On March 17, when Bai Qi decided to attack Yangguan with both defeats, Sima Cuo, who was stationed in Xibei, summoned the defeated soldiers who fled from Wancheng to his army, and also learned about the bad news that Wancheng was attacked by the Wei army.

Wancheng was attacked, and the food and grass piled up in the city were burned by the Wei army. Peng Tang, the general stationed in the city, was also killed by Wei general Cao Chun. When Sima Cuo heard this series of bad news, he was shocked and angry.

He didn't understand why the Wei army could bypass Bai Qi's army and attack Wancheng bypass?

Could it be that Bai Qi deliberately cheated him?

Sima Cuo doesn't think so.

You know, even when he had the worst relationship with Bai Qi, Bai Qi never did anything to frame him on purpose, not to mention that the two of them are getting along more and more harmoniously now. His second son Sima Jin is now serving as a guard beside Bai Qi and is taught by Bai Qi.

In this case, what reason does Bai Qi have to deliberately frame him?

Could it be that Bai Qi was defeated by Meng Zhong?

This is not right. First of all, Bai Qi has 60,000 troops under his command. Not to mention that Bai Qi is the one who commands the troops, even if Xiang Shou is here to command the troops, the Wei army in Yangguan may not be able to defeat the 60,000 Qin army in such a short time, right?

Not to mention that so far, he has not received any letters of help from Bai Qi, let alone news of Bai Qi's defeat.

"Did Meng Zhong use some method to bypass Bai Qi's army and attack Wancheng?"

If you think about it carefully, Sima Cuo thinks this guess is the most likely.

In order to confirm his guess, he immediately sent a team of soldiers and ordered them to go to Fangcheng to verify with Bai Qi and see what was going on.

At the same time, he also sent a team of soldiers to Wuguan to find a way to raise another batch of food and grass to solve his urgent need for food shortages between him and Bai Qi.

After arranging these, he immediately summoned his generals Jin Kuang, Changchi, Wu Rong and others to reveal to them the news that Wancheng was attacked by the Wei army and Peng Tang was killed in battle.

The bad news only made the generals shocked and looked shocked.

The attack on the granary in Wancheng was a major event that concerns the life and death of more than 100,000 Qin troops in Sima Cuo and Bai Qi's army!

"What is Bai Qi doing? Why did he ask the Wei army to go around so easily?"

"Can Bai Qi be defeated by the Wei army?"

"And Peng Tang, what is that guy doing?"

Seeing that the generals argued in a mess, Sima Cuo suppressed them and said in a deep voice: "At present, it is useless to hold the responsibility accountable. The most urgent task is to find a way to deal with the current crisis." After a pause, he continued: "The food and grass in the army can last for about eight or nine days. I have sent someone to ask for help from Wuguan and ordered them to prepare a batch of food and grass to relieve the crisis of our army's food shortage... In short, save some food and grass in the past few days and wait for the food and grass from Wuguan to be delivered."

The generals nodded after hearing this.

Immediately, Sima thought about it and said, "Wancheng is the center of Wanfang land. You must be guarded against it, Changchi."

"The last one will be there."

"You will immediately move to Wancheng. After you arrive in Wancheng, you will be able to reorganize the local soldiers and build the granary again. Remember to be careful of the Wei army's sneak attacks, and you must not be ambushed by the Wei army again."

"Here!" Qin general Changchi held his fists and answered the order, and then hesitated and asked: "Now here in Xi County..."

He was a little worried about the side of Xi County. After all, South Korea's Grand Marshal Baoyuan was leading tens of thousands of troops to the north of Xi County, and so far, he has launched three attacks on Xi County.

Although it is not clear why the Korean army suddenly turned into defense to offense, it must be admitted that the army under Bao Yuan is quite elite and deserves to be the Korean soldiers who survived the Battle of Yique.

Hearing Changchi's words, Sima Chuo stroked his beard and said in a deep voice for a moment, then said in a deep voice: "Although Xixian is a channel for Wandi to attack South Korea, it is not irreplaceable. In comparison, Wancheng is still more important now."

"I understand." Changchi hugged his fists.

On that day, Qin general Changchi led his 10,000 troops to Wancheng.

