Chapter 6667 Life and Death

Chapter 6667 Life and Death
"Military Advisor Masinde specially took out the talisman and handed it to me. I actually knew what he meant. He should have seen it a long time ago, but I don't want this kind of charity. We can fail and be beaten to our knees, but we can't even abandon our long-cherished wish." Sidney pushed Ward and rushed forward.

Next comes Sidney's war. In this world where belief is enough to change reality, the orthodox Great Yuezhi, who have a century-old wish and are forging ahead courageously, have enough power while distorting themselves. However, their power is mixed with their beliefs. If they use it to seize the princess, the limit of their burst will be far greater than it is now.

But in the present Kushan Empire, in order to survive, this power of faith itself has long ceased to produce the desired effect.

Sidney personally led 1,300 men to block the Qiang people, who were ten times larger than his own people, while Fu Ward silently led the remaining less than 2,000 soldiers to rush towards the mountainous area in northern Tibet.

Sidney is very strong. When he is free to do whatever he wants, he is not much weaker than Fu Ward. After all, just like Cabachi and others under Barak, he is the commander-in-chief of the area. If it weren't for those troubles in Kushan, these people would have been the future heirs.

However, no matter how strong a general is, he will not be able to exert much combat effectiveness when facing an enemy force that is ten times his size, with only a thousand men on his side and more than ten thousand men on the other side.

The command ability was greatly reduced on this scale, and Yongwu had to face the suppression of the Qiang people's cloud energy. In such a cruel situation, all Sidney could do was to delay.

Mangzhong wanted to kill Fu Ward, but Sidney's blocking prevented him from escaping. He was almost killed by Sidney's sudden attack when his front line was dispersed. Mangzhong was more or less aware that Sidney was a tough guy.

Therefore, Mangzhong no longer hoped to kill Fu Ward, but instead concentrated his forces to strangle Sidney and the elite Kushan soldiers left behind by Fu Ward. As Fu Ward withdrew, until the distance was widened to a certain extent and he successfully entered the northern Tibetan mountainous area from the west, Fu Ward's mental image finally lost its blessing.

The glow of the mental image disappeared, and the sky also dimmed. The battle that had dragged on from noon to now was finally coming to an end.

"Surrender." Mangzhong looked in the direction of Sidney and called out. Influenced by the Han Dynasty, Mangzhong also had the attitude of capturing those alive if possible. After all, in this era, capturing prisoners is more meritorious than beheading them. "My target is Fu Ward, not you."

Sidney looked in the direction of the light, and then looked at the camel riders who had lost the blessing of the mind image and were already tired, hungry, and completely exhausted. There were less than eight hundred of them left, and except for himself, everyone was injured and at the end of their rope.

"If you are willing to surrender, please lay down your weapons. As a general, I will have to give you an explanation, and you have done your best." Sidney said as he looked at his soldiers who had fought to a desperate situation.

As for Sidney himself, he was not ready to surrender. His mentality was inclined towards self-destruction. The merger of Northern Gui and Southern Gui, while gaining more practical benefits, also made him give up Northern Gui's long-held beliefs. For Sidney, it was almost equivalent to the collapse of his heart. He left his legion in Kushan and flew to find Fu Ward, just to let Fu Ward answer his doubts.

However, the doubts were not resolved. Fuward did not think this was a wrong thing. Sidney respected Fuward's choice, but he also further strengthened his judgment - the Kushans now were shit! The Great Yuezhi who gave up their long-cherished wish were wild dogs!

Just die here!

Sidney bent his body slightly and imitated a cheetah charging, and the camel riders under his command also refused to surrender. They had followed him here and vowed to die for their country, so why humiliate this belief? Let's fight!

A pale silver light emanated from Sidney's body. This was his mental image, bestowing him with a false destiny.

Mangzhong's eyes lit up, and then became much more solemn. He had never thought that this guy who chose to cover the retreat and looked like a deputy general would actually have a mental image. You know, even in the Kushan Empire, not every well-known officer has this kind of thing.

In fact, if one possesses one of the Legion Talent, Mind Image, Heart Abyss, or Illusionary Eagle Flag, he or she can at least be considered to have stepped onto the world stage.

Therefore, when he saw this scene, Mangzhong was somewhat shocked, but because of this, after the other party expressed his unwillingness to surrender, he did not persuade him any more and directly led a large group of young and strong men to rush up. When the moon rose over the top of the mountain, Sidney suffered more than a dozen wounds and died of exhaustion.

"My name is Sidney, bring my head to claim the reward." Sidney, who was wounded dozens of times, was not angry at all. Instead, he seemed to be relieved before his death. However, even though he achieved inner relief, Sidney still maintained the dignity of a military officer with internal energy out of his body and died in battle.

