The summer is hot and hot, even in the camp at night. Especially when someone died in the tent, even though some servants had cleaned up bloody corpses and sprinkled spices to cover the smell of blood, many smells mixed together make people dizzy and their thoughts become blocked.

Shi Hu drafted several orders in the tent, and his whole body was covered with sweat and felt even more stuffy and hot, so he got up and prepared to patrol the camp.

He had just put on light armor here, and all the generals outside the tent had gathered here to wait for the call. Although Yingkou's defeat caused great losses to its troops, many direct troops were sent out to defend all sides, the current Central Army camp still had more than 5,000 troops gathered.

When talking to Zhang Chai just now, although Shi Hu was in a tone of perseverance and courage as he frustrated, his true mood was far from as optimistic as he showed. Moreover, the harsh situation of the army was by no means expressible to words.

Although before the news of the defeat had not spread, Shi Hu took the lead and used tough measures to seize Guo Ao's troops to supplement the damage to the war. However, he did not dare to trust Guo Ao's old subordinates, so he did not even dare to station in Qiaocheng near him. Instead, he set up camps in the wilderness, because he was worried that the soldiers might cause chaos and rebel against Qiaocheng, and he did not dare to place all his direct forces near Qiaocheng.

Although there is still a lot of calmness in the words, the arrangement of the army camps reveals Shi Hu's fear and crampedness at the moment.

The camp was extremely broad. Except for more than 5,000 Central Army Yicong gathered around the headmaster's camp, the rest of the people and horses were stationed separately. The setting of this scattered camp was different from the previous terrain on Huai River. It was just to separate the soldiers from various units and avoid gathering in one place to cause chaos.

Shihu is not born with power, but it also starts from the slightest moment, so he is not ignorant of what the people and the soldiers think. He also has his own experience of the art of controlling the inferior. The essence is nothing more than the intimidation and use of the destruction.

Although the defeat this time caused great morale, it was not irreversible. The vast majority of soldiers themselves did not know what the army had encountered. The southerners did not take advantage of the situation to attack from afar. Although Shi Hu had no chance to fight back in the field and turn defeat into victory, they did not directly impose the threat of disaster and life on every soldier. What these soldiers could feel was the panic and chaos, and the blind people were suddenly frightened, and they did not even understand what the specific threat was.

The ant people are so sad. They are driven by the general trend and blindly move in the world. When the general trend moves forward, they move forward. When the general trend retreats, they retreat. As long as they are not bewitched and incited by the traitor, they will blindly run around until they die, and they will never rise up to resist.

Therefore, what we really need to be wary of are the powerful generals who have their own troops. Not only those who are miscellaneous, Hu Qu and Guo Ao’s old soldiers, but also the direct generals under him. How much loyalty can he retain when he is newly defeated and in a difficult situation is still unknown.

Shi Hu also had many methods to deal with these soldiers and generals who were arrogant because of the crowd. Previously, because of his noble prestige and always strong style, he did not need to use too much effort. No one dared to disobey the military orders. Just like before, he forcibly seized Guo Ao's troops, and when his reputation was not damaged, he would use the strong ones once he broke up. Even an old minister and general like Guo Ao would not dare to disobey.

Therefore, in recent times, Shi Hu mainly targeted the military leaders who had their own troops. First of all, the general Qu who had always been disrespectful to the Hu, a considerable number of them were detained in the central army for various reasons, or directly beheaded, and first set a bloody tone with a strong attitude, which shocked those who had thoughts.

Although there are many Hu soldiers, they are not completely united. Eliminating a few unruly people and distributing their soldiers to the weak will make these Qu generals happy and even frame each other.

However, Guo Ao's old subordinates and generals were still mainly attracted. Although these generals were from Guo Ao, they did not rely entirely on their retainers' private parts. If there was a better choice, they might not have changed their families.

Just like the brave and fighting young Li Nong in Guo Ao's army, Shi Hu personally met and tested his attitude after seizing the army, and then directly appointed him as the prefect of Qiao County, and the newly seized Qiao City was also handed over to his defense. Such power and status were not given by Guo Ao. Even if Li Nong was worried about the old master's plan, he had to consider whether he would be in trouble in the future and would make Guo Ao feel irresistible.

As for his subordinates, Shi Hu relied more on the newly emerging young generals, such as Ma Qiu. Relatively speaking, these young generals are more dependent on themselves and have more loyalty. If it were not for his own disciples, these generals would never be able to surpass many veterans in the country to take up their posts. Only by following them closely can they be more evident.

Old generals like Zhang Chai are now kept by Shi Hu. They seem to be trustworthy, but they are also a kind of threat. Similar to Zhang Chai, they gathered together in their early years, and there were many thoughts and experiences of self-reliance. Once they were released, they might not be able to listen to the fingers.

