On August 17, the imperial court attacked Luoyang's central army, that is, the ten towns in Guanzhong led by Yang Fugong, and the Jin Shang and Shaanxi Guo towns in Guandong were joined by the two towns in Tongguan and officially launched the army. This was still a joint force, including the 36 new Shence Army established by Yang Fugong's brothers, as well as the troops and horses drawn from Jingnan, Dingnan, Baoda, Zhenwu, Jingyuan, Fengxiang, Zhenguo and other towns, totaling 300,000 troops.

, the elite warriors also reached 100,000. If this number of troops were in the prosperous Tang Dynasty, the scale of this number was not worth mentioning. During the Kaiyuan period, any major vassal state could bring out 70,000 to 80,000 elite warriors. However, since the Yizong Dynasty, the Shence Army could still pull out 36 troops at a time, which was already a grand expedition by the Central Imperial Army. Especially after the Huang Chao Rebellion, the original Shence Army system was already in name only.

Emperor Li Ye personally rushed to Tongguan Yang from Chang'an, landed on the gate of Shangtongguan City, and gave the army farewell. Yang Fugong, the commander of the Central Army, was even more confident. He asked Li Ye to retreat the eunuchs on his left and right, and then said to Li Ye in his habitual exaggerated tone: "I will go on a war today, first eliminate external troubles for Your Majesty, and wait for the triumphant day to eradicate your internal worries for Your Majesty."

Yang Fugong's words are very interesting. Li Jing is an external trouble, who is an internal trouble? In other words, the Li family has been dominated by eunuchs for many years. The biggest internal trouble is the autocracy of eunuchs. However, Yang Fugong will definitely not regard himself as an internal trouble. The internal trouble he mentioned is indeed an eunuch, but he specifically refers to Tian Lingzi in Chengdu. Although he spent a lot of money this time, he took the initiative to unite Tian Lingzi, Zhu Wen and others under the attack of the Qin vassal. But in fact, he has always been unhappy about Tian Lingzi, who is also an eunuch. Today, under the pressure of Li Jing, he temporarily made peace with Tian Lingzi, but in front of the emperor, he had already made it clear. After Li Jing was settled, he would be the first to attack the old thief Tian.

Li Ye did not have much hope for the official army's expedition, and even came to Tongguan. It was just Yang Fugong's request. Although he was young, he was not a playful monarch as he was his brother, but he was indeed a king who blindly wanted to revive the Tang Dynasty. Unfortunately, the Tang Dynasty was already in a serious state and was unable to turn the world back. He understood all this and had already begun to consider the future.

Since Emperor Yizong's reign, the largest conquest of the imperial court has begun. The scale of this dispatch was even higher than the troops that had attacked Huang Chao. Even Tian Lingzi, who was far away in Xichuan, could temporarily give up his personal grudges with Yang Fugong and send troops to help.

However, although the imperial court dispatched many troops and large scale this time, until this time, they had not yet used the banner of attacking Li Jing, and the reason for sending troops was still to attack Wang Chucun and Yang Shouliang, the rebels of Luoyang. This situation where the troops had been opened but they dared not declare war, fully demonstrated the hesitation of the commander of this expedition.

Yang Fugong and the others were hesitating, but Li Jing did not hesitate at all.

The five troops of the imperial court were still in clusters, and Li Jing was already the first to take action, without any ambiguity. Li Jing was the first to deal with Zhaoyi Town. Among the four troops scheduled, Hebei was the first to take action, divided several troops to attack Xing Mingci at the same time. In just three days, he took down the two states of Mingci and surrounded Xingzhou.

On the fifth day, Xi Zhongxin, the guardian general who guarded the important pass of Zhaoyi, was rebelled and led his troops to surrender. The surrender of the guardian general of Tianjing Pass made the most important Taihang Mountain barrier between Heyang and Zezhou a smooth road. Li Cunxiao, Gao Siji, and Wang Yanzhang, under the order of Li Jing, led 20,000 troops to cross the Taihang Mountains, pass through the Tianjing Pass, and raided Zezhou. Zezhou, which was just returned by Heyang not long ago, fell into the hands of the Qin army again.

