During the Lantern Festival, the Emperor of Heaven celebrated with the people, which made Yanjing City lively for a while, and then the night of Yanjing City fell into the cold silence of the curfew.

This is already the eighth year of the fall of Yanjing, and Ye Zier has been the emperor in Yanjing City for eight years, although most of the officials trapped in Yanjing City chose to surrender at that time, but the hearts of the people in Yanjing City are still far from being attached.

After the Battle of Jingxiang, the anti-Hu movement in Yanjing City was even more surging, and there was a tendency to move from behind the scenes to the front of the stage, and several assassinations were also carried out, which made Yanjing City loud and quiet-

The Nine Cities Soldiers and Horses Division also destroyed several secret strongholds of resistance forces in the city, but none of them interfered with Huaidong's intelligence line - break your toes and think about it, anyone can think that Huaidong has a very deep eyeline lurking in Yanjing, but it can't be dug out, so it can only use barbaric military means such as curfew to suppress the role that Huaidong's hidden personnel can play in Yanjing City.

The result of the battle of Jingxiang was a great shock to people's hearts. Although the princes and grand dukes of Yanhu still have strong self-confidence, for the Han people in Yanjing City and those Hanchens who are not very willing to join Hulu, they all think that the day of the Northern Expedition of the king can be expected - it is difficult to use Yanhu's secret room and secret agents to infiltrate Jiangning, while Huaidong's secret room and secret agents infiltrate Yanjing and lurk easily.

The only regret is that among the underground resistance forces in Yanjing City, there are many people who regard the Yuan clan as orthodox and have strong resistance to Huaidong, which makes Huaidong's latent network in Yanjing City unable to fully grasp the underground resistance forces. Many resistance forces, in their own positions, did not follow orders and did not take orders on their own, often resulting in unnecessary casualties, which also made it more difficult for Huaidong's sleepers in Yanjing to carry out their work.

I'm not afraid of a wolf-like opponent, I'm afraid of a pig-like teammate--it was also a case of assassination of the prefect of the plain a year ago, the assassination failed, and the assassin was arrested and couldn't stand the punishment, which led to the leakage of the secret intelligence station of the Military Intelligence Department of the Military Department in Hebi, and the loss of nearly 20 latent intelligence officers at a time in the early stage of the Northern Expedition, from Jinan to the plain to Cangzhou and Jinhai, the secret strongholds were all forced to be transferred, and the communication line was not restored until the Lantern Festival, and the loss was great.

The Northern Yan Jiucheng Soldiers and Horses Division, who specialized in arresting and arresting thieves, did not know that their destruction of the Hebi intelligence station would cause such a big loss to the intelligence work of the Huaidong Military Intelligence Division in the north. Occasionally, when people who were sick at night and rescued doctors walked around, they would also intercept the soldiers and horses patrolling the city, completely ignoring the urgent illness of their family members and seeking medical treatment, but brutally brought back the soldiers and horses to be tortured and interrogated.

For a city with hundreds of thousands of mouths, such tragedies happen every night.

There are nine gates in Yanjing City, only the Xicheng Taiyang Gate for firewood and water trucks to enter and exit after nightfall, and the other eight gates are closed, and they are not allowed to open under very special circumstances.

When the stars and moon were in the sky, Tong Huacheng, the overseer of the West Temple, who was in charge of intelligence affairs in the Southern Dynasty, galloped to the Shengtai Gate under the escort of dozens of horsemen, looked up at the dim wind lantern in front of the city gate tower, and remembered that Jiangning City had begun to implement the use of glass lamps as street lamps, and he could especially feel the gap between the north and the south.

Tong Huacheng is a Han citizen in Liaodong, although he is still a Han person, but he has to be given the surname Tong, and he has entered the Donghu noble family, and he has regarded himself as a Hu person from the bottom of his bones - unlike other ministers in charge of espionage, Tong Huacheng has twice disguised himself and lurked in Jiangning, Chongzhou and other places for several months to understand the Southern Dynasty, and he is actually one of the officials who has the deepest understanding of the Southern Dynasty and Huaidong in Northern Yan.

