"What? Silver sand thief? ”

When Li Yu heard the news that the silver sand thief was really coming, the stone in his heart finally fell to the ground.

The silver sand thief is a nail that Zhu Quanzhong nailed to Jingxiang, right on Nanyang's side, threatening Li Yu's revival plan at all times.

He had long planned to pull out the nails.

From the beginning of his arrival in Nanyang, the silver sand thieves appeared at critical moments and repeatedly threatened Li Yu's development.

The reason why he has been passive defense is that he doesn't want Zhu Quanzhong to pay attention to him.

Now the situation has changed.

First, Wang Shifan still effectively contained Zhu Quanzhong's main force, and second, Li Keyong also launched an offensive in the west, so that Zhu Quanzhong had no time to care about anything else.

The three Fangcheng passes are about to end, and Zhao Kuangning's five thousand elite soldiers are also in place, and they cooperate with the barbarians to cut off Jingxiang's main road into the Central Plains, which makes Li Yu's sense of security in his heart enhance a lot.

Now the silver sand thief doesn't have to scruple when he comes again.

This time, the silver sand thieves rode through Luyang Pass and went straight to Fangcheng in Tangzhou.

According to past experience, most of the silver sand thieves were active in the area of Xiangcheng Nanyang, and as far south as Xinye, and rarely entered Tangzhou eastward.

This time, he actually dispatched a thousand horsemen to go straight to Fang City, and this goal was clear enough.

"Hit!"

……

"Huh~~~~"

The thousand horses gasped for heavy breath, snorted, and slowly stopped.

In the distance, a black line appeared between the two mountains.

The crowd of black crushed people was busy near the black line.

"General, in front of you is the newly repaired Fangcheng Pass."

Outpost scouts report the situation in front of the horses.

"Report to the general, they are still building the wall and are not prepared for our army."

"Well, probe."

"Dismount and trim."

All the soldiers dismounted one after another and took out hay bales to replenish the horses.

Half an hour later, the horses returned.

"Report to the general, there are 3,000 infantry in Fangcheng Pass in front of the gate."

"Hmm. Get on the horse and move forward. ”

These cavalrymen disguised as bandits were neatly packed up and mounted to prepare for battle.

As soon as the general lifted the reins of the horse, the war horse slowly advanced, approaching Fangcheng Pass, which was still under construction.

Ten miles.

Eight miles.

Five miles.

The walls can already be seen really.

The wall they face is only surrounded by a wooden fence, God help me!

Before closing the gate, more than 3,000 foot soldiers with spears set up a dense military formation, waiting for the battle.

Huh, infantry against cavalry? Isn't that for nothing?

In these years, cavalry is the ultimate type of troops, why do northern nomads always press the Central Plains to fight? Just because the cavalry can't do it.

The Silver Sand Thief cavalry slowly came to a halt two miles away.

The general waved his hand to the lieutenant beside him.

The lieutenant drew his broadsword, lifted the reins of his horse, and shouted "Outflank on the left!" He rushed out first.

Behind him, the soldiers and cavalry under his command roared and rushed out.

The earthquake trembled, and the momentum was like a rainbow.

I saw these hundreds of cavalry passing over the left side of the battlefield in an arc, galloping and shooting.

The opposite infantry formation faced the cavalry charge, and there was a commotion.

An arrow shot towards the Fangchengguan infantry formation.

Bang~~~~

The rattling arrow rang out with a roar on the large cowhide shield of the sword and shield soldiers in the front row, buzzing and trembling.

Bang bang bang ~~~

A rain of arrows fell from the sky like locusts, most of them on the shields, and a few unlucky ones were shot, screaming and falling to the ground, being dragged into the formation, and others filling the gaps.

"Foot shooting!"

With a command, a bowstring jumped in the big array, and the black-pressed arrows slashed across the sky and rushed towards the rushing cavalry.

Puff puff~~~

Yes~

Rhythm ~~~

Some of the cavalry were hit by arrows and fell off their horses, and some of the horses were carrying arrows, and the blood was pouring out, and they ran wildly with a scream.

The general in the distance saw that the formation was slightly chaotic, and waved his hand again.

Another lieutenant rushed out with men and attacked from the right side.

The two sides fought a bloody battle on the plain in front of Fangcheng Pass.

Bang bang bang ~~~~

The cavalry rushed into the infantry formation without hesitation, knocking the platoon squads in the front row, and a gap appeared.

The cavalry in the rear continued to rush forward, widening the gap.

Flesh and blood flew from the impact, and screams continued.

The cavalry that fell off their horses was directly killed by the sword and shield men behind.

Most of the bones and tendons are broken.

Seeing this, the silver sand thief had a door, and the general lifted the reins of his horse, drew out his horizontal knife and pointed forward, "Rush!" ”

The earth trembled like a drum.

All the cavalry of the Silver Sand Thieves poured out of their nests and rushed towards the dilapidated infantry formation on the opposite side.

The gap in the infantry formation was getting closer and closer, and the Silver Sand Thief General had a cruel smile on his lips.

He thought of the letter he had received from Luyangguan two days ago.

In the letter, Deputy Envoy Li ordered him to destroy Fangcheng Pass no matter what, and he would have a heavy reward for defeating King Liang.

The thought of a heavy reward made his heart feel hot.

I have been a bandit in Yinshaling for more than three years, and although I have made a lot of benefits, I still want to leave as soon as possible, otherwise I will have no chance to make a contribution. Now is a good opportunity to leave, and I must not miss it.

