In fact, the Chuji coalition army has no chance to run away, Uncle Zhou has spent so many hands and feet on his mind, and has paid a considerable price, and finally weakened part of the strength of the Chuji coalition army, laying the foundation for the next war of annihilation, how could he watch the Chuji coalition army slip away and flee to other places to prolong the time of the war in Qidi?

Therefore, it was just the early morning of the next day, and Uncle Zhou ignored the fact that the northern line of the Han army had just experienced a large-scale field decisive battle, and sent the Han army general Lu Kuang, who had a steady personality, to lead 30,000 troops to the south, and rushed to the southwest of Jinjiling to set up camp on the Chidao Road, blocking the southern escape road of the Chuji coalition army, and directly put on a posture of annihilating the Chuji coalition army at any cost.

This arrangement of Zhou Shu also made the differences and contradictions within the Chuji coalition army more intense, and a part of the Western Chu generals led by Ji Bu resolutely advocated immediately going south with all their might, and retreating to Boyang at any cost to establish the Wenshui defense line; Once the loss of Licheng is equivalent to the loss of ninety percent of the land, the king of Jibei, Tianda, advocated sticking to Jinjiling, waiting for the Western Chu army to send reinforcements and even Xiang Yu personally led the army to help, Xiang Zhuang, who was really able to make an idea, hesitated and could not make a decision.

Han Xin, who had previously advocated sticking to the Licheng battlefield, once again stood on the side of Tian Da, Han Xin clearly pointed out that even if the Chuji coalition army can succeed in retreating now, it will definitely suffer heavy losses on the way to break through, and there is no hope of resisting the upcoming Han army reinforcements, and at the same time, Boyang City, located on the north bank of Wenshui, is also impossible to block the trebuchet bombardment of the Han army, and cannot play the role of acting as a tactical support point for the Wenshui defense line, and the Chuji coalition army still cannot escape the doom of being heavily damaged or even annihilated by the Han army.

Therefore, Han Xin believed that instead of losing his troops and paying a heavy price to flee south, it was better to make a desperate bet and go all out to defend the Jinjiling camp, which was easy to defend and difficult to attack, and fight against the Han army with too many troops on the front line and difficult to supply, and at the same time asked Xiang Yu for help, asking Xiang Yu to personally lead the army to turn the tide of the war.

Han Xin's words did not make Xiang Zhuang make a decision, and after pulling Han Xin to the side, Xiang Zhuang explained the truth to Han Xin and said: "Expecting our king to personally lead the army to reinforcements, or counting on the rear to send us reinforcements, I am afraid that things are already unrealistic." Our king has now been entangled in the Puyang battlefield by Han thieves, and although he is not left behind, it is difficult to withdraw back to reinforce us. In addition, the troops that we can draw from Chudi have been basically emptied now, and Huainan and Jiangdong may be able to draw some more troops, but those places are too far away, and it will be difficult to recruit enough troops to go north to reinforce us in a month or two. ”

"It's about the same as the last general's estimate." Han Xin sighed helplessly, and then said in a low voice: "But we can only defend, because we have not only retreated extremely difficult now, but even if we reluctantly retreat to the front line of Wenshui, it is absolutely impossible to stop the army of the Han thieves, if we reach Wenshui and then retreat south, it will be our native land of Western Chu, and the Han thieves do not need to rush into our homeland, as long as we calmly annex Qi and gather the manpower and material resources of Qi Di, we will not be the opponent of the Han thieves." ”

"But how long can we hold out?" Xiang Zhuang said with a wry smile: "There is some food in the camp of Jinjiling, but no matter how much we save, it will only be enough for us to use for less than two months at most. ”

"Not necessarily!" Han Xin's words were shocking, and he said in a low voice: "Zuo Sima, if we go on, we may not be a dead end!" There are two reasons, first, Jinjiling is easy to defend and difficult to attack, we can brake quietly, wait patiently until the veterans of the Han Thief Division are tired and show their flaws, see the opportunity to suddenly counterattack, and turn the tide of the battle by surprise. Second, after the Han thieves join the school, there will definitely be all kinds of internal problems, and once there are contradictions and suspicions within them, we will have loopholes to exploit. ”

"General Jib is a prime example." Han Xin said in a low voice: "He relied on his qualifications and made great contributions, and he didn't take Zuo Sima as the boss in his eyes at all. The Han thief must be the same, not to mention anything else, just the two thorns of Zhu Jishi and Li Shang, who have merit and qualifications, will definitely not be convinced by Uncle Zhou, and the battle situation in Qi may change at any time, so we may not be able to get the opportunity to fight back. ”

"What if we can't wait for such an opportunity?" Xiang Zhuang asked worriedly.

