Chapter 646: Shangdang Battle (8)

Li Huaixian's camp was located in Tunliu County. He had 70,000 troops under his command. These 70,000 troops were basically the original Fanyang army, mainly Han people from prefectures and counties near Youzhou.

Although Li Huaixian himself was only half of the Han ancestry, he was fully sinicized, which made it difficult to see that he was once a Hu slave to the Khitans. He claimed to be a Han and concealed his experience when he was young. Except for An Lushan and a very few confidants, Fan Yang's army thought he was a Han.

Li Huaixian is about forty years old this year and is thin and tall. He has been in the army for nearly twenty years and has been very cunning in the army. Li Huaixian is not a good man and a woman. The big reason why he opposed Li Guiren's massacre and looting was that his soldiers were all Han people. The Han army had strong resistance and anger towards the massacre and rape of the Hu people. In order to calm the anger in the army, he had to repeatedly make gestures and strongly condemn Li Guiren's atrocities.

Li Huaixian was also an ambitious man. Among the three towns in Hebei in history, he occupied Youzhou and became a de facto local separatist force. In fact, the so-called quelling the Anshi Rebellion in history was actually just the result of the compromise between the court and the rebels. The rebels no longer called themselves emperors and tried to replace them. The court also accused of the separatist military towns, and formed a total of three separatist forces, Tian Chengsi of Weibo Town, Li Baochen of Chengde Town, and Li Huaixian of Youzhou Town. This was the separatist rule of the vassal states in the late Tang Dynasty.

Faced with the serious situation at this time, Li Huaixian was also considering his retreat. He thought of only two plans, one was to surrender to Li Qing'an, seek the status of a general, and finally achieve a prosperous and prosperous ending; the other plan was to imitate Shi Siming to form a separatist force, occupy several prefectures and counties, and enjoy the fun of occupying the mountain and becoming the king.

In the big tent, Li Huaixian stood alone in front of the sand table, looking at the Hebei sand table in front of him for a long time and pondered. Although Li Huaixian had sent someone to send Li Qing'an a letter of intent to surrender, he did not make the final decision. He was still in a contradiction and entanglement whether to surrender or to become independent.

At this time, a personal soldier at the entrance of the tent reported: "General, Mr. Han and General Fei Yong asked for a meeting."

Li Huaixian slowly woke up from her thoughts and nodded, "Let them come in!"

Mr. Han’s full name is Han Li, and he is Li Huaixian’s aide. General Fei Yong is Li Riyue, and he is Li Huaixian’s confidant general. These two people are both literary and military, both Li Huaixian trusted the most. After a moment, the two walked in. They did not meet at the door of the tent, but had already discussed that they came to persuade Li Huaixian to surrender to Tang.

"See General!"

Li Huaixian waved his hand and smiled, "Sit down and talk!"

The three of them walked to the table and sat down. Li Huaixian glanced at Han Li, then smiled and said, "Mr. Han is here to persuade me again!"

Han Li is over 30 years old, a native of Chenliu. He has been poor since childhood. He studied hard. He went to Beijing to take the exam twice in the tenth year of Tianbao and Tianbao in the eleventh year of Tianbao. Both of them failed. He returned home without any shame and lived in Hebei. He made a living by writing letters to others. By chance, he wrote several letters for Li Huaixian, which was highly appreciated by Li Huaixian and made him his own aide. Over the years, he has come up with many ideas for Li Huaixian, and gradually became Li Huaixian's most trusted aide.

Han Li smiled. He did not directly answer Li Huaixian's question, but asked back: "How much time does the general think there is still?"

It means that there is still much time left for him to consider and make choices. Li Huaixian has always been confused about this issue. He also knows that time is very tight, but he can't explain it clearly. Li Huaixian pondered for a while and said, "I really didn't see this clearly. Please tell me about it."

"General, you actually have only one day. If I guess correctly, Yin Ziqi's army will approach Shexian tomorrow. Once they arrive in Shexian, An Qingxu will definitely leave first. Should the general leave or stay? Let's go, where is the general's foundation? Let's stay, where is the general's credit? General, it's urgent!"

Li Huaixian said for a while: "If I leave, I want to occupy Cangzhou and Dezhou. There is still a little population there, and the destruction is not very large. Mobilizing soldiers to station troops should be my foundation."

"What then?" Han Li chased after him, "Then in the Hebei battle, which faction the general is going to stand in, An Lushan or Shi Siming?"

"I don't stand any of them, I will stand up and let them fight."

Han Li sneered repeatedly, "General, you think of the problem too simply. Not to mention that you cannot stay out of it, nor do you have food to support so many troops. Just say one thing, how long can the general think his separatist can last? Half a year, or a year?"

Li Huaixian said nothing, and Han Li said again: "If it were Li Longji's era, the imperial court had weak military strength and might have been in power, and the imperial court could do nothing, so he could only agree that Li Qing'an is in charge of the government. With his strong military strength, would he allow the general to separatist? What would the result be if the general was wiped out after separatist? Like An Lushan and Shi Siming, they would be exiled at the least, and the general should be exiled at the worst, and the general should be exiled at the worst. The general must consider it carefully!"

