My younger brother Zhuge Liang

Chapter 17 My Lord! Sir has asked General Zhang to take Guangling!

After the disastrous defeat, Ji Ling was still hesitant about withdrawing his troops.

So after escaping back to the camp, he immediately defended the camp, gathered the defeated soldiers, and prepared for the enemy's possible counterattack.

Guan Yu did chase all the way to Ji Ling's camp, but Ji Ling already had half of the troops in the camp and did not participate in rescuing Liu Xun, so he could wait for the enemy to tire themselves out.

Guan Yu, who was already injured, could not gain any advantage, so he decided to withdraw decisively.

After stabilizing the camp, the deputy generals Liang Gang and Le Ju were still worried and requested to withdraw:
"General, our army was badly defeated today, and Liu Xun's entire army collapsed. We don't know whether he is alive or dead. Why don't we retreat to Xuyi on the safe side?

Now is a good time to retreat while Guan Yu has just been scared off. If we delay for a few more days and wait for Liu Bei's army to recover from their injuries, it won't be so easy."

Ji Ling was still sober and directly rejected it:
"We can't leave so quickly! Have you forgotten? Liu Bei's Xia Pi has already been lost. The reason they still have the courage to fight to the death today is probably because Liu Bei's military discipline is strict and the blockade is effective, and the soldiers don't even know that their home is gone!

But after this battle, they will definitely capture a lot of our prisoners, and our army will also capture their prisoners. We can let these prisoners know the truth and then release them back to Liu Bei's army. Liu Bei's morale may collapse!
In this way, although our army is no longer superior in terms of manpower, we may still have a chance to kill Liu Bei! If Liu Bei finally decides to go back and counterattack Xia Pi, we can still pick up the empty Huaiyin for free! Now we must stick to Liu Bei!"

When Liang Gangle heard this, everyone looked at each other in surprise. They didn't expect that General Ji had such ambition.

In fact, this is not because Ji Ling is calm or smart - with his level, he has no intelligence at all.

Ji Ling was just going crazy because he was tortured by the sunk costs these days. He had already invested so much money in order to make Liu Bei's army collapse after knowing the bad news, and today he fell into a trap and suffered such a great defeat.

This is the only thing he is thinking about, and he will never give up unless he plays this trump card fully.

This feeling is like a card player who has a deck of kings in his hand but has not yet played them. Even if he knows he is going to lose the game, he still has to play the king first to feel satisfied.

……

Ji Ling was stubborn and refused to retreat even after being defeated. He was determined to make full use of the fact that his hometown had been stolen.

After hearing what Guan Yu reported, Liu Bei also looked very solemn:

"You defeated Ji Ling's troops who came to rescue Liu Xun so badly, but after returning to the camp, Ji Ling still decided to hold on and stick to us, and was unwilling to withdraw directly to Xuyi?
It seems that the situation is more serious than Ziyu originally thought. How can we go south to attack Guangling if we are entangled like this? If we leave too few troops here, it will be difficult to defend, and if we leave too many troops, Guangling will be difficult to take."

Guan Yu thought for a moment, covered his left arm and said, "Brother, if it really doesn't work, we should divide our forces. When the enemy army was 40,000 strong and surrounded the city, we could still defend it with 12,000 men. Now that more than half of the enemy army has been annihilated, we can definitely defend it with 3,000 or 4,000 men! You can take all the remaining soldiers to attack Guangling.

This matter cannot be delayed. Liu Xun has just been defeated and his soldiers are scattered. If we chase him quickly, the scattered soldiers will not be able to regroup by the time we reach Guangling. We will only have to deal with the few soldiers Liu Xun has guarding his home. If we delay for another day, more scattered soldiers will be able to regroup. "

After listening to the advice, Liu Bei thought about it quickly, but still felt unsure.

Before this battle, they had 12,000 soldiers. Although Liu Bei's army won the decisive battle today, casualties were inevitable.
A quick count after the war showed that the total number of casualties was at least two thousand, so there were at most ten thousand people left, including some sick and lightly wounded soldiers who did not leave the front line.

