Chen Sangliang has never deliberately blocked the external communication channels of the Daxing rebels. The reason is that it is very difficult and lacks troops, and the second is that the counties and counties in Guanzhong are defecting one after another depending on the situation. Let the rebels know that they can just hit the morale of the enemy. Naturally, there is no need to spend any more effort to block and cut off. Ordering Li Jing and Qu Tutong to launch a strong attack on Xinfeng to put pressure on the rebels is also because Chen Sangliang expected that Li Yuan and his son will always maintain contact with the Xinfeng rebels. will know the news.
There are advantages and disadvantages. The mechanism is too clever to calculate, and what Chen Sangliang, who does all kinds of evil, never expected is that his doing so will bring about a very dangerous consequence, and it may even lead to the terrible consequence that all previous efforts in the Guanzhong War will be wasted! On the day when the Sui army's partial division was ordered to attack the Xinfeng rebels, it was also the same day when Chen Sangliang received the sad news that Hulaoguan had once again fallen. The soldiers did not have the opportunity to block the roads, and they came to Daxing City to ask to see Li Yuan, and they were able to enter the city immediately after identifying themselves.
An enemy's enemy is a friend. Li Mi, who also deeply hates Chen Sangliang, has been in secret contact with Li Yuan and his son in private, exchanging information from time to time. Student Wang Bodang's brother-in-law Pei Shufang was also an important party at that time, and he was an old acquaintance with Li Yuan and his son and Li Mi's in-law Liu Wenjing. After entering the city, he was naturally summoned by Li Yuan and his son immediately, and received a rather solemn and warm welcome.
Li Yuan and his son warmly welcomed Pei Shufang, the purpose of which was of course eager to understand the situation outside the customs and to let the Zhai Li coalition army share the pressure on Li Yuan's rebels. Unfortunately, this sent a wrong message to Pei Shufang. The mourning soldiers approached Daxing City in a critical situation, and seeing Li Yuan and his son coming out of the palace to greet him in person, Pei Shufang, who was born as a small landlord in the countryside, was unavoidably complacent, and his attitude was rather arrogant. Pei Shufang's villain Dezhi only reciprocated with a sneer in his heart, and on the surface he still talked and smiled calmly, and soon took out a lot of important information outside the customs from Pei Shufang's mouth.
Most of the information outside the customs that Pei Shufang can provide to Li Yuan and his son is out of date. The latest big move of Zhai and Li's bandit army that Pei Shufang knows is just that Zhai Rang and Li Mi took the opportunity of Chen Sangliang's western expedition and joined forces to invade. Hanoi County is protected by customs clearance. In addition, Pei Shufang heard the news on the road, saying that in order to ensure the safety of the northern line, Dongdu has arranged for Wang Shichong to lead an army of 50,000 to cross the river to reinforce Hanoi. Pei Shufang, who came here by stealth, knew nothing about the battle situation.
Zhai Rang and Li Mi will definitely take action after Chen Sangliang leaves the Eastern Capital. This is already expected by Li Yuan and his son, and it is definitely good news, but Li Yuan and his son are not satisfied with it. After knowing the size of Zhai and Li's army marching to Hanoi, Li Er couldn't wait to ask Pei Shufang a key question, "Brother Shufang, what about Hulao Pass? Has your army sent troops to Hulao Pass?"
"Of course." Pei Shufang said quite proudly: "Our army is powerful, with a total strength of more than 200,000 troops. General Fangxuan Zaofang led an army of 15,000 to cross the river at Niuzhukou, and stationed troops outside Hulao Pass. The officers and soldiers at Hulao Pass did not dare to fight at all, and hid in the pass like turtles, daring not to come out. , General Fang has deep trenches and high fortifications, just wait for our main force to defeat Wang Shichong, and he can enter Hulao Pass at any time to meet our main force."
