Thief Emperor

Chapter 356 Fooled!
Things like killing an entire family are naturally told to scare people.

But Li Yun had no choice. At this time, the slogans had to be shouted loudly.

According to the court's rules, neither the Jiangdong Army nor the Pinglu Army in the north should appear in Huainan Road at this time, let alone outside Yangzhou City.

In the name of justice, it is natural to label the other party as a traitor.

If the Pinglu Army had won the battle outside Yangzhou City at this time, Yangzhou City would most likely open its gates to welcome the Pinglu Army into the city. After all, the Pinglu Army had accumulated a reputation over decades.

However, in the battle outside the city last night, although Li Yun actually won the victory, he did not wipe out the Pinglu Army, nor did he achieve a complete victory.

Although people in Huainan Road had heard of him as the Jiangdong Recruiting Envoy, he was, after all, a newcomer who had only risen in the past two years.

Now, it is clear that it was this Li Shijun from Jiangdong who started competing with the Pinglu Army for territory. Now standing on Li Yun's side would offend the Pinglu Army.

The chances of opening the door for him are slim.

After Yang Xi left to knock on the door, Zhao Cheng expressed his opinion, and then whispered: "Envoy, no matter what, this battle has made our reputation known. If we scare them in Yangzhou City, it will be enough to terrify the people in Yangzhou City."

"If we really can't open the gates of Yangzhou, we will have no choice but to leave Yangzhou tonight and cross the river from Liuhe back to Nanjing to rest."

"These Pinglu cavalrymen are all half-baked. Their attacks during the day are very mediocre, and at night they are almost useless."

Li Yun glanced at him and frowned, "If we withdraw like this, our trip to Huainan Road will be in vain."

Zhao Cheng nodded first, then smiled bitterly and said, "But will Yangzhou open the door to you, envoy?"

"Probably not."

Li Yun lowered his head and drank a sip of tea, then said, "I didn't expect them to open the door for me now and let Yang Xi go out and shout a few words..."

"We are just trying to keep up appearances. We can't let outsiders think we are showing weakness."

"Let's set up camp."

Li Yun rubbed his brow and said, "Let's set up camp here."

At this time, it was already afternoon, and they were only a few hundred feet away from the Yangzhou city gate.

Zhao Cheng was thoughtful and felt that it was not right to set up camp at this time. However, Li Yun had great authority in this army. Although he had some objections in his heart, he still did what Li Yun said and went to do the job.

As soon as Zhao Cheng left, Yang Xi returned to the army and walked to Li Yun, hanging his head and saying, "Sir, it seems that there is no one in Yangzhou City. I have been shouting and cursing for a long time, but no one has replied."

"There's not a single person on the tower!"

Li Yun smiled and said, "At this time, of course they can only pretend to be dead."

"Just shout. Whether you shout or not is our business. Whether they hear or not is their business. And as long as we shout..."

"Those people in the city will definitely hear it."

Li Yun patted Yang Xi's shoulder and said slowly, "We are already setting up camp. When it gets dark, the Pinglu cavalry nearby will be much safer. You should go and get some sleep."

"Tonight, maybe there will be..."

"Important things."

Yang Xi didn't understand what was going on, so he nodded and went downstairs to rest.

After all, most people didn't get much sleep during this whole day and night. Even Li Yun went to his tent and took a short nap.

…………

That night, the moon was dark.

In Li Yun's camp outside the city, there was another group of people, about a hundred people. They only lit two or three torches and quietly left the camp.

Not far from Li Yun’s camp, on a high slope, Zhou Chang was staring at Li Yun’s tent.

He suffered a huge loss!

Nearly half of the five thousand elite troops were lost in just one battle. If he returned to Qingzhou with such results, it was hard to say whether General Zhou would kill him. But from now on, he would probably find it difficult to lead troops again.

Captain Shen, with gray hair, stood beside him, his eyes fixed on the location of Li Yun's camp, and he said slowly: "Since the hour of You, these Jiangnan soldiers have quietly started to leave the camp. Judging from the direction they left, it should be the direction of Liuhe. They are going to cross the river from Liuhe Ferry and return to Jiangnan."

The old captain frowned slightly: "This is troublesome."

During the day today, he was the first to identify the weaknesses of Li Yun's troops, and then ordered the cavalry to harass them along the way, which indeed had some effect.

These Jiangnan infantrymen had no way to deal with the harassing cavalry.

However, the cavalry of the Pinglu Army was only half-baked.

Although he shot and wounded some people during the day, he actually killed less than ten people, and he also lost one of his own.

At this rate, it would be almost impossible to kill Li Yun with cavalry.

Moreover, Li Yun was now sneaking away from Yangzhou at night, so they were even more helpless. Those cavalrymen had no accuracy during the day, and they were even more blind at night.

The old captain thought for a long time, then shook his head and said, "Major General, they left quietly at night. With our current strength, there is no way to stop them."

Zhou Chang's face was grim: "How can I explain this to my father when I return to Qingzhou?"

