My younger brother Zhuge Liang

Chapter 183: In the midst of laughter and conversation, masts and oars were reduced to ashes ( words long chapter)

"Gongjin! I don't want to give up. As for now, should we attack fiercely at all costs?" Sun Ce was really unwilling and asked angrily.

Zhou Yu's face was not looking good either. He calmly pointed out: "Now we know that Wang Lang used an inexplicable secret method to persuade so many Shanyue people to help. As long as the Shanyue people risk their lives, even if we fight hard, the losses will be great. It's not worth it for these two small counties."

Sun Ce: "Is there no other choice but to retreat?!"

Zhou Yu: "Even if we don't retreat, it's unlikely that we'll succeed in a strong attack. The only solution now is for our army to send the fleet back to Dong'ou to transport food and supplies. Fortunately, before our army attacked, we had already used the previous batches of ships to transport food from Juzhang and Haiyan in the rear to Dong'ou and Linhai for storage.

This time, the grain transportation will only take 600 miles each way, a total of 1,200 miles. I think it can be reached within ten days by sailing day and night. However, this method is too wasteful. If we persist until the end of spring and still cannot break the city, I suggest giving up. "

Zhou Yu actually wanted to persuade Sun Ce to give up, but he knew Sun Ce's temper. He was always strong-willed and never retreated. How could he afford to lose this man after suffering such a big loss? Sun Ce had never been defeated by a corrupt scholar like Wang Lang.

Moreover, this battle is not completely hopeless. After all, both sides are fighting for morale. As long as Wang Lang can't hold on, it is still possible to decide the outcome of the battle.

Sun Ce actually knew what Zhou Yu meant, so he promised: "Okay, then we will send food by boat to prolong the siege. Even if we only try it once or twice, it can be regarded as a way to explore the tactics of crossing the sea and expedition. These experiences are valuable and may be useful in the future. If we still can't see the trend of the siege being over, we can only give up."

Sun Ce also knew that there was little strategic value in conquering central Fujian, as it was too mountainous and poor.

But he had to find another way to sum up some combat experience to pave the way for the future - he knew very well that his territory had been surrounded by Liu Bei. If he did not break off relations with Liu Bei and wanted to expand outward, he could only find some weak opponents along the coastline to bully.

If we can summarize the experience of "crossing the sea to support the war" through actual combat this time, and explore a path that the ancients never imagined, then maybe we can directly bully those useless people in Jiaozhou who are completely vulnerable in the future?
A rubbish like Shi Xie also knows military affairs? Isn't he the "Confucius of Jiaozhou"? Sun Ce spent his whole life killing those rubbish who flaunted morality.

Maybe if a few thousand fierce warriors could successfully land, they could fight to support the war, force more and more local people to follow their grandson, and uproot Shi Xie completely? The warlords who emerged in the Central Plains couldn't bully the princes in remote areas who had never fought a war?
At least that's what Sun Ce thought. Even if it was just to explore the way this time, he had to find out everything clearly.

……

After Sun Ce made up his mind, he finally allowed Zhou Yu to allocate some troops, mainly sailors and necessary escort personnel, to return to Dong'ou for another round of supply transfer to ensure that the troops would have at least three months of military rations.

On the other hand, after entering the continuous siege, Sun Ce was not idle. Even if there were no Shanyue tribes to kill and plunder within a hundred miles, he would go to a place farther away.

After all, Bu Zhi and Yu Fan only had more than a month beforehand, so it was impossible for them to gather all the Shanyue tribes in the northern part of central Fujian into the city of Dongye.

After Sun Ce's army had spread out for 150 miles, they could finally see scattered Shanyue tribes. They showed no mercy and immediately started to slaughter and plunder, and indeed obtained some food. Every time they succeeded in robbing food, the army could last for at least three or four days, and at most seven or eight days.

The number of individual Shanyue households that were exterminated totaled more than a thousand. When the remaining surrounding tribes heard the news, they had no choice but to abandon their nests and huddle together for warmth.

One day in late January, Sun Ce's army finally encountered a tough problem.

He sent out a food-searching team of a thousand men, led by a military commander, who went upstream along the Minjiang River for about 200 miles and arrived at a mountainous basin roughly equivalent to the later Gutian County through the northern tributary Gutian Creek, where Shanyue farming tribes lived.

The Sima of Sun Ce's army still wanted to slaughter the people and rob their stored food, but he didn't know that other Shanyue tribes within dozens of miles had already learned about Sun Ce's army's killing and looting, and they all rushed here to huddle together for warmth.

