Chapter 2257 I must not lose if I shoulder the survival of a country


    Chapter 2254: I must not lose if I shoulder the life and death of a country


    The Tang army clearly only needs to defend Chang''an to the death, but why did they take the initiative to go out of the city to challenge? The reason is actually Li Jing.


    Although Li Jing has not sent troops to attack Chang''an directly, his series of strategies after siege Chang''an undoubtedly put greater pressure on the top leaders of Li Tang.


    You should know that if you are under too much pressure, you will not see hope and eventually you will be completely desperate.


    Li Jing calculated Li Tang tightly from all aspects, which undoubtedly created an illusion that Chang''an would be broken sooner or later for the senior management of Li Tang in the city, and gradually disintegrated the will of the defenders in the city.


    After all, fighting is not scary. What is scary is fighting a battle that has no hope and will definitely lose even if you know it.


    Li Shimin naturally realized this. He racked his brains and tried all kinds of ways, but he still could not inspire the fighting spirit of the defenders. After all, the Tang army''s disadvantages were getting bigger and bigger, which was an ironclad fact.


    At this time, the Tang army had a weak will, but it was obviously not yet at the point of fighting. It really made Li Shimin decide to go to war because of the battle between Zhang Liao and Li Keyong not long ago.


    After receiving the news that Zhang Liao led his army eastward, Li Shimin guessed that Zhang Liao''s target was Tongguan, so he immediately summoned his advisers to discuss countermeasures.


    However, with Li Ru and Du Ruhui''s death in battle, Changsun Wuji was captured, Sima Yi was in Baling, and the only remaining counselor Li Jue in Chang''an was not as good as Li Shimin''s military strategy, so obviously he could not give Li Shimin any better strategy.


    After some thought, Li Shimin finally decided to send a letter to Li Keyong, ordering him to give up Tongguan and retreat to Huayin to continue to resist and defend.


    After all, under the attack of the Qin army on both sides, Tongguan''s geographical advantage was greatly reduced, and it was only a matter of time before it fell. It would be better to give up voluntarily to preserve the vitality and continue to resist.


    Li Keyong had long wanted to give up Tongguan. After receiving the order, he immediately began to prepare for the retreat without saying a word, but he did not expect that the Qin army from Hangu Pass rushed over.


    Tan Daoji led 20,000 elite troops, controlled 300 catapult cars, fifty well railings, and one thousand siege crossbows, and launched a fierce attack on Tongguan again, obviously trying to hold Li Keyong away from him safely.


    Tan Daoji''s behavior actually aroused Li Keyong''s sense of crisis. He left behind 10,000 defenders after they were cut off from Tongguan, and led 30,000 defenders to withdraw from Tongguan overnight.


    Zhang Liao''s army had just passed Xinfeng County and received news that Li Keyong had withdrawn from Tongguan and was preparing to withdraw to Huayin County. So he led 5,000 cavalry to take the lead and rushed forward at night to stop it.


    When Zhang Liao''s cavalry arrived in Huayin County, Li Keyong''s army was entering the city, and half of the soldiers had already entered the city.


    When the Qin army was coming, the Tang army was shocked and rushed into the city. The formation was in chaos during the push.


    Zhang Liao naturally would not miss this good opportunity and took the opportunity to launch an assault on the Tang army, killing Li Keyong with a sudden attack, forcing Li Keyong to close the city gate and abandon nearly 10,000 soldiers.


    Zhang Liao led his army back and forth to kill 3,000 Tang troops, killing the Tang army no longer dared to resist, and surrendered more than 7,000 Tang troops, and then verbally challenged Li Keyong, hoping to incite Li Keyong to fight.


    Li Keyong was so calm that there was a man who felt sad and bleeding due to the casualties of the army, but he would not go out to fight because of impulse, so he naturally ignored it.


    Zhang Liao failed to provoke. After the rear army arrived, he left 5,000 cavalry guarding Li Keyong in Huayin to prevent Li Keyong from leaving the city to attack. He personally visited all the infantry to go to Tongguan and cooperated with Tan Daoji to attack on both sides.


    After Zhang Liao led his army to arrive, under the attack of the Qin army on both sides of the east and west, Tongguan, which had only 5,000 defenders, was captured after only three days.


    The Qin army killed three thousand enemies and captured two thousand prisoners.


    After the capture of Tongguan, Zhang Liao and Daoji army joined forces and their troops increased to 50,000.


    Zhang Liao ordered Gongsun Yan to lead 5,000 troops to guard Tongguan, while he himself led 40,000 troops back to Huayin with Tan Daoji. Then the army besieged the city, intending to take advantage of Li Keyong''s unstable foothold and take advantage of the situation to capture Huayin City in one fell swoop.


    After receiving the news from Li Keyong, Li Shimin felt desperate. When the 40,000 troops in Tongguan retreated into Huayin, there were only 20,000 left, and they were trapped by the 40,000 to 50,000 Qin troops.


    The other counties in Guanzhong were afraid of being killed by Huo Qubing, so they did not dare to fight at all, let alone support Chang''an.


    Now Chang''an is completely isolated and helpless. Only by relying on itself can we overcome this difficulty. However, people inside Chang''an are panicked and have no fighting spirit at all.


    If this continues, the Chang''an defenders'' will to resist will become weaker and weaker, and the Qin army does not need to attack. I am afraid that the people inside will open the city and surrender themselves.


