Li Siye sat in Youzhou City, and the generals under his command debated an issue, whether to attack Yuguan first and enter Liaodong to eliminate Shi Siming, or go south to drive Guo Ziyi to Henan first, which is a choice that is difficult to judge based on the pros and cons.

In the Battle of Jizhou, the Flying Tiger Cavalry and the Xuanwu Artillery Battalion both suffered a lot of losses, although Guo Ziyi had withdrawn his troops to Yecheng, but if he gathered strength to make a comeback in the future, it would be enough for them to drink a pot.

There is no doubt that Guo Ziyi is the biggest enemy at the moment, and Duan Xiushi, Li Chongbao and others all suggested concentrating on cleaning up Guo Ziyi stationed in Yecheng first. Prime Minister Xu Bin raised objections, he believed that although Guo Ziyi had occupied Yecheng, he was still at a disadvantage in terms of geographical advantages, as long as Zhang Guangtao was replenished with a certain number of troops, and ordered him to hold Jizhou, it would be very difficult to advance north with the current strength of the imperial court.

And now Shi Siming retreated to Yingzhou in Liaodong, which is still within the scope of his old nest Pinglu Jiedu envoy, as long as he is left alone, Shi Siming's vitality will soon recover, and as long as our army relaxes its control over Youzhou City, he will come out of Yuguan and make a comeback to recapture Youzhou. Moreover, the forces in the eastern Liaodong region were complex and intertwined, and Shi Siming relied on the money looted from Luoyang to establish friendly and cooperative relations with many forces here, such as Murowei and Heishui Yao, and close to Bohai and Silla. If Shi Siming cooperates with these regimes to form an alliance of interests, it will not be easy to eliminate him at that time.

Li Siye seems to be difficult to decide, if he wants to go north into Liaodong, Yuguan is a very difficult bone to gnaw, and he will inevitably have to go through a long period of attack, Guo Ziyi will definitely take the opportunity to wave his army north, and he will not be very comfortable with the enemy on both sides at that time. If the pioneers who went south drove Guo Ziyi, then Shi Siming would definitely attack Youzhou from Yuguan.

He finally made up his mind to seize Yuguan in his hands first, so that he could seize the initiative and hold the road to Liaodong with relatively few troops. At that time, as long as he sends someone to hold Yuguan, he can rest assured that he will lead the army to attack Yecheng.

Li Siye immediately ordered an infantry army to go to Jizhou to change defenses with the Flying Tiger Cavalry and Xuanwu Artillery Battalion, although the two armies suffered heavy losses in the night attack some time ago, but Li Siye had a strong reserve force, as long as the troops were replenished and given a certain period of rest, he would certainly be able to recover his full prosperity.

Naturally, there is not only the Flying Tiger Cavalry under his command, the original Hexi Army, Beitinghan Navy, Anxi Mo Knife Team and Qiuzi Cavalry all belong to the Longyou Dao system, and their combat effectiveness far exceeds that of other feudal towns. In the entire Tang army array, only the northeast military camp represented by An Shi is qualified to touch them, and even the core strength of Guo Ziyi's army in the south is also from the Shuofang army in the northwest military system.

Li Siye transferred the Flying Tiger Cavalry and the Xuanwu Artillery Battalion back, naturally he would not overuse them as he did a while ago, but only used the firepower of the Xuanwu Artillery Battalion to baptize Yuguan with artillery.

The general of Yuguan is Zhang Zhongzhi, a general under Shi Siming, who belongs to the first veteran cadre who followed An Lushan to raise troops.

Yuguan is north of Yanshan, south of the Bohai Sea, blocking the throat of Liaodong and Hebei, Shi Siming arranged most of the troops to garrison here, Li Siye naturally will not wait to ignore it, he used 300 artillery pieces to display on the plain in front of the pass, the artillery fire roared endlessly every day, and with more than 100 giant Kong Ming lanterns, floating over Yuguan to drop bombs in turn.

The area of the whole Yuguan Pass is not small, there are nine small cities in a row, the Hengsai Pass is displayed as a natural danger, in order to resist the shelling and bombardment of the Hexi Army, Zhang Zhizhong ordered people to build a lot of simple bunkers on the city wall, and also built or dug a lot of Yongdao and tunnels in the city, most of the time it can be done without showing its head, but sometimes it is impossible to hide from showing up, if it is possible, Zhang Zhongzhi hopes to find a cover to cover the entire Guancheng.

This was a protracted and long offensive and defensive campaign, and in order to maintain a continuous offensive, Li Siye customized a rotation schedule for the Hebei armies, and 150,000 people rotated every seven days on average. It's a lot like a math problem in junior high and primary schools, where 150,000 people rotate every seven days to find out how many people are attacking the city every day.

