Chapter 485 Clever Scheme

A few days later, Xue Chongxun's troops arrived near the city of Zhongshou, and the soldiers and horses transferred from all over the country also arrived one after another, with a total of about 100,000 foot cavalry, and countless miscellaneous servants of the people, and countless grains and grasses piled up. There was also the convergence of the Murong clan and the coalition forces of various ethnic groups in the north, and at this time, the troops near the three cities reached more than 100,000 people, claiming to be 300,000 and preparing for a large-scale northern expedition.

Xue Chongxun took the Shence Army as the central army, and the other eight armies had their own positions on the plains, and the momentum was very strong, and the staff made the order flag tokens in advance in order to unify the command, and assigned dozens of civilian officials to engage in the work of monitoring and advising the commanders of various departments, and were also responsible for translating secret letters.

At this time, the Chinese army received a military report from Du Siam in Heisha City, and the Mosi Khan had returned to Mo Nan and was marching towards Heisha City. The main Turkic force was attracted back, and Du Xian sent a message asking about the next step of the Mingguang army.

Some of the staff of the Chinese army believed that the strength of the Tang army was not inferior to the main Turkic force, and they just took advantage of this opportunity to fight a decisive battle with it near Heisha City. But Zhang Jiuling objected: "The marching speed of our army's infantry cavalry is not as fast as that of the Turkic cavalry. At this time, the Mingguang army had captured the Turkic capital, and the purpose of building momentum was achieved, so that it could retreat first to avoid the enemy's edge, and it would not be too late to fight a decisive battle with our army when it was ready. ”

Someone objected: "When we are ready, the Turks may not be willing to fight us head-on, and it will cost a lot to delay it, and I am afraid it will not be a long-term solution." ”

Zhang Jiuling laughed: "This time the Tang army sent more than 100,000 troops, if the Turks can't achieve a decisive victory and defeat us, sooner or later the Monan region will be placed under the control of our Tang Dynasty, and at that time, all the tribes of Khitan, Goguryeo and Tiele will inevitably be inclined to the Tang Dynasty, and the Turks will be defeated." ”

Xue Chongxun immediately clapped his head and said: "Mastering the shape and dividing the enemy camp is our established strategy before the war, so we immediately ordered Du Xian to evacuate Heisha City and not fight to the death with the enemy, and it is the best policy to preserve our strength." ”

…… Wang Changling was in charge of preparing the military order, and sent a team of fast horse cavalry out of Zhongcheng to report to Heisha City, the location of Heisha City was only a few hundred miles away from Zhongcheng, and the fast horse arrived in about two days. Unexpectedly, he encountered a Turkic ranger halfway through.

After Mo Si led his troops back to Monan, some strategists took advantage of the familiarity of the local terrain to send forward light cavalry to intersperse between Black Sand City and Tang Realm, and perhaps there would be unexpected gains. As expected, at this time, the Tang army had already taken control of Heisha City, and regarded the territory between Heisha City and Sanshou City as a sphere of influence.

The Turkic rangers rushed from both sides, released an arrow first, and then killed with their weapons. The messenger's guard was outnumbered, and the general next to him shouted: "Brothers, take a while, so that you will destroy the military report!" ”

But the survival instinct made the messenger not do that, but turned his horse's head and ran to the gap with a few of his relatives, hoping to escape with the fast horse. The Turkic cavalry behind them were in hot pursuit, and they had just crossed a small grassy knoll when the messenger suddenly felt a slight sound from his body and a roar of his horse, and with a "boom" he fell into a large pit with his men and horses. It turned out to be a trap to catch wild beasts, and the messenger chuckled in his heart and knew that something was wrong, so he hurriedly took out the bamboo tube containing the letter and scraped the paint on it, but his fingers did not listen to the call because he was anxious. It was too late to take out the military order, and a Turkic soldier jumped down from it and knocked him to the ground. After a while, the other Turks also arrived, seized the military order, and captured the messenger.

After their meritorious service, the rangers quickly withdrew northward, bringing important things into the tent of the silent slur. Mo Si was overjoyed when he heard that the military order of the Tang Army had been intercepted, and immediately called to pass it on. Unexpectedly, when he opened it, he was stunned, and he couldn't recognize a word of what was written on the paper. Mo Si can speak Chinese, although he doesn't recognize many words, he can finally recognize a few, but the words in front of him don't look like Chinese characters at all.

