Late Tang

Cat Island was captured by a surprise attack, and it was withdrawn from the attack to the capture. The United Fleet in Duli Town did not notice any movement beforehand.When a boat from the Feng family in Duli Town landed on Cat Island, they found a dead and silent island.There was not a single boat on the pier, the gate of the strong fortress was open, and the wide ditch two feet deep was almost filled with clansmen and guards of the Feng clan on the island.

When the news spread back to Duli Town, the members of the Feng Clan were extremely furious and rushed to the City Lord's Mansion to question the fleet's dereliction of duty.The city lord immediately gave the United Fleet an order to search for the killer in all directions.The sailors and horse envoys of the United Fleet were scolded and reprimanded by the Feng family and the city lord for a long time. After returning to the fleet, half of the fleet was immediately sent out to sea to search the sea with all their strength, intending to tear the thieves who dared to break ground on Taisui to pieces.

However, the fleet spread out all the way, but it was like seeing a ghost.They searched the sea for nearly a hundred miles around Duli Town, but they didn't find any suspicious ships at all.The military envoy Pei You personally took people to Cat Island, searched carefully, and finally found a line of blood engraved in the castle hall in the castle: "Blood for blood, blood for blood! Avenger Zhen Sanjiang's son, Zhen Donghai !"

Who are Zhensanjiang and Zhendonghai? Pei You naturally knows who they are. Twenty years ago, Pei You was just a warship captain of the United Fleet, a small lieutenant officer.At that time, he personally participated in the battle. The joint fleet surrounded the Zhensanjiang pirates who attacked Cat Island, but deliberately let go of a hole.In the end, thousands of pirates in Zhensanjiang were desperately trying to break through to the hole, and then they suffered the most violent attack. More than three thousand pirates died in a battle, and the burning pirate ship fragments covered the sea surface, and the waves swallowed countless pirates .In that battle, the warships he led rushed from left to right and performed outstandingly. They sank three Zhensanjiang pirate warships and killed hundreds of thieves. They made great achievements and were promoted to general after returning.

Zhen Donghai is the remnant of Zhen Sanjiang who escaped back then, and Pei You has been trying to exterminate them all these years.It's just that this group of pirates is very cunning, cunning rabbits have three dens, come and go like the wind, although they have appeared in Duli Town many times, their lairs are far outside the range of Duli Town.

Will Cat Island really be broken by Zhendonghai?Pei You doubted this result very much.Zhensanjiang had assembled more than 3000 people and failed to capture Cat Island. He knew better than anyone else the strength of Cat Island that the Feng family had been operating for so many years.But according to the situation at the scene, the other party not only broke through Cat Island very easily, slaughtered all the Feng clan members and guards on the island, but also calmly emptied all the goods on the island, even the slaves Whores are not spared.

He had already asked the Feng family to know how much goods had been transported from the island.It is speculated that such a large amount of goods cannot be transported away without two hundred ships.

With a fleet of 3000 ships, and silently breaking through Cat Island overnight, Pei You would never believe that this was actually done by those pirates in Zhendonghai.Zhendonghai is to bring all the ships and all the pirates. They only have forty or fifty ships at most, and less than [-] people.With that little people, not to mention breaking through Cat Island, even after breaking through, they would not be able to transport all the goods.

In the end, he judged that it was definitely not Zhendonghai who attacked Cat Island this time, let alone other pirates.Coupled with the fact that the fleet searched in all directions but could not get any results, this further confirmed the conjecture in his heart.The murderers who attacked Cat Island had a fleet of at least a hundred ships. In addition, the killers had extremely strong combat effectiveness, and the most important point was that they were very close to Cat Island, and they could take advantage of the heavy rain to capture Cat Island in one night. The goods of hundreds of ships on the island were transported and evacuated within half a day.

In this way, there are only two people who meet this condition. One is the Dengzhou garrison on Wuhu Island, south of Duli Town.However, the garrison of Wuhu Island belongs to one of the three major archipelagos under Daxie Village, and the envoy of Daxie Village is Feng Zhang, who is from the same family as the owner of Cat Island. It is impossible to sneak attack on one's own private island and massacre many members of the Feng clan.

After excluding the award of Daxie Village, the only target in Baili who meets this condition is left.That is the mortal enemy of Duli Town for a century, the gang of horse thieves in Qingnipu.

"The thieves from Qingnipu must have raided and ransacked Cat Island, and then deliberately left behind the name of Zhendonghai!" Pei You said with certainty.

