The north wind rolls the yellow sand, and the cold light brings a knife at night.

Xia Mu rolled over from his horse and walked down, standing on the top of a bare hill with only a tall pine tree towering between a few large rocks, looking silently ahead, and standing a group of undressed cavalry, about one or two hundred people.

I saw a middle-aged general with a burly figure, thick eyebrows, big eyes, and sideburns walking in front of me, with a solemn and majestic demeanor, it was Li Chengliang.

Li Chengliang glanced at Xia Mu at this moment, his eyes were faint, and he was riding motionless on the horse, holding the reins with one hand and holding a red flag tightly with the other. The banner carries a tassel made of snow-white horsehair and a silver spear with a white light, and the center of the flag is embroidered with a large "Ming" character in black satin.

In front of the banner stood a particularly tall steed with a shortened mane and tail, which was dark gray with white spots and curly hair.

Riding on it was a thirty-one or twelve-year-old general, tall, with broad shoulders, bulging cheekbones, full heavenly court, high nose bridge, deep eye sockets, thick eyebrows, and a pair of blazing eyes staring at Xia Mu forward, this person was Zu Chengxun.

Xia Mu looked into their eyes, but felt a sense of perseverance, composure, and wisdom.

At this moment, looking at the two of them, he sighed, and now the plateau in the seventh month of the lunar calendar is already very cold, so he is wearing a half-worn green cloth sheepskin robe over the iron armor. In order to take it off at any time in a battle that could be encountered, all the buttons on the robe were loosened, but a war belt was used to tie it at the waist.

was about to dismount and speak, but he noticed the bow that Li Chengliang was carrying diagonally on his back, and saw a sword and a cowhide quiver with vermilion lacquer and gold painted in his waist, and more than a dozen carved arrows inserted in it. In the Ming Dynasty, only the utensils used by the royal family were allowed to be decorated with vermilion lacquer and gold painting, and others were forbidden.

In the twenty-sixth year of Hongwu, Zhu Yuanzhang made a special strict rule: officers and sergeants were not allowed to paint gold with their quivers, and violators would be executed.

Li Chengliang's bow was personally given to him by Emperor Jiajing when he left Beijing, and since then, he has been carrying this quiver all year round.

For more than 20 years, this quiver has galloped tens of thousands of miles with him, crisscrossing half of China, and has been battled, grinding sulfur in some places, and carrying knife wounds and arrow marks in some places, and almost the entire quiver has faded in the wind and sun, rain and snow, and dust and sand flying in the years and months.

"Uncle, the first to come is Li Chengliang, the governor of Liaodong, and the one behind him is Zu Chengxun, the deputy chief soldier of Liaodong!" Yu Dawei hurriedly introduced them one by one.

When Xia Mu heard this, he stood motionless on the top of the mountain, and because he was standing taller, and the northwest wind was blowing, it was particularly cold, and the heat that came out of him formed crushed ice on the sparse stubble on his lips.

Most of the warriors around him were thinly dressed, and many of them had patches of dried stains on their clothes, especially on their sleeves, and they were already tired from the long journey, and some of them clasped their arms together and shrunk their necks as far as possible into their round necks in order to resist the cold. Some of them staggered and fell asleep, and suddenly they suddenly fell into a slump, their foreheads almost touched their horsehair, and at the same time the weapons on their waists made a slight clattering sound, so they woke up in shock and opened their eyes.

Xia Mu frowned at them, and shouted angrily: "What kind of body is Cheng, I can't stand the cold at all, how can I go on the field to kill the enemy!" ”

Jinyiwei and Dongchang's fans knew that Xia Mu was powerful, and they didn't dare to slack off, so they cheered up, but the forbidden army was not, although they were also afraid of Xia Mu, but they were used to eating and drinking on weekdays, wandering around the capital all day long, not seeing the war, how could they have suffered like this.

Xia Mu wanted to reprimand again, but when he saw Li Chengliang and Zu Chengxun coming over, he dismounted and waited quietly for them to come forward.

"The last general will see Ning Yuanbo!" The two saluted in descending order from the smallest to the largest.

