(Asking for tickets: the last two days of the month, asking for a monthly pass, thank you!) ）

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Dongyuan City, the back hall of the castle guard.

A day ago, this was the place where Li Li's pet concubine and the foot trainer lived, but now it is the resting place of Yuan Shao, Cao Cao, Lu Bu and other princes of the Seven Roads.

Compared with the barracks tent, the princes still preferred to live in spacious and comfortable mansions.

It was hundreds of thousands of allied troops who camped outside the city, but their lord lived in the backyard of the castle guard's mansion, and was accompanied by his favorite concubines and beautiful artists who accompanied the army on the expedition.

In this era, when the commander-in-chief general went out to fight, there was no rule that he was not allowed to bring his female dependents. Ordinary soldiers and middle- and low-level generals naturally cannot bring female dependents, but generals with higher official positions can take female dependents to the battle, and the commander in the army can even bring his wife, concubines and children as long as he wants. This rule was followed until the Tang Dynasty. Since the addition of the yellow robe of Zhao Kuangyin, Taizu of the Song Dynasty, the emperor has more and more requirements for the generals who go on expeditions, and they have become more and more strict, even to the harsh Cheng Dù. Then, when the generals lead the troops to go out, they need to leave their wives and concubines and children in the capital or the county government as hostages, otherwise they will support the troops and respect themselves, plot against them, and be suspected of conspiracy and rebellion.

In the backyard hall, Yuan Shao and Cao Cao were sitting opposite each other at this moment, except for the two of them, there was no third person in the hall.

"Half an hour ago, I saw Zixiao walking into Meng De's bedroom with a happy face, presumably Zixiao led the troops to explore the camp and gained a lot?" Yuan Shao asked softly with a smile on his face.

After Cao Cao heard this, the corners of his mouth were slightly curled up, and he smiled and said, "In the words of the first brother." Last night, after I let the Li thief play a trick, I immediately wanted to return the color to let the Li thief also taste the taste of being teased. Then I secretly ordered Zixiao to lead more than 600 cavalrymen, put on the armor left by Li Thief on the straw man at the head of the city, and quickly whipped out of the city, and finally sneaked into Anyi City in the middle of the night.

After entering the city. Zixiao and his entourage went directly to the Wei Mansion to hide, and then summoned the servants of the city sergeant clan and the Haoqiang mansion to surprise and attack the granary of the Li thief's army. Unexpectedly, he succeeded in one fell swoop, and the hundreds of thousands of stones, grains, and grass of the Li thief's army were burned clean by Zixiao and others. However, the Li thief was also really good, the granary was burned, and instead of rushing to send a large army to extinguish the fire, he closed the city gate as soon as possible. As a result, when Zixiao and others went out of the city, they were chased and killed by Teng Xiao under the command of Li Thief, and suffered heavy casualties, and only more than 100 of the more than 5,000 people who went out of the city finally escaped alive. The others were all killed by their pursuers. ”

"Ugh! Hahahaha! Yuan Shao was stunned when he heard this, and then laughed and said: "Good, good, good, it burns well!" I have heard that Meng De is the best at judging people's food and grass, and now it seems that this is indeed the case, and the rumors are true! ”

Overjoyed. Yuan Shao suddenly stopped laughing, and asked with a surprised expression, "How did Meng De know where Li Thief's grain and grass were?" How can you get in touch with Hedong Weijia in time. Could it be that you had already expected that the Li thief would flee without a fight? ”

Cao Cao bowed his head slightly, his eyes narrowed slightly, and he smiled: "I have always been good friends with the Wei family, and I have a personal relationship with Wei Jia, the son of the Wei family. This time, we will join the alliance to defeat the Li thief. Just as Sun Ce was leading the army to set off, I sent Xizuo to the county seat of Anyi, and handed over the secret letter to the head of the Wei family, asking the Wei family to come forward to unite the city sergeant clan and Haoqiang, who was dissatisfied with the Li thief, to gather the servants to prepare. When our army captures Anyi City, the inside and outside should join forces and capture Anyi in one fell swoop. I don't think about it, but last night Zixiao led the army to visit the camp, but he hit it crookedly, and burned down the granary of Li Thief's army in one fell swoop.

