"What a pity, Li Yan's trick was to burn only a few thousand Green Camp soldiers to death." Li Guodong looked at the battle report sent by Jinan and said regretfully. "Lord, will Li Yan's failure in burning his own city affect our army's plan?" Han Dashan asked worriedly.

"It won't affect. Jiannu has suffered a few losses. This time Li Yan's plan did not work, but Duoduo refused to enter the city. Li Yan set up an empty city, and Duoduo would not be so simple to be deceived and led the Eight Banners soldiers into it. If we want to destroy this Jiannu, we cannot simply empty city plan, but a complete set of chain plans are needed. This requires a certain price. Yangzhou City must be defended first. After a few days of defense, our army's main force gradually withdrew, leaving a group of dead soldiers in the city, and wait until Jiannu enters the city and ignites the fire." Li Guodong replied.

The Qing army would not worry about the tunnels near Yangzhou. With current technology, tunnels cannot be excavated in such low-lying areas. If the ground is dug a few feet deep, it will reach the groundwater level. There is no way to dig tunnels near Yangzhou. Therefore, when Duoduo attacks Yangzhou, there will be no pressure, which will help Li Guodong implement a chain plan.

Since we want to lure the Qing army into the city, we must prepare for the Yangzhou defensive battle and fight with decent battles. First, we must leave mobile troops outside the city, and use the navy to cooperate with the cavalry to conduct mobile combat, which puts certain pressure on the Qing army that sieges the city. When the Qing army sieges the city, we must stick to the end and guard until it is almost impossible to defend, and then withdraw the main force from the water gate and directly to the canal.

As long as the Qing army believed that they had captured Yangzhou, rather than the Huai army voluntarily gave up, the Eight Banners soldiers would enter the city.

So far, there are still many people in Yangzhou City who are unwilling to evacuate. Since they are unwilling to leave this city that is about to be destroyed by war, Li Guodong no longer forces it. Since he can't persuade him, why should he persuade him again? If he uses force to drive away, the censors may have to speak again. Some people stay in the city, which is actually a bait to lure the Qing army into the city.

As long as the Qing army entered Yangzhou City, a group of dead soldiers who remained in the city would ignite the fire, burning the Qing army, together with the people who refused to evacuate, and most of the dead soldiers, to death in the city.

Li Guodong walked out of his Duke of Chu in Yangzhou and surrounded by a group of guards, he walked out of the city.

The Yangzhou city wall is being transformed and reinforced. The auxiliary soldiers built raised enemy platforms outside the city wall. This kind of enemy platform is equivalent to the role of a bastion. Each two enemy platform is about a hundred steps apart, and there is a concave city wall in the middle. In this way, when the Qing army attacks, they will be attacked by firepower on three sides.

The most important thing about the mobile forces outside the city is the combination of navy and cavalry. Although the canal north of Huai'an has been suspended due to the closure of the Hongze Lake water gate, the crisscrossing rivers and lakes south of Huai'an provide sufficient water for the canal.

The entire Yangzhou to Huaian area was given by the Yellow River's diversion, and there were many lakes and dense water networks. The Yellow River was diverted back into the sea, but the large amount of silt and sand carried made the river silt and unable to enter the sea. It could only pour into Hongze Lake and then flowed into the Yangtze River along the canal. As a result, many lakes were produced on both sides of the canal, Ailing Lake, Xinkai Lake, Shaobo Lake, Gaoyou Lake, Baima Lake, and dozens of water networks were spreading. The canal, the various tributaries of the Huai River, and dozens of lakes and ponds, making the Huaiyang area extremely dense.

To the east of the canal, the Zhangjiaqiao area is an open space between river networks, where Li Guodong's cavalry is training.

The cavalry of the Huai Army was supplemented by the war horses sent by Zheng Sen. Currently, the Huai Army has 4,000 heavy cavalry, 5,000 light cavalry, 10,000 dragon cavalry and 1,000 flying cavalry artillery, and 20,000 cavalry were trained on the Jiangbei Plain in the lower reaches of the Yangtze River to the east of Yangzhou.

"Hello, General!" When Li Guodong appeared in front of the cavalry team on a horse, Cao Bianjiao and his heavy cavalry soldiers saluted Li Guodong and shouted in unison.