The movements of the entire ten thousand Qin soldiers were naturally beyond their eyes and ears of the Han army. A scout from the Han army immediately informed the commander Bao Yuan of the news.

After learning the news, Bao Yuan was very surprised.

To be fair, although Bao Yuan had had a lot of dealings with Wei Zhang, Gan Mao, Ying Ji, Xiang Shou and others, this was the first time he had fought against Sima Cuo's army.

But considering Sima Cuo's fame, Bao Yuan personally faced Sima Cuo and also became very energetic.

After all, at present, Sima Cuo is indeed the only remaining veteran in Qin State who is good at fighting. His status and fame are above Xiang Shou, Bai Qi and others. To put it bluntly, Xiang Shou is not as good as Sima Cuo, and Bai Qi is not as famous as Sima Cuo. [ps: In history, Wu'an Jun won the Battle of Yique, so he surpassed Sima Cuo in one fell swoop, whether it was fame or Qin's expectations for him.]

It is precisely because of this that the battle situation in Xixian County has reached a stalemate. Neither Sima Cuo nor Bao Yuan can do anything to the other party in a short period of time. If the Wei army in Yangguan had not attacked Wancheng, it would have been possible that these two people would have been in a stalemate for a year or two.

"Sima Chou... divided the troops?"

After the scout who came to report the news withdrew, Bao Yuan was thinking about this matter alone in the coach's tent.

To be fair, he did not think of regaining Xixian immediately. After all, Xixian was just an empty city. When the Han army retreated to Rushui on the entire line, he had moved all the civilians in Wancheng and Xixian to the country. Therefore, in Baoyuan's original idea, he only needed to set up defenses in the Rushui area to block the Qin army.

But there was no way, Zhai Zhang of Wei wrote a letter asking him to take the initiative, so he led his army to retreat in a large-scale manner while the Chu general Zhaoju was retreating for some unknown reason, and prepared to recover Xixian and Wancheng, and then meet with Zhai Zhang.

But unexpectedly, as soon as Zhaoju's army retreated, Sima Cuo immediately led 60,000 Qin troops to enter Xi County first, blocking the only way for the Korean army.

To be honest, if it weren't for the disguised threat from Zhai Zhang's letter, Bao Yuan would never have confronted Sima Cuo's army head-on, let alone attack Xixian, which was stationed by Sima Cuo.

But since Zhai Zhang ordered him to take the initiative to attack, he could only obey the order. After all, he still needed to rely on Wei to fight against Qin. Therefore, he could not ignore the request of Zhai Zhang, the Grand Marshal of Wei.

Of course, although he was dissatisfied with all kinds of dissatisfaction, Bao Yuan was not without confidence in this battle. At least Zhai Zhang "magically" predicted the movements of the Chu army, which made him have some confidence in defeating Sima Cuo and defeating Bai Qi.

So far, he still couldn't figure out how Zhai Zhang accurately predicted that Zhao Ju would withdraw his troops.

He roughly guessed that Zhai Zhang must have learned something and did not tell him.

Of course, this doesn't matter. For him, as long as he can defeat the Qin army, it would be enough.

It is precisely because of this that Bao Yuan did not drag the Wei army back. He tried to attack Xixian many times in the past few days, but unfortunately he was defeated by Sima Cuo every time.

Today, the Qin army divided more than 10,000 troops for some reason, which gave Baoyuan hope to retake Xi County.

However, at the same time, he was also extremely confused about the Qin army's actions.

You should know that Xixian is not a key strategic location, both for Qin and Wei: for Qin, Qin can send troops to attack Yiyang and Xincheng at any time; for Han Dynasty, the Rushui defense line was established by Bao Yuan to resist the army under Sima Cuo.

Since Xi County is not a key strategic location, it is not difficult to understand even if Sima Cuo gave up stationing in Xi County.

Of course, on the other hand, Sima Cuo does not want to advocate the momentum of the counterattack of the Korean army, and hopes to interrupt it in Xixian, which makes sense in Bao Yuan's opinion.

But only the current reaction of Qin army made him unable to understand.

He had to guard Xi County and divide his troops out, so what was Sima's mistake?

