Chapter 732 Key Piece
Chapter 732 Key Piece
At dusk, Fang Yanzhao hurried to Li Mi's official residence. He had received a secret order from Xiao Xia, asking him to persuade Li Mi to open the north gate and retreat.
When he walked to the courtyard, he happened to meet the military doctor coming out. Fang Yanzao asked in a low voice: "How is the lord?"
The military doctor sighed, "The situation is not good. The lord may have lost hearing in his left ear."
"Ah! Is it temporary or permanent?"
The military doctor shook his head. "I don't know. Let's wait and see in three days! If he can't recover within three days, then he will be in danger."
Fang Yanzao walked into the lobby and saw Li Mi with disheveled hair and a concubine massaging the acupoints near his ears.
"My lord, can you hear me?" Fang Yanzhao walked forward and asked.
"Go ahead! I can hear you."
"My lord, I just received a letter from Zhang Tong'er, saying that they are stationed in Jiaocheng County."
Li Mi was immediately furious. "Why is he stationed in Jiaocheng County if he doesn't come to rescue me?"
"My lord, calm down. Zhang Tong'er is stationed in Jiaocheng County for a reason. He is afraid that the Sui army will besiege the city and attack the reinforcements. In fact, it is very likely to happen. My lord, according to the situation today, a fire bomb can blow up the tower, so blowing up the city gate is no problem. It is better to retreat as soon as possible. Once the city is breached, most of the brothers will not be able to escape."
Li Mi sighed, "Where can I retreat to?"
"We can go north to Yanmen County, and from Yanmen County we can take Feihu Pass to Shanggu County, and then directly pass through Zhuo County and Yuyang County to reach Beiping County."
Li Mi suddenly understood, "You mean to go to Liaodong?"
Fang Yanzhao nodded slightly. Li Mi hesitated. Going to Liaodong was his original strategy, but he had to give it up in the end because it was unrealistic. But now it seems feasible again.
Li Mi thought for a while and said, "There are two questions. First, how can we get food on the road? Second, will Luo Yi allow us to cross the border?"
Fang Yanzao smiled and said, "We have 50,000 troops in the city, plus Zhang Tong'er's 30,000 troops, that's 80,000. The lord collected 100,000 donkeys to transport food before, and now they are just in time to use them. Each soldier is equipped with a donkey, which is just right for carrying food, and then we can replenish it in Yanmen County. As for Luo Yi, we have 80,000 troops, as long as we don't occupy Youzhou, he will remain silent."
"Let me think about it!"
As soon as Li Mi finished speaking, a crisp sound of "pop" suddenly came from the sky. Fang Yanzao and Li Mi were surprised and walked out of the hall. They saw that the sky was full of paper pieces, as if covering the entire Taiyuan city.
At this time, a piece of paper fell in front of Li Mi. Li Mi grabbed it and opened it to take a closer look. It was a printed leaflet, "A Letter to the Wagang Soldiers".
'In the fourth year of Renshou, I was appointed as the governor of Liangzhou, in charge of Liangjun, Dongjun and Xingyangjun. The soldiers should still remember that I treated the people well. Most of you were my subjects. Now the autumn harvest is approaching, and your parents, wives and children are looking forward to your return home. I promise that as long as you lay down your weapons, I will treat you as civilians and send money and food to you to go home. But if you insist on resisting me, you will all be killed without mercy. Don't blame me for not warning you.
Jin Wang Yang Xia, July of the 13th year of Daye.
Li Mi was horrified by what he saw. His army was recruited in large numbers when grain was released to Luokou Granary. Most of them were from Liang County, Dong County and Xingyang County. This leaflet from the King of Jin would completely undermine the morale of his army!
At this moment, Li Mi finally made up his mind. He shouted, "Pass on my order. The army will assemble on Jinyangmen Street immediately!"
Li Mi said to Fang Yanzao again: "I'll leave the logistics arrangements to the military advisor!"
Jinyangmen Street is the north-south axis of Taiyuan City. Fifty thousand troops began to gather on Jinyang Street, and 100,000 donkeys and mules were also brought out. These were collected by Li Mi from all over Hedong for grain transportation. Hedong is rich in donkeys and mules, so it is not difficult to collect them. Fang Yanzao immediately made arrangements, each donkey or mule was to carry two stones of grain and a load of hay, and 5,000 soldiers were assigned to be responsible for it, and the donkey and mule team followed the army.