"Then we can wait until later." Han Xin replied: "Our army just experienced a big battle yesterday, the soldiers are tired and their physical strength has decreased, it is difficult to retreat, and so much military grain and grass must be difficult to take away, either forced to burn, or cheap thieves for nothing." Rather than this, we should be patient and confront the Han thieves for a period of time, it is of course better to wait for the opportunity to counterattack, but it is really not good, or we can wait until the Han thieves can not attack for a long time, and their morale declines, and then it is not too late to find an opportunity to break through and retreat. ”

After listening to Han Xin's words, he felt reasonable, and seeing that the Han army had already divided his troops to close the road in advance, and now it was very difficult to retreat in a hurry, Xiang Zhuang thought about it for a long time, and finally made up his mind, gritted his teeth and said: "Guard!" Stay the course! Until the last moment, we will never consider giving up the retreat of Jinji Lingnan! ”

Of course, Xiang Zhuang's decision was strongly opposed by Ji Bu and others, but in the afternoon, Ji Bu and others no longer had any nonsense, because in the afternoon, the front of the Han army reinforcements led by Li Shang rushed to the Licheng battlefield one day earlier than expected by the Chuji coalition army, and crossed the Jishui on the same day, and joined the Han army Zhou Shu's corps, which also completely crushed the last hope of the Chuji coalition army to retreat overnight at night. So after receiving this news, even Ji Bu, who was not convinced by Xiang Zhuang's 10,000 people, could only reluctantly accept his fate, and instead supported Xiang Zhuang's decision to stick to it, and also started to transfer the army under the mountain to the mountain on the same day, not daring to stay under the mountain and wait to be smashed by the trebuchet of the Han army.

Let Han Xin secretly rejoice, after the 30,000 former army led by Li Shang crossed Jishui, Uncle Zhou really did not let Li Shang's army directly enter the original camp of the Han army, and chose to let Li Shang set up camp ten miles northwest of Jinji Ridge.

After all, Li Shang, who won Hanzhong Bashu and other places for the Han army, is not very different from Uncle Zhou in terms of merit and qualifications, and he has been in charge of Hanzhong for a long time, and Uncle Zhou, who has just become the general of the Han army, wants to convince Li Shang and bow down to orders, which is indeed a big problem.

On the second day, Zhu Jishi, the general of the Han army, who was a bigger thorn, also led the main force of the Han army reinforcements to the Licheng battlefield, which completely established the absolute strength advantage of the Han army over the Chuji coalition army, and then like the former army of Li Shang, the main force of the reinforcements led by Zhu Jishi was also stationed in the northwest of Jinjiling, and did not directly associate with the army originally led by Uncle Zhou.

Although his emotional intelligence is not very high like Han Xin, Uncle Zhou also understands the various internal problems he is about to face, and he knows that once he does not handle the relationship between his superiors and subordinates with a veteran of the Han army, it will be internal discord at least, and if it is serious, it is not impossible to bury the current good situation of the entire battle situation, so when Zhu Jishi, Li Shang, Feng Zhong and Fu Kuan and other Han army veterans came to visit him, Uncle Zhou did not dare to put on the stand of the first person in the Han army military circle. Hurriedly personally led the main civil and military under his command to the gate of the camp to greet them.

Fortunately, although I was really unconvinced by Uncle Zhou, the general, Zhu Jishi, who was older than Uncle Zhou, still gave Uncle Zhou a little face, even if it was just perfunctory, the etiquette that should be done in front of everyone was not less at all, and Li Shang, Fu Kuan and others with qualifications under Zhu Jishi saw him like this, so they didn't shake their faces, even if they were still a little unconvinced, they still obediently bowed to Uncle Zhou.

