Li Gang is not a qualified military strategist... A military strategist who always loses battles must fail! And he is not an excellent bureaucrat, because he has been an important minister for so many years, but he still has not seen through the nature of the emperor in front of him.
Zhao Huan would have escaped... As long as he could really make the decision instead of being "kidnapped" by a group of unqualified military strategists and confused bureaucrats, with his ability to escape, no one would be able to catch him. Even if Yue Fei comes out to arrest him personally!
Just as Li Gang led the "Great Song Cai Cavalry" numbering less than two thousand, they evacuated the battlefield in an orderly manner before the Northern Army landed on the beach of the Yangtze River in Tongling. In Guazhou Town, several hundred miles away, Zhao Huan had also boarded an imperial boat and was preparing to cross the river to consolidate the Yangtze River defense line.
At this time, the "slow-moving" Yue Fei had just led his troops into Jiangdu City and was busy calming people's hearts and rebuilding social order.
Because Zhao Huan escaped too quickly, the wealthy merchants and celebrities in Jiangdu City were not prepared at all. Not only did they not have time to organize the people to welcome the king's master, but even the order in the city was disrupted after Zhao Huan escaped. The city of Jiangdu is originally a "salt city", and if there is official salt, there will be private salt. If there is private salt, there will be salt gangs. Where there are salt gangs, there will be gang wars and promiscuous gang thugs... As a result, the government As soon as they ran away, the wealthy merchants and gentry in Jiangdu City were not prepared. These gangs of monsters and monsters jumped out to smash, loot, and burn, causing chaos in Jiangdu City.
In fact, this kind of thing often happened in the past wars with gold thieves and the puppet Song Dynasty, and the generals of the Red Turban Army of the Northern Song Dynasty did not care much.
But this time Zhao Kai asked to "take all of the southeast"... It would be best to collect the money like Zhao Huan immediately after "taking all"!
In order to collect money better and faster, a major salt industry town, a weaving center and the second largest city in the southeast like Jiangdu must not cause chaos.
Therefore, after entering Jiangdu City, Yue Fei temporarily ignored Zhao Huan who was running away, but was busy regulating order in Jiangdu City. At the same time, he also allocated a large number of troops to advance north and east of Jiangdu to capture Gaoyou, Baoying, Chuzhou, Yancheng, Taizhou, Rugao and other cities. Although these cities on Huaidong Road cannot be compared with the cities south of the Yangtze River, compared with the cities in the north that have experienced war, all of them are extremely wealthy...
Although Yue Fei was busy "taking over" the extremely rich city, he could not take care of Zhao Huan for the time being who ran to the impregnable Guazhou Castle.
But Zhao Huan still felt that it was really unsafe to stay in Jiangbei, so after staying in Guazhou for two days, he was ready to cross the river to... Mingzhou!
"Ming...Mingzhou? Officials, the Zhenjiang city on the south bank of the Yangtze River was rebuilt during the Jingkang period. It is very strong. Last year, a triangular fortress was built, which is enough to resist the big tube. It is better to move the line to Zhenjiang first. , then rely on the Yangtze River and the strong city to ensure that the three Wu forces are not lost."
"The officials and ministers also think that they cannot withdraw to Mingzhou... The Northern Army has not yet crossed the river, and Jinling Mansion is also in my hands. Even if the officials think that Zhenjiang is too small, they can still return to Jinling!"
"Yes, Mingzhou is not on the bank of the Yangtze River at all. Even if you sit in Mingzhou, you can't reach the Yangtze River!"
"Guan, now that the Northern Army has just captured Jiangdu, you are going to Mingzhou. If the Northern Army really crosses the river, wouldn't you be going to Guangzhou?"
There were some experts among the accompanying ministers who could see through Zhao Huan's thoughts at a glance!
Zhao Huan glanced at the man, and it turned out to be Xue Bi, the left deputy commander of the Privy Council. He actually nodded and said: "What Xue Qing said is very good... I am planning to tour the south of Guangdong and Guangxi! The King of Jinling recently reported that Vietnam, Chenla, Champa, Dali, Sri Lanka, Cholu, Dashi, Bagan and other eight countries are forming an alliance, and they want to join the Northern Expedition to the Central Plains to carve up our country in the Song Dynasty. Therefore, Guangzhou is already the gate of the country, and I should, with the dignity of the emperor, stick to the gate of the country and resist the eight-nation alliance!"
The current situation of the Song Dynasty is really precarious!
There is the Great Jin in the north, the Western Tang is rising in the Western Regions in the west, there are traitors in the east who have founded Kyushu, and in the south there is an alliance of eight countries that wants to carve up the Song Dynasty... And there are still brotherly disputes within the Song Dynasty!
It seems that the Song Dynasty may be over!
At this time, the ministers on the imperial boat were speechless, because the "Eight-Nation Alliance" really existed! Not only did Zhao Chen, King of Jinling, play it, but Zhao Shu and Zhao Buqiu also played it.
Since Zhao Shu and Zhao Buqiu captured the Dazhan Haikou of Champa Kingdom and defeated the "hundred-thousand-thousand-strong army" of Danang Kingdom (Vietnam's official country name at the time), Danan, Champa, Chenla, and Srivijaya were The four countries panicked, fearing that the Song Dynasty would further develop and grow in Nanyang. So the four countries began to unite for warmth and formed an anti-Song alliance.
But after the four countries formed an alliance, they still felt that their strength was a bit insufficient, so they roped in Dali and Bagan, the two powerful countries on the southern land, and also found the Western overlord Tianzhu Zhuluo Kingdom and the maritime trade power Dashi Country to join them, and they made it together. An eight-nation alliance.