"Send a letter to the commander-in-chief. We have tried our best and killed a Kushan officer with telepathy." After Sidney died, Mangzhong sat down on the ground. After such a long battle, he suffered several wounds and one of his sons died. Mangzhong himself was exhausted. He was able to hold on until now thanks to holding his breath.

But now that Sidney was dead, his breath was let out, and Mangzhong felt exhausted from the bottom of his heart, and he completely lost the strength to continue chasing Fu Ward.

In Xinzhou, after relying on thunderstorms to eliminate most of the remaining locusts on the mountain roads, Liu Yan realized that his original idea was rash. Although the thunderstorm was indeed very strong, it was indeed beyond his ability to deal with such a locust plague numbering in the billions.

After that, Liu Yan could only try his best to eliminate the locusts. As for keeping the enemy out of the country as mentioned earlier, just pretend that he didn't say anything. After working so hard for ten days, Liu Yan gave up eliminating the locusts because the damn ones were already dead, and he had no good way to deal with the locusts that rushed into Xinzhou.

So after closing up his stall, he returned to the government office in Xinzhou. At this time, Jia Xu was still hiding in the county magistrate's mansion, which made Liu Yan somewhat embarrassed.

"Has the locust plague been eradicated successfully?" Jia Xu asked sarcastically.

"We have underestimated the scale of the locust plague. Even if we build super-dangerous lightning-inducing weapons, we can't solve the problem when facing the overwhelming locusts. I have indeed underestimated the scale of this locust plague. No wonder the three empires need to join forces." Liu Yan said with some tiredness. He didn't care about Jia Xu's teasing. After all, having worked with Jia Xu for so many years, Liu Yan knew clearly that Jia Xu would at most joke with them. In front of other people, he was always solemn.

"Over in East Africa, the combined strength of the three empires has killed the vast majority of the locusts. Only less than one in a hundred of the remaining ones can reach New South Wales." Jia Xu replied with a smile.

"So I had no hope of solving this problem from the beginning, right?" Liu Yan said unhappily, "Speaking of which, what have you been doing recently? I feel like you've been busy lately, but you seem to have been free these past few days. What happened?"

Jia Xu glanced at Liu Yan. Although there was still a considerable gap between him and their group in terms of intelligence, the weakest Liu Yan had made a lot of progress over the years. At least it was possible to tell whether he was slacking off or working.

"Because you were assassinated, I have to take some precautions and see if I can solve this matter at the same time." Jia Xu said calmly.

No matter what, he is a person who would harm God but not Wenhe. Even though the assassination of Liu Yan could be said to be a complete accident, and because he had enough guards, Liu Yan was not injured at all and even captured the assassin, but even so, after Jia Xu came to Xinzhou, he would still take action to solve the problem from the root if he could.

"Oh, Fu Ward, right? I didn't understand what you meant before, but after thinking about it when we were killing the locusts, I more or less realized it." Liu Yan said Fu Ward's name on the spot. Jia Xu was not surprised by this and just nodded.

"By the way, Fuward is in Tibet, and you are operating it here, remotely controlling it, right?" Liu Yan asked curiously.

Jia Xu shook his head and said, "No, I just readjusted the deployment of local troops in Xinzhou and strengthened the management capabilities of each area."

Liu Yan was stunned for a moment, then looked at Jia Xu, "Fuward is going to Tibet? How is that possible? If he insists on staying in Tibet, we don't have any good solutions. But if he goes to Tibet, we will only deal with him quickly. Whether he goes to Xinzhou or Yizhou, he will die."

Compared with the Qiang people in Tibet, the local legions that carried out blockades in Xinzhou and Yanbian areas of Yizhou were not tough guys, but they were all capable of truly blocking the camel cavalry.

The Qiang people in the Tibetan areas cannot be stopped, apart from the problem of weapons and equipment, another very important point is that the Qiang people in the Tibetan areas have not accepted comprehensive military service in recent years. Well, even if they have accepted universal military service, it is impossible for a 15-year-old child to master various skills and tactics in just a few years.

As for the local legions in Xinzhou and Yizhou Yanbian areas that blocked the passage to Tibet, at least every soldier had received proper training. If nothing else, they were at least standard regular troops with core centurions to strengthen their organization and ensure that their soldiers could perform with due combat effectiveness.

This is completely different from the Qiang people in the Tibetan area. The Tibetan area said that they would mobilize hundreds of thousands of young and strong people this time, but most of them could not even be considered as regular soldiers with one talent. They were really bullying the camel cavalry under Fu Ward. Because they had no mounts, they had no way to exert their due strength. Only those with double talents were close to the strength of the Royal Guards. Otherwise, it was nonsense for the young and strong Qiang people to stop Fu Ward.

The gap in hard power between the two sides is too big, which is why Fu Ward has fewer people and cannot use his core talents. Otherwise, when Fu Ward was at his peak, he could have easily defeated the 10,000 or 20,000 Qiang people if he didn't care about the losses.

