Outside the city of Jurong

At that time, the camp had been reduced to ashes, and there were wreckage everywhere, dotted with many gray traces of gunpowder.

The soldiers were carrying the wounded and the dead, everyone was in full swing to clean up the barracks and clean the burned places, the military doctors were bandaging the wounds of the disabled soldiers, and everyone was already busy in the camp.

Ma Chengcheng and Ma Chengshun looked at the camp that was burned by the fire, the two were walking on the field, Ma Chengxin always had a feeling of grievance in his heart, Ma Chengjun also knew his thoughts, he knew that the Jurong camp had suffered more losses this time than the last time.

Ma Chengcheng stood up, clenched his fists, and slashed weakly into the air, "The hateful Lin Renzhao sneaked up on my Jurong camp, and I must avenge this revenge." ”

Ma Chengjun comforted him and said: "Big brother, this time my troops on the Lishui side have not been used once, and after I ask Your Majesty, my Lishui and Jurong armies will unite to deal with the Lin Renzhao rebels not far away." ”

After listening to Ma Chengjun's words, Ma Chengxin felt a little fulfilled in his heart, and then he said: "I have to go back to Jurong City tonight, and Brother Xian will go to Jurong with me to rest for a day, and then return to Lishui tomorrow." ”

"Well, that's fine. I'll go to the city and figure out what to do next. ”

After speaking, Ma Chengcheng and Ma Chengjun drove their horses back to Jurong City.

After Ma Chengjun arrived in Jurong City, he immediately wrote a letter and handed it to his sergeant, and sent it to Jiangning Mansion that night with an expedited fast horse along with Jurong's military newspaper.

……

In the Jinling Imperial Palace of Jiangning Mansion, which is hundreds of miles away, the lights of the palace at night are only sporadic at night.

In the Zhaoqing Palace, Li Congqing had just gotten up from the bed, he opened his hazy sleepy eyes, looked up, and saw that it was dark outside the hall, and Li Yannian on his side had slept hazy, snoring him, Li Congqing touched Li Yannian's wide back, and a lust * fire began to burn again in his body.

Li Yannian only felt a burst of soreness and crispiness underneath...... Soon after, Li Congqing hugged Li Yannian and fell asleep.

Early the next morning, when the sun had just risen, there was a hurried footstep not far from the hall at this moment, and Li Congqing knew that something might have happened ahead when he thought about it.

Sure enough, at this moment, there was a sharp knock at the door.

Li Yannian had already woken up, and he said, "Your Majesty, let's go and have a look." ”

Li Congqing helplessly put on a dirty robe under Li Yannian's service, and immediately got up to greet him.

As soon as the door opened, the sergeant who delivered the letter knelt on the ground, and after a long journey, he collapsed to the ground when he arrived here, and choked up: "Your Majesty, urgent military report." The camp outside Jurong was attacked by traitors last night, and the camp was burned to the ground......"

Li Congqing was still apprehensive, and then was awakened by the sergeant's words.

"How so? Good and decent, how can the camp outside Jurong City be like this, is it that you are not well defended? Li Congqing tugged at the sergeant's clothes, and then lifted it up with one hand.

"Ahem......" The clothes were dragged by Li Congqing, and the sergeant was already so strangled that he couldn't breathe, and his face had slowly turned blue.

In an instant, Li Congqing let go of his hand, and the sergeant fell to the ground.

Li Congqing asked rhetorically: "Jurong City didn't miss." ”

"Your Majesty, that's not true." The sergeant said, and then he kowtowed and said again, "Your Majesty forgive me, Marquis Ma Yu was going to attack Lin Renzhao's camp last night, but who would have thought that he was actually attacked by Lin Renzhao, and it was ......" The sergeant couldn't say any more, he kowtowed on the ground and knocked on the floor tiles.

"Ma is honest, there is not enough success, and there is more than enough failure." Li Congqing looked at the sergeant, and then asked, "Now in the army, has the secretary in charge of the army counted the losses?" How much is the loss? ”

"Your Majesty, this ...... The last general said that your majesty must not be angry. The sergeant looked at Li Congqing's gloomy face and said tremblingly.

