My younger brother Zhuge Liang

Chapter 263 The strong always walk alone, the weak always stick together
Sun Ce was reminded by Zhou Yu's analysis and for the first time he seriously thought about the issue of his retreat.

He was a fearless person who wanted to leave his name in history books.

But he also knew that he couldn't gamble with the fate of his entire family.

After all, the Sun family had only been a small warlord that controlled several counties for four or five years, and it was not without the opportunity to withdraw from the struggle.

In the past ten years or so, there have been many small warlords of his level who were defeated and fled, and then went to the court to find a job as a minor official.

Not to mention the distant past, just take Hua Xin and Wang Lang in history, didn’t they also govern one or two counties in Jiangdong? After their defeat, they just went to Xu Du and were transferred to become one of the Nine Ministers, but they had no real power.

In history, the path that Wang Lang was able to take might also be a path that other relatives of the Sun family might have the opportunity to take - although Wang Lang in this life has not reached this point, and Sun Ce could not learn from Wang Lang's example.

After Sun Ce realized this possibility, his inner decadence was aroused. He stared blankly at the sunset for a long time. He didn't know how many thoughts were fighting in his mind before he finally came to his senses.

He subconsciously looked around a few times, and confirmed that there was no one else nearby except Zhou Yu, before he decided to speak frankly and talk to Zhou Yu about the issue of retreat.

Anyway, no outsiders will hear it, so it won’t dampen morale.

Sun Ce sighed and said earnestly, "Gongjin, there is no way out for me in this life. I have killed too many people and offended too many people. Once I lose power, I will be attacked by enemies from all sides.

But you are different. You crossed the river to surrender after Yuan Shu proclaimed himself emperor in order to avoid being a traitor. Although you served as Yuan Shu's general in the early years and helped me fight a few battles in the first year after I crossed the river, you did not offend the Jiangdong aristocratic families and did not make any personal enemies..."

The more Zhou Yu listened, the more he felt something was wrong, so he quickly stopped him and said, "Why do you say that, Bofu? Do you want me to live in disgrace and find a way out in the future if the situation turns unfavorable? Am I such a person?"

Sun Ce raised his hand and pressed it lightly, signaling Zhou Yu to calm down, and then continued: "Don't be anxious, how can I not understand you? Of course I know that you are brave and righteous. But the other peers and juniors of the Sun family are still young and immature, and none of them can be trusted.

I can risk everything, but the Sun family cannot follow me. I only occupied three counties for five years. In such a chaotic world, it is not a difficult situation to ride a tiger and put the family's foundation on the line.

I hope you can help the Sun family find a way out. If something goes wrong in the future and the gamble fails, at least Zhongmou and Shaoer can retreat and preserve the bloodline and title for our Sun family.

If Cao Cao can defeat Yuan Shao, that would be the best. Then we can find a way to break through Liu Bei's blockade and surrender to Cao. Cao Cao will remember our Sun family's contribution in helping him hold back Liu Bei during the stalemate at Guandu and prevent him from being attacked from all sides. Zhongmou and Shao'er will definitely be treated well and will still retain their titles of nobility.

If Cao Cao fails to defeat Yuan Shao, the situation will be more complicated. Where can we go? Are we, the descendants of the Sun family, only able to float on the sea?"

Zhou Yu was finally moved by Sun Ce's sincerity. He subconsciously looked around to make sure that no one was around and that it would not dampen morale, and then he opened his heart and helped to deduce:

"If it really comes to that... Yu swears to keep the Sun family safe, but there is no need to be so pessimistic right now. We should still focus on the defensive battle at hand.

Even if Cao Cao won, it would not be easy to surrender to him. Now Liu Bei occupied the two counties of Guangling and Xia Pi in Jiangbei, and the six counties of Yidong in Donghai County, completely occupying the coastline of the East China Sea.

Further north, the two counties of Yidong, Zhuxian and Juxian in Langya County of Xuzhou are in the hands of Yuan Tan. Unless Cao Cao can defeat Yuan Shao in the future and tear open a gap between Qing and Xu, we can go directly to Cao by sea, otherwise we will inevitably pass through Yuan Shao's territory.

Yuan Shao and we may not have direct hatred, and he will not make things difficult for us like Liu Bei did, but we must also be prepared that all the troops we bring to surrender to Yuan will be detained by Yuan Shao, and we can only wait for the right time and the enemy's vigilance to relax, and then escape alone and surrender to Cao. It is impossible to take the army through Yuan Shao's jurisdiction.

If Cao Cao fails to defeat Yuan Shao, then there is no point in joining Cao. We are surrounded by Liu Bei on three sides, and we can only go out to sea from the east. At that time, we can only cross the sea through Minzhong to Jiaozhou, and we don’t know how many ships will sink or be damaged by wind and waves on the way.

If they did not go to Jiaozhou, they could only go to Yizhou on the other side of Minzhong, but they would have to cross the deep and difficult Black Water Channel, and Yizhou was a place full of barbarians and smog, so they could only survive. A similar situation to Yizhou was to go north to Qingzhou, then cross the Qingzhou Peninsula straight eastward and go to the Three Kingdoms of Korea without any care.

