At the beginning of September 889, after Li Xuanqing led the personal guard battalion to Tongguan, the battle between the Tiance army and Li Keyong's Jin army near Hezhong Fu was finally inevitable, and hundreds of thousands of horses and horses on both sides set up positions in the Hezhong region to start a big battle.

However, compared to the Jin army, which was constantly transporting troops from the rear, the Tiance army divided into part of the troops after the concentration of troops and swept Danzhou, Cizhou and other places, creating a stable two-wing position for the follow-up army to enter the river.

Moreover, with the entry of the Second Army Corps into the Hezhong area, the strength of the Tiance Army on this side has also reached four corps, 150,000 horses, plus a reinforced artillery battalion mobilized from the Fengzhou area, and the strength of the frontal corps is not inferior to the Northwest Group Army concentrated in Hexi not long ago, both in terms of firepower and strength.

"My lord, the deployment of troops in the river has reached its limit, is there a choice of war now?" After Li Xuanqing arrived at the front-line camp, Yang Tiancheng briefly explained the current situation and asked.

Li Xuanqing didn't answer, but frowned and asked: "The Jin army has concentrated 200,000 people, this is a battle with all its might, Li Keyong didn't come over, do you know who is the commander of the troops on the other side?" "With such a large-scale concentration of troops, the front-line generals of the Jin army basically have no way to command so many troops, and Li Keyong is still in Taiyuan Mansion and has not come out, Li Xuanqing really can't think of anyone who has such the ability to deter those arrogant generals.

"This time, the Jin army did not play tricks in the battle of Chang'an, their Chinese army is handsome and hangs the banner of Zhou Dewei, and the other generals are basically Li Siyuan, Li Sixun, and Fu Cunxian, by the way, Li Keyong's son Li Cunqiao is also in the army, as Zhou Dewei's deputy general." Yang Tiancheng sorted out this information and said: "But I feel that Zhou Dewei should not be able to control these people, and Bacheng is still waiting for Li Ke to use it." So at present, although the men and horses of the Jin army are in place, Zhou Dewei has no intention of immediately entering the battle, so I wonder if we should form a large formation to actively attract the other party to challenge, so as to hit the opponent and bring the morale of the other party before Li Keyong arrives. ”

"Attract the other person to come to the challenge? Tiancheng thinks too much, although Zhou Dewei's qualifications are not enough to control these Taibao, but at least on the surface, these people will not joke with military orders, and Li Cunqiao is still in the army. Zhou Dewei is both wise and brave, and he is extremely good at forbearance, and he will not fall for it. Li Xuanqing glanced at Yang Tiancheng with a smile and said, "What about your second plan?" It's not just a plan. I received the news of your occupation of Cizhou before I came, what about the southern front, there won't be no action, right? ”

Yang Tiancheng was broken by Li Xuanqing's words, scratched his head a little embarrassed, and smiled: "Sure enough, you can't hide anything from the lord." On the southern front, I have asked Wu Huan to lead the Eighth Corps to Shaanzhou secretly, concealed in the middle line from Shaanzhou to Hezhongfu, and the Eighth Corps should have arrived at the area secretly selected by Xuan Yingwei now, I have agreed with Wu Huan, and we will start from the hidden area in five days. If our army is already engaged with the Jin army by then, we will attack its flank, and if it is not engaged, we will directly show the banner and use it as a right wing corps. At the same time, the Cizhou area has also been occupied by Chen Yu with his army, and at the same time used as a left-wing corps, with the frontal battlefield to form a meniscus-shaped Erlong water array. In order to allow the three divisions of the army to cooperate, Xuan Yingwei has set up a special communication unit to ensure that the fighters are not delayed. ”

Yang Tiancheng drew his ideas on the map little by little while narrating, and soon the situation of this battlefield came out.

"There is nothing wrong with this arrangement, the army echoes before and after, the left and right cooperate, the frontal corps and the two wings of the strange soldiers can achieve the effect of Qi Zheng, but your frontal corps is only two legions, and there are only seventy or eighty thousand people at full play, how can you withstand the impact of the opponent's 200,000 cavalry? The guard battalion has other functions, it will not be put into the battlefield for the time being, are you sure you can withstand it? Li Xuanqing nodded and said with a smile: "Honestly, is it the idea of planning to fight the heavy cavalry camp again?" ”

"I've had people ask, and Tie Liang said that his heavy cavalry battalion has recovered its combat strength and is ready to go into battle at any time. Moreover, the terrain in the middle of the river is open, which is suitable for the group charge of the heavy cavalry battalion. If the Heavy Cavalry Battalion can be put into battle, we will definitely get twice the result with half the effort. Yang Tiancheng nodded and said: "The plan formulated by the General Staff in the early stage is also to mobilize the heavy cavalry battalion to participate in the battle in case of emergency, and use it as the main force on the frontal battlefield. ”