He frowned and asked, "The capture is indeed the Tang Army messenger?" ”

The Turkic general said: "The clothes and appearance are all Han Chinese, and the same is true for speaking, so you can't be wrong." ”

Mo Si handed the letter to Yang I Zhi on the side, and Yang Wu Zhi also said that he didn't know him. Mo Si then asked someone to bring the captives in for questioning, and sure enough, he was a Han Chinese, and he also spoke in Chinese. Yang Izhi on the side said: "It should be the military order of the Tang Army, but it may be in ciphertext, and it can only be translated by the prisoners." ”

Mo Si turned his head to look at the messenger and said coldly, "What is written in the letter?" ”

"I don't know." The Messenger said.

Mo Si said angrily: "Last time, I caught an envoy in the northeast, and I ate the documents into my stomach, so I asked someone to break open his stomach alive and take it out." If you have an empty mouth and can't speak, then I'll cut your tongue out first! ”

The messenger's face changed suddenly, and he hurriedly said: "The ciphertext is made by the prince's shogunate, and only their people have the book to compare the translation, and we people really don't know." Even if the Khan killed me, I don't recognize anything like the Book of Heaven. ”

Yang I Zhi also said: "Father Khan, the commander of the Tang army used ciphertext to write military orders, just to prevent the enemy from intercepting and leaking military aircraft. If this person can read it, then the ciphertext is useless, so I think he probably doesn't understand it. ”

Mo Si was furious, "Useless things, pull them out and cook them!" The messenger cried out for mercy, but to no avail.

It took a lot of effort to intercept something, and now he didn't know the content in front of Mo Si, which made him very unhappy. Yang Izhi said: "Judging from the location of the interception, the messenger came from the side of the three cities, located between the Black Sand City, and it must be a military order from the Tang Dynasty to the Black Sand City. The content is nothing more than two kinds: or inform Du Xian to defend the city to the death and wait for reinforcements, and the main force of the Tang army will rush to fight a decisive battle with me; Or tell Du Siam to abandon the city and retreat to avoid falling into the siege of our army. ”

"Which one is that?" Moss muttered. The people around looked at each other, and most of them couldn't guess.

Not long ago, Tosi Little Khan, who had escaped to join the main force of Mur, said indignantly: "If Du Xian doesn't leave, it's best, let's rush over and surround Heisha City and catch turtles in an urn to avenge a stone's throw in an arrow!" ”

Mo Si Khan said: "Du Xian is only 10,000 people, you have more men and horses defending the city than besieging the city, and you actually lost the city wolf bèi and fled, what kind of battle did you fight, and now you think of revenge?" ”

Yang I helped my brother speak: "At the beginning, Tuyuhun had twice as many soldiers and horses as Toxi, but he was defeated; Later, Du Xian's army easily captured the city with only 10,000 horses. From this, it can be seen that the Du Xian division currently in Heisha City must be the elite division of the Tang Army, otherwise it would be impossible for Xue Chongxun to send fewer troops to attack Heisha City after the first defeat. The strength of the army is not all about the number of people, the enemy is strong and I am weak, so it is no wonder that the elder brother is not effective in combat. ”

Yang Izhi's words reminded the Turkic ministers' train of thought, and Mo Si's brother-in-law immediately said: "In this way, I am afraid that Xue Chongxun's military order to Du Xian is to retreat, and he is not very willing to let the best elite warriors risk being besieged by my army of more than 100,000 troops." ”

Another person chimed in: "It's not a bad thing that the main force of the Tang Army really wants to rush to Black Sand City to fight us in a decisive battle. If they want to reach Heisha City before our cavalry, they have to travel lightly, and it will not be a small problem for more than 100,000 people to eat at that time, and they must be very dependent on the follow-up grain transportation. We just happened to attack its grain route, so that it could not last for a long time, and if we retreated, we would take advantage of the situation to cover up and kill, which would be of great benefit to me. ”

Mo Si nodded thoughtfully and said, "Then we will make a plan and use the seal of the Tang Dynasty messenger to send a new military order to Du Xian, and let him stay in Black Sand City to wait for help." Our army rushed to Heisha City to surround it, and no matter what the Tang army planned, lured its main force to come to the rescue. If Xue Chongxun doesn't come, let's eat Du Xian's elite and break back a game. ”

The ministers chimed in: "The Khan is wise. ”

So Mo Si chose a Han minister to change into the clothes and armor of the Tang Dynasty envoy, and asked a few Han people who defected to the Turks to pretend to be attendants, forged a military order, and went to Heisha City with seals and other things to "pass the order".

