From the last moment of lunch to the beginning of dusk in the afternoon, Zang Ba has been on his way.
Wherever the Qingzhou Army went, they watched the wind and descended.
The county magistrates of Qingyuan and Guantao hardly hesitated. When they saw the army outside the city, they opened the city gates and presented their official seals.
There was nothing he could do if he didn't surrender. Firstly, Yuan Shao left no defenders east of Qinghe, and there was almost no defensive force in the city except for some county government officials.
Secondly, Yuan Shao is now unpopular in Jizhou. When the people in the city heard that Liu Shijun's army was coming, they shouted to join him. There was also a military intelligence department lurking among them to stir up public opinion. If the county magistrate did not open the city gate, they would soon be filled with people.
The people of the city were beaten to death.
Therefore, even if there were still officials loyal to the Yuan family, under the general trend, they could only open the city gate and let Zang Ba's Qingzhou army enter the city.
It was forty or fifty kilometers from Jieqiao to Guantao, and we stayed in Qingyuan for an hour. So after we captured Guantao, it was already dark. Zang Ba brought some officers into the city to talk to the county magistrate.
After walking around for a while, we had dinner, rested for a day, and set off again the next day.
Soon, Yuancheng was also taken, followed closely by Wei County. Wei County actually still had some Jizhou Army defenders, but the number was not very large. After two days of siege, under the pressure of the city being destroyed, the defenders finally chose to attack.
The city gates surrendered and prayed for forgiveness.
As a result, most of the territory east of the Qinghe River fell into the hands of the Qingzhou Army. Zang Ba only brought more than 10,000 troops with him, but Huang Zhong and Tai Shici's navy moved north along the Yellow River and reached Fanyang.
Yin'an.
At the same time, the Luoyang army set off in great force, divided into two groups. On the other side was Zhao Yun's tribe, which took Neihuang from Dangyin, occupied Liyang, and joined Huang Zhong, Tai Shici and other troops in the Yin'an area of Fanyang.
The second route was Guan Yu's tribe, who personally led the army north to Anyang, and ordered Xu Huang to cross the river from the upper reaches of Linluguhuan River and advance towards Jiuhou City and Wucheng.
With three routes surrounding Wei County, and Xian Yufu's troops from the north, the entire Jizhou was already in danger.
Under this situation, Yuan Shao also quickly requested assistance from the allies of the Xianbei and Xiutu tribes in the central part. The northern part of Jizhou was like smoke for a while, and the Wuhuan Xianbei Huns tribes were fighting against each other. Coupled with the Han conquest of Youzhou, the Hejian Zhongshan Kingdom Changshan
The country and other places are in flames of war.
When Jizhou was in flames of war, after several days of reconnaissance, the Jizhou cavalry in Guangchuan was also preparing to move in full force. Yuan Jun learned the news that millions of grains of grain had been delivered. In the past two days, Liu Bei had sent soldiers to respond.
The uniformly roaring cavalry went south like a torrent, and the sky gradually darkened. When the circling dusk crows began to return to the forest, the gorgeous fire clouds in the west gradually turned gray, and the world began to fall into darkness.
Guo Tu glanced at the bright silver disk rising in the eastern sky. Although the sun had set, it was not completely dark yet, and the visibility was very far. Standing on a hill, he could see for several miles.
Outside, on the desolate plain, stood a huge camp.
The camp covered thousands of acres of land. Horse-drawn carriages were constantly coming and going from the camp. There were countless sentries around and the security was extremely tight. As night fell, the dome granary rising high in the middle of the camp stood out in the night.
clear and distinct.
When the Han people built granaries, they did not build a large house and then pile grain and grass inside. Instead, they built small cylindrical warehouses made of rammed earth and covered with straw. When pouring grain, they would
Remove the straw from the top of the cylinder and pour it inside. When taking out the grain, take it from the small door on the side of the cylinder.
A granary can store several tons of grain and grass. One million stones of grain and grass are piled up like a mountain, which is 120 million kilograms when converted into kilograms. One kilogram in the Eastern Han Dynasty is about 223 grams, which is almost more than 20,000 tons and nearly 30,000 tons in weight.
There will be four to five thousand warehouses to be built. The entire camp is filled with densely packed granaries.
Guo Tu observed carefully for a long time. He found that the Linxi granary was very large, stretching back and forth for several miles. Although there were many defenders, there was always a breakthrough. If he could take advantage of the cover of night and quickly approach the gate of the west camp, he would be able to escape before the enemy.
Before taking precautions, rush into the granary and throw torches and fuel everywhere.
The granary is inherently a flammable place, and the granary is covered with straw at most. Once it is ignited, the fire will spread quickly. There are no rivers nearby, and it will be too late to draw water from the river. There is a spring breeze today, and the fire will soon take advantage of the wind.
The entire camp will be burned to the ground.
