In October of 212 AD (the seventeenth year of Jian'an), Cao Cao set up the troops in Yuzhou and claimed to be 400,000 troops (actually 150,000), and handed over to Xiahou Dun and Cao Ren to direct command, supplemented by Wang Ling, Hao Zhao and Zang Ba.

The army arrived in Shouchun in the same month, and soon Xun Yu died of illness. After the news reached Yecheng, Cao Cao was very sad. In his mind, Xun Yu had an unparalleled "talent of a king and a disciple", and he told people several times that he was his Zhang Liang.

So far, due to differences in political ambitions, the two sides are unable to continue working together. Cao Cao is the one who regrets the most.

In order to express his guilt towards Xun Yu, Cao Cao intended to marry his daughter to Xun Yu's eldest son Xun Yun. When summoning Cao Jie, Cao Xian, Cao Hui and others to ask, Cao Cao noticed that only Cao Hui seemed to have a good impression of Xun Yun, so he promised Cao Hui to Xun Yun, hoping to make up for his debt to Xun Yu.

Xun Yun originally wanted to push for his engagement with Cao Hui on the grounds that he was filial, but unexpectedly, Cao Hui was not only not angry or sad, but instead, he also wore filial clothes to accompany Xun Yun to guard Xun Yu, and told Xun Yun that he was willing to wait for him.

While moved by Cao Hui, Xun Yun also discovered that if he married Cao Hui, he would become a member of the Cao clan. At that time, he would have the opportunity to contact Cao Zhi and would not be able to realize Sima Yi's lofty plan.

Thinking of this, Xun Yun put his hand beside him on the back of Cao Hui's hand, who was kneeling on the cushion together...<

Afterwards, Cao Hui moved to Xun Yun's home despite her unmarried identity, taking care of the daily life and food of Xun Yun and his brothers.

Sima Yi was worried that "Liu Ji" and Guo Huai and others would attack Xun Yun when he was in chaos during the reign of his mind, so he appointed Sima Fu, who had not revealed his true identity, to take off his veil and go to Xun Yun's house as his attendant to protect him.

It just so happened that Cao Jie was not at ease with how his sister, who had been inseparable from her for a long time, lived in the Xun family. He often brought supplements and clothes to visit him, and often met Sima Fu, dressed in a servant.

For some reason, when Cao Jie saw Sima Fu's eyes, he always felt an inexplicable throbbing in his heart. This phenomenon was not once or twice. Almost every time she saw Sima Fu, she felt this way.

In order to find out what the reason was, Cao Jie began to pay attention to Sima Fu's every move and tried to frequently contact Sima Fu to test. Although Sima Fu always kept a distance from Cao Jie in order to avoid his identity leakage, the two began to talk invisibly over time until they had a heart-to-heart talk.

Gradually Cao Jie found that this "Jia Ming" was not suspicious. Just when she thought it was her own illusion and wanted to stop, she accidentally passed through the scene in front of Sima Fu's bedroom and completely turned all her previous guesses into reality:

Standing in front of the door, looking inside with a crack in the door, Cao Jie was surprised to find that Sima Fu, who was sitting on the collapse, was carefully wiping the crossbow-shaped gun in his hand with a piece of white cloth. Cao Jie would never admit his mistake. It was exactly what Sima Fu held when he appeared to save him.

Soon Sima Fu, who had a sensitive sense, found someone outside the door. He quickly walked to the door with the crossbow-shaped gun in his hand. When he pulled the door open, he found that Cao Jie was standing outside the door...

Meeting with his true identity was extremely embarrassing for Sima Fu. He realized that Cao Jie's eyes were not looking at him, but on the crossbow-shaped gun he held in his left hand, he couldn't help but carry the crossbow-shaped gun behind him, intending to pretend to be nothing but greet her the same as usual: "<

Miss, how could you..."<

But before he could finish speaking, Cao Jie interrupted him coldly:

"Why...why do you want to deny..."

Sima Fu knew that even if he concealed it, he would not be able to deceive Cao Jie, so he had to put away his forced smile and turned around to walk into the house: "This has nothing to do with the lady, and I have no obligation to explain to you so much..."

At this time, Cao Jie, who was clenching his fists tightly, wanted to tell Sima Fu loudly that he had been holding it in his heart for so long that he wanted to express his feelings and thoughts to him, but when she heard the cold words Sima Fu said to him with his back, all the things she wanted to express suddenly disappeared in Cao Jie's mind.

