Chapter 1139: The Footsteps of War

Chapter 1139: The Footsteps of War (Part )
"Ding ding..." The soldiers rang the huge copper bell.

A moment later, the three gates of Jiangling Water City, east, south and north, rose one after another, and ships sailed out one after another and gathered on the vast lake outside.

After the first group had gathered, Huang He, the commander-in-chief of the left naval camp, led the warships in front and sailed south into the Yangtze River.

Inside the water city, Shen Hun, commander of the navy camp, put on a whale-skin armor with faint patterns.

Whale salamander, commonly known as "big fish", is what later generations called "whale". At this time, a slight distinction was made, the male was called "whale" and the female was called "salamander".

Shen Hun's family is rich, and she spent a lot of money to buy this whale leather armor.

Many years ago, a whale salamander was washed ashore by the waves for unknown reasons and ran aground. Someone then killed it, cut up its skin and made a lot of leather armor, wet suits and rain boots. Shen Hun asked someone to purchase a few of them for him and he always treasured them.

There are so many benefits to wearing this thing during naval combat.

It has extremely strong protective power, not much worse than iron armor, is waterproof and warm, will not sink after falling into the water, and is extremely flexible. Which naval officer would not want one?
But it is rare to come across a stranded whale shark, and you only come across one once in many years, so there is nothing you can do about it.

Well, Yang Bao also has one now, of course it was given to him by Shen Hun.

The navy has expanded very quickly in the past two years.

After taking over the three counties of Badong, Jianping and Yidu, they recruited a large number of men to make up for the losses in battle. At the same time, they carried out a reform, dividing the army into three camps, left, middle and right, with 3,000 people in each camp. The total number of ships was more than 500, mostly small warships.

The right camp is currently stationed in Shibao City - because the name Shicheng is too common, Shao Xun personally named it "Shibao".

Shibao City had a part of the land army stationed there, storing some military supplies and food, while the navy camped in the river south of the city. On weekdays, they only fought with the enemy on a small scale, but once a large army attacked, they would immediately avoid the battle and try to preserve their strength.

The Left Camp and the Central Camp were both stationed in the Jiangling Water City, which had been almost completed. Their main task was to escort food and military supplies to Badong and even Linjiang County for storage, to maintain the daily consumption of the local troops while accumulating various types of combat supplies as much as possible.

This operation was not very smooth, and so far only enough food and supplies for 30,000 soldiers to last for several months have been stockpiled.

However, this time more than 50,000 troops were mobilized in the Badong direction, which was far beyond the original plan, so this amount of stuff was not enough - of course, the time for the operation to destroy Cheng was also advanced. It was unlikely to be launched this winter because some people in the court believed that Li Xiong was in poor health and they could wait until he died before taking action.

It's no use saying all this now, the war is about to break out and no one can stop it.

After breakfast, the soldiers in the central camp rested for half an hour, and then began to load various supplies onto the ship.

Shen Hun climbed to the top of the city wall and overlooked the entire area.

On the northern river, a continuous stream of ships were heading towards the water city. They were not suitable for entering the Yangtze River, but they had no problem sailing on the inland river.

The first batch of grain sent from Xiangyang has arrived, a full 300,000 hu, which immediately filled the almost empty palace.

In addition to the ships, a large number of ox carts, horse carts, mule carts, etc. entered Jiangling. The court used almost every means to satisfy the appetite of the war beast.

Outside the north gate of Jiangling’s main city, some people were still fleeing.

Shen Hun saw it and chuckled.

There were rumors in the city that during the battle between Liang and Cheng, the State of Jin might take advantage of the situation and seize Jiangling.

The rumor is very convincing, but you know what, many people believe it because the Eastern Wu really did that in the past.

But most people can't run away. If they don't work, they won't have a meal. How can they eat if they run away? If they stay in Jiangling, they can still have work to do, get wages to buy food and support their family. If they run away, they will lose everything.

Therefore, only those who have houses and relatives in the local area are destined to leave. Today is the last wave and the number of people has been greatly reduced.

"Hurry up! Hurry up!" Du Pi, a military officer of the Jiangling Shogunate, came over. Before he could say anything, the young historians surrounding him started shouting.

