When Xiong Jing got up in the morning, there was a piece of ice floating in the copper basin on the shogunate's main case. The colder the weather, the more likely the water will freeze every night, and the ice means that the battle will be won, and the Chu army has already entered a state of combat readiness and is ready for the last fight. As for the Qi army, the Ba people, and the Xiou tribes who were rushing on the road, Xiong Jing would not wait, and the twenty Chu army divisions had already exceeded the shogunate's previous expectations for troops.

"Your Majesty, the ice is thin." Zhuang Wudi shook his head, and under the gaze of the generals, the ice was still too thin.

"Thick geometry?" The generals of each division were also in the curtain, and everyone was staring at the copper basin. Of course, most people can't see it, only Yue Wuzhu, Dongye Gu, and Deng Sui, who are sitting closer to Xiongjing, can see the thin ice floating in the water. The warmth of the shogunate didn't melt it immediately, and it floated there calmly until Xiong Jing touched it with his hand.

"One inch." The figures reported by Zhuang Wudi are no different from the thickness that Xiong Jing is looking at now. Ice thickness cannot be measured in the evening or morning, but at noon and in the afternoon, when the temperature is at its highest.

"An inch is not enough." Xiong Jing shook his head. Sima, the general who stretched his neck in the audience, heard that the ice was only an inch thick, and gasped slightly.

How thick ice can be marched and fought, and the Operations Division has long had test records, and an inch of ice will definitely not work. With the Chu ruler, the non-commissioned officers of Chu need at least one inch and seven minutes of ice to march in a single column, two inches and six feet to march in two columns, and four inches to march in three columns.

In addition to the soldiers, the Chu army also had artillery and baggage, and these things had much higher requirements for the thickness of the ice than the foot soldiers. The short-barreled cannon is light, the ratio of the bullet is only 40, and the total weight of a 68-pound cannon is still two tons, and it needs five inches of ice to operate safely; A four-wheeled carriage, with a ton or so of supplies, requires six inches of ice to travel safely. Now the ice is only one inch thick, and even a foot soldier can't walk an inch, and it is even more impossible to fight.

"Huai Shui Bing?" Xiong Jing asked again, the girder is eight hundred miles away from the Huaishui in a straight line, and the water near the girder is frozen, and the Huaishui is likely to be frozen.

"There's thin ice." Zhuang Wudi said: "Da Sima Mansion thinks that after the Qi sergeant dies in Xiapi, he should not go south to Huaishui, but when he goes north to Pengcheng, and then rushes from Pengcheng, he can arrive within ten days." The rest of the divisions and brigades ......"

Zhuang Wudi shook his head, in mid-November, Shuize formed an inch thick ice, and then the weather will get colder and colder, the Ba people and the Xiou tribes have just arrived at Huguan and Qingyang, once the Han River is frozen, it is impossible to arrive in a decisive battle for more than a thousand miles. Only the Qi people have the possibility of coming.

"Huaishui only has thin ice, can't it come from Huaishui?" Xiong Jing asked subconsciously.

"Today is just thin ice, tomorrow, the day after tomorrow or not." Zhuang is not authentic. "Pengcheng is 900 miles from Daliang by land, and Shouying is also 900 miles from Daliang. If the chasm is frozen when the Qi sergeant arrives at Shouying, he can arrive two days in advance if he abandons the boat in Pengcheng. ”

"Where is Refractive now?" Xiong Jing understood what Zhuang Wudi meant, but he didn't know when the Qi people would arrive.

"You can go to Xiapi today." Zhuang Wudi knew his confusion, and estimated: "Qi Shu is lightly dressed three times a day, and he will know that he will be opened in ten days." If the gap freezes when you arrive at Shouying two days later, you need to arrive in 12 days. If the water is frozen tomorrow......"

The waterway should first reach Huaishui from Surabaya, then go east along Huaishui, and turn into a chasm after arriving at Shouying. After going around in this way, you can reach Shouying two days later, and the distance from Shouying is equal to the distance from Pengcheng to Kaifeng. Which way to go faster depends on the weather, the Huaishui divide is not frozen within three days, the waterway is faster, the Huaishui gap is frozen within three days, and the land route is faster.

"Can't you go down the water?" Xiong Jing didn't want to choose either way, he wanted to take a shortcut.

"The river channel in Danshui Mayi has been blocked, and it cannot be desilted for a few days." Zhuang is not authentic. It was not that the shogunate did not discuss this route.

"After arriving in Mayi, abandon the boat and land, how many miles to Kaifeng?" Xiong Jing asked.

"More than four hundred miles." Zhuang Wudi said: "However, there are two captains of the Qin army in the north of Mayi, and the Wei land is occupied by the Qin people. Even if the Qi army can win the battle, under the wind and snow, the Qin people will be strong and clear, and the grain and straw will inevitably be insufficient for more than 400 miles. ”

"Do the Wei people really wish the Qin people to burn down the houses?" Xiong Jing suddenly asked. He didn't fully believe in the Wei people, but he believed in the ordinary people of Wei that the common people of Wei would not willingly cooperate with the Qin people to clear the wilderness.

"This ......," Zhuang Wudi couldn't answer the question. There are also shogunate strategists who think that the 400 miles from Mayi to Daliang can be marched, but the Qi army is a large army with no structure, no logistics, and may even be reluctant to fight in formation, and no one dares to take such a risk.

"Who is stationed in Mayi?" Xiong Jing asked again.

"Mayi is garrisoned by Yongbo's Peishi." Zhuang replied without land. He had been talking to Xiong Jing for too long, and he was about to say that he would speak after the military discussion at this time.

