The howling wind blew ashes all over the sky, and after wiping out all Huang Gai's troops, Shen Chen continued to pursue Zhou Yu.
When he arrived at the river bank, Cheng Pu joined the main force of Jiangdong's army and captured a large number of ships.
The general who stayed behind was Zhang Hu. Although he resisted vigorously, the number was too small. He relied on several main ships and hundreds of small ships to resist, but he still failed to win.
The battle situation reached a stalemate, but fortunately Jiangdong's army did not stay much longer. Lu Meng cried and risked his life to carry Zhou Yu's body back. About 30,000 of the more than 40,000 Jiangdong's troops barely escaped back to the ship, using bows and arrows to cover their own people on board. Block the pursuers from behind.
At this time, Shen Chen had already sent someone to notify Huang Zu, asking him to divide 5,000 troops back to his own ship, and first use Huang Zu's ships to intercept the Jiangdong Army's retreat.
Unfortunately, Huang Zu's fleet was on the west coast, and he was now going with the current and against the wind.
Because if the Jiangxia navy attacked from south to north, it would follow the water of the Xiangjiang River and Dongting Lake. Coupled with the southeast wind, it would be a smooth sailing. Therefore, the ship speed was extremely fast, and only then could the raid be successful.
However, Huang Zu's position was in the west, and he sailed from west to east. Following the water of the Yangtze River and going against the southeast wind, the speed of the boat was much slower.
The journey of just over ten miles took nearly two quarters of an hour to sail.
This resulted in the delay in Huang Zu's fleet coming to rescue. Zhang Hu relied on the main ship for defense. Shen Chen's army was unable to shoot at the people on the other side's ship on land, and could only watch the Jiangdong navy escape.
Fortunately, there is a technical gap between the ships of the Jiangxia Navy and the ships of the Jiangdong Navy, and the shapes and internal structures of the ships are completely different, which leads to many problems when driving the ships. They even collide with each other when driving. Skilled, it took some time.
In the end, most of the Jiangdong Navy escaped, but a small number were intercepted by the Huang Zu Navy and the remaining Zhang Hu Navy. The Jiangxia Navy's ships immediately approached, rushed aboard, and engaged in close combat, annihilating all of them. Share Jiangdong Navy.
At this time, the white fish belly has turned up in the east, the vast river surface is rolling with rolling yellow sand, and the green and yellow river water is flowing northward. Only the burning flames on the river bank still remain with the light of the sky.
It's dawn.
Shen Chen sent someone to notify Huang Zhong, who was staying at the camp, to come and take over, clean the battlefield, and count the battle damage. After a busy night, the troops from his headquarters took a boat back to the camp to rest.
After returning to Baqiu, the soldiers went to eat and sleep first, while Shen Chen had to deal with various affairs.
For example, arranging the next tasks, judging the future direction of Jiangdong Army, and waiting for news from all parties to make arrangements.
"Report, Jiangdong Army did not stop in Jiangxia and returned to Yuzhang."
"Report, General Huang has inventoried the enemy's and our battle losses. Please take a look at them."
"Report, according to the command of the governor, all the corpses of our soldiers have been collected and buried on the spot, while the corpses of the enemy soldiers have been burned."
"Report, we interrogated some prisoners of war, and an officer of the Jiangdong Army said that Zhou Yu is dead."
"Zhou Yu is dead?"
On the second day after the war, Jiangdong's army had withdrawn to Yuzhang, Huang Zhong also cleaned up the battlefield, and various information was gathered to Shen Chen.
The last news surprised him very much. Sitting in the general's tent, he was astonished.
"Yes."
The scout replied: "The Jiangdong Army officer said that when he learned that we had raided the river bank, Zhou Yu suddenly vomited blood. Before he died, he whispered a few words to Lu Meng and planned to escape, but he himself died suddenly."
"How did he die?"
"I heard that it was because I suffered floods in the battle of Yixian in the early years. I kept coughing every year and my health has not been getting better. This time it must be caused by anger."
"As expected, I understand. Go down and rest."
Shen Chen waved his hand. Zhou Yu's death was indeed deeply related to him. In the battle of Yixian a few years ago, he had water in his lungs and had not received effective treatment. He has been in a weak state. This time, it was a recurrence of the old disease. He died suddenly.
However, after Zhou Yu's death, Shen Chen didn't feel any joy in his heart. He just sighed a little. A generation of talents emerged from the country, and Zhou Yu was so high-spirited in history that his oars and oars disappeared into ashes while talking and laughing.
But now that he has met himself, he can only hate Baqiu in the end. Just like him in history, he died of illness on this land.
"Congratulations to the Commander-in-Chief, congratulations to the Commander-in-Chief."
Zhang Nanqu dared to wait for the generals on his left and right and said with great joy: "Zhou Yu is our strong enemy. Once this person is eliminated, there will no longer be an opponent in Jiangdong who can be our enemy."
