Chapter 636 Accident

Fucheng Pass is a pass built at the entrance of a valley. This pass is neither strong nor tall. It is not as steep as Niangzi Pass. The city wall is about three miles long, more like a city. The wall is three meters high, and there is no moat or suspension bridge. Because it lives inside the East River Road, no one has the awareness of defending the enemy as a dangerous enemy. After a hundred years, it has not been renovated, making it seem very dilapidated. In the battle between the two armies, it is easy to be captured by the enemy.

Despite this, Fucheng Pass still has a great advantage, that is, it is on the verge of Qinshui. The surging Qinshui flows closely against the pass, making the open space in front of the pass very narrow, and the enemy cannot set up a battlefield. Li Siye established two lines of defense for this purpose. One is to deploy 6,000 troops on the bank of Qinshui to defend. If An Lushan's army breaks through the first line of defense, then the 6,000 people can retreat to the pass to establish a second line of defense.

It was dusk, the setting sun was as bloody as the sun was, and a dark red sunset was about to fall to the horizon. The afterglow reflected the sky and the dilapidated city walls into purple-red. Li Siye stood on the top of the city with his hands and stared at the other side of the Fen River. On the other side, Li Guiren's vanguard army had already set foot in the camp, as if it was a kind of ridicule and provocation. The Anxi Army was originally going to encircle and annihilate Li Guiren's army, but the situation turned sharply. Not only did the Anxi Army fail, but it was forced to retreat west of the Fen River, which made Li Siye extremely angry.

Nan Jiyun's analysis was not wrong. Li Siye was born with pride. From the beginning, he did not take An Lushan's army seriously. If Li Qing'an's military order had not arrived in time, he would have fought a decisive battle with Li Guiren after assembling the army, and it would have been a shame of defeat in Wei Bo Yu's tribe.

But Li Siye was not a wise and reckless person. When Wei Boyu told him that he was defeated by the Yiluohe cavalry, Li Siye began to realize that the Yan army was not as vulnerable as he imagined. As the Yan army in Taiyuan Prefecture continued to move south, Li Siye also knew that this would be a big battle. He finally suppressed the idea of ​​sending troops to fight Li Guiren's army, strictly guarded the Fucheng Pass, and waited for the arrival of reinforcements.

At this time, Wei Boyu slowly walked to Li Siye and asked in a low voice: "Are the deputy commander unwilling to accept it?"

Wei Boyu was about 36 or 7 years old. He served in the army in Anxi for many years. He was the deputy lieutenant of Modao. He participated in the Battle of Talas and had earned merits to the governor of the Jun Zhan. He has followed Li Siye for many years and became Li Siye's right-hand man with the general Tian Zhen. After Tian Zhen followed Li Qing and Andong, he became Li Siye's confidant general. He was promoted to general at the beginning of this year. Li Siye valued him very much. This time he sent troops to Hedong. Li Siye was the main general and he was the deputy general.

Seeing that Li Siye was in a heavy mood, Wei Boyu understood Li Siye's loss. This was a battle that Li Siye had been looking forward to for a long time, but in the end he was unable to command independently.

Li Siye shook his head and said in a deep voice: "There is no reluctance, but a little scared."

"I'm afraid? General, this is your chance to make a name for yourself in the world, but the general failed to get it. I feel sorry for you."

"Boyu, you're a big mistake!"

Li Siye turned his head and stared at him and said, "Do you think the general doesn't give me this opportunity? It's because you didn't see the great significance of this battle. An Lushan has regarded it as a key battle to seize Hedong, and even gave up Taiyuan. An Lushan has invested the biggest sum of money. Even if the Anxi army is strong, it will be difficult to defeat three times the enemy. If the Anxi army is defeated, it will not only lose Hedong, but also seriously affect the reputation of the general, but will also reverse the entire battle situation, causing the Northern Tang to be passive, and even more serious and affect the general's advance. I can't afford this responsibility!"

