Fenghou

Suddenly, the north gate of Fugu County opened, and a soldier on horseback galloped out, heading north.

The Song Army scouts found him immediately, and more than a dozen scouts urged their horses to chase after him. The scouts all knew that this person was most likely going to the Kingdom of Jin to ask for help, and if they were caught, they would be able to know the situation in the city.

The leader who led the scouts to chase the messenger was Li Sanghuai, the deputy commander of the scout battalion. He was very experienced, and he was not in a hurry to catch up with the messenger. I have diarrhea almost every half an hour, and even in the initial stage, I have diarrhea several times a day, and I can't help vomiting.

Li Sanghuai led his men to follow until noon the next day, and the other party showed no signs of diarrhea. Li Sanghuai judged that the other party was not infected. He and his men immediately chased after him. They chased for about an hour, and they were less than a hundred steps away from the messenger. At that time, Li Sanghuai drew out an arrow, stretched his bow and set the arrow and shot it, hitting the opponent's horse. The horse suffered from pain, but did not slow down.

Li Sanghuai shot another arrow, this arrow was very precise, it hit the horse's hind leg, the horse fell down, and the soldier who sent the letter was thrown a foot away, the soldier who sent the letter hit his head on a tree, and passed out.

The scout soldiers worked together, stripped the messenger soldier naked, burned his leather armor and underwear, and sprinkled quicklime all over his body. The messenger soldier was woken up by the pungent lime smell, and found himself naked , naked, scared him with his legs together and curled up.

The scouts laughed and threw a rough cloth to him, "I'm afraid that there will be dirt on your body, and your armor will be burned."

The reporting party soldier muttered in a low voice, "I'm not sick!"

"If you can speak Chinese, that's great!"

The soldiers found an important letter from the horse bag and handed it to Li Sanghuai. It was actually written in Chinese. It was written by Brother Li Cha to Wanyan and Lisa. Li Sanghuai didn't read it, but rolled up the letter and put it in a bamboo tube Inside, there is a lot of very fine lime powder in the bamboo tube, and the letters will not be infected with the virus when they are taken out of the bamboo tube.

Li Sanghuai ordered: "Take him back to the camp!"

……

When Zhe Yanzhi heard that the messenger of the enemy army had been captured, he immediately sent someone to interrogate him. He opened the letter written by Brother Li Cha to Wanyan and Lisa. Brother Li Cha's tone in the letter was very sad. , the city could not be defended anymore, too many people died of illness, many of them died for a few days before being discovered, and even nearly half of the soldiers were infected with the disease, their morale completely collapsed, and they had no fighting power. He was going to lead the army to break through. Go to Datong Mansion and implore Jin Bing to accept it.

Brother Li Cha actually wanted to break out of the siege, Zhe Yanzhi immediately sent someone to invite Zhang Xiao and Niu Gao, and showed them the letter, Niu Gao sneered and said: "He thinks too much, how could the Kingdom of Jin let a group of plague gods pass by."

Zhang Xiao said with a smile: "Niu Dutong, tell Zhedutong the news!"

"What news?" Orihiko was startled.

Niu Gao hurriedly said: "I also just received the Xinzhou Express News that His Royal Highness King Yong has arrived in Xinzhou and is coming to Fuzhou. This is information from two days ago. It is estimated that he is already on Lanzhou Road now and will return in two days. It's here."

Zhe Yanzhi was overjoyed, "Is His Royal Highness King Yong coming?"

Niu Gao nodded, "So we have to be extremely careful, we must not let the soldiers get the disease, the scout who got this letter will be quarantined for three days first, and see the situation."

"They have been quarantined. In addition, they arrested a messenger who came out of the city. The military doctor is examining him. If there is no problem, the interrogation will begin. We must learn the information in the city as soon as possible, otherwise it will be difficult to report to King Yong."

Both Niu Gao and Zhang Xiao believed in Zhe Yanzhi's words. Even if they don't attack the city, they must keep abreast of the latest situation in the city...

At dusk, the military doctor's examination was over, and it was confirmed that the soldier who delivered the letter was not infected with the disease. Song Jun immediately interrogated him, and the result of the interrogation surprised everyone.

No one knows exactly how many people died in the city. At the beginning, Bari Zuren went to check everywhere. Now he is afraid of being infected, so he doesn’t go anywhere, and the officials don’t want to go. The number of people, how many people are still alive in the city, and how many people have died have completely become an unknown mystery.

