Zheng Yunming couldn't help but be a little embarrassed when he came to such a conclusion in front of the generals, but he quickly calmed down and said: "Tang Taizong said, 'If you take people as a mirror, you can know the gains and losses. Today, Wang Jingsong is my best mirror, and Zheng Yunming has been taught here. ”

After that, he bowed deeply.

Straightening up, Zheng Yunming turned to the five generals who were surprised and said, "I hope that each of you will remember the shortcomings I exposed in today's battle, and don't make the same mistakes as me in the future." ”

The crowd agreed.

"After you have returned to the camp, you should also organize your subordinate officers and sergeants to examine whether there were any omissions and mistakes in today's battle, or any useful experience gained in the defense of the city."

"Each team has to submit a summary to me. Although there is no writing for the time being, and only the scholars and generals write it by themselves, in the future, each team of soldiers will be assigned a clerk to record the activities of the soldiers and summarize the successes and failures of the battle. ”

Ge Huai's eyes widened and he stuck out his tongue: "Scholars lead soldiers to make trouble, and if they win the battle, they don't hurry up to get some wine and good food to celebrate, but they want to make a summary of the battle." I was really angry to death, so I hurriedly ordered the Huotou Army to prepare a celebration banquet and merit is serious! ”

"Ge Lao, don't be impatient." Zheng Yunming said with a smile: "Now there are 100 jars of fine wine in square urns outside the tent, all of which are treasured by local wineries in Shatou City. I'm sure you'll have a good drink in a while. ”

Ge Huai's laughter was amidst a soldier who broke in: "Lord Beizhijie of Jiangling Mansion sent someone to invite the general to come over to discuss the matter. ”

"This old gentleman's news is so fast." Zheng Yunming discussed with Wang Deng: "After I leave, you urge the soldiers to speed up the cleaning of the battlefield and repair the city walls. Although Natath claims to be attacking again, we need to be careful. ”

He lowered his voice again and said: "We must focus on searching for the corpses of Li Tongzhi and his subordinates, and bury them all in coffins, the generals in Jiangling Mansion are all watching here, and the Tulong Army must set an example of treating friendly troops well." ”

"This matter is a serious matter," Ge Huai said loudly: "The corpses of the Jiangling brothers must be properly contained, and no one can poke our backbones and scold us for damaging our Yin Virtue." ”

He scratched his head again and asked suspiciously, "But this deputy envoy is in such a hurry to find the chief manager, is there anything important?" ”

Bei Zhijie, the deputy envoy of Jinghu Establishment, is in his forties, slightly obese, but his face looks quite shrewd. He is a local person in Hubei, since he was admitted to the Jinshi in the early years of Jiading, he has been promoted all the way in the Lianghu area, and has always achieved the position of deputy envoy of the Jinghu system.

Unlike the Zhao Fan brothers, who grew up in the army with their father and have been in the army for a long time, Bei Zhijie was promoted from the position of local officials and handled local affairs competently and decisively, but he didn't know much about the affairs of the army.

When Zheng Yunming saw him, he was leaning over to look at a topographic map of Jingxiang, and he was hesitant in his heart.

Seeing Zheng Yunming bowing down to worship, the second governor of Jinghu hurriedly stepped forward to help.

"That's it, it's really a hero out of a teenager." Bei Zhijie said kindly: "I can't do anything when I am old, and Jingxiang in the future must be a place where you juniors can make great achievements." ”

Zheng Yunming was busy thanking him, and asked again: "The deputy envoy is in a hurry to recruit Yunming to come, I don't know if there is anything to order?" ”

"Come and see." Bei Zhijie pointed to the topographic map of Jingxiang on the case: "I received a report yesterday: Fan Yongji, the governor of Junzhou, has surrendered, the Mongol army is crossing the Wudang Mountains, and the next target should be Fangzhou." ”

Fangzhou, south of Wudang Mountain, is a small state city with little defensive strength. Once the Mongols crossed the Wudang Mountains, they would be able to easily capture them.

"There is no hope for Fangzhou." Bei Zhijie frowned and said, "The next target of the Mongolian army that I am worried about. ”

He circled a large area on the map with his hand, which was from Xiazhou at the exit of the Three Gorges to Gangneung Province.

"After attacking Fangzhou, the enemy army has two routes to choose from, the first is to capture Guizhou and Xiazhou to the south, and then turn around and attack Gangneung."

"The second plan is to point to the southwest, follow the mountain road to the Jingmen army, and then take Jiangling along the south of Zhangshui."

"Exactly," Zheng Yunming said, "Generally speaking, this road is much more difficult than going down the Han River. However, the defensive force deployed by the officers and troops on this road was too weak, and most of them were only a few hundred regular soldiers, and in some places only the militia was holding on. Once the enemy came to attack, the states and counties along the road had no power to resist. ”

Bei Zhijie raised his eyes and looked at Zheng Yunming and asked, "Chief Manager Zheng thinks that the enemy should come from?" ”

This question has already been answered from the field when Zheng Yunming traveled to Jingxiang.

