Chapter 49 The fourth quarter, the lonely city is full of vertical and horizontal

Tian Dan tasted the hardships of fighting for the first time. One battle outside the city, four battles to defend the city, and five fierce battles before and after, the population of Jimo dropped by half, from more than 200,000 to just over 100,000!It used to be overcrowded, and there were dense tents everywhere in the alleys.After several wars, all these open-air tent camps disappeared. With the bleak autumn wind, all the people moved into houses filled with bloody smell, and Jimo City returned to the spaciousness and emptiness of the past.The original tens of thousands of infantry were the main force to defend the city, but in the four major wars, most of them were lost, leaving only more than 6,000 wounded soldiers.All the men under the age of sixty in the city are all in the army, and there are only about 50,000.Of the common people in Jimo City, there are actually only a few thousand old people and tens of thousands of women and children left.The population of Tian Dan's own tribe has also dropped sharply from more than 3,000 people who just entered the city to 700 or 800 people.

When the battle comes together, the whole city is boiling. Although it is extremely tragic, it is also simple and happy without thinking about it.As soon as the war is over, thousands of troubles will come together, which is more difficult than fighting.Just how to dispose of the numerous corpses piled up in the city and scattered in the streets and alleys has become the number one problem in Jimo.Although the sea breeze is getting colder, these tens of thousands of corpses emit a stench that permeates the whole city every day. If the plague is not buried early and the plague spreads, it will really be a catastrophe!

Looking at the sunset from the top of the city, Tian Dan was helpless.Little Jimo, even if he dug three feet into the ground, how could he bury such a mountain of bones?Let's set it on fire, but where does so much firewood come from?Let’s use fierce kerosene, one accidental triggering of the whole city will burn everything, not to mention that there are only a thousand barrels of kerosene left. "Report to the general!" There were hurried and heavy footsteps behind him, and the chief of the scout battalion was already on the top of the wall out of breath, "Le Yi returned to the camp, the Yan army retreated twenty miles!" "Twenty miles back?" Tian Dan Can't help being surprised, "Do you know the reason?"

"Qin Kai and Qi Jie are in conflict with each other, the details are not yet known." Tian Dan was thinking about it, but saw a fast horse flying towards the twilight, he rushed to the outside of the west gate and shouted loudly: "General Tian Dan listened, my general has a letter-!" As soon as he landed, he saw Lai riding a bow and setting an arrow, and the scout chief shouted, "General, get out of the way!" A thick white object flew towards the eyes with the sound of the wind!Tian's single hand was sharp, and he caught it in the air.When he looked closely, he saw that the arrow shaft was wrapped in a piece of white cloth, but a bamboo tube was tied to the arrow shaft.

"General, be careful, there are words on the white cloth!" The scout chief exclaimed. "Don't be impatient, how can Le Yi use such means?" Tian Dan smiled lightly, and unfolded the white cloth, and two rows of large characters suddenly flooded into his eyes - the accumulation of blood corpses, the danger of plague!Our army retreats for three days, and the general can bury the corpse. Tian Dan was pleasantly surprised, and shouted loudly: "Thank you, General! Fight again in three days!" The cavalry under the city disappeared like lightning with a sound of "Hi!"

Tian Dan immediately ordered: all the soldiers and civilians in the city should be mobilized immediately to dispose of the corpses in four ways—three thousand sergeants placed winches and rope ladders at the top of the city, and lowered the corpses directly outside the city; two thousand soldiers searched for the scattered corpses in the city and carried them out of the city; 20,000 soldiers went out of the city to dig a deep pit three miles away, and 20,000 soldiers carried it and buried it.In the deep twilight, thousands of torches were lit on the top of Jimo City and the fields, and the unprecedented mass burial began.The people of Qi have always paid great attention to funeral rites, but when the country is ruined and their families are in ruins, they want to stuff their relatives into big pits one by one.As soon as the gate of the city was opened, the miserable cry permeated the wilderness where the autumn wind was bleak.Dozens of winches at the top of the city were set up, and the soldiers picked up a corpse and cried out a familiar name. As the corpses were released into the city, the soldiers at the top of the city were all hoarse from crying.