"If it is feasible, let Master Pei and Master Qi come." Xiong Jing commanded. Whether Qi people can follow Zhen Danshui to come to the beam, this is not something he can judge alone. But at the moment, time is urgent, and arriving sooner will give us more hope of victory.

Zhuang Wudi retreated, and only then did he Xiong Jing speak: "This morning's ice is one inch thick, not enough for a battle." Astronomy knows, when will the ice be half a foot? ”

It was rare to bypass Sima and ask the astronomical strategists directly, but the weather was too important, and Xiong Jing had to ask directly.

"Yu Da Ao, when the day is very different, the sky is easy to be cold, and the minister thinks that he will be frozen for half a foot within ten days." The shogunate had several astronomical advisors, led by an old man, whose reply was based on empirical intuition, not on the instrument of the Navigation School.

"Ten days?" Xiong Jing didn't believe in the old man, he was just surprised that the time was so short, and it was only the middle of November.

"Ten days at most." The old man replied. "Or maybe five or six days."

"If the Qin people want to attack me, they can leave the camp if the ice is less than half a foot." Peng Zong reminded.

"However, the Qin people also have baggage carriages." Zhuang Wudi reminded him instead. "The sea of sand is seventy miles away from me, and if the Qin people have no heavy grain and firewood, they camp in the ice and snow, which is no different from Linzi back then."

"The seventy-mile march is only two days, and the decisive battle is only four days." Higashino has always been old. "If the ice is more than two inches, I will prevent the Qin cavalry from attacking me; The ice is more than three inches, and the whole army should pull out the camp and go north, Muze is only more than 20 miles, and you can reach the sand sea in one day. ”

"This is the same as what the shogunate has discussed." Zhuang is not authentic. "What we are discussing today is the matter of our army's formation and battle."

The garrison has been stationed for a long time, and the shogunate has long planned how to fight a decisive battle. There are all arrangements for how the 20 divisions will be arrayed, how the 20 divisions plus the 50,000 Qi troops will be arrayed, and how the 20 divisions plus the Qi army, the Ba people, and the Xiou tribes will be ......arrayed. The reason why the generals are gathered today is to explain the formation during the decisive battle, and then to the various precautions before the decisive battle:

In cold climates, corporals are prone to frostbite, and how the two armies line up above the water, neither side can make fire. Although the distance from the sand sea is shortened after the ice, only more than 70 miles, but if it snows, the transportation of more than 70 miles will become extremely difficult. The masters of each division had to learn how to ride the sled in the shortest time possible.

No matter how big or small, from the formation to the artillery, and finally to the baggage transportation and medical and health services, all the problems that could be thought of were mentioned again. It may not be possible to remember the general rate, but the details of these snow season operations have been bound into a book, and they have been sent to the shogunate of each division last month, and they are mentioned again now, in order to strengthen the impression of the division leaders and reduce non-combat attrition.

"How are the Qin people?" The division of the Zhu clan led the battle arrow and asked. "Why don't you know about the news of the Qin people?"

Dou Ya came from Fan Xiang and arrived in Kaifeng for only a few days. What puzzled him the most was that there were a lot of reports from the Qin army during the military discussion in the past, but this military discussion basically did not mention the Qin army, and what he knew in the military discussion was basically no different from what he knew in Xiangfan.

"News of the Qin people......" Zhuang Wudi couldn't help but smile bitterly on his face, one of the predicaments of the Chu army was not only dissatisfied, but also that there were fewer and fewer real and useful news about the Qin people.

"Yu Da Ao, this subordinate has obtained this morning." The shogunate was crowded with people, and the voice of the concubine was not noticeable until he lifted an object, which had been sent by a horseman just now.

"Is it armor?" The generals looked at the gray-white thing and said. "The armor of the Qin people?"

The armor in Fei Jing's hand was quickly sent up, and Xiong Jing couldn't see what it was from a distance, but he knew what it was instantly when he got it in his hand.

"Linen armor." He looked at the armor in his hand and threw it again, very lightly. Only then did he nod and said, "It's indeed a flax armor." ”

"Linen?" The more Wuzhu has heard of this kind of thing, the sea boat canvas is made of linen.

"The country of the far west has flax armor." Xiong Jing said from memory that this kind of armor had been mentioned in the previous proclamation.

"Linen is cloth, and if it is cloth, it should be inferior to leather armor." Yue Wuzhu stepped forward to take a closer look at the flax armor, the armor was extremely thick, and he tossed it in his hand like Xiongjing, and he also felt that the flax armor was very light, and the weight was less than half of the armor.

"Linen armor layering, if it is ......" Xiong Jing thought about everything about the linen armor, and finally only looked at Fei Jing: "Where did you get this armor?" ”

"Yu Da Ao, it was obtained after reprimanding the cavalry and killing the enemy cavalry this morning, and it is west of Fengze." Fei Jing Road. Therefore A is strange, so he unloads it and brings it back. The cavalry general said: This armor is tough, and the arrow is not penetrable. ”

"Riding a bow ......" Zhuang Wudi just wanted to say that riding a bow is not the same as stepping a bow is not transparent, but he didn't expect Fu Jing to add another sentence, "Make the archer shoot it, and it will not be transparent even if it is ten steps." ”

"Ten steps? Ten steps through? "The whole account was shocked. There are more than 500 archers in each division, and if ten steps can't be shot through, then what use are the archers?

"Summons the archers!" Xiong Jing was also extremely surprised when he heard this. He only knew that there was flax armor, but he did not know the defensive capabilities of the linen armor.

"Call the archers." The order was quickly heard, and the archers came. Not outside the tent, he gave up a distance of ten steps in the shogunate to test the shot, and an arrow was shot, and Qin Jia was really impenetrable.