So the Shanyue allied forces set up an ambush at the entrance of the Gutian Basin and fought a fierce battle with Sun Ce's army. Sun Ce's army was ambushed and surrounded, and more than a thousand people were killed, with only a few hundred people breaking through and escaping.

Sun Ce was furious when he heard the news of the defeat. He selected 5,000 troops from the Dongye siege force and personally led the army upstream along the Minjiang River to the Gutian Basin. In a great battle, he slaughtered all the local Shanyue tribes and took back all the stored food.

After his success, Sun Ce was also very proud: Even if Zhou Yu had not transported back the food, this harvest alone would be enough to extend the military food reserves from only enough to last until mid-February to until mid-March.

Combined with the previous piecemeal looting, it would be no problem for him to eat until the end of March. If Zhou Yu brought in more food, he could last until May!

However, this kind of plundering that exhausts all resources is obviously not a long-term solution.

Although the battle of Gutian Basin was successful in looting, it also completely weakened the neutral forces of Shanyue who had originally planned to "neither help the king nor the grandson."

When Zhui and Yu Fan used advanced productivity to persuade the Shanyue people to surrender, some conservative and old-fashioned Shanyue chieftains were still unmoved. Now the most conservative Shanyue chieftains have been killed by Sun Ce. The rest, either due to reflection, hesitation, or hatred, have all turned to Wang Lang or Liu Bei.

It's just that Wang Lang is now surrounded in Dongye County and has no power to take care of these Shanyue people. But as long as He Qi Buzhi wins this battle and re-establishes his rule in central Fujian, the resistance to his rule in the future will definitely be much smaller.

With a certain amount of surplus food, Sun Ce continued to show off his military might and launched several tentative or deterrent attacks on Dongye. The main purpose was to show off his military might and to tell the defenders in the city:
They killed many Shanyue tribes and looted enough military rations to last until May! If they continue to kill and loot, they will get more! Let the defenders not dream of using scorched earth to consume food and drive back Sun's army! If they surrender now, they can be pardoned for their previous resistance! We promise not to massacre the city!

However, He Qi was not deceived by Sun Ce's words. He firmly believed that Bu Zhi and Lu Yi would not allow Sun Ce to maintain the sea transportation of grain, and He Qi had enough manpower to defend the city and consume the enemy's resources.

He Qi insisted on patrolling the city every day to boost morale. Yu Fan also knew that the situation was urgent and the key now was people's hearts, so he advised Wang Lang not to rest, and a group of civil servants also patrolled the city every day.

Use the simplest and most easy-to-understand principles to tell the soldiers that Sun Ce is cruel and will never keep his promises, so everyone must not be fooled.

The battle under Dongye City dragged on until the beginning of February, and the situation was still not resolved. The siege continued for a long time. During this period, Sun Ce's army also built some other complex siege equipment to make it easier to attack the city.

Unfortunately, there were many defenders in the city and they were not afraid of a war of attrition. He Qi also kept publicizing Sun Ce's deeds of slaughtering the Shanyue tribes to make the Shanyue people give up their fantasies. All of Sun Ce's little tricks failed to work.

……

Time quickly came to the sixth day of February.

Early in the morning, off the coast of Dongye.

Zhou Yu, who had been away from Dongye for half a month, finally appeared on the sea at the mouth of the Minjiang Bay with hundreds of warships, transporting military supplies for Sun Ce from Dong'ou and Linhai in the rear.

When they came for the first time, Sun Ce's fleet carried more than 15,000 soldiers, so there was very little space left for food, only enough to feed these 10,000 people for more than a month.

The returning fleet, including sailors and soldiers, had only 4,000 people, saving more than 12,000 tonnage for food, which was enough to transport an additional 30,000 stones, enough to feed the army for two more months.

Zhou Yu also knew that when Wang Lang retreated from Kuaiji, he took away a remnant of one or two thousand soldiers, all of whom had ships. So when Zhou Yu organized the grain transportation, he specifically asked Sun Ce for 4,000 soldiers and sailors, just to ensure that the number of people could completely overwhelm the possible navy under Wang Lang's command.

Even if Wang Lang used only the local Shanyue people in central Fujian to defend the city and formed all the veterans withdrawn from Kuaiji into a navy to intercept Zhou Yu's grain transport fleet, Zhou Yu would not be afraid, because that was all the ships Wang Lang brought at that time.

