My younger brother Zhuge Liang

Chapter 148 Is There a Woman in This City?
In the north of Wancheng, two blocks west of the government office where Zhuge Jin was temporarily staying, there was a dilapidated general's mansion in the backyard.

A group of maids were huddled in the woodshed, while in the main room were two young girls in heavy mourning, shivering as they burned something in front of the altar.

"Sister, what should we do? There are so many rebel soldiers outside. They won't... won't rush in to burn, kill and loot, right?" The younger girl was the first to be unable to bear this mental torment and asked timidly.

The older girl looked miserable upon hearing this, and she closed her eyes and sighed, "Silly sister, you are lucky to be killed. I am just afraid, I am afraid... Alas, when the crisis comes, it is better to hang yourself to avoid humiliation."

The young girl exclaimed, "Ah? Why go to that far if you can survive? Sister, don't do that."

The older girl actually didn't have a very strong will, and was shaken by her younger sister's crying and became at a loss.

She couldn't help thinking: "If my younger sister is unwilling to die for her husband, I will die alone. I am afraid that it will backfire and anger those villains, causing her to be humiliated even more...

Besides, hanging oneself from the beam cannot guarantee one’s reputation after death, so it is better to throw oneself into a well to avoid being found by the bad guys. If I were to be publicly insulted and brought to the doorstep, how could I live in shame…”

Just as the sisters were feeling anxious, they suddenly heard the noisy noise in the front yard suddenly quiet down.

They didn't know what was happening outside, but the feeling was like a deep mountain where hundreds of beasts were fighting and roaring. Once the tiger returned to the mountain, all the beasts returned to silence.

"Greetings, General! Those inside are Qiao Rui's relatives, and we dare not enter without permission. However, some of the property in the outer house had already been taken before we came..."

"Alright, I'm not an unreasonable person. I won't pursue the property outside the house."

A young but powerful voice gave a few unquestionable instructions, and then silence returned to the outside again, with only the sound of a person's footsteps approaching.

……

"crunch-"

Zhuge Jin held the scabbard of his sword in one hand and pushed open the dry broken door with the other.

Perhaps it was because the door hinges hadn't been oiled for a long time, the noise was really tooth-grinding.

Seeing him come in, the two girls in the main room immediately hugged each other tightly.

The younger ones hid their heads completely in their sister's arms, not daring to look at all.

The older man hugged his sister, and had no place to avoid his eyes, so he looked over timidly, but he didn't dare to look directly into Zhuge Jin's eyes. He had no choice but to look at his chest and waist.

Silver seal and blue ribbon! Judging from his gait and stride, he seems to be a young and tall man. How can he resist when he is so young and in a high position?
She couldn't help but raise her eyes slightly, quickly glanced at the other person's face, and quickly looked away before they made eye contact.

He was a man of eight feet in height and with a refined demeanor. If he were alone, he would not be publicly humiliated, nor would he seek death...

Zhuge Jin, who was standing opposite him, felt a little disappointed when he saw the two women.

He could tell that these two girls were definitely beauties with great potential in the future... but right now, they seemed too young.
Her face and figure have not yet fully developed, and she is still a little too cute and lacks feminine charm.

For a moment, Zhuge Jin suddenly remembered that in his previous life, when he was searching for old TV dramas on the Internet, he once had a sudden idea to search for what the beautiful seniors like He Qing and Zhou Huimin looked like when they were young.

The results were all without exception. It was found that their stills before the age of 22 were so cute and round that they were unbearable to look at. Their facial features were without any edges and corners. They could not arouse men's possessive desire at all, and at most only a little protective desire.

Moreover, the two girls were dressed in mourning clothes, and the Han Dynasty ruled the world with filial piety, so Zhuge Jin did not want to create any more trouble.

Although it is said that "if you want to be pretty, wear mourning clothes", this saying is not until the Song and Ming dynasties. In later times, women's mourning clothes were mainly white silk, which looked as plain as Xiaolongnu, which of course could arouse men's evil thoughts.

The Han Dynasty wore yellow and white coarse linen, and the edges were cut directly with a knife, without curling or sewing. The sleeves and collar edges looked tattered, which was very disappointing.

Zhuge Jin walked up to the two girls and asked coldly, "Are you Qiao Rui's daughters? Are you the elder sister?"

The older girl immediately put her younger sister down and crawled on her belly to beg: "I dare not deceive the general. I am an orphan and I dare not expect anything. But I still beg the general to have pity on our filial piety and not... do not publicly humiliate our reputation."

