,,,,,,,,,,,,

Zhu Ling did not argue, but turned his horse and ran back to the camp. Xu Huang looked at both sides. A thousand crossbowmen were lined up in a double tower arrow formation. He was in the middle, with five people on both sides, holding military crossbows, half-kneeling on the ground in front, but standing in the back row, looking very well-trained.

Xu Huang nodded secretly and stared at Jiang Xiajun who was following him. When he saw Liu Jing, his eyes narrowed and he shouted coldly: "Target the target at the main general of the horse riding."

A thousand military crossbows were aimed at Liu Jing. At this time, Liu Jing also saw several rows of Cao army crossbow soldiers in front of him blocking the road, with a thousand people. The cold crossbows pointed at them. He waved his hand and "stop all"

He stopped the pursuit of Jiangxia army and then turned around and ordered: "The army is in full swing, and the sword and shield army is the forefront."

As the drums sounded, ten thousand Jiangxia troops quickly lined up, and the Thousand-Blade Shield Army rushed out of the team, holding a large shield in hand, and a semicircular shield wall arranged into a stern-shaped shield wall. Liu Jing shouted again: "Attack"

"Dongdong" sounded the drum of the slow attack, and the Thousand-Bad Shield Army began to surround the Cao army two steps away step by step.

The formation of Jiangxia Army changed rapidly, and Xu Huang could see clearly. He couldn't help but secretly praised Liu Jing's proper command and Jiangxia Army was well-trained. Seeing that Jiangxia's sword and shield army had reached 150 steps away, Xu Huang shouted: "Shoot the sword and shield army and withdraw to the camp immediately."

A crisp sound of crossbows sounded from Cao's crossbow formation, and a thousand arrows shot towards the sword and shield army like a storm. The sword and shield army stopped immediately. The soldiers half-kneeled and hid behind the shield. Only a crackling sound was heard, and a thousand crossbow arrows shot into the sword and shield army semicircular formation.

Although there were no casualties, Cao's army took advantage of the opportunity of the sword and shield army pausing to avoid it and quickly gathered into a torrent and rushed into the camp.

On the wall of the Daying, another thousand Cao troops left behind in the Daying were also ready to deploy. They held bows and arrows in their hands to cover the retreat of the crossbow army, which seemed to be orderly.

At this time, Li Jun urged the horse to Liu Jing and whispered: "The Cao army seems to be ready. I recommend that the heavy armored infantry be transferred to attack the military camp."

Liu Jing shook his head and smiled, "You can bluff and shoot with bows and arrows. You might as well shoot more rockets. As for heavy-armored infantry, there is no need to mobilize them for the time being."

Li Jun was surprised and did not understand Liu Jing's intention. If he used heavy armored infantry to attack the camp, he should be able to break through, but the governor of the state refused to agree. Why was he unable to understand?

But Liu Jing's order was to be implemented. Li Jun immediately mobilized five thousand soldiers to fill soil with sandbags and quickly built a six-foot-high and two-mile-long semicircular protective wall. The protective wall was about 10 or 20 steps away from the Cao army camp, and it was completed in just one hour.

Thousands of crossbowmen immediately hid behind the protective wall and shot against Cao's army. The arrows were like rain, and they shot into the military camp. There were shiny rockets in the middle, and the two sides launched a fierce arrow battle.

.........

Just when fierce battle broke out in Longzhong, an army of more than 10,000 people quietly appeared in Ping'an Town, about ten miles south of Xiangyang City.

Since Cao's army controlled Xiangyang, Jingzhou, which had 5,000 people, was divided into two places, with 20,000 people stationed in Xiangyang City, and 15,000 people stationed in Fancheng and Xinye. There were no Jingzhou troops stationed outside these two places.

Therefore, the emergence of the Ping'an Town army made the local people feel a little panicked, especially after discovering that this was the army of Nanjun, the fear of war caused many people to flee to Xiangyang City.