What's more, Zhou Yu knew that Wang Lang didn't have the courage, so he was just prudent.

However, just when Zhou Yu thought he was safe enough, an accident happened.

At 9:00 a.m., when the fleet was passing through the sea 20 miles northwest of what is now known as Matsu Island and heading for the mouth of the Minjiang River, it was suddenly intercepted by dozens of warships coming from the direction of Matsu Island.

"Zhou Zhonglang, there is an enemy attack from the direction of the island in the southeast!" The lookout of the grain fleet immediately sounded an alert.

Upon hearing the news, Zhou Yu rushed to the port side and took a look. Sure enough, there were small boats dotted around the horizon, and they seemed to be coming at a fairly fast speed.

"Is this Wang Lang's navy? It should be. It looks like there are only a few dozen ships. How many soldiers can they carry? It turns out that Wang Lang's plan is to clear the land and intercept our grain team at sea, so that Bofu will retreat when the grain runs out!
Haha, if he had this ability, he wouldn't have been killed so miserably by Uncle Youtai (Sun Jing) in the battle in Zhejiang! When he was in Shanyin County, he couldn't do it as a local tyrant, so he expected to do it in Minzhong? Wishful thinking! "

While Zhou Yu was thinking, the lookout shouted again: "General! Deputy Generals Ling and Deng have sent a flag signal. Do you want to know if we should turn to intercept?"

Zhou Yu was stunned for a moment, then he came to his senses. He brought two naval lieutenants with him to escort the grain fleet, Ling Cao and Deng Dang.

These people want to fight, so let's fight. Zhou Yu has already judged that the enemy will not be too large. Because Zhou Yu's army has passed by this nameless deserted island three times, and he has also made a rough observation before, but he did not see any signs of troops stationed on the island, nor did he see any fleet anchorage.

It's not that Zhou Yu was not careful enough, but that there were too few enemies. They could just hide in any harbor. Zhou Yu was unfamiliar with the place, so it was normal that he couldn't find them.

Zhou Yu immediately ordered his men to raise the flag, and had Ling Cao on the left and Deng Dang on the right, to encircle the two wings, trying not to give the enemy room to maneuver - although the two armies were still more than a dozen miles apart, Zhou Yu had keenly discovered that the speed of the approaching ships was obviously faster than his own. If he did not encircle them, he would most likely be taken for a walk.

The general had no intention of dodging and still maintained the original speed, approaching rapidly. If nothing unexpected happened, they would be caught by Ling Cao and Deng Dang in another half an incense stick of time.

However, just two cups of tea later, just as Ling Cao and Deng Dang returned to their positions and began to close the net, Zhou Yu thought he had figured out a plan and things suddenly changed.

The approaching ships were already at least 10% to 20% faster than Zhou Yu's warships, and just as Ling Cao and Deng Dang were about to close the net, the enemy accelerated again.

Dozens of oars on each boat extended into the sea, paddling hard, making the hull, which was already not slow just by the sails, draw a graceful arc and head straight for Zhou Yu's rear military food team.

"What? These boats can still speed up? Just now they were relying only on sails without oars?"

At this time, the distance between the two sides had been shortened to within two or three miles. It was only when they were so close that Zhou Yu could see clearly what had happened. It turned out that the enemy ship had not been using oars before.

As the enemy accelerated, Ling Cao and Deng Dang, who had planned to encircle the route, were immediately left behind. When the two generals joined forces again, the enemy's mere forty or fifty warships had already entered the gap.

Although Zhou Yu had twice as many people as Bu Zhi and Lu Yi, he had more than ten times as many ships as Bu Zhi and Lu Yi.

Bu Zhi was able to leave sixty soldiers and sailors on each ship, but on Zhou Yu's side, most ships had less than ten sailors, and only those professional escort warships had more people.

Then, Zhou Yu watched a crushing speed. Although the enemy ships were few in number, they were highly maneuverable, and they attacked the weak points like swimming fish. Then they began to fire bows and crossbows, and javelins and darts flew everywhere, intercepting and killing the grain ships with few people.

Zhou Yu, Ling Cao and Deng Dang turned around and gave chase, but they were too slow and could not catch up.

Bu Zhi and Lu Yi did not engage them head-on, but instead evaded Zhou Yu's escort warships and targeted the grain ships.

Soon, more than twenty grain ships were boarded and all the sailors on board were killed. They were drifting aimlessly on the sea and lost power.

