Hundreds of years later, when the world looked back on this period of ups and downs in history, they suddenly found that in just a few dozen days in the winter of the second year of the Xia calendar (Wang Yong's year name) (559), the Middle Earth Divine Continent centered on the Central Plains suddenly had a number of major events that were enough to affect the course of later history.

Overseas, Wang Ze sent a large number of troops to open up a sea base to the South and Western Oceans in the winter of that year, and also began to develop the Whale Island, Sakhalin Island, and Heilongjiang River basins.

In the Central Plains, these major events involved almost all the countries at that time, from the Southern Chen of the Southern Dynasty to the Northern Qi of the Northern Dynasty and even the Northern Zhou Dynasty, far-reaching events were happening, and no one paid attention to the Western Liang who survived under the protection of the Northern Zhou.

First of all, in October of the third year of Chen Yongding, the eloquent Emperor Chen Baxian could not survive the cold winter of the Southern Dynasty and died, and in November, under the pressure of many old departments, fathers, and generals of Chen Baxian, Empress Zhang Yaoer could not withstand the huge pressure and had to agree to be taken by Chen Baxian's nephew Chen Qian to ascend to the throne and inherit Chen Baxian's throne.

Then, also at the end of November, Chen Baxian's sixth son, Chen Chang, finally set off from Anlu in the territory of the Northern Zhou Dynasty through the war zone between the Southern Chen and the Northern Zhou, and safely entered the territory of the Southern Chen, and soon he met Hou Andu, the general of the Southern Chen who crossed the river to meet him.

When Chen Chang crossed the river by boat that night, he was also pushed into the river by Hou Andu at night and drowned when there was no one in the night, and he didn't know if this kid was stupid after reading so many books, but he only felt that he was Chen Baxian's son-in-law, but he forgot that no matter who he was, he would go crazy for power.

Although Hou Andu is Chen Baxian's close comrade-in-arms, he has been closely related to Chen Qian over the years, and he will definitely continue to reuse Hou Andu after Chen Qian ascends the throne.

In the original history, Emperor Wenxuan Gao Yang, the founder of the Northern Qi Dynasty, should have died of illness in the same month as Chen Baxian, but now history has changed a lot by Wang Ze, Gao Yang has long been tossed by Wang Yong, Wang Ze and his son to report to his father Gao Huan a year in advance.

However, history often has his stubbornness, although there is no Northern Qi Emperor Gao Yang to be his companion, this time Chen Baxian has the Northern Zhou Ming Emperor Yu Wenyu as a companion to go to Huangquan, and it is rare for the two emperors to die together.

Yuwen Yu is the eldest son of the founder of the Western Wei Dynasty, Yuwen Tai Yuwen Black Otter, the first emperor of the Northern Zhou Dynasty (then called the Heavenly King) Xiao Min Emperor Yuwen Jue was his third brother, since the beginning of the year Yuwen Hu returned to power, because of his hard work, the rule of the Qing Dynasty caused the jealousy of the Northern Zhou Dynasty minister Yu Wen Hu.

More importantly, because Yu Wenyu prefers Sinology, and ignores the Futu Sect that the Xianbei people trusted before, which greatly aroused the uneasiness of the Futu Sect in the Northern Zhou Dynasty, so at the beginning of November of this year, with the support of the Futu Sect, Yuwen Hu secretly instructed Li An, a palace man, to quietly poison the sugar cake that Yuwen Yu liked to eat, and poisoned Yuwen Yu, who was twenty-seven years old at the time.

In fact, Yu Wenyu also knew who poisoned him, but he knew that if he exposed Yuwen Hu, it would inevitably lead to the killing of all his brothers and relatives, so before he died, Yu Wenyu endured the pain and pretended not to know who poisoned him, and designated the fourth brother Yu Wenyong to take the throne.

This young man, who was known as Emperor Wu of the Northern Zhou Dynasty in later generations, was only seventeen years old at this time, and Yuwen Hu felt that Yuwen Yong was younger and easier to control, so he agreed to Yu Wenyu's decision, but now Yu Wenhu, the powerful minister of the Northern Zhou Dynasty, probably didn't know that it was the shy young man in front of him who would take his life in the future.

In Sanqi is also this month, according to Wang Yong's new calendar to calculate it is the second year of the summer calendar, Xia Gong Wang Yong used the improved sleigh to break through the dilemma of heavy snow blocking the road for days, and rushed to Jiaozhou City a few days in advance, and then Wang Yong defeated the 60,000 elite army of Northern Qi led by the famous general Dugu Yongye of Northern Qi with weak troops, so that tens of thousands of Qi troops ambushed the city, shocked the world.

However, the above mentioned major events that will affect future generations are only the problems that later generations have summarized and discovered when looking at this period of history, and the most shocking thing about this winter is that after a long stalemate, the war in Jeju and Jebuk County, which lasted for more than half a year, seems to have begun to turn around.