Ten thousand people were indeed the army of Nanjun, led by military advisor Zhuge Liang and general Guan Yu. Although Liu Bei was still on his way back to Jiangling at this time, Zhuge Liang received news of Jiangxia's troops. He immediately realized that the time to seize Xiangyang was coming.

In the early morning, Zhuge Liang stood on the hill and looked into Xiangyang from afar. In late autumn, the morning mist was filled with fog, and the mist was flowing in the sky like a veil, making the vision unclear. But if you look closely, you can still see a little bit of the shadow of Xiangyang City in a vague way.

Of course, Zhuge Liang was not looking at Xiangyang City, he was considering how to use the battle between Jiangxia and Cao's army to seek the final benefit of the fisherman and occupy Xiangyang City.

Xiangyang City is the most strategic city in Jingzhou. The ownership of Xiangyang City will be directly related to the changes in the power structure of Jingzhou. If the army of Nanjun seizes Xiangyang City, the power structure of Jingzhou will become a situation where they are the leader and Jiang Xia follows it.

On the contrary, if the Jiangxia army seized Xiangyang City, then Jiangxia and Xiangyang would be connected together, and they would lose the opportunity to go north, and they would be forced to develop into Jiaozhou and lose the qualification to compete for the Central Plains.

But to judge the various signs in front of them, their situation is not optimistic. Zhuge Liang is not optimistic at all.

"Does the military advisor think Cao's army will withdraw from Xiangyang?"

At some point, Guan Yu appeared beside Zhuge Liang. Guan Yu still had doubts about this young military advisor. He believed that Zhuge Liang had no combat experience and no matter how smart he was, it was just a talk on paper. He didn't understand why his elder brother valued Zhuge Liang so much.

Moreover, Guan Yu was also dissatisfied with Zhuge Liang sending troops without his elder brother's consent. Although the elder brother handed over all the power of the generals to Zhuge Liang when he went to Jiangdong, in terms of power, Zhuge Liang could send troops, but Zhuge Liang had just arrived, so he should know how to control himself and use power with caution.

Therefore, Guan Yu was always dissatisfied with Zhuge Liang's decision to send troops. It was his joint opposition with Zhang Fei that forced Zhuge Liang's plan to send troops by half, turning into 10,000 troops.

Zhuge Liang looked back at Guan Yu and said slowly: "I expected Liu Jing's intention when he sent troops. Now it is becoming more and more obvious, which is to use the absolute advantage of the Jiangxia naval army to cut off the ties between the Han River and thus isolate Xiangyang.

Didn’t he start attacking Longzhong last night? This is obviously cutting off Cao’s army from retreating west, but he didn’t seem to be in a hurry. He actually gave Cao’s army a chance overnight. Yun Chang, haven’t you seen Liu Jing’s intention?”

Guan Yu shook his head, "I am not good at plotting and can't understand his intention."

Zhuge Liang smiled, "His intention is very simple, to force Cao Ren to leave Xiangyang. If Cao's army was cut off too early, the Cao army would have to defend Xiangyang to the death. At that time, Liu Jing would pay a heavy price to attack Xiangyang again, and he should not be willing to pay such a price.

If I did not make a mistake, once Cao Ren retreated westward, the Jiangxia navy would immediately land from the Xiangyang Wharf, demolish the bridge on Tanxi, and cut off the Cao army to return to Xiangyang, and another Jiangxia army had already ambushed east of Xiangyang."

Guan Yu couldn't speak for a long time. Zhuge Liang's analysis was a bit incredible, but it was reasonable. After a while, Guan Yu said: "If this is the case, what should we do?"

"It's very simple. Once Cao's army evacuates, Cai Mao will not be able to defend Xiangyang City. He will have no choice but to surrender. If we don't give him a choice, he will have to surrender to Liu Jing."

Speaking of this, Zhuge Liang sighed helplessly. If Guan Yu and Zhang Fei did not obstruct his plan and asked him to lead 20,000 troops to fight, then he could deploy calmly, and he would be 70,000 sure to capture Xiangyang City.

