In November of the fifth year of the Qing calendar of the Great Song Dynasty, Song Liao took advantage of the internal turmoil in Western Xia to stop and the decline of national strength and the winter famine to jointly launch an attack.

The Great Song Dynasty took the Northwest Army as the main force, and mobilized the Lizhou Yongning Army, the Bazhou Xingrong Army, the Wenzhou Zhangxin Army and other border armies to be under the jurisdiction of the Northwest Army.

Su Jin was awarded the rank of general of Zhenbei to command the whole army, and the left and right vanguard commanders were Jingtai and Pan Jiang, with dozens of generals under their respective commands, forming an army of 200,000 soldiers to march north along Weizhou and Yanzhou in two ways, and advanced to the southernmost fortresses of the Western Xia Kingdom, Huizhou and Youzhou.

At the same time, the Liao State was on the northwest border of the Western Xia Kingdom, entangled with 220,000 iron cavalry, and the Liao Xingzong Yelu Zongzhen personally led 100,000 cavalry out of Jinsu City to the south, and the emperor's younger brother Chongyuan led 60,000 cavalry out of the south pass of Helan Mountain; Xiao Xiaoyou, who stayed in Tokyo, led his division as a backup; Xiao Hui, the privy envoy of the North Court, led 60,000 troops out of the north entrance of Helan Mountain; The three-way army rushed straight forward in the shape of a zigzag.

Yelu Zongzhen is bound to win this time, and the elites led by the Liao State are mainly cavalry, and the purpose is naturally to seize a large area of Western Xia territory with a thunderous momentum, and quickly occupy the summer capital Xingqing Mansion; In the eyes of the monarchs and ministers of the Liao State, this battle could not actually be regarded as a real contest, under the premise that the Song State contained the main force of the Xia army in the south, all the Great Liao Iron Cavalry had to do was to destroy the scattered resistance forces along the way and reach the Xia capital as soon as possible.

And the reason why the elite 200,000 troops were sent to come was another reason, these 200,000 cavalry were actually not used to deal with the Xia army at all, but after occupying the Xia State, they became a sharp weapon against the southern Song army.

The monarchs and ministers of the Liao State have made a deduction, the 200,000 troops of the Song State will attack from the south to the north, and will be the first to engage the Xia army, the center of gravity of the Xia State is in the southwest, and most of their limited forces are also deployed in the southern cities, although the Xia State is in a difficult situation, but the Xia State army with a large number of cavalry will still make it difficult for the Song people to move an inch; Even if the Song army can finally win, at least more than half of the 200,000 troops will be killed or wounded, and at that time, the Great Liao Iron Cavalry has already occupied Xingqing Mansion, and then swung its army south to grab more victories.

Xiao Hui, the privy envoy of the Northern Yuan, said well at the pre-war meeting: In the distribution of benefits after the war, the Song people have no right to bargain with us, because they don't even have an inch of merit, and they may not even be able to defeat the Xia army's cities and pools.

On the one hand, they envy the Song State for having a large area of rich land, magnificent mountains and rivers, and covet the luxury of the Song State all the time, especially the two countries have close exchanges with ministers and merchants, the more people go to the Song State, the more they will sigh at the prosperity of the Song State after they come back; But on the other hand, they have the weakness of despising the Song Kingdom, a country so rich that even a small Western Xia in the northwest can't cope with it, and they really don't deserve to have such a rich life.

But at the same time, due to the limitation of national strength, as well as the momentum of the Three Kingdoms, the covetousness of the Liao people has been well hidden, after the alliance of the Yuanyuan, the two countries are about the country of brothers, and the Song people are soft and send New Year's coins every year to serve, but let the Liao people have the hesitation to reach out and not hit the smiling face.

In the spring of the second year of Qingli, there was an opportunity, when Li Yuanhao and the Song State were in full swing, he invited the Liao State to jointly send troops to destroy the Song Dynasty, Yelu Zongzhen was also moved at that time, and gathered more than 200,000 horses to arrive at the border of Bazhou, but in the end, because Li Yuanhao's move contained evil intentions, he wanted to use the power of the Liao State to contain the Song people's forces, and his plan to go straight to Bianliang was recognized, and finally the 200,000 troops only gathered on the border to standby, and did not really attack.

The Liao people don't want the Song State to be strong, and they also don't want the Xia State to be strong, and even in some respects, the Xia State is more of a threat than the Song State, the Song people at least pay attention to some face, and scruple some words, while Li Yuanhao's Western Xia never acts according to common sense, the border nuisance between the two countries continues, Li Yuanhao's border defenders continue to cross the border to burn the border people of the Liao State, and also instigated the rebellion of the Black Mountain Delier Department, and finally the Nerd Department will be contained, this incident alone made Liao Xingzong vomit for several months.

Of course, the Song people are not good birds, and when they sent the Liao envoy Xiao Temo and the deputy envoy Liu Liufu to the Song State at the moment when the 200,000 troops were assembled at the border, the idea was that even if they did not plan to help Yuan Hao attack the Song State, they would take advantage of this opportunity to get some benefits.

But the actual situation is that the Song people played a conspiracy and tricks, deceived Xiao Temo and Liu Liufu, and vainly claimed to have developed a powerful musket and cannon, so frightened that Xiao Temo not only gave up the request to increase the New Year's coin, but also wrote off the New Year's coin set by the Yuanyuan Alliance, and got a drawing of that firearm in his hand.

