As early as two months ago, Zhang Xuan secretly sent an envoy to Luoyang to hand over a handwritten letter from Zhang Xuan to Wang Shichong. Pen "Fun" Pavilion www.biquge.info

In the letter, Zhang Xuan put forward a suggestion, a reminder, that the Sui and Zheng sides jointly attack Jingzhou, the Zheng army attack Xiangyang, the Sui army attack Jiangxia, and afterwards divide the seven counties of Jingbei equally.

The other is to remind Wang Shicheng to open up the Nanxiang Road with the Tang Army, and suggest that he send heavy troops to deploy defenses.

Wang Shichong accepted Zhang Xuan's reminder and immediately sent another 30,000 troops to Xiyang County, bringing the strength of Xiyang County to 60,000 people, and strictly preventing the Tang army from moving south from Shangluo County.

As for Zhang Xuan's proposal that the two sides jointly suppress Jingzhou, Wang Shichong did not reply, but not replying does not mean that he is not moved, but he needs to wait and see, and needs to wait for the opportunity, for this reason, Wang Shichong strictly kept secrets, and even his brother Wang Shiyun did not see the letter sent by Zhang Xuan secretly.

The time finally appeared, when the Sui army and Li Xiaogong's Tang army confronted each other in Fushui, Wang Shichong used the excuse of inspecting the folk customs in various places to drive to Nanyang County in person, and stayed in the Nanyang Palace, and he secretly transferred 20,000 troops from Xiyang County and Luoyang County into Nanyang, plus Nanyang County itself 10,000 garrisons, so that the strength of Nanyang County has reached 50,000 people.

It's just that Wang Shichong did it very secretively, and the 40,000 troops he transferred were stationed at the edge of Nanyang County, so that Xiangyang County could not feel that Wang Shichong had increased his troops in Nanyang, and Wang Shichong sent a large number of spies to Xiangyang City at the same time, paying attention to every move of the Tang army in Xiangyang at any time.

Early this morning, Wang Shichong had just gotten up, and two palace maids were waiting for him to wash, when a report from a eunuch came from outside the palace, "Your Majesty, Xiangyang has sent urgent information!" ”

Wang Shichong perked up and hurriedly said, "Hurry up and show it to me." ”

A eunuch walked into the room quickly and presented a piece of information to Wang Shichong, who took the information and read it carefully, then stood up and shouted, "Someone! ”

The two palace maids and the eunuch who delivered the letter were so frightened that they knelt down and kowtowed together, Wang Shichong realized that he was a little out of shape, so he smiled and said: "I'm just so happy, you guys get up, finish washing me quickly, I still have important things to deal with." ”

The palace maid and the eunuch got up tremblingly, and hurriedly finished grooming Wang Shichong, Wang Shichong put on a regular dress and walked out of the inner palace quickly, and came to the temporary imperial study in front.

Not long after, Prime Minister Wang Shiyun, Shangshu Yun Dingxing of the Ministry of War, and generals Wang Renze, Wang Xingben, Tian Zhan, Guo Shiheng, Yang Gongqing, Zhang Tong'er and other major officials and generals rushed to meet him.

"Ladies and gentlemen, the reason why I am in such a hurry to summon you here is because there is a major matter to discuss with you......

Wang Shichong paused his tone and watched everyone listen to his lecture humbly, he liked this feeling of being on top of his head.

"I just received the Xiangyang Express, Wu Shi Tong led 20,000 troops to Jiangxia to fight the Sui army, there are only 3,000 defenders left in Xiangyang, this is our opportunity, I have 50,000 troops in Nanyang County, just waiting for this opportunity."

Wang Shichong said that it was a discussion, but in fact he had already decided to send troops, but he just wanted to listen to the opinions of the audience in the details, and everyone understood this in their hearts, otherwise the Son of Heaven would not have toured Nanyang County in the south, stayed in the palace for nearly half a month, and blocked all news, obviously just to send troops.

Wang Ren understood his uncle's intentions better, and asked cautiously tentatively: "Since there are only 3,000 people in Xiangyang County, Weichen thinks that 50,000 troops are a bit of a slaughtering knife, unless Your Majesty wants to ........"

Wang Shichong said with a smile: "You are right, how can a Xiangyang County satisfy me, since it is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, it is natural to get the greatest benefits, Zhang Xuan promised to give me three counties, Xiangyang County, Chungling County and Handong County, Xiangyang County I can accept, but Chungling County and Handong County are both mountainous areas, sparsely populated, with many mountains and few fields, and more importantly, there is no room for expansion here, so I don't plan to ask for these two counties, but go south to seize Jingling County and Nanjun, in fact, it doesn't matter if Jingling County wants it or not, However, it is an important passage connecting Nanjun and Xiangyang County, and it will not work without it. ”

Everyone was dumbfounded when they heard this, the saint actually wanted Nanjun, Nanjun is the core county of Jingnan, Xiangyang is the core county of Jingbei, these two counties want to be taken for themselves, will Zhang Xuan agree?

