Chapter 2749 Conquering Twelve Cities
The emperor was already preparing to move camp. Upon hearing the news of Nuosa's death, he sighed slightly and waved his hand, "Let the Mo family bury him with honor."
After that, he asked Gu Zhong to pick out some porcelain and jade to send to the Mo family.
Gold and silver wares can be converted into cash directly, and even though they are not as valuable as porcelain and jade, the emperor does not want to give them away.
Man Bao bowed and said, "Your Majesty, I will take my leave first."
The emperor waved his hand, and when everyone turned around, he called her back, "It's difficult to march in the snow. Can the people in your medical tent hold on?"
Man Bao said, "Since we have already joined the army, we are soldiers. Your Majesty does not need to treat us differently."
The emperor nodded in satisfaction and said with a smile, "With your words, I feel at ease. Even if the snow falls, I can continue my eastern expedition."
Yin Li strode over, and after the others had reported, he pulled aside the curtain and came in, bowing and reporting, "Your Majesty, the fifth batch of grain has arrived."
The emperor's eyes lit up slightly. After calculating the time, he said, "This time, they've been sensible. Have they checked everything?"
Yin Li said: "We have checked everything and there are no major problems." Minor problems are inevitable.
The emperor breathed a sigh of relief. Now that they had enough food and grass, it would be a shame not to take down Goguryeo.
He laughed heartily and said, "Okay, give the order to move camp early tomorrow morning."
"yes."
With Gao Zhi as the vanguard, the Jin army marched straight down and soon gathered in Guonei City.
Because Gao Zhi, Duke Zhao and Ashina cleared the obstacles along the way, the main camp only needed to move eastward. Even the snow did not slow down their speed much, and the group quickly caught up.
When Gao Zhi arrived at the last small town blocking the inner city, the main camp was not far away from them, only about eighty miles away, and could be reached in one day.
This city has become Shangshu Feng's stronghold. Because he didn't know about Gao Zhi's surrender, he thought it was the reinforcements of Goguryeo and was planning to guard the city gate. As a result, he squatted on the city wall to look at the flag. The more he looked at it, the more it looked like the flag of their Great Jin. It seemed that he was not mistaken about the big word "Jin", right?
Gao Zhi didn't know that the city had been occupied by the Jin army, and was planning to send someone to persuade the city lord. As a result, when the two sides met, he also felt that the flag on the opposite wall did not look like their Goguryeo. Ugh, it was from the Jin Dynasty.
The two sides stared at each other, but Minister Feng did not believe them and kept them outside the city until the troops led by Duke Zhao and Ashina arrived, and then he let them in.
As Gao Zhi walked in, he thought that if the gate officers had followed such rules when Ashina pressed the trigger on the city gate, Anshi City would not have been broken.
When the emperor arrived in this small town and saw Shangshu Feng, he almost didn't recognize him.
Not only has he lost a lot of weight, his beard is messy, and even his clothes are smelling.
Upon seeing the emperor, Minister Feng excitedly stepped forward and saluted, "Your Majesty, I am glad to finally see you."
He originally planned to hold out for a few more days after the snow fell, and then withdraw by sea if there was no more news of the army.
He was alone in the deep and slept with his eyes open.
Seeing the emperor at this moment, I felt excited, relieved, and wanted to cry.
The emperor was mostly distressed. He looked carefully at Minister Feng and the generals behind him. He felt so distressed that he took their hands and said, "Thank you for your hard work, my dear ministers."
The king and his ministers were in tears. Not far away, Doctor Zheng was also crying while holding Doctor Lu. In fact, he wanted to hold Zhou Man's hand, after all, she was the chief officer, but there was a difference between men and women.
So he could only hold Doctor Lu and cry in front of Zhou Man. This trip was really too hard for him.
Seeing how thin and out of shape he had become, and the students behind him also looked drastically different, Manbao felt incredibly distressed and quickly asked, "Why are you like this? Did Minister Feng withhold your military rations?"
"That also requires a ration deduction." Doctor Zheng wiped his tears and said, "We are not like you. We are traveling by sea and are alone in deep territory. Apart from the initial supply of food and fodder, we can no longer transport food and fodder in the future."
Manbao nodded to show his understanding. After all, they had few people with them and it would be difficult for them to defend the route along the way. Sending food and fodder would basically be aiding the enemy, so it would be better not to send it.
"So we had to raise food ourselves," Doctor Zheng cried. "At first, it was all right. Minister Feng was very good at attacking cities, and he captured many along the way. Every time he captured a city, he would collect food from the city's warehouses, and then visit some wealthy people and stay with them, and then we would have food."
"But twenty-five days ago, Goguryeo started to get aggressive. Every time we captured a city, they would rather burn all the houses and food in the city before retreating than give us anything."
The following cities were all severely damaged, but except for the city gate which was attacked by them, the rest were attacked by Goguryeo's troops with extremely brutal means.
Before being appointed Shangshu, in order to prevent the Goguryeo people from cutting off his retreat, he had always been friendly to ordinary people and always restrained the army from disturbing the people.
They could gather food and supplies without disturbing the people, so their relationship was pretty good.
But after the Goguryeo people acted like this, it became difficult for them to maintain good relations with ordinary Goguryeo people.
Between the Goguryeo people and his own soldiers, Feng Liang chose his own men without blinking an eye, and directly ordered people to collect food and grass. If they could not collect them, they would rob them. He fought all the way to the Neigu City in such a brutal way.
But the Guonei City was strong, and most of the remaining Goguryeo troops were in the Guonei City. Of course, Feng Liang could not win the battle with only his troops.
So he had no choice but to turn back and seize this small town as a base.
But it was also difficult. The city was so small. When the officials evacuated, they took away what they could take away, and burned down what they couldn't take away. There were not even a few Goguryeo people left in the city.
They could only collect food and fodder, occasionally rob nearby villages and towns, and besiege the domestic city.
Because of food shortages, everyone only eats two meals a day, and each meal is watery, but the amount of exercise is also high. As a result, won’t everyone lose weight?
Manbao and Doctor Lu both looked at him with sympathy, especially Doctor Lu. Zhou Man still needed to go to the battlefield, but he was with the emperor most of the time and was the most relaxed of the three.
Doctor Zheng suffered the most.
Manbao comforted Doctor Zheng and promised, "I'll treat you to steamed buns tonight."
Doctor Zheng paused in his tears, looked up, and asked, "Is it true?"
Manbao nodded.
Seeing that the students behind Doctor Zheng were also swallowing their saliva, he said, "Come together."
They nodded immediately, almost nodding their heads off.
The arrival of the army provided Shangshu Feng with sufficient food and fodder along the way. As soon as the two armies met, they started cooking. The aroma of food wafted everywhere in and outside the small town. Even the people who had been staying at home could not help but go out and look around.
Minister Feng saw this and said, "Your Majesty, these people who remain are all poor people who cannot escape. I have previously plundered some food and grass from them. Now it's snowing. Without food aid, they may not survive this spring."
See you at 6pm
(End of this chapter)
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