Shen Chen said in a deep voice: "I still admire Zhou Yu's character very much. His death is indeed a good thing for us, but respecting our opponents is also respecting ourselves, just like we should treat Huang Gai's body well. , don’t be so happy, just treat it with a normal heart.”
"yes."
Zhang Nanqu dared to look at each other and nodded hurriedly.
Shen Chen added: "Although we defeated the Jiangdong Army in this battle, our losses were also very heavy. We ordered the three armies to rest for two days, and then the navy went north along the Mian River to Xiangyang to support Ambassador Liu, and then told General Han Sheng, Let him stay in Baqiu to prevent Jiangdong from coming back."
"only!"
All the officers and men obeyed the order.
At present, Jiangxia Navy was resting in Baqiu and preparing to go north.
Taking advantage of this time, Shen Chen still exerted his subjective initiative and conducted self-analysis and self-criticism every time the war ended.
This is a habit he has had for many years of fighting. He has started to reflect and deduce it every day since he was eight years old in Xuzhou.
After so many years, it can be regarded as one step at a time. From the beginning, he was just an ordinary farm boy who knew the historical process, and now he has grown up to be a well-read poetry and book, a brave warrior, a resourceful man, and a wise and brave general who leads troops in war.
Shen Chen believes that the reason why he can win this battle is not because of how good his strategy is, but because he is familiar with history and can achieve success with God's help.
Stationing troops at Baqiu and forcing Zhou Yu to station troops at Hongkou was the next best thing. In fact, even those who did not take advantage of the southeast wind would do this.
Because in the entire Dongting Lake area, Baqiu was the only strategically important place. Later, Sun Quan and Zhou Yu built a city here, which also proved this.
Therefore, the subjective factor for winning was actually that he knew that there would be a southeasterly wind and made arrangements in advance.
Zhou Yu lost because of his poor skills.
In fact, Zhou Yu did much better than Cao Cao. He was not sure whether Shen Chen would attack at night, but he planned every step, including setting up ambushes, preparing for fire prevention, and deducing how their scouts would find the enemy, and then the enemy would kill them. The boat speed at Benhongkou has been perfected as expected.
The only thing he failed to calculate was that he underestimated the weather and Shen Chen's manpower. The southeast wind was sometimes strong and sometimes weak. As a Jiangdong native, Zhou Yu knew very well that the southeast wind in spring is usually relatively light, while the southeast wind in summer is the strongest.
Therefore, he never expected that after returning to spring early, an extremely strong southeast wind suddenly blew, coupled with the appearance of the ship, which caused him to miscalculate the speed of the Jiangxia Navy, making it too late for all defensive measures to make up for it. .
To put it simply, with God's help, Shen Chen launched a blitzkrieg, catching Zhou Yu off guard.
But even so, Zhou Yu did not lose too badly.
Because strictly speaking, this battle should be a lose-lose battle. Even if the Jiangdong Navy suffered heavy losses, the Jiangxia Navy did not take much advantage.
Both sides invested 50,000 troops in the Jiangdong Navy, about 30,000 in the Jiangxia Navy, and 40,000 in addition to Huang Zhong later.
In the Battle of Hukou, the Jiangxia Navy had a small victory. Later, the scouts from both sides fought, and the Jiangdong Navy had the upper hand.
Immediately afterwards, Zhou Yu launched several battles to attack the north bank. If Huang Zhong's reinforcements had not arrived in time, Jiangxia Navy was almost wiped out.
Therefore, except for the initial Battle of Hukou, Jiangdong Navy suppressed Jiangxia Navy at other times. In terms of battle losses, both sides lost almost thousands of troops.
Shen Chen killed and wounded about 4,000 people, and Zhou Yu killed and wounded about 6,000 people.
It seems that Zhou Yu suffered more losses, but don't forget that Shen Chen's side occupies a favorable terrain. Zhou Yu is the one who takes the initiative to attack. Such losses are acceptable to Zhou Yu, and he almost won the battle.
Therefore, even though he used iron ropes and boats to resist the Jiangdong Army's attack at Hukou at the beginning and achieved a small victory, Shen Chen did not win completely. Instead, Zhou Yu found a flaw and was almost defeated.
In the end, Shen Chen relied on God to complete the comeback. Even in the Battle of Hongkou, Zhou Yu made clever calculations and allowed most of the Jiangdong navy to escape successfully. Fifty thousand people returned with about 30,000 troops. After the whole battle, he only had The loss was less than 20,000.
On the other hand, during the Battle of Hongkou, Shen Chen was worried about the situation in the north and was eager for success. He chose to go ashore to confront Zhou Yu, so he was ambushed and lost many men.
This shows how powerful Zhou Yu is.
According to post-war statistics, Shen Chen suffered more than 9,000 casualties and Zhou Yu suffered about 20,000 casualties in terms of troop losses. Therefore, this battle can only be said to be a small victory, not a big victory. It only defeated Jiangdong. Destroyed, but not completely annihilated.
