Chapter 151: The power of a punch can be so great!
Pingyang County, Jiangyi County.

On the top of the city wall, which was less than two meters high, Pingyang prefect Song Zhou, governor Wu Ji and others hysterically urged their soldiers and military officers to intercept the Li rebel army that was about to attack.

"Hurry up and stab with your spear or halberd. If you're late, you might as well lose your life!"

"Don't be stingy with your stones. Hit as many bandits as you can."

Around Jiangyi County, mobile cavalrymen firmly guarded the city gates to prevent the defenders from fleeing. Outside the north gate of Jiangyi City, thousands of rebel soldiers had deployed in a siege formation.

Twenty archers were hidden behind a dozen knife carts, suppressing the enemy on the city walls with arrows. The ten centurions in the lead had already set up long ladders. The rebel soldiers gathered at the foot of the ladders with shields in their hands, climbing up the ladders one by one to attack the city despite the feces and stones hanging on their heads.

General Li was also among the soldiers attacking the city. The catapults that could throw people had already been assembled in Pingyang County and other places, but it would take several days to push them over. There was no need to show off one's ultimate killer move so quickly to attack a small county like this.

In order to capture the entire Pingyang County as quickly as possible, Li Hao followed the soldiers to climb the ladder.

Because the commander knew the soldiers well, the reward system of the rebel army was quite reasonable. Those who climbed the ladder first were military officers such as sergeants and squad leaders. In order to prevent commanding officers such as centurions from taking the credit for being the first to climb the ladder, General Li also specifically ordered centurions and other officers not to be the first to engage in battle.

Centurions and other officers can share in the military merit simply by successfully commanding tactical actions during the attack.

The first wave of rebel soldiers who attacked the city wall had a very difficult fight, because the enemy had only a few targets and they could just stab them with their halberds. Once the soldiers behind them climbed up, the balance of the situation on the city wall began to tilt towards the rebels.

After General Li joined the battle on the city wall with a ring-handled sword in hand, the balance of the situation began to tilt vertically towards the rebels.

"Corrupt official, accept your death!"

After the rebel soldiers pointed out the location of the enemy general to the general, Li Hao suddenly jumped up and rushed towards Wu Ji and Song Zhou at the speed of an arrow.

Even though the Jin soldiers gathered on the top of Jiangyi City realized that the god of death had already attacked the top of the city, they had no time to react. General Li, with a knife in both hands, killed these unruly soldiers one after another in the moment they passed by.

Many Jin soldiers had expressions of three parts shock, four parts regret, and five parts horror on their faces.

They could hardly believe that the enemy general could kill dozens of people along the way in such a short time.

"Stop him quickly!"

Song Zhou was suddenly horrified and staggered back. He did not dare to retreat too fast because there were bandits on the city walls everywhere.

As the governor of a large county, his military talent was not inferior to his administrative talent. The county towns in the entire Pingyang County were lost one after another. If a mediocre person had been in charge, I am afraid that the soldiers stationed in the nine counties of Pingyang County would have fled cleanly the moment General Li appeared at Fenshui.

But at this point, even the Jin soldiers who were most loyal to the Sima family did not dare to stand between the enemy general and the prefect.

His men had no intention of fighting, and Song Zhou and his brother-in-law Wu Ji didn't care about much else and tried to stay away from the leader of the bandits first.

Seeing that the two of them were trying to escape with a few of their followers, Li Hao used all his strength to push off the ground with his legs and chased after them at a speed beyond ordinary people's imagination. He first stabbed Wu Ji, who was wearing the most complete armor, with his knife, then quickly chased him for a few steps, jumped up, and smashed the back of the head of Song Zhou, who was still running for his life, with his clenched right fist.

It was too late to draw the sword, and the only way to subdue the fleeing Governor Song was to punch him.

The screams of his brother-in-law Wu Ji reminded Song Zhou of the change in the situation. Perhaps the enemy general chasing him from behind was too fierce, and the prefect Song somehow turned his head and watched the situation.

