At night, Zhaoguan became quiet. Several soldiers were patrolling back and forth on the top of the city. The streets less than a hundred steps long were deserted, and only a small tavern came from the crazy laughter of the drinkers.

The hotel where Zang Ba lived was even quieter. The shopkeeper and two friends were killed. The body was thrown into the well. The hostel was controlled by Zang Ba and seven subordinates.

Zhaoguan is very small, with a circumference of only more than 400 steps in the city wall, and less than 100 defenders. In addition to the military camp and warehouse, there are more than a dozen shops in the city. All the shops are built close to the city wall. This hostel is located in the southwest corner, and above the head of the hostel is a towering beacon tower. The reason why Zang Ba chose this one among the three hostels was that he took a fancy to the location of the hostel.

He led several subordinates into the backyard and stood close to the city wall. An old camphor tree was lush with branches and leaves, covering their figures. Zang Ba nodded to his subordinates and whispered: "Go up"

The three soldiers quickly climbed up the camphor tree, climbed up the camphor tree, and soon climbed up the city wall. The beacon tower was located on the southwest corner, divided into three layers, with pavilions below, which can be passed through the middle. The second floor is the hostel, which is where the soldiers on duty rest. The uppermost floor is the fire platform, which is filled with firewood.

Zhaoguan has not been used for several years, and the soldiers gradually lost their vigilance. Generally, soldiers on duty cannot sleep and must wait all night. But in fact, only three of the five soldiers on duty were left. Two of them slipped to the tavern, and the other three fell asleep.

Two agile Cao soldiers climbed up the fire-raising platform with ropes and locked the entrance with iron chains, making it impossible for the soldiers in the lobby to climb up the fire-raising platform. After waved, Zang Ba led the other soldiers to climb into the lobby from under the pavilion. With just a few muffled screams, the three soldiers killed them in the lobby.

Zang Ba led his men into Zhaoguan, while his deputy general Chen Qi led his army to ambush in the woods two miles away, waiting for the signal of attack. Cao's army waited until the third hour, at this moment, a fire appeared on the head of Zhaoguan city. Several soldiers discovered it at the same time and shouted, "General, the signal is here."

Chen Qi was overjoyed and immediately ordered the 1,000 vanguard military order: "Strike"

A thousand Cao army soldiers rushed out of the woods and rushed towards Zhaoguan. The patrol soldiers on the top of the city had been solved by Zang Ba. The city gate was wide open, and Cao army soldiers rushed into the gate without any stop.

....

Without Zhaoguan’s news, the beacon towers along the way lost their function. Zang Ba led Cao’s army to walk along the path, bypassed the beacon towers along the way, and headed straight to Liyang County.

Liyang County is just a small county with not many garrisons. The county town is close to the Yangtze River, but the mine is ten miles away from the county town and is connected by a canal river. In normal times, a large number of flat-bottomed boats will transport the ore from the mine and pile it in the cargo warehouse on the wharf. The civilians will then carry the ore onto the mine and transport it to the distant Jingzhou. At the busiest time, more than 2,000 mine ships from the Yangtze River traveled between Jingzhou and Jiangdong.

In winter, the wind direction turns to northwest wind. Mining ships without wheels cannot move against the wind, and the ore has stopped transporting. Most of the mine ships have returned to Jingzhou, but some mine ships are also moored in Liyang, waiting for spring to begin.

Zhang Liao received information from the scouts and had about 400 mine ships moored in Liyang, all of which were over 1,000 stones. The largest ship even had 3,000 stones. At this time, the New Year was just over, and it was the lazy time of the year. There were no civil servants on the dock. Hundreds of mine ships stopped from the dock into the Caohe River, deserted. Except for the boatman guarding the ships, everyone else hid in the county town and happily spent the 21st year of Jian'an in the county town.

When ten thousand Cao troops arrived in Liyang County, it was already late, and the night was shrouded on the Yangtze River and the river banks on both sides. Everything outside the city was silent, with only a huge figure of mine ships, mooring on the docks and Caohenoi.

