Early the next morning, Huangzhushan became noisy. After a hurried breakfast at home, many young people gathered on the playground with dry food and weapons.
Although Huangzhushan had just experienced a huge defeat not long ago, which resulted in a total of thirty-two people not being able to come back alive, when it came to attacking Shuilong Village, everyone had no objection or indifference, but everyone was silent.
Various preparations began.
Even the old and weak women and children began to prepare dry food, clothing, etc. for the men who were about to go out to conquer Shuilong Village.
Why? Because they all know that Huangzhu Mountain is short of food. If they cannot obtain enough food, then the people in the village will face a food crisis, and they will not know how many people will starve to death by then.
So even though the last fiasco was still lingering in their minds, they all knew that they had no choice.
If you don't want to starve to death, you have only two options, one is to go out to the mountains to 'collect grain' and plunder, the other is to attack Shuilong Village to steal grain.
The method of going out to 'collect grain' was also commonly used by them in previous years, but this year the situation has changed, because now there are officers and soldiers gathering outside the mountains.
I don’t know whether it was because the succession of Li Xuan and his son as emperor stimulated the government, which led to the government dispatching a large number of officers and soldiers to hoard outside the mountains, or because the banditry problem this year was particularly serious, and the government paid more attention to the encirclement and suppression of bandits in the mountains.
In short, there was a troublesome situation that the bandits in Huangzhu Mountain were unwilling to face, that is, there were too many officers and soldiers outside the mountain.
According to the situation of several spies secretly sent out by Huangzhushan, officers and soldiers have now set up inspection checkpoints at several traffic arteries entering and exiting the mountain, and a large number of officers and soldiers have been stationed in several large villages and towns close to the mountain.
Under such circumstances, the bandits in Huangzhushan who dared to go out to rob the mountain with such arrogance were basically looking for death themselves.
If you are stuck in the mountains and can't get out, you have to find another way to solve the food crisis.
If it is after the autumn harvest, then there will be no problem, because during the busy summer that just ended, Huangzhu Mountain has reclaimed a lot of land and planted food. The land at the foot of Huangzhu Mountain is balanced and fertile, and several streams passing by are enough to irrigate the fields.
Therefore, they will be able to harvest enough food after the autumn harvest.
But the problem now is that their existing food reserves cannot last until the autumn harvest!
To solve this problem, when it was not feasible to go out to collect grain, their only option was to attack Shuilong Village.
Because according to Wang Wenhua, Shuilong Village already has a large amount of food, property and other reserves, and these are the wealth accumulated by Shuilong Village after more than ten years of looting.
Another point is that Shuilong Village had just plundered a farm, robbed a landlord's granary, and brought back a large amount of grain.
Whether it's money and other property or food, they all have a fatal attraction for the many bandits in Huangzhu Mountain.
It's just that these are the thoughts of ordinary bandits, and Li Xuan still has his own thoughts, that is, he wants to take this opportunity to gather the people of Shuilong Village under his command.
Nowadays, officers and soldiers gather outside the mountains. Although the specific number of officers and soldiers is not yet known, there must be thousands of troops. Such many officers and soldiers have come early and late. They appeared after Li Xuan and his son became emperor and rebelled. If there are
Li Xuan wouldn't believe it if it was just a coincidence.
Li Xuan was at least 80% sure that these officers and soldiers were here for him.
Perhaps in the near future, these officers and soldiers will enter the mountains in large numbers and search for the whereabouts of the Huangzhushan bandits and themselves, the Emperor of the Tang Dynasty. Once they find themselves, a battle will be inevitable.
In order to have greater certainty against the attacks of officers and soldiers in the future, Li Xuan now urgently needs to expand the strength of his troops.
Nowadays, the most suitable place to expand and supplement the strength of 'Datang' is naturally Shuilong Village, which is dozens of miles away.
If this operation can be successful, then the number of subjects under the jurisdiction of the Tang Dynasty is expected to exceed one thousand, and the number of young people can reach more than two hundred.
This means that Li Xuan has more power to fight against the officers and soldiers!
After the sun rose, Li Xuan appeared on the playground with Liu Bagou and others.
Looking at the densely packed young people in front of him, Li Xuan couldn't help but sigh. This time, he, the emperor, will personally lead the expedition.
Since Li Xuan was on the expedition himself, Liu Bagou would not let Li Xuan travel alone no matter what he said. He was worried and followed him. In addition, Wang Wenhua, who was responsible for leading the way, also came with him.
Almost all the young and strong 'big army' in Huangzhushan gathered on the playground. Among them, there were nearly a hundred ordinary bandits. They were divided into two armies, each with about fifty people. The left army was commanded by the general of chariot and cavalry, Jun Dongquan, and the right army.
The army was led by Hussar General Chen Tufu.
The 24-man Guards and the 12 individually selected archers were combined into the Central Army, commanded by the Guards General Wang Danxu.
In this expedition, not only did most of Huangzhushan's senior management leave, but only Bai Yunqi, Qian Mengjiu and others stayed behind. In fact, almost all the young people in Huangzhushan were in the ranks of the army.
All men between the ages of forty and forty are on the march.
To put it bluntly, the attack on Shuilong Village was an overwhelming battle for the Tang Dynasty!
If the plan goes well, it will be easy to win, but if it fails and all Huangzhushan's elite are trapped in Shuilong Village, the consequences will be disastrous.
Precisely because he knew that this expedition was of great importance, even related to his own life, Li Xuan had always been very cautious. Before the expedition, he personally took Liu Bagou, Fang Dongquan and others to check the preparations of the soldiers, from dry food to weapons.
Check them one by one to make sure nothing goes wrong.
When Li Xuan led everyone to check and found that nothing was missing, he got on a short bad horse, then pulled out the sword from his waist and pointed towards the north: "Let's go!"
Following Li Xuan's order, the bandits began to walk out one after another.
Just looking at the chaos of these bandits, Li Xuan couldn't help but frowned. The first to set off was the left army led by Fang Dongquan, followed by Chen Butcher's right army, and the bandits under these two men were all
They were ordinary young men and had no concept of marching in formation at all, so they walked as chaotically as if they were on an outing. Many people were talking and laughing while walking, and from time to time they could be heard laughing.
Fortunately, the neat formation of the Guards at the back made Li Xuan feel relieved. After more than two months of training, the Guards already looked like an army.
Although the soldiers in the Guards are all children of fifteen or sixteen years old, and their physical fitness is not as good as that of strong men in their twenties and thirties, these people line up in neat formations and move forward carrying weapons such as spears, swords and shields.
, it still made Li Xuan feel relieved a lot.
He knew very well that whether it was the attack on Shuilong Village this time or the subsequent resistance against the officers and soldiers, the guards he could really rely on were these half-grown children, not the noisy young and strong bandits.
The neat formation of these children as they marched today gave Li Xuan hope of victory and hope of survival!