The winch rope ladder was originally used by the scouts to go out of the city or to receive letters from the city when they were surrounded by the enemy. Unexpectedly, it was used to release the corpses at this extraordinary time, and even the craftsmen were very sad and wailed.After two rounds of day and night, all the corpses were buried properly.Tian Dan immediately ordered the military doctor to prepare anti-virus prescriptions, and then boiled the anti-virus herbs into boiling water to repeatedly wash away the scars left by the corpse.After two days like this, amidst the strong smell of herbs, the lonely city regained its tired calm.

Tian Dan suddenly remembered that the letter tied to the shaft of the arrow had not been opened yet.Hurriedly back to the Ximen Inner Shogunate, walked into the edict room, opened the bamboo tube and took out a roll of parchment, and saw a piece of strong handwriting: There is another page of parchment, which is the five decrees issued by Le Yi in Linzi.Tian Dan has always been careful and quiet, after pondering these five decrees carefully, he was silent for a long time.He believed in Le Yi's sincerity, and also admired Le Yi's strategy of benevolent government in Qixi.In any case, Le Yi never killed the Qi people in the same way that the Qi army entered Yan back then. A large army that came for revenge can be so restrained.

However, regarding Le Yi's persuasion to surrender, Tian Dan was really hard to make a decision. Having been a business traveler for a long time, traveling all over the world, Tian Dan's loyalty to Qiguo will never fall into pedantic and foolish loyalty.When the Qi State was not destroyed, he fully supported Lu Zhonglian's multi-party mediation to save the Qi State, and the price he paid was far beyond what an ordinary businessman who was far away from the court could bear.In theory, Qi Wang Tiandi is indeed the king of subjugation. After seventeen years in power, Qi's government and the people have been corrupted, and his wanton rampage is really a fire.With such a state, such a royal family, and such a court situation, it is unreasonable for it to be immortal.In fact, on the day he escaped from Linzi, he had already buried Qi in his heart.At that time, the only thought was to escape from Jimo to the island, and then flee to Wuyue to be a business traveler.Unfortunately, all kinds of dangers happened, he became a general of the Jimo People's Army, and he fought alone in the city for half a year.Thinking of it, Tian Dan himself felt a little unbelievable.

It was the half-year bloody battle in this isolated city that gave him a new understanding of the destiny of Qi.One of the biggest changes is that the more the battle is fought, the more solid it is, and my own military talents are magically displayed. As long as there is a back-up support of food, grass and luggage, Jimo can fully support it, and then contact Jucheng with the camera, and it is not impossible to restore Qi. of!However, it is precisely the illusion of backup that poses a real threat.Whether or not to descend to Yan does not depend on the loyalty of the Jimo people to Qiguo, but on the time that the current food, grass and luggage can support.Based on the tradition of business travel, Tian Dan has already conducted a thorough check of the grain and inventory in the city, and all private grain and property are confiscated and dispatched in a unified manner.Even so, the total grain stock is only more than 20,000 hu, and it will last until next spring at most; more than half of the iron and copper materials for making and repairing weapons have been consumed, and seven or eight out of ten of the rings in the arsenal have been used up.What's more urgent is that, seeing that the weather is getting colder, all the stocks of silk cotton and ramie have been searched out, and even the cotton armor stored in the armor warehouse is not enough to make up 50,000 sets of cotton armor.Survive the winter and there will be a spring famine, and the army will be in chaos without food.

