Chapter 823: Win It All in One Battle

Strategic deception is a little different from ordinary lying.

A lie usually doesn't spread very far; sometimes it's just a matter between two people.

In that case, a lie really can fool someone for a lifetime.

But strategic deception doesn't work that way. It covers far too many aspects, and especially once the initial stage is over and operations have begun, it becomes even harder to keep the deception going. Sooner or later, something somewhere will give it away.

When it reaches that point, you have to grasp the main factor, seek only to conceal the most critical information, and gradually release the secondary information on your own initiative, drawing the enemy's awareness into your own rhythm.

Murong Xinzhang, for example, handled this brilliantly. At the moment his true objective was about to be exposed, he deliberately released the plausible-sounding misdirection of "driving the tiger to devour the wolf."

With that one move, Murong Xinzhang, who in fact had the Great Zhou at his back and possessed a powerful backer, was portrayed as a Liu Xuande driven by desperation.

The Goryeo people read Romance of the Three Kingdoms too. The edition personally edited by me, Sage Zhang, was a massive bestseller across these three thousand li of rivers and mountains. Even a Goryeo slave knew the great name of Imperial Uncle Liu.

The moment this "driving the tiger to devour the wolf" story came out, it very easily made the Goryeo people automatically cast themselves in the role of Yuan Shu.

It really did fit! Goryeo held the home ground, with elite troops and ample provisions. Though they couldn't stand against Cao Mengde, who held the Son of Heaven to command the feudal lords — that is, the Great Zhou —

still, against you, a Liu Bei (Murong Xinzhang) covertly viewed with hostility by the court, as long as they didn't imitate Yuan Shu by directly declaring themselves emperor and cutting themselves off from the world, what was there to fear?

At the same time, Murong Xinzhang, aware that the fact of his tens of thousands of armored troops might frighten all of Goryeo, slowly released the information that he had only twenty thousand armored men, and that the greater part of the rest were Jurchen and Balhae people from the forests, rounded up and captured.

And this information, in the eyes of the Goryeo people, was entirely believable.

Who could have imagined that Murong Xinzhang alone had forty thousand armored troops under his command, and that even his unarmored horse archers were elite troops? This completely exceeded the imagination of all of Goryeo.

Or to put it in extreme terms, if Murong Xinzhang had said he now had fifty thousand super-elite soldiers, the Goryeo leadership most likely would not have believed it either.

Goryeo lay far off east of the sea, and they still lacked any direct sense of how wildly the martial virtue of the Central Plains yabing guards had exploded in recent years.

They had not seen much of the fighting power of the Central Plains warriors, and instead, because those warriors had not gone abroad to display their ferocity, they even assumed that compared to the Great Tang, the fighting power of the warriors of this era had declined considerably.

Not just in this era — this notion was a common belief even among later generations.

People generally assume that warlords fighting in the last days of a dynasty could never compare with its golden age.

That after the An-Shi Rebellion, the Great Tang's military might fell like a shooting star, plummeting — that is what fits the popular understanding.

Well, strictly speaking, it's not too far off. Compared to Xiangji Temple, the fighting power of the Five Dynasties warriors had certainly declined.

But the decline was not great. What declined most was organizational strength and logistical supply capacity, not martial prowess.

And so, under the double deception that Murong Xinzhang was at the end of his rope and that he had only twenty thousand armored troops,

Wang Zhao on one hand ordered Huangfu Zhao, Commandant of the Red Guard Cavalry, to lead three thousand infantry and cavalry north and encamp near Longgang County, a little over sixty li from the western capital of Pyongyang, while on the other hand urgently mobilizing within the country.

Defending a city in this era was not, in fact, what later generations imagine — that with a strong city in hand, holding the high ground, as long as there was enough food, one could hold out indefinitely.

In reality, being trapped defending an isolated city was an extreme torment for the defenders, because it meant that all your hopes had been cut off, and with the slightest carelessness your entire family would be wiped out.

Under this kind of prolonged, extreme mental pressure, the thing most prone to break down is the human heart.

In many cases, a strange situation would even arise where the besieging side held no great advantage, yet as the fighting went on, merely by calling for surrender they could get their hands on the city.

All of this stemmed from the defenders' long-term endurance of enormous pressure, a process of self-collapse in the face of unknown terror.

That is why in history, Lü Wenhuan defending Xiangyang and Zhu Wenzheng defending Nanchang became so famous — because it truly was that difficult.

