The main general of Liucheng County is Lu Chifeng. He is from the Lu clan of Liaodong County. The Lu clan of Liaodong is a branch of the Lu clan of Fanyang. It was the same lineage a hundred years ago.

Lu Chifeng has a tiger-back and a bear-waisted waist, a rough face, a pair of neat thick eyebrows as hard as a brush, and his eyes are like copper bells, and his eyes are particularly shining.

He was originally an Eagle-Steak General in the army of General Xue Shixiong, and he was a middle-level general in the Great Sui army system.

After the third Battle of Goguryeo, the army where Lu Chifeng was located remained in Liaodong. Lu Chifeng was originally stationed in Luhe Town and had only one thousand men under his command. However, after the Liaodong garrison was defeated by Gao Kaidao, Lu Chifeng took the initiative to collect 6,000 defeated soldiers from all over the country to retreat to Liucheng. It has been three months since then.

On the top of the city, Lu Chifeng stared at the bandit camp in the distance with worry. Although Gao Kaidao failed to attack Liucheng several times, he did not give up. He directly stationed the camp in Pingdu Town to the south. Gao Kaidao obviously refused to let go of Liucheng County.

Lu Chifeng of course knew that Gao Kaidao was fighting against Liucheng County. He wanted to seize the grain and food supplies of the Liucheng County warehouse. There were 250,000 stones of grain in the thirty warehouses, and there were tens of thousands of soldiers. Once Gao Kaidao got it, he could quickly recruit soldiers and the number of troops surged to more than 100,000, and the entire three counties of Liaodong would be completely lost.

Deng Yang, the prefect of Liucheng County next to him, whispered: "General Lu, there are 50,000 or 60,000 young and 60,000 people in the city. If you arm them, I think you can fight Gao Kaidao."

Lu Chifeng shook his head, "Empress, fighting is different from defending the city. Without sufficient training, once you arrive on the battlefield, it is easy for the entire army to collapse. At that time, the entire Liucheng will be over."

"Then it's not a solution to drag on like this. Panic has begun in the city. If you don't find a way, the city will not be able to hold it sooner or later."

After pausing, Deng Qing asked in a low voice: "Is there still no news from Governor Luo?"

Lu Chifeng's eyes showed anger, "I have asked him for help three times, but he never responded. I feel more and more that the rumors in the city may be true."

Deng Xin was shocked, "Is Gao Kaidao really Luo Yi put in Liaodong?"

Lu Chifeng snorted coldly. "I sent someone to Lu Longsai to inquire. Gao Kaidao's army did not pass through Lu Longsai at all. Then they could only come from Beiping County and had to pass through Linyu Pass. If Luo Yi had not let them come over, who would have been?"

"But what's the point of doing this?"

"Your envoy still can't think of it? Those Goguryeo who delivered food to Gaokai Road."

Lu Chifeng did not continue to say anything, and Deng Qing was silent. This was the most terrifying scene that he could not accept. Luo Yi actually colluded with Goguryeo. He really couldn't believe that a dignified Youzhou governor would actually collude with alien races?

But he really couldn't understand Luo Yi's intention to let Gao Kaidao enter Liaodong, especially when they found that a Goguryeo army actually escorted food to Gao Kaidao. Only then did they realize that there were Goguryeo people standing behind Gao Kaidao.

After a long time, Deng Qing sighed, "Or... let's ask the court for help!"

Lu Chifeng still shook his head, "Eunuch, it's not a question of asking for help now, but our people can't get through Linyu Pass at all. Even if our people have passed Linyu Pass by luck, how can the imperial army come to Liaodong? Frankly speaking, I think the imperial court has given up Liaodong."

Deng Ting smiled bitterly, "General Lu is a little alarmist."

"No! It's not that I'm exaggerating. Even the emperor almost died at Yanmen Pass. This shows that the strength of the Sui army is now far inferior to that of the time. The emperor clearly knew that Goguryeo was eyeing Liaodong, but there were less than 10,000 defenders who remained in Liaodong. Isn't this obvious idea of ​​giving up Liaodong?"

As the two were talking, a soldier rushed over and reported urgently: "Qi reported to the prefect, Qi reported to General Lu. A letter delivery man came outside the northern city, saying that he came to deliver the letter under the order of General Zhang, the envoy of Hebei.

Deng Hao and Lu Chifeng looked at each other. Both of them were very surprised. How could Zhang Xuan deliver a letter to them?

Lu Chifeng hurriedly said, "Crack belt sender comes here!"

Soon, a young man dressed as a civilian came over quickly, bowed and presented a letter: "According to the order of my general, I came to Liucheng to deliver a letter to Prefect Deng and General Lu!"

Deng Hao quickly took the letter and opened it and looked carefully. Lu Chifeng asked the messenger in confusion and said, "How did you come? Didn't you encounter cross-examination in Linyu Pass?"

