Entrepreneurship in the Late Tang Dynasty

Chapter 236 Xia Qiu
On the twelfth day of the third month of the third year of the Qianfu era, in Xiaqiu, Yanzhou, the sky was clear and cloudless.

An eagle soars through the sky, looking down at the magnificent city that sits on the north bank of a long, winding, silvery river, like a giant spider crouching on its web, waiting for its prey to come to it.

This is Xiaqiu, the capital of Yanzhou and its economic and military center.

In the overall geopolitical structure of the Central Plains, the mountain ranges such as Mount Tai, Mount Lu, and Mount Ni constitute a local uplift of the Central Plains and are the absolute commanding heights of this region.

Among them, Mount Tai forms a north-facing line, Mount Meng forms a middle line, and Mount Ni forms a south-facing line, together forming two horizontal valley passages.

One of them was called the Nimeng Pass, from which troops could be directly deployed to Yizhou and then enter the Huaidong region; the other was called the Culai Pass, from which troops could enter the Laiwu Valley and finally enter Zibo and Qingzhou through the mountain passes.

Xiaqiu, the capital of Yanzhou, was an important city controlling the outermost edge of the Nimeng Pass. From here, it was possible to lock Mount Tai to the north and rely on the Si River to the south to establish Xuzhou.

Thus, Xiaqiu became a crucial battleground for the Central Plains' military campaigns in the southeast.

Two months ago, in the winter of the second year of Qianfu, 40,000 rebel troops, led by Wang Xianzhi and Huang Chao, miraculously broke out of the encirclement and entered Yanzhou.

At that time, Yanzhou was also plagued by locust plagues, and the elite troops who had been tempered in the war for more than two years entered the area and immediately won the overwhelming support of the starving people.

In just two months, the number of members of the Grass Army has grown like a snowball, and even the two commanders, Wang and Huang, are still unable to determine exactly how many people there are.

With the help of these local famine victims, the rebel army successively captured several important cities on the Sishui River, including Qufu and Sishui, and finally opened up the passage into the Nimeng Valley before advancing into Yizhou.

At that time, the Cao army did not realize the geographical importance of Xiaqiu, the capital of Yanzhou. They simply regarded it as the main base of the Tang army in Yanzhou. Therefore, following the principle of taking the easy way out first, they first took Qufu and Sishui, which are located in the northeast direction, upstream of the Sishui River.

Then the problem arose.

Although Qufu and Sishui fell one after another due to internal collusion, most of the elite troops and local tyrants in the cities fled to Xiaqiu, which objectively strengthened Xiaqiu's defenses.

But that wasn't the most fatal thing. Once they occupied Qufu, they suddenly discovered that Xiaqiu's location was like a sharp knife pointed at their back door.

If Xiaqiu is left unchecked, given their strength, they are fully capable of blocking the Cao army's rear when the Cao army launches a full-scale attack on Yizhou.

With Yizhou in front and Xiaqiu behind, the two forces will attack from both sides, and the more than 100,000 rebel troops will be completely blocked on the Nimon Pass.

It was precisely because he foresaw this consequence that Wang Xianzhi ordered his subordinate general Liu Yanzhang, along with his generals Wang Chongyin and Liu Hanhong, to lead 40,000 troops to besiege Xiaqiu.

While it was said to be 40,000 men, no one could say for sure how many soldiers there actually were. In any case, after acquiring many cities and the grain reserves of local tyrants, the rebel army began to recruit displaced people into the army in a steady stream.

Every day, a large number of refugees die in battle, but countless others grow into the core of the bandit army in the fighting, becoming capable of wielding swords and providing fodder for the enemy in battle.

Even so, Xiaqiu on the north bank of the Sishui River still stood firm, and this was the tenth day since the Cao army launched its attack.

……

At this moment, Liu Han Hong, the commander of the grass army who was actually in charge of the siege of Xiaqiu City, was riding a brown warhorse. He looked at the grass army that was once again retreating from the enemy camp, his face expressionless, and then turned his horse around and went back.

Countless battles of this kind have taken place in the past ten days, but now the rebel army has not only failed to breach the city walls, but has not even captured the camps outside the city.

As one of the leading naval forces in the Central Plains, the Yanhai Navy has been renowned for its bravery and skill in battle ever since it was separated from Ziqing Town, especially for its cavalry charges.

Based on these days of probing and observation, Cao Jun roughly learned that there should be about a thousand Yabing (military officers) in the city, then about two thousand Yawai (military officers outside the city), and about the same number of state and county support troops.

