"On the opposite side is Wu Sangui's army. I have to say that Wu Sangui arranged his troops very well."

Zhou Yafu followed Chu Tian to the Yi River to observe the strength of Wu Sangui's army.

As a military advisor, Fang Xuanling was also observing the other side: "Wu Sangui's 30,000 soldiers and horses were originally Taishan bandits under Chang Xi's command. If they are recruited in the name of Zang Ba and Sun Guan, even if they do not surrender, the morale of the army will be reduced."

So shaken."

"The top priority is to attack the heart, and the next priority is to attack the city. You can set up a pontoon bridge to cross the river to attack, with Zang Ba and Sun Guan as the vanguard. If you encounter the Taishan bandits on the opposite side, you can ask them to persuade them to surrender."

Chu Tian quickly understood what Fang Xuanling meant.

After a period of time between the two, Chu Tian and Fang Xuanling gradually developed a tacit understanding.

"But we still have to wait for the right time."

Chu Tian was not in a hurry to attack Wu Sangui. If he wanted, he could force the Taishan bandits to build a pontoon bridge to cross the river overnight.

The Taishan Bandits are similar to the Yellow Turban Army. They are cannon fodder who do not need to pay a salary. They are also responsible for the hard work. The real elite troops will only come in handy at critical moments.

At this time, Yi Li was dueling with Xue Rengui, but was easily defeated by Xue Rengui and pinned down in the snow.

"What a great effort, but I failed."

Yi Li had to admit that Xue Rengui's force was far superior to his.

When Chu Tian saw Yin Li taking the initiative to challenge Xue Rengui, wasn't he making himself uncomfortable?

Among the Taishan thieves, except for Zang Ba and Sun Guan whose attributes can be seen, the others are all gold-level generals, on the same level as Zhang Kai and Mi Fang.

They have not yet surrendered to Chu Tian. He wants them to give up their military power and must show absolute force to defeat Wu Sangui.

Wu Sangui was a little restless, but Chu Tian gathered 50,000 people, overwhelming his more than 30,000 people in terms of momentum.

However, Chu Tian never crossed the river to attack, which made Wu Sangui unable to judge Chu Tian's intentions.

"You guys go to Beihai Kingdom to ask the Qingzhou Yellow Turban Army to move south quickly. If Langya Kingdom is unified, it will be a big deal!"

"Go to Jucheng and ask Xiao Jian, the Prime Minister of Langya State, for help. Now that your lips are dead and your teeth are cold, he has to save you!"

Wu Sangui sent two groups of soldiers to ask for help.

Xiao Jian, a prince in Ju County, had 20,000 professional soldiers in his hands. He received a letter from Wu Sangui asking for help and asked for the opinions of his strangers.

When the strangers heard that Chu Tian from Xia City was calling, they were silent for a while.

They had never had a confrontation with Chu Tian, ​​but they were greatly frightened when they learned that Chu Tian captured Langya City and defeated the coalition forces in the battle of Yangdu County.

"Master Prime Minister, we might as well wait and see what happens."

"Xia Cheng Chuzi seeks to raise the tiger and wolf divisions. Do not fight with them."

"Li Guang, the generals of Xia City, and Hua Mulan are ten thousand enemies. Even if we have a hundred thousand soldiers, they are no match for us."

The strangers, that is, the players who took refuge in Xiao Jian, all talked about it. Most of them advocated that Chu Tian was unstoppable and advised Xiao Jian not to send troops to aid Wu Sangui to avoid getting burned.

Xiao Jian didn't know much about Chutian, but Chutian was famous among the player community. He had won the first place in two epic battles, and he had recently occupied two counties and defeated the anti-Chutian alliance, which was terrifying.

Most players would not antagonize a prominent lord unless they had different stances.

Xiao Jian listened to a group of strangers praising Chu Tian and was very unhappy: "You can retreat."

Considering Chutian's threat to Ju County, Xiao Jian decided to send more than 10,000 troops to help Wu Sangui defend Ju County.

The soldiers and horses in Jucheng were mobilized, and the strangers found that Xiao Jian had his own way, and they were disappointed.

Some princes can listen to the advice of strangers, but some princes cannot. If all princes can listen to advice, then there is no such thing as a weak king.

"How could Xiao Jian defeat Chu Zimou without a famous general under his command?"

"Now we are finished. It took me a year to get into the position of a hanger-on, and I live and eat for free every day. Now Xiao Jian is seeking death, and I don't know who to turn to in the future."

"It's better to seek refuge with Chu Zimu in Xia City. He owns two counties and is more powerful than Xiao Jian. As the first lord of the Eastern Han Dynasty, he is already a small prince."

"He has many talented people under his command, and he doesn't accept any customers. It's not easy for us to make a living at his place."

"But that's not necessarily the case, as long as we have merit..."

A group of strangers are already looking for a way out for themselves. They originally did not expect that Xiao Jian, who was not famous in the Three Kingdoms and was defeated by Zang Ba in history, could compete in the Central Plains. They only wanted to join him to make a living and get a promotion in the future.

springboard.