The next thing is the key, with a smile on his face, Uncle Zhou entered the big tent of the Chinese army, Zhu Jishi and Li Shang and other veterans of the Han army immediately paid attention, Uncle Zhou set up a position next to his handsome position, one on the left and one on the right, and suddenly muttered in his heart, and said secretly: "Look at how you arrange it." ”

Uncle Zhou also quickly made arrangements, first smiled and invited Li Shiqi to sit on his left, and then pointed to the right position and invited Zhu Jishi: "General Zhu, please sit here." ”

Li Shang, who has been in charge of Xiang Kang's account for a long time, has his mouth closed, the reason is that Zhu Jishi's qualifications are older than him, and the second is that Uncle Zhou has already invited his brother Li Shiqi to sit down, if Li Shang still dares to compete with Zhu Jishi for the remaining position, he doesn't need Uncle Zhou to speak, and the eldest brother Li Shiqi, who raised him with his own hands, will be able to slap his ears immediately, "Little erector, have you grown your skills?" Do you know what it means to respect the elders and respect the elders, and even if you dare to be on an equal footing with your brother? ”

Li Shang, the commander-in-chief of the Hanzhong Bashu Military Region, did not dare to speak, and the rest of the young marshal army elders such as Fu Kuan, Worm Da and Ling Jing naturally did not dare to speak, and Feng Zhong, who was older than Zhu Jishi, was a good old man, and he just took the initiative to stand below Li Shang with a smile. However, Zhu Jishi felt a little embarrassed while his self-esteem was satisfied, and after looking at everyone present, he took the initiative to say to Feng Zhong: "General Feng, your qualifications are older than mine, and you should sit in this position." ”

"No, no." Feng Zhong waved his hand with a smile and said, "It's better for General Zhu to sit down, and I'll just stand." ”

After pretending to be humble for a few more words, seeing that Feng Zhong resolutely did not sit, Zhu Jishi, who was respected, still sat in the position arranged for him by Uncle Zhou, Li Shang and Feng Zhong followed closely, and the rest of the Han army generals also stood obediently according to their own rank and qualifications. And the civil officials are the same, after seeing the world-famous old men of Shangshan Zhou Shu and Cui Guang taking the initiative to stand below Li Shiqi, the other Han army civil officials didn't even dare to take a breath, and obediently stood according to their ranks.

Patting the sycophant is patting the sycophant, Mr. Shusun is still a little strange in his heart, and said secretly: "What's the matter? Uncle Zhou is not good at this area, how can he come up with such an idea? Use the old man Li to suppress Li Shang, use Shangshan Sihao to suppress our civil officials, Feng Zhong's puppet is a bad person, as long as he coaxes him behind his back, it is easy to say anything, and then lift up the old Zhu Jishi a little, the generals have nothing to say, why don't you usually see that Uncle Zhou's little vertical has such a wrist? ”

Mr. Uncle Sun's doubts were quickly answered, and after accidentally seeing the smug look on the face of Zhou Shu, the old man of Shangshan, Mr. Uncle Sun quickly came to his senses and said secretly: "Old man, I really love you, a junior with the same surname and name, to come up with such a way to solve the seat problem for him." ”

Getting back to the point, when Mr. Uncle Sun muttered in his heart, Uncle Zhou had already begun to speak at length, first thanking Zhu Jishi and Li Shang and others very politely for their thousands of miles of help, and then pretending to be modest and saying that he was flattered, but he didn't expect to be entrusted with such a heavy task by Xiang Kang, and then gradually turned the conversation to the topic, probably introduced the current situation of Qi to Zhu Jishi and others who had just come, as well as the general situation of the Chuji coalition army, and finally said: "The situation is basically like this, as far as the current situation is concerned, we are indeed in a good situation, But after all, the Chuji thief army is a hundred-legged insect, dead and not stiff, there is still the possibility of dying and struggling, in addition, the battle situation of Qi is still unclear, whether we can take Qi and annihilate the Chuji thief army, I hope that the generals will work together to urge the soldiers to fight bravely and complete the task assigned to us by the king as soon as possible. ”

