Chapter 40 Chapter Forty

The emperor's chariot supported by the land army did not arrive for a long time. This was not because the march was slow if there was a chariot, but because a major event happened on the way-Cen Wenwen was exhausted to death. Cen Wenwen once predicted that Ma Zhou would be exhausted to death, but unexpectedly, he died of exhaustion earlier than Ma Zhou. Marching and fighting is not that simple. Not only the food, supplies, and equipment of the army need to be taken care of by people, but also the actual number of troops, the number of sick people, the color of the flag, marching deployment, guard deployment, and route planning all need careful analysis by people. ,record it.Li Shimin was worried about others, so he handed over the task to Cen Wenwen.In the era without computers, relying on manual calculation and analysis alone is absolutely overwhelming.

So, why not find a few more stewards? Remember, this is a military plane, whoever leaks the military plane will die. Cen Wenwen is serious and responsible in his work, and he never leaves his hands for daily calculations and pen and ink.After a few days, I was exhausted from worrying and worrying, and my mind was in a trance. That day, Li Shimin called Cen Wenwen over and wanted to ask some questions, but found that he was in a trance and answered irrelevant questions.Those who talk have a relationship, but those who are obedient are worried.Li Shimin realized that the fifty-one-year-old Cen Wenwen was tired and stupid.After Cen Wenben withdrew, Li Shimin's face turned ugly, and he said to his courtiers as if he had lost something: "Ben Wenwen set off with us, I'm afraid we can't go back together."

Li Shimin did not expect that his words would be fulfilled that day. Cen Wenwen fell ill and died. That night, there was the sound of martial law drums in the army. Li Shimin couldn't bear to hear it, so he said to his subordinates: "Ben Wenwen is dead. I can't bear to hear the sound of the drums. Let's withdraw tonight!" After Cen Wenwen died, He was posthumously presented as Shizhong and Governor of Guangzhou, given the posthumous title of Xian, and was buried in Zhaoling. However, the story of Cen Wenwen is not over. He is a loving and strict father.Cen Wenwen's descendants will still be wonderful.

One thing down one thing. This is true, the death of Cen Wenwen is a great thing for author Lang Xu Jingzong.Because from the perspective of Xu Jingzong's position, only the death of Cen Wenwen can make him stand out.If we want to talk about Comrade Xu Jingzong, we must also talk about Comrade Ouyang Xun.If we want to talk about Comrade Ouyang Xun, we must also talk about classmate Xiao Yu.To talk about student Xiao Yu, we must start with a unique archery competition. Many years ago, that day happened to be a good time for September 9th. The north wind was blowing coolly, and the arena was full of voices, very lively.This is an archery competition organized by Emperor Taizong Li Shimin of Tang Dynasty.

Although civil servants are no match for military generals, at least one or two of the ten arrows can hit the straw man.When it was student Xiao Yu's turn to play, when the student drew his bow, everyone started booing. "Song Gong (Xiao Yu is Song Guogong), haven't you eaten?" "Song Gong is brewing emotions!" "Song Gong is weak, why are you shivering?" "Song Gong was windy and windy last night, and the rain hit the tide and the waves were rough." "Hahahaha, hahahaha!" Xiao Yu didn't care about these sarcasm, he firmly believed that as long as he hit the target, those mockers would be ashamed in the end.

So, he started to shoot. Xiao Yu drew his bow in a dignified manner, raised his head proudly, and glanced roughly at the grass man, staring at him like a tiger. The arrow was on the string and had to be fired, but Xiao Yu's arrow finally shot out.What was annoying was that the arrow didn't have enough range, and it stopped five or six meters in front of Xiao Yu.Everyone laughed, Xiao Yu became more and more angry, and shot nine arrows in a row. The nine arrows seemed to be against Xiao Yu, and they just ran around the straw man.Ouyang Xun got the order and wrote a poem to explain the situation. The poem said:

The strong wind blows the slow arrow, and the weak hand controls the strong bow. If you want to go up and down, you should go west and go east. Ten times, they all landed on the ground, with both hands raised in the air. If I ask who did this, it should be Song Gong. Sarcasm poems were very popular at that time, although Ouyang Xun made fun of Xiao Yu, in fact he was the biggest enemy.Because Ouyang Xun is extremely ugly, everyone loves to make fun of his appearance.More than ten years ago, Changsun Wuji once wrote a poem to joke about him: Shrug your shoulders into a mountain character, bury your shoulders without your head.

On the Lin Pavilion of someone's house, draw this macaque. Although Ouyang Xun's appearance is a bit off-putting to the audience and a bit beyond human imagination, but his heart is very worthy of his job, he is an upright person.Changsun Wuji said: "Student Ouyang Xun is very thin, with high shoulders, and a wretched appearance, like a macaque." Ouyang Xun was not annoyed, and wrote poems in return.This poem is called "Xun Miao Wuji" of "Mutual Laughing with Ouyang Xun", and it is famous in history: Suotou and back are warm, and the crotch is afraid of the cold.