Pei You reported his investigation results to the city lord and the Feng family, and both the city lord and the Feng family of Duli Town agreed with his speculation.Afterwards, the city lord convened the representatives of various business groups and families in the city lord meeting, and all the representatives of the 180 seats attended the meeting. At the meeting, the representatives of the Feng family strongly expressed their anger towards the Qingnipu horse thieves, and claimed that this was Qingnipu The horse thieves are preparing for a full-scale act of instigation of war against Duli Town.He asked the representatives to agree to the joint fleet to attack Qingnipu.

One of the 36 representatives with the right to veto said: "In the past hundred years, we have used countless methods against Qingnipu, but so far none of them have succeeded. We have sent troops more than a dozen times, each time consuming a lot of food and rewards. , But in the end they all returned with no success. I am naturally angry with the horse thieves in Qingnipu, and I hope to eradicate them immediately. They often plunder our Liaodong trade roads, and sometimes even send their ridiculous number of only 3000 people It is beyond the tolerance of our small fleet to rob the ships of our merchant group."

Having said that, his words resonated with most of the delegates.The purpose of the merchants was to ask for money, and many families joined forces to control Duli Town, not to restore Li Tang's control of Liaodong, they just wanted to ask for money.It is true that the Tang army wants to restore Liaodong, I am afraid they will be the first to oppose it.How can Liaodong under the control of the imperial court be as strong as this free ship?

After a pause, the meticulously combed, energetic, and gorgeously dressed old man continued: "However, after so many fights with horse thieves, we should have already understood. Although we own the entire Liaodong and even the entire north, The most powerful fleet from Dengzhou to Liaodong and even Silla, while Qingnipu only has a small fleet of 3000 people and only has dozens of broken ships. But everyone should not forget that there are more than 40 large and small islands in the periphery of Qingnipu The island chain formed. Although those horse thieves are not good at naval warfare, they have built a large number of fortresses on the islands and along the coast, plus they have a fleet of 3000 people. Every time we want to attack Qingnipu, we have to We need to wipe out these island chains as gateways first."

"But the result of the fact is that every time we try to break through and wipe out those island fortresses with all our strength, the horse thieves in Qingnipu will send their best cavalry to detour behind us and raid our castles, barracks, straight Behind the town of Chiduli. Although the town of Duli has high walls and strong walls, we still have many castles and barracks on the outside, and those castles are mostly the private castles of all of us here, and the Fengjiamao that was just breached Islands are extremely important and precious.”

"The more critical point is that once our two families go to war, the land commercial routes from Liaodong and Dengzhou to Koryo and the Bohai Sea will also be affected and blocked. Every day the two commercial routes are blocked, the damage we will suffer It's going to be huge."

The representative of the Feng family was also an old man with white beard and hair. He couldn't help but groaned softly and stood up, shouting loudly: "Then what do you mean, I, the Feng family, have to hold my nose and suffer this big loss? And you I never thought, since they are the ones who took the initiative to make trouble first, even if we give in, will the other party be willing to stop?"

"Then is it necessary to drag everyone into the water for a little personal grievance of your Feng family?"

"Stop arguing!" Wang Pu, the city lord of Duli Town, stopped the two fighting with a loud voice.Wang Pu is about fifty years old, with a burly figure, a thick back, a wide mouth and a long nose, and a face with tendrils.When he was young, he served in the Chang'an army and was very brave. Later, he was sent to Duli Town by his family, and then joined the outer town army of Duli Town. He led the outer town army to fight many other forces in Liaodong many times, and performed outstandingly.This year, the position of the city lord was rotated as usual, and when it was the Wang family's turn, the Wang family pushed Wang Pu to the front of the stage as the city lord.

Wang Pu is different from many other former city lords. As a general, he is even tougher, and even tries to change the status of the city lord as a middleman who mediates disputes between many representatives of the alliance.As soon as he took office, he began to propose increasing military spending, expanding troops, and improving combat readiness.

Wang Pu glanced at the white-haired old men in the hall of the City Lord's Mansion, and frowned involuntarily.Duli Town occupies such a good location and has such a powerful military force, but these old men are all just a group of businessmen who only care about money.They only think about making money all day long, and don't think about making progress. As long as no one comes to attack Duli Town, they will happily spend their days here.In his view, with such a strong military force, it is time to make a big splash and wipe out Liaodong.

