That night, Xiangyang City was shot into a lot of letters by Gao Huan's people, and the defenders opened it to see that it was full of Xiao Duo's crimes, and the momentum of the soldiers in the city was lower, plus Xiao Fangzhi shouted outside the city, and there were many deserters in the city in the second half of the night that night, Gao Huan gathered all these deserters together, and waited for them to eat and drink, so that they could continue to shout in turn to the city.

The butterfly effect of the scheming raged like a plague among the defenders, and after dawn more deserters fled from the city walls openly, and none of the soldiers left behind came out to dissuade them because they were all their own people, and some even said goodbye to each other, as if they were in love. That night, Gao Huan decided to launch a final general attack early the next morning, and at this time it was estimated that the defenders in Xiangyang City were less than 5,000 people, and a large number of them were Xiao Duo's government soldiers and personal guards.

Xiao Duo came to Xu's room with a cloak at this time, only to see that she was disheveled, her hair seemed to be very messy, and there were obvious kiss marks on her neck. Xu Shi was a little shocked by his sudden appearance, and then got up and said dissatisfiedly: "Why don't you come in and don't knock on the door, I'm resting in the room, you go out quickly." Xiao Duo opened one eye, looked at a man's shoe under the bed, and scolded angrily: ", do you really think Lao Tzu is scared? Over the years, you have stolen men and raised men, and Lao Tzu has endured them, but now that the disaster is coming, you still care about messing with men, saying who is he? ”

Xiao Duo took out his sword and pointed at the plump Xu, only to see Xu's bun and said very indifferently: "You are still embarrassed to be our husband and wife for many years, have you looked at me squarely after marrying you all these years?" said that I raise a man, why don't you spend all your time drinking outside, and you even do it as a palace maid, am I not as good as a palace maid? ”

It turned out that Xiao Duo had a very beautiful palace e, the one-eyed dragon fell in love with her, and one day when he got up early in the dressing room, he forced her on, and later this palace e's became pregnant, and after the Xu family knew about it, he sent someone to push her into the well and drown, and pretended to be an accident. Xiao Duo has stayed away from this woman with a heart like a femme fatale since then. Xiao Duo said hatefully: "You slut, Lao Tzu was born with a disability, how can you look at you squarely, you just want to ridicule me, then why did you marry me in the first place?" ”

Xu said angrily: "If I knew that you were such an honor, even if you killed me, I wouldn't marry you." Xiao Duo became more and more angry, pulled her up from the bed and said, "You slut, I will kill you today, and then commit suicide!" At this time, there was a sudden movement under the bed, Xiao Duo let go of his hand and shouted under the bed: "Come out for Lao Tzu, you are hiding, Lao Tzu will kill you with a knife." ”

At this moment, a man crawled out from under the bed with his upper body naked and shouted, "The king spares his life, the king spares his life." Xiao Duo saw that it was a pro-soldier squad leader in the house, and he was quite handsome. So he pointed at Xu and scolded angrily: ", are you a man?" Lao Tzu fulfilled you two sluts today. The sword in his hand stabbed into the man's chest, and the blood splashed on his face at that time, Xu Shi exclaimed, and wanted to come forward to help, Xiao Duo kicked her away and said: "Lao Tzu has fulfilled your two adulterers." With a flutter, the sword stabbed into Xu's stomach again.

Xu stared at Xiao Duo without a blind eye, Xiao Duo was already delirious and entered a state of madness at the moment, he asked the eunuchs and attendants to fill the ground of the three-story building with firewood, he was wearing a white underwear, his hair was scattered, he was holding a bloody sword with a stubble and shouting for the eunuchs to hurry up, and let people bring his two sons and a daughter to the small building, the sons and daughters saw that their father had gone crazy, and wanted to force them to commit suicide together, and they cried and called for their mother.

