In 775 A.D., the thirteenth year of Xinghan, October 29, the royal hunting ground of Western Qin.

Zhao Ziliang and a dozen cavalrymen scattered in all directions of a large bush surrounded five antelopes, uneven, thick bushes blocked the flight path of the arrows, Zhao Ziliang and the knights could only keep moving their positions to find the best shooting angle, but the antelopes did not stand still, they were always moving.

If you want to shoot an antelope that is constantly moving in the bushes, you need to seize the moment and shoot arrows quickly, accurately and fiercely, which is the best activity for training archery.

"Whoosh!" Zhao Ziliang seized the opportunity to shoot an arrow, the arrow pierced the air and made a sound, and an antelope fell in response, and its limbs kept kicking and swallowing.

The opportunities appeared one after another, Zhao Ziliang felt keen, reacted quickly, and shot several arrows one after another, killing all the several antelopes in the bushes, and each arrow was shot in the head.

Zhao Ziliang put away the treasure carving bow and waved his hand: "Go over and bring the prey back!" ”

The knights jumped off their horses and walked towards the antelope that was shot, and after a while, the soldiers came over with five antelopes, and a chief bowed to Zhao Ziliang and hugged his fists and said: "King Shenwei, all five arrows hit the head of the prey, and none of them missed!" ”

"Let's go, go back and get some food!" Zhao Ziliang said that he turned around and returned, and the other soldiers rode their prey and turned over their horses and followed closely behind.

Before Zhao Ziliang and the others arrived to rest on horseback, Wang Can took a few people to meet them on horseback.

"Ritsu-" After the two horses met, Dulema stopped.

Wang Can hugged his fists at Zhao Ziliang and said, "King, there is urgent news from the Great Food Country and the Eastern Roman Empire!" On October 20, al-Mansour died; After Constantine V died of illness on September 14, his son Leo ascended the throne as Emperor for Leo IV, but several of his half-brothers questioned the legitimacy of his emperor and launched rebellions in various places, but they were put down in less than a month, and several half-brothers were all killed by him, and Leo IV's throne was completely secured, and no one dared to oppose him again! ”

Zhao Ziliang looked stunned, and immediately said: "Let's go, let's go back!" ”

With that, the horse galloped forward, and Wang Can and the others followed and quickly disappeared into the hunting ground.

Back at the palace, Zhao Ziliang changed his clothes and came to the Qinzheng Palace, where Wang Can and the ministers of the imperial court and some generals of the military were already waiting.

"Let's talk about the Eastern Roman Empire first, since Leo's half-brothers doubted the legitimacy of his emperor and launched a rebellion, how could Leo IV put down the rebellion in such a short period of time, this is unreasonable, even if he has three heads and six arms, it is impossible to do it!"

Wang Can had apparently investigated the matter, and he replied: "The ministers have already analyzed this matter, unless Leo IV knew that his half-brothers would start a rebellion, so he began to make arrangements early on, and when they rebelled, his side immediately started to wipe them out."

Zhao Ziliang nodded when he heard this, "Yes, only this makes sense!" Leo IV is only twenty-five years old this year, right? I can't imagine that this person has such scheming and means, he is decisive in killing, and he treats his brothers mercilessly, which should not be underestimated! ”

Wang Can said: "Leo is indeed not inferior to his father Constantine V, but the minister thinks that he does not have such a strong and decisive means and deep scheming, the minister thinks that this matter should not be planned by him, and his character is not so decisive and cruel!" The minister sent someone to check, Leo IV's queen was originally called Riela, but she later changed her name to Irina, the same name as her mother-in-law, and our spies in Constantinople found that Leo's every success was behind this Irina shadow in the process of probing! ”

Zhao Ziliang asked, "You mean that this Irina is behind the scenes to advise Leo IV?" ”

Wang Can nodded and said: "Yes, our fine work has also been to her hometown of Greece to check, this Queen Irina is extremely beautiful, rich, intelligent, well-educated, he and Leo IV have a child, also named Constantine, is already four years old!" ”

The legendary beauty of the school? Zhao Ziliang couldn't help sighing, there is no shortage of beauties at any time, and there is no shortage of talented women, but the best beauties who are both beautiful and intelligent are rare, and this kind of woman is favored by God. Zhao Ziliang believed that Leo IV might have some talents, but he was afraid that he was too far from his queen Irina.

"So Irina had a lot of influence on Leo IV?"

Wang Can nodded and said, "Yes, it's very big!" Leo IV was almost obedient to Irina, and since marrying her, Leo IV has not come into contact with any other woman! ”

Is this possession? A woman who wants to be strong, with extraordinary beauty and intelligence! Zhao Ziliang made a judgment on Irina, but with the current situation of the Eastern Roman Empire, Leo IV is only afraid that he will focus on internal affairs first, and will not focus on the outside, after all, he has just ascended the throne, even if there are no brothers to compete with him for the throne, but the Eastern Roman Empire is not very calm, rebellions occur from time to time, and it is the right choice to rectify the interior.

