My younger brother Zhuge Liang

Chapter 822: Killing Sun Quan in Battle and Taking Over Hedong

Considering Xiahou Dun's noble status, we can't just sell such a heavyweight teammate casually.
Sun Quan hesitated in the end and did not flee immediately upon hearing the news.

Even with Ling Tong's persuasion, Sun Quan finally decided to hold Anyi for a few days and wait for the situation to change. At the same time, he sent an urgent messenger on horseback to Shangdang County to inform Xiahou Dun of the changes in Hedong at a speed of 400 miles a day on the mountain road.

He wanted to travel 600 miles a day, but the roads in the Bingzhou mountainous area were too difficult to travel on. Even if he didn't spare any effort, running 400 miles a day would be his limit.

From Anyi to Shangdang, which is roughly from Yuncheng, Shanxi to Changzhi, Shanxi in later generations, the whole journey is more than 500 miles. If you take a slight detour along the mountain road, the news can be delivered in two days.

Give Xiahou Dun another day to make a decision and return to inform Sun Quan, a total of five days. Sun Quan can get Xiahou Dun's decision reply, whether to defend Anyi to the end or find another way to retreat.

When Xiahou Dun's order arrived, Sun Quan would follow it. Then, even if Xiahou Dun failed to escape in the end, Cao Cao could not blame Sun Quan. At least Sun Quan had tried his best.

The reason why Sun Quan dared to take such a gamble was that he felt that he could definitely hold on for five days.

Guan Yu had just reached Dongyuan County. After his long journey and successful surprise attack, didn't he need to rest for a while? Guan Yu took a day to sleep and rest, and to recuperate the wounded soldiers. He only had four days left at most.

There are still more than 200 miles from Dongyuan County to Anyi. Will it take time to march? If they rush to Anyi in such a hurry, will they rest before attacking? Can Guan Yu guarantee that Anyi can be captured immediately after the battle? Or can he cut off the retreat of the defenders of Anyi?

Sun Quan also knew his own weight and knew that his military talent was definitely far inferior to Guan Yu's.

But Sun Quan thought to himself that he couldn't possibly hold off Guan Yu for three days, and even if he delayed the attack, he could ensure that he would not be surrounded and cut off by Guan Yu.

When Sun Quan was with Cao Ren and Cao Zhen in Yingchuan, he also held off Zhang Fei and Wei Yan for a long time. He was at the forefront of Shangcai, making great contributions to the Cao family and was as solid as a rock!
Although Sun Quan didn't know that Zhang Fei's original order was to delay the main force of Cao's army with a feint attack so that Zhao Yun in Hebei could find an opportunity to attack. At least Sun Quan himself felt that he had the strength to hold off Zhang Fei on the front line for several months.

Sun Quan knew that he was not good at field battles, let alone counterattacks, but defending cities and maintaining defense lines were his strong points, which had been tested in bloody battles with the enemy.

Even if Guan Yu is stronger than Zhang Fei, he is not that strong.

……

Although Sun Quan decided to hold on temporarily and wait for Xiahou Dun's instructions, he was not stupid and would not wait blindly.

So after sending out the envoy, he immediately made two deployment adjustments and handed them over to Ling Tong to handle.

"Gong Ji, there are two military matters here that are very important. You are to supervise them personally.

First, Guan Yu came from Henei, broke through the pass of Chen and entered Dongyuan County, so his army must have come from the south bank of the Minshui River. He came over the mountains and could not have brought any boats, so if he wanted to cross to the north bank of the Minshui River, he could only rob our army's boats or search for civilian boats.

You should lead your troops upstream to search and seize all civilian boats, regardless of whether they are on the south bank or the north bank. Those who dare to resist and refuse to surrender can be killed directly. In this way, even if Guan Yu reaches the shore of the Minshui River, he will not be able to find a boat to cross the river. At most, he can temporarily cut down bamboo and make a raft. In this way, our army will have a better chance of winning.

