"Are these the mirrors and cups that the barbarians brought?" A middle-aged man with a long beard was playing with a glass cup. There was a silver mirror on the table next to him.
"Yes, Sir."
"I don't quite believe that those barbarians could come up with these things," the middle-aged man said doubtfully.
"They belong to Sir now."
"Hmm, not bad. Are there any other gains? "
"There are 270,000 taels of silver. There are 17 mirrors and 42 cups like this … "
"Send them to the treasury." The middle-aged man smiled. According to the prices that the aboriginals had been selling these things for, they were worth another 700,000 taels. In total, there was a million taels of silver, which could be used to equip at least 20,000 soldiers.
"Sir, will those barbarians take revenge?"
"What's there to be afraid of? They can't even take care of themselves right now. If they are not careful, they might even destroy the country. Furthermore, the order has been given to dispatch troops within the next few days. Our city will also dispatch 10,000 soldiers. "The middle-aged man waved his hand nonchalantly. With this million taels of silver, even if the 10,000 soldiers were to be lost, they could easily be replenished.
"I see. If Great Xia and the Yun Nation join forces to attack, I'm afraid those barbarians won't be able to hold on for long!" the subordinate exclaimed.
…
Boom!
At night, an explosion suddenly occurred in a certain area of the Great Xia camp. Some of the surrounding tents were directly torn open. Some of the soldiers in the tents had already died in their sleep. Some of the injured were awakened from their sleep and groaned in pain after feeling the severe pain.
The soldiers in the surrounding tents hurriedly ran out and helped to drag the corpses away. They then carried the injured to the casualty barracks before rushing back to their tents to get dressed and lie down. However, before they could fall asleep, they heard another explosion in the distance.
However, these soldiers acted as if they hadn't heard it and went back to sleep.
At first, they were nervous, but after a long time, they got used to it. Over the past few days, there would be several explosions every night. They would go out to take a look if they were nearby and pretend that they didn't hear anything if they were further away. They slept and dreamed.
Wu Shenghou walked out of his tent with an ugly expression in the early morning.
Wu Shenghou's expression hadn't been good for the past few days.
Sullen!
He had been in the army for decades and had never fought such a sullen battle.
He had known for a long time that it would be difficult to fight Dayao and had even planned for it for 20 years.
How many twenty years does a man have in his life? He had planned for an uncertain event for twenty years. From this, one could see his temperament.
No matter how strong the ancient race was, he was prepared and confident that he would be able to obtain victory in this war.
As long as time dragged on, the aboriginals would lose all their land in the north, the Yun Nation would send out their troops, the south would rebel, and Great Xia would send new recruits to the frontlines. That would be the time when the aboriginal barbarians would be chased back to the mountains.
The development of the war from the beginning was indeed within his expectations.
However, in the past 20 days, everything had changed.
It was unknown where the other party had gotten his hands on some completely unfamiliar weapons, but they were rather powerful, especially when used against ordinary soldiers on the battlefield.
A small object thrown on the side of the road that no one would notice could cause hundreds or even dozens of casualties.
In the beginning, he thought that the other party did not have much and would soon run out of them. However, the other party seemed to have an endless supply of items. He used one after another, changing his style from time to time.
On the battlefield, in the barracks, regardless of whether it was day or night, thunderous explosions could always be heard. Whether it was on the battlefield or when they were resting, or when they were fetching water for cooking, they would encounter such explosions from time to time. Over the past few days, everyone in the barracks was filled with tension.
This was especially true during the attack. Recently, the other party would always throw a small exploding ball after the number of troops had reached a certain level. This would interrupt the subsequent attacks and then kill all the soldiers at the frontlines before the reinforcements could arrive.
Over the past few days, the attacks were not effective at all. The number of casualties on his side was increasing, but the casualties of the other party were decreasing.
Now, every time he heard those explosions during an attack, he knew that the rhythm of the siege had been disrupted again.
He no longer had the fluency that he used to have when he commanded the troops to attack.
His attacking rhythm was interrupted every now and then, causing him to feel irritated and suffocated.
On this battlefield, the morale of the army was getting lower and lower, which was also something that worried him.
If the other party did not have those strange weapons, even if the attack was temporarily thwarted, the morale would not have dropped so quickly.
