Late Tang

Early the next morning, Zheng Jiezhi, the envoy of Duli Town, received a message from the Shamen Town Army, asking him to go to the meeting hall.He finally breathed a sigh of relief when he heard the news. He had been in Duli Town for a whole day, but he was told not to go anywhere except being strictly ordered to stay in the inn.After staying in the inn room for a day, he had already seen that this inn was not an ordinary inn. From the shopkeeper with the scar face, to the lame guy, and the blind waiter, there was no normal person, and they were all disabled people. people.And when these people saw it, they had an aura that was different from that of ordinary shopkeepers.

This is a group of veterans. Although they have retired due to injuries, the smell of blood is still there.He knew that it must be the person who watched him from Shamen Town, so he had to stay in the room honestly all day.

Li Jing saw that his place was on Salmon Island instead of Daxie Island, so he followed a group of armored soldiers with serious faces to Salmon Island by boat early in the morning.Along the way, he observed carefully and found that the wharfs of Daxie Island and Shamen Island were full of ships and countless piles of goods, and a large group of porters were loading the ships.In addition, there are many arrow towers on the pier, especially on the side of Shamen Island. When he landed at the Phoenix Mountain pier, he saw a total of nine towers with a circumference of fifty steps and a height of six feet, which looked like a crown. fortress.Beside the bastions crouching like 36 giant beasts, there are 36 arrow towers that are also six feet high.

He remembered what he had heard before, when Feng Zhang attacked Shamen Town for the first time, he was directly defeated here.At that time, he thought it was a bit too surprising, but now that he actually set foot on this pier, he became less shocked.Such dense fortifications are indeed easy to defend and difficult to attack.

But when he followed the soldiers to the front of Shamen Town, he was even more surprised.

In front of him was a brand new huge castle.The whole town is [-] steps long from north to south, [-] steps from east to west, and [-] steps long in circumference.The entire town is much larger than Daxie Walled City, which is [-] paces in circumference, and not too small compared to Chishan Town and Dengzhou City, which are [-] paces in circumference.

At this time in April, due to Li Jing's massive investment in manpower, material and financial resources, the construction of the entire town has accelerated a lot compared to the original plan.Right now, the entire most critical city wall has been basically completed, the huge six-foot-high wall covered with rammed earth and bricks has been completed, and the entire castle is an enlarged version of a small bastion on the pier.The city wall full of edges and corners is tall and majestic, standing like a huge mountain.

In addition to the towers, turrets, and arrow towers on the city wall that have not yet been built, the city gate urn and the moat ten feet wide and three feet deep have also been dug. It is filled with running water from the foot of Phoenix Mountain.

The [-]-step range outside the moat was completely cleared. There were no forests or mounds of earth, and everything was shoveled into flat ground.With a clear view from the top of the city, it will be very difficult for anyone who wants to sneak close to the city.

Besides, except for a curving [-]-step-wide avenue in front of the four city gates, the rest of the place is covered with sinkholes the size of two-foot-deep washbasins, and there are countless shin-length sharp wooden piles interspersed here and there. .In addition, there are many barbed thorns scattered on the ground. This kind of barbed thorns has four legs about three inches long.Such caltrops were scattered all over the city, together with pits and deer feet, they formed a solid line of defense.Even if soldiers and horses can raid the city, these few things alone can greatly hinder the enemy's footsteps.By the time they take the time to clear this obstacle zone, the defenders on the city will have already prepared for defense.

Stepping over the suspension bridge suspended by the thick iron chains of pigeon eggs, and entering the tall door opening, Zheng Jiezhi kept looking at the door opening of the urn city with his eyes, but saw that besides the two giant iron-clad wooden doors outside, there was actually a huge stone gate inside. , I reckon it can weigh at least a thousand catties. If you don't use oxen and horses, you won't be able to twist the door at all.Moreover, on the walls on both sides of the city gate, there are actually many caves for Tibetan soldiers and shooting holes, and the archers inside can hide and shoot directly.

After entering the gate of Wengcheng, what we faced was a tall city wall. We had to walk a hundred steps eastward to find the real south gate.Zheng Jiezhi looked at the countless protruding edges and corners, and he secretly calculated in his heart that even if Wengcheng was captured, the attacking soldiers would be completely under the full-scale firepower attack of the prismatic city wall within a hundred steps from the gate of the urn to the inner city gate. , which is a dead zone.