Under ordinary circumstances, without a great general like Lü Wenhuan or Zhu Wenzheng, you had to give the defenders some hope in order to sustain them.

So Wang Zhao did indeed know his business. Although he had no way to mobilize a large army north to lift the siege in the short term, he very astutely dispatched Huangfu Zhao north with the only mobile force that could move at any time.

Huangfu Zhao came from the Huangfu clan, a powerful family of Huangzhou. His uncle Huangfu Tigong was a founding meritorious official of Goryeo, so he could be counted as a tiger son of a military family.

When he reached Longgang County and looked, he saw the "Liao" army surrounding Pyongyang on all four sides, banners waving and drums thundering, and immediately understood that his few thousand men would not even be enough to fill the gaps between the enemy's teeth.

After sending out two waves of death-defying soldiers to try to break through into Pyongyang to deliver word, all of whom were killed by the Liao army's iron cavalry, Huangfu Zhao decisively led his troops away from the indefensible Longgang County and into the foothills of the Cibei Ridge range northeast of Pyongyang.

This place was about thirty li from Pyongyang. Huangfu Zhao ordered his soldiers to raise red flags on the mountaintop and light signal fires every morning at dawn, to let the soldiers and civilians in Pyongyang know that relief troops still existed and to encourage them to hold on.

Murong Xinzhang saw this from afar and actually felt a touch of admiration for the man's talent. Smiling, he said to Wang Pu:

"This man led troops south, and along the way his marching reconnaissance was thorough and well-judged. Seeing our great army in strict order, he quickly assessed the situation and encamped in the mountain forests.

And now he has even thought of using signal fires to encourage the soldiers and civilians. If he does not die, he could hold a district for me."

Wang Pu also smiled and chimed in: "In my view, Great King, you should rather make this matter known to all your generals, so that they do not write off the Goryeo people as worthless and become arrogant soldiers."

Murong Xinzhang deeply agreed. Since they still could not be completely certain of the Goryeo fighting strength, and whether all of it was at the level of the western capital garrison troops, this was indeed something to watch.

Murong Xinzhang immediately ordered dispatch riders to notify the officers and men of every camp, then ordered Gao Song to give a portion of the armor to the civilian laborers accompanying the army and to the conscripted Jurchen and Balhae people, having them disguise themselves as the main force and attack Pyongyang with full strength.

Huangfu Zhao was actually bolder than Murong Xinzhang imagined. He did not stay on Cibei Ridge at all. Instead, dressed in Jurchen clothing, he led several dozen riders close to within a dozen or so li of Pyongyang to observe, and several times was nearly caught by the Zhou army's roving patrol cavalry.

But it was precisely Huangfu Zhao's bold yet meticulous actions that further strengthened Murong Xinzhang's strategic deception.

Outside Pyongyang, he saw the "Liao" army assaulting Pyongyang like a tide — this was definitely not the thunderous but rainless show of surrounding a point to strike the relief force; they were attacking with full force.

At the same time, he also discovered that although the "Liao" army had excellent armor, attacked bravely, and had high morale, their fighting power really was not very high.

It was roughly between Goryeo elite troops and prefectural-county troops, or perhaps comparable to Goryeo elite troops, but certainly not as good as the armored soldiers of the military aristocracy.

Huangfu Zhao observed carefully for several days in a row, and only after confirming without error did he send riders flying south to inform Great King Wang Zhao.

In Gaegyeong, the frantic Wang Zhao was still driving the Goryeo court to operate at high speed. Conscription was never an easy matter in any ancient dynasty.

Wang-founded Goryeo looked like it had over a million commoners, a standing army of twenty or thirty thousand, and reserve forces easily numbering over a hundred thousand, but actually mobilizing them was an extremely difficult task.

April was the critical period for spring plowing. Whether it was the auxiliary troops of the prefectures and counties, the semi-standing regular troops, or the private retainers of the great clans and military aristocracy, all had to carry out agricultural production — the only difference was how much.

If the western capital of Pyongyang could not be held, the greatest loss would be to the Great King's family; it mattered little to the great clans of the various regions.

They were even inclined to watch the Great King's family take a fall. That way, Great King Wang Zhao would certainly not have the strength to bare his fangs at the great clans the way he had before.

On the other hand, if they responded enthusiastically, the spring plowing affected would be their own family's. If the autumn harvest came in several tens of thousands of shi short, the loss would be enormous.

So even though Wang Zhao urged them on with reddened eyes, the troops gathering toward Gaegyeong still came at an unhurried pace. Pyongyang had been besieged for fifteen days, and he had only barely managed to conscript twenty thousand soldiers.

