Since Zhang Ren broke through on July 16th, Zhang Liao captured Duanshi County. Three days after that, Yuan Shao's army's attacking troops from Shangdang, gradually added troops along Guanglang Valley to the Qinshui River Valley, expanding the occupation of the front.

Wen Chou left the 10,000 people at Guanglang Valley Pass in Kongcangling, had already been pulled up. The 30,000 people in Guanglang City were also being transferred forward in batches.

On July 18, Zhang Liao once again captured part of the city walls of Fuze County south of Duan. But unfortunately, the terrain around Duan and Fuze was all narrow river valleys in the Taihang Mountains.

The Duan City had delayed the time before, so Zhang Ren was fully prepared when he continued to defend in Wuze. He set up a series of simple wooden fences and long trenches in the south of the city.

Losing one can retreat to the next one, which is very suitable for long-term hysteresis of elastic defense, making it difficult for Zhang Liao's catapult to exert its decisive power.

Moreover, as the front line pushes further and further south, the straight line distance from Shimenxing where Guan Yu's main force has been stationed has been shortened to 100 miles. Including the twists and turns of the mountain valley, the total distance is only 130 to 40 miles, so Guan Yu is also sending troops to the north line to help Zhang Ren defend.

The more Zhang Ren retreated, the stronger his troops became, and Zhang Liao became less and less capable.

On the morning of the 19th, Zhang Liao's breakthrough achievements yesterday had been passed to Wen Chou of Guanglang City through messengers. He only had 20,000 people left in Guanglang City and Kongcangling Guanglang Valley Pass.

During the 70,000 troops that went to the expedition this time, 50,000 had been put into the front line by Zhang Liao, expanding the occupied area. Moreover, after several fierce battles, the casualties had already exceeded 5,000.

In addition, the heat had not yet faded in mid-July. When the troops were transferred from Hanoi, the cases of cholera in the army were not screened out, and the disease gradually worsened during the battle.

So the 50,000 people Zhang Liao used were only more than 40,000, so of course he wanted Wen Chou to continue to increase his troops.

To the south of them, the surrounded Guan Yu army and Zhang Ren retreated the remaining soldiers in succession, which totaled only 40,000 people. Zhang Liao wanted to play the role of "anvil". In the process of Yuan Shao and Xu You's "hammer" completely surrounding Guan Yu, the "anvil" itself cannot be soft or retreated, and of course it must be further strengthened.

To make a blacksmith need to be strong himself.

"General Wen and General Zhang Liao attacked Wu Ze yesterday and had already broken through the city wall. However, the remaining enemies in the city still rely on the southern wall and resisted the layers of camps outside the southern city, blocking our army's journey south along the Qinshui River Valley.

General Zhang Liao asked you to send more reinforcements from the rear to reinforce, and to spend more than break through Zhang Ren's last line of defense."

After hearing the request from the front, Wen Chou agreed to the matter after repeated consideration.

After all, he considered that the area occupied by Zhang Liao in front after passing through the Qinshui River Valley was already 60 miles deep in the north and south, and his defense was tight enough. The Guanglang Valley Pass was already the rear of "thirty miles of river valley and sixty miles of mountains" and Guanglang City was more than 100 miles away from the front line.

In the battle in the mountainous areas, it is safe to climb a rear that is more than 100 miles away from the front and only climbing a mountain for more than 80 miles. How safe is it? Too many people are not suitable for eating.

...

"Wen Chou finally transferred nearly half of his troops away. It's time to take action."

In the Taihang Mountains more than 20 miles southeast of Guanglang City, on a mountain suitable for the observation point of commanding heights, a nine-foot-foot-tall general personally took a telescope to observe the enemy situation. He was Guan Yu, the Grand Marshal of the Han Dynasty.

Taihang Mountain is very difficult to move, but it is still possible that elite small troops are coming over the mountains.

Guan Yu's troops were located in the south of Wuze County, which was 120 miles away from Guanglang City Road and 90 miles away from straight lines, which was behind the line of defense that Zhang Ren was still stalemate with Zhang Liao. He walked eastward and penetrated into Taihang Mountains diagonally and experienced ruggedness.

Guan Yu was carrying only a few hundred people, and there were only more than a hundred cavalrymen. The horses were led along the way and did not dare to ride. Even the horse breeds were rare in the north and were not suitable for the plains to raid.

