General Qin

"The Qin army captured Qi (qí) two days ago, and also captured Duke Qi?"

On the Southwest Avenue about ten miles away from Qiyi, Zuo Sima Zhaoping was stunned when he received the news from the vanguard.

Jing Tong, who was following at the side, was also surprised: "How can this Qin army move so fast?"

"After we received the imperial edict, we immediately rushed from Shouchun to Qiyi. The Qin army was heading east in Huainan, but they had to go to Zhongli first, cross the Huai River from there, and then rush to Qiyi. Ah, this distance is much longer than ours, how could we run ahead of our army, and it took two whole days sooner.”

Zhaoping squinted his eyes, looking at an orange grove not far away under the winter sun.

Looking up, there is a piece of yellow, and from time to time, there is a rotten sweet and sour smell floating in the wind.

"Perhaps my judgment was wrong. The Qin army did not cross the Huai River from Zhongli, but directly crossed the Huai River to the north shortly after leaving Shouchun. This way, they could save hundreds of miles of travel. Qin Jun Before being able to cross the Huai River from the west of Shouchun to the south, I think I have mastered a certain method of crossing the river."

"It's getting more and more interesting."

Zhaoping sneered, and said to Tong Jing, "March faster and go to Qiyi first."

"only."

Jing Tong promised to step down.

Soon, the Chu army speeded up their march, and after half a day, they arrived outside the city of Qiyi.

"Zuo Sima, you must catch that Qin army and rescue Duke Qi."

Duke Qi's son, Dou Yuan, saw the Chu army coming, and accompanied Zhaoping into the city with a weeping face.

Zhaoping ignored him, but looked around the city, and saw that there were traces of a fire in the Qiyi city, and dozens of houses between the Lilu had been reduced to ruins. Terrible.

"Qin Jun still set fire?"

"That's right, those Qin soldiers set fires everywhere when they entered the city. While the people in my town were putting out the fire, they stormed into the mansion, captured my father, captured my treasury in Qiyi, and took away the food and property inside." goods, and then ran away from the north gate."

Dou Yuan was talking with snot and tears, and he didn't know whether he was worried about Qigong who fell into the hands of the Qin army, or the food and goods that were robbed by the Qin army.

Zhaoping's heart moved, and he asked, "How many people are there in this Qin army?"

"About two... there should be three or four thousand people!"

In the middle of Dou Yuan's speech, he suddenly remembered that if the number of this Qin army was reduced, wouldn't it appear that they were incompetent.

When the whole country was victorious and the main force of the Qin army was defeated by the Shangzhu Kingdom, Qiyi was not only raided and destroyed by one or two thousand Qin troops within a day, but the dignified Lord Qi was also captured and taken prisoner by the Qin people. If it gets out, I'm afraid they will be laughed to death by the Chu people. Do they want to save the Dou family's face?

It's better to exaggerate a little bit, anyway, with Zuo Sima's command of nearly ten thousand Chu troops, there is no difference between two thousand and three or four thousand.

"Three or four thousand people."

Zhaoping nodded slightly. It was a little short of the 5,000 he expected, but the gap was not too big. After all, the Qin army shuttled through the Chu region, captured cities all the way, fought against the Chu people, and with other reductions in personnel, When they arrived in Qiyi, there were only three or four thousand people left, which is reasonable.

"Zuo Sima, with such a number, it seems that they are the ones. This Qin army is going out of the north gate. Presumably, as Zuo Sima expected, they want to flee northward from Suiyang. Shall we go north immediately and pursue them?"

Jing Tong asked, he was in his twenties, and he and his younger brother Jing Ju were outstanding children of Jing's generation and future pillars. He was sent to Zhaoping's subordinates by Jing's relationship, so that he could learn the experience of fighting on the battlefield and meet the army.

Zhaoping smiled, and said calmly: "Why panic? It's more than enough time to go to Suiyang for hundreds of miles, not to mention my army is deployed near Xiangyi. They can't run away. First send cavalry to catch up and find the trace. Besides, our army will rest in Qiyi for a while, drink water and eat food, and then go on the road."

At dusk, when the sun was setting, the cold winter wind blew up a few fallen leaves and danced in the air.

Standing at the north gate of Qiyi, Dou Yuan watched the tens of thousands of Chu troops led by Zhaoping disappear into the distance, and then said angrily: "Damn ten thousand people, this is really edible. The Qin army just snatched it, and you come to eat it again." How can Qiyi afford such waste of food?"

He looked sideways at the place where the Chu army camped outside the city, and couldn't help but feel heartbroken. After being eaten like this, the food in the city would soon run out.

Fortunately, both Qin Jun and Chu Jun left, and Dou Yuan heaved a sigh of relief, and turned back to Yizhong to clean up the mess.

His father, Duke Qi, was taken captive by the Qin people, and he was naturally in charge of the whole Qi city.

However, Dou Yuan was relieved for two days. On the afternoon of the third day, a Chu army with a Chu flag and red armor appeared again in the south of Qiyi, about a thousand people.

"From the south? Qu's general?"

Dou Yuan was full of doubts, but he didn't doubt the other party's identity.

First, it was the other party's Chijia Chuqi, who was obviously dressed by one of his own people.

The second reason is that in the current state of Chu's great victory, it is basically difficult to see an established Qin army in the territory, and the only one has just been chased northward by Zuo Sima Zhaoping, so Dou Yuan is not worried about whether this Chu army is counterfeit.

Of course, the most important point is that Dou Yuan didn't know that there appeared in Huainan a Qin army wearing the armor of the Chu army going around defrauding the city.

Zhaoping knew about it, but he thought that the Qin army was the Qin army that had just broken Qiyi and went north to Suiyang.

