Chapter 136: Entering Dingling Eastwards will be full of pets
Chapter 136: Go east to Dingling and hunt for pets
After Liu Bei arrived in Runan, he did not contact Shen Chen immediately. Instead, he went to Pingyu County, the seat of Runan County, which is also called Runan County and is the ancient city in the Romance of the Three Kingdoms.
The reason why I came to Pingyu was to contact and coordinate the territory of Runan County and support Yuan Shao's forces.
As the ancestral home of the Yuan family, the Yuan family had a very high reputation in Runan County. Their disciples, former officials, and guests were distributed in various counties, and they defended themselves with troops everywhere, harassing Cao Cao behind enemy lines.
Later generations looked at the Battle of Guandu as if they simply thought that Yuan Shao hoarded more than 100,000 troops in Guandu, and then Cao Cao burned the food and grass and was defeated.
In fact, Cao Cao's predicament was more difficult than anyone imagined. At this time, Yuan Shao's forces were everywhere around Yingchuan, and there were constant harassment from the rear. Yuan Shao's cavalry on the front broke through the blockade and even reached the vicinity of Xudu.
His grain road was attacked, and county officials from Yanzhou, Xuzhou, Yuzhou and other places responded to Yuan Shao's call. Basically, except for Li Tong and Man Chong, almost everyone in Runan had rebelled and surrendered to Yuan.
It would be no exaggeration to say that Cao Cao is besieged on all sides right now.
However, due to the delay in news, Liu Bei came to Runan a little late. Only after he arrived did he find out that Man Chong had already taken the initiative and eliminated most of the former disciples and former officials of the Yuan family who responded to the call.
After learning about this incident, Liu Bei had no choice but to recruit soldiers on the spot. He is still the shepherd of Yuzhou, General Zuo, and Tinghou of Yicheng. It is reasonable for him to come to Yuzhou to recruit soldiers.
At that moment, many people came to seek refuge, and with the remnants of Yuan's disciples and former officials, Liu Bei gathered tens of thousands of troops in a short period of time.
Soon, Cao Cao also heard about this incident, but he couldn't spare any manpower, so he sent Cai Yang to conquer it.
However, before Cai Yang set off, Guan Yu also received news that Liu Bei was in Runan, so he bid farewell to Cao Cao, returned to Xudu, picked up Mrs. Mi and Mrs. Gan, and headed south to meet Liu Bei in Runan.
At the end of June of the fifth year of Jian'an, Shen Chen sat cross-legged on the desk of his mansion in the county office of Kunyang County, Runan, holding an official document on a bamboo slip in his hand, which was a letter written by Liu Bei.
In addition to saying hello, the content of the letter also expressed his gratitude to Shen Chen. Now he has arrived in Pingyu, Runan, and is currently recruiting troops. He is preparing to take advantage of the current confrontation between Yuan Shao and Cao Cao in Guandu to go north to attack Xudu. He hopes that Shen Chen can Give him some advice.
"Xuan Degong has just arrived in Runan, and the soldiers he hastily recruited have not been trained. The morale and morale of the soldiers may be unstable. I actually don't recommend that he send troops immediately."
Shen Chen put the letter on the table and said to Tai Shici who was sitting beside him.
Tai Shici continued to work as a postman. Who told him to do this in his early years? So every time he traveled a short distance, he came to deliver letters to Shen Chen.
Hearing Shen Chen's words, Tai Shici also smiled bitterly and said: "My lord has no choice. Now Mr. Yuan is still in Yangwu, and Cao Cao is guarding Guandu and cannot leave, so I have to let my lord come to Runan to lead troops to attack Xudu in secret."
Shen Chen thought: "Well, this is indeed a helpless move. Uncle Ziyi, please go back and inform Duke Xuande that if you want to attack Xudu from Runan north, you must defeat Li Tong and Man Chong. Li Tong has many soldiers." We have few troops, so we can attack Dingying together first, and then break through Xiping, so that we can go north and take Linying directly."
Taishi Ci was overjoyed and said: "Okay, I will go back and tell the lord, Ah Chen, when will we agree to march together?"
Shen Chen said: "July 1st."
"Then I will report back immediately."
Taishi Ci didn't want to delay and was going back directly.
Shen Chen said: "There is no need to rush. Kunyang is still three hundred miles away from Pingyu. Even if you ride a horse, it will take two days. Let's go after eating."