In just a few breaths, an extremely huge fist grew larger in Song Zhou's peripheral vision, and then hit his left temple heavily.

The enormous force instantly made Song Zhou lose consciousness. In the moment before his death, he thought that it would have been better if Wu Ji had not been appointed as the governor.

Maybe this group of Li's bandits are still serving as military households or tenant farmers honestly.

The effect of General Li's full-strength attack was remarkable. The brains of Governor Song were beaten out, and his previously round head was compressed into half. His facial features were squeezed together, and all kinds of juices covered the surface.

"Please spare my life, General! Please spare my life, General!"

"We are just ordinary people trying to make a living, and we have no intention of becoming enemies with the general."

With their superior being killed on the spot and the enemy general being so ferocious, the defenders of Jiangyi County no longer had the will to resist and surrendered one after another on the north city wall.

This is the last county town in Pingyang County. The counties to the south are all under the jurisdiction of Hedong County and Henei County. The military households and soldiers of these two counties have not yet completed the millet harvest and have no time to support Pingyang County in the north.

Maybe they didn't want to come at all. After all, it would be the same no matter who came. If they angered General Li, he might even give the reinforcements heading north a strange death.

Wu Ji was wearing a heart-protection goggles, so General Li's sword attack did not kill him on the spot, but only seriously injured him.

"Oh my!" Li Hao felt very regretful, "How could I kill Song Zhou so easily? My second brother was going to kill you two with his own hands!"

He hurriedly summoned the veterans brought from Zhaojun and Changshanjun, and ordered them to find a way to preserve Song Zhou's body intact, and try to save Wu Ji if possible, and at least let Wu Ji see Li Ju alive.

"Thieves, kill me quickly!" Wu Ji roared in severe pain. He pressed his wound, slowly stood up, and made a gesture as if he would never surrender to the bandits.

"My lord is in the south; do not let me die facing north."

General Li was still regretting that he had hit Song Zhou too hard and cut off half of his head, but after being treated like this by Wu Ji, he was at a loss whether to laugh or cry.

"You still installed it." He walked over and twisted the ring-handled sword hard.

Wu Ji felt pain and cold sweat broke out again. Finally, he could not hold on any longer and fell to his knees.

"You guys take care of the cleanup. Send a centurion to escort this man and his body back to Leping County overnight."

Although there was chaos on the city wall, the situation had been controlled by the rebel soldiers.

Several centurions, Liu He and Liu Cong who arrived one after another saw the death of the prefect Song Zhou and were amazed.

"The power of a single punch is so great!"

"Is the general's fist already so hard?"

"No one will survive this blow."

Liu Cong and these Southern Xiongnu people originally planned to find an opportunity to escape with their troops and go to Shangdang to split the land and dominate the world. After these siege battles, Liu and his sons were more disheartened than each other. They had no intention of becoming enemies with the general. The Southern Xiongnu soldiers even regarded the general as a god.

Who dares to defect?
After capturing Jiangyi County, the rebel soldiers rested for two days and prepared to attack south or east. At that time, military information from Jingxing County and Leping County was presented to General Li.

The Jin army in the three directions of Youzhou, Zhongshan State and Yecheng in the north and southeast began to gather its forces. It was rumored that the central army from Luoyang also sent tens of thousands of troops and was about to march north.

Before the main army moved, food and fodder were sent ahead. The rebel forces in Zhao and other places had already found out that the Jin army had sent advance troops and civilians to transport food and fodder.

General Li resisted the urge to capture Hedong County and Henei County in one breath, and after carefully arranging the defense line of Pingyang County, he prepared to lead his troops north.

He wanted to take away the Southern Xiongnu soldiers and some of the Pingyang County surrendered soldiers. "Zhang Qi will be stationed in Jiangyi City, promoted to a lieutenant, and will lead the righteous soldiers in the city. Feng En will be the military supervisor, and at the same time, the number of households and acres of land in each city of Pingyang County will be sorted out. The land of the surrendered soldiers will not be moved, and the land of the gentry will be taken over by the government."