"You really have any cards to fight. I originally planned to mobilize cavalry and fight a regular cavalry battle one-on-one with the Jin army. I didn't expect you to be more ruthless than me, and you are directly ready to use the heavy cavalry battalion, in this case, let the directly subordinate battalion go north, change the plan, and fight a conventional battle with the frontal corps, and a surprise attack battle on the northern front. It is also in line with the basic situation of your two places. Li Xuanqing was also a little helpless about Yang Tiancheng's character, shook his head and said: "The guard battalion continues to stand by in Tongguan, I plan to wait until you and Li Keyong are anxious to take the guard battalion to Taiyuan Mansion and take a walk in front of Taiyuan Mansion City." ”

Yang Tiancheng discovered the meaning of Li Xuanqing's words at a glance, and said in surprise: "You are still powerful, while the fight between the two of us is in full swing, go directly to Li Keyong's lair to make a false shot, smart." If I were Li Keyong, I wouldn't care about the life or death of the front line at all, and it would be important to transfer troops to protect Taiyuan Mansion. ”

"It is not enough to transfer the front-line troops, but the troops of Xue Atan and Li Cunjin will definitely retreat to Taiyuan, and then the rebel army stopped by Xiaosi will be able to take a breath easily, so that we will form a combat situation of internal and external line cooperation, and Li Keyong's brain basically can't think of this. The tone of this war can be set. In addition to fighting Li Keyong, your mission is to always be prepared for a sneak attack by Zhu Quanzhong, he will not watch us destroy Li Keyong. So when Li Keyong is going downhill, the possibility of him sending troops is also increasing. When necessary, you can consider sending Houchun and them to the Eastern Front to deal with Zhu Quanzhong. Li Xuanqing pointed to Zhu Quanzhong's territory on the map and said: "The Xuanwu Army's territories in the west, Huazhou and Yuzhou, are one of their points, and I have asked Xiaosi to keep an eye on them." ”

Yang Tiancheng nodded and said: "Don't worry, my lord, we have a plan in this regard, as long as he dares to come, I will chop his claws." ”

"Alright, I'll go to Feixue to discuss other things, and I won't talk nonsense with you here. Concentrate on directing your battle. By the way, Xiaosi is here, let him go to Tongguan to find me. Li Xuanqing waved his hand, and when he saw that he already had a plan, he didn't say much, and walked straight out. He knows Yang Tiancheng's temperament very well, he is steady, and he is very strategic, as long as he thinks of it, he will definitely have a way to deal with it, so Li Xuanqing has nothing to explain.

When Li Xuanqing returned to Tongguan, Hu Xiaosi had just arrived in Tongguan, and Li Xuanqing didn't say much about this elusive intelligence leader, but just discussed with him for a long time about the problem of the rebel army in the Youhe area, and then asked him to go to Fengzhou, so that Chen Fan could get ready, and at the same time connect with the troops of An Xiu Xiu, and do the necessary cooperation work. Then he told Li Feixue to start preparing for a long-distance raid. For this operation, even the Flying Eagle Brigade, which had been wandering behind enemy lines, was urgently recalled and used as a surprise soldier.

Seeing that all this was arranged, Hezhong also officially entered the wartime stage, Zhou Dewei realized that he might be cut off by the opponent at any time after realizing that Cizhou had been occupied, and began to prepare for the transfer of front-line troops to recapture Cizhou, but the secrecy of hundreds of thousands of troops could not be seamless, and Xuan Yingwei still had reconnaissance tactics ahead of this era, so Zhou Dewei's army had not yet been dispatched, and Chen Yu had already received the message. did not hesitate at the moment, and secretly mobilized the 10,000 cavalry in his hands to ambush outside the city, preparing to give the opponent a dismount and defeat the opponent first.

The big war has not really begun, and the battle for the corners has already begun. Li Xuanqing didn't care about these either, and after explaining the supplies of the Ministry of Civil Affairs and the Logistics Department, he and the personal guard battalion disappeared in place. Since the pro-guard battalion itself did not go to the front line of Hezhongfu, everyone did not know where to go when it disappeared, and as a suspicious plan, the station of the pro-guard battalion was also taken over by the logistics department, and as a logistics transit base, the blockade was extremely strict, and outsiders did not know the real situation inside.

And almost at this moment, Chen Fan of the Northern Front also met Hu Xiaosi, and after learning about the changes on the Southern Front, all the legions under the jurisdiction of the Northern Front Group Army were also in place, the Fourth Army Corps, the Fifth Army Corps, the Seventh Army Corps, a cavalry corps and a mixed corps recruited by the recruit department plus 30,000 cavalry of the directly subordinate battalion that had just arrived at the front line, totaling more than 180,000 people, and the formation was no worse than the frontal corps of the Southern Front. Moreover, Tahi's steppe cavalry battalion had also crossed the Yin Mountain on the way to come. In this way, the northern front concentrated a cavalry force of 100,000 people, and with the infantry, it already had the strength to occupy the Hetao area in one fell swoop.