"Supervisory Army."
The cavalry commander Zhao Rui came over and asked: "When will we take action?"
Guo Tu said in a deep voice: "Don't worry, wait until the night is dark and the wind is high."
Zhao Rui asked again: "Where to move?"
"Simon."
"Simon?"
"good."
Guo Tu nodded: "Because the east gate is transporting grain, it has the most guards, so it is difficult to rush in. The west gate faces the boundary bridge, and Liu Bei has already sent troops there. It is the closest, so the defense must be the loosest."
"I see, that's what the supervisor has said."
Zhao Rui raised his thumb. He hadn't read much and didn't know the art of war, so he admired these scholars the most.
Time passed by, the sky became gloomy, and the endless night completely covered the entire world.
In a jungle south of the camp, Zhang Fei and Tian Feng were waiting.
"Damn it, he's been waiting for two days."
Zhang Fei spat on the ground, scratched his hairy arms that were covered with mosquito bites, and complained: "Commander, how long do you have to wait?"
Tian Feng put his left hand behind his back, and touched the three-inch long goat's beard with his right hand. He kept an unchanged expression on his thin cheeks and said calmly: "Don't be anxious, Yide, you won't achieve great things if you are too impatient."
"The military advisor puts it lightly. My soldiers and I have been feeding on mosquitoes for two days. If we don't take action, we will all be bitten to death by mosquitoes."
Zhang Fei smiled broadly, but felt MMP in his heart.
If an ordinary soldier had spoken to him like this, he would have been whipped long ago. However, Tian Feng was a scholar-official, and Zhang Fei respected scholar-officials the most, so there was nothing he could say.
"No rush, no rush."
Tian Feng said slowly: "If my prediction is correct, the enemy will take action today or tomorrow. Ming Gong's army will arrive the next day. Once the food and grass are taken over by Ming Gong's army, they will never have a chance again."
, so it’s only two days at most.”
"That's good, that's good."
Zhang Fei reluctantly calmed down his impatient heart. Although he was itching unbearably, he couldn't drink wine, he couldn't beat the soldiers, and he couldn't scold Tian Feng. He couldn't bear it, but now he had no choice but to find a big tree with a Zhangba snake spear.
Just poking there and passing the time out of boredom.
Just as I was getting bored waiting, the sound of thundering horse hooves suddenly came from the distance. A sharp whistle sounded from the east gate of the camp. A long roar of "enemy attack" pierced the night sky, breaking the silent night and making people feel sad.
Suddenly woke up.
Zhang Fei was refreshed, and hurriedly touched his horse Wuyun Zhuixue, muttering: "Come on, come on, brothers are ready to mount and fight, today I want to kill a lot."
"Yide is not busy!"
Tian Feng quickly stopped him.
Zhang Fei was about to climb on his horse at this time. Thousands of cavalry hidden in the jungle behind him got the order and got on their horses one after another. Their movements were not neat and scattered, and there was no unified order.
Thousands of people are not a small number, and the trees are covering them up. Everyone is divided into small teams and hid in the woods. Orders need to be conveyed and shouted constantly before they can go down. The people at the front get on their horses, and the people at the back don't even know what's ahead.
Already preparing for battle.
As soon as Tian Feng stopped him, Zhang Fei couldn't get on his horse. He turned back to Tian Feng and asked, "Commander, what's the matter? The enemies are coming, why aren't you in a hurry?"
Tian Feng patted his arm to signal Zhang Fei to calm down, and said: "Yide has lived in the land of Youyan for a long time, so he is very familiar with horses."
"Of course."
Zhang Fei said proudly: "My family is rich and powerful in Zhuo County, and there is no shortage of money. My father bought me a pony when I was a child. I have been riding on horseback since I was a child, and my riding skills are extremely superb."
Once upon a time, the four brothers Liu, Guan, Zhang, and Chen were racing horses. Liu Bei was first, Zhang Fei was second, Guan Yu was third, and Chen Mu was fourth.
In fact, among the four brothers, Guan Yu had the worst riding skills, but Chen Mu had a higher emotional intelligence and gave way to Guan Yu in that competition, so that his second brother did not make a fool of himself.
It's normal for Liu Bei to take first place. He was a knight-errant in his early years. He followed Su Shuang and Zhang Shiping in the horse-trading business, and also dealt with ethnic minorities in the border areas. He has the ability to ride a horse and can ride with his legs without stirrups.
The horse's belly, then bend the bow and set the arrow.
Zhang Fei was able to take second place because he was born in Youyan Border Pass, and his family was wealthy and had no shortage of horses. He grew up on horses. Although he was not like Liu Bei who had accumulated superb equestrian skills due to his years of travelling, he
It is also much better than Chen Mu and Guan Yu, whose family is too poor to buy a horse and is not from a border family.
That's why when Tian Feng asked Zhang Fei if he knew enough about horses, he seemed so confident.