Second, on the premise of ensuring that Guan Yu could not cross to the north bank of the Wushui River, our army divided its troops into several groups and sent them out of the city, crossing the Wushui River from Anyi, setting up camp along the valley on the south bank, cutting off the river valley on the south bank and preventing Guan Yu from bypassing Anyi by land along the river valley.

In this way, even if our army cannot defeat Guan Yu, at least we can ensure that he cannot cut off our retreat, let alone reach Pubanjin and cross the Yellow River. This matter is very important and we must not make any mistakes. "

After Ling Tong received the order, he immediately roared in agreement and went to do it. While walking on the road, Ling Tong pondered over the young master's plan, and he also felt that this deployment was really ingenious.

Guan Yu came over the mountains and had to find a boat again after reaching the Weishui River Basin. This was Guan Yu's biggest weakness. He couldn't solve the problem of boats, so what if he was beaten to Pubanjin?

Considering the worst case scenario, even if Guan Yu reached Pubanjin, he would neither be able to cross the Yellow River to the west into Guanzhong, nor would he be able to cross the Weishui River to the north to cut off Sun Quan's retreat.

As long as Sun Quan controlled the fleet, even if Guan Yu stationed tens of thousands of troops on the south bank of the Weishui River and shot arrows and threw stones at the river, he could not stop the fleet from escaping into the Yellow River by water. As long as the Weishui River channel was not cut off, Sun Quan's life would be absolutely guaranteed, and he might even be able to hold on until Xiahou Dun was rescued.

No wonder Sun Quan dared to withstand Guan Yu's attack and tried to hold out until Xiahou Dun made a decision on whether to return to defend and withdraw his troops.

The Cao army in Hedong County quickly took action and confiscated all the surrounding ships in precise accordance with Sun Quan's requirements.

Then, on the south bank of the Weishui River opposite Anyi City, a trench, earth wall and antlers were urgently built to cross the river valley, ensuring that Guan Yu's army could not sneak across quickly after arriving here.

Of course, because time was very short and manpower was not available, Ling Tong could only mobilize a few thousand people to build fortifications, and he did not expect them to be very solid. It would be good enough if he could dig a trench several feet deep and pile up a few feet high earth wall behind the trench.

There was no time to sharpen the wood for the antlers, so they just stuck whatever logs or even tree branches they could find into the rammed earth. Everything was done as quickly as possible, and they estimated that the construction time would be only one or two days at most, maybe even shorter.

……

While Sun Quan was anxiously preparing to clear the countryside, Guan Yu's vanguard had already set out from Dongyuan County, first heading north to the Xishui River, and then going down the Xishui River to Anyi and Jie County.

Guan Yu's ability to command troops was certainly much better than Sun Quan's. Guan Yu had thought of the same points as Sun Quan, so he was so eager for time and did not dare to rest for too long.

From the start of the surprise attack to the current pursuit, more than two days have passed. The only time I slept was last night. The rest of the time I was either fighting or traveling.

I definitely couldn't save my sleep last night. After all, I had already fought once before, and I had to breathe a sigh of relief after taking over the Chenguan Pass. If I didn't sleep for a long time, the army would collapse without fighting.

Guan Yu had tried his best to rush to the bank of the Wei River as quickly as possible, but after only one or two hours of searching upstream and downstream, Guan Yu discovered that all the boats had been taken away by Ling Tong.

There is no way around it. They are fighting in the interior and at home, so their reaction is definitely faster than Guan Yu's. This cannot be blamed on anyone.

Moreover, Sun Quan did not wait until the battle broke out before he suddenly decided to search and confiscate civilian ships. Before the situation became tense but before the battle started, Sun Quan had already collected a considerable number of civilian ships, leaving only the minimum required to ensure people's livelihood.

This time Ling Tong came only to collect the last minimum number of civilian ships, so the workload was not large and the speed was so fast.

Guan Yu searched for a while but found nothing. He even saw that several places on the south bank of the Huai River, which seemed to be fishing villages, were burned down by Sun Quan and Ling Tong's men, leaving nothing behind.