Zhuge Jin snorted coldly. Although he was lustful, he could not give in to the righteous cause. He immediately pointed out:

"You also know that you are the orphan of a criminal general. Qiao Rui stubbornly resisted the imperial army until his death. His crimes are not comparable to those of a surrendered general. Knowing that Yuan Shu is a traitor who usurped the Han Dynasty, why do you still insist on having your own way!"

Being gentle and considerate to women is for normal women, not for the family members of criminals.

As for why Qiao Rui insisted on resisting, Zhuge Jin himself couldn't figure it out. However, in history, Qiao Rui also died in the Battle of Qiyang in Chen County. Perhaps this is also the inertia of history.

Because Yuan Shu was at the turning point of decline at that time. Before that point, the people under him still thought that Yuan Shu had a chance to win.

After the battle of Chenjun in which nearly 100,000 main forces were lost, the loyalty of Yuan Shu's generals completely collapsed. Anyone with a discerning eye could see that Yuan Shu would be finished sooner or later, and it would be much easier for him to surrender from then on.

Ohashi naturally had no way of answering this question, and could only nod and say, "I am a weak girl in the inner chamber, and I really don't know what's going on in the outside world."

Zhuge Jin: "You can be ignorant of external affairs, but you must know your own identity. I can reward you with freedom, but you cannot ask for it - how old are you this year, where is your sister."

Daqiao replied tremblingly, "I am already 28 years old, and my sister is two years younger."

Zhuge Jin was stunned. The novel said that the big and small bridges were twins born in the same year. It seemed that this was written specifically to match the dramatic effect of "Sun Ce and Zhou Yu were of the same age". In fact, the Records of the Three Kingdoms never mentioned whether the big and small bridges were of the same age.

Historically, it took Sun Ce and Zhou Yu about a year and a half to conquer Lujiang County, so the small bridge was also built. Now I came too early, and only the big bridge was built.

Zhuge Jin's heart moved, and he asked tentatively: "Since you are young and ignorant, I can give you a way out, but I don't advise people to abandon their ancestors. If you don't want to be a slave in this life, there is only one way, that is to hide your real name, or just vaguely call yourself "the daughter of Mr. Qiao", but don't say who Mr. Qiao is.

Qiao Rui was besieged by the imperial court in Chen County for three months and never surrendered. This sin can never be washed away. This is not a fight among the princes, but a rebellion! There is no such thing as "each serving his own master"! You should think clearly. "

Zhuge Jin was not harsh on beauties, or treating women in a certain way. He was very good to Bu Lianshi, and never treated her badly because of her humble background.

The key to this problem is that they are the descendants of diehard rebels. In other words, if Qiao Rui's son was caught, he would be sent to beheaded, and even his life would be lost. Only his daughters would have a chance to be punished as slaves and survive.

Similarly, Chen Lan, Liu Xun and others could not have survived with their original identities. In history, before and after the fall of Yuan Shu, there was indeed a group of Yuan's soldiers and civilians who chose to completely abandon their old identities and start from scratch as illegal households or bandits to serve other princes.

Those who do not understand this point can only be said to be not clear enough about the seriousness of "joining the rebellion and claiming to be emperor."

After Zhuge Jin pointed out the way to Daqiao and Xiaoqiao, the two girls indeed showed panic. They looked at each other and confirmed each other's eyes. Daqiao gritted his teeth and said:

"My late father was already unfaithful, so I cannot be unfilial again. It would be better to be a slave for the rest of my life and regard it as atonement than to deny my ancestors and get away with it. It doesn't make any difference anyway, as long as I don't leave any bloodline and don't let future generations suffer this shame."

Seeing that the other party still had some backbone, Zhuge Jin looked at him with a little more respect and said in a slightly slower tone: "In this case, I will grant your wish!"

Daqiao knew that he couldn't resist, so he just bit his lips several times and asked a question: "I just heard someone outside calling you General Fubo. I guess you must be General Zhuge. I have no other intentions, I just want to know who has taken over."

"It's good that you know. I am General Fubo." Zhuge Jin saw that the other party had completely understood the situation, so he said no more and left. Now the scattered bandits in the city have not been completely eliminated, and Zhuge Jin did not want to cause any more trouble. Today he just came to warn them first, and the rest can be discussed later.

Daxiaoqiao looked at his back, feeling a sense of loss and hope.

In the following days, Zhuge Jin temporarily stayed in Wancheng and continued to restore order. He would occasionally go to the big and small bridges to take a look every day.

He gradually became familiar with the bridges and was no longer so afraid. Occasionally, he would take the initiative to massage his shoulders and legs, carefully serving him and relieving him from the busy military affairs.

Daqiao apparently gradually realized that being captured by Zhuge Jin was already a very lucky thing.

At least they were not captured by the old and ugly enemy, and Zhuge Jin was gentle and polite and did not like to humiliate others. His every move was very graceful.