Most of this heavy cavalry was equipped with the Bellshuren horses introduced from Europe, and some were Arabian horses. The cavalry soldiers were wearing silver-shiny plate armor and silver-white iron helmets. There was also a pair of silver-white masks on the iron helmets. The horse's head and horse neck were also covered with iron armor. There was an arrow curtain hanging around the neck, and there was leather armor behind the arrow curtain. When such heavy cavalry charged head-on, their opponents could not shoot through people and horses at all, so they could only watch the cavalry approaching them.

The formations of heavy cavalry were arranged neatly. The front was the one-thousand horse-sling iron cavalry, the second echelon was the armored lancer, the third echelon was the long-handed lancer, and the last one was the one-handed raid cavalry. When charging, the horse-sling cavalry rushed to the front with the advantage of the length of the horse-sling, colliding with the enemy cavalry formation, and then the armored lancers rushed up and poked. After the cavalry's cavalry contacted the enemy, the cavalry immediately let go, discarded the cavalry, and then pulled out the sabre to fight. Behind were the lancers and the one-handed raid cavalry. Both of these cavalry were after the long-armed cavalry in front passed, and with the help of horsepower, they used heavy weapons to defeat the heavy armor of the Qing army.

"General Cao, please stop for a while and say a few words." Li Guodong called Cao Bianjiao.

Cao Bianjiao quickly turned over and dismounted and followed Li Guodong into the central army tent at the training ground.

Afterwards, Li Guodong called Shi Lang, Wang Fuchen, Hao Yaoqi, Han Dashan and other generals and summoned them to the Central Army to question.

After everyone sat down, Li Guodong asked: "Brothers, I'll come to your drill today to see how your cavalry and navy's coordinated combat drills are being practiced."

Shi Lang stood up and bowed: "Master, we have been practicing cooperation with the cavalry brothers for five months. We can perform for the Grandmaster and ask the Grandmaster to point out the shortcomings."

"Okay, let's start now." Li Guodong nodded.

The transport ships were parked on the bank of the river. Cao Bianjiao led the heavy cavalry in an orderly formation and passed the springboard to board the 200 transport ships moored on the bank. The entire boarding process took only a short cup of tea, and all four thousand cavalrymen boarded the transport ships.

Next, five thousand light cavalry began to board the ship. The same time as the heavy cavalry boarded, all five thousand light cavalry boarded the ship in less than a cup of tea.

Finally, ten thousand dragon cavalry and one thousand flying cavalry artillery boarded the ship. Since the artillery boarded the ship more complicatedly, it took about a quarter of an hour to all the dragon cavalry and flying cavalry artillery boarded the 700 transport ships moored on the shore.

Li Guodong himself boarded an inland gunboat, the navy warship set sail, left the riverside dock, and then the transport ship loaded with cavalry also left the shore and headed towards Yangzhou.

The fleet crossed the Yangzhou Canal, continued to sail north, entered Shaobo Lake, and then sailed westward, entering a tributary. Finally, the fleet arrived at the riverside in the Sunzhuang area.

First, the navy ships fired fire and bombarded the shore violently, opening up a safe landing ground for the light cavalry. Then one transport ship after another docked, and the cavalry went to the shore through the springboard and gathered on the shore. All five thousand light cavalrymen went ashore in just one cup of tea and charged towards the scarecrow formation that symbolized the enemy. The light cavalry was about to approach the enemy formation and immediately turned, and the cavalry bow in their hands shot overwhelming arrows, and the scarecrows were immediately shot into hedgehogs.

At the same time, a transport ship full of heavy cavalry detours from another river channel and landed behind the enemy formation. After the heavy cavalry landed, it immediately launched an attack from behind the enemy formation. The transport ship full of dragoons and flying cavalry artillery detoured from the south river channel blocking the enemy's retreat.

Shi Lang pointed to the exercise field and said, "Master General, our tactics can be flexibly changed. We can also allow the dragon cavalry and artillery to land first, face the enemy with powerful firepower, and the light and heavy cavalry landed in detour from the side and behind respectively. We can also let the light cavalry come out to lure the enemy, lure the enemy between two rivers, and then use naval artillery fire to annihilate the enemy."
Chapter completed!