Wei Boyu lowered his head in shame, "The general is far-sighted, and the humble gaze is short-sighted."

Li Siye shook his head and smiled bitterly: "Actually, at the beginning, I was short-sighted. I always thought that Li Guiren was greedy for merit and made a breakthrough, so I wanted to cut off his retreat. Now I know that An Lushan was trying to destroy our Anxi Army from the beginning. Even the general was in Chang'an, and I was confused at first sight. There were also Li Guangbi's 70,000 reinforcements. He might not be willing to obey my command. The consequence of each formation was to be defeated one by one. Therefore, only the general was to command this battle, so we could coordinate the army and make us in an invincible position."

"What are we doing now?"

"We have to do only one thing now, guard the Ducheng Pass and wait for the general to arrive!"

Speaking of this, Li Siye pointed to Qinshui in front of him with a horse whip and smiled: "Let's go! Let's take a look at Qinshui's defense."

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The Pujin Ferry is located between Tongzhou and Puzhou in Gyeonggi Province and the Hedong Road. It is a famous ferry crossing in the middle of the Yellow River. During the Kaiyuan period, Li Longji visited Taiyuan, the northern capital several times, and crossed the river from this ferry. Tens of thousands of Yulin soldiers built a floating bridge overnight, allowing Li Longji to ride a horse across the river.

Li Qing'an led 30,000 cavalry from Chang'an to run day and night. In just two days and two nights, the 30,000 army arrived at the Pujin Ferry. At this time, Wang Sili had led 20,000 Tongguan troops to build a pontoon bridge in advance. This was to collect thousands of civilian ships, connected by iron chains, and build wooden boards between the ships.

Thirty thousand cavalry arrived at the Pujin Ferry, almost without stopping, crossing the river directly from the floating bridge. At this time, Wang Sili came to Li Qing'an, bowed and bowed, "See General!"

Li Qing'an replied with a smile: "Thank you General Wang for building the floating bridge, thank you for your hard work."

Wang Sili said sincerely: "It is a blessing for me to be able to serve the general on the expedition. If I had not been responsible for defending Tongguan, I would be willing to be a small soldier under the general and go to the expedition with the general and make unparalleled achievements!"

Li Qing'an pondered for a moment and said, "General Wang can defend Tongguan steadily, so he defends Guanzhong. Perhaps it is difficult for An Lushan to have the opportunity to attack Guanzhong, but it is possible for Southern Tang to hope that General Wang can defend the city without delay. He sends more scouts to Jingxiang to understand the movements of the Southern Tang army and take the initiative to grasp the intelligence. This is also the way to defend the city."

Wang Sili never thought that guarding Tongguan would actually send a scout to Jingxiang. Li Qing'an's suggestion seemed to open a window for him, making his thinking suddenly broaden. Defending the city is not just about defending the enemy's dynamics, it is an attack, but it is also the most wise defending the city. He couldn't help but feel excited and bowed deeply: "Remember the teachings of the general in his heart!"

"General Wang, please take care of yourself, I'll take the lead."

Li Qingan bowed his hand on the horse, turned his horse's head, and whipped the war horse hard, and the war horse rushed towards the ferry entrance.

One hour later, all 30,000 cavalry crossed the Yellow River and entered the Puzhou territory. They rested on the east bank for two hours, and the army cheered up and continued to rush towards Jinzhou hundreds of miles away.

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At the same time as Li Qing'an crossed the Yellow River, Li Huaixian's 80,000 army also arrived in Luzhou and joined Li Guiren's main force, but at this moment, something unexpected happened.

As the saying goes, every family has a difficult sutra to recite. An Lushan's Yan army is like Li Qing'an's Anxi army, and there are many hills. Shi Siming, Li Huaixian, Li Guiren, Tian Chengsi, Cai Xide, etc. are all generals who guard the same side. They are not convinced by each other. Li Huaixian has gained the most profits due to his long-term station in Youzhou. He has won 30,000 cavalry of Youzhou alone, but he has made little contributions, so other generals have always been dissatisfied with him.

