Guide to Traveling through the Northern Song Dynasty.

Chapter 1052 1047 [The people are always the ones who suffer]

Wu Jie was from the Yao family army, and Sang Zhong was from the Zhong family army. Although they were both from the Western Army, they could not possibly get along.

Wu Jie's current big backer is actually Zhang Guangdao. He was reorganized during the years when he was stationed in Shanxi, and it was almost snatched from Yao Pingzhong by Zhang Guangdao.

Sang Zhong's situation was much more complicated. He was reorganized by Yang Zhi at first, and then followed Zhang Tong to pacify Shandong. Then he became a subordinate of Han Shizhong. When Han Shizhong was transferred to Linfu, he became a subordinate of Guan Sheng. When selecting the imperial guards of the two capitals, he was transferred back to Luoyang with Guan Sheng. His direct leader was Guan Sheng, and his backer was Yang Zhi.

Yang Zhi is a good guy who likes to keep things peaceful. Being a general of his faction is actually a bit disadvantageous.

"General Sang, our army has won a great victory on the banks of Hongliu River, and even captured Hongliu Village. There is no danger ahead, and the general can advance with confidence." The one who came to report the news was an officer, who spoke in a somewhat sarcastic tone, implying that Sang Zhong watched his friendly troops being surrounded without rescuing them.

Sang Zhong said expressionlessly, "I understand. Go back and tell Wu Xianfeng that Shankou Village is located at a strategic point. I will stay here to protect the exit from the mountain."

This reason is very legitimate, and it also makes the behavior of not rescuing friendly forces clean and without any fault.

The officer who reported the news smiled and suddenly said, "If General Sang doesn't have enough drinking water, you can send someone to the Hongliu River to get some. The water there is much better to drink than the bitter spring water."

Sang Zhong retorted: "Please tell Wu Xianfeng to be careful of the enemy cutting off the river upstream!"

The officer who reported the news said: "Our army has limited manpower. We can only defend Hongliu Village and continue to open up the road. As for protecting the water source upstream, I'm afraid it is General Sang's responsibility. General Sang is the first main force to go out of the mountains. The military order he received is to help us stabilize the Hongliu River line. My general said that if the river is cut off, General Sang should be careful of being punished by military law."

"I understand. You can go back now." Sang Zhong was too lazy to talk to a junior officer anymore.

If the Hongliu River is in a state of being cut off when the subsequent army arrives, then Sang Zhong and Wu Jie must bear joint responsibility.

No one can escape punishment, they must cooperate.

In desperation, Sang Zhong left some auxiliary troops to increase the defense of Shankou Village, and then moved towards Wu Jie with the remaining troops.

After he arrived at Hongliu Village, he only met with Wu Jie for the sake of courtesy.

That night, he led his army to rest outside the village, and the next day he set out to head further upstream and camped near a red willow forest. The water source here was relatively abundant, and there was even a tributary that flowed into the Hongliu Valley, which was about 25 miles away from the Hongliu Village where Wu Jie was stationed.

Two days later, another 10,000 Ming troops came out of the mountains and stopped for a while at Shankou Village.

It was also at this time that Xiao Chalaa learned that Hongliu Village had surrendered. He immediately sent thousands of cavalrymen to go around the upper reaches of Hongliu Valley for dozens of miles. Instead of blocking the river, they threw livestock carcasses and various feces into the river.

Sang Zhong led his troops to drive away the enemy cavalry, and then cleaned up all the filth in the river.

According to the military doctor's advice, he sent someone to tell Wu Jie not to drink river water in the next few days, but to drink the stored water that had been drawn from the river. If the stored water was not enough, the river water must be boiled before drinking, even for the horses.

Although the two generals had conflicts, neither of them dared to act recklessly in military matters.

The Western Liao cavalry were driven away by Sang Zhong once, but they soon came back a second time and went further upstream to throw feces.

I'm not afraid of poisoning.

They wanted to poison the running water and defeat the Ming army downstream, but there was no such poison in ancient times.

What is really disgusting are the corpses and feces. God knows what kind of germs are in them.

