The Chang'an reinforcements that Xu Huang heard about were obviously brought by Zhuge Liang, and he also brought generals such as Zhang Ren, Dian Wei, and Wu Ban.

Because Xu Huang's injuries had not yet recovered, and he was afraid that the troops in the enemy camp in the northeast of the city would take advantage of the chaos to make trouble, so he chose to hold his troops and refused to send people to support him, waiting for reinforcements to enter the city to meet.

Unexpectedly, Xu Huang had this move, but instead caused some twists and turns to the seemingly natural meeting.

In Zhang Liao's camp, the main general in charge of guarding the Anyi side was Hou Cheng and Wei Xu. Because Zhang Liao himself was still besieging Wen Xi and could not get rid of his body, he sent Hou Cheng and Wei Xu to keep an eye on Xu Huang.

Jia Xu suggested Zhang Liao at that time: Although Hou Cheng and Wei Xu could not capture Anyi alone, if Xu Huang sent messengers to break through and mediate Liang and Puban's troops to reinforce Anyi, he could annihilate the enemy's small reinforcements in field battles, so as not to prevent too many defenders in the city from attacking Anyi after Wenxi captured it and then attacking Anyi.

Surveillance of Anyi, besieging the city and attacking aid, is a very standard tactic.

Now that Zhuge Liang is here, if Hou Cheng doesn't even look at it, it will be too ungrateful, so he sent scouts from afar to investigate the enemy situation and make pre-deployment. He also soon learned from the scout's reward that Zhuge Liang's fleet seemed to be quite large, and it should be more than enough to pretend to be more than 10,000 people.

However, Zhuge Liang did not use his own banner, and Hou Cheng did not know where the reinforcements came from.

Before he was dispatched, Wei Xu advised: "Brother Hou, I think this matter is safe. Although General Zhang ordered us to monitor Anyi and annihilate the enemy reinforcements, the aid of the enemy's reinforcements was expected to be attacked by only the enemy soldiers from Puban, Jieliang and others. Those small counties could divide a few or at most a group of troops from the army Sima to Anyi.

But now when the scouts repay the size of the enemy fleet, they may be able to hold tens of thousands of people. The number of troops here is only 5,000 or 6,000, and the main force is still on General Zhang's side. We are now more people than Xu Huang's direct troops, but far less than the scale of the enemy reinforcements and Xu Huang's joint forces. What should we do if we are attacked from front and back?

Besides, the reinforcements are strict and not the kind of small boats that ferry in Puban. They have cabins and piles. Most of our army is cavalry, and we cannot use cavalry to shoot against warships, and we suffer more losses. It is better to report this situation to General Zhang, as he can understand our difficulties."

Unfortunately, Hou Cheng is a man who is more warlike. After thinking about it, he always feels that it is too much of a loss to give up without doing anything, and he is afraid that Zhang Liao will blame him. He paced back and forth a few steps before the case, then looked at the map for a while, and then flashed with inspiration:

"It may not be that troublesome. We are cavalrymen, so we have to take a look. At worst, we can just try the enemy's reality and leave. The enemy comes from the water, can we catch up with the cavalry?

As for the ranger's loss in shooting with a warship with a bunker, how can I not know? I heard that it was on this water. Yang Feng and Han Xian lost twice after Guan Yu and Xu Huang. Mr. Jia had told him before departure. Can we not be careful?

However, this Anyi City is not directly adjacent to the Tongshui River. The city on the map is still several miles away from the river. We pretend not to dare to act rashly, and when they land on the shore and enter the city, we suddenly rushed over and tried to intercept the kill halfway."

Wei Xu also looked at the map and saw that Hou Cheng’s words made sense, so he agreed to cooperate and give it a try.

Then, they waited for a while, and made complete preparations in the camp, and then they waited until Zhuge Liang's vanguard troops were on the northwest of Anyi and the east coast pier on the east coast of the Tengshui River, and then they went out to kill.

Because the two places are only a dozen miles apart, the cavalry can still rush to the scene in an instant.

Along the way, Hou Cheng asked the soldiers to take the opportunity to set fire, burning all the towns that had fled the people near the dock outside the city, further creating chaos and delaying Zhuge Liang's reinforcements to fight.

...

Perhaps some readers may wonder: The four county towns on the banks of the river, including Puban, Jie Liang and Wenxi, all built the city closely together with the river. Why did the Anyi county town have to build the city ten miles south to the south of the river?

Moreover, the location and transportation in the city are inconvenient, but there are bustling towns and wharfs outside the city. Isn’t it good to wrap these urban areas with city walls? Why not put them outside the city?

This characteristic of Anyi City actually has a deep historical opportunity. It is mainly because when the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period and the Three Families divided Jin, Zhibo dug water to flood the capital of the Zhao family, Jinyang. At that time, Zhibo bragged to Wei Hengzi Han Kangzi: He originally only knew that river water could become a barrier to defend the country like a city wall, but he did not expect that it could also flood the city and destroy the country.

Anyi and Pingyang happened to be the capitals of the Han and Wei families at that time. The head of the family was frightened after hearing Zhibo's unintentional words. Later, they led to their rebellion and joining forces with Zhao Xiangzi to destroy Zhi, and the three families divided Jin.

People are always particularly sensitive to the recent lesson. After the three families divided the Jin Dynasty, the two cities, Anyi and Pingyang, which are now within Hedong County, gradually moved to a height farther away from the river in the Warring States Period.

Therefore, there is only one Anyi in the Fengshui River Basin that does not rely on the Fengshui River, and there is only one Pingyang in the Fenhe River Basin that does not rely on the Fenhe River. This is all about sacrificing the convenience of transportation in exchange for strategic national defense security and preventing the country from being attacked by water.

