Chapter 899 Rainy Night
Threads of lightning tore through the dark sky, briefly lighting up the surrounding area, but soon fell into drowsiness again.
Under the gate of Kaiyang City, the heavy rain crackled on the eaves like arrows. Apart from the occasional lightning, the whole world was filled with the sound of thundering rain.
The rainy season has arrived.
Everyone living in Jianghuai is familiar with this.
People born and raised in Si rely on this abundant rainfall to bring about a bumper harvest, but there is one drawback, that is, when the rainy season arrives, all activities will be delayed.
At this time, Kaiyang Ling Chen Ying was standing under the eaves of the gate tower, looking at the majestic rain and couldn't help but frown.
Just look at the heavy rainfall today, which is much more than in previous years, but this is not a good thing.
The plum rain in March is actually called "Peach Blossom Rain", which refers to the heavy rain that falls when the peach blossoms begin to bloom in March.
The real plum rain should be after May, when the yellow plum blossoms are in full bloom.
According to the observations of contemporary people, the size of this peach blossom rain is directly related to the yellow plum rain in May. If the amount of rain in peach blossoms is large, then the amount of rain in Huangmei will be small.
Therefore, there is a proverb in the Jianghuai area that "peach blossoms water during Qingming Festival, and fields crack at Beginning of Summer".
Now that the peach blossom rain is so heavy, the precipitation after the Ear Grain in May will be very worrying.
Mi Fang, the staff member next to Chen Ying, looked at Chen Ying with his brows furrowed and said worriedly:
"Mr. County, are you worried about what will happen next?"
Chen Ying sighed.
He and Mi Fang both belong to the second echelon of Xuzhou's ruling class, and they are related by marriage, so they have been working together in the past few years.
It is precisely because of this that Chen Ying and Mi Fang understand each other's thoughts.
Therefore, Chen Ying did not hide Mi Fang's intention. He looked at the tooth soldiers around him who were all standing far away, and then whispered to Mi Fang:
"Zifang, do you know that I, Xuzhou, can't hold on much longer?"
Mi Fang was startled. After looking around, she cautiously responded:
"Didn't you hear that my brother has gone to Jingzhou to collect grain? Is there something unexpected going on?"
Chen Ying nodded and couldn't help but cursed:
"Liu Jingsheng is still a member of the Han clan, but he only knows how to protect himself when he controls Dazhou. He is really a dolphin."
After that, he told the whole story of the incident.
In fact, this still talks about an internal scandal in Xuzhou.
Last summer, the Central Plains encountered a drought, but Xuzhou was not affected at all because of the plum rain, and it still had a bumper harvest that year.
Last year's bumper harvest could instantly stabilize Xuzhou's floating public sentiment.
Xuzhou has been suffering from wars since Tao Qian's time, and its vitality was severely damaged during the war with the Qingzhou Army. Because the war was burning in Donghai County, the most elite area of Xuzhou, Xuzhou at that time was actually riddled with holes.
Later, after Chen Deng took charge of Xuzhou, he ushered in good harvests for several consecutive years. This undoubtedly greatly enhanced the legitimacy of Chen Deng's position as state herder in an era when divine induction was prevalent.
At the same time, with food in hand, Chen Deng began to vigorously organize and train the new army. By eliminating and absorbing the old Xuzhou Army, he developed his own army from more than 10,000 to 50,000, with two cavalrymen. Thousands, a huge army with three hundred ships.
But there is still a regret, that is, the Danyang soldiers, who were the absolute core of Tao Qian's military force, all ran back to their hometowns because of the emperor and his courtiers.
Therefore, although Xuzhou's military strength during Chen Deng's period was much greater than that during Tao Qian's period, it was not much stronger in terms of absolute combat effectiveness.
It is for this reason that when the two Yuan and Taishan armies were fighting fiercely in Yiluo, Chen Deng was overhauling his internal skills and trying to improve the combat effectiveness of his troops.
Under Chen Deng's training, with sufficient food and troops, and mobilized by the Xuzhou people's spirit of defending Xuzhou soil, the Xuzhou Army's combat effectiveness has been significantly improved.
However, after the Taishan Army went south to the Central Plains and launched a series of offensives in Qingzhou, Chen Deng took command of Pengcheng, and a steady stream of supplies was sent from Xiapi to the Pengcheng front line.
It was at this time that something no one expected happened.
In order to supplement the frontline military rations, Chen Deng ordered the opening of several granaries in Guangling and Xiapi, but problems arose after opening them.
There is no rice in these granaries, only a granary of sand.
Now, things got serious.
Chen Deng was furious and ordered a thorough investigation to get the food back.
