Nine is the number of extreme yang in the "Book of Changes", so September 9 is also called Double Ninth. On the Double Ninth Festival, young people climbed high together and ate flower cakes in the palace. The emperor led all officials to climb high to worship the world. It was a very grand day in ancient times.

The soldiers on the front line did not have so much leisure and were still rushing to the road.

On the way, the military chief of the military doctor, Shi, who was accompanying the army, reported to Li Xingzhou that all the casualties counted by the army since the expedition.

"Your Highness, the emperor has planned for a night and finally there is a total of 10,270 people." The old man with a ravine face said with a smile, "Since this time, our army has suffered a total of 10,270 casualties, but this is only a plan."

Li Xingzhou was not surprised by this number. The so-called casualties are injuries and deaths. Slight and serious injuries are counted. Even if you have a cold during the march, you will be considered injured, so the number will naturally be large.

"How many people were killed?" Li Xingzhou asked directly on his horse.

"One thousand seven hundred and four people, Your Highness is simply unprecedented. Besides, tens of thousands of people were injured but only so many people died!"

As soon as he spoke, the old man frowned and felt that he had expressed his mistakes. He seemed to be gloating, so he changed his words, "Your Highness, what I mean..."

"Stop talking, I understand." Li Xingzhou waved his hand.

Tens of thousands of casualties were injured, but only more than 1,700 people died in the end. The biggest contributor was alcohol.

In the era of cold weapons, the number of people who died directly in battle was a small number, because whether it was long-range crossbows or close-range combat, it was impossible to directly cause fatal injuries that caused short-term deaths.

Not to mention the lack of kinetic energy of the bow and crossbow, the metaphysics of the quasi-head, there are also blood and bones blocking after the armor, and the penetration power is limited. Even in melee combat, it is often impossible to kill one blow.

Most of the time it causes trauma and causes the enemy to lose its combat effectiveness.

Therefore, many brave generals in ancient times had dozens of scars on their bodies at any time.

But on the battlefield with harsh logistics conditions, the general had a lot of people carefully taken care of, but ordinary soldiers did not have one.

In the view of later generations, first disinfection and sterilization, stop bleeding, then sew a few stitches, or perform a minor operation to remove foreign objects in the wound, and apply anti-inflammatory injections to recover. There is no need to worry about life-threatening injuries. Nowadays, it is a life-threatening gambling!

There is no disinfection and sterilization, no surgery to remove wound residues, no anti-inflammatory injections, and no tetanus vaccine.

Whether you die or not depends entirely on your face. Infection and ulceration of wounds is basically death. If you can’t stop bleeding, you will die. If you can’t remove the arrows and iron sheets in your body, you will basically die.

Therefore, post-war reduction is the big deal of the death.

Soldiers will also apply feces, urine and feces to the arrow, so that even if the person who is hit is injured, it is likely to cause wound infection.

There is also a sharp weapon to defend the city. It directly boils the shit and urine onto the enemy's head. It is not only burned, but even if it is not dead, it will be infected with the wound and can only wait to die.

It can be said that in ancient times, it was very miserable to be injured. Most of the time, I could only leave it to fate and seek blessings for myself.

Moreover, watching his comrades get thinner and maggots get lost in the wail, but they have no choice but to wait for death, which has a great blow to morale. Many recruits who have seen them for the first time cannot bear such a scene.

Some soldiers were thinking about the passionate blood of galloping on the battlefield and the great cause of Fenglangjuxu, but they faced such powerless and tragic reality and their spirits would collapse.

However, the important resources of the Xinjun logistics are alcohol. Direct cleaning of alcohol is not good for wounds, but it is better to prevent infection and prevent these tragedies. Almost no injured people in the army have infected and caused the wound to ulcerate and die of fever.

Although some of them were indeed seriously injured and could not be treated, at least they died less painfully.

This greatly reduced the reduction of military personnel and reduced morale pressure. In the deaths of more than 1,700 people, the front-line troops were not the big ones, but more were the auxiliary soldiers and the labor service in the rear.

During the confrontation stage outside Ningyuan City, Wanyan Zongbing, as a veteran on the battlefield, keenly realized that the head-on confrontation could not defeat the Jing army, so he began to use light cavalry to stumble behind the food and supplies tactics, which once made Li Xingzhou very irritable.