This number of troops is not much compared to the huge city of Xiaqiu, but Liu Han Hong did not dare to underestimate them at all, because he knew what kind of skilled warriors were those who could join the Yanzhou guards.

The two provinces of Yan and Yun already had many elite soldiers, and the soldiers of Yan province were selected from among the best, each capable of taking on ten men.

How did Liu Hanhong know this? Because he was a military officer from the Yanzhou system, but not a mere soldier.

It wasn't that he didn't want to, but that he couldn't be selected. And Liu Hanhong was quite brave and strong; otherwise, he wouldn't have been promoted so quickly after joining the bandit army.

Even someone like him wasn't selected as a soldier in Yanzhou at the beginning, which shows how high the quality of the Yanzhou navy was.

To put it simply, the Weibo troops to the north were known as the elite of the land, numbering around eight thousand. However, the Weibo troops were repeatedly defeated by the smaller Yanhai troops during their southward campaigns.

It is precisely because of the existence of such core military force that the defensive layout of Xiaqiu City, although conservative, is very systematic.

The overall terrain of Xiaqiu is low in the west and high in the east, so the entire city is built on a gradually rising terrace, and to its north is the famous Sishui River.

Meanwhile, the Yi River, flowing from Yishan Mountain further east, converges with the Si River, which comes from the north, at the east gate of Xiaqiu. Then, it circles the southeast corner of Xiaqiu and finally flows south into Xuzhou.

Therefore, it was natural that the Sishui and Yishui rivers together formed the Yanzhou Navy's defense lines on the east and south sides.

To the west, there is also a river protecting Xiaqiu, namely the Guang River.

Ultimately, these two rivers encircled three sides of Xiaqiu, forming its natural barrier.

Therefore, naturally, the Cao army's offensive front was reduced to the north, and its city walls were 24 li in circumference and over 10 zhang high, making it easy to defend and difficult to attack.

However, the Yanzhou Navy within the city was not satisfied with this. Although it remained on the defensive, it still built three lines of defense in the north of the city, preparing to resist the large-scale attack of the Cao army step by step.

The reason for this was that the city walls of Xiaqiu were not very sturdy. Due to a lack of maintenance, Xiaqiu, like many other vassal states, had many sections of its walls collapsed, and some of the city gates could not even be closed.

Later, when bandits rose up in the neighboring prefectures of Pu and Cao, the governor of Yanzhou at the time was worried that the civil unrest would spread to his own prefecture. So he withheld a portion of the taxes and levies to specifically fund the repair work. The governor himself even went to the city walls to supervise the work. Finally, the city walls were completed by the end of the year.

Then the rebel army began to enter Yanzhou on a large scale.

It can be said that if it weren't for the old governor's foresight, Yanzhou would have been captured immediately.

Even so, a large number of defensive works on the city walls had not yet been completed. So when they realized that the chances of directly defending the city were slim, the Yanzhou navy chose to set up fortifications outside the city when the enemy troops arrived, defending both inside and outside the city.

Outposts and patrol boats were set up along the Guang River in the west and the Si River in the southeast, while three lines of defense were constructed in the north.

However, during the construction of the third fortification, the overworked governor of Yanzhou died of illness. At that time, the newly appointed governor of Yanzhou had not yet taken office, so the chief secretary Li Xi acted as governor.

The Li family came from a military family. The Li family was the great-grandson of Li Sheng, the Prince of Xiping. His great-grandfather was a meritorious official who could paint portraits for the Lingyan Pavilion and was ranked alongside Emperor Taizong and other old ministers.

Despite his background, Li Xi did not enjoy high prestige in Yanzhou because he lacked both courage and strategy. Although he could speak eloquently about military strategy, he was nothing in the eyes of the lower-level warriors.

His predecessor, the old prefect who died of illness, was surnamed Cui. He was a ruthless man. He had once pushed a military officer to the yamen and beheaded him because the officer failed to report to the yamen. He was a decisive and ruthless person.

But the soldiers believed these things.

In this day and age, to secure the position of governor, one either needs to be ruthless, capable of killing to establish authority without being killed by a mutiny, or possess martial arts skills, strategic acumen, and military achievements that command their respect.

However, apart from his good family background, Li's faction seems to have nothing else to offer, so how can he have any prestige among the soldiers?

For this reason, after Governor Cui's death, the Li faction was unable to push forward the construction of a third line of defense.

According to the original plan, the timber for building the third line of defense was to be used by demolishing houses in several neighborhoods in the north of the city.

These houses and mansions belonged either to local tycoons or to soldiers. They hadn't dared to oppose Governor Cui before, but after Li Xi became the acting governor, they all jumped up in opposition.