In the county government office of Jiangyi County, Li Hao arranged the defense of the city.

Zhang Qi was the sergeant named Zhang who requested to fight in the Battle of Huaihe. He had been promoted to centurion before entering Pingyang County. After Li's rebel army took over the surrendered soldiers from various cities in Pingyang County, Zhang Qi was promoted to the lord of five hundred.

Under the rebel army system, a captain was in charge of three 500 commanders and had up to 1,500 soldiers under him, which was already a very high-ranking official.

Millet is grown in Hedong and Hexi, so it will take some time for the Jin troops to assemble and attack these places. After General Li leads his troops to defeat the Jin troops in Jizhou, there will still be time to quickly return to support Pingyang County and other places.

At that time, we will take over the original Bingzhou in one fell swoop.

The situation in Guanzhong at this time was quite complicated. The Qiang and Hu people occupied northern Shaanxi, Hetao and other areas, and the Jin court controlled Weishui, Jingshui, Chang'an and other areas.

As for the west side of the Yellow River's big bend, it was occupied by the Hexi Xianbei. To the south of the Hexi Xianbei was the territory of the Di and Qiang peoples.

General Li was prepared to wait and see. If the Jin court did not engage in civil war, he would catch the Sima princes and fight them. If Sima Ying, Sima Yi and other younger brothers stood up for Sima Zhong and fought against Sima Lun, the King of Zhao who controlled Sizhou, he would seize the opportunity to quickly resolve the mess in Guanzhong and Longyou.

In a word, in this era, only Li Hao can make the decisions.

The two people who were assigned to garrison Jiangyi County stepped out to receive orders.

Feng En, who thought he was quite talented, also made a special suggestion: "General, Hedong County was previously governed by several capable officials. Since the Cao Wei period, it has been a large county with a large grain production and livestock, and the people are very loyal to the government. The general's government's policy of private tenants cannot attract the people of Hedong to join the rebel army. It is better to change the private tenants to government tenants for five or ten years, and then give the tenants the land. This will help to divide the people of Hedong County and the Jin government."

The policy of civilian tenancy implemented by the rebel army was no different from the policy of civilian settlement implemented by Cao Wei and Sima Jin. Both were aimed at keeping most of the harvest from the land in the hands of the government in order to feed the large-scale army.

In the final analysis, this kind of settlement is to tie up the refugees on the government's land as serfs, and the people who can't stand the exploitation will flee after a few years.

Li Hao originally wanted to reform the system, but at the beginning of the uprising this year, there was little territory, so in order to raise funds for the rebel army's war expenses, he implemented a policy of tenant farmers. Now that he has occupied several large counties, it is time to find a way to make some changes.

The Western Jin Dynasty inherited all the drawbacks of the Eastern Han Dynasty since the reigns of Emperors Huan and Ling. Land annexation reached a level that the common people could not bear, and the central government's control over the local areas seriously deteriorated.

"This is a good idea. The land will be divided after five years of renting. In your spare time, you can communicate with the people and listen to what they want. At the end of the year, I will call together officials from all regions for unified discussion."

Up to now, the rebel army has only raised the banner of dividing the land among the big families without distinguishing between individual households. It has no killer moves such as equal distribution of land and light taxation to quickly win over the hearts of the lower classes of people.

General Li still had ideals. It was impossible that the regime he established would be worse than that of Sima Jin.

Feng En was so delighted that he could not help himself. He flattered the general continuously and praised him as the wisest ruler in the three generations.

The Three Dynasties are Xia, Shang and Zhou. The last emperor who could be praised as "Three Dynasties" was Emperor Wen of Han.

"It's already a great achievement if I can capture the Sima family and the nobles and make them work in the coal mines. The next step is to expel the Five Barbarians. The rest will be judged by the people of the world."

If the nobles who own thousands or tens of thousands of acres of land are killed off, the lives of the lower-class people will get better. If the barbarians are made to submit, Li Hao's KD will be almost complete.

The officers and soldiers of the rebel army also kept flattering General Li, who was so angry that they finally stopped.