The wilderness of the Three Kingdoms of Korea may be better than Izu, but the sailing distance should be longer than that of Izu. Whether we choose Jiaozhou, Izu or the Three Kingdoms of Korea as our retreat route, we must reorganize and gather all the excellent sea vessels at hand to have hope - I wonder if our army captured Guan Yu's new sea vessels in the Jiangyin naval battle last month?"

Inspired by Zhou Yu's brainstorming, Sun Ce also remembered that in the naval battle in the Yangtze River Bay in Jiangyin nearly a month ago, although his side lost 20,000 soldiers, it was not completely without gain.

We have at least wiped out more than half of the 5,000 men of Taishi Ci's army. It's a pity that the ships that Taishi Ci's army was riding were all old-fashioned battleships, with no technological gap and no research value.

As for the naval forces led by Guan Yu and Zhang Duo, who were attacking Sun Ce from both directions, in order to rescue Taishi Ci, they had no time to take detours or fight guerrilla warfare. They just rushed up and engaged in hand-to-hand combat, using every move to hit the enemy's flesh.

In the end, although Sun Ce was completely crushed and defeated due to his tactics and the right time and place, as long as it was a fair and bloody battle, both sides would definitely have suffered casualties and prisoners.

On Guan Yu's side, some medium-sized and light new keel speedboats were destroyed by Sun Ce's army and thus captured. Some warships were unable to kill the enemy in boarding battles, but were unwilling to surrender, so they jumped into the river wearing bamboo life-saving armor to escape, and the empty ships were captured by the enemy.

This is inevitable and it is impossible to keep the technology absolutely confidential.

However, even if Sun Ce seized a small amount of new equipment, it was too late for him. It was impossible for him to build a large number of new warships and weapons to turn the tables.

Naval construction has always been a long process, and Sun Ce no longer has time.

However, since they did not intend to use these technologies to turn the tables, but only wanted to escape, it was still possible to rely on the few medium-sized keel speedboats and nearly ten keel boats that were captured, and then imitate and rush to build them. When the time came, it would be possible to carry the Sun family members and confidants across the sea.

Once this line of thought came to mind, Sun Ce's mind suddenly became clear and he thought of many other possibilities.

Thinking of the wonderful point, Sun Ce clapped his hands and exclaimed:
"Gongjin is indeed a man of foresight! This theory has inspired me. Perhaps our army should take advantage of the stalemate stage to repair all the warships captured in the naval battle last month, and then rush to build replicas, not for naval battles, but for fast sailing and easy transfer. By extension, there are some unprecedented things captured on those ships, such as armor connected by bamboo tubes, which can help people float on the water.

There were also strange incendiary ointment weapons. It was the sticky, hard-to-wash-off kerosene that was stuck to the side of the warship and set fire to it, burning down our ship!

Although we have little chance to use these things, if we can provide them to Cao Cao, they will be a stepping stone for him to surrender and exchange for official titles in the future, which will be enough to help Zhongmou win Cao Cao's trust. If Cao Cao can repel Yuan Shao in the future and fight Liu Bei, he may be able to use them. "

To be honest, Sun Ce's idea is somewhat similar to the Germanian's technology information transfer plan at the end of World War II.

At that time, they knew that their own country might not be able to hold on first, so they wanted to secretly transfer their nuclear program and some other scientific research materials to their ally Japan, and continue research and resistance in the hope of a chance of a turnaround.

Although Sun Ce did not have much technological accumulation, he had more experience in fighting against Liu Bei's army and had summarized many lessons. However, Cao Cao's army had not fought with Liu Bei so far (not counting the old accounts before Zhuge Jin surrendered to Liu).

The lessons learned and the spoils of war that Sun Ce's army gained from the loss of 30,000 troops must have been very attractive to Cao Cao, as it could prevent his army from making the same mistake again in the future.

However, for many of the captured items, you only have samples but no formulas. It is very doubtful how well Cao Cao could reverse engineer them after getting them.

For some mechanical structural innovations, we can at least imitate 70% to 80% of them with samples, such as life jackets and some shipbuilding structural tricks.

As for oils such as "high-viscosity fire-attack fish paste", Cao's army craftsmen only saw the actual product but had no formula. They could only experiment by trial and error. They had no clue yet, and it would be good if they could imitate 20% to 30% of the effect.

Zhou Yu and Sun Ce were inspired by each other, and Zhou Yu also had some ideas, and soon he came up with a point:

"Indeed, for the sake of long-term planning, we should carefully sort out and think about this aspect. I also thought of a point: the reason why I was defeated in the Battle of Guangling was mainly because the drawings and craftsmen we provided by Cao Jun and the imitation Ge Gongche had too many drawbacks!

