Troubled times: Start practicing spiritual practice by taking care of your sister-in-law.

Chapter 601: The End of Prince Huai
The second year of Yong'an, early October.

Toyosu.

After Prince Huai vomited blood and fainted, the generals under him evacuated Prince Huai and nearly 7,000 troops from Jing County according to the order issued by Prince Huai before he fell into a coma. The remaining Huai troops stayed in Jing County to hold back the Chen army led by Yue Ruyan.

However, with such a big incident, the morale of the Huai Army had long been in chaos and low. Moreover, the generals who stayed behind to cover the rear were Chong Wang's men, and the soldiers who covered the rear were also Chong Wang's men. After all, when Huai Wang fled from Fengzhou, he only had a few thousand troops.

Abandoned by Prince Huai, the army was in chaos, and the general in charge of the rear guard did not obey Prince Huai's orders to delay the Chen army.

When Yue Ruyan led the Chen army to the gate of the city, the generals behind him opened the city gates and surrendered, and told Yue Ruyan the direction in which the main force of the Huai army fled.

Yue Ruyan led the Chen army in pursuit without any hesitation, and sent a pigeon message to the Chen army that had landed on the north bank of Fengzhou, asking them to chase and intercept the Prince of Huai in the direction of his escape.

A day later, Prince Huai woke up and learned about the Chen army that was chasing him closely and the surrender of the rear guard general. He was so angry that he started coughing violently. However, after analyzing the current situation, he knew that it was not the time to blame others. With nearly 7,000 troops, they were too big a target and it was obviously unrealistic to expect all of them to escape.

Prince Huai really wanted to send someone else to cover the rear, but he was afraid that the incident of Jing County opening the city and surrendering would happen again, so he was reluctant to let his own guards cover the rear.

Therefore, he ordered a three-pronged breakout and retreat to Yanzhou.

At present, he doesn’t know that Prince Anping has sided with Chen Mo.

After dividing the troops to break out, they retreated faster due to their smaller numbers. In addition, the Chen army behind them had no idea which way the Prince of Huai escaped, so they were forced to divide their troops to pursue him.

mid-October.

The Chen army that landed in Fengzhou from the north bank, led by Li Yunzhang, blocked two routes of the Huai army, but the King of Huai was not found in either of the two routes.

This also let Yue Ruyan know the movements of Prince Huai, and she began to gather a large number of troops to hunt down and intercept Prince Huai.

October 19th.

A small unit of the Chen army discovered the trace of Prince Huai at Xianhou Mountain in Lanshan County.

However, the general leading this small force was no match for Prince Huai, allowing Prince Huai and his 3,000 guards to escape.

This also completely exposed the whereabouts of Prince Huai.

On the 22nd, the main force of the Chen army arrived and besieged Prince Huai and his guards at Xianhou Mountain, annihilating more than 2,000 of Prince Huai's guards.

Only Prince Huai and his personal soldiers, numbering less than a hundred, escaped.

The reason why Prince Huai was able to escape was because Xianhou Mountain was too big, and Chen Jun only had one top-grade warrior, Yue Ruyan.

It is impossible for Yue Ruyan to take care of every corner of Xianhou Mountain.

The King of Huai was also lucky. He chose a way out where Yue Ruyan was not stationed and fought his way out of Xianhou Mountain.

Chen Jun could only continue the pursuit.

To be honest, as the number of Huai Army troops decreased, and the Prince of Huai learned his lesson, he stopped taking the official roads and the wider roads, and instead took the mountain roads and crossed mountains and ridges. This made the pursuit significantly more difficult.

After all, Prince Huai is a top-grade warrior. If you send too few people to search, you won't be able to catch him at all. If you send too many people, there will be omissions.

This meant that the pursuit work lasted from the 22nd to the end of October.

In the dark night, Prince Huai and more than thirty of his personal soldiers walked on a mountain road with the help of moonlight.

Although Prince Huai was not caught up by Chen's army these days, many of the nearly one hundred personal soldiers who followed him lost money, were unable to run, fell off cliffs, etc. during the escape. Now, including Prince Huai himself, there are only thirty-two people left.

Thirty-one years old. This was undoubtedly the most miserable time for Prince Huai.

When they evacuated from Fengzhou, there were still thousands of guards.

In the past, before he was sent out to serve as a fiefdom, when he was the prince of Tianchuan, there were more than thirty-one guards following him.

At this moment, Prince Huai was disheveled and his clothes were tattered. He had been on the run these days and had hardly stopped, not even washing his face.

Because Chen's army was mainly searching along rivers and mountain streams, if Prince Huai and his men got close to a water source, they would easily be discovered.

Instead of taking the usual roads, they only walked on the mountain roads. Prince Huai and his companions were somewhat lost and kept fleeing in the southeast direction.

In the vast darkness of the night, it seemed as if countless man-eating beasts were lurking.

The wind on the mountain was very strong. The evening breeze blew with a whistling sound and rolled straight towards Prince Huai and his entourage, almost making it impossible for them to open their eyes.