However, Chen Deng's Ya soldiers personally went to the local area for interrogation for more than a month, but they only found that the grain had been transported to the Central Plains long ago.
As for how it was sent and which party it was sent to, no matter how the tooth soldiers searched, they couldn't find out.
Even in a certain county in Guangling, the posthouse where the tooth soldiers who were investigating the case caught fire that night, and all the six tooth soldiers and the files previously recorded inside were burned to ashes.
Where is Guangling? That was Chen Deng's base, but on his own territory, such a shocking and major case occurred.
Chen Deng now understood that this major case had already involved a group of powerful figures in Xuzhou.
If it had been in the past, Chen Deng would have investigated it regardless, but now that he was facing a powerful enemy and needed to share the same hatred, he knew that he could not dig deeper.
Once there is no way to survive internally, and they are forced to rebel against the Taishan Army, the gain outweighs the loss.
Therefore, Chen Deng could only find a way to make up for this vacancy. On the one hand, he negotiated with Sun Jian to let Yangzhou also supply part of the military rations to supply himself.
This matter actually made the Yangzhou Army very dissatisfied, because when Chen Deng invited the Yangzhou Army to go north, he mentioned that Xuzhou would be responsible for all military supplies.
But now that they are going back on their word, what does this make the Yangzhou Army think?
Sun Jian was also very angry at the time and went directly to Chen Deng, but I don’t know what the two talked about. Anyway, after returning, Sun Jian agreed to Chen Deng’s request. From then on, the supply and demand of the Yangzhou Army were directly supplied by Yangzhou.
But although no one knows what Sun Jian and Chen Deng talked about, most insiders can still guess that Chen Deng must have promised something big, otherwise Sun Jian would not agree even if he knew the overall situation again.
You must know that a change in the military food supply is not a trivial matter. Eating Xuzhou food in Xuzhou and transporting food from Yangzhou to Pengcheng are two different things.
Just such a change would cause Yangzhou to lose more than twice as much military rations.
But no matter what Chen Deng promised, he still won Sun Jian's understanding.
In addition to doing this, Chen Deng also ordered Mi Zhu to use his connections to buy grain from other states. The most important one was to buy grain from Liu Biao in Jingzhou.
Although Liu Biao has been shrinking in recent years, it is undeniable that Jingzhou has avoided several wars. Except for the previous fight with Yuan Shao, its main body is relatively safe.
Therefore, Liu Biao was not short of food. Chen Deng believed that as long as Liu Biao was not stupid, he would not refuse him.
After all, if Qing Xuyang's side collapses due to lack of food and grass, what good will it do to Liu Biao? No matter how many villages there are, they are only for the Taishan Army. But what should have been a sure thing turned out to be unexpected.
When Mi Zhu's people went to Xiangyang, they met the envoys of the Taishan Army. They were also in Xiangyang.
Chen Deng made a huge misjudgment about the Taishan Army here, that is, he thought that the Taishan Army's purpose and style would never come into contact with Jingzhou.
But Chen Deng didn't know that the Taishan Army not only came to contact Liu Biao, but also received a high-level reception from Liu Biao.
This reversal directly frustrated all Chen Deng's previous plans to buy grain.
Liu Biao showed enthusiasm to the Xuzhou envoy, but after the other party made a request to buy grain, he never said a word of agreement.
In the end, Xuzhou borrowed the Mi family's connections in Jingzhou and purchased a batch from the private sector before going back to deliver the goods.
But in troubled times, where can we still purchase large quantities of food on the market? Therefore, those who were sent back were only used by an army for one day.
However, the envoys from Xuzhou did not gain anything after they returned.
They brought bad news to Chen Deng.
When Jingzhou entertained them, these people spent a lot of money to bribe Cai Mao, a powerful figure in Jingzhou, and from him they learned the reason for Liu Biao's change of attitude.
It turned out that when Zhang Chong led the main force eastward out of the Central Plains, Yu Jin of Chang'an gathered 20,000 troops after integrating the surrendered troops. In addition to the 30,000 troops and horses they brought out during the Western Expedition, the total army was 50,000.
When the world's center of gravity was converging on Pengcheng, Yu Jin launched a series of attacks on the remnants of Dong's party under Zhang Chong's instruction that "it is better to leave the remaining brave men to pursue the poor bandits."
He fought seven battles and seven victories, almost strangling all the Dong family members in Liangzhou.
Later, the Yong and Liang troops invaded Hanzhong, and Zhang Lu of Hanzhong led his troops to surrender. Although there was a slight setback in the later battle with the Yizhou army, he almost regained the western territory for Tai Tai.
