The unusual movements of the Wei army in Wancheng were quickly detected by spies of the Han army, and were sent to Guan Yu's desk soon after.
Whether it was Zhu Shuo leading his army south, or Wancheng's messengers constantly going to various places, every move of the Wei army fell in Guan Yu's eyes.
The cavalry in the Han army was valuable, and the dozen or so teams of light cavalry sent by Guan Yu were not just for spreading news.
When the dozens of teams of light cavalry traveled all over Nanyang County, they also played an important role as scouts.
When Guan Yu learned of all Cao Pi's actions, he immediately summoned all the generals currently in the camp to discuss matters.
Under Liao Hua's call, many generals who were always in a state of war preparedness came to Guan Yu's tent.
After the generals arrived, they took their seats in their own order and waited for Guan Yu's next instructions.
But just after all the generals were seated, a heavyweight came belatedly.
This man is Ma Chao, the great Han hussar general who is currently ranked only below Guan Yu in the army.
Ma Chao's cavalry general's status is one level higher than Zhang Fei's cavalry general.
However, when this heavyweight arrived, all the generals who were talking and laughing among themselves fell silent.
The generals watched with suspicion as the powerful and powerful general entered the tent.
The generals' suspicious eyes were not concealed at all.
At present, as long as there are loyal people in the entire big tent, they don't have a good impression of Ma Chao.
No matter how great his reputation is and how high his status is.
Of course Ma Chao also knows what kind of impression he has in everyone's mind, but he has gotten used to it over the years.
Because he knew this, when he came to the camp some time ago, he took Ma Dai and his troops to find another place to camp far away, not close to the tents of the Han generals.
That's why he arrived late today.
After Ma Chao took Ma Dai into the big tent, Ma Dai found a seat to sit down according to his status, while Ma Chao went straight to a seat and sat down.
The place where Ma Chao sat was right next to Mi Yang.
Originally, according to the ranking, Ma Chao should be sitting closest to Guan Yu, and there was Zhang Fei between Mi Yang and Ma Chao.
But Zhang Fei and Guan Yu had a good personal relationship, and Zhang Fei disdained Ma Chao's character.
So as soon as he entered the big tent, he immediately walked to Guan Yu and sat down.
It was obvious that Zhang Fei didn't want to sit with Ma Chao.
But this is normal. If Liu Bei showed kindness to Ma Chao for the sake of the overall situation, then Zhang Fei, who has a jealous personality, definitely does not want to associate with Ma Chao.
Zhang Fei did not take out his spear and fight Ma Chao for hundreds of rounds, because he was considering the overall situation.
Mi Yang looked at Ma Chao, who was as tall as a bear and a tiger, taking vigorous steps and came to sit next to him.
Putting aside Ma Chao's personal qualities for the moment, if we just talk about his personal bravery, Ma Chao is completely worthy of the word "divine power" whether in history or in the Romance of the Three Kingdoms.
In Mi Yang's eyes, Ma Chao looked more like a scholar in terms of personal appearance.
But Ma Chao's figure is very majestic. When he moves around, he looks like a tiger ready to attack, ready to devour anyone he chooses.
The most rare thing is that Ma Chao's sturdy figure does not conflict with his rugged appearance. Instead, the two are blended together to form a very special sense of beauty.
Ma Chao's whole appearance is in line with the mainstream aesthetics of the world, masculine and heroic.
So there was only a wrong name, not a wrong nickname. The reputation of Jin Ma Chao was just right for the person in front of me.
However, when Ma Chao sat down next to Mi Yang, Zhang Fei, who was sitting next to Guan Yu, looked at Ma Chao with disdain.
When Ma Chao had just surrendered to Liu Bei, Guan Yu heard about it because Ma Chao was not an old friend, so he wrote to Zhuge Liang and asked Zhuge Liang who could compare with Ma Chao's talents.
Zhuge Liang knew that Guan Yu was competitive, so he wrote back to Guan Yu: "Ma Chao can be compared with Yide, but cannot be compared with you."
Guan Yu was very happy after reading the letter and showed it to all the guests.
When this happened, Guan Yu was happy, but Zhang Fei was quite unhappy.
Even a little aggrieved.
Everyone in the world knows that Zhang Fei was loyal and loyal throughout his life, but Zhuge Liang actually said that Ma Chao and he were the same person, which of course made the third master uncomfortable.
But Zhang Fei also knew that Zhuge Liang was trying to appease Ma Chao and Guan Yu.
In addition, Zhuge Liang only said that Ma Chao's ability was about the same as him, but did not mention his moral character, so Zhang Fei did not have an attack at that time.
But Zhang Fei always kept this incident in his mind. He kept thinking about competing with Ma Chao one day.
