"Do we still have a chance to win?" Although Xiao Jing was a little skeptical of Wang Rui's words, it was precisely because he knew Wang Rui's talent that Xiao Jing immediately stopped and turned around when he heard Wang Rui say this: "Brother Wang, I don't know what the opportunity to win is?" ”

Looking at Xiao Jing, who was nearly fifty years old but still personable, Wang Rui smiled and said to him, "My lord, where do you want to go if you want to leave here?" ”

Seeing that Xiao Jing was not angry, Wang Rui continued: "According to my observation on weekdays, I see that although the little marquis is amiable to his subordinates and the people on weekdays, he is very resentful of those who have offended him and the general. ”

Before Wang Rui's words fell, he saw Xiao Jing's back tremble imperceptibly, it seems that Xiao Jing is also quite jealous of Wang Ze in his heart, in case he quietly leaves Jiaozhou, Jiaozhou City and the subsequent states and counties are quickly taken by the Qi army, and finally lead to Wang Yong's defeat and misfortune, then Wang Ze will definitely go crazy.

Crazy people have always liked to find someone to settle accounts, and the one who took the lead in escaping and causing his morale to be low was Wang Ze's punching bag, so no matter where he ran to, Wang Ze would come to settle accounts with himself, not to mention that the relationship between the Southern Dynasty and Wang Ze who wanted to escape was also good.

No matter what Xiao Jing thought in his heart, Wang Rui continued: "Your Excellency, you must know that although there are few soldiers in Jiaozhou City today, there are still 7,000 soldiers guarding the city, and there are nearly 100,000 people in the city, as long as they are mobilized, they can mobilize tens of thousands of young people to help defend the city, as long as the adults and others have been holding on in the city, they can hold the city and wait for the arrival of the general's reinforcements!" ”

Xiao Jing was quite moved by what Wang Rui said, thinking about it carefully, Jiaozhou City is far taller and stronger than Nanqingzhou City, and there are so many soldiers in the city, as long as they can strengthen their determination to defend the city, they will always be able to defend it, and if they abandon Jiaozhou City, there will be no place to stop the Qi army.

It's just that when I think of the so-called 7,000 soldiers in Jiaozhou City now, Xiao Jing's head is big, is the militia also considered a soldier, and now at least more than 5,000 of the 7,000 people in the city are militiamen, and they are basically recruits who have just participated in a few months of training.

People have a desire for power, as long as they have the right, they want to be able to control it, since the decline of Xiao Liang, after Xiao Jing defected to Wang Yong, it took so many years to go through so many hardships, and it was not easy to get to this point!

If there is a chance, where is Xiao Jing willing to give up the status he has obtained from Wang Yong, and now Xiao Jing is at least one of the top five senior officials in terms of officials under Wang Yong, and if it is in terms of qualifications, it is second only to Wang Yong's old department Lu Wen.

Wait until one day in the future, if Wang Yong achieves great things and ascends the throne as emperor, he can at least be a scholar or something.

As if for Xiao Jing's confidence, Wang Rui said to him again: "My lord doesn't know yet, when I came over just now, the messenger from Jiaozhou Port sent an urgent report, saying that the reinforcements led by Shen Sanshui and Shen Duwei of Jiaozhou Port are about to arrive, and now they are only more than 20 miles away from the state capital, and they will definitely be able to enter the city tonight!" ”

Although Jiaozhou and Jiaozhou Port are both called Jiaozhou, but the two are not the same thing, today's Jiaozhou is near Zhucheng in later generations, and Jiaozhou Port is near Qingdao in later generations, and the two are at least more than 100 miles apart in a straight line.

Since receiving an urgent report from Jiaozhou City three days ago, Shen Sanshui was in a hurry, and immediately gathered the 3,000 elite infantry under his command, casually packed up some salutes and prepared to set off from Jiaozhou Port to Jiaozhou City for rescue.

Later, it was Kong Yi, the chief civil affairs officer of Jiaozhou Port, who stopped him and asked him to first hand over the shore garrison of Jiaozhou Port and the port to the Yue Haichao Department of the Navy stationed in Jiaozhou Port, and then summoned the militia of Jiaozhou Port and its surroundings to gather and assist the Navy to defend the city, and Shen Sanshui was able to set off again.