Zhuge Jin was just adamant about what was right and what was not. His harshness at the beginning was just to make the other party recognize their identity as "relatives of guilty ministers". According to the national law, their property should be confiscated, and it was not targeting anyone.

……

While stationed in Wancheng, Zhuge Jin was certainly not idle with military affairs.

During this period, he divided the troops into two parts. Taishi Ci led 10,000 troops to continue pursuing Chen Lan and attack Shucheng and Lu'an as planned.

The remaining troops, led by him and Gan Ning, rested while encircling the land, quickly recovering the enclaves that had been divided from Yuan Shu's army.

Zhuge Jin first asked Gan Ning to lead 3,000 soldiers in relatively good condition, as well as the surrendered troops who had led the way before, to continue to advance upstream along the Wan River. Three days later, on May 9, Gan Ning advanced to the upper reaches of the Wan River and deep into the Huoshan Mountain area, and captured Shiting, another key point upstream of Wancheng.

Yes, it is the Shiting where the battle between Sun Quan and Cao Xiu, "Zhou Cang cut off his hair to earn Cao Xiu's favor", took place during Zhuge Liang's Northern Expedition. This Shiting is also the last traffic node in the upper reaches of the Wanshui River. If the troops north of the Dabie Mountains were blocked here, they would not be able to enter the Wanshui River Valley and go south.

In this way, with the barrier of the Wan River and Huoshan Mountain, the western half of Lujiang County was completely cut off from Yuan Shu's core territory. With the people in panic, there should be no need to attack violently, and they could be swept away directly.

Starting from mid-May, Gan Ning spent more than ten days and successively captured Longfeng, Wutang, Songzi and Xunyang counties at a small cost. Basically, there was no fighting. He just sent troops to intimidate the enemy and force them to surrender.

……

Taishi Ci's army also made smooth progress. During this period, after five or six days of marching and five or six days of siege, he captured Shucheng. Chen Lan once again fled like a frightened bird and went to Lu'an to meet Liu Xun.

Moreover, after Taishi Ci captured Shucheng, Zhuge Jin's army was able to successfully join forces with Guan Yu's troops.

From late April to mid-May, Guan Yu's offensive was also very swift. Although Guan Yu's army did not have new siege weapons such as Lu Gongche, his deterrence and leadership skills were enough to make up for this shortcoming. The enemies Guan Yu faced were also more spineless than Chen Lan.

As early as late April, Guan Yu successfully captured Ruxukou, even more easily than Zhuge Jin captured Wankou. Xu Qian, who was also a pirate from Danyang, was even less resistant than Zhang Duo and surrendered directly after being intimidated by Guan Yu.

Maybe Guan Yu was born with a special appeal to people like "bandits". In history, whenever Guan Yu launched a northern expedition, the bandits in the enemy army, or the local uprising forces, would respond to Guan Yu.

Looking at the entire history of China, this kind of thing seems to be more common only in Guan Yu and Yue Fei. As soon as these two people set out to the north, bandits behind enemy lines would immediately respond.

After taking Ruxukou, Guan Yu launched a swift offensive upstream along the Ruxu River, first breaking Dongxing and then Juchao County. Dongxing at this time was just a small town under Juchao County, and did not have defensive fortifications such as the Dongxing Dike at the time when "Ding Feng fought with short weapons in the snow on a night."

In history, the Dongxing Dam on the Ruxu River had to wait for Zhuge Jin's son Zhuge Ke to repair it. Now Zhuge Jin must have changed his wife, and the history books do not record who his original wife was, so his son will definitely not be the original Zhuge Ke, and everything will definitely become unrecognizable.

After breaking through Juchao County, Guan Yu spent about ten days to eliminate the Chaohu bandits. He then divided his troops into two groups. One group went west along the Hangbu River to attack Shucheng with Taishi Ci, and the other group went north along the Fei River to prepare to besiege Hefei.

However, Taishi Ci conveyed to Guan Yu the progress and deployment of Zhuge Jin's army, and suggested that Guan Yu join forces with the Western Army to first capture Lu'an and cut off the wings of the enemy in Hefei. Guan Yu thought it made sense, so he first attacked Lu'an.

……

Time flies and it is May 28th.

Zhuge Jin, who had been stationed in Wancheng for half a month, saw that all parties had done a good job of cleaning up and there were frequent good news from the front. It seemed that a decisive offensive was about to be launched against the next heavyweight strategic target.

He then began to wonder whether he should continue northward and take Gan Ning's troops to join forces with Taishi Ci and Guan Yu to launch a general attack together.

However, on that day, Taishi Ci and Gan Ning sent back two pieces of news to Wancheng, one good news and the other bad news.

