Chapter 264: Changhuan City Break

Outside Changhuan City, in the large camp of the Zhao army and in the central tent, Zhao Xin summoned all the generals to discuss the siege of the city. The 800,000 Zhao army has been going south for almost a year. Although Zhao State has prepared very well for this time, fighting for such a long time still has a great impact on the people's livelihood of Zhao State. Now Qi and Wei can be said to have been crippled by the Zhao army, and there is no threat to Zhao State. Therefore, someone in the Zhao State's court has already proposed to ask Zhao Xin to withdraw his troops and wait for the battle in the future. If it weren't for the Xiong Tuwei in King Zhao's heart that he was willing to support him and let King Zhao suppress all the advice of retreating troops, I'm afraid Zhao Xin would have to bring the army back to Jinyang with him.

What Zhao Xin needs to do now is to quickly conquer the Wei Kingdom and give the ministers in the court confidence, so that they know that it will not take long to destroy Qi and Wei and seize the Central Plains, so Zhao Xin can't wait any longer.

"Everyone, in recent days, the Wei army in Changhuan City has changed. If I was not mistaken, Pang Kuo had lost his power. Now the person in charge of Changhuan City is Wei Bu, the general of the Wei army. Although I don't know if this is what the King of Wei means, it is certain that changing the commander in the last battle will be a huge blow to the morale of the Wei army. Our army's opportunity is here." Zhao Xin looked at the generals and said.

"General, is this matter true?" Li Rubing asked. Changing commanders at the last stage was a taboo in military strategists. Li Rubing did not believe that the King of Wei would be so stupid, so he became suspicious of this matter.

Zhao Xin said: "General Li, I know what you are worried about, but what I can be sure of is that this matter is almost the same. Besides, even if it is the trick of the Wei army, what can I do if there are some conspiracies in the face of the strength of our hundreds of thousands of troops?"

Li Rubing nodded, and Zhao Xin also made sense. As the saying goes, one force will bring down ten goals. In the face of absolute strength, any conspiracy will be very pale and powerless.

Seeing that no one had any objections, Zhao Xin talked about his plan of siege and said, "Now our army has more than 400,000 troops here, four times the Wei army, and has an absolute advantage, so I decided to attack the city. As long as we conquer the Wei Kingdom, we can siege the Qi Kingdom. The pressure on the court is very great. I will completely destroy the Qi and Wei within one year. I hope you all will encourage you!"

"Yes, General!" everyone responded.

On June 12, 18th year of Qianyuan, the Zhao army launched a strong attack on Changhuan City, and Wei Bu also led the Wei army to fight to the death. However, due to the struggle for power and profit in the army, the morale of the Wei army was greatly damaged, so the Wei army did not resist very fiercely, which made Zhao Xin very proud and ordered the army to strengthen the offensive.

Wei Bu was also very helpless about this. He had tried many methods to stimulate the morale of the Wei army, but it was just futile. After all, Pang Kuo's prestige in the Wei army was so high that many people in the Wei army were dissatisfied with Wei Bu. Wei Bu could not convince the entire army for a while, so Changhuan City began to shaky under the powerful offensive of the Zhao army.

Wei Bu was furious and killed several Wei generals who failed to resist. This made Zhao Xin, who was even more disinterested in the Wei army, also took advantage of the chaos of the Wei army to start bewitching the generals of the Wei army to surrender.

On the night of June 20, the 18th year of Qianyuan, a Wei army general quietly opened the Changhuan City and let the Zhao army enter the city.

As soon as the Zhao army entered the city, countless Wei soldiers who were still sleeping were killed. Wei Bu also woke up from his sleep and led his troops to resist in panic.

Just when Zhao army entered the city, Chu Fei brought a large number of Pang Kuo's old subordinates to the grain warehouse and found Pang Kuo. Seeing this, Pang Kuo was shocked. He heard the deafening shouts of killing and asked quickly: "What happened?"

Chu Fei said urgently: "Grand Sima, Zhao's army has entered the city!"

"What!" Pang Kuo heard this and was shocked: "I heard a few days ago that the Zhao army had just started an attack. How could it break the city so quickly? Are the tens of thousands of soldiers of our Great Wei in the Great Wei Dynasty all decorations?"