Just because the heart is muddy, the dough is lumpy. Changsun Wuji was a big fat man, and his belly was pregnant every day. Ouyang Xun greeted him warmly and said, "You should wear bigger clothes, otherwise your belly will be exposed.But after the last sentence, he turned around and started laughing at his face. This made Li Shimin very unhappy. Everyone is joking, what do you mean by "just because your heart is muddy"?You can attack someone's appearance, but don't attack people's heart! Of course, this situation is different from now. The current situation is that you can say that someone who is really beautiful is ugly without any scruple, and you can never say that someone who is really ugly is ugly.Different from that time, now we pay more attention to hurting people and heart, not appearance.

For example, if you have a good relationship with someone, you can say to him: "You are rubbish." But generally you can't say: "You look like Bajie, and you still want to chase him." In Li Shimin's opinion, Ouyang Xun's joke about Changsun Wuji's dirty heart is indeed a bit too much. Li Shimin was a little angry, he asked Ouyang Xun: "Aren't you afraid that the queen will know?" Only then did Ouyang Xun apologize for his actions, expressing that he had no intention of attacking Changsun Wuji's heart.Changsun Wuji was also a good person, he excused Ouyang Xun with his big belly, and the matter passed like this.

Ridicule also has a degree. By time, by atmosphere, by occasion. On the day of Empress Changsun's funeral, Ouyang Xun also attended as required.Among the civil servants, Xu Jingzong didn't have the heart to mourn the queen. He had nothing to do in his free time, either thinking about this person or analyzing that matter.I was really bored, so I looked down at the ants moving, and was very annoyed when I found that there were no ants in the cold weather of November.Xu Jingzong was terribly annoyed by the long days and no intention of mourning. Suddenly, he thought of a person. In order to pass the boring time, he decided to watch Ouyang Xun! This suggestion in his heart made Xu Jingzong laugh from the bottom of his heart. On this extremely solemn occasion, Xu Jingzong glanced at Ouyang Xun. Yes, he saw it, the one who couldn't forget once he saw it.Xu Jingzong suddenly laughed heartily, laughing inhumanely.When he reacted, he realized that everyone else was staring at him.Xu Jingzong suddenly felt a tingling sensation in his scalp, this time he played too much, wait to be dealt with.The censor impeached Xu Jingzong for laughing at the queen's funeral, and Xu Jingzong was relegated to Hongzhou Dudu Mansion as Sima. But Xu Jingzong is Xu Jingzong, relying on his background as an eighteenth degree scholar in Qin Wangfu and his own talents, he quickly climbed back to Chang'an. This time he went out with the army, he was Cen Wenwen's deputy.He didn't do his best when it was time to work, but now that Cen Wenwen was exhausted, he successfully took over Cen Wenwen's job. Xu Jingzong originally had a happy family, but Yu Wenhuaji was responsible for killing his father, Xu Shanxin, so that he could not be filial. But Xu Jingzong has his own way, because everyone who was present at that time can testify that this guy kowtowed to Yu Wenhuaji when Yu Wenhuaji killed his father.If you are touched, it means that you really flattered him.He kowtowed not to beg Yu Wenhuaji to spare his father's life, but to beg others to spare his own life.Therefore, anyone who has experienced this incident will understand that Xu Jingzong is actually a slut through and through. Feng Deyi commented on this matter: "Shiji was punished, Shinan prostrated himself and begged for his replacement; when kindness died, Jingzong danced to survive." Therefore, the fateful Feng Deyi offended Xu Jingzong. Li Shimin saw that Xu Jingzong was talented, so he sent him to compile history books. Xu Jingzong got the order and began to use his remaining heat to write Feng Deyi as a picky talent, which is unsightly.What's even more irritating is that, in order to keep his official title, he even got close to the big fish Yuchi Jingde.It is true that Feng Deyi's yin and yang hold both ends, but some things are not as bad as described in the history books.As for Yuchi Jingde, it was also difficult for people to understand what kind of mistake he made that made Li Shimin so disappointed in him. There are no more detailed records in the history books. But Xu Jingzong was destined to be unwilling to be lonely. His son married Yuchi Baolin's daughter, and he took a lot of bribes.When writing a biography for Yuchi Jingde, he only said that Da Laohei was good, and almost all the sins were omitted.In order to commend the eldest grandson Wuji, Li Shimin once wrote a poem "Fu of the Phoenix" and bestowed it on the eldest grandson Wuji, and Xu Jingzong also secretly changed it to Yuchi Jingde. Now, relying on his outstanding ability to inherit Cen Wenwen's position, what good things can he do? The car driver continued to advance, and the Xuantu City surrounded by Li Ji and the new city surrounded by Li Daozong still refused to fight. The two armies did not fight with them, and both set out to join forces in the deeper city of Gaimu (Fushun, Liaoning). After the two armies joined