My younger brother Zhuge Liang

Chapter 373 If we don’t take Cao thief, he will

In the Battle of Nanpi, Taishi Ci and Zhou Yu captured as many as 26,000 to 27,000 enemy prisoners on the main battlefield alone.

If we also clean up the battlefield after the war, hunt down scattered deserters, and simply deal with some of the enemy's lightly wounded, we can wait for them to recover on their own.

The total number of people captured by Liu Bei's army must be at least 30,000.

At its peak in the Nanpi battlefield, Yuan Shang's army had as many as 50,000 to 60,000 troops.

Thousands of them had been led by Lu Kuang to retreat to Dongguan County the day before, thousands more had seized boats and escaped during the battle last night, and thousands more had scattered and collapsed on land.

Adding these three parts together, the number of Yuan's troops who left the Nanpi battlefield alive was about 15,000 to 16,000. In addition, there were nearly 10,000 casualties accumulated over so many days, and more than 30,000 surrendered or were captured, which added up to the account.

Unfortunately, among the 30,000 people that Liu Bei's army could control, the total number of elite Yuan army soldiers and veterans was only 4,000, and the rest were all new recruits and civilians.

These civilian laborers were obviously not suitable to be used as combat troops. Taishi Ci and Zhou Yu decided to keep them under temporary custody, give them food, let them do some work, and then ask Zhuge Jin in the rear to come up with a long-term and safe resettlement plan.

After more than two years of tug-of-war, although the western half of Bohai County had become barren and became the frontier of the confrontation between the two Yuans, the population also dropped sharply during the same period. Therefore, if these tens of thousands of people were moved eastward to the coastal rear to cultivate land, there would still be enough land to plant, and it would not be a problem to feed them.

Taishi Ci and Zhou Yu spent two days cleaning up the battlefield and hunting down the remaining enemies. After completing all this, they sent back the victory report. It was up to Zhuge Jin and Liu Bei to decide whether to pursue or defend.

After all, the primary purpose of Taishi Ci and Zhou Yu's visit this time was to help Yuan Tan out of trouble.

……

With the great victory in this battle, the news that Taishi Ci and Zhou Yu defeated tens of thousands of enemies in Nanpi and killed Lu Xiang was naturally spread to the rear at a rapid speed.

Lu Xiang was killed in the middle of the night on May 26th. Taishi Ci spent the whole next day hunting down the remaining enemies and stabilizing the situation. It was not until the early morning of the 28th that he sent a courier on horseback to the rear with an official victory report.

Just two days later, the victory news was delivered to Yuan Tan by crossing the Yellow River to Linzi.

The specific people who handled it were Xin Pi and Guo Tu. Guo Tu was unwilling to miss this opportunity to report the good news. After receiving the victory news, he rushed directly into Yuan Tan's shogunate despite the fact that it was late at night and his master had already gone to bed.

"My lord, great joy! General Taishi and Captain Zhou defeated the troops of Lü Kuang and Lü Xiang and killed Lü Xiang. The siege of Nanpi has been lifted! Most of the enemy troops besieging Nanpi have been annihilated, and the remaining troops have fled in panic. There are no more Yuan Shang's bandit troops in Bohai County!"

Yuan Tan was originally quite grumpy about being woken up just after falling asleep, but when he saw Guo Tu's smiling face that was as blooming as a chrysanthemum, he couldn't help but want to kick him.

But after hearing the victory report from Guo Tu, Yuan Tan was completely stunned. Just as he was about to raise his calf to kick someone, it froze in mid-air.

It was not until a long while later that Yuan Tan felt a tightness in his chest and numbness in his leg muscles. He took a few deep breaths, put his legs down, and rubbed them vigorously. He had been worried for a long time, but he finally let go of his worries.

Finally, I don’t have to worry about Nanpi’s defense anymore.

Uncle Liu is really a man of honor. He helped him out of the predicament just like that.

"What a fluke... Look at that villain Yuan Shang, who was blind and begged for mercy and peace from a treacherous villain like Cao, and what was his final fate!

I was farsighted and knew that Uncle Liu was sincere and would always keep his word. The best gamble I made in my life was to make the Emperor's uncle my support."

For a moment, Yuan Tan suddenly had an illusion: if Uncle Liu appeared in front of him at this moment, his legs would probably be so weak that he couldn't stand up straight.

But fortunately, Uncle Liu was not there. After he calmed down a little, his reason told him: Don't be impatient! Wait and see! If the trend continues, Uncle Liu and Cao will soon have a fair fight.

At worst, I could let Xin Pi or Wang Xiu write a letter of surrender and obedience and hold it until Liu Shu could defeat Cao Cao in the main battlefield of Xuhuai. Then I would send the letter to thank him for his help.

But for now, he can also express his opinion.

Yuan Tan had not been very wealthy in the past two years, and the army's rations were not very sufficient. But the Yuan family was still a big family, with three officials for four generations, and they still had a lot of gold and silver utensils and jewelry in stock.

He asked people to select a batch of gold, silver and jewelry and sent them to Taishi Ci and Zhou Yu as a reward for the troops. He also sent some to Zhuge Jin, who was in charge of Langya and was in charge of the reinforcements.

Although Yuan Tan was still a local lord, it was a taboo for him to use a large sum of money to befriend Liu Bei's civil and military officials. However, Liu Bei was magnanimous and was very confident that his subordinates could not be bribed by Yuan Tan with gold and silver. This was purely a courtesy, so he would not investigate.

Who would be stupid enough to hook up with a sinking little ship when Liu Bei's big ship is sailing through the waves?