After they came to Black Sand City, they were examined and met with Du Siam. Because those things are inherently true, there is naturally nothing wrong with them. When Du Xian met with him, he originally thought that it was someone from Xue Chongxun's faction, and asked a few words about the weather in the three cities, but the fake messenger talked nonsense, but there was nothing wrong.

But when Du Xian opened the letter, he immediately felt that something was wrong, because it was written in Chinese characters, not ciphertext. According to Xue Chongxun's consistent practice, military orders dozens of miles away were written in ciphertext, and naturally there were civil officials from the Jin King Shogunate in the Mingguang army who were responsible for translating the characters. But how could it be written directly in words this time?

Du Xian glanced up at the messenger, and the messenger's gaze looked elsewhere with a look of ease. Du Xian was also silent, first carefully read the content of the general's order, and ordered him to consolidate the city's defenses and wait for reinforcements, lure the Turkic main force to Black Sand City, and then fight a decisive battle with it.

This military order was completely opposite to Du Xian's expectation of an immediate retreat, he hesitated for a moment, and then said: "There is news from above, let the brothers pack up and prepare to abandon the city, there is nothing to be nostalgic for this Black Sand City to be broken like this." ”

The messenger was stunned and said, "Didn't you tell you to defend the city, and you dare to disobey?" ”

Du Xian suddenly smiled: "This letter is sealed with lacquer, how do you know?" ”

The messenger's face immediately turned red: "I heard the counsellors say this. ”

Du Xian laughed: "Which strategist? ”

The messenger didn't know the name of Xue Chongxun's staff, so he couldn't answer for a while. Du Xian immediately decided: "Come here, arrest and detain the fine work, and ask for guilt after bringing it back!" ”

"You're going to rebel?!" The messenger cursed. Those two words were very harsh, so that the civil officials on the side also turned their ears sideways, and their duty was to monitor the generals, so they were particularly sensitive to this kind of thing. But no one stood up against Du Xian's decision, because everyone really couldn't think of any reason and possibility for Du Xian to rebel.

General Du Xian showed it to the staff next to him, and said: "The prince's strategy is by no means to risk a war with the Turks, he has been trying to gradually weaken the strength of the Turks and strengthen the coalition army from the beginning, and it is impossible to change it temporarily this time." In addition, there are many doubts in this letter, so there is no need to listen to the letter, and it is the best policy to withdraw from Black Sand City. ”

……

When Mo Si led the army back to the lair, where was there still the shadow of half of the Tang soldiers? The city's grain and belongings were plundered, few houses were burned down in the war, the walls and gates were collapsed, and they were not repaired, and almost lost most of their defensive capabilities. However, the Tang army did not slaughter the city, and not many civilians and herdsmen died in the city. Originally, Mo Si thought it was a clever plan, but it was useless at all, and Du Xian still ran away.

At this time, the Tang army was advancing, and the Turks were paying attention to the victory or defeat of the war. However, there is at least one person who is most concerned about this, he is the grandson of Zuoxian Wang Tunyugu, Qi Tler, as soon as he entered the city, he hurried to find the princess Ashina Zhuo, but no one was found, and asked her family that she was captured by the Tang army.

Later, Qi Teller learned from the Turkic population in the city that Ashina Zhuo was sent back to the three cities by Du Xian to be dedicated to Xue Chongxun, the king of Jin, and Qi Tler's mood at this time can be imagined.

He was full of anger and went to find the little Khan Tosi, told what happened to Ashina Zhuo, and pointed to Li Shizhi's nose next to him and scolded him for being ungrateful, asking Tosi to kill to avenge Ashinado. Li Shizhi defended a few words, and Qi Tler said: "In vain, Princess Ashina Zhuo usually obeys you, and when the matter comes, she only cares about running for her life!" I was still fighting outside the city, so why didn't you take the princess with you in the city? I'm afraid she'd forgotten all about it by then! ”

This sentence is not only blaming Li Shizhi, but even Tossi and others are also implicated, because Tosi and they are also with Li Shizhi, and they really left their families and ran away.

Tosi was dissatisfied: "You don't know the situation at that time, the earth shook the mountain, the city gate suddenly collapsed, and the army was defeated like a mountain, where do we still have the opportunity to save people?" You can't complain about Li Gongzi, he and we are all worried about the war, and it is understandable. When he spoke for Li Shizhi, he was actually defending himself.

"Li Shizhi is just a Han man, and the princess is the younger sister of the little khan, why do you need to protect him?" Ketler said indignantly.