This is the will of heaven, Li thief will kill himself if he commits many injustices, God is destined for him to have this defeat, and sooner or later he will be destroyed by my allies! Hahaha! ”

After speaking, Cao Cao finally couldn't help but laugh and couldn't help laughing.

Yuan Shao echoed with a smile on his face full of appreciation, and said eagerly: "In this case, now is a good time to kill the Li thief, and we will immediately send troops to attack Anyi City, but Meng De dissuaded our allies from postponing their advance." I don't know what Mengde's intention is? You should know that the opportunity must not be missed and will not come again, and there are not many opportunities to kill Li Thief in one fell swoop like this? ”

"Could it be that Brother Benchu forgot so quickly the advance strategy that I agreed upon when we were waiting for the secret discussion of martial arts?" Cao Cao groaned, then smiled, and said in a solemn voice: "Does the first brother know how many Xiliang troops are gathered around Anyi?" According to Zixiao's exploration camp, at least 80,000 Xiliang warriors were gathered in the Anyi camp outside the west gate of Anyi City, and there were more than 50,000 infantry troops in Anyi City.

With such a heavily defended city, it was a fluke that Zixiao was able to burn down the Li thief's granary in one fell swoop! In addition, there are two reasons. First, the timing is right; When we entered Dongyuan City, we immediately followed the people who moved to Anyi to Anyi, and the soldiers who defended the city did not know the defenders of Dongyuan City, so we were able to enter the city in a muddle. Second, the Li thief was negligent, and we were unexpected; Li Thief thought that we would definitely be stationed to rest after we captured Dongyuan City, and he didn't expect that we would immediately send people to catch up, so he didn't immediately replace the city gate guards stationed in Anyi City, thus giving us an opportunity to take advantage of. If we had missed the favorable opportunity of last night, it would have been impossible for us to sneak into Anyi City again, and even to get close to the city would have been a luxury. ”

After relieving his breath, Cao Cao continued: "Now that the granary of the Li thief's army has been burned, the grain and grass have been lost, and the city of Anyi can no longer be defended. At this time, if our allied troops are approaching the city, and they are just in the hands of the Li thief, he will definitely lead the army to fight to the death with us. If my allied army of 430,000 horses is Cao Cao's army alone, I will not let go of the opportunity in front of me no matter what, and I will kill Li Thief under the city of Anyi at any cost. It's a pity that we are now an allied army composed of the princes of the Seven Roads, once Li Thief leads thirteen or forty thousand foot cavalry to fight to the death, who of the Seven Roads Princes dares to fight with the Xiliang Iron Cavalry, and who can fight to the death with Li Thief regardless of casualties?

To tell you the truth, my 80,000 soldiers and horses are no match for the army under the command of Li Thief, so I won't fight him now. With his own life, presumably the first brother will not lead his troops to fight Li Thief to the death regardless of a single qiē, right? If none of us are willing to do this, how can we expect other princes to fight to the death? What's more, Anyi City is extremely strong, and it has been a fortified city for the Xiliang Army for several years, and it is not far behind Chen Liucheng. If the Li thief is defeated by our allies, he can retreat to the city and defend it, and then who of our seven princes is willing to lead his troops to storm the city? ”

Yuan Shao's expression changed slightly when he heard this, his cheeks were slightly red, and a trace of anger flashed in his eyes. However, he had to admit that Cao Cao was right, the current allied forces were indeed very fragile and could not withstand any blows at all. This kind of fragility is not that the allied soldiers are weak, but that the relationship between the princes is very delicate, and on the surface they are harmonious, but in fact they are wary of each other, and they all want to preserve their strength and do not want to follow in the footsteps of the Baibo army.

