Chapter 892: No Escape
On February 20, the fourth year of Taiwu, Li Hu fell into Pei County.
In this battle, the Taishan military formation killed the enemy general Jiang Qin and his 16 subordinate Ya generals, 232 Ya soldiers, killed 1,250 officials and captured 4,300 people.
With the great victory in Peixian County, the Taishan Army took the lead in taking the gate of Pengcheng before the decisive battle. The situation tilted towards the side that helped the Taishan Army.
While this is detrimental to Chen Deng in Pengcheng, it also makes Cao Cao in Qingzhou's options smaller and smaller.
For him, as the Taishan Army concentrated its forces to the north of Xuzhou, the opportunity arose for Cao Cao to complete his strategy of sniping from the north and annihilating the south.
So, relying on the intelligence from the military school officials, Cao Cao had a clearer understanding of the situation on the Qingxu battlefield, so he began to take action.
……
Wenshui River has always been nourishing the southeastern part of Qilu.
Its source is connected to Jishui, and its end is connected to the sea, which ensures its abundant water and makes it endless.
Since ancient times, Wenshui has been the lifeline of communication in the Qilu area. Dongyi Ernian, who lives in this area, relies on Wenshui to connect with the outside world.
Chunyu is a small city located on the edge of Wenshui River in Beihai. This place was originally the capital of the state. Later, the country was destroyed in Qi, and its clan settled in Chunyu City. Later, the clan became the Chunyu clan.
To this day, the Chunyu family is a prominent family in Beihai, Qi State, and it can be said that it has been a prestigious family for thousands of years.
Chunyucheng can be regarded as a small commercial city. The fish salt from Donglai can be sent to the Central Plains faster from here. But in general, this is an ordinary small city. There are no cities even within dozens of miles, only large areas of desolation.
Today, this cookie-cutter waterfront town is filled with a certain sadness.
Before the sun set over the Fuyan Mountain, a soft ray of light suddenly jumped into the painting, giving this monotonous black and white painting a sudden burst of color and vitality.
The gentle rays of sunlight coated everything with golden color, and turned the clear Wenshui into ginger yellow.
But in the blink of an eye, the sun set over Fuyan Mountain, the sky and the earth suddenly faded from color, and the rays of light floating on the city slowly dissipated, slowly, until everything darkened, it was a feeling of losing all the blood The sculptures are withered and lifeless.
On this day, an army consisting of a large number of horses, mules, and carts entered Chunyu City.
They were Cao Cao's troops who had withdrawn from Gaomi.
In the original plan, Cao Cao planned to dispatch Guan Yu's army by withdrawing to Linzi, but who knew that the enemy army never showed up during the whole process.
At the same time, he received an urgent military report from Xun Yu in Linzi.
Only then did he learn that the entire Jishui defense line had collapsed. Tens of thousands of troops had now withdrawn to Linzi and were now surrounded by the Taishan Army.
Cao Cao did not tell the whole army about this situation, but digested it silently. He knew that he could not be impatient or panic, and he must be calmer at this time.
After thinking calmly, Cao Cao saw the good side of the unfavorable situation.
Although the Jishui defense line was broken, Cao Ren had already taken over the original Xia Houyuan's troops at that time, so at least 20,000 elite troops successfully evacuated to Linzi City, which greatly enhanced the latter's defensive strength.
The second person responsible for guarding Linzi is Xun Yu. Cao Cao had enough trust in Xun Yu, and trusting him was the same as trusting himself.
Xun Yu also expressed his confidence in guarding Linzi, saying in the military report that Cao Cao should not worry about the war situation in his heart, and let him continue fighting in Beihai.
As Cao Cao said, if he fights better outside at this moment, Linzi City will be safer.
Finally, there is the situation of Guan Yu's tribe. His thinking along the way actually gave him a way, and it is being implemented. Now that he has arrived in Chunyu City, he is just waiting.
Waiting for when Guan Yu makes a mistake.
……
In the Langya Mountains, two hundred miles southwest of Chunyu.
At that time, General Jianwei of the Han Dynasty led the two counties of Langya and Donghai. Xuzhou General Zang Ba, who had the power to initiate war in the east, was marching with an army of 20,000.
Previously, he received a military order from Chen Deng, asking him to cooperate with Cao Cao in the north to intercept Guan Yu's troops who appeared in the Beihai area.
Zang Ba secretly despised this military order, because it was true that he had a grudge against Taishan's army, but he also had many blood feuds with Cao's army.
Back then, Cao Cao went south from Beihai along Juxian County. At that time, Zang Ba's army's old camp was located in Juxian County. Many members of his clan died under Cao's army's weapons.
In fact, not only Zang Ba was unhappy, but also the officials in the army did not understand the thoughts of their superiors.