……

Two days after Yuan Tan received the victory report, it was Zhuge Jin's turn to hear the news in Zhu County. To show his seriousness, Yuan Tan asked Xin Pi to ride a fast horse and travel hundreds of miles a day with Taishi Ci's messenger.

Zhuge Jin's calm reaction when he received the good news really impressed Xin Pi again.

Zhuge Jin was playing chess with Lu Su at the time. He threw away the victory report and turned to share it with his third brother Zhuge Jun who was standing next to him: "Your brother-in-law has defeated the bandits."

His expression and behavior are no different from normal.

There is no doubt that this scene will definitely be written into "A New Account of Tales of the World. Appearance and Determination" in the future.

After hearing this, Lu Su immediately put down his chess piece and asked anxiously, "We defeated the enemy? Didn't we defeat them? How many enemies were killed?"

Zhuge Jin: "About thirty to fifty thousand."

Even a man as magnanimous as Lu Su couldn't help but shake his sleeves slightly, which hit the chessboard and broke a few white jade chess pieces: "How many?!"

Zhuge Jin: "Still think it's not detailed enough? Then be modest and count 30,000. Ziyi and Gongjin were impatient and didn't have time to carefully count the results of the battle. They were in a hurry to report the victory after just one day of fighting. If you want to hear more details, wait a few more days."

Lu Su quickly explained: "I don't think the number of 30,000 to 50,000 is inaccurate... How could it be so serious? To be honest, when you first told them to defeat the enemy, not just to hold out, I thought your strategy was not prudent enough.

After all, under normal circumstances, once Yuan Shang recalls Lü Kuang and Lü Xiang, these two generals will become Yuan Shang's new force to fight Cao Cao. Under the premise that the lord hopes that Yuan Shang and Cao Cao will both suffer losses as much as possible, excessively weakening Yuan Shang is not the best solution, and it will increase our army's casualties.

But I really didn't expect that in the end, it only cost so little to kill so many enemies and capture so many prisoners. In this way, it is more beneficial than sending Lu Kuang and Lu Xiang's entire division back to consume Cao's army - by the way, how many casualties did our army suffer? "

Zhuge Jin then picked up the victory report sent by Xin Pi, glanced at it, and said a number. Lu Su also looked more and more surprised, and was obviously very pleased with Zhou Yu's victory.

Xin Pi saw all this and was even more impressed: the princes' calmness was definitely not pretended, he really didn't even look at the specific loss figures at the beginning, and only took a look at it when asked by Lord Lu.

In such occasions, apart from watching the fun and secretly worshipping them in his heart, he did not dare to interrupt at all. He could only watch Zhuge Jin and Lu Su talking as if no one was around.

Not to mention Xin Pi, Zhuge Jun, the third brother of the Zhuge family, was the same. He didn't dare to say a word and just listened to the analysis of the senior experts.

Zhuge Jin opened his folding fan with a snap, and helped Lu Su analyze why he had insisted on Taishi Ci and Zhou Yu pursuing the annihilation of the enemy instead of wasting time:

"According to the correct way of military strategy, when two tigers fight, one of them will be injured, or even both will be injured. We should not pursue the annihilation of the two Lus, but let them go back to fight Cao Cao. But although you know the art of war, you don't know people.

Of course, this is not your fault, because you have never been to Hebei and are not familiar with those Hebei generals. I am different. Aliang went to Hebei several years ago and had at least a few encounters with the generals of the Yuan family. I also tried to find opportunities to talk to and observe the famous ones. After Aliang came back, he also had several in-depth discussions with me, so I also have a good understanding of the talents and personalities of the Hebei generals.

Lu Kuang and Lu Xiang were not men of firm will to fight, nor were they loyal to the Yuan family. They were just trying to gain support.

According to Cao Cao's current strategy of sending troops, even if the two Lu brothers retreat, Cao will definitely not let them escape back to Yecheng to join in the defense of the city. He will definitely try to intercept them halfway. The battlefield may be in Qinghe County or in Julu County.

Given that the two Lu brothers were weak-willed and fickle, if they were really surrounded by Xiahou Yuan and Cao Hong on the battlefield, they would surely surrender decisively. Then wouldn't these tens of thousands of people become a helper to Cao's army?

In this case, it would be better to kill Lu Xiang first on the Nanpi battlefield and then capture tens of thousands of those mobs. This way, the number of Lu Kuang's troops who will later surrender to Cao Cao will be smaller.

All we can say is that the Yuan family's generals have lost their morale, and Yuan Shang has no ability to take them back - if we don't take them, Cao will."

Zhuge Jin's words were spoken in a cheerful and elegant manner, and he spoke with such ease.

But in fact, what he said was half true and half false.

He knew about Lü Kuang and Lü Xiang, but not because Zhuge Liang had been on a diplomatic mission to Hebei four or five years ago, but because Zhuge Jin himself had foresight from what he read in history books.

Zhuge Liang was just used as an excuse to cover up his information. Anyway, Lu Su couldn't go to Zhuge Liang to verify it, and Zhuge Liang had communicated with his elder brother hundreds of times over the years.

How many things did brothers talk about in their daily conversations? Who can remember them all? Zhuge Jin said that he had said it a few years ago. If Zhuge Liang had no impression, he would just think that he had said it and forgotten it.

After hearing this, Lu Su was not surprised, but admired him even more: he could learn from the Zhuge brothers in terms of domestic affairs and strategy, but in terms of vision and ability to judge people, he was lagging behind...

If Lu Su was like this, let alone Zhuge Jun and Xin Pi.

(End of this chapter)