Tuo Xi said: "Although Li Gongzi is a Han Chinese, he is not our enemy, he is not guilty, why should we kill a friend who is facing us?" ”

Also present was Qi Tler's grandfather Zuo Xian Wang Tun Desire Valley, Tun Desire Valley also had an abacus in his heart: that Princess Ashina Zhuo is a red face and trouble, provoking the contradiction between the former Khan's son Qu Tler and the Tun Desire Valley tribe, and now that she has been taken away, it can resolve the resentment of the two families to some extent, without this woman, the relationship can still be slowly mended in the future. Considering this layer, Ashinazhuo's captivity cannot but be said to be a good thing. So Tun Desire Valley also helped Li Shizhi say a few words, and also reprimanded Qi Tler in the tone of an elder and let him go down.

Almost everyone stood on Li Shi's side, and Ratler couldn't match several mouths with one mouth, and his heart was suffocated. His unfavorable situation is to push Li Shizhi into the position of Tosi and others, and naturally he will not get support.

After Ketler returned, an elder of a tribe advised him: "There are so many unmarried ladies on the grassland, why do you have to take the people of the Ashina family?" After the princess is taken captive, you can devote your mind to the battle, and after making a contribution, you may even inherit the position of the leader of the tribe from the valley of desire. ”

But Ketler didn't listen to him at all, he was now not interested in any heir, he was simply disheartened, and had no other idea than hatred. In fact, Ashina Zhuo and his relationship when he was a child was really good, the two can be said to be childhood sweethearts, I remember that when I was a child, Ashina Zhuo was always on her side, someone bullied her, and Ashina Zhuo must help her out, but when she grows up, Ashina Zhuo is different, but Ashinazhuo's mind has not changed. From the time he can remember to the present, he has always had that beautiful princess in his life, and if he loses this qiē all at once, he really doesn't know how to face it.

After a few days of depression, he finally found a way out of despair, and only revenge, in the expectation of revenge, could he live! There are two people to blame for this qiē tragedy, and the one who hates Qi Tyler the most is naturally Li Shizhi!

But just killing Li Shizhi can't solve the hatred in his heart, just like the way he did in his childhood, the person who directly bullied Ashina Zhuo will also get the retribution he deserves.

After figuring this out, Ketler seemed to have suddenly found the direction of life again, and he was much more energetic when he stopped drinking. The relatives in the tribe were relieved to see this, but no one understood his psychology.

Ratler gathered some of his usual henchmen, said that he was going to do a big thing, and asked everyone if they would like to follow. The dozens of warriors who arrived were all from a tribe that had grown up with him, and they all expressed their willingness to follow him, and someone said: "Even if the leader of the tribe of Lust Valley is not Utler in the future, we will only listen to you!" ”

Seeing this, Ketler had a bottom in his mind and began to conceive of his own revenge plan. It is really uncommon for him to think about "stratagem", and almost all the methods used to do things were force, but Li Shizhi also made him feel that sometimes using brains and stratagems is more powerful than simply using force.

He found a few people he trusted most and said to them, "The Mosi Khan is violent and selfish, and it is not good for our tribes, and sooner or later he will be defeated by the Tang people." Why should we play for him anymore? You'll have to find another way. ”

A few Turkic warriors stood there a little frightened, and they didn't understand what was going on, but when it came to the strength of the Tang army, they did know it well during the battle of Black Sand City. These Gentler's henchmen are the same as Gatler's style, they are reckless men who don't like to use their brains very much, but they are loyal to Ketler, so they carefully follow the words: "Every time the pasture is divided, the best place for water and grass is the one of the Mosi tribes, and the cattle and sheep are the ones they want the most......"

Qi Tler said: "You quietly sneak into the Tang Realm, hand over my letter to the King of Tang and Jin, and let's go over to save ourselves being angry in the hands of Mo Si." ”

Someone said in fear: "If Mo Si knows, he must kill us." "If the Khan of Mur Si lets him go, whoever dares to betray him will be boiled to white bones."

Ketler's answer was also very simple: "Don't let him know!" ”

After deciding this, he began to prepare letters and other things, but he could not write Chinese characters, and he could not go to the people who would write for fear of leaking the news, so he had to write in Turkic. I thought that there were a lot of people who read and wrote in the Tang Dynasty, and there were always people who knew Turkic writing.

When he did this kind of thing, he really didn't have any psychological pressure, except for being occupied by hatred, he didn't have much affection for the Khan and the tribal elders, especially his grandfather, so he couldn't think too much at this time, and his thinking really couldn't be so wide. Q