"The two generals don't have to be polite, it's so cold, get up!"

Li Chengliang stood up when he heard this, looked at Yu Dawei's smirk, stood there for a moment, and suddenly burst into tears, choked up and said, "General Yu is looking forward to you!" As soon as my Great Tomorrow Army arrives, my Hetao is finally expected to be recovered! ”

Xia Mu was stunned for a moment, and then smiled with relief: "His Majesty the Ming Emperor's kindness to survive and die is like the sky is high and the earth is thick, and the thieves in the north don't know the height of the sky, and they have committed my Hetao for many years, thanks to the general's survival, Xiao Bo is grateful!" ”

Li Chengliang didn't care about the etiquette, wiped the tears on his cheeks with the sleeve of his robe, then bent down and led forward with his hand, and said, "Please enter the account and talk ......about it again."

"Brothers, get off your horse and rest!" Xia Mu then jumped off the horse lightly, and the hilt of the knife touched something, making a pleasant metallic sound.

When all the soldiers had dismounted, he glanced at them cordially, and then walked towards the vigorous ancient pine. The terrain there is higher, and you can see the whole army more clearly.

At this time, a bright moon emerged from the dark clouds, unusually bright.

Xia Mu asked the whole army to be stationed outside the city of Daling in Yizhou, set up camp, and began recruiting and training troops tomorrow. As he spoke, he walked down the hill, asked Luo Kedi and Dao Meteor to rectify military affairs, and took Yu Dawei to take the lead in Xingyuan.

On the way, Xia Mu glanced at Li Chengliang slightly, and Li Rusong on the side followed cautiously. Xia Mu glanced at the Northern Yuan yurt that was faintly visible in the distance of the Daling River, the coldness in his eyes became more and more revealed, and he said slowly to Li Chengliang: "The war ahead is urgent, and we can't afford to wait here to sit and talk about it." Let's talk as we go, and first settle down in the city of Uiju to prepare for war......"

When Li Chengliang heard this, he didn't expect that this heroic Ning Yuanbo would talk and do things without delay, and he would be decisive and fast, so he waved his hand and asked his sons to bring the mounts, and Zu Chengxun and others got on the horses one after another, leading Xia Mu and Yu Dawei to lead 10,000 Ming heroes to the direction of Daling City in Yizhou.

On the way, Xia Mu said lightly as if unintentionally: "Ben Bo once heard in the capital that there are only 30,000 soldiers left in Liaodong who can fight, and they have won successive battles, causing the northern captives to lose their armor and suffer many casualties...... It seems that it is not difficult to get rid of Meda! ”

When Li Chengliang heard the question, he set his eyes on Zu Chengxun. Zu Chengxun understood, and hurriedly replied: "This ...... This one...... Our actual situation is not as Uncle Ye heard, in previous years, we also truthfully reported the military situation, but they were all rejected by Yan Gelao, in fact, except for the 10,000 main force of the army, the rest of us are already defeated...... Alas... The Yuan captives are well armed, and we are completely defeated, and now we only have six or seven thousand men and horses left......"

"The traitorous ministers have misled the country, Yizhou can still hold the last line of defense outside the Shanhai Pass, it's hard for you!"

An hour later, in the big tent of the Ming soldiers outside the city of Yizhou, Xia Mu sat on a tiger skin chair. The generals of Zhengyuan were high-spirited, standing solemnly under the tent, respectfully obeying orders.

Xia Mu glanced at Yu Dawei and gestured. Yu Dawei nodded slightly, and said: "Ladies and gentlemen, this scripture has spoken in advance today, so please understand: since the self-conscription army entered the city of Yizhou, this scripture strategy has specialized in the matter of resisting captives, and today I will move out of the army and live in the Jinglu Mansion of Yizhou City. The whole business of this scripture is to prepare food, weapons, and salaries for the soldiers who have been recruited. If you have any difficulties, even if you come to find this scripture, this scripture will never be pushed! ”

