Trapping Nanyang and taking Jingzhou, Ye Ji Luorong's mind has been decided, and the task left to Zhou Fan, Tian Chang and other generals is to capture Nanyang City as soon as possible and completely open the passage for the army to go south.

Twenty days have passed since Zhou Fan, Tian Chang, and Meng Ancian led their troops to Nanyang City. However, in the early stage, the main thing was to clear the obstacles on the periphery of Nanyang City, fill in the moats, build siege roads, build siege weapons, and carry out tentative attacks.

It was not until 8 August that the offensive and defensive battles in Nanyang entered a real climax.

More than 70,000 soldiers and horses took turns to seize the head of Nanyang City from the siege road or ladder or climbing vehicle; Hundreds of various catapults forced Nanyang City, and there were not many stones around Nanyang City, so they smashed the stone tablets, grinding plates and other things collected around Nanyang City.

For a time, the arrows inside and outside Nanyang City were like dense rain, and the blood flowed like a river.

Ye Ji Luo Rong and Hao Wenzhuang also stayed in the Dushan camp in the north of Nanyang City to supervise the battle. Ye Ji Luorong didn't care about the casualties of the siege soldiers and horses, he only cared about the casualties of the defenders at all times, only whether the defenders' will to fight was shaken, and only cared about where to invest stronger combat power, so as to tear a hole in the defense of Nanyang.

On the third day, Ye Ji Luorong allocated more than 1,000 elite Bai Yan who accompanied him to the Dushan camp to Zhou Fan for the siege of the city.

The source of troops in the early wars of the Yandong tribes mainly came from the tribal soldiers, and it was not until the change of the Yeqiu Jian that the elite soldiers from the various tribes were selected to form a standing army and horses, called the Wangshu Guard.

These people are skilled in bows and horses, have practiced martial arts since childhood, and have participated in brutal warfare all year round, and are the real elite of the Yandong tribes.

In the ninth year of Chongguan, Yezier personally led 100,000 soldiers and horses to break through the pass and invade Yannan, and only 10,000 people were selected as the guardians of the king's tent.

With the annexation of Yanxi Zhuhu, the cavalry troops controlled by Northern Yan became larger and larger, and the scale of the newly annexed army also rapidly expanded to more than 200,000 horses. Except for some of the original king's tent guards, who stayed in Yanjing and guarded the court, almost half of them were assigned to the princes as personal guards.

On the basis of the elite of the king's tent guards, Ye Ji Luorong formed his lineage army, composed of 6,000 people, these years of southern and northern wars, for the elite of the Northern Yan elite, because of the habit of wearing white felt to fight, and Ye Ji Luorong under the command of other troops and horses are different, so it is also known as the white army.

In order to open the gap as soon as possible and capture Nanyang City, Ye Ji Luorong could only hand over the Bai Yu line to Zhou Fan to participate in the bloody white-edged battle.

The 50,000 soldiers and horses of the newly attached army of Zhou Fan's department were formed by the Xuanzhen surrender army and the formation of other surrendered troops and Minzhuang.

After the establishment of the new military household system, the status of the soldiers has been improved, and there are few things in the army that have withheld food and salaries, so the morale and combat effectiveness of the new annexed army have improved compared with before the surrender, but most of the elite troops in Zhou Fan's department are the Xuanzhen border army that surrendered with him, and the total number is more than 20,000 people. Even more than 20,000 people, not all of them will fight to the death.

Yandong Zhuhu originated between the white mountains and black waters, with Bulun Mountain as the ancestral land, and was born in fishing and hunting in the early years, not as a nomadic people in the traditional sense. The Bai Yu army under the command of Ye Ji Luorong is actually a hundred battles of tiger ben who are familiar with horse warfare and foot combat, and they are all warriors who can fight to the death for Northern Yan to win the world in exchange for battle results, and the armor they wear and the bows and knives they carry are the best in the Yanbei army.

The elite of Bai Yu was integrated into the siege soldiers and horses, forming a sharp knife-like blade, going up along the siege road, stabbing the already precarious Nanyang City defense out of bleeding wounds one after another, causing the casualties of the defenders to rise sharply.

With Ye Ji Luorong standing on the viewing platform, Hao Wenzhuang watched a team of soldiers and horses continue to stand at the head of the city, and the defenders began to fight for the white-knuckle battle at the head of the city, and the defenders were defeated and retreated, and secretly felt that the tiger elite tempered by the bloody battles of the Northern Yan clan and the country by war was really unusual, and the elite of the tiger tempered by the bloody battles was really extraordinary, thinking that such an offensive would continue, so that the Nanyang defenders would continue to bleed, even if Liang Chengchong died and did not withdraw from Nanyang, he could not hold on for a few days.