    Therefore, a victory must be fought to inspire the fighting spirit of the defenders, and fighting generals is the best way, and only in this way can the defenders see the hope of persistence.


    Li Shimin knew the strength of the Qin army generals outside the city. Generals such as Sun Lingming, Gao Chong, Yuwen Chengdu, and Lu Bu were all in Li Jing''s army, but he was not without ace.


    In Chang''an City, in addition to generals such as Ma Shanwei, Gao Siji, Shi Jingtang, and Xin Wenli, there are three brothers Yang Jian and Kong Peng.


    Since Xinfeng''s defeat, Yang Jian did not return to Baling and Sima Yi to meet, but returned to Chang''an to help Li Shimin stabilize the situation. After all, Chang''an needs him even more.


    After the defeat of Fenglingdu, the three Kong Peng brothers wanted to escape from Guanzhong and not get involved in the war between Qin and Tang, but Zhang Liao chased them. In desperation, they could only rely on the Tang army to avoid the pursuit, and retreated all the way back to Chang''an with Yin Kaishan''s defeated army. Considering that among the Qin army, the two generals Lu Bu and Yuwen Chengdu are currently in injuries, while Yang Jian and Kong Peng are in full swing, so Li Shimin dared to take the initiative to fight.


    This is Li Shimin''s last chance. If he fails, Chang''an will be really difficult to defend.


    Yang Jian also knew Li Tang''s current situation, and was anxious and guilty. If he hadn''t retreated from Shangluo to Baling, the situation in Guanzhong would have been so depressed. Therefore, he decided that he would never lose in this battle and must win back for the Tang Kingdom.


    Yang Jian had a reason to not lose, and he was extremely ruthless in his move, which was fatal.


    Sun Lingming met an opponent of the same level and was happy to see the hunt, he tried his best.


    The war between the two sides is extremely fierce, and people don’t want to miss a minute or a second.


    Looking at Yang Jian who was fighting fiercely with Sun Lingming under the city, Li Shimin silently cheered him up in his heart, then turned his head to look at Kong Peng beside him, and found that the other party was watching the battle without turning his eyes, and he held back his words.


    Li Shimin has missed the wisdom and wisdom of Jiang Shang, and now he has met Kong Peng, the bravest army of the three soldiers. He is not willing to miss it anyway, but the other party obviously does not have much interest in Li Tang at the sunset, so Li Shimin is particularly careful when dealing with Kong Peng.


    Kong Peng didn''t care about Li Shimin''s attitude, and stared at Yang Jian and Sun Lingming outside the city, his eyes full of complexity.


    He thought he was the third most powerful person in the world except for his elder brother and the Li Cunxiao he had never met, but he didn''t expect to meet two people who were stronger than him so soon, Sun Lingming and Yang Jian.


    "Wait, I, Kong Peng, will surpass you sooner or later."


    Not only was Kong Peng not hit, but his eyes were filled with fighting spirit and he felt that leaving the family was so correct.


    The duel between Sun Lingming and Yang Jian outside the city has been in two hundred rounds. The armor on their bodies has been damaged and is not decent, but the two parties involved are still fighting fiercely without realizing it, until the war horses can''t bear it and are exhausted.


    "Change horses and fight again."


    The two of them said in unison, then returned together, changed the horse and fought again, until they reached four hundred rounds, and the second horse was exhausted again.


    This time the two of them were not changing horses, but chose to dismount and fight in a staircase.


    What no one expected was that the two of them had fought until dark, but they had no intention of stopping.


    Li Jing had no choice but to order the soldiers to raise the torch and let Sun Lingming and Yang Jian "fight at night."


    Sun Lingming and Yang Jian both had amazing eyesight, and even in the dark, it was like daylight, so Li Jing''s move was a waste of time.


    In the second half of the night, Li Jing was so sleepy that he went back to rest first, and asked Gao Chongyu and Wen Chengdu to scoop up Sun Lingming to prevent Sun Lingming from making mistakes. He didn''t want to wait until he woke up and the showdown between the two was not over.


    After a fierce battle day and night, both Sun Lingming and Yang Jian consumed a lot of physical strength, but the two of them were still persisting and no one was willing to admit defeat.


    "Hey, Yang, it''s hard to decide the winner if we continue to fight. How about a draw if we don''t have such a battle?"


    After hearing Sun Lingming''s words, Yang Jian said indifferently. "What, are you going to give up?"


    Sun Ling was angry: "Absent from defeat? You deserve it."


    "Then keep fighting."


    "If you want to fight, you''re afraid you''re your grandson."


    Nails, nails, nails...


    The battle reached noon, and the two fought for more than a thousand moves, but the winner was still not decided.


    After Sun Lingming beat Yang Jian with one stick, he gasped with a stick. While alerting the other party, he asked in confusion: "Hey, Yang Jian, you know you can''t beat me, why do you have to fight so hard?"


    "I must not lose if I shoulder the life and death of a country."


    Yang Jian breathed a long breath, his eyes full of determination, and he gritted his teeth and said, "There is no draw in this battle, and the winner must be decided."


    For Yang Jian, a draw is a defeat, so he does not accept a draw.


    Even if he sacrifices his life, he must win, and he can''t afford to lose this battle.


    (This chapter ends)