Please call me Your Majesty!

Chapter 140 Yang Fang regained the title of Marquis of Changping, and the Liangzhou Army is on the march!
However, when Yang Fang completely calmed down from the bloody battle, he was still feeling frightened.

After all, the army led by Wu Zhen at that time was the main force that robbed and killed the enemy.

Among Chu Shizhao's detachment, only 3,000 cavalrymen were truly elite soldiers, who could be considered veterans with rich combat experience. The remaining 7,000 were all newly recruited troops of the Great Zhou Dynasty.

Even though Chu Shizhao's Northern Army was carefully trained and equipped with the most elite standard weapons, they were still a group of new recruits who had never been on a battlefield.

With the same equipment, whether or not they have combat experience is the key to whether they can make a difference on the battlefield.

It takes an extremely long period for new recruits to develop combat effectiveness.

No matter how good your equipment is, if you don't dare to fight and are afraid of fighting, you will be defeated if the situation is not right.

Even if we give them better weapons, we still won't achieve any results.

What's more, Wu Zhen's main division was at a disadvantage. Judging from Yang Fang's many years of military service at that time, it would be very difficult for their small division to achieve anything.

First of all, in terms of position, they are not the main attackers, but are more responsible for supporting work, like being in a position to guard the situation on the battlefield, where it is easier to fight when the wind is favorable and to retreat when the situation is unfavorable.

Once Wu Zhen was defeated, their small army would theoretically have no combat capability at all, and the strategic core would lie in Wu Zhen's division.

Thinking about it now, Yang Fang felt that Chu Shizhao's move of temporarily giving in and waiting for a second opportunity to raid the camp was like divine help.

It perfectly distracted the Huns' troop deployment.

When they attacked, it might even be the weakest moment of the Hun camp tonight, which made up for the lack of experience of the soldiers. At least most of them were dealing with some remnants and tired soldiers who had not had time to react and were raided by the Great Zhou Dynasty, and had just awakened from their sleep and had little combat power.

Now, when Yang Fang thought about Chu Shizhao's marching route again, he felt that Chu Shizhao was too bold.

No one could have imagined that there would be such a sudden turn of events.

When he entered the palace and saw Emperor Yongjin, what Yang Fang saw closely was Chu Shizhao sleeping beside Emperor Yongjin's lap.

Now Chu Shizhao has changed into clean clothes, and the palace maids have brought thick quilts and are covering him with them.

"Your Majesty." Yang Fang called out softly.

Emperor Yongjin called upon the palace maids and eunuchs beside him to provide Chu Shizhao with a more comfortable environment. He stood up, still with the graceful and elegant demeanor of a saint.

"General Yang." Emperor Yongjin nodded to Yang Fang, "This battle will not be easy."

Yang Fang cupped his hands and said, "I dare not take credit for this. If it were not for the plan of His Royal Highness Prince Jin, I would have been stuck in a quagmire and would have had difficulty returning to the court."

Emperor Yongjin waved his hand and said, "Why do you say that? They are all men who fought for the country. I am incompetent."

"If it weren't for me, how could the country fall into such suffering?"

At this point, Emperor Yongjin paused and said, "What a pity, General Wu."

Yang Fang lowered his head silently, as if mourning for the dead and wounded soldiers.

There was silence between the two for a moment.

Emperor Yongjin once again broke the deadlock. He asked, "When I first heard the battle report, the generals on the front line had already been defeated, General Wu was killed on the spot, and the capital was in turmoil. Countless people advised me to move south."

"If it weren't for your victory report, the capital would be in chaos. Even I am ready to lead the army into battle myself."

"The only thing I'm curious about now is how you managed to repel these Huns after General Wu Zhen's death."

"Only tens of thousands of people."

Emperor Yongjin's gaze was fixed on Yang Fang.

Yang Fang pondered for a moment, as if he was brewing his words. At this moment, whether he spoke well or not was related to the rewards of the entire army, so Yang Fang was extremely cautious and did not dare to speak rashly.

"To be honest, Your Majesty, when our army first learned that General Wu Zhen had been defeated, we wanted to retreat." Yang Fang said seriously.

"Moreover, the most important thing is that the Huns had anticipated that our army would attack our camp at night, which is why General Wu was defeated."

When Emperor Yongjin heard this, his eyes suddenly became sharp. He asked in surprise, "The Huns have made preparations in advance."

"That's right." Yang Fang did not dare to lie and described the scene in words: "The detachment that the King of Jin and I were in, under the command of General Wu, was at the rear of the right wing."

"General Wu Zhen advanced first, but was badly defeated in just a moment. Several of them fled to different places, and one general happened to come to where our army was."