There were vague lights on several large ships. They were the boatmen guarding the boat gathered together to drink and chat, and excitedly talking about the romantic affairs that happened between women and ports in various places. In the lonely foreign land and under the fumigation of alcohol, these were always the most interesting topics of boatmen. They didn't know that danger had quietly come.

Zang Ba did not engage in reckless activities. They wanted to seize hundreds of large ships intact and capture the boatman who could drive the ship. Zang Ba stared at the county town and the big ships from afar, pondered for a moment, and said to the deputy general Chen Qi: "We divide our troops into two groups. You can lead 3,000 people to block the county town. No one is allowed to escape. I am responsible for seizing the ship."

Chen Qi nodded, waved his hand, and said to the three tooth generals: "Come with me."

Chen Qi led 3,000 people to the county town, and Zang Ba immediately said to other generals: "We divide the work together, each of them is responsible for fifty large ships. Everyone should act quickly, try not to kill people, and do not burn the ships in fire."

The generals discussed for a while, assigned the targets, and led their troops there. Zang Ba led 3,000 people to the dock. This place is located in the Yangtze River and is a medium-sized water village. About a hundred mine ships are parked in the water village. Most of the ships are tied to the dock with cables, and there are few dozen ships parked in the center of the water village.

The Cao army soldiers rushed onto the large ship one after another. Zang Ba led more than a hundred soldiers to the largest 3,000 stone mine ship. The lights in the boat hall were brightly lit, and dozens of boatmen were gathered to gamble, shouting endlessly.

At this time, the gate was kicked open, and countless fully armed Cao soldiers rushed into the lobby. The soldiers shouted loudly: "Everyone kneels down, those who resist will kill you."

Cao's army seized the mine ships one after another, but in the dark night, a 500-stone pedal impeller quickly left the dock and fled to the Yangtze River.

...

Just as Zang Ba led his army to capture more than 400 Jingzhou mine ships in Liyang, a small boat also sent military advisor Cheng Yu to Jianye.

At this time, Jianye was also in a strong atmosphere of war. Sun Quan and He Qi from Kuaiji County reached a merger agreement last fall. He Qi had no intention of becoming independent and was willing to support Sun Quan as the lord of Jiangdong. In return, Sun Quan promised not to take over He Qi's army and appointed He Qi as the prefect of Kuaiji.

After just reached an agreement with He Qi, Sun Quan could not wait to join forces with the Kuaiji army to launch a north-south attack on Wujun. The two sides fought fiercely in Yuting Town in the northern part of Wujun. Jiangdong general Xu Sheng killed Wujun commander Zhang Feng and defeated Wujun North Road Army.

However, the Kuaiji army on the southern front was defeated by Lu Xun, and the troops on both sides had their own victory or defeat. As the Kuaiji army retreated south, Lu Xun led his troops to support the north, forcing Sun Quan to withdraw his troops.

Although the two sides did not decide the first battle, Wujun was clearly at a strategic disadvantage. Sun Quan once again rectified his troops and prepared to launch a large-scale attack on Wujun after the beginning of spring. At this time, Cheng Yu arrived in Jianye City.

Cheng Yu's arrival surprised Sun Quan, and he also attached great importance to it. He went out of the city to greet him personally. "Mr. Cheng came to Jianye in person, could it be that Duke Wei also arrived in Yangzhou?" Sun Quan asked with a smile.

Cheng Yuxing smiled and said, "What the Marquis of Wu said is right. Now Duke Wei is inspecting Shouchun. He wanted to visit Mr. Wu in person, but he had a lot of things to do and had no time to withdraw, so he had to entrust me to greet Mr. Wu on his behalf."

"It's a pity that Mr. Wei doesn't come to Jianye"

"Duke Wei does want to come, but the war in Hefei is imminent and involves a lot of things. Duke Wei is really unable to escape. Please forgive Wu Hou."

Cheng Yu hinted to Sun Quan that the war in Hefei was approaching. Sun Quan immediately realized that Cheng Yu was coming with a major task. Without much greeting, he asked Cheng Yu to get on the carriage. A hundred guards rode horses on both sides to escort the carriage and drove towards Jianye City.