It’s not that Pang Kuo was so surprised. The Wei army had at least 100,000 people. Although the Zhao army had 400,000 or 500,000, it was still possible to break through Changhuan City in less than a year or two. How could it be that the city could be broken in just a few days?

Sun Ru said angrily: "The Grand Sima is all the waste of Wei Bu. If it weren't for him, how could Zhao Jun break the city so quickly?"

"Wei Bu? What's wrong with him? With his ability, there is no reason to lose so quickly." Pang Kuo was even more puzzled. Although he and Wei Bu were not in harmony, he still recognized Wei Bu's ability. In the Wei Kingdom, only he could suppress him. How could such a person be defeated so quickly? Or was Zhao Xin and Zhao Army too powerful? If that was true, what hope would Wei Kingdom have?

"That's the case." Chu Fei explained: "Since the incident in the Grand Sima, the morale in the army has been sluggish. In the battles a few days ago, they were all suppressed by the Zhao army. In a rage, Wei Bu killed several side generals and deputy generals in a row. One of the side generals' younger brothers was also side generals. In order to avenge his brother, he secretly contacted the Zhao army and opened the city gate tonight and let the Zhao army enter the city."

When Pang Kuo heard this, he was furious and said, "Wei Bu was wronged. He didn't find out in advance if he had such a relationship. As a result, our army was defeated, he would definitely become the sinner of the Great Wei!"

"Grand Sima, it's not the time to talk about these things. Please think of a solution." Chu Fei said, now that the Zhao army has entered the city, and the Wei army is in chaos. If you don't find a way, these tens of thousands of people will be destroyed in Changhuan City.

But what can Pang Gua have? With the city in hand, Pang Gua still has the confidence to deal with Zhao Xin, and even dragged it for a year and a half to the Zhao army out of ammunition and food, and he took the initiative to retreat. But now the city is gone, what can he use to resist hundreds of thousands of Zhao troops?

Pang Kuo smiled bitterly and said, "What else can I do? The Zhao army has entered the city. Staying in Changhuan is just a dead end. Only now can you quickly withdraw Changhuan with your troops and horses, how much strength can you keep, Sun Ru, Feng Kui!"

"The last one is here!" Sun Ru and Feng Kui responded.

"You two will immediately summon troops and horses in the name of Sima. How much can you gather? After half an hour, we will withdraw from Changhuan." Now the Zhao army has entered the city, and there is not much time left for Pang Kuo, so Pang Kuo only gave Sun Ru and Feng Kuo one hour. After one hour, no matter how many troops and horses they gather, they will withdraw from Changhuan. It will be too late.

After Sun Ru and Feng Kui left, Pang Kuo said to Shangluo again: "General Shang, go and control the south gate quickly and help us retreat!"

"Here!" Shang Luo replied.

Sun Ru and Feng Kui raised Pang Kuo's banner. For a moment, the Wei army, who was still panicked, seemed to have found an organization and came, but this was also discovered by the Zhao army. A large number of Zhao troops came here, so Feng Kui had to lead troops to block the Zhao army and let Sun Ru continue to gather his troops.

One hour later, Pang Kuo led his troops out of Changhuan from the south gate, but there were less than 50,000 Wei troops who could follow Pang Kuo out. After leaving the city, Pang Kuo did not dare to stay, but went south all the way. As for Wei Bu, he could only let him die.

After Pang Kuo left, the beliefs in the minds of a large number of Wei soldiers collapsed instantly and they put down their weapons and surrendered one after another. However, Wei Bu, Wei Li and others died in the chaos.

In this battle, the Zhao army suffered more than 10,000 casualties. In addition to the losses caused by the siege in the past few days, a total of more than 40,000 casualties were killed, more than 50,000 Wei troops were killed and more than 20,000 prisoners were captured, and a complete victory was won.

After controlling Changhuan City, Zhao Xin sent troops to send a group of Wei troops to the north of the Yellow River to prevent him from causing trouble.

When cleaning the city, Zhao Xin found that Pang Kuo had taken tens of thousands of Wei troops to kill him. Zhao Xin also frowned. Not killing Pang Kuo was still a trouble for Zhao Jun, but now that things have come to this, Zhao Xin has no choice.
Chapter completed!