Of the ten thousand men, three or four thousand were left for Guan Yu to guard Ji Ling and Huaiyin City, leaving only six thousand men who could counterattack Guangling.

Even if the troops led by Liu Xun collapsed, could these 6,000 people storm Liu Xun's troops defending his home?

The situation remains very serious.

If Liu Bei's chance of winning was 10% before today's great victory, then after his desperate fight, the probability has only increased to about 30%, but he is still far from over the danger.

Liu Bei finally sighed and said, "Well, there is really no better choice. I will leave you 3,000 infantrymen, and I will take the wounded soldiers to recuperate. I will take 6,000 infantrymen to attack Guangling. Victory or defeat will be left to fate. If we delay any longer, the morale boosted by today's victory will be lost and we will still collapse."

Guan Yu thought for a moment and asked, "Brother, please leave the 1,000 cavalrymen to me, at least most of them, and you can just take some of the scouts with you.

I have been planning to launch a feint to counterattack Xuyi these days, but I will never fight to the bitter end. Perhaps I can scare Ji Ling away and make him return to defend Xuyi. Anyway, you don’t need cavalry to attack the city.”

Liu Bei thought it made sense, so he agreed. Of the one thousand cavalrymen, two to three hundred were lost in today's battle. He left five hundred for Guan Yu and only took two hundred with him, to serve as personal guards and scouts.

However, around the end of the morning hour, when the hasty deployment had just been completed and Liu Bei was still preparing rations for the siege troops, a general suddenly rushed into the shogunate with several messengers and scouts to report urgent military intelligence to Liu Bei.

Liu Bei looked up at the visitor in surprise. It turned out to be Chen Dao and Mi Zhu's son Mi Wei who came to visit. He was surprised.

Mi Wei is only in his teens now, still a young man. He has not taken a name and has not officially entered officialdom.

But Liu Bei was very caring towards Mi Zhu's family, so he knew them all. He knew that Mi Wei had also been in Haixi County with his uncle Mi Fang, but he didn't know how he came to be there.

Fortunately, Chen Dao spoke up and immediately resolved his doubts: "My lord, the three generals sent Mi Shaojun as a messenger to report important military information." Liu Bei immediately stepped down and pulled the man to sit aside, asking him seriously. Mi Wei also told him everything:
"My lord, I was sent by my father to follow the three generals back to Huaipu County from Haixi two days ago, where I monitored the situation on the Huaiyin battlefield.

Then the three generals led a thousand soldiers and horses to Sheyang County. He followed Mr. Zhuge's advice, saying that once they found out that Liu Xun was defeated in Huaiyin, they would immediately set out from Sheyang and disguise themselves as Liu Xun's defeated cavalry to attack Guangling..."

Before Mi Wei finished speaking, Liu Bei was terrified: How dare Third Brother? A thousand men dared to disguise themselves as enemies and launch a sneak attack?

Although his intentions were good and his purpose was clear, which was to share his worries and help everyone break the desperate situation, Liu Bei soon realized that there was absolutely nothing right with this plan!

He felt a rush of blood to his head, so he interrupted Mi Wei's report with a gesture and shouted, "Bring me the map!"

Immediately, an attendant presented a cloth map, and Liu Bei quickly spread it out on the table and looked at it carefully. Because he took the map too roughly, there was even a sound of the cloth tearing, but Liu Bei didn't care anymore.

From the map, it can be seen that Sheyang County is indeed located halfway between Huaiyin County and Guangling County. Because it is located on the east bank of the Hang Canal, it is indeed now controlled by Liu Bei's army.
It was just because the geographical location was not important that Liu Xun did not send any troops to cross the Hang Canal to take it when he went north. It was just left there. There were only a few hundred soldiers of Liu Bei's army guarding the city.

If we attack from Sheyang County, we can indeed shorten the journey to Guangling County - it can save about 100 miles compared to attacking directly from Huaiyin, and we only need to walk 160 miles to arrive.