The leader who led the way saw him looking left and right, couldn't help but chuckled, and said to him, "Well, this city is magnificent enough!"

"Majestic!" Zheng Jiezhi nodded seriously.Zheng Jiezhi was born in the Zheng family of Xingyang, and he is a direct descendant of one of the five surnames and seven noble families in Shandong. He is over half his life, and he has never been to Chang'an, Luoyang and other places in the world.The city, which is much more majestic than Shamen Town, has been seen widely.Not to mention Luoyang, Chang'an, but Duli Town, which is also a huge city with a population of 20 and a floating population of 40 to 200 throughout the year.Duli Town is much bigger than Shamen Town, but what he praised was from the bottom of his heart.Shamen Town may be a little small, but judging from the defensive performance of this city, it is definitely the largest and the strongest defense among cities of its size.In particular, this is actually a fortress built in four months, which is amazing no matter what.Duli Town was a city that existed for hundreds of years in Goguryeo. Later, after the Tang people occupied it, it was operated for more than [-] years before it reached its current scale.Li Jing built such a castle in April, and Li Jing is only a small general, how can this not be amazing.

Entering the center of the town, in front of the town hall, the blue wolf carved in stone opened its teeth and claws, revealing sharp fangs and sharp claws. The wolf eyes made of glass, with a trace of blood red in the pupils, seemed to be there all the time. Watching everyone who passes under it, the timid ones will feel a huge coercion and shudder.

After passing under the giant wolf, there are several arrow towers in front of it. A row of military policemen wearing black armor but red armbands and writing the word "inner guard" are on guard duty. When passing by, Zheng Jiezhi was strictly blocked behind before being released.

Going forward, there are 99 steps in front of the town general's mansion, and the two sides of the steps are covered with tall soldiers with silver helmets and silver guns.They stood still, motionless as if they were two rows of sculptures.But Zheng Jiemin believed that if this group of guards, who were as immobile as a mountain, moved, they would be like tigers.When he went up the stairs, he had just endured the coercion of the giant wolf, and now he was coerced by this group of sculpture-like guards. Zheng Jiezhi felt his calves were trembling constantly, almost cramp.He thought it was very absurd, and he had seen a lot of strong winds and waves, but today he was really a little out of control and was deterred. This is a kind of fear from the bottom of his heart.

Entering the hall, he saw a crowd of people in the hall at a glance.

The left side is full of bureaucrats wearing hard-horned and spread-winged headdresses and round-neck gowns.

On the right side, there are all tall generals wearing red lacquer mountain armor and red cloaks.

Wen left and Wu right, left superior and right inferior, this position of civil and military surprised him a little.As far as he knows, in today's world, not all feudal towns respect martial arts, and the status of literati is not high.Unexpectedly, the small Shamen town has made great military achievements, but the military generals are still inferior to the literati. This Shamen town really reveals a different mystery everywhere.He raised his eyes and secretly looked at the first seat.

It was a black iron seat, and on the back of the black and blue iron seat, there were nine shining swords stuck upside down in a fan shape, with the sword tips facing upwards, which was very strange.Under the edge of these nine long swords, a young man sat on an iron seat.He is really young, although he is tall and straight, nearly seven feet tall, with sword eyebrows and star eyes, white face and red lips.He wears a scarlet-colored Shanwen battle armor and a long scarlet-colored golden silk cloak. He doesn't wear a headband or a hood, but a purple gold crown with hair tied up, and his hands are resting on the iron seat. A pair of eyes was looking at him with a smile.

Zheng Jiezhi hastily lowered his head, not daring to meet Li Jing's eyes, walked forward a few times, bowed and saluted: "Zheng Jiezhi, the city lord of Duli Town Wang Put, the special envoy Zheng Jiezhi, pays his respects to General Ji Yu, and greets the general on behalf of my city lord."

"Hello, General Zheng!" Li Jing looked down at the silver-haired emissary who was over fifty.He had already obtained all the information about this messenger from Gongsun Lan and Li Wei, and since he hadn't seen him all day yesterday, he was going to let people find out about him.This man is a descendant of the Zheng family in Xingyang, Henan, but he is not the eldest son but the second son, so he was finally arranged to go to Duli Town.He has been in Duli Town for many years, and now he is serving as the deputy city lord of Duli Town. He can be regarded as a person with more authority in Duli Town.This time Duli Town sent him as an envoy, which was considered very sincere.

