Late Tang

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In February of the third year of Qianfu, the town [***] entered Pingzhou.

The Eight Thousand Yanyun Army received the transfer order and returned to Dengzhou by boat from Youzhou for training.In Pingzhou, Li Jing sent counselor Li Zhen as the governor of Pingzhou, and Lin Wei as the defense envoy of Pingzhou. He also selected the front army, Sirius army, and crane control army to station in Pingzhou.

Liu Xun led the frontline army to garrison the Lulongsai line in the north of Pingzhou, and Fu Wenda led the Sirius army to garrison Yuguan, the gateway to the east of Pingzhou.On the other hand, Shicheng County on the west side of Pingzhou and the border of Jizhou was stationed by the Crane Cavalry Army led by Li Juyi.

At the same time, the three counties of Lulong, Shicheng, and Macheng in Pingzhou also transferred three experienced county magistrates from the counties under the town [***] to be promoted to county magistrates, and they also transferred from county magistrates, county lieutenants to Lu Wait for all the officials in the entire yamen to be transferred.

Li Jing also ordered the construction of a water city on the seaside of Yuguan and the estuary of the Luan River that runs through Pingzhou and flows from the Xi nationality to Pingzhou to the sea, and stationed two water army camps.

After the army and officials were in place, Li Jing immediately transported a group of newly recruited refugees to Pingzhou to garrison fields and reclaim wasteland.And immediately recruited people on the borders of Pingzhou, Jizhou and Yingzhou, one east and one west.

These actions of Zhen [***] did not wait for the consent of Liu Yue or Fan Xinglong at all.

Li Jing just let out the news first, made a war mobilization, and took Li Keju to Dengzhou, and then took Liu Rengong's [-] Uighur cavalry to the Youzhou camp.Afterwards, Li Jing began to march towards Pingzhou. When Fan Xinglong heard that Li Jing went directly to Pingzhou by land and water, he angrily chopped up the beloved red sandalwood table in front of him.He immediately sent an order to gather the soldiers, but when the soldiers and horses gathered, Fan Xinglong sighed and ordered the soldiers and horse officials in Pingzhou to withdraw to Jizhou immediately.

In the end, Fan Xinglong could only lead the soldiers and horses to follow all the way far away, and then sent the soldiers and horses of the town [***] into Pingzhou, and then directly occupied Pingzhou.

Liu Yue sent envoys to Dengzhou and told Li Jing that Pingzhou could be temporarily handed over to Li Jing to deal with the Khitans, but Li Jing must hand over the traitor Li Keju to him.However, Li Jing ignored this request at all. Instead, he replied that Lu Longjun promised to give the town [***] [-]% of Youzhou's annual tax, but this year it has not been paid yet, so let them prepare.

The two sides just come and go, wrangling each other, and doing some war mobilization and military exercises from time to time.

After a year, Chang'an sent back news that although Chen Jingxuan, Yang Shili, and Niu Xu escaped from Youzhou, they refused to come to Youzhou again.Finally, I heard that the three of them played a game with the emperor to bet on the position of Sanchuan Jiedushi. In the end, Chen Jingxuan won the first place. Because Xichuan was the richest, he was immediately appointed as Xichuan Jiedushi; Yang Shili was next, Dongchuan Jiedushi Niu Xu is the third, the Jiedu envoy of Shannan West Road.

The three went to Sanchuan to serve as Jiedu envoys, but Tian Lingzi and the emperor, uncharacteristically, did not send anyone to serve in Youzhou.On the contrary, Chen Jingxuan was decreed to remove the deputy ambassador of Jiedu, and Li Keju was left behind, but Li Jing still held the post of Lulong Jiedu envoy.As for the new Jiedu Deputy Envoy, Jiedu Marching Sima, Jiedu Judge, and even Deputy Ambassador, Liuhou and other important positions, no one was proposed.

After this decree was issued, Liu Yue and others understood that the emperor did not intend to send any more people here.At this time, he stopped arguing with Li Jing and acquiesced to the fact that Li Jing occupied Pingzhou.Instead, the three of them began gearing up for Lu Longjun's position as commander.

Liu Yue and others began to dispatch soldiers and horses, and they were already on guard against each other.Fan Xinglong really wanted to fight Zhen[***], after all, Pingzhou belonged to him, but Li Quanzhong and Liu Yue got Li Jing's guarantee to occupy Pingzhou, just to recover Liaodong and Liaoxi, so they temporarily endured it.

Li Jing couldn't help sighing in his heart seeing that the three of them were unwilling to rush ahead, each with their own ulterior motives.

The strongest feudal clan back then is now in the sunset.Lu Longjun is no longer strong.The internal fights continued, and finally their strength was almost exhausted.

Such Lu Long, if he fights his life, he might be able to win him in one fell swoop.But Li Jing also wanted to understand, such a neighbor, don't worry.Keeping them temporarily can also be used as a barrier between the other towns of the imperial court. After the old land of Anton is taken down, they can be taken at any time when they look back.

After mutual intimidation, threats, and bluffing, Zhen [***] finally occupied Pingzhou without a single soldier.Although this is just a remote state of three counties, Li Jing is still very happy.

After winning Pingzhou, he already occupied the land of the three states.If you count the sixteen counties in Ziqing Town, there are still two states.

Dengzhou has another celebration banquet tonight, celebrating that an official will go to Pingzhou to take up his post.

However, Li Jing didn't go tonight. After taking Pingzhou, Zhen[***] has a greater advantage in recovering Liaodong.Li Jing and others have discussed many times, and finally decided to attack Liaodong after the summer harvest.

