Chapter 368 Qin Zhen vs Xun You, Cao Ang's Defeat In March of the seventh year of Jian'an, during the spring ploughing season, Liu Bei's army suddenly launched a Northern Expedition. While Liu Bei was holding Cao Cao back in Hanzhong, Qin Zhen led his troops into Nanyang and reached Jiyang in early April. After arriving here, in order to attract Cao's army to advance westward, Qin Zhen stopped advancing and went straight to set up camp to wait for Cao's army. On the other hand, after receiving the news, Cao Ang followed Xun You's suggestion and brought Li Tong, Cao Xiu, Lu Qian, Cao Chun, Li Dian and other generals to reinforce. After arriving in Wancheng, Zhang Xiu went out of the city to meet him, briefly described the current situation, and then welcomed Cao Ang into the city. After entering the city and looking at the current route map of Qin Zhen's advance, Xun You said to Cao Ang: "Qin Zhen is advancing in two directions. One direction is to capture Wan County, while the other is to advance westwards. I'm afraid he intends to attack Wuguan." "We should send an army to garrison there to prevent Qin Zhen from opening the Guanzhong Passage and endangering Chang'an." "Besides, Qin Zhen has a large number of troops and many tricks at the moment. We must not let them approach the city." "We can station troops in Jiyang City, block Qin Zhen's route to the north, and use cavalry to harass his food supply."

"When their food runs out, they will retreat, and if we follow them, the enemy will surely be defeated by our army." After hearing what Xun You said, Cao Ang led his 20,000 troops and joined Zhang Xiu's troops to march towards Jiyang. Unexpectedly, as soon as their army gathered in the south, they heard reports from spies that Qin Zhen had captured Jiyanggu City and was advancing northward. Upon hearing this, Xun You hurriedly asked the spy how Qin Zhen captured the city. The spy reported that Qin Zhen had already deployed his troops in Ji Yang and had not taken any action for several days. It was not until yesterday that they launched the attack and captured the city in one fell swoop and entered Ji Yang City. Cao Ang was surprised to hear that Liu Bei was so powerful, but Xun You secretly thought something was wrong and said in a deep voice: "Qin Zhen is coming suddenly, so we should fight him quickly. He is keeping his troops still, so there must be some conspiracy behind this." "Since their main attack direction is not in the east, it must be in the west. I wonder if there is any news from the counties in the west?" Upon hearing this, Zhang Xiu hurriedly said that there had been no news from the west since the fall of Shunyang and Nanxiang. Upon hearing this, Xun You concluded that Taishi Ci was besieging Dan Shui, and hurriedly advised Cao Ang to send troops to rescue as soon as possible. Cao Ang followed his advice and ordered Cao Chun to lead his only 3,000 cavalry to Dan Shui for reinforcement. After receiving the order, Cao Chun led his troops directly through a small road to attack Taishi Ci's rear. After two days, he arrived at Shangmi Township, northwest of Nanxiang. As soon as he arrived here, he heard a scout report that Dan Shui had been captured by Taishi Ci for more than two days. When Cao Chun heard this, he couldn't help but wonder, weren't these two days the time when he just sent out his troops? Taishi Ci had captured the city for two days and was determined to launch a surprise attack on Wuguan. If he did not go to rescue it, Wuguan would be captured by Taishi Ci. It must be said here that Dan Shui is the last barrier in front of Wuguan. Once Dan Shui falls, Taishi Ci can directly attack Wuguan. Cao Chun was ordered to launch a surprise attack on Taishi Ci from behind. When he saw that Taishi Ci might have already marched into Wuguan, he intended to pursue Taishi Ci. With this idea in mind, he moved northward along the Danshui River, intending to use the river bank to cover his tracks. He arrived at Sanhu Pavilion upstream of the Dan River before crossing the river. However, as soon as he arrived here, before his troops had crossed the river, he saw a group of people rushing out from the mountain. At the same time, a general with a beautiful beard rode out on his horse, stood on the mountain and laughed loudly:

