Overlord!

Chapter 142 Yangzhou City Under Control

Although the wealth of the Jiangdong government treasury is not much, it is equivalent to selling ten shi of grain to the county government for each household in Wu County, but this is not much compared to the huge scale of officials and [-] troops in the five Jiangdong counties.

It is enough to supply [-] elite soldiers and [-] civilians for the Northern Expedition across the river.

Basically, as long as there is no large-scale overturning of the army, the loss of food, grass and luggage will be exhausted.Steady and steady fighting is enough to ensure the smooth development of the Northern Expedition.

Sun Ce acted resolutely, and after confirming the important military and political affairs with Zhang Zhao and Zhang Hong, he directly led the elite cavalry north to Dantu County, where the Beifu Army was stationed, across the river from Guangling County in Guangling County.

At the same time, the fleet organized by Zhou Zhang, the captain of the navy, also began to gather here at Guangling Ferry.Prepare to transport people across the river.

Sun Ce has not had time to build Jiangdong's navy. The main problem is that the treasury is stretched.

As Liu Biao and Huang Zu boasted, there are thousands of warships, even if Sun Ce boasted, he would not be able to boast.

After all, building a navy requires building a shipyard, and building a shipyard requires recruiting thousands of shipbuilders and tens of thousands of civilians to transport timber, supplies, tools, etc. for this purpose.

At present, Jiangdong needs to build water conservancy, flatten mountains and cross mountains, and suppress the thieves of the clan, and there are tens of thousands of female workers and captives. There is really no spare capacity to build ships, and only maintain Danyang and Wujun. Hundreds of ships and a few thousand sailors were captured in the three counties of Kuaiji and Kuaiji.

This expenditure is counted among skilled artisans in the same category as craftsmen and female workers.

Anyway, as a prince, money and food are needed everywhere in order to barely maintain the current scale.

Of course, the failure to vigorously build a naval force is also related to the current strategy.

Jiangdong does not intend to attack Liu Biao for the time being, and the navy is useless.

To be able to have the current scale, it is enough to transport troops and supplies.

And just when Sun Ce led Lu Su into the Beifu military camp, preparing to launch the Northern Expedition.

A major event also happened in Luoyang, and it was a major event that completely changed the direction of history.

Cao Cao, the general of Zhendong, entered Luoyang to pay tribute and asked the emperor to move eastward.

But the emperor directly rejected Cao Cao's request, saying that the capital will not be moved to the second place!Now that the emperor and all the officials have returned to Luoyang, they must stabilize the hearts of the people in the world and stop moving the capital.

Although Cao Cao's request to move the capital was also rejected in history, it was rejected by Yang Feng, Dong Cheng and others, and the emperor did not strongly object.He, Cao Cao, was still relying on the food shortage in Luoyang, first let the emperor temporarily go to Luyang, which is closer to Xu County, in order to ensure the food supply, and successfully abducted the emperor.

When Yang Feng reacted and wanted to chase, the emperor had already reached Cao Cao's sphere of influence.

But right now, the emperor himself directly rejected Cao Cao.The emperor said that with the tribute from the three towns in the south of the Yangtze River, Luoyang has barely enough food.

Luoyang, as the capital, was always short of food. An important reason before it was that tens of thousands of troops and tens of thousands of court ladies and eunuchs were stationed inside and outside the palace city.

Today, the emperor's monk, Yang Biao, is working hard to rule. In addition, a large number of court personnel died on the way from Chang'an to the east. In fact, there are only a few hundred people in the court.

When Liu Yao entered Luoyang, he also began to reorganize the army. The troops that had previously belonged to the generals were all integrated.The Three Rivers and Five Schools of the Han court had always adopted a recruitment system. Liu Yao unceremoniously eliminated some old and weak members of the army, and then began to recruit new soldiers.

In Luoyang City, the army returned to the scale of ten thousand people.And it is all supported by the tribute received by the emperor.

This makes Luoyang's grain barely able to support in terms of support.