But now, they had to be careful when they walked and had to look up at the sky when they attacked. Even many of the soldiers had begun to feel at a loss.
The reason why he was persevering now was to at least achieve the strategic intention of this war. He had to wait for the two armies that had penetrated deep into Dayao to achieve the desired goal.
At the same time, he was unwilling to admit defeat and wanted to see how many more of those strange weapons the other party had.
He didn't believe that the other party would never run out of them.
…
Wu Shenghou was in a bad mood, but Ren Baqian was in a good mood.
Every night, he would plant a few mines outside and fire two cannons at the enemy's barracks from the top of the city wall. Seeing how the Great Xia soldiers would lower their heads and raise their heads every day when they went out to battle, Ren Baqian felt satisfied.
Especially now, the soldiers in the city almost regarded him as a god.
Even though his individual strength wasn't strong, those messy weapons of his had indeed been very useful during the defense of the city.
At present, there were still 80,000 Great Xia soldiers who could fight outside the city. Under the situation where half of their soldiers were injured or dead, the Great Xia soldiers still had no intention of retreating. Ren Baqian felt that they would not give up until they saw the end of the road.
The situation inside the city wasn't too good. After sending out 300 winged cavalry warriors to intercept the other party's supply team, there were still 800 winged cavalry warriors and 3,000 soldiers left in the city. There were only 3,800 soldiers in total. Some of the commoners who had participated in the defense before the empress arrived had been mobilized to go up the city wall to assist.
However, Ren Baqian wasn't too worried. These commoners had been tempered by the flames of war and only lacked some military knowledge to become a new force. Whether it was in terms of strength or individual bravery, they weren't inferior to the army.
In addition, there were two other Great Xia armies wreaking havoc within the borders of Dayao. One of them only had about 80,000 soldiers. When Ren Baqian first arrived in Liao City, he had already destroyed many strongholds. It wasn't until all the strongholds gathered in the city that the casualties started to decrease.
However, in addition to that army, there was another 100,000 soldiers doing the same thing. After not having any gains in the wilderness, these two armies had already begun to attack the cities. Recently, two cities had already been breached.
There were many casualties in the cities, but the casualties of those two armies weren't light either.
According to Ren Baqian's plan, after deploying over 3,000 soldiers to guard the city and forming a militia, it would be difficult for them to form a fighting force in a short period of time. Even if their individual strength was much higher than that of the Great Xia soldiers, they still couldn't avoid the fate of breaching the city walls.
In the past few days, three cities had already been breached, and the casualties were no less than 40,000.
It had to be said that the individual combat strength of the aboriginal commoners was enough to be proud of the fact that a group of militia and commoners caused 60,000 casualties in the face of the elite Great Xia soldiers.
This was also the reason why Great Xia couldn't pursue and kill those commoners who escaped after the city was breached. The losses were too great.
At the same time, 3,500 soldiers were on standby, ready to rendezvous with the reinforcements from the Protectorate of the South and give the 120,000 Great Xia soldiers a fatal blow.
The reinforcements would be able to rendezvous with the 3,500 soldiers in seven days. 85,000 against 120,000.
Even if Great Xia won, the remaining soldiers wouldn't be able to do anything other than withdraw.
Furthermore, Great Xia might not necessarily win.
Ren Baqian strolled to the side hall of the city commander's residence. The two radio stations were there, and the other radio station had been taken away by the winged cavalry that went out to intercept the Great Xia soldiers.
"Any news?" Ren Baqian went in and asked.
"Not yet." The empress and Li Qianqiu's guards were in charge of the operator in the side hall.
Ren Baqian nodded. Just as he was about to turn around and leave, he heard a rustling sound coming from the radio station. Following which, a voice said, "This is the Protectorate of the Northeast. Is Principal Ren around?"
"Looking for me?" Ren Baqian was slightly puzzled. He walked back to the radio station and asked, "Yes, I am. What's the matter?"
"Sir, I'm Tang Feng." The person in front of the radio station had changed.
"Aren't you in Great Xia? I was still wondering if you had made it back. I didn't expect you to be in the Protectorate of the Northeast. "
Ren Baqian was telling the truth. He had really thought about the situation with the caravan, but unfortunately, it was difficult to transmit messages. At that time, he hadn't brought back the radio station. Although the yabao could be used, it was expensive and was only used to transmit messages between cities. Later on, he could only hope that they were lucky enough to return safely with his money.
