The night of May 15th is a night that determines the fate of many people, but they themselves are not aware of it. Come the day of May 16th, they still don’t understand the situation.

"One of the thieves' battalions, all Qingqi, should be Liu Heifu, whom we met before. Last night they attacked a village twenty miles south and slightly west of here, where we and General Cui (Hongsheng) were. But after Liu Heifu defeated the soldiers and horses there, he did not follow the clues to touch us or General Cui overnight. He only took a short rest and continued to the west before dawn..."

"interesting."

"General He Xi sent a message saying that at three o'clock last night, another battalion of thieves arrived from the northeast of him. Because it was night and it was raining, he did not dare to fight, but continued to surround the originally trapped camp. The reinforcements did not move, but instead controlled the road and laid out positions in the northeast, so I don’t know who it is.”

"There is another battalion that fought with a general under General Zhang Jin yesterday, and directly broke through the general's three thousand soldiers, but did not increase the damage at all, and also went directly to the west... What General Zhang meant Yes, that person seems to be a man named Han who harassed us before, but I’m not sure.”

"Yesterday afternoon, soldiers and horses should have attacked strongholds such as river crossings and pontoon bridges, but I don't know which battalion they were, nor their subsequent routes, or even how many strongholds they were in, or how many battles were fought. The news is too confusing. Already."

"I don't know if Zhang Qianda's troops have moved or not, and what the consequences will be... General Yu doesn't even know what's going on."

"Has a message been sent to General Tuwanlao?"

"Almost ten couriers have been sent... In fact, General Yu has also tried to send a few over."

"When will Zuopushe arrive? How many troops and horses will there be?"

"We can arrive in the afternoon. What he said last night was that there were nine thousand people around him at that time, and Yuan Lizheng will also come with him."

"The strength is the same as ours. Together they are 18,000."

"In addition to the 4,000 people from General He Xi... no, it's 6,000 people. There are another 2,000 people there who will join us at noon today."

"This is twenty-four thousand people."

"That's enough. We have a total of 78,000 personnel. If you remove the 10,000 at the front and back, the main force between the Fei vortices is 58,000, which is almost half. Who can't deal with it? Fifteen battalions of the army can do it together. Victory! Besides, several of their battalions have obviously gone westward."

"I know, is there anything else?"

"..."

"Well."

Along with the slightly weakened rain in the early morning, Sima Jinda, the right servant who had just finished eating the sour breakfast porridge, was sitting under a thatched shed in a farmyard. After listening to the report, he summarized the current intelligence. "The current situation is The situation is:

First, the thieves broke out suddenly, and by taking advantage of the rain and our turn, we were caught off guard, so that we couldn't even find the location of our own troops, and the battle situation information was even worse;

Secondly, the task given to the bandits crossing the river should be to cross the river westward at all costs in order to disrupt our subordinates and make us not know how to respond;

Third, judging from the current situation, the soldiers and horses that appeared by the rebels should be the same soldiers and horses that harassed and oppressed us before. There are no obvious reinforcements. But even for the fifteen or sixteen battalions they exposed before, we don’t know where they are.

Where;

Fourth, General He Xi accidentally captured the opponent's battalion;

Fifth, there is no news from General Zhang Qianda and General Yu Lao on the east bank of the Guohe River...is that right?"

"yes."

The person who answered Sima Jinda was Niu Fangsheng, who was marching on behalf of the army. In addition to the two of them, there were several generals and more than a dozen team generals under the shed, who also nodded many times.

"Well, let me make a bold guess now. These thieves have a plan. They just want to use quick military operations to confuse our subordinates and kill some of our soldiers and horses, so that we dare not cross the river to the other side of Guoshui.

We don't dare to continue going north to Xingyang. Anyway, they want us to turn around and go to Huaixi." At this point, Sima Jinda obviously hesitated, but he still said it. "And the soldier they want to kill should be Zhang

Qian Da and General Yu Lao."

Everyone nodded in approval, but Niu Fangsheng seemed to be aware of Sima Jinda's hesitation, and couldn't help but sigh: "Sending out five or six battalions to intersperse is also a suspicious soldier. It makes it impossible for us to concentrate our troops for a while, and then we can concentrate our superior troops to attack first.

Lose General Zhang (Qianda), and then eat General Yu... So the key to this battle is whether we can save it? If not, we will really be played by others with more than a dozen battalions; if

To rescue, the Prime Minister and Zuo Pushe must make a decision together, cross the river together to supervise the division, and Old General Tu Wan must follow closely, and even faster! To be honest, Zhang Qianda has no hope, General Yu Old can still respond!