When I get to Zezhou, I can’t support myself in Luzhou.

Zhaoyi Town, and three states were lost in the middle of the five prefectures, leaving one Luzhou and one Xingzhou, across the Taihang Mountains, facing each other from east to west, but each was besieged by the Qin army.

Wang Chongrong, the closest to Zhaoyi, received a letter of help from the river. He felt that his lips were lost and his teeth were cold. He was worried that Zhaoyi would completely become an isolated army. He ordered people to continue to guard the river. He also sent people to ask for help from Yang Fugong of Tongguan, and sent his brother Wang Chongying to lead troops to rescue Luzhou in order to keep the safety of the flanks.

Gao Siji and others entered the Luzhou fortress, and were not allowed to advance for a while. Zhaoyi surrendered general Xi Zhongxin asked to step forward: "I was under the command of Lieutenant Colonel Guo and had not made any contributions. Now I am willing to lead a thousand brothers to secretly walk the path around Huguan and enter Luzhou's heart, to smash the momentum of the defenders and promote our army's power."

In the camp, the three Taibaos were mainly Wang Yanzhang. When he heard Xi Zhongxin know the secret path, he was willing to lead the army to go. He nodded in his heart and turned to look at the other two brothers. Gao Siji and Li Cunxiao both nodded. The elite Qin army was not afraid of fighting big battles, nor were they afraid of fighting small-scale battles. Such small troops sneaked into the enemy's hearts, and they fought too much. They all nodded at the moment, and at this time, Guo Wei asked to go to the battle with Xi Zhongxin.

"In this way, please ask General Xi and General Guo to select a thousand Yuan Zhaoyi soldiers to fight, bypass Huguan, and harass Luzhou."

On that day, Xi Zhongxin and Guo Wei selected a thousand elite veterans from the original Tianjing Pass and Zezhou. After dark, they walked around Huguan. The next day, Xi Zhongxin and Guo Wei suddenly led their troops outside Luzhou City.

They bluffed their flags and set up suspicious formations, which caused panic to the city's guards.

The defenders in the city saw the Qin army's flags as sea, the cavalry appeared and loomed in the forest, and the camps and tents at the foot of the mountain were all panicked, thinking that Huguan had lost.

Huguan is an important pass in Zhaoyi, just like Tianjing Pass. What's more important is that Huguan is the connection passage between Luzhou and Xingzhou. Once Huguan is lost, the passage through Huguan and Taihang into Yecheng, Hebei will be cut off. Xingzhou has completely become an isolated city, and Luzhou has also become an isolated city. At this time, the Qin army dispatched from Taiyuan direction is also constantly approaching. Under such circumstances, the morale of the defenders in Luzhou City is low and the morale of the army is uneasy.

Xi Zhongxin sent his subordinates to sneak into the city to find out the news. He was originally a general Zhaoyi, and he was also a general of Luzhou Ya. Luzhou Ya was always a group of soldiers who were as domineering as Wei Boya's soldiers, and was extremely xenophobic. At the moment of internal and external difficulties, Xi Zhongxin immediately felt the opportunity. He said to Guo Wei: "The morale of the Luzhou guards is low, and they all feel desperate about the war. I thought that if someone came forward to persuade them to surrender at this time, they might be able to convince them to open the city to surrender." He spoke very noble to Guo Wei and did not regard him as a subordinate at all, not to mention that Guo Wei is indeed no longer his subordinate. This time Guo Wei came out with him, and it was obvious that he was his deputy, but he knew that it was more of a military supervisor.

“将军有几分把握?”郭威问.

"At least six points, if someone enters the city in person, at least seven points, if someone plans to take a trip in person. If things fail, then the troops here will be handed over to Brother Guo."