Zhang Fei looked at Ma Chao with warlike eyes, and Ma Chao, who had keen senses, certainly felt it.
But he knew that Zhang Fei's identity was not comparable to his, so he pretended not to see Zhang Fei's gaze and deliberately turned his head to the other side.
Zhang Fei's movements were clearly seen by Guan Yu, who was sitting next to him, but he could understand Zhang Fei's thoughts.
If Zhuge Liang hadn't said that, he would have challenged Ma Chao long ago.
It's just that today he gathered the generals to discuss the army's next strategy, so after Guan Yu gave Zhang Fei a warning look in his eyes, he opened his mouth and told the information he received.
And when the gathered generals of the Han army learned that the Wei army had finally taken action, excitement appeared on everyone's face.
The tortoise turns into a hare and starts to move.
Seeing the excitement on the faces of the generals after hearing the news, Guan Yu nodded with satisfaction.
As a coach, the most important thing for him is not to offer advice, but to play the role of a leader.
The first role of a leader is to determine whether the military morale is available.
From what he just said, the Han generals already knew that there were currently 60,000 Wei troops outside Yancheng, and their strength was comparable to theirs.
Coupled with the news that messengers are constantly being dispatched from Wancheng, it can be inferred that more and more Wei troops will gather outside Yancheng.
But despite this, there was no fear on the faces of the Han generals, which shows that the military morale of the generals is still very high.
This kind of military spirit gave Guan Yu greater confidence in the upcoming decisive battle.
It's just that as the commander-in-chief, Guan Yu certainly couldn't just sit back and watch the enemy troops gather so unscrupulously.
Ever since, Guan Yu issued an order to the generals:
"Starting tomorrow, our army will retreat outside Fancheng and slowly retreat all the way to the Han River."
After Guan Yu's order was issued, some of the Han generals in the big tent began to have puzzled looks on their faces.
Now that the Wei army has begun to take action, why do they still want to withdraw now?
But after thinking carefully, the generals understood Guan Yu's intention.
Guan Yu's intention had three levels. The first level was that Guan Yu was worried that in the future, when fighting the Wei army, the Wei army in Fancheng would attack them from both front and rear.
Although Fancheng was now completely surrounded by the Han army, Guan Yu's original purpose was to encircle the point and mobilize reinforcements, so he did not launch an attack on Fancheng.
The Wei army in Fan City had not experienced any defensive battles and was not damaged.
In this case, if their army starts fighting with the Wei army in the future, and the Wei army in Fan City takes this opportunity to attack them from behind, it will be very dangerous.
A fortress without soldiers to guard it is just a dead thing.
By choosing to withdraw from Fancheng, the 60,000 Han troops could shrink their defense line and leave their rear to friendly forces with water control.
The second purpose of Guan Yu's move was that once the news of his withdrawal from Fancheng reached Cao Pi's ears, Cao Pi would think that the Han army was afraid and wanted to escape.
As soon as Cao Pi had this idea, he would issue another edict urging Zhang Liao to attack them.
In this case, it would be equivalent to invisibly breaking Cao Pi's method of summoning good generals from various places.
The purpose of Guan Yu's encirclement and reinforcements was just to capture the 30,000 Wei troops in Zhang Liao's hands. He did not want to rely on the 60,000 Han troops in his hands to challenge the entire Wei.
Even if Guan Yu has this ability, the Han Dynasty currently does not have the national strength to support Guan Yu to eat Cao Wei's entire field army.
As for whether Cao Pi would order Zhang Liao to advance quickly after hearing that the Han army wanted to retreat, the answer is yes.
Cao Pi raised the army out of anger, so he definitely couldn't stand the Han army humiliating him and then retreating safely.
If this is the case, there will be no way to escape the shame he suffered this time.
As for Guan Yu's third level intention, it is relatively obscure.
Once the Han army withdraws from Fancheng, it means that Cao Xiu in Fancheng is free.
Originally, the commander of the 60,000 Han army was Zhang Liao, but once Cao Xiu, the general of Zhennan and a relative of the Cao family, came out of Fancheng, would the commander of the 60,000 Wei army still be Zhang Liao?
You must know that Cao Xiu is not a useless second generation like Cao Tai.
Although Cao Xiu is nominally the second generation, his actual time with Cao Cao is not much shorter than that of Cao Ren, Cao Hong and other generations.
And the most important thing is that Cao Xiu has a lot of military exploits. When Cao Cao was alive, he relied heavily on Cao Xiu.
What's more, it has been an unspoken rule in the Wei army for many years that the Cao family members control generals with different surnames.
Changing generals before battle is a taboo for military strategists.
Even if Cao Pi could not change the generals, would Cao Xiu, a clan member of the Cao family, be willing to be under Zhang Liao, a second general with a different surname?
