Late Tang

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On February [-]th, Wang Jingchong led [-] cavalry to the city of Cangzhou.

As soon as he entered Cangzhou, he received bad news that Lucheng, the northernmost city in Cangzhou, had fallen.

Lucheng was only a hundred miles away from Cangzhou City. Hearing the news, Wang Jingchong was both surprised and happy. He was surprised that Li Jing's cavalry came so quickly, and he was happy that Li Jing finally stepped into the encirclement of the four towns.

The day after Wang Jingchong arrived in Cangzhou to take over all military and political affairs, the [-] infantry of the Chengde Army finally arrived in Cangzhou.In the city of Cangzhou, there were [-] infantry, [-] cavalry, and a total of [-] troops.

At this time, he had already received news that [-] Wei Bo troops were coming to Cangzhou for reinforcements.

Then, that night, another news came from here that Jingcheng, sixty miles away from Cangzhou, had fallen, and the Northeast Army's forward had approached Cangzhou, only thirty miles away from Changlu County to the north of Cangzhou.

Before Wang Jingchong sent troops, he had ordered his two brothers to fortify the walls and clear the fields in Cangzhou. All the people in the counties and villages near Cangzhou were forced to evacuate to Cangzhou, all houses were burned, and all wells were filled, and Li Jing was not given a chance to replenish.

The people who moved back everywhere, and tens of thousands of German troops crowded the city of Cangzhou.

Although this lion city has a circumference of fifteen miles, the population it can carry is limited. Now, the streets are full of immigrant people sleeping everywhere, and the pressure on food has suddenly increased.

Wang Jingchong did not divide his troops to defend Changlu and Jingcheng counties, but directly shrank all his troops to Cangzhou and let Li Jing go south.

At the same time, Wang Jingchong ordered that among the people who entered the city, young and strong men who had practiced martial arts and bows and arrows were recruited to fill the defense team. Shiguan, if it is an officer, the reward is even heavier.Wang Jingchong recruited a large number of soldiers, Cangzhou native people are strong and practice martial arts, within a few days, he has already recruited [-] young men equipped with spears, horizontal knives, bows and arrows.

With [-] infantry, [-] cavalry, and [-] young and strong, Wang Jingchong's confidence greatly increased.

Then what made Wang Jingchong a little strange was that he waited for three days in a row to prepare for war in Cangzhou City, and until the fourteenth day, the Liao soldiers who had captured Jingcheng, sixty miles west of Cangzhou three days ago, did not attack Cangzhou. Attack.Changlu County, thirty miles away, is still not occupied.Except for the discovery of a small group of Liao army scouts, the Liao soldiers seemed to have stopped in front of Cangzhou.

Wang Jingchong discussed with his counselors several times, but he couldn't guess what Li Jing was thinking.

Li Jing only had food and grass for seven days, and it was said that Li Jingli was making a quick decision, but now four days had passed, Li Jing only captured the two cities of Lucheng and Jingcheng, but the army had already penetrated a hundred miles into Cangzhou.

Li Jing launched this war suddenly, there must be a purpose.

Wang Jingchong and his counselors could think of nothing more than a few, one is to attack Youzhou.Second, go south to Henan by land to rescue Dongdu and relieve the siege of Huangchao.Third, the real purpose of destroying Guo by false means was to capture the Yichang army, so as to connect Li Jing's northeast territory and eastern Henan territory through the coastal area of ​​Hebei.Fourth, plunder Hebei and rob the population.

All four goals are possible.Now that Li Jing has captured half of Lulong, it would be reasonable to attack Youzhou at this time.But if you want to attack an important town like Youzhou, what you need is not cavalry, but infantry that is good for besieging the city.Moreover, Youzhou is the most important town in the north, and the siege may be long-term. Therefore, not only infantry, but also more auxiliary troops and siege equipment are needed.Judging from Li Jing's force allocation of [-] cavalry and [-] infantry this time, the momentum of Qingqi going south is more inclined to the latter three.

To seize the Yichang army was to seize the territory, and to go south to Henan, at this time, it must be aimed at the empty Taining army and Tianping army.When Ziqing Town was strong, it used to be a land of fifteen prefectures including De and Di in the north, Yi and Hai in the south, and Yun and Yan in the west.Wang Jingchong would never believe that Li Jing was really going to rescue Dongdu.Li Jing went to grab the territory under the banner of rescuing the Eastern Capital, which is somewhat believable.

However, this cannot completely negate the last possibility. Perhaps Li Jing's troop dispatch this time is not aimed at siege of cities and land, but at looting the population of Hebei.After all, judging from Li Jing's actions over the years, this guy's favorite thing is to rob people.At the beginning, he had robbed Youzhou a few times, which severely damaged Youzhou's vitality.

Everyone knows that Li Jing now has a lot of territory, but what he lacks the most is population.

After thinking about it, it seems impossible to attack Youzhou at this time, so the remaining three goals, robbing Yichang Town and going south to Henan, must pass through Cangzhou to open up this channel.If this is the case, the Chengde army is guarding here, and as long as the previous plan is implemented, they can hunt Li Jing.But if Li Jing was just planning to plunder Hebei this time, the situation would be a little more complicated.

