When Yang Yan heard this, he couldn't help but be surprised, and immediately recognized it, sure enough, it was Wei Jiao, and hurriedly jumped off Hai Dongqing, grabbed Wei Jiao and said, "Wei Jiao, how did you become like this.?" < VIII

It turned out that this Wei Jiao was Wei Sheng's eldest son and Wei Chang's brother. After the expedition, Wei Sheng's second son Wei Chang was an official in the household department because he was good at making tools, and Yang Yan also brought him to the south to improve equipment and make sharp weapons in the south. And Wei Jiao has been following Wei Sheng to garrison Haizhou, and this time he also gave up Haizhou with Wei Sheng, returned to Lin'an, and stationed in Huzhou. And now seeing Wei Jiao like this, Yang Yan was shocked in his heart, could it be that Huzhou is dangerous?

Sure enough, Wei Jiao cried and said: "Yang Yuma, Huzhou has been lost, my father was killed by an arrow, and he has been loyal to the country." ”

It turned out that after Yan Changzhi led the naval army south, the Jin army divided its troops into three routes to storm all parts of Jianghuai in order to contain the Song army. Among them, the monk Wanyan Chen led an army of more than 50,000 people to attack Suzhou. And Li Xianzhong sent the general Bi Zaiyu to guard Suzhou, Bi Zaiyu commanded the Song army to guard very tightly, and the monk Yan Chen attacked for several days, but he returned in vain.

At this time, after Wei Sheng led the army back to Lin'an, only Li Quan and Yang Miaozhen, who returned to the Song Dynasty, were left in Haizhou to lead the Hongwo Army to garrison. Jin general Wan Yan Ting took the opportunity to lead an army of 60,000 to attack Haizhou. Li Quan had only more than 5,000 men under his command and could not hold it at all, so he had to abandon Haizhou and retreat to Xuzhou.

After capturing Haizhou, Wan Yanting immediately led the army to storm Xuzhou. Xuzhou was also tight, and Li Quan asked Liu Bao for help. However, Liu Bao was originally afraid of the Jin army and did not dare to fight with the Jin army, so on the grounds that there was no order from the imperial court, he did not move his troops in Chuzhou and did not go to the rescue of Xuzhou. Seeing the situation, Monk Wanyan Chen confronted Bi Zaiyu in Suzhou, but sent Pu Cha to lead an army of 20,000 to cooperate with Wanyan Ting to attack Xuzhou, and captured Feng County, Pei County, Anmin Town, Xiao County, Pizhou and other places.

At this time, the order of the imperial court came down and transferred Liu Bao back to Lin'an, and after receiving the order, Liu Bao took this opportunity to lead the army to abandon Chuzhou and return to Lin'an. As a result, the door of the Song army was wide open, and Wan Yan Ting sent a group of men and horses, and the soldiers were bloodless, so they captured Chuzhou, and then attacked Xuzhou from the flank and rear. In this way, Xuzhou was attacked on three sides and finally lost, and Li Quan and Yang Miaozhen had no choice but to lead the Hongwo army to retreat to the Xuyi army.

Then Wan Yan Ting and Wan Yan Chen attacked Suzhou from both sides. Bi Zaiyu couldn't stay in the state and was forced to retreat to Haozhou.

Jin general Yang Woyan led the army to attack Haozhou, involving Bi Zaiyu. Monk Wanyan Chen and Wanyan Ting joined forces, took the opportunity to go south, and successively captured Chuzhou, Gaoyou Army, Yangzhou and other places. It went all the way to Zhenjiang Mansion on the Yangtze River.

At this time, Liu Bao had retreated to Zhenjiang Mansion and was preparing to cross the Yangtze River to return to the south, and the generals persuaded Liu Bao to leave some men and horses to defend Zhenjiang and prevent the Jin army from crossing the Yangtze River. However, Liu Bao did not leave a single soldier and led all his men and horses to cross the Yangtze River on the grounds of the imperial court's order.

Monk Wanyan Chen personally led 5,000 elite cavalry troops, rushed for a day and a night, bypassed Zhenjiang Mansion, and caught up with Liu Bao, who was preparing to cross the river, at the foot of Jinshan. At that time, the Song army still had more than 40,000 men and horses, and the number of men and horses was several times that of the Jin army. But they were crossing the river, and the people and horses were confused and unprepared. As soon as they saw the Jin army killed, they immediately messed up, and were killed by the army led by Wanyan Chen several times, and the Song army was in chaos, and they were crowded and trampled on each other, and there were countless casualties among men and horses, and many people were squeezed into the Yangtze River and drowned. Liu Bao was desperate, gave up all the heavy grain and grass, and fled in panic, and the Song army that crossed the Yangtze River was less than 10,000 people. Later, Wan Yan Ting personally led the Jin Army Brigade to kill and capture Zhenjiang.

