Pei Xingyan lived up to his expectations. In the evening, five hundred cavalry returned to the county town at a speed. Pei Xingyan annihilated two spies of the thief army and captured two spies according to Zhang Xuan's request.∽↗∽↗,

In the room, the two thief soldiers seemed to have completely collapsed, kneeling on the ground, trembling like sieve.

"Interrogation separately!" Zhang Xuan looked at the two spies in disgust and waved his hand. He didn't expect that the two spies were so weak that there would be signs of all explanations without strict examination.

The soldier dragged the two spies out. At this time, Fang Xuanling, who was sitting aside, asked with a smile: "Did the general think of it? Why didn't Wang Bo go to explore Mengyin Fort, but to explore Dong'an County?"

"Wang Bo wants to find out the news from me."

Before he finished speaking, Zhang Xuan suddenly realized, "Joining the army means that Sun Xuanya is responsible for the attack on Mengyin Fort, and Wang Bo is not easy to intervene, so he came to investigate Dong'an County. Is that true?"

Fang Xuanling still shook his head and said lightly: "Maybe I'm thinking too much, but I have a intuition that Wang Bo wants to attack Qi County directly."

Zhang Xuan frowned, "Attack Qi County, what are you doing to investigate Dong'an County?"

"He should be calculating the strength of troops! He probably already knows how many soldiers there are in Mengyin Fort. He then calculates how many troops there are in Dong'an County, and then from the forces that Pei Renji sent troops to attack Wagang, he can infer how many defenders there are in Qi County and Beihai County."

Fang Xuanling glanced at Zhang Xuan's surprised expression, and sighed, "I just infer that if I were Wang Bo, maybe I would directly enter Qi County."

"But do you want his lair?" Zhang Xuan was still a little confused.

"General, Zhuanyu County is tall and strong, easy to defend but difficult to attack. He only deploys five thousand troops to make it difficult for us to capture for a while. Besides, Sun Xuanya's army is on the other side to restrain us. This is Wang Bo's opportunity."

While he was thinking, a sergeant walked in quickly and presented two confessions, "General, they have confessed, all the confessions are here!"

Zhang Xuan was excited. He quickly took the confession and quickly turned it over. The contents of the two confessions were similar. It seemed that they did not lie, but what made Zhang Xuan strange was that Wang Bo did not seem to be preparing to attack Qi County as Fang Xuanling said, but was strengthening the city wall and actively preparing for defense. In addition, he was also contacting Sun Xuanya to jointly attack Mengyin Fort.

Zhang Xuan looked at Fang Xuanling in confusion. Fang Xuanling smiled and said, "Half a month has passed, and Wang Bo only remembered that he wanted to fight Mengyin Castle. Isn't it a bit too late?"

"Is joining the army saying that Wang Bo is pretending to behave?"

Fang Xuanling nodded, "The key is that Pei Renji led his army to leave Qi County. Qi County has empty troops. That is Wang Bo's former nest. How could he not be moved? How could he still have the heart to fight Mengyin Fort. I even suspected that he sent these sentries to spy on the news and deliberately let the general catch them and use their confessions to mislead the general. Otherwise, how could a small spy know about the secret exchanges between his lord and Sun Xuanya?"

Zhang Xuan slowly walked to the sand table and looked at Langya County on the sand table. This was the Langya County sand table he had just made. It was indeed much more convenient than the map. His eyes turned back to Qi County.

Once Wang Bozhen sends a large army to attack Qi County, with the weak force of Qi County, he will soon lose his troops. When he returns to Qi County, Sun Xuanya's army will definitely chase and kill him. The two thief troops intercepted him and killed him, and his army will undoubtedly be defeated.

At this time, Fang Xuanling came over and picked up the wooden pole and pointed it at Xintai County. "This is the key. Wang Bo's army went north secretly and would inevitably replenish supplies in Xintai County."

Zhang Xuan stared at Xintai County. He understood Fang Xuanling's meaning, but what if Wang Bo didn't plan to go north?

Fang Xuanling smiled and said, "With Mengyin Fort here, Dong'an County should be foolproof."

In the night, an army of 6,000 people was silently marching westward along a rugged mountain road. This army was the 6,000 elite Sui army led by Zhang Xuan and Pei Xingyan.

Zhang Xuan ordered the side general Li Shoujie to lead two thousand troops to defend Dong'an County, and then left Fang Xuanling to assist him, so he personally led the army to Xintai County.

Once Zhang Xuan accepted Fang Xuanling's judgment, his intuition began to become sharper. Pei Xingyan told him that the spies had increased since yesterday, which showed that Wang Bo was already preparing to go north and was likely to set off in the past two days.

Even after receiving the eagle letter from the spy being caught, Wang Bo set out overnight, and like himself, he was also heading towards Xintai County.