The Liao people thought that they had made a big profit, and if they had developed the same firearm with the drawings of this firearm, then the Great Liao cavalry would be invincible in the world, but after testing it thousands of times, this firearm was either inconvenient and weak because the iron sand that was shot out was weak and weak, and it was impossible to penetrate Lu Min, or it was fired indiscriminately before and after the explosion of the chamber, causing a lot of casualties; Xiao Temo, who was in charge of the research and development, was also blinded by the iron sand of the musket that was blown up in an experiment, and became a wasted man.

At first, the Liao people thought that the technology was not up to par, but gradually they felt that something was wrong, since the Song people had such powerful firearms, why did they not see them on a large scale of equipment to the border army? Even in several skirmishes between the armies of the two countries, the shadow of such a firearm has never been seen.

The Liao people felt that something was wrong, so they ordered Xizuo to collect information in the Song Kingdom, and the results they got made them angry and crooked their noses, there was no powerful firearm at all, all this was just a trick of the Song envoy Su Jin, who was in charge of the negotiation, and deceived Xiao Temo, who was as stupid as a pig, to take the initiative to give up the New Year's coin and further requirements, and ran back with a forged drawing; Now the storyteller in the teahouse in the capital of the Great Song Dynasty is still foaming at the water and laughing at the Liao people about it, and the Liao envoy's visit this time is an out-and-out joke in the eyes of the Song people.

This kind of intelligence suppression made the monarchs and ministers of the Liao State who knew about it feel humiliated, and at the same time, they also had more hatred for the Song State, but this kind of messy thing naturally could not be a reason to start a war, and it would become a joke in the whole world when it was spread, so they had to swallow this disgusting breath, and at the same time remember the name that made them hate: Su Jin!

But Su Jin, who was shrouded in hatred, was not unlucky because of countless curses, but also won the champion and became the prefect of Weizhou in the northwest, when Li Yuanhao attacked Weizhou, Liao Xingzong abandoned his previous suspicion and was willing to provide craftsmen who made catapults to Li Yuanhao.

Heaven does not fulfill people's wishes, Su Jin did not die, Weizhou did not break, on the contrary, Li Yuanhao returned with a feather, the Liao people regretted but also had some luck to reap the profits, whether it was Li Yuanhao suffered a loss or the Song State was injured, it was good news for the Liao people.

The national strength of the Xia State deteriorated, and Li Yuanhao had to agree to many harsh conditions of the Liao people in exchange for the food aid of the Liao State, but as soon as Li Yuanhao died, the newly powerful Empress Dowager Yeli immediately announced that all the terms agreed by Yuan Hao would be null and void, and Yelu Zongzhen finally moved the idea of attacking Western Xia, but the only obstacle was not whether the Xia State could be defeated, but whether the Song State would stand still.

After careful deliberation, a wonderful plan to drag the Song State into the water was released, in the eyes of the Liao people, the Song State must hate the Western Xia to the bone, he disturbed the northwest of the Song State for decades, so that the northwest of the Song State is not peaceful, in the hearts of each generation of Song emperors, the Xia State is a fish bone standing in the throat, can pull out this fish bone Song people must raise their hands in favor.

Facts have proved that the speculation of the Liao people is reasonable and correct, the secret letter reached the hands of Zhao Zhen, the Song Emperor, Zhao Zhen quickly made a positive reply, the Liao monarch and the minister said that they celebrated, and used this as bait, but the real big fish was the Song people, and the situation was under control.

On the twentieth day of the twentieth month, this is a foggy and gloomy day, the 60,000 troops of Xiao Hui, the privy envoy of the Northern Court of Liao, and the king of South Korea, crossed the Helan Pass to officially set foot on the land of Xia, after solving the small Xia army defenders on the border, Xiao Hui ordered the army to camp on the vast Gobi of Pingchuan, he was not in a hurry to go south, he was waiting for the latest news, once the news came, he could wave his army to the south, and set foot on any town where he went.

In the evening, the heralds galloped in from the rear, and Xiao Hui, who was drinking and sitting alone in the big tent, hurriedly ordered someone to bring the heralds into the camp tent, and asked, "Is there any news?" ”

The herald's face was purple from the cold wind, his lips were chapped, and he opened his mouth to speak.

Xiao Hui picked up a bowl of wine and handed it to him and said, "It's done." ”

The herald took it and poured it down, stretched out his hand to wipe his lips, thanked him dumbly, took out a secret letter from the inner lining of the close-fitting sheepskin jacket, handed it to Xiao Hui and said: "This is a secret letter sent by the emperor to the king, and the emperor instructed the small one to bring a message to the king, from today on, the king can gallop to Masixia, and the army of the emperor and the prince will respond on both sides of the rear, following the footsteps of the king." ”

Xiao Hui unfolded the letter and read it from beginning to end, looked up to the sky and laughed: "Okay, good, if you really do it, this time the Song people have a hard time, and the order will go down, tonight the soldiers who slaughter cattle and sheep have a good meal and a good night's sleep, from tomorrow we will wave the sword and cut off the nose of the Xixia people." ”