At this moment, the thunderous sound of horse hooves rang in the ears of Prince Huai and his men. Countless torches lit up on the hill opposite them. A large flag with yellow and red characters was illuminated by the flames, and the red character "Yang" looked particularly creepy.

In the light of the fire, Prince Huai and his men saw that these people were wearing rattan armor.

"Your Highness, it's Yang Xian's Rattan Armor Army." The personal soldier of Prince Huai said in a trembling voice.

"Prince Huai, I have been waiting for you here for a long time." On the mountain, Jiang Li shouted loudly at the Prince Huai opposite him.

When Jiang Li learned that the Chen army on both sides were chasing Prince Huai in a crescent-shaped pursuit, Jiang Li, who entered Fengzhou from the southwest, immediately changed his marching direction based on his own experience and headed to the southeast of Fengzhou, which is the direction of Yanzhou.

Waiting at the junction.

In other words, Prince Huai was not lost at all.

Not only that, we are about to reach Yanzhou.

Unfortunately, he was blocked by Jiang Li.

Jiang Li waved his hand, and the surrounding rattan armor soldiers rushed down the mountain road in front of Prince Huai and others and surrounded Prince Huai and others.

Prince Huai's expression changed, and he said in a deep voice: "Let's go into the mountains."

Prince Huai changed direction and headed into the mountain behind him.

"whoosh"

The sharp sound of breaking wind was heard very far away in the dark night sky. The Huai Wang and his men heard the sound and their faces changed immediately. Huai Wang shouted, "Get out of the way! It's a crossbow."

Jiang Li and the others had been waiting here for a long time, so they were naturally well prepared.

Prince Huai and his men have been surrounded by the Rattan Armor Army. It is not easy to escape.

As soon as he finished speaking, two unlucky bodyguards were shot through by the crossbow. The huge force pushed their bodies out of the mountain road.

"put!"

A loud shout was heard, and countless arrows flew towards Prince Huai and his men.

Prince Huai is a third-rank warrior.

Jiang Li was only a fourth rank, and although he had the strength of numbers, it was not easy to capture him alive, so Jiang Li wanted to fight to the death.

He didn't dare to rush up and fight King Huai alone.

"shhhhhh"

"Pfft, pfft."

Most of the personal soldiers of Prince Huai were shot like hedgehogs by arrows.

Even Prince Huai was having a hard time hiding.

Because of the escape in the past few days, the innate spiritual energy in his body was almost completely used up. The innate spiritual energy he absorbed was dragon energy, and the dragon veins in Fengzhou were scarce, so he had no way to replenish it.

Therefore, he had no spiritual energy defense to protect his body.

It would be difficult for these ordinary arrows to hurt him, but if he was hit by a crossbow, he would be doomed to die.

In the blink of an eye, Prince Huai became a lonely man.

But he also managed to get into the woods.

Under the cover of trees and darkness, it is difficult for arrows to be effective.

Jiang Li also obviously discovered that the King Huai's innate spiritual energy was exhausted, and was overjoyed: "Let's attack together, regardless of life or death."

Once your innate spiritual energy is exhausted, you will not be able to use your supernatural powers.

But human power has its limits.

In other words, Jiang Li has a chance to capture him alive.

But he would not be careless, nor would he use the lives of his men to fill the gap. After all, if he wanted to exhaust the King of Huai's strength to capture him alive, he would probably have to pay the price of thousands of casualties.

"kill!"

After killing a soldier in rattan armor who was rushing towards him, Prince Huai threw away his sword, picked up the opponent's spear, and then fired a blast.

Even if a warrior in the supernatural power realm cannot use supernatural powers, his qi and blood strength is still there. He can slaughter the soldiers as if he were mowing the grass. With a sweep, the vine armor is torn apart, and flesh and blood fly everywhere. The ground is full of debris, leaving a line of blood on the ground.

Such a bloody scene frightened the soldiers in rattan armor so much that they dared not move forward.

But this is only temporary.

A voice came: "Whoever kills the rebel King Huai will be rewarded with a thousand gold coins and be made a marquis of ten thousand households."

Hearing this, the soldiers in rattan armor immediately became excited.

There are many such examples in history.

Let’s not talk about that too far.

Take the time when Emperor Taizu led an army to overthrow the tyranny of the previous dynasty. A small soldier simply snatched the thigh of a prince of the previous dynasty, and he was directly made an earl, and his story was even recorded in history books.

"Kill..."

"kill him."

Arrows were flying, knives were waving in the woods, blood and flesh were flying everywhere, most of them became the souls killed by Prince Huai's gun.

Before the Prince of Huai had fled a hundred steps, more than a hundred corpses were left behind.

However, Prince Huai also suffered many injuries. Although they were only flesh wounds and not serious, they boosted the morale of the Rattan Armor Army in the eyes of them.

It turns out that even top-tier warriors can be hurt by ordinary soldiers like them.

Prince Huai did not linger in the fight, as it would have consumed too much of his physical strength in this situation. After he had created a gap in the enemy's defenses, he immediately fled quickly, relying on the speed advantage of a top-grade warrior.