At that time, Zhuge Jin was in the study room of the government office, enjoying Daqiao massaging his shoulders and back and Xiaoqiao making tea for him.

Suddenly Liu Ye came to the door of the study and cleared his throat. Zhuge Jin signaled Daqiao to step back with a look and not to show any intimacy so as not to humiliate Daqiao's reputation. Then he signaled Liu Ye to come in.

After Liu Ye entered, he bowed again and reported: "General! There is a victory report from the Taishi Colonel! He and General Guan have joined forces to capture Lu'an and kill Chen Lan. Liu Xun himself broke through and fled to Hefei to defend it.

Yuan's army was in extremely low morale because they had lost cities one after another. No one from top to bottom had the confidence to hold Lu'an. Seeing that General Guan was coming so fast, they abandoned the city and concentrated their forces within a few days. The general's strategy of "overwhelmingly strong and resolving the problem" was truly amazing! "

Zhuge Jin stroked his stubble and said, "What's so magical about this? The battle was fought by Yunchang and Ziyi. I just built up the momentum first. Is there anything else?"

Zhuge Jin was not too concerned about the specific process of the two small battles in Shucheng and Lu'an. In his opinion, he had already created such an overwhelming pressure, so it was normal for the small city to collapse directly due to the spread of fear.

If every city continued to fight with Wancheng like this, then all his power would be in vain.

After Liu Ye and Zhuge Jin digested the good news, he mentioned the second piece of news with a serious look: "There is another piece of news, which is hard to say whether it is good or bad. Captain Gan forced the Yuan army in Xunyang to surrender four days ago.

They originally wanted to continue westwards, hoping to capture the Yingshan counties controlled by Yuan Shikai. However, after two days of rapid march, when they arrived at Qichun County, they were shocked to hear that Qichun, Zhu County and several other counties in Yuzhou had been forced to surrender by Huang Zu of Jiangxia after crossing the river.

Captain Gan did not dare to confront Huang Zu without the order, so he sent a messenger back to ask for instructions. He only asked the messenger to negotiate with Huang Zu with courtesy first and then with military force, but Huang Zu said that Liu Jingzhou and he were also Han ministers, and it was their duty to fight against Yuan.

Moreover, Huang Zu's people also argued speciously, saying that although the area west of Xunyang was Yuan Shu's territory, it was not considered a county of Yangzhou, but a county of Yuzhou.

He also said that the lord was only the governor of Yangzhou, and the counties of Yangzhou under Yuan Shu's rule should naturally be recovered by the lord. And if Yuan Shu occupied the counties of Jingzhou, it would naturally be Liu Jingzhou who would recover them. As for the counties of Yuzhou under Yuan Shu's rule, they would naturally be occupied by those with virtue, and whoever arrived first would be the one to fight the enemy. "

Zhuge Jin's facial lines twitched when he heard this, and he slammed the table heavily, "Huang Zu has been bordering Yuan's army in Sui Huang's land in the north of the Yangtze River for many years, why hasn't he crossed the river to fight in the north?
After our army separated Yuan Shu's territory southwest of Yinghuo Mountain and west of Wanshui from his heartland, these counties lost contact and the people were in panic. Huang Zu came to take advantage of it. How dare he say, "The thief who usurped the Han Dynasty can be punished by everyone"? "

Seeing Zhuge Jin's rare anger, Liu Ye was also a little worried. He gritted his teeth and advised: "General, you should not be impulsive at this time! Hefei and Shouchun are still in the hands of Yuan Shu. You can't lose the big picture for the sake of the small! If you conflict with Liu Biao, the plan to destroy Yuan will probably be delayed indefinitely.

It would be better to send someone to the court to condemn the actions of Liu Biao and Huang Zu, to show that we will not admit this loss. In this way, we can also keep an excuse to turn against Huang Zu in the future, but we don't have to use it in a hurry. In the future, we can also bypass Huang Zu to negotiate with Liu Biao, and maybe there will be another way to solve the problem. "

Zhuge Jin glanced at Liu Ye with amusement.

It seems that this guy is not just good at saying "Ah, yes, yes, yes", but also knows how to judge people by their appearance. It must be that his personality charm is strong, which makes Liu Ye willing to work for him, and now he dares to speak out and make suggestions.

He must have stayed in the abalone shop of sycophants for too long, socializing with scum like Liu Xun, so how could he not become a scoundrel?

Zhuge Jin took a deep breath and said, "Of course I know that now is not the time to fall out with Huang Zu. I'll put this account down for now. I'll go to Hefei in a few days and ask you to send someone to Xudu to sort out the right and wrong first."

(End of this chapter)