When Xiao Yiqing crossed the river and returned north to Yuzhou, Han Qian was at Hulao Pass.

Hulao Pass had now completed its initial repairs, with its defensive system perfected. Even with Shen Peng transferred to the Xuzhou Field Army, Chen Kun needed only five thousand elite troops garrisoning Hulao Pass to have no fear that enemy forces could breach its gates.

The defensive priority east of the Yi-Luo River this spring was to extend fortifications to the Yi-Luo River confluence, while simultaneously advancing the navy’s defensive line to the confluence. Subsequently, they would focus on repairing the Yu River’s southern embankment east of the Yi-Luo River confluence to achieve the goal of thoroughly keeping enemies beyond the Heluo region.

“That Wuji could so decisively capture Chenqiao Stronghold truly surprised and delighted me. Xiao Yiqing rushed south in a panic to meet with Liang Shixiong, but with only twenty thousand-plus remnant troops defending Xingyang, whether to defend or flee—they must still be wavering in their hearts…” Han Qian said, holding Zhao Ting’er’s hand as they ascended the battlements of Hulao Pass.

“I’ve been constantly worried that Wuji lacks experience commanding large armies and might not consider things thoroughly enough. I haven’t slept soundly these past days…” Zhao Ting’er said.

After arriving in Luoyang, Zhao Ting’er rarely accompanied Han Qian outside the capital to inspect military affairs. This time she came to Hulao Pass with Han Qian only because she was truly anxious about the battle situation with the Xuzhou Army. At least here she could learn of the Chenqiao Stronghold battle situation more quickly. Now the heart that had been in her throat finally settled.

Han Qian smiled slightly, recalling when Zhao Wuji had first followed him as merely a stubborn fourteen-year-old youth who had killed someone with a bow over an injustice. Smiling at Zhao Ting’er, he said: “When Wuji was expanding territory southward along the Qu River in Xuzhou in those years, it seemed he faced resistance only from tribal strongholds of a hundred-plus people, at most a few hundred, but the situation was far more complex than imagined. Even then he had the capability to handle matters independently. It’s just that I needed people I could fully trust at my side, so I never let him go out to independently command large armies in battle.”

Chen Kun received an intelligence report and handed it to Han Qian, saying: “Your Majesty, it was indeed Xiao Yiqing returning to Mengzhou surrounded by his escort guards…”

Han Qian glanced at the report, then looked with a smile at Feng Liao, Gu Qian, Han Yuanqi, Zhou Daoyuan, and others who had accompanied him to inspect military affairs at Hulao Pass again, asking: “What do you suppose—how complex must Xiao Yiqing’s feelings be as he returns to Mengzhou at this moment?”

“With the abilities of Xiao Yiqing and Liang Shixiong, they should by now be able to discern Your Majesty’s intention to take Xingyang this year. From Xiao Yiqing’s position, he certainly hopes Liang Shixiong and Zhu Rang will defend Xingyang to the death regardless of cost. However, for Liang Shixiong and Zhu Rang, if they could easily hold Xingyang, fine—but seeing us pressing tens of thousands of elite forces from the eastern and southern fronts with determination not to return until Xingyang falls, they will have no resolve to fight to the death. After all, for the Eastern Liang Army, Xingyang is not a position they must defend!” Feng Liao said with a smile. “As Your Majesty said, Xiao Yiqing can easily surmise Liang Shixiong’s thoughts. Returning to Mengzhou by boat now, his heart must naturally be filled with mixed feelings. Since the situation has already become clear, why not directly spread word that Your Majesty is determined to capture Xingyang and annihilate all of Liang Shixiong’s forces before winter? This could further disrupt the enemy soldiers’ morale…”

Han Qian gazed at the Yu River with its ice-jammed waters.

This was the Yu River’s ice flood period. In the Yu River north of Luoyang, the thick river ice had just begun melting but hadn’t completely melted yet.

Upstream waters had already risen, impatiently breaking through the river ice in many places. The broken ice could not flow downstream and accumulated to form raised ice dams, further exacerbating the channel blockage.

Upstream waters mixed with broken floating ice unable to flow downstream could only surge sideways into low-lying areas on both flanks, even destroying embankments and flooding fields and villages.

Although the ice layer north of Xingyang still looked relatively intact, Chen Kun and Wen Bo had issued orders ten days ago to cease their troops’ river-crossing operations or supply transport to guard against changes.

For Xiao Yiqing, such an important figure among the Mongols, to still directly cross the ice at this time could be called quite a risky action. This simultaneously demonstrated Xiao Yiqing’s anxious state of mind about the current situation.

