Lu Bu: My wife comes from two thousand years later

At Sishui Pass, a cold wind howled and snowflakes danced. Wrapped in a thick cloak, Jia Xu paused, gazing into the distance, and asked leisurely, "General, are you clearing out your own men before the battle even begins?"

"Why do you think so?" Lu Bu turned around and looked at him strangely.

Jia Xu said, "There is nothing wrong with the general's arrangement, but the reminder to General Niu was too deliberate."

"You can tell from just one sentence?" Lu Bu was secretly shocked. Could it be that this old fox could read minds?

"No!" Jia Xu shook his head. "Dong Zhuo has no descendants. Of all the possible heirs, the General and Niu Fu hold the highest prestige. Judging from the current situation, the General will undoubtedly be the next in line to take power. However, his roots in the Liang Province army are too shallow. If he wishes to assume full control of the military, he must first eliminate these veteran Liang Province generals, with Niu Fu naturally being the first to bear the brunt of the consequences."

"However... Niu Fu is timid. No matter how much you provoke him, he won't dare cross the river to fight. Yuan Shao may not even come on his own initiative. I'm afraid your wish will not be fulfilled."

Lü Bu said, "It won't work with just one word, so I'll have Xu Rong and Hu Zhen go to Yingchuan first to make achievements. If I win two more battles here, he'll probably be restless."

"What if he still sits on the throne?"

Lu Bu frowned, "Then we can only try other methods."

Jia Xu said jokingly, "General, why don't you just issue an order to have him cross the river and repel the enemy?"

"Then the whole army will see that I want to kill Niu Fu." Lu Bu followed up with a quip, "It would be simpler to just kill him with one blow."

Crossing the river to fight is not easy, and we are on the defending side. Unless the combat conditions are extremely favorable, crossing the river to fight is tantamount to seeking death given that our troops are already less than those of the enemy.

Lü Bu leaned against the city wall, gazing at the vast expanse of white wilderness outside the pass. He said, "Tomorrow I intend to leave the pass to visit Suanzao. I expect to be back in three to five days. Sir, please help me think of a solution for the next few days."

Jia Xu raised his eyebrows, "General, are you going to kill Suanzao?"

"Well, take them by surprise."

Jia Xu nodded slightly, "Alright, a light cavalry attack, perhaps a thousand men can defeat a hundred thousand strong army."

"A thousand men are still too many. Five hundred light cavalry will suffice."

"The General is too arrogant..."

Are they arrogant? Lü Bu didn't think so. If the coalition forces pushed the battle line to Xingyang and set up camp in front of Sishui Pass, even 5,000 men, let alone 1,000, might not be able to break through his camp of 100,000. But now these people had just gathered in Suanzao, and the camp was probably not yet established. Moreover, the troops on all sides were in disarray and lacked unified command. 500 men were more than enough to break through.

…………

Suanzao is Yanjin County, the westernmost part of Chenliu County in Yanzhou, about two hundred miles away from Sishui Pass. At that time, eight armies including Liu Dai, Cao Cao, Qiao Mao, Bao Xin, Kong Zhu, Zhang Miao, Zhang Chao and Yuan Yi gathered here, with a total force of 100,000.

"Benchu ​​and Gongjie (Wang Kuang's courtesy name) have stationed troops at the ferry crossing on the other side of Mengjin, tying down part of Dong Zhuo's forces. I intend to take advantage of his unpreparedness and send troops to capture Ao Cang and Xingyang tomorrow, pushing the front line forward." In the eastern coalition camp of Suanzao, Cao Cao pointed to two locations on the map and said to everyone.

"Dong Zhuo has 4,000 troops stationed in Ao Cang and Xingyang. I'm afraid it will be difficult to take them. It won't be too late to send troops after Yuan Gonglu and Sun Wentai in the south are ready." Yanzhou Governor Liu Dai suggested, twirling his beard.

Yuzhou Governor Kong Rong followed up, saying, "Gongsun Zan of Youzhou has also sent 2,000 cavalrymen, who should arrive in a few days. His cavalrymen fought against the Wuhuan in the north and defeated Zhang Chun, and they are quite effective. Dong Zhuo's Liangzhou and Bingzhou armies also have a large number of cavalrymen. I think we should wait for Gongsun Zan's men to arrive before engaging them!"

