Chapter 26 twenty five

Li Shimin himself was not very nervous. Li Shiji's ability to march westward under the imperial edict showed that Li Jing approved of the coup, and his heart was half relieved.Although Li Yi had a large number of troops, he was not very worried, because the tens of thousands of elites from Prince Qin's residence had already returned to the army, he immediately decided to divide most of the troops, led by Yuchi Jingde and others to go north, leaving only more than 20,000 people and At the same time, Li Jing of Lingzhou was ordered to attack Li Yi together with Yuchi Jingde. Li Jing also accepted this order and attacked soon, which made Li Shimin more at ease.

While Li Shimin was concentrating on dealing with Li Yi, a puff of smoke quietly rose from the wilderness in the northwest of Jingzhou. These days, Li Yi in Jingzhou City is intoxicated with the joy of victory in the first battle.After setting up a rebellious flag, his initial plan was to attack Chang'an with a blitz. As soon as the team set off, Li Shimin's tens of thousands of elite soldiers went north, and Li Jing also rushed from the east.Seeing that Li Shimin sent a lot of troops, Li Yi decided to return to Jingzhou to defend. Soon, a messenger came to appease him with Li Shimin's personal letter, but Li Yi didn't even care about it.Then the Tang army approached the city wall, and when the two sides fought, Li Yi actually won a big victory. The Tang army left two to three thousand corpses, and was covered by Li Yi's men for thirty miles.It turned out that the forward of the Tang army was not the elite soldiers of Prince Qin's mansion, but more than 10,000 mansion soldiers led by Cheng Zhijie. Those mansion soldiers were all newly recruited to help Wucheng. How could they defeat the elite Li Yi who had been fighting for a long time?After this battle, Li Yi's confidence immediately increased. He told his trusted generals that Li Shimin had not held military power for many years, and the people in the Qin Palace were not as good as before, so there is no need to be afraid.Just as he was happy, the news that Huating was attacked and occupied by Hu Qi suddenly came.

In the final analysis, wars were fought for money and food. Without the food and grass in Huating, the 70,000 to 80,000 people would not be able to last long with the food stored in Jingzhou City.If Li Yi was struck by lightning, he sighed in the tent all afternoon.While I was in trouble, there was a noise outside the gate of the camp. A small school came in to report that there were more than a dozen rangers of the Tang Army hiding on the top of the mountain in Nanguan, and they were spotted by the soldiers in the sentry tower. General Lu Ji led a hundred soldiers out of the city. Captured, in an instant, most of them were shot and killed by the opponent with a big boxwood bow, and Lu Ji himself was shot by an arrow and captured.This made Li Yi a little surprised, he rode out of the city with a fine horse, and came to the side of the hill where the battle took place.

The setting sun was about to set, and the ground was in a mess, with the corpses of more than a dozen soldiers lying on the ground, most of them were shot by a long arrow. Under the afterglow of the setting sun, the surrounding fields were vast, only a few partridges were calling.Li Yi's eyes lingered on the battlefield. A small school got off his horse and pulled out an arrow and handed it to Li Yi. Li Yi looked at it, and his eyes fell on a soldier's corpse. Long lance with handle. Li Yi rode forward and circled around the corpse, he looked at the valley in the distance and said to himself: "I can smell him." General Yang Ji asked: "Who? "Li Yi spat out three words: "Li Shimin."

At night, by the bonfire in front of a tent in the Tang army camp, more than a dozen soldiers were huddling together to warm up.An old soldier holding a spear said: "I have been eating military rations for 20 years. I have never seen any battles. The great men in Wagang Village, General of the Sui Dynasty, have all been taught by them, but this Lu Ji, hey, really he Mom is no longer a human being, she is a god. I saw him in Nanguan that day. He was two feet tall, with eyes like copper bells, and holding a Fenghuo sword in his hand. When he chanted the mantra, hundreds of heads fell to the ground. That's it - at noon, we lost three thousand people." All the soldiers were startled and let out a sigh of surprise.A younger soldier said: "He is right. I heard that Li Yi is stronger than Lu Ji! Anyway, I will not go to Jingzhou City. I don't know how I died."