Xiao Duo roared even more angrily at this time: "What are you crying about, this is the price of being born in the emperor's family, you can enjoy the glory and wealth, and you must bear the death of the country." At this time, the general of the guard ran in and shouted: "Oh no, the enemy army outside the city has begun to attack the city, and the troops defending the city have all fled, and at this moment they have opened the city gate, and a large number of enemy troops are coming here, what should we do, my king?" ”

Xiao Duo sneered and said, "Hmph, I can't even save myself at the moment, and you still ask me what to do?" Run, hahaha, you all run for your lives. When the general heard this, he turned around and ran, and the people up and down the house began to carry packages and loot property, Xiao Duo didn't care anymore, he walked into the small building and closed the door, turned around and went upstairs, and the children upstairs were crying around him. He shouted to the crowd downstairs with a hideous face: "You will all die, I am waiting for you in hell, hahaha." As he spoke, the torch in his hand fell.

Gao Huan saw thick smoke billowing from the direction of Xiao Duo's palace, and a herald came to report: "Xiao Duo has died of self-immolation, the palace is in chaos, and there is no defender in the city." Looking at the soldiers searching for the defenders everywhere and the black smoke rising in the distance, Gao Huan sighed: "This may be the fate of the head in a different place, and the whole family will not die well." He turned back to Chen Ba behind him and said, "Let's go into the city, General Chen." Chen Ba answered the promise first, and then took the lead to walk in front and open the way.

At this time, Gao Huan had a little more humanity in his heart, more like a boss than a master. Is this what Yang Tan said about Gao Huan? The group entered Xiangyang towards the East City Gate.

Xiao Duo's demise is a huge event for the entire Southern Liang, and it is even worse news for the Yuwen family in Guanzhong, which further shows that there is no one in the Southern Liang who can confront Gao Huan head-on, and it is only a matter of time before the unification of the Southern Liang is not a matter of time, and there is no resistance at all. If Southern Liang is unified by him, then Gao Huan's next target will definitely be Western Wei, which is a well-known thing.

After learning of Xiao Duo's death, Xiao Lun and his wife and daughter originally wanted to go north to join Han Xiong in Guanzhong, but before leaving, Xiao Lun canceled the plan and planned to go south to Xiangyang to surrender to Gao Huan, because he knew that if this person could unify Southern Liang at this time, it would only be a matter of time before Guanzhong was conquered by him.

Sometimes it is enough to do it once, and there is no need to challenge your dignity. Xiao Lun just saw the development of the real situation, so he decided to switch to Gao Huan's arms. Gao Huan also valued him very much, knowing that he had been a good official in Yizhou for three years and had done a lot of good things for the local people, so he wanted to hand over Xiangyang to him, but his subordinates were against this proposal, especially Chen Baxian and Gao Longzhi, who had never known each other, but the two unexpectedly agreed on this matter: if Xiao Lun occupied Xiangyang, it would be the second Xiao Duo.

If the situation really turns out as they say, then it will be meaningless to eliminate Xiao Duo by themselves, and the people in the Jingxiang area will once again be reduced to disaster victims and suffer from the war. So he decided to test Xiao Lun and let him go to Jiaozhou as a special envoy of the imperial court to persuade Shiyan to surrender, let Shiyan send his son to Jiankang, and let Qianzhong and Lingnan be relinquished, leaving only him Guangzhou, Jiaozhou (northern Vietnam), Aizhou (central Vietnam), Dezhou (southern Vietnam), and Minh Zhou (southern Vietnam), which is equivalent to putting all the relatively wealthy Lingnan prefectures and counties under the jurisdiction of the central government (in fact, these areas originally belonged to the jurisdiction of the Southern Liang court).

If Shi Yan was a gentleman, he would definitely not agree to such a harsh request, so Gao Huan sent Xiao Lun to persuade him. This is obviously an impossible task, everyone is snickering, and some people are also slightly worried about whether this will provoke the resistance of the local forces in Lingnan, Gao Huan doesn't care about these at all, for the central government, they are just local bureaucrats, one country cannot tolerate two masters, if even Lingnan Jiaozhou can't be done, he Gao Huan will not have the courage to unify the Central Plains.

Xiao Lun himself didn't have a strong reaction, and honestly set off south to meet Shiyan according to the date. Lingnan has been the land of China since ancient times, but in that barbaric era, even a powerful empire like the Han Dynasty was beyond the reach of the remote Lingnan, and it seemed impossible to really and effectively control which places, but the Han Dynasty used prisoners and immigrants to integrate the ethnic minorities in these places. Then use Han education to naturalize them, so that they know etiquette, understand education, and technology.