“I would rather Liang Shixiong defend Xingyang City to the death, and that this battle could annihilate all of Liang Shixiong’s forces and behead Liang Shixiong beneath Xingyang City—that could comfort Brother Zhu Yu’s spirit in heaven,” Han Qian said with a slight sigh.

“Your Majesty, Chen Kun asks nothing else except that when finally attacking Xingyang City, Chen Kun may personally lead elite forces to be the first to kill into the city, not letting that dog thief Liang Shixiong have a chance to escape!” Chen Kun requested earnestly.

To complete preparations for attacking Xingyang, first Zhao Wuji needed to capture Mi County as quickly as possible and press forces from the southern front to the outskirts of Xingyang City. Simultaneously, the navy’s elite forces needed to sever contact between Xingyang and Mengzhou on the Yu River’s north bank.

Accomplishing these two steps would essentially complete the final preparations before attacking Xingyang. But as long as they didn’t surround Xingyang City so tightly that not even water could leak through, even if they ultimately captured Xingyang City, the probability of catching Liang Shixiong was not high.

They essentially needed the vanguard elite forces who were first to enter the city to make capturing or killing Liang Shixiong their direct objective from the moment of scaling the walls—only then would there be a greater probability of not letting Liang Shixiong escape.

Of course, capturing Xingyang City was the most fundamental core battle objective. As Hulao Pass’s commanding general, Chen Kun wanting to personally lead elite forces to be first into Xingyang City to capture Liang Shixiong naturally required Han Qian’s permission.

“Wait until Wuji captures Mi County and Lin Jiang’s forces blockade the Yu River. When conditions for the final attack on Xingyang City truly mature, then we’ll discuss arrangements for attacking Xingyang City,” Han Qian said, patting Chen Kun’s shoulder.

Leading vanguard elite forces in attacking the city carried the greatest risk. Moreover, after entering the city, still pursuing and killing Liang Shixiong’s personal guard escort in the chaos? Han Qian didn’t want to directly refuse Chen Kun’s request for battle, but neither did he want him taking such enormous risks merely to capture Liang Shixiong at the final moment of taking Xingyang City.

The atmosphere grew somewhat somber. Feng Liao changed the subject, saying: “In another five or six days, the river ice will completely melt. Then our navy’s warships can enter the Yu River from the Yi-Luo River confluence. It’s time to let Mengzhou’s navy witness the magnificent sight of our Great Liang navy’s warships…”

Although the Xuzhou Army had captured Chenqiao Stronghold, the passage south of Chenqiao Stronghold into Changge County territory was narrow and still at risk of being flooded by seasonal waters. Initially they needed to repair the roads to ensure subsequent troops and supplies could continuously mass at Chenqiao Stronghold. Only then would they proceed to attack Mi County.

Meanwhile, although Luoyang’s navy’s goal this spring was to ensure not a single enemy vessel could invade the Yi-Luo River, they absolutely would not simply defend passively. They still needed to gradually contest with Mengzhou’s navy for control of the Yu River waterway from the Yi-Luo River confluence eastward to Wuzhi.

As subsequent new warships were built and they could suppress Mengzhou navy’s warships to the Yu River’s north bank, unable to support Xingyang on the south bank, only then would conditions for finally attacking Xingyang be met.

They now needed to excavate an artificial lake on the west side of Hulao Pass and construct a major naval base. That way, when they spotted Yuzhou’s navy deploying, they could deploy their naval warships at maximum speed from nearby to suppress Yuzhou navy’s warships on the north bank, preventing them from moving south, and attack enemy naval camp facilities along the river.

When Xiao Yiqing reached Mengzhou and joined Zhao Mengji, his mood was extremely heavy. Seeing Zhao Mengji, Vice Commander Xiao Siqing, and others come out of the city to welcome him, he didn’t speak much. Surrounded by numerous escort cavalry, he rode first toward Zhao Mengji’s Mengzhou Prefectural Governor’s office.

“Han Qian should be at Hulao Pass right now!”

After the Heluo campaign, Lü Qingxia had not directly gone to Taiyuan with Wusu Dashi and Xiao Yiqing. With Wusu Dashi’s permission, she remained in Mengzhou with Yao Xishui and others to rebuild Wanhong Tower.

Wanhong Tower was of course not merely one tower pavilion, but required recruiting and training new disciples to gather intelligence for the Mongols and monitor movements in Hedong, Guanzhong, and Hebei—it was an espionage organization under the Great Mongol Southern Bureau of Military Affairs.