At this time, a voice came from the campfire: "Is Lu Ji as evil as you say?" The veteran glanced at the man, and saw that he was a man about thirty years old, leading a horse and wearing old clothes. The battle armor was full of dust, followed by a dozen or so cavalrymen with horses.The veteran asked: "Brothers, where are you from?" "Chang'an, we are from Chang'an." The man answered loudly. The veteran said: "No wonder you don't believe it. After a few days of tasting other people's swords and arrows, you will know how powerful Lu Ji is."

The man said loudly: "What are you going to do in a few days?" He stretched out his hand and pulled a big man who was tied behind his back from a nearby horse, pointed at him with a whip and said, "Tell the brothers who you are?" The big man bowed his head Said: "I, I'm Lu Ji." Everyone was stunned for a moment, the veteran stepped forward, lit a torch and looked: "It's really Lu Ji! I beat you ass, you killed so many of our brothers." As he said that, he rushed forward and grabbed Lu Ji to fight, and all the soldiers rushed forward. A soldier walked up to the man and said, "Brother, you are angry for those brothers who died in Nanguan. We must spread the word to you. Dare to ask your name?" The man smiled and spit out three words. One word: "Li Shimin." All the soldiers were stunned, stopped beating Lu Ji, and stared at the man blankly.The old soldier blinked his eyes to look at Li Shimin, and fell to his knees with a plop: "That's right, it's really the emperor, the little dog's eyes really grow on the donkey's buttocks!" Everyone knelt down together: "The emperor!" Veteran: "It's not an exaggeration for those who don't know. Get up quickly. It's windy and cold. Aren't you afraid of the cold? Go warm up for me." The veteran said: "Now, the little ones are not afraid of anything, are you still afraid of the cold? ?” Li Shimin looked at the soldiers: “Then if I tell you to go back to the city of Jingzhou tomorrow, you are not afraid?” Everyone said in unison: “Not afraid!”

At this time, Li Jing and Yuchi Jingde came out to meet him.Li Jing was still a little apprehensive about not supporting Li Shimin during the Xuanwumen Incident. When he saw Li Shimin, he took a big step and kowtowed: "My subject Li Jing knocks down to welcome the emperor!" Li Shimin hurriedly stepped forward to help him up, and said: "Brother Jing, please stand up!" In front of the crowd, he said the word "Brother Jing" very emphatically, so that everyone could hear clearly, Li Jing couldn't help being taken aback: "Your Majesty, how can I deserve this title?" " Li Shimin said: "You are twenty-six years old, don't you think it's a word? Hurry up and talk!" After speaking, he took Li Jing's hand and walked towards the tent. up.

After entering the big tent, Li Shimin told the generals what he saw when he faced the enemy. He pointed out that Jingzhou city defense is very strong. .As for how to fight skillfully, he proposed to send an elite army to go around from the north to attack Li Yi's granary, Huating, so that the Yan and Liao troops would be chaotic if they did not fight.All the generals said yes, everyone was preparing to discuss the plan to capture Huating, someone sent a letter in hastily, Li Shimin opened it to read, he was surprised, the letter was actually written by Li Yi.While thinking about it, Li Shimin said: "It's strange, I once sent someone to appease, but Li Yi flatly refused. He just won such a victory in Nanguan, and his arrogance is in full swing, why did he come to ask for appeasement by himself?"

Everyone was also very surprised. When there was a lot of discussion, a general came in and told Li Shimin that Lu Ji, who had been captured, had just confessed an important situation: Ashina Simo, a general under Jieli's command, suddenly took Huating and took away all of Li Yi's possessions. The stored grain retreated northward.Yuchi Jingde slapped his thigh when he heard the words: "I said he was so tough before, why did he soften all of a sudden, that's how it is! This is really God bless the Tang Dynasty, your majesty, please give me an order, if the dog runs out of food, the army will be in chaos. Let's besiege him immediately, and within a few days, we will be able to clean up these bastards." The atmosphere in the tent also became heated, and everyone talked about God helping Datang, Li Yi's end is here.Li Shimin didn't say anything, and walked slowly towards the map. Li Jing hurriedly moved a candle over, held the candlestick, and stood cautiously beside Li Shimin.Looking at it, Li Shimin closed his eyes and meditated for a moment, then opened his eyes suddenly, turned around and said something that surprised everyone: "Send someone to Jingzhou and agree to Li Yi's conditions!"