However, although it was delayed for most of the day in Jiaozhou Port, thanks to the convenience of Jiaozhou Bay without freezing, Yue Haichao directly sent Shen Sanshui's troops to the official road to Jiaozhou at the mouth of the Laihe River overnight with naval ships, which saved almost a day's time for Shen Sanshui's troops to march.

Therefore, although the Jiaozhou Port where Shen Sanshui is located is about the same distance from Jiaozhou City as other states and counties, it is the first batch of reinforcements from the surrounding states and counties, and the reinforcements from Shen Sanshui can be regarded as the largest group of troops that can be sent nearby.

Knowing that Shen Sanshui was not far from the city, Xiao Jing's heart that had been uneasy was relieved a lot, and with the addition of Shen Sanshui's elite infantry army, there were at least more than 4,000 regular troops in the city.

There is such a large number of regular troops with more than 5,000 militiamen, the most important thing is that Jiaozhou City finally has generals who can preside over the overall situation, and then rely on the tall and strong city of Jiaozhou City to resist the Qi army that does not carry large siege equipment, so that it can resist for at least ten days or so, and by that time Wang Yong's reinforcements can arrive no matter how slow they are.

However, there is one thing that Xiao Jing did not think of, how many reinforcements Wang Yong could send under the frontal containment of the hundreds of thousands of troops of the Hu Lawyers Association and Murong Qi.

A large army marched along the winding valley of the tributaries of the Wei River without stopping, and even the thick snow in the valley and the mountain roads made more steep by the ice and snow could not stop them for a moment.

The beetle that should have been in the middle of the army unexpectedly appeared at the forefront of the army, Dugu Yongye was elected to lead the team in front in order to boost morale, since the generals are in the front, the soldiers also mustered up all their strength to move forward.

Although it is no longer snowing, Dugu Yongye can still feel the cold air in the air, compared to Dugu Yongye, who is stationed in Heyang all the year round, the tens of thousands of Qi soldiers from the Northern Xinjiang Town Army under his command, because they used to be stationed in the cold Northern Xinjiang all year round, but they are more suitable for the current climate.

Since overcoming Guan Shuai at the cost of thousands of dead and wounded, Dugu Yongye still snowed heavily regardless of the sky, and after staying for a while in Guan Shuai, he led tens of thousands of infantry troops to set off in advance. every day

It was already very embarrassing to be delayed for ten days in front of Guan Shuai Pass, a small pass that had never been mentioned before, if it was blocked on the road by the heavy snow for a few days, but Wang Yong's side came back with reinforcements in time, then he would be embarrassed and embarrassed, not to mention, he would have to run in vain.

In order to seize time, Dugu Yongye left the tens of thousands of cavalry who were inconvenient to pass due to snowy weather behind the large army, and personally led the infantry to set off first, although at the beginning there were many obstacles set up by Li Shun, the captain of the Jiaozhou garrison who came to support Guan Shuai, along the way, and even attacked the Qi army many times at night, but limited to the number of troops, after all, it could not add too much trouble to the Qi army.

When the Qi army went down the river to the open place of the river valley, the tall Jiaozhou city wall was displayed in front of Dugu Yongye, the city was surrounded by water on one side of the mountain on both sides, and it was also an easy place to defend and difficult to attack.

Meng Lingtong, who was wearing a robe, also followed at this time, but because he was a scribe, after all, his physical strength was not as good as that of the soldiers, and his pace was far from keeping up with the pace of the soldiers, so Dugu Yongye specially arranged for eight soldiers to take care of him along the way.

In order to allow Meng Lingtong to keep up with the army, Dugu Yongye also specially arranged for the craftsmen accompanying the army to make a pair of chairs for him, which can be regarded as robbing Li Shimin's invention in advance.

In this way, Dugu Yongye's careful arrangement made Meng Lingtong even more grateful, and suddenly gave birth to a feeling of death for a confidant.