At present, Li Yuan and his son, who are also shrinking their heads, don't care about Pei Shufang's map cannon. Li Yuan also secretly exchanged glances with Pei Ji, Li Jiancheng and others, and he became more and more convinced that Chen Sangliang's claim that the news of the fall of Hulaoguan was not clear, and he fell into a coma in public. It was also a pretense, but Li Er became more and more suspicious, and couldn't help asking Pei Shufang: "Brother Shufang, General Fang Xuanzao was ordered to attack Hulao Pass, but he never launched a siege? How did General Fang replace him?" Your main force will share the pressure? The officers and soldiers only need to guard the Hulao tightly to be able to deal with your partial division, so how can your partial division be able to contain the reserve force of the Eastern Capital's official army?"
"This..." Pei Shufang, who relied on nepotism, couldn't answer, and could only say vaguely: "I'm not very clear about this, anyway, Wei Gong arranged it like this, and Hulao Pass is famously strong. Majestic, easy to defend but difficult to attack, General Fang can hold back the defenders in Guanzhong, which is considered good."
Only then did Li Er close his mouth, but he was suspicious of Yi Sheng. Pei Shufang was afraid that Li Yuan and his son would hurt face by asking him questions that he couldn't answer, so he quickly took out Li Mi's autographed letter, handed it to Li Yuan and said, "Tang Guogong, This is a handwritten letter from Duke Wei, please read it."
He took the letter with very polite hands, and when Li Yuan opened it to read the contents carefully, he couldn't help but burst out laughing. Only then did he realize that not only the messenger Pei Shufang sent by Li Mi was a ridiculous clown, but Li Mi himself was a clown who didn't know what to do. Forget about his arrogance, he even directly asked Li Yuan to regard him as the leader of the alliance, implying that he asked Li Yuan to lead thousands of elite soldiers eastward to Hanoi to join forces with him and formally sign an alliance—the speed of news transmission in this era is too slow, when Li Mi wrote Little did they know that Li Yuan's strength and control territory had already surpassed him at that time.
Of course, Li Yuan, who was old in the city, didn't care about Li Mi's arrogant letter. Not only was he not angry, but he immediately ordered a banquet to be prepared for Pei Shufang to clean up the dust. Pei Shufang happily bid farewell and left, but as soon as he left, the rebels who accompanied him, Zhu Wenwu, immediately scolded him, all annoyed that Pei Shufang's villain was successful, but Li Yuan didn't care, waved his hands and laughed: "Why care about these trivial matters? We need Li Mi to share the pressure for us now. These trivial matters, just bear with it."
After all, Li Yuan showed Li Mi's autographed letter to several civil and military confidants. Pei Ji, Dou Cong and others were even more furious when they saw it. They angrily reprimanded Li Mi for not knowing the heights of heaven and earth, and suggested that Li Yuan should fight tit for tat. In turn, he asked Li Mi to lead his army into the customs In the alliance, let Li Mi regard Li Yuan as the leader of the alliance. Li Yuan laughed even more when he heard the words, and said, "Why are you so annoyed? A little talk is cheap, so what's the point of caring about it? Now we need Li Mi to disturb the back of Chen Yingliang's little thief, why do we have a deadlock with him? Why don't we flatter him for a while and let him attack Chen Yingliang's back more vigorously, this is in our best interest."
Li Yuan himself could endure such humiliation, and Pei Ji, Dou Cong and the others couldn't say much, they could only nod their heads and sing promises. It was at this time that Li Er, who had been thinking about it all along, suddenly said, "Father, there is Do you find it strange that after Chen Yingliang's little thief went west to Guanzhong, Zhai Rang and Li Mi didn't take the opportunity to go straight to Luokou warehouse in the eastern capital, but they chose to put the main force into the relatively minor Hanoi battlefield?"
"What's so strange about this?" Li Yuan replied casually: "Pei Renji had already captured Linqing Pass before, and Hanoi has no danger to defend. Li Mizhai can attack any city in the hinterland of Hanoi at will, which is convenient for entering troops. If you want to attack Dongdu and Luokou Warehouse had to take Hulao Pass first. Even if Chen Yingliang's little thief is not in Luoyang, the eastern capital, with Wang Shichong's ability, he is sure to hold Hulao Pass. Li Mizhai's excuse is to avoid reality, what's so strange? "
"Avoiding the truth is indeed the truth of the military strategist." Li Er pondered and said: "But attacking Hanoi is not the best policy for Zhai and Li's bandits, not to mention that they will also be stubbornly blocked by the Sui army in the eastern capital headed by Wang Shichong. Even if the whole county of Hanoi is successfully taken down, there will be little money for food, and there is still a natural danger in the Yellow River to defend the eastern capital. May not see that."