Before, the superiors kept shouting to expel the Cao thieves and restore Xuzhou, but now they are turning around and the Qingxu family is kissing? Just because you, Chen Deng, married a daughter of the Cao family?
So when Zang Ba was lingering around the Langya River Valley, the whole army agreed.
Save Cao Cao? Save the shit!
At first, Zang Ba was worried that his intransigence was too obvious and would be difficult to explain to Chen Deng.
Zang Ba and Chen Deng have known each other since they were young, and their friendship was the result of a bloody battle together. Zang Ba doesn’t want to ruin their relationship because of this.
But now, he got information that a group of remnants of the former Taishan Army were entrenched in Langya Mountain, and he could just go and exterminate this group of people.
This is also painful. The Langya Mountains were once his old camp of Zang Ba, and their group even had the name Langya Bandits.
But later, Guan Yu of the Taishan Army continued to penetrate into Langya Mountain, and finally most of the people in the mountain began to have the surname "Tai".
Now that he came back, he happened to kill these people along the way, and he was also ashamed of himself.
……
Langya Mountains have always been the home of bandits and gangsters.
Unlike many people who think that they are the ventilators of violence, most Langya people actually live a very difficult life.
The most fertile land in Langya County is the river valley near Mushui, but these have long been occupied by powerful and powerful families. Those Guizhou leaders who can't survive can only go into the mountains to become thieves.
Actually, being a thief is just trying to survive in the mountains.
After all, the poor have already entered the mountain. How can they steal from those powerful people at the foot of the mountain?
The resources in the mountains are very poor, and most of the Langya Mountains are starved of food, and they have to be exploited by the powerful people in the mountains.
Yes, the power here is the heroes who had Zang Ba and his son as the core.
Of course, these people would not be able to provide enough food and clothing by themselves. All food and drink expenses would be taken from the people in the mountains.
So, during the period of Zang Ba and his son, the people of Langya Mountain deeply hated these "Langya thieves".
It wasn't until the Taishan Army sent a group of people into the mountains that these people began to "awaken" and became angry.
This group of people is centered on four people, namely Yang Mu, Ge Gong, Ma Jian and Ruan Zhong.
It can be said that these four people were Langya bandits back then, but they were captured when they went out of the mountain and entered Yimeng Mountain to fight with the Taishan Army.
It was in that battle that the proud and arrogant Zang Ba suffered the worst defeat in his life.
Although the four of them are also Langya bandits, they are locals of Langya Mountain. They are different from outsiders like Zang Ba. They have feelings for the people here. The four people saw a lot in the Taishan Army and learned a lot. They watched the changes in the people of Mount Tai and saw that their lives were getting better day by day. They also wanted to return to Langya and lead their elders to a better life.
Later, before going out to fight in the mountains, Zhang Chong decided to send out capable personnel to develop various base areas. Four of them, Yang Mu, were sent to the Langya Mountain area.
Among these four people, the most soulful person is Yang Mu.
He was born in a shack in Lianhua Mountain, and his family was poor. Although many villagers said that their family was once a wealthy family at the foot of the mountain, and they came to the mountain to avoid vendetta.
But this cannot change Yang Mu's humble status. There is no way to support a child in the mountains to grow up. Everyone needs to go to the mountains to survive when he grows up.
Relying on his brains and bravery, Yang Mu gradually grew into a small leader, with dozens of people in his team. Although he was not ranked high in the mountains, he was able to have enough food and clothing.
But everything changed when they came out to attack Taishan's army.
After being captured by the Taishan Army, Yang Mu truly broadened his horizons and deeply identified with the "Taiping Jing" and the ideal of the Huangtian Era.
After Yang Mu and the others returned to Langya Mountain, their power developed rapidly due to the support of the Taishan Army and their claims against the poor mountain people.
Several teams and five or six camps were established in the Wulian Mountain area.
Later, Guan Yu took command of Mount Tai and attacked Zang Ba, forcing Zang Ba to go south to Xuzhou. The base area around Wulian Mountain grew stronger.
It was during this period that Xu Sheng, Xu Miao and others discovered and grew up.
But after its peak, as Guan Yu shrank his peripheral troops, the base area of Wulian Mountain inevitably declined.
The Zang Ba Langya thieves who had been expelled also came back at this time, and Yang Mu and the others also suffered a huge defeat.
Among the four core members, Ge Gong died first.
He was surrounded by Langya thieves on the peak when he was retreating. In the end, he jumped off the peak unyieldingly and died.
Then there are Ma Jian and Ruan Zhong.
When the two were rescuing the Shanliao in the mountains, they were ambushed by Langya thieves. Ma Jian was shot to death on the spot, and Ruan Zhong was killed directly after being captured.
In this way, Yang Mu was left among the four, and he was still fighting.