"Enemy general, don't run away. You want to attack me from behind. I have received orders from Lord Qin to wait for you to come!" "Now that you have been ambushed by our army, why don't you surrender? Do you want to die here?" When Cao Chun saw him standing on the mountain, he became angry. Then he saw his troops and became panicked, so he quickly ordered his men to retreat. When Taishi Ci saw that he was about to retreat, he ordered his crossbowmen to shoot. After a burst of indiscriminate shooting, Cao Chun's formation was in chaos. When Taishi Ci saw this, he gathered his troops and attacked. Cao Chun did not dare to engage in battle and retreated along the mountain path. Suddenly, another group of soldiers appeared in front of him. They were led by Huo Jun and lined up in front of him, blocking his way. Cao Chun looked at the battle array in front of him and ordered his men to charge. When they reached the front of the battle array, they were suddenly hit by a rain of arrows. Cao Chun was caught off guard and a stray arrow hit him in the chest, nearly causing him to fall off his horse. But at this critical moment, he ordered the cavalry to continue charging. But when his cavalry moved forward, he saw Huo Jun ordering them to raise their shields, and the hook-and-sickle spears kept extending out to chop the horses' hooves. Not only did the charge fail to break through the enemy's defense, but it also resulted in the loss of a large number of cavalry. The Cao army had never encountered Qin Zhen's hook-and-sickle spear, so they were naturally at a loss when they suddenly encountered such a sharp weapon. Cao Chun was already injured, and seeing that he could not break through, he had to order his soldiers to jump into the water to save their lives. At once, his soldiers jumped into the Dan River one after another, and countless people drowned. Due to excessive blood loss, Cao Chun was washed downstream and bled to death. Only a few of his personal guards escaped. After Taishi Ci and Huo Jun defeated Cao's cavalry in a battle, they gathered the defeated troops and headed towards Dan Shui again. On the other hand, Cao Chun's personal guards escaped, but because their commander was killed, they had to return to the army in despair. After another three days of marching, he returned to the south and gathered Cao's army. When he saw the commander Cao Ang, he cried and said: "Danshui was captured by the enemy long ago. Taishi Ci ambushed the general on the road and he was killed by a stray arrow." "All three thousand of our cavalry were destroyed. We jumped into the water to survive and were able to escape back here." At this time, Cao Ang had led his troops to the south and had been confronting Qin Zhen for many days. He allowed Qin Zhen's generals to provoke him but he did not come out. I thought that this would stabilize the situation, but I didn't expect that the general Cao Chun would be killed before the battle even started. Cao Chun was Cao Cao's cousin and Cao Ang's uncle. Cao Ang was a filial son and burst into tears. Xun You saw that Qin Zhen pretended to hold his troops and set an ambush to eliminate their cavalry in advance, and sighed: "The general's death is really my fault. Qin Zhen is a very capable person and I cannot defeat him." "It would be better to increase the number of stoves, send the soldiers out of the camp at night, and return to the camp during the day." "Let them think that our army is too numerous and they dare not attack, so they can continue to hold their ground!" As the saying goes, a good cook cannot cook without rice. Their troops were originally inferior to Qin Zhen's, and now they have suffered heavy casualties. Qin Zhen is likely to launch an all-out attack on them, and only by creating the illusion that they have a large number of troops can they intimidate Qin Zhen's troops. Cao Ang had lost his general at this time and had no way to fight the enemy, so he could only agree to this plan and ordered 3,000 soldiers to leave the camp at night and let them return to the camp the next day. So on the second night, another 5,000 soldiers were ordered to leave the camp, and on the third morning they were allowed to return to the camp. As they did so, the spies reported the news to Qin Zhen's camp, saying that the enemy had more than 10,000 reinforcements coming.

