In the last moment before dawn, flames swirled over the earth.
Mountains, forests, rivers, fortresses... Long queues assemble in the dark night, the sound of heralds, the sound of footsteps, the neighing of horses... Various sounds boiled the night and gathered together.
In mid-November of the tenth year of Wu Jianshuo, in the northwest of Fancheng, hundreds of thousands of troops were gathering in the same direction.
This is the battlefield between the Jurchen West Route Army led by Wanyan Zonghan and the West Group Army headed by the Beiwei Army. The entire battle has lasted for nearly three months.
The West Road battlefield is centered on the Xiangyang and Fancheng systems which are divided into the north and south sides of the Han River, and is based on the Han River. On the Jurchen side, Zong Han's main force in the southern expedition consisted of 260,000 troops, with the Han army of nearly 400,000 who could be mobilized by the original puppet Qi warlords. At the core, there are more than 800,000 defensive formations composed of dozens of troops around.
The number of troops may be watery, and the strength is also uneven, but even if the imaginary number is cut by nearly half, there is still an army of nearly one million before and after, filling the area of 100 miles around the two cities of Xiangfan, and fighting solidly three times. more than a month.
Judging by the strength and record of the Jurchen when the country was founded, it was only a core team of 260,000 people, which was already a terrifying force capable of sweeping the entire world. But now and then, one has already experienced three southern invasions, which is terrible for the Jurchen, and the Wu Dynasty also has a certain psychological preparation. Half of the huge power generated by the economic expansion has been put into combat readiness, and the Yangzhou, Zhenjiang and Xiangfan systems are the most important.
The defense force built up with the material resources of the whole country won a certain respite for the Wu Dynasty at this time.
Within a few years of retaking Xiangyang, Yue Fei did not hold the idea of defending and defending the two cities of Xiangfan. Relying on the Han River, more than 20 castles and water villages were built on the banks, mountains, and key points of each danger on both sides of Xiangfan City Pool. During this time when Jurchen came to the south, the defenders of the West Road stationed heavy troops in various cities, echoing each other. On the one hand, the advantage of city defense weakened the Jurchen attack. On the other hand, Yue Fei used Han water to transport elite troops, echoing everywhere and even taking the initiative. strike. Attack the weak points of the Jurchen army and the Han army with low combat power.
In more than three months, the Beiwei Army has won nine major victories, once defeating the main force of the Bronze Wolf Army led by Wanyan Saba, once repulsing Tua Lisu head-on, and then fighting against Yin Shuke and Zong Han. Retiring from the body, this general Yue, who was only in his early thirties, not only used his troops bravely and decisively, but also had strict military law, and his orders were like mountains. Those who retreat, beheaded, those who do not obey orders, beheaded, those who are slow to obey orders, will be relegated to the vanguard...
In a battle in August, the 60,000-strong army under Li Huai, the general in charge of defending the flank, was defeated by a single blow due to a command error. The Jurchen army gathered fire, and more than 4,000 people fled first. Yue Fei ordered the Beiwei army to form a formation, waved his sword mercilessly in the face of the fleeing crowd, and killed nearly 2,000 fleeing soldiers one after another, ordering the remaining 2,000. Soldier Yu actually stopped in his tracks, and many people were so frightened that they would rather turn their heads to meet the Jurchen than run to the blade of the Wei Army.
In October, Peng Hai, the nephew of the Minister of War, Peng Guangyou, delayed the military flight due to alcoholism. Yue Fei took several officers who were drunk that night and put them on the execution platform. All were beheaded.
In the past, Yue Fei had a heavy weapon and ran Xiangfan. His military law was strict, even to the point of inhumanity, and the rest of the army only heard about it. In many major events, Yue Fei did not seem serious when dealing with other martial artists. He was strict with the rules of the army, and everyone only thought that it was his territorial awareness on one-third of his own land.
Unexpectedly, when the war started, Jun Wujian handed over all the armies of the West Road to Yue Fei to lead the deployment, and this military law actually fell on the heads of others on the battlefield.
Li Huai leads 60,000 troops and is also a general in the military of the Wu Dynasty. Speaking of the level of Yue Fei, his seniority is even older. Yue Fei, who usually treats him very low and respectful, was arrested because of his command error. Beheaded with a knife.
