Tibet

After a few days of rest, Guo Ziyi divided his troops into two groups and ordered Ma Lin to lead 40,000 troops to guard Liucheng, and strive to transfer all kinds of food and grass supplies from Juehua Island to Liucheng.

Guo Ziyi personally led 120,000 troops to the heartland of Khitan, the Khitan's old nest Songmo Dudu Mansion.

At this time, the Khitan was far from being comparable to the Khitan Kingdom a hundred years later. In the later period, the Yelu tribe rose. With the efforts of several generations such as Yelu Abaoji and Yelu Deguang, the Khitan completely annexed the Liaodong tribes, including the Bohai Kingdom, and conquered the nomadic peoples in the north, establishing a powerful Khitan Kingdom.

Later, they took the Youzhou that they had dreamed of for a hundred years from Shi Jingtang, obtained the advanced military technology of the Han people, further expanded their strength, and established the Liao Dynasty, while forming a strategic advantage over the entire northern part of the Song Dynasty.

But this is the Khitan more than a hundred years later. The current Khitan is still led by the more conservative Yaoyan tribe and the emerging Diela tribe. It is just a large tribe in Liaodong with a population of hundreds of thousands and an army of more than 100,000.

His only advantage was that he annexed the Baixue tribe in the north during the Tianbao period, giving the Khitan a strategic depth to the north, and accepted 60,000 surrendered troops from the Bohai Kingdom last year.

In addition, the Khitan also had a traditional ally, the Xi tribe, which sent 20,000 troops to cut off the retreat of the Tang army at the request of the Khitan.

The reason why Li Ye valued the Khitan and asked Guo Ziyi to exterminate the clan was not only because the Khitan killed his brother Li Huai, but more importantly, Li Ye knew the later history of the Khitan, and he would never allow the Khitan to have another chance to rise.

The loss of Yingzhou and the annihilation of the 50,000-man army shocked the entire Khitan. Su Khan Yaoyanbo was afraid and hurriedly discussed with Yilijin Yelu Salad.

Yilijin means the general of the alliance, and also the military leader of the Khitan tribes. It is currently held by the leader of the emerging Diela tribe, which is the later Yelu tribe. The leader of the Diela tribe, Yelu Salad, is the great-grandfather of Yelu Abaoji.

Yelu Salad certainly wanted to rescue Liucheng. Diecifeng was not only his nephew, but his 30,000 troops were also the elite of the Dieci tribe.

However, under the unanimous opposition of Su Khan and the leaders of various tribes, Yelu Salad finally gave up the rescue of Liucheng and let Diecifeng break through, resulting in the annihilation of 30,000 troops.

Yelu Salad was extremely angry, but he also knew that if he went to rescue, more troops would die.

It was just that the attitude of Su Khan and the tribes made him very angry. They obviously had selfish motives in opposing the dispatch of troops.

Although he was angry, Yelu Salad still put the overall situation first. Now the Khitan tribe was at the critical moment of life and death, and he could no longer be selfish and willful.

Yelu Salad pondered for a moment and said, "The Tang army is coming with great momentum and is extremely powerful. I suggest giving up Songmo and heading north to Xundi to avoid its sharp edge."

Su Khan was shocked, "Songmo is our ancestral land for generations. How can we give it up so easily? Didn't we agree to only withdraw women, children and the elderly, and not the main force?"

Another nobleman, Xiao Naigu, said worriedly, "This time the Tang army's northward march is unusual. They may want to restore the Andong Protectorate and rebuild the prefectures and counties. I'm worried that once we give up Songmo, we will never come back."

Yelu Salad shook his head, "The Tang army's target of attacking Liaodong this time is not just Khitan. If we retreat north, the Tang army will temporarily let us go and turn around to attack the Japanese army entrenched in Bohai, as well as the Silla army, and even the Xi tribe, especially the Xi tribe. If they are destroyed, there will definitely be a large number of scattered Xi people coming to us, and our strength will increase. If we can convince If the Shiwei tribe joins hands with us, we may have more than 200,000 troops at that time, and we can fight the Tang army. Once the Tang army is defeated, Songmo Prefecture can still be recovered. At that time, the two sides will negotiate peace, Khitan will be saved, and we will be stronger. "

Yelü Salad's words moved Su Khan, and he was a little worried and said: "The Tang army is all cavalry, and they come very quickly. I am afraid that we will not have time to retreat and the Tang army will come to kill us."

Yelü Salad nodded. This is indeed a big problem. He thought about it and said: "You can send Yelu Shula and Diecifeng to lead 60,000 Bohai troops to intercept the Tang army. Since these guys are not sincere, it is just right to consume them and buy time for us to retreat!"

This plan was approved by Su Khan, and Xiao Naigu beside him did not say anything. Yelu Shula was Yelu Salad's eldest son. Yelu Salad actually sent his eldest son to intercept, and Xiao Naigu could not say anything.

Moreover, the 60,000 Bohai troops surrendered to the Khitan, but refused to change their flags and banners. They were determined to fight back to recover their homeland and demanded high treatment, which made the Khitan people very angry. When they were asked to intercept the Tang army, Su Khan and Xiao Naigu did not object at all.

The Khitan tribes began to mobilize to retreat northward. Although some Khitan tribes did not want to leave their ancestral land, they had to bear the pain and follow the other tribes.

