Martial arts mastery? But I'm just a spoiled brat!

The next morning, news of Cao Shaolin, the young marshal of the Cao family, disappearing in Shanxi Province spread rapidly thanks to the Cao family's extensive publicity efforts.

At the same time, the Cao family used this as a pretext to send out their pre-prepared army towards Jin Province.

"So? Will my second brother relinquish his military command or leave the city with his 20,000 soldiers?"

Inside the cultivation room, Yan Qing's cultivation was not interrupted by the start of the war. However, he still took a moment to inquire about the situation during his spare time.

Yesterday, after Yan Qing communicated with Zhang Shaoshuai of Northeast China by telegram, he sent Lan Yue to find his second brother, Yan Xuan, with the seal given to him by his father.

At such a time, all resources within the province must be concentrated.

The army only had 50,000 men in total, and 20,000 of them were in the hands of the second brother, Yan Xuan. Naturally, Yan Xuan would not be allowed to make decisions on his own at this time.

Therefore, the military order was to send Yan Xuan's 20,000 soldiers to the front line. As for Yan Xuan, there was no mandatory requirement in the military order; everything was up to Yan Xuan to decide.

"The second young master had been insisting on coming to see the young master, but after receiving news of the Cao family's military deployment, he felt unwell..."

Lan Yue answered from the side, her face expressionless as she spoke.

"Tsk..."

Yan Qing shook his head slightly and clicked his tongue, then changed the subject and asked another question:

"Besides the 50,000 troops, how many police officers were mobilized in total?"

The Yan family has been entrenched in Shanxi Province for so many years and has so many factories, so they naturally have no shortage of weapons and equipment. Even though Yan Fengqi has taken away the vast majority of the army, he can quickly mobilize manpower from various towns and cities to rebuild a new army.

With ample military supplies, their strength won't be too much different; at least, they'll be perfectly capable of fighting defensive battles.

"A total of 20,000 police officers have been mobilized, which is the limit."

"Not bad. With a total of 70,000 combat troops, they shouldn't be defeated so quickly against the Cao family's 400,000-strong army."

Yan Qing was quite satisfied with this. As the saying goes, "When there are more than ten thousand people, there is no end to the world." Even in modern warfare, a war with so many people would not be easily defeated if the defense were to be on the defensive.

Most importantly, Yan Qing didn't want these people to hold out for too long; he only needed them to provide some resistance.

With 70,000 troops stationed there, and the mountains in Shanxi Province serving as a natural barrier, defense was relatively easy.

"How did the city's residents and merchants react?"

"Everything is under control, there has been no major unrest, and there has been no large-scale exodus of people."

In fact, wars between warlords are relatively restrained in today's society. Most wars do not break out in towns and cities, so ordinary people rarely lose their lives innocently, except for the impact on their livelihoods.

There's no need to flee. Besides, in this day and age, where can you go if you leave your hometown? And where is there no war?

If they stayed in Shanxi Province, although the Yan family's governance was strict, there were many supervisory agencies, and the forced conscription was extremely rare, so it was still much better than other places.

"Okay, go ahead. Proceed according to plan. Let me know immediately if there are any changes."

With everything in place, what followed was no longer of much concern to Yan Qing.

Although his father, Yan Fengqi, had taken away his general Yang Qing, he had left behind other deputy generals.

Therefore, Yan Qing didn't need to worry about how to fight the war; he only needed to grasp the general direction and then sit firmly in the rear.

It didn't even interfere with his daily martial arts training.

Three days passed in the blink of an eye.

In the past three days, the Yan family army and the Cao family army have encountered and fought in many places in the mountainous areas of Shanxi Province.

News of battle losses kept coming back from all sides, but it was only the early stage of the war. The army's morale was at its peak, and it also had a supply advantage. So, although the front-line troops suffered some setbacks, they did not collapse.

"When the losses are too great, abandon the front line and retreat to the second line of defense to continue the defense, and continue the rest as before."

For three days, Yan Qing only gave this one military order, and then left Wanxing and Lanyue to handle various tedious tasks.

Fortunately, his father, Yan Fengqi, had already consolidated his power in Shanxi Province. The entire province had its own team, ensuring basic operations could be maintained in both peacetime and wartime.

That's why Yan Qing had time to continue practicing martial arts in the training room at this time.

"Bang! Bang bang!!"

Inside the training room, Yan Qing's arms were like knives and his legs like axes as he relentlessly pounded the iron man's stake in front of him.

The heavy iron stake began to shake under Yan Qing's constant bombardment.

However, whenever the Iron Man Stake was about to collapse, Yan Qing would change his body shape and angle to continue striking with his palm or leg.

As Yan Qing's palm struck the iron man's post, a crack began to appear on the cast iron man.

Pig iron is hard, but it is also brittle. With the appearance of a crack, each subsequent bombardment by Yan Qing would deepen the crack or cause a new crack to appear.

Baguazhang: Hidden Strength 2496/2500

Baguazhang: Hidden Strength 2497/2500

Baguazhang: Hidden Strength 2498/2500

As the cracks in the Iron Man grew larger and more numerous, and words kept appearing before his eyes, Yan Qing ignored them.

Gradually, as Yan Qing continued to bombard him, his body began to tremble slightly, a result of prolonged high-intensity exercise.

However, Yan Qing only saw the fist, the constantly circulating internal energy, and the bones and muscles that tightened and twisted as the force was exerted.

This time, Yan Qing did not unleash his full power with each punch, but instead used only 70% of his strength each time, allowing the remaining power to accumulate.

"drink!!!"

Just as Yan Qing felt his body was about to reach its limit, he changed his palm into an elbow, and at the same time, he exerted force with his feet. Using this impact, he used his elbow as a spear to forcefully strike the iron man in front of him with the strength he had been accumulating.

Yan Qing's move was the Bajiquan Dingxin Elbow, but unlike before, this move not only contained Ming Jin (manifested strength), but also the An Jin (hidden strength) that he had been accumulating before, which was also poured out with this strike.

"boom!!"

Yan Qing's "Heart-Piercing Elbow" was powerful and fierce, with an explosive burst of hidden force. When the elbow tip made contact with the iron mandrel, the iron mandrel could no longer withstand such a forceful impact and burst open, sending countless iron fragments flying out.

"Da da da~~"

Countless fragments of pig iron fell like rain onto the wall, leaving small pits, but Yan Qing didn't care at all.

At this moment, he had stopped all his movements, and as he stopped, the pores on his entire body opened up.

Instantly, countless drops of sweat and heat gushed out from his open pores, and as he sweated profusely, a cloud of hot mist rose around his body.

Baguazhang: Hidden Strength 2500/2500