It is precisely because of this that Yezir relied so much on him in the espionage affairs of the Southern Dynasties.

Tong Huawei should have returned to Yanjing after the year and told the Emperor of the Mandate of Heaven that the situation in Xushou and Yihai was abnormal, but it happened that Hebi smashed an ambush stronghold of the Huaidong Military Intelligence Division and captured sixteen sleepers in Huaidong alive. Tong Huacheng temporarily rushed to Hebi and personally arrested the torture, which was delayed for more than half a month.

Although Huaidong's military stronghold in the north was quickly transferred, Tong Huacheng's trip to Hebi was still a great gain, and after leaving Hebi, he rushed back to Yanjing on horseback.

Entering the city from Shengtai Gate, Tong Chenghua rushed directly to the office of the West Temple Supervisor in Yanjing City, and his subordinates asked him: "Does Lord Tong go back to the house to rest, or do you spend the night in the small room in the back?" ”

"The emperor wants me to return to Beijing as soon as I return to Beijing," Tong Hua said to his subordinates, "You go to the palace with me, if the emperor rests, we will rest without delay......

Tong Huacheng and his subordinates had just left the government office, and the courtiers sent by Yezier to summon him hurried over: "Lord Tong, the emperor knows that you have returned to Beijing, and he specially summons you to ......."

Hurried to Yezier's tomb, Tong Huacheng entered the hall and kowtowed, and saw that in addition to Fan Wenlan, the governor of Henan, Ye Ji Luorong, the king of Chengji County, was also in the palace, and hurriedly saluted him: "When did the prince and Lord Fan return to Beijing?" ”

"I was going to Hebi to meet you, but there was a temporary incident in Jinzhong, Wen Lan and I borrowed the road from Jinzhong to return to Beijing, but I didn't expect it to be two days earlier than your kid." Ye Ji Luorong sat next to Ye Zier and responded to Tong Huacheng's words.

Fan Wenlan was originally one of Yezier's most relied on Hanchen of Liaodong; Since the strategic focus was on the Western Front a few years ago, Ye Zier sent Fan Wenlan to Ye Ji Luorong as an assistant, responsible for the grain and straw on the Western Front and the operation of Hezhong Province.

Jingxiang was defeated, and Yezier also had to leave Fan Wenlan in Hezhong Mansion to stabilize the defense of the western line of Hehuai. Now Dong Yuan has different intentions, and he can't urinate in the same pot as Huaidong, which actually greatly reduces the military pressure on Northern Yan on the Western Front. Ye Ji Luorong also has to take the responsibility for the fiasco of Jingxiang, Ye Zier can't immediately transfer him back to be reused, temporarily summon him back to ask for advice, and then he will still be sent to Hezhong Mansion to sit in charge of the defense of the western line of Hehuai, but Fan Wenlan will stay in Beijing.

Ye Zier's health is getting worse and worse, Zhang Xie is an old fox again, and the other princes and ministers have no particularly powerful figures, so they can only summon Fan Wenlan back from Hehuai as an assistant.

Tong Huacheng knew that Fan Wenlan would be transferred back to Yanjing, but he didn't expect that the Emperor of Heavenly Mandate would also summon the eldest prince to Yanjing for advice, which shows that the Emperor of Heavenly Mandate also saw the current situation in his mind to be at a critical moment.

"You get up quickly," Ye Jier asked Tong Huacheng to get up, and asked the courtiers to bring Tong Huacheng a small couch to give him a seat, and asked a little impatiently, "What do you get from going to Hebi......