The turning point was not anything else, but the two wide rivers of the Yellow River and Jishui, which had not frozen for nearly a hundred years, had frozen over, and it was a thick layer of ice that was enough to pass through the carriages and horses.

Originally, the river froze and Wang Yong could also send troops to break the ice on the river like the Northern Zhou at this time, but because the river froze too suddenly, Wang Yong's army defending the south bank of the Yellow River had no time to prepare, and was seized by the Qi army commander Hu Lawyers Association.

The Hu Lawyers Association, who was supposed to command 200,000 Qi troops on the front line in Jeju, suddenly appeared on the north bank of the Yellow River on the opposite bank of Qizhou, and took advantage of the freezing of the two major rivers of the Yellow River and Jishui, and quickly crossed the Yellow River and Jishui in succession, occupying the gateway of the entire Sanqi land - Qizhou.

Suddenly, the two sides changed their offensive and defensive positions, and the situation immediately became very unfavorable to Wang Yong, not to mention that Wang Yong of Jinan City in Qizhou stored a large amount of grain, grass and weapons here, which could greatly replenish the Qi army, and there were also Qizhou Assassin Shi Puyangxun, Cheng Chong's eldest daughter Cheng Xueying and old son-in-law Zhou Cheng in Jinan City.

What made Wang Yong even more anxious was that once Qizhou was occupied by the Qi army, the back road of the hundreds of thousands of troops who were originally fighting with the Qi army on the front line of Jeju and Jibei County would be cut off, and as long as the Qi army occupying Qizhou and the Qi army on the frontal battlefield were attacked from both sides, they could quickly capture all the hundreds of thousands of troops that occupied more than 80 percent of Wang Yong's total strength.

Originally, because the weather was colder than in previous years, the section of the Yellow River and Jishui River from the Jeju section of the river to the mouth of the sea began to float countless ice floes on the wide river surface at the end of October, and even caused the naval armies of the Northern Qi and Wang Yong, who were originally fighting on the river from time to time, to be in a useless state.

At this time, the Yellow River and Jishui can be said to be completely impassable, and at this time, the Yellow River and Jishui really formed a moat that was enough to resist the Northern Qi army.

During this time, people on both sides of the river could hear the sound of a large amount of ice floe crashing into the river every night in the dead of night, and even countless ice floes drifted down the river into the sea, forming large pieces of ice floe.

When Wang Ze returned to Qingzhou, he encountered a large area of ice on the northern coast of Qingzhou, and suddenly froze because these ice floes from the Yellow River and Jishui were blown there by the north wind.

After the time entered November, the weather became colder and colder, and the two rivers of the Yellow River and Jishui turned to the northeast from the two places of North Yuzhou and West Yanzhou respectively after flowing through Henan, and the two rivers flowed from the southwest to the northeast in this section of Shandong in the later generations, so that the section of the river that entered the sea downstream was colder because it was in a more northern position.

In later generations, many people who lived along the lower reaches of the Yellow River in Shandong, or along the Yellow River in Hetao, Inner Mongolia, may have heard of Lingxun, which is now said because the temperature of the downstream is lower than that of the upstream, resulting in the downstream river surface freezing earlier than the upstream river surface, so that the upstream river water is not flowing smoothly and continues to accumulate and impact the flood season formed by the riverbank.

The situation is the same today, because of the unusually cold climate this year, the river surface has long been full of ice floes, and a few days later, another powerful cold current blowing from the hinterland of the desert grassland blew in, resulting in the Yellow River and Jishui, which have not been frozen for nearly a hundred years, actually frozen, and a large amount of ice floes began to be frozen and solidified together in the estuary of the Yellow River and Jishui to form a thick layer of ice.

As the ice accumulated, the river flow rate dropped further, and the reduced flow speed meant that the ice formed faster, so the ice continued to spread upstream to the Jeju River, but by the time the ice condensed to this section, it was already relatively soft and could not bear the weight of people.

However, this section of the river is located at the northernmost estuary, because the climate is colder and freezes for a longer time, so the ice on this section of the river is very thick, enough to withstand a large number of people and horses to pass on it.

At this time, it was the cavalry guard general Ge Wei who was in charge of the position of the south bank of the Yellow River from Qizhou to the mouth of the sea, and after discovering that the floating ice that had been floating on the Yellow River was suddenly frozen to form a thick layer of ice, he who had been in charge of inspecting the south bank of the Yellow River naturally did not dare to slack off.

