Chapter 110: Working for More Than Two Years
At this time, there was a noisy sound outside the gate. Zhao Yulin and his wife walked to the door, and the guard came in to report that some people knew that the young master was leaving Yangzhou, and came to deliver eggs and noodles.
He saw a little girl in patched clothes standing in the front, holding two eggs in her hands and shouting "Third Young Master". Ma Ling'er and he went forward and squatted down to look at the childish girl. The little girl told them that her family moved into the upstairs of Xinjie, a house that was built for them by the young master and his wife. Her mother was sick and asked her to deliver the eggs to the third young master no matter what.
Zhao Yulin's eyes were moist. He hesitated for a moment, took the eggs from the little girl's hand, and said thank you for everyone's kindness. He would accept the eggs and noodles, but would not accept any other items.
Zhao Yulin walked towards the house, and the people outside kept shouting: Third Young Master, please accept it;
Buddha bless the young master and the lady to live a hundred years...
Looking back, he said to Ma Ling'er: Let's leave as early as possible so as not to disturb the folks in the city.
At noon, Gao came in.
As soon as you enter the door, tell them that they have a gift for you. Don't despise it, and don't refuse it.
Zhao Yulin was delighted and went out with Ma Ling to see what it was.
The guards brought in two red Tibetan horses, one large and one small. Ma Linger liked them at first sight and reached out to take the reins of the pony to ride.
Zhao Yulin quickly said, "Be careful, the horse is shy."
Gao Jin said with a smile that he picked it specially for Sister Ma Ling, and it was very docile.
Ma Ling'er jumped onto the horse's back proudly, and the foal trotted around the yard. Zhao Yulin at Sanqiang, asking him to keep watch, and went to the study with Gao Jin.
Gao Jin reported: He came with 5,000 cavalry and musketeers. The muskets had not encountered any major battles in Wenzhou and Tianshui, so it was not clear how much advantage they had for the time being.
Zhao Yulin nodded and told him that the musket was the same as the cannon. It would fail when it came into contact with water, so he had to be careful to use them in coordination.
Gao Jin began to talk about his cavalry. A large number of horses were seized in the last Tianshui battle. After selecting good horses to replenish the cavalry, there were more than 15,000 horses in total.
"Brother, please give me some riders." Gao Jin stretched out his hand to ask for people.
Zhao Yulin teased him: "If you don't have anyone, go find a wife and have a baby yourself."
Gao Jin started to argue, saying that all the columns were growing like mushrooms after a spring rain, but only his cavalry column had horses but no men, and his brothers no longer cared about them.
Zhao Yulin said that in the past, everyone supported his riding, and they all gave him the horses to look after the house, so where would he find someone else? Now that he has horses, why doesn't he share some with others?
No matter how reluctant Gao Jin was, he still agreed to send 300 war horses to each column.
He said that Qingyeyuan only has 3,000 cavalrymen now, and our Shenwei Army needs 15,000?
Aren’t you afraid that Qingyeyuan will become jealous and the imperial court will forcibly take away one of our cavalry?
Three thousand horses were also sent to Qingyeyuan.
Gao Jin was not happy with this, and looked at him like a little wife holding a treasure chest, and said seriously that these were all captured with the hard work of our brothers.
Zhao Yulin was silent for a while before saying that we are all soldiers of the Song Dynasty. Right now, the imperial court is discussing an alliance to destroy the Jin Dynasty. If Qingyeyuan is ordered to attack, what will they do without horses?
Gao Jin was at a loss, and said that the only thing left was to practice with muskets, but there were only one hundred of them, so how could he do that?
Even if you practice more, you will only be able to do so much.
Zhao Yulin glared at him and said that if they helped each other and learned from each other and practiced together, they could train two hundred, four hundred, or eight hundred people. Look at Lai Chuanfang, he has been working in the mountains for more than two years.
You are already a general, how can you accomplish great things without patience?
Zhao Yulin watched Gao Jindong go, then calmed down and wrote a letter to Miao Gui, secretly telling him the strategy to capture Tianshui, as this place was his lifeline.
Then I got busy with moving...
At the Song army camp in Qingyeyuan, Cao Youwen had already entered the central army tent. Several generals and aides drank together to celebrate the commander-in-chief's promotion.
Gradually they talked about Zhao Yulin of Yangzhou who had been promoted to deputy envoy and would be stationed in Xingyuan Prefecture. Commander Liu Hu said that Deputy Envoy Zhao had a strong army under his command. It was said that he now had seven columns, each with more than 10,000 people, not including cavalry and navy.
Mu Bin said that he also has a reserve force that trains new recruits for combat troops. With these included, there are probably more than 100,000 people.
Cao Youliang said bluntly: The Zhao brothers are upright and honest, no matter how many there are, they are still our Qingyeyuan's soldiers.
Some people made noises, saying that this person was not greedy or corrupt and was dedicated to developing the army, but this was a taboo in the court, as Yue Fei was a precedent.
If there is a rebellion someday, the few soldiers we have in Qingyeyuan will not be enough to fill the gaps in the Shenwei Army's teeth.
Lao Cao didn't like what he heard and replied: What are you talking about?
Are we still a family?
Our headquarters will pay the salaries of 100,000 soldiers of the Divine Power Army starting from this month, and provide them with corresponding supplies and food.
Cao Youliang also said that's right. The Shenwei Army even took the initiative to propose to guard the Wuxi Pass and give up the Xianren Pass.
At this time, a lieutenant came in to report: The first cavalry column of the Shenwei Army has sent horses.
When Lao Cao heard about the horses, he was delighted and immediately asked how many they were.
