Yelu Ren was a smart man first, and smart man had to deal with him with the methods of smart man. Li Zhang also prescribed the right medicine. He did not use fame and fortune to tempt the other party, but directly convinced him with the future of the Khitans. It turned out to be effective. Although Yelu Ren did not agree on the spot, depending on his appearance, as long as the Song Dynasty conquers Zhongjing, Yelu Ren will lose the last glimmer of hope and will definitely agree to be used by the Song Dynasty.

Although Yelu Renxian had his own selfish intentions, the Song Dynasty could also use him to appease the Khitans. In recent years, almost all the Liao Kingdom was supported by Yelu Renxian. His reputation in the Liao Kingdom was also extremely high. If he was willing to help the Song Dynasty appease the Khitans, he would definitely stabilize the Liao territory in the shortest time.

A few days later, Cao Mata's army also rushed to the city of Zhongjing, but before the army could capture the city, Di Qing on the other side suddenly heard good news: they actually captured Shangjing in one fell swoop.

Originally, Di Qing and his team's strategic goal was Raozhou, because according to previous calculations, it was very difficult to conquer Shangjing with their troops. Even if they tried their best to really take Shangjing, they would probably suffer heavy losses and would never be able to contribute to this war in the future.

Therefore, Di Qing and his team chose Raozhou, which was easier. Although Raozhou is also a big city of the Liao Kingdom, it cannot be compared with the five capitals after all, and there are not many troops in the city. As long as we capture this place, we can cut off the connection between Shangjing and Zhongjing, thereby cutting off the road from Zhongjing to the north.

But what no one expected was that the Liao Kingdom sent the Jurchens to Shangjing to support them was a big trick. Before, when Di Qing arrived at Shangjing, the Jurchens had just arrived. Faced with the threat from Di Qing's army, the Khitans and the Jurchens were still somewhat restrained, and there was no big conflict.

But just after Di Qing led the army away from Shangjing with a false shot, the conflict between the Khitans and the Jurchens immediately broke out. In the eyes of the Khitans, the Jurchens were just a group of two-legged beasts. In fact, the Jurchens were indeed in the primitive society period and acted very barbaric. When they encountered problems, they would only solve them by force.

Shangjing is the birthplace of the Khitans, and the Khitan nobles here are very old-fashioned. In addition, the living habits of the Jurchens were completely different from those of the Khitans. As a result, the conflict between the two sides became deeper and deeper, and in the end it broke out in full swing almost without warning. At the beginning, the two sides were just a small conflict, and even had tacit understanding without weapons.

But the conflict between the two sides was too deep, and as long as they fought, they would get more and more hot. In the end, the fight directly turned into a large army on both sides to start a war. Both sides fought for the battlefield with no chance of opening up the battlefield, and even the Jurchens had the upper hand. After all, these Jurchens were really desperate to get crazy. The garrisons in Beijing have been peaceful for many years and rarely had the chance to see blood, so they were no match for the Jurchens for a while.

However, the chaos in Shangjing was soon over. No one expected that Di Qing, who had already left, would actually kill and shoot back. Taking advantage of the chaos within Shangjing, he seized Shangjing City in one fell swoop. The Jurchens and Khitans who dared to resist all fell to the ground. Now the entire Shangjing finally calmed down.

In fact, when Di Qing left Shangjing before, he speculated that the Jurchens and the Khitans might have conflicts, so although his army left, he left spies to pay attention to the situation in the city. When the two sides fought, he had just arrived in Raozhou. Then he decisively gave up Raozhou and indeed captured Shangjing.

When news of the capture of Shangjing was heard, the Song army was also very strong, while the Liao army was depressed, because this meant that their retreat was cut off. Although they had other directions to retreat, such as retreating eastward into Goryeo, there was no other way out there. If they really retreated to Goryeo, it would be only a matter of time before they could lose.

Cao Ma led a large army to siege Zhongjing City. Yelu Zongzhen personally climbed the city to fight, but Cao Ma did not rush to attack the city. Instead, he asked someone to shoot the letter to the city, and made a big fuss about the capture of Shangjing City. At the same time, he also persuaded the people in the city to surrender, as long as they surrender, they would not suffer from the suffering of swords and weapons.

Cao Mata's move is actually to play psychological warfare. Now the Song Dynasty has an absolute advantage. There are only 50,000 defenders in the capital. Although there are quite a few, they are actually newly recruited. Many of the teenage Khitan teenagers were summoned to the army, and even the old man was not spared. Some grandfathers and grandchildren even had the same camp.

With these 50,000 miscellaneous troops, Yelu Zongzhen could not have defended Zhongjing at all, but he still refused to surrender, and even climbed the city to boost morale every day. However, the psychological warfare in the Song Dynasty was also very powerful. With one letter of persuasion to surrender and threw it into the city, Zhongjing was also in a state of turmoil, and even some ministers had their own plans.

In fact, if Yelu Renxian was there, he could help Yelu Zongzhen stabilize the hearts of the people in the city, and at least he could help him watch the ministers. But now Yelu Renxian has become a prisoner of the Song Dynasty, and it was said that the Song Dynasty did not kill him, which made many ministers also tempted. Even Yelu Renxian could tolerate the Song Dynasty, let alone them.

"Kill! Kill them all!" On the main hall, Yelu Zongzhen roared with an angry look on his face, and all the ministers in the hall were trembling with fright. Last night, someone wanted to leave the city in the dark, but was discovered by the defenders and found a letter. This letter was written by a minister in the city to Caomata outside the city. The purpose was naturally self-evident. This made Yelu Zongzhen also furious and immediately ordered that the other party be arrested and beheaded for public display.

If Yelu Ren was here first, he might have dared to persuade him, but now no one in the hall dared to speak out. Even Yelu Zhirang, who was very trusted by Yelu Zongzhen, hesitated for a while and finally lowered his head silently. Although he was trusted by Yelu Zongzhen, speaking out at this time might have been used by Yelu Zongzhen to vent his anger, so he didn't want to touch the other party's bad intentions.

Yelu Zongzhen saw that all the ministers under his command were silent, but he felt even more angry and even wanted to kill all of these people. Of course, he could only think about it. If these ministers were really killed, there would be wars everywhere in the city the next day.

Finally, Yelu Zongzhen got angry and announced the severance of the court. This made the ministers withdraw from the hall and leave quickly, fearing that Yelu Zongzhen would attack them, but Yelu Zhirang was kept by Yelu Zongzhen, which made him quite depressed.
Chapter completed!