"If you can see this, what's the use if you can't do it?" Li Yuan sneered, and continued to casually say, "Is Hulao Pass so easy to take? The little thief Chen Yingliang couldn't take Hulao Pass for almost half a year. We can only rely on Wang Shichong to force Zhai Rang and Li Mi to leave, and Li Mi wants to take down Hulao Pass quickly, unless he..."
"Wait!" Li Yuan suddenly came to his senses, and then jumped up, blurting out: "Li Mi's main force invaded Hanoi County, could it be that they are trying to attack the west? The purpose is just to introduce the main force of the Eastern Capital led by Wang Shichong into Hanoi County. Fang Xuanzao, who was covering him outside the Hulao Pass, came out with a surprise army, suddenly exerted his strength to take down the Hulao Pass, and then took advantage of the emptiness to attack Luokou Cang?!"
"My boy is also so suspicious." Li Er nodded, and said darkly: "My boy even suspected that Li Mi and Zhai Rang had been running Hulaoguan for nearly half a year, and they took the opportunity to leave behind, so they were willing to give up later. Hulao Pass, and then dared to use the main force to cover the partial division to attack Hulao Pass, killing Dongdu by surprise!"
Li Yuan began to show ecstasy, and said in his heart that if this is the case, then the old man really doesn’t have to worry about anything. Once Dongdu is in emergency, the little thief Chen Yingliang who is left behind in Dongdu will definitely be forced to come back to help. If he can survive until he retreats, he doesn't have to worry about running out of food and breaking the city. But when he thought about other aspects carefully, Li Yuan's heart suddenly thumped, and he thought to himself: "Could it be true? Could it be that what happened the night before yesterday was true, that little thief Chen Yingliang was really sick? That's why he repeated it again and again." , Repeatedly bluffing, intimidating the old man from leaving the city for a decisive battle? Let him take the opportunity to recuperate, and then calmly retreat to save Dongdu?"
Sooner or later, other civil and military officials of the rebel army also realized the key point one after another, and they were showing ecstasy, but officials rushed to report from outside the hall, saying that the Sui army's partial division had filled up the moat of Xinfeng South Gate at noon. Afterwards, they immediately launched a strong attack on Xinfeng. Although Duan Lun and Qiu Shili tried their best to fight back, they were still unable to repel the Sui army's attack, and both sides suffered a lot of losses.
Chen Sangliang, who doesn't like frontal attacks, uncharacteristically launched an ant-attached siege, and combined with various other intelligence, Li Yuan's heart suddenly became clear, knowing that Chen Sangliang was taking precautions, and capturing Xinfeng as soon as possible would allow the The Sui army's partial divisions freed up their hands to help the main force, and they could take precautions to remove the only obstacle on the way of the Sui army's retreat, so that the main force of the Sui army could retreat in the future when it was absolutely necessary. After thinking about this point, Li Yuan seldom showed a relaxed smile for many days, and said with a smile: "Give Duan Lunxian an order and order him to stand firm. As long as I guard Xinfeng for the old man for a few more days, the Guanzhong battlefield will definitely turn around."
The official in charge of liaison made promises and immediately went down to make arrangements, while Li Er asked Li Yuan, "Father, what should we do? Do you want to give it a try?"
"No hurry, let me think about it again." Even though he already suspected that Chen Sangliang was really sick, Li Yuan still didn't dare to make a decision lightly, and still decided to think carefully for a while. There is such a plan, "Shouldn't you take the risk of going to war? The possibility of Chen Yingliang's little thief in the rear is extremely high. With a strong city to consume him, although it is a little embarrassing, it is better to be safe, and you can also take the opportunity to preserve your strength."