But now his troops are insufficient, as the saying goes, a clever wife cannot cook without rice. His confidence in seizing Xiangyang City has been greatly reduced, and he can only settle for the second best and get a share of the battle of Jiangxia army in the battle to capture Xiangyang.

Of course, that was just his lowest attempt, and he still had to take it as his responsibility to seize Xiangyang City.

"General Guan, let's do our best."

.........

The sky gradually became brighter, and the city of Xiangyang was still dead, with the streets empty and there was no pedestrian. After several escapes in Xiangyang City, there was only a population left in the city.

Stores closed, businesses were in decline, and every family closed their doors, and people stopped going out. Even the government stopped operating due to the large number of officials' escapes, and the entire city was taken over by the army.

There are currently 25,000 garrisons in the city. In addition to the 5,000 Cao troops, there are 20,000 Jingzhou troops, distributed in the five barracks stationed in the city. Except for the Northern barracks, which are stationed by Cao troops, the other four barracks are stationed by Jingzhou troops.

The Jiangxia army's warships' power in the Han River have seriously affected the stability of the morale of the army. In particular, the Cao army's helplessness exposed the weak side of the Cao army's naval army, which has given new ideas to many Jingzhou generals who were originally afraid of the Cao army and surrendered.

In addition to Cai Zhong and Cai He, the four military camps stationed in Jingzhou, were each in charge of 5,000 people, and the other two military camps were led by generals Zhang Qu and Huo Jun. Zhang Qu is the younger brother of the Zhang Yun clan and is also the son-in-law of the Cai family, and is loyal to Cai Mao.

Huo Jun is the younger brother of the general Huo Du of Jingzhou. After Huo Du unfortunately passed away six years ago, his troops were handed over to his younger brother Huo Jun. He had more than a thousand troops. He was originally appointed as the commander of the Nanjun County but later belonged to Wang Wei and was stationed in Linju County.

During the split of Jingzhou not long ago, Wang Wei led his army to surrender to Nanjun, but Huo Jun was unwilling to surrender to Liu Bei, so he led his army to retreat to Xiangyang. At present, he led 5,000 people to station in Daying in the east of Xiangyang City.

The so-called Dongdaying was originally a schoolyard, which was temporarily established as a military camp, covering dozens of acres of land, and built a large tent. In the main tent, general Huo Jun was walking back and forth with his hands behind his back. Huo Jun was about ten years old this year, tall, thin cheeks, yellow and translucent complexion, and a little like a teenager.

Huo Jun was originally a supporter of Liu Qi and one of Kuai Yue's confidants. His family has close ties with the Kuai family, and his mother is the daughter of the Kuai family.

Although Huo Jun supports Liu Qi, influenced by Kuai Yue, he also gave up his support for Liu Qi. More importantly, Liu Qi has become Liu Bei's puppet, which disappoints Huo Jun.

He withdrew his troops back to Xiangyang to support Kuai Yue. Because of his existence, Cai Mao was somewhat afraid of Kuai Yue. However, at this time, Kuai Yue had already gone to Xudu to become an official, and Huo Jun lost the object he supported.

Cao Cao organized him into Cai Mao's general and appointed him as Sima of other departments, Cai Zhong and Cai Heping, which made Huo Jun a little dissatisfied. Cao Cao obviously meant to discriminate against the Jingzhou army. He was originally a commander, and was once the highest military commander of Nanjun, and one of the important generals of Jingzhou.

Now he was only named Sima of another department, and was half a level lower than the Duwei, and he didn't even have a title. Huo Jun also knew that this was because Cai Mao was appointed as the General of the Central Army. If Cai Mao could not get high, how could he get a high title? And he felt deeply humiliated to put him along with Cai Zhong and Cai He.

The appearance of Jiangxia warship also shocked Huo Jun. He suddenly realized that Cao's army was not invincible. Liu Jing had the advantage of the navy. If he could unite with Jiangdong, he might not be defeated by Cao Cao. Huo Jun's heart began to shake.
Chapter completed!