Chapter 102: Successive defeats, Ji Ling's death Let’s not talk about the wind and rain inside Shouchun City, but let’s talk about outside Shouchun City. After Sun Ce left the camp at three o’clock in the morning, he headed north. After marching for a long time, they finally found the trace of Ji Ling's troops. Seeing that the enemy had more than 10,000 soldiers, Sun Ce said angrily: "Qin Zhen is a good scheming kid. Almost all the soldiers in Shouchun City have come out. Now the enemy's feint attack is defeated again. It shows that Shouchun is empty!" "They took the city, but now they want us to fight here!" Zhou Yu heard this and said bitterly: "It's my fault this time. I failed to see Qin Zhen's plan and Fang Zhong's calculations!" As he said this, his heart was filled with guilt. Obviously he was cautious enough, but he still fell into Qin Zhen's trap! Who could have thought that Qin Zhen spoke so righteously on the surface, but was actually doing shady things behind the scenes. Looking back at all the opponents they had encountered in the past, there had never been anyone as difficult as this one.

You can't defend against this person's methods at all. The only way is to prepare in advance. Therefore, in his opinion, the current situation is mostly his responsibility. He didn't see Qin Zhen's plan. When Sun Ce saw Zhou Yu like this, he knew that he was upset, so he simply changed the subject: "Ji Ling has a lot of troops at the moment. If they find our army behind them, they will probably attack desperately. Our army should think of a way to defeat them so that we can save Jiang Qin and other troops." Zhou Yu heard this and realized that the situation was critical and it was not the time to regret. He thought for a moment and said: "I am concerned that our army has too many soldiers and horses to pursue us, so I will charge forward suddenly to cut off Ji Ling's way back. He will fight to the death." "It would be better to send knights north first to inform Jiang Qin to be on alert, and then split the troops into two groups, one group will follow the enemy north, and the other group will go around the enemy from the west and north. After the two armies have engaged, we can attack from the flank." Upon hearing this, Sun Ce nodded in agreement, and hurriedly ordered the knights to march north, dividing the troops with Zhou Yu to march north from the west. He himself led 5,000 soldiers and horses to pursue. On the other hand, Ji Ling had no idea that he had fallen into the enemy's trap. He went all the way north, thinking that he had succeeded, so he was not on guard much. It was not until Sun Ce got to the rear that the spies noticed and hurried over to report: "General, a large group of soldiers suddenly appeared behind our army!" Upon hearing this, before Ji Ling could say anything, Qi Ji and other generals beside him were horrified and stepped forward and said: "General, this is bad. The enemy may have discovered our plan. What should we do?" When Ji Ling heard this, he felt depressed. He thought that the enemy was indeed difficult to deal with. Not long after they left the city, the enemy sent troops to rescue them. This showed that Yuan Huan's feint attack strategy did not work. He had no idea of ​​the situation in Shouchun, and only thought that the enemy had discovered something unusual and came to pursue them. Their main force had already left the city, so the enemy had only two choices: either withdraw camp quickly or attack the city by force. But no matter which one it is, there is no turning back now! Because the coalition forces had a total of 40,000 troops, and he was now far away from Shouchun, if he turned back suddenly, he would surely fall into an enemy ambush.

If these troops are lost, Shouchun will also be unable to be defended. Therefore, his only option was to break through the dam and then march back. As a general, Ji Ling naturally understood the reason. After thinking about it, he made a decision and asked hurriedly: "How many soldiers are there in the rear?" As soon as he asked this question, the spies reported: "There aren't many soldiers, only a few thousand!" Hearing this, Ji Ling said in a deep voice: "This is not the main force of the enemy. It must be that the enemy is not yet on alert!" "Advance at full speed, and after the dam is broken, turn back and attack them!" After giving the order, he led his troops and rushed northward. After half an hour, a spy reported that the location of the enemy's dam had been discovered. The water volume of the Huai River tributaries was not enough, so in order to flood Shouchun, Sun Ce stationed at the dam this time and diverted the main trunk of the Huai River, which was quite far away from Shouchun City. At this time, Ji Ling heard that the location of the dam had been discovered, and he was overjoyed, and hurriedly ordered his soldiers to speed up again. However, he did not know that Jiang Qin, under the order of Sun Ce, had already gone out of the dam area. As a result, before Ji Ling arrived, he saw Jiang Qin leading his troops blocking the way ahead. Seeing this, Ji Ling raised his knife high and shouted: "If we win the battle today, you can all protect your families. Don't be afraid of fighting. Follow me and kill them." With a loud shout, he led 12,000 soldiers and charged towards Jiang Qin's 3,000 soldiers. Their numerical advantage is enough to make up for the gap in individual combat power. The two armies fought together, and Jiang Qin's army formation was almost broken through by Ji Ling. However, Jiang Qin was also a fierce general. Seeing the enemy coming in full force, he personally took up his sword and stood in front of them, killing and wounding more than a dozen people in a row, and finally stopped Ji Ling's charge. When Ji Ling saw this, he flew into a rage and shouted: "Everyone, please fight hard. There are pursuers behind us. If we don't defeat the troops in front of us, we will surely be destroyed here!" Upon hearing this, the soldiers under his command all began to fight hard. Just as they were about to break through Jiang Qin's army, they heard the spy report back again: "General, the enemy has reached within 500 steps behind our army!" When Ji Ling heard this, he looked at the remaining thousand soldiers of Jiang Qin and hesitated for a moment. While he was hesitating, Qi Ji came forward and advised: "The enemy has few soldiers and horses, why don't you divide your forces to fight them?" "If we let the enemy attack us, how can we resist?" After hearing Qi Ji's words, Ji Ling thought that the enemy had only a few thousand men and horses, so even if he divided half of his troops, it would be enough to resist! After thinking for a while, he said to Qi Ji: "Order Kong Shuo to lead 3,000 soldiers back to stop the enemy. I can defeat this army in just two moments!" When Qi Ji heard this, he hurriedly took the order and left.