There is a great risk to enter the city to persuade surrender, and it is difficult to ensure that the Luzhou soldiers will not be able to defeat the enemy and die together. However, looking at Xi Zhongxin's request, Guo Wei did not refuse. First, this is Xi Zhongxin's opportunity to make contributions, and second, if he can really persuade the Luzhou defenders to surrender, this is the most important thing.

That night, Xi Zhongxin first pretended to be a messenger and went to the city to ask for entry, but was put down the basket by the defenders and pulled them into the city.

After a night, when Guo Wei was already anxious and thought that something had happened to Xi Zhongxin, he loudly reported outside that the Luzhou city gate was opened and a white flag was picked up in the city.

The Luzhou garrison was shocked when they saw Xi Zhongxin who came to deliver the letter last night. After he explained his purpose, they discussed for a long time and finally chose to surrender. However, after Wang Yanzhang and others received surrender and took over the city gate, the Luzhou garrison discovered that the 50,000 Qin vassal army that Xi Zhongxin said yesterday had come from outside the city, and the Huguan and Xingzhou had been captured. The news of Meng Fangli's battle was just a fool, and each face was very exciting. However, at this point, no one had any trouble. Luzhou had fallen into the Qin army's defense, so how could they still have room for regret? Besides, the Qin army had not captured Huguan and Xingzhou, which does not mean that they could really defend it.

As soon as Luzhou City surrendered, the pass guards outside Luzhou also heard the orders to surrender to the Qin army. The Qin army on the northern route rushed into Luzhou, and the piece of meat in Luzhou was completely swallowed by the Qin army. At this time, the reinforcements led by King Chongying of Hezhong had just arrived at Wuling Mountain at the junction of Jinzhou and Luzhou in Hezhong. By the time he arrived at the border of Luzhou, there had already been news that the Qin army had already joined forces with Luzhou City. Luzhou had already gathered 30,000 Qin troops.

Wang Chongying had to stop moving forward and temporarily stationed in Wuling Mountain. While sending someone to return Wang Chongrong to the next step of his instructions.

When Wang Chongrong heard that Luzhou had been lost, he was extremely frightened and asked Wang Chongying to station on the Wuling Mountains on the spot to defend against the Qin army. At the same time, he urgently sent a messenger to ask Yang Fugong for help, asking them to cross the river to help quickly. After waiting for two days, Yang Fugong had just arrived in Shanzhou, and the Qin army had already captured Xingzhou.

昭义镇五州,全部落入秦军之手.

After taking Zhaoyi, the Qin army did not stop the offensive, but instead strengthened the offensive, attacking Jinzhou from all sides at the same time from Fen, Qin, Lu and Ze.

Wang Chongying led his troops to fight, and the two sides fought a great battle on the Fenshui River in Jinzhou, Linfen.

After a fierce battle, Linfen lost, Wang Chongying was defeated, and almost wiped out the entire army.

The Qin army took advantage of the victory and advanced rapidly, capturing the entire Jinzhou. Wang Chongrong gathered troops to defend Jiangzhou, and was defeated three times a day and was forced to retreat south. Hezhong Towns the states, and at this time, only one Hezhong Prefecture was left. At this time, Yang Fugong's reinforcements vanguard finally crossed Fengling Pass and arrived in Hezhong.

Later, Yang Fugong led the 36 capital Shence Army, as well as the large troops of Zhenguo, Jingyuan, Jingnan, Dingnan, etc. Finally arrived in the river. For a moment, more than 200,000 official troops crossed the Yellow River, with great momentum. The Qin army finally stopped its rapid offensive at this time. After occupying Cizhou, Leizhou, Jinzhou and Jiangzhou, the troops stopped on the northern border of Hezhong Prefecture. The vanguards of the two armies went down to the camp thirty miles away, looking at each other from afar, but no one took action first.
Chapter completed!