In the face of this delicate and fragile alliance of princes, Yuan Shao knew that there was only one way for them to really fight to the death with Li Li, and that was to try to make Li Li beat them up and force them to fight to the death with the Xiliang army. Unfortunately, it is easy to say, but it is difficult to implement, and it is difficult to find the right time.

Originally, the fiasco of the Baibo army was a good reference, but unexpectedly, the defeat of the Baibo army was too complete and the whole army was annihilated, so that instead of hating the same enemy, the princes of all walks of life were more afraid of the Xiliang army, more cautious, and restrained.

Seeing Yuan Shao's gloomy face, Cao Cao secretly sighed in his heart, and also felt helpless for several allies in the alliance, and the person who gave him the most headache was Lu Bu. In his opinion, Lu Bu's gang was really a little unpredictable after this alliance, first he gave up his position as a vanguard general, and after Sun Ce was seriously injured, Lu Bu once again refused to serve as the vanguard of the alliance, and the advance speed of Lu Bu's army along the way was also extremely slow, and he seemed careless.

This made Cao Cao annoyed and very surprised, and then had to guard against Lu Bu carefully, always keeping an eye on Lu Bu's military advisor Chen Gong, for fear of being calculated by Chen Gong. Originally, Cao Cao never took Lu Bu in his eyes, thinking that Lu Bu was a martial artist and not to be afraid. However, this time Lu Bu's sudden change made him suspicious, and he suddenly became suspicious, and he was careful everywhere. In addition, Lu Bu's army has not lost a single soldier so far, which also makes Cao Cao dare not act rashly, for fear that his soldiers and horses will be damaged too much, and his vitality will be greatly damaged, and Yanzhou will never be able to be taken back.

"Mengde, Mengde, what should I do now?" Just as Cao Cao was distracted, Yuan Shao asked.

Cao Cao woke up when he heard this, quickly put aside many distracting thoughts in his mind, and said thoughtfully: "The most important thing for us at the moment is to implement the next step, and now is the best time to implement the second step plan in the entire thief hunting plan that directly determines the success or failure. ”

"Well, that's fine." Yuan Shao bowed his head lightly and said thoughtfully: "Although the implementation of the second step plan is half a month ahead of the scheduled time, it is indeed a good opportunity now, and it should not be missed. How to implement it, and what are Mengde's opinions? ”

Cao Cao seemed to have been prepared, and said in response: "The allied forces are temporarily stationed in Dongyuan City, so they will deploy suspicious soldiers, delay time, and drag Li Thief in Anyi City, while I will take the opportunity to implement the second step. After the second step is in place, the first brother will lead the army to take Anyi City directly, and the second step plan will be carried out at the same time, cutting off the retreat of the Li thief in one fell swoop, and then capturing it in one net, such a big thing can be achieved! ”

"That's very good." Yuan Shao nodded happily and said, "I have already ordered Zhang Yang to prepare a qiē, and Meng De can lead his troops to go." However, it will take some time for Muang Duc to return the same way, and the route from Hanoi County is much longer than that of Ha Dong County, and it is estimated that it will be delayed for several days. ”

Cao Cao shook his head and said: "It's okay to travel farther, but it must be kept secret, and this matter must not be leaked." If Li Thief learns of such confidential matters, my Cao Cao's life is in danger! ”

Yuan Shaoshen nodded approvingly, and immediately solemnly assured: "Meng De rest assured, only me, Lu Bu, and Zhang Yang know about this matter, and although Xu You also knows about it, he doesn't know when Meng De will leave. ”

"Well, in that case, I'll lead my troops to set off tonight, and I'll leave the aftermath to Brother Benchu!" As he spoke, Cao Cao stood up and bowed to Yuan Shao, looking extremely sincere.

―――――――――――― (To be continued)(To be continued......