However, the number of deaths and patients in the army is clear. More than half of the people have been infected with the disease, and more than 4000 people have died.

But even with this data, there are still problems in it, because the number of infected people counted has already developed symptoms, but there are still many people who have been infected but have not yet developed symptoms. Therefore, it is generally believed that the number of infected people is close to [-].

The Dangxiang Army originally recruited more than [-] people temporarily, and the morale of the army was very unstable. Now it was hit by the plague and its morale had completely collapsed. Now even if the Song Army went to hit the city gate with a battering ram, no one would stop it.

Of course, the Song army did not dare to attack the city. Now the offensive and defensive momentum of the two sides has completely changed. The Song army's crossbowmen are ready. Their task has become to prevent the opponent's plague soldiers from coming to attack the camp and prevent anyone from the opponent from escaping.

They must shoot and kill all the escaped people from the other side in time. Even civilians cannot be merciful. If there is a slight negligence, the Song army and the people in the surrounding counties will fall into a horrible situation of extinction.

After listening to the report, Zhang Xiao pondered for a moment and said: "Now it seems that Brother Li Cha has signs of jumping over the wall. I suspect that it is just an illusion that he sent people to Datong Mansion to deliver letters. It stands to reason that he should write letters in Dangxiang or Jurchen script to be respectful." It is unreasonable for the other party to write a letter in Chinese, and it is very likely that he wrote it for us to read. Brother Li Cha knows that the letter will be intercepted by us, and he also knows that the Kingdom of Jin will not take him in, so he is probably making a fuss."

"Where does the military adviser think he will go?" Everyone's eyes were fixed on Zhang Xiao.

Two words came out of Zhang Xiao's lips, "Lingzhou!"

Zhang Xiao has been the magistrate of Lingzhou for two years. Only he knows best what Lingzhou means to party members.

There is the burial place of their ancestors. If they cannot escape this catastrophe, they will definitely return to the ancestral land and reunite with their ancestors' souls.

……

It was nightfall, and on the inner street of Xicheng, [-] Dangxiang cavalry had been assembled. In front of them were two generals, Xia Houliang and monk Dongyan, and hundreds of soldiers were protecting Brother Li Cha and Bari Zuren.

This is the [-] soldiers who have not been infected yet, and it is also the last strength of the party members.

Brother Li Cha was going to lead his army to break through the siege and head to Lingzhou, the place where their ancestors were buried. Even if they all died in the end, they would die in the arms of their ancestors.

"My lord, the time has come!"

Brother Li Cha nodded, and shouted with all his strength: "Open the city gate, let's go home!"

The city gate slowly opened, and under the moonlight, six thousand cavalry rushed out of the city gate like a flood and galloped westward.

Chapter 9 and Seven

Six thousand cavalrymen ran for less than a mile when they suddenly neighed in pain and their horses fell to the ground one after another. The cavalry behind them stopped their horses in shock. Xia Houliang asked sharply, "What's going on?"

A soldier fell to the ground and moaned in pain, "There are barbed wire on the ground, all of them!"

Xia Houliang was taken aback, and quickly ordered people to dismount to search for it. Sure enough, the ground was covered with thorns and caltrops. This was a big trouble, Xia Houliang hurriedly reported to Brother Li Cha.

Brother Li Cha said angrily: "When did the Song army plant the barbed wire? Today?"

Xia Houliang bowed and said: "It shouldn't be today. The subordinates have been observing. The Song army didn't move today. It should have been deployed before."

"Don't worry about when the barbed wire was planted, hurry up and find an exit for me, the Song army can't block it all!"

"Follow the order!"

Xia Houliang immediately sent a hundred teams of ten people to search for a way out in all directions, and they found them not long after. In the southwest, there was a rocky beach, about one mile wide and more than ten miles long, filled with piles of rocks. Large and small stones make it difficult for horses to walk, and it is also difficult for people to walk.

But it is also this rocky beach that is not easy to travel, but it has become the only way for the party army to break through.

They didn't care whether there would be an ambush by the Song army ahead, if there was an interception, they would rush over.

It was not easy to ride horses on the rocky beach, everyone got off their horses and led their horses on foot. It was the middle of the night, and the camp five miles away from the Song Army was pitch black, which made the Dangxiang soldiers feel lucky. escape.

There was a strange smell in the air. During this period of time, they had smelled too much of the smell of corpses in the city, and they were numb to all kinds of strange smells.

