Li Ruzhang's side was settled smoothly. On the other side, Du Tong's side was also settled smoothly.
Just as Ma Wei had guessed, Du Tong had no intention of fighting desperately. When the troops were halfway through, it was freezing cold and the river was frozen. Moreover, there was a food problem in the rear. Du Tong took the opportunity to stop marching and planned to go back to check the situation. However, he was stopped by the military supervisor.
The military supervisor insisted that Du Tong speed up the march. Du Tong was annoyed and directly ordered his guards to tie up the military supervisor. Then he ordered the troops to stop marching and went back to check the situation.
Naturally, it was the White Pole Army that caused the food problem. After receiving Ma Wei's order, Ma Qiancheng and Qin Liangyu immediately went to work. They divided into two groups and crossed the mountains to carry out their own tasks. They carried out their tasks perfectly. They facilitated the mutiny of the Ningxia soldiers and also facilitated the opportunity for Du Tong to surrender.
After hearing that Li Ruzhang had surrendered, Du Tong pretended to be in a dilemma and thought about it for an hour. Then he made the difficult decision to surrender and join the big family of the Zhennan Army to contribute his strength to the Northern Expedition. The 30,000 Guyuan soldiers didn't need to be reorganized. They just turned around and went back.
They would take Tianshui and open up the situation for the army. Then they would go to Guyuan.
As the commander-in-chief of Guyuan, Du Tong was very familiar with this road and led the way smoothly. Liu Gu didn't encounter any obstacles along the way. After walking for more than ten days, they arrived at Tianshui City and successfully occupied Tianshui City.
It was already the tenth of the twelfth lunar month. On the same day, Ma Wei and Wang Hui led the army and arrived at Da Shan Guan. Da Shan Guan surrendered without a fight and gave up the city. Li Ruzhang's side was almost the same. Mei County was not prepared for Li Ruzhang's sudden return and was easily conquered by him. When Deng Zilong led the army out of the Praise Valley Path, hot rice and soup were already prepared.
The main force of Li Wennan's 100,000 troops had all surrendered to the Zhennan Army. They turned around and fiercely fought back. More than half of the elite troops from the four northwestern towns were gathered here, and the rest were scattered all over the place. Moreover, they had lost the unified command of the three governors, so the local Inspector-Generals were defenseless and could only fight on their own.
The first to bear the brunt was the unlucky Liu Guangguo. Without Li Wen at the front, he did not have many troops to mobilize, and most of them were concentrated in Mei County to transport food for Li Ruzhang. As a result, he was easily taken in by Li Ruzhang, and he was almost a commander without an army.
After Li Ruzhang took over Mei County, he waited for Deng Zilong to arrive. Then, he discussed with Deng Zilong how to advance his troops. In the end, they decided to divide their troops into two groups and advance together.
Li Ruzhang led his troops to attack Fufeng, Wugong, Xingping, and Xianyang, and then prepared to attack Xi 'an. Deng Zilong advanced eastward along the Weishui River, attacked Zhouzhi County, and then went straight to Xi' an. At the same time, he also asked Li Ruzhang to send elite cavalry to take a detour and attack Tongguan. He wanted to block Liu Guangguo and Tan Xisi, the masters of escape, so that they could not escape from Tongguan.
Li Ruzhang obeyed the order and made rapid progress. No one could stop him along the way. Deng Zilong's attack was even faster because there were no obstacles along the way. He advanced eastward along the Weishui River, and there was not even an army to stop him. Only the people living along the coast were surprised to see this large but well-organized army.
Liu Gu was bored in Lueyang. He did not fight a single battle and did not make any contributions. After arriving at Tianshui, he immediately decided to attack fiercely. He also advanced in two groups with Du Tong. Du Tong took the route of Zhuang Lang and Longde, and then entered Guyuan Town, while he took the route of Qingshui, Huating, and Pingliang Prefecture, and then entered Guyuan Town.
All in all, after destroying this military hub in the northwest, the conquest of the northwest was basically completed. The rest was just to be handed over to Liu Gu.