Dian horses are specialty horses in the southern and central region and are not used to the cold. However, the summer seasons in June and July of the lunar calendar are just right to use on the northern battlefield, and they can also cross mountains for a short distance.

The off-road ability of the Dian horse is much stronger than that of the northern grassland horse breeds. Its endurance is not enough, but its sprinting power is not good. Because it is a short horse, its legs are short, and it is not suitable for cavalry rushing.

Guan Yu has been here in person these days and handed over the defense of the main force in the south to Zhuge Liang, Zhang Ren and others for flexible defense, in order to avoid Wang Ping's top mountain army such as the Flying Army, but he is still no match for the famous general Wen Chou.

After all, to take down Guanglang City, what is needed is the strength to attack. With a brave general like Wen Chou who is invincible to defend the city himself, Wang Ping still doesn't have enough to see it, so he still has to find a way to further mobilize the enemy.

Fortunately, since it is to command troops and supervise the battle, Guan Yu does not need to lead too many people, and a small team of core officers is enough. The main force of the battle is Wang Ping's army.

The two sides agreed on a date. Wang Ping was very active, even one and a half days earlier than the day Guan Yu had cared for before, and he was ambushed in the mountains northwest of Guanglang City, only thirty miles away from his final destination, waiting for Guan Yu to personally command the final deployment.

Because the mountains were steep and hidden, there were 20,000 or 30,000 enemies stationed in the mountains thirty miles away, and Wen Chou didn't even know. Wang Ping's troops were also very hard-working. In summer, they lived in the mountains without a tent, so they slept directly in the shade of trees.

Everyone should apply some anti-worming medicine from Sichuan and Yunnan. The mosquito poisonous insects in the Taihang Mountains in the north are no problem - in southern Zhong and Jiaozhou, because there is no winter in the tropics, the insects will not freeze to death even in the twelfth lunar month.

Therefore, mosquitoes in the north are born in annual life. Every winter, the young mosquitoes grow back in the second year. However, Nanzhong and Jiaozhou often have mosquitoes with a lifespan of three to five years or even longer. They can grow huge. If you suck it in one mouthful, you will feel that you can draw a small needle blood.

(If you don’t believe it, you can check out the videos of “How big are the mosquitoes in Guangxi” on Douyin. The mosquito legs are as long as the width of the pillow.)

The cruel people trained by the old poisonous mosquitoes in Southern Zhong and Jiaozhou are of course so thick that they can't bite the mosquitoes in Taihang Mountains. They don't have tents, drink mountains and rivers, eat dry food, and eat wild fruits. They can survive in the wild for ten days and half a month without any problem.

Among these 30,000 people, there are 10,000 Ailaoyi, 10,000 Banhuan barbarians, 5,000 Qingqiang soldiers in Qilian Mountains, and 5,000 Laos soldiers in Daliang Mountains. They are all barbarians with strong folk customs. If it were northerners who were not resistant to summer mosquitoes, who would have thought that they would be able to hide their enemies in such a harsh environment?

...

At this moment, Wang Ping continued to stay in the mountains north of Guanglang Valley. He was also afraid that 20,000 to 30,000 people would be discovered by Wen Chou when he passed through Guanglang Valley, so he would not let the troops act rashly until the moment of the final attack.

Wang Ping himself only brought a small group of officers to the mountains in the south of the valley. He followed the detailed map to find the mountain that he had made an appointment with Guan Yu, and came to meet and listen to the final pre-war guidance and deployment.

"Taiwei, our army's 30,000 divisions have arrived here. Each of them has carried rations for half a month. They have sent troops for five days. They have used wild fruits, birds and animals as supplies along the way. They have not used all dry food, so there are still 12 days of food left. At least 14 days of combat, they have to return to find supplies. Within 14 days, the Taiwei can deploy our army at will, and there is no need to worry about military rations."

Wang Ping first reported the status of the troops to avoid being constrained when Guan Yu was deployed.

Guan Yu put down his telescope and stroked his beard and smiled: "It's enough. If it goes well, it's okay to take down Guanglang City in three or five days. This morning, ten thousand people who supported Zhang Liao were passing by. According to Wen Chou's habit, there should be a team of supplies and grain trucks shortly after the main force passed.

