Chapter 705: Planning for Hedong

Lv Songli thought for a moment and said, "Dad, we have a chance to take Hedong without a single soldier."

Lv Desheng took a breath for Song Mo, "If we take Hedong, Song Mo will probably have trouble sleeping and eating, right?" You know, Hedong is not far from Chang'an.

Lv Songli smiled softly, "God gives it, so take it."

Lv Desheng nodded, "If you don't take it, you will be blamed."

This time, Pingzhou launched an all-out attack, and Lu Songli was very satisfied with the results achieved.

Dali's army retreated to Hedong, Henei, and Chenliu, obviously to defend Chang'an behind them.

So she didn't plan to attack Chang'an at this time.

First, after fighting for so long, the inventory of military equipment and military supplies has reached the bottom.

Second, it is not the time to attack Chang'an.

If the Pingzhou army attacks Chang'an, Dali will definitely fight to the death and constantly dispatch troops to come to the king. The escalation of the war will become very uncontrollable. This is also what Lu Songli does not want to see.

But now, she has a chance to take Hedong without any effort, so of course she has to work hard.

Chang'an, Imperial Palace

Song Mo has been very upset recently. He wants to protect Xie Zhan, but almost everyone opposes.

Song Mo feels that outsiders do not understand his painstaking efforts to protect Xie Zhan, and spread him as a tyrant who is confused by his ministers.

As cities are lost one after another, Song Mo feels more and more pressure.

But as an emperor, if he can't even protect Xie Zhan, it would be a joke.

But how to protect him, he has not found a way yet.

Pingzhou obviously wants him to execute Xie Zhan, only in this way can Pingzhou be satisfied. This is the first condition, and there may be other conditions in addition.

This is contrary to his original intention.

Upset!

Song Mo stood up and walked out.

Liang An quickly signaled the eunuchs to follow. Recently, the emperor would go to the queen's palace every afternoon to take a look at the eldest prince, and he was used to it.

Five years after the Emperor ascended the throne, the harem gave birth to two sons and two daughters, referring to the ones who survived. The Emperor would occasionally visit them, but recently the Emperor's visits to the eldest prince have become more and more frequent.

When Song Mo arrived at the Queen's Palace, he learned that the Queen was hosting a banquet.

Song Mo found that he didn't know what the Queen was talking to the people inside, and the Queen even drove out her personal maids.

For a moment, he was curious and stopped the maids and eunuchs from reporting, standing outside the door and listening to the corner for a while.

As the chief eunuch in the Queen's Palace, Li Jieying glanced at the Emperor who was standing at the door, and carefully moved his feet to Liang An to greet him.

"What's going on?" Liang An asked him.

"The Queen is talking to Old Lady Xie."

In the palace, Old Lady Xie was asking the Queen to help tell the Emperor to transfer her youngest son Xie Wei back.

Then Song Mo learned that Xie Zhan actually had a twin brother who served in the army?

Suddenly, Song Mo had an idea.

Then he heard that the old lady Xie inside actually wanted to transfer Xie Wei back to Chang'an to be the head of the family.

Is this abandoning the elder to protect the younger?

Stupid!

Song Mo left with a flick of his sleeves, without going in to see the eldest prince.

Liang An hurriedly followed with a group of palace servants.

Li Jieying's eyes flashed, and he felt that it was necessary to write down what happened today and send a letter to Pingzhou.

Bingzhou, Taiyuan

In the tent of the Xianbei king, Tuoba Khan, who was trapped in the besieged city, was puzzled.

How could this happen?

From the time he sent troops south, he planned to rule the Central Plains.

At that time, he saw that the court of Dali was corrupt, the administration was corrupt, and there was no strong army. The Central Plains was in decline, and it was a good time to rule the Central Plains.

But after the battle, he found that the war was too unsuccessful, which was seriously inconsistent with his original expectations.

How to say it, the combat power of Dali was indeed as expected by the Xianbei, vulnerable.

But he didn't expect that a new force in Pingzhou would break his dream of ruling the Central Plains.

Because of Pingzhou, they had almost no achievements.

Most of the cities captured from Dali were taken back by Pingzhou before they could even warm up.

Only the northern border and Liangzhou were still in their hands, but they also lost two large territories of Fuyu and Sushen tribes.

In other words, the wars they fought in the south for several years were in vain. Not to mention that he lost his eldest son and his second son was abolished. If you really count it, this deal is a loss.

Yuchi Rui also felt that "it really shouldn't be like this."

"The internal struggle between Dali and Pingzhou should be beneficial to us Xianbei."

"There is a saying in the Central Plains that you must keep the country stable in order to resist foreign aggression. The Dali court did so."

Tuoba Lian said faintly, "But Pingzhou didn't do that."

Everyone present looked at him expressionlessly.