As a result, Chen Deng used a three-bow crossbow equipped with cast iron giant arrows, thick hemp ropes and huge stone pulleys to pull it over, greatly reducing the siege force. Later, I also summarized some of the key points and experiences of Ge Gongche's improvement, and asked the defeated soldiers and prisoners in detail to find out Chen Deng's method of restraining Ge Gongche.

If these methods can be provided to Cao Cao, Cao Cao will certainly attach importance to our army, and it can be regarded as leaving an extra way out. Moreover, it is said that Cao Cao and Yuan Shao are in a stalemate at Guandu. Cao Cao chose to build high fortifications and deep trenches to resist the enemy, so Yuan Shao will certainly attack Cao's camps and castles.

If Yuan Shao also relied on rumors to copy Ge Gongche to attack Cao's camp, wouldn't it help Cao Cao withstand Yuan Shao's offensive tactics if we revealed Zhuge Jin's back-up plan to guard against Ge Gongche? Only if Cao Cao defeated Yuan Shao, we would have hope. "

Sun Ce heard this and stroked his beard. He felt that what Zhou Yu said made sense, but he was still a little worried, so he confirmed with Zhou Yu:
"Liu Bei and Yuan Shao should have formed an alliance in secret, right? Could it be that Liu Bei has revealed technologies such as the Ge Gongche to Yuan Shao? If Yuan Shao has Liu Bei's technology, rather than just imitating it, the reminders we provide may not be able to help Cao Cao..."

Zhou Yu thought about it and was very confident, so he answered the question directly:
"I don't think it's possible. We have to join forces with Cao Cao because the weaker the stronger, the stronger the weaker. Liu Bei and Yuan Shao are the stronger parties. Liu Bei will definitely hold back and scheme against Yuan Shao.

If Yuan Shao defeated Cao Cao in the future, Liu Bei would still want to fight Yuan Shao for the world. How could he pass on his secrets to someone who would become his enemy in the future? We have no choice. If we don't do our best to support Cao Cao, we will be defeated one by one, and naturally we will have no reservations when communicating."

Sun Ce was stunned for a moment, and finally made up his mind and said, "In this case, Gongjin will take care of all these matters. You will have nothing to do in Moling in the next few months, as you are not needed to guard the city anyway.

You should take advantage of the fact that Jurong has not yet been cut off by Guan Yu and lead a team of cavalry to march quickly and lightly to support Wuxian, and take charge of the overall situation for me in Wuxian, Qiantang and other places, and organize the spoils and experience of our army in the battle with Liu Bei.

Then send out secret envoys on patrol boats, disguised as civilian merchants, sneak through Liu Bei's jurisdiction, and hand over the secret scrolls to Cao Cao's people, so that our Sun family can make a good relationship with Cao Cao in advance. When sending secret envoys, send several waves, and don't be afraid that one or two waves will be intercepted and seized by Zhuge Jin or Guan Yu.

Anyway, these things belong to them, so it doesn't matter if they are seized. As long as we ensure that one of the secret scrolls is delivered to Cao Cao, we can improve Cao Cao's combat power against Yuan Shao. The sooner Cao Cao defeats Yuan Shao, the easier it will be for us to survive until the day we emerge victorious."

With Sun Ce's decision, the "Sun-Cao Technology Alliance" has actually been formed.

Although Liu Bei's technical and scientific research capabilities were still the best among the other princes, Sun and Cao could at least fully share their knowledge and experiences.

Ensure that the losses suffered and lessons learned by one party can be directly absorbed by the other party without having to suffer the loss again.

As for how much you can learn from each loss, it depends on your learning ability. This is fair, and you can't blame anyone.

It is entirely conceivable that in the future Han Dynasty, there will be a situation where "the princes who are closer to Liu Bei's camp have more fights with him. Although they will be beaten more fiercely, they will also benefit more from the diffusion of technology, and it will be easier for more remote princes to gain technological advantages."

It's like the armored forces that rolled out of the European battlefield during World War II. When they fought against the US Army, they could immediately beat the US Army's armored forces into submission (under the premise of bad weather and the US Army being unable to use its air force, only ground armored forces were considered for a one-on-one duel).

And after the US military has defeated the "world's number one competition area for armored technology", they can go back to the Pacific battlefield to defeat the Japanese pirates and defeat the Japanese pirates' armored forces.

After Zhou Yu received Sun Ce's order, he immediately chose to follow it, and took a small team of cavalry and rushed back to Wu County to take charge of the overall situation in the rear and implement these plans. He also knew that he would not be able to do anything else in Moling for a few months, anyway, Sun Ce just needed to defend the city.

Once the results were sorted out, they were immediately and secretly sent to Cao Cao.

At the same time, during this period of stalemate between Guan and Sun, Liu Bei's army also made a number of breakthroughs on the western front and seemed to be gradually able to extricate itself.

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PS: This book will have a dual narrative line. The map will be changed later and the timeline may be slightly regressed. Please forgive me. The next chapter will start with Liu Bei, Zhuge Liang, Zhang Fei and Zhao Yun fighting in Jingnan and tell a parallel story.

(End of this chapter)