On the battlefield, each army enforces military law, and there are strict rules. However, on the day that Xiangchengzhai was defeated, facing an army that is not under his subordinates, he waved his sword without hesitation in his back, which was originally a taboo. Who would have known that the 4,000 people escaped, and the army behind Wei killed half of them. If the 2,000 people in the rear did not stop, everyone could see that Yue Fei could even kill them on the spot. Such a determination, It's really tingling.
Peng Guangyou, the minister of military affairs, has numerous relationships in the army, and Yue Fei usually has a good relationship with him. After Peng Hai's accident, he also participated in the war in Xiangfan. Liu Guangshi, the veteran with the most seniority and prestige, also found Yue Fei and interceded for Peng Hai. Yue Fei took out the sword of the emperor and gave it to Liu Guangshi with both hands: "If you want to save Peng, Please kill me with this sword." Liu Guangshi's stomach full of words stuck in his throat, and he finally left with a flick of his sleeves.
Not to mention the hundreds of thousands of troops mobilized from other places. During this period of time, even within the Beiwei Army, many soldiers have suffered due to strict military law. Over the past few years, feeling the pressure from the north, the Beiwei Army has expanded to 140,000 people, and it is hard to say whether more than half of them are elites.
After three months, Xiangyang is like a huge Shura field. The number of casualties on both sides has exceeded 100,000, and the casualties of each other are still rising. But many people can already see that if there were no such strict military law constraints, and no Beiwei Army was active in it, the Hanshui defense on the front line of Xiangfan would have been broken long ago.
Since the start of the war, the strength of the Jurchen army's offensive has been staggering.
As an old official who followed Agu to fight, and the number one general in the Jurchen army for a long time, when Wanyan Zonghan showed his attitude of letting go, the Wu Dynasty army on the front line in Xiangfan was faced with overwhelming pressure.
Just like the battle situation that Lu Qiaoshan felt in the southwest, with the emergence and large-scale application of new weapons such as artillery, the situation on the battlefield has undergone many new changes. The infantry team, which used to be limited by a square formation, could easily suffer huge losses in front of a large number of artillery pieces.
Although in the early stage of artillery, some people believed that the cavalry was restrained, but due to the limited position of the artillery, the slow movement and other factors, the high-speed mobile attack and flexible tactics were put on the top agenda again, regardless of the cavalry or the infantry, "Master soldiers" with insufficient morale or training and a certain level of quality can play a role in addition to hiding behind the city wall, but on the battlefield, they have lost their meaning.
If we go back to the first battle of defending Tokyo more than ten years ago, the army of the million-strong king near Bianliang will certainly be vulnerable in front of the more than 100,000 Beiwei army.
In three months, the Beiwei Army won nine large-scale victories, but in the vicinity of Xiangfan, Zong Han, Xi Yin and others continued to remove all camps outside the city with fierce offensives. The fortresses have been abandoned or conquered. On the night of November 13, near the fortress called Funiu City by the Han River, Shi Yunpeng, the commander of the Wuhui battalion of the Wu Dynasty, led 40,000 troops to encounter the Jin army on the way to transfer. After the pace of turning forward, the two sides continued to have friction on a small scale, but each of them had already sent troops to ask for help. Behind Shi Yunpeng, Liu Guangshi's main force of 60,000 was stationed in Funiu City, and more than 100,000 were stationed in the distance. The army can be mobilized to come.
On the morning of November 14th, when the first ray of fish maw white was drawn in the eastern sky, nearly 400,000 troops from both Jin and Wu rushed to the vicinity of Funiu City. The Jurchen elite main force, etc., entered the battlefield one after another.
The war broke out this morning, and since then, nearly 200,000 people have come from all over the place, opening the prelude to the largest battle in Xiangfan since the start of the war. The whole battle lasted for more than ten days by the Han River. Yue Fei commanded the army to continuously set up positions and build defense lines, and gradually transferred the battlefield to the vicinity of Funiu Castle. Relying on the geographical advantage and the strength of the army, the Jurchen army confronted and attacked and defended. On November 17, Zong Han led 30,000 "Tu Shanwei" soldiers under his command to join the battlefield, and fought with the Wei Army to cover the rest of the troops retreating.
This Tu Shanwei is the most elite guard that Zonghan has managed for many years. Most of the more than 30,000 people are the bravest of the Jurchen soldiers. Some are even over forty years old. peak. Yue Fei led the Beiwei Army to fight with him for half a day, but finally retreated.
