Jiangxi is surrounded by mountains on three sides, the north is bordered by the big river, and the terrain is from south to north, from the two wings to the center slowly, with a slight basin form.

Shangrao is the eastern gateway of Jiangxi, when Wu Chu Minyue is at the cross, the south controls Minyue, the east leads to the two Zhejiang, is the east defense of Jiangxi, the traffic is rushed, there is the water of the Xinjiang River and the Ganjiang River meet and enter the Poyang Lake, the Quzhou Basin (the valley in Zhejiang), and the two Zhejiang; Nantong Fuzhou, through Shanguan, Tieniu Pass, water pass can enter Shaowu in northern Fujian.

If Shangrao is lost, not only will the door of Jiangxi be opened, but the communication between northern Fujian and Jiangxi will also be cut off.

By early November, the luxury family had gathered more than 30,000 troops east of Shangrao with Shangrao as the center; Huaidong is centered on Quzhou, and the number of soldiers and horses assembled in the west of Quzhou has increased to 50,000.

This number has exceeded the number of troops set by the Privy Council for the Chongcheng Army at the beginning of the year, in addition to the main soldiers of the Chongcheng Army, it also includes the original Zhejiang East Camp Army and the new soldiers recruited from Quzhou and other places in the later period.

At this time, the battle of Shangrao was already an arrow on the wind, and it was imperative.

The soldiers and horses of the Chongcheng army stationed in Jiangshan County, on the tenth day of November, divided the troops out of the city, avoided the fortresses built by the Zhejiang-Fujian army in Litang, advanced westward along the Fenglin River, and attacked the beacon pier of the Zhejiang-Fujian army on the Guanxi Ridge, opening the prelude to the Shangrao war.

Guanxi Ridge is the division of Jiangshan County and Hengshan County, and it is also the watershed of Shangshan Creek of Qujiang Branch, Fenglin Creek and Shanxi of Xinjiang Branch, and is the remaining vein of the southern foot of Huaiyu Mountain.

Li Baidao took off his saber from his waist, stood on the ground, raised his eyebrows, and stared at more than 100 soldiers from the two wings of a steep slope about 100 feet deep, holding shields to suppress the attack.

The place where Li Baidao stood was originally a valley with staggered houses, and it was a small village with about ten families. At this time, the village was already empty. Both sides have increased their troops in the border areas, and the peasant households in the deep mountains are either conscripted to serve as servants, or they have left their hometowns early, leaving this place of right and wrong, where can they still find people?

The beacon pier is built on the gap of the ridge, although after the beacon pier is built, the left and right ridge roads will be extinct, but from the weeds and shrubs between the withered and glorious sides, you can still see the remains of the predecessors Fan Shan and the mountains. At this time, the beacon pier seals the mouth of the ridge, becomes a roadblock, from the pier, several pillars of black wolf smoke like a pillar straight to the clouds, the sound of the horn is heard between the mountains and valleys, not only the side of the Guanxi Ridge, Zhejiang and Fujian in the north Qingyang Ridge, Huozi Mountain and other places set up the beacon pier, also burn the wolf smoke together.

The scouts, who had already touched the ridge, had observed the enemy's garrison at Shanxisai, and had sent more than a thousand reinforcements to this side. Before the enemy reinforcements arrived, they failed to capture a beacon pier and gain a foothold on the ridge of Guanxi Ridge, and this attack could only be regarded as a failure.

The many attacks launched today are false in other places, but only Li Baidao knows in his heart that this place in Guanxiling is real.

Shangrao is between Huaiyu Mountain and Wuyi Mountain, the southern foot of Huaiyu Mountain and the northern foot of Wuyi Mountain are the watershed of Xinjiang River and Qujiang River, and there is a long section of road in the middle that is not connected by waterway, so it is necessary to change to land route. Directly from Quzhou to the west, the most spacious, easy passage, for the southern foot of Huaiyu Mountain jaw valley road, but also the main post road between Zhejiang and Jiangxi has always been connected, since ancient times there are jaw passes standing in the meantime. After the jaw pass, it is Changshan County, an important town in the east of Shangrao.