Tuoba Lian was unaware and was still racking his brains to think of how to describe it. "Pingzhou is the kind of, how should I put it, it hits us Xianbei twice before slapping Dali. The inside and outside are very clear."

Take Pingzhou's full-scale war this time. When dealing with them Xianbei, they used that explosive at every turn, just to kill them. When attacking Dali, they were much more cautious when using explosives.

"Okay, don't say it." Tuoba Khan said, "In short, because of Pingzhou, we Xianbei have not made any progress in the past few years."

Hearing this, the generals present also felt exhausted.

"The current war situation is obvious. Pingzhou is committed to driving us out of the Central Plains."

Everyone nodded. Yes, they occupied Taiyuan and were struggling to hold on.

"Everyone, this Khan will unite with Dali to contain Pingzhou."

"That's totally fine. I guess Dali is also very troubled by Pingzhou now."

"Khan, before that, let's rob Hedong first, shall we?"

At this time, the autumn harvest has been completed and the grain has been stored in the warehouse. It is a good time for them to go south to rob.

"But, Dali has deployed heavy troops in Hedong?"

"What are you afraid of? It's not like we haven't fought against Dali's army before." If Pingzhou is the one who deployed heavy troops, then they Xianbei need to be cautious.

More than half of the members present agreed to rob Hedong.

This year, because Pingzhou unexpectedly sent troops, many of the grain that they Xianbei expected to collect were not received, such as Changshan, Zhaojun, Xinxing, Leping and other places, which were all places where they were preparing to collect autumn grain.

It's a pity that these territories were taken away from them by Pingzhou, and the autumn grain that was expected to be collected naturally had no place to go. Especially in Yanmen, the Xianbei people were still responsible for farming, and this year's autumn grain was cheapened by Pingzhou.

Only in Taiyuan and Hexi, they harvested all the autumn crops as they wished.

The autumn crops harvested in only two places were not enough.

If they did not store more food, they would be seriously short of food in winter.

At this time, the princes and generals in the Xianbei royal tent who were ready to fight did not know that Pei Ji of the Pei family had returned from Pingzhou.

When he went out, he took dozens of family guards with him, and when he came back, he still had a group of guards. It's just that these guards seemed to have more blood and murderous aura.

"The third son is back!"

The people of Hedong were very happy to see Pei Ji.

Recently, the people of Hedong were also very uneasy. The court sent heavy troops to garrison in Hedong, but there were Xianbei in the north and Pingzhou in the south. It was uncertain when the Xianbei army or the Pingzhou army would come.

The Pingzhou army had a good reputation. They never took a needle or thread from the people, nor would they rob food and money. What they feared most was that they didn't know when the Xianbei army would come.

During this period, they were busy with the autumn harvest while paying close attention to the movements of the major families in Hedong. Because if these major families in Hedong leave Hele, it means that they can no longer stay in Hedong.

But now, the Pei family has not left, the Xue family has not left, and the Liu family, the three major families in Hedong have not left. Does it mean that their Hedong is still safe?

Chang'an, the palace

There were only Song Mo and Xie Zhan in the whole hall, and even Liang An retreated to guard the gate.

Song Mo looked at the people of the prince and said coldly, "Xie Zhan, I saved your life, how do you plan to repay me?"

Xie Zhan showed just the right doubts, "My ambition is to emulate Zhuge Wuhou of Shu Han, and work hard for the emperor and Dali until his death."

Hearing this, Song Mo did not comment.

Xie Zhan smiled bitterly and said, "Unfortunately, I may not have this opportunity. Your Majesty, Pingzhou is now powerful, and the power of the noble families should be used. You might as well agree to their requests first and get through this difficult time."

"Among the noble families who are now loyal to me, are there any who secretly defect to Pingzhou?"

"Probably not."

"What about you?"

"In this world, in this court, anyone can defect to Pingzhou, but I can't, and I can't. I have a deep hatred with Lu Songli."

Song Mo knew what he meant by this, and he saw this in him, so he would protect him.

"I want you to swear and promise that you will not attempt to usurp the throne during your lifetime, otherwise, you will not die well and your Xie family will die out."

Xie Zhan swore without hesitation, "I, Xie Zhan, swear to heaven that I will never attempt to usurp the throne during my lifetime, otherwise, I will not die well and my Xie family will die out."

After Xie Zhan swore, he asked a question at the right time, "Your Majesty, I dare to ask, how are you going to protect me?"

"You don't have to worry about that!"

The next day, Song Mo issued an imperial edict, a secret edict.

In the imperial edict, the Minister of the Honglu Temple was ordered to go to Pingzhou to negotiate peace.

The Minister of the Honglu Temple requested the emperor to let the Imperial Censor Zhou Chengzhong go with him, saying that he had worked with Lu Desheng before and had some face.

The corners of Zhou Chengzhong's mouth twitched. Why him? There were so many ministers in the court who had worked with Lu Desheng!