And this time, he wants revenge.
......
After learning about Yang Mu's final hiding place, Zang Ba sent Wu Dun to wipe out the remnants of the Taishan Army.
Wu Dun took two thousand people from Zang Ba as his own soldiers, and then went to Langya Mountain to gather troops.
His method of gathering troops was very simple and crude. He surrounded all the settlements he saw, forced the men to join the army, and all the women rushed into the rear camp.
In a short period of time, Wu Dun gathered an army of more than 5,000 people.
Of course, the strength of such an army must be worrying, but Wu Dun doesn't care about this. Even if his soldiers use ropes to torture the soldiers accompanying him, anyway, as long as he plunders manpower ruthlessly, the Taishan Army will It will be less.
At the same time, Yang Mu, who was occupying the Lianhua Mountain area, was also working hard. The previous exposure of their old camp was caused by Yang Mu deliberately.
Because after more than a year, he once again got in touch with the main force of the Taishan Army.
Guan Yu's troops went deep into Langya Mountain and successfully found them, and brought supplies and equipment to Yang Mu and the others.
Equipment and supplies sufficient to arm two thousand people were sent into the mountains from the mountain roads, and the strength of the Wulian Mountain base grew rapidly.
At this time, the number of troops trained by Yang Mu had reached more than a thousand, and they were also equipped with a hundred pairs of iron armor. Even the bows and crossbows were replaced by those used by the main force of the Taishan Army.
The restoration of military strength made Yang Mu immediately think of revenge.
He has never forgotten the humiliation and hatred of more than a year, so he immediately started to implement this plan.
First lure the Langya soldiers into the mountain, then surround and annihilate them.
After entering the mountain, Wu Dun marched very slowly. By the time Yang Mu and the others arrived at the ambush point in a hurry, they had not even walked dozens of miles.
After waiting for two days, Yang Mu finally saw Wu Dun's troops approaching slowly. After a one-day battle, Wu Dun's troops were defeated and the entire army collapsed.
Not only were all the Shanliao captured by him liberated, but the two thousand Xuzhou troops who had previously been Wu Dun's own soldiers were also wiped out.
Wu Dun was also on the way to escape, and was chased by the angry Langya Mountain gangsters, who finally killed him in a forest.
When word of Wu Dun's failure came back to Zang Ba, who was stationed in Ju County, he fell silent.
Zang Ba has a keen sense of smell on the battlefield, and he saw something was wrong from this incident.
How come the Wulian Mountain Base Area, which was so poor that it was about to starve to death, suddenly became combat-effective? This had to make Zang Ba wonder whether those people were supported by Guan Yu's department.
And if so? Will Guan Yu just help Wulian Mountain? Will he target himself?
At this time, Zang Ba felt great fear in his heart.
It can be said that he lost two battles in front of Guan Yu, and if he fought for a third time, he didn't think he could win.
So, Zang Ba gathered the scattered troops as soon as possible.
Moreover, barriers and warehouses were built here in Ju County, and a number of transport ships were prepared to dock on the Mu River, thinking that if the war went unfavorable, they could board the ship and go south back to Xu.
It can be said that Zang Ba is full of points in terms of escape.
In fact, it is understandable that a military leader like Zang Ba, even if he trusted Chen Deng, would still consider his own military strength as the first priority.
The act of conserving strength has long been deeply imprinted on Zang Ba's soul.
After that, Zang Ba stood guard in Ju County, watching everything on the battlefield closely.
The following information continued to converge on Zang Ba.
On February 18th, Wulian Mountain soldiers came out of the mountain to attack the four northeastern walls of Ju County.
On February 19, a military report came from Gumu, the northern gate of Langya, Xuzhou. A large number of enemy troops appeared in the territory and were moving south. They were unable to stop them and were in danger.
On February 20th, Wulian Mountain soldiers broke through the four barriers of the mountain pass and marched for 20 miles. They encountered 4,000 Xuzhou troops who came to support them and retreated.
On February 22nd, the Xuzhou Army who went out to rescue Sibi received Zang Ba's military order and quickly returned to the city, but was ambushed by Guan Yu's troops who appeared on the road.
At this time, Wulianshan soldiers came back from the rear, and the two armies joined forces to annihilate 4,000 Xuzhou soldiers.
After the war, this unit joined forces with the Wulian Mountain Soldiers. Instead of continuing northward to Ju County, it turned directly to the rear area of Ju County.
In March, Zang Ba, who had been waiting anxiously, suddenly received news that the Mushui city walls behind him had fallen one after another, and for a time the Xuzhou army's route to retreat to Xuzhou was cut off.
It was also on this day that Guan Yu, who had not appeared for a long time, appeared outside Ju County with his army.
At this moment, Zang Ba couldn’t escape even with his wings.