Tibet

Li Ye and Li Mi immediately divided their forces into two groups. Li Mi went to Tangzhou to inspect the combat readiness, while Li Ye came to Luyang Pass.

Luyang Pass currently has 3,000 defenders. The general is named Huang Xinwu, who is from the Huang family of Dengzhou. He was originally the training envoy of the Dengzhou regiment and commanded 2,000 Dengzhou state soldiers. After Li Ye recruited all the state soldiers in Shannan East Road, he met Huang Xin Wu was brave, good at fighting, and highly skilled in martial arts, so he appointed Huang Xinwu as Yingyang Lang General. A month ago, he appointed him again as the general of Luyang Pass.

Huang Xinwu accompanied Li Ye to Guancheng and looked at the mountains and official roads in the north. The traces of the war under the city had disappeared, but the surrounding area was still bare. It was because the Yan army had cut down all the trees.

"Have any enemy spies appeared?" Li Ye asked.

"It often happens. Yesterday, a group of enemy spies appeared. There were more than twenty people. I sent people to arrest them. It turned out that these spies were too cunning. They escaped as soon as the city gate opened. I planned to station an army outside. Army, when the enemy comes again, there is no need to open the city gate and they can just arrest them."

Li Ye nodded, "This method is good, but there will be precursors for the enemy's main force to attack. For example, they built three transit warehouses between Ye County and Luyang Pass. It is said that they have been damaged and abandoned, so you only need to keep an eye on these three. If you notice that the enemy has begun repairing and re-activating a warehouse, it means that the opponent's army is going south again."

"I understand my humble position, now I'm waiting to monitor the abandoned warehouse."

Li Ye smiled and asked again: "Is there a flying pigeon connection between Luyang Pass and Nanyang City?"

"Yes! I have established a connection with Fei Ge."

Li Ye immediately ordered: "Once you find that the enemy is repairing an abandoned warehouse, you must immediately report to Xiangyang by flying pigeons!"

"I humbly obey my orders!"

After inspecting Luyang Pass, Li Ye began to return to Xiangyang. When passing through Rang County, Li Ye once again summoned Lu Jiong, the governor of Dengzhou, and Liu Yan, the transshipment envoy of Shannan East Road.

"From the current overall situation, the Yan army has stabilized Hebei and controlled Guanzhong and the Central Plains. Next, they will launch offensives from three directions. One is Hedong Road to attack Taiyuan, so that Hebei, Hedong, Central Plains and Guanzhong will be linked together. One body.

The second is to attack Jianghuai and open up the passage to Yangzhou and Jiangnan. The third is to attack Jingxiang and occupy the Jingxiang thoroughfare. It will become very smooth and convenient no matter east, west or south.

So we are going to face a tough battle, and we will do our best, but we must also be prepared to lose. "

Speaking of this, Li Ye glanced at the two of them and said, "Do you two envoys understand what I mean? There is a half chance that we will be defeated."

Lu Jiong said in a deep voice: "Does Jiedushi mean that we need to evacuate in advance?"

Li Ye nodded, "First evacuate the official supplies, and then the people who are willing to evacuate will organize their evacuation. The people who are temporarily unwilling to evacuate must also evacuate. Once the situation is critical, they can evacuate immediately."

"Jiedushi asked the people to evacuate because the rebels would massacre the city?" Liu Yan asked.

Li Ye sighed and said: "That's true. The Yan army likes to use massacres to warn opponents who refuse to surrender. This is what I'm worried about. Once we are forced to evacuate, the Yan army is likely to use massacre to avenge our previous victory. "

Lu Jiong nodded, "Bizhi understands what Jiedushi meant. Regardless of whether the Tang army is defeated or not, Bizhi will ask the people to stay away from the battlefield as much as possible and temporarily withdraw south to avoid the war."

"exactly!"