"Huaidong's military intelligence chief in Hecheng died in arresting and resisting, and if he failed to catch this key person, the information that can be pulled out is not complete," Tong Chenghua sat in a precarious position, detailing the results of his trip to Hebi, and said, "But he still took out some information that the Western Temple Supervisor had not grasped before." First, there are big people in Huaidong who recently passed through Shandong and sneaked into Taihang Mountain. The specific characters are unknown, but the rank will not be lower than the brigade commander. When the slaves rushed to Hebi, they missed the opportunity to round up, which was a pity. In addition to this unknown big man, in the past six months, Huaidong has transferred as many as 100 people to Taihang Mountain through Hebi. Nuchen estimates that, with the addition of other lines, Huaidong may have sent more than 200 people to Taihang Mountain in the past six months......"

"It's so dense!" Ye Zier gasped when he heard this, patted the long case angrily, and ordered the courtiers beside him with anger on his face, "Draft, Ye Jiduodi will dismiss the officials of Hebi and Pingyuan from their posts and investigate them, immediately cut off the passage downstream of the river, and all business travel transit will be strictly regulated, and no one from the Southern Dynasty can be asked to cross the border from Shandong and Henan again......"

Ye Ji Luorong's expression also suddenly became solemn.

Previously, all kinds of signs, including Yue Lengqiu's leadership of Zhengyang and Wuyang, the princes and grand dukes of Yanjing tended to think that Lin Jian was preparing for the usurpation of the throne and becoming the emperor, but in the past six months, the Southern Dynasty has sent such intensive lurkers to the Taihang Mountains, which shows that the Southern Dynasty is actively preparing for the Northern Expedition.

Taihang Mountain is thousands of miles long, the west is connected with Jinshan, the north is connected with Yanshan, the terrain is intricate, the resistance forces rise and fall one after another, together is the henchman of Jin Ji, it is very difficult to exterminate. Especially after the Battle of Jingxiang, the ordinary people of Jin Ji were ready to move, not only secretly exchanging materials with the resistance forces, but also assisting in ventilating and reporting from time to time, making it difficult to carry out the attack and go deep into the depths of Taihang Mountain.

Yanjing can only roughly know the scale of the resistance forces in Taihang Mountain at the moment, from thirteen in the early years to today's Five Army Alliance, with a total strength of about 20,000 people.

Although the equipment of these resistance forces is very poor, and the force is not very strong, for many years they have only taken advantage of the steep and deep terrain of the Taihang Mountain to resist stubbornly, but their ability to fight out of the mountains is not strong. However, Taihang Shanxi is connected to Jinzhong, east to Yanji, south to Henan, and also adjacent to the plains and Hebi of Shandong.

Once the Southern Dynasties organized a large army from Hehuai and Shandong to the north to attack the Henan and Shandong defense lines of the Northern Yan, these resistance forces would unite and go out of the Taihang Mountains to strike at the flanks of the Henan and Shandong defense lines and destroy the grain, and the problem would be quite thorny.

"It is said that the East China Sea Fox is good at using suspicions," Fan Wenlan frowned and said, "Jing Xiang's battle was too hasty, and I feel especially deeply at this time......

Tong Huacheng can understand the deep meaning of Fan Wenlan's words.

They had previously thought that Lin Jian would usurp the throne and claim the throne first, so they would make an active attack on the Henan and Shandong defense lines; It is not that it will really use troops against the Huaidong army's defense line in Xusi and Yihai, but to give Dong Yuan, who is guarding Xuchang, the courage to confront Huaidong.

If the soldiers and horses of the Northern Yan do not press up, Dong Yuan will face a flank attack from Nanyang, Zhengyang in the north and Wuyang in the west. Xuchang's foundation is too poor, Lin Jian really transferred 100,000 elites to attack it, it is hard to imagine that Dong Yuan can last a month in Xuchang. And once the soldiers and horses of Beiyan pressed up, even if Dong Yuan did not accept Lin Lian's usurpation of the throne and became emperor, Lin Lian would not dare to use troops against Xuchang easily.