After all, the current number of personnel has almost dropped to one-tenth of the previous one.

Moreover, it was not only the three towns in the south of the Yangtze River who paid tribute to the emperor. Duan Yan was in Hongnong, Wang Yi was in Hedong, and Zhang Yang was in Hanoi, all of whom would send taxes to Luoyang.

In the eyes of careerists, the big man is indeed falling apart.

But in the eyes of ordinary officials, they are officials of the great Han Dynasty, and countless scholars still regard the imperial court as orthodox.Now that the imperial court is stable, it is natural that Fu should be issued according to the canonical system.

It should be said that most of the county and county officials in the Han Dynasty have no idea of ​​changing the dynasty. From the first year of Chuping to the first year of Jian'an today, the country has only been in chaos for six years.Most people never thought that the Han Dynasty would come to an end, and thought that the country would finally settle down, and perhaps usher in ZTE.

Even Henan County, where Luoyang is located, has begun to regain its vitality. People have returned from Jingzhou one after another, especially some scholars, who have gone to Luoyang to prepare to serve as Sangong's mansion.

With so many forces paying tribute, and several counties in his hands, the emperor needs to support 1 troops, which will not be much more difficult than Sun Ce's raising [-] troops with one Wu county.

Therefore, after being moved by Gao Cheng's return to the mountains and rivers, the emperor gritted his teeth and wanted to compete with Sun Ce, firmly rejected Cao Cao's proposal, and asked Cao Cao why he did not send envoys to pay tribute.

The imperial court appointed him as Fang Mubo to govern Yanzhou.Now that Yanzhou is flat, and he has a good harvest in the fields, why not pay tribute to the emperor?Could it be that Yanzhou is no longer the Yanzhou of the great Han, but the Yanzhou of Cao Cao?

You, Cao Cao, don't follow the system to lose taxes, and separate one side, how can you have any sense of loyalty?Are you a loyal minister of the Han Dynasty?
These accusations are very heavy for any prince at present.

The so-called worshiping the emperor to beg for disobedience.This is the case.

The emperor thinks that you are not a Han subject, but a national thief of the Han Dynasty.

Once the court announced that Cao Cao would quickly fall into a situation where everyone shouted and beat Li Jue and Guo Si.

Although the authority of the emperor has been weakened a lot, in this troubled world, other princes may not immediately send troops to surround Cao Cao.

But if it is true that this kind of reputation is lost, Cao Cao's reputation and situation will plummet.

But the problem now is that the emperor and Cao Cao are fighting wolves with carrying poles, and they are afraid at both ends.

No one dared to force the other too much.

Cao Cao expressed his willingness to pay tribute and sent [-] stones of grain and grass to the emperor.

On the other side, he personally led the army to attack the revolving door pass among the eight passes in Luoyang.

The Revolving Gate Pass is in Chenggao, which is the famous Hulao Pass in the interpretation.

When Cao Cao defeated Bianshui, he took this road, and now he can be regarded as revisiting his old place.

Cao Cao aggressively attacked Luoyang, and the emperor was so frightened that while sending troops to strengthen the defense, he urgently summoned the princes to serve the king.

The envoy who was promoted traveled all over Hongnong, Jingzhou, Nanyang, Hanoi, Hedong and even Shouchun.

Duan Yan was close at hand, and he took the lead in responding. He personally led more than [-] troops from Huayin to march eastward, and wanted to enter Luoyang to help the emperor resist Cao Cao.

However, the emperor had already suffered from the chaos and chaos of the foreign vassals, and he hesitated in the face of the teacher of the king.He asked Duan Yan's troops to march westward, go to Wuguan and join Zhang Xiu, the Jianzhong general in Nanyang, and attack Cao Cao's flank together.

Zhang Xiu was also very afraid that the emperor would liquidate him, so he took the initiative to respond to the emperor and attacked Cao Cao's southern wing with Liu Biao.

