Outside the city of Beloea, the camp of the Western Qin army.

It was late at night, the camp was patrolled frequently, the sentry posts were lined up, the defense was tight, and the whole camp was brightly lit, but in addition to the sound of these non-stop patrols and walking, the whole camp was snoring one after another, and each camp tent was heard snoring of different sizes, and these snoring echoed each other, playing a unique sleep song in the barracks.

The butter in the oil lamp hanging on the wall of the tent in the big tent of the Chinese army crackled, Zhao Ziliang stood in front of the map and hugged his arm, touching his chin with one hand, this posture has become a habit of his, even if this habit of not having a good image can also show an extraordinary temperament in him, which is probably the unique temperament of the person in the upper position.

At this time, there was laughter and talking not far from the big tent, this is the return of the generals of the various departments who had just inspected the defense and security affairs in the camp, they all had the task of patrolling the camp at night, and some of them were not finished until the soldiers were all asleep, but the other generals still needed to be on duty at night, and they had to go to the big tent of the Chinese army to report the inspection after the inspection.

It will not take a long time, these generals are approaching the Chinese army tent in turn, and then report to Zhao Ziliang one by one the situation of the inspection, Zhao Ziliang listened carefully to everyone's report, although it is the same situation, but he did not show a trace of impatience, this is an attitude, if he is perfunctory, the following people are only afraid that they will be perfunctory, if he is serious and meticulous, the following people and generals will not dare to be lazy and perfunctory during the inspection.

After everyone finished reporting, Zhao Ziliang said: "Okay, according to the arrangement, Chen Qing and Wei Gao will stay on duty tonight, and everyone else will go back to rest!" ”

"Wait for the resignation!" The generals and officials withdrew from the big tent one after another.

Only Chen Qing and Wei Gao remained, and Zhao Ziliang asked, "Chen Qing, can we attack the city tomorrow?" ”

Chen Qing hugged his fists and said: "Back to the king, in the recent section of the marching route, the baggage team and the siege camp are acting with the main army, they can fight at any time, the siege equipment only needs an hour to complete the assembly, and the parts are ready-made, but the siege equipment such as trebuchets that need to fire stone bullets and fire oil bombs cannot be put into use, because it is necessary to organize people to make stone bullets and fire oil bombs, because there is a trench under this castle that is ten zhang wide and six zhang seven deep, and there is a smooth slope from the bottom of the ditch to the castle. Our siege engines, well railings, and other siege equipment cannot be used, and even siege ladders cannot be carried under the castle! King, this Beloea Castle is a hard bone, it's not easy to fight! ”

Syria has experienced many civilizations and kingdoms here, successive civilizations and kingdoms have built and expanded this castle, so that the entire hill has been built into a castle, and the castle is located on the hill, from the top of the hill to the bottom of the trench is a smooth stone slope with an angle of 50 degrees, it is very difficult for people to climb up, let alone siege cities, most of the siege equipment can not be used, such a castle is unique in the world, with a unique terrain as a basis, conventional siege methods are not applicable here at all. However, there is one point, the area of the castle is not large, and there are not many garrisons and garrison materials that can accommodate the city.

Zhao Ziliang asked, "How many defenders are there in this castle?" ”

Chen Qing said: "I'm afraid I'm going to ask General Wang Can!" ”

Zhao Ziliang pointed to a guard next to him and ordered: "Go and call Wang Can over!" ”

"No!"

Wang Can quickly rushed over, and after Zhao Ziliang's inquiry, he replied: "According to the spies of the East Factory, this castle has 5,000 defenders, 1,000 Roman troops in the Middle East, and 4,000 strong slaves, according to the scale of this castle, 1,000 defenders are enough." During the day, the king also saw that this castle has a unique terrain, which can be described as very, very dangerous, and it is not easy to attack it. However, this castle also has a weakness, that is, the problem of water source, there is no water source on the top of the mountain, although there is a cistern, but for 5,000 people, I am afraid that it will not take long. However, according to the spies, in order to defend this place, the Eastern Romans armed the 4,000 elite slaves in the castle and issued them weapons! So what we are going to attack now is not a thousand Eastern Roman troops, but five thousand! ”

Zhao Ziliang frowned, "This castle is indeed a hard bone, although it has the weakness of not drinking water, but we can't keep surrounding here and wait for them to run out of water and food······ In this way, Chen Qing, let the baggage battalion organize the slaves to make stone bullets and fire oil bombs tomorrow to prepare for the siege. If it really doesn't work, I will arrest all the civilians in the vicinity and let them fill in the trench of this king, as long as it is convenient for the siege! ”

Chen Qing promised: "Yes, king! ”

In later generations there is running water, of course there will be no shortage of water in the castle, but there is no running water in this era, although there is a cistern on the top of the castle mountain, but the water storage is limited after all, a thousand people can also be used for a period of time, if it does not rain for a long time, and the city is besieged, there are more than 4,000 people to use, this water storage type will definitely not take long, this only weakness is the fatal weakness, otherwise this castle will not be so well preserved for thousands of years, it has long been destroyed by the enemy army besieging the city, it is because of this lack of water factor, Let the defenders stationed in it have to surrender in all the sieges.