Aksuhe, who lived in Sangzhong’s army, took out a pen and paper and wrote:

"A general named Sang was very enthusiastic towards me. He was an excellent general. The Black Khitans (Western Liao) suffered setbacks on the front battlefield and dumped corpses and feces upstream of the river. General Sang's response was to drive out the enemy, clean up the filth, and all the soldiers, livestock and horses drank boiled water."

"This place is extremely desolate, with rubble everywhere. Apart from scattered low weeds, there is only a kind of tree called red willow by the river. In order to boil water for drinking, the red willow forest is being cut down very quickly. It is estimated that it will be completely cut down in half a month."

"Yesterday, another friendly army arrived and set up camp near the red willow forest more than ten miles upstream. Together with the troops of General Sang and General Wu, there are a total of three Ming armies working together to protect the river from pollution."

"That General Wu was extremely brave. He led 5000 soldiers and had already taken down seven Black Khitan fortresses, and defeated tens of thousands of Black Khitan troops head-on. And he himself only had a few hundred casualties. I don't know how he did it. I wanted to ask him in detail but was met with indifference. General Wu was a cold-blooded soldier, and he didn't have a good face towards me."

"..."

When the 40,000 regular troops of the Ming army arrived one after another, the entire army began to advance towards Yizhou City (Hami).

At this time, the commander of the Ming army automatically became Chen Ziyi, who arrived later and had the highest military rank.

And finally, after much difficulty, two large-caliber artillery pieces were transported.

Goal of the advance: To eliminate the enemy stronghold thirty miles away and control the river there to ensure sufficient water supply.

The 40,000-strong army, plus auxiliary troops and civilian laborers, had a total number of nearly 100,000, and there were countless war horses and livestock, moving across the Gobi Desert in an overwhelming manner.

When the battle unfolded outside the enemy's stronghold, Aksuhe was extremely shocked.

Before the fall of Asia Minor, the Eastern Roman Empire had a peak military strength of about 25. As Asia Minor was torn apart by repeated battles, even though some of its population has been restored, the total military strength of the Eastern Roman Empire is still less than 10.

This so-called total military strength refers to the number of soldiers that can be recruited, not the standing army that always exists!
The first few troops of the Ming army that arrived during the Western Expedition were equivalent to half of the Eastern Roman Empire's military strength.

"Boom, boom, boom!" Two large-caliber cannons bombarded the village wall, and countless small-caliber cannons bombarded the battle sheds and arrow towers.

The repeated bombardment made Aksuhe feel as if the ground was shaking.

"This... is this the cannon that the Fatima scholars mentioned?" Aksuhe was so dry-mouthed.

Chen Ziyi smiled and said, "There are only two cannons, and the rest are small cannons. The march was too difficult, so the cannons were left behind. Otherwise, the scene would have been spectacular."

Even after the fort was breached, reinforcements from Western Liao did not appear.

That night, an Illinois nobleman arrived in a panic, and brought his entire family with him - his own family and the families of several elite cavalrymen.

They were all captured and taken to see Chen Ziyi.

The Izhou nobleman bowed and said in a difficult-to-understand Chinese with a northwest accent: "General of the Ming Dynasty, my name is Yue Nan (the transliteration of John Nan), and I am a nobleman whose manor is in the suburbs of Izhou. I used to be very hospitable to Han merchants. I have always been loyal to the Ming Dynasty, and this time I brought my whole family to seek refuge with the Ming Dynasty!"

Chen Ziyi thought about the fact that no reinforcements from Western Liao had come to rescue the fort, so he asked, "Have the defenders of Yizhou City retreated westward?"

The Uighur Nestorian noble named Yue Nan was stunned for a moment, and then quickly replied: "They all retreated to Gaochang City (Turpan). My estate is here, and my property is also here. I didn't want to give up my property, so I fled quietly."

"Are there many local nobles who are unwilling to retreat westward?" Chen Ziyi asked.

Yue Nan said: "The nobles in Yizhou didn't want to evacuate, but the families of the great nobles were controlled by the Liao officials, so they had to follow them even if they didn't want to. I'm not a great noble, and the Liao officials didn't guard me well, so I fled with a few loyal knights."

Chen Ziyi took out the Gaochang map, pointed to the location of the Barkol grassland and asked, "Where is this place?"

