Right Houwei camp.
"Commander Qi, the Chunming Gate is wide open, and the Crown Prince's honor guard is leaving the city!"
"Report! The prince is coming west under the protection of the Imperial Guards and the Six-Leader Guards of the East Palace!"
"Report! There was no movement from the Zuo Wuwei, but Gao Kan commanded the Youtun Guards to form a formation and confront the Zuo Wuwei!"
…
Battle reports came one after another. Inside the tent, Yuchi Gong was like a gleam on his back, with a layer of fine beads of sweat on his forehead. He was pacing back and forth in the tent, rubbing his hands and asking Yuwen Shiji: "The prince has indeed left the city, what should we do?" response?"
The prince actually left the city regardless of the danger, and used this extremely powerful gesture to force Li Ji to make a choice - surrender to the East Palace, or raise troops to invade Chang'an!
Yu Chigong has always been calm and capable, and has gained the trust and importance of His Majesty Li Er. However, now he is trapped at the intersection of various armies. Once the war starts, he will bear the brunt. It is really difficult to remain calm and self-possessed. Moreover, no one knows whether Li Ji will openly break with the prince. If Li Ji becomes ambitious, he will definitely be ordered to lead the right marquis guard to attack the prince's honor guard. If you obey the order, you will step into the pit of "treacherous ministers and traitors" and be unable to extricate yourself, and may be ruined; if you disobey the order, Li Ji's first military order is probably to command the army to kill him from behind... Yuchi Gong has already thought about it. Hesitant and confused, I just feel that I am in a dilemma and don't know what to do.
Yu Wenshiji sat firmly and said comfortingly: "Why should Jingde be panicked? Be calm and don't be impatient. The matter has come to this point. It's no use thinking too much. Let's wait and see what Li Ji chooses. But in my opinion, Li Ji will probably not start a war."
He said it lightly, but treating it indifferently could not affect Yuchi Gong. The army was the foundation of Yuchi Gong. How could he calm down when he was frequently being massacred by the three armies?
Yuchi Gong was extremely dissatisfied and spread his hands to complain: "If I had known today, why did I do it in the first place? If everyone in Dayun Temple was not sitting on pins and needles facing Cheng Yaojin's pressing step by step, fearing that they would be killed, why would they have summoned me to come over? As for disobeying military orders and irritating Li Ji, leading to the current crisis? Previously, you asked me to obey orders to cross the river and station here, but now you ask me to stand still and wait for the situation to change... If I wait any longer, if either side goes to war regardless, my subordinates and I will The soldiers will die without a burial place!"
He was extremely disappointed with the performance of Guanlong Clan.
Since he knew that the prince would rely on Guanlong to fight against the powerful families in Shandong and Jiangnan, how could the East Palace sit back and watch Cheng Yaojin send his troops to attack Dayun Temple? Either the Youtun Guards or the Sixth Army of the East Palace, one of them would eventually be sent to provide support in an emergency. Cheng Yaojin would not dare to act rashly, so why would he rush to recruit himself and thus challenge Li Jizhi's authority?
Now that he was following orders and fell into a dead end, with the whole army in danger of being annihilated at every turn, the gang of Guanlong bosses who were huddled in Dayun Temple on Zhongnan Mountain were helpless and could only wait for Li Jizhi's decision... They were screwed!
Yu Wenshiji was displeased by his grumbling words and frowned: "Could it be that Jingde thought that if he obeyed Li Jiyan, he would let you go, the last full force in Guanlong? No matter Li Ji, Shandong No matter, even the East Palace is included, which party do you think is willing to see your right guard with all beards and tail, and jumping around?"
Yuchi Gong choked and was speechless.
Why was Guan Long able to dominate the world back then, while even a great leader like His Majesty Li Er was timid in the early days of Zhenguan? It's because Guan Long controls the most elite army in Guanzhong. More than half of the sixteen guards are under the control of the Guanlong clan. His Majesty Li Er probably has to worry about whether he will wake up in the middle of the night and Guan Long's army has killed him. Entering the palace city, there is another "Xuanwumen Incident"...
Today, His Highness the Crown Prince needs powerful families from Shandong and Jiangnan to fill the power position vacated by Guanlong, but why is he so wary of the Shandong aristocratic families? Because Li Ji, who had hundreds of thousands of troops in his hands, had deep entanglements with the Shandong family, if he was not careful, he would lose imperial power and become a puppet emperor.
Since the prince wants to use Guan Long as a sword to fight against the powerful families in Shandong and Jiangnan, how can he allow Guan Long to still control an army of sixteen guards?
Therefore, the current situation of Yuchi Gong and his subordinate Youhou Wei is really embarrassing...
"Report!"
The soldiers rushed in from outside the tent and shouted loudly: "Commander, the British Lord has ordered the army to march towards Chang'an, saying that he will join the prince... At the same time, he ordered the commander to be the vanguard of the entire army and break camp immediately!"
"Mom!"
Yuchi Gong's expression suddenly changed, he stamped his feet and said, "Li Ji is really crazy!"
At this time, the army broke out of camp and advanced towards Chang'an. How could it be possible that it would meet up with the prince? Since His Majesty has passed away, his coffin must be in the army. If Li Ji has no intention of starting a war, he must station his troops by the Ba River and wait for the prince to go and receive his majesty's coffin. There is no way to move his majesty's coffin to cater to the prince.
Now that Li Ji's army has set off, the only choice is to start a war.