Yun Dingxing couldn't help but say: "Your Majesty, Nanjun is not trivial, do you want to send someone to communicate with Zhang Xuan first, so as to avoid unnecessary misunderstandings between the two sides." ”

Wang Shichong's face suddenly became gloomy, and he said coldly: "I am also a county of a country, do I need to look at other people's faces when I do something?" ”

Yun Dingxing was so frightened that he hurriedly lowered his head and said: "Weichen didn't mean this, Weichen was worried that there was no tacit understanding between the two sides, and the army would meet in Nanjun and a war would break out, and the result would only be cheaper for the Tang Dynasty, I believe this is also the result that His Majesty does not want to see." ”

Wang Shichong's face softened slightly, and he said slowly: "I sent people to Nanjun to investigate, maybe everyone didn't expect that the Sui army has not yet entered Nanjun, but Li Xiaogong's 20,000 troops have withdrawn to Nanjun, this is why I gathered 50,000 troops, we can't take Nanjun so easily, we have to face a big battle with the Tang army, as for Zhang Xuan's side, his target is not the south, but the Hexi Corridor and Longyou, so with us as a buffer between him and the Tang Dynasty, I think he will be happy to see it." ”

Tian Zan next to him was sincerely convinced: "Your Majesty's vision is far-reaching, beyond the reach of foolish ministers such as us, and Weichen fully supports Your Majesty's decision." ”

Wang Shichong nodded and said: "This is indeed a big problem that I have been thinking about for a whole year, our territory has been difficult to expand, the only way out is to the south, and take Nanjun, the door of the entire south is open to us, I might as well tell you a secret, after taking Nanjun, I am ready to change the name of Jiangling to Nanjing, as our second capital, so taking Nanjun is the top priority of our southern expedition, at all costs, we are bound to win Nanjun." ”

"Your Majesty is wise!" The crowd bowed together.

Wang Shishi acted as an immediate dispatch general, and 50,000 Zheng soldiers went south in three ways, one was led by Yang Gongqing to attack Xiangyang County, one was led by Guo Shiheng to attack Jingling County, and the third was the main force, with 40,000 troops led by Wang Renze and Wang Xingben to attack Nanjun.

Of course, it was impossible to march at the same time, and the three-way army first concentrated on attacking Xiangyang City.

Two days later, 50,000 Zheng troops were assembled in Xinye County and entered Xiangyang County.

Zhou Ting'an, the Cheng of Xiangyang County, urgently asked for help from Chang'an and Jiangxia by means of flying pigeon messages.

........

In the war in the south, the annual imperial examination ended in Zhongdu and Chang'an, compared with the last imperial examination, this imperial examination is slightly bland, first, there is no more brilliant talent, secondly, the imperial examination is also more decent, more importantly, the atmosphere of the war has greatly diluted people's interest and attention to this imperial examination, which is especially obvious in Chang'an.

Since the Sui and Tang dynasties entered a state of war in the south, the whole Chang'an has been shrouded in a faint unease and turmoil, the most typical manifestation is that prices are rising slowly, although not skyrocketing, but the support is quite large, and prices are rising across the board, from firewood, rice, oil, salt, clothing, food, housing and transportation to various industries are rising.

In fact, this is also inevitable, once a war breaks out, it will inevitably consume a lot of resources, such as grain, meat, pig iron, livestock, cloth and other bulk materials, these resources must be supplied to the army in large quantities, in the civilian nature there will be less, and the rise in prices will be inevitable.

However, everyone is also accustomed to the impact of the war on life, but the impact of the war is not only in the price, but more importantly in the confidence of the people, in the public opinion of the government and the opposition, when the Sui army captured Baling County, Li Xiaogong was forced to withdraw from Yuzhang County to Jiangxia after the news spread in the government and the opposition, the people were in an uproar, and the Tang army withdrew north to Jiangxia, which meant that the Tang army's eastern crusade failed, and the streets and alleys were full of dissatisfaction with the Tang army.

At noon on this day, the Qingyun wine shop was crowded with officials who came to eat as usual, in a private room on the third floor, seven or eight officials of the military department were gathering together for a drink, these officials were not high-level, Lang Zhong, Wai Lang, the main book, the record, and everything was available, everyone ordered more than a dozen dishes, three pots of wine, and while drinking and eating, they talked about the government in a low voice.

A member of the staff asked: "Jiang Envoy, you have the most extensive news, what is the situation in the south now, I only heard that King Zhao led the army to Jiangxia, but what is the final result, there is no news, is there still a confrontation now?" ”

This official surnamed Jiang is called Jiang Qingde, who is in his forties, and is the highest-ranking of all officials in the official driving department, and he has a good personal relationship with Zhao Cijing, a squire of the military department, and can get some top-secret information.

Maybe it was because he drank a few more glasses of wine and his head was a little hot, or maybe it was everyone's expectations that satisfied Jiang Qingde's vanity, making him feel that he couldn't show his superiority if he didn't reveal some news.

Jiang Qingde drank all the wine in the cup, and sneered repeatedly: "Now I am still talking about Li Xiaogong's withdrawal from Jiangxia in the north, when did this happen, let me tell you, there has been a big incident over there in Jiangxia a long time ago." (To be continued.) )