It has to be said that the emperor lives in Luoyang, although it is Jiangdong's strategy.But it is indeed in the best interests of Liu Biao.

With Cao Cao's capture of Yingchuan, the borders of Yanzhou Mu Cao Cao and Jingzhou Mu Liubiao were connected together.

Liu Biao had long felt a chill on his back and wanted to attack Cao Cao.

Now that the emperor has summoned him, his first battle with Cao Cao begins immediately.

No matter what Duan Yan scolded behind his back, Liu Biao and Zhang Xiu's calculations, a battle of King Qin started in this mighty situation.

However, Cao Cao was also very shrewd. He failed to close the revolving door guarded by Zhu Hao, so he immediately withdrew his troops and retreated. Regardless of Zhang Yang, Wang Yi and others on the northern wing, he directly drew troops into Yingchuan and stationed troops in Wuyang and Ye County. .

He knew very well that if Zhang Yang and others were short-sighted people, if they were allowed to ignore them, they would just watch from the sidelines after King Qin, and would not dare to go straight to attack Yanzhou.

But Liu Biao, Zhang Xiu and others are outstanding people, and they are really eyeing Yingchuan.

Moreover, Xu County, where Cao Cao's farm is located, is only a few hundred miles away from Nanyang. Once Liu Biao and Zhang Xiu's army invaded Xu County, his foundation would be severely damaged again.

This year's reign name was changed to Jian'an by the Son of Heaven, but the Central Plains is full of uneasiness.

Cao Cao and Liu Biao fought in the west, while Yuan Shu and Liu Bei fought in Huainan.

The former has just begun, while the latter has already been decided.

Yuan Shu was hit head-on, and Liu Bei and Guan Yu commanded an army of [-], which made Yuan Shu panic and dare not look north.

Guan Yu even completely established his reputation as an enemy of ten thousand people, and none of the generals in the Yuan camp dared to compete with him.

So when Sun Ce led his troops into Xuzhou, instead of being angry, Yuan Shu was quite excited, thinking that Sun Ce was leading troops to help him.

But from Liu Bei's point of view, this is really the case.

Yuan Shu's army attacked the west of Guangling County on the west side of the Huai River, and Sun Ce's army came across the river to attack the southeast of Guangling County.

He, Liu Bei, was stationed in Xuyi. On the left, he was attacked by Yuan Shu's [-] troops, and on the right, he was attacked by Sun Ce's [-] elite soldiers.It can be said to be the enemy.

But Sun Ce is not interested in participating in the war between the two of them.

Sun Ce led few soldiers, and even Liu Bei, who was weak in defense, could detect it.

Therefore, after Sun Ce's troops entered Guangling, he had no interest in marching northwest to participate in the pincer attack on Liu Bei. Instead, he gathered his troops and began to storm the counties in the south of Guangling.

Contrary to the fact that the essence of Jiangdong is located in the northern counties, the hinterland of Guangling’s essence is all in the south, especially close to the Yangtze River. From west to east, there are six counties: Tangyi, Yuguo, Jiangdu, Guangling, and Hailing.

After Sun Ce crossed the river, he directly sent his troops to attack Jiangdu County.

Jiangdu is the well-known Yangzhou city in later generations, and it is the main traffic route that controls the entire south of the Yangtze River.

The reason why Sun Ce stormed here was also to control the canal Hangou going north here.

Depart from Jiangdu by boat, go north along Hangou, you can enter Guangling, and then go down the canal to reach Hailing.

It can be said that if Jiangdu is captured, Guangling and Hailing can already be counted as lost.

Xuzhou Mu Taoqian did a lot of good things during his tenure.The canals in Guangling County were dredged by him, and they are now passable.Before Ruo Rong fled to Jiangdong two years ago, he was in charge of water transportation in Guangling County.

In the south of Guangling County, Cao Cao suffered relatively little damage here. When Cao Cao marched eastward, the massacre stopped at Juling, which is the north of Xuyi, where Yuan and Liu confront each other.