"I heard that the dispute between the two of you just now has its own reasons. Feng Lao's proposal to take the initiative to attack is very reasonable, and Zheng Lao's concern is also reasonable. However, I have a latest news to tell you, which may dispel Zheng The old man is worried." Wang Pu paused, and then said louder: "Just today, the city lord Li of Beisha City sent an envoy, and he also heard that those horse thieves in Qingnipu dared to provoke war on their own. The peace of the water and soil, he expressed his willingness to join hands with us to kill the horse thieves in Qingnipu."

As soon as the news came out, the whole hall suddenly became chaotic and noisy, and all the representatives whispered and chatted in low voices.

"Is this news true? Those people in Beisha City are also a group of horse thieves, not much better than Qingnipu. We didn't have much friendship with them before. Why did they make this proposal and what are their demands?" Zheng's old man was the first to ask.

"That's a good question. People die for money, and birds die for food. Although the horse thieves in Beisha City have no friendship with them, they have even less friendship with the pirates in Qingnipu. Right. They are all horse thieves, so naturally they have disliked each other for a long time. Beisha City has only one request, to capture Qingnipu, and he wants the harbor of Qingnipu and the forty or so islands. Except for the city where the port is located, all other land sites under our control belong to us."

"The harbors and islands should belong to us, and the land territory can be given to them." The surname Zheng immediately changed his attitude of not supporting sending troops, and immediately put forward his own new conditions.A large group of old and immortal representatives behind them also immediately seconded the proposal, and they have already discussed how to allocate these newly acquired islands as everyone's private islands after they get the harbor and wharf.

Wang Pu looked at these greedy old men coldly, cursed a few times in his heart, but still had a smile on his face, and said loudly: "Everyone, everybody, in my opinion, we might as well agree to Beisha City first, they have been staying in Dasha City for a long time. Montenegro has been jealous of us earning a lot of wealth by relying on sea roads for many years. Now, they propose to join forces, and it is entirely for the harbor of Qingnipu. We can promise them first , When we defeat those horse thieves in Qingnipu, we will talk to the horse thieves in Beisha City about the new partition conditions, I believe they will understand our approach."

"This time, I propose that the combined fleet of 2 troops should be dispatched to attack the outlying islands of Qingnipu, and pull them out one by one. Qingnipu used to send their [-] soldiers every time it was not our attack. Are the fine cavalry coming to attack our rear? This time, there are horse thieves from Beisha City outflanking the rear of the horse thieves from the land. The cavalry of Beisha City is in the north, and our fleet is in the south. The horse thieves who fought across Qingnipu took the largest and best harbor in the north into their pockets in one fell swoop!"

Voting began, among the 180 representatives, 150 of them passed with seven votes, especially the 36 representatives with veto power all passed.More than two-thirds of the people passed the coalition's proposal to send troops, and the final resolution took effect.Wang Pu immediately appointed Pei You as the military envoy of the United Fleet, with full authority to command and take charge of the offensive.

As for Zhendonghai?From the beginning to the end, no one mentioned it.

On Wuming Island in the Liaohai Sea, after the initial wild cheers, Li Jing immediately sent several scout boats to inquire about the movement around Qingnipu and Duli Town.Before dawn, they reported one after another that Duli Town was indeed ready to go to war with Qingnipu. They also brought back news that Beisha City to the east of Qingnipu also sent [-] infantry, [-] cavalry, and logistics auxiliary troops. There are more than [-] civilians, and it is said that an army of [-] has already left Daheishan and is attacking the rear of Qingnipu.

Upon receiving this news, Whitebeard and the others proposed with high interest that they might as well take advantage of the entire combined fleet to go out and attack one of the other private islands in Duli Town.However, this proposal was immediately vetoed by Li Jing. The spoils from last time were not ready to be transported away, so what is the reason for making another move at this time?

During the day, Li Jing persuaded Baibeard and the others to veto their plan to return to their lair, and asked them to follow him back to Dengzhou.The pirates on the small island worked together with the slave artisans and the town soldiers of Shamen Town, and more than 100 ships shipped all the materials on the island.

When it was dark, everyone boarded the boat and set off after having a full meal. The huge fleet under the banner of King Zhao Li Rui did not return according to the way they came.Instead, go westward first, and then turn southeast after leaving the three archipelagos of Daxie Village.In the dark night, we moved forward slowly, with full vigilance along the way, and finally drove into Tangwan safely more than an hour before dawn.

(To be continued)