Zhou Yu finally closed the distance by taking advantage of the enemy's opportunity of boarding and losing speed, but the enemy immediately gave up the plan to expand the victory in close combat and accelerated his escape again, shuttling through the grain ship formation.

"Don't fight too long! Don't board the enemy ship and try to capture it! Just throw the swallowtail torch to burn it and disrupt the enemy!"

Lu Yi shouted loudly on the warship. He had already learned how to use the "swallowtail torch", a new naval weapon from Huainan. It was indeed very useful. When it was thrown out, it had a counterweight and good inertia, just as stable as a hand grenade thrown by later generations. It could also use the force of the throw to pierce the forked nails at the tail into the wooden board of the hull. If it was not swept away, it would soon spread.

"The grain fleet speeds up and retreats! Charge into the Minjiang River! The rest of the warships form a butterfly formation to cover the rear and protect the grain ships!"

Zhou Yu was extremely anxious when he saw the ships carrying grain on fire. He had to use the dumbest method, like sprinkling pepper on the surface, and let the warships with more soldiers to cover the periphery of the formation, giving up the idea of concentrating his forces to fight a decisive battle with the enemy.

The enemy is too fast! We can't catch up in the pursuit of a decisive battle.

Since we cannot achieve success, we can only strive to avoid mistakes and minimize losses!

However, as Zhou Yu's sailors spread out like pepper, each protecting their own troops, Bu Zhi and Lu Yi on the opposite side became more ambitious.

Lu Yi found an opening and suggested to Bu Zhi: "I think the fleet protecting the enemy's right side is extremely weak. In order to protect the grain ships inside, the battle formation has been stretched too far. If we attack any point at random, they will not be able to take care of both ends and will not have time to rescue us. Let's not fight to the end, just strike and leave!"

Bu Zhi thought about it and felt that the opportunity for battle would be fleeting, so he should still trust Lu Yi.

So he nodded to the plan, and Lu Yi immediately went to carry it out.

The fifty keel-bone speedboats of the Han army regrouped and acted as if they were going to quit while they were ahead. In fact, after turning back a short distance, they suddenly turned sideways and charged towards Deng Dang's troops.

If Deng Dang joined forces with Zhou Yu and Ling Cao, Lu Yi would certainly not be able to defeat him with just his few men.

The keel warship does not provide any close combat advantage. Its only advantage is its speed, which makes it easy to pull the enemy away and then concentrate its forces to attack.

At this moment, Deng Dang was alone in protecting one side of the grain fleet. He was already too scattered. After confirming that the enemy was targeting him, it was too late for him to ask the friendly forces in front and behind to gather together.

The two sides soon fought each other. The Han army had an absolute advantage in manpower. Crossbows flew and swallowtail torches were thrown everywhere. Deng Dang's ship soon caught fire. The Han army used their numbers to bully the few. Danyang soldiers on several warships boarded Deng Dang's ship and attacked him with swords and spears. Dozens of soldiers around Deng Dang were shot and hacked to death. Deng Dang was finally killed by Zhang Duo, a former bandit general from Chaohu.

"Sima Deng!"

"Brother-in-law!"

Seeing that their general was in danger, several warships of Deng Dang's army nearby rushed over to support them in a desperate battle. They were extremely fierce and for a while they were evenly matched with Lu Yi's men.

Seeing that the enemy was fighting desperately, Bu Zhi reminded Lu Yi that he should quit while he was ahead.

Lu Yi was also very nervous. He observed the situation for a while and nodded decisively: "Just now, we broke through the enemy's formation and jumped on the enemy's side just to ensure that we could kill the general and cause chaos in the enemy. At this moment, the enemy is counterattacking in anger. We must not engage in close combat with them! Use more swallowtail torches to repel the enemy!"

The Han army warships began to throw the remaining swallowtail torches at all costs, setting several enemy ships that were chasing them closely on fire. Then, while the enemy was in chaos and trying to put out the fire, they distanced themselves and retreated.

On a warship next to Deng Dang's ship, his 20-year-old brother-in-law, Lü Meng, who was only a village chief, saw his brother-in-law being killed. He wanted to take revenge, but his own ship was also on fire and it was difficult to put out the fire, so he could not sail at all. Lü Meng could only take off his armor, abandon the ship, jump into the sea and swim to the next ship.

There were more and more people like Lu Meng jumping off the boat to escape on the sea. Zhou Yu needed to salvage his own soldiers who fell into the water and had no intention of fighting. He just protected the remaining boats and retreated to the mouth of the Minjiang River.

