Lu Yihao shook his head, obviously opposing Emperor Zhao's opinion.

However, this Lu Xianggong was harsh to his subordinates and colleagues, but was obviously accommodating to the emperor. So, probably to save face for Emperor Zhao, Lu Yihao shook his head, turned around and glared at Li Qiong, who had previously taken a clear stand, and scolded him in public:

"Li Qiong, as a general in charge of tens of thousands of troops, when you are about to fight, are you thinking about how you are also from Hebei and how pitiful the people of Hebei are? Are you grateful to this man on behalf of the people of the two rivers? Do you want to send more medicine and weapons to the city?! The morale of 300,000 soldiers, the great grace of the emperor, and the manpower of 500,000 people from Henan and Guanxi, what are they in the eyes of you, the deputy governor?! If you really care about the people of the two rivers, you should rack your brains to think about how to attack the city and how to cut Shi Gao into pieces to deter future generations!"

Li Qiong was frightened for a moment, and hurriedly bowed to Prime Minister Lu, and then knelt down in the direction of Emperor Zhao to apologize.

This time, Zhao Jiu did not have the same rapport with his subjects as he did in front of the military camp. Instead, he simply nodded with his hands behind his back, approving of Lu Yihao's words to Li Qiong and also reprimanding himself: "Li Qiong... Prime Minister Lu's words were a bit excessive, but his meaning was right. There are millions of people in Lianghe, and everyone can have grievances and be bewitched by such people, so that they can appreciate his virtues... Only you, the frontline generals, who are also from Lianghe, have many feelings, but you have to keep them in your hearts... You should never, ever, say those words in public as a general in that situation."

"I am ashamed." Li Qiong became more and more embarrassed.

"Judging from the tone of your words just now, you have communicated with Shi Gao a lot, right?" Zhao Jiu finally turned around.

“Yes, yes…”

"Send him my manifesto." Zhao Jiu responded calmly. "Also, give him the list of sixty or so war criminals I drew up on the way. Also send him the words I discussed with Prime Minister Lu today... Tell him clearly that I am here, but I will never pardon him... Not only that, by noon tomorrow, all those who serve as officers and officials of the pseudo-Jin army in this city will not be pardoned if they do not surrender. As the saying goes, regardless of whether they are Han or Yi, we only judge by obedience and rebellion and by the law!"

Li Qiong nodded in agreement, feeling relieved for a moment. The emperor sent over the "edict of guilt", which, although it said no pardon, was actually a pardon. And since Zhao Jiu had been dealt with, he went straight past him and headed for the central army tent.

There was silence all night, and the next morning, the role of Emperor Zhao and Long Fu finally became apparent.

Just when Li Qiong was hesitating whether he should rush to attack the city in the absence of enough artillery carts if the city still wanted to hold out, in order to prove his and the Eight Character Army's determination, Shi Gao, the governor of Anyi and the governor of Jiezhou of the Jin Kingdom, finally gave up the idea of ​​resistance after reading a series of manuscripts and letters sent by Li Qiong the previous evening, and after seeing the dragon banner and the captured black and white banners in broad daylight, as well as the countless elite soldiers of the imperial camp that arrived with the dragon banner.

Early in the morning, he summoned his student and chief clerk Liang Su, as well as the leaders of the civilians and officers of the provincial army in the city, and asked them to give up resistance, open the city and surrender. He also asked Liang Su to meet with Emperor Zhao and beg him to pardon the innocent people in the city.

In addition, he also asked his son Shi Ju, who had followed him to take office, to visit Li Qiong in person to express his gratitude.

Seeing that Shi Gao decided to surrender, all the officers and civilian leaders in the city were relieved... These people were willing to follow Shi Gao, not because they were loyal to the Jin Dynasty, but because Shi Gao had always been kind to them. They were tied down by Shi Gao himself layer by layer, and even so, they were completely shaken yesterday, and there was already a situation of collusion and loss of control from top to bottom.

Now that Shi Gao was willing to let go, they naturally felt relieved.

Relatively speaking, Liang Su and Shi Ju had similar thoughts...but everything they started from was based entirely on Shi Gao, so they had an extra layer of concern.

"Then Zhao Song... will Emperor Zhao pardon the teacher?" Liang Su looked at him seriously. "Did General Li say anything?"

"No." Shi Gao smiled as he spread his hands behind the county court. "I guess the death penalty is waived, but the punishment is not... But the most embarrassing thing is hard labor in the army. It's not something we haven't done before when the Jin Dynasty first moved south."

"If that's the case." Liang Su was relieved. "I will do it with my teacher... When this matter is settled, I will return to my hometown to study and never take up an official post again."

Shi Gao seemed to be thinking about something, then nodded and smiled: "Yes, I will not serve as an official after I return, and so will my elder brother... We can study peacefully... But no one will kidnap us and force us into hard labor again."

Shi Ju nodded excitedly: "I am not afraid of hard labor!"

Shi Gao nodded slightly to his son, then turned his head and reminded his student sternly: "But Meng Rong (Liang Su's courtesy name), if Emperor Zhao sees that you are young and grants you an official position..."

"I know." Liang Su quickly responded with a smile. "It concerns the life and death of the whole city, and whether our teachers and students should do hard labor... I will not be pedantic."

"Then don't delay." Shi Gao nodded, and then urged the two to hurry up. "The deadline is noon, and I am a criminal... You should hurry up, especially because we are worried that someone in the city will see the dragon flag arrive yesterday and will not be able to hold back and start a fight first, which will cost everyone's lives in vain."

Liang and Shi responded quickly and then left in a hurry.

Just like that, in the morning, they arrived at the camp outside the city. When they heard that the people in the city had surrendered, everyone was naturally excited.

However, when they saw that the people who came to surrender were two young men, although others were fine, Lu Yihao's face immediately became gloomy... Several close ministers, such as Yang Yizhong, Ren Baozhong, Yu Yunwen, Mei Li, etc., also felt a little uncomfortable, and then they all stole glances at Emperor Zhao.

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