Prince of Song Dynasty

Chapter 567
Wang Jing listened to the conversation between the three, and looked at Lin Renzhao's expression, he was already startled. After a long while, he saw Lin Renzhao's shoulders shaking: "Hahahahahahahaha" and laughed.

The next moment, the knife light flashed, Xu Yaoxing's head fell to the side, and blood gushed out several feet high.

Yang Jialun screamed, got up and ran, Lin Renzhao swung his right hand, and the long knife in his hand flew out like lightning. Just looking at Lin Renzhao's strike, it can be seen that Lin Renzhao's martial arts strength has reached the first-class level.Yang Jialun was able to become a general under Lin Renzhao's command, and his strength was not low, but he did not escape the knife thrown by Lin Renzhao casually, and was pierced through the back of the heart by a knife. He continued to run two steps forward, looked down at the tip of the knife on his chest, Turning around hard, looking at Lin Renzhao, he said in horror and despair: "Marshal, you will regret it."

After finishing speaking, with a puff, Yang Jialun spat out a mouthful of blood, fell directly to the ground, and died on the spot.

At this time, the fighting and screaming all around also started.Xu Yaoxing and Yang Jialun each had nearly a thousand soldiers. Under the leadership of several confidants of the two, they had just made a change, and they were surrounded and killed by the people brought by Lin Renzhao. Most of them knelt down and surrendered. kill.As for the soldiers Xu Yaoxing and Yang Jialun each brought back to the village, although there were nearly [-] soldiers in total, their prestige was far from that of Lin Renzhao's. But no one dared to make a difference.

The wind is whimpering, the huge military stronghold under the night sky, Lin Renzhao has been operating here for nearly ten years, and has paid countless silver taels. Now the city wall is tall and strong, and combined with the terrain, the defense alone is not worse than some big cities. A female behemoth.

At the mouth of the gorge to the southwest of the city, the Song army began to set up camp. If they want to attack the city tomorrow, they must make psychological preparations for a long-term attack.After Pan Mei recognized this point, she was worried that she would be restrained here, but instead, Zhao Zan was the first to beat her to Jinling City and took the lead.

Pan Mei is eager to make contributions, and is also an extremely decisive person. She made a decision overnight. Cao Wei and Yang Yanjun will lead 2 people, plus [-] troops from Chizhou, and stay here with nearly [-] sailors to watch over the harvest. Shiji Lin Renzhao.And he himself led an army of nearly [-] strong and went directly to the south, heading towards Jinling.

Jinling, the imperial palace, the main hall.

Li Yu, Han Xizai, Lou Yanming, Wang Dongyang, Li Congshan, Xu Xuan and other important ministers of the Southern Tang Dynasty surrounded the huge map, discussing enthusiastically how to implement Han Xizai's strategy of strengthening the wall and clearing the wild.

"The imperial decree enshrining Lin Renzhao as King of Chu probably has already arrived at Caishiji..." Wang Dongyang looked at the document in his hand, drinking tea while talking casually.

Han Xizai glanced at him, took a stack of papers from the Minister of the Ministry of Households, and said, "The topography and household registration information of the Ministry of Households, the preliminary plan for the transfer of all villages and countryside north of Jinling City, the old man has already prepared. Of course, as long as Lin Renzhao can block Pan Mei, these are all useless."

After learning that Pan Mei destroyed the pontoon bridge by herself in order to win the victory, Han Xizai led his staff to conduct a lot of predictions and deduction, especially after analyzing Pan Mei's character, and came up with a relatively optimal Aggressive deduction.Judging from the comparison of the strength of the Song army against the Southern Tang army, the Southern Tang field battle was not an opponent of the Song army at all, and it could not do anything to the advance of the Song army, but some states and cities could still be defended or at least for a period of time.This may cause Pan Mei to go all the way south and take Jinling directly.Therefore, in the end, it is very likely that the only battle and decisive battle will be Jinling City.

Because of this, Han Xizai proposed the strategy of strengthening the wall and clearing the wild.

In the past, Han Xizai would not bring such an inference to the Golden Palace.Because the other party started to go south.Our side said: "Abandon the entire north of Jinling, they may not be meaningful at all." Such an argument cannot be justified anywhere, but if it is true, there are more than [-] troops stationed in the states north of Jinling , but how much they can hinder the Song Army.Everyone seems to have no confidence at all.

"With Pan Mei's personality, she will definitely fight to Jinling before Zhao Zan by any means. So no matter whether Lin Renzhao can stop the Song army, we have to start preparing to fortify the wall and clear the field." Han Xizai was still a little hesitant when he saw Li Yu's expression, and the others Most of them didn't take it seriously, and secretly cursed "a bunch of idiots" and finally emphasized it again.

At this moment, someone outside the hall shouted the Chizhou urgent report. The palace outside the hall was regarded as the eunuch and no one dared to stop it. The spy ran all the way into the hall, knelt down at Li Yu, and took out a piece of information in his hand. He held it up, and said loudly: "Your Majesty, Shuai Lin was defeated and has retreated into Caishiji, surrounded by the Song army."

With a bang, the teacup in Li Yu's hand fell to the ground and shattered. He was so flustered that he didn't know what to do next.