After nearly a month of attacking, Yuguan was still standing, and because winter was approaching, Li Siye decided to stop the attack, and the three sides entered a short truce. He also organized the construction of workshops in the three cities of Youzhou, Yunzhou, and Jizhou, which were used to mass-produce gunpowder shells and improve artillery technology. He once thought that next year's attack on Yuguan would still be a long wrestling.

But as soon as the Shangyuan Festival of this year passed, there was a forced change of power within the pseudo-Yan, Shi Chaoyi killed his father and seized the throne, and killed his stepmother Empress and legal heir Shi Chaoqing. The source of this internal struggle comes from the selection of the heir, because of the suspicion and discord between Shi Siming and Shi Chaoyi's father and son, causing Shi Siming to set his youngest son as the legal heir, the original heir Shi Chaoyi is of course dissatisfied, thinking that once his younger brother succeeds to the throne, he will definitely suffer from the poisonous hands of his stepmother and brother.

Therefore, the amount is not a gentleman, non-toxic and not a husband, and men should be self-reliant. Everything he does is for self-preservation. As for whether the inherited power that has been snatched can be continued, this is a matter for the future.

After Shi Chaoyi succeeded in usurping the throne, the first thing he faced was that his foundation was unstable, and his ability and qualifications were difficult to convince the public.

Originally, with the strength in his hands, it was completely enough to protect himself, but in today's rebel array. Most of them are on par with Shi Siming, and these people respect An Lushan and Shi Siming as two saints, but they really have no respect for Shi's son. You hairy lad, what qualifications do you have to ride on our heads?

After Shi Chaoyi forcibly inherited the throne, he decided to go to personally command the town, saying that as the monarch of Dayan, he was willing to share weal and woe with the soldiers.

Zhang Zhongzhi was wary of him, thinking that Shi Chaoyi was trying to snatch military power from him, so he sent a letter to Shi Chaoyi to refuse, but in fact he was warning him not to step into Yuguan for half a step.

In fact, since Shi Siming's killing of An Qingxu, the entire Northeast Domain has entered a dangerous and disorderly stage of power, and the traditional legal father-son succession does not work among the warlords of the Domain. The handover of the previous ruler to the next must be the ruling faction in the military, otherwise they will soon be replaced, and this confusion continued until the early Northern Song Dynasty, and it was not until the brothers Zhao Kuangyin and Zhao Guangyi slowly got rid of it.

Shi Chaoyi had no choice but to write a letter to Zhang Zhongzhi to persuade him, but the general Tian Chengsi was not used to Zhang Zhongzhi and began to instigate Shi Chaoyi to take tough measures against Zhang Zhongzhi.

If Shi Chaoyi had a clear understanding of his current situation, he should have listened to his inner decision and adopted a policy of appeasement towards Zhang Zhongzhi.

Now most of the strength of the Yan army is in the hands of Zhang Zhongzhi, Li Huaixian and Tian Chengsi. Before Shi Chaoyi usurped the throne, he only had a pro-military camp in his hands, not even the crown prince, and the prince was also deprived by his father. If he wants to integrate the entire Yan army, he needs to make a false relationship between these three people, use the contradictions between them to check and balance each other, and finally concentrate power on himself.

Of course, Shi Chaoyi did not have such an imperial manipulation technique, not only could he not control these three people, but also made Tian Chengsi whisper in his ear all day long, trying to encourage him to deal with Zhang Zhongzhi.

"Your Majesty, Yuguan is the gateway to Pinglu, Zhang Zhongzhi commanded 50,000 troops in Guancheng, but he did everything he could to prevent His Majesty from going to the town, this is not a backbone."

Shi Chaoyi asked hesitantly: "Tian Gong, it is precisely because of his excessive military power that I can't act rashly, in case he makes any radical moves, so that he leads his troops to attack Yingzhou, wouldn't it be for Li Siye of Youzhou to reap the benefits." ”

"What is Your Majesty worried about? There are soldiers and horses under my command here in Yingzhou, and there are Khitan soldiers under Li Huaixian in Liaodong City, and both of us are loyal to you. If His Majesty is worried that he will switch to Li Siye, he can find a way to lure him to Yingzhou City to kill him. ”

Shi Chaoyi was finally moved, and asked excitedly, "How to booby-trap?" ”

Tian Chengsi leaned into his ear and whispered: "The third day of the next month is Zhang Zhongzhi's birthday, Your Majesty can plan in advance to expand Zhang Zhongzhi's mansion in Yingzhou City, and crown him as the king of the county, so as to eliminate his vigilance." Then he first crowned his son's official position, and deceived his family members into Yingzhou City to treat him politely. On the eve of his birthday, he invited him to Yingzhou on the grounds of holding a banquet in Yingzhou to celebrate his birthday, and ambushed the knife and axe hand at the birthday banquet in advance. ”