The next day, Li Ye returned to Xiangyang City, and the governor Lu Jiong began to make comprehensive arrangements for the evacuation of the people. The transshipment envoy Liu Yan even mobilized tens of thousands of camels and more than 10,000 ships to rush to the counties of Dengzhou to assist the evacuation of the people and government supplies.

Yancheng is the prefecture of Yuzhou and an important city in the Central Plains. It is not in the center of Yuzhou, but in the northeastern part of Yuzhou, close to Xuzhou.

Prince An Qingxu of the Yan Kingdom was defeated in his attack on Dengzhou half a year ago and lost tens of thousands of people. However, he soon summoned more than 100,000 troops from all over the country to surrender. After several months of training, he personally led an army of 100,000 troops to go south again. Counties surrendered one after another, and Xuzhou, Chenzhou and Yuzhou were occupied in just one month.

His target is still Jingxiang, and Dengzhou is the northern gate of Jingxiang. Taking the Nanyang Basin is the first step to attack Jingxiang.

This time, An Qingxu learned the lesson from the last failure. Yan Zhuang planned for him a strategy of attacking from the east and attacking from the west. On the one hand, he continued to attack Luyang Pass. On the other hand, he sent a strong army to attack Tangzhou from the east and penetrate directly into Dengzhou. Prefecture, seized the Tang army's retreat.

General Wu Lingyu of the Yan Army led an army of 30,000 troops to station in Yancheng, ready to launch an offensive against Tangzhou at any time.

That morning, a small caravan consisting of more than twenty mules entered Yancheng. This caravan was the intelligence scout of the Tang Army. Intelligence scouts and field scouts are not the same thing. Intelligence scouts sneak into the enemy's city. Inquiring about information, there are old people, women and middle-aged people, as well as a small number of young and strong men.

They belong to the Jianghan Army Staff Camp and are under the jurisdiction of Jianghan Army Sima. The leader of this intelligence scout is Wang Shen, a middle-aged man about forty years old. He came to Yancheng with three of his men to establish an intelligence point. First of all, He entered the city as a merchant.

Fortunately, normal order has been restored in Yancheng, but the control is still very strict, especially for outsiders. If there are more than five people in a group, they must go to the government to register and undergo review.

Therefore, there were only four people in Wang Shen's party, and they were just on the edge of legality.

"stop!"

A group of people approached the city gate, and several soldiers guarding the city stepped forward and stopped them.

"Where are you from?"

Wang Shen quickly smiled and said: "We are Tangzhou businessmen, coming from Tangzhou!"

He spoke with a Tangzhou accent, and the soldier stepped forward and patted the cargo on the mule, "What is it?"

"Reply to the military master, it's medicinal materials!"

"What medicinal materials?"

"They are Eucommia ulmoides and Angelica sinensis, which are the specialties of Tangzhou."

"Pour it all out and check it out!"

"Master Jun, you can't pour out the medicinal ingredients. Can't you open it and take a look?"

At the same time, the two pieces of money were handed over obediently, "Tea for the military men!"

"Wait, I'm going to ask for permission!"

The soldiers took the money and ran to the top of the city. On the top of the city, a captain on duty was staring at them. The soldiers ran up to report.

"The other party said they were medicinal materials, Eucommia ulmoides and Angelica sinensis, and gave me two ounces of money."

The captain nodded, "I'll ask for another amount of money, and then search it. Except for daggers, no other weapons are allowed into the city!"

"Follow the order!"

The soldier put down the money, ran back and said to Wang Shen, "I still want more money!"

Helpless, Wang Shen took out another amount of money and gave it to the soldier. The soldier took the money and said, "You are not allowed to bring any weapons into the city. If you have weapons, hand them over as soon as possible!"

Wang Shen asked the man to hand over the self-defense dagger, and the soldier waved his hand, "You can carry the dagger!"

They searched the goods and made sure there were no weapons. The soldier waved, "You can go!"

Wang Shen secretly breathed a sigh of relief, gave an order, and the four of them led the mules loaded with medicinal materials and walked slowly towards the city.