In the evening of the same day, Li Yuan, who was finally in a relaxed mood, held a grand banquet in the Hall of Wude. He warmly entertained Pei Shufang, the envoy of Li Mijun, and took the opportunity to relax the generals under his command who had been tense for many days. It is said that there are silk, bamboo, bells and drums dancing with beautiful women to add to the fun, which is very lively. And after Pei Shufang enjoyed the beautiful maid Li Yuan sent to help him change clothes and bathe, he was embarrassed not to give Li Yuan any face, and his arrogance restrained a lot.
"General, the Chen Yingliang dog thief sent an envoy to the city with a white flag in his hand, asking to see you, and said that he has a gift to present to you in person."
At the happy moment, the devastated Chen Sangliang suddenly sent someone to make trouble, and received the news that Chen Sangliang's envoy asked to see him. Although he knew that Chen Sangliang had no good intentions, in order to better understand the situation of the Sui army, Li Yuan ordered to meet with him. , and soon, the envoy of the Sui army, holding a gift in his hand, was led into the Wude Hall, and led to Li Yuan, who was having a banquet with many subordinates—this was also Li Yuan's unlucky reminder.
What was even more unfortunate for Li Yuan was that the envoy Chen Sangliang sent to give gifts this time was not an ordinary person. If other envoys saw so many rebel soldiers present, in order not to completely irritate Li Yuan, they might even give Li Yuan a gift. To save face, invite Li Yuan to the side to give gifts alone. It is a pity that the envoy Chen Sangliang sent this time is Zhang Yongtong, who is the most fearless envoy under Chen Sangliang. Fearful, he saluted straightforwardly and said: "Little ambassador Zhang Yongtong, under the order of Ambassador Chen, who stayed behind in the Eastern Capital of the Great Sui Dynasty and arrested the ambassador in Guanzhong, pays homage to Grandma Li, Grandma Li Jin'an."
The banquet hall, which was still extremely noisy just now, suddenly became completely silent. Li Yuan also suspected that he had heard it wrong, and asked in surprise, "What is your name, old man?"
"Grandma Li." Zhang Yongtong replied in a clear voice, his words were correct, and he raised his head and said: "Grandma Li, under the order of Chen Liushou, the envoy sent you a letter of engagement, asking you to fight tomorrow outside the city. In addition, Chen Liushou I also asked the villain to bring you a set of women's clothes. If Grandma Li doesn't have the guts to fight us decisively, she can just wear this set of clothes in public, and we, Chen Liushou, will not challenge you again."
The sound of swords being drawn out of their sheaths was endless, and the rebel soldiers who escorted Zhang Yongtong kicked Zhang Yongtong to the ground from behind. I'm a young man who only hurts people in the back. I've been sent to Zhai Li's bandit army three times this year, and I've written three times to scold Li Mi Zhairang. Those ant thieves haven't treated me like this. After returning his mother's name, bah! Even Zhai Rang It's not as good as that little Facao!"
Several generals of the rebel army came forward with their swords in their hands, but fortunately Li Jiancheng shouted in time: "Stop! The two countries are fighting each other, don't kill the envoys! Chen Yingliang has never hurt our envoys, do you want to disgrace our volunteers?"
"But this poor man uttered evil words and insulted the general!" Wang Changxie said with a livid face.
Li Jiancheng didn't answer, but turned to Zhang Yongtong who had stood up again, and shouted: "The envoy over there, don't you even know a little bit of etiquette? Is there an envoy like you in the world?"
"A villain does what he is ordered to do, so he must not do it." Zhang Yongtong smiled, and said to Li Yuan: "Grandma Li, don't blame the envoy for being rude, it is Chen Liushou's order. The envoy's duty is to act according to the order. This is the letter and gift from Chen Liushou, please have a look."
As he spoke, Zhang Yongtong handed the letter and the woman's clothes forward, smiling and waiting for Li Yuan's response, but Li Yuan was trembling with anger, and after a long while he gritted his teeth and asked, "Prince, are you not afraid that the old man will kill you?"