Since the targets had already appeared and passed Qiyi, he naturally wouldn't specifically remind Dou Yuan of this matter.

Under such circumstances, when Dou Yuan went out of the city unsuspecting to meet the General Qu, he was captured.

"General Qu, what are you doing?"

Dou Yuan looked at the sword on his neck, and the red-armored Chu army who quickly entered the city after taking down his attendants, controlling the city gates and traffic arteries.

Dou Yuan's head is confused, he is all from Chu, why are you robbing my city?

However, the general who was sitting in the carriage and called himself "Qu An" ignored him. Instead, he turned his head to look at another young man on the horse, and said respectfully: "The two or five hundred lords involved, Qiyi has already been taken." , the army can come over."

"Well, it's hard work for the General."

Shejian nodded, he didn't expect that Qiyi would be so easy to win, even in Huainan, the tactics that failed were still so easy to use in Huaibei, the news of these Chu people is not very well-informed.

Shejian sent someone to report to Zhao Tuo in the rear that Qiyi had fallen, and ordered the army to come quickly.

On the other side, people were sent into the city to control the treasury and other important places in the city.

She Jian walked towards Dou Yuan who had just been controlled by himself, and he wanted to ask for information about the city.

After a while, Dou Yuan, who already knew the identity of this army, was still taken aback by the black-armored army that arrived from behind.

The strong soldiers lined up, one after another, wearing armor and holding spears, with their heads held high, and several black flags were flying in the marching team.

Qin Jun!

And its number is four to five thousand people!

Dou Yuan opened his eyes wide with disbelief on his face. When did such a huge Qin army appear in the south of Qiyi?

The south of Qiyi relies on the Huai River, across the Huai River, it is the real heartland of Chu State, Huainan.

Where did this Qin army come from?

Huainan?

Dou Yuan couldn't help thinking of the tens of thousands of Chu troops led by Zuo Sima Zhaoping two days ago. The reason why they came to Qiyi was said to be to stop a Qin army here.

At that time, Dou Yuan thought that the Qin army that Zuo Sima wanted to intercept was the one that had just broken Qiyi and went north. In addition, Duke Qi was taken away by that Qin army, so he naturally kept bragging about how powerful that Qin army was.

Therefore, Zhaoping was misled by him. Although he had doubts, he didn't think too much, and led his troops northward to pursue.

"hiss……"

Thinking of this, Dou Yuan felt cold all over his body.

Something seems to be wrong.

At this time, Zhao Tuo, who had just arrived in Qiyi on horseback, also learned from Shejian what had happened in Qiyi in the past few days.

"Two days ago, Chu Zuo Sima Zhaoping led troops to Qiyi, saying that he wanted to chase a fleeing Qin army?"

Zhao Tuo was also taken aback.

Even though the warm sun was shining in winter, it wasn't that cold, he couldn't help shivering, and a cool air rose from the soles of his feet and spread throughout his body.

"If you really don't underestimate the heroes of the world, the Chu State has been passed down for 800 years. How can there be no real good generals in the army. It's normal for a veteran in the battlefield like Zuo Sima of the Chu State to be counted as my route back to the army. On the contrary. It's because I lacked consideration, I never thought that General Chu would not pursue me in Huainan, but would come directly to Huaibei to stop me."

Zhao Tuo shook his head with a wry smile. Some time ago, because he had won several consecutive victories in Huainan and captured Zhong Limei, the pride he had accumulated was swept away by the incident in Qiyi.

After Xin Wu got the news, he came over and comforted Zhao Tuo: "Don't think too much, Qiyi is the only way for us to go north, and it is normal for Chu people to come here to block you. A veteran like me is also worried.”

Under Xin Wu's comfort, Zhao Tuo calmed down again. The fact that he was almost blocked by Chu Zuo Sima this time sounded the alarm for him, but it didn't make Zhao Tuo discouraged.

After thinking about it, Xin Wu was right. It was a normal operation for the Chu people to calculate that the Qin army must pass through Qiyi when going north.

Because as long as you cross the Huai River near Zhongli, if you want to go north and return to Qin, whether you take the road of Suiyang or the detour mentioned by Zhao Tuo, you must go through Qiyi, which is an important road.

If that Chu army did not go north, but was stationed in Qiyi, then Zhao Tuo had to bite the bullet and come over if he wanted to go back, defeat the opponent, and blaze a way back to Qin.

"However, the fact that the Chu army was lured away is a good thing for us. You can't go to Suiyang anymore, just follow your Zhao Tuo's instructions, go east to Fuli, cross Suishui, and return to Peiyi by detour."

Xin Wu gave up his plan to go north to Suiyang after he knew that there were more than ten thousand Chu troops in the Zuo Sima of Chu State, and he agreed with Zhao Tuo's proposal to detour to Fengfeng, which solved the problem of the Qin army's route, so there was no need to worry about it.

Zhao Tuo responded, since the incident had already happened, he didn't think about it any more, and immediately arranged for the soldiers to rest, and asked people to carry food and supplies from the city.

Although Qiyi's treasury was almost overwhelmed by the previous Qin army and Zuo Sima's Chu army, there were still big households in the city.

Zhao Tuo was not from Chu, so he didn't have to worry about his reputation, so he directly asked Heigui to take his Qin soldiers to raid the home of a wealthy family in Qiyi, and robbed a lot of food and supplies.

The Qin army boiled water, slaughtered dogs, killed chickens, and made rice outside Qiyi city in the setting sun, feasting on the soldiers.

Seeing the happy faces of his soldiers eating and drinking, Zhao Tuo couldn't help but look north.

"Whose subordinate is that Qin army?"

"He actually helped us lure Zuo Sima of Chu State away by mistake. He is really a good man."

"Hope they're okay."

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