At the same time, the generals Yelu Shuci and Diecifeng led 60,000 Bohai surrendered troops to the south to intercept the 120,000 Tang troops heading north.

The main force of the Tang army entered the Songmo area, which covers a large area. The west is hilly and mountainous, which is today's Chifeng, and the east is today's Khorchin grassland.

Therefore, the Khitan people are more complicated. There are fishing and hunting tribes in the west and nomadic tribes living in the eastern grassland.

The Tang army did not move north quickly. After all, the Songmo area was unfamiliar to them, and this was the Khitan's old nest. Moving north hastily would easily put them in a passive position due to the terrain, which was not in line with Guo Ziyi's style.

Early that morning, as the army was gathering and about to rise, suddenly a scout came to report that an army appeared thirty miles away to the north, numbering about 50,000 to 60,000 people. Judging from the attire, it did not look like the Khitan army.

Guo Ziyi was stunned. Are there other armies in the Songmofu area?

"Commander, is this a joke?"

"impossible?"

Guo Ziyi shook his head and said: "The Xi people are in the south and cannot come from the north."

At this time, General Zhang Dian suddenly said: "Commander, the opponent cannot be the Bohai Navy! Didn't it say that the main force of the Bohai Navy surrendered to the Khitan?"

This is very possible. If it is really the Bohai Navy, it would be interesting. The Khitans did not come by themselves, but sent the Bohai Navy to intercept them. This is obviously consuming this army.

Guo Ziyi suddenly thought, "Oh no, the Khitans must have started to retreat north, so they sent the Bohai Navy to stop them."

But soon, Guo Ziyi calmed down again. Regardless of whether the Khitans retreated or not, he could not be impatient, let alone underestimate the enemy, otherwise he would suffer big losses.

At this time, Zhang Dian suggested again: "Commander, the Khitans seem to want the Bohai Navy to work hard, but the Bohai Navy may not be willing to really work hard. I feel that if I use some hard measures to show them, maybe they will have other ideas." Got an idea!”

As expected of the number one scout of the Tang Army, Guo Ziyi was deeply convinced by his bold and innovative insights. He turned around and ordered: "Order the Third Firearms Battalion to come up!"

The Third Firearms Battalion has a thousand men and is equipped with the latest firearms, which were just sent to Liaodong from Chang'an. They are called arrow thunders, which are fired with large yellow crossbows. A total of 1,500 were sent, although most of them were given away. For the army to conquer Nanzhao, 1,500 pieces were enough.

One thousand people were divided into five hundred groups, each group of two people, equipped with a large yellow crossbow and three thunder arrows, as well as normal heavy crossbow arrows and explosive arrows.

There were too many 120,000 troops, so Guo Ziyi decided to send only 20,000 troops northward. Guo Ziyi personally led an army of 100,000 to support them from behind.

The 20,000-strong army was led by Zhang Dian. In more than ten years, Zhang Dian grew up step by step from a scout brigade commander to the commander-in-chief of the generals, from a third-grade champion general to a Duke of Jincheng. He made many achievements, including the Guanlong Army and even the Tang Army. In history, only Li Chenghua, the commander of the internal defense, could rival him.

After marching twenty miles, a black line appeared in front, and 60,000 Bohai troops appeared.

There are nine generals in the Bohai army. The main general is Yelu Shuci, the deputy general is Die Cifeng, and the other deputy general is Ren Tianling.

Ren Tianling was the commander-in-chief of the Bohai Army. After the Bohai Kingdom was destroyed by the Japanese army, Ren Tianling was frightened and angry. At this time, their logistics was interrupted and their food and grass were about to be cut off. In desperation, he had no choice but to surrender to the Khitan.

One of the conditions for surrender at that time was that the Khitan would help them regain their country, and the Khitan fully agreed.

Therefore, the Bohai Navy did not change its flag, and even its military uniforms did not change. It still maintained the battle flag of the Bohai Kingdom, which made the Khitan very dissatisfied.

And Ren Tianling kept urging the Khitan to fulfill its promise and send troops to help the Bohai Kingdom recover. However, at this time, the Khitan had just signed an alliance agreement with the Japanese army to resist the Tang Army. How could it be possible to send troops to restore the country on their behalf? So they just postponed it and dealt with the Bohai National Army.

How could Ren Tianling and other generals not see that the Khitan was perfunctory with them? They were resentful in their hearts, but they were helpless. They needed the Khitan to supply their army. Once the food was cut off, their army would fall apart.

This time Yelu Salad still used logistical supplies as a threat to force the 60,000 Bohai Navy to go south to stop the Tang Army.

Even though Ren Tianling was extremely reluctant and short-tongued, he had to agree to send troops.

Behind Ren Tianling are six generals from the Bohai Kingdom, each commanding an army of 10,000 people.

At this time, spies came to report that 20,000 Tang army vanguards were found ten miles ahead.

Die Ci Feng was startled and hurriedly whispered: "The Tang army is extremely cunning, we must not underestimate our enemy!"

Yelu Shuci glared at him. The original purpose was to consume the Bohai Navy. If he didn't underestimate the enemy and didn't force them to fight, would he still lead them to retreat?

Yelu Shuci immediately said to Ren Tianling: "General Ren, now is your chance to repay the Khitan!"

Ren Tianling nodded, turned around and shouted: "The First Army, the Second Army, and the Third Army are ready to attack!"