Now that the supply of medicinal herbs had been cut off, the empress was bankrupt, and her treasury was only left with the money to maintain the palace and the guards.
"Sir, not only am I back, but even Old Gu is back. However, he is still bedridden. I'm afraid he won't be able to wake up for at least half a month," Tang Feng said.
Ren Baqian frowned. Old Gu was Gu Ziheng, and he should be in Yun City now. Even he had gone to the Protectorate of the Northeast. What had happened?
One had to know that after the war with Great Xia, he knew that his mirror and glass cup were no longer in Great Xia. He only hoped that the Yun Nation would bring him some silver taels.
One had to know that without money, there would be no medicine. Without medicine, he wouldn't be able to level up. If he couldn't level up, he wouldn't be able to marry the empress. If he couldn't marry the empress, it would be more serious. Was he supposed to become a great sorcerer?
"Sir, I didn't even bring the money back. It was robbed … I only brought back 2,000 taels of gold from Great Xia. The rest were robbed. Old Gu was slightly better than me and barely managed to escape with 5,000 taels of gold. The rest of the goods and silver were robbed by Warlord Qingfeng."
Ren Baqian's eyes widened when he heard this.
He was counting on this money to train, and now it was actually robbed?
The metal chain crawled out from his head, slithered to the ground, wrapped around the stool next to him, and then raised it up high.
Everyone in the side hall couldn't be bothered to look at Ren Baqian's emoticons anymore. All of them were looking at the metal chain swaggering around the stool and exclaiming in admiration.
"How much was robbed?" Ren Baqian squeezed out a few words from between his teeth. He didn't care about the money that wasn't sold, but the money that was sold was his hard-earned money!
It was actually robbed? This was intolerable!
"About 500,000 taels." Tang Feng said a number that made everyone shudder with fear.
This was one-fourteenth of Dayao's annual income and the empress's income for four years.
"Say it again, who robbed it?" Ren Baqian gritted his teeth and asked.
"I escaped from Great Xia's Juruo City, and the one who robbed it was the military there. Old Gu escaped from Yun Guoqing's Feng City, and the one who robbed it was the warlord of Qingfeng City."
After hearing this, Ren Baqian turned around and walked away, dragging a stool behind him. The sound of the stool bumping against the ground didn't attract Ren Baqian's attention at all.
"Your Majesty, your money has been robbed!"
The empress, who was watching a television series and eating popcorn, raised her head and was somewhat puzzled.
"A total of 1,000,000 taels!" Ren Baqian stretched out a finger.
The empress's eyes widened all of a sudden.
"It's those mirrors and glasses that I asked the caravan to bring over previously. I wanted to sell them to replenish the imperial treasury. A total of 1,000,000 taels were robbed by the warlord of Yun Guoqing!"
"Boom!" The table in front of the empress was smashed into pieces.
"Great Xia also robbed a portion of it."
However, the empress obviously didn't notice his last sentence. Her attention was completely attracted by the words "1,000,000 taels to replenish the imperial treasury" and "warlord of Qingfeng City."
"He actually dared to …" The empress's hair stood on end as she spat out each word through gritted teeth.
"Your Majesty, it seems like the Yun Nation is going to send troops!" Ren Baqian first talked about serious matters. From this incident, it could be seen that the Yun Nation had already made up its mind. Otherwise, how could a warlord be so bold?
The empress calmed down after hearing this, but it was still difficult to quell the anger in her heart. She had always been the one robbing others, but today, she was actually being robbed? And it was even 1,000,000 taels?
How much could she do with 1,000,000 taels?
"However, before dealing with the Yun Nation, we can first send experts to deal with the warlord of Qingfeng City. This kind of person whose hands are full of the people's hard-earned money must be punished and his family property confiscated. It's too slow to deal with him after we destroy the Yun Nation. Ten thousand years is too long, and we can only seize every minute. "Ren Baqian raised his fist and exerted force.
Fighting a war is one thing, but I can't tolerate the fact that you stole my money! As for Great Xia, I'll settle this score later. After I destroy the Great Xia army, I want all the rats in the national treasury to come out with tears in their eyes.
"Exterminate his entire family!" The empress immediately set the tone.
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