The counselors had a good idea, but Wang Jingchong didn't believe that Li Jing dispatched 20 soldiers and horses at a time, just for the purpose of looting Hebei and robbing money, food and people.After all, Li Jing's Liao soldiers are different from the soldiers and horses of other towns, such as the four towns of Hebei and Huangchao. The recruits who got up sounded like a lot of people.And Li Jing's soldiers, although most of them may not be as strong as their old battalion of tooth soldiers, but on the whole, they are well-armed and well-armed, much stronger than their army.

The last time Li Jing robbed Shunzhou, he only dispatched [-] cavalry. If it was just a robbery, there would be no need to use [-] troops.

After much deliberation, he felt that Li Jing's goal was Yichang Town or via Henan.But if this is the case, then Li Jing should go south quickly, after all, Li Jing only has food for seven days.He should avoid Cangzhou directly and go directly south to Henan.

Therefore, after the Liao soldiers quickly captured Lucheng and Jingcheng, there was no movement suddenly, which is really puzzling.Could it be that Li Jing knew that his soldiers were reinforcing Cangzhou, and that he already knew the plan of the four towns to encircle him, so he was going to withdraw?

This is possible. Li Jing always likes to avoid the real and attack the weak when using troops, and he rarely likes to confront the tough. Maybe Li Jing really wanted to capture Yichang Town before, and then went south.But now seeing the reaction of the four towns, he shrinks back in fear.

But it's all just guesswork, he knows as little as possible about what's going on in the north.He asked Zan Hua, who was in charge of the military situation, to send spy scouts to both Lucheng and Jingcheng, but it would take time for these secret agents to report back.

Before that, all Wang Jingchong could do was wait in the city of Cangzhou.

On February [-]th, south of Huichang County, Zhuozhou, south of Jumashui, bordering Mozhou.

The two prefectures of Mo and Ying to the south of Jumashui have always been controlled by Lulong Town.After Li Keju's defeat, the two prefectures were named Lulong Township, which was actually controlled by Li Quanzhong.After Li Quanzhong captured Yiwu Town, he handed over Mozhou to Liu Yue as agreed, but in fact Mozhou was controlled by Liu Rengong.

Moying two prefectures have a very important position in Hebei. There is Juma Water in the north, a canal in the southeast, and Hutuo Water in the middle.

During the Spring and Autumn Period, Erzhou belonged to the Jin Dynasty, during the Warring States Period, it was the territory of the Three Kingdoms of Yan, Zhao, and Qi, and Qin was the land of Julu and Shanggu.The Han Dynasty established Hejian State, which got its name because it was between two rivers.Hejian County was established in Wei Dynasty, Hejian County was restored in Sui Dynasty, and Yingzhou was established in Tang Dynasty.

On the south bank of the Juma River, a temporary camp.

Li Jing, who was in armor, sat in the tent and listened carefully to Gongsun Lan's report to Li Jing of the information received and analyzed.

"Dong Zhang's yamen led the cavalry army to capture Lucheng four days ago, and Gao Jichang's yamen also led the cavalry army to capture Jingcheng three days ago."

"How did Wang Jingchong and others react?" Li Jing asked while stretching out his hand to roast on the brazier.

Gongsun Lan was wearing a Suzaku-style full body armor. The silver-white plate armor was round and full of streamlines. It set off that charming face and made her whole person more seductive.Without flipping through the notepad, she replied directly: "As expected by the king of the county, Wang Jingchong is indeed unwilling to give up Yichang Town, where he had come to his mouth. Not only did he refuse to spit out this piece of meat, but he even planned to bite us. According to the exchange and analysis of the information sent back by all parties, we have obtained information that Wang Jingchong has almost brought out the entire Chengde army this time. Send [-] infantry to each of Dedi and Dizhou to attack and defend the north bank of the Yellow River."

"The other three towns?"

"Han Jian dispatched [-] Wei Bo troops to march towards Cangzhou. At the same time, he is still dispatching soldiers and horses, and then he will go north in person. Li Quanzhong also dispatched [-] Yiwu troops to move closer to Youzhou. Lu Huichang and Yongnu cut off our way back and surrounded us."

"Do you want to swallow our [-] army?" Li Jing chuckled, and all the generals beside him also laughed.

Wang Pu, Shangshu of the Ministry of War, laughed: "Dong Zhang and Gao Jichang fought well. The [-] cavalry outnumbered [-] soldiers and horses. I guess Wang Jingchong and others thought that the soldiers and horses of Jingcheng and Lucheng were ours. The main force."

"They would never have thought that our main force is not far to the south of Huichang City." The commander of the Chinese army, Lin Wei, also nodded with a smile.The four towns in Hebei received news that Li Jing had only brought food and grass for seven days, and there was no logistics battalion, so it was determined that no matter what purpose Li Jing sent troops this time, it must be beneficial to a quick decision.

But they never expected that Li Jing had dispatched troops for four days, but actually only two cavalry troops were dispatched.His [-] main force is only fifty miles south of Huichang at this moment.

"Tianxiong did a good job. The soldiers of the Flying Cavalry Army killed all the scouts in the four towns, so that they couldn't figure out our reality." Li Jing was very satisfied with Yang Shihou.Since the dispatch of troops this time, the actual performance of several disciples has proved that Li Jing's decision to vigorously promote them and appoint them as the chief generals of each cavalry army was correct.

Guo Chengan reminded on the side: "Since Wang Jingchong is already in the game, shall we start to act?"

At this time, although the army was only fifty miles away from Huichang City, there was indeed not much food and grass. (To be continued.)