It was also during that stage of confrontation that the army suffered a lot of losses in auxiliary troops and labor.

While listening to the report of the Chief Secretary and thinking about the negotiation conditions, time passed quickly and the chill in the air became heavier and heavier.

.........

On September 9th, almost noon, Li Xingzhou's front army went north to meet the cavalry company sent by Liu Ji to pick him up, and then led the way and continued to go north.

By noon, they arrived on the hillside thirty miles south of Shangjing City. The high grounds on all sides of the hillside were filled with Jingjun flags, and the army was continuous, with Jingjun within a radius of several miles.

Liu Ji personally led his generals to report his life.

Li Xingzhou looked north on Meixue's back. At the foot of the hillside several miles ahead was the station where Li and his party met.

A small civil and wooden post station stands alone next to the muddy road. According to Liu Ji, it had just rained lightly last night. Many people in Jin Dynasty dressed in formal clothes and were waiting on the avenue outside the post station. They should be their king and civil and military officials.

Five or six miles away from the rear, the Jin army flags were also flying on both sides of the avenue. It was impossible to see how many were there from a distance, but just looking at the flags, I thought there were tens of thousands of people.

However, Liu Ji had just told him that it was impossible for the Jin army to have so many people at the moment.

The main force was dispersed in Liaodong, and Wanyan Zongbi led the remnants of his troops to flee to the northeast snow forest. The imperial guards in the capital were defeated more than three times by the black-clad cavalry under Liu Ji, beheading more than two thousand, and they were defeated and could not be organized.

Nowadays, all the strongholds and roads around Shangjing are under the control of black cavalry. People in the imperial city cannot leave Shangjing and cannot organize a large number of people. Three thousand people are the highest estimate.

Li Xingzhou nodded, and they divided their troops to stay in various important towns from Shanhaiguan.

Then Yang Hongzhao and Wei Yubai took away another group, but now the people he brought, plus the black-clad cavalrymen brought by Liu Ji, still have more than 15,000 troops.

The mountains south of the post station were full of their people, and they occupied all the commanding heights. If the Jin Dynasty regretted it, it would be impossible for them to take advantage of the situation to attack Shangjing.

Li Xingzhou looked at the ministers and emperor of the Jin Kingdom who were still waiting from a distance, and then said, "Pull a few new cannons to the high ground and prepare. If the negotiation is incorrect later, or they will fight to the end, they will directly blow the Jin Kingdom emperor into the sky."

The people around were stunned and immediately started to act.

Li Xingzhou had planned early and would pull their emperor out to negotiate today. He would either compromise or send him back to the west, and then the army would go to take over the capital, and would not lose any loss.

"The matter will be over today. Liu Ji, you are ready." Li Xingzhou said.

Liu Ji nodded, "I understand." He turned his horse's head and started to gather cavalry behind the hillside. If the negotiations were not completed, they would rush down from the high ground, and neither the Jin emperor nor the ministers would run away.

Li Xingzhou ordered a bunch of people, all of whom were generals in the army, and six personal soldiers guarded them, heading towards the post station at the foot of the hillside.

......

At noon, the sun shone brightly, and the flags of Jingguo people were flying on the hills in the distance. There were everywhere on all the hills, and people could not be seen clearly from afar, but everyone was frightened.

There was a Jin army who was supporting them in the back. Everyone present knew that there were only more than a thousand people who came together. The Prime Minister Liu Xu asked them to bring more flags and bluff.

But no matter how bluffing, even if they have the advantage of the number of people, they are not a match for the Jing army. Now there are many soldiers in Jing.

Pu Chaling was as nervous as everyone else.

Since we must meet the Jing Kingdom with the etiquette of seeing the sect leader, the king and the mother of the country must be present. She was wearing a grand queen's robe and accompanied the emperor, and there were civil and military officials behind them.

Only a few princes were not present. They had already left the north gate of Beijing with their oldest prince. If something went wrong here, they would take the prince to flee north.

Everyone started waiting early, and it has been more than a few hours now. However, the emperor and the ministers were afraid of angering the butcher Li Xingzhou, so they did not dare to complain. They just kept sending people to Jingjun to ask when they would arrive.