Therefore, Guangzhou, where Shiyan was located, was a military fortress and important town in Lingnan at that time, which played a defensive role against enemies overseas, and invaded enemies on land, such as Vietnam, which was once ruled by the Han Chinese. However, Shiyan was a Han Chinese, and he was not much interested in ruling foreign countries to expand his territory, but had coveted the Yangtze River valley for a long time.

Shiyan's ancestor was a native of Qingzhou, Shandong, and later served as an official in the Jin Dynasty, and later followed the Eastern Jin Dynasty royal family to move south to the Sanwu region of the Yangtze River Basin, and then to Shiyan's father's generation was appointed as the Jiuzhen Taishou, quelling the local Yue rebellion. In Shiyan's generation, because of their long-term residence in Lingnan and the fact that a large number of Han children moved south to Guangzhou and other places, a military, economic, and cultural circle centered on Guangzhou was gradually formed.

At that time, the Southern Qi Dynasty could not effectively control the large area south of Lingnan, so it simply appointed Shiyan as the envoy of Guangzhou and Jiaozhou. Specializing in the Lingnan area. When Xiao Yan ascended the throne, Shiyan was attached to the Liang Dynasty and was favored again, and the official worshiped Taifu, the general of the Kaifu, and the Marquis of Dingnan. Although he was under the banner of Nanliang, Shiyan still sat on the soil emperor of Lingnan until Gao Huan's army came.

He was ordered to lead an army of 15,000 people into the territory of the original Hou Jing, and took over the counties that originally belonged to the imperial court, according to Gao Huan's intentions, a group of officials selected by Gao Longzhi and Xiao Bo, Wang Lin and Wei Zai and others went to the post one after another, most of these people came from Liang Ting's Guozijian, Liang Ting has not had **** bureaucrats for many years, and the official positions in many places turned out to be hereditary, which surprised Gao Huan, so this time taking advantage of the opportunity of the reshuffle, Gao Huan called new officials in large quantities, Although most of these people are also the children of the family lords, compared with the old school of old people who are old and stubborn, they are willing to accept new things, and dare to open up and innovate, which is what Gao Huan's new regime needs.

All the official positions are not only stamped with the emperor's jade seal, but also the seal of the great prime minister Gao Huan, which is to tell those new officials that he is the defender and changer of their fate.

Wang Seng Bian's troops escorted Xiao Lun to Guiyang County, and then went back. The envoys sent by Shiyan were waiting in Shixing County (roughly in the area of present-day Shaoguan). Xiao Lun has a new understanding of the Lingnan region, before he was in Shuzhong, where the four seasons are like spring and the climate is pleasant, after arriving in Lingnan, he found that it is also sunny, but it is a little more stuffy and scorching, although it is close to autumn, but the weather is hot like in the middle of summer.

After stumbling along the way, he finally went through dangers and obstacles to Guangzhou, and found that the people here were dressed strangely, some wore Hanfu, some wore Yue people's cross-dresses, and even wore nothing bare. There are more fruits in Guangzhou, Xiao Lun has eaten all kinds of peculiar things along the way, some melons and fruits are broken and eaten seeds, some melons and fruits are shaved and drunk water, and some have removed the hard skin, and the flesh inside is delicious and tender.

Shi Yan waited for him in Taishou Mansion for several days, knowing that the Lingnan road was rugged, and it was really hard for people to ride horses and carry sedan chairs all the way, so when he saw Shi Yan Jiu, he was very enthusiastic about hosting a banquet to entertain him, and asked him many times about his feelings about Lingnan during the banquet, Xiao Lun praised the hospitality of these locals. Shi Yan also smiled: "That's why I regard this place as my hometown, and the people here are kind-hearted and benevolent. It's better for us to be officials here than to be light in the Central Plains. ”

Xiao Lun heard his voice, smiled and did not answer, but frequently asked him about the customs of Guangzhou and Jiaozhou, and seemed to be very interested in the lives of the local people. Shiyan did not hide the clothing customs and customs of each ethnic group. (To be continued.) )