At that moment, Wanyan Chen monk and Wanyan Ting divided their troops, and Wanyan Ting led the men and horses to capture other places in Jianghuai, clearing the obstacles for the siege of Jiankang Mansion, and Wanyan Chen Monk led the army to cross the Yangtze River, continued to go south, and attacked Lin'an with all Wanyan Changzhi. At this point, the Jianghuai defense line of the Great Song Dynasty, except for Haozhou, Luzhou, Hezhou, Jiankangfu and other areas, collapsed along the entire line.

Besides, after Liu Bao lost his troops and returned to Lin'an in a panic, the Song family did not blame him for the defeat of the army, and continued to order him to garrison Huzhou to resist the Jin army's attack on Lin'an. and Wei Sheng, Li Quan, etc. were all assigned to Liu Bao's moderation. After receiving the order, Liu Bao ordered Wei Sheng to lead an army of 5,000 to garrison Changxing, and ordered Li Quan to lead 5,000 troops to garrison Si'an, and he led a large army to garrison Huzhou.

At this time, the autumn rain continued for several days, and Wanyan Chen led 40,000 gold troops, all the way south in the rain, like a broken bamboo, even down Danyang, Jintan, Liyang, Yixing and other places, and the soldiers pointed directly at Changxing. Wei Sheng asked Liu Baobing for support, and on the other hand, he led his army to engage in a fierce battle with the front of the Jin army led by Shi Dingyue.

The two armies fought in the rain, Wei Sheng's father and son made a big sword, took the lead, personally went into battle and tore the Jin army, injured more than ten places, blood-stained robes, and still fought by themselves. The two sides fought fiercely for half a day, and there was no winner or loser. At this time, Wanyan Chen and Shang had already led a large army to arrive, and the Jin army was several times larger than the Song army. Wei Sheng knew that he was invincible and retreated to Changxing City.

The Jin army surrounded Changxing and launched a fierce attack, Wei Sheng took Shifu as a formation, led the crowd to fight, the blood flowed like an infusion, mixed with the rain to dye the earth red, and fought fiercely until the evening, the Song army had lost more than half, but also killed thousands of Jin troops, Wei Sheng asked for help from Liu Bao several times. However, Liu Bao used the reason that the rain was too strong and it was not suitable to send troops, so he never came to the rescue.

Guarding until midnight, the Song army was less than a thousand people left, and the arrows were exhausted, and the rescue troops still did not arrive, Wei Sheng had no choice but to order the soldiers to break through and retreat. And said to the soldiers on the spot: "If I die here, some of you who escaped and returned to Lin'an should be reported to the Son of Heaven and live up to my heart of returning to Song." So he ordered the infantry army to be in front, and the cavalry army to the rear of the palace, and stood out from the encirclement.

Seeing that the Song army broke through and retreated, the monk Wanyan Chen immediately led the Jin army to chase closely, while the Song army retreated in battle, and was finally scattered by the Jin army at the border of Bian Mountain. Wei Sheng and Wei Jiao father and son with more than 100 Song troops were surrounded by more than 500 cavalry of the Jin army, Wei Sheng led the army to attack in all directions, dozens of shots in the body, and finally killed the encirclement, he personally broke off, and cut more than ten Jin soldiers in a row, the other Jin troops did not dare to chase, but unexpectedly fell off the horse and died.

The Jin army captured Changxing and continued to attack Huzhou non-stop, but Liu Bao did not dare to engage the Jin army and abandoned the city and fled. Li Quan, who was stationed in Si'an, saw that the general situation was gone, and he and his wife Yang Miaozhen led the army to flee westward. And Wei Xiao collected the remnants of the Long army, and fled all the way to Lin'an, and happened to meet Yang Yan on the way.

After Yang Yan heard what Wei Tan said, he knew that Wei Sheng had died, and he was also saddened. During the Northern Expedition, he served under Wei Sheng for a period of time, and knew that Wei Sheng was loyal and righteous, but he didn't expect Huzhou to be lost so quickly, and even Wei Sheng was killed, and he hated Liu Bao for fearing the enemy. But once Huzhou is lost, Chongde will be difficult to preserve, and Lin'an will be directly exposed to the Jin army. Unexpectedly, he hadn't rushed to Chongde, so he went on his own and was irretrievable.