Thief Emperor

Chapter 439: Learned from the Envoy!
At this time, Zhao Cheng was in Yangzhou, and the most suitable troops to serve as the main force in Jiangnan were those led by Su Sheng.

After all, Zhou Liang's troops had never fought any tough battles, not even any big battles. And although Li Zheng also led his troops to "expand territory" in the south of Jiangnan East Road this year, he was not actually fighting.

At best, it can only be said that it is just to eliminate the opposition forces within Jiangdong.

Only Su Sheng had no problems in all aspects and had experience in fighting. Moreover, when Li Yun inspected the various armies, it was Su Sheng's troops who were the best at training.

Su Sheng was also full of confidence, so after receiving Li Yun's letter, he immediately rushed to Jinling with only two or three followers to meet Li Yun.

He looked at Li Yun and said, "The Pinglu Army is too arrogant. We must make them suffer a great loss this time. How should we fight? Erlang, please give us a word!"

"I'll get ready right away."

Li Yun first motioned him to sit down, then said with a smile: "Brother Su, in this battle, your Jinling Army will be the main force, General Zhao from Yangzhou will assist, and General Zhou will be the reserve army, ready to fill in the battlefield at any time."

"I have arranged for General Zhou's troops to be stationed in Dantu, Runzhou. If the situation in Yangzhou becomes tense, he can cross the river at any time to provide support."

At this point, Li Yun picked up a thick stack of documents from his desk, handed it to Su Sheng, and said, "This is the intelligence I received about Jiangbei during this period. Brother Su, take it back later and take a good look at it."

Su Sheng took it, stretched out his hand and squeezed it, then pulled out a document from it, took a quick look, and then looked at Li Yun in surprise and said, "The information about Jiangbei is so detailed."

“I paid a lot of money for it.”

Li Yun lowered his head and drank his tea: "Of course in detail."

Su Sheng was surprised and asked, "Can this thing still be bought?"

Li Yun put down his teacup and sighed: "I have deployed hundreds of people in Jiangbei. In the past year alone, these people have cost me tens of thousands of coins."

"If the information is not detailed enough, I will be so angry that I will die."

In the past year, apart from the reorganization of the army and military expenditure, Li Yun's largest investment was probably the investment in the Nine Officials.

Knowing that intelligence was his weakness, Li Yun invested a huge amount of money in intelligence, in order to make the Ninth Division as large as possible, and at the same time as precise and professional as soon as possible, so as to obtain detailed intelligence for him.

From what we can see so far, money is indeed useful. After spending a lot of money in a year, and with the help of several "mentors" from the Imperial City Bureau, the Nine Bureaus of Jiangdong have made rapid progress. The information about Jiangbei in Li Yun's hands is now quite complete and detailed.

Li Yun's investment paid off.

Next, he will invest more resources and must develop and expand Jiusi as quickly as possible. After all, he needs to deploy personnel in more places than just Jiangbei.

“So this is how you buy it.”

Su Sheng laughed in silence, then turned serious and looked at Li Yun and said, "Erlang, should I transfer the Qiantang Army as soon as possible and go directly north from Jinling to occupy Liuhe Ferry?"

Li Yun shook his head slightly: "Don't be so anxious, Yangzhou has not been completely surrounded yet."

"Besides, the river is so long. No matter how many people the Pinglu Army has, it is impossible to block the entire river. We don't need to rush to go north."

Mr. Li continued, "I suspect that they want to use the opportunity of encircling Yangzhou to attract our reinforcements so that they can surround and attack the reinforcements."

"Besiege the point and attack the reinforcements..."

Su Sheng clapped his hands and smiled, "This statement is concise and interesting."

"Then how do you think we should fight this battle?"

"Yangzhou can't give up."

Li Yun said bluntly: "We must not abandon the Jiangdong soldiers in Yangzhou City, so our bottom line in this battle is to keep Yangzhou."

"Everything is carried out with this goal as the center."

At this point, Li Yun continued: "If possible, I want to... occupy the area south of the Huai River and drive all these Qingzhou soldiers back to the north of the Huai River!"

Su Sheng was stunned by these words. He whispered, "If that's the case, I'm afraid I'll have to cripple Zhou Xu."

"It all depends on people."

Li Yun said softly: "Even if we don't fight now, we will have to do this in the future. If we don't defeat the Pinglu Army, we won't even be able to occupy Jiangdong."

Only with the Huai River as the boundary, Li Yun could be said to have truly and completely mastered the south of the Yangtze River, and had the capital to establish a country and live in peace in a corner.

The most difficult part in achieving this goal, of course, is to take back the area between the Yangtze River and the Huai River, namely Huainan Road, from the Pinglu Army.

Su Sheng thought for a moment, then whispered, "No matter what our purpose is, shouldn't we cross the river now and occupy a stronghold in the north? Otherwise, when the Pinglu Army arrives, it will be difficult to cross the river."

"If it's difficult to cross the river, we can go to Yangzhou from Luzhou."

"Yangzhou can be defended for at least three months to six months. General Zhao even said that it can be defended for more than six months. We can't rush this matter. We can't rush it."

