In addition, Qiu Yizhi sent Yuchi Jiming and eighteen soldiers back to Shanyin County to take Wen Lingjiao, Wu Ruofei, Yang Qiaoer and other female family members into the army to prevent them from being captured by Lingnan. The king used it to threaten himself and prepare for mobile warfare.
In this way, the army stayed under the Yuezhou City for three or four days. The scouts sent out by Qiu Yizhi to patrol sent news that the Lingnan Army in the south of the Yangtze River had heard that Yuezhou had fallen and had gathered 40,000 people to besiege them. Want to take back the city.
Qiu Yizhi did not panic after hearing this, and sent out a few more light cavalry. After finding out that the Lingnan army was attacking from the northeast, he led the army to break out of camp and head toward the southeast. He relied on the strong to bully the weak and dispersed several troops. After being ordered to come over for reinforcements, one or two thousand reinforcements surrounded Lin'an City in Hangzhou Prefecture.
Lin'an is a small city, and there are not many defenders in the city, and most of them came out to reinforce Yuezhou under orders. Qiu Yizhi sent troops to besiege on all sides, and it took less than half a day to break the city. According to the old practice of Yuezhou City, he requisitioned and dispersed the grain, grass and money in the city, and then drove the army out of the city.
Hearing that Lin'an was in danger, the Lingnan Army quickly changed direction and detached several thousand troops to continue attacking beyond Yuezhou. The main force rushed towards Lin'an.
Of course Qiu Yizhi was unwilling to fight with the main force of the Lingnan Army, but he sent his army southward, aiming directly at Wenzhou.
Zheng Yu, the third son of the King of Lingnan who was in charge of Jiangnan, was horrified when he saw this situation. He knew that Wenzhou was the hub from Jiangnan to Lingnan. If Qiu Yizhi defeated him, the now extremely empty Lingnan Road would inevitably be opened. , I am afraid that this sharp and cunning Qiu Yizhi will get through the gap, jump into Lingnan, and take away his lair.
So Zheng Yu strictly ordered the troops from all over the country to immediately gather at Wenzhou Prefecture, and they must defend Wenzhou City and ensure that no soldiers from the imperial court were allowed into Lingnan Road.
However, he did not expect that Qiu Yi's attack on Wenzhou was just a false shot. After he learned that the Lingnan Army was massively supporting Wenzhou, he immediately raised his troops to the north without any hesitation. In less than three days, he had returned to Hangzhou. They surrounded the city of Hangzhou, which had suffered a defeat.
Unexpectedly, Hangzhou is a fortified city. Although there are not many soldiers guarding it, the city wall is extremely tall and strong. The tunnels originally used by the Lingnan Army to attack the city have long been filled in, making it impossible to use secret passages for sneak attacks.
Qiu Yizhi came all the way and was engaged in mobile warfare. He did not carry heavy siege equipment, so he only attacked Hangzhou City symbolically, and then quickly went north to Suzhou Prefecture.
Suzhou was once the place where Qiu Yi fought against the Japanese. He was very familiar with the terrain and people. He knew which city was easy to fight and which city was difficult to attack. Therefore, without hesitation, he captured the two cities of Songjiang and Wujiang, bypassed the big city of Suzhou without attacking, and instead advanced to the northwest, harassed Changshu and captured Wuxi. There was a faint tendency to break the siege of Jinling.
Zheng Yu, who was guarding Jiangnan for Lingnan King Zheng Gui, was in a dilemma.
He also knew that following Qiu Yi's tail like this would not only be ineffective, but would actually drag down his army, which was the worst of the worst. He and several advisers and generals in his shogunate also thought about whether they could guess Qiu Yizhi's direction of action and set up obstacle traps in advance to catch turtles in his urn or attack him from both front and rear.
However, Qiu Yizhi didn't care about the gains and losses of a city or a place. When he encountered a slightly stronger resistance, he immediately changed his direction and attacked elsewhere. Like a slippery loach, even if he caught it, he would twist his body left and right. , and then ran to nowhere.