All the generals were horrified when they heard this, thinking that the combined forces of Cao Ang and Zhang Xiu numbered more than 20,000 men. Now with another 10,000 troops added, there are now more than 30,000 soldiers in the camp in front of us. Apart from Taishi Ci's troops, they only had 40,000 men in total. How could they storm the enemy's camp? Zhang Liao immediately suggested that Qin Zhen divide his forces to raid Wancheng. As the number of troops in the enemy camp increased, the number of troops guarding Wancheng would decrease. There are 10,000 additional troops here. There must be not many garrison troops in Wancheng, so they can just divide their forces to launch a surprise attack. However, Qin Zhen heard this and shook his head and smiled, saying, "How dare the enemy mobilize the troops of Wancheng?" "They don't have enough troops now. If we mobilize Wancheng's troops, we will be cutting off our own retreat." "I heard that the enemy's strategist is Xun You, an old acquaintance of mine, with extraordinary wisdom and strategies. This must be his plan!" "I guessed that Ziyi had succeeded, and the enemy suffered heavy casualties and was afraid of our attack, so I planned to add more stoves!" "Even if he wants to increase the number of stoves, our army will lure him by reducing the number of stoves. If he does not come, we can attack by force." Therefore, Qin Zhen immediately ordered his troops to respond by reducing the number of cooking fires, and at night he sent Zhang Liao and Xu Sheng to lead more than 10,000 troops to the north. As for Bai Ri, they took a detour back to the camp and pretended that they were dividing their forces to launch a surprise attack on Wancheng. After the spy learned of this, he passed the news to Cao Ang's military camp, saying that Qin Zhen had sent his troops north. At this time, because of the news of Cao Chun's death, all the generals were furious. Seeing Qin Zhen dividing his troops, they all came to ask for a fight. Seeing this, Cao Ang had no choice but to ask Xun You for his opinion, but when Xun You heard that Qin Zhen was reducing the number of stoves, he immediately frowned. Because his plan to increase the number of cooking fires was just a bluff, and it would be useless once the enemy saw through it. But there are two possibilities for Qin Zhen's reduction of the number of forts. One is that Qin Zhen saw through their plan and pretended to divide his troops to lure them to attack; One is that Qin Zhen might have really fallen into the trap and sent his troops north to capture Wancheng, so they could easily attack. These two possibilities lead to different results, but they have one thing in common: they must send troops. If they do not move, Qin Zhen will immediately realize that something is wrong and lead his troops to launch a full-scale attack. After all, after Qin Zhen's apparent division of troops, their "troops and horses" had exceeded the total number of Qin Zhen. If they don't try it at this time, it would be telling Qin Zhen that they don't have enough troops and dare not try. But the problem is that they don't have many soldiers and if they try, they will definitely suffer heavy losses. Is it worth sacrificing troops to make Qin Zhen hesitate? After thinking for a moment, he sighed: "This must be Qin Zhen's plan to test our army. If our army goes, they will be defeated by him. We must not go there!" Upon hearing this, Cao Ang decided not to mobilize any more troops and ordered his generals not to attack Qin Zhen. After two days of this, seeing that the enemy army had made no movement, Qin Zhen confirmed his judgment that Cao Ang did not have enough troops! After reaching this conclusion, he mobilized his troops and launched a full-scale attack on Cao Ang's camp that night. That night, his generals Zhang Liao, Xu Sheng, Cai Mao and Wei Xu each led an army of 5,000 and launched a fierce attack on Cao's camp. Liu Bei's army today is no longer the poor and miserable one it once was in Huainan. Although not all of his soldiers wear armor, most of them hold swords. In contrast, Cao Cao's troops had been fighting every year, and half of their elite troops had been lost, and most of Cao Ang's troops were soldiers from counties and kingdoms.

Not only were the combat capabilities of these counties and kingdoms inferior to those of the armored soldiers, their equipment was also mostly extremely crude, and most of their ring-handled swords had become rusted and blunt. In addition, after Qin Zhen's reform, war and spoils of war were tied together, making his soldiers all want to gain military merit and obtain land. Due to a combination of various factors, Qin Zhen's troops had a firm advantage from the beginning of the battle. The war started in the first half of the night and lasted for two hours. The east and west camps under Cao Ang were successively defeated. In desperation, Cao Ang had to order the entire army to retreat and rushed out of the camp with the remaining 10,000 soldiers and horses. Unexpectedly, just after leaving the camp, he was ambushed by Gao Shun and Liao Chun under Qin Zhen's command. Under Gao Shun's strong resistance, Cao Ang was defeated again. In this battle, General Lu Qian was killed, Li Tong was captured, and more than half of Cao Ang's 10,000-strong army was lost, leaving only a few thousand people who retreated to Wancheng. On April 21st of the seventh year of Jian'an, Qin Zhen gathered his troops in the south and defeated Cao Ang's troops, killing more than 5,000 enemies and capturing more than 6,000. On the 24th, Qin Zhen marched to the city of Wan County and joined forces with Taishi Ci to surround Cao Ang in Wan County. After hearing the news, Cao Ren was shocked. He did not care about Guan Yu in the east and hurriedly ordered General Zhu Ling to lead troops to reinforce Wan County. This move also allowed Guan Yu in Runan to see an opportunity, and he began to take action based on Xu Shu's suggestion. (End of this chapter)