Xintai County and Dong'an County are about a hundred miles apart, and there is a straight official road connected by a straight road, but there is a mountain road dozens of miles in the middle. Last time Pei Renji was ambushed by Wang Bo on this mountain road, and there were heavy casualties.

But today Zhang Xuan did not follow this official road. He guessed that Wang Bo had arranged for spies to monitor along the way. After several months of back and forth fighting, Zhang Xuan gradually understood the opponent's combat style.

Frankly speaking, Wang Bo is a military tyrant leader, insidious and cunning, and very strategic, completely different from the kind of bandit Zhang Jin said that he was murderous.

Wang Bo was originally a backbone of the Bohai Association. It was precisely because of his ability and ability that he was sent to Qi County by the Bohai Association to set off a storm of rebellion at the end of the Sui Dynasty. If Wang Bo had not been ambitious himself, he could have become Gao Hui's most capable military advisor.

Unfortunately, his ambition to be emperor made him and the Bohai Association turn against each other. He lost the support of the Bohai Association and was eventually defeated by Zhang Xutuo.

When fighting a cunning opponent like Wang Bo, Zhang Xuan must remain vigilant and be careful every step.

At the fifth hour, Zhang Xuan's army had already walked out of the mountains and rushing towards Xintai County in a basin.

Ten miles away from Xintai County, Zhang Xuan waved his hand and turned around and ordered: "Stop the march!"

He saw a pine forest a hundred steps away, and ordered him again: "The army goes to the pine forest to rest."

At this time, Pei Xingyan urged him to come forward and asked, "Is the general going to send a scout to Xintai County?"

Zhang Xuan nodded, "You don't want to go, let Chen Xu go!"

Chen Xu, the chief cavalry general next to him, bowed, "Abide by the orders with humble duties!"

He waved his hand and led a team of scouts to Xintai County.

Zhang Xuan walked into the black pine forest and sat down in front of a big rock. The personal soldiers brought him a pot of water and two mutton dried biscuits. Zhang Xuan handed him a piece to Pei Xingyan. He was hungry and drank it himself. He drank the kettle and took a bite of dry food and started eating.

This mutton dried biscuit is the dry food of the Sui Army. The mutton is cooked and sliced, wrapped in the dry biscuit with sweet sauce. A lotus leaf is wrapped on the outside and tied with a thin rope. A meat patty weighs about half a pound, which is just enough to eat for a meal. The mutton sauce tastes good, but the dry biscuit is very hard and must be eaten in water.

Like Zhang Xuan, all the soldiers were eating the same dry food, gathering together and talking and laughing, talking about more delicious dishes.

"Second uncle, give me one too!"

Qin sat next to Zhang Xuan with his butt. He was also hungry. Zhang Xuan handed him a piece of dry cake and asked with a smile: "I heard that your father asked you to go back, why don't you go?"

Qin Yong chewed the dry cake and said vaguely, "Why go back? Last time Wang Bo shot my horse and I want to settle the score with him!"

The last time he was ambushed when he withdrew his army, Qin Yong's treasure horse was shot two arrows and almost died. He is still in Licheng County. Qin Yong hated Wang Bo. This time he volunteered to lead his army south to avenge Wang Bo's one arrow.

Of course, Zhang Xuan knew that the real reason why Qin Yong refused to go back was that he wanted to help himself. This was his simplicity. Zhang Xuan patted his shoulder and smiled: "If your horse cannot go to the battlefield, I will find a way to get you another one."

"Thank you, Uncle Second, I hope it's okay. I really don't want to change horses!" Qin Yong lowered his head.

Zhang Xuan nodded, stood up and walked out of the pine forest. His hearing was extremely sharp, and he had heard the sound of horse hooves coming from afar.

After a moment, Chen Xu led two cavalrymen to come over like lightning, and immediately tied up a thief army. Chen Xu turned over and dismounted, saluted Zhang Xuan, pointed to the thief soldiers and said, "This is a patrolman I caught on the road. The general wants to understand the situation in Xintai County, just ask him."

Zhang Xuan looked behind his shoulder and asked, "Where are the other brothers?"

"Weizhi asked them to go south along the official road to see if they could find the main force of the thief army."

"Bring him into the pine forest!"

Zhang Xuan returned to the pine forest and sat down. The soldiers of the thief army patrol were immediately taken in. Seeing that there were so many Sui troops in the pine forest, he was immediately frightened and knelt down in front of Zhang Xuan, kowtowing like pounding garlic. "There is also an old mother and young son in the villain's family. The general spares my life."

"If you tell me honestly, I won't kill you and spare your life!"

"I said! I said everything."

Zhang Xuan thought for a while and asked, "I want to know how many troops are currently in Xintai County?" (To be continued.)
Chapter completed!