Chapter 9 What? We escaped and Chang'an was defended?
At this time, several days had passed since the Mawei Incident.
Li Longji and his son Li Heng had separated at Mawei Slope. Li Longji went south to Shu, while Li Heng decided to go north to Lingwu to proclaim himself emperor and take charge of the overall situation.
At the same time, two swift horses galloped to deliver the battle report from Chang'an City to the Li family father and son. Although the father and son had long since become estranged, after reading the battle report, they both showed identical expressions.
Surprise, annoyance, and regret were the two's instant reactions.
After leaving Mawei Slope, Li Longji was in a state of extreme humiliation and had lost the support of his people. He regretted it so much that he wished he could go back ten days and do everything over again.
I didn’t expect Li Neng to have such talent!
If he had listened to the advice of Li Tan and others and stayed in Chang'an City, he would not have been forced into this situation by these rebels who wanted to seize power!
Maybe he could even capture An Lushan, Shi Siming and other rebels alive, and he would still be the emperor high above everyone else in Chang'an!
"Saint, Chang'an City has not fallen yet. Should we return to the capital?"
Chen Xuanli, the imperial guard general who followed Li Longji to Shu, asked this question.
However, Li Longji thought about it over and over again, hesitated and crumpled the battle report in his hand, and finally shook his head.
No, there are hundreds of thousands of rebels surrounding Chang'an now.
He might be able to raise his arms and reclaim the imperial power if he returned, but what if something went wrong? What if he was torn into pieces by the rebels?
The desire to live and survive had made the seventy-year-old man dare not take any more risks, so in the end, he sighed and continued on his way to Shu.
At the same time, some ministers around Li Heng also made proposals.
"If Your Highness returns to Chang'an and ascends the throne to assume power, morale will surely rise! Once reinforcements arrive, the rebels will be unable to capture Chang'an."
However, Li Heng paced back and forth in confusion, and finally felt that the situation in Chang'an was tense and unclear and too dangerous.
"A son of a wealthy family should not sit in a low hall. Emperor Taizong also decisively withdrew his troops from Goguryeo. Now it is best for me to continue north to Lingwu."
Li Heng did not know that Taizong himself had already known all these words clearly through the sky curtain. Looking at the victory report from Chang'an City, he felt some resentment and dissatisfaction towards his son Li Tan.
At that time, Li Shen went back under the banner of guarding their rear, but who would have thought that he would disregard the order and go back to defend the city?
What did Li Neng mean by this? Was he secretly resisting his own and his father's decision?
Also, as soon as he returned, he defended Chang'an, but he and his father escaped. Where did this put his face?
"This Sanlang is truly unfilial!"
Li Heng scolded seriously.
Being unfilial is a great sin against heaven. Fortunately, at this very moment, Li Shimin's letter was delivered to Li Heng at full speed.
After Li Heng read Li Shimin's heartfelt words about "fatherly love and son's filial piety", he said that he missed his father so much after not seeing him for a few days, and asked him whether he should continue to stay in Chang'an or follow his father. It was obvious that he cared about his father.
Only then did Li Heng's brows relax a little.
“It turns out that Sanlang was just attacked by rebels by chance, and had no choice but to retreat back to Chang’an.
Good, good, my Sanlang is still the filial Sanlang."
Only then did Li Heng feel relieved and continued to head north.
Soon, Li Heng proclaimed himself emperor in Lingwu. At the same time, news came almost simultaneously that Li Longji had appointed his sons as military governors in various places.
Someone in the audience had already told Li Shimin the news that Li Heng was comparable to Taizong. Li Shimin saw it with gnashing teeth and wished he could beat these two unfilial descendants eight hundred times a day!
"He actually dared to compare my conquest of Goguryeo?!"
It has been several days, and Li Shimin is still shocked and angry when he thinks about it!
How can this great-great-grandson have the nerve to do this?
[Our Erfeng failed to conquer Goguryeo because the weather was getting colder at that time, and we wanted to prevent the soldiers from freezing to death or getting frostbite in the north.
So he decided to retreat immediately, a decision that turned out to be a wise one in hindsight.
Even so, they won a great victory with only 20,000 men against an enemy force of 100,000! They even captured more than a dozen cities in one fell swoop.
How can this be called a defeat? This was clearly a great victory, but we just didn't completely wipe out the opponent.
It's like the perfect score for an exam is 100, and you want to get 120 in every subject, but then you accidentally slip up and get only 99!
How shameless must one be to make such an analogy? Is one really as thick-skinned as a city wall?]
What made Li Shimin even more depressed was that while the external rebels were approaching with a large force and were arrogant, Li Heng and Li Longji had started an internal fight?
As soon as one of them became emperor, the other one immediately handed over power to his other sons. What does this mean?
Isn't it obvious that local generals don't know who to listen to?
The father and son fought very excitingly, but Li Shimin continued to defend Chang'an alone, trapped by the enemy.
At this time, Li Heng was still gathering his troops and sent the Shuofang Army to wipe out the remaining rebels in Longxi. Because he was too busy, he ordered Li Shimin to continue guarding Chang'an and wait for reinforcements.
Chang'an City remains an isolated city to this day. During this period, the rebels launched several attacks, but Li Shimin used various strategies to stop them at the gates, and the two armies continued to fight each other.
Under this situation, the biggest problem is not the lack of manpower, but the lack of food and supplies.
As the capital of the Tang Dynasty and the largest international city in the seventh century, Chang'an had a population of one million and consumed a huge amount of food every day.
