have nowhere to escape after the two states of Shuodai were recovered by the Tang Dynasty, and they were closed by Cheng Wuting and beaten by the dogs. Cheng Wuting led the army to chase them for three days, and finally gathered them here to annihilate them and successfully eliminated the trouble.

Knowing this, Xue Shao felt a chill and fear in his heart, it turned out that Cheng Wuting did not make a special trip to save me, and Li Duozuo did not send troops to save me - our group of defeated soldiers and people who fled were unlucky to meet the fleeing Turkic bandits, and we were lucky to meet Cheng Wuting who came to annihilate the enemy!

Did Niu Ben deliver my letter?

If so, why didn't Li Duozuo send troops to save him, did he want to kill me?

If not, how did Cheng Wuting go to a group of difficult soldiers to find "honor"?

Contradictory, too contradictory! …… A cloud of doubt rose in Xue Shao's heart.

Later, Xue Chuyu and the other five people all walked over to this side. The first time they went into battle, they won a big victory and killed heartily, and these five people were very excited, just like the tiger cub hunted its prey for the first time, and the wildness and murderous spirit in their bones were stimulated.

Radiant and proud!

"Brothers!" Xue Shao stood up and called them.

The five people were stunned neatly, and they didn't recognize Xue Shao, a "wild man", for a while. However, Xue Chuyu's eyes were sharp, and he was surprised, "Xue ...... Checkmate? ”

"Won't it?" Cheng Boxian and the others were shocked, "It's really General Xue!" How did you end up here, and still be like this? We'll not even recognize you! ”

When they were shocked, the suspicion in Xue Shao's heart became even thicker-even the five of them didn't know what to do with me!

Cheng Wuting seemed to see Xue Shao's doubts, and hurriedly stepped forward to explain: "General Xue, I was afraid that the five of them would be messed up if they cared, so I didn't tell them about you." If there is anything wrong, please forgive me! ”

"It's okay, General Cheng must have a reason for doing this." Xue Shao smiled indifferently, thinking to himself, could it be that the matter of finding me and saving me is still a secret mission, and it will not see the light?

Cheng Wuting must have something to hide from me, and there must be a lot of trouble in this!