"What he said at the time was an ambush." ​​Yang Fang pondered for a few seconds and said, "This kind of ambush must have been prepared long ago."

"But I think this ambush by the Huns is very strange." Yang Fang said from his own perspective: "They have been advancing all the way, avoiding many heavily guarded places on the way, and those places without government troops stationed were easily broken through."

"If I were the Xiongnu army, I would never have thought that Chang'an would launch a surprise attack. After all, Chang'an is the capital of my Great Zhou. Defending is not the best strategy, but it is also the most stable and most victorious one." Yang Fang spoke very cautiously.

He didn't dare to say that robbing the camp was a foolish act, because the final decision of the Great Zhou Dynasty was made by the ministers and His Majesty.

But now think about it, Chu Shizhao's proposal to defend Chang'an and send troops from all directions to defend the king is actually the best way to break the deadlock.

Under the current circumstances, Chang'an's military strength has been severely depleted. Not to mention the 7,000 soldiers brought back by Chu Shizhao, there are only more than 10,000 official troops left in the entire Chang'an.

This battle wiped out the elite troops of the central army. If the military governors of various places had any rebellious intentions, then this battle would be the foreshadowing of the downfall of the Great Zhou Dynasty.

Whether from a strategic perspective or from the perspective of the country, advocating an attack would lead to the possibility of instability in the country of the Great Zhou.

After listening to Yang Fang's words, Emperor Yongjin felt a new possibility.

"The implication is that either someone from the Xiongnu saw the possibility that our army was planning to raid our camp, or someone secretly communicated with the Xiongnu and told them our deployment."

Emperor Yongjin paced for a while.

"As a general rule, they couldn't have expected that Chang'an would send out all its troops."

Yang Fang did not dare to continue, "But I still tend to the former. If someone really had secret communication with the Xiongnu, they would have surrendered Chang'an long ago."

Emperor Yongjin frowned. There are two types of internal supporters. One is to see that the situation is not right and quietly provide some help so that you can retreat. The other is to help with all your strength.

But Emperor Yongjin had to consider this possibility.

However, since this inference had not been confirmed, it was impossible for Emperor Yongjin to spread this news everywhere and shake the morale of the army in Chang'an.

However, Emperor Yongjin thought again, since the Huns were prepared, how did the Fourth Emperor win this miraculous battle?

"It seems that our army's chances of winning are extremely slim. How did you win?" The tone of Emperor Yongjin was no less than giving face to Yang Fang.

Now the Great Zhou army had won, at least they had defeated the Huns. Emperor Yongjin asked about the situation from the perspective of victory and implicitly praised the division of Chu Shizhao and Yang Fang.

This soothed Yang Fang's emotions after the long battle. He couldn't help but say excitedly, "Yes, at that time we all thought that this battle could not be won."

"General Wang Huai directly advised us to return to the capital and make preparations to defend Chang'an in advance." Yang Fang actually accepted Wang Huai's choice at that time.

In that situation, no matter who considered it, they would think that not fighting and retreating was the best option.

Don't seek merit, but definitely don't make mistakes.

Because all the problems were caused by Wu Zhen. He failed in the first wave of raiding the camp, and continuing to fight with the remaining troops would be tantamount to surrendering. The only way to survive was to retreat to Chang'an.

Even if the court punished him, it would be Wu Zhen's fault.

In terms of shirking responsibility, there was nothing wrong with their entire army's retreat.

"It was only His Royal Highness the Prince of Jin who came up with a plan that allowed us to win in this dangerous situation." Yang Fang couldn't help but get excited when he said this. "The Prince of Jin thought that if we retreated, the Huns would definitely chase us and leave us all outside Chang'an."

Emperor Yongjin followed Yang Fang's line of thought and was surprised to find that if he was the commander of this Xiongnu army, after defending against the first wave of camp raids, he would also continue to expand the results of the battle, thereby annihilating all the troops of the Great Zhou Dynasty stationed outside Chang'an and continuously expanding his own advantages.

Retreating to Chang'an became an undesirable decision.

"So, you chose to attack the Huns' camp again?" Emperor Yongjin had already experienced Chu Shizhao's radicalism in war, and he quickly thought of what Chu Shizhao was most likely to do.

"That's right." Yang Fang said.

As expected of him.

It's really him!

In this way, it makes perfect sense that Chu Shizhao's current fighting methods are actually exactly the same as Chu Shizhao's fighting methods at that time, and they are each unique.