After all, Cao Cao only slaughtered a few 10 people. The main direction of his attack was Donghai County, Pengcheng County, and Xiapi County. The population of these three counties was about 150 million.

Xuzhou had a population of 280 million at its peak, and more than [-] people in Guangling County were spared.

However, after the Yellow Turban Rebellion, the Ruo Rong Rebellion, and the southward migration of the population, the total population of Guangling County is now less than 20.

The army was attacking Jiangdu City, and Lu Su and Sun Ce stood under the city to watch the battle. Lu Su praised: "The Beifu army under the general's command is brave and has been trained for a long time. Tens of thousands, but it is difficult to be a member of the Beifu army, and they were captured on the top of the city in just half a day, and the victory of the city is just around the corner."

Sun Ce looked at the soldiers who were fighting bravely on the top of the city. The Beifu army recruited a lot of bravery. Among them, there are like a cloud of fierce generals.

Now it is Dabao Xu Sheng who is the first to attack the city!
Anyone who violates the territory of our Great Wu will be destroyed by Sheng.This sentence made Dabao famous in later generations.

Wearing Xuanjia and holding a steel knife, Xu Sheng is indeed worthy of his reputation, leading the elite Beifu army to beat the defenders to the point of collapse.

There was no Liu Bei's main army in Jiangdu City, and the county magistrate abandoned the city again. Only the county magistrate and the recruited men defended the city.These peasants who had been hastily pulled to the top of the city could not stop Xu Sheng and dozens of professional warriors from rushing left and right, hacking horizontally and vertically.

This is just a senseless massacre.

With a serious face, Sun Ce said, "The Beifu army mostly chooses refugees, so they are fierce and good at fighting. But because of this, I heard that the Beifu army's military discipline has always been corrupt."

This is absolutely intolerable to Sun Ce.

The 2000 members of the Beifu Army were divided into four divisions, which were not under the control of each other.Today's four Sima are Pan Zhang, Xu Sheng, Zhang Nan, and Xiong Xing.

They have been training troops in the north for nearly a year.

It can be said that Sun Ce entrusted the Beifu army to them.

During this year, Sun Ce has been leading the main force of the army in the south, attacking Kuaiji, pacifying Shanyue, and opening up Danyang.

There is no energy to manage the training situation of the Beifu Army.

However, Sun Ce had heard Zhang Zhao and Zhang Hong mention counties and counties several times, saying that the military discipline of the Beifu Army was not good.

Zhang Hong was left in Wujun by Sun Ce to take charge of the military deployment of the five counties in Jiangdong.

So this time, Sun Ce planned to take advantage of the Northern Expedition to rectify the military discipline of the Beifu Army himself.

While Sun Ce was thinking about it, a burst of warm cheers suddenly came from ahead.

I saw that the city gate of Jiangdu had been captured by Xu Sheng, at the opened gate, Jiangdong's elite Beifu army cheered and shouted, holding high banners, and filed in from under the gate.

This city with a population of tens of thousands, and an important place for water transportation in the south of the Yangtze River, is completely open to the east of the river.

Thousands of troops poured into it, and only the young and strong defended city could not resist it at all.

Soon Xu Sheng held a head in his hand, ran up to Sun Ce happily, and said, "General, this is the head of the Shoucheng county magistrate. He doesn't know the general situation. It is clear that the south of Guangling is empty and there is no army, but he recklessly resists. It led to the killing of innocent people. The tyrants in the city killed him and sent them to our army."

These tyrants are not good things either.Repelling all foreign conquerors, seeing that they could not resist, they suddenly turned back.

It is impossible to say that the county magistrate dared to raise troops to resist without the support of Xuzhou's local aristocratic family.

The Xuzhou aristocratic family has the same tradition as before in terms of xenophobia.

However, the importance of winning this water conservancy hub city in the south of the Yangtze River is incomparable to the great cause of the Northern Expedition.

At least the water boats of the Jiangdu clan can greatly help Sun Ce transport grain and grass.

(End of this chapter)