The year has passed, ushering in the five years of Jianwen.

The fifth year of Jianwen is destined to be an eventful autumn, after the masters from all walks of life gathered in Jiangdu and Laoshan respectively, the smell of gunpowder between the two sides is getting stronger and stronger, and there are more and more tentative fights, and the monstrous waves can often be seen on the sea surface that should be calm to the extreme in winter, no need to ask, this must be another master of the Xiaoyao realm to fight, although there is no Shangguan Xianchen this level of fighting, but the Xiaoyao realm is the Xiaoyao realm, and the debate of the six qi is far from the realm of heaven and man can be compared.

Now Jiangbei is on the offensive and Jiangnan is on the defensive, that is to say, the initiative of the war is in the hands of Xiao Yu, if he does not move, the world will be able to have a few years of peace for a while, but after Lu Qian has enough strength to go on the Northern Expedition, this is not something that Xiao Yu alone can say, so Xiao Yu does not want to dream a lot at night, and is determined to divide a winner in the fifth year of Jianwen.

After Xiao Yu basically unified Jiangbei, he began to prepare for the second southern expedition, in terms of military affairs, in Qizhou to train sailors, send Wei Ban garrison Shuzhou, prepare for the southern expedition, and at the same time send Xiao Jin to the northeast, prompting the herdsmen to return to obedience, the little emperor Qin Xian, canonized the herdsmen and Cha Mang, so that Mu Chuer rushed to the eastern capital as a hostage, to relieve the worries.

On the other hand, Xiao Yu married his righteous daughter Xiao Yuyi to the little emperor Qin Xian, stepped down as the regent, and no longer gave people the excuse of "coercing the Son of Heaven and ordering the princes", and at the same time used the cabinet and the Metropolitan Governor's Mansion to elevate the little emperor in the court, and then continued to control the court behind the scenes through the cabinet assistant Lan Yu and the metropolitan governor Xu Lin.

After seven years of training, Xiao Yu is already very handy in terms of power and art, when to do what to do, when not to do something, master the fire and the furnace perfectly, at first it may seem like a cloud and mountain fog cover, but in the end, I suddenly found that it is interlocking and not leaking.

Xiao Yu's army of sailors was to cross the river in the autumn, but the Wei Ban army stationed in Shuzhou had already moved one step earlier.

Although the spring is cold, but fortunately, Shuzhou is warm in all seasons, except for some tall mountains, there is almost no snow.

Wei Ban's army went all the way south, in just three days, one go forward more than 200 miles, almost unhindered into the Huzhou realm, obviously Lu Qian's Jiangnan defenders did not have the confidence to compete with the Northwest Army on the frontal battlefield, they could only shrink to Xiangyang and Xiangfan two cities, now Xiangyang Guard is Jiangdu Left Governor Du Mingyu, Jiangdu Right Governor Wei Huang is the garrison Xiangfan, the two are each other's horns, there is a big posture to be a turtle with a shrunken head, even if Wei Ban personally leads the troops, there is a sense of no way to start for a while.

Thirty miles outside the city of Liangxiang, there is a temporary simple military tent, Wei Ban, as the chief general of the southern expedition, summoned the generals above the commander here, together with Zhuge Gong and Tang Chunyu, a total of seventeen people.

There is a huge case in the middle of the big tent, and on it is a delicate sand table, the two Xiangcheng pools and the Han River are jumping on it, lifelike, and even some small fortresses are also marked in detail.

Wei Ban and a group of generals stood around the sand table, Wei Ban pointed to the Xiangyang City on the sand table with a sword, and said in a deep voice: "Xiangyang is located in the middle reaches of the river, after breaking Xiangyang, go down the river to the east to take the south of the Yangtze River like a broken bamboo, and to the west it is connected with Shuzhou as a whole, it can be said that it can be attacked and retreated, and it can be defended. Later, Emperor Jian learned from the pain, first took Xiangyang, forced the Great Chu royal family of Shuzhou into a desperate road, and then took Xiangyang as a foothold to capture Jiangnan, almost overturning the entire Central Plains, which shows that the weight of Xiangyang can be called the winner or loser of this battle. ”

Zhuge Gong asked softly: "Wen Shuai means that our army is going to attack Xiangyang?"

Wei Ban nodded and said: "If there is no Xiang, there will be no Huzhou, and if there is no Huzhou, Jiangnan will be at your fingertips, when Mr. Lan set a three-step strategy for the king to take Shu into the lake, sweep the south of the Yangtze River, and go straight to the Jiangdu, the key is still on a lake, and the key to the lake is in a Xiangyang." ”

Zhuge Gong said in a deep voice: " The weight of Xiangyang, Lu Qian saw it very clearly, after the first southern expedition, he regarded Xiangyang as the fundamental, related to the survival of the south of the Yangtze River, opened the city to build a city, the army training, and stored grain, and even did not hesitate to let his two generals personally guard the two Xiang, making it the first military town in the entire south of the Yangtze River, to prevent our Northwest Army from making a comeback, and now the number of defending troops in Liangxiang is almost the same as ours, if you want to attack, it is still possible to raise the whole army, and now we are just partial divisions, and it is difficult to capture Liangxiang. ”

Wei Ban said slowly: "Three hundred Zhongdu cannons, the king was ready to use these three hundred Zhongdu artillery to bombard the city wall of the eastern capital, but later Dongdu went down without a fight, and these three hundred Zhongdu artillery did not come in handy, and now the king has assigned all the three hundred Zhongdu cannons to our army." ”

The atmosphere in the tent was suddenly suffocated.

Needless to say, how powerful the Zhongdu cannon is, it was only a few dozen guns that were used to shatter the walls of Dayi Mansion, if it weren't for this, Xiao Yu would not have canonized Elena who improved the Zhongdu cannon as a viscount.

Thinking of the scene of the three hundred Zhongdu cannons roaring together, the faces of the people in the tent had a somewhat relaxed look, their own family knew their own affairs, and this Xiangyang City had not been entered, if it wasn't for the shepherd who stabbed a knife in the back, forcing Lan Yu to withdraw in a hurry, most of Huzhou should still be in the hands of the Northwest Army now! Therefore, for the thickness of the city wall of Xiangyang, everyone knows in their hearts that if 600 cannons are fired at once, this scene of the sky and the earth cracking is comparable to the blow of the free immortals, it is not impossible to break the city wall of Xiangyang City, but the defenders in the city are not decorations, and they will never let the Northwest Army put up a stable formation of 300 cannons.

Wei Ban Zhengse said: "The art of war cloud, ten are surrounded, five are attacked, and multiple is divided." But this time, Ben Shuai will do the opposite and besiege the city with a similar force!"

A meritorious veteran said cautiously: "Wen Shuai, this is to give the enemy a chance to break up, and the two cities of Xiangyang and Xiangfan are each other's horns, if both sides send troops at the same time, then our army will be a belly and back to the enemy." ”

Wei Ban sneered, "What I'm afraid of is that they don't go out of the city, these so-called defenders, in a corner of the south of the Yangtze River, have not been in war for a long time, on the other hand, our Northwest Army, the southern and northern wars, have gone through countless large and small wars, are you veterans still afraid of these recruits? Even if you meet the enemy on your back, my northwest iron cavalry should also be one hundred!"

Everyone held their breath and said in a deep voice: "No!"

It's not about arrogance, it's about the self-confidence that comes from winning one victory at a time.