For this decisive battle, the General Staff has also mobilized the main mobile forces of the Tiance Army, the purpose of which is to complete the battle and not give the opponent the slightest respite. The goal of the battle on both the north and south fronts was to completely annihilate the living forces of the Jin army, reduce the population of the Shatuo people to a minimum, and create conditions for the resettlement of the Shatuo people after the war.

With the successive assembly of soldiers and horses on both sides, this shocking battle also made the other princes tremble, and even the feudal towns on the south bank of the Yangtze River tried their best to find out the specific situation of both sides. Yang Shouliang, Wang Jian, Li Maozhen, Zhu Quanzhong, and others, who were close at hand, even dispatched hundreds of intelligence personnel to monitor the movements of the two sides at any time, and it can be said that the whole world revolves around the two sides.

In the middle of September 889, just when Yang Tiancheng was about to attract the other party to attack him, Li Keyong also came to the front line in Hehezhong, and the handsome banner of the Chinese army quietly became the banner of Li Keyong. This change caused Yang Tiancheng to abandon his previous plan and began to assemble the heavy cavalry battalion, and the infantry brigade was then prepared, and the troops on both flanks were notified to be ready to standby, and the battlefield was getting closer and closer as Li Keyong arrived at the front line.

And at this time, Chen Yu's cavalry ambushed outside Cizhou City also took off guard and forcefully destroyed the Jin army vanguard that came to attack Cizhou. Because he wanted to attack the city, Zhou Dewei basically chose a small number of infantry brigades in the Jin army. However, in the battle sequence of the Jin army, the strength of the infantry was the weakest, and it was generally used as an auxiliary in addition to the siege, so although Chen Yu annihilated more than 20,000 opponents, the strength was not damaged for the advance of the Hezhong front, but only dispelled the opponent's idea of capturing Cizhou. And with the arrival of Li Keyong, the strategy of the Jin army is also changing, and it began to prepare for the attack, and several major Taibao under his command led their headquarters to continue to hone their troops.

On September 15, Li Keyong sent people to issue a war letter, agreeing that the two sides would fight in three days. Yang Tiancheng immediately agreed on behalf of the supreme command organ of the Tiance Army. In this way, the big battle of September 18 was inevitable. The two sides also began to formally mobilize their troops and horses to prepare for war.

Three days passed in a flash, and the whole army of Tiance Army left the camp on this day and set up a vast array in the open space outside the camp, and hundreds of thousands of troops were neatly lined up into a huge military formation with clear layers, waiting for the other side.

"Tianxiang, you are on the viewing platform of the Chinese army, pay attention to the mobilization of the rear army and support troops, and I will go to the front army to sit in town." Yang Tiancheng said to Xu Tianxiang, who came urgently.

"Don't worry, the crossbow brigade and the hellfire brigade of the artillery battalion and the logistics department have all arrived at the position, which is enough for the other party to drink a pot." Xu Tianxiang has rarely appeared on the battlefield since he took over as chief of the general staff, so he glanced at the brother next to him with envy at this moment and said with a smile: "Remember to find a way to take down Li Ke for me later, I still want to meet him." I hadn't seen this one-eyed dragon before, so I couldn't miss it this time. ”

"Haha, this is probably difficult. If my estimate is correct, it's time for a message from the lord's side. This time, even the Flying Eagle Brigade has been transferred, maybe now Taiyuan Mansion has been taken by the lord. Do you think Li Keyong has already gotten the message? Yang Tiancheng said with a smile.

"That's right, Xiaohu is a group of bold guys, there is nothing they dare not do, and Feixue is the same. I really don't know if the Lord chose them to accomplish this task. Xu Tianxiang couldn't help but laugh when he heard this: "Forget it, don't talk about them, you hurry up and go to the front army, the other party's formation is almost there." Li Keyong is really old-fashioned, and it is really redundant to fight a war and write a war letter. ”

At this moment, the news from the Pegasus of Taiyuan Mansion also arrived at the Jin army camp as soon as possible, and a moment later, Li Keyong's angry voice came from the tent. The several major Taibao who were waiting to attack on the side were inexplicably unaware of what was going on. Half an hour later the messenger rode out of the camp again and galloped towards the rear. Among the crowd, only Zhou Dewei flashed a trace of worry on his face, as if he had noticed something, and sighed silently and didn't say anything more.

"Is there something wrong in the rear?" This doubt lingered in everyone's minds until the guards at the gate of the tent summoned the news and the armies were reorganized and ready to go to war. It's just that no one expected that this question would be suppressed at this time, and there would be no chance to solve the puzzle again.