After the luxury family abandoned Quzhou, they built several military fortresses around the jaw pass, and completely sealed the jaw post road.

In addition to the jaw pass, in the southwest of Quzhou in the northwest of Jiangshan County, between Xianyan Mountain and Daao Mountain, there is Pingyi Valley Road, which can directly reach the west of Changshan County, the bank of the Xinjiang River, there is a town named Litang in the meantime, it is Jiangshan County and Changshan, Hengshan, Shangrao counties are connected to the big port, this post is also called Litang Post Road, so that from Pucheng, Xianxialing to enter Jiangxi Minjun business travel can avoid from Quzhou less detour nearly 100 miles.

The luxury family built a number of passes between Xianyan Mountain and Daao Mountain to close the Litang Post Road.

These fortresses and fortifications, together with the cities of Changshan, Hengshan and Shangrao on the inner line, constitute the Shangrao defense line of the luxury family on the eastern front.

Jaw Road and Litang Road are the only two main roads between Shangrao and Quzhou that do not need to cross mountains and mountains.

Of course, between the many mountains at the southern foot of Huaiyu Mountain and the northern foot of Wuyi Mountain, there are still countless dangerous trails leading to the two places. From Jiangshan County to the southwest along the Fenglin River, before reaching Guanxi Ridge, there are also trails taken by medicine farmers and mountain people in the early years leading to the south of Hengshan County.

The easy-to-travel ridge gap has long been blocked by the luxury family's beacon fire pier, which has added many obstacles to people.

It's just that although the Guanxi Ridge is dangerous, but fortunately, the ridge mountain is thin, from the steep slope across the valley road to climb over the past, only three or two miles deep, then to the upper reaches of Shanxi, there is a valley passage that can directly attack the periphery of Shangrao, the relatively weak Hengshan, Shanxi Zhusai.

In order to spare the fortresses that the Zhejiang and Fujian armies had built in Litang, Jaw and other places, and stationed heavy troops, crossing the Guanxi Ridge was one of the options for the Huaidong Army to advance westward.

No matter how dangerous the mountains are, there are steep and concave along the mountains, and there are also rain creeks that are washed down by the rain and weathered heavily, which are often shortcuts and gaps over the mountains and mountains. It's just that the gap in the front of Guanxi Ridge is blocked by a beacon pier for the luxury family, and it becomes dangerous and abnormal. The trees in front of the beacon pier were also set on fire, leaving only a bare steep slope and a few new shrubs and weeds.

The soldiers held shields to suppress the attack, and a large number of boulders and giant trees were suddenly thrown down in the beacon pier. The stones and trees rolled down along the Yuxi Road between the dangerous slopes, and rolled down with the gravel accumulated by the Yuxi Road for many years, the sound was terrifying, and many generals could not avoid it, and they broke their muscles and bones when they were on it, and rolled down, and the rest could only take refuge in the shrubs and trees on both sides.

Seeing that it was extremely difficult to go up from the gap in the front of the beacon pier, Li Baidao asked the soldiers to dig mountaineering holes in the more dangerous places on both sides with a shovel, so that people had a place to step on and climb over a cliff slope that was more than ten feet high and was not easy to be hit directly by the rolling stones......

The shovel can be used as a shovel hoe, digging soil and breaking stones, cutting branches and breaking wood, digging out a steep straight plank road for soldiers to climb hand and foot in the blink of an eye, dozens of soldiers have climbed up, avoiding the front of the beacon pier can give the wood giant an attack angle, climb to the ridge.

You can't use rolling stones to attack wood directly, even if the arrows are shot from the foot bow, there is not so much threat to the Huaidong soldiers who are wearing strong armor and equipped with shields.

Soon, about half of the battalion soldiers touched the ridge and stormed the beacon pier about three zhang high.

Although the luxury family invested a lot of resources to build a defense line in Shangrao in the later period, they were trapped by financial resources after all, and they could not build every beacon pier as a pass.

The beacon pier at the pass of Guanxi Ridge is more than three zhang high, there are only more than 20 steps around, the space in the pier platform is very narrow, it is only equivalent to a small courtyard on a mountain ridge, and there are half of the guards stationed in the capital to defend.