During this period, he would speed up the transfer of the stored grains in Guanglang City to Duanshi, and some of them would be transferred to the Wuze in the future. When the grain team arrived, five hundred elite ambushes were sent out, and the way they were cut off. After a cup of tea started, five hundred ambushes were sent out in the rear, and the way they returned was cut off.

We must pay attention to this time difference. We must not attack each other from the beginning to the end. We must first and then the end to give the grain transporter to send someone back to Guanglang City to give Wen Chou a chance to report his urgent situation. In this way, Wen Chou will know that our army is only more than hundreds of thousands of times, and it should be just a small grain-burning team that crosses the hundreds of miles of mountain road to harass him, so that he will have the courage to rescue him."

Even after Wen Chou's latest wave of support for Zhang Liao, the Yuan army soldiers guarding the dangerous areas at Guanglang City and Kongcangling Guanglang Valley Pass still had more than 10,000. If they could not defend themselves, it would be difficult to take them quickly.

Therefore, the ability to lure the enemy out of the city to rescue his own grain transport team and feel that the rescue operation is easy can maximize the creation of conditions that are beneficial to the Han army.

Wang Ping received the order and went back to deploy immediately.

About an hour and a half later, near noon that day, a team of hundreds of ox carts and hundreds of donkey carts in Guanglang City finally appeared. It was Wen Chou who normally transferred food to the front line.

The only thing that surprised Guan Yu and Wang Ping was that the grain transport team had a large number of guards this time, with about 3,000 combat soldiers.

In this way, there may be only three thousand guards left at the Kongcangling Pass, and at most five or six thousand guards in Guanglang City - unless there are new reinforcements behind Wen Chou! Yuan Shao has added another person to him!

This made Wang Ping hesitate: According to the original plan, if these convoys were dominated by civilians and only had a thousand soldiers, he would have 500 people from the beginning and end to rob the grain and burn it, and the morale attack effect of sneak attacks was easily achieved.

But there are 3,000 enemy soldiers. What if Wen Chou thinks they can withstand it with their own strength and don’t need to rescue the Han army when facing a small-scale attack on the mountain?

If too many people take action, Wen Chou would also doubt: It was not agreed that Guan Yu would not have Wudang Flying Army available. If there were thousands of elite troops at the level of people who could cross the mountains, Wen Chou’s inherent judgment on whether Wudang Flying Army existed would collapse and would scare him.

Therefore, the enemy's grain team has more troops several times, but Guan Yu cannot increase the grain robbery several times, otherwise it will be missed.

"See clearly who the grain transporter is on the other side? Do you still want to take action?" Wang Ping had no choice. He was sneaking in the mountains for many days, and his news was not very well-informed. If the enemy had made arrangements and adjustments on the outside, he and Guan Yu would not know.

When Guan Yu faced Wang Ping's request, he took a telescope and looked carefully. The generals who transported grain naturally couldn't see clearly, but the flag could barely see it. Fortunately, the enemy general's surname is relatively rare, and you can tell who the other party is by looking at the surname. If the surname is Zhang and Li, who is the surname Dalu, who is it.

"Chunyu? That's Chunyu Qiong's food transport? It must be Yuan Shao's addition of troops to Wen Chou! Maybe he learned that Zhang Liao suffered heavy casualties in the past few days, so he should make up for Zhang Liao and Wen Chou's losses.

Chunyu Qiong was on the battlefield in the Hanoi before. He was the Eighth Captain of Xiyuan ten years ago. He once had a squash with Yuan Shao at the level of He Jin. Such a respected person came forward. If there were less than 10,000 reinforcements, he would probably not be worthy of Chunyu Qiong's identity.

In this way, it seems that it is a bit difficult to win Guanglang City. However, now that things have come to this point, we have to fight. Our army is dispatched in the mountains, and it is normal to have a delay in grasping the enemy situation for five or six or even ten days. It is impossible that everything will be exactly as planned.

Wang Ping, you brought all the hundreds of elite officers and soldiers around me, gathered up 1,500 people, and must show off your momentum, making Chunyu Qiong feel that 'he has three thousand grain transport soldiers and can't stand the surprise attack', and forced him to ask Wen Chou for help. Also, when you attack, you only pretend to be a young general in our army, and you cannot reveal your identity at this point! You should be in Beya, in Dabie Mountains!"
Chapter completed!