After walking for about four or five miles, countless black figures suddenly appeared in front of them. They shot towards this side with bows and arrows. What they shot were gunpowder arrows. Hundreds of gunpowder arrows fired bright red fireworks, which were particularly red in the night sky. The soldiers stopped in their tracks.

But the power of the gunpowder arrows seemed to be insufficient, and they all landed dozens of steps ahead of them, but the ground suddenly burned. At this moment, Lieutenant General Shang Dongyan suddenly realized that the smell he remembered was the smell of kerosene.

"There is kerosene on the ground!"

Shang Dongyan yelled, but it was too late, the flames spread too fast, before they could react, the raging flames engulfed them, and thousands of people struggled in the flames.

The war horse neighed, its mane and tail were ignited, like a ghost horse rushing out of hell, it ran out of the flames, but stepped on a barbed wire before running a few steps, fell to the ground, twitched, and gradually stopped moving.

The soldiers were also screaming, and countless soldiers ran out of the fire field with raging flames all over their bodies, but they fell down after running for a long time, and curled up with burns all over their bodies.

In the distance, Niu Gao sighed softly, "If there hadn't been a plague outbreak, these soldiers would have been able to mine, what a pity!"

Orihiko said coldly: "Since these party soldiers are in the army, it is their fate to die on the battlefield. You don't have to pity them!"

At this time, thousands of Dangxiang soldiers tried to rush out of the trap of the Song Army, but under the intensive shooting of [-] Song Army crossbowmen, groups of Dangxiang soldiers were shot down by arrows, and even Brother Richard was shot through by dozens of crossbow arrows body, and fell into the flames.

The soldiers of the Song Army kept throwing hay and fire oil balls, so that the fire continued until the sky was bright, and the fire gradually extinguished. Overnight, the Song Army burned more than 3000 enemy troops to death with fire, and another [-] Dangxiang soldiers died tragically in Song Dynasty. The army's bow and arrow array.

All 6000 people were burned to black charcoal, and it was impossible to tell who was Brother Li Cha and who was Barry Zuren. The soldiers of the Song Army simply dug a big and deep pit and buried them all.

……

Although the west city gate was wide open and a raging fire burned all night outside the city, the city was always silent and no one escaped.

At this moment, Zhe Yanzhi and others got the news that King Yong Chen Qing had led his army twenty miles away, and Zhe Yanzhi and others couldn't care about the county seat for the time being, so they rushed to twenty miles away to welcome the arrival of King Yong .

With flags unfurled, spears like a forest, [-] cavalry and [-] camels are like a long dragon, lying mightily on the endless grassland.

The sunshine in Fuzhou is more dazzling than the sunshine in the southeast of the river. Chen Qing opened his hands and looked towards the city in the distance, and the outline of Fugu County could be seen faintly.

"Your Highness, they are here!"

From a long distance, Yang Zaixing saw a group of cavalry running towards this side.

This time Chen Qing didn't let Yang Zaixing fight, Yang Zaixing felt uncomfortable at all, he heard that King Yong was going to inspect the battle situation in Fuzhou, Yang Zaixing tried his best, so Chen Qing had to agree to go with him.

After a while, the cavalry came to the front, and the person at the front was Zhang Xiao. Although Zhang Xiao was a military adviser, he was qualified to walk in the internal affairs hall and could come back at any time to serve as a counselor. He was the person with the highest official position in this Northern Expedition.

Zhang Xiao stepped forward to salute, "See His Royal Highness King Yong!"

Chen Qing said with emotion: "Military Master, we haven't seen each other for almost two years!"

"It's not been more than two years since I went to work in Lingzhou the year before last. In fact, I went back to Jingzhao Mansion a few months ago, but His Highness happened to go to Lin'an, so I didn't see him."

Chen Qing nodded, "Hedong Road is on the right track, the military division should go back to Jingzhao first!"

"It will take about half a year for Rong Beizhi to arrange the transfer of salt and iron on Hedong Road."

"Yes!" Chen Qing didn't force Zhang Xiao either.

At this time, Zhe Yanzhi and Niu Gao came forward to pay respects, Chen Qing smiled slightly and said, "Zhe Dutong, has the army captured Fugu County?"

Zhe Yanzhi hurriedly said: "Reporting to Your Highness, the main force of Jurchen wanted to break out last night, but we wiped out all of them with fire and crossbow arrows. There was no one left, but the situation in the city is unknown, and the soldiers dare not go in."

"It's wise for soldiers not to go in. Once infected, the consequences will be unimaginable. This time I brought five hundred doctors and a large amount of herbs, so that the doctors can come to the city to have a look."