Han Xizai, Lou Yanming and others looked equally ugly. Han Xizai took a deep breath, regardless of the dignity of the monarch and his subjects, ran over and took the intelligence from the spies before grabbing a eunuch, and began to examine it carefully.

"Now I don't need to continue talking nonsense, Jianbi Qingye really needs to use it now." Han Xizai sighed, and passed the information to others, and then everyone fell silent, Wang Dongyang said: "Your Majesty" and then Seeing that Li Yu's face was pale, he was obviously panicked, so he smiled wryly and stopped talking.

At this time, the one who can really provoke the leader is definitely not the Emperor Li Yu of the Southern Tang Dynasty, but Han Xizai, the source of corruption in the Southern Tang Dynasty, and Lou Yanming, the source of the chaos.

Originally, when the war started, Han Xizai took the initiative to take charge of the logistics, leading the counselors and household officials under his command to undertake many trivial and complicated tasks, but at this time, the sense of urgency was finally suppressed, and Han Xizai's strength was completely ready to move .Then, under the coercive persecution of local officials in the Southern Tang Dynasty, residents in many places around Jinling began to leave their residences with their families under the threat of war.The food, food and grass that could not be taken away were all burned by the Nantang government, or directly poured into the river.

But the bad news followed one after another, and the monarchs and ministers of the Southern Tang Dynasty fell into grief, indignation and despair.

Yangzhou, Shuzhou, Huangzhou, Hongzhou and five other major counties announced their separation from the Southern Tang Dynasty and surrendered to the Song Dynasty. They opened the city gates to welcome the troops of Zhao Zan or Pan Mei to enter the city, and provided food and grass in the city for the Song army. edible.After the news reached Jinling, Lou Yanming decisively ordered the masters of Maitreya Sect to assassinate the prefects and guards of the five prefectures and five counties, but they were all destroyed by the masters sent by the Huaxia Weifu who had prepared in advance.

Of course, even though the Southern Tang court was so corrupt, there were still true patriots. There were many officials, generals, and even ordinary people who swore to die for the survival of the country.

Although Caishiji has a special terrain that is easy to defend and difficult to attack, it is also difficult for Lin Renzhao's army to get out as long as the Song army is stuck in the canyon at the exit of the army village.Cao Wei and Yang Yanjun knew that Lin Renzhao still had nearly 5 troops under his command. With Lin Renzhao's ability, it was difficult for them to destroy them. It collapsed.In this way, if the Tang army wanted to come out of the Caishiji military stronghold, there were only two ways to come out by water or over mountains.

The waterway was blocked by the Song army's navy, and even if it came out after crossing the mountains, it would inevitably become a tired army or pull out the team, and be surrounded and killed one by one by the Song army's concentrated forces.In addition, there were some problems within the Tang army in the Caishiji army camp. Even though Lin Renzhao decisively killed Xu Yaoxing, Yang Jialun and their confidants that day, there were many soldiers and officers who secretly did not want to continue fighting with the Song army.After all, the Southern Tang Emperor Li Yu and the incompetence and corruption of the court have been deeply rooted in the hearts of the people. With such a court and emperor, it would be good if they could win the war at the beginning, but if they lost, the morale of the army would definitely be shaken. In such a situation, if Lin Renzhao's prestige was not very high, and he acted decisively and ruthlessly, before the Song army attacked the army stronghold, some people in the stronghold would have surrendered voluntarily.

At the same time, a huge chaos is spreading in the area from Caishiji to Jinling.

Chizhou was defeated in the First World War. Lin Renzhao, who was regarded as hope by the Southern Tang Dynasty, was trapped in Caishiji. Although Pan Mei only brought 6 horses, the journey along the way, except for a few passionate generals in the Southern Tang Dynasty, was like an egg hitting a rock. In addition to generally sending to death, most of the Southern Tang army scattered and fled in all directions.Then along the way, groups of soldiers and generals began to form formations again, either stationed and waiting for orders, or gathered in nearby big cities.But Pan Mei did not stop, and the force of the army quickly expanded to the surrounding counties, towns and cities.

Finally, on the eighth day of March, in Wuhu City, which is two hundred miles away from Jinling City, Pan Mei encountered her first hard battle since Caishiji. The guard Liu Wenlu led ten thousand defenders to defend the city for two days. They arranged for people to dig a tunnel under the city wall, and blew up the city wall with explosives provided by the Huaxia Weifu, and the city was destroyed on the fourth day.

Then, the killings spread across the city, as if submerging the tide that covered the past.The defeated army and some residents of the original city organized sporadic resistance, and were crushed without a trace under the catastrophe.

This is a big city after passing Caishiji. Of course, compared with cities like Jinling, this place can only be regarded as a small and medium-sized city.Because it is close to Jinling City, its city defense is still relatively tight, and the business from south to north has prospered here, making it a permanent population of nearly [-]. The reason why Pan Mei insisted on breaking down this city was because of the Southern Tang Prime Minister Han Xizai's strategy of strengthening the wall and clearing the country. With the effect, Pan Mei led an army of [-] troops without enough food and grass.And the states and counties that voluntarily surrendered under the secret leadership of the Huaxia Weifu happened not to be on the route of Pan Mei's march.

(End of this chapter)