Xu Rong was not idle at this time. He had already sent people to Yiyang and other places to convey orders to the county soldiers stationed on the eastern defense line to go south. At the same time, he ordered that this time Chen Mu's clues must be caught, and at least light cavalry should be sent.

Scout, hang behind him first to find his trace.

The last time Hua Xiong actually almost caught up with Chen Mu, and as long as he kept up with his troops, sent light cavalry in turns to follow, followed by the large troops, and sent messages from time to time, Xu Rong would definitely be able to formulate a complete encirclement.

It's a pity that Hua Xiong did not complete the task.

When analyzing afterwards, Xu Rong found that Chen Mu had already calculated everything to death, including the mountainous terrain, the time of Hua Xiong's arrival, the comparison of the combat power between the enemy and ourselves, etc.

Chen Mu seemed to know where Hua Xiong was and how long their cavalry had been running, so he deliberately chose a place to ambush.

If it weren't for Hua Xiong and the others who had been running around all morning and only rested for a short time in the middle, then Hua Xiong would not have fled even if he was defeated. Instead, he would have chosen to hang up with Qingqi to achieve the purpose of entangling Chen Mu.

.

If they were not ambushed in the mountainous area, Hua Xiong and the others would have a wider range of movement. They could select war horses with sustained horsepower and act as scouts to follow them.

If Hua Xiong had arrived a little later or had rested for an hour or two more, the result would have changed and developed in another direction.

But there are no what-ifs in this world. Hua Xiong underestimated the enemy and rushed forward, only to be repelled by Chen Mu. There was nothing he could do.

After all, Xu Rong also understood the battlefield situation.

What we need to do now is how to remedy it.

Let's see if we can find Chen Mu again, and then formulate a new encirclement. They didn't even find the enemy. They were defeated so completely in the first confrontation. Xu Rong felt a little unwilling.

"Where will he go next?"

Xu Rong was riding on his horse, urging the soldiers to go to Handan, thinking in his mind.

Chen Mu seems to be good at using strange weapons.

Now I don't even understand his strategic intentions. Xu Rong doesn't know whether he will choose to go north or east.

But one thing is for sure, some new news will come soon.

Here Xu Rong is marching rapidly, and over there Yi Yang and other defenders on the eastern front also received orders early and began to rush towards Feixiang.

In fact, when they arrived at Feixiang, they were almost at the same time. They arrived not long after Chen Mu left.

Because Xu Rong and Hua Xiong marched all night last night, they had to rest. No matter how fierce the Xiliang army was, it was impossible for them to march for another day without rest for 24 hours.

You must know that Wu'an is more than 70 kilometers away from Feixiang. At normal marching speed, it takes one day.

If Xu Rong dared to order the march, the army would mutiny immediately.

The defenders on the eastern front were stationed in the city and had rested last night.

Therefore, this morning, Xu Rong asked an officer from the Wu'an County Government to bring his order, telling the defenders in the direction of Yiyang to set off immediately and rush to Feixiang to intercept Chen Mu.

As mentioned before, Feixiang Yiyang Quliang scolded Zhang Lieren and other counties that were very close to each other. Lu Zhi used chariots to transport troops and was able to capture these counties overnight.

Although the distance between Yiyang and Feixiang is the farthest, one is in the northeast of Handan and the other is in the southeast of Handan, which is more than 60 kilometers away.

But at this distance, if Yiyang's defenders marched lightly and quickly, they could arrive within four hours and complete the siege of Chen Mu's army, who was sleeping soundly and without any defense.

Unfortunately, Chen Mu was clever and calculated not only the distance from Yiyang to Feixiang and the marching speed, but also the speed at which Xu Rong received information about him in Feixiang and the speed at which orders were sent from Wu'an to Yiyang.

After all, there were no radio stations or telephones in this era. To transmit information, we relied entirely on the officials in each county.

For example, Taishi Ci once held the official position of serving as an official to Cao Cao, responsible for delivering information and documents. However, even though Taishi Ci was incredibly powerful, he could not transmit information instantly. He still had to rely on horses, which was inferior to radio stations and telephones.

Precisely because he suffered from the loss of information transmission, Xu Rong could not guess where Chen Mu was. However, Chen Mu could use various deceptions, deceptions, etc. to confuse Xu Rong.

He doesn't need to know where Xu Rong is, he just needs to show up.

Just like the saying, "Wherever the person is buried, the trouble will occur. Wherever the trouble occurs, Huang Silang will follow." It is the same truth.

certainly.

Some people may ask, since the information was obtained from Xu Rong, the order was issued, and the garrison in Yiyang, Handan and other places received the order, it would take a long time to arrive.

So if the Feixiang County Magistrate reported directly to the Handan garrison, wouldn't the Handan garrison be able to send troops immediately?

In fact, Feixiang Ling did exactly this.

But the Handan garrison didn't come.

As mentioned before, the elite county soldiers from various places in Jizhou have been transferred to Bingzhou by Zhu Jun. The current county soldiers are temporarily recruited.

The Han people were obliged to serve as corvees. Even if they served as soldiers for two years, the county guards could still recruit them after they retired. Like Chen Mu's father, he was recruited to fight at the border.

Therefore, these county soldiers are now within the scope of corvee service. Most of them are over 30 years old and have limited combat capabilities. They cannot fight with the regular army at all.