Zhao Ziliang turned the topic to the issue of the Great Food Country: "Today is October 29, and Mansur died of illness on October 20, nine days have passed, which means that now Baghdad and the Persian-controlled areas of the Great Food Country have lost their owners!" ”

Wang Can said: "Yes! The Persian-controlled areas of Baghdad and Dashi must be very chaotic, and with the conditions of messaging there, Mahdi in Damascus will not be able to receive news for half a month! ”

Zhao Ziliang walked back and forth in the main hall, thinking in his mind, and after a few minutes, he stopped and looked at the military generals and asked: "Generals, adults, now is a rare opportunity, Mansur's death has deprived the area under his control, we have made some arrangements in the Great Food Country in the past few years, and secretly bribed and rebelled against some officials, generals and chieftains of the Great Food Country, if we decisively send troops now, it is very likely that we will capture all of Persia and the two river valley regions without much effort, what do you think?" ”

Someone stood up and said, "King, although this may be successful, we are afraid that we will not be able to recover the loan and compensation!" ”

Zhao Ziliang said with a smile: "As long as we take all of Persia and the two river valley regions, it doesn't matter if those reparations and loans are wanted, can't we still scavenge them back from the big cannibals?" The point is, we can continue to ask Mahdi for money, and if he doesn't give it, we will beat him until he does! ”

The generals also laughed.

Zhao Ziliang said that he wanted to fight, the generals agreed to fight, the opinions of the civil officials were not unanimous, and naturally they could not stop the troops, Zhao Ziliang immediately ordered to send an urgent message of 800 li to Zhao Lei stationed in the Persian region, ordering him to lead the plateau army to attack the western part of Persia and the two river basin areas, and at the same time ordered to send the slave army from Oghuz to fight in the Persian region, and appointed Li Siye as the commander of the western expedition to command the plateau army and the slave army, a total of 100,000 standing troops.

Since its establishment, the Slave Legion has changed three commanders, and the current commander is Bai Xiaode. According to the regulations, whether it is a standing army or a compulsory army, the chief officer and adjutant at the corps level can only serve for four consecutive years in the same corps, so as to avoid the phenomenon of generals not knowing the soldiers and the soldiers, and to a large extent, avoiding the drawbacks of generals supporting the troops and respecting themselves.

Li Siye is not young, nearly seventy years old, but he is still old and strong, Zhao Ziliang wants to give him one last chance to command the army, he is old and calm, rich in combat experience, is a more suitable candidate for commander.

Just when Li Siye rushed to Persia with his generals and soldiers from Xinjing, Bai Xiaode also led the slave army on the way from Oghuz to Persia, and the eight-hundred-li expedited was obviously much faster, using the post stations along the way to send Zhao Ziliang's will to Yazd, Persia at a speed of eight hundred miles per day.

Zhao Lei, who was in Yazd, soon received an edict from Zhao Ziliang, and Zhao Lei immediately ordered the Plateau Army to attack western Persia from the third route, and set off from Shiraz on the southern route; The middle lane departs from Yazd; The northern route departs from Ira.

In the chaos of the western Persian people, the people were panicked, the town guards had no masters, and they had no intention of spending time on the city fortifications, when the Western Qin army killed from the three roads, the defenders of the big food army in the towns could not resist at all, and even if they resisted, the resistance was extremely weak.

In just a few days, the Western Qin army reached Basra on the southern road, and joined up with the garrison originally in Basra, and the central route army successively captured Spahand, Arak, Daurud, Khoramabad, and Ilam, and soon approached the vicinity of Baghdad; The Northern Route Army attacked all the way to the west, capturing large towns in the northwest such as Qazvin, Ardabil and Tabriz, and the Armenian region soon fell into the hands of the Northern Route Army.

The Southern Route Army joined up with the 1,000-cavalry garrison of Basra and advanced rapidly northwest along the Euphrates River, where it soon joined forces with the Central Route Army under the city of Baghdad.

Baghdad's army did not want to be trapped in the city, so they hurriedly went out of the city to meet the battle, but were attacked head-on by the Western Qin cavalry led by Zhao Lei, and returned with a crushing defeat, 40,000 elites were annihilated, and only a few thousand fled back to Baghdad.

November 25, the Western Qin Army Plateau Corps besieged the city of Baghdad, Baghdad was translated by the Western Qin officials as the city of Bounda, this city has been quite large-scale after more than 10 years of construction, but its city wall is not tall, it is circular, so it is also called the regimental city, it covers an area is not small, divided into the outer city, the inner city and the palace city, there are three city walls, with the palace city as the center, the city wall constitutes 3 concentric circles. The city wall has four gates at equal distances, and four main streets stretch from the central area to the gates, which resemble the spokes of wheels. Miyagi has a palace, an official residence, a mosque, a library, a garden, and more.

The siege of tens of thousands of Western Qin troops made the residents of Dashi in the city panic and terrified. On the day of the siege, Zhao Lei sent people to announce to the defenders in the city that surrender can avoid death, and if they stubbornly resist, once the city is breached, there will be no chickens and dogs.