After the summer harvest, there is plenty of grass and food, and the key is the more than 200-mile-long swamp in the Liaoxi Corridor, which can only be passed smoothly in autumn and winter.And when the rains flood in spring and summer, the entire swamp area will become a dead zone, and people and horses are rare.With this isolation belt, when Zhen [***] attacked Liaodong, the Khitans would not be able to quickly send reinforcements from Liaoxi to Liaodong.And now that there are soldiers from Pingzhou, Pingzhou can also send troops to raid the old nests of the Khitan people in Yingzhou and kick their butts hard.

The war is getting closer and closer, and I am not too worried about Li Jing's recovery of Liaodong. What I am worried about is that I will have to confront the Khitan people head-on.

During this period of time, the busiest ones were the Xiaoqi Division and the Staff Division. Countless information was continuously collected from all directions to Dengzhou, and finally analyzed, then summarized, and reacted.

Khitan has been in chaos recently, first Yili Jin Yelu Yunde died, and then Yelu Runde who killed Yundeshi was beheaded by Yelu Puguzhi at the Chai Book Ceremony.It didn’t take long for Yelupu Guzhi to become Yilijin, and the conflict between the Yaoren tribe and the Diel tribe became more and more serious. Then, on the night after Yelupuguzhi and Bala Khan competed for the Central Plains’ commodity share, they and his son-in-law Yelurude had his head cut off as well.

The newly appointed Yelvhende has already determined that Yelv Puguzhi killed his father, and has threatened to kill Puguzhi several times in public.

Three Yelu seven tribes, Khan Hende have reached an agreement with the six tribes of Yaoni and Dahe tribes, Yilijin, and Yelupu Guzhi has also received the support of several of the twenty tribes.The situation on both sides is now tense, like a volcano that is about to erupt at any time.From time to time, some warriors from both sides had their heads cut off, so now that it was getting dark, the Khitan people couldn't sleep.I can only use alcohol to alleviate this irritable mood.

Li Wei lived a cool life on the grassland, and now he has become the most popular person in Khitan.The original caravan of 3000 people has now expanded to tens of thousands.As long as the Khitan people brought something, whether it was cattle, sheep, horses, ores, herbs, or even slave women, leather goods and dried meat, Li Wei would accept whatever they had.There are more and more things that can be exchanged from him. From the initial tea, wine, salt, perfume glass, etc., to now even fine armor and sharp steel knives are also sold. Although the price is astonishing, only tribal leaders buy it. In fact, if an ordinary warrior wanted to buy a set of armor, he would have to take out all his belongings and couldn't afford it.

But now the situation has changed. After the vendettas of various tribes continued to escalate, a small tribe was finally defeated, and then all the remaining men, women, children, and children became slaves, and their cattle, sheep, horses, and tents became their trophies.The victor found Li Wei and was willing to sell him all the spoils, including the captives, in exchange for the excellent weapons and armor in his hands.

Li Wei quickly completed the transaction, and even sent an extra high-quality steel knife because this was the first customer to make such a large transaction.

Thousands of defeated tribes only exchanged for ten sets of armor and weapons in the end, but the man felt that he had made a fortune.Many envious or hate-blindfolded tribes also began to join in this brutal cannibalism.

Seeing that these tribes finally started killing each other because of hatred and interests, Li Weichang stretched his waist and yawned, "It's terrible, these damned Khitans are finally fighting each other. People are going around to carry out assassinations."

More and more Khitan people exchanged their enemies' cattle, sheep, and even family slaves for goods, and most of them came for weapons and armor.Li Wei immediately raised the price, and only sold high-quality armor weapons. There are as many precious armors and swords worth thousands of calibers as you want, but iron armor with hundreds of calibers, leather armor with dozens of calibers, simple spears, bows and arrows, etc. , but nothing.

There is no need to worry about selling treasure armor to those tribal leaders Li Wei. Even if all the Khitan tribe leaders have a set of treasure armor, they will not gather together to form an armored phalanx.

The situation in Khitan is good, and it is developing in the direction Li Jing expected.

Regarding the situation in the Central Plains, I don't know whether to say good or bad.

Wang Jingwu, who was tricked by Li Jing, is almost crazy now. He has captured all the young and strong men over the age of 15 and under the age of 70 in the ten counties of Ziqing Town as strong men and organized them into the army.Because too many people escaped, Wang Jingwu directly tattooed the faces of all the captured recruits.Once a fleeing soldier with tattoos on his face is found, he will be killed immediately as soon as he is found.

Relying on this ruthlessness, Wang Jingwu searched ten counties in Ziqing and arrested a total of 10 people, all of whom had the words "Luohedu" tattooed on their faces.On the other hand, many scholars without any strong background were also arrested and joined the army, and the words "one mind and one mind" were tattooed on their arms.

In the entire ten counties of Ziqing, almost all the men had tattoos on their faces and hands, and the rest were white-haired old people and young children.

After arresting all the people, Wang Jingwu searched for food and money in various places in Ziqing. Because most of the big households were moved away by Li Jing, Wang Jingwu became even more unscrupulous.They searched for food and grass from house to house, and all the money, cloth, etc. were also robbed.Most of the people in Ziqing fled to the counties under the control of the town [***]. The entire ten counties of Ziqing are now full of ruins, and there are no people for hundreds of miles.

At the end of the twelfth lunar month, Wang Jingwu led 10 troops from Luohedu to launch an attack on the two cities of Bochang and Qiancheng in Qingzhou controlled by Li Jing. In the first battle, he defeated Wang Jingwu's army and won more than [-] soldiers. (To be continued.)