When Guan Yu arrived, the flames had of course burned out long ago, but some black smoke from the embers still remained, as if telling of Sun Quan's brutality, which affected the common people at all costs.

Guan Yu was a native of Hedong. When he saw this scene and saw his fellow villagers being killed by Sun Quan, he was naturally very angry.

In order to prevent him from getting ready-made wood to build rafts and boats, Sun Quan burned down all the fishing villages on the banks of the Huai River!
"The entire army will turn west and go down the Wei River to Yishi and Jiexian downstream! I don't believe that we can't find a boat in the county town!"

Guan Yu swung his Qinglong sword and his cavalry immediately turned around. Thousands of them rushed downstream along the southern bank of the Weishui River with rumbling hooves.

After all, Dongyuan was two hundred miles away from Anyi. Guan Yu was afraid of encountering the enemy with his exhausted crossbows, so he found a few villages along the way and let his cavalry rest and sleep for a night.

Of course, Guan Yu did not disturb the people. He carried dry food with him and also brought some Shu brocade. When he came across a village with people still living there, he would use the Shu brocade to ask for a place to stay or to buy some supplies.

The main reason is that Hedong County is Guan Yu's hometown. He has been away from his hometown for decades. Now that he has returned, he still wants to leave a good impression on his fellow villagers, so he pays special attention to this aspect.

The soldiers under his command also knew this, so they would rather spend money to solve the problem than disturb the people.

After resting for a night, they marched only a few dozen miles the next day and finally reached the other side of Anyi, where they ran into a temporary defense line set up by Ling Tong to block the river valley.

The defense line had only just been built, consisting of a long ditch and a dirt wall. The antlers were sparse, with a few scattered branches and logs here and there, and they did not pose much of a threat.

Guan Yu observed the situation briefly and immediately ordered his cavalry to break through the blockade.

"It's only a five-foot-high earth wall. We can just charge over it. Luckily our army arrived quickly. If they had built it a few feet higher, it would have been difficult for the cavalry alone to defeat it."

Guan Yu was very fortunate and personally led his troops to charge into battle.

Ling Tong on the opposite side was also helpless. In just two days, he had to assign people to take care of so many things, including searching and confiscating civilian ships, burning fishing villages, and building fortifications. He had already tried his best to accomplish this level of work. He did not expect Guan Yu to come so quickly and decisively.

"Stop Guan Yu! Guan Yu only has cavalry, he can't attack! All spearmen and halberd soldiers should line up behind the earth wall!"

Ling Tong observed the enemy approaching, so he stopped construction in advance and assembled his troops to be ready for battle.

Guan Yu saw this but did not charge directly. Instead, he separated a part of the cavalry, dismounted from his horse, took out the crossbow from behind, and then leisurely used the range advantage to shoot arrows to suppress the enemy for a few rounds.

Ling Tong's defensive fortifications were not perfect, and the five-foot-high breastwork could not provide much protection, not to mention that Guan Yu's crossbow could also be launched.

After more than a dozen rounds of arrow rain, Ling Tong's formation was in chaos. Some soldiers wanted to rush out of the cover and counterattack to kill Guan Yu's crossbow team, while some felt that there was no hope, their morale and mentality collapsed, and they wanted to escape backwards to get out of the enemy's shooting range.

Amid the chaos and inconsistent military orders, Guan Yu keenly seized the opportunity and directly ordered the remaining cavalry to launch a fierce attack.

Ling Tong's formation was not in good order, and the spearmen's defense line was not tight everywhere, so there were still several weak gaps in the formation. Guan Yu's cavalry would naturally focus on these gaps to penetrate.

Although the first few waves of cavalry that rushed up suffered a lot of casualties, some were killed by trenches and pits, and some were stabbed and fell off their horses when they charged with spears and halberds.

But after the initial casualties of about a hundred people, several gaps were broken open, and Guan Yu's rear cavalry attacked Ling Tong's formation and reached behind the earth wall. At this time, Ling Tong no longer had any fortifications or terrain to rely on, and he suddenly became the target of Guan Yu's unilateral slaughter and crushing.