In addition, it is worth mentioning that the reason why Chen Mu is better at riding than Guan Yu is because he cherishes his life too much. So after he got a horse, he trained hard every day. Even when he later went to Luoyang, he still rode horses in the countryside all the time, maintaining
Excellent riding skills are just to avoid being caught up when you run for your life in the future...
"Since Yide is very familiar with horses, how many horses does Yide think are there in the movement outside?"
Tian Feng asked a soul torture.
"How many horses?"
Zhang Fei was stunned for a moment, then his face immediately became serious, and he pricked up his ears to listen.
I could hear the thunder of iron hooves outside the granary, but the momentum didn't feel that strong, and it was nowhere close to the spectacular sight of thousands of horses galloping together.
Tian Feng muttered: "I believe you have heard it. I don't know much about horses, but because I have worked with Yide for many years, I have often seen seven or eight thousand of our cavalry dispatched together. The mountains collapsed and the ground collapsed.
This feeling has stuck in my mind. Although Yuan’s army’s cavalry was completely wiped out and the number of cavalry that was rebuilt was far less than ours, it would never be that small. There must be a scam here.”
"Thinking about it this way, it doesn't look like there are many horses. It feels like there are only a thousand or even hundreds of horses."
Zhang Fei nodded. He was dazed by the battle before. After calming down, combined with Tian Feng's analysis and his own expertise, he quickly judged the number of enemy cavalry.
The noise caused by five thousand horses and four thousand horses galloping may not be much different, but the noise caused by four thousand horses and several hundred horses are absolutely different.
Guo Tu did not send out all the cavalry. To be on the safe side, he decided to send out 800 cavalry to pretend to attack the east gate. After attracting the enemy's attention, the main force broke in through the west gate, set fire everywhere, and finally exited through the north or south gate.
It can also be regarded as a typical strategy of seducing the east and attacking the west.
This strategy was not initiated by Xun You. As early as the Western Han Dynasty, it was recorded in the military book "Huainanzi: Military Training" written by Liu An, the king of Huainan. Although Liu An was unable to rebel, there was still something in the military book. This strategy was later adopted
Many people still use it.
After realizing that the enemy might use a trick to attack the east gate, Tian Feng immediately stopped Zhang Fei's recklessness. Now he was sure that the enemy was only harassing the east gate with a small number of cavalry, so he said: "I guess the enemy must be just feigning an attack on the east gate.
The main force must be at the west gate. Wing De is calm and patient, and we can just wait at the south gate."
"Let them go into Linxi Warehouse?"
Zhang Fei was puzzled.
Even if we guess that the enemy's main attack point is at the west gate, shouldn't we go to the west gate to intercept it?
Tian Feng shook his head: "What we are going to fight is a battle of annihilation. If we don't let them in, the Jizhou cavalry will come and go like the wind on the plains. It will be too difficult to intercept them. We must trap them in the warehouse."
"But food..."
Zhang Fei's eyes widened and he trapped the enemy in the warehouse. Wasn't that inviting the wolf into the house?
However, Tian Feng laughed and said: "Yide doesn't think that there are really millions of stones of grain and grass in this, right? This is Zi Gui's Li Dai Tao Zang plan. The grain and grass are all filled with straw and some stones that are easy to ignite.
Just let them burn it."
Zhang Fei was shocked and said: "But I heard that the front line is already short of food. If we don't transport food and grass, where is the big brother?"
"shell mound!"
Tian Feng spat out two words: "Yide, don't forget that Zigui has devised the trick of three cunning rabbit holes. Ganling's grain reserves are only one-third, and some of the grain and grass are in the shell hills, Dongzhao and Xiabao.
The villages such as Jianzhong and Linxi are actually empty shells, just used as bait to wipe out Yuan Shao's cavalry."
Zhang Fei felt enlightened and suddenly felt refreshed. He laughed loudly and said: "As expected of my fourth brother, this strategy is really vicious. As long as Yuan Jun's cavalry is completely destroyed, then our cavalry can control them at will."
the hinterland.”
"Exactly."
Tian Feng nodded: "With the saddle, the importance of cavalry has gradually increased. In the future, it will become a battlefield for cavalry. Yuan Jun's cavalry was wiped out, and now Luoyang has also formed cavalry, with tens of thousands of cavalry.
Stand across Yuan Shao's hinterland and attack his food routes. If you want to win this battle, you have to gain three points!"
While the two were talking, the earth-shattering sound of horse hooves was indeed heard from the west gate of the Linxi camp again. This time the sound was many times greater than the last time, as if the earth was shattering the mountains and avalanches were coming towards the camp in a mighty manner.
The number of guards at the west gate was not large to begin with. Faced with this situation, they had no intention of defending and started to disperse.
The Jizhou cavalry suddenly entered the camp as if they were in a deserted area.