Xiao Yiqing placed great hopes in them and did not place Wanhong Tower directly under Wang Jingrong.

Precisely because Mengzhou was too important and also to facilitate gathering military intelligence from Luoyang, Xiao Yiqing had Lü Qingxia remain in Mengzhou to rebuild Wanhong Tower. He also appointed Zhou Yuan as Deputy Minister of the Southern Bureau Ministry of Works and concurrent Mengzhou Works Section Staff Officer to oversee Mengzhou’s construction and shipbuilding.

Though Zhou Yuan seemed to have no outstanding achievements in the Chu court and before the palace coup served as Vice Minister of Works without even entering the Policy Council, after defecting to the Mongols, if one searched through Hebei and Hedong for someone more expert in construction matters than him, one truly might not be able to count even a handful.

Whether Wang Jingrong in Dingzhou or Xiao Yiqing greatly developing construction in Yanyun, initially they all obtained the latest construction techniques from Xuzhou through Wanhong Tower. Zhou Yuan in Xinchang Prefecture and subsequently serving as Vice Minister of Works in the Chu court had quite deep immersion in all this…

Lü Qingxia and Yao Xishui were unwilling to appear before the world with their true faces. Their faces veiled in black gauze, each riding a date-red horse, they welcomed Xiao Yiqing into Mengzhou City. Only while entering the city did they remind Xiao Yiqing that Han Qian was currently at Hulao Pass.

Although scouts and planted agents had no way to infiltrate deeply, Han Qian’s carriages, horses, and ceremonial entourage entering Hulao Pass were quite distinctively characteristic. Lü Qingxia basically understood Han Qian’s general movements in the Heluo region.

Xiao Yiqing only sighed lightly. That Han Qian was currently at Hulao Pass, closely monitoring changes in the Xingyang situation, only further proved his earlier speculation was correct.

Zhu Rang might not be willing to dispatch more reinforcements to defend Xingyang. Neither was it convenient for him to directly transfer troops from the north bank to cross the river southward. The only thing he could do was ensure that when Liang forces proceeded to attack Xingyang, Zhao Mengji in Mengzhou could reinforce south bank Xingyang at any time.

Of course, this required Mengzhou’s navy to possess stronger combat strength.

Although before winter arrived last year, Mengzhou’s navy still held absolute superiority on the Yu River, now that an entire winter had passed, how much advantage could Mengzhou’s navy still maintain? Xiao Yiqing truly could not be certain.

Even if Zhao Mengji and other commanders still maintained relatively optimistic attitudes, Xiao Yiqing could not be certain whether by this autumn Mengzhou’s navy might still possibly continue maintaining relative superiority on the Yu River.

Once Mengzhou’s navy on the Yu River lost superiority facing the newly organized Luoyang navy, or was even firmly suppressed on the north bank, this would mean that during the nearly ten months annually of the non-freezing period, contact between Mengzhou and Xingyang would be severed.

In the future, never mind dispatching troops to reinforce Xingyang—how would grain supplies for Xingyang’s current garrison of over twenty-five thousand troops be transported would still be a major problem. Liang Shixiong currently faced superior Liang forces on his eastern and southern flanks. His forces could only defend Xingyang and Mi County, losing control over the broad rural areas outside the cities. The over twenty thousand shi monthly grain rations could only be transported into Xingyang City from Wuzhi via the waterway.

Although Luoyang’s navy was newly organized and Luoyang’s government-operated Yique Shipyard only successfully built its first warship by mid-last year, to assume Luoyang navy’s combat strength was negligible would be a grave error.

No one could deny that the most direct and critical point in Liang and Chu ultimately reaching a peace agreement was that Han Qian possessed overwhelming naval power on the Yangtze River, finally forcing the Chu court to choose compromise.

Although waterways were not connected and Han Qian could not transfer sturdy and sharp warships under the Southern Secretariat’s jurisdiction into the Yu River, Liang forces absolutely did not lack the era’s most brilliant and experienced shipwrights, nor skilled naval commanders and sailors familiar with naval warfare.

How could Luoyang navy’s combat strength be weak? The speed of replenishing warships subsequently could only grow faster and faster.

It was precisely considering this that he had originally suggested Zhu Rang and Liang Shixiong quickly construct the ford embankment road between Wuzhi and Xingyang. But unexpectedly, Zhu Rang and Liang Shixiong had disregarded his suggestion.

Ultimately, Xingyang was not a position the Eastern Liang Army must defend. They were unwilling to allocate limited resources toward Xingyang.