"So that's the case. Sorry, I'm so troubled..."

When Cao Jie lowered his head and left silently, he closed his eyes with his back to Sima Fu, who had always turned his back to the door...

In December of the same year, Sun Quan, who noticed Cao Cao's army was moving south, felt great pressure, but the governors Lu Su and Lu Meng believed that Cao Cao's attack was not worth worrying, and on the contrary, it was an excellent opportunity for Sun Quan.

Lu Su believed that Liu Bei was now stationing troops at the invitation of Liu Zhang. Liu Bei would definitely attack Bashu and seize CDs over time. This is something Jiangdong didn't want to see. Now Cao Cao was invading the territory. He could ask Liu Bei to send troops to support him according to the spirit of the "Sun-Liu Alliance". In this way, if Liu Bei refused, he would betray the alliance, which would create a favorable situation for Jiangdong to seize Jingzhou in the future. If Liu Bei agreed to withdraw his troops, he would lose this great opportunity to seize Yizhou.

Sun Quan recognized Lu Su and Lu Meng's proposal and sent an envoy to Jiameng Pass for help.

After receiving Sun Quan's letter of help, Liu Bei comforted the envoy on the surface and said:

"Liu Sun is a family. Since Wu Hou wrote letters to me, I will not sit idly by. But now I have agreed to Liu Zhang to resist Zhang Lu in Hanzhong for him. Even if he wants to withdraw his troops from the east, he needs to inform Liu Zhang and ask you to report to Wu Hou. He said that after I finish the Yizhou affairs, I will rush back to help him retreat to the enemy as soon as possible."

After the messenger left, Pang Tong, who was hiding beside him, stood up and said to Liu Bei: "Does the lord really want to go back to save Sun Quan?"

After folding Sun Quan's letter, Liu Bei sighed and looked at Pang Tong:<

"So what? After all, there is an alliance between Sun Quan and I. If Sun Quan is defeated by Cao Cao, we will lose the security of the East. At that time, the battle between the two fronts will be in an extremely unfavorable situation. Instead of doing this, it is better to take advantage of the fact that we have not yet broken up with Liu Zhang and send Cao Cao away first."

Pang Tong expressed his objection to this: "The lord's army is on an expedition. It is a great time to conquer Bashu. We have not fought with Zhang Lu during this period, which has caused dissatisfaction among Liu Zhang and the gentry of Yizhou. If we retreated like this, the prestige established in the local area will be immediately lost. Liu Zhang is indecisive. This time, the lord's withdrawal of the gentry of Yizhou will definitely make a big fuss. In the future, it will be difficult to go deep into the hinterland of Yizhou so smoothly."

Fa Zheng did not agree with Liu Bei's withdrawal from Jingzhou like this. He believed that Cao Cao did not take any advantage in the previous battles between Sun Quan and Cao Cao. This time Cao Cao went to the expedition, and probably would not have any major results this time. From a long-term strategic perspective, the alliance between Sun and Liu is only temporary, and there will definitely be a battle that determines the pattern in the future. Now, Cao Cao can be used to destroy Sun Quan.

As Pang Tong said, it would be too difficult to make a comeback if you miss this opportunity.

Seeing that Liu Bei was still worried, Pang Tong offered three strategies: the top, middle and lower. The first strategy was to directly raise an army to attack the south at the speed of thunder; the Zhongst strategy could use Sun Quan's request for help to pretend to return to Jingzhou, and lead the Baishui Pass commander Yang Huai and Gao Pei to attack, and then capture and kill the two generals with the name of bad intentions, Xu Tu made progress; the worst strategy was to lead the troops back to Badong, rely on Jingzhou and then go to the map.

After soliciting Fa Zheng's opinions, Liu Bei agreed to the strategy offered by Pang Tong, and wrote a letter to Liu Zhang to declare the Jingzhou crisis in the rear. He wanted to resist the enemy first, and wait until Sun Quan's danger was lifted before returning to Yizhou to help Liu Zhang.

In addition, Pang Tong also sent a secret letter to Zhang Song, who was in CD. He mentioned that Liu Bei had already begun to waver because Cao Cao's army invaded the territory, hoping that Zhang Song could personally persuade Liu Bei to strengthen his confidence.

However, shortly after Pang Tong sent someone to send the letter, another carrier pigeon flew out of Jiameng Pass and headed straight for CD...