Seeing that Zhou Yu didn't dare to chase him, Bu Zhi and Lu Yi of course used their speed advantage again, following behind him, looking for an opportunity to bite back at his weak spot, which made Zhou Yu very disgusted.

Zhou Yu had great skills in water warfare, but his boat was too slow to catch up. The battle was so frustrating that Zhou Yu was so angry that his face turned green.

……

In the evening of that day, Zhou Yu, covered in dust and dirt, arrived at the Minjiang Wharf outside Dongye County with the remaining supply fleet, with more than 20% of the ships destroyed.

When Sun Ce learned that Zhou Yu had returned, he was of course extremely excited and came to greet him in person, but when he saw this scene, he could not help but be stunned.

"How is it possible? Is there anyone in the world who can make Gongjin suffer in a naval battle? What is going on? Victory and defeat are common in the military, just explain it clearly."

Sun Ce subconsciously did not think that Zhou Yu was derelict in his duty. He knew Zhou Yu's ability. This situation must have been caused by a huge change that was beyond human control.

Zhou Yu's throat was dry, and even his voice had changed. He cleared his throat several times before sighing dejectedly:

"It's not that our army didn't fight hard, it's just that Wang Lang got a kind of fast ship that we haven't seen before, and we can't catch up with him, and we can't escape. Although our army has a large number of people, there are more grain ships with only sailors but no soldiers.

That mysterious Wang Lang navy was like a hungry wolf seeing a flock of sheep. They circled around us, looking for an opportunity to attack us, and when they saw an opportunity, they would come up and take a bite. When I tried to fight them with all my might, they sped up and ran away!

At least a hundred warships were lost today, and at least dozens were captured. I didn't dare delay and didn't assign people to tow the ships. Nearly a hundred ships were burned by swallowtail torches, and a few were hacked to death by the boarding. "

When Sun Ce heard this, he was as surprised as Zhou Yu was a few hours ago when he first encountered the enemy. He couldn't help but blurt out:

"How could Wang Lang suddenly have such a good warship? I don't believe that he couldn't build a light warship when he was in Shanyin, but suddenly he had one in Minzhong thanks to these barbarians!"

Zhou Yu was also gritting his teeth in hatred, and he had almost figured it out in the few hours before returning, so he said:
"It must be Liu Bei's doing! I think there was something wrong with the last envoy Bu Zhi! Could it be that he secretly passed on some of the Zhuge brothers' secret techniques to Wang Lang?
Maybe the Shanyue barbarians said that Wang Lang suddenly persuaded them with a method of fishing and boiling salt that was several times more efficient. Those secret methods were also given by Brother Zhuge!"

After hearing this, Sun Ce was also furious and wanted to fight to the death.

But the siege was not successful at the moment. Although some food supplies could be transported, if they were consumed like this, if something went wrong in the future, they might not even be able to retreat - what if the warships were lost again? If they couldn't even transport 10,000 people in the future, how would they return to Wujun? The night was long and dreams were many. Who knew what would happen if they stayed in the south for too long and something happened in the north?

Sun Ce stroked his goatee and said, "If we can't take Dongye before we eat half of this batch of food, we will give up completely and withdraw our troops back to Wujun. We can't withdraw now, otherwise the food has just been transported here with great difficulty, do we have to transport it back? There are not enough cabins.

We have to continue the siege and see if there is a chance of success. We have lost so many warships, and with so many troops now, we probably can’t transport them all at once. We will fight Wang Lang for a while, and when the number of people is reduced to a level that the fleet can transport all at once and the food is almost gone, if we still can’t take it, we will go back immediately!”

Zhou Yu knew that Sun Ce was unwilling to give in and was unwilling to aid the enemy or let the things he had transported for free go to Wang Lang, so he agreed to make three rules with Sun Ce. If he still couldn't succeed this time, he must never act so willfully.

Over the next month, Sun Ce did as he promised and tried several times to attack the city, risking all his strength, but failed every time.

In addition, Sun Ce also had this thought in mind: If I want to consume troops, reduce the number of people, and ensure that the fleet can be transported away in one go, it would be better to first consume those troops who had just surrendered to me in Kuaiji.

After all, the Danyang soldiers and Wujun soldiers have been loyal to Sun Ce for three or four years respectively, and they are all old and direct descendants.