If Lin Jian usurped the throne and became emperor, Beiyan must win over Dong Yuan and support him to support the Cao family's new emperor in Yuzhou.

Looking at the past six months, Huaidong has sent two or three hundred lurkers to Taihang Mountain, and it seems that Huaidong is going to go on the Northern Expedition first, but it is also likely that Huaidong is suspicious and confuses the sight here.

Once it is determined that Huaidong will go on the Northern Expedition first, especially if it does everything possible to strengthen its control over the resistance of the Taihang Army, Yanbei will not only not be able to press its forces to the outer defense line, but also retain quite strong troops in the northern and southern Shanxi regions adjacent to the Taihang Mountain, so as to ensure that when the outer defense line resists the Huaibei Expeditionary Army, the butt of the Shandong and Henan defense lines will not be stabbed by the soldiers and horses of the Taihang Mountain Resistance......

Ye Zier sighed thornily: "The information brought by Huacheng is very important, but if this information is deliberately released by Huaidong, and we believe it to be true, the troops in the Shandong and Henan defense areas are all focused on the inside, which is actually equivalent to asking Huaidong to have two or three hundred lurkers to stabilize 100,000 soldiers and horses!" ”

The troops deployed by the Northern Yan on the defense line of Shandong and Henan have reached 260,000 people, but at present, the main focus is on the inner line, especially the cavalry corps, which are concentrated in the southern Jinnan and northern Shandong regions.

If these soldiers and horses don't press south and don't give Dong Yuan strong support, once Lin Jian usurps the throne and becomes emperor, Dong Yuan probably doesn't have the courage to directly raise the banner of supporting the Yuan imperial family to oppose Lin Lian's claim to be emperor - Xuchang's foundation is too weak, Yue Lengqiu and his banner are clearly attached to Huaidong, if there is any change in Xuchang, the Changhuai army in Wuyang and Zhengyang is likely to pounce fiercely and bite hard; If Dong Yuan wants to resist Lin Yu, he must at least be able to withstand the first wave of offensive.

Dong Yuan's soldiers and horses in Xuchang are not monolithic, Lin Tie usurped the throne and became the emperor, Dong Yuan immediately raised the banner of supporting Yuan and opposing Lin, and he could use this to tie all his soldiers and horses to a warship. And Dong Yuan can't immediately raise the banner of supporting Yuan and opposing Lin, he will lose his righteous name in the future, and can only be embarrassed to be caught in the middle, and Lin Yuan will have enough means to divide Xuchang's soldiers and horses in order to achieve the goal of completely weakening and eliminating Dong Yuan.

"Yue Lengqiu chose this time to openly surrender to Huaidong, just like a knife against Xuchang's waist," Ye Ji Luorong said, "The deployment of troops on the Shandong side can be different, but in the front of Wuyang, two to thirty thousand elites should be sent to press down the new commander Huai's army, so as to support Xuchang." ”

"Send an additional 20,000 to 30,000 soldiers and horses to the front of Voryang, then Jinnan's troops will be empty," Ye Jier felt that his head was swollen and painful, which had seriously affected his thinking, and asked Ye Jiluo Rong and Fan Wenlan, "Can you draw 20,000 soldiers and horses from Yanjing and Jinhai to make up for it?" If things do not develop as we expected, we must also step up the attack on the bandits in Taihang Mountain, and we cannot let this elbow and armpit problem harm the overall situation in the future. ”

Tong Huacheng was in charge of spying on the military situation, and he didn't dare to intervene casually about the general affairs, listening to the Emperor of Heaven's Mandate discussing with the eldest prince and Fan Wenlan and deciding to transfer another 20,000 soldiers and horses from the hinterland of Yan Ji to the southern front in case of emergency, and said: "In the intercepted information, in recent months, there have been many ambush fire crossbows, third-level battleships, fourth-level battleships and other buildings, and the slaves thought that they had to take a closer look......