But the problem is that Sheyang County is not adjacent to the Han Canal, but is to the east of the Han Canal.

Liu Bei felt that Zhang Fei was just fooling around, and slammed the table in dismay:

"Impossible! Absolutely impossible! Even if Yide is reckless, Ziyu is extremely intelligent. How could she possibly give him such an idea?
Sheyang is not near the Han Canal, and is to the east of the Han Canal, so there is no ferry available there! Guangling County is to the west of the Han Canal.

Yide used cavalry to disguise as the enemy and launch a surprise attack. How did he finally cross the Han Canal to Hexi to attack the city? How could a defeated cavalry army bring boats with them?

Moreover, Liu Xun's main force was defeated west of the Han Canal. If the "ruined cavalry" appeared east of the Han Canal, they would be directly discovered!"

Liu Bei felt dizzy and anxious. In his mind, he almost saw the tragic scene of his third brother being exposed, besieged and finally exhausted and defeated.

However, he seemed to have no choice. The third brother took the risk to break the situation.

He was going to counterattack Guangling anyway, so he had to speed up as much as he could to clean up this mess for his third brother.

Just when Liu Bei was almost crying and ready to fight for his life.

Mi Wei always seized the opportunity to continue speaking:
"My lord, rest assured and listen to my explanation! Mr. Zhuge's strategy is certainly not so crude. I was interrupted before I could finish my speech..."

After hearing Mi Wei's follow-up explanation, Liu Bei's frightened mood finally calmed down a little, and reason regained control of his brain.

Indeed, he had sent a world-class genius like Ziyu to follow his third brother! With Ziyu's talent, how could he make such a low-level mistake!
So it seems that Mi Wei is the one who is breathing heavily when he speaks?

Liu Bei rubbed his chest and let out a long sigh: "Why didn't you finish what you said at the beginning?! Quickly explain Ziyu's plan!"

Mi Wei was helpless: It was you who interrupted...

But now is not the time to worry about these things. Mi Wei took a deep breath, organized his words and said in an orderly manner: "Of course, the three generals have relied on something for this move. My father has followed Mr. Zhuge's advice and prepared a merchant fleet five days in advance to urgently sail south along the coast from Haixi and flow upstream to the mouth of the Yangtze River.

Disguised as Sun Ce's merchant fleet in Danyang, they went to Guangling County and entered the Han Canal to provide siege equipment and military rations for the three generals' surprise attack troops. By the way, they could also help the three generals' cavalry cross the Han Canal from Sheyang to the west at night.

The three generals ordered me to go into the city and inform the lord of the action as soon as I found out that the lord had defeated the enemy who was besieging Huaiyin, and ask the lord to rush to the rescue with the main force of the infantry. The three generals should wait for the lord to help and take over the city. "

After hearing these explanations, Liu Bei was stunned for a while, then he looked at the map and finally came to his senses.

Tzuyu’s talent is truly divine!
In such a hurry, he actually thought of letting Zi Zhong cross the river in white clothes, disguised as Sun Ce's merchant, but in fact providing logistics and river crossing convenience for the sneak attack troops!
In this case, the third brother's sneak attack should have a good chance of success. Although there is definitely still danger, at least there is an opportunity.

The only one who needs to work hard now is myself. I cannot let down the city gate that my third brother fought so hard to steal!

How did Lü Bu let Xu Dan defend the White Gate Tower to the death and delay until Lü Bu's main force captured Xiapi? Today, I will let my third brother capture the Guangling East Water Gate, and then I will capture Guangling!

Heaven has its own cycle, and retribution is really unpleasant.

"This is the gift from heaven to Ziyu to protect Han and eliminate the enemy!" The lines on Liu Bei's cheeks twitched for a rare moment, and he gritted his teeth and roared out an order:

"Immediately mobilize 6,000 men and follow me downstream to Guangling County! Don't prepare military rations, just take five days of rations! Move forward quickly with light equipment! Rescue Yide! We must completely annihilate the remaining troops of Liu Xun in this battle!"

(End of this chapter)