Ling Tong still wanted to stabilize the situation, so he led his personal guards of more than a thousand people to put out fires and plug leaks. After fighting in the melee for a long time, he finally collided with Guan Yu's personal cavalry.

Guan Yu had long noticed the bravery of this young general, and he gave him enough respect. Seeing that the number of people around Ling Tong was decreasing, Guan Yu shouted loudly, dragged the Qinglong sword backwards, gathered strength and rushed towards Ling Tong. When he was more than ten feet away, Guan Yu suddenly swung the Qinglong sword towards Ling Tong with one hand. Ling Tong narrowed his eyes, instinctively felt a sense of extreme danger, and the hair on his body stood up.

He had never expected that Guan Yu would start from such a distance, because if he held the knife with both hands, a considerable portion of the length of the handle would be held by both arms, and the attack would not be able to reach far. But he did not expect that Guan Yu's first knife was swung with one arm purely relying on inertia and sprint acceleration.

The force of this knife is definitely not as strong as a swing with both arms, but its suddenness is more than twice as strong.

Ling Tong suffered from his lack of experience after all. He hastily drew his sword to block, which caused his arm to become numb and his blood to boil. Even so, he could only block 70% to 80% of Guan Yu's force.

At the critical moment of life and death, he tilted his head slightly to the side, and the residual force of Guan Yu's sword hit his shoulder diagonally. Even though his shoulder was covered with iron armor, it was still smashed directly and his collarbone was cut off.

With the collarbone broken, although the arm was not removed, one arm was completely useless. Ling Tong was equivalent to fighting Guan Yu's two arms with one arm. After several moves, he was still defeated and was beheaded.

The troops sent by Sun Quan to block the road were also easily defeated by Guan Yu.

"General, do you want to find a boat to cross the Wushui River directly to the north and besiege Anyi?" After seeing the great victory and hastily annihilating the remaining enemies, the generals were all excited and came to Guan Yu to ask for a fight.

Guan Yu was very calm: "No need! Even if we look for boats, we can't find many. I heard from the captives that Sun Quan is still in charge of Anyi, so we can't force them to surrender. Let's go downstream to Yishi or Jiexian and see if we can persuade them to surrender.

Only by forcibly landing in the city can we get enough ships to block the waterway of the Weishui River.

However, not all of them can go. Some cavalry should be left in Anyi to guard the rear. Otherwise, if the enemy succeeds, what if Sun Quan gets the news and abandons his troops and escapes over the mountains overnight?

Although the terrain of Hedong County is isolated, if you ignore the army, don't want the baggage, and are willing to abandon the military supplies and flee alone, it is still possible to cross the mountains to the north and enter the Fen River Basin. We must be wary of this, so we must leave some soldiers to guard Anyi.

We can find a place downstream with dense forests and hills suitable for hiding, hide a few soldiers and horses, and the rest of the people can go to Jie County to persuade them to surrender. "

Guan Yu was indeed a man of great skill and courage. Even though he only had a few thousand cavalrymen with him, he still dared to divide his troops into two routes again.

However, considering that the enemy had been defeated in successive battles, Cheng Pu was captured, Ling Tong was beheaded, and only Sun Quan was left alone and incompetent in field battles, Guan Yu dared to do so. Moreover, Gao Shun's main infantry force would soon reinforce, so the time difference would not be too long.

The accompanying generals all thought that General Guan's arrangement was reasonable, but soon a new problem emerged: If Guan Yu himself did not go to Jie County, who could ensure that Weiming Wine could directly force Jie County to surrender? If Guan Yu himself went to persuade Sun Quan to surrender, who should be left behind to ensure that Sun Quan could be retained?
Guan Yu himself also thought about this problem, so after a little hesitation, he called his son.

"Ping'er, you have been fighting with me for several years. I have given you many opportunities to gain experience since the Battle of Xiangfan against Cao Ren. You have made great progress in the past few years. Today, you choose one. Do you want to go and force Huaxian to retreat on my behalf, or do you want to stay here and set up an ambush to monitor Sun Quan?"