Ye Ji Luorong stood on the railing and said to Zhou Fan: "I haven't slaughtered the city for a long time, pass the order, and after breaking the city, I will allow the siege army and horses to slaughter for three days and then march south!" ”

Listening to Ye Ji Luorong's order, Lu Wenzhuang's heart was like a dry well, and he didn't move.

Hu Wenmudang will not give up Jingzhou easily, but only after crossing the Han River, from Xiangyang to the south, there are several cities in Dangyang (Jingmen) in front of him, so that he can reach the city of Jingzhou.

Although Hu Wenmu used Dangyang as the outer fortification of Jingzhou, and there were not many garrisons, he also had to waste a lot of time after he captured them one by one.

If the enemy of Dangyang was asked to delay the pace of the Northern Yan's march into Jingzhou, perhaps the main force of the Huaidong Army would be asked to cross the river before them and form an encirclement of Hanjin (now Hankou).

Now in Hanjin, Yang Xiong has more than 10,000 naval troops to defend the city and blockade Hanshui. Although after taking Wuguan, Ye Ji Luorong ordered Sun Jichang, one of the eight capitals of the newly attached army, to lead 15,000 cavalry to Hanjin for reinforcements and strengthen the defense of the southern front; Even if Sun Jichang could arrive at Hanjin in time, with the strength of Hanjin, it was far from enough to fight with the main force of the Huaidong Army in the open area between Hanjin East and Qichun.

Huaidong's soldiers and horses in Jiangzhou at this time, there were nearly 40,000 water infantry troops, and after Huaidong's part of the forbidden camp water infantry army in Ganzhou, Yuanzhou, Fuzhou and even Jiangning was transferred to Jiangzhou, Lin Tie could call in Jiangzhou to fight Hanjin's total strength, up to 100,000 people.

If the main force of the Huaidong Army was asked to cross the river one step ahead to form a siege in the Hanjin area, and they took Jingzhou south to block the road to Dangyang and other cities, then they could only abandon Jingzhou without fighting, and first go south along the east bank of the Han River to relieve the siege of Hanjin.

The slaughter of Nanyang was to deter the guards of Dangyang from resisting stubbornly.

The slaughter of Nanyang is to make the newly attached army and the newly attached generals of the luxury family become more bloody and murderous, let go of their ideological baggage, and let go of the delusion that surrendering to Huaidong will escape the reckoning.

Zhou Fan was ordered to go to the front to supervise the battle, and Ye Ji Luorong said to Haowenzhuang: "The matter of military food is also carefully discussed with the King of Min......"

"Yes." In response, he returned to the big tent with Ye Ji Luorong.

After the capture of Nanyang, the Han River rushed to Jingzhou, and the biggest headache for Ye Ji Luorong and Luwenzhuang was not the lack of troops, nor the large-scale gathering of the Huaidong Army in Jiangzhou to cross the river to the north, but the collection of grain and grass.

This time the attack on Nanyang was very hasty, but in order to gain time and prompt Luo Xiancheng to send troops to contain Huaixi, the Nanyang War had to be launched in July in advance.

Fortunately, Chen Zhihu defeated the soldiers and horses who withdrew from Hezhong Mansion with Liang Chengyi at the Beiru River, and intercepted a large amount of grain, so that Ye Ji Luorong could lead the main force of tens of thousands of foot cavalry to immediately attack Nanyang from the western Henan region.

In the past, the soldiers and horses of the Northern Yan were accustomed to grabbing food from the battlefield to supplement the army's food, but all the provinces in Henan were disabled, and Nanyang and Huaixi carried out a thorough clearing of the fields before the war, so it was impossible for the soldiers and horses of the Northern Yan to raise enough food from the local area after entering.

For this war on the Western Front, Emperor Ye Ji'er of the Mandate of Heaven specially transferred Zuo Chengzheng Fan Lan to Luoyang, Hezhong Prefecture, to sit in charge of the food and salary of the Western Route Army.

Although Yan Ji and Jinzhong have recovered well in production over the years, and they were able to raise an extra million stone of grain for the war on the Western Front a year ago, it was not easy to transport these grains from the banks of the Yellow River to Nanyang.