At this time, the purpose of letting himself lead the Youhou Guards as the vanguard is self-evident. He can only use the Right Guards to kill the elites of the Sixth Army in the East Palace, and then Li Ji will lead the army to cover up and kill them from behind, and it will be decided in one go...
He looked at Yuwen Shiji in panic and asked anxiously: "What can we do?"
Yu Wenshiji also felt guilty. He expected that Li Ji would not dare to abandon his reputation and sit down to attack Chang'an. After all, Li Ji now has hundreds of thousands of troops and is the leader of the prime ministers. He is already inferior to one person and superior to ten thousand people. , even if the prince is deposed and a new crown prince is established, he will only gain a little more power, but these small differences are almost insignificant compared with the chaos in Chang'an and the destruction of the capital...
But now that Li Ji's military order has been issued, it has been proved that his mind is bigger than the sky, which completely annihilated Yu Wenshi and the last trace of luck in his heart.
He stroked his beard nervously, thought for a while, and said in a deep voice: "Follow the order, but the speed of gathering the troops should be slower. Wait until the prince arrives in front of the formation to see how Li Ji does it, and then make a decision. "
Yuchi Gong was completely speechless. Wouldn't this force him more and more into a situation where he is in opposition to all parties?
At that time, the prince believed that he was the enemy of the East Palace, and Li Ji also believed that he was disobedient and disobedient... Attacked from both sides, there were no human beings inside and outside, how could there be a way to survive?
Seeing his expression, Yu Wenshi said slowly: "Don't worry, how can I harm you? Now we are in a situation where we are surrounded by enemies on all sides. No matter what we choose, it actually has nothing to do with the overall situation. Why not just stop quietly and express ourselves to all parties? The 'innocent' nature may still be able to be changed. Besides, I still don't believe that Li Ji really risked the world's disapproval to do such a rebellious act when the prince's position was already stable."
There was another sentence he didn't say: Unless Li Ji really had His Majesty's edict on deposing...
But he didn't feel that this edict existed.
This was the result he inferred from Changsun Wuji's performance. Rumors about the "edict" had been rampant before, and almost everyone believed that the reason why Li Ji made all kinds of unreasonable actions was because he had His Majesty's "edict" in his hand. Moreover, there is an order related to "easy storage" in the "edict", and Yu Wenshiji also believed this.
But Changsun Wuji had always turned a cold eye to this, which made Yu Wenshiji suddenly understand the most important point: since Changsun Wuji dared to sneak back to Chang'an from the Liaodong Army and preside over the mutiny, he must have confirmed that His Majesty Li Er was driving The collapse, and since he can confirm this, it is extremely likely that the whole thing was the work of Changsun Wuji...
With Changsun Wuji's profoundness and caution, how could he give His Majesty Li Er time to leave a testament if he dared to commit such a treasonous act against His Majesty Li Er?
Once His Majesty Li Er leaves a posthumous edict, it will definitely not be about the so-called easy storage, but an order for the troops of King Qin from all over the world to come to Beijing and cut into pieces the corpse of Changsun Wuji, the ruthless and rebellious minister who killed the king...
There is probably no so-called "edict".
Since there is no such "edict", everything Li Ji did was his own initiative, so it is unlikely that he would risk the reputation of being a "rebellious minister" and storm Chang'an City under such circumstances, bringing the Tang Empire to its knees. The center was riddled with holes and in pieces.
Of course, these are just his speculations without empirical support. It would be difficult to convince Yu Chigong.
However, Yuchi Gong pondered for a moment, let out a long sigh, and said dejectedly: "That's all we can do... Come here, pass the order, the troops will begin to assemble, and they will be assembled within half an hour."
"Here!"
The soldiers received the order and ran to deliver the order in a daze.
The assembly was completed in half an hour?
Chunming Gate is only about twenty miles away from Chunming Gate. The prince has already left the city and rushed here. He has arrived outside our camp gate in half an hour. What's the use of gathering at that time...
…
Behind the right Houwei and on the bank of Ba Bridge, groups of elite Eastern Expedition troops have crossed Ba Bridge one after another and slowly gathered in the open space by the river. In the breeze and drizzle, the flags were fluttering to cover the sky and the sun. These troops returned from Liaodong. The elite troops had taken enough time to rest and recuperate along the way. At this moment, their helmets were bright and their armor was bright, and they were full of energy. The formations quickly gathered by the river, majestic and murderous.
Li Ji, wearing a helmet and armor, sat astride a war horse and stood at the end of the bridge. He raised his head and looked at the majestic Chang'an City Wall in the distance. He held the horse's rein tightly in his hand and his eyes were deep and difficult to understand...
Cheng Minzhen rode from the front. He reined up his horse and stood still in front of him. He shouted loudly on the horse's back: "Commander General, after receiving the order, the right marquis guard began to assemble, but the speed is very slow. At this moment, half of the army has not been assembled. Is it right?" Do you need to send a military commander to give orders and supervise?"
Li Ji raised his hand to wipe the rain from his face, sighed softly, and said slowly: "Give the order, the army will set off immediately. It will pause after arriving at the Youhouwei camp. We will wait there for His Royal Highness to arrive."
"Here!"
Cheng Mingzhen took the order, reined in his horse, turned around, and galloped towards the front of the formation.
Zhang Liang rode his horse to accompany Li Ji. At this time, he looked back and saw a group of cavalry in black helmets still stationed on the west bank of Bashui that had not yet crossed the river.
That is a "black armor cavalry" that follows His Majesty and is inseparable...