If divided by faction, Li Huaixian and Tian Chengsi are one faction, belonging to the local Han general sect, while Shi Siming, Li Guiren and Cai Xide are another faction, belonging to the foreign Hu general sect. Although there was no major conflict of interest in the two factions under the reconciliation of An Lushan, there was also a clear distinction between them and the water of the well does not interfere with the river.

This time, An Lushan ordered Li Huaixian tribe and Cai Xide tribe to jointly attack Hedong. Considering that the two of them have different factions and are difficult to work together, they are even more worried that they will have conflicts, so they let their eldest son An Qingxu be the main general and the two be the deputy generals.

Although Li Huaixian's 80,000 troops arrived in Luzhou, he stationed troops in the south of Tunliu County, about forty miles away from Li Guiren's camp. Unlike Li Guiren's army's brutality, Li Huaixian's army was mostly Han army, and many were Fanyang army in the past, with a little strict military discipline. Although there were incidents of robbing people's wealth, his army did not have the crime of massacre of the city or robbing women on a large scale.

Li Huaixian also heard about the series of atrocities by Li Guiren's tribe in Luzhou, slaughtering more than 100,000 people, and the people in Luzhou were almost massacred by him. Li Huaixian was deeply dissatisfied with this. He believed that this move would destroy An Lushan's political ambition to seize the Tang Dynasty. At the same time, another incident happened, which also made him extremely angry with Li Guiren.

Li Huaixian had a fellow villager named Zhou Xun who was in the army of Li Guiren. Because he was a Han Chinese, he was excluded by the Hu people. In addition, he was deeply dissatisfied with Li Guiren's army's massacre of Han people, so he fled from Li Guiren's army and found Li Huaixian. Li Huaixian naturally took him in, but Zhou Xun told Li Huaixian that Li Guiren defeated the Yu tribe of the Anxi Army not long ago and captured more than 2,000 war horses. These war horses were all Dayuan horses of excellent breeds, and even dozens of large-food horses.

This made Li Huaixian very moved. Their war horses were all Turkic horses, and their horse breeds were short. Although they could travel a long distance, the impact and speed needed by cavalry were insufficient. Li Huaixian also wanted to get more than a dozen excellent Dayuan war horses as stallions, and it would be better to get one or two big-food horses. For this reason, Li Huaixian sent someone to meet Li Guiren with a generous gift of 8,000 guan, hoping that he could meet his small requirements for the sake of the Yan army.

Unexpectedly, Li Huaixian's request made Li Guiren deeply afraid. Originally, they were a kind of competition between different factions. Li Huaixian had sharp and elite Youzhou Iron Cavalry, and Li Guiren also had the Yiluohe Cavalry who was invincible in the world. They wanted to poison all the other horses to death. How could Li Guiren improve the excellent horse breeds for him? Besides, these war horses were like treasures to Li Guiren. He had sent most of the war horses back to the Xi tribe and the Khitan tribe, and the remaining hundreds of war horses were also given to his own soldiers. Even if An Lushan ordered him to give them, he would not have them.

Li Guiren immediately refused Li Huaixian's request. Not only that, he also seized the 8,000 guan of generous gift from Li Huaixian and asked Li Huaixian to hand over the defector's chief Zhou Xun to him for disposal. Otherwise, the 8,000 guan of money would be used as compensation for Li Huaixian to take in the defector.

When Li Huaixian heard this, he immediately led the camp to retreat north and retreated to Licheng County north of Luzhou. He vowed to be stationed in different directions from Li Guiren's army. At this moment, Cai Xide's 50,000 troops also arrived in Luzhou, but joined forces with Li Guiren's army. In this way, a split occurred within the Yan army that An Lushan had not expected in advance. Li Huaixian's army did not obey Li Guiren's order and formed a group of its own.
Chapter completed!