He looked at Su Sheng and smiled softly, "Brother Su, General Zhao doesn't have any powerful generals under his command. Isn't Meng Qing's injury healed?"

"Send him to Jiangbei while the blockade of the Pinglu Army is not too strict."

Mr. Li said softly, "Just treat it as such and let him go and broaden his horizons."

Su Sheng smiled when he heard this: "Wherever there is a war, Erlang will send him there. It seems that he really wants to cultivate him."

"It is impossible for us to defend Jiangdong forever."

Li Yun chuckled and said, "When we leave Jiangdong in the future, we will need a brave general who can conquer cities and plunder lands. Meng Qing... has quite some talent." "Okay."

Su Sheng said, "Then I'll write to him right away, but it's settled."

He looked at Li Yun, coughed, and said, "I'm just lending him to Yangzhou temporarily. After this war is over, the child will return to my command."

"If Zhao Cheng wants to ignore him and not return it, Erlang must take charge and get it back for me."

Li Yun shook his head slightly and said, "How could General Zhao do such a thing?"

"you do not know."

Su Sheng said seriously: "Young people like this who are calm and commanding on the battlefield and are both intelligent and brave are popular in any army."

At this point, Young Master Su seemed to have remembered something and sighed, "If my father were still alive, he would probably be happy to adopt him as his adopted son when he saw him."

Li Yun was also a little emotional when he heard this, but in order to ease the atmosphere, he still smiled and said: "I was under the command of the general at the beginning, and the general did not want to recognize me as his adopted son."

Su Sheng glanced at him and said unhappily, "On your first day in the army, you almost beat him up. According to his rules for managing the army, if he didn't like you, he would have taken you out and executed you right then!"

Hearing this, the last bit of smile on Li Yun's face disappeared and he let out a long sigh.

"The great general was burdened by the villain."

“It’s a pity.”

…………

In a blink of an eye, a few days passed and the Pinglu Army's siege of Yangzhou became more and more obvious. At this time, the gates of Yangzhou City had been completely closed.

Xu Ang, who is currently in charge of government affairs in Yangzhou, is walking on the Yangzhou city wall with Zhao Cheng, inspecting the city defenses.

After the two of them walked around, Zhao Cheng clasped his fists towards Xu Ang and said with a smile, "Brother Xu, leave the city defense to me, don't worry about it."

Xu Ang looked at Zhao Cheng, bowed and returned the greeting, saying: "General Li, I also received the letter sent by the envoy. This time the Pinglu army is coming with great force, so the general must be careful."

"If there is anything you need, just send someone to tell Xu. Whatever Xu can get, he will definitely get it for General Li."

After a pause, he said, "Hot oil should be needed to defend the city. If General Li needs it, Xu will collect oil in the city."

Until now, Zhao Cheng's name in Jiangdong is still Li Xiao. He himself does not want to change it, so he has been using it.

Only a few people, such as Li Yun, would call him Zhao Cheng.

Zhao Cheng waved his hand and said with a smile: "Brother Xu, don't worry. This is a big city with solid walls and plenty of food and water. There is no reason why we can't defend it."

Xu Ang nodded silently, and bowed to Zhao Cheng, saying, "In this case, I am relieved."

After saying this, the de facto governor of Yangzhou turned around and walked down the city wall.

Zhao Cheng walked on the tower with his hands behind his back. After a while, Liu Bo came to Zhao Cheng at a trot and said, "General, the nearest army of Pinglu Army is less than 30 miles away from Yangzhou."

"Thirty miles..."

Zhao Cheng pondered for a while, then asked Liu Bo: "Brother Liu, do you know how many people there are?"

Liu Bo shook his head slightly: "I don't know the exact number, but it should be more than a thousand people..."

"That should be the vanguard, coming to Yangzhou City to gather information."

Zhao Cheng said this, waved his hand, and shouted: "Pass my order, all soldiers in the first battalion, assemble at the city gate immediately!"

During this period, Li Yun came to Yangzhou once and reformed the military system and implemented it in Yangzhou.

Now the captain battalions in each army are arranged in order of one, two, three, and four.

The school lieutenant camps under the command of the commander were divided according to the heavenly stems.

For example, the first lieutenant battalion under a battalion is called the Yijia Battalion.

With Zhao Cheng's order, the army quickly understood.

Liu Bo stood in front of Zhao Cheng and couldn't help but whispered, "General Zhao, what the envoy means is that Yangzhou must be stable. If we rashly leave the city, will there be risks?"

"risk?"

Zhao Cheng lowered his head and thought for a while, then he smiled and said, "Brother, you have your Jiusi, and I have my scouts, don't worry, nothing will go wrong."

He stood up and looked outside the city: "This is a great opportunity. If I don't go out and take advantage of it, I've been following you for nothing!"

He strode towards the city gate and said in a dignified voice: "First Battalion, follow me out of the city!"

Upon hearing this, Liu Bo shook his head and smiled bitterly.

My second brother has so many advantages! But you just learned them all...

A word of recklessness!
(End of this chapter)