Although it was a new army, Yang Yizhen's troops were not simple.
Powerful crossbows, heavy swords, broadswords, war hammers, axes, and even a lot of iron armor. It can be said that for this reinforcement, Yang Yizhen actually used the authority of the right prime minister and turned the arsenal of Taijing City upside down.
If it weren't for the need to leave necessary supplies for the Taijing Garrison Corps, Yang Yizhen would have dared to requisition every last kitchen knife in the city of Taijing.
After all, as the right prime minister in charge of the national military, Yang Yizhen was very powerful in words, but this was his first time leading an army to war.
Yang Yizhen, who was usually quite confident in his military tactics, thought about it over and over again and decided not to command the troops personally. After all, he had his own skills. Others might not know it, but shouldn't he know it?
So although the nominal commander-in-chief was Yang Yizhen himself, the actual leader of the army was Qin Shou, the deputy commander of the Taijing Garrison Corps, who was also his own man promoted by him.
Even without mentioning anything else, just by looking at his name, one could tell that Deputy Commander Qin Shou was no ordinary person, not even a normal one. He had participated in the Khmer conquest of Xichuan as a lieutenant general. During the brief alliance between the Khmer and Chen dynasties, he had also led troops into the central battlefield, and was said to have made considerable contributions.
"What do you think? Should we send all our troops to reinforce Jingdong directly or divide them up to guard the dam?" Yang Yizhen, riding on his horse, seemed to be thinking seriously for a while and said to Qin Shou.
Qin Shou was speechless for a while.
We have been on the journey for quite some time and are almost at our destination, but I didn't expect that my benefactor is still thinking about this problem.
It seems that the reason why I can't become the right prime minister is because I am too smart?
"En Xiang," Qin Shou said, taking Yang Yizhen's pride into consideration. He organized his words and said, "En Xiang's plan is actually not bad, but there is a prerequisite."
"Oh? What's the premise?"
"If the Qinghe people only have one army besieging the city, then we can send a small force, a few thousand people, to protect the dam, and then the whole army will go straight to Jingdong, and cooperate with Lord Pan Liangyong from inside and outside to kill him.
But the information we received from our scouts is that Qinghe has at least two groups of troops in the direction of Jingdong, one of which is surrounding Jingdong, and the other is coming specifically to stop us."
"At least?"
"Well, at least. Although the scouts only discovered two groups of troops, they saw the flag of Qinghe Bo Lin Hai from afar. I think Lin Hai would not send all his troops out, and would at least leave some behind as his guards. That is probably Qinghe's reserve force, so even though we didn't see that group, we have to include it in the count."
"Well, you are thoughtful. But if there are troops to stop us, why don't they show up?" Yang Yizhen asked the second question.
This problem gave Qin Shou even more headaches. Could it be that this old man was dozing off during the military meetings every night?
But he is obviously the head coach, and he signed and stamped every order he gave, right?
Does that mean you agreed without even reading the content?
If you had known this would happen, you would have given me the seal of the head coach and stayed in Taijing City to enjoy yourself, wouldn’t it?
Going on the expedition would be a waste of military rations.
Oh no, considering this old man's appetite, three portions of military rations would have been wasted.
"Prime Minister, judging from the scouts' report, the enemy should be Qinghe's Third Army, led by Ding Lin." Since his Prime Minister knew nothing, Qin Shou could only start from the beginning.
"Scouts discovered signs of encampments on both sides of our route, at locations suitable for ambushes. It's clear they had planned to launch a surprise attack. However, we didn't split up our forces, but instead marched forward as a whole. They probably decided they couldn't defeat us, so they retreated."
"Oh? You mean the people of Qinghe are afraid of us?" Yang Yizhen looked a little complacent.
This made Qin Shou a little worried, because he didn't think the people of Qinghe would be afraid of the 40,000 new recruits under his command.
"Judging from the number of troops, Qinghe's Third Army is estimated to be only around 10,000. If they want to ambush us, they have to spread out, so they probably don't have the confidence. But as for being afraid, I don't think it's likely. After all, Qinghe's troops are considered elite, and they wouldn't be afraid of fighting."
Qin Shou chose his words as carefully as possible. After all, he had to alert Yang Yizhen, but he also couldn't be accused of "exaggerating the enemy and disrupting our army's morale." This was difficult for him as a military general.
Fortunately, as a senior bureaucrat, although Yang Yizhen was not good at fighting, he was very good at listening to the hidden meaning behind other people's words.
Sure enough, Yang Yizhen's expression changed slightly, then he nodded heavily and said, "Then I'll leave it all to you. Speaking of attacking Qinghe, you should be considered familiar with it, hahahahahaha."
"Your Excellency is right," Qin Shou said with a bow.
When Yang Yizhen gathered his trusted generals and asked who was willing to lead the army to war, all the generals hesitated and refused to speak. In the end, it was he who stepped forward and expressed his willingness to give it a try.
It was simply because when Cambodia and the Chen Dynasty formed an alliance, he was the one who fought in Qinghe County next to the central battlefield.
Although the defenders of Qinghe were only a few hundred at the time, and they were all temporarily conscripted civilians, he did conquer it after all, right?
It is said that the current Qinghe was established by the survivors of Qinghe County back then, so I should have some psychological advantage over them.
But it’s better not to let them know that you have been to the former Qinghe County.
Qin Shou thought so.
Although he had deliberately massacred the city just to intensify the war between Liang and Chen, and in this world, massacring a few cities was not a big deal.
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