Taishi Ci said: "It is precisely because the matter cannot be delayed that we need to report it to the lord immediately."
"good."
Shen Chen nodded: "Please tell Mr. Xuande to be careful."
"I see."
Taishi Ci said goodbye and left in a hurry.
Shen Chen walked him to the door, returned to the mansion, and fell into thinking again.
Now Cao Cao's defense against him is actually very tight. There are a large number of Cao troops deployed in the north, northeast, east, southeast, south and other counties of Kunyang.
Xia Houyuan was in Xiangcheng, Li Dian was in Linying, Li Tong was in Xiping, and Man Chong was in Dingying, almost blocking the Nanyang exit.
So now it is almost impossible for Liu Bei to come over and join him. The only way is to break out of the encirclement.
And if you want to break out of the encirclement, you have to find the weakest point.
Where is it?
Full of love and affection.
These days, he also sent a large number of spies into Yingchuan to explore the enemy's situation.
According to the information received, Xia Houyuan and Li Dian had nearly 10,000 soldiers guarding Xudu. In order to prevent Shen Chen from repeating his old tricks and pretending to attack Xudu from the southwest, Cao Cao specially transferred two to three thousand elite backbones from the front line to garrison. .
Li Tong himself had nearly 10,000 troops. Although he had lost most of his troops in previous battles, there were still 5,000 to 6,000 troops entrenched in Xiping.
There are far fewer people who are full of favors.
Historically, when Manchu conquered Runan, he recruited 500 people, conquered more than 20 fortresses, designed to trap and kill more than 10 leaders, and captured 2,000 soldiers. The total force now is less than 3,000.
Therefore, it is obviously easier to find a breakthrough from him.
Didn’t the great man once say that?
You have to learn to eat the easy things first and then the hard ones. If the bones are difficult to chew, don’t gnaw them first. Eat the meat first and then gnaw the bones.
Coincidentally, Pingyu County, where Liu Bei is located, is located behind Dingying.
When Shen Chen's troops left Kunyang, they were able to attack Manchong, who only had two to three thousand men, with him. Then they jumped out of the encirclement and headed north from Zhaoling to Xudu.
You, Cao Cao, only defend me on the southwest line, so I will not attack from the southwest, I will attack from the southeast.
Thinking of this, Shen Chen felt that everything was fine, so he sent people to talk to the generals to discuss the matter. July 1st was only a few days away, and all the surrounding cities were observing his movements, so he had to make other preparations.
Soon, Gan Ning, Lou Fa, Shen Mi, Deng Zhao, Shen Zhen and other major generals in Shen Chen's army gathered in the hall.
Everyone entered one by one and saluted Shen Chen.
Only Shen Zhen remained silent and secretly followed everyone, finding a seat at the back and sitting down.
It's not that he doesn't like to talk, but when he meets Shen Chen in formal occasions, he can't salute or say hello.
To some extent, he was actually a little embarrassed.
The commander-in-chief of an army is his son. If he is not called a general in the army, it will lose the majesty of Shen Chen. If he is called a general, it will lose the majesty of his father.
However, he and Deng Zhao single-handedly led the Huangmenting soldiers and horses. The two had high prestige in the army, so to lead them in battle, Shen Zhen and Deng Zhao must be present.
So he simply didn't speak or be polite, and just treated father and son in a respectful manner in private.
But these are just small things.
After everyone sat down, Deng Zhaoxian asked: "General, why did you summon us?"
Shen Chen said in a deep voice: "Xuan Degong has arrived in Runan and has gathered his troops to prepare for a secret attack on Xudu. I plan to join him and attack Xudu twice, so we must make arrangements."
"General, please speak!"
Gan Ning said seriously: "Now that Cao Cao has arrived in Guandu and is fighting Yuan Shao, it is a good opportunity for us to send troops."
He understands this too.
Shen Chen said: "The movements of our army are now being closely monitored. Cao soldiers are all in the surrounding counties. If there is any slightest sign of trouble, they will definitely attack in groups. Therefore, we must not go east to join Xuande Gong at the first time." . Instead, we should mobilize the enemy's troops to make them mistakenly think that we will continue to move north, but in fact we will move eastward."
Lou Fa wondered: "Is this another feint to attack Xudu? Xudu is heavily guarded along the route. I'm afraid they will be surrounded not long after we send out troops."
