But at this moment, it really doesn’t matter. I’m lucky to be able to come back alive.
Of course, after everyone in the city learned the news that the government was "using thousands of troops as bait to bypass Xiangyang", although they were shocked and felt that someone was being callous, they at least realized that the Song Dynasty had not yet fallen and the city could still be defended, and order in the city was gradually restored...but it was impossible for morale to return to its previous high.
In fact, something happened that night - an officer of Fu Qing's army believed that Emperor Zhao was cold-hearted by nature and had used tens of thousands of people as bait to escape, so he wanted to take advantage of the chaos to lead his troops to abandon the city and surrender to the Jin people.
The matter was discovered by Yang Yizhong, who insisted on working despite being injured, and these people were directly captured in the military quarters. For this reason, Fu Qing went to find Lu Yihao to apologize and plead for mercy.
In response to this, Prime Minister Lu Yihao not only agreed to the plea, but also publicly reprimanded Yang Yizhong for disregarding the overall situation and convicting innocent soldiers based on rumors.
There was a follow-up to this incident. On the second day, these people really escaped when they were taking turns to go up to the city. Fu Qing came to stop them in person, but he only killed half of them. In the end, a few people escaped. After Fu Qing came to apologize again, Lu Yihao praised Fu Qing's position and temporarily promoted Fu Qing to the deputy envoy of the four walls defense of Nanyang Prefecture on the spot. As for the few rebel soldiers who escaped, they did not have a good end either... The Jin army learned from these escaped people that Emperor Zhao had secretly crossed the Chencang Pass and might have fled to Xiangyang without finding the whereabouts of Emperor Zhao Song. It was inevitable that they were furious!
Wanyan Wushu, who was emotionally excited, personally ordered that these people be skinned alive in front of the tent, and then fell into the dilemma that many officials in Nanyang City had expected... He didn't know whether to immediately send a troop to the south to besiege Xiangyang! Or, leave a troop to guard Nanyang, and send the main force to Xiangyang? Chase... It is definitely impossible to catch up?
And two days passed in this chaotic situation... No one knew where Zhao Guan's family was, and no one knew whether Zhao Guan's family was safe.
I must add one more thing here. The Yanling-Changshe battlefield is located in the northeast of Nanyang, just outside the northeast exit of the Nanyang Basin. The straight-line distance from Nanyang to Yanling is about 300 miles. The road is extremely flat. When elite cavalrymen act as messengers, one person rides two horses. If there is no fighting and entanglement, they keep changing horses and can arrive in a day and a half by galloping back and forth.
But that road was too dangerous. If the 800 cavalrymen encountered the Jin army, they would be dead. So Zhao Jiu chose the road that Du Yan came from, which was to first go east through Zhongyang Mountain, walk out of the Nanyang Basin, and then use Xiping as the axis point to bypass the battlefield where the Jin army might exist, and finally go north to bypass Yancheng and go to Yanling.
After this detour, the actual distance expanded to more than four hundred miles.
More than 400 li, combined with Hanli, is about 500 li. Xiahou Yuan once said that he could cover 500 li in three days, but that refers to the extreme rush under the condition of maintaining the organization and combat effectiveness of the army. In fact, Du Yan, a civil servant, rode here regardless of everything, but he only took two and a half days to complete this journey.
Zhao Jiu followed this route. In the afternoon of the first day, he drove away half of the soldiers and rode two horses at a time. In the early morning of the second day, he bypassed Xiping and took the main road. He again left some soldiers behind and selected selected horses. However, he was inevitably a little faster than Xiahou Yuan and Du Yan.
Of course, not much faster.
On the morning of the twelfth day of the first lunar month, Emperor Zhao, with his thigh muscles regenerated and a pair of rubbed thighs, led a few unconscious entourage and less than two hundred knights who had fallen behind, and arrived in front of the Song army camp under the city of Yanling. It had indeed been two and a half days.
But when they got to this point, the situation ahead was unclear, and Zhao Jiu did not rush to the camp. Instead, he ordered the entire army to dismount and rest in the open space south of the camp, using the last bit of dry food and the stream water directly picked up on the road for replenishment.
This action made some of the accompanying knights a little puzzled. The Song army’s camp was right in front of them, so why didn’t they go into the camp to enjoy hot water and hot meals?
Not only that, this strange action also attracted the attention of the scattered troops around and some officers in the camp. Soon, a mixed force of 400 to 500 cavalry and infantry took the initiative to rush out from the camp at the southernmost end of the camp to investigate.
More than a hundred cavalrymen circled far to the west, and the infantry deployed in front of them. Then a general reined in his horse and looked forward, obviously in a posture of guarding against siege.
In the past, the soldiers of the Loyalists, who were actually part of the imperial guard system, would have been unbearable, but now they were exhausted and didn't even have the energy to shout or scold.
After a while, the white-faced general who was leading the team probably noticed the fatigue of the Red Heart Cavalry, so he felt relieved, put his spear in hand, and stepped forward and asked:
"Whose army are you from? Where have you come from?"
"We are the imperial guards, and we come from Nanyang City."
Zhao Jiu swallowed a mouthful of water and sent away the dry fried noodles in his throat, but he tried to raise his voice to answer Liu Yan and others who were looking back at him... After running for two consecutive days and nights, even if he tried hard to hide his fatigue, it was difficult for Zhao Jiu to hide the fact that his voice was a little hoarse. "I am Fan Zongyin, the secretary of the Imperial Secretariat, and beside me is Feng, the chief of the Ministry of Internal Affairs. I have been ordered to come to Yanling to announce the imperial decree."
Upon hearing this, the general first noticed Lan Gui beside Zhao Jiu, then saw the treatment of this troop with multiple horses for each man and the excellent armor and weapons carried by the horses, and then looked at the scholars who were exhausted but could not hide the aura of superiority, and he immediately believed it 60%.
However, this person was always meticulous, so he couldn't help but ask again: "Since you are an angel of the court, why don't you just declare your seal and enter the camp, and recuperate before entering Yanling City, but eat dry food here instead?"
Zhao Jiu gave a half-truthful and straightforward answer: "I have been traveling day and night, and I am covered in dust. I want to rest up, change into my official robes, and then go in, so as not to bring disgrace to the royal family."
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