In the cover of night, the army opened the north gate and quietly left the city.
The reason why Xiao Xia only stationed troops in the South City was to leave three city gates for the Wagang Army to retreat. Since he deployed Fang Yanzao, the key chess piece, he wanted him to play a role at the critical moment. Of course, Xiao Xia also made some cooperation. He sent people to pretend to be Zhang Tong'er's subordinates and delivered a piece of false information from Zhang Tong'er, indicating that Zhang Tong'er was still waiting in Jiaocheng County.
As long as there was no large-scale street fighting in Taiyuan and it was not destroyed, Hedong would be basically taken over intact. Except for Hedong City where the Wagang Army and the Tang Wang Army fought fiercely and thousands of civilians died, which was indeed heavy casualties, the other fierce battles were almost all carried out in the wild and no civilians were harmed.
Xiao Xia sent out a large number of scouts, so as soon as Li Mi's army left the city, they were immediately discovered by the scouts and rushed back to report to Xiao Xia.
Xiao Xia was overjoyed and immediately ordered the cancellation of the plan to blow up the city gate. He then made a deployment and sent out 30,000 cavalry to intercept the enemy 80 miles away. He personally led 50,000 troops to chase after them. At the same time, he ordered Sima Zhang Zhenzhou to lead 10,000 troops to station in Taiyuan City.
In the cover of night, 50,000 troops marched rapidly northward along the official road along the Fen River. Behind the army followed 100,000 mules and donkeys, driven by 5,000 soldiers.
The mules and donkeys were carrying too heavy a load and had difficulty walking, so they were not very fast and gradually fell a mile behind the main force.
At this moment, Fang Yanzhao, the military advisor in charge of logistics, sent someone to deliver an order, ordering the mules and donkeys to rest for two quarters of an hour.
The general in charge of logistics was named Zhang Kuangyuan, who was Fang Yanzao's subordinate. He looked at Fang Yanzao's order and immediately waved his hand and shouted, "The military advisor has ordered that the mules and donkeys rest where they are for 25 minutes!"
They were already one mile behind, and this rest made the mules and donkeys fall even further behind.
One general worriedly said, "If we rest for 25 minutes, we may fall behind the army by 10 miles. It's easy for something to go wrong!"
Zhang Kuangyuan glared at the general fiercely, "This is the order of Military Advisor Fang, and the Military Advisor has his own arrangements!"
The general didn't dare to say a word. At this time, in the dark night, a cavalry of ten thousand people was approaching the mule and donkey team silently from several miles away.
More than a dozen boats appeared on the river, sailing slowly on the Fen River.
At this time, a soldier approached Fang Yanzao and whispered, "Mr. Fang, please come aboard with me!"
Fang Yanzao was overjoyed, as it turned out that the boat was here to pick him up. He used the excuse of going to check on the mules and donkeys, left the team and ran quickly backwards, and soon disappeared without a sound.
In the dark night, no one noticed Fang Yanzhao's disappearance. The army lowered their heads and hurried on their way, only wanting to get further away from Taiyuan.
The army marched more than fifty miles in one breath, and it was already five o'clock in the morning. Li Mi ordered the soldiers to rest on the spot. Seeing that the mule and donkey team could not keep up with the team, he hurriedly sent people to urge them.
Unexpectedly, no matter how they waited, the mule and donkey caravan did not arrive, and the soldiers sent to urge them were nowhere to be seen. Li Mi felt something was wrong, as he had asked his military advisor Fang Yanzhao to be in charge of logistics.
"Where is Military Advisor Fang? Ask him to come see me?"
Soon, the soldiers brought up several of Fang Yanzao's followers. The followers clasped their fists and said, "Military Advisor Fang went to the back to check on the mules and donkeys. He never came back. We don't know what happened."
Li Mi's eyes widened. Could it be that his mule and donkey team was caught up and intercepted by the Sui army? That was 100,000 dan of grain! Without grain, how could he go to Liaodong?
The sky gradually brightened, but there was still no news from the mule and donkey team. The army began to get confused. The soldiers retreated very hastily, and Fang Yanzao did not distribute dry food to the soldiers. The soldiers were hungry, but they didn't even have breakfast.
(End of this chapter)