After the rain, the road is still muddy and difficult to walk. On the mountain road in Pinggang, groups of Han cavalry marched slowly, and many cavalry led their horses on foot, and the marching speed was extremely slow.

The heavy rain of the first two days did not stop them from advancing, and on the third day it cleared up, but it rained again that night, until the rain stopped at dawn. I thought it wouldn't rain again this time, but I didn't expect to be afraid of something, and it was stormy and rainy on the evening of the fourth day. This is the third heavy rain in four days.

On the fifth day, after dawn, it rained again and the sky cleared. The stop-and-go Han army embarked on the journey again, chasing all the way in the direction of the barbarian army's escape.

Although the heavens were not beautiful, after five days, the cavalry of the Han army clung to the defeated barbarian army and pursued for more than 500 miles, and did not give up the pursuit until this moment.

However, the pace of today's march is indeed too slow, and the slippery and muddy roads are only one aspect of the speed, but not the most important thing. What really constrained the speed of the Han army's pursuit was that they had been without food for two days. In other words, they have been hungry since the third night, and they have been holding on for two days now.

After two days of marching on an empty stomach, all the bodies of the soldiers have been exhausted, and today is the third day, and the soldiers really can't support it. After five days of marching in the rain, cold, hungry and tired, even the iron-clad men had their time of exhaustion, and now they were like that, physically and mentally exhausted, hungry and unable to walk anymore.

Compared with the cavalry, their horses were also tired enough, and although they were not tortured by hunger, the muddy roads tossed the horses a lot. One step and three slides, each line is very difficult.

"Zilong, I can't chase anymore. Find a suitable camp in front and settle down. Rest on the spot. At the front of the march, Gongsun Zan Lema, who was full of exhaustion, stood on the side of the road, watching the soldiers pass in front of him with little strength, and he sighed softly helplessly.

Zhao Yunlema stopped beside Gongsun Zhan, and was also anxious about the scene in front of him, but he couldn't find a solution to the difficulty, and he was worried.

After hearing Gongsun Zhan's words. Zhao Yun didn't blindly agree, the expression on his face became more and more worried, and he said in a low voice: "The scout just came to report." Over this mountain, less than a hundred miles further is the Xianbei Royal Court. Half an hour ago, after the defeated army of Badun stopped at Xianbei Court for a while, they had already led tens of thousands of remnants of the army to the east. It looks like it's going to their old nest, Liucheng. This time. It would be too dangerous for our army to camp here, and the Xianbei people already knew that our army was following behind Badun, and they would definitely send a large number of scouts to keep an eye on us at all times. Once the Xianbei people know that our army has been out of food for many days, they will definitely come out and rob and kill our army; If that were the case, we could all be wiped out at any time. ”

Gongsun Zhan was gloomy when he heard this, his expression was melancholy, and he sighed in a low voice: "I don't know what Zilong said!" But you've seen it all. The soldiers were hungry and tired, and they had no combat strength at all. Even if you catch up with the remnants of the Tun army, what can you do? Isn't it in vain? In other words, even if our army continues to march, in case the Xianbei cavalry suddenly attacks when passing through the Xianbei royal court, then we will not even have a way to retreat, and we will still not be able to escape the bad luck of the annihilation of the whole army.

Therefore, at the moment, we have no choice but to rely on the mountain pass in front of us to build a defensive formation to resist the possible offensive of the Xianbei people, and temporarily settle down here. The mountains here are quite high, easy to defend and difficult to attack, and this mountain forest area is not small, which is a relatively ideal place for the army. There is a way to rely on the mountains to eat the mountains, and when we wait for the temporary army here, we can go up the mountain to hunt or dig some wild vegetables to satisfy hunger, and when the soldiers recover their strength, they will have the ability to protect themselves. At that time, we can take the initiative to attack and defeat the Xianbei Royal Court, which is also a great achievement, and it is not in vain for us to brave the rain to pursue a fight. This is the safest way I can think of, I don't know what Zilong wants? Gongsun Zhan's words were extremely pertinent, and they were obviously the result of careful consideration.

Zhao Yun was silent for a long time after hearing this, weighing the pros and cons repeatedly, but he really couldn't think of a better way, so he nodded in agreement. And the reason why he hesitated was not because Gongsun Zhan's strategy was not good, but because the 30,000 iron cavalry led by them had no other defensive weapons except bows and arrows and portable weapons. The most important thing is that these soldiers are all cavalry, and they are not good at defense, and the cavalry charging is their strength. Now he wants 30,000 hungry cavalry to dismount as infantry troops, avoiding long lengths and shorts, which is really extremely aggrieved. However, this qiē is forced by the shape shì, and it has to be so, otherwise there is a danger of annihilation.

?????? Two hours later, an army of 30,000 was stationed in the mountains and forests. More than a dozen camp tents were poorly built, and the rest were all straw huts, which were very simple, but they finally had a shelter from the wind and rain. Fortunately, it is the rainy season, there is a lot of rain, and the trees are green, so there is no need to worry about the Xianbei people using fire in the short term.