The newly empowered Li faction still needed to rely on these people to defend the city, so they dared not offend them.

Therefore, the Li faction opted for a less desirable option: instead of building the third line of defense with wood, they constructed an earthen city.

But at that moment, the grass army arrived in a mighty force. They had only dug half the soil and could barely build a chest-high earthen wall before hastily ending the effort.

However, Li Xi was not just a theorist; coming from a top military family, he possessed sufficient theoretical knowledge of city defense.

He disciplined the city's districts, eliminated spies, set up fences on the streets, and inspected those entering and leaving; then he began to reorganize the military.

At that time, a large number of soldiers and local militias from various prefectures and counties poured into Xiaqiu. Li Xi specially merged them into camps and eventually organized them into two commanderies of yabing (military troops), four commanderies of fanbing (military troops), and four commanderies of prefectural and county troops. In addition, he also trained three thousand brave soldiers to defend the city from the local magnates and militias who poured into the city.

Although such a force was not considered formidable, it was still enough to barely cope with the relentless attacks of the bandit army.

The fact that the Cao army could not break through the first line of defense of the Yan navy even after a ten-day siege by the Cao army is enough to demonstrate the effectiveness of these troops and defense systems.

……

Liu Hanhong, the vote-getter, was well aware of all of these situations.

Liu Hanhong joined Wang Xianzhi at the beginning of this year. At that time, he led about a thousand local militiamen on a mission to annihilate the invading bandit army.

Yes, let Liu Hanhong, who only has a thousand or so soldiers, kill Wang Xianzhi, who has tens of thousands of soldiers.

Therefore, Liu Hanhong did not hesitate to plunder the rear supplies, distribute them to his subordinates, and then lead them to join the bandit commander Wang Xianzhi.

Wang Xianzhi also valued this local military officer highly, so even though Liu Hanhong joined the group late, he still became a commander with independent military power.

Liu Hanhong himself may really be suited for this line of work. In any case, after two months of large-scale troop expansion, Liu Hanhong now has a core army of 4,000 and a following of 15,000, which puts him in the middle tier among many popular generals.

Of course, these figures were compiled by Liu Hanhong when he arrived in Xiaqiu on Wang Xianzhi's orders. Now, after ten days of fierce fighting, many people have died, and many more have been captured. He doesn't know the exact number of people now.

However, he no longer cared much, because in his eyes, even if more refugees were added, they would still be cannon fodder.

These past few days he has personally come to the front lines to observe the battle and see up close how the rebel army attacks the stronghold.

These people charged in a swarm, carrying logs and ladders, but after a few volleys of arrows, they were driven back and routed.

After these people returned, they began to cook rice with a clear conscience, saying that they had fought a hard battle for a long time that day.

Liu Hanhong naturally had his own thoughts about these scoundrels, so he decided to give them a good talking-to.

However, when he shared some of his ideas with other grassroots military leaders, he was met with a lot of ridicule and lack of support.

This was not the first time such a situation had occurred. In fact, although Liu Hanhong was not originally a military officer of the Yanzhou Navy, he was still a member of a legitimate regional military force and had a strong instinct for training troops.

However, training troops requires material support, including weaponry, provisions, capable officers, and a relatively stable training environment so that they are not disturbed by external warfare during training.

But the voters laughed, saying that this kind of training was meaningless because all they needed to do was capture a group of people, fight them a few times, and as long as they survived, they were trained.

At the time, Liu Hanhong was a nobody and didn't say much.

But now, seeing the performance of his own troops, he just wants to ask those who said those things.

You can send them to the battlefield, but how they fight is their business. They fight bad battles and run away at the drop of a hat, and when they do, it's in groups. What are you going to do?
No matter how many battlefields this kind of soldier goes to, he will still be a farmer and will never be able to transform into a warrior.

At this moment, having just returned from the front lines, Liu Hanhong locked himself in his tent and was looking at the information on the rebel leaders, which he had spent money to acquire over the past two months.

There are probably fifty or sixty names in total, all of whom are the current top supporters of the grassroots army.

After reviewing the information in detail, Liu Hanhong couldn't help but feel some concern about Cao Jun's future.

Among all these people, only Shang Rang can be considered knowledgeable.

Shang Rang was the younger brother of Shang Junzhang, the strategist of the Grass Army. He had received a proper education and rose quickly in the Grass Army after joining Wang Xianzhi's uprising with his brother. He was skilled in both literature and martial arts.

Even the Taiping Army and Pinglu Army, who had fought against the rebel army, said that Shang Rang was fierce, intelligent, brave and capable in battle, so his reputation grew day by day.