The Kuaiji soldiers only started to join Sun in the second half of the previous year, and their longest service was only one and a half years. In the case of a possible war of attrition, Sun Ce gave priority to consuming these Kuaiji soldiers whose morale was not yet stable.

This move was not very obvious, but the surrendered troops from Kuaiji and the Kuaiji military officers who voluntarily surrendered after Sun Ce entered Kuaiji still vaguely felt this trend.

The city defense troops on the opposite side of He Qi also vaguely noticed the change in mentality, weakening offensive and disunity of the attacking enemy forces.

Finally, in a siege before Sun Ce decided to withdraw, the siege troops were defeated again.

Dong Xi, the general who led the troops and was a former bandit from Kuaiji, was also slightly injured and led his troops to retreat as usual. However, He Qi in the city changed his usual habit of defending the city to the death and actually opened the city gate to rush out, taking advantage of the situation to defeat Dong Xi's troops and killing and capturing more than 2,000 Kuaiji soldiers under Sun Ce.

This period brought the internal conflicts among Sun Ce's Danyang soldiers, Wujun soldiers and Kuaiji soldiers to a climax. Many generals from Kuaiji began to spread the rumor that Sun Ce was excluding the people of Kuaiji in order to use Dong Xi as cannon fodder.

In order to maintain internal unity and rally the people's hearts, Sun Ce had to hastily decide to withdraw his troops early. The destruction of Dong Xi's troops also happened to free up enough space for Sun Ce's army, ensuring that the rest of the troops could all retreat.

On the way of the final withdrawal, Bu Zhi and Lu Yi did not forget to prioritize safety, and harassed and bit Sun Ce a few times, and killed more than a dozen of Sun Ce's patrol ships or lone ships, and then called it a day and sent them out of the country with courtesy.

Sun Ce lost more than 3,000 soldiers in the naval battles, and a total of 4,000 to 5,000 in the siege. In the end, the number of warships that escaped was one-third less than when he attacked, and the number of soldiers dropped to less than 10,000.

There are also many soldiers who fell ill due to acclimatization to Fujian’s climate and water conditions and are not included in the count.

As for the generals, Deng Dang was killed, Dong Xi was seriously injured and captured. Zhou Tai and Chen Wu were also injured. Especially after Sun Ce conquered Kuaiji, the former soldiers of Wang Lang who were forced to surrender and the newly recruited Kuaiji soldiers were almost annihilated as a whole, and many Kuaiji soldiers were captured by Wang Lang's army.

It was like the bargaining chips that Sun Ce had eaten when attacking Shanyin and Juzhang. Now he had to travel thousands of miles to Dongye to fight a battle, but then he completely vomited them back and gave them to Wang Lang. Sun Ce was so angry that he couldn't eat for several days.

After this battle, he had completely given up, knowing that Minzhong was not worth his investment. As for the so-called sea crossing expedition, he was still young, and this time he was purely here to pay the tuition for Liu Bei's people.

Sun Ce's inner resentment towards Liu Bei was also growing, but he had not yet found any solid evidence of Liu Bei's direct involvement.

Moreover, Sun Ce had just suffered a crushing defeat and needed to recover. He would probably have to rest and lick his wounds before the autumn harvest this year, and would definitely not dare to act rashly.

On the other hand, after Bu Zhi joined forces with Lu Yi and He Qi to defeat Sun Ce, he took the opportunity to send out a harassment fleet to follow and send people north across the coast of Wujun and land in Guangling.

The news of victory was passed on to Liu Bei, and the letter described it in detail, also mentioning the good news that Wang Lang, Yu Fan and He Qi had completely surrendered.

Zhuge Liang, who was in Jiangbei, got the news before his brother.

However, more than ten days later, Liu Bei and Zhuge Jin in Wuhu also received the good news. They immediately felt relieved, knowing that Sun Ce would not cause any trouble for at least half a year.

Liu Bei and Zhuge Jin could let go and deal with Huang Zu first, and then choose an opportunity to put pressure on Sun Ce, allowing Sun Ce to rebel and risk the wrath of the world.

Zhuge Jin was not afraid that Sun Ce would see through the clues and hate Liu Bei.

As long as there is no hard evidence to be brought to the court in Xudu to condemn Liu Bei, Sun Ce's hatred is worthless. If he loses his temper, Liu Bei can just act in "self-defense."

-

PS: Although there are two updates today, with more than 3 words, it is actually equivalent to four updates of words for others.

(End of this chapter)