Of course, there was another problem, which was Da Yun's Gansu Town. Da Yun had been called to the capital to be in charge of the defense. Now there was only the Inspector-General of Gansu Town. If they wanted to take it down, they might have to go through a lot of trouble.
However, Liu Da was very happy, because it meant that they could go to war. Following Du Tong to attack Guyuan Town was almost a smooth journey, and no one would resist. After all, Du Tong was the commander of Guyuan Town. However, attacking Gansu was different, and they might encounter resistance.
But it did not matter. Gansu Town had no source of food. What else could they do but surrender? Starve to death?
Liu Gu was very proud of himself.
On the other side, after Ma Wei and Wang Hui's army left Dasan Pass and captured Baoji, they would march to Fengxiang Prefecture. Then, they would also advance eastward toward Xi 'an Prefecture. They would meet up with Li Ruzhang and Deng Zilong to discuss the next step.
As for Ningxia Town and Yulin Town, Niu Bingzhong and Li Ruzhang would have to worry about them. Zhu Zhengse, the Inspector-General of Ningxia, did not seem to dislike Xiao Ruxun. It seemed that they could still fight for him. But Wang Jianjia, the Inspector-General of Yan Sui Prefecture, might need to go through some trouble.
But it did not matter. At worst, they would have to fight with him, or they could use mutiny to get rid of him. Anyway, it had been like this several times before.
After getting rid of the Inspector-General, the towns would be stabilized. After arranging the defense of the border, everything would go on as usual. Ma Wei and Wang Hui could lead the army eastward to Datong, Shanxi. After passing through Zijing Pass, they would enter the Gyeonggi region. After passing through Shanxi and Datong, where the Northern Barbarians were wreaking havoc, there would be no place that could stop them. They just needed to keep moving forward.
The entire strategy was clear. The Great Northwest and Guanzhong were already in the bag, and any resistance was nothing more than a mantis trying to stop a chariot. The powerful army would roll over them majestically, and anything in their way would be crushed to pieces.
Of course, it wasn't that there weren't any mantises willing to resist. Li Ruzhang and Deng Zilong had both encountered mantises who were willing to resist, shouting at the top of their lungs, saying that they were disloyal and unjust, that they were rebels, and that they wanted to execute them on behalf of the imperial court. But no matter how loud their slogans were, their strength was truly negligible. It could be seen that it had always been their tradition to use words more than guns.
Unfortunately, on the battlefield, words really weren't as useful as guns. Zhuge Kongming hadn't been able to curse Wang Situ to death, and he was living well. He was a high-ranking official with a generous salary, ate well, and was in excellent health. After Cao Rui succeeded to the throne, he died of old age and was conferred the title of Marquis of Lanling. His daughter married Sima Zhao and gave birth to Sima Yan.
Yes, the emperor's maternal grandfather.
From this, it could be seen that words didn't seem to be of much use.
Fortunately, the generals and even the scholars under Xiao Ruxun were well aware of this, so they all had their feet on the ground and were clearly much more useful than those who only had words but no action.
Otherwise, his one hundred thousand troops wouldn't have been able to conquer more than half of the Daming Dynasty. Now that a two-pronged attack had taken shape, the most elite troops of the Daming Dynasty would soon gather at the gates of the capital to present Shen Yicheng with the gift of a long-awaited reunion.
To tell the truth, Xiao Ruxun very much wanted to know what it would be like when he came face-to-face with Shen Yicheng again.
Speaking of which, Xiao Ruxun had only met Shen Yicheng a few times before he had launched his mutiny, and they had even been very friendly colleagues. However, it was very clear that the Great Master, who had been a Jinshi of the Hanlin Academy, disdained to associate with a Qiu Ba like him, so he had used the power of other Qiu Ba to drive him away.
Fortunately, he had been lucky enough to run into Liu Huangshang who had been willing to help him. Otherwise, he really would have died in the capital.
Since he hadn't died, Xiao Ruxun naturally had to prepare a generous gift for Shen Yicheng. Otherwise, how could he be worthy of Shen Yicheng's deep affection?
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