Niu Gao said from the side: "I have an idea. I can ask the soldiers to call the people out on the city wall. After understanding the situation in the city, I can formulate a plan for entering the city."

Chen Qing nodded, "This plan is good, it can be implemented!"

Twenty thousand cavalry went to the big camp to rest, and Zhe Yanzhi sent thousands of soldiers to climb the ladder to the city, and shouted in the party language on the top of the city: "There is medicine outside the city, and you can live if you go out of the west city!"

It really worked. After a quarter of an hour, people began to come out of the city one after another. Most of them were women and children. Helping the old and the young, continue to walk along a wooden road to the resettlement camp.

Not long after, Li Muqing went forward to report to Chen Qing, "The military doctor asked about the situation in the city. It was very serious. Most of them died, but nearly a million cattle and sheep were fine, and none of them were infected."

Chen Qing pondered for a while and asked, "How much lime do we have?"

"There are still a lot, 10,000+ catties."

"First use quicklime to pave a road from east to west. The soldiers take precautions and follow the doctor into the city. As long as they are alive, they will be pulled out with a cart first, and then the entire county will be burned. Understand what I mean ?"

"The humble officer understands that the soldiers all drank the medicine, and then went in with a thick cloth covering their mouths and noses."

Chen Qing nodded, "Everyone must wear leather gloves, and these gloves will be burned in the end!"

Li Muqing agreed and went to implement it.

At this time, Niu Gao led tens of thousands of soldiers to remove the caltrops. The Song army's method of removing the caltrops was very simple. Using powerful magnetite, the soldiers pushed carts full of iron ore and walked on the grass. All the tiny caltrops were sucked into the trolley, and none slipped through the net.

At the same time, tightly packed soldiers and military doctors also drove carts into the city, spread limestone on the street, and they began to shout from house to house, and people kept crawling out of houses struggling for help. After the soldiers sprayed lime powder once, Lift the person onto the cart.

Hundreds of soldiers of the Song Army opened the South City and drove out the millions of cattle and sheep raised in the South City. The South City was safe, and there were no common people living here. None of the more than 300 people who took care of the cattle and sheep were infected.

After working for a whole day, more than 4000 people were rescued, most of them were infected with the plague, and only [-] people remained after more than [-] people. This severe plague was really tragic.

At night, a raging fire ignited in Fugu City, and millions of tons of forage were turned into fire starters, and soldiers of the Song Army dumped thousands of barrels of kerosene.

The raging fire engulfed the entire Fugu City.

This also means the complete demise of the remnants of Xixia.

Chapter 9 and Eight

At night, Chen Qing got up from Yu Ying's delicate snow-white body, and lay down slowly. Yu Ying wiped the sweat from his forehead and snuggled into his arms.

Yu Ying whispered: "Husband, lying on the carpet feels very different from the bed."

Chen Qing smiled and said: "That's for sure, lying on the ground, I can feel the breath of the earth, my hometown, this is called grounding."

Yu Ying whispered in Chen Qing's ear again: "Do you want more, Husband, I can serve Husband again."

"Forget it tonight. I always feel that there is a plague in the air in Fuzhou. I'm not in the mood. Let's talk about it when we leave Fuzhou!"

"I didn't expect this plague to be so serious!"

"Normally, this kind of severe plague spreads very quickly, there is no cure, and the entire city will be wiped out in a very short period of time."

"Will that be..." Yu Ying was a little worried.

Chen Qing smiled slightly: "I said that the air smells like a plague is just a metaphor. In fact, the plague does not spread in the air. The main disease enters through the mouth. Food and water, the groundwater in the entire Fugu County are polluted. I I heard from the military doctor that the people who survived boiled the water and then threw the noodles into the boiling water to cook and eat. Common people, boil water to drink, and wash hands frequently, so that the infection will not be so fast."

"Then how many people survived, I mean not infected with the virus?"

"About nine thousand people."

"what!"

Yu Ying exclaimed, "There are only over nine thousand people."

"This time I brought a lot of medicinal materials. If the infected people are relatively young, they should be able to be rescued. In the end, I estimate that there are about 5000 people."

"What about us soldiers?"

Yu Ying asked again: "Is anyone infected?"

Chen Qing shook his head, "Not yet, the key is not through respiratory infection. Soldiers don't eat their food and wear gloves. They take off their gloves and coats and burn them immediately after leaving the city. They are well protected."