Dark Sand: My Players Are All Actors

Clearly, this was the ancient top troublemaker.

Li Hongyun found it hard to imagine what kind of state of mind Prince Qi was in to do such a thing. After all, Nanny Chen was his lifesaver, and her advice was only meant to make him take care of his own health and not to recklessly endanger himself. However, he repaid kindness with hatred, and she died inexplicably.

So, Li Hongyun naturally had to correct this outrageous mistake.

He sincerely said, "Yes, I have already had the maids return all the weapons and armor to the armory, and I will not let them wear armor or practice fighting anymore."

Nanny Chen was stunned for a moment, seemingly not expecting the persuasion to go so smoothly.

But upon seeing Prince Qi's sincere expression, she felt greatly relieved and turned to take her leave.

Following that, Li Hongyun, in a gesture of reforming himself, filled in the pits Prince Qi had previously dug.

Prince Qi loved hunting and had over thirty carts loaded with hunting nets. Dou Dan, who assisted him, not only did not stop him but accompanied him out of the city in civilian dress to hunt and trample crops. Yuwen Xin advised him repeatedly, but to no avail.

Therefore, Li Hongyun set all these hunting nets ablaze and then bestowed the carts to the armory to be used for transporting military supplies.

Prince Qi liked to shoot arrows at people in the city for fun, watching pedestrians dodge for entertainment, and even "opened his mansion gates at night to indulge in debauchery," allowing his soldiers to rampage and plunder, causing public resentment to boil over in the city.

Li Hongyun then had Yuwen Xin reiterate military discipline, and directly executed dozens of soldiers who had plundered civilians in the bustling market as a warning to others. At the same time, he expressed remorse to the city's civilians at the scene and took a large number of gold and jewels from the mansion to compensate those previously injured by arrows.

Afterward, he handed over all major internal affairs to Yuwen Xin and focused on inspecting the defense duties every day with his subordinate generals.

Until Liu Wuzhou once again led five thousand cavalry to Yellow Snake Ridge.

This time, Li Hongyun certainly would not let Zhang Da lead a hundred men to their demise; upon receiving the signal of Liu Wuzhou's troops moving, he immediately ordered his men to implement a scorched earth policy, relocating all population and food from the surrounding villages either to nearby cities or having them hide in deep mountains.

After that, he let Liu Wuzhou lead five thousand cavalry to attack and plunder as he pleased, and Li Hongyun remained unmoved.

He only ordered his generals to firmly defend Yuci County and Jinyang, holding out for reinforcements.

Without the treacherous Zhang Da leading the way, Yuci County held out a bit longer this time, but Liu Wuzhou was ultimately too powerful and the strong city fell after persisting for more than a month.

Following that, the southern cities of Pingyao and Jiezhou State also fell within two months.

By then, the Liang Dynasty had already been informed of the military situation and sent reinforcements, but the problem was that the reinforcements were not led by Lord Qin.

Thus, the reinforcing Liang Army was successively defeated, and the suburban counties around Jinyang were cleared.

From north to south, except for Jinyang—a lone city—it had all fallen into the hands of Liu Wuzhou.

Liu Wuzhou's strategy was simple; he too knew Jinyang, later known as Taiyuan, was a large and strong city, easy to defend and hard to attack, so it made little sense to force an attack. Instead, he chose to clear the surrounding obstacles first and wait until Jinyang became an isolated city, and Prince Qi a trapped turtle. Then, Jinyang would naturally surrender without a fight.

And history indeed unfolded just as Liu Wuzhou had predicted.

Upon learning that the surrounding counties had been occupied and that Prime Minister Pei Ji, who came to their rescue, had been defeated, Prince Qi decisively deceived his subordinates and fled.

Thus, the morale within Jinyang City was scattered, and coupled with Prince Qi's previous foolery which had completely alienated the people, the strong city was easily conquered.

After all, no matter how strong a city is, to hold it, there must first be morale and organization within.

Throughout history, Taiyuan was an extremely resilient city. In the era of cold weapons, as long as there was sufficient food within the city and the troops maintained basic organization, it was nearly impregnable.

Li Hongyun was well aware of this, so his strategy was simple: hold Jinyang and wait!

Lord Qin would eventually come, and once Lord Qin arrived, if he could defeat Liu Wuzhou at Queshu Valley and hold Jinyang, it would be a great achievement.

Even while Lord Qin was severely attacking Liu Wuzhou, troops could be dispatched from Taiyuan to encircle him from two sides and establish military achievements.

...

Time passed swiftly in the Trial Illusion.

Liu Wuzhou finally subdued the surrounding counties and repelled the relief forces from the Liang Army, advancing upon Jinyang City.

The force of Liu Wuzhou was not particularly large; his vanguard cavalry numbered five thousand, and the total military strength was probably over twenty thousand.

After sweeping through the counties and defeating the Liang Army, absorbing the remaining troops did not significantly increase his numbers, making it unlikely to completely besiege Jinyang.

After establishing camp and conducting initial probes, Liu Wuzhou decided to attack the city.

Although this time Prince Qi did not flee at the news and continued to stay in the city, in Liu Wuzhou's view, Jinyang was already a solitary fortress, and whether Prince Qi stayed or not wouldn't make much of a difference.

The war drums resounded, and soldiers carrying scaling ladders charged toward the city walls.

Previously, they had captured the surrounding county cities in just this simple manner, so they felt nothing was amiss.

However, at that moment, they saw a young man, who appeared to be only sixteen or seventeen, appear on top of the city wall.

He was clad in armor, holding a large bow, and yelled out loudly,

"I am Lord Qin... oh no, I mean, I am Prince Qi too!"

This shout left the soldiers about to attack the city stupefied.

How could one shout one's own name wrong?

Li Hongyun silently wiped away his sweat, having gotten used to shouting it.

Previously, he had always played the role of Lord Qin, and each time before battle started, a shout like this would directly give his own soldiers a morale boost of 100% and impose a debuff reducing the enemy's morale by 99%.

This time shouting as Prince Qi obviously didn't produce such an effect.

But it didn't matter, after all, once bitten, twice shy; he had already made up his mind that from then on, every time he played Prince Qi in battle, he would shout in this way.

After shouting, Li Hongyun directly drew his bow and notched an arrow, aiming it at the soldiers below the city and releasing it.

With a "thud," the arrow penetrated the soldier's armor and brought him down.

The basic infantrymen, although also armored, generally had quite rudimentary protection, which was not very effective, certainly not everyone was covered in Ming Guang Armor.

Therefore, Li Hongyun's arrows still possessed tremendous lethal power.

Without pausing, he drew his bow and notched another arrow, and another soldier fell at its release.

The continuous twang of bowstrings resounded from the city walls, the defending Liang soldiers were inspired, their morale greatly boosted as they fired their arrows, inflicting heavy losses on Liu Wuzhou's troops assaulting the city.

Watching this scene from below, Liu Wuzhou's expression became stupefied.

Wasn't it understood that Prince Qi was just a wasteful scion?

How come, concerning Emperor Gaozu of Liang and including all his children, each of them was an expert archer?