Guan Ping thought about it and decided that the forced landing in Jie County would require a person's reputation rather than relying on brute force. His father's reputation was feared throughout China and was irreplaceable.

In contrast, setting up an ambush here to monitor Sun Quan only depends on personal martial arts and the ability to lead a small group of cavalry. Guan Ping's martial arts have improved greatly over the years, and he is young and strong.

Therefore, he obviously had a bigger gap with his father in terms of reputation. However, in terms of leading small troops in battle, he could already be considered a "cost-effective replacement" for his father.

"I am willing to stay and ambush Sun Quan!"

Guan Yu also appreciated his son's decision, but he couldn't help but confirm it in the end: "Oh? What if Sun Quan learned that Ling Tong was dead and the county town downstream was forced to land by our army, and our army got enough ships, and then he fled in a hurry and was caught by you, how can you ensure that Sun Quan can stay?"

Guan Ping thought for a moment and said, "If an enemy comes, we will fight him! If Sun Quan really wants to break out, he will definitely not take the mountain road to the north at the beginning. He will definitely take as many smooth roads as possible and will only go north over the mountains when he is really forced to do so.

Therefore, I must hide my identity at the beginning, and not act rashly. I will wait for Sun Quan to approach me, and then I will suddenly attack him. As for the final stage of the battle, Ling Tong has already been killed by my father. Even if Sun Quan has elite guards, I am confident that I can annihilate him! Moreover... I can also use the banner of the pass. At most, I can put on some long beards, use my father's reputation to intimidate Sun Quan's last troops, and thus gain the upper hand!"

When Guan Yu heard this, he felt quite satisfied.

This kid actually thought of using his own reputation to pretend to scare the enemy. Not bad.

Moreover, Guan Yu has always been the most arrogant person. He was very happy when he heard his son said he wanted to borrow his fame. Doesn’t that just prove that his fame is useful?

"Okay! Then follow this arrangement! If we can really keep Sun Quan, His Majesty will definitely reward him greatly! Sun Quan is a traitor who killed the king!"

If it weren't for his own son, Guan Yu would have been reluctant to leave this opportunity to make a contribution to someone else.

After the father and son divided the tasks, they went to carry them out separately.

Guan Yu led more than 2,000 cavalrymen and continued downstream, holding Ling Tong's head to intimidate the counties downstream, forcing them to open the city walls and surrender and hand over the ships collected in the city.

Cavalry cannot attack cities, so two thousand people are enough. The purpose of this trip was mainly to bluff, relying on the first move of killing Ling Tong and Guan Yu's face to accomplish the goal.

As for Guan Ping, he may still have to fight a real battle in the future, which requires more troops.

After a day or two, Guan Yu made smooth progress. When he arrived at Yishi, people from Hedong came to surrender one after another. Some local tyrants from Jiewu Fort also came to surrender, bowed their heads and offered Guan Yu the civilian ships they had hidden for his use.

Guan Yu was overjoyed and immediately made promises to the local tyrants who donated the boats. He said that if they could intercept Sun Quan and prevent the Cao thieves in Hedong from escaping through Pubanjin, he would definitely go to His Majesty and give each of these righteous men who donated the boats a captain's official position.

Even if they failed to kill Sun Quan, these righteous men would be given the official position of military Sima.

Although the position of a captain was not small and the salary was high, compared with the merit of hunting down Sun Quan, Guan Yu felt that these rewards and promises were worth it, and his elder brother would definitely approve of such a matter in an emergency.

Because in the propaganda of Liu Bei's camp, the death of the previous emperor was caused by Sun Quan's direct regicide.

If we can catch and kill the regicide, what does it matter if we allow a few captains to go free?
Guan Yu relied on these small boats to successfully cross the Huai River and reach the north bank.

His hometown, Jie County, is on the north bank. Guan Yu was originally unable to reach the north bank, but now with a boat he can finally come.

Guan Yu's face and reputation really work in Xie County.