"good."
Shen Chen nodded and said, "So we can't go north, we can only go east."
"Going east?"
Everyone looked at each other, not knowing why.
Shen Chen called everyone over, pointed to the map on the table and said: "Look, the main force of Cao's army is now distributed in Xiangcheng, Linying, Xiping, and Dinying. Why is Dingling in the east undefended?"
Gan Ning was not an illiterate person. He had read many books in his early years, and he blurted out: "Because Dingling is right in the center, wouldn't you be surrounded on all sides when you go to Dingling?"
"Exactly."
Shen Chen nodded: "Dingling is surrounded by these four places. If we go there, we will be besieged by Cao's troops from all directions, so they have not set up troops at Dingling. But if we go east after arriving at Dingling, What should I do if I go to Yancheng?"
Yancheng?
Everyone hurriedly looked over to see.
You can see that the location of Yancheng is very special. It is east of Dingling, south of Linying, north of Dingying, northeast of Xiping, and southeast of Xiangcheng.
From here, go east to Zhaoling, and then go north from Zhaoling to Jianqiang. To the north of Jianqiang is Xudu.
In other words, if we follow what Shen Chen said, we can completely bypass the northeastern defense line of Xiangcheng and Linying through this route, go around behind this defense line from the east, and attack Xudu.
When the time comes, the defenders of Linying in Xiangcheng will inevitably go to Xudu or Jianqiang to garrison, and Li Tong from Xiping will most likely go north. At this time, if they go south again and join Liu Bei in a north-south attack on Dingying, they can then attack Dingying. Ying has completed the rendezvous.
But Gan Ning still had a different opinion and said: "But the enemy will not just look at us. If we set off immediately to Qian Dingling, I am afraid we will be surrounded by them before we reach Yancheng."
Shen Chen nodded and said: "So I plan to divide my troops again, go all the way north to Fu City, pretend to attack Yangdi, and wait for Xia Houyuan to be mobilized on the other side, and then go east immediately. Because Xudu can be reached directly from Fu City, Yangdi, and Yingyin, so Li Dian and Xia Houyuan will definitely not go south, and then the only ones we will face are Man Chong and Li Tong."
"Divide the troops again? Our army lost thousands of troops in the previous pursuit of Cao's army."
Gan Ning frowned. They had already lost a lot of troops in the previous battles, and now they only had less than 7,000 troops on hand. If they were to divide the troops again, their strength would be too weak.
Shen Chen sighed and said: "There is no way. Each of these soldiers and horses under my hands is extremely valuable in my eyes. I had no choice but to pursue Cao Cao before. If we don't fight to the death with Cao Cao, the defensive strength on the southern front will be even worse." If there is enough, we will be more passive."
Through the operation of several previous battles, the battle loss ratio between them and Cao's army reached one to three. One Shen Chen army replaced three Cao soldiers. Some of them were elite, but most of them were second-line troops. For Shen Chen, not worth it.
But no matter how unworthy it is, they can only fight such a war of attrition. If they don't fight, they will face an extra 10,000 Cao troops. By then, it will be too difficult for 30,000 to 40,000 Cao troops to defend Xudu.
Now there are only more than 20,000 people. After joining Liu Bei, their strength will reach at least 17,000 or 8,000, which is not much less than Cao's army in terms of military strength.
"All right."
In the end, Gan Ning had no choice but to compromise and agreed to Shen Chen's strategy.
At present, Shen Chen ordered his father Shen Zhen to lead a thousand people to garrison Kunyang. Most of their supplies and food were here, and Kunyang could not afford to lose anything.
He also ordered Lou Fa to lead 1,500 men north to attack Yangzhai from his father city. In later generations, this route was actually from Ye County to the north to attack Pingding Mountain and then through Jiaxian County to Yuzhou. It was all flat.
Because Father City and Xiangcheng are separated by the Ziyun Mountain Mountains, and there is no Cao army in Father City, by the time Xia Houyuan and Li Dian get the news, Lou Fa has probably arrived in Yangdi, and Xu Du can leave Yangzhai. If it is too close, they will definitely not neglect it.
So when Xia Houyuan and Li Dian send people, Lou Fa can return to Kunyang along the way he came. In this way, the strategic purpose of attracting Cao's army is achieved, and Shen Chen and Gan Ning can march east to Dingling to fight with Liu Bei. Will hunt for pets!