Upon seeing this, Ji Ling once again urged his soldiers to kill the enemy, but his division of troops hindered their advance, giving Jiang Qin a chance to catch his breath. He ordered his men to form a circle and block Ji Ling's advance. Ji Ling was furious when he saw how stubborn he was. He wanted to go forward and kill the general, but he was afraid that his troops would have no one to command them, so he could only worry. Before I knew it, I saw Qi sending back a report: "General, our rear wing has been breached by the enemy, and Kong Shuo has been killed by the enemy!" Hearing this, Ji Ling felt as if he had fallen into an icy cave, and couldn't help but exclaimed: "Who is leading the enemy troops? They are so brave and courageous!" He didn't know that Sun Ce was leading the army himself, he only knew that the troops behind him were powerful and broke through his rear wing in less than a moment. I was extremely panicked and was just about to think of a countermeasure. Unexpectedly, a burst of shouting and killing sounded on the grassland in the west, and then a soldier came to report: "General, General, a large number of enemy troops suddenly appeared on our flank!" Hearing this, Ji Ling was even more shocked and turned around and shouted: "Oh no, we've fallen into the enemy's trap. Follow me to withdraw our troops and break out!" At this point, he knew that he had fallen into a trap. The enemy army did not have just a few thousand troops, but tens of thousands! Now they were blocked by Jiang Qin in the north, there was a river in the east, and there were enemy troops in the south and west. They were surrounded on all sides. If he did not break out at this time, once the enemy surrounded him, his troops would be trapped and die. Ji Ling was also very experienced. When he saw that Sun Ce wanted to wipe out his troops, he immediately changed from the rear team to the front team and started to break out towards the southwest corner. Although he was experienced, he was not as good as Zhou Yu and Sun Ce in using troops. Seeing that they had surrounded Ji Ling, the two men knew that there was no way they could let Ji Ling break out easily. Without communicating at all, the troops from both sides gathered towards the southwest corner. Ji Ling fought desperately and finally broke out of a passage. He led his troops to charge out, and by the time he broke out of the encirclement, only less than 5,000 of the 12,000 soldiers were left, and most of them remained in Sun Ce's encirclement. Seeing this, Ji Ling naturally felt resentful in his heart. I thought it was a good plan by Yuan Huan, but now most of the soldiers have been killed before the dam is captured. If we go back to Shouchun, we don't need to dig anything at all. The enemy can take Shouchun by force alone. But he had no way to continue attacking the dam. After all, there were tens of thousands of enemy troops in the rear. If he went back, not only would the dam be difficult to attack, but the remaining thousands of men might also be killed outside the city. After much deliberation, Ji Ling had no choice but to lead his troops towards Shouchun. As a result, when they were halfway there, they saw a soldier coming to report: "General, urgent news from Shouchun!" "Our army in Shouchun was attacked by a large number of enemy troops!" "General Lei Bu sent me here to tell you that our army has fallen into the enemy's trap. We must stop attacking the dam and return home immediately!" But when Ji Ling heard this, he flew into a rage and said: "You came to deliver the message, why did you arrive only now?" "If we had come earlier, our army would not have suffered such a defeat!"