After reading Pang Tong's letter, Zhang Song suddenly became nervous. He was afraid that his long-planned plan would cause a miscarriage, so he followed Pang Tong's advice and immediately wrote the letter, advising Liu Bei to attack CD at all costs, otherwise it might change.

Just when Zhang Song finished writing the letter and was about to get up and send someone to Jiameng, Huang Quan suddenly led his troops into his home. Seeing that Zhang Song had a letter in his hand, Huang Quan immediately took him over. After reading it, he looked fierce and said:

"The lord has never treated the lord badly, and he did not think that since the lord sells his lord and seeks honor to do such a miserable thing!"

Only then did Zhang Song realize that it was his biological brother Zhang Su who betrayed him, but he didn't understand why Zhang Su knew that he had secretly communicated with Liu Bei and how the news leaked.

Zhang Song's incident made Liu Zhang very angry. At Zhang Ren's suggestion, he immediately ordered the killing of Zhang Song and ordered Yang Huai from Baishui Pass to strictly prevent Liu Bei's attack. He could attack at the discretion of the situation.

In order to avoid causing wars within, Liu Zhang specially sent Zhang Song's head to Jiameng Pass to warn Liu Bei that he had already defended himself to prevent him from launching an attack.

Liu Bei, who originally wanted to launch an assault on Baishui Pass, believed that Zhang Song's affairs had already alarmed the enemy, and Baishui Pass would inevitably have heavy troops to guard it, and a strong attack would not work. So he sought the opinions of Pang Tong and Fa Zheng:<

"We are now in a dilemma. What should we do, two gentlemen?"

At this time, Pang Tong advised Liu Bei not to act rashly, because Liu Zhang sent Zhang Song's head but did not send troops to attack. It seemed that he still had doubts about whether Liu Bei had a rebellion, so he warned Liu Bei with great fanfare. But even so, Liu Zhang would definitely be prepared. Therefore, he advised Liu Bei to keep silent for the time being to paralyze Liu Zhang and wait for the opportunity to attack.

However, Fa Zheng openly put forward a completely opposite opinion to Pang Tong. He believed that since Liu Zhang had already suspicious of Liu Bei, it would be a matter of time before the breakup was broken. Liu Zhang would definitely force Liu Bei to go north to attack Zhang Lu. If Liu Bei refused, it would prove that he had the intention of turning against the enemy. Instead of doing so, he should take advantage of the fact that the envoy who was sent to Baishui Pass should take the lead in attacking before he arrived.

This time, after hearing Fa Zheng's opinion, Liu Bei did not know why the messenger sent by Liu Zhang had not arrived at Baishui Pass for a long time, which gave Liu Bei great space. He first tricked Yang Huai and Gao Pei out of the city and then suddenly launched an attack, causing Gao Pei and Yang Huai to die on the spot. After that, Liu Bei occupied Baishui Pass and annexed the defenders within the pass, and then went south to attack Fucheng.

After occupying Baishui Pass and Fucheng one after another, Liu Bei wrote to Liu Zhang, who was a CD, stating that Yang Huai and Gao Pei had forcibly withheld the food and wages sent to Jiameng. Liu Bei went to the pass to ask for help but was attacked by them, so he was forced to fight back. As for occupying Fucheng, it was just to eliminate the remnants of the rebels, not a military action against Liu Zhang.

However, after the war, Liu Bei strictly ordered martial law in Fucheng, and did not allow any Yizhou officials to enter, and he had no intention of withdrawing troops and retreating to Jiameng. Later, Liu Bei expressed his intention to delay support to Sun Quan on the grounds that Liu Zhang intended to act against him, which made Sun Quan suffer a loss. After getting the short promise, he had no reason to cause trouble for Liu Bei, so he had to deal with Cao Cao alone.

At this point, Liu Bei successively adopted the strategies of Pang Tong and Fa Zheng, which not only dealt with Sun Quan in Jiangdong and captured two cities in a row, but also prevented Liu Zhang from attacking him because of this. It was obvious that he had already taken the initiative to start the war.

But in fact, the relationship between Liu Bei and Liu Zhang has completely broken down and a war is about to break out...

The unrest in Yizhou was conveyed back to Yecheng through the scouts placed in the prefecture of Cao Cao. Cao Cao believed that Liu Bei would not give up the great opportunity to seize Yizhou for Sun Quan, so he firmly decided on his strategic plan to go south to the Yangtze River.