However, Chang'an City itself did not have so many fields for the local people to eat, and most of the food was transported from Luoyang, Huainan and other places.
Therefore, the besieged Chang'an at this time was equivalent to having its lifeline strangled, and the army's food and grass could not last for a few days.
Fortunately, Li Shimin had already sent Du Fu and others to collect food and fodder. The people in Chang'an were relatively wealthy, and many of them had food stored at home.
The people were unwilling to hand over their grain just like that. Du Fu appealed to their emotions and reason, and went to persuade each neighbor one by one. After several days of talking his mouth off, he finally persuaded the people to hand over their stored grain for military use.
[As expected of Du Fu, his eloquence in poetry is truly remarkable!]
[If it weren't for Li Shimin's advance arrangements, otherwise it would have completely collapsed by now.]
[But is the food we get from the people enough? The landlords still have to have more surplus food!]
This is indeed the truth. Li Shimin unexpectedly discovered that these descendants sometimes looked naive, but they were actually quite smart, and he hit the nail on the head.
How many days will the food the people have be enough to feed the army?
The key lies in the powerful officials, aristocratic families, and royal family members in Chang'an City.
"I went to the princess's residence and tried to get them to donate some food, but I was too insignificant to even enter the door of these dignitaries..."
Du Fu was also powerless to do anything about this.
The rich enjoy wine and meat, while the poor freeze to death on the streets. This is particularly striking and ironic not only in times of peace, but also in times of war.
"Oh, it's because I defended Chang'an so smoothly that these people didn't even have the slightest intuition that their lives were in danger!"
Having said that, Li Shimin really wanted to curse at this descendant of his royal family.
It's already this late, and you're still only concerned about your own little food! Don't you think about the rebels attacking? How can you, the descendants of the Li family, survive?
Another day when I want to beat up my children and grandchildren!
"Prince, what should we do now? Or we can just kill the horse."
"Not yet."
Li Shimin's face turned cold at this time:
"Tonight, you and I will imitate the Wagang and rob the royal family. If they don't give it to us, I will kill a few royal family members to show them!"
"Prince... Prince, please don't..."
These words shocked Cheng Qianli, Du Fu and others.
After all, they are aristocratic families and royal clans, and they have always been closely connected. Killing them would cause big trouble.
Moreover, will he still maintain his reputation as a prince in the future?
However, Li Shimin did not listen and made the decision happily with a wave of his hand.
Li Shimin couldn't even make the decision to kill his own unfilial grandsons?
[Reputation? Our Shimin family is known for its brotherly love, filial piety, and kindness to fathers. This reputation will be passed down through the ages. How could Erfeng care about such a trivial matter?]
[But if that's the case, it'll be even harder for Erfeng to succeed. I truly sympathize with her...]
Just when Li Shimin was about to make a death list of his unfilial grandsons, a servant suddenly came to report that dozens of horse-drawn carriages loaded with grain were parked in front of the Prince's Mansion, followed by dozens of good horses.
Li Shimin was surprised and quickly went out to see. It turned out to be Wang Wei, Jingzhao Wei and others who came to offer grain.
Wang Wei was born into the Wang family of Taiyuan in Hedong, also a prominent family. Recently, he had been running around the city making plans and even writing letters to several aristocratic families in Guanlong asking for food.
Although he only held a fifth-rank official in the court, he was quite famous in Chang'an because of his poetry and literary talent.
Wang Wei stepped forward, saluted Li Shimin, and said:
"Wei is a mere civil official. I wish to kill the bandits, but I lack the strength to do so. After much deliberation, I have no choice but to raise grain for Chang'an to relieve the worries of the prince and the people."
[Wow, it's the great Wang Wei! I can't walk around Chang'an without bumping into poets! There were so many poets in the Tang Dynasty!]
Li Shimin glanced at the sky, then nodded to Wang Wei:
"The Secretary is thoughtful. Food and fodder are indeed my most pressing problem right now."
At this time, Wei Shu, who was from the Jingzhao Wei family, also stepped forward and saluted:
"Now that the nation is facing imminent crisis and Chang'an is still in dire straits, my daughter is constantly urging me to gather food and make preparations as soon as possible and to be frugal in food and clothing.
Today I have collected a thousand dan of grain, hoping it will be of use to the prince."
[This shows that not all aristocratic families are second-generation rich; there are still people who understand reason and justice.]
[I just looked up the Jingzhao Wei family. Wow, they are one of the top families in the Tang Dynasty!
There were more than 20 prime ministers and one empress in the Tang Dynasty.
[Today, the Samsung chaebol is nothing. It can't be compared with the great clans that have existed for more than a thousand years!]
After the fall of Chang'an, Wei Shu refused to serve as an official for the rebels and committed suicide by starvation. This is also quite tragic.
The women of the Wei family were also so sensible and knew right from wrong, so Li Shimin thought highly of them.
After thanking Wei Shu, he was about to leave when he saw the woman in the veil suddenly step forward and speak in a sweet voice:
“Although my daughter is weak, she also hopes to share my worries in Chang’an.
These days, my daughter, my friend, and my brother have gathered together dozens of fine horses, as well as over a hundred kilograms of ironware and cloth, hoping to relieve the prince's urgent needs."
Li Shimin paused when the other party spoke, and when Wei's voice fell, a gust of wind suddenly blew and blew away the woman's veil.
Looking at that familiar face, Li Shimin suddenly took a few steps forward, and for a moment he was stunned and speechless.
Guanyin maid!
Although his facial features had changed, he would never make a mistake based on his eyes and tone of voice!
This is his Guanyin maid!
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