He now really wants to kill Yuan Huan. It doesn't matter if he sends his troops earlier. As long as he sends his troops before the enemy surrounds him, he won't be defeated like this! Now that the dam cannot be attacked and the enemy is attacking Shouchun fiercely, what is the use of his thousands of soldiers and horses? The soldier was terrified when he saw this, and said in a trembling voice: "After receiving the order, I headed north without any slackness!" "I beg you to spare my life, General, and don't kill me!" His appearance also made Ji Ling lose the intention to kill. Seeing this situation, Qi Ji could not help but advise: "General, Shouchun is difficult to defend now. We might as well withdraw to Ruyin to garrison!" But when Ji Ling heard this, he immediately shouted coldly: "Your Majesty ordered us to defend Shouchun to the death. We still have troops. Even if we retreat, we must rescue Lei Bu and others!" His overall view is much stronger than Qi Ji's. He knows that even if he cannot take back the city now, he has to rescue Yuan Huan, Lei Bu and others. Otherwise, if those soldiers were captured again, they would find it difficult to stop the enemy even if they retreated to Ruyin. Without waiting for Qi Ji to persuade him further, he led his troops back towards Shouchun. He thought that since the enemy was attacking the city with all their might, there would be no ambush on the road, so he simply led his troops and marched quickly. But as soon as they reached the dense forest in the north of the city, they saw a group of soldiers rushing out. The leader was Qiao Rui, who raised his sword and shouted: "Ji Ling, why don't you surrender immediately!" As the so-called one-shot, and then decline, three and exhausted. Ji Ling had been marching rapidly all night, and his soldiers were already exhausted. When they saw another ambush, they panicked and found it difficult to form a battle formation. Seeing Qiao Rui rushing out, Ji Ling suddenly became anxious and angry, and cursed: "How dare you, a traitor to your master, do this!" After cursing, he rushed out with a gun in hand and fought with Qiao Rui. The two fought for more than ten rounds but neither of them won. Qi Ji looked at the chaos everywhere and Ji Ling was fighting in the melee, and shouted: "General, you must not fight to the death!" Upon hearing this, Ji Ling hurriedly used his spear to deflect Qiao Rui's long sword, then turned his horse and fled. But when he turned around, he saw a man on a brown horse and holding a silver spear, coming straight towards him. Ji Ling was startled and rushed forward with his gun, but he saw the opponent's body tilted sideways and the bullet hit his back. Ji Ling was horrified by the injury and asked hurriedly: "Who is coming?" But the other party remained calm and uttered four words coldly: "Runan Chen is here!" After saying this, he rode his horse towards Ji Ling again. Ji Ling naturally had never heard of Chen Dao's name. Seeing the opponent coming again, he had no choice but to fight him with great pain. Although Chen Dao is not well-known, his martial arts skills are quite impressive. Ji Ling had already exhausted all his strength, so he was no match for Chen. In less than three rounds, he was stabbed and fell off his horse.

Seeing Chen Dao raising his spear to stab, Qiao Rui rode towards him at full speed, shouting: "Shuzhi, please show some mercy. This man is a great general and should be captured alive!" Chen Dao stopped firing his gun upon hearing this, but Ji Ling, seeing this, shouted: "Stop talking to those who betray your master. If you cannot be loyal to your master now, then you will die here. What is there to fear?" After cursing like this, he grabbed Chen Dao's spear and stabbed it into his chest. Blood gushed out at once, and the spear pierced his chest. Before Qiao Rui could reach him, he fell to the ground dead. As Qiao Rui walked along, he saw that Ji Ling was dead, and he sighed deeply. He originally wanted to save Ji Ling's life, but he didn't expect Ji Ling to be so foolishly loyal! When Chen Dao saw Qiao Rui like this, he stepped forward and said: "This man is determined to die. General, don't worry about it. Just follow me and gather the soldiers." Qiao Rui also knew that the dead could not be resurrected, so after sighing for a moment, he began to gather his soldiers. As the army formation under Ji Ling was in chaos and the soldiers had no will to fight, and seeing Ji Ling dead, Qi Ji knew that he was powerless to save the situation, so he led his men to surrender. With his leadership, a large number of Yuan Shu's soldiers began to surrender. Soon, Chen Dao and Qiao Rui led their troops to confiscate the weapons. A brief count revealed that nearly four thousand people surrendered. After capturing the prisoners, the two men headed towards Shouchun again. However, before they entered the city, they saw Zhang Fei coming to meet them. When the two armies met, they realized that Liu Bei had already occupied Shouchun. Chen Dao and Qiao Rui were both overjoyed when they heard that Shouchun had fallen. Because Sun Ce had not arrived yet, they simply took the captives and marched into the city. (End of this chapter)