"

The meaning is obvious. Sima Huada is in the north at this time. He should not have left yet, so he can call him now... After all, he has already said that if he wants to cross the vortex to fight on the east bank, the prime minister must personally lead the army.

However, Sima Jinda was silent for a moment, but only shook his head: "I will send a letter to the Prime Minister to explain the situation. Zuopushe should be on the way at this time, and regardless of whether he can be rescued or not, we must work hard to move forward now.

The purpose of eating this chess piece trapped by the gang first, and then talking about other things, is to gather soldiers and horses for discussion... Therefore, before setting off, we will send envoys to find the various ministries scattered everywhere. In addition to those who have already occupied

The father city of the city must be guarded by people outside, and the troops and horses must be gathered as much as possible.”

"That's right, we have to wait for people anyway. We have to clear out Hexi first, and then go east and eat this camp before talking about anything else!" Niu Fangsheng nodded and didn't care about it anymore, obviously knowing that their brothers were embarrassed these days.

The two reached an agreement and immediately mobilized their troops, with about 9,000 troops and set off. Sima Huada also set off for Qiao County, the largest city in Guoshui, under the protection of Linghu Xing, as if nothing had happened.

One of the two brothers was facing south, the other was facing north, walking with their backs to each other.

Prime Minister Sima didn't mention it, he just said that Sima Youpu shot this way... This place is only twenty miles away from where the battalion was besieged, so we can just go south-east. Niu Fangsheng led his troops first, and the troops behind him have not yet fully activated.

Then, Sima Jinda received new news about the battle situation... It turned out that the Hexi Naili Army had arrived at another battalion.

At this time, Sima Jinda began to frown a little.

Because according to his inference, the soldiers and horses crossing the river should mainly intersperse, in order to disrupt the subordinates of the Forbidden Army and delay the counterattack of the Forbidden Army. At this time, even if a battalion was accidentally surrounded, they should be ruthless.

right.

It was reasonable and reasonable to send a battalion to provide support before, but now another battalion is sent. Aren't you afraid that the Forbidden Army will gather in and easily eat it?

Of course, it is also possible that they are helping the rebels, unable to decide which battalion to leave on the battlefield, or that the leaders regard their own battalions as private property, and connect with each other to act on their own on the battlefield.

This is a good thing.

After thinking about this, Sima Jinda, who put down his worries a little, finally got ready and hit the road.

And when the right servant shot the rear army and marched about six or seven miles, and Niu Fangsheng had gone more than ten miles in front, another military message arrived, but it was not the military message from somewhere in the front, but the military message from last night.

, I just found this right servant and shot him in front of me... To be specific, at the southernmost end of the battlefield, another battalion was trapped by the Forbidden Army.

The right guard general Li Anyuan is considered a powerful force in the Forbidden Army. His unit not only has troops recruited before the Three Expeditions, but also has the old foundation of the Shengsheng Army in the old Forbidden Army. The thieves bumped into him at night, but not only did not shake this elite Forbidden Army,

Instead, they were beaten to a pulp and suffered heavy casualties. Not only that, Li Anyuan commanded well. Knowing that it would be difficult to pursue in the rain at night, he divided three elite teams into three directions, like a claw to keep up with the thieves and harass them continuously.

Then at dawn, the first part of the army launched a counterattack, and sure enough, they pounced on the opponent in a small market five or six miles west of Guoshui, and were attacking quickly.

Moreover, as the day dawned, this group of soldiers and horses was also clearly photographed, and it turned out to be the first battalion of thieves that they had encountered before. The leader's surname was Shang, and it was said that he was Zhang's confidant.

This is of course good news, and even Sima Jinda feels a little relaxed.

After all, judging from the summary of military information from yesterday to now, although both sides have their own victories and defeats, from the point of view of the establishment of combat operations, the overall quality of the Forbidden Army is still obviously better than that of the army. At the same time, the thieves' soldiers and horses have never exceeded those of the previous ones.

The scope of military exploration.

These are all reassuring.

In this way, Sima Jinda felt relieved and continued to march. After walking for about four or five miles, he was only about twenty miles away from him in a straight line. On a platform ten miles west of Guoshui, there was a slightly crude building.

In the Baidi Temple, Zhang Xing and others also received the news of this battle!

