Chapter Ninety-Eight: Yuanji Falls

Li Yuanji led the army to the east, at the beginning of the march all the way, even the battles were victorious, the Xia army was defeated, and the morale of the Tang army was greatly boosted, and the soldiers became more and more arrogant, Wang Shichong saw that the signs were wrong, and wanted to dissuade Li Yuanji from being cautious and not to underestimate the enemy, although Dou Jiande was not from a wealthy family, he was just a rough man who farmed in the countryside, but he was able to go from a small common man with no connections to such a point in troubled times, step by step, it was definitely not simple, and the defeat of the Xia army in the past few days was really a little strange, It seems that people can't help but suspect that they seem to be defeated, not like they are really defeated, because in every battle, they lose not many soldiers and horses, but there are a lot of tools and materials, such as armor and horses, and the result is obviously that the Great Xia army is defeated and retreated in front, but in the eyes of the Tang army soldiers, there are only these soldiers, horses, grain and grass, and there is no defeated army at all, so after a few battles, the Tang army has gained a lot, but there are not many enemy troops killed. Pen & Fun & Pavilion www.biquge.info

"Your Highness, in the past, Cao Di was in the polemic, and there was a drum of strength and then three times and exhaustion, and we have been attacking for several days at this time, and the army is exhausted, although the morale has not dropped, but it has become a lone army, so please Your Highness do not chase anymore and wait for the arrival of the rear army!"

Li Yuanji was very important to Wang Shichong at the beginning, and there was indeed no general under his command who could take charge alone, and Wang Shichong had led the army for many years, had rich experience, and had an extraordinary mind and could make strange plans, so he had a good impression of Wang Shichong, thinking that it was just a big arm given to him by God, but after a long time, Wang Shichong's conduct was not as high as he had been evaluated before in Li Yuanji's eyes.

He is young and vigorous, forge ahead, but Wang Shichong is old and serious, he does not dare to be greedy, and he has repeatedly persuaded him to have a solid foundation and not to rush forward, he **** said, Li Yuanji was tired of saying this, and when he heard Wang Shichong continue to say this, he really didn't hold back his anger in his heart, and shouted: "General Wang, what did you just say?" Say my army is exhausted? Do the rank generals again, now our army is in full swing, like a bamboo, the rank thinks we should stop the army, or drive straight into Jicheng for a long time? ”

The generals of the Tang Army in the tent are all good at observing words and feelings, and when they saw Li Yuanji at this time, they obviously understood their anger, and they naturally knew what to say, so they echoed one by one, saying that the elite soldiers under their command couldn't wait to enter Jicheng one by one, and said that the soldiers' heart to serve the country was unbearable, and they were just waiting to fight on the battlefield.

Li Yuanji was even satisfied with the statement of his subordinates, but he was very dissatisfied with Wang Shichong, so he ordered Wang Shichong to lead troops to escort grain and grass, and did not let him participate in the war, and gave him a logistics job to humiliate him.

What kind of city is Wang Shichong, Li Yuanji didn't listen to his advice, that was a definite defeat, he didn't want to follow Li Yuanji to die, so naturally he wanted to find a way to pick himself out, and now Li Yuanji punished him to escort the grain and grass, which can be said to be just what he wanted, so he didn't delay for a moment, and immediately set off overnight to go to the rear to receive the grain and grass.

Li Yuanji thought that he was embarrassed by being humiliated in public, so he ran away in a hurry, so he didn't care.

He ordered his soldiers to rest well and continue the attack the next day.

Dou Jiande's army was about to collapse at the touch of a button, and had been defeated and retreated more than a dozen times one after another, although it seemed that he had lost his armor and lost very badly, but in fact his men and horses did not receive great losses, and he also learned from Sun Bin, a famous general in the Spring and Autumn Period, and used the reduction of stoves to deceive the Tang army.

In fact, of course, some people in the Tang army were suspicious of such a defeat of the Xia army, but they received information that Dou Jiande's general Liu Heimin was disobedient and disrespectful in Shandong, and refused to return to Hebei with his own army of more than 100,000 troops, which caused the defense of Hebei to be empty, and Dou Jiande only had 70,000 or 80,000 soldiers in his hands, but in order to strengthen the army, he actually sent troops to arrest Zhuangding, and forcibly captured 1890,000 people, and incorporated these people into the army to strengthen their momentum, and the result was that this was the 300,000 people they saw in the Tang Army.