Who doesn’t know that dividing troops is a taboo in this situation?

Then the question arises. What exactly is the reason that a famous general like Sima Cuo had to divide more than 10,000 troops?

After thinking about it casually, Bao Yuan guessed it roughly: It must have been the Wei army that did something, which grabbed the lifeline of the Qin army.

But, what exactly is the reason?

Baoyuan is unknown for the time being.

On March 19th, the third day when Bai Qi blocked Yangguan and attacked the pass, a Korean army soldier reported to Bao Yuan, saying that more than a dozen Fangcheng cavalrymen were bypassing Yingshan and coming to his army.

Bao Yuan immediately met these Fangcheng cavalry and asked about their purpose.

The leader of Fangcheng cavalry handed a letter to Bao Yuan and said in a deep voice: "Fangcheng ordered us to come day and night just to report this news to the general Bao."

『Meng Zhong?』

Bao Yuan took the letter in surprise, spread out the bamboo book and glanced at it, and then smiled: "Haha, it is worthy of being Fang Cheng Ling, and it is worthy of being Fang Cheng Jun..."

After being overjoyed, he ordered the guards to take these dozen Fangcheng cavalrymen to the camp to rest and treat them well.

At this time, the guard beside Bao Yuan asked in confusion: "I wonder what was written in Fang Chengling's letter, which made Grand Sima so happy?"

Bao Yuan laughed and said, "I said two days ago, why did Sima Cuo go against the military strategy? He still divided more than 10,000 troops despite the threat of our army. Today, when I received a letter from that boy Meng Zhong, I suddenly realized that Sima Cuo had gone to reinforce Wancheng... Hahaha, Meng Zhong is really not simple. If I guess correctly, he should be fighting with Bai Qi at this moment. He sneaked into Wancheng under Bai Qi's nose and burned the Qin army's granary, hahahaha..."

When he laughed here, he was stunned for a moment and looked at the bamboo slips in his hand as if he was aware of it.

It must be said that the situation of the Wei and Han coalition forces was very good, and it can be said that they had already gained the upper hand. However, the key point was that the Fangcheng army under Meng Zhong's command attacked Wancheng occupied by the Qin army and burned the Qin army's granary. Before that, the Wei and Han coalition forces actually did not have any advantage.

Then come. Since he didn't have any advantage at the beginning, why did Zhai Zhang dare to write a letter to threaten him and order him to attack the Qin army together, as if he was sure to win?

Think about it carefully, Zhai Zhang rarely deals with the Qin army before, so where did he get the confidence?

The Chu general Zhao Ju withdraws troops for no reason. How could Zhai Zhang know in advance that the Chu army would retreat? Zhai Zhang has no connections in Chu. In contrast, it is Meng Zhong, the boy from Fangcheng...

"Is the letter that day actually sent it by that boy Meng Zhong in the name of Zhai Zhang?"

Touching the beard on his jaw, Bao Yuan's face showed a strange expression.

"Sima, what's wrong?"

Seeing that Bao Yuan looked strange, he asked curiously from the guard next to him.

“…”

Bao Yuan looked at the bamboo slips in his hand and shook his head slightly, feeling a little complicated.

If the letter was really written by Meng Zhong in the name of Zhai Zhang, Bao Yuan would naturally be angry. After all, he thought that his relationship with Meng Zhong was still very good, and Meng Zhong should not deceive him like this.

But on the other hand, he could understand the reason why Meng Zhong did this.

『… Let’s try to repel the Qin army first.”

Bao Yuan thought to himself.

I have to say that if we put aside the factor of being deceived, he actually prefers Meng Zhong to write to him under the name of Zhai Zhang, because this proves that Meng Zhong already had a strategy to defeat the Qin army - Fang Cheng army sneak attacked Wancheng, which is an excellent example.

Thinking of this, he also added some confidence in this battle.

On that day, Bao Yuan summoned all the generals under his command to discuss strategies.

He said to the generals: "I just received a letter from Fangcheng Order Meng Zhong. In the letter, Meng Zhong said that the Fangcheng Army had successfully burned down the food and grass of the Qin army, causing Sima Cuo and Bai Qi to fall into a crisis of food shortage..."
To be continued...