"I'm afraid, of course I'm afraid." Zhang Yongtong replied very frankly, and then said: "But there is no way, Chen Liushou has explained, and the envoy can only follow orders, and the envoy also believes that after you kill me, Grandma Li, Chen Liushou will definitely will avenge me."
Zhang Yongtong's arrogant attitude completely angered every rebel soldier, civil and military, shouting and shouting everywhere, but Li Yuan calmed down, knowing that killing Zhang Yongtong was not only useless, but also would only leave an envoy of infamy in vain. After Tooth ordered the letter to be submitted, Li Yuan saw that the content was indeed an appointment for him to fight tomorrow, and he also humiliated himself as a coward who dared not go out of the city. He was no different from a timid old woman. It also suddenly became uglier.
Li Er came up to him, carefully read Chen Sangliang's signature, and reminded him in a low voice, "Father, pay attention to your signature."
Of course, Li Yuan also paid attention to Chen Sangliang's signature, and found that Chen Sangliang's signature was the same as the arrow book in the morning, with insufficient wrist strength and slight trembling. Having made up my mind, I quickly calculated in my mind, "Is this the little thief Chen Yingliang's trick to lure the enemy? Or is it his continued bluff that makes me more determined to defend the city?"
At this time, Zhang Yongtong spoke again, his attitude finally improved, and he said with a smile: "Senior Li, now the envoy is speaking to you on behalf of himself, and I respectfully address you as an old senior. Forget it, old senior, you know this is Our Chen Liushou's trick to lure the enemy, knowing that this is a trap, why jump into it? You must not learn from our general Chen Leng of the Sui Dynasty. He left the city after being provoked by Du Fuwei, but was beaten by Du Fuwei Running for your life alone, and being laughed at by our Chen Liushou, is better than your hundreds of thousands of troops being completely wiped out by our Chen Liushou."
Li Yuan glared at Zhang Yongtong, Zhang Yongtong smiled even more calmly, and said: "Senior Li, it seems that the villain has made this trip in vain this time. Let me leave. The villain will go back and report to Chen Liushou. Senior, you still don't have the guts." In the decisive battle, we should just attack the city directly."
After finishing speaking, Zhang Yongtong turned around and left. Li Yuan finally made up his mind and shouted, "Stop! Go back and tell Chen Yingliang, that little thief! See you on the battlefield at 3:30 tomorrow morning!"
Zhang Yongtong's body trembled, and he didn't turn his head back. He just smiled and said, "Senior, have you thought it through? It's too late to take back what you said just now. Now the soldiers of Dongdu are fighting bravely, and everyone is fighting with us tomorrow. I'm afraid of you." Go out of the city standing up, and come back here lying down."
"Stop talking nonsense, I'm afraid you won't dare to come to the decisive battle tomorrow!" Li Yuan slapped the table and roared, "Drive this arrogant man out of the city, and don't allow him to stay in the city for a moment!"
The soldiers in the hall sang Nuojian and immediately stepped forward to expel Zhang Yongtong. Without fear, Zhang Yongtong flicked his sleeves and left with his head held high. As soon as Zhang Yongtong left, Pei Ji immediately came up to him and said in a low voice, "General, we must prevent the little thief Chen Yingliang from doing it on purpose." Lure the enemy and deliberately provoke our army to fight. Although our army agrees to a decisive battle, we can also find excuses to break the appointment."
Li Yuan kept a stern face and kept silent, but in his heart he was constantly at war between heaven and man, hesitating whether to break his promise and release Chen Sangliang's pigeons, but after hesitating for a long time, Li Yuan finally made up his mind, and secretly said: "The old man won't believe it, The old man personally leads the army out of the city for a decisive battle, so he is still no match for the little thief Chen Yingliang! Fight! If the little thief Chen Yingliang is really sick, take the opportunity to kill him in one fell swoop and avenge the past! You can still retreat to Daxing City and confront him! It’s nothing to lose some soldiers, but it’s just enough to save food for the old man!”
Thinking up to this point, Li Yuan finally opened his mouth and ordered word by word: "Command the whole army to prepare for battle. In the early morning of tomorrow, the old man will personally lead an army of 70,000 out of the city to fight Chen Yingliang's little thief!"