Xiao Jian led more than 10,000 Juxian soldiers to support Wu Sangui, and dozens of flags were waved.

"This idiot."

Qi Xiaobai couldn't help but murmured when he heard that Xiao Jian was bringing soldiers to reinforce Wu Sangui.

Chu Tian temporarily handled internal affairs in the camp and confronted Wu Sangui unhurriedly.

Recently, a large number of refugees have poured into Langya, including players, and most of them are from Beihai Country.

There were too many Yellow Turbans in Beihai, and the people were in dire straits. The civilians had to either join the Yellow Turbans or flee.

For Langya State, which is adjacent to Beihai State, this is a good opportunity to absorb the population of Qingzhou.

According to the report of Fang Xuanling, who manages the household registration, there were about 20,000 refugees from Beihai Kingdom in the territory under Chutian's rule recently. Chutian placed them all outside Xiacheng and slowly digested them.

The population of Xia City was originally 50,000. Later, 100,000 people from Langya City were moved to enrich Xia City. Together with 20,000 refugees from the Beihai Kingdom, there were a total of 170,000 people, making it the second largest city in Chutian territory.

Li Kui organized the refugees to reclaim wasteland, build water conservancy projects, and dig drainage canals and sewers.

City planning is relatively cumbersome, and the scale of Xia City has expanded to the point where more complex urban sewers need to be dug, otherwise the plague will soon become rampant.

Fortunately, "Lord" has special construction drawings for open channels, culverts, etc., and the construction of urban sewers is also very fast.

But it costs money...

The windfall that the Xuzhou family financed for Chu Tian was quickly wiped out by Chu Tian.

Chutian's more income still comes from spoils of war, land taxes, city taxes, land sales, and the economic buildings of the lord's mansion.

"Lord, it's snowing."

Xue Rengui, who was serving as a guard outside the military tent, followed Chu Tian's order and reminded Chu Tian after it snowed.

Chu Tian put on his cloak and came outside the tent. He saw that the sky was gray and snow was falling heavily.

"Instruct the Taishan bandits to prepare a pontoon bridge and cross the river to attack Wu Sangui."

Chu Tian knew that the time for decisive victory was coming, so he mobilized his army to prepare.

Chutian's army had prepared timber and wooden boats in advance.

The ice on the river is not strong, and tens of thousands of people crossing the river will definitely collapse, so the only way to cross is with the help of pontoons.

The Taishan bandits were treated as cannon fodder by Chu Tian, ​​so of course the hard work of building the pontoon fell on them.

"It's really hard to go out to fight in the dead of winter."

The Taishan bandits were carrying planks and wooden boats, complaining incessantly, and their fingers were frozen.

Not many people are willing to march and fight in the cold winter.

When Wu Sangui's cavalry scouts patrolling the river discovered that the Taishan bandits who had surrendered to Chu Tian began to build a pontoon bridge, they were shocked and immediately reported to Wu Sangui.

"Send two thousand archers to camp on the shore. Once the pontoon bridge built by the opponent approaches, thousands of arrows will be fired."

Wu Sangui has his own way to deal with the opponent's floating bridge.

With the morale of the Taishan thieves on the opposite side, they simply cannot withstand the rain of arrows shot by a large number of archers, and they will soon collapse as their morale drops to the bottom.

Two thousand archers came out of the camp and set up another camp on the opposite side, keeping a close eye on the Taishan bandits who were setting up the pontoon bridge.

"We were discovered by the enemy on the opposite side. Do we still need to repair the pontoon bridge?"

The Taishan thieves panicked because of the archers appearing on the opposite side, and asked their leader Yin Li.

Yin Li also asked Chu Tian, ​​the current top figure among the Taishan bandits, for instructions.

"Continue to practice until you are within the shooting range of the bow and arrow on the opposite side."

"yes."

Although Yin Li didn't understand why Chu Tian suddenly devoted himself to building the bridge, the force displayed by Chu Tian forced him to act according to Chu Tian's arrangements.

So the Taishan bandits continued to build a bridge across the Yi River in the heavy snow.

"Is the person on the other side a fool? He didn't go home to pick up his wife and children in the dead of winter. He came to the river without attacking for several days. He didn't build the bridge until now, and we discovered him."

The archers sent by Wu Sangui were just a joke.

If there are archers stationed there, the pontoon bridge cannot be built at all. This is the danger of mountains and rivers.

The defending side only needs to use hundreds of thousands of people to block an army of 100,000 people.

The Taishan bandits also understood this truth, and under Chu Tian's pressure, they still had to build the bridge.

When more than half of the pontoon bridge was built and it entered the shooting range of the archers on the opposite side, one Taishan bandit was shot to death, and the other Taishan bandits dispersed in a hurry.

Yin Li reported the matter to Chu Tian, ​​and he could be regarded as completing the task assigned to him by Chu Tian.

Chu Tian just arranged for Yin Li to personally lead the troops to guard the half-built pontoon bridge, and asked him to stand still.

Yin Li didn't know what was going on, but still agreed.
To be continued...