On a small hill in the west of Liaodong City, a wooden platform as high as eight zhang appeared overnight, and the sentries of the Sui army stood on the high platform, and could clearly see every move in the city, although the Goguryeo army hated this high platform to the core, and pointed at it every day to scold, but there was nothing to be done.

In the evening of that day, several Sui army sentries on the tower noticed an anomaly in the city, and the Goguryeo soldiers began to show signs of gathering, and the sentries immediately rushed back to the barracks to report the anomaly.

After the food was delivered to Xincheng, Zhang Xuan's pressure to withdraw troops disappeared immediately, and he could more calmly lay out the siege of Liaodong City, forcing the Goguryeo defenders to abandon Liaodong City themselves.

In the big tent, Zhang Xuan is discussing the next plan of action with Du Ruhui, this time the strategy of the Sui army is very clear, take advantage of the Sui army's strong naval superiority, occupy Yalushui, divide the Goguryeo battlefield into two, concentrate troops to annihilate the 70,000 Goguryeo army deep into Liaodong, and then turn back to deal with Pyongyang.

Although the goal is very beautiful, it is not easy to achieve it, especially the complex terrain of Goguryeo, frequent flash floods, mudslides and other disasters, making it difficult to complete many of the initial plans, and both sides are currently in chaos, the Sui army lost contact with the black bone city, and Goguryeo was divided into two by the Sui warships.

However, with the unexpected capture of the new city, the whole battle began to turn around rapidly.

At this time, the voice of the soldier came from outside the big tent, "Commander, there is urgent information!" ”

Zhang Xuan walked out of the big tent and asked, "What urgent information?" ”

"Marshal Qiyu, the sentry over there is news that the Goguryeo army in Liaodong City has shown signs of gathering."

Du Ruhui walked up from the tent and said with a smile: "It seems that the enemy army is about to break through." ”

"Where can they break through?" Zhang Xuan sneered.

"I think it should be Xincheng, at the moment they don't know that Xincheng has changed hands, that's the only place they can go, if they find that Xincheng is lost, then they can only find a way to cross the river to Liaodong."

Zhang Xuan turned around and walked back to the big tent, standing in front of the sand table to carefully check the road from Liaodong City to Xincheng, Du Ruhui was indeed right, Xincheng is closer to Liaodong City, and the road is flat, if you march day and night, you can reach Xincheng in two days.

Zhang Xuan pondered for a moment, and immediately ordered: "Let Luo Shixin come to see me!" ”

After a while, Luo Shixin hurried over and bowed down, "See the big handsome!" ”

Zhang Xuan pointed to Liaoshui Dao north of Xincheng with a wooden pole: "You can immediately lead 5,000 troops to Liaoshui to ambush Xincheng, if the Goguryeo army in Liaodong City tries to cross Liaoshui to the north, you can attack it halfway." ”

"Obey the order!"

Luo Shixin turned around, and Zhang Xuan wrote another warrant, asking the messenger to rush to Xincheng immediately to deliver the letter, and after arranging the Xincheng side, he immediately ordered the army to temporarily withdraw to the south bank of Liaoshui and station.

Zhang Xuan didn't want to fight hard with the defenders of Liaodong City, he wanted Liaodong City, and at the same time, he wanted to completely annihilate the Goguryeo army that was about to run out of food at the lowest cost

Night fell quietly, under the cover of night, seven thousand Goguryeo troops have been assembled in the city, ready to kill out of the city, the main general Ning Wuli stood on the head of the city and watched the Sui army camp outside the city, the Sui army has withdrawn, the camp tent is gone, leaving only rows of thick fences.

This made Ning Wuli have an indescribable worry in his heart, he knew why the Sui army withdrew, it must be the sentry on the high platform who saw the signs that he was going to break through, so the Sui army withdrew and let himself go.

But why were the Sui army willing to let themselves go, weren't they afraid of retreating to Xincheng by themselves? Or are they ready to ambush themselves halfway?

At this time, one of his generals said in a low voice: "General, the retreat of the Sui army is very strange!" The lowly felt that there was deception in it. ”

Ning Wuli sighed lowly, "This is not strange, this is the other party's public call, but do we still have a choice?" ”

"Can we only go to the new city?"

Ning Wuli nodded, "If we go to the Black Bone City, most of us will starve to death halfway, and we have just enough food to go to the new city, even if the Sui army is ambushed halfway, we can only break out, and it is much better to break through as much as we can than to go to the Black Bone City to destroy the whole army." ”

"I understand the humble position, the general will give the order!"

Ning Wuli walked back to the female wall and ordered the soldiers under the city: "Open the city gate and go!" ”

The gate of Liaodong City was opened, and thousands of Goguryeo soldiers slaughtered out of the city, marching quickly along Liaoshui in the direction of the northeast new city.