But soon, as Huangfu Zhao's news came back from the front, the Goryeo magnates who had been slacking off became like donkeys lashed by a whip — not only did they stop being stubborn, they pulled the millstone so fast it nearly threw off sparks.

The biggest reason for this was what Huangfu Zhao had discovered through reconnaissance: following the Liao King Murong Xinzhang south, besides twenty thousand armored troops and tens of thousands of civilian laborers, there were also more than three hundred thousand common people.

Soon, the eminent monk Shili Fuluo of Puji Temple also received a reply from the monks of the north, confirming that over three hundred thousand people were following the Liao King south.

At this, the great clans of every region exploded. If these Liao people had come merely to plunder, then holding Gaegyeong and protecting their own interests would have been enough — Pyongyang, after all, belonged to the Great King's family.

But now, the invading Liao King had brought a full three hundred thousand people. That was not plunder — that was coming to seize the magpie's nest.

This was going to swallow up the shares of us powerful families too! That would never do — mobilize at once, march north to the rescue!

Murong Xinzhang stood on high ground, watching the laborers and the conscripts of the various Jurchen tribes being carried back from the distance. Though a look of pity appeared on his face, he gave no order to stop.

This was the road an invincible commander had to walk to become an emperor.

On the walls of Pyongyang, after the shouts of battle had ceased for half a watch, they began again.

The laborers and conscripts armed with heavy armor fought the six thousand Goryeo defenders of Pyongyang to a standstill.

After thirty days of siege, corpses lay strewn across the fields below the walls, and corpses piled like mountains atop them. The Defender of the Western Capital of Goryeo, Xin Kang, had personally rushed to the battlements to join the defense. The ferocity of the fighting seemed real to everyone who saw it — and in truth, it was.

The only difference was that Murong Xinzhang's elite troops had not truly been committed.

"Great King, urgent report from the Marquis of Datong: Fleet Commander Zhao Kuangyin and Deputy Commander Chen Hui, leading sixteen thousand officers and men of the Heng hai Garrison naval force and eighteen thousand sailors aboard three hundred warships, have arrived at Xuanzhou Harbor and are prepared to move south.

The Marquis of Puyang also sent a fast boat with the Heng hai Garrison, saying the trade winds came late this year, so they could not set out at the start of the fourth month. Now the winds have arrived, and by the end of the fifth month, the vanguard will surely reach Ganghwa Bay."

The Marquis of Datong was Zhe Deyuan, and the Marquis of Puyang was Zhao Yanjin. Murong Xinzhang was overjoyed. "If Xianghaier and Sixth Brother can both arrive in the fifth month, I will have no worries at sea.

Pass the order: rest the troops for three days, feast the soldiers grandly, and have every unit take back the iron armor to prepare for battle. If after three days the Goryeo men still do not march north, then we will advance by water and land together and go find them!"

After speaking, Murong Xinzhang said to Wang Pu and Han Kuangtu beside him: "For the laborers who died beneath the walls of Pyongyang, give pensions at the rate of armored soldiers, and treat the wounded with full effort!"

On the seventeenth of the fifth month, on the Pyongyang plain, Wang Zhao had finally assembled the great army to march north and break the siege.

For this campaign, Goryeo fielded ten thousand regular soldiers equivalent to its standing army, thirty thousand prefectural and county troops whose auxiliary soldiers could basically only serve as laborers, and twenty thousand retainers of the great clans — among them about fifteen hundred military officials — plus ten thousand capital guards from Gaegyeong.

In all, seventy thousand troops: ten thousand cavalry, fifteen hundred armored horses, sixty thousand infantry, with nearly thirty thousand armored men.

But of these, only fifteen thousand had iron armor, that is, hanging plate armor; the rest wore relatively inferior gear — old-style plate armor called short armor and other poor-quality leather armor.

Plate armor — this thing is actually a bottomless pit, because unlike lamellar armor and cloth-faced iron armor, which allow areas not struck to deflect force, plate armor can only take the hit head-on.

This means that if plate armor is to have high defensive power, there is only one option: forge it from extremely strong, extremely fine materials.

And in an era with insufficient smelting technology, such iron simply cannot be produced.

A large piece of plate armor hammered out of wrought iron and low-carbon steel might have less defensive power than an iron wok of later ages.

Imagine strapping a cheap iron wok to your chest, and then someone shoots an arrow at you — what happens? Naturally, one arrow and you're dead.