Early the next morning, Zhao Ziliang and the guards rode to the main gate of the castle again to observe the defense of the castle, he spent a morning around the trench outside the castle, and returned to the main gate of the castle again and ordered the guards: "Go and call Li Muchen!" ”

Soon Li Muchen rode over and dared to come, "Your name is Weichen, King?" ”

Zhao Ziliang beckoned to Li Muchen, "Li Qing, give you one thing to do, you write a letter of persuasion to surrender and send someone to the defenders to persuade them to surrender!" Although they may not really surrender, but God has the virtue of a good life, our posture still has to be done, lest in the future someone criticize this king for killing innocents indiscriminately, and write a letter of persuasion to them, if they do not surrender, they are stubborn, not this king is cruel and murderous, and those defenders have no excuse to attack this king, do you say this reason? ”

Li Muchen arched his hand and said: "The king is wise, Weichen will write it immediately!" ”

Zhao Ziliang didn't expect the Eastern Roman army in the city to surrender at all, and he returned to the barracks after giving Li Muchen's orders. The siege camp organized the slaves to make stone bullets and fire oil bombs in an orderly manner, and the 2,000 elite cavalry led by Xuan 13 has been hanging behind the army of the Syrian governor Niserus, often harassing, sneaking attacks, and assaults, making Niserus annoyed and suffering heavy losses.

Niserus had to send his own 1,000 light cavalry to fight, but Xuan 13 suddenly withdrew with his troops at this time, and Niserus's 1,000 light cavalry had to return, but within a day, Xuan 13's 2,000 light cavalry appeared again and carried out a large-scale sneak attack, so that most of Niserus's slaves escaped.

Niserus was so angry that he jumped to his feet, pointing to the sky and scolding his mother, he was ruthless this time, vowing to destroy the Western Qin cavalry that would only sneak attack this time, he once again sent his own 1,000 cavalry to meet Xuan 13's men and horses, but Xuan 13 led the army away again, the Eastern Roman light cavalry did not return this time, but bravely pursued, this time it was in the hands of Xuan 13, they were deceived A canyon was completely annihilated, Xuan 13 destroyed the thousand Eastern Roman light cavalry and then pursued Niserus to the south again.

Nisserus's army was soon attacked again, the military spirit was already very unstable, after two consecutive attacks, his direct line of men and horses had been lost, only more than a thousand people remained, and the cavalry was less than a hundred, these were his guards, and there were less than two thousand slaves left, and one night, the slaves fled one after another, and Niserus could not control the bullet pressure, nor was he able to pursue these escaped slaves, so he had to quickly retreat to Damascus with the remaining more than a thousand people, But Xuan 13 was still in hot pursuit.

Knowing that more than ninety percent of his men were infantry, at this pace of marching, he was afraid that he would be completely annihilated by the Western Qin cavalry before he could withdraw to Damascus, so he had to order the infantry to stay and garrison in a small town called Tel Bisse, in the pretense of preparing to defend this small fortress, while he himself secretly fled to Damascus in the south with the light cavalry of the Hundred Guards that night.

On the twenty-fifth day of the first month of 777 A.D., late at night.

Zhao Ziliang was dealing with the pieces sent from Xinjing, these were all pieces that Zhao Lei couldn't make a decision on, so he sent someone here.

Zhang Ben, the commander of the scout battalion, rushed to the door of the big tent and saw that the lights were still on inside, so he asked the guards standing guard: "Is the king asleep?" ”

The guard replied, "Not yet!" ”

If it is daytime, there are other officials and generals in the big tent who follow Zhao Ziliang to work together, and there are many guards standing guard, and the generals and officials who come to perform can enter at will, but at night there is no one else in the big tent except Zhao Ziliang, and the officials and generals who want to come to play cannot enter casually, and they need to be notified and allowed to enter.

Zhang Ben immediately shouted: "King, the ministers serve Zhang Ben in the camp and have something important to report!" ”

"Come in!"

Before Zhang Ben walked into the big tent, two of the four guards at the door immediately approached the tent and quickly stood in front of Zhao Ziliang facing the tent.

Zhao Ziliang put down the pen and looked up and said, "What's the matter with coming so late?" ”

Zhang Ben hugged his fists and said: "King, just now the spies who Weichen arranged to monitor and probe near the castle reported that there were a large number of shouts and killings in the castle, and the flames were soaring, and large-scale battles were taking place in the entire castle around the fortress arrow towers and city walls, and Weichen also went over to see it in person, and it was indeed as reported by the spies!" ”

When Zhao Ziliang heard this, he couldn't sit still, and immediately said to the guards: "Prepare the horse!" ”

"Yes!"

When Zhao Ziliang and the others came to the castle, they saw that there were battles everywhere in the castle on the top of the mountain, and the fires burning everywhere in the castle illuminated the entire castle.

Li Muchen, who rushed to the scene with the news, was surprised and said, "Is this infighting?" ”