After that, the army of the Wu Dynasty took the Funiu Walled City and cooperated with the navy to defend it. The siege equipment of the Jurchen army had also been pressed here. By the end of November, both sides had accumulated huge numbers of casualties. The Jurchen was removed, and the army of the Wu Dynasty retreated to Xiangfan, but still controlled the dominance of the Han River.
In the fierce and tenacious tug of war in Xiangyang, at the end of November, several major events broke out in the world.
In the southwest, Zhangcun, the center of the Huaxia Army, when Ning Yi saw the envoy of the Wu Dynasty who came sneakily, and after listening to the other party's whimsical plan, Ning Yi fell into a state of stupefaction.
The Wu Dynasty envoy who came in secret was named Cao Ji, with a square appearance, but his eyebrows were smart and smooth. He came to express his goodwill on behalf of the Wu Dynasty emperor Zhou Yong. In each other's mouth, according to Zhou Yong's ideas, they have dealt with each other before, and even met when they were in Jiangning. Since Ning Yi is Jun Wu and Zhou Pei's teacher, they are a family, and now Jurchen The situation is great, and the Wu Dynasty is in danger. The Huaxia Army has said in the previous letter that in times of crisis, we must be consistent with the outside world, and we must not fight against each other in the same room. Zhou Yong hoped that the Huaxia Army could send troops to fight against the Golden Dog and fulfill its promise.
Of course, as for the details of how to send troops, Zhou Yong himself did not have many regulations. He only said that if the Huaxia Army had the will, the Wu Dynasty would definitely cooperate fully. As for how to cooperate, Zhou Yong believes that the ideal state is that Ning Yi can find someone to come out, mediate at this time of embarrassment, anyway, do more publicity, he is there, as long as there is a step to go down, he will follow the trend Can come down... Barabara, that's what it means anyway.
Ning Yi repeatedly asked several times, and finally determined that there was absolutely no participation from Jun Wu or Zhou Pei and others. Considering the fierce battle going on at this time, Ning Yi discussed with the general staff and others and sent Zhou Yong a letter to repair. , The letter sincerely told the difficulty of the matter, and emphasized that if Zhou Yong really had such an idea, he would hand over the whole matter to Zhou Pei or Jun Wu, and everyone would discuss the matter carefully and openly.
In December of the tenth year of Jianshuo, this incident was like a wonderful joke. Every time Ning Yi thought about it, he couldn't help but laugh. He felt that it was full of quirky irony and illusion, just like a spicy and interesting story. the fable. Of course, neither he nor anyone involved in the incident had yet imagined the nightmarish consequences that would follow.
In December of this year, there was less snow in the south of the Yangtze River, but the world was extremely cold.
In the palace of Lin'an City, Zhou Yong, the emperor with a gradually thin body, white temples and decadent appearance received a reply from the southwest. This is Ning Yi's handwriting, and the wording is not formulaic. The words are kind and polite, which makes Zhou Yong's heart begin to warm up.
At this moment, the table in the imperial study where Zhou Yong was sitting was already full of battle reports from all over the world. He even had people hang a large map on the wall, marking the places in a way that he could understand. battle situation. Over the years as Emperor, Zhou Yong has never been so diligent in his administration, but for the past six months, he has been looking at these things every day. These things made him feel cold, not as warm as the letter from the southwest.
What made him feel cold the most was actually not these battle reports, but something that even his closest sons and daughters never knew.
In the box in the corner of the imperial study, there were records about Jingping's shame, about the cousin Zhou Ji who had been taken to the north, and about all the tragic things that happened because of the Jurchen over the years. After becoming the monarch of the Wu Dynasty, some people felt that he was incompetent and ignorant. Although his abilities were limited, how could he be so ignorant
At the beginning of being the emperor, he just thought that Jurchen was powerful, and it wasn't long before he began to think about the current situation he was going to face. He fled to Yangzhou, thinking that it was far enough, and was drunk in the palace, but the Jurchen soon killed him, he fled to the sea, and even left his own children because of the fear in his heart, and stayed until the Jurchen retired and returned to On the shore, he came to Lin'an. He seemed foolish, but in fact, he wanted to know what he wanted to see about the outside world, and he was able to see it after all.
He knew how powerful the Jurchen was. He knew what the Jurchen would do to him. He could also see clearly from the things that came from the north every year. How did his cousin Zhou Ji live in the north? The days when the dog was inferior; the shame of Jingping, what happened to those relatives, those princes and princesses. If you just listen to the story, maybe it will be fine, but this is his future.