Speaking of this, he glanced at Li Chengliang deeply again, and said slowly: "At the same time, Ben Jingluo is here today in front of all the soldiers and soldiers to publicly declare: In the future, all military and political affairs and the right to command and decide in the Northern Expedition will be in charge of Ning Yuanbo. He has the sword of Shang Fang and the banner of the emperor's order given by His Majesty, and he is captured on behalf of the king. All the soldiers must work together with him to build miraculous feats! ”

"My subordinates understand!" The generals under the tent bowed down in unison and said, "The governor is on behalf of the king to march north, and the three armies of the Ming Dynasty obey their orders, and their subordinates should serve as dogs and horses." ”

Yu Dawei smiled slightly, turned around and stretched out his hand to invite Xia Mu. Xia Mu also took the lead, stepped forward, and said solemnly: "This governor would like to thank General Li and all the soldiers for their full support. Now that the conquest is urgent, the governor will no longer talk nonsense. Let's start talking to you now. ”

Li Chengliang glanced at Xia Mu with appreciative eyes and nodded deeply. Then, he commanded his son Li Rusong aloud: "Li joins the army, you will put up the military topographic map of Daling City!" ”

"Yes!" Li Rusong answered, and then left the account.

The soldiers quickly put a large military topographical map of Daling City on the bookcase in the tent.

Seeing this, Li Chengliang hurriedly stood up, walked to the bookcase, took a slender copper ruler from Li Rusong's hand, pointed to the icon lines on the military topographic silk map of the whole city of the Great Tomb, and talked eloquently:

"Daling City sits in the north and faces south, is rectangular, the city wall is as high as five or six zhang, easy to defend and difficult to attack, extremely dangerous. There are eight gates in the city: there are two gates of Datong and Yongle in the east, two gates of Hanzhu and Suzaku in the south, two gates of Daxi and Xiaoxi in the west, and two gates of Seven Stars and Xuanwu in the north. We are now in a critical situation, with the Erqi Department in the north, an army of 300,000 troops, and the Han Department and the Duoyan Department in the vicinity. Now Boyan Jina is robbing in Xuanda in the name of Lao Yuda, and Wang Chonggu, the governor of Xuanda, came with news the day before yesterday. ”

Zu Chengxun interjected and said: "Boyan Jina is a Haralu clan, and he is also a descendant of the Yuan Dynasty general Boyan, who is a member of the Mongolian Wanhu Mansion, and lives in Puyang County, Kaizhou!" ”

"Boyan?" Xia Mu frowned when he heard this, "Is it the Battle of Yashan, the general of the Yuan Dynasty who died in the Song Dynasty?" ”

"It's this person's descendant!" Li Chengliang nodded, seeing Xia Mu pondering, he continued, "There are Jianzhou Jurchen tribes on the back, the leaders **Hachi, Shuerhaqi, although the two are young, they are better than their father Tashike, and now the Jianzhou Jurchens have 100,000 soldiers and horses, and they occupy Liaoyang and other places, and they have lived for generations, although our army is stationed, they are often provoked. ”

After hearing this, Xia Mu gradually put away his thoughts, pondered for a while, and replied thoughtfully: "Just now, Admiral Li has explained to us the internal and external terrain conditions, but the ancients said: 'It is shallow on paper, and you must do it if you know it. 'The Governor wants to take his military guide and lead the Governor around the city to make a careful tour of the city, and then make a detailed plan with you, so that the recovery of the Hetao will be foolproof. ”

After listening to Xia Mu's words, Li Chengliang nodded and said with a smile: "Yue Fei, a famous general of the Great Song Dynasty, has a cloud: 'The magic of using soldiers is to be single-minded. Li also believes that with the wisdom and courage of the governor and the talents of the sky, there is no city in this world that you can't conquer. ”

Xia Mu heard this compliment, smiled faintly, and said to Yu Dawei: "Tomorrow is the general in front of the governor's account, the new terms of conscription will be issued, as well as the training of the new army, and all the firearms such as the Shenji battalion will be put into the warehouse, and the officials of the Yan family, if they are lost, they will be dealt with by military law!" ”

"Subordinates obey!" All the generals under the tent responded loudly in unison.