The saying "one Han can defeat five Hu" refers to the same level, that is, one elite Han army with double talents can beat five Hu army legions with the same double talents, rather than the so-called elite Han army of the Imperial Guards who can only beat five times the number of young and strong Hu people. If it were the latter, the Imperial Guards would have committed suicide directly. What a shame it is.

Therefore, even a guy like Liu Yan who knew nothing about military affairs knew that if Fu Ward stayed in Tibet, he could barely survive, but if he went to Tibet, he would really die. The gap between the combat effectiveness of the young and strong Qiang people and that of the regular army of the Han Dynasty was too obvious.

To be more practical, it is not just the difference in basic quality, but the difference in weapons and equipment. It is not that Chen Xi deliberately disparaged the Qiang people's equipment, but the weapons and equipment Chen Xi gave to the Qiang people according to the population ratio and the equipment needed by the young and strong army formed by the Qiang people by drawing one out of four are completely different things.

Therefore, under such circumstances, Liu Yan believed that Fuward's going to Tibet was simply seeking death. Although staying in Tibet was also a form of chronic suicide, it was much better than dying suddenly on the spot.

"What you said is very normal, but that is a normal situation. After you were assassinated in Xinzhou, the local army in Xinzhou would inevitably be affected. According to normal logic, even if investigators came from Chang'an, the local army would be ordered to withdraw first." Jia Xu agreed with Liu Yan's judgment, but that was just a normal situation. When had he, Jia Xu, ever been normal?

"After you were assassinated, some of the things that Mashind covered up had to be revealed. Mashind would not let Fu Ward do anything that would affect the subsequent handover. In fact, the most important thing Mashind did in the past two years was to bring the tens of thousands of people under Fu Ward's command to our side. If we had delayed any longer, Mashind would have brought all the people under his command." Jia Xu said with some admiration.

Jia Xu was also aware of Ma Xinde's abilities. His subsequent position would be Liu Yan's deputy. It didn't sound like a high position, but if Liu Yan really wanted to say it, he was the head of the Human Resources Department of the Han Dynasty. Ma Xinde was basically parachuted in and had real power.

Chen Xi originally did not intend to let Ma Xinde solve the problem in the Tibetan area, but directly let Ma Xinde serve as Liu Yan's deputy. However, Ma Xinde said that one must finish well from beginning to end. He brought Fu Ward to the Tibetan area, so he must give an explanation to Fu Ward in the end. Moreover, if he came to solve the problems in the Tibetan area, it would reduce a lot of losses.

This is not an empty statement. If Masinde had not assimilated the more than 30,000 Kushan soldiers under Fuward, when Fuward had no choice but to fight with the Qiang people in Tibet, the damage caused would have been several times, or even ten times, of what it is now.

However, according to the time, Masinde should not have confronted Fuward at this time. However, after Fuward sent people to Tibet to collude with people in Shule and Khotan and assassinated Liu Yan, some things had to be revealed.

According to Jia Xu's understanding of Masinde, at this time, Masinde should have consumed 80% of Fuward's forces, and Fuward should choose to take his men back to Kushan.

As I said, both the Han Dynasty's civil officials and Masinde were aware of Fu Ward's mentality, so the next thing Jia Xu had to prepare for was to deal with Fu Ward.

However, Jia Xu would not go beyond Mashind to deal with Fuward. This was Mashind's dignity and also Jia Xu's recognition of Mashind.

"So you are making arrangements in Xinzhou, waiting for Fu Ward to come down?" Liu Yan lowered his head and thought for a while, then he understood what Jia Xu had been doing recently. It was obvious that he was setting up a pocket formation in Xinzhou, waiting for Fu Ward to come down, and then gathering the power of the Yanbian area of ​​Xinzhou to knock Fu Ward to death.

"Yes, but Fuward did not come down. He probably went to the Karakoram Corridor. It seems he escaped." Jia Xu said calmly.

"Escaped?" Liu Yan was confused. "Wait, why did you go through the Karakoram Corridor? Isn't it difficult to go there? Aren't there many passages in the Himalayas? Why do you have to go through the most difficult place for supply? If you really want to go, you can go through Quma Mountain, Kashmir and other places."

"We will take action in those places." Jia Xu said calmly, "Our deal with Masinde is that Masinde will solve the problems in the Tibetan area and handle everything. That is, we will not interfere in this matter and let Masinde handle it. But this does not mean that Masinde will completely let Ward run back with the core elite. We will not care."

Jia Xu agreed with Masinde's logic. Although Chen Xi was unhappy, he had not intervened until now, which actually showed that Chen Xi could accept it.