The water system leading from the Yellow River to the south mainly converges on the Huai River, and grain can be transported to the south with the help of the river. The safer route is to transport the grain and grass of Jinzhong and swallow thistle to Luoyang, and then transfer from Luoyang to Nanyang.

From Luoyang to Nanyang via Ruyang, there is no direct waterway to go, and the water systems such as Yishui, Rushui, and Shashui must be cut off. If you want to mobilize the one million stone grain from Yanji and Jinzhong to Luoyang and transport it south to Nanyang by land, it will be a great test for the logistics system that Beiyan has just established.

From Fangcheng to Luoyang, it is about 700 miles, and unlike the rapid march, 20,000 people and thousands of mules and horses carry grain between Luoyang and Fangcheng, which takes about a month.

Walking one round trip a month, it can only transport 1120,000 stone grain to Fangcheng, and nearly 20,000 stone grain will be consumed on the way.

This kind of logistics capacity naturally cannot satisfy Ye Ji Luorong, but no one can do better than Fan Lan.

After a large amount of consumption in the early stage of the war, the current grain reserves in Fangcheng and Ruyang are only 60,000 or 70,000 stones, and when the next batch of grain is transported, the reserve grain will not exceed 100,000 stones, which should be said to be insufficient to support the 100,000 troops who immediately went south to attack Jingzhou after taking Nanyang.

Therefore, it is necessary to raise more grain and grass reserves from its channels and in Xiangyang for the upcoming Jingxiang war.

At this time, there were three sources of grain raising in Xiangyang, one was collected from Xiangfan, the second was drawn from Suizhou, and the third was requisitioned from Guanzhong through Wuguan.

However, these three places are not places where there is surplus grain, and how much grain can be raised in a short period of time, Haowenzhuang himself is not at all sure.

However, in Ye Ji Luorong's eyes, the most difficult period will not be too difficult, and it is already early August.

In the Jingxiang area, including Suizhou and Xiangfan, the wheat is planted in spring and ripe in autumn, and almost in mid-to-late September, a large amount of autumn grain can be obtained on the Jinghan Plain to supplement the shortage of military food, and only before the autumn grain is harvested, 200,000 stone of grain can be raised in Xiangyang, which can support the early war consumption of the invasion of Jingzhou.

However, on the food issue, Luwenzhuang is not as optimistic as Ye Ji Luorong thought.

Luo Xiancheng sent troops from Tongbai Mountain to fight Huaixi, and a large number of Ding Zhuang were transferred into the army, and the Tuntian system in Suizhou was almost in a state of semi-desolation after June. Even if there is grain in the field, a large number of people must be sent to harvest it in the ten days when the autumn is ripe. In order to make up for the horse food of the war horse, the green seedlings outside the city of Nanyang are eaten by the war horses, from Xinye to Fancheng, it is the strategic buffer zone between Nanyang and Suizhou, the grain field cultivation situation is very poor, and from Xiangyang to the south to the Hanjin (Hankou) of the Hanshui East Bank Plain, broken for several years, after the remnants of the luxury family entered, want to clean up the wasteland and cultivate the plant, it is not a short period of time.

Don't say that right now, even when the autumn is ripe, there will not be too much food that can be levied from Xiangfan and Suizhou, and I am afraid that it will be seriously insufficient to supplement Luo Xiancheng's own soldiers and horses; The situation in Guanzhong will definitely not be better than Suizhou.

In the end, it is necessary to strengthen the transportation capacity from Luoyang to Nanyang.

As long as the grain can enter Nanyang, it can enter the Hanshui through the water and go south to the front. The other is to raise grain from the periphery of Jingzhou.

From Dangyang to the south, Jingzhou to the north, between Hanshui and Jingshan, is the main wheat planting area of Jinghu, the farming situation is also better, after the autumn ripening, should be able to raise a part of the grain.

Haowenzhuang carefully analyzed many things with Ye Ji Luorong, and said: "As far as I can see, from Luoyang to Nanyang, the transportation of grain is still too slow, and 10,000 soldiers and horses should be drawn to make up for the lack of transportation capacity, and it is possible not to delay the next Jingxiang war......"

When it comes to food, Ye Ji Luorong will not be sloppy.

However, even if there is not enough grain from Jingxiang when the autumn is ripe, Ye Ji Luorong believes that as long as Nanyang is taken and the passage from Luoyang to Nanyang via Ruyang and then through Fancheng and Xiangyang to the south is unimpeded, Luoyang's grain will still be transported to the Jingxiang front line in a continuous stream of energy, and perhaps the transportation capacity will need to be strengthened.