So although the Goryeo men had thirty thousand armored troops, their armor was not in the same class at all as Murong Xinzhang's armored soldiers — sixty percent iron lamellar and ring-mail, over twenty percent cloth-faced iron armor, mixed with other light armor.

Besides this force that barely counted as seventy thousand, plus forty or fifty thousand laborers, it was a horse-and-foot army that claimed three hundred thousand.

Wang Zhao had also mobilized a naval force of over seven thousand men, with nearly two hundred warships, moving north together.

Though this naval force was small in men and its warships were small, it was actually the force Wang Zhao valued most, because Wang Zhao's ancestors had originally been local magnates of Ganghwa Bay, who had risen through maritime trade and fishing at sea.

Therefore the Wang family held the strongest navy on the peninsula, and after Wang Geon founded the state, this family navy became the navy of the Goryeo court.

Wang Zhao did not think a steppe people like the Tuyuhun would have much of a navy — even the Khitan Liao of old had little naval force.

He therefore gave orders to the naval Commander Kang Chengxun: if the relief of Pyongyang went smoothly, the navy was to land at Nampo southeast of Pyongyang, link up with the Pyongyang garrison from the flank, and strike the Liao army's flank to expand the victory.

If Pyongyang became a stalemate, then Kang Chengxun was to lead the navy further north, land in the Xuanzhou area, use the local magnates not yet killed off by the Liao army to raid the Liao supply lines, and force the Liao army to withdraw.

The Pyongyang plain — this is the plain formed around Pyongyang by the Taedong River and its tributaries, the Nam River, the Jaeryong River, and others. For the Korean peninsula, it is a relatively vast plain.

Historically, in the Joseon period, the Pyongyang plain alone could be opened up into roughly one million mu of farmland.

Land on such a great plain with perfect irrigation conditions cannot be compared to fields on hillsides and in valleys. This one million mu was almost all top-grade land, with much higher yields.

Even in later ages, under conditions of total isolation, the people of the Pyongyang plain were the best-off Koreans under the Three Generals' rule — without exception.

Even at this time, the Pyongyang plain had already been opened into many farm fields, and could be counted among the richest lands held by the Goryeo royal house.

Wang Zhao appointed the founding general, Grand Rectifier, Acting Right Vice Director of the Department of State Affairs, and Senior General Gang Gong-jin as Deputy Commander-in-Chief of the field army and concurrently its Troop Commander.

The eldest son of another founding general, Yu Geum-pil — Yu Gyeong — was made Troop Commander of the vanguard army.

Hong Sun, son of Hong Tao, a magnate of Uiseong and likewise a founding meritorious official, and Park Yeong-gyu, a surrendered official of Later Baekje, were made Left and Right Troop Commanders.

The great army stretched over ten li, divided into vanguard, center, and rear armies, each army divided into more than ten companies, each company sending out over a hundred armored men as guards.

The ten thousand-odd cavalry were divided into ten units, providing the army with forward reconnaissance, concealment of movement, and protection of the flanks.

At the same time, Hwangbo Jo on Mercy Ridge, upon receiving word that the great army was marching north, took the initiative to lead his troops down the mountain and form ranks with their backs to the forest, his vanguard even ranging to within less than five li of Murong Xinzhang's great army.

All this was to guard against Murong Xinzhang suddenly sending out cavalry to raid. On a wide open area like the Pyongyang plain, the power of the northern iron cavalry could be magnified to its fullest, and Wang Zhao was still somewhat worried.

On Murong Xinzhang's side, the generals also petitioned to go out and raid. Murong Yanchao even shouted loudly: "The rebel curs think they have responded properly, but in truth they rely too heavily on cavalry escorts.

Looking at the strength of their cavalry, it is far inferior to the Khitan Pishi Army of old. If the Great King orders this general to attack, I need only three thousand riders to rout the enemy cavalry, then pursue and strike to shatter them utterly!"

Murong Yanchao was so certain because he had just personally led fifty-odd riders in a skirmish with the Goryeo cavalry.

The result was naturally overwhelming, so he felt that with only three thousand riders he could utterly rout Goryeo's ten thousand-odd cavalry.

As soon as Murong Yanchao spoke, the surrounding officers all feared the battle honors would be snatched away by him, and one after another they too spoke up asking to fight.

Murong Xinzhang smiled and waved his hand. "Those fellows are weak and cannot withstand a charge, but they know the mountains and rivers well. Merely routing the bulk of their cavalry and their forward vanguard is not the best plan.