Now that these people are left by their side, one can use their old reputation to shock the army and not cause chaos, and the other is to suppress their desire to seek other things. Zhang Chai has been humble and respectful recently, and how could Shi Hu not know what his intentions are. He is indeed a matter of employing people at the moment, but before the situation of the big battle situation improves, he will not consider supporting Zhang Chai again.

Shi Hu's intentions are so hard that it is not mainly because of the enemy in Huainan. To be honest, even if the newly defeated army is difficult to dispatch, if the Huainan army really dares to attack southern Henan, Shi Hu will have enough confidence to defeat them in the field.

After all, the failure of the initial battle was not a crime. The reason why the army fled was not entirely due to the impact of the Huai River breaking. Those hateful Jin people were in chaos before the battle and broke the army camps. He was worried that Guo Ao would be detrimental to him and failed to return to the army in time to take charge of the army.

In short, there are many reasons, and the defeat is unwilling. Including the generals under his command, they are all enduring humiliation and shame. If the Southerners really dare to attack from afar, they will not consider the morale of the military. Just relying on the private military corps of the generals, they can also eliminate the arrogance of the Southerners in the field!

What he was most worried about was that this failure would have any bad impact on his situation in the middle of the country. For example, he wanted to shock the inside and outside with the victory of the southern expedition. This kind of deliberation no longer needs to be considered now, and not letting the situation evolve into a worse situation is the best situation for Shi Hu.

Shi Hu did not report the news of the failure of the army to the Central Committee, but I believe that Xiangguo will receive the news soon. Shi Hu could not guess what the Lord would react, but this was not the issue he needed to consider at the moment. He is now leading his troops, and no matter what his situation is, the Lord would not want to impose too many bonds on him!

What really needs to be considered is the reactions that the army may have after hearing this news.

There is no need to think about Shi Sheng. In his early years, Shi Hu repeatedly criticized him for losing more often in every battle, which was a shame for his family. Now he must have been gloating to the extreme. However, now he led his troops to fight in Han Mian. The old slave Tao Kan from the southerner was definitely a difficult opponent. I guess Shi Sheng should not be very good. At most, he laughed at him for a few words and was unable to directly intervene in the war in southern Henan.

Although Taobao in Runan had long been secretly mingling with Shi Hu, he had even expressed his grudges when Shi Hu came south and had even made a statement that he would help him achieve great things. However, Shi Hu could not believe in his close confidants Zhang Chai and others. At present, he would not put too much hope on Taobao. Especially when he took over Guo Ao's troops, he would probably make Taobao wary and dare not be too intimate.

Shi Hu was most worried that Shi Sheng might take this opportunity to win over Taobao. Taobao didn't need Taobao to completely turn over. He just needed to persuade him to lead troops temporarily and not launch a new army. If he had no other troops to make achievements and create opportunities for war, he would not dare to move lightly. If Taobao could not delay, Shihu would have to be dragged in southern Henan and could not advance or retreat.

So when the situation in Qiao County was slightly stable, Shi Hu immediately sent people to Runan to persuade Taobao and lure him for huge profits. As long as Taobao can break Runan and break the Huai River defense line, no matter what rewards the master has, no matter what needs Taobao has for him, he will try his best to satisfy him.

Shi Hu really needs a victory and breakthrough to restore morale and reverse the current unfavorable situation. Because Shi Kan in Xuzhou poses too much threat to him, Xuzhou is a major city in the south, and Shi Kan is also the one that the Lord has devoted himself to in recent years. If the Lord has any dissatisfaction with him, if he directly issues it to him, he can still ignore it. But if it is expressed through Shi Kan, Shi Hu must be solemnly opposed.

Moreover, this time he came to the south, Shi Kan was also the target he had to solve, and his importance was even greater than that of the enemy in the south. Even his eagerness to fight led to his careless failure, because he wanted to solve Shi Kan as soon as possible.

Even if nothing else is the turn, you should know that Shi Hu and his sons are still recruiting brave and powerful martial arts in Qingxu land. If those recruited people have evil thoughts because of his defeat and bind their sons to Shikan, it would be really unpredictable. If they just simply lose a few sons, it would not be an unacceptable loss, and the son will be reborn after he is gone.

However, these sons were responsible for the plan of him and his cousin Shi Daya to seize the throne. After raising them for so many years, these sons were considered to have grown up and had a good martial arts. Even if they reborn in the future, they would take more than ten years of feeding and training to be able to be used.

So Shi Hu was really anxious at the moment. On the one hand, he sent someone to inform his sons to act carefully, while on the other hand, he closely monitored the news of all parties, especially Shikan, Xuzhou. On the other hand, he was eagerly looking forward to Taobao taking Rukou and giving him the opportunity to attack Huainan again.

As for the guidance of the troops to retreat to the country, Shi Hu didn't consider it at all. Yingkou's previous defeat had completely lost his way out. If he returned so empty, he would most likely be directly detained by the master. Even in a situation that was worse than before, his life would be placed in the hands of man.
Chapter completed!