Now this loach has swam to Jinling and Suzhou.
Jinling City is the capital of Jiangnan Road and is still in the hands of the imperial court. Once the two armies join forces, the force surrounding Jinling will be unsustainable. The defenders in Jinling City counterattack and break the camp, and the situation in Jiangnan Road will be ruined. Out of control.
And Suzhou City is the most prosperous city in the south of the Yangtze River, second only to Jinling. If it is captured by the imperial court, it will be difficult to defend the surrounding cities. However, these cities are the essence of the south of the Yangtze River. If they fall, the losses will be huge.
Zheng Yu was really in a dilemma when faced with such a situation. However, several generals and counselors from Lingnan Road were fighting on the Western Front with his father Zheng Gui. He had no reliable staff to lead the army independently in the south of the Yangtze River. He could only wait for Qiu Yi's action and see him again. Recruit and demolish.
However, Qiu Yizhi just acted according to the opportunity. Seeing that his opponent had no movement, he rested his troops in the city of Wuxi with peace of mind. However, the city of Wuxi has both water and land connections. It is connected to official roads and is also a hub of canals. Qiu Yizhi was stationed here. Not only did he have enough food and clothing, but he also had to harass and attack everywhere, which made Zheng Yu unbearable.
The confrontation lasted for more than a month. Seeing that the New Year was approaching, there was a powerful enemy sleeping soundly beside Zheng Yu's bed. Even this New Year might not be able to be spent with peace of mind. So he quickly wrote a letter and sent a reliable person thousands of miles away, passing through Lingnan and Yunnan and Guizhou, and sent it to the Lingnan King Zhenggui on the front line of Shanxi and Shaanxi, asking him to make up his mind on how to deal with this difficult Qiu Yizhi.
By the time Zheng Yu received the reply from his father Zheng Gui, it was nearly a month later. The person who sent the letter was not just a messenger, but an army of 30,000 people.
These 30,000 horses were recruited and trained by Zheng Gui from Yunnan, Guizhou and Bashu in a few months. Now Zheng Gui is under the command of Zheng Yu, and his army is increased to more than 150,000 people. In addition to guarding various places and continuing to besiege Jinling, he can also gather 70,000 to 80,000 people to attack Qiu Yi's headquarters. .
On Qiu Yizhi's side, although some men and horses were lost in several battles, they combed the Lingnan Army's grain and bank vaults and collected the remnants of Jiangnan Dao soldiers who had fled to various places. They actually gathered around 10,000 men, and the total strength of his troops reached Nearly 20,000 people. These people have food and military pay, and are rigorously trained by Qiu Yizhi and others. Their combat effectiveness is certainly not what it used to be, and they have the capital to compete with the Lingnan Army.
Therefore, Qiu Yizhi originally thought that he could use 20,000 men, but Zheng Yu could only use more than 30,000 to less than 40,000 men to deal with him immediately. If you can fight one against ten soldiers and brave men, you will definitely be able to win.
However, he did not expect that Zheng Yu could actually assemble more than 70,000 troops at once and swoop towards him with great fanfare. He knew that it would be difficult to win easily when he had insufficient troops and the combat effectiveness of his soldiers could not exceed his opponent's.
But in the past two months, he had won many battles against Zheng Yu. The discouragement that he had felt after he was defeated at the hands of Lingnan King Zheng Gui and his entire army was wiped out completely disappeared, and he did not want to see the superior force coming. Retreating without firing an arrow hurt the morale of the newly recruited soldiers from Jiangnan Province.
Therefore, while Qiu Yizhi sent his own soldiers to closely monitor Zheng Yu's actions, he finally caught two opportunities. Taking advantage of the opportunity when his small group of troops broke away, he sent heavy troops to quickly fight and win two more battles. , a total of more than a thousand people were annihilated.
In this way, Zheng Yu seemed to have been knocked on the head. He strictly ordered the vanguard troops to stop moving forward, gathered all the troops together, and advanced one by one. Although his method of advance was extremely slow, it was extremely safe and did not leave any chance for Qiu Yizhi.