Shen Hun was unhappy, but considering his own situation, he could only sigh, put on a smile, go down the city wall, and deal with the shogunate officials.

The ship was slowly filled with cargo.

When the bell rang for the second time, the ships of the navy camp left one after another and sailed into the vast swamp.

The soldiers and civilians of Jiangling all heard the deep and dull bell sound, and were all speechless.

Most people don’t care about who wins or loses—maybe only the Northerners care—they just want to finish the war quickly and not drag it out too long and ruin everyone’s livelihood.

This is a major commercial town, and there are too many people who make a living from business. If we can open up Shuzhong and lift all the commercial restrictions of Chengguo, we can support it. But I am afraid that the war will be protracted, and merchants will have to donate money to support the military, and the people will be conscripted without compensation or even wander around, which will be too difficult.

The ships left one after another, slowly and steadily, just like the battle to destroy Cheng.

******
From entering the gorge at Yiling to exiting at Badong, this is called the Three Gorges of the Yangtze River, totaling more than 500 miles, which was called 700 miles in ancient times.

The Three Gorges have many names, such as the ancient Xiling Gorge (located in Fengjie), also known as Guangxi Gorge and Kuimen. It was renamed Qutang Gorge in the Tang Dynasty and is still called this name today.

The name of Wu Gorge (located in Wushan) has never changed, but it also has other names, such as Mingyue Gorge.

Xiling Gorge (located in Yichang) was called Zigui Gorge, Guixiang Gorge, and Guangde Gorge before the Wei and Jin Dynasties. Later, it gradually took away the ancient name of Qutang Gorge (Xiling Gorge), but no one knows why.

During the Wei and Jin Dynasties, from west to east they were Kuimen (Guangxi Gorge), Wu Gorge, and Xiling Gorge.

Among the Three Gorges, Kuimen is the most dangerous and Wu Gorge is the longest. At this moment, a large army was passing through the north bank of Wu Gorge.

Leading the way in the front were more than a hundred riders, holding a large flag with seven large characters inscribed on it: "General Huang of the Right Jinwu Guard."

Obviously, these were the government troops from Taiyuan, with twelve defense units and three thousand six hundred combat soldiers.

Sima Zhanghe, the commander of the anti-bandit defense department of Longxiang Prefecture in Jingling, got off his horse and continued on foot.

As a person who once rode in the same chariot with the emperor, Zhang He's name was once known throughout the army, and many people still remember him today.

However, after he took office as Sima of the Separate Department and obtained an official position, although he had participated in battles, he only earned honors and no longer had the opportunity to rise to the top overnight like before.

Fortunately, Zhang He was open-minded, generous, and easy-going. He only felt a little regretful and seemed very satisfied to be able to become an official. After all, before this, he was just a commoner in Xiangcheng, and his ancestors had never been officials in eight lifetimes.

While marching, Zhang He turned his head and looked at the river.

The weather was good today, the river was sparkling, and countless ships filled the river, which looked quite impressive. Light and flexible boats traveled in front and behind the fleet, constantly delivering orders.

The slightly larger Mengchong is narrow and long, covered with raw cowhide, and has a bow as sharp as a knife, which can ram enemy ships - there is no doubt that this is the backbone of the Daliang Navy today.

A tall ship was sailing in the middle of the fleet. In addition to hundreds of naval officers and soldiers, it also carried more than a thousand auxiliary troops.

Flags were constantly raised on the masts, and drum sounds were heard from time to time.

The rowers shouted rhythmic slogans and the oars struck the water in unison.

Zhang He closed his eyes in fascination, as if he could breathe in the scent of fresh tung oil on the hull.

As a northern landlubber, he actually liked these ships very much, and felt that they were more majestic and mysterious than the endless cavalry.

After a moment, he opened his eyes, looked at the soldiers of the defense office who were also absorbed in their study, and scolded them with a smile: "Hurry up, hurry up! Travel day and night and rush to Chengdu to celebrate the New Year."

The crowd roared with laughter.

It would take almost the entire Chinese New Year just to walk to Chengdu, not to mention the war. But no one corrected him, this was a beautiful expectation.

"Sima, how much money can we get when we go to Chengdu?" asked a boy who was only sixteen or seventeen years old.