"God is dead! Jimo can do nothing?" Standing in the cold night wind for a long time, looking at the starry sky, Tian Dan couldn't help but sighed a long time.Suddenly, there was a rush of shouting and commotion at the top of the city, but it immediately subsided.The shogunate's large tent was already three or five feet below the city wall, so if there was any movement on the city, the shogunate would be able to notice it immediately.At this moment Tian Dan was outside the tent, he was startled suddenly - could it be that some soldiers escaped from the city to join the enemy?Just as he was about to send Sima of the Chinese army to investigate, he saw some ragged soldiers walking over with two men in cloth bags. "Report to the general: These two people came out of the secret passage below the city, and I captured them. They only opened their mouths when they saw the general!" !" As soon as the huge cloth bag was pulled away, Tian Dan suddenly shuddered!He strode forward and took a look. Although the moonlight was hazy, the tall and familiar face was very clear, and he couldn't help but exclaimed: "Zhonglian?!" "Brother Tian!" The tall figure stepped forward, and the two hugged each other tightly, speechless for a long time. "Quick! Go in and talk!" Tian Dan pulled Lu Zhonglian up and entered the dilapidated shogunate tent. As soon as he entered the big tent, Lu Zhonglian pulled a heroic young man who was following behind him and said: "Brother Tian, ​​let's get to know each other first. This is Zhuang Xin, and now he is the Zuo Yin of the Chu Kingdom!" "Ah, Brother Zhuang Xin!" Tian Dan suddenly cupped his hands and laughed, "A famous scholar in Jixia, but he has been admired for a long time!" Zhuang Xin bowed his hands solemnly: "Brother Tian Dan is the mainstay, he is truly a model for saving the world, and Zhuang Xin admires it!" "Come, come," Tian Dan didn't care to thank you for the entertainment, "Sit down and talk, how did the two of you get together?" Get Jimo? Serve tea! By the way, find another burner, and dry clothes!" Tian Dan suddenly noticed that the two of them were covered in mud and water stains, clearly coming in danger. "Brother Zhuang, change your clothes first, and I'll talk to Brother Tian." Lu Zhong even took off his muddy boots, and sat barefoot on the straw mat, gulping down a large bowl of herbal tea. He let out a long sigh, and then began to speak eloquently. After breaking up with Tian Dan, Lu Zhonglian stayed in Xueyi for nearly a month.It turned out that upon hearing that the Five Kingdoms had sent troops to attack Qi, Lord Mengchang suddenly fell ill with fright and anger. Once Qi's 600,000 army fell, Meng Changjun's illness became more serious.At that time, Le Yi had already sent military envoys to send documents: as long as Meng Changjun stood on the sidelines and did not encourage Qi people to rebel against Yan, the Yan army would not enter Xueyi.However, if Lord Mengchang died suddenly, the three hundred miles of Xueyi would definitely fall into the hands of the Yan army; once Xueyi was lost, the foundation of Qi people's restoration of the country would no longer exist!In desperation, Lu Zhonglian went to sea alone, and invited an old alchemist from Penglai Island.Returning to Xueyi in a hurry, Mr. Mengchang was already dying.The old alchemist was also miraculous, he insisted on adding the elixir he had refined with the "art of controlling qi" to save Mr. Mengchang from danger.Lu Zhonglian and Feng Huan immediately agreed on a strategy to preserve Xue Yi in front of Meng Changjun's bed: Xue Yi declared self-reliance, would not help Qi, and would not belong to any major country. In fact, Xue Yi would provide a secret support base for Qi's anti-Yan army and civilians.According to the plan, Lu Zhonglian took two letters written by Mr. Mengchang to the south of Chu State in the starry night.Chu State is in a panic. Although Chu Wang Mi Heng hated the humiliation suffered by King Qi Min back then, and Mi Zhao Nao Chi encouraged the refugees of Qi State to kill King Qi Min, but seeing Yan State's five-way march succeeding every step of the way, Qi State was really about to perish The king and ministers of the state of Chu panicked.Chu State, which is called "Southern Man" by the Central Plains, has always despised the old aristocratic Yan State the most. Yan State