Yuchi Jiming agreed, pushed away several soldiers next to him, pushed his legs hard on the ground, then rose more than two feet on the spot, made a circle in the air, and then landed steadily on the spot.
Qiu Yizi hurriedly asked: "Jiming, did you see it clearly?"
Yuchi Jiming nodded and said, "I can see clearly that it is indeed Li Shengjie. I saw more than a dozen ships parked by the river, all flying the white whale flag. It must be Li Shengjie."
"Great! That's great!" Qiu Yizi cried out in joy after hearing this. "I had asked Li Shengjie to move to the lower reaches of the Yangtze River a long time ago, but I didn't expect him to arrive at such a critical moment. With Li Shengjie's huge ships and cannons, we still have a chance to win!"
In order to lure Zheng Xin to cross the river and fight in the north, Qiu Yizi arranged for Li Shengjie to lead the fleet to the upper reaches of the Yangtze River and closely monitor the situation on the river. Once Zheng Xin completed the crossing, Li Shengjie would command all warships to the Xuzhou section of the Yangtze River and attack Zheng Xin's rear wing with artillery.
This plan was originally very safe, but unexpectedly, Zheng Xin transported all nearly 300,000 troops to Jiangbei in just one day. Such a large-scale action not only caught Qiu Yizi on the shore by surprise, but also caught Li Shengjie on the river off guard.
Being on the water is different from being on land.
No matter how fast a ship moves, it will be affected by wind direction, water currents, tides, etc. Therefore, when Li Shengjie, who was anchored far away in the Huguang area, heard that Zheng Xin used the method of ants moving house to move more than 200,000 troops across the Yangtze River in one go, it was two days later. When he sailed downstream and arrived at the Xuzhou section of the river, another three days had passed. He only arrived when Qiu Yizi was almost defeated.
The original strategy was that after Li Shengjie arrived at the battlefield, he would immediately use artillery to bombard the rear wing of Zheng Xin's army, using the power and momentum of the artillery to kill a large number of enemy troops and undermine enemy morale, thereby assisting Qiu Yizi in the frontal battle.
But Li Shengjie saw from afar that Qiu Yizi and Zheng Xin's troops had become mixed together. If a shell was fired, not only would it kill or injure the soldiers under Zheng Xin's command, but it would also harm Qiu Yizi's soldiers. This really proved the old saying "Be careful when throwing a weapon at a rat".
Without the powerful weapon of artillery, Li Shengjie could not do anything against Zheng Xin's army with only more than 300 sailors on these dozen ships. However, he had a decisive force on board that could change the situation of the war.
It turned out that when Li Shengjie's fleet was docked in Huguang Road, he contacted Liu Qing, the former governor of Jiangnan, who temporarily replaced the left general Wei Hu to guard the Huguang camp. Through Liu Qing, he communicated with Dai Luanxiang, who had his own troops in Jiangnan.
These three people were on Qiu Yizhi's side, and Liu Qing's army also had Wang Laowu who was responsible for delivering Qiu Yizhi's orders. After a brief discussion, Dai Luanxiang knew that Qiu Yizhi's strategy of "inviting the wolf into the house" was too risky. If he made a mistake, he would lose everything, and there would be no room for recovery. Therefore, Dai Luanxiang, who had the most experience among them, made the decision to let Li Shengjie's fleet stationed at the Huguangdao Wharf, and wait until Dai Luanxiang led his 20,000 troops to the riverside to board the ship before taking action together.
Dai Luanxiang led his army from Jiangnan Road to Huguang Camp, and Yuezhou was the only way to go. Fortunately, although Xu Rong, the current governor of Yuezhou, was originally a retainer of Zheng Xin, he had long been in secret contact with Qiu Yizhi. Seeing that Dai Luanxiang was going to pass through his jurisdiction, he turned a blind eye and let him lead his army to slip under his nose.
In this way, Li Shengjie and Dai Luanxiang's navy and army joined forces and finally arrived at Xuzhou on the north bank of the Yangtze River in the afternoon of the day of "Xiaoman".
Former General Dai Luanxiang was a man well versed in military strategy and was known as "the best general in the country." After a brief observation on the ship, he knew that Qiu Yizi was on the verge of failure, so he asked Li Shengjie to quickly line up the ships and ordered his soldiers to disembark immediately to help.
But in such a hurry, how could the 20,000 troops on the high sea ship not all disembark and line up? Only one or two thousand soldiers landed one after another, and even the original organization was disrupted.
Faced with such a situation, Dai Luanxiang did not stick to the tactics of war at all. He immediately ordered his son Dai Song to lead the troops of less than a thousand people, form a horizontal formation, and rush directly towards the direction of Zheng Xin's central army flag.
Dai Song was full of vigor and vitality, and Qiu Yizi had saved his life, so he naturally did not hesitate at all after hearing his father's order. He immediately carried a long sword and led his soldiers to charge towards Zheng Xin.
At this time, Zheng Xin had invested almost all of his troops in the battle with Qiu Yizi, and he had less than 3,000 guards behind him. Seeing Dai Song rushing towards him from the riverside with murderous intent, he quickly ordered his guards to line up behind him and not let Dai Song get close.
The guards beside Zheng Xin were indeed the elite soldiers he had repeatedly selected from among his elite soldiers. Although Dai Song was very aggressive, he was unable to break through the defense of these 3,000 elite soldiers and could only fight to a draw.
Dai Song was about to reorganize his troops to fight the army in front of him, but he heard the sound of retreating troops from behind. Although he was young and full of vigor, he was very afraid of his very strict father, so he quickly gathered his soldiers and retreated to the riverside while fighting.