"If I were a Mongolian, I would definitely choose the road of Guizhou and Xiazhou." Zheng Yunming said: "Although this road is remote, there are avenues that can be directly connected all the way. ”

"From Fangzhou to Jingmen Army, they almost have to march parallel to the Jingshan Mountain Range, and the roads are all undulating mountains. There are also several rivers to cross, and according to common sense, no army will choose such a route. ”

Bei Zhijie has no actual experience in leading soldiers, and he can only nod yes to Zheng Yunming's opinion.

"Guizhou is a city by the river." Zheng Yunming groaned: "It's hard to defend. And Xiazhou is a mountain city, during the Three Kingdoms, Lu Boyan burned back Liu Xuande's 700,000 army with a fire, which shows that it was a place to use troops in ancient times. ”

"For now, it is better to go to Xiazhou with a group of soldiers and horses, seize the advantage of land advantage, and strive to intercept the Mongols going south in Xiazhou. The deputy envoy should be able to ensure the safety of Gangneung Province with the support of the naval army along the river. ”

"That's a good idea." Bei Zhijie said: "I will immediately send men and horses to Xiazhou to garrison." ”

Of course, Zheng Yunming knew the meaning behind the words of the deputy envoy of Lu Dao, he straightened up and said, "There is no need to work for other generals. ”

"I took 3,000 people from my headquarters to Xiazhou, but after our army was deployed, my lord had to respond with a naval army."

There is a naval army of thousands of people stationed in Jiangling Prefecture, with hundreds of warships, although they are not big ships, but the sailors are fishermen recruited from Taihu Lake, and they are fierce and capable of fighting. If you want to defend an important pass on the Yangtze River, you can't do it without the cooperation of the navy.

"There is no problem with this," Bei Zhijie promised, but Zheng Yunming still felt uneasy.

It has become a habit in the Song army to be greedy for life and afraid of death, and to sit back and watch friendly troops fall into a dead place without rescuing. Just a few years ago, when the dying Jin State and the Song State were at war, they often relied on more than 10,000 troops to attack everywhere in the territory of the Great Song Dynasty, relying on the inferior nature of the Song army generals to protect themselves and not want to rescue each other.

The one who has the most insight into this should be Zheng Yunming's top boss Zhao Fan. When Li Quan, the commander-in-chief of Shandong in the Song Dynasty, led the people to rebel and attack Huaidong on a large scale, Zhao Fan was the commander who commanded the rescue of the Zhulu army. Li Quan was a famous general in the world, and he was brave and famous in the north and south, and none of the more than 100,000 troops who rescued Huaidong were willing to advance to the front line.

It wasn't until Zhao Kui moved out of the emperor's order and got angry and wanted to kill people on the spot with a sword, that the generals of all walks of life reluctantly advanced to Yangzhou, and after a long battle to defend the city, Li Quan was finally killed under the city.

In view of the above examples, Zheng Yunming is not absolutely sure about the reliability of the so-called friendly rescue. But what he understood was that instead of waiting for the enemy to enter the city of Gangneung and destroy the rice on the outskirts of Gangneung City that was already waiting for harvest, it was better to take the initiative to attack and intercept the enemy under the city of Xiazhou, which was easy to defend and difficult to attack.

Of course, he would not insist on "The gentleman is worried, when this courtier is difficult?" So take the lead. What he didn't worry about was just the big and small generals of Jinghu and their troops.

Rather than entrusting the war and their lives to them, it is better to do it yourself.

Zheng Yunming thinks that he is not a hard-working person, the reason why he is so diligent in state affairs and works hard for military training is actually just that he is really afraid of death.

Of course, Wang Deng and Ge Huai couldn't see this thought at all. When Zheng Yunming issued the order to move the town to Xiazhou in front of the whole army, they were just worried about whether this little scholar was too enthusiastic.

"The soldiers retreated from the enemy in a bloody battle in Shatou City, and they are already very tired." Ge Huai couldn't help complaining: "Those who eat dry rice in Jiangling Mansion have been recuperating for a long time. With them, we don't need to mobilize our tired army."

Wang Deng also hesitated: "Although we won the first battle by luck, after all, we are inexperienced, and the soldiers are not yet able to adapt to the garrison battle of the weak against the strong under the continuous march. ”

Zheng Yunming said loudly: "The deputy envoy said that he would send a navy to assist us." ”

Wang Deng snorted coldly from the depths of his nose, obviously in his mind, the reliability of the Song Army's rescue of friendly troops was even more unreliable.

Zhu Sheng opened his mouth and asked, "If I go to the rescue, what will I do in Shatou City?" ”

"Later, the Gangneung Mansion will allocate 5,000 troops to replace us." Zheng Yunming said: "How can the sentinel in front report back? Is Tath really retired? ”

Zhu Sheng replied: "The spies followed them to the north of the Han River, and saw that they had joined the sailors, and they were marching north with the captive people, cattle and horses. ”

"In this way, the Mongolian soldiers who are preparing to go south from Wudang Mountain have become a lone army." Zheng Yunming said confidently: "If they can be intercepted in Xiazhou, then the Mongols' strategy for Jinghu should be able to end here." ”

"That would buy us a whole year of recuperation."

Later history proved that Zheng Yunming's wishful thinking was nothing more than his wishful thinking.