The rumbling hooves are so beautiful, like the most beautiful music in the world, and like his triumphant song.

Suddenly, he caught a glimpse of several black dots in the air and smashed them at them.

How can there still be a tail?

Just when I was in doubt, boom~~~~

An earth-shattering thunderclap exploded in front of him.

With a scream, the mount lifted him into the sky.

He looked at the gradually shrinking pro-soldier division under his feet, and didn't understand it for a while.

Thundered~

Thundered~

He couldn't hear the explosions and thunder one after another, but he could only see people chasing him from front to back, left and right, with teeth and claws, and terrifying faces.

When he landed again, he was numb, and a lot of flesh fell in front of him.

It was the last sight in his eyes.

Thundered~~

Thundered~~~

Countless black dots streaked across the sky and fell into the cavalry, and the sound of smoke and explosions never stopped.

A quarter of an hour later, the explosions stopped.

The smoke in front of the infantry was blown away by the wind and gradually dissipated.

Through the gradually thinning smoke, the scene in front of them made the sergeants in the formation widen their eyes and couldn't believe it at all.

The fifty zhang in front of him became the Shura Hell.

The dark red ground was muddy, the stumps and broken arms were scattered everywhere, and there were warhorses that had not yet swallowed their breath moaning in pain, and some of the cavalrymen who had fallen to the ground had long been frightened by this scene, and sat in a daze.

There was silence in the footsteps, and the images unfolded here became their permanent memories.

"Clean up the battlefield!"

With a command, a new army ran out of the infantry formation.

Trotting all the way to the front of the battle, drawing a pistol to clean up the battlefield.

Bang!

Bang!

Bang!

The battlefield resounded with the sound of gunfire one after another.

Li Yu stood on the wall and witnessed the entire battle.

"The first regiment cleaned up the battlefield, and the second regiment marched to Yinshaling."

Li Yu got down from the wall, mounted his war horse, and set off with the guards with the second regiment.

……

Yinshaling is thirty miles west of Luyang Guan.

Three days later, they arrived at Silver Sands.

The ancient trees here are towering, the terrain is dangerous, and it is at the foot of Funiu Mountain.

Li Xiong took the second battalion and surrounded and suppressed the only few hundred cavalry left.

Only then was Li Yu able to enter the real Silver Sand Ridge.

When you enter the walled gate, there is a small town inside.

It turned out that there were not only more than 1,000 silver sand thief cavalry here, but also more than 5,000 miners smelting copper here.

Asking the foreman here, Li Yu understood what Zhu Quanzhong was doing here.

It turned out that Zhu Quanzhong also knew that this was the base of copper smelting, although he returned Dengzhou, but how could he give up this copper mine? So he arranged for the army to disguise themselves as mountain bandits, occupy this place and not return it, and secretly smelt refined copper, and transport copper ingots to Kaifeng through Luyang Pass twice a year to support his campaigns in various places.

"Open the storeroom."

Li Yu was stunned by the scene in front of him.

Dozens of large warehouses are piled up with yellow copper ingots.

"Why are there so many? Haven't shipped it yet? ”

The foreman said with a smile on his face: "My lord, they suffered a few defeats last year, plus there was a period of time when Luyang Pass was lost, so they didn't have time to ship, they planned to start shipping in a few days, no, the carriage is ready." ”

The foreman took Li Yu to see the stable, where there were thousands of horses and hundreds of carriages parked.

Hehe, it looks like I've cut off my beard!

Some of these miners were brought by Zhu Quanzhong from the Central Plains, and some were local to Jingxiang, and they could not get in or out.

There are dozens of blast furnaces for copper smelting.

It can smelt 50,000 catties of blister copper and 1,000 catties of refined copper every day.

What else do you have to say, transport the copper ingots in the library back to Nanyang.

All of a sudden, there were constant cars and horses on the road from Yinshaling to Nanyang.

Thirty miles to the south of Yinshaling is the upper reaches of the water.

Li Yu asked people to build a simple road to lead directly to the water, build a wharf, and the copper ingots behind it were directly transported by water.

Back in Nanyang, Nanyang Money Foundry finally has raw materials.

When the first Xiangzi Kaiyuan Tongbao landed in Li Yu's palm, he grinned.

This one also carries a warm copper coin, which is heavy, calm, and legible, and it is genuine at first glance.

"Okay, speed up the minting of money, we don't have much in the library."

"Yes."

This money casting workshop is under the jurisdiction of Gao Shi, Li Yu attaches great importance to it, this is the lifeblood of Nanyang, he instructed Gao Shi to arrange a powerful and trusted subordinate to manage it, and there must be no mistakes.

recovered Yinshaling, but fulfilled Li Yu's wish for more than a year.

With money, many things can be done quickly.

Since Zhu Quanzhong was not forced to move the capital, his father Li Ye was still enjoying happiness in Chang'an, and Li Yu had the heart to do other things.

The first is to continue to recruit displaced people.

In the past three years, 10,000 households have been recruited and 120,000 acres of new land have been cultivated.

Day after year, his goal is to recruit another 10,000 households.

In this way, by the end of the fourth year of Tianfu, Nanyang was a prefecture with 25,000 households and a population of 120,000, so it was justified to expand the scope of jurisdiction.

"Changshi, spring ploughing is about to begin, and we have to continue to work hard!"