It turned out that yesterday evening, the gang decided to form a formation to freeze the river water, and it was actually successful. Then, relying on the solid ice pontoon bridge, twenty-seven battalions came over in one night, plus the five battalions that were originally crossing, and those who followed from behind the other four places last night.

Of the four battalions, more than thirty battalions have arrived, a few of them are scattered elsewhere, and most of them are gathering at a place more than ten miles south of Chengfu and five or six miles west of the Uishui River.

It is to prepare here and then launch a full-scale attack.

Including Jia Runshi who was sent out last night and Zhai Kuan who was sent out this morning, it was not so much to rescue Jia Wugen, but rather to conceal the battlefield information and cover this heavily armed group.

In fact, starting from last night, the mission of the scouts who dispersed was no longer to conduct reconnaissance, but to be restricted to a ten-mile radius around them and work hard to counter-reconnaissance. Even the military experts were doing their best to reduce surveillance.

However, just when the whole army was recharging its strength and preparing to use Jia Wugen as a bait to allow the Forbidden Army to gather more troops and fight a big battle, Mang Kingang from the lower reaches did not hesitate to use his true energy to personally deliver a huge piece of bad news.

.

"The whole camp collapsed?" In the Guanzhong Hall, which was almost full of people, even Zhang Xing was startled. "Where is Shang Huai'en?"

"It should be more serious." The bald Mang Kingang's head was covered with water stains, but it was not rain, but sweat. "I received a defeated soldier on the road and knew that the entire battalion of Chief Shang was destroyed, so I quickly sent the troops to

I retreated to the nearest town and went to see it myself... When I got there, I saw the Forbidden Army holding up a white short cloak and showing off their power! I was so confused and afraid that the military situation was serious, so I came directly to find the chief!"

"I'm going to take a look!" Xiong Bonan's eyes turned red not long after he had just returned, and he was about to leave again. "At least the bodies we need to snatch are back!"

"The king can't go!" Xu Shiying shouted sternly to stop her brother-in-law. "We just formed a formation last night and the river froze. We need you to sit in front of the battlefield later, just in case! Now we also need you to sit here to prevent the enemy's masters.

Come and investigate for yourself!”

"That's the case, that's the case." Xiong Bonan was clearly in a state of chaos. "Have we ever suffered such a defeat since Zhang Xuguo that day?"

In the rain, almost all of the surrounding leaders, including Shan Tonghai, Chai Xiaohe, and Wang Shuyong, including many clerks, soldiers, and generals, looked miserable. It was obvious that this unexpected loss of the formation had greatly shaken the army.

Li Ding frowned slightly and wanted to say something, but he also knew that his words were unpleasant and his attitude was not good, especially when Zhang Xing, Xiong Bonan, Shan Tonghai and others were all here, and their attitudes were like this

Generally speaking, if a conflict occurs before the battle, it will inevitably affect the subsequent battle.

In fact, it is precisely because of this that he did not stop Xiong Bonan just now, including Zhang Xing. With his status, it is difficult for him to speak at this time.

"I have something to say, which is a bit unpleasant." At this moment, Xu Dalang spoke again. "I don't know whether Leader Shang is alive or dead. This is indeed bad news. A battalion has almost been wiped out, which is even more terrible news. But with all due respect, it's just

In terms of the general situation of the war, Leader Shang's defeat at this time will actually be of some benefit to us... Because the Imperial Army will inevitably underestimate the enemy, and Leader Jia and the others will attract more soldiers and horses in front of them, and they will be even more unprepared... At this time, we

We should get rid of distracting thoughts, continue with the original plan, and push to the west! This can be regarded as the revenge of the monk leader!"

Many people, including Xu Shiren, nodded immediately. Shan Tonghai, Wang Shuyong and others thought for a moment and nodded accordingly.

Even Xiong Bonan calmed down and nodded: "I think too much. At this time, I can't mess up the arrangement."

Seeing everyone being turned around, Li Ding withdrew his gaze from Xu Shiying and turned to ask Mang Kingang: "It is easy for a battalion of soldiers and horses to be trapped in the rain, but it is really difficult to be defeated by them all. Where is Shang Huaien, we will start from

As soon as I received the message at dawn, I asked the leader of Mangda to go to the rescue, but he couldn't hold on until you got there?"

"Because the reinforcements from the Forbidden Army are arriving faster and in greater numbers." Mang Jingang quickly explained. "Looking at the banner, it is Zhang Qianda's tribe, with a total of five or six thousand people. They will directly join Li Anyuan's general."
To be continued...