Disagreement between generals is also a taboo for military strategists.
This is Guan Yu's conspiracy, and this is also Guan Yu's upright way of using troops to retreat in order to advance.
Of course, only a few people in the big account can understand Guan Yu's third-level intentions.
With Guan Yu's current status and prestige, the orders he issued did not require too much explanation to convince everyone.
After issuing this order, Guan Yu discussed many matters with the generals. After discussing everything, Guan Yu asked the generals in the big tent to go down one after another and act in accordance with the order.
Before all the generals left, Guan Yu asked Ma Chao and Mi Yang to stay.
When Ma Chao heard Guan Yu's order, he didn't know what Guan Yu wanted.
It's just that Guan Yu's current prestige and reputation are higher than his, so in the face of Guan Yu's orders, Ma Chao can only act according to his orders.
Among the entire Han army at present, apart from Liu Bei, probably only the Dongmao commanded by Guan Yu has surpassed him.
Mi Yang certainly had no doubts about Guan Yu's orders.
It's just that after Ma Chao and Mi Yang stayed, besides Guan Yu, there was a third person in this big tent.
That person was Zhang Fei.
Guan Yu didn't care what Zhang Fei was doing in the tent. After all the generals left, Guan Yu stood up first and walked to Ma Chao and asked Ma Chao:
"I heard that Meng Qi came this time and brought three thousand Qiang and Di warriors?"
Hearing Guan Yu suddenly ask him about this, Ma Chao's heart skipped a beat.
At the beginning of the Battle of Xiabian, Ma Chao mobilized more than 10,000 people from the Leiding Seven Tribes of the Di tribe to respond to Liu Bei and contain the main vanguard force of Cao's army.
Although the tens of thousands of Di warriors later suffered heavy losses in the war, some were still left behind.
In addition to some Qiang people who are following Ma Chao, there are currently nearly 3,000 Qiang and Di warriors around Ma Chao.
Three thousand Qiang and Di warriors were willing to follow Ma Chao solely because of his prestige as the mighty general.
These three thousand Qiang and Di warriors have always been regarded as Ma Chao's private soldiers. After Liu Bei learned about this, he did not deprive him of this part of his military power.
This time when he went south, in order to protect himself, Ma Chao brought all the 3,000 Qiang and Di warriors in Mianyang with him.
Because the purpose of bringing the Qiang and Di warriors was impure, when Guan Yu asked about it, Ma Chao had a look of panic on his face.
Seeing this, Zhang Fei unconsciously put his hand on his sword.
Later, he discovered that the person standing in front of Ma Chao was Guan Yu, and he silently lowered his guard.
The reason why Ma Chao was a little panicked was that he thought Guan Yu had doubts about him having three thousand Qiang and Di warriors with him.
After all, aliens are not welcome in the first place, let alone the aliens he leads.
In panic, Ma Chao first replied to Guan Yu: "Exactly."
After answering these two words, Ma Chao wanted to continue explaining with his fists clasped, but Guan Yu did not give him this chance.
Guan Yu said to Ma Chao: "In the previous battle, our army defeated the enemy's cavalry and captured many war horses and cavalry armor. I will order them to be sent to your camp later."
"With these, is Meng Qi confident that he can turn those three thousand Qiang and Di warriors into an invincible cavalry army in a short time?"
After Guan Yu finished speaking, Ma Chao knew what the real purpose of Guan Yu's question was.
In fact, Guan Yu's attitude towards Ma Chao was similar to Zhang Fei's, that is, there was absolutely no trust.
But Guan Yu didn't trust Ma Chao, but he trusted Liu Bei very much.
He knew that since Liu Bei would send Ma Chao to the front line, it meant that Liu Bei believed that Ma Chao was available, and Guan Yu was convinced by Liu Bei's eyes.
Therefore, Guan Yu did not want to test Ma Chao at all. What he wanted now was just to let Ma Chao play his role to the maximum extent.
What Guan Yu said was exactly why he asked Liu Bei to summon Ma Chao to Fancheng.
Hearing that Guan Yu meant this, Ma Chao felt instantly at peace.
When Guan Yu asked about his strengths, Ma Chao's face immediately showed pride, and he said to Guan Yu:
"Don't worry, General. In less than three days, Chao will definitely form a tiger and wolf cavalry army."
In three days, a cavalry army was formed that was like a wolf and a tiger. If someone said this, everyone would think he was talking big words.
But now it was Ma Chao who said this, and his words gave people a sense of trust.
The Tiger and Leopard Cavalry and the famous Wuhuan Cavalry were all defeated by the cavalry army led by Ma Chao.
It's a little late to get the phone, so it's not a big problem.
This chapter has been completed!