Cao Cao said, "My allied forces have a hundred thousand soldiers. Even if we were to pull our troops over to scare those four thousand men, we would be able to scare them away. Why should you be afraid?"

Zhang Miao, the prefect of Chenliu, said, "It's not that I'm afraid, but with Alliance Leader Yuan away, who will command our combined forces? And who will lead the charge during the siege?"

Zhang Miao raised the two most pressing issues that needed to be addressed. They had all elected Yuan Shao as their leader, and naturally they would follow his orders. But now that Yuan Shao was in Hanoi, were they going to let these provincial governors and prefects obey the orders of Cao Cao, a man without a position or territory?

Although Cao Cao followed Yuan Shao's example and named himself the General of Fenwu, this was just a nice-sounding title for a commoner. Who would believe in a self-proclaimed official title? The people elected Yuan Shao as the leader not because he named himself the General of Chariots and Cavalry, but because his family was powerful.

Moreover, the casualties of those who take the lead in attacking the city will inevitably be the greatest, and no one can let their own troops die.

These two questions really stumped Cao Cao. He thought for a moment and said, "Each division should select a proportion of its troops to form a vanguard. These people will lead the attack. As for the commander, we can nominate someone to temporarily replace Yuan Benchu."

Everyone was silent. Who wanted to take over temporarily? If they won, the credit wouldn't go to them, and Yuan Shao, who was petty, might even be unhappy, after all, he was the leader of the alliance. But if they lost, everyone would blame the commander for his poor command. It was a thankless job.

As for drawing troops in proportion, that doesn't work either. Those with more soldiers will draw more. For example, Cao Cao only had five or six thousand soldiers, so he must have drawn the least. All of them came to fight Dong Zhuo, so why did he draw less?

After everyone discussed it for a long time without any conclusion, Bao Xin could no longer bear it and stood up and said, "Meng De, he can't wait, let's go first."

Zhang Chao followed up, "I can also send some people over."

Cao Cao nodded, finally there was someone who shared the same ideals as him.

When the others saw that Cao Cao and his two companions were really going to send troops, they felt embarrassed to just stand by and watch, so each group finally sent some people, making a total of 30,000 people.

However, just as they finished discussing, a soldier rushed in from outside the door and shouted, "Report..."

The soldier held his words out, his gaze sweeping across the crowd before clasping his fists and saying, "My Lords, Lords, and Generals, General Lu Bu has arrived at our camp."

"What? Lu Bu is attacking?" Kong Rong was surprised.

They were the ones who came to smuggle the thieves, yet they let the thieves come to their door first? This is outrageous!

"Where are the people? How many soldiers and horses are there?" Cao Cao asked in a deep voice.

The soldier said, "Less than a thousand. When I came in to report, the enemy was less than ten miles away. I'm afraid they're already at the gate now."

"Less than a thousand?" Cao Cao's expression relaxed, a mixture of surprise and sarcasm. Was Lu Bu just being arrogant or just being arrogant? How dare a mere few hundred men raid his army of a hundred thousand? Who gave him the courage?

Qiao Mao slammed the table and stood up, "Does Lu Fengxian regard all the heroes in the world as nothing?"

Zhang Miao was furious. "Arrogant! Extremely arrogant! Wait for me to send a fierce general to capture and kill him."

After saying this, he said to a guard beside him, "Go and call Dian Wei out. If you can capture and kill Lu Bu, you will be rewarded handsomely."

As soon as he said these words, everyone felt that the ground seemed to start shaking. Cao Cao hurriedly walked out of the tent and climbed onto the arrow tower nearby. He saw an earth dragon rising from the wilderness not far away. Under the rolling yellow earth, countless war horses were galloping, and the rumbling sound of horses' hooves seemed to shake the arrow tower.

"Quick, pass the order to fight the enemy!" Cao Cao shouted from above.

To pass on orders, whose orders are they? To defend against the enemy, how do we defend against the enemy?

The soldiers below looked around in confusion, not knowing what to do. The princes who followed them out of the tent also looked around in confusion. After a moment, they reacted and ran towards their own troops, shouting as they ran, "Quick, quick, form a battle array to resist the enemy!"