In case the Qi army finds that this section of the Yellow River and Jishui are all frozen, and their own defensive forces in this section are very weak, then as long as the Qi army mobilizes tens of thousands of cavalry to cross the river from here, it will be a big trouble. China Library

Knowing that the situation was not good, Ge Wei immediately sent his cronies to Qizhou, Jeju, Jibei County, Qingzhou, Jiaozhou and other places to send urgent reports, and at the same time he spread a large number of gunpowder shells on the river surface to prepare to blow up the river, and at the same time prepared to mobilize a large number of gunpowder shells from Qizhou and Qingzhou, even if it could not destroy all the ice, so that the ice could not withstand too much pressure from soldiers and horses.

But before Ge Wei could put it into practice, hundreds of thousands of Qi troops suddenly appeared on the other side of the Yellow River, and these Qi troops seemed to have known in advance the news that the Yellow River was going to freeze, and they began to cross the river from a hundred miles downstream of Ande County on the other side of Qizhou when the sky was bright on the morning of the second day when the Yellow River had just frozen.

When he knew that the army of Qi crossed the river was full of 100,000 people, Ge Wei's heart was cold, at this time, as General Wei, Ge Wei's side, there were only less than 2,000 cavalry, and the people in this large area between the Yellow River and Jishui were evacuated to the Jiaolai area to Tuntian early, and it was impossible for Ge Wei to mobilize some militia to assist him in the battle.

Although Ge Wei had 10,000 cavalry under his command, it sounded like a lot of people, but because this army was responsible for patrolling the entire south bank of the Yellow River from Qizhou to the mouth of the sea, such 10,000 cavalry were too scattered to be gathered for a while.

Originally, because of the obstruction of the two big rivers of the Yellow River and Jishui, it was impossible for the Qi army to cross the river from here, and there were also Zhong Likai and Zhang Feng's naval troops on the river at any time to defend against the Qi army that might cross the river, and Ge Wei's cavalry was only used to defend against a small group of Qi troops crossing the river.

But now because of the floating ice on the river, Zhong Likai and Zhang Feng have already withdrawn to Long Island to hide, leaving only Ge Wei's 10,000 cavalry to defend against the Qi army on the long riverbank.

The Qi army, which had long been ready to cross the river, was undoubtedly fast, and before Ge Wei could reflect, more than 100,000 Qi troops were distributed in more than a dozen gentle places on the river beach and began to cross the river.

A group of Qi soldiers carried bundles of wheat straw on their backs to the ice, opened the wheat straw and spread it on it, and soon paved a wide road, some of the places where there was more broken ice and may be easy to break were laid on it with large wooden planks after laying the wheat straw, and then a large number of Xianbei cavalry of the Northern Qi Dynasty walked through the ice in small steps.

Just by looking at the war horses, it can be seen that the Qi army is obviously fully prepared, and the hooves of each war horse are wrapped with a thick layer of wool felt, so that the vibration generated by the war horses when crossing the river will be much smaller, and it is not easy to crush the ice on the river surface.

Even if Ge Wei gathered all the 10,000 people under his command together, he couldn't stop the 100,000 army, not to mention that now Ge Wei only had about 2,000 people around him, although Ge Wei also led these 2,000 people to attack a wave of Qi infantry troops, but they were immediately surrounded by the cavalry of the Qi army crossing the Yellow River.

When Wang Yong received the news that the Qi army had crossed the river, Qizhou had been occupied by the Hu Lawyers Association, Wang Yong grabbed the messenger in front of him with red eyes and said viciously: "How is the whereabouts of Mr. Puyang Xun?" Where did Cheng Xueying and Zhou Cheng go? In fact, Wang Yong didn't dare to ask about the situation of the hundreds of thousands of troops on the front lines of Jeju and Jibei County.

At this time, Wang Ze, who heard that his father had come to Wang Yong's camp, was also very worried about the safety of Pu Yangxun and Cheng Xueying, but when he saw that Wang Yong was so out of shape, he hurriedly pulled away Wang Yong's hand holding the messenger's collar, and then comforted the messenger and said: "These things have nothing to do with you, you just talk about them slowly!" ”

The messenger glanced at Wang Ze gratefully and continued: "The villain was sent by Lord Liu Xin, the assassin of Qingzhou, and the messenger who was sent to Qingzhou by Lord Puyang, the assassin of Qizhou, died of serious injuries not long after arriving in Qingzhou!" So the villain only knows these situations at the moment! ”

Looking at Wang Yong's crazy appearance, Wang Ze comforted: "Father, now that things are like this, it's better to make arrangements early, I have already arranged for someone to send my mother and two younger brothers to Jiaozhou Port to pause, let's hurry up and support Qingzhou City!" As long as we can hold Qingzhou City, these dozens of cities in Qidong are still our territory! ”

Before Wang Ze's words fell, he saw a messenger riding a horse, and when he saw that Wang Yong's banner was almost rolling off the horse, the messenger got up and came to Wang Yong with his hands and feet to send an urgent report: "Junhou, the big thing is not good, this morning the Northern Qi general Pi Jinghe led nearly 30,000 cavalry to cross the river from the south of Leling one after another, and occupied Le'an County early this morning!" ”

"What? Pi Jinghe has already occupied Le'an County!? This time Wang Yong was shocked, Le'an County is not far from the mouth of the lower reaches of Jishui, but it is only a hundred miles away from Qingzhou, which is closer than Wang Yong's army is now from Qingzhou.