Before he knew it, they had arrived before Mengzhou’s Prefectural Governor’s office. Thinking of these matters, Xiao Yiqing let escort generals lead away his horse. Turning his head to look at Zhou Yuan, he inquired about the trial production situation with new warships.

Zhou Yuan felt somewhat bitter, not knowing how to answer Xiao Yiqing.

Because naturally curved timber for making ship ribs was rare, and large sharp-bottomed boats, besides requiring one large timber as the keel, necessarily required numerous ship ribs to strengthen the hull structure.

Xuzhou had very early on directly used refined iron castings to replace naturally curved timber in making ship ribs.

The oared sailing warships Xuzhou sold to the Right Dragon Militant Army were all iron-timber combinations, commonly called iron-framed wooden-hulled ships. Zhou Yuan understood all the structural details.

Xiao Yiqing also wanted to quickly build various types of iron-framed warships that were fast and structurally solid to strengthen Mengzhou navy’s combat power.

Mengzhou’s ironworks had assembled the finest batch of craftsmen from Hebei and Hedong, then repeatedly tested for three or four months, yet still to this day had not been able to cast a single usable iron ship rib.

“In this subject’s view, the Prince of Longxi should construct iron chains at Yongzhou to blockade the Wei River and concentrate all naval warships in Mengzhou—that wouldn’t be excessive,” Lü Qingxia said, helping Zhou Yuan deflect the question.

Xiao Yiqing sighed inwardly. He knew some things were easy to say but extremely difficult to do.

This cast an additional shadow over his mind.

Just then, a convoy of carriages and horses braved the biting cold wind of early spring and galloped into Mengzhou City.

Hearing the sounds of wheels and hooves approaching, Xiao Yiqing looked questioningly at Zhao Mengji. Lü Qingxia said: “Perhaps it’s Wang Chou returning to Mengzhou…”

“Oh.” When Xiao Yiqing was in Xingyang, the chief steward of Guanjiang Tower and Wang Jingrong’s adopted son Wang Chou had sent someone to Xingyang to report that he had an extremely important item to present, but hadn’t said what it was. He didn’t know what mystery Wang Chou was playing at.

Xiao Yiqing, Zhao Mengji, and Xiao Siqing walked into the government office, waiting as they walked for Wang Chou to arrive.

Soon they saw a convoy of carriages and horses gallop to a halt before Mengzhou’s Prefectural Governor’s office. Wang Chou jumped down from his date-yellow horse and handed it to someone behind him to hold. He personally lifted the carriage curtain and had four strong men carefully carry out something wrapped in hemp cloth, then proceeded into Mengzhou’s Prefectural Governor’s office.

Xiao Yiqing and the others stood in the courtyard watching Wang Chou unwrap the hemp cloth, revealing a damaged crossbow nearly one zhang long.

This damaged crossbow had only the crossbow arms and arrow channel remaining. The frame, bowstring, and cocking mechanism had all been destroyed.

Seeing this object, Xiao Yiqing was startled and asked: “Is this the divine mechanical giant crossbow newly used by Liang forces?”

“Yes. The Shouzhou Army managed to capture one with great difficulty. Xu Mingzhen refused to hand it over no matter what, so I had no choice but to bribe Xu Mingzhen’s subordinates and steal this giant crossbow out to present to you, my lord,” Wang Chou said.

“What is this crossbow arm’s draw weight?” Zhao Mengji asked, his tiger eyes fixed intently on the giant crossbow.

“We haven’t measured precisely yet, but it takes two strong horses to barely pull it open. Liang forces use a special gear windlass to cock it…” Wang Chou explained.

Measuring the bow arm only required handy tools and was quite simple. As a veteran general of the former Shu state who also greatly emphasized military equipment manufacturing, Zhao Mengji immediately had people carry this damaged crossbow to measure more precisely the bending tension when the crossbow arm was fully drawn.

After the time it took to burn an incense stick, the escort guard responsible for measuring dragged the damaged crossbow back and reported: “Only after adding weights to seventeen shi did the crossbow arm fully open…”

Xiao Yiqing, Zhao Mengji, and Xiao Siqing were all dumbstruck, not expecting this new crossbow arm to be nearly three times as powerful as traditional bed crossbows. No wonder it could shoot a short spear-like crossbow bolt over four hundred paces.

The various previous rumors had not been exaggerated in the slightest!

“Apart from using enough warships to win through boarding combat at close quarters, it’s hard to imagine how Mengzhou’s navy could prevail over Luoyang’s navy on the Yu River,” Lü Qingxia said. When she had first learned of Liang forces equipping new war crossbows, she had never doubted the veracity of the rumors. Now seeing even Zhao Mengji furrowing his brow tightly, she again mentioned the suggestion she had raised earlier before the government office.