Even if you hide in the thickest city wall, what if you watch thousands of soldiers outside the city guarding you? They can't beat Jurchen.
I really killed it, and I really couldn't hide on the day I lost the battle.
Zhou Yong used to be a playboy. He played with the world and bullied the people, but even he couldn't do such a crazy thing. Now, these things are going to fall on his head. Millions of soldiers? Thousands of Limin? Saying a lot, I really want to lose, and in a few months, I will be caught on the way to the north.
He didn't know that his son would read Zhou Ji's news every year over the years, gnashing his teeth and feeling extremely humiliated and angry. But over the years, Zhou Yong himself was actually in a dark corner. Every year he saw those things, and he felt the fear from the bottom of his heart.
The battle report on the table, the things written every day, he can understand, the comparison of the numbers, the southward withdrawal of the defense line every day every day... The daughter is lonely and has made up her mind. Reassure yourself as a father, he can understand all these things.
Therefore, he sent envoys and secretly found Southwest to communicate. Of course, things are quite difficult. He actually doesn't know how to wipe out Ning Yi's crime of murdering the king, but the gentle attitude in the other party's heart makes him feel that this is a good start. As long as the other party is interested, his emperor will be killed, how difficult other things can be.
Zhou Yong didn't dare to tell Zhou Pei about it. This winter, he asked his daughter to talk to him twice. After Zhou Pei's words became more firm and decisive, Zhou Yong felt that his daughter was unable to communicate.
It seems that, as the emperor, I can release goodwill to the southwest first. Zhou Yong thought about this in his heart, and then he felt more and more reasonable. He was the emperor, and he insisted on his own words. As long as he made the beginning of the matter, the courtiers couldn't suppress it if they wanted to. In the southwest, Ning Yi was so clever. Naturally, it will take over the situation...
In this way, the seeds of disaster began to germinate in Zhou Yong's heart.
At the same time, Wanyan Zongfu's army crossed the Yangtze River forcibly, seized the pier near Jiangning, and launched a large-scale battle with the Wuchao Navy and Army, with casualties on both sides. In Zhenjiang, Jun Wu wrote a New Year's Eve to the court, detailing the strength of the warring sides, their strengths and weaknesses, and also pointed out that Wu Qimai of the Jin Kingdom had been bedridden for nearly a year, and his health was deteriorating. At this time, it is still unbroken, and several of our elite armies already have the fighting strength to fight with Jurchen. We only need to hold back the Jurchen army in the coming year. The Wu Dynasty will win, and the Jurchen will eventually be defeated.
Although such a performance is partly exaggerated, the entire strategic thinking cannot be wrong, and it is indeed a future picture that can be reached and realized in front of everyone. On the 16th of December, the troupe had not yet been sent to the south, and the battle of Jiangning was still going on. The urgent military situation came from the east and was sent to Zhenjiang.
Fourteen, Wushu in Jiangyin, forcibly crossed the Yangtze River.
Jun Wu stood up from the room, and after a while, he rushed out the door.
"… stop him."
Only this thought reverberated in his mind. Of course, at this moment, he only subconsciously realized that something was wrong, but he hadn't yet imagined what a huge chain reaction the whole thing would trigger.
Southeast of Jiangyin, Xiaoxue.
The huge cavalry bypassed the city and was heading south. Wushu was on the hill, and in his eyes, there was his usual fierceness and seriousness.
The most elite cavalry unit in the Eastern Route Army, more than 50,000 people, are all here with him.
The secret letter from Xi Yin was in his sleeve, and the handwriting on the secret letter was almost blurred. If in the past, Xi Yin didn't like him, and he didn't like Xi Yin, but in many major events, Wu Shu had to admit Xi Yin's vision and wisdom. This time in the southern expedition, Xi Yin did not show too much hostility to the East Route Army. Earlier, he communicated and planned a strategy with this side. After the massacre in Yunzhong, Xi Yin also sent urgent reminders and suggestions one after another.
Zongsuke and Wushu took the advice.
The young prince of the Wu Dynasty wanted to drag the decisive battle to Zhenjiang and Jiangnan, but the real decisive battle was not here.
In December, Wushu's cavalry avoided the decisive battle.
Directly to Lin'an!