The old captain whispered, "As long as the young general can occupy Yangzhou, everything will be easy to explain."

Zhou Chang took a deep breath. "That's the difficulty. This battle was too ugly. The people in Yangzhou saw it all. They are unwilling to open the door to these southerners, but they may not be willing to open the door to us either!"

"Only by waiting for my father to send more people over, can we open the gates of Yangzhou."

The old captain's eyes fell on the tent of Li Yun's troops, and he whispered, "Major General, I have counted that more than ten teams of Jiangnan soldiers have left from the evening hour to now."

“But the number of tents has not decreased.”

"Most likely, they knew our scouts were watching them, so they wanted to leave Yangzhou quietly, even leaving their tents behind."

"Tomorrow morning, these tents outside Yangzhou City will become empty camps."

The old captain said this with a sigh, "I have to say, although I have never heard of these Jiangnan soldiers before, whether it was the frontal battle last night or the escape tonight, they were quite impressive."

"If they can return to Jiangdong safely, I'm afraid this army will become famous throughout Jiangnan, and even the world."

Zhou Chang looked at Li Yun's tent from a distance and suddenly understood what the old captain meant. He looked at the old man thoughtfully: "What Mr. Shen meant is..."

"If my guess is correct, there are only a few hundred Jiangnan soldiers left under the Yangzhou city."

"Now most of the way has been gone."

Captain Shen paused and continued, "But now, we only have cavalry near Yangzhou City. It's not safe to go there now. Let's wait a little longer until they send more people away."

"We will attack their camp and set it on fire. Their camp is so close to Yangzhou. Once it starts burning, the people in Yangzhou will be able to see it."

"Who knows how many people will be left in this camp by then? Those people in the city will know that the victory or defeat has been decided. With the reputation of the Pinglu Army, they will most likely open the door to the young general. As long as we occupy Yangzhou, our trip to the general will be a merit!"

This time, it was the radical major general's turn to hesitate.

"Mr. Shen, will there be any problems?"

The old captain lowered his head, thought about it again, and shook his head slightly, saying, "Those Jiangnan soldiers were able to take advantage of their rest and trick the young general once, which shows that their leader is definitely not a fool. In this situation, Yangzhou will not open the gates to them. Our cavalry will follow them around. If they stay in Huainan Road and Yangzhou, they will die sooner or later."

"As long as you are not stupid, you will get out as soon as possible."

"They have hidden themselves very well, but after all, these people from the south of the Yangtze River are not familiar with the terrain of the north of the Yangtze River. There is no moon tonight, so they have to use torches to lead the way."

"More than a dozen times a night."

Elder Shen bowed his head slightly and said, "Young General, you don't have to worry about this. I will take the cavalry and trample their tents. When the fire starts, the victory or defeat will be clear!"

Zhou Chang took a deep breath and nodded slowly.

"Be careful, Mr. Shen."

The old captain bowed his head, clasped his fists, turned around and walked away with big strides.

About half an hour later, rockets were fired at Li Yun's tent.

Soon, two or three tents were set on fire.

But nothing happened.

In addition, when Li Yun set up camp, in order to prevent fire attacks, the tents were separated, and the fire in two or three tents did not cause the entire camp to catch fire.

Seeing this, Captain Shen was completely relieved. He rode on his horse, waved his hand, and shouted, "Charge the camp of these rebels!"

A group of cavalry rushed towards Li Yun's tent.

The camp was indeed full of empty tents, with almost no people left.

Captain Shen dismounted from his horse and frowned slightly.

He originally thought that he could catch some of the remaining Jiangnan soldiers, but he didn't expect that these Jiangnan soldiers ran so fast.

There is not one left...

wrong!

The old captain was stunned for a moment as his mind flashed through his mind.

There's no way they could have gone so cleanly in such a short time!

This thought flashed through his mind, and he immediately looked at the Pinglu soldiers who were setting fires everywhere and shouted, "Get on the horses! Get on the horses!"

But how could it be too late?

The sound of bowstrings vibrated all around.

Arrows were shot at the Pinglu troops from all directions!
The old captain managed to avoid the arrows with great difficulty, and then he saw a tall young man walking out from the shadows with a gun in hand, and beside him was another young man.

The young man with the gun was talking to another young man with a hearty laugh: "See, I said there are smart people among them."

"If you are not a smart person, you will not be fooled by this."

The other young man looked at the war horses with shining eyes and shouted loudly.

"Don't hurt the horse, don't hurt the horse!"

　There were a lot of controversies in the last chapter!! I wrote very quickly these past two days because some people have been saying that I was writing too slowly, so I deliberately sped up the pace. As a result, this battle, which I had planned for a long time, came a little abruptly. As for the outcome of the battle... In the author's setting, the individual quality of the Pinglu Army is not as good as that of the protagonist. Their strength lies in battle formation and experience.

　　I will pay more attention to the subsequent rhythm. I'm sorry, dear readers! !
　　
　
(End of this chapter)