Daliang, where Wei finally moved its capital, did not learn this lesson. As a result, when Qin destroyed the six kingdoms, it was flooded and the Daliang city wall was destroyed and the country was destroyed. Even one or two thousand years later, when Li Zicheng broke Kaifeng, he still let the Yellow River flood the city.

There is no need to say too much about these historical stories and reasons. Anyway, Hou Cheng and Wei Xu do not read history, so they just look at the map and find ready-made answers. They think that the distance between Anyi City and the Tongshui River can be intercepted by Zhuge Liang, so they can intercept it.

Hou Cheng took the lead, Wei Xu stayed at home, and responded according to the situation, and the division of labor was very clear.

After burning some buildings in the Anyi Wharf town, Hou Cheng's cavalry felt that Zhuge Liang had not yet settled down and wanted to attack and test it.

But Zhuge Liang is so kind that he is very steadily doing things. If he wants to march ashore, he must first ask Zhang Ren to lead a small number of troops to line up tightly and go ashore in batches to cover and advance. Before ensuring absolute safety, he will not leave the fleet's cover and range too long.

In addition, when Hou Cheng was several miles away, Zhuge Liang began to let Zhang Ren be in full swing. Hou Cheng was facing a hedgehog-like spear formation and a crossbow on a cart. The crossbowmen who did not get ashore behind them were also hiding behind the piles of warships and arrows.

At the same time, Zhuge Liang had an idea and ordered Zhang Ren: "If the enemy dares to come to disrupt our army, I believe that we don't know the reality of our army. You can only use your banner after you get ashore. Don't expose your banner for the time being, so they think that you are the only one of the troops to help."

Zhang Ren received the order and said that he would definitely implement it. He could understand that Zhuge Liang wanted to take advantage of the enemy's misunderstandings to further hide his strength and lure the enemy into a rash move.

Hou Cheng didn't know the pros and cons, so he let hundreds of cavalry trampled on him first, and his guns and arrows were all at once, just to rush the Han soldiers who were still standing on the river beach.

As a result, a storm-like crossbow arrow immediately taught them how to be human, and the spearman with his calf standing in the water was not at all confused. Hou Cheng lost only a hundred people, and realized that Zhang Ren's defense was excellent and would not give people the opportunity to "set up a formation unstable and half-cross the attack."

Hou Cheng was not giving up because he had at least tried to test that the enemy general was Zhang Ren. Zhang Ren is still relatively small in Guandong. He mainly fought with the Xiliang army, mainly guarding Jieting and later helping Guan Yu guard the camp when he fought Jincheng. He gave people the impression that he was not a comprehensive general, and he had never heard of his personal martial arts.

(Note: In the Romance of China, Zhang Ren's military strength is relatively high, similar to Yan Yan. But according to his aspirations, he only has a certain ability to command troops, and his personal martial arts has no reliable records)

Hou Cheng saw that he could not defeat Zhang Ren's reinforcements, so he would have no dates to attack the enemy's anger, provoking and hitting the anger of the enemy: "Zhang Ren is a man! I am Hou Cheng, a powerful general under the tent of General Zhengbei! You dare to come out to fight me!"

If he refused, it would be fine, just treat it as a blow to the morale of the Han reinforcements. Hou Cheng also knew that he was worth it. If Xu Huang in the city went to fight in person, he would definitely run away immediately. Hou Cheng knew very well that Xu Huang's martial arts were only slightly inferior to Zhang Liao, and he was definitely not Xu Huang's opponent.

Zhang Ren was hesitating whether to agree. A messenger next to him ran over quickly and whispered: "Zhuge Sima said not to agree, but said he was disdainful to fight with Hou Cheng. He was not worthy. He was enough to kill the pioneer Wu Ban."

Zhang Ren was stunned and thought to himself that he had also figured out the military power of Wu Ban along the way, how could he take such a risk? Besides, Wu Ban actually has a higher official position than him. His sister (cousin) is the prince's concubine. If there is a missed official position, would he have to do it?

However, along the way, he had fully believed in Zhuge Liang, and knew that Zhuge Liang was Li Su's confidant and did not offend him, so he did as he did.

Hou Cheng was furious after hearing this: "Wu Bangou, I heard that you were the lieutenant who gave the girl to Liu Bei*. You dare to die with such martial arts?! It just happened to be promoted to your position."

After saying that, he jumped into the horse and thrust forward.

A general rushed out from the Han army. His riding skills were not superb, but he was just a perfect match. He seemed to have just jumped off the boat and rushed up with a horse. While rushing, he was still depressed and forced himself to bear it for the time being. He followed Zhuge Sima's order to capture Hou Cheng alive and asked about the military situation before talking about it.

When Hou Cheng saw the enemy general rushing to the near, he was slightly surprised and distracted: How could Wu Ban describe it as ugly? Is his sister not Liu Bei's concubine? In theory, brothers and sisters are similar, how beautiful can his brother be? Is Liu Bei a strange person with a unique taste?

This kind of despair made his death faster. "Wu Ban" took advantage of his confusion and rushed to within ten steps. He threw several hand halberds and threw them out. When he killed someone with his hand halberd, he usually threw them at five steps, but he just had to shoot and catch them alive. Then he could pull them away ten steps away. In this way, the speed of the halberd was decayed and the kinetic energy was not large, so he would not directly hit the person.

Hou Cheng's eyes were blurred, and he subconsciously blocked it, but he still hit two halberds in his forearm and thighs. Just when he was dizzy, a heavy iron halberd hit his chest with a pole, making him spitting blood and falling off his horse as if he was hit by a huge hammer.
Chapter completed!