"But, His Royal Highness the Prince of Jin asked us to wait." Yang Fang didn't have a map, and stretched out his hands nervously, saying, "If we attack the Xiongnu camp right away, the Xiongnu won't have time to set off yet. We need to avoid the Xiongnu's most powerful attack, so we have to wait for an opportunity."

"So the King of Jin led us to bypass the main pursuit route of the Huns."

"He thought that if the Huns wanted to intercept the troops in Chang'an, they would definitely go to the periphery of Chang'an to block them, so he took us to the rear of the Huns' camp, making a big detour and avoiding the Huns' pursuit route."

"When the time is almost right, we will directly launch a second attack on the camp and attack the Huns' tents."

"When we attacked, the Xiongnu camp was indeed empty, with only the remnants of the soldiers defeated by General Wu Zhen and some garrison troops who were recuperating."

"Our army will attack them by surprise, eat them all, and burn the Xiongnu's food. In this way, even if the Xiongnu eat our army, they will have no food and can only attack the city for one day at most." Yang Fang continued: "Then even if Chang'an has no troops, as long as there are people willing to defend it for a full day, the Xiongnu will still have no way to deal with us."

When Emperor Yongjin thought of this, he became more and more moved. Chu Shizhao was determined to die and bring fire to the Zhou Dynasty.

It takes a lot of courage to return and attack the Hun camp again. You have to know that this decision was made even though they knew that the previous army had suffered a defeat.

"However, we fought very hard throughout the battle. If it weren't for the bravery of His Royal Highness Prince Jin, who killed several generals in succession and showed his strength, we would have been left in the camp." Yang Fang said this and couldn't help but said, "Your Majesty, I would like to ask for credit for Your Highness."

"When our army was retreating, His Royal Highness the Prince of Jin personally led the cavalry to cover our retreat in order to protect us infantrymen, and he nearly died. Moreover, when our army returned to Chang'an, the defenders were unwilling to open the city. I want to impeach that defender." Yang Fang could not contain his anger when he thought of this. They had been fighting hard on the front line and were ready to die on the battlefield. It was not easy for them to fight their way back to Chang'an, but they were not allowed to return to the city.

Emperor Yongjin was also a little embarrassed at this time.

Because at that time Chang'an had already believed that all the front lines had been defeated and it was impossible to let anyone into the city, so the strategy of defending the city was the main one. This decree was issued by him personally, and the defenders strictly implemented it.

If this is the reason, the defenders must be punished. How should the general's orders be carried out in the future?

"This made our army wait until dawn, and I don't even know how the King of Jin finally fought his way back to Chang'an." Yang Fang said indignantly.

Emperor Yongjin nodded and said, "In a few days, I will personally punish them. Now is the time to reward them according to their merits."

"Your ancestors were canonized as Marquis of Changping, but after several generations, they did not achieve any achievements and were caught up in disputes between the government and the public, so their titles were abolished. Now that you have made such great achievements, I will canonize you as Marquis of Changping again to carry on the glory of your ancestors."

Yang Fang dreamed of restoring the glory of his ancestors. Now that the position of Marquis of Changping has returned to him, he knelt on the ground and said, "Thank you very much, Your Majesty, for your grace."

The Great Zhou Dynasty had not conferred the title of marquis for a long, long time. It was extremely difficult to confer the title again at this time. The reward given by Emperor Yongjin was definitely exceptional.

What is worrying Emperor Yongjin the most now is how to reward Chu Shizhao. He is already a Prince, and having made such contributions, it would be inappropriate to give him an honorary title, which would easily hurt the feelings of this meritorious official.

However, the reward given to him was too generous, and Emperor Yongjin was more worried that the big families in the court would not give Chu Shizhao a good life.

The previous Emperor Yongjin seldom considered the issue of succession, but now he had to prepare in advance to consider it.

The rules of appointing the eldest son over the most capable one and appointing the legitimate son over a concubine's son are in front of him. Emperor Yongjin does not want to break the rules, but the current situation of the Great Zhou Dynasty is such that Emperor Yongjin must think of a suitable and appropriate successor in advance.

He was certain that after his death, the Great Zhou would not have an outstanding crown prince to succeed him, and there was a high possibility of turmoil that he could not have anticipated.

Even before Emperor Yongjin passed away, he encountered the major incident of the siege of Chang'an. How could Emperor Yongjin be at ease with the current country?

And thousands of miles away.

The army from Liangzhou that is coming to support the king is on the way. Huan Jie is wearing armor and looking forward. Behind him are tens of thousands of elite soldiers from Liangzhou.

Huangfu Jian and Duan Qi led the elite troops from various units and advanced in an orderly manner.

(End of this chapter)