Zheng Xin saw that the enemy army was retreating without being defeated, and he knew that there must be something fishy going on, so he did not dare to lead his army to pursue. As expected, as soon as Dai Song retreated, another army attacked again.
This attack was led by Dai Luanxiang himself, with 2,000 men who had just landed from the ship. Compared with the fledgling Dai Song, Dai Luanxiang was just as brave in battle, but he had added a few more sophisticated rules. He did not just charge and attack, but divided the team into three teams, commanded by himself, and attacked the junction of the opponent's formation.
Zheng Xin's guards had just suffered a fierce attack, and before they could recover, they were hit by Dai Luanxiang's precise attack. Although they were not defeated immediately, they were still at a disadvantage. They barely pulled themselves together and were about to fight back, but the enemy retreated again, leaving them with nowhere to vent their strength.
When Zheng Xin was thinking about how to deal with the enemy, the enemy troops that attacked him from behind actually retreated. Zheng Xin knew that Li Shengjie's fleet was the overlord on the water, and the power of the artillery on the ship should not be underestimated, but the sailors on the ship were not familiar with land warfare, and there were not many of them. He couldn't understand why so many such good soldiers would attack him from behind.
So Zheng Xin quickly ordered his scouts to investigate the situation, and the report he received was that the attacking troops were all imperial guards, and many of them were acquaintances of his.
Zheng Xin was shocked when he heard this, and risked his life to look forward, only to see the words "Former General Dai of the Han Dynasty" clearly written in bowl-sized letters on a large flag in the enemy's formation.
"Dai Luanxiang is here!"
Zheng Xin was so surprised that he almost cried out - you know, when his father was fighting against the rebellion, the progress was very slow at the beginning because Dai Luanxiang was blocking Youyan and Luoyang; in the end, it was Qiu Yizi who used some kind of counter-espionage plan to make the false emperor Zheng Yao recall Dai Luanxiang from the front line, which allowed Zheng Rong, who was still the King of Youyan, to seize the opportunity and succeed in one fell swoop.
It was this Dai Luanxiang who, after being ordered to cross the river to Nanjing, used his prestige to constantly summon his old subordinates. Seeing Dai Luanxiang's actions, Zheng Xin knew that he must have some ulterior motives, and he also issued several orders, asking him to hand over his military power or march the army to Nanjing and obey his command. However, Dai Luanxiang ignored Zheng Xin's orders on the grounds that he was a former general of the imperial army and only obeyed the emperor or the regent prince.
Zheng Xin thought of cutting off the food supply to force Dai Luanxiang to surrender, but Dai Luanxiang somehow got the help of Zheng Tinghang, the general manager of the grain transport, and obtained an endless supply of food and grass from him, which gave him the capital to be independent of Zheng Xin.
Zheng Xin also thought about sending troops to attack Dai Luanxiang. But when he thought about how Dai Luanxiang used his troops in a very dignified and upright manner, and how clever and decisive he was, he would suffer heavy losses even if he could win. Zheng Xin's main opponent at the moment was Qiu Yizi in the north of the Yangtze River, so he could not easily provoke trouble with Dai Luanxiang at this juncture.
Therefore, Zheng Xin could only think that Dai Luanxiang was just looking for power because he saw the situation was unclear. When he won the Han Dynasty, the first person to congratulate him would be this "number one general in the country". After deceiving himself for a while, Zheng Xin only left 20,000 troops to monitor Dai Luanxiang's actions, and led his army to cross the Yangtze River to the north to look for an opportunity to fight Qiu Yi.
To Zheng Xin's surprise, the 20,000 troops under Dai Luanxiang somehow avoided his surveillance, and somehow became connected with Li Shengjie, and boarded Li Shengjie's large sea ship, appearing behind him when he was about to win.
Although he didn't know the ins and outs of the matter, the only thing Zheng Xin was sure of was that Dai Luanxiang was by no means an easy person to deal with. If he allowed Dai Luanxiang to attack him, Zheng Xin himself would probably be captured alive by Dai Luanxiang before Qiu Yizi was defeated.
But the problem they are facing now is that Dai Luanxiang had deployed no less than five thousand troops in the last two waves of attack, while Zheng Xin only has three thousand guards. Although these three thousand people are elite, they may not be able to withstand the repeated charges of Dai Luanxiang's army. Only by withdrawing at least 20,000 troops from the army besieging Qiu Yizi can they rely on the numerical advantage to quickly defeat Dai Luanxiang.
Zheng Xin has now formed a three-sided encirclement of Qiu Yizhi from the left, center and right. The right wing has the most troops, but not only does it have to deal with the resistance of Qiu Yizhi's troops, but it is also entangled with the Bohai Iron Cavalry, so it is impossible to withdraw troops; although the pressure on the front is light, there are only 10,000 or 20,000 troops, which cannot be mobilized; only the left wing is fighting with Zhao Chengxiao, a general under Qiu Yizhi, and not only is the force relatively strong, but the loss is relatively small. It seems that withdrawing 20,000 troops will not cause much impact...
So Zheng Xin immediately issued an order to withdraw 20,000 troops from the left wing and return to the formation to deal with Dai Luanxiang behind him.
The general commanding the left wing of Zheng Xin's army was quite resourceful. When he heard Zheng Xin's order, he did not rush to withdraw troops. Instead, he first sent troops to launch a charge to slightly compress Zhao Chengxiao's troops. Then he ordered the several teams farthest from the front line, totaling more than 20,000 people, to slowly withdraw from the battle and immediately move closer to Zheng Xin.
This group of soldiers who were temporarily transferred to protect Zheng Xin were attacked by the enemy before they could even gain a firm foothold.