Zhang He glanced at him and said, "Why are you only thinking about money?"

"I spent too much money on my parents' illness, and in the end they couldn't be saved. I want to go to Chengdu to make back my money," said the young man.

Zhang He sighed, patted the boy on the shoulder, and said, "Follow me when we go into battle, don't run around."

The young man responded, and then said, "Sima, I have been practicing martial arts since I was seven years old, and I am not bad. Now I am listed in the Right Jinwu Guards, how can I be as afraid of death as this woman."

The others were amused by him.

"Go to Chengdu and grab a few pieces of yellow and fine cloth, send them to Li Gua's house, and marry him off right away." The thirty or so soldiers laughed.

"Nonsense!" Li Gua couldn't hold it in any longer and said, "My daughter won't marry this guy."

After hearing this, the young man muttered in a low voice: "I don't like your ugly fruit either."

Everyone laughed even harder until they heard the sound of horse hooves from behind, then they stopped smiling and aligned themselves slightly.

"Boom boom..." The sound of drums came from a distance.

This is not an order to advance, but an order to reorganize the ranks.

Almost at the same moment, all the marching soldiers stopped and aligned themselves.

After the team was assembled, the leader struck the small drum around his waist in response.

"Boom boom..." The drums of each team responded one after another.

A moment later, the military drum sounded again, and the troops that had been standing still began to move slowly again.

As if to compete with them, drums sounded on the river, and the warships began to adjust their positions and form battle formations.

Only on the river beach below the post road, the trackers were still singing loud track songs, hesitating with every step, and towing the deep-draft and extremely heavy grain boats forward.

Huang Biao stood on the top of Wushan Mountain and overlooked the panoramic view.

"Pass the order, don't form a formation when marching, and hurry up." After looking for a moment, he gave the order.

As soon as the words were spoken, someone repeated the order and went down the mountain to convey it.

Huang Biao walked among the grass and trees with his hands behind his back, and couldn't help asking, "Where are the people from Sanjiao Mansion?"

The four prefectures of Jingling, Sanjiao, Dongwo and Guangmu constituted the expeditionary lineup of the Right Jinwu Guard. Nine hundred people were recruited from each prefecture, and only one was left to guard the house.

Among the four prefectures, the men from Jingling Prefecture walked in the front, while the men from Sanjiao Prefecture and the baggage and auxiliary troops were at the end.

The Jiangbei post road was narrow and difficult to navigate, and it took only a few thousand people a long time to make the journey. The vanguard had already passed Wushan, but the rear team was still dozens of miles away, which made him speechless.

"We have passed Shimen Beach." Sima Benwei immediately stepped forward and answered.

Huang Biao hummed, and then asked, "Where is the Zuo Yulin Guard?"

"In Liu Bei City."

Liu Bei City is near Zigui County. It was the seat of Zigui County in the Han Dynasty and the ancient Guizi Kingdom (destroyed by the Chu State). It was built by Liu Bei and the seat of Jianping County in the Eastern Wu Dynasty.

When the Jin Dynasty attacked the Wu Dynasty, the prefect of Jianping strung an iron chain across the river here, and also made an iron spike over a meter long, which he secretly placed under the river water to block boats and ships. Therefore, it is also called "Locking Water Head".

This place is more than 40 miles east of Shimentan.

Fa Cheng's troops were really too stretched out, almost in a long snake formation, and could not be deployed at all. No wonder Liu Bei had a headache about where to set up camp. It was really difficult to find a place, especially when your army strength reaches 50,000.

"Have the Zuo Jinwu Guards moved forward?" Huang Biao looked at Sima and asked.

"They are the fastest, and they even took the risk of traveling by boat for a while. They should have reached Linjiang by now."

“Maybe—” Huang Biao said anxiously: “He has already fought with Cheng Ze.”

In front of the Right Jinwu Guard were the Right Yulin Guard, the Silver Spear Army, the Black Shadow Army, etc., tens of thousands of people gathered in a mighty force, occupying the river and mountain roads. Flags covered the mountains and fields, and the sound of drums continued for hundreds of miles.

"Let's go!" After hearing this, Huang Biao uttered only one word and went straight down the mountain, speeding up his journey.

(End of this chapter)