forces, they showed extremely strong combat effectiveness.Relying on continuous combat effectiveness, within seven days, they successfully breached the city, captured more than 20,000 people, and obtained more than 100,000 shi of food.But soon, a problem that had to be faced made Li Ji and Li Daozong entangled. The first question is, is it better to garrison in Gaimu City and wait for the follow-up army to arrive, or to lead the vanguard to continue fighting? The second question is, even if you don't move forward, but only stay in Gaimu City, if the vanguard army is blocked by Gai Suwen's reinforcements and encounters enemies, how can you be relieved? Li Ji chose the latter. The army continued to move forward, heading for another, more fortified city.Back then, Yang Guang's million-strong army was defeated in this city.This city, named Liaodong City (Liaoyang City, Liaoning Province), has extremely strong defenses and is difficult to break.When the vanguard arrived here, they could only hang out with them, waiting for the arrival of the army behind the car, which seemed to be indefinitely far away. Liaodong City is not the city with the most abnormal defense. To Zhang Liang, Liaodong City is really trivial.When the vanguard of the Pyongyang Road and Sea Route Army crossed the vast ocean and arrived at Beisha City, Zhang Liang was so excited that he cried. What a perverted city this is! Beisha City, surrounded by mountains and rivers, the city is very strange, and the location of the city wall is also speechless.As you can see, almost all the city walls have a characteristic, that is, they are located on the cliff.What's more characteristic is that the cliff is so high, there are no plants, only waves beating, and it is impossible to go up without a helicopter, unless you become a birdman.For a mountain city near the sea like Beisha City, all the instruments in the Tang Army failed. What a ten-meter-long ladder, a thirty-meter bird's nest, and a two-hundred-meter crossbow are all piles of rotten wood. Zhang Liang's heart suddenly turned cold. Bisha City, where is your weakness? Zhang Liang is a person who is good at discovering. A seemingly flawless defense actually has a fatal weakness! However, the steep cliff told Zhang Liang that the biggest shortcoming of Beisha City is that it is too perfect and not modest enough.The foam from the waves made Zhang Liang a little frustrated. He boarded the shore where he could dock and looked at the towering Beisha City from afar.Beisha City, on Dahei Mountain in Jinzhou District, Dalian City today, stretches for ten miles with cliffs and stone wall villages. The city is steep and magnificent.Beisha city is a canyon where guards can be set up. As for the outside of the city where Zhang Liang is staying, it is too unreasonable. To put it simply, for Beisha City, Zhang Liang can only be obsessed with it, and can't get close to it. Suddenly, Zhang Liang discovered a big flaw. He was very excited to find that there was a slope lying outside Beisha City, and its end point turned out to be the gate of Beisha City!This was deliberately reserved by the defenders of Beisha City to attack the enemy.It is precisely because of this that this slope, which is dominated by going down and attacking, has become the only gap in Beisha City.A person's beauty is usually an advantage when applying for a job, but it is a disadvantage that can kill people when they are robbed. Even so, the attack on Beisha City cannot be taken lightly. That night, Zhang Liang ordered Cheng Mingzhen to lead a surprise attack.After a hard fight, Wang Dadu, the deputy general manager, took the lead to go to the city. After fighting for several days, he finally captured Beisha City.The significance of this battle is by no means ordinary. The 8,000 captives were forgotten first. Just successfully opening the entrance for the Tang Dynasty sea army can be called a first-class achievement.After occupying Beisha City, Zhang Liang sent a general to be the first general manager, and went straight to the Yalu River by sea. The chief of the Yalu River march was named Qiu Xiaozhong, the son of Qiu He. Qiu Xiaozhong had a very important task to go from the sea to the Yalu River.He didn't come to attack the city, nor did he come to wave the flag, he came to attract the attention of the enemy.You know, if Gai Suwen wanted to send troops from Pyongyang to aid the north, he would definitely cross the upper reaches of the Yalu River.Qiu Xiaozhong beat gongs and drums in a very high-profile manner, and the gates of the city near the Yalu River were closed tightly. He hoped to hold off Gai Suwen's reinforcements by this. In Liaodong City, Li Ji had been fighting for many days, but the defenders still refused to show their faces.The protracted offensive made it difficult for the defenders of Liaodong City. Twelve days later, something that made them even more discouraged finally came. While the Tang army used all kinds of siege equipment to attack the city, countless mighty soldiers and horses surrounded the canopy and rolled towards them.The army spanning hundreds of miles gathered outside the city of Liaodong with a roar of killing.The guard of Liaodong City saw that there was Li Shimin's car in the army that stretched for hundreds of miles.