Outside Fuqi City, Lu Dongzan finally breathed a sigh of relief as he looked at the city fading away.

That day, he encountered a car accident in Chang'an City. It was still dark that day. He, Sambuza and a dozen other people crowded into a carriage and secretly left the city gate. Even the injury to his leg was not healed.

There is a cement road from Chang'an City to Liangzhou. After a quick trip, we arrived at Liangzhou City very quickly.

Then they purchased some horses and supplies in Liangzhou and continued to ride west quickly.

Lu Dongzan has already given instructions that they will wait for the remaining envoy team at the junction of Tubo and Tang Dynasty. After all, many things have to be transported back to Tubo from Chang'an.

If we could wait until the envoy team returned normally, then the car accident that day might really be an accident, and Tibet would definitely continue to abide by the various trade measures discussed with Datang.

However, if he could not wait for the envoy team to return, then Ludongzan would have to reconsider the relationship between Tibet and the Tang Dynasty; he would even have to return to Luoche City quickly to let Songtsen Gampo prepare for the attack from the Tang Dynasty at any time.

"Prime Minister, there are no pursuers behind us all the way. Maybe we are too worried."

Serugong looked at the dusty group of people and thought about how to deal with Songtsen Gampo.

Ludong sighed in admiration, "I would rather believe that something exists than something that doesn't exist. During that time in Chang'an City, I always seemed to have a pair of eyes staring at us."

Sambuza: "It's already like this. There's no point in worrying about whether it's true or not. Everyone is safe. Although the marriage did not succeed, other things have been basically negotiated. The most important thing is that we have to pay attention to Datang."

It's worth it to have a more real and accurate understanding."

Lu Dongzan: "Let's go. Now that Tuyuhun's territory has been included in the Tang Dynasty, we'd better hurry up first. If there are really pursuers, it will be troublesome."

…

On a piece of grassland to the west of Chang'an City, there are more than a dozen hot air balloons floating in the sky.

Zhu Fufu wore a pair of sunglasses, stuffed a piece of dried whale meat into his mouth, and looked at the scene below.

These sunglasses are the product of an accidental experiment in the glass workshop.

After burning and burning, brown glass was produced, and then Chen Dali unexpectedly discovered that this kind of glass seemed to have a better shielding effect on sunlight.

Although he didn't know what the use of such glass was, he still reported it to his superiors as a new discovery.

When Li Kuan read the monthly summary of each workshop, he naturally knew about brown glass and immediately thought of sunglasses.

Whether we are sailing at sea or flying in a hot air balloon, we are often faced with situations where the wind is too strong and it is difficult to open our eyes. It would be very practical to have a pair of sunglasses.

Li Kuan said that it would not take long for the glass workshop to have sunglasses.

As the captain of the hot air balloon camp, Zhu Fuyu was naturally the first to be equipped with sunglasses.

"It's almost done, let's light the fire."

In order to confirm the effect of the explosive package exploding on the grass, Zhu Fuyu specifically found this place.

"Snapped!"

There were four people on a hot air balloon. One of the people in charge of keeping the fire dumplings lit the fire dumplings immediately after hearing Zhu Fuyu's words.

One of them is to remove the fuse of the explosive package from the special packaging.

"The height is about two hundred steps. It takes about three breaths after the fuse is lit before it is thrown out."

"Swish, swish, swish!"

The fuse was quickly ignited, and the soldier holding the explosive bag silently counted three times before throwing the explosive bag out of the hot air balloon.

Just a few breaths later, a huge "Boom!" reached everyone's ears.

Zhu Fuyu started, and several other hot air balloons also started dropping bombs one after another.

Suddenly, there was a constant "rumbling" sound on the grass, which startled a group of nearby birds and flew up screaming.

A mile away from this grassland, Su Lie and Xue Li were watching the scene here with telescopes.

"Rengui, the explosive package made by the prince is really too powerful. This time our brothers join forces, Xue Yantuo will definitely suffer a big loss."

Ever since Su Lie received the imperial edict and knew that he could lead the army on his own, he had been in a state of excitement these days.

Now I see that the power of the explosive pack with the cooperation of the hot air balloon camp is so terrifying, I feel even more excited.

"Your Majesty has always been good at creating legends. This time we attack Xue Yantuo, my subordinates are confident that it will become a battle that will be passed down through the ages."

Xue Li's posture was relatively low, knowing that Su Dingfang's prestige in the military was much higher than his own, and his experience was much richer.

However, his confidence in Li Kuan is as strong as ever.

"Let's go and see what's going on on the grass."