"Say—"

The sergeant kowtowed and said, "Your Majesty, according to the secretary's statistics, the Jurong battalion lost a total of 500 military tents, 100,000 stones of grain and grass, 30,000 sets of armor, and the rest totaled more than 40,000, and burned to death the wounded...... Eleven. ”

"A night attack actually caused such heavy losses to our rear battalion, you ...... If it weren't for the fact that I didn't have soldiers and generals available, you would have ...... a long time ago" Li Congqing has long been accustomed to hearing the battle report of defeat, the three armies on the periphery of the capital have all lost, and the water god guard and water army have almost been wiped out, Li Congqing is thinking about how to win, but now the troops and fierce generals in his hands are really stretched and rare.

The next moment, Li Congqing said: "Let Ma Chengxin make meritorious contributions, I hope that next time I can hear the news of their defeat of the rebels, and I will mobilize my Tang Navy to strengthen the Qinhuai River as soon as possible." ”

The sergeant didn't expect the new emperor to be so merciful, he quickly kowtowed, and said, "Thank you, Your Majesty, Your Majesty, there is still a letter from General Lishui Ma Chengjun here, and I want to forward it to Your Majesty." ”

Li Congqing took the letter and read it immediately.

"That's right. You send a message to Ma Chengjun in Lishui, and ask him to help Ma Chengxin. ”

"Yes, Your Majesty."

The sergeant left, but Li Congqing had a straight face, he dragged his body tiredly, and then returned to the dragon bed, the defeat made his heart even more devastated, only in the bed, he could feel that he was a victorious general.

In the Zhaoqing Palace, Li Yannian was still asleep, Li Congqing immediately pulled up the bed tent, at this moment he galloped on his horse, wanton, the horse roared, and the people under him had fainted countless times.

After the incident, Li Congqing suddenly thought that if the defense line along the Qinhuai River (Zhongshan-Jurong-Lishui) collapsed, Li Congqing would have to mobilize troops from the side of Jiangyou (the naval army in Hukou, Quarry, Chizhou and other places).

It's just that he had such a flash of inspiration, and then a few palace maids came to the door of the hall, "Your Majesty, it's time to wash." ”

……

In Chen's mansion, a faint fragrance of plum blossoms hit, and the water droplets dripping from the eaves condensed into icicles in the cold winter, like sharp swords.

In the past few days, Chen Qiao and Lin Jingmen have been unable to sleep, they are worried about whether Han Xizai will do what Lin Renzhao said, and now if it drags on like this, I am afraid that it will change later.

Chen Qiao and the others didn't know what happened in Jurong last night, if they knew, they would be happy for Lin Renzhao, and they felt that the Tang Dynasty was still saved, at least they thought so in their hearts.

Not far away, on the banks of the lower reaches of the Qinhuai River, in the Qingyin Pavilion, a burst of morning light illuminated a pot of stone orchids on the window.

Suddenly, Zhao Dezhao was blinded by the sun, and he noticed a trace of movement outside the window.

"It's a carrier pigeon." Zhao Dezhao had a keen insight into everything.

A line of words has been tied to the carrier pigeon, which is about the Jurong camp last night, and Zhao Dezhao's eyeliner provided this information.

It's just that he looked at it, but he was a little unhappy, if Lin Renzhao really let his army enter Jinling, their painstaking plan would become more and more difficult.

The sun had risen, a wave of warmth had returned, and the icicles under the eaves had begun to drip with water.

Suddenly, someone knocked at the door, and Zhao Dezhao immediately got up and opened the door again.

The man flashed in, "My subordinates have seen the young master. "This person is the killer of the black-clothed Tanhua-Ming.

Ming hasn't shown up for a long time, and at this moment he must be here for the affairs of the south, "The work done by the young master's subordinates has been completed, and the army of the plant inspection has already set off from Guangzhou, and at this moment it has passed Chenzhou and is heading towards Jinling, and the troops will be able to come to the city in a dozen days." ”

"Well, you've worked this matter, so you don't have to go out of the city today. Wait until they get to Jiangning Mansion, and then talk about it. ”

The next step of Zhao Dezhao's plan was to let the (southern) Han army quickly reach the city of Jinling, and now the chosen road is to go north from the southern territory of the Song Kingdom, and then take a boat down the river from Jiangling Mansion, and then cooperate with the Song army to land in quarrying.

Ming only chatted with Zhao Dezhao for a short time, and then returned the same way.