In fierce infantry and cavalry combat on open ground, if Liang Army battle formations had thirty to fifty such war crossbows, perhaps it still wouldn’t constitute a fatal threat. After all, such war crossbows, using gear windlasses to cock, had quite slow rates of fire. One could use elite cavalry to rapidly assault their crossbow formations.

That the Shouzhou Army could capture such war crossbows on the battlefield also proved this point. But Liang-built warships were both fast and equipped with such war crossbows maneuvering on lakes and rivers—the advantage was far too obvious.

Of course, currently on the Yu River, concentrating all warships from the Wei River and upper Yu River, they still held absolute superiority in numbers and scale.

Moreover, even during summer and autumn, the Yu River’s water surface was far less broad than the Yangtze. Liang warships’ speed advantage would be suppressed in relatively narrow waters.

If Mengzhou’s naval camp at this time could utilize the advantage of having more warships, not fearing boarding combat and using fire attacks as much as possible, they might not necessarily lose control of the Yu River waterway and could possibly continue maintaining contact with Xingyang on the south bank.

Although Lü Qingxia was a woman, Zhao Mengji dared not hold such a woman in contempt and seriously considered what she said…

Setting aside how Xiao Yiqing and Zhao Mengji were preoccupied with transferring all their warships and naval forces from the Wei River and upper Yu River to Yuzhou to guard against and contain Luoyang’s navy, in late February, after this year’s ice floods completely passed and the Yu River’s water strength became relatively stable, both newly organized naval brigades were all transferred into Gong County territory under Chen Kun’s command.

Although Mengzhou’s naval camp still held absolute superiority in warship numbers and naval soldier scale, the naval brigades repeatedly struck out from the Yi-Luo River confluence, relying on the defensive fortifications there.

When small groups of enemy vessels prowled on the Yu River, naval warships would flow downstream, approach the enemy vessels after exiting the confluence, then use spring-powered bed crossbows and scorpion crossbows to attack enemy vessels from distance. When enemy vessels deployed in large numbers, naval warships relied on their swift speed advantage to quickly contract back inside the Yi-Luo River confluence, using the defensive fortifications on both sides of the confluence to blockade enemy vessels outside the Yi-Luo River.

To accomplish this, during the cold winter and early spring, Han Qian directly ordered specially made shuttle-shaped cargo boats loaded with sand and stone quarried from Mount Song’s western foothills to be dragged by hundreds and thousands of trackers sliding on ice to the riverbanks on both flanks of the confluence, then had the bottoms of these cargo boats pierced.

When the river waters rose, these cargo boats sank underwater and could serve as bridge piers for erecting iron beams, forming iron beam bridges extending into the confluence waters. This ensured that light war crossbows positioned on the iron beam bridges could attack every part of the Yi-Luo River confluence waters.

In the third and fourth months, the two sides’ navies primarily engaged in repeated tug-of-war combat around the Yu River waterway outside the Yi-Luo River confluence. Mengzhou’s naval camp had approximately one hundred warships destroyed or sunk in the Yu River, while Luoyang navy’s casualties were only one-tenth of the enemy’s.

In mid-May, six new iron-armored mengchong warships built at Yique Naval Base were successively incorporated into the naval order of battle, making Mengzhou’s naval camp suffer even more.

Traditional mengchong warships had two to three levels of cabins built above the freeboard, with the bottom level opened to allow sixteen, twenty-four, or thirty-six sweeps to extend into the water.

When encountering enemies, the collapsible cabin roof and masts vulnerable to enemy fire attacks would be lowered, with sailors rowing the sweeps in the bottom cabin to rapidly advance and retreat. The upper cabin had crossbow ports and spear holes open on all four sides to attack enemies from all directions.

Additionally, the cabin roof was covered with raw cowhide to prevent enemy vessels from splashing oil and setting the ship on fire.

The new iron-armored mengchong warships built at Yique Naval Base, besides using refined iron components for the keel and ship ribs, no longer covered the upper cabin roof, bow, and side bulwarks with raw cowhide, but directly covered them with a layer of iron armor.

These six iron-armored mengchong warships, serving as main combat vessels incorporated into naval brigade ship formations, took on the heavy responsibility of charging into battle. Now even when surrounded and attacked by three or four times the number of enemy vessels, naval warships could still persist in fierce combat with the enemy on the Yu River rather than contracting back inside the Yi-Luo River confluence to temporarily avoid the enemy’s offensive edge…