……

The county seat of Taiyuan County was Jinyang County.

Before returning to support the two counties of Jizhou, this important town must be in the hands of the rebels. Therefore, General Li specially led his troops north to capture this city first.

As an important central town in a large province, Jinyang City was built in an orderly manner. The city walls were all covered with bricks. The height of the city walls was estimated to be about three meters. There were also moats and city walls.

It’s just that there are fewer soldiers guarding the city.

This cannot be blamed on the new Bingzhou governor Wang Jun for failing to gather Jin troops from various places.

Because all the counties to the north of Bingzhou were lost, and Pingyang County and Hedong County to the south were swallowed up by Sizhou, there was a period of time when the Jin court did not set up Bingzhou. Taiyuan County and Yanmen County and Jinchang County in the north were all under the jurisdiction of Jizhou. Later, Bingzhou was established separately, but the governor of Bingzhou was concurrently served by the governor of Youzhou most of the time.

As for not allowing the neighboring Jizhou governor to concurrently govern Bingzhou, it might be because the Sima family was worried about the two states north of Luoyang being in the hands of a powerful governor at the same time.

The Sima family has always been wary of foreign officials.

"Wang Jun, you can't defend Jinyang either, so why not surrender to the rebels? The general has reserved a good position for your Jinyang Wang family in the Jingxing coal mine. If you wait until the rebels break through the city, your Jinyang Wang family will be in danger!"

The rebel soldiers with loud voices were shouting at the foot of the city. This was certainly not a sincere attempt to persuade them to surrender, but General Li was deliberately trying to disgust the defenders such as Wang Jun in the city.

Wang Jun was a native of Jinyang. His nominal father, Wang Shen, was originally a subordinate of Cao Shuang. After Cao Shuang's three clans were wiped out, Wang Shen stayed around Cao Mao.

When Cao Mao was preparing to lead an army to attack Sima Zhao, Wang Shen, Wang Ye and others informed Sima Zhao, which led to Cao Mao being assassinated in the street. Later, Wang Shen's career was prosperous because of his contribution in informing, and he was promoted to the position of Grand Commander of Jiangbei and General of Cavalry.

For a family like this, even if they were sent to Jingxing Coal Mine to mine coal, Li Hao felt that the coal they dug out would be unlucky, and he would kill Wang Jun's entire clan sooner or later.

The defenders on the city wall, such as Wang Jun, still wanted to rely on the strong city to resist the enemy soldiers, and they also sent people with loud voices to make announcements.

"General, there are only a few thousand soldiers in Bingzhou. They are not enough to resist the Xianbei in the north and the Qiang and Hu in the west. They are powerless to fight against the rebels. It is better for our two families to stop fighting and make peace. What do you think?"

The Jin soldiers in the city did not want to engage in a head-on battle with the more than 5,000 rebel soldiers outside the city, and the defenders hoped to reach a brief verbal ceasefire.

Li Hao sneered, "Alright! Ask them to hand over Wang Jun's nine clans, and I will stop fighting and make peace."

The rebel soldiers conveyed the general's intention in full to the Jin army defenders on the city wall.

It was naturally impossible for the Jin army to hand over the native governor of Bingzhou, and the two sides could not even reach an agreement on polite words.

Li Hao was not polite and waved his hand to let the rebel soldiers push the reinforced catapults to the edge of the moat.

These catapults were pushed from Pingyang County to Jinyang City by the rebel soldiers at all costs. Wang Jun's nine clans were barely worthy of consecrating these catapults.

On the top of the city wall, 48-year-old Wang Jun looked at the catapults pushed out by the bandits below the city, and doubts suddenly appeared in his heart.

"What are they going to do? Does Li Hao think he can break into Jinyang City with just a few catapults?"

He was quite confident in the strength of Jinyang City. In order to boost morale, he laughed and mocked the bandits' actions.

The defenders around Wang Jun held the same view, and soon they could no longer laugh.

PS: Please give me recommendation votes and monthly votes.

(End of this chapter)