The lieutenant colonel told him: three thousand strong war horses.
Lao Cao got excited and stood up and asked people to go out and take a look.
Outside the big tent, war horses were lining up to come in. Everyone was speechless looking at the strong horses. Lao Cao sighed and said: He is indeed a trustworthy man.
Tianshui won a great victory that day, and the young man told him that the horse was infected with plague and needed to be raised for a while before being screened and sent back.
It was actually delivered today.
Cao Youliang led a big black horse over and looked at it, exclaiming that there were three thousand horses, and Qingyeyuan's cavalry was going to double.
Three days later, the Yangzhou camp of the Shenwei Army left Xixiang, and the people voluntarily went to the East City Gate to see them off.
As the morning light broke, both sides of the official road were already filled with common people. Officials and gentry were lined up neatly outside the city gate. Ma Linger got off the car, took a sip of the wine, and told everyone: Commander Zhao had already set out in advance and asked her to wish the people of Yangzhou better lives.
The common people saw them off all the way, and even after the boat had sailed ten miles, there were still people waving and greeting them on the shore.
Ma Linger felt a little emotional. The people of Yangzhou are so nice. She must tell her brother Yulin about this scene later.
At this time, Zhao Yulin was already at Raofeng Pass.
At dawn, he set out with the combat envoy Liu Honggen to Jinzhou to deploy troops to deal with Wu Xian.
The team stopped at the pass, had breakfast and continued on their journey, arriving in Xunyang in the evening. After a night's rest, they boarded Zhou Ping's warship and traveled by water.
Through Zhou Ping's rapid development, the Hanzhong Navy now has 300 warships, most of which are newly built, and some are new large ships directly from Yibin.
He looked at Zhou Ping's smug look and said: This time when we fight Wuxian, the navy will definitely get a piece of the fat meat.
Zhou Ping said happily that he was afraid that he would not come, or would hide in those narrow paths.
Zhao Yulin said that he would definitely come, and would definitely come by water, so we had to wait on him carefully.
When Zhou Ping heard his affirmative answer, a smile spread across his honest face, as if he had picked up a large piece of pure gold.
We arrived at Wudang City in the afternoon and all the brothers were there.
Zhou Ping asked Huo Fenghuang to sit next to Zhao Yulin. Fenghuang's face was tanned, and he placed the tea bowl brought by the guard in front of the woman with some distress.
Phoenix looked at him, her face full of happiness.
Zhao Yulin asked everyone to talk about the situation: Lu Youpeng reported from Shunfeng that Wu Xian did have about 130,000 troops, but they were all refugees from various places and defeated soldiers of the Mongolian army.
The Beggars' Gang intercepted the letter he wrote to the Emperor of the Jin Dynasty, and they were indeed planning to go west to Jinzhou and take Hanzhong as the base for the Jin Dynasty to turn things around.
At this time, only Caizhou and Nanyang were left in the Jin Dynasty, and refugees and bureaucratic defeated soldiers from all directions were rushing to these places. As the last important minister of the Jin Dynasty, it was naturally much easier for Wu Xian to raise a big flag and gather troops. They were all eager to find a place to settle down.
Yang Xingyun reported: The scouts have learned that Wuxian’s food and grass are almost exhausted, and they are gathering ships, planning to advance westward along the Zhejiang-Chuan River.
At that moment, Gucheng had gathered 30,000 troops from the 2nd and 3rd columns, plus 5,000 troops from the cavalry column and the navy, as well as a newly trained reserve force of 10,000, so they were ready for a battle.
Zhao Yulin said that the reserve troops should not be included, as most of them were Han people who grew up in the Jin territory and had just joined our Shenwei Army. They would be transferred back to Yangzhou to continue their training, and Lai Chuanfang's first column would be sent down to participate in the battle.
The combat envoy suggested to keep the enemy outside the defense zone, and use the Second Column as the main force to attack Wuxian's gathering place, burn their ships, disrupt their action plans, and thus prevent Wuxian from advancing westward.
Zhao Yulin disagreed. He said that we only have so many soldiers now, and if the battle line is stretched, we cannot form a combined force and cannot deal a fatal blow to the enemy. Then Wu Xian will again and again fantasize about moving westward.
He suggested setting up a battlefield in Wudang. The enemy would flee like they were moving a house, and they would be bloated and unable to move with their families. This would be a good opportunity for us to take action.
Lu Youpeng agreed with this plan. He said that Wu Xian was short of food and grass and was here to steal food and territory. So we should clear out the land and completely pack up the food and people in the war zone, leaving him with nothing to eat and no one to help carry the wounded.
Yang Xingyun agreed immediately, saying that if we fight on our territory, we can find familiar positions and ways out by feeling our way around. The enemy has come a long way and is short of food and clothing. If we leave some brothers in the reserve team to do the division and disintegration and appeasement, Wuxian will definitely collapse.
Zhao Yulin nodded, gave Yang Xingyun a thumbs up, and said with a smile that this is right. Wu Xian is going west this time to send people to us. He asked everyone why Li Dagui was transferred to guard Gucheng?
We need to raise the banner of Da Kui and recruit more brothers to join our Shenwei Army. We need to make full use of Da Kui's personal connections and explain clearly our Shenwei Army's strategy of employing people "brothers from all corners of the country" to attract them to come to Jinzhou to join us.
After Zhao Yulin explained the purpose of this battle to his brothers, Yang Xingyun led everyone to analyze intelligence, study the terrain, and began to formulate a battle plan.
Fire Phoenix came to the back hall to have tea with him, and he asked, "Aren't you making a battle plan? Why don't you discuss it with your brothers?"