Seeing that the hot air balloon had left the sky over the grassland, Su Lie couldn't wait to see the conditions of the grass people, tents and lambs arranged on the grassland.

For a group of people riding horses, the distance of one mile is just a cup of tea.

"hiss!"

When Su Lie came to the front of the grassland, he couldn't help but take a breath of air.

What a miserable row!

All the scarecrows are staggering, and some are even finished and no shadows can be found.

The worst thing was the lambs. Either their flesh and blood were scattered everywhere, or they couldn't even be found.

A few lucky lambs were a little far away from where the explosive package exploded, and were killed by the sound waves of the explosion.

"General manager, with this sharp weapon, our borders of Datang will be stabilized!"

Although Xue Li has seen the power of black powder, this is the first time he has witnessed the method of using explosive packs.

If he was a little worried about going to Xueyantuo alone at the beginning, now he is eager to go out.

"It is truly a great blessing to have His Royal Highness the King of Chu in the Tang Dynasty."

Su Lie couldn't help but sigh.

…

In early July, Su Lie and Xue Li left Chang'an City with four thousand cavalry, one man and two cavalry.

The first half of the road is easy to walk, and the cement road has basically been paved.

However, after leaving Jinyang City and continuing north, the road conditions obviously worsened.

Fortunately, God gave us strength and didn't cause any more trouble to everyone.

It took less than half a month for the team to appear outside Shuozhou City. However, except for understanding the current situation on the grassland with the local defenders, Su Lie continued to go north without even entering the city.

This step basically meant that we were leaving the actual ruling area of ​​the Tang Dynasty.

"General manager, there is no enemy within a radius of thirty miles."

The hot air balloon team had no combat missions for the time being, so they acted as lookouts, reporting the situation in the surrounding grasslands to Su Lie and Xue Li in a timely manner.

This allowed the army to effectively avoid being surrounded by the Xueyantuo people.

However, it had only been more than a month since Yi Nan attacked the Eastern Turkic tribes. According to his speculation, even if the worst situation happened and the Tang Dynasty sent troops, it would not be that fast.

So in fact, Su Lie's worries were in vain.

"General Manager, this area is under the control of the Yunzhong Governor's Mansion. If Yi Nan doesn't move fast enough, we will probably run into them in this area."

Taking advantage of the break, Xue Li took out a map from his arms and discussed the next course of action with Su Lie.

The grassland is so big that if thousands of people were thrown into it, there would not even be a splash.

Why have the Hu people in the north been a big trouble for the Central Plains dynasties in all dynasties? It’s because the area here is too vast. Although the Hu people may not necessarily have a lot of troops, you can’t destroy them if you can’t find them to fight decisively.

And once you retreat, they will have countless places they can choose to invade, making you extremely annoyed.

Along the way, Su Lie and Xue Li were no longer worried that their thousands of men would be wiped out by Xue Yantuo's 100,000 troops; what they were worried about was that they would not be able to find Xue Yantuo's main force.

"The herdsmen I met along the way said that the Xueyantuo people appeared in this area a few days ago, so now they are most likely to continue eastward."

Su Lie combined the recent news and basically determined the next march direction.

Anyway, there are no official roads on the grassland, so you just go wherever you go.

In this way, they marched for another five or six days in the vast grassland, and Zhu Fuyu finally brought good news.

"General manager, we found Xue Yantuo's army about fifty miles to the east. There was a large area of ​​densely packed tents with at least tens of thousands of troops." As soon as Zhu Fuyu received the report, he happily came to Su Lie's military tent.

"Fifty miles east?"

Su Lie immediately came to the map and quickly thought of countermeasures in his mind.

"Rengui, according to the information I got from the sporadic herdsmen I met in the past few days, the East Turkic tribe in the north should be the latest to be wiped out by the Xueyantuo people. Now that they have appeared fifty miles to the east, then their next

One goal is nine times out of ten, right here.”

Although it has exceeded the actual territory ruled by the Tang Dynasty, it is still within the territory of the Yunzhong Dudu Mansion after all. The distribution of various tribes in Jisi Prefecture is relatively easy to figure out.

Speaking of which, the Tang Dynasty's policy of restraining the state was a failure.

It is equivalent to returning the conquered territory to the captives for management.

At the beginning, because the opponent was afraid of being beaten, there was no need to worry about rebellion immediately.

However, as time goes by and the new generation of Hu people grow up, the fear in their hearts becomes smaller and smaller, and then a new reincarnation will begin again.

Xue Li: "According to the Xueyantuo people's marching speed, they should think that they can defeat the East Turks, and they are not in a hurry. Manager, I have a bold proposal!"
To be continued...