Cheng Yu entered the Palace of Wu, sat for a while, and was invited to the convention hall. At this time, several high-ranking civil and military officials were already seated in the lobby, Zhang Zhao, Zhuge Jin, Yu Fan, Bu Zhi, Cheng Bing, Lu Meng, Huang Gai, etc.

Cheng Yu walked into the lobby, and everyone stood up to greet him. Cheng Yu and everyone greeted him one by one, and then sat down at the east end. Zhang Zhao asked with a smile: "I heard that the Han-Xiong War was in the war, and the Cao-Liu family formed an alliance. Duke Wei still wanted to marry the Han-King King, but Hefei was at a strife. Could it be that the Cao-Liu alliance was about to break down again?"

Cheng Yu smiled, "The things in the world are just fighting and harmony. Can't you still understand them deeply between Jiangdong and Jingzhou?"

Zhuge Jin next to him said: "I heard that Liu Jing has appointed Li Yan as the grain commander of Jingxiang, supervised the escort of grain and grass from various places in Jingzhou to Chaisang, and sent troops to Chaisang, which shows that Liu Jing is about to use troops in the south, and I don't know what Duke Wei has plans."

But everyone wanted to know this sentence, and everyone looked at Cheng Yu together. At this time, Sun Quan walked in, everyone stood up to salute, and Sun Quan waved his hand and smiled, "Please sit down, if there are distinguished guests here, we ourselves don't have to be too polite."

Everyone sat down, and Zhang Zhao smiled and said, "Just just now, Zhuge Changshi mentioned that the Han army was actively preparing for war, and asked Cao army what plans were."

Sun Quan nodded, "This is exactly what I want to know, can Military Secretary Cheng give me advice?"

Cheng Yu said calmly: "The Han army is preparing to launch the Hefei Battle, which is already clear to both sides. The Han army is preparing for the war, and the Cao army is also preparing for the war. But what is the purpose of the Han army launching the Hefei Battle? I am afraid that this is the key point, and this is also my mission to go to Jiangdong this time."

Cheng Yu had something in his words, and everyone looked at each other. Lu Meng couldn't help asking: "Mr. Cheng means that the purpose of the Han army launching the Hefei Battle is for our Jiangdong."

Cheng Yu nodded definitely, "It's right."

There was an uproar in the lobby. Cheng Yu's affirmative tone made it difficult for everyone to accept. It was obviously the Han army and Cao army fighting for Hefei, but Jiangdong had to bear the consequences of the war. This was not reasonable. Cheng Yu was Cao Cao's military advisor, and his identity was extraordinary. He usually did not speak nonsense. It must have a basis, which made everyone's hearts full of surprise and suspicion.

Even Sun Quan couldn't sit still and asked quickly: "I don't quite understand what Jun Zheng said, can you explain it more clearly?"

Cheng Yu bowed slightly and said, "Hefei is not only the gateway to the Central Plains, but also a knife hanging on the head of Jiangdong. Once the Han army occupied Hefei, the biggest threat was not the Central Plains, but Jiangdong. I think Wu Hou should be very clear about this."

Of course, Sun Quan knew that Hefei was always an unavoidable heart disease in Jiangdong. In order to seize Hefei, they used large-scale troops twice, and both times were defeated. More than 100,000 troops were wiped out. Even Taishi Ci died in Hefei. The huge war losses and casualties hit Jiangdong severely, and became the root of the division of Jiangdong.

Since Liu Jing exchanged Yuzhang and Poyang for Lujiang County, which had a small population and area, Sun Quan once suspected that Liu Jing's real purpose was to seize Hefei. Later, it was confirmed that his suspicion was not wrong, and the Han army was indeed for Hefei.

This made Sun Quan frightened. Once the Han army seized Hefei, he would rely on Hefei as the logistics support and station troops in Ruxukou, which would directly threaten Wuhu and Jianye. It was not worth worrying about Cao Cao's naval army being extremely weak, but the Han army's naval army was strong and thousands of warships blocked the Yangtze River, which would be a catastrophe in Jiangdong.
Chapter completed!