is also the oldest prince of the emperor, and has never had any contact with Chu State's Southern Man.Since the Warring States period, even in the period of Su-Qin alliance, Chu and Yan had no substantive state-to-state exchanges such as mutual marriage, mutual hostage exchange, mutual rescue, etc., and they were really strangers.The ruling and opposition parties of the two countries believed that unless the three great powers of Qi, Wei, and Zhao that lay between them were destroyed, the two countries of Chu and Yan, which were thousands of miles away, would almost always be irrelevant.Unexpectedly, the world is changing, and the Yan State unites to attack Qi, and the Qi State, which is so powerful that it is also known as the "Eastern Emperor" with Qin State, collapses in an unimaginable day!The princes and ministers of the Chu Kingdom immediately widened their eyes in astonishment.At the beginning, Chu State was unwilling to join the joint vertical attack on Qi, not because it was truly loyal to Qi State, but thought that the joint vertical attack on Qi was simply child's play!At that time, Chu State, Wei State, and Qi State joined forces to attack Qin. Which time did they not return in a big defeat?Now that a weak swallow stands out, worthy of 400,000 soldiers, can it destroy the Huanghuang Qi State with 600,000 elite soldiers? What the people of Chu thought was impossible, happened to be approaching like a thunderbolt. If the Yan State destroys Qi quickly, the most dangerous thing is the Chu State that did not join the alliance.The power of the Liaodong iron cavalry from the Yan State has already impressed the world. How can the semi-old army of the Chu State withstand these fierce Liaodong tigers and wolves?Yan State, which annexed Qi State, went south to attack Chu, which was extremely convenient.Shouying, the new capital of Chu State, is already on the south bank of the Huai River. If the Yan army marches south from Langye and Xueyi, it will take less than three to five days to attack the capital of Chu. What can we do? At this moment of panic, Lu Zhonglian arrived at Shouying. Lu Zhonglian was the first to persuade Huang Xie, Lord Chunshen, and he and Lord Chunshen jointly presented King Chu Qingxiang.The deep and taciturn king of Chu said only one sentence: "As long as Chu can be reassured, I will follow it!" Lu Zhonglian also only said one sentence: "Chu will be the backup, support Qi's army and people against Yan, and hold Yan's army from going south. The world must change again, and the state of Chu will be at peace!" "The state of Qi resists the Yan?" The King of Chu was surprised, "With more than seventy cities lost, how can the people of Qi resist the Yan?" "The king of Chu knows, but one of them." Lu Zhonglian smiled leisurely, "Although we lost more than 70 cities, there are still three places that can support us. In the east is Jimo, which has gathered more than 200,000 elite merchants from Qi; in the south There is Jucheng, where more than 300,000 common people of Qi State have gathered; to the west is Xueyi, Lord Mengchang, whose wealth foundation is still there. If Chu State lends a helping hand, the people of Qi will be able to restore the country!" The King of Chu laughed loudly: "In this way , the fate of Qi is in my hands, Great Chu?" "Lips and teeth depend on each other." Lu Zhonglian was indifferent, "The fate of Chu is also in the hands of the people of Qi. If there is no Qi people who fight against Yan with blood, today's Qi will be tomorrow's Chu." "Lu Zhonglian said Great!" The young Zuoyin Zhuangxin stood up abruptly, "Chu State has not joined the Yan State, and has been isolated in the five countries. If the Qi Nationalist Army is not rescued, the day when the Yan State swallows the Qi State, the Chu State will hang around and wait for death. Already!" The King of Chu thought for a while, and finally came up against the case: "Okay! This king follows Lu Zhonglian's policy and supports the Qi State." On that day, the King of Chu appointed Zuo Yin Zhuangxin as the special envoy to aid Qi. , Lu Zhonglian jointly planned to aid Qi.It was a matter of the survival of the Chu state, and for the first time in history, the Zhao family and other old aristocratic families did not come forward to oppose it. Tian Dan's eyes lit up: "So, you must have come by sea?" "Brother