As soon as the Huaidong army surrounded it, dozens of oil canisters were thrown into it one after another, and the entire pier made of stone on the periphery fell into a sea of fire, and there was no hiding place in the middle.

The soldiers of the Zhejiang-Fujian army, who were surrounded by fire, rolled out of the pier platform, and it was the help of the Huaidong army that extinguished the remaining fire. At this time, the Zhejiang-Fujian army from Shanxi Village had just arrived at the foot of the western foot of Guanxi Ridge, and watched the loss of the beacon pier, that is, they swarmed and suppressed the attack, and they were bound to recapture this ridge pass.

Although the western slope of Guanxi Ridge is relatively gentle, the Huaidong Army's armor has a condescending advantage at this time, which is enough.

Li Baidao gave Hu Conghug to climb the ridge, watched the battalion under his command to organize soldiers to rush down the west slope to pursue the rout, and shouted: "Turtle son, get ......back to Lao Tzu" On the one hand, he organized soldiers and horses to guard the ridge, cut down trees and bury fences in the easy place, and on the other hand, he organized soldiers and horses to widen the steep path at the west foot as much as possible, and in the distance, the post horse was galloping towards Jiangshan City, reporting the capture of Guanxi Ridge.

***************

The Huaidong Army's fighting style became conservative, and when they captured Guanxi Ridge, they let go of the rout and did not pursue, so that the ambush deployed by the Flying Bear on the back side of Guanxi Ridge between the lower river passes could not play a role.

In Shanxi Village, after receiving the news that Guanxiling was lost and the Huaidong Army was not able to establish Guanxiling, Xuan Feixiong frowned, his face was heavy, and he did not slow down for a long time.

Shangrao's main general was originally a pawn farmer Sima Deng Yu, after Hao Feixiong led his troops to aid Shangrao, Deng Yu was reappointed as deputy marshal, and Shi Hejin, Wang Hui and others will guard the key passes and organize logistics grains.

"Could it be that the Huaidong Army wants to open Guanxi Ridge and turn Guanxi Ridge into the main passage for the west to attack Shangrao?" Extravagant Bear stared at the map on the long case, frowning.

Extravagant Fei Xiong seemed to muttered to himself, all the generals looked at each other, what is the reason why the Huaidong Army gave up the jaws and the valley road that was easy to walk in Litang and took the Guanxiling trail? It is not that the Huaidong army occupies the Guanxi Ridge, and it can directly attack the Shangrao City along the Shanxi River, along the Shanxi River, the Shanxi Village and the Hengshan City are dependent on each other, and it is also an important place for the Zhejiang-Fujian army.

Even if the Huaidong soldiers and horses can climb over the Guanxi Ridge and go down the Shanxi River, how can tens of thousands of grains pass through the Guanxi Ridge?

"The terrain around Shanxi Village is open, although it is a horn with Hengshan City, but to hold it, you also need to fill in more soldiers and horses here," Deng Yu said, "It is possible that the Huaidong Army is not in a hurry to conquer Shangrao, but constantly stretches the defensive line and confronts us, dragging us down!" ”

Flying Bear took a charcoal pen and marked a mark on the map of Guanxi Ridge.

Indeed, although the passage of jaw and Litang is much wider than that of Yuling Pass, after all, it is a valley road sandwiched between Huaiyu Mountain and Wuyi Mountain, and there are lofty mountains on both sides.

The sudden onslaught is likely to repeat the mistake of the repeated setbacks of the Yuling Pass in front of the Yuling Pass, open up a new channel, and lengthen the defensive line to contact, so that the Huaidong Army's military and material superiority can be brought into play, and the defenders of Zhejiang and Fujian will be exhausted to deal with it.

The Shanxi Pass is located on the innermost side, not to mention the more open terrain, and once Huaidong captures Shanxi Fortress and Hengshan City, it can cut Changshan City, Jaw Pass Fortress and Litang Fortress with Shangrao. However, if the Huaidong Army wanted to gather troops and horses to storm Shanxi Fortress and Hengshan City, it must first solve the bottleneck restrictions on grain supply in Guanxiling.

Could it be that when the two armies were facing each other, Huaidong still had time to open up mountains and mountains?