It is under this background that everyone in Jingzhou actually understands what the world situation is like.
Faced with the overwhelming momentum of the Taishan Army, who can have the confidence to hold on? What's more, Liu Biao's body did not allow him to fight in the war.
In this way, finding a suitable escape route for himself and his family became the most rational choice.
Even Liu Biao thought this way, what could other families in Jingzhou do?
In fact, they also understand that their era will eventually come to an end. At this time, they are not going to die together, but to preserve their vitality.
Moreover, the Taishan Army's treatment of powerful and aristocratic families is no longer as harsh as it was at the beginning.
The actions against the noble family turned more from personal hatred into a change in the system. What the Taishan Army wants is the land and population in the hands of these aristocratic families, and it is already very gentle to absolutely eliminate the aristocratic families physically.
As time goes by, those aristocratic families are recognizing the reality and changing. In fact, the Taishan Army is also recognizing the reality and changing.
The world has been in chaos for eight years, but people's minds are calm and their minds are at peace.
At the critical moment of unifying the world, Taishan Army needs to seize the opportunity and end the troubled times.
When the hearts of the people returned to the Queen Mother, the Taishan Army did not even need military means to solve the family's problems, only administrative means.
How long will it take for this person to return to his beloved wife?
Zhang Chong and Duman discussed this matter, and their common view at that time was that it would take twenty years.
It will take twenty years to resume production, restore order, and integrate the authority of Da Tai into all aspects of society. After that, things can be calmly dealt with.
This consensus reached by the top brass of the Taishan Army was also spread to the ears of the Jingzhou family through various connections.
It was precisely because they knew that the Taishan Army would not move the family for twenty years that these Jingzhou families finally made up their minds to join the Taishan Army.
In their view, since they can be immobilized for twenty years, there is no chance of extending it for another twenty years. And after forty years, will King Zhang still be on the throne?
In this way, everything is just a tomorrow that will never come.
All this information was told to Mi Fang by Chen Ying. After he finished speaking, the two of them were truly speechless for a long time.
Chen Ying was speechless because he felt tired.
As Chen Deng's younger brother, he should share his brother's worries, but because he is Chen Deng's younger brother, he has a more comprehensive source of information, so he understands how desperate the path his brother has chosen is.
What is the situation of the war at this time?
The elder brother and Sun Jian led a total of 70,000 troops to garrison in Xuzhou, but even before the battle was fought, Pei County, the gateway to Pengcheng, was lost.
And what about Cao Cao in Qingzhou? First he lost Pingyuan, and then he lost Jinan. After retreating again and again, he was afraid that he would have to defect to his brother later.
But what's the use? Although Chen Ying did not have much military experience, he had common sense.
What is common sense? That is, a person cannot fail all the time, and then suddenly succeed at a critical moment.
Let's talk about which of the three Qing, Xu, and Yang families was not defeated by the Taishan Army? Have you ever won against the Taishan Army?
Oh, so Cao Cao won, but didn’t he still lose everything later? Winning first does not count as a win.
Then the three defeated generals united, and they were suddenly able to defeat Taishan's army after the disaster? This goes beyond common sense.
Not to mention, who is responsible for this decisive battle? That's Zhang Chong!
People living in this era, whether they like or hate Zhang Chong, must accept the fact that King Zhang is the sun that dominates their generation!
How does this make Chen Ying confident?
And now it's better. Previously, his boss, Langya Prefect Zang Ba, was surrounded by Guan Yu in Ju County, and then cut off the passage to Mu Shui.
In this situation, Chen Ying could not help much, because although he was Chen Deng's younger brother, Chen Deng emphasized that prime ministers should be appointed from prefectures and counties, and strong generals should be appointed from the ranks.
Therefore, he was sent down by Chen Deng for training very early. Now he is a Kaiyang Order. Although it is an order for a key area, he only has more than a thousand officials under his command. It is absolutely impossible to go out of the city to rescue Zang Ba.
What can he do? Just keep the Kaiyang Order.
But Chen Ying didn't worry too much, because he actually knew that the reinforcements from the East China Sea were already on the way. Since Zang Ba is staying in Ju County, there will definitely be no problem for a while.
Now in the rainy season, those Taishan troops cannot stay outside the city for long.
But for some unknown reason, Chen Ying told Mi Fang so much about the external situation, but he forgot to mention that reinforcements from the East China Sea were already on the way.
This directly caused the silent Mi Fang to make a huge misjudgment, and this misjudgment would also cause the first major change on the Qingxu battlefield.
At this time, Chen Ying knew nothing about it and was still watching the heavy rain under the gate.
You see, the rain tonight is really heavy!