Soon Sima Yi received a mysterious letter from Yizhou. After he opened it, he found that it was written by Pang Tong. Compared to receiving Pang Tong's letter, Sima Yi was even more shocked by the contents of the letter. He immediately said to Cheng Wu beside him:

"Cheng Wu, if you have time, you can rush to Fucheng as soon as possible. If it is too late, I'm afraid everything will be too late..."

Zhong Yu, who had received the letter, looked at it and shook his head and said:

"I'm afraid it's too late..."

The reason why Sima Yi was so nervous was that what Pang Tong said in the letter involved the purpose of what he did since he left Jiangdong and followed Liu Bei.

In fact, when Pang Tong left Jiangdong, he was completely a double act with Lu Su. His real purpose was to lure Liu Bei to attack Yizhou, and then cause Liu Bei's plan to betray Zhang Song.

In Pang Tong's view, the occupation of Yizhou cannot be ended in a short period of time. Moreover, Liu Bei went deep into the army alone and completely cut off the food and military supplies from Jingzhou. It will definitely be difficult to continue over time. By then, Liu Zhang may have the possibility of conquering him and eliminating this ambitious generation of heroes for the Han Dynasty.

In addition, Pang Tong also made careful considerations. He thought that even if Liu Zhang could not kill Liu Bei, he could trap them in Yizhou. At that time, Liu Bei would inevitably ask Zhuge Liang from Jingzhou to lead his troops into Sichuan to reinforce. This was also the time agreed by Pang Tong and Lu Su. By then, the main force of Jingzhou entered Sichuan would be a good opportunity for the Eastern Wu to attack.

However, in Sima Yi's view, although Pang Tong's plan has a far-reaching vision, the risk of implementation is too great. After all, he has to face people like Zhuge Liang and Liu Bei. What's more, Cao Cao has decided to attack south, which is undoubtedly a major interference to Pang Tong's plan. Even if Zhuge Liang leads his army into Sichuan, Sun Quan will not be able to attack Jingzhou.

Once Pang Tong's plan, who was in the enemy camp, was exposed, then the result of waiting for him can be imagined...<

After the celebration meeting in Fucheng, Liu Bei was very satisfied with the current situation. He took advantage of the wine to express his current complacent mood and also used the attack on CD as a banquet. For this reason, he walked to Pang Tong and said to him:

"Shi Yuan, I think this banquet should be over, right?"

Although Pang Tong has been helping Liu Bei with advice, he is always loyal to the Han Dynasty. In addition, his long-term dissatisfaction and hostility towards Liu Bei were leaked under the drunkenness. He actually stood up and publicly questioned Liu Bei's behavior in person:

"The Lord has established the world with his destiny of benevolence and righteousness in the Gregorian calendar, but today he has developed an unknown army and regards attacking brothers of the same clan and plundering other people's territory as a happy thing. Is the trust and righteousness advocated by the Lord has been false and deceitful?"

As soon as this sentence came out, the originally joyful atmosphere of the banquet was instantly broken, and everyone looked at Pang Tong with incredible eyes. They did not expect that Pang Tong, who had always firmly supported the rapid destruction of Shu, would say such horrifying and unscrupulous words. For a moment, the banquet was silent. Everyone didn't know why Pang Tong said such words, only Fa Zheng calmly observed the situation...

Pang Tong's words undoubtedly angered Liu Bei, who was in the pride of spring. He angrily threw the wine bottle in his hand to the ground: "According to you, King Wu also sang and danced in front of him when he attacked King Zhou. Isn't this a benevolent and righteous teacher?"<

After Liu Bei's anger, Pang Tong's drunkenness suddenly dissipated. He immediately realized that what he said just now was extremely inappropriate, so he stood up and bowed to Liu Bei, and turned around to leave.

Liu Bei also found that his words were inappropriate, so he quickly sent someone to invite Pang Tong back.

After sitting back to his original position, Pang Tong began to feel a little panicked. He was afraid that his words would be revealed, so he pretended to be calm and drank and ate meat as usual, and didn't even look at Liu Bei. Seeing this, Liu Bei felt a little embarrassed, so he poured wine for him and asked with a pleasant look: "Some of us just spoke too much..."

In fact, Liu Bei's original intention was to give Pang Tong a step and let him apologize to him, but Pang Tong replied calmly: "Indeed, because that was the fault of both of us..."
Chapter completed!