The sergeant sent the letter smiled and said, "Report to General Lu, Bei Yi came over the sea by boat. The big ship was moored in Liaodong Bay. I then took a small boat to head north along the White Wolf Water and arrived in Liucheng last night."

Lu Chifeng was stunned when he heard this. He actually came over the sea. At this time, Deng Hao had already read the letter and was extremely excited. He quickly handed the letter to Lu Chifeng and said, "General Lu first read the letter, we are saved!"

Lu Chifeng quickly took the letter and read it, and was immediately overjoyed. In the letter, Zhang Xuan expressed his desire to cross the sea to attack Gao Kaidao and defend Liaodong. He asked quickly: "I wonder when your general is going to send troops and how many troops will be sent north to Liaodong?"

"I don't know how many troops were sent to Huye, but the general told Huye before leaving that if Liucheng could withstand Gao Kaidao's fierce attack, the army would definitely be able to reach Liaodong within half a month at the latest."

Lu Chifeng nodded, "Please tell General Zhang that we will mobilize the whole city to defend Liucheng and wait for his reinforcements to arrive!"

………

The camp of Gaokaidao is located in a wilderness ten miles south of Liucheng County. It is a wall-shaped barracks with nearly 30,000 troops. Since Gaokaidao's army received full support from Goguryeo. Although the Goguryeo army did not enter Liaodong for the time being, Goguryeo provided a large amount of military armor and food left by the Sui army to the Gaokaidao army, and built Gaokaidao's army into an elite army.

Gao Kaidao was originally a general of Hebei bandit Ge Qian. Since Ge Qian was defeated by Yang Yichen at the beginning of the year, Gao Kaidao led more than 20,000 troops to Liaodong north and develop in Liaodong.

But Gao Kaidao's other identity was the illegitimate son of the Goguryeo royal family. Although he was not from a good background, his father was a distant royal family of the Gao family and his mother was just a maid. However, with his strong martial arts and shrewdness, he was promoted step by step in the Goguryeo army. He was finally appreciated by the upper class of Goguryeo and sent to the Central Plains. He lurked in Geqin's army and became Geqin's right-hand man. After Geqin was defeated and died, Gao Kaidao led his army north to Liaodong for development under the instruction of Goguryeo.

Gao Kaidao is about his early thirties. He has a horse face and slender eyes, which makes him look particularly sinister and cunning. However, he has a good figure, six feet five (about 1.9 meters), broad shoulders, and very developed muscles on his arms. He has learned martial arts since he was a child and has practiced a strong martial arts skill, making a long-handled copper hammer weighing 80 kilograms, which is a brave man who is not worthy of it.

Gao Kaidao's development in Liaodong was unstoppable. It swept across the three counties in just three months, and its troops increased rapidly from the initial 20,000 to 40,000 troops. However, since he began to attack Liucheng County, the last strong city in Liaodong a month ago, his career in Liaodong was in a bad mood. He attacked Liucheng County for a whole month, not only did he not take down the first city in Liaodong, which stored a large amount of grain and armor, but instead lost more than 10,000 soldiers.

Of course, Gao Kaidao did not think that the army defending the city was so powerful. More than half of the six thousand troops were killed or injured, and tens of thousands of civilians helped defend the city. The army was not worth worrying about. The key was that Liucheng's city was too tall and strong, with a city wall of four meters high and a moat of three meters wide. It was connected with Bailangshui. It was not possible to use ordinary siege ladders. It was necessary to use cloud ladders to attack the city. It was because Liucheng's easy defense and difficult attack, which caused Gao Kaidao to suffer heavy losses and did not capture Liucheng for a month.

As early as ten days ago, Gao Kaidao stopped siege. He was waiting for the extended siege ladder that Goguryeo was about to send. This siege ladder was a special ladder made by the Sui army to attack Liaodong City. It was wide and high, and the ladder body was heavy. It was generally difficult for steel forks to push it out of the city. It was the weapon needed to attack Liucheng. According to information, this siege ladder had crossed the Liao River three days ago. On the way to Liucheng, Gao Kaidao was very excited.

However, a letter sent by Youzhou Governor Luo Yi last night ruined Gao Kaidao's expectation.

In the big tent, Gao Kaidao was paced back and forth with his hands behind his back, and his eyes glanced at the map on the table from time to time. He drew an arrow on the map with a stroke, drawing it from Beihai County to Liucheng County, crossing the entire Bohai Sea.

Zhang Xuan was actually preparing to send troops to Liaodong to wipe out himself, which made Gao Kaidao both uneasy and annoyed. He had heard of Zhang Xuan's name for a long time, and had great military achievements. Now he was fighting towards Liaodong. Can he resist it? But he was angry because he was targeting Luo Yi. If Luo Yi was willing to cooperate with him to open the gate of Liucheng County, he would have taken down this strong city long ago, and he would not have been stationed in the field today. However, Luo Yi was very cunning and refused to help him in the side city.
Chapter completed!