It is said that Li Xingzhou killed tens of thousands of defenders who dared to resist him in the south. His heads were piled up in mountains and blood made the moat come out. All the rumors made people frightened and their spine became cold.

I was also afraid that the army on the distant hillside would suddenly attack them, and that would be even more unstoppable.

It was tormented until noon, and a huge yellow dragon flag appeared on the hillside. Everyone was shocked and Li Xingzhou arrived!

Many people present had never seen Li Xingzhou himself, but these three words are already a common psychological shadow for everyone, including the emperor.

In the distance, dozens of people rode down the hillside in the distance and came to this side.

Pu Chaling was stunned and found that the emperor grabbed the corner of her clothes and his fingers turned white.

The emperor is afraid...

In fact, she was also afraid, so she quickly held the emperor's hand with her back, and the emperor also grabbed her tightly. This was the first time since she came to Shangjing to Liaodong, she felt that the emperor was so close to her.

At this point, Pu Chaling also understood why the emperor had alienated her in the past two years.

When the Jin Dynasty fought against the Liao Kingdom in the area of ​​Zhongxing Prefecture to the west, almost all men in the area of ​​Liaodong went to the battlefield and all kinds of supplies were sent to the front line, and life was very hard.

A large number of injuries on the front line were sent to the back and could not take care of them at all. She had just married into the Wanyan family and was thinking about how to contribute to her husband's family. She ignored the dissuasion of people around her and regardless of her identity, she took her maid to the city area to help the doctor take care of the injured soldiers.

At that time, she just thought that the sooner these people recovered, the sooner they could return to the front line, and the less pressure the husband and father would be, and they would serve their husbands and family.

But unexpectedly, rumors spread in a few days, and she had an affair with a certain soldier. She couldn't stand the rumors that her husband was not lonely and had a private meeting with the soldiers.

At first she felt that the purity would be clear, so she could let them go until her mother-in-law found her and warned her not to do anything beyond her identity, and seriously said that it might harm her for the rest of her life.

Because she did not want the conflict with her mother-in-law to intensify, she agreed indignantly and couldn't figure it out. She just wanted to help her husband more.

But many years later, she finally understood the kindness of her mother-in-law to her, and also understood why her husband became increasingly alienated from her after she went from Liaodong to Shangjing.

He is the emperor, not an ordinary man, and never lacks women. Even if it is just some rumors, she has long been "unclean" to the emperor.

For the emperor, there are so many women in the world, the worst thing is to change another one, and for her, she can only have one husband in her life...

In recent years, she wanted to try to remedy her, but she had no results. The emperor was always cold and kept a sense of distance. If it weren't for her father, her queen might have been unable to sit still.

Maybe today will be an opportunity...

Pu Chaling thought to himself that at the moment when the emperor was so worried, he was by his side. As long as he worked together to overcome the difficulties, the emperor might change his mind and get closer to her. Then she would find an opportunity to explain the misunderstanding at that time...

Thinking of this, I have the motivation to overcome the difficulties in front of me.

In fact, Pu Chaling was also very scared, and her slender thighs were trembling under her long skirt. Facing the legendary Li Xingzhou, who in this world can be afraid? She asked herself.

Soon, the figure became closer and closer, and the person became clearer. It was probably obvious that Li Xingzhou was very tall, and there was a little white and majestic tall war horse between his crotch and eyebrows, condescendingly, like a hill pressing against everyone's heads.

He was followed by many generals, with twenty or thirty people.

Seeing Li Xingzhou approaching, everyone's heartbeats couldn't help but accelerate. The legendary murderer was terrifying and an unrivaled evil ghost...

Soon, a tall young man turned over and dismounted. He was wearing armor, and was a head taller than the emperor, and everyone needed to look up at him.

Then many generals behind him dismounted and followed him, and the armor rubbed and cracked as he walked, coming with a sense of depression.

The other party stopped three steps away from them.

Pu Chaling felt that the emperor's hand was getting tighter and tighter, and even made her feel a little hurt, but she didn't dare to speak out, for fear of annoying the murderer in front of her.

I only dared to look up quietly.
To be continued...