These men are poor at field battles and skirmishes, but if scattered everywhere or holding strong cities, they do great harm. Better to let them come beneath the walls of Pyongyang, and destroy them in one gathering."

This was Murong Xinzhang's truest thought. He did not intend to fight a see-saw war of attrition with these Goryeo men for half a year or more, nor did he want to besiege the strong city of Gaegyeong and assault it. What he wanted was to settle everything in a single campaign — to capture Wang Zhao directly and annihilate the Goryeo army completely.

It was already the fifth month. If they fought quickly, perhaps they could still plant some grain in time.

Fighting quickly also meant the grain in the official granaries of great cities like Gaegyeong and Suju (Suwon) would not be wasted in a grinding siege.

Moreover, Murong Xinzhang had one more trump card — the navy!

At Tonghae Harbor, Zhao Kuangyin, stripped to the waist and wearing only shorts, stood with the naval soldiers on a small boat that could hold just over ten men, shouting loudly.

As the red flag waved on the large ship, the sailors on these small boats suddenly rowed hard, and the boats shot out like arrows loosed from a bowstring.

The soldiers on the boats each held a weapon much like a dip net. When two boats crossed, whoever netted an opposing soldier's head and dragged him into the water won.

For a time drums thundered, and the sounds of splashing and cheering were endless.

The Heng hai Garrison could be counted as Zhang Zhou's finest naval force, and even though Zhao Kuangyin had practiced for a long time, he was still quickly netted and dragged into the seawater.

But Zhao Kuangyin was not the least bit annoyed — on the contrary, he was delighted. After the exercise ended, Chen Hui beat the drum, and Zhao Kuangyin personally distributed rewards: the last soldier left standing alone on a small boat received a heavy prize of ten strings of cash, and the second, third, fourth, down to the top ten all received rewards.

But today, besides Chen Hui being present, Zhe Deyuan was also there. He watched Zhao Kuangyin and nodded with satisfaction.

"Your elder brother feared you would not adapt to the climate east of the sea, so he specially entrusted me to bring you medicinal herbs. But it seems you, Zhao Dalang, are indeed a hero — you have no need of such things."

Zhe Deyuan was five or six years older than Zhao Kuangyin, but historically the gap in status between the two men had been enormous.

Yet in this time and place, Zhe Deyuan — as the Emperor's adopted fourth son, long stationed at Datong Prefecture, now bearing the staff of office to guard the northern desert, and married to a woman of the imperial clan's close branch — held a status far higher than Zhao Kuangyin's.

Zhao Kuangyin's elder brother had died at the age of five, so he was essentially the eldest son of the family, and his parents generally called him "Big Brother" as well.

And now he, Zhao Kuangyin, was also a high-ranking general commanding twenty thousand troops and held a count's title. The only man who could make him sincerely submit and wish to call him elder brother was Murong Xinzhang, who had taught him and raised him up.

Zhao Kuangyin clasped his hands toward Zhe Deyuan and said with some feeling, "Your younger brother has been busy with military affairs and has not yet gone to pay respects to our elder brother since arriving in Haedong. Thinking on it, it is truly improper. I beg Brother Zhe to offer my apologies to Brother Xinzhang on my behalf."

Zhe Deyuan waved a hand and said with a chuckle, "What the Commandery Prince is thinking, you know as well as I. As long as you can help him on the battlefield, that is better than paying respects a hundred times over."

Hearing this, Zhao Kuangyin knew that Zhe Deyuan had come with a mission. He immediately clasped his fist. "Brother, speak. The twenty thousand brave lads under my command have long been ready."

"Good!" Zhe Deyuan took Zhao Kuangyin by the hand and headed straight for his command cabin.

"The Commandery Prince has received secret reports from Kaesong. The Goryeo navy, under the command of Commander Kang Chengxun, has about fifteen thousand men moving north from Ganghwa Bay. They are expected to reach the waters around Nampo Port very soon.

The Commandery Prince orders you to muster your troops at once, first defeat the Goryeo navy, then drive straight in and raid Ganghwa Bay. My ten thousand infantry and cavalry will move together with you."

Zhao Kuangyin studied the map and could not help but beam with delight. With this intelligence, as long as they destroyed the Goryeo navy, they could enter Kaesong before the land battle ended — that would be the foremost merit in destroying a kingdom.

And Zhe Deyuan was right: this was the best chance to repay Murong Xinzhang.

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