Lord: Start with a book of Water Margin

Chapter 511 Situation
On the second day, Tu Qiao got Zhao Zhen's promise and went to Lu Fang's house in the city in person to invite Su Jinniang to be his deputy general.

Su Jinniang listened and obeyed the order. However, when she saw the White Flag Guard, she looked strange: "My pretty lady, why are they all infantrymen?"

Tu Qiao said helplessly: "There are not many women who can ride and fight. Sanniang and Liqing came early, but where are they now? We can only select these people from the female soldiers as the backbone, and recruit some strong women to train every day, hoping to form an army as soon as possible."

Su Jinniang looked at the female soldiers swinging stone locks on the training ground and said, "Fortunately, we all have strength. It won't be difficult to learn some spears and sticks."

Without going to talk about how Tu Qiao and Su Jinniang discussed the training of these female soldiers, let's just talk about Zhao Zhen. After seeing Zhao Xing put twenty-two [Yellow Cloud Turtle] into a newly dug pond next to the lotus pond, he stood up and went to the front to talk to [Little Li Guang] Hua Rong.

Speaking of these [Yellow Cloud Turtle], Zhao Zhen initially thought that these spiritual species would have intelligence, but he was greatly disappointed. The fourth-level pair could not communicate and could only be used as food.

In the hall, [Little Li Guang] Hua Rong and [Fire Eyed Suanni] Deng Fei had been waiting here for a long time. After greeting each other, Zhao Zhen asked, "Two brothers, are the soldiers and weapons ready?"

Hua Rong said: "My husband, everything has been handed over. We can set off today."

Zhao Zhen nodded and said, "Mizhou was plundered by Qingzhou bandits, and the officials fled. Although it has been recovered, except for Ju County where Madam Lu is in charge, the other four counties and towns are full of rogues and scoundrels, and some even dare to rob the local area. Brother Xue Yong is exhausted from running around, so this time I will call you back to be the military commander to pacify the local area. The three of you will cooperate with the prefect Pei Xuan to wipe out the rebellious bandits within a month. The most heinous crimes will be killed, and the rest will be sent to the mines to do hard labor."

Hua Rong nodded and accepted the order.

As early as when Zhao Zhen sent troops to Kouzhou, he appointed Pei Xuan as the governor of Mizhou. Of course, it was just an appointment made by Zhao Zhen under the pretext of being the vanguard of the expedition to the Eastern Capital and in charge of suppressing bandits in the east of the capital, so the court would certainly not recognize it.

In addition, Xu He was appointed as the governor of Yanzhou, and Chao Gai was appointed as the military commander. Xiao Rang was appointed as the governor of Liangshan, and Sun An was appointed as the military commander.

Zhao Zhen also made adjustments to the military commander, who led an army of 2,500 cavalry and infantry on a daily basis and handled military affairs in the state. In times of war, he could mobilize troops from other counties in the state. The military strength of each county was also gradually adjusted. Depending on the location, only one militia was set up, with 500 to 1,000 people retained, or even no longer stationed troops.

For example, in Shouzhang County, only the county lieutenant will be in charge of reviewing archers, investigating traitors and suppressing violence. The quota is 300 people, plus the "three squads" of the county magistrate, including the doormen, servants, strong squad, soap squad, and fast squad, as well as more than 100 people such as grain runners and coroners, which is considered the entire armed force of the county.

Another example is Fan County, which is located in a strategic location. In addition to the more than 2500 local militia archers in the county, the two people, Sun An, the military commander, and Yang Lin, the chief military officer, led cavalry and infantry to garrison there.

Kouzhou to the north of Yanggu County is now also under control. Except for the county's local militia archers, only Fu Yu is left to lead the militia, commanding 1000 soldiers to garrison in order to support Wei Yangyin's troops in Kouzhou.

After sending Hua Rong and Deng Fei away, Zhao Zhen also planned to lead an army to Laiwu County and besiege Song Jiang.

Yesterday, Guan Sheng brought news that Weizhou had won a great victory. Guan Sheng led seven generals, including Xuan Zan, Yang Xiong, Li Zongtang, Li Kui, Tang Meng, Li Gun, and Xiang Chong, and killed [Drunken King Kong] Fahui in the battle of Beihai County, captured [Mao Tou Xing] Kong Ming, and broke through the city of Beihai. Afterwards, they captured Changyi and Changle, which were unguarded, and completely recovered Weizhou.