As soon as the Goguryeo army withdrew, a Sui army of 2,000 people, led by the general Qin Yong, entered Liaodong City and occupied this strategically important city, while Zhang Xuan led an army of 20,000 to follow unhurriedly ten miles behind the Goguryeo army.

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After two days and two nights, the Goguryeo army, which had been exhausted from the forced march all the way, finally arrived at Xincheng, they had run out of food, although the generals had a little game to replenish along the way, but the soldiers were not treated so well, every soldier was hungry and dizzy, they were full of longing for Xincheng, as if the city was full of rice and bread, and hot broth.

But the reality was cruel and ruthless, at noon, 7,000 Goguryeo soldiers from Liaodong City finally arrived at the city of Xincheng, but they were greeted not by rice and flour, but by cold arrows and the Qinglong battle flag of the Sui army fluttering at the head of the city.

All the Goguryeo soldiers were stunned, they could not imagine that the new city, which was even stronger and more impregnable than them, had fallen.

Almost everyone turned their heads to look at the main general Ning Wuli, Ning Wuli looked at the city head blankly, and after a while, he weakly ordered: "The army returns to the woods to rest temporarily!" ”

The Goguryeo army retreated to a wooded area three miles away, and the soldiers lay under the trees, desperately enduring hunger in their bellies, while in a small tent, Ning Wuli was discussing countermeasures with several major generals.

"I heard someone complaining that we shouldn't give up Liaodong City, as if the responsibility should be borne by me Ning Wuli, but I don't want to hear this bullshit a second time, whoever has a kind will starve to death in Liaodong City, don't come out with me!"

"General, no one will complain about the general, everyone understands in their hearts that General Yizhi took most of the food away, but the backup food from the Black Bone City was not delivered, and the responsibility should be on the side of the Black Bone City."

"This has nothing to do with the Black Bone City, if I didn't guess correctly, the Black Bone City has been conquered by the Sui army, otherwise where did this Sui army come from?"

Ning Wuli glanced at everyone and said, "The question now is, we have run out of food, but the new city has fallen again, what should we do?" ”

There was silence in the tent, no one spoke, no one knew what to do.

At this moment, there was a commotion outside the tent, followed by many people screaming, all the generals were taken aback, and hurriedly walked out of the camp tent, but there was no sign of the Sui army's attack, Ning Wuli suddenly said angrily: "What happened? ”

A hundred brave people ran to report, "Report to the general, just now hundreds of people scrambled for a fruit tree and caught fire, and twelve people died. ”

Ning Wuli and the generals walked quickly to the side of the fruit tree where the conflict occurred, this is an unknown fruit tree, there are still a few green fruits left at the top of the big tree, the other branches have become bare, the ground is full of wounded soldiers, who are groaning in pain, on the other side are the corpses of twelve soldiers, all of them are covered with blood and flesh, and the woods in the distance are full of Goguryeo soldiers, all of them have cold eyes and dissatisfied faces.

Ning Wuli forcibly swallowed back the angry rebuke that had already surged into his mouth, he had already realized that if he punished himself, he was afraid that he would provoke a mutiny.

Thinking that he still had a sheepskin raft to cross the river, Ning Wuli finally ordered: "Boil the remaining rice into gruel, eat a bowl per person and go to Liaoshui to cross the river!" ”

This order caused an uproar among the soldiers, and the soldiers used fleeing to express their dissatisfaction, but Ning Wuli's heart was as hard as iron, and he ignored the large-scale flight of the soldiers and forcibly drove the soldiers towards Liaoshui.

Ning Wuli has no choice, everyone will starve to death if they go south, and only by entering Liaodong and Yizhi Wende will they have a glimmer of life.

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Liaoshui is the most important river in the whole eastern Liaodong region, the river surface is up to 100 zhang wide, the water is abundant, the water flow is turbulent, it is very difficult to cross the river, when the Sui army attacked Goguryeo for the first time in the eighth year of the great cause, it suffered a big loss when crossing the river, and tens of thousands of people, including the famous general Mai Tiezhu, died on the river.

When Goguryeo marched into Liaodong to cross the Liao River, it used the method of building and connecting double pontoon bridges, and collected thousands of small boats within hundreds of miles of the Liao River to build two pontoon bridges, so that the 50,000 Sui troops of Xincheng and Liaodong City could successfully cross the Liaoshui.

It's just that these two pontoon bridges have been completely burned down by the Sui cavalry, and it is extremely difficult for the Sui army to cross the river or the Goguryeo army to cross the river.

In the afternoon, a desperate Goguryeo army rushed to the shore of Liaoshui, and the massive flight of soldiers along the way left the original army of 7,000 men with less than 4,000 men. (To be continued.) )