This person is currently in charge of the war in the Yizhou area and has once again made outstanding military achievements, demonstrating the ability to command independently.

But there was only one such hero who possessed both literary and martial talents; apart from a few who had a rudimentary understanding of literature, almost everyone else was illiterate.

Although these people all held the position of commander of the peasant army, they actually only got the position because of their relationship with Wang Xianzhi. There were not many of them who could truly command tens of thousands of troops in battle.

Liu Hanhong also reviewed the battles fought by the Cao Army over the past two years. Eighty percent of these battles were fought by these people, yet they only accounted for twenty percent of the number of vote commanders. What a small number!

This was actually unavoidable, since most of the current leaders of the bandit group were ruthless salt smugglers who had never led more than ten men before. How could they possibly be competent to manage over ten thousand men at once?
This couldn't help but worry Liu Han Hong. Warfare is all about the ability of generals and commanders. With such an illiterate commander, could the Tang Dynasty really be overthrown?
However, if we set aside these people, Liu Hanhong also discovered an advantage: the lower and middle-ranking officers of the peasant army were not from the miscellaneous troops. Most of these people came from self-cultivating farmers, but lost their homes due to the great disaster.

After joining the rebel army, they learned that the devastating disaster was caused by the imperial court's failure to provide relief, and they began to hate the imperial court.

This group constituted another group within the salt smuggling army. Unlike the cunning and treacherous salt smugglers, these people were genuinely hardworking, young, and full of vigor.

It was precisely these people who grew rapidly through the war and accumulated combat experience through actual combat that enabled the Grass Army to maintain its aggressive offensive.

But can the current situation continue?

With the current tactics of the Cao Jun army, they'll never be able to take down Xiaqiu, not even in a year.

But at that moment, a messenger from the main camp came to find him, saying that General Liu Yanzhang wanted to see him.

Liu Hanhong said, "Understood," then put the book away. He then donned his armor, rode a brown warhorse, and led fifty trusted knights straight to Luqiu, which was encamped ten miles north of the city.

……

Two quarters of an hour later, when Liu Han Hong arrived at the main camp on Chuqiu, he saw that generals from various grass army groups were rushing towards him all the way. Clearly, something must have happened.

When Liu Hanhong entered the camp, he and several familiar soldiers went into the tent and saw a corpse lying inside.

General Liu Yanzhang sat listlessly on a stool, his eyes vacant.

Although he had only been in the bandit army for three months, Liu Hanhong still recognized the corpse, simply because the man was too famous.

He was Liu Yanzhao, the younger brother of Liu Yanzhang. He was an outstanding cavalry general who often led a hundred or so riders to charge into the Tang army's lines. He was a rare cavalry general in the common army.

But how did this man die? Wasn't he supposed to have been transferred to the front lines in Yizhou? Could something terrible have happened in Yizhou?
Many people in the military tent realized this possibility, and their faces turned pale instantly.

Meanwhile, after everyone had arrived, Liu Yanzhang suddenly shouted:
"Zikrjan! The one who killed my brother, Zikrjan!"

None of the people recognized this man, and Liu Yanzhang didn't seem inclined to explain further. Then, while everyone was still in shock and confusion, he held up three fingers and said:
"Three days. I'll only give you three days. After three days, I will break through Xiaqiu and then return to the front lines in Yizhou. If I can break through in three days, I, Liu Yanzhang, will give all of my brother's possessions to that person. But if I can't break through in three days, then don't blame me, old Liu, for disregarding brotherly affection!"

Seeing that everyone was still silent, Liu Yanzhang suddenly roared:
"Did you all hear me clearly on these three days?"

Everyone was startled, terrified by the imposing presence of Wang Xianzhi's top general, and quickly clasped their hands in response:

"Listen clearly!"

Then Liu Yanzhang pointed to Xiaqiu to the south and said fiercely:

"Then why aren't we attacking? Let's go today! Give it a fierce assault, strike hard!"

So the generals dared not say another word, and they all clasped their hands and left the tent. While they were still outside the tent, they could vaguely hear crying coming from inside.

The thought of Liu Yanzhang's ruthlessness and heartlessness sent a chill down everyone's spines, and they all returned to their respective units.

Before long, the various camps of the Grass Army outside Xiaqiu City began to sound horns and drums.

The deep, resonant sound of drums and horns echoed across both banks of the Si River, signaling to everyone that the most brutal war was about to begin.

　Chapter 2 will be released after noon tomorrow.
　　
　
(End of this chapter)