In the room, Zhao Dezhao was looking at the map alone.

"Jurong is the southeast gate of Jinling City, Jiangning Mansion, Lishui is the south gate, Zhongshan [Purple Mountain] is the east gate (originally Runzhou is the east gate), quarrying is the west gate, the north gate has been opened, as long as the four gates of Jiangning Mansion are controlled, Jinling will be exposed under our noses, and these four gates must be controlled in our hands."

Zhao Dezhao pondered for a moment, and then combined with the current situation.

Like today's situation.

In recent days, in the southeast, Qian Yu, the king of Wuyue, led the southeast of Shengzhou to recruit and appease the envoys, and personally led tens of thousands of troops from Xifu (Hangzhou) to the north, along the canal to the north, and at this moment has arrived outside Suzhou. Zhao Kuangyin also sent Ding Deyu as the capital supervisor (that is, the supervisor of the army) of Wu Yuejun, and at this moment Wu Yuejun said a few words to the generals in Suzhou City with the slogan of respecting the king and rebelling, but the officials defending the city of Suzhou did not know why King Wu Yue personally led the army to Suzhou.

In the upper reaches of the Yangtze River, in order to strengthen the defense of Jinling and resist the entry of Lin Renzhao's army in Runzhou, Li Congqing specially mobilized most of the naval troops from Hukou, Wankou and other places to go down the Yangtze River, and has strengthened the defense from Jiangzhou, Quarry, Qinhuai River, and the northwest water surface of Runzhou. However, as soon as the naval army on the other side of the lake moved, the strength of the entire naval army on the border of the Song and Tang Dynasty was the weakest, and the troops were also emptied at once.

Because Cao Bin is in Jinling City at the moment, it is Zhao Kuangyin to order Pan Mei to be the capital supervisor, the waterway army is 50,000, the commander is Cao Bin from Jiangling Mansion, Yang Changjiang is moving eastward, and the West Road is mobilizing Wang Ming from near Shu to inspect the pond and Yuejiang Road, and the battle is all deployed, and at the critical time, in order to contain the deployment of the Tang State Navy and ensure the eastward advance of the main force.

In the capital, during this period, Zhao Kuangyin successively went to Jiaochuan Pond, Jinming Pond and Yujin Garden to strengthen the preparation of the naval army and the deployment of the infantry army and the bow army. In the north, because of the fear of a sudden invasion of the (northern) Han and Liao, Zhao Kuangyin strengthened the border defense in the north, and Wu Shouqi guarded Jinzhou and other places, especially the deployment along the Jinzhou line, and at the same time, in order to strengthen the defense in the northeast direction, he sent the Dengzhou naval army to patrol and practice in the sea area near the port of Dengzhou every day, and mobilized a part of the horsemen from Shamen Island to join the patrol near the coast.

In the south, Liu Gang sent 20,000 soldiers and horses to the north, this time by the forbidden army in front of the palace to check Zhi Tingxiao led 6,000 horsemen, 10,000 infantry, 4,000 archers to the north, and another 100,000 stones of grain and grass to the north, along the Lingqu north.

Chen Hongjin, the Qingyuan Jiedu envoy of Quanzhou on the southeast coast, did not send troops this time, but the edict of the Great Song Dynasty had to be followed, and he mobilized several ships and other burdens from Quanzhou this time to provide them to the Three Kingdoms Alliance.

All this is about to bring the war to a climax.

Later, what everyone didn't know was that when Jurong was in a stalemate, hundreds of miles away, a rocket had been aimed at the head of Suzhou City, this kind of thermal weapon was provided by the Song State, and it was the best for attacking the city. Soon after, there was a roar, the ground was trembling, and the south gate of Suzhou and the city gate were bombarded by artillery.

A few hours later, at the end of the night, Suzhou was occupied by Wu Yueguo's army, Wu Yueguo's army immediately led his division into Suzhou City, three o'clock, after resting for an hour, Ding Deyu, the capital supervisor, and Qian Yu, the king of Wu Yue, led the army to the direction of Changzhou.

At the same time, far to the south, Zhi Tingxiao was waving his army to the north at the moment, leading the army of the (southern) Han to cross Chenzhou, and was heading north day and night. The military report of the loss of Suzhou did not come so quickly,