When the two met, they hugged each other with a smile. Han Jiang punched him on the shoulder again, pretending to be dissatisfied: "After all, I am a political affairs officer, the Shaanxi Road Administration, the emperor actually asked me to obey your order unconditionally. Why?"

Fan Ning smiled slightly, "With Mr. Han's wisdom, can't you think of the reason?"

Han Jiang nodded, "When I saw the top secret military newspaper sent by the imperial court, I couldn't believe it. When I thought of attacking Xixia from the north, my first reaction was that it was impossible. But when the Song and Liao handed over Dongshengzhou and the army entered Yulin County, I realized that this plan could be fully implemented, and I went south to initiate the attack on Xixia. Why didn't I think of this method before?"

"In the past, it was blocked by the Liao Kingdom and entered the territory of Xixia directly. It was a vast desert. It was unrealistic, so we could only fight hard from the south. As long as we entered Hetao to establish the foundation and had sufficient logistics supplies, the layers of defense lines established to the south of Xixia will be completely useless, and Xingqing City will be directly exposed to us."

"It's right, all you need craftsmen, big stones, limes, and glutinous rice are ready. In order to prepare the city stones, we demolished three military cities and Suide County in Yan'an Prefecture, and a large number of military forts to prepare stones, which is enough to build two medium-sized counties."

The most important thing for Fan Ning's operation in this operation was to quickly establish a foundation in Hetao at the fastest speed. When Xixia reacted and launched a large-scale attack, the Song army had already gained a firm foothold in Hetao.

Generally, it takes about a year to build a city, and more than 60% of it takes to prepare materials. Then a thousand craftsmen are leisurely building. There are only two ways to shorten the construction period. One is to prepare building materials in advance, and the second is to increase the craftsmanship. Fan Ning takes a two-pronged approach. He hopes to complete the construction of the city within 20 days.

Fan Ning heard that all the supplies had been transported to Yulin, and was overjoyed and didn't care about rest. He immediately followed Han Jiang to the warehouse tent.

In a broad sense, the Hetao Plain is divided into Western Tak, East Tak, Front Tak and Back Tak. The Western Tak region refers to the core of the ruling of the Xixia Kingdom, Xingqing Prefecture, Xiping Prefecture, Jingzhou, Dingzhou, Lingzhou and other places.

The front cover plain is a large grassland in the shape of rope covers that is formed after the Yellow River is forked into two lines, and then reunited. The back cover plain is the Yulin area of ​​Dongshengzhou.

The east condom is the two sides of the Yellow River between the front and back condoms.

But what the Song army was going to seize this time was the Qiantao Plain, which is also the Hetao area in a narrow sense.

Currently, the Hetao area belongs to the territory of Xixia. Because it is cold in winter and there is no enemy threat, the friendly neighbors of Liao Kingdom to the north and east, and the Gobi and deserts to the south, so Xixia is not enthusiastic about the operation of the Hetao area. There are endless grasslands everywhere. The relics that the Han and Tang dynasties have worked hard here are either flooded with dust or become a little ruin.

In fact, the Hetao Plain is an extremely rich place. The Yellow River flows smoothly, irrigation is convenient, and the land is very fertile. Since the Han Dynasty, the central court has immigrated to Hetao for reclamation. By the Eastern Han Dynasty, the immigrants in Hetao had reached nearly one million, and more than a dozen county towns were built, including Linrong, Woye, Guangmu, Chengyi, Yiliang, Linwo, and Heyin.

Unfortunately, after the Five Barbarians invaded China, all prosperity and population disappeared.

Xixia called the Hetao area the Heishan Fuwei Army Division. Currently, only two military cities have been built, with 2,000 troops garrisoned. The largest city is called Tiande Army City, located between the north and south Yellow Rivers, close to the North Yellow River, with 1,000 troops garrisoned.

In addition, at the entrance of Hetao on the south side, there is a small military city with 500 troops stationed. On the way to Xingqing Prefecture, there is also a supply military city with 500 troops stationed.

For more than a hundred years, no war has occurred here, so that the Western Xia soldiers jokingly claimed that their enemy was a prairie wolf pack.

There was no war in a century, and the Song army could not come. The Xixia army stationed here just to symbolically declare sovereignty, which made the Xixia defenders extremely relaxed. At night, there were almost no defenders on the top of the city, and only two old soldiers who were guarding the gate slept in the city gate.

Although the Western Xia court had learned through spies deployed in the capital of the Song Dynasty that the Song and Liao dynasties had reached an armistice agreement, the content of the armistice agreement was not disclosed to the public at the request of the Song Dynasty, and only some clues were obtained from the newspapers.

For example, exchanging hostages, such as the Song Dynasty withdrew troops from the Liao Kingdom.

However, the news of the exchange of land between the Song and Liao countries was strictly blocked, including the Liao Kingdom. Yelu Hongji did not want his subjects to know that the Liao Kingdom was forced to hand over Dongshengzhou to Songcheng.

It was this tight blockade that made the Western Xia court unaware that the Western Xia had been betrayed by the Liao Kingdom and that Dongshengzhou had been replaced by the Song army. They even unexpectedly, a huge Song army fleet sailed into Hetao for the first time in a century and was heading towards Tiande Army City.

An army of ten thousand people was ambushed two miles away, with two thousand cavalry inside. The flying tiger team composed of more than a hundred elite Song army soldiers quietly arrived at the city of Tiande Army.