Fortunately, the Xianbei people dozens of miles away did not take advantage of the Han army to camp and send troops to attack. Until the evening, the defense of the mountain pass was completed, and the Xianbei people still did not move at all, and there was no sign of sending troops. This made Gongsun Zhan, Zhao Yun and others, who had been anxious, deeply relieved, and finally able to eat their first hot meal in five days - wild vegetable and mushroom soup in peace.

??????

When they went up to the mountain to pick wild vegetables in the afternoon, many soldiers were no strangers to wild vegetables, after all, they were all from poor backgrounds and had dug wild vegetables since they were young. However, they were afraid of the mushrooms that could be seen everywhere in the mountains and forests, and no one dared to pick them, not even the wild vegetables that grew on the side of the mushrooms.

When the first batch of soldiers who dug wild vegetables came back, Zhao Yun was surprised to see that none of them picked mushrooms, all of them were verdant wild vegetables. Because mushrooms grow exceptionally vigorously after the rain in summer, don't even mushrooms grow in the mountains and forests near the Xianbei Royal Court?

After questioning the soldiers, Zhao Yun smiled dumbly. It turns out that there are not no mushrooms in the woods, on the contrary, the forests are full of mushrooms, and even the number of mushrooms is far more than wild vegetables. Unfortunately, the soldiers did not dare to pick mushrooms, because when they were children, they saw many people picking mushrooms and poisoning their entire families. Since then, many people would rather starve than pick mushrooms after the rain, and they are really afraid of the well rope after being bitten by a snake for ten years, and they are afraid of the tender mushrooms.

After learning the reason, Zhao Yun personally led the team up the mountain and identified those mushrooms one by one that could be picked. Speaking of which, it's not like no one eats mushrooms these days, and there are some people who are familiar with the toxicity of various mushrooms and know that many of the colorful mushrooms are edible. It's just that the cost of screening all kinds of edible mushrooms is too great, and it is by no means something that can be identified with a silver needle. In addition, some people cherish themselves and will not tell others what they know, which invisibly aggravates the difficulty of screening edible mushrooms, making many people see mushrooms as if they see poisonous snakes, and even more fearful than seeing poisonous snakes.

A few years ago, Zhao Yun was the same, and he didn't dare to eat mushrooms at all. However, after following Li Li on his expedition to the west for so many years, he has inadvertently learned many things, such as identifying edible mushrooms is one of them. To this day, Zhao Yun can't remember the names of various mushrooms, but he can recognize the real thing, and knows the most simple and easy-to-understand common sense. That is, mushrooms are the same as poisonous snakes, the brighter the color, the more colorful and beautiful, the more poisonous and inedible; On the other hand, mushrooms with a relatively single color and the more inconspicuous they are, are mostly edible. The most common are the red umbel-shaped oak mushroom, the yellow trumpet-shaped bush mushroom, and the larger gray mushroom. As the name suggests, most of these mushrooms grow in their respective bushes.

Fresh mushrooms are watered before eating, that is, washed in boiling water to remove toxicity (most of the time to be safe), and then added to other ingredients to make dishes and soups, which are extremely delicious and have an endless aftertaste.

In this way, the hungry soldiers ate the most delicious wild vegetable and mushroom soup that they will remember for a lifetime. And the first one to eat was still Zhao Yun, many soldiers, including Gongsun Zhan, were already salivating when they smelled the fragrance of the vegetable soup, but they didn't dare to put their mouths down. It wasn't until they watched Zhao Yun gobble up an urn that there was nothing to do for a long time, and everyone finally confirmed that the mushroom soup in the cauldron was edible. As a result, the first batch of boiled mushroom soup was drunk in a blink of an eye, and the average person was less than a mouthful, which was not useful at all.

Then, from afternoon to late at night, nearly 100 cauldrons cooked wild vegetable and mushroom soup over and over again, each cauldron added a hare or pheasant, followed by mushrooms and wild vegetables. Don't expect to eat meat for rabbit meat and pheasant, but the "base" of mushroom soup, which adds a little meat to some extent, and can be regarded as replenishing the body of the soldiers. Simply, the meat was also in the pot when it was boiled, and more than 30,000 soldiers and more than 100 generals such as Gongsun Zan and Zhao Yun all ate in one pot, without discrimination. For this reason, many Youzhou soldiers were moved, and some soldiers even shed tears of excitement because they had never had this kind of treatment before, and even in the big war, they could not eat the same food as the generals. But the Xiliang soldiers have long been accustomed to this, not only the chief general Zhao Yun and they share weal and woe, but even the commander Li Li often eats with the soldiers.

Therefore, this time the unexpected food shortage encountered turned a bad thing into a good thing because of a pot of mushroom soup, which invisibly shortened the distance between the generals and 30,000 soldiers and prompted the soldiers to come together. More than 30,000 people were twisted into a rope, and when they recovered their strength, their combat effectiveness could be imagined.

?????? Difficulties are only temporary, and there is no hurdle that cannot be overcome. This sentence is undoubtedly very accurate when applied to the 30,000 army led by Gongsun Zan and Zhao Yun, who are alone in the depths. On the night when they were forced to camp in the mountains and forests, the 10,000 iron horsemen of Xu Huang's command, who had been ordered to gallop to their aid, finally caught up.

―――――――― To be Continued ―――――――――――――― (To be Continued......

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