Now Yang Xiong was left to guard Beihai, Li Gun to guard Changyi, Xiang Chong to guard Changle, Guan Sheng led the remaining troops and joined forces with military advisor Wu Yong to surround [Iron Fan] Song Qing, [No Cover] Mu Hong, [Little Cover] Mu Chun and 6,000 Qingzhou bandits in Ye County. Wu Yong also sent a military report, intending to wipe out Song Qing's group.

After reading the military report, Zhao Zhen was overjoyed.

Zhao Zhen did not stay any longer and transferred 2000 people from the Left and Right Guard Battalions, the Left and Right Brave Cavalry Battalions, 5000 archers led by Pang Wanchun, Lei Jiong and Ji Ji, and 2500 people from the Firearms Battalion led by Ling Zhen, along with siege equipment, to Laiwu.

Hu Yanzhuo repeatedly urged Zhao Zhen to encircle Song Jiang. Now Guanghui, Deng Yuanjue, Gou Huan brothers, as well as Li Zhong, Zhou Tong, and Meng Futong had also broken through Linqu. [Optimus Prime] Ren Yuan and [Ugly Scholar] Wanqi De fled hastily to Yidu with only a thousand people.

Laiwu City has become an isolated city. Apart from going north via the Zibo River to Qingzhou, the only option is to defend Laiwu. In Zhao Zhen's opinion, Song Jiang will never defend Laiwu, and he is probably ready to abandon the city and leave. However, Hu Yanzhuo's troops and Zeng Toushi's troops are all cavalry, which can chase the enemy north, so he has not acted rashly.

The troops Zhao Zhen sent out in three places to attack the weak points of the Qingzhou bandits, recovering lost territory and making some gains.

In the other two battlefields, the government troops lost more than they won.

Let's talk about Linzi in the north first. Earlier, the governor Gao Lian had left Yun Tianbiao and his men behind and led his troops to attack Boxing in the north. [Jinlinmang] Ma Yuantan got the news and, according to [Simashi] Wanqichun's plan, only [Liejue Dalang] Helian Jinming led 3,000 troops to garrison Linzi, and [Hunjianglong] Li Jun guarded the Zibo River. He led 20,000 troops to sneak out of Linzi at night, set up an ambush at the Mian River, and attacked them halfway across the river. Most of the 10,000 troops of Gaotang Prefecture were drowned.

Although Gao Lian activated his Taoist magic, he was defeated by Ma Yuan, who was well prepared, with pig and sheep blood. Gao Lian was shot in the shoulder by Helian Jinming. With less than 4,000 soldiers left, he was no longer able to attack Boxing alone. He had to retreat to Zichuan and join forces with Yun Tianbiao and Wei Tianbao, waiting for Liu Menglong to defeat Li Jun of Zihe before attacking Linzi.

Under the city of Laiwu, the two sides had been fighting for many days, and Song Jiang also realized that the situation was not good. He sent Song Qing to deliberately take a detour through Mizhou and finally go to Dengzhou via Laizhou. Unexpectedly, before reaching Dengzhou, the troops were surrounded. The news that the ships of the Dengzhou navy were seized made Song Jiang realize that his layout here had long been seen through by Zhao Zhen of Liangshan.

He never tried his best to wipe him out. I'm afraid he was just planning to drive the tiger to devour the wolf and let himself occupy the prefectures and counties. He would recover the lost territories later, and not only would he be promoted, but his territory would also be expanded a lot.

At this time, Zhao Zhen, the nominal supreme commander, was busy fighting in Kouzhou. The government troops under the city of Laiwu were not under the same command. Although Hu Yanzhuo was the main general, he had only more than 5,000 soldiers. Shan Tinggui and Wei Dingguo of Lingzhou had 10,000 soldiers, and Zengtou City had more than 3,000 cavalry and infantry. The three troops set up camps in each place.

With this, Song Jiang, relying on his strong army, took the initiative to leave the city and drove 50,000 Qingzhou bandits to attack the government army camp desperately, intending to take the opportunity to defeat the government army.

Zengtou City had the fewest soldiers and horses, but its stockade was closest to Laiwu City and was the first to be attacked. After two days of continuous attacks, it was already in danger. Zengtou City never took Shan Tinggui and Wei Dingguo seriously, and asked for help many times, but the two ignored it.

At night, the three brothers Zeng Mi, Zeng Kui and Zeng Sheng saw that they had suffered too many casualties and were unable to defend the camp, so they packed up the camp and fled. Coincidentally, after three o'clock in the morning, Song Jiang used Yong'er's plan and led 3,000 elite soldiers to rob the camp, but found that Zengtou City's camp was already empty.

(End of this chapter)