But even so, Zhou Yu died of illness, and 20,000 Jiangdong elites died in battle. For Sun Quan, his vitality was severely damaged, and he almost no longer had the ability to expand outward.
Therefore, in a strategic sense, the results obtained from this battle have been very great.
"Zhou Yu is indeed Zhou Yu. In that desperate situation, he was able to calmly plan for me to let most of Jiangdong's army flee back. Otherwise, General Huang would have burned their food and grass, and I would immediately return to the ship. , they will definitely be annihilated."
"Fortunately, we won this battle. We used the southeast wind and the ship to successfully destroy Jiangdong. Jiangdong's vitality is seriously injured, and it is difficult to hold me back. Next, as long as we repel Cao Cao and use Jingzhou's foundation, we can sweep across In the south, first look at the situation to determine whether it is Bashu or Jiangdong, then reorganize the troops and go north to regain the world, and then we can create a new era."
Shen Chen's eyes were firm. He firmly believed that what he did was right. Even though Zhou Yu and Cao Ren were once the proud men of this era and left a heavy mark on the history books, only he could lead the development of the era. , because in his mind, he has the direction that points the empire forward.
During the era of the Han Empire, the entire world was in a barbaric era. Chinese civilization had already been at the forefront of world civilization. If we could unify the country, leave behind its industrialized knowledge, and change the existing system of oppression, let the Han be the first to take root. If we live in this vast and undeveloped world, the people of the Han Dynasty will live a better life in the future.
At least if the first industrial revolution can be started within three hundred years after his death, in an era when the global population is only two to three hundred million, there will be countless unexplored ores, resources, oil, and natural gas waiting to be exploited. , continuously feed the Han people, then a global empire will be born in five or six hundred years.
This is more than a thousand years earlier than the new era of later generations!
So Shen Chen never felt that there was anything wrong with him killing the proud men of these eras. History is history, and today is today. For him now, even the protagonists of the Three Kingdoms era, such as Cao Cao, Cao Pi, and Sun Quan, are nothing but obstacles to his progress. It's just a roadblock.
"Cao Cao and Sun Quan were just warlords from the feudal era. Although I am also helping a warlord from the feudal era. But at least in terms of personal morality, his morals are much higher."
"Liu Bei can be trusted, just like he trusted Zhuge Liang unconditionally in history, and Zhuge Liang trusted him unconditionally."
"So no matter how the country's system becomes in the future, whether the feudal monarchy era ends or not, at least we should pay more attention to the people at the bottom and eliminate those exploiters, landlords, wealthy people, and powerful people. I have the same goal with them. .”
"Then if this is the case, let's forge ahead together, create a better era together, and move towards this goal."
Shen Chen stood on the bank of Baqiu River and looked to the south.
Sun Quan.
For my great cause.
Let’s do your first surgery first!
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December 30, the 13th year of Jian'an.
As the New Year approaches, Jiangdong has no trace of joy at this time, but is full of sadness and desolation.
What hangs at the door of every house is not the peach charms that were popular in the Eastern Han Dynasty, but strips of white plain cloth, gently swaying in the southeast wind.
The death of 20,000 soldiers at Baqiu Hongkou means that 20,000 families have lost their backbone. Many mothers have lost their children, wives have lost their husbands, and children have lost their fathers.
The cry spread across the entire Jiangdong, and the wails followed the wind, making countless people on both sides of the lower reaches of the Yangtze River mourn.
Yuzhang County, Chaisang County.
Sun Quan personally supervised the battle, and Zhou Yu personally led the Jiangdong army to attack Jiangxia and take Baqiu directly.
But what Sun Quan was waiting for in Chaisang was not the good news that Zhou Yu had defeated Shen Chen, captured Jiangxia in one fell swoop, and had invaded Jingnan, and then marched north to Nanjun, taking the entire Jingzhou into his hands.
Instead, they waited for Zhou Yu's body and the bad news of the Jiangdong Navy's defeat.
The entire Chaisang County government office was in a state of panic for the past two days. Sun Quan experienced disbelief, then rage, then sadness, and finally almost collapse.
It was not until today that I cheered up with the persuasion of Lu Su and others.
In fact, Lu Su was even sadder.
His relationship with Zhou Yu is just like the relationship between Zhou Yu and Sun Ce. They are not only colleagues, but also best friends.
But now he had to endure the grief of losing his beloved relatives and friends, persuade Sun Quan to be rational, and even had to propose a new strategic plan to him that was extremely painful for him.
"What?"
At the Chaisang County Government Office, Sun Quan, who had barely calmed down, still had tears on his face. He had planned to attend Zhou Yu's funeral, but after hearing Lu Su's words, he could no longer hold back and roared: "That thief Shen Chen killed Gong Jin. Kill my 20,000 elites, 20,000 elites! But you still want me to write a letter to Liu Bei asking for peace. How can there be such a reason in this world? I, Jiangdong, will fight with him, Chen Chen, and Liu Bei until death!"