Tian is indeed on a business trip to Sun Wu." Zhuang Xin said with a smile, "There are three large sea ships, and they are on Zhifu Island. They have everything you need, and you just need a shipping plan." "Okay!" "The sky is immortal! But what can Le Yi do?" With a wave of his big hand, he said, "Sima of the Chinese Army, immediately gather 30,000 strong soldiers and all the vehicles in the city, and all of them will be on standby as business travelers." "Hi!" Sima of the Chinese army hurried out of the tent immediately. Lu Zhonglian pondered: "Brother Tian, ​​isn't the city empty when tens of thousands of people are on the road?" "It's also God's will." Tian Dan took the roll of parchment, "Le Yi is trying to persuade him to surrender, and he won't attack the city for at least three or a few days." Lu Zhonglian laughed after reading the letter: "Le Yi underestimates others Yes! I wrote back to him on behalf of Brother Tian." "Okay!" Tian Dan got up abruptly, "You reply here, and Brother Zhuang Xin and I will go." "That won't work." Lu Zhonglian also stood up, "The most important thing is to go for the first time, and you will come back to sit in the town tomorrow." At that moment, the three of them all changed into full armor, got on their horses and galloped to the east gate.The soldiers and vehicles in the city had already assembled, and Tian Dan issued an order: Cattle with cages and horse bits, oiling the axles, extinguishing the torches, and marching fast in the dark!After tidying up in a moment, the east gate slowly opened, and 30,000 horses and horses rushed out of the city gate without a sound.This 罘 is on the seashore more than a hundred miles northeast of Jimo.There is a small fortress castle by the sea—Xicheng, more than 30 miles north of Xie is the vast sea.The earth raised its head suddenly by the sea, and there was a steep hill. Zhifu Island and the steep rocks looked far away, as if they were a pair of whispering sisters.Therefore, this seaside hill was also called Zhifu Mountain.Between Zhifu Mountain and Zhifu Island is a deep bay. The private salt ships of pirate merchants have always been anchored in this hidden bay.Although Lu Zhonglian was not a business traveler, he had heard Tian Danbei describe in detail the secret seaport where the Jimo Tian family used to do salt and iron business.This time, the ship sailed north from Langya, Chu State, which was the closest to Laoshan Bay, but because Laoshan Bay is a well-known landing place for merchant ships, Lu Zhonglian insisted on taking a detour to the north to berth in Fu, although the journey was much longer, But as long as it is secret and safe, it has to be like this.For this reason, Zhuang Xin spent a lot of trouble and searched for the Yidun family, a great merchant in Chu State, to find a group of sailors who were familiar with this smuggling sea route.After half a month of rough seas, the three big ships were finally moored steadily in Lizhifu Bay.Tian Dan has been a business traveler for a long time, and he often has contacts with private goods on sea ships. Naturally, he is familiar with this place and does not need a village guide.Thirty thousand horses galloped overnight, and reached the seaside when the sun jumped out of the sea.Looking at the white masts and sails in the bay, Tian Dan was immediately refreshed, and immediately ordered: the sergeant had a two-hour rest to have a full meal, and then he moved all the supplies of the sea ship to the empty city to stock up! At dusk, the three large ships finally finished carrying all the food and other things. The ships left behind a small fast boat to pick up Lu Zhonglian and Zhuang Xin, and then quietly went south in the dark.Tian Dan immediately ordered: 3,000 elite infantry secretly garrisoned in Yucheng; 2,000 cavalry marched forward to clear the road, and immediately captured any suspicious persons; In the middle of the night of the next day, this large army of food, grass and supplies finally arrived in Jimo safely and secretly, and the unloaded food and supplies filled the three large warehouses in Jimo.The morale of the army and civilians in Jimo suddenly soared, with cold clothes on their bodies and bright armor, cheers resounded throughout the city.Just as the sun was rising, Yiqi flew out of Jimo Ximen and headed straight for the Yan Army camp.