At the beginning, the Tang army saw that the Xia army had 300,000 people, and they were scared enough, the gap in the number was too far apart, but when the two sides fought, the Xia army fled quickly, lost their armor, just to save their lives, which confirmed that there were too many strong men in their army, which affected the morale and combat effectiveness of the army, so they would collapse at the touch of a button, and they fled so fast, presumably Dou Jiande was unwilling to fail, so he repeatedly urged them to come to the battle, but they were not regular troops after all, Therefore, it is not surprising that when you arrive on the battlefield, you will be timid, lose your armor, and only care about running for your life.

After the generals of the Tang Army reported these "heavy discoveries", Li Yuanji's heart was even less concerned about Dou Jiande, he was still worried, worried about whether he had been tricked, but after knowing the truth, he was no longer worried, coupled with the Xia Army's reduction plan, he felt that the escape situation in the Xia Army's army was very serious, and the number of people was getting smaller and smaller, but I was afraid that when his army arrived at the city of Jicheng, the Xia Army was afraid that even the soldiers defending the city had escaped.

Because of these reasons, Li Yuanji's wariness of Dou Jiande was lowered a lot, but he didn't know that everything he saw was carefully arranged by Dou Jiande.

The Tang army went deep into the hinterland of Hebei, and soon found a problem, that is, the troops transporting grain and grass behind them could not keep up, and their connection with the rear army was cut off, Li Yuanji realized that something was wrong at this time, but at this time it was too late to think about it, he thought that Liu Heimin, who had a huge contradiction with Dou Jiande, led an army of 100,000 to cut off his retreat, and Dou Jiande went and returned, and surrounded him with an army of 200,000, the Tang army won countless along the way, and Li Yuanji was cutting the army all the way, Let them send these booty back, and as they advanced farther and farther, more and more soldiers needed to stay behind to protect the grain routes, so at this time the Tang army was only 50,000 men.

He only noticed that Dou Jiande's men and horses were constantly fleeing, but he didn't find that his troops were also decreasing, and after Dou Jiande surrounded him, he realized that he had been fooled, where did Dou Jiande's soldiers and horses decrease in the slightest, he was obviously using a plan.

Li Yuanji, as the commander-in-chief, was so panicked, then the soldiers under his command were naturally not much better, the Tang army was panicked all of a sudden, the soldiers were uneasy, they were under siege, and now only Li Shimin's troops stationed in Tongguan could save them.

Li Yuanji thought of this, and he couldn't care about the grievances and grievances between the two, so he immediately wrote a letter and sent someone to ask Li Shimin for help, but it was easy for him to get in, but it was difficult for him to get out, his messenger was shot and killed by Xia Jun, and he couldn't rush out at all, and they had completely blocked contact with the outside world.

Dou Jiande's men and horses are six times that of the Tang army, but he is not in a hurry to attack immediately, although the number of Tang troops is small, but if they attack at this time, they will definitely be trapped in the beast and fight, and the Xia army will inevitably have certain casualties, since he has Zhizhu in his hands, he will naturally not pay these unnecessary costs, so he ordered the siege but not the attack.

At this time, there was not much grain and grass in the army, and the grain and grass in the army were only enough for ten days.

Li Yuanji was so anxious, his letter could not be delivered, and the people outside did not know that they were surrounded, he only sent a good news to the imperial court not long ago, so the imperial court now completely did not know that he was folded here, even if the imperial court had a foresight and knew the news, but the far water could not save the near fire, and when the imperial court transferred troops from all over the country, they would have been completely wiped out.

He knew what Dou Jiande was planning, he must have known that the food and grass in his army were not enough, and he would besiege and not attack here, and he would have to wait for the morale on his side to be low, the grain and grass would be exhausted, and the army would be discouraged before launching an attack, in that case, even if they wanted to resist, they could not do anything.

Li Yuanji was surrounded, the first to get the news was Wang Shichong, he tried to rescue Li Yuanji, led the troops to attack Liu Heimin's army, but the Tang army inside did not immediately cooperate with him, and Liu Heimin's counterattack came quickly, his soldiers were few, and he was worried about being surrounded, so he quickly retreated, because he came at night, so Liu Heimin did not know the specific situation, and did not dare to blindly pursue, so Wang Shichong's men and horses got out proudly.

He asked people to write a letter to Li Shimin, the king of Qin, asking him to send troops to rescue Li Yuanji, the king of Qi, but before his letter arrived, bad news came from the direction of Taiyuan, Liu Wuzhou and Song Jingang raised troops to attack Shanxi, at this time Taiyuan City was in danger, and the generals who defended the city hurriedly ran over to him for help, which made Wang Shichong's heart fall to the bottom.