With the Eight-Nation Alliance as the backing, Emperor Li Yanghuan of Southern China was of course full of confidence, clamoring to gather "the heavenly soldiers of the Eight Kingdoms, the Northern Expedition of Wu thieves, drink horses from the Yangtze River, and punish Luoyang." Not only Zhao Huan must be destroyed, but Zhao Kai, who has never provoked him, must also be destroyed...
Seeing that the people below were speechless, Zhao Huan immediately showed his decisive strength and issued an edict loudly: "Pass my decree, the whole army boarded the ship and set off...cross the Yangtze River first, then enter the canal, and go south Mingzhou!"
There are two water routes that can be taken from Guazhou south to Mingzhou. One is along the Yangtze River all the way east, and then takes the sea route after exiting the Yangtze River estuary.
The other is to cross the river and then take the South Canal, passing through Zhenjiang, Changzhou, Pingjiang, Xiuzhou, Hangzhou, Yuezhou, and finally arriving in Mingzhou.
It is of course faster to take the sea route from the Yangtze River Estuary to Mingzhou, but the risk of taking the sea route is higher, and not just any ship can go to sea, and the transportation volume is definitely not as good as taking the canal.
Moreover, Zhenjiang, Changzhou, Pingjiang, Xiuzhou, Hangzhou, and Yuezhou passed along the South Canal are all good places to get rich.
In order to maintain the order of the running team, of course Zhao Huan would not order the looting, but of course he would not let go of the official treasuries of the states and counties along the way... There were millions of dollars in these official treasuries.
Of course, Zhao Huan would not run away with the copper coins (he would bring a lot of copper coins with him), but would exchange them all for silk, porcelain, tea, ironware and other materials. These things are not very expensive in the southeast, but they are very valuable in Guangdong, Guangdong and Nanyang.
Of course, the speed of running like this is relatively slow, and it is a "jogging", but "stupid birds fly first and enter the forest early, and jogging first arrives early." If you run early, you can still escape the pursuit of Zhao Kai, Yue Fei and others.
...
When Zhao Huan started to "jog", Zhang Suo, who was running quickly, had already led more than 10,000 defeated troops back to Jinling City!
There were 50,000 troops when we sent out the troops, but when we came back, there were only more than 13,000 left... Of course, it was not the 37,000 that were lost by Zhao Kai. In fact, the Battle of Tongling was not really fought at all. After less than a quarter of an hour of shelling, Li Gang and Zhang Suo began to organize a retreat. By the time Li Shifu commanded the troops to land across the river, the two of them had already led the troops on the road to retreat.
However, because Li Gang and Zhang Suo had divided their troops on the way to Tongling, it was not easy to collect troops. In addition, it was inevitable that there would be stragglers and deserters when running away, so those who followed Zhang Suo to Jinling were There are only more than 13,000 people left.
In addition, there were thousands of people who were cautiously setting up defenses on the banks of the Yangtze River outside Jinling City. Li Gang also led one or two thousand cavalry behind to collect the stragglers and the troops who had been withdrawn from various strongholds along the river. It can be collected to more than 10,000.
In other words, this was a random dispatch of troops, without a proper fight, and only a small number of 20,000 people were scattered... This level of troops is really unparalleled!
However... Jinling citizens are still emotionally stable!
The markets in the old and new cities of Jinling are still prosperous, with prices remaining stable and no panic buying happening.
A little different from when Li Gang and Zhang Suo left, the militia in Jinling City have been mobilized. From time to time, groups of strong men wearing paper armor and carrying spears and crossbows can be seen patrolling inside and outside the city. .
Jinling New City, Jinling Old City, Mufu Mountain City, Zhongshan Fortress and other places have also been fortified.
It seems that Jinling City can really hold up for a while... But is the empress in the palace really determined to resist?
Zhang Suo, who felt a little relieved but full of suspicion at the same time, brought his troops back to the military camp and immediately went to the palace to see Zhu Lian.
When he arrived at Kunning Palace, Zhang Bangchang and several princes and clan ministers who stayed in Jinling had already received the news and arrived first.
"Your Majesty, I and Privy Li met Tiance in Tongling... They met the official army and were defeated!"
Zhang Suo reported to Zhu Lian with tears in his eyes and a guilty look on his face.
Zhu Lian was surprised and said: "You met the official army and you managed to run back... It's not easy!"
"This lady doesn't know something..." Zhang Suo blushed, "During the battle that day, the two armies faced each other across the Yangtze River. The government officials used some tricks to launch explosive pots from large tubes. As soon as we reached the Yangtze River, we were blown up and turned upside down. Li Yuanshu made a decisive decision and ordered the entire army to retreat and personally went to the rear... In addition to the more than 10,000 people I brought back, he should be able to bring back a lot of people."
"That's not bad..." Zhu Lian nodded, "So what are Zhang Qing's plans? Do you want to submit to the official family in Jinling City, or do you want to submit to the official family in Pingjiang Mansion?"
Zhang Suo frowned. Apart from surrendering, is there no other way out for me? Moreover, I led the troops to fight against the officials in Tongling. Now that I have surrendered, will I be settled by the Queen of Autumn?
"Empress, minister, minister..."
Seeing him hesitating, Zhu Lian smiled and said, "Zhang Qing, don't worry...as long as you make some merit, you can make up for the fault of the Battle of Tongling."
Merit? Zhang Suo's frown deepened, "My dear, Li Yuanshu hopes that we can close the gate of Jinling City and arrive at the official residence for a while, so that King Wu can run farther away."