"Hurry up and chase him, don't let him run away."

He ran away from them.

Although Prince Huai had the advantage in speed, he was heading into the woods, and there were few roads in the mountains and forests. Sometimes Prince Huai had to open the way, so the distance between him and the Rattan Armor Army was not particularly large.

This escape and chase lasted all night.

Originally, Prince Huai was only one step away from Yanzhou.

As a result of Jiang Li's actions, Prince Huai was getting further and further away from Yanzhou.

Finally, on this day of November 1st.

Prince Huai's escape came to an end.

Chen Jun led by Yue Ruyan arrived.

Surrounded on three sides, the Chen army and the Rattan Armor Army had a total of nearly 30,000 soldiers and horses.

Prince Huai had no way to escape.

The most important thing is that after escaping for a night, Prince Huai’s physical strength was almost exhausted.

As the encirclement became smaller and smaller, Prince Huai was trapped on a mountain called "Suolonggang".

This mountain is not big.

Legend has it that in ancient times there was a demon dragon wreaking havoc between heaven and earth. Immortals captured the demon dragon and finally sealed it in this mountain, hence the name Suolonggang.

But this is just a myth after all.

To prevent Prince Huai from escaping again.

After the two armies surrounded Suolonggang, they searched the mountain step by step.

King Huai was driven to hide in the land temple on the mountain.

Yue Ruyan and Jiang Li arrived.

This was the first time the two met.

Jiang Li roughly guessed the other party's identity, and bowed to Yue Ruyan and said, "I am General Jiang Li under Lord Yang. After receiving the letter from Duke Anguo for help, Lord Yang immediately sent me to lead the army to Fengzhou to assist your army."

Yang Xian did receive Chen Mo’s request for help.

But the so-called first time is complete bullshit.

He had been watching from the sidelines before, and only brought troops in after seeing that Chen's army won a great victory in the battle of Huaizhou.

Yue Ruyan was naturally aware of this, but she had no actual evidence to expose it. After all, they really did come to help, even if it was a little late.

"I am Yue Ruyan, a general under the command of Duke Anguo. Nice to meet General Jiang Li." Yue Ruyan said politely.

"General Yue, you're too polite." Even if Yue Ruyan was not Chen Mo's woman, the fact that she was at the supernatural power realm made her someone that Jiang Li could not afford to offend.

He looked at the land temple not far in front of him and said, "Since General Yue is here, we can capture the King of Huai alive."

"No need." Yue Ruyan said coldly.

Jiang Li was shocked, knowing that Duke Anguo wanted to kill Prince Huai.

No matter what, Prince Huai is Chen Mo's father-in-law.

Thinking of this, Jiang Li felt a sigh in his heart.

Think about it, Prince Huai was the most powerful vassal prince of the Song Dynasty. He was married to the Xiao family, dominated Huaizhou and the south of the Yangtze River, was the richest man in the world, had a large number of soldiers and generals. A few years ago, he sent troops to defend the king and led an army of more than 500,000 to attack Xu Guozhong. Although he returned without success, it was still a magnificent move.

It only took a few years.

I watched him build a tall building, and watched his building collapse.

The last journey of his life was to linger in this dilapidated temple.

Jiang Li pondered for a while, then bowed and said, "I won't bother you with this matter, General Yue. Give me a stick of incense, and I promise I'll catch him."

After saying this, he was about to call on the rattan armor soldiers below to surround and kill them.

Yue Ruyan waved her hand to stop Jiang Li. She wanted to give Prince Huai some respect.

"No need to trouble General Jiang." Yue Ruyan walked towards the land temple personally.

Jiang Li was stunned, thinking that Yue Ruyan was going to do it herself, and couldn't help but think that she was a ruthless person.

In the dilapidated land temple, Prince Huai sat on the weed-covered stone steps, breathing heavily, looking at the land statue with a leisurely gaze, as if he saw the land temple when it was first built, just like himself at that time.

Just then, the sound of footsteps interrupted Prince Huai's thoughts.

Prince Huai looked up and saw a figure that looked particularly dazzling under the sunlight.

Prince Huai laughed bitterly and said, "Are you here to take my life?"

As he spoke, Prince Huai held his spear in his hand, stood up with difficulty, and shouted, "Then let me see your ability."

"Pounds."

But who would have thought that the other party would throw a dagger in front of him, and said in a cold voice: "I think you were once a powerful vassal king, you probably don't want to die in the hands of a woman. I will give you some dignity, you can decide for yourself."

Prince Huai was stunned for a long while, then he raised his bitter face, and his memory went back to his youth. Finally, he laughed crazily: "Chen Mo, I will wait for you in the underworld."

After saying that, he picked up the dagger on the ground and slashed his neck.

After waiting for a while, Yue Ruyan stepped forward to check on Prince Huai's life.

After seeing that the other party was really dead, Yue Ruyan snapped her fingers.

After a while, a big fire broke out in the land temple.

(End of this chapter)