But there is a bottom line in this matter: if Fu Ward goes back alone, the Han Dynasty will not stop him. However, if Fu Ward wants to take the most core elite troops back with him, then Masinde will have to give a decent explanation that both sides can accept.

The Han Dynasty would never accept that thousands of people had experienced the harsh climate of Tibet and successfully returned to the main backbone of Kushan under the siege of hundreds of thousands of Qiang people. This was tantamount to stepping on the face of the Han Dynasty. This was why Masinde persuaded Fuward to go back by himself. If he had to take these people back, it would definitely be a question of conscience.

As I said, we, the Han Dynasty, said that you, Mashind, should handle the affairs of the Tibetan area yourself. So in this situation, if Fuward fought back hundreds or nearly a thousand people under the siege and blockade of the local people in the Tibetan area, the Han Dynasty would accept it. But if Mashind still gave Fuward advice and let him take the main force back, then don't blame the Han Dynasty for being rude. This is also the reason why the main force of the Han Dynasty has not been eliminated until now, because the affairs of the Tibetan area were fully handed over to Mashind.

By the way, this is also the reason why Zhang Ji persuaded the Qiang people that it was enough and there was no need to do so, because Fu Ward's ending was the final dignity given to Fu Ward by Ma Xinde. Zhang Ji did not realize it before, but after being knocked unconscious by Ma Xinde, he calmed down and understood what Ma Xinde was waiting for.

But this all has a prerequisite, that is, Fuward did not leave Tibet, but ran around inside Tibet, and finally broke away from the blockade and went to Kushan.

But if Fuward went to Tibet and was killed by the Han army, he would not be able to blame others, because this honor was given to Masinde, who was given full authority to handle the Tibetan area. Beyond this scope, it would not be Masinde's business, but the business of the Han Dynasty.

Therefore, Jia Xu had been constantly adjusting the local army corps in Yanbian, Xinzhou, some time ago, waiting for Fu Ward to rush down to the Tibetan area and die. However, as of yesterday, Fu Ward still did not rush down, and Jia Xu realized that Fu Ward did not choose this path in the end.

"Oh, oh, oh, in the Tibetan area, it's Mashind's business. Outside the Tibetan area, there's no Mashind's business. I can understand this." Liu Yan nodded when he heard it. He could understand this.

"Fu Ward didn't go to Tibet. If he came down, I would have killed him directly. If he didn't come down, there's nothing I can do. It's still Masinde's business." Jia Xu said with some regret. Although Fu Ward's assassination was not aimed at Liu Yan, and did not really hurt Liu Yan, this behavior alone was enough for Jia Xu to be cautious.

It's a pity that with such a bright opportunity, Fu Ward didn't run down from the Tibetan area. He went down to Tibet first and then entered Tibet. It's really a pity.

"What should we do now?" Liu Yan asked curiously. This did not involve any secrets, so Liu Yan just asked directly if he wanted to know.

"Just wait for the latest news. Fuward has escaped." Jia Xu was not surprised. Accidents are inevitable. "But the problem in the Tibetan area has been completely solved. We can talk about the future later. According to Zichuan's habit, the Qiang people should be compensated a lot later. After all, the Qiang people did contribute to the Tibetan area this time."

The Qing Qiang, Fa Qiang, and Di people made great efforts in the siege of Fuward, so the necessary rewards still need to be given, and in the future, to maintain the strategic advantage of the Tibetan area over the southern Guizhou region, these people will also be needed to contribute. The Tibetan area will have to enter a new round of development in the future, and all of these require Chen Xi to increase investment. Although Jia Xu doesn't quite understand why Chen Xi wants to develop the Tibetan area, on this kind of thing, Jia Xu and others are too lazy to ask even if they don't understand. After all, that is Chen Zichuan, who is truly invincible in internal affairs.

"So in essence, the purpose of letting Fu Ward run away was also to prevent the Qiang people from feeling overwhelmed when they collect the supplies later, right?" Liu Yan explained the matter in his own words. Jia Xu thought about it and felt that this was pretty much the meaning.

After all, if more Qiang people don't die, with the way Chen Xi distributes supplies now, the Qiang people have to consider what Chen Xi wants to do with so many supplies, and whether they deserve these rewards. If you think too much about some things, it will be bad for everyone.

What Chen Xi needs is the kind of people who, after taking the supplies, don't think about anything else and just listen to the command from Chang'an. The Qiang people have clearly shown that if they take the supplies from the Han Dynasty, they will have to fight to the death. So it is better to fight first, expel the biggest threat to the Tibetan area, and make this merit higher. Then, when the Qiang people collect the supplies, it will not be so easy for them to get burned.

After all, the Qiang people have obviously returned, and there is no need to let them suffer because of the problem of supplies. As for Fu Ward who ran away, in Chen Xi's eyes, he is almost a tool.

I got up late, and the high temperature holiday is over. I feel sad.