Seeing that Meng Lingtong came to his side and did not fall, Dugu Yongye laughed and stepped forward to take Meng Lingtong's hand and said, "Sir, is your health okay all the way?" If there is anything uncomfortable, please explain it one by one, after all, Mr.'s body is important! ”

Seeing that Dugu Yongye cared so much about himself, Meng Lingtong was even more grateful with tears in his eyes: "On the next road, I was taken care of by a few strong men, and I didn't expect that the little official in the next section would be so courteous to the general, and he would just die for the general!" ”

"Where did Mr. say what he said, if it wasn't for Mr. to give advice along the way, how could Shiji (Dugu Yongye) build such a great achievement, now Wang Yong has been a fish on the chopping board, and we are a knife, how to slaughter the knife and listen to Mr.'s teaching!"

As soon as it came to marching and fighting, Meng Lingtong immediately came to his senses, he tightened the clothes on his body, stood on a high ground on the edge of the river valley with Dugu Yongye, pointed to the Jiaozhou city in the distance, and said: "For today's great general, the first step to recover the land of Sanqi is to capture this big city!" ”

"Sir, now that the hinterland of the land of Sanqi is empty, why can't you bypass this city and directly attack Qingzhou and Qizhou?" Dugu Yongye saw that Meng Lingtong's words were a little different from his own thoughts, and immediately asked.

Meng Lingtong said disapprerovitously: "The general is an expert in marching and fighting, and I shouldn't have said this, but if we take Jiaozhou City before we think about defeat, we will have an important place to attack, retreat and defend, even if we can't recover the land of Sanqi, we will also seize an important place in the future!" ”

Dugu Yongye nodded after hearing this: "Yes, Mr. is full of concern, but I just want to win with surprise, but I forget that you shouldn't be lucky in the war, and it is safest to attack with a dignified army!" ”

Originally, Dugu Yongye had 50,000 soldiers and 30,000 soldiers from Northern Xuzhou, and later sent the general Dugu Sheng to lead 10,000 town troops and 10,000 former Northern Xuzhou soldiers to stay in Northern Xuzhou to defend against the possible attack of Nanchen, and stationed 1,000 to 3,000 soldiers and horses in Guanshuai, Pingyi and other important places along the way, so that there were 10,000 people, and then excluding the 5,000 soldiers consumed before Guan Shuai closed the city, now the army under Dugu Yongye still has more than 45,000 people.

These armies say a lot less but not too much, there are still a lot of uncertainties in the later battles, if you can capture Jiaozhou City first, and then use it as a base to attack the three Qi, it is also a good guarantee for the probability of winning the later battles.

Seeing that Dugu Yongye had followed his advice, Meng Lingtong was still quite happy, and he continued: "The defenders captured from Guan Shuai once confessed that there were only 1,500 defenders in Jiaozhou City at most, and it was the hundreds of soldiers led by Li Shun, the captain of Jiaozhou, who attacked and harassed us a few days ago, so that as soon as Li Shun was injured, there would be no generals in the city, and he would definitely be able to fight down!" ”

"But we have been delayed outside the official city for too long before, will there be a lot of troops waiting inside the city now?" Dugu Yongye is still a little worried.

Meng Lingtong waved his hand and said: "The heavy snow has been falling for so long, and the reinforcements will be blocked by the heavy snow, and when we capture Jiaozhou City and then go downstream along the Wei River to seize Gaomi County, then we can divide the land of Sanqi occupied by Wang Yong into east and west."

"After capturing Gaomi County, you can attack Donglai County, Changguang County, and Jiaozhou Port in Gwangju to the east, and follow the flat road built by Wang Yong to the west, and you can fight to Qizhou along the flat road built by Wang Yong, so that Wang Yong will be under the enemy's back, and it will not be long before the army will be in chaos and lose money."

"Hahaha, it's interesting to think about, Wang Yong has worked hard to build such a flat avenue, but it has provided us with such a great convenience for the strategy of Sanqi!" Dugu Yongye laughed.

"Yes! Wang Yong's road repair was also good, but after all, he was born as a thief, and the overall situation was much weaker! Otherwise, where would we have the opportunity to make a great contribution! Meng Lingtong was also deeply touched.

Dugu Yongye turned to the soldiers beside him and said: "Pass the order, the army can make food, and attack the city in two hours!" I'm going to stay in the city tonight! ”

At this moment, the low sound of the horn was heard in the city, and the horn of battle sounded!