Yue Nan carefully identified the area and replied, "That area also belongs to Yizhou, but there are few farmers and many herders. A few days ago, there was a big battle with the Heavenly Soldiers (Wu Jie's troops), and some of the tribal cavalry there died. The leaders were already scared by the Heavenly Soldiers. But they didn't dare to disobey the Liao officials, so they all withdrew to Gaochang City."

Chen Ziyi asked again: "How many of the former Gaochang nobles were loyal to Western Liao?"

Yue Nan replied: "It's half and half. Since the Western Liao Dynasty took direct control of this place, many small and medium-sized nobles have been promoted. They are still very loyal to the Western Liao Dynasty. But it's hard to say about the great nobles. Except for a few who were given important positions, the rest did not get any benefits from the Liao people."

"How many defenders are left in Yizhou City?" Wu Jie suddenly asked.

Yue Nan shook his head: "I don't know. I was in a panic when I escaped here, and I didn't dare to get close to the city wall."

Chen Ziyi asked Wu Jie: "What do you think?"

Wu Jie said: "Send troops to Yizhou City immediately and take it down. Then there is no need to rush. The infantry will stay in Yizhou City, and the cavalry will go north to the grassland (Balikun) to sweep the tribes. There should not be many young and strong people left in the grassland tribes there. Capture the old, weak, women and children and force the enemy cavalry to surrender."

"I guess the old, weak, women and children on the grassland have already migrated westward along the northern foothills of the Tianshan Mountains. Why would they wait foolishly for us to kill them?" Sang Zhong said with a smile.

Yue Nan said, "There are mountains on all sides, so it's not easy to go west. The women and children left behind by the various tribes should either hide in the mountains temporarily or go south to Yizhou and then retreat west. Since the withdrawal was hasty, it is estimated that they will not go south, but hide in the mountains. It will be difficult to find a place in the mountains, as there are countless valleys."

Chen Ziyi said: "Since it is difficult to find, there is no need to disperse the troops to the north. First, occupy Yizhou City and then go west to capture various water sources."

Aksuhe was listening nearby, with Du Jushi translating for him.

Suddenly, Aksuhe wondered, "I heard that the Black Khitan army is very powerful. Why did they abandon the city and retreat after only a small defeat? Will they set an ambush along the way?"

Sang Zhong said: "The main force of Western Liao has not arrived yet, and the enemy generals don't have many elite troops. Instead of defending Yizhou, they should take the initiative to retreat and lengthen our already extremely long food route. When the main force of Western Liao arrives, they can rely on the strong city to continue to fight us until it becomes difficult to transport food and grass in winter."

Aksuhe pointed to the marked area on the map and said, "Are all these places desolate and uninhabited?"

Chen Ziyi nodded: "They are all deserts or Gobi."

"What a damn battlefield and supply line." Aksuhe couldn't help but complain.

That night, midnight.

The Ming Dynasty's reconnaissance cavalry brought back another small noble and his subordinates who came to seek refuge.

Moreover, they found flames rising from the direction of Yizhou City, which must have been burned down by the Western Liao during their retreat.

The next day, Chen Ziyi led his troops westward and found many refugees along the way.

The Western Liao not only burned down the city, but also allowed its soldiers to plunder civilians. On the one hand, it was a disguised form of clearing the countryside, and on the other hand, it was a way to reward the resentful soldiers through looting.

"They are all civilians whose money and food have been robbed. Should we save them?" Wu Jie asked.

Chen Ziyi shook his head: "Our army is having trouble getting supplies, so it's impossible for us to give out military rations to help. But we can just do it for show. We can select a few hundred young and strong men to serve as auxiliary soldiers, and take in their families as well. The rest of the civilians will be left to fend for themselves. Whether they can survive depends entirely on luck."

Sang Zhong said, "We can drive these civilians to the border of Gaochang City. When the army attacks Gaochang City, we can organize the civilians who have not yet starved to death, give each of them half a cake and let them attack the city, so as to consume the defenders' supplies."

Chen Ziyi muttered, "If things turn out like this, the old territory of Gaochang will probably be destroyed. There's no need to kill any nobles to seize their land. After the war, there will definitely be unowned land everywhere, which will be more than enough to distribute to the Han immigrants."

(End of this chapter)