Tiande Jun City is made of strong large stones. The stones have not been polished and have clear edges and angular appearances, and they look very rough. However, the city wall is very high and strong. There is no moat or suspension bridge outside the city wall. Even the only southern gate is a bit decayed because of the years.

Dozens of pivoting ropes hooked the top of the city, and hundreds of Flying Tiger Army soldiers quickly climbed up to the top of the city. The city was very quiet and there was no defender, which was really beyond the expectations of the Song army.

It was the third update, and the defenders in the city were sleeping soundly. When the generals of the first battalion waved their hands, they divided into two groups. One of them rushed towards the city gate with dozens of soldiers, while the generals of the battalion led the other soldiers to the city tower.

Generally, there are places for soldiers to sleep in the city tower, but when the Song army rushed to the city tower, they found that the city tower was empty, at least one inch of dust was covered with dust. No one had been here for many years.

The camp general was stunned for a moment, and then he realized that Tiande City had no sense of defense at all.

At this time, Duduo rushed to the top of the city and said, "There are only two old soldiers under the city, and they have been killed."

"Set the rockets and open the city gate!"

In the thick night, three gunpowder arrows shot out in a row in the vast grassland, and the bright fire flashed across the grassland, as if three meteors were flying arrows.

The commander of the attack on Tiande City was the commander Wang Shiquan. When he saw the rocket, he waved his hand and 10,000 soldiers immediately rushed to Tiande City two miles away. In just a moment, he rushed to Tiande City and saw a large group of war horses running out of the city.

Feihu brought the horse ring at the city gate, and more than a thousand war horses were released.

Wang Shiquan was overjoyed and immediately ordered: "Infantry encircled outside the city, and cavalry entered the city to encircle and suppress it!"

Eight thousand soldiers were ambushed outside the city and surrounded the city gate. The Flying Tiger Army simply lit a fire outside the city, illuminating the outside of the city gate as daylight.

Two thousand cavalrymen rushed into the city, and a thousand defenders in the city were caught off guard. They had no intention of resisting and fled one after another. The streets were full of running soldiers and cavalry ruthlessly massacred.

In less than a quarter of an hour, most of the 1,000 soldiers were killed and injured, and many Xixia people in the city who were doing business also died in the chaos.

More than 300 soldiers rushed out of the city gate, and they were ruthless arrows. The arrows were as dense as locusts, and the soldiers of the escaped city fell one after another.

The commander Wang Shiquan was really a little disappointed. He thought there would be thousands of people, but he didn't expect that it would be over after only three or four hundred people ran out.

The cavalry commander shouted: "The battle in the city is over!"

Wang Shiquan waved his hand, "The army entered the city!"

Just as ten thousand Song troops captured Tiande City, at the entrance of Hetao a hundred miles away, five thousand Song troops also captured another five hundred military city, and the five hundred Xixia troops were completely destroyed.

After dawn, the huge fleet of the Song army also arrived in Tiande City. Fan Ning and Han Jiang both appeared on this uninhabited grassland, which also shows the Song Dynasty's attention to the Hetao region.

Fan Ning and Han Jiang came to Tiande City, and commander Wang Shiquan knelt down on one knee to report, "Report to the two ministers, the city has been taken down, and none of the thousand defenders escaped."

Fanning nodded and smiled, "Thank you for your hard work, is there a Xinying flying away?"

"No! The Flying Tiger Army seized the Eagle Tower in advance, and none of the ten trust eagles flew away."

This was what Fanning repeatedly instructed. Seizing the Eagle Tower is much more important than seizing the city gate. I believe that the five thousand soldiers in another military city will also firmly implement their intentions.

Han Jiang asked again: "When did they replenish supplies?"

"I interrogated the captured warehouse managers. They just replenished supplies last month. The next time they will be at the end of September and early October, and no one will come here during this period."

Fan Ning smiled at Han Jiang and said, "There should be time for two months."

He immediately ordered the soldiers to carry all kinds of supplies off the ship, and the craftsmen set up a camp.

Fan Ning and Han Jiang were patrolling around the surroundings. Han Jiang pointed at the broken walls of several sections of the Tucheng not far away with a horse whip and smiled: "Do you know what broken walls are?"

Fan Ning shook his head, "Please help Mr. Han solve his doubts!"

Han Jiang urged him to step forward, looking at the long wall and sighed: "The Qin general Meng Tian attacked the Xiongnu in the north, set up Jiuyuan County in Hetao, and built 34 counties, with Wuyuan County as the county governing. I specially looked at the map. Wuyuan County is nearby. If I had no mistake in judgment, this should be the city wall of Wuyuan County. I didn't expect Tiande City to build a city on the ruins of Wuyuan County."

Fan Ning looked around and said, "This area is really good. The terrain is high and will not form puddles. I think not to demolish Tiande City, just let Tiande City be an inner city. We will build an outer city along the former Wuyuan County site, with two strong cities inside and outside."

Han Jiang smiled bitterly and said, "But if this happens, I'm afraid the big stone will not be enough to build two cities."

"I mean, you don't need to build two more cities, just build one city."

Han Jiang thought about it carefully and said with a smile: "If we only build a large outer city, there will be a lot of big stones left. It is better to demolish the Xixia Military City at the entrance of the Hetao. We will build a smaller military city dozens of miles away from the east. The two cities echo each other. What does Fan Xianggong think of this?"
Chapter completed!