Fu Youde followed Alon's pointing and looked at the mountains in the distance. After some observation, he said in a deep voice: "There are still twenty miles."
"The general is really amazing." Aaron couldn't help but praise: "Few people can see so accurately."
"It's just basic skills." Fu Youde smiled faintly and asked Aaron: "Is there a place where I can observe from a high position?"
"Yes." Alon nodded quickly and said, "The place where His Highness and the Marquis of Xiping set foot was very good."
"How to go?"
"Go up from the top of the mountain in front and follow the mountain ridge to get there." Alon quickly replied: "It will take about half a day to walk."
"Yes." Fu Youde nodded, and first told his lieutenant Jin Chaoxing: "Marquis Xuande, lead your people to continue moving forward and find a suitable place to camp early today."
"Yes." Jin Chaoxing is an old subordinate of Fu Youde. He was granted the title of marquis following Mu Ying's conquest of the Western Qiang, but it was not the kind of hereditary rule.
Fu Youde then said to a 17 or 18-year-old soldier next to him: "Mu Chun, take a few people with me and take a trail to investigate."
Mu Chun was Mu Ying's eldest son. This was his first time joining the army. When he was eager to try and full of energy, he immediately went to work after hearing this.
~~
Aaron took Fu Youde and his entourage up the mountain, looking for the marks left last time, and walked through the dense forests and mountain ridges for half a day. At dusk, they arrived at the mountain ridge where Zhu Zhen and Mu Ying originally looked at the canyon.
A grand canyon three to four miles wide and forty to fifty feet deep appeared in front of everyone.
Fu Youde saw at a glance the heavily fortified military camp at the entrance of the canyon. Several trenches were dug outside the camp and deer and firewood were installed. It was a well-prepared battle.
Looking up into the distance, I could vaguely see the flat-topped mountain standing abruptly in the canyon, as well as the fortress on the mountain.
"That's Puding Fort." Aaron explained: "That area is also the widest part of the canyon, it must be ten miles wide."
Then he said with a sigh: "My dear, when I left before, there was nothing at the mouth of the canyon. In less than ten days, there is such a big military camp."
Fu Youde ignored him and continued to stare at the canyon. It was just when he was cooking dinner that smoke rose from the canyon. Fu Youde silently counted the smoke until it was so dark that he could no longer see anything. Fang slowly said: "It is nearly three meters from the entrance of the valley.
Ten thousand people. There are still 40,000 people coming to Puding Fort. After excluding the 25,000 people in the fort, there should be more than 10,000 enemy troops."
"More than 40,000 enemy troops?!" Aaron couldn't help but gasped, but he didn't agree in his heart. It seemed that the old general also had some objections, so he corrected him: "But the three troops of Puding, Pu'an and Luoshan combined can't even make it together.
Send out thirty thousand troops."
Fu Youde smiled and did not argue with him. He thought to himself: "The enemy has probably discovered us. A frontal attack will cause too much damage."
"Ah? When did they find out?" Aaron asked in surprise.
"Quiet!" Mu Chun scolded him: "Don't keep interrupting our general's train of thought."
"Oh." Alon winced and quickly covered his mouth. He thought to himself that not everyone seems as easy-going as His Highness and Marquis Xiping.
"It doesn't matter." Fu Youde waved his hand and explained: "Looking at the strict laws and regulations in the Yuan army's camp, you know that their generals are not idiots. As long as they are not idiots, they will never wait around."
"The mountains are high and densely forested. The scouts only need to go to the top of the mountain and keep an eye on the road we must pass. When they see the army, they can send a signal." Mu Chun also answered: "We have such a large army.
Don't try to escape their eyes."
"But eyes can sometimes be deceiving." Fu Youde suddenly said something enigmatic: "If you rely too much on geographical advantages, you will often be deceived by geographical advantages."
Then he asked Alon: "Where did your Highness and the others put the lanterns?"
"In the west, because the west wind was blowing at that time." Aaron pointed to the distance and said: "We walked a long way along the southern cliff until we reached the west of the fort, and then we found a place to put the lantern."
"Go and have a look." Fu Youde said in a deep voice.
"It's already dark, can the general walk on the mountain road?" Aaron asked.
"As long as you can walk, don't worry about me." Fu Youde chuckled, and Muchun said to Alon: "Our general has been in the army all his life, what road has he not walked?"
"Okay, then I will lead the way." Aaron then felt relieved and led the way.
As I was walking, I heard a thud behind me and someone fell to the ground.
"General!" The soldier quickly helped the man up from the ground.
"It doesn't matter, I have a strong body..." Fu Youde's voice trembled as he fell, but his mouth was still very strong.
After saying that, he said with a self-deprecating smile: "Time is not forgiving, my legs and feet are not as good as they used to be."
"It is inevitable to stumble when walking on a mountain road." Muchun quickly smoothed things over and said, "My subordinate also stumbled just now."
"How about we wait till dawn?" Aaron asked again.
"No need." Fu Youde said resolutely: "Soldiers need speed, so we can't waste time."
Aaron was very convinced when he heard this and said that the Ming Dynasty was really different from the Yuan Dynasty. The marquis and even the princes of the Ming Dynasty were all able to endure hardships and were not afraid of death. The noble lords of the Yuan Dynasty were just the opposite. No wonder they lost the world.
~~
Along the way, everyone fell down twice, with bruises and swollen faces, and finally arrived at Puding Fort in the middle of the night.
Fu Youde looked at the torches on the fort shining in the sky, and the camp below the mountain was also brightly lit. He finally breathed a sigh of relief and said to Mu Chun: "Your Highness and your father are fine."
"Yes." Muchun nodded, feeling relieved when he saw that Puding Fort had not been captured yet.
"And in the past few days, the enemy troops should not have attacked the city again." Fu Youde asserted again.
"Ah? Lord Marquis knows all this?" Aaron was almost incredulous.
"Aren't you a hunter? Can't you tell that there is only the smell of corpses in the air and no fresh smell of blood?" Fu Youde said lightly.
"Really?" Aaron sniffed hard and did smell a bit of a stench.
"There must have been a fierce battle a few days ago, but for some reason, there has been no fighting these days." Fu Youde rubbed his swollen wrist while reviewing the battles of the previous few days, trying to get a glimpse of the generals on both sides.
thought.
"You all have a guess, what's going on?" He asked Mu Chun and others again.
"Did we fight for a long time and then stop fighting when we saw that we couldn't defeat it?" Mu Chun guessed.
"Then what are they still doing here?" Fu Youde frowned and said, "And the troops deployed at the mouth of the valley are twice as strong as here. This is clearly a siege but not an attack, and they don't want us to join the people in the fort."
As he spoke, he suddenly took a breath of air and said, "Could it be that they already know that His Highness is in the castle?"
"Where can they go? Unless His Highness takes the initiative to tell them." Aron said casually.
"It's really possible that His Highness took the initiative to reveal it." Fu Youde's eyes lit up and he said, his eyes as bright as morning stars: "The purpose is to delay the enemy and help us create opportunities to annihilate them!"