It seems that this time, Taiyuan and King Qi, Datang must make a choice, the key is that the person who made the trade-off is Li Shimin, not Li Yuan, conniving Li Yuan because of the deep love between father and son, he really wants to save Li Yuanji, but he is also out of reach, Li Shimin was already at odds with Li Yuanji, and there is no reason to save him at this time, and he will definitely send troops to Hedong and take Taiyuan, so that the territory belonging to him King Qin will expand a lot.

Wang Shichong didn't dare to continue to stay in Hebei, so he hurriedly led the army back to Guanzhong, and he didn't dare to continue to stay in Hedong, once Li Shimin's army entered Hedong, it was difficult to guarantee that he wouldn't do anything to himself, after all, King Qi was on the side of the prince, and he was also the prince's person, so Li Shimin would definitely not allow him, and it was very likely that he would solve him.

As soon as Wang Shichong left, Li Yuanji was even more lonely, and Li Shimin really led the army across the Yellow River and attacked Taiyuan northward, as Wang Shichong expected.

Liu Wuzhou and Song Jingang have not occupied Taiyuan for much time, they heard the news that Li Shimin led the army to come, which made them feel very unhappy, according to their agreement with Dou Jiande in advance, the territory that was beaten down belonged to them, although they took advantage of the Tang Army's main force to advance eastward, Taiyuan defense was empty opportunity to seize the opportunity, found a gap, but this Taiyuan City did not come in vain, they broke through the city and lost a lot of people, if Li Shimin came ten days and a half a month late, When they looted all the property, jewels and population here, then even if they gave up Taiyuan City, they didn't care, but now they had just entered the city, and their buttocks were not yet hot, and they were going to be thrown out, which could not be done in any case, so they immediately led their troops south, preparing to drive Li Shimin out while his foothold was not stable.

At this time, when the army of Li Shimin, the king of Qin, reached Hedong, Wang Shichong's men and horses also crossed the Yellow River and arrived in Guanzhong, and immediately sent a fast horse messenger to report to the Tang court about Li Yuanji, the king of Qi.

After the matter spread, Li Yuan closed his eyes and was silent for a long time, he knew that his son was only afraid that he would be more than lucky, and he would not be able to escape, so it depended on whether Dou Jiande would risk his life to make a deal with him.

And Li Jiancheng is even more flustered, Li Yuanji is his right-hand man, and his biological brother, although Li Yuanji is not highly educated, but he is a prince after all, and he has a strong army in his hands, and he also guards one side, once he is defeated and killed, his strength in the military can be said to be a big loss of an arm, and Li Shimin will also take the strategic place Taiyuan in his hands, this situation is becoming more and more unfavorable to him.

Dou Jiande did not think that Li Yuan would be killed by Liu Li Yuanji, during the siege of the Tang army for fifteen days, the Tang army had organized a breakthrough many times, but one by one was resolved by the Xia army, it was difficult to break through, and seeing that the breakthrough was hopeless, the soldiers began to compete to surrender to the Xia army, after a long time, the Tang army had already surrendered more, insisted less, the Xia army took the opportunity to attack, the remaining Tang army was simply unable to resist, and was killed and defeated, Li Yuanji disguised himself as a small soldier and tried to escape, but was captured by the Xia soldiers, Dou Jiande did not intend to kill him, But at the suggestion of his subordinates, he finally killed him and gave his life, but poor Li Yuanji died in his first large-scale military operation.

As soon as Li Yuanji died, Dou Jiande took advantage of the situation to march westward, and at this time Li Shimin and Liu Wuzhou fought three battles, each other won and lost, Liu Wuzhou had a fierce general, called Wei Chigong, this person was superior in force, brave and brave, the vanguard of the Tang Army was repeatedly broken by him, and he had lost three games in a row when his foothold was not stable.

Li Shimin cherished his martial arts and couldn't bear his bloody battlefield, so he personally went out to persuade him to surrender, saying that as long as he was willing to surrender to the Tang Dynasty, he would treat him well and entrust him with important tasks.

Wei Chigong had an arrogant personality, so he asked Li Shimin: "Since you persuade me to surrender, then come out with enough strength, I only serve the strong, if you can't beat me, I will definitely not betray the master!" ”

Li Shimin then sent the first fierce general Li Yuanba to fight, Li Yuanba came out of the battle, suddenly the wind and thunder changed color, the wind was fierce, the Tang soldiers showed a crazy look, and they all shouted loudly, and the soldiers on Liu Wuzhou's side lost a step in momentum, Li Yuanba's momentum was too strong, so that he swept everyone's glance, and the cold murderous aura had already made everyone cold, and they couldn't afford to be enemies at all. (To be continued.) )