When Cao's army in Xie County saw Guan Yu coming and Ling Tong's head, and heard Guan Yu's troops say that Sun Quan and Ling Tong had been defeated, they dared not resist any more. In addition, many local people in the city were willing to respond, and with the help of internal and external forces, except for a few stubborn resistance who were killed by internal and external attacks, the rest of the county surrendered to Guan Yu.

Guan Yu obtained the entire county's inventory of civilian ships, so the river crossing and water transportation capacity naturally increased exponentially many times.

The news of Guan Yu's successful encirclement reached Sun Quan's ears only one or two days after the news of Ling Tong's death in battle.

Sun Quan was finally completely confused and anxious like an ant on a hot pan. He knew that Anyi could not be defended for sure. Once Guan Yu surrounded him, he would be killed without a burial place.

In addition, at this time, new news came from the east, saying that Gao Shun had finally brought Guan Yu's large army, especially the large group of heavy infantry who were good at attacking and breaking through cities, and had marched 200 miles from Dongyuan and Chenguanxing to the vicinity of Anyi.

What Gao Shun brought was the Xianzhen Camp, which was the best at attacking cities! It was not the cavalry like Guan Yu!

Once the Xianzhen Camp surrounded Anyi, how could Sun Quan still be alive?
"Retreat quickly! Take all the cavalry and those who are good at climbing mountains and retreat downstream immediately!" Sun Quan made the decision immediately and asked the troops to get ready as soon as possible to cover his retreat.

"General Sun! Guan Yu has already occupied Jie County and must have got the boats. Where else can we retreat to if we retreat downstream? Do we have to fight a naval battle on the Weishui River to break through Guan Yu's blockade?" A general under his command reminded Sun Quan.

Sun Quan made a prompt decision: "We will retreat as far as we can! We will not retreat all the way to Jie County or Pubanjin. If our scouts find that Guan Yu's fleet is blocking the road downstream, we will bypass it and go over the mountains to Linfen in the north! We can still retreat to the Yellow River via the Fen River!"

Soon after he issued this order, his own cavalry was ready, and they brought a group of light infantry for cover, and left Anyi to prepare for a breakout.

Sun Quan walked and stopped many times, and had just walked less than thirty miles along the Wushui River when he passed a relatively narrow part of the Wushui River valley, with relatively high mountains and dense forests on both sides. At that time, the first day of the march was almost over, and the sky was getting dark. Sun Quan's troops had to light torches and walked slower and slower.

Just when Sun Quan was feeling uneasy, there was a sudden burst of drums and horns from the hillside on the right, and countless soldiers shouted loudly.

"Sun Quan, you thief, don't run away! Guan Yu is here!"

Behind the gentle slope and dense forest, a group of cavalry rushed over. The leader also held a Qinglong sword in his hand, and was wearing a green robe and golden armor. He rode a majestic warhorse and seemed to have a long beard as dense as his hair.

How could he know that Guan Ping had simply shaved off the long hair of a prisoner and glued the entire set of cut long hair to his chin with glue, imitating his father's three-foot long beard, which was even thicker than his father's real beard.

"Guan Yu!"

"Why is Guan Yu here?"

"Our army is defeated!"

"General Sun is dead!"

Seeing the might of Guan Yu personally leading the cavalry to charge out, Sun Quan's personal guards, who had heard about Guan Yu capturing Cheng Pu and Guan Yu beheading Ling Tong in just a few days, no longer had the courage to resist.

Guan Yu's reputation is indeed useful, especially in recent days, because he has just committed two major crimes, and the people around Sun Quan are the most frightened and afraid of the enemy like a tiger.

Seeing Guan Ping, who was suspected to be Guan Yu, rushing towards them, Sun Quan's personal guards scattered like birds and beasts, and fled in all directions after a commotion.

When Guan Ping rushed forward, Sun Quan's scalp tingled and he had to draw his sword to fight him himself. Naturally, he was beheaded by Guan Ping in less than three moves.

(End of this chapter)