Wang Ze is strange, didn't Pi Jinghe fight against the Yan army in the three counties of Zhangwu in the north of the river before? Why did he suddenly participate in the attack on the land of Sanqi? No wonder I always felt that the actions of the Hu Lawyers Association did not match the reputation of its famous generals, and Qingzhou, which put Wang Yong's administrative center, did not fight but attacked Qizhou.

Now it seems that the consideration of the Hu Lawyers Association is the most appropriate, as long as Qizhou is taken first, the back road and all the supply sources of hundreds of thousands of Xia troops on the Jeju front can be cut off, if a part of the Xia army flees into Jinan City, Qizhou, I am afraid that the battle of Jinan City more than a year ago will be repeated.

Here, the Hu Lawyers Association went to attack and take Jinan City, and then Pi Jinghe led 30,000 cavalry to suddenly cross the river to occupy Le'an County, to seize Qingzhou and deprive Wang Yong of the most important steel production area, so that even if Wang Yong gathered hundreds of thousands of young people again, he would not have enough weapons to arm his troops.

"Not good! Pi Jinghe went to Yidu's arsenal! Wang Ze suddenly realized that the real intention of the Qi army was not Qingzhou City, but Yidu, not far from Qingzhou City, where the output of weapons now accounted for more than half of all the weapons of Wang Yong's troops.

More importantly, under the guidance of Cao Blacksmith, the Yidu Arsenal has cultivated a large number of skilled senior blacksmiths, who are very familiar with many advanced technologies such as carburizing steel and Suzhou iron method, and as long as the Qi army captures these talents, their combat effectiveness will continue to increase in the future.

In order to rush back to Qingzhou as soon as possible, Wang Yong decided to only lead the cavalry to Qingzhou first, at least to protect all the blacksmiths in the Yidu Arsenal, and Han Biao, Zhou Guang, and Luo Huan These infantry troops will arrive on foot quickly.

As for Wang Ze's request to go to Qingzhou with Wang Yong's refusal, Wang Yong said affectionately to Wang Ze before leaving: "Now things are critical, and your two younger brothers are still young, once I have an accident, you can still take care of your mother and two younger brothers, if you and I have an accident together, who can take care of them?" ”

Wang Ze was silent, Wang Yong took one last look at Wang Ze and rode away with Shi Haiguang and Fa Yan without looking back, leaving only Wang Ze, who was clenched with his hands clenched, looking at their distant backs and being silent.

Waiting for the back of the cavalry led by Wang Yong to gradually move away, Wang Ze said to Guo Erlang: "Erlang, you immediately go to the East China Sea and let Gao Shi lead all the members of the wolf tooth to Jiaozhou Port, and inform Mr. Yang and Jiang Chuan, Qu Liulang and others that they will fight another big battle!" ”

Since learning that Lu Wen was captured by Taishan thieves in Qingzhou, Wang Ze took Zhao Yong, who was originally from the wolf's tooth special forces, and Erzizi who had been with him to Liu Xin's former cottage to investigate the news of Lu Wen, leaving only Guo Erlang by his side.

This time, Guo Erlang took Wang Ze's warrant and hurried to Jiaozhou Port, Wang Ze only had a dozen ordinary guards around him, and when he saw that his side was empty again, Wang Ze was advancing towards Jiaozhou City.

Wang Ze figured out in his heart that now only Jiaozhou City still has some troops available in the prefectures and counties of Qidong, and there are still more than 2,000 people in Shen Sanshui, 4,000 under Zhao Kun, and more than 2,000 people under the newly attached Xu Yong.

What's more critical is that Shen Sanshui still has more than 10,000 recruits who have experienced the Jiaozhou City War, so that all the troops in Jiaozhou City alone add up to nearly 25,000 people, and when Wang Ze transfers Chu Honghang, who has just taken over the defense of Jiaozhou Port, there will be more than 30,000 troops.

Wang Yong was only more than 150 miles away from Qingzhou at that time, and the cavalry advanced quickly in less than three hours to reach the outside of Qingzhou City, which made him breathe a sigh of relief that Qingzhou City was still in his hands, but a large group of Northern Qi cavalry could already be seen in the surrounding countryside.

It turned out that Liu Xin followed Wang Ze's advice and gathered thousands of militiamen to train in the city early, which came in handy this time, but as soon as Wang Yong saw Liu Xin, Liu Xin hurriedly said: "Junhou hurry up and go to reinforce the Yidu Arsenal, which is being besieged by a large number of Qi troops!" ”