On Qiu Yizhi's side, there really was nothing Zheng Yu could do. He was a man who had experienced battles for a long time. He knew this way of marching. As long as he rashly attacked the enemy, he would be surrounded by other troops of the opponent - his own strength was weak. , which is even more devastating.
He saw Zheng Yu's soldiers and horses rolling in like volcanic lava, but he had no choice but to withdraw from Wuxi City and transfer to the outside of Changshu City. After Zheng Yu slowly caught up with him, he had no choice but to withdraw from Changshu and go to Suzhou...
In this way, in just half a month, Qiu Yizhi had already covered half of the journey from Shanyin County to Wuxi, and then reached the vicinity of Hangzhou.
On this day, Qiu Yi's troops were camping next to a hill outside Hangzhou. He was disturbed by difficult military affairs and was patrolling the camp with concern. Zhang Qi walked up to him and asked in a low voice: "Sir, are we After traveling for so many days, seeing that the New Year's Eve is approaching, is it okay to take a break? It would be better to go to the city to spend the New Year, and then fight with the Prince of Lingnan? "
When Qiu Yizhi was in a dilemma, he immediately got angry after hearing Zhang Qi's words: "Now when we enter the city, if we are accidentally surrounded by enemy troops, won't we become a turtle in a urn? Now Zheng Yu wants to kill We are rushing to death. It is too late for me to hide, but it is better for you to crawl into death yourself. "
Zhang Qi was stunned and didn't dare to speak, but he didn't back down. He slowly followed Qiu Yi and walked a few more steps before he plucked up the courage and said, "My lord, what you said is all right. It's a pity that brothers don't think so. If we fight outside for a long time like this, it will be difficult to maintain the morale of the army... "
Qiu Yizhi was stunned for a moment after hearing this, and his anger that had just calmed down was suddenly aroused again. He turned around suddenly, gritted his teeth and said loudly to Zhang Qi: "I didn't miss them a single penny of silver reward, and I didn't let them miss a penny of food." After a good meal, why can't the morale of the army be maintained? If anyone thinks my side is not good, then please leave now and see if they can have a stable meal during this time of war and chaos!"
Zhang Qi lost his temper at Qiu Yizhi's words and stood aside timidly, either retreating or following.
At this embarrassing moment, I saw the curtain of a tent nearby was gently opened, and a person walked out. He smiled and said: "They say winter is a time for self-cultivation. Why is it that Sir is so angry, as if it is in the middle of summer?"
Qiu Yizhi looked around and found that she had reached Lin Shuhan's tent. She smiled helplessly, shook her head and said with a smile: "Although it is winter, I feel like I am being roasted on the fire, so what?" Can you cultivate your moral character?"
Lin Shuhan laughed loudly twice, opened the folding fan in his hand, fanned Qiu Yizhi's body and face, and asked: "How is it? Are you feeling better now, sir?"
Although Jiangnan Road is south of the Yangtze River, it is very cold in winter. Qiu Yizhi was already shivering after being teased by Lin Shuhan like this. He quickly grabbed Lin Shuhan's wrist and said, "It's so cold. Sir, he wants to freeze to death." me?"
Lin Shuhan didn't seem to care, and said with a smile: "Since you are cold, how about you come and sit in my tent? Although my tent is not as spacious as the Chinese army's tent, it is quite warm!" After that, he picked it up. He opened the curtain and let Qiu Yizhi into his tent.
Lin Shuhan's tent was only one foot square. There was a charcoal basin in the middle, with several red-hot charcoal balls on it, which were "sizzling" with steam. There was a copper kettle placed on top of the charcoal basin. I don't know if the water in it was heated. Next to the copper pot sat Lin Shuhan's confidante Wu Ruofei. She was holding her breath, holding a book and reading attentively. Even Qiu Yizhi followed Lin Shuhan into the tent without noticing.