Are these county generals in charge of the eastern defense line not fools, bringing a group of old and frail infantry and heavy cavalry into a head-on confrontation?

That is no different than courting death.

Therefore, even if the defenders of the Guangnian Xiang Kingdom in Handan, Yiyang knew that Chen Mu had appeared in Feixiang, they did not send troops at all on the grounds that General Zhonglang sent by the imperial court ordered them to defend the county.

It was not until Xu Rong's military order was issued that they reluctantly came over.

Nowadays, the real strength in Jizhou are those powerful ones.

The soldiers and horses of the Jizhou rebels were still intact, but now they have been withdrawn to Jizhou and taken back by many powerful people.

If these powerful people also start to join in the encirclement and suppression of Chen Mu, it will be a big trouble.

The problem is that the powerful people raised armies before to oppose the tax collection by Emperor Xiaokang of the Han Dynasty and to protect their own interests.

This chapter is not finished yet, please click on the next page to continue reading the exciting content! Now let them attack Chen Mu, there is no profit, why should they listen to Dong Zhuo?

So the current situation is.

Xu Rong, who had the strength to fight, could not catch up, Jizhou County soldiers who could catch up could not fight, and the local tycoons who could fight did not want to fight.

Therefore, although Chen Mu seemed to be surrounded by the imperial court and besieged on all sides, he was actually very stable.

But this time, the message Chen Mu left behind was to go east.

So according to the time calculation, Xu Rong must have received the information near the evening.

When Xu Rong rushed over, it was probably already midnight.

And this time is enough for Chen Mu to move.

In Yuangu Township, more than ten miles southeast of Feixiang County, Chen Mu entered Wei County with great swagger, as if he was going to conquer the hills and then go to the pottery museum.

Behind him, more than 8,000 soldiers from Yiyang and Handan counties combined followed slowly.

The geographical location of ancient Feixiang and later Feixiang was different. Later Feixiang was located at the intersection of ancient Fu River and ancient Zhang River, while ancient Feixiang was located between the two rivers, almost in what would become Cheng'an County, about three miles away from Handan.

Ten kilometers distance.

It is thirty kilometers from Yiyang to Handan, and thirty kilometers from Handan to Feixiang.

If you look at a map, you will find that the four counties of Wu'an - Yiyang - Feixiang - Linshui form a diagonal square.

In the middle of the square is Handan.

It is basically about 30 kilometers from Handan to any one of these four counties. However, the distance between other counties is almost 60 kilometers.

Hua Xiong's previous pursuit of Chen Mu started from Linshui, was ambushed in the direction of Wu'an, and then retreated to Handan.

Chen Mu, on the other hand, took the direction of Yiyang, but instead of going north, he temporarily went south to Feixiang.

Xu Rong followed Chen Mu to Wu'an.

The two of them were in completely opposite directions, perfectly staggered.

This is a time difference and a space difference. At the same time, it also means that Chen Mu is very close to the local garrison and far away from Xu Rong.

Although there is another Hua Xiong in Handan, Hua Xiong's team has just finished resting. Even if the Qingqi sets off and is thirty kilometers away, even the galloping horses will take close to an hour and cannot catch up so quickly.

Towards evening, around six o'clock in the afternoon, Chen Mu arrived at the north bank of Zhangshui. Since there was no bridge, he seemed unable to cross the river.

The county soldiers and scouts who followed him were surprised to find that their large army entered a forest on the north bank.

This was good about the Han Dynasty. Many ancient rivers had not yet dissipated. Both sides of the river were densely covered with vegetation and forests. There was almost no so-called soil erosion. The greening and natural environment were a hundred times better than those of later generations.

After all, in an era when you can encounter jackals, tigers and leopards on any hilltop outside the city, and even wild rhinos and elephants in the Yellow River Basin, compared with the modern era where high-rise buildings and roads are everywhere and cars are everywhere in later generations, compared with the primitive society

There is no difference.

Seeing that the sky was getting darker and darker, the pursuers hesitated to move forward. Some scouts who were greedy for the reward offered by the court wanted to continue to follow, but they saw more than a dozen light cavalry emerging from the forest. The leader was the world-famous Zhang Fei and Zhang Yide.

The gun immediately stared at them.

Unfortunately, these scouts had no choice but to stay a hundred or two hundred meters away. At the same time, they sent people back to report the news to the large forces in the rear. They did not dare to come near at all.

A large army of soldiers from two places arrived and saw Zhang Fei standing in front of the woods with more than ten horsemen from a distance. The county generals leading the team looked at each other and wanted to send troops but did not dare. What if someone ambushed them in the woods?

Although the woods are not conducive to cavalry running, there is a flat land on the river bank in front of the woods. As long as the heavy cavalry rushes out, there is no problem in killing them without leaving any armor behind.

For a while, both sides were in a stalemate, and the sky became darker and darker. When it got dark, Zhang Fei and his men turned around and went into the woods and disappeared.

It was only at this time that Hua Xiong finally arrived at the north bank of Zhangshui River and met with the generals from the two counties.

"Where are the people?"

Hua Xiong was eager to get rid of his crime and make meritorious service. After coming over, he immediately asked the county general anxiously.

General Yiyang County said: "I entered the forest but didn't come out."
To be continued...