Han Li's persuasion made Li Huaixian's desire for separatism a little shaken. At this time, Li Riyue next to him also advised: "The last time the Hebei ambush, our army was able to retreat without being chased by the Tang army because the target of the Tang army's extermination was not us, but Li Guiren. Li Guiren's army was brutal and killed and lost all his conscience. I heard that Li Qing'an had issued an order not to accept Li Guiren's surrender. Our military discipline was good and there were no evil deeds such as massacre. This is the greatest capital of the general. Why didn't the general use this capital to gain a future for himself instead of being an enemy of the court?"

The two of them had already surrendered to Li Huaixian's turn, and the weight of surrender in his heart had already reached 70%. At this moment, footsteps ran over outside the tent, and a personal soldier said, "General, the brothers who went to the Tang army camp to deliver the letter are back."

"ah!"

Li Huaixian was excited and said repeatedly: "Take them in!"

He said to Han Li and Li Riyue again: "You might as well see what news they brought back?"

After a moment, three personal soldiers who delivered the letter were taken in and half-kneeled to salute together, "General, we are back!"

"No need to be too polite. Have you seen Li Qing'an?"

The head-in-chief said: "Report to the general, we met Li Qing'an, and he wrote a letter to the general."

"Where is the letter? Where is the letter?" Li Huaixian asked hurriedly.

The captain took out a letter and handed it to Li Huaixian. Li Huaixian opened the letter impatiently. It was Li Qing'an's handwritten letter. At the beginning, he said: "To General Li Huaixian, the governor of the Jizhou governor of Fanyang Jiedu,......"

Li Huaixian couldn't help but sigh in his heart. He slowly finished reading the letter and handed it to Han Li, "Sir, take a look!"

Han Li quickly finished reading the letter and couldn't help but smile: "General, this is an opportunity! Li Qing'an gives you a chance to make meritorious service. This is better than leading troops to surrender directly. General must seize this opportunity."

Li Riyue also read the letter and said with a smile: "It can be seen from the letter that Li Qing'an did not regard the general as a rebellious general, but still called the general the governor of Jizhou. The general surrendered to him, but in fact, it should have surrendered to him. The army between different factions of the court changed to surrender, which is why the general did not kill him."

Seeing that Li Huaixian was still hesitating, the two of them couldn't help but feel anxious and said together: "General, make a decision quickly! If you don't decide, you will have no chance!"

At this moment, Li Huaixian finally made up his mind. He gritted his teeth, "Okay! I will do as he asked in his letter."

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Unlike Li Huaixian's decision to surrender to the Tang army and An Qingxu was preparing to withdraw to Hebei, Li Guiren's was a firm war pro-war faction. He was a Xi person. His idea was much simpler than Li Huaixian and An Qingxu. His greatest wish in his life was to fight a good battle with a strong opponent. Even if he died on the battlefield, he didn't care. From this perspective, he was a pure professional soldier.

In Li Guiren's view, the strongest enemy is naturally Li Qing'an. If he defeats Li Qing'an, then Li Guiren will be the number one soldier in the world. Although he has suffered two major losses in a row and suffered heavy casualties, not only did he not make a setback, but he has become more determined to fight with Li Qing'an. Two consecutive battles are sneak attacks. What if it is on the front battlefield? It is still unknown who will win!

Especially Li Guangbi defeated 30,000 Yan troops with two thousand cavalry. This face made Li Guiren really unable to afford it, and it also inspired his ambition. He would not be a human being if he did not find this face back.

Li Guiren's decision to fight to the death was firmly supported by general Cai Xide, but Cai Xide's ideas were slightly different from Li Guiren.

Although Cai Xide was also a Xi person, he had a very good relationship with the Turkic Shi Siming. Among the factions of the Hebei army, Shi Siming, Cai Xide, and Li Guiren were one faction, and Li Huaixian and Tian Bingsi were another faction. However, the relationship between Shi Siming and Cai Xide was far greater than that of ordinary factions, but it was an alliance relationship, even closer than the alliance relationship.

Cai Xide had just received a secret letter from Shi Siming, asking him to drag the Yan army on the Hedong battlefield for two or three days. At most, Shi Siming could free up his troops to move south. At that time, the army on the Hedong battlefield could only surrender to him. Shi Siming. If Cai Xide could do this, Shi Siming would be named Deputy Commander and the two would share wealth.

It was precisely because of this thought that Cai Xide strongly supported Li Guiren, but their army alone was not enough. The two of them had only 80,000 people, and they had to add Li Huaixian's 70,000 troops to compete with the Tang army. But could Li Huaixian cooperate with them?

Both of them were a little troubled. The only way was to find An Qingxu to see if he could persuade Li Huaixian to fight together. But the question is, what is An Qingxu's attitude?

Just as the countermeasure was being discussed, someone came to report that Li Huaixian's aide, Han Li, asked for a meeting.
Chapter completed!