"General Zheng!" Supervisor Zhang Chengye sat first on the left, above Zhang Hong.He said in that unique slightly shrill voice: "Duli Town wants to cease fighting, but I don't know what kind of conditions you brought. Just say it. If there is no sincerity, there is no need to say it."

Zhang Chengye's aggressive attitude made Zheng Jiezhi frowned.Although I expected that this trip would not be easy, I didn't expect it to be so difficult.He raised his head and said with some doubts: "I don't know who this is?"

"This is the close servant of His Majesty the Emperor of Chang'an. Zhang Chengye Zhang Jianjun, who once served as a small envoy of the Supervisory Academy of Ziqing Town, and his father is Zhang Gong, the regular servant of Chang'an, are now specially sent to Shamen Town to serve as the supervisor of the army." Li Jing replied.

Zheng Jiezhi was even more surprised, Shamen Town is only a small town, and now there is a supervising army.And it's not just an ordinary military supervisor, this young eunuch is actually the adopted son of Zhongchang Shi.He couldn't help feeling headaches, he still underestimated Li Jing when he came here.Li Jing has such a supervising army, so he can reach Tianyan directly.

Zheng Jiezhi bowed to Zhang Chengye again, and then said in a more humble tone: "I am here to invite peace on behalf of Duli Zhente. What happened last time was just a misunderstanding. It was all because of Feng Zhang's false words and deceit, which moved me. The Feng family in the city, they lobbied many representatives in charge, and finally fought the last battle. We were also deceived, but we are willing to make up for our mistakes." Zheng Jiemin said their conditions: "Everyone Lizhen is willing to compensate Shamenzhen and Qingnipu with 20 guan each. In addition, we also hope that we will pay for the redemption of our soldiers captured by the two families, and we will pay [-] guan to redeem all the prisoners. Correspondingly, Duli Town hopes to cease the war with Shamen Town and Qingnipu and restore friendship."

Zhang Chengye cleared his throat, "Daxie Zhai's Deputy Army Envoy, Shamen Township General, Ziqing Town Jiedu Pioneer, Jiedu Yaya, Guerrilla General, Shangqi Duwei General Li Jing, and Qingnipu General Li Lingfu , and our family and everyone have carefully considered the peace terms you proposed, but I regret to tell you that these terms are unacceptable. Please go back and tell Wang Pu that we will give you a chance for a formal decisive battle. Choose a day freely, and the three of us will fight it out."

Zheng Jiezhi was stunned for a moment, he had just put forward his conditions, but the eunuch actually said that they had considered everything, isn't this nonsense.But he didn't dare to accuse them yet, who said he was the one seeking peace now.Swallowing his saliva, Zheng Jiezhi licked his dry lips, "I would like to ask you generals to think about it again. It is not good for anyone to ignite the flames of war. Harmony makes money, and harmony makes money. If the generals don't agree with our conditions, Satisfied, you can also put forward your own requirements. We are easy to discuss, discuss slowly, and in the end we can always seek common ground while reserving differences."

Li Jing smiled, Du Lizhen was as afraid of going to war as he expected.Since they all want peace, then he can't blame himself for asking a hard price.

"My conditions are as follows!" Li Jing said loudly: "All soldiers and horses in Duli Town must return to Datang, declare their allegiance to His Majesty the Emperor of Tang Dynasty, and have to pay taxes to the court in the future. Each family must send a direct descendant The children came to my Shamen Town as hostages. As long as Duli Town is loyal to Datang from now on, their sons will be treated politely and will never be harmed. This is a prerequisite. Only when this condition is met, the next details need to be discussed .”

Zheng Jiezhi was taken aback when he heard this condition. In fact, although the entire Liaodong and Liaoxi are no longer under the control of the court.But in fact, Liaodong and Liaoxi still belong to the territory under the rule of the Tang Dynasty. Up to now, no one in the countries of Bohai Sea and Silla has dared to openly violate this rule.Therefore, in fact, Duli Town was originally under the rule of the Tang Dynasty. It was only because of various special situations in Liaodong that Duli Town has been in the free trade city for a hundred years.Now Li Jing's request to belong to the Tang Dynasty is nothing, it is just to pay some taxes to the imperial court, it is impossible for the imperial court to really reach out to Duli Town.

"Okay, we are willing to accept this."

Hearing this and accepting it, Li Jing instantly smiled like an old fox.

(To be continued)