The Han army and the civil and military sang the promise together, and then Zhu Jishi asked: "General, how many troops does the Chuji thief army in the Jinjiling area still have?" ”

"How many troops the Chuji thief army still has, we can't confirm it yet." Uncle Zhou replied: "However, judging from the number of heads we captured the day before yesterday, as well as the size of the camp of the Chuji thief army, I estimate that their total strength is still more than 100,000, which should not be underestimated. ”

"So what are we going to do next?" Zhu Jishi asked again: "Is it to fight Licheng first?" Or hit Jinji Ridge first? ”

"Jinjiling is easy to defend and difficult to attack, and it is very difficult to win it by strong attack, of course, it is to fight Licheng first." Uncle Zhou answered directly without thinking about it, and pointed to Li Shang and Feng Zhong, who had made sacrifices on the seat issue, and said with a smile: "General Li, General Feng, work hard, I will leave the matter of attacking Licheng to you." After the camp is settled, the two of you take turns to lead the troops to attack the city, and whoever takes the city will be credited. ”

Knowing that Uncle Zhou wanted to compensate himself and give himself the opportunity to make meritorious contributions, of course Li Shang immediately hugged his fists and sang a promise, and Feng Zhong also sang a promise, and then asked very honestly: "General, our camp is farther away from Licheng than your camp, and it is not convenient to send troops to attack the city, is it a little inappropriate to arrange it like this?" ”

"Sure enough, he is an honest man." Uncle Zhou smiled in his heart, and then replied: "It's okay, General Feng, you and General Li work hard, and take the army to walk a little more." ”

After that, Uncle Zhou turned to Zhu Jishi again, and said with a smile: "General Zhu, I won't interfere in the matter of the reinforcement camp for the time being, and I will leave it all to you." Remember, on the night after we take Licheng, we must be careful to prevent the thieves on Jinji Ridge from robbing the camp and sneaking up on your camp, and it is best to arrange an ambush outside the camp in advance, and then give the Chuji thief army a surprise. ”

"The general is so sure?" Zhu Jishi asked in surprise.

"You'll know when the time comes." Uncle Zhou deliberately sold a pass, and then said with a smile: "Okay, it's rare for so many people to get together, hurry up and send the wine and food, we have to celebrate it today." ”

In this way, in accordance with Uncle Zhou's order and arrangement, after quickly building a strong camp in the northwest of Jinjiling, Li Shang and Feng Zhong'er generals took turns to lead the headquarters of the people and horses to march eastward, and attacked Licheng with the siege weapons prepared for them by Uncle Zhou's army.

After three days of siege battles, Xiang Kang transferred the Han army general Li Shang from the south line to the north, and finally led the troops to break through the city, almost completely annihilated the nearly 10,000 defenders in the city, not to mention, but also killed the Jibei army general Tian Ji who was defending the city in the street battle, and the news was brought back to the Jinjiling camp by the defeated soldiers who escaped by luck, Tian Da also immediately cried loudly, and was saddened by the death of the love general.

When Tian Da was crying, Xiang Zhuang, Liu Laosan and others were also beside him, their faces were gloomy, because they all knew very well that after the Han army took Licheng, they would definitely turn around and fight Jinjiling immediately, and the main force of the Chuji coalition army would no longer want to hide in the mountains and rest in peace. On the contrary, Ji Bu suddenly had an idea, and hurriedly said: "Everyone, the reinforcements of the Han thieves have been attacking the city for three consecutive days, and the soldiers must be very tired. In this case, as long as we send an army to attack the camp of the Han thief reinforcements tonight, we will definitely be able to kill the Han thief by surprise. ”

Hearing Ji Bu's reasoning, Xiang Zhuang, Liu Laosan and others were immediately moved, Tian Da also nodded again and again, agreeing to take this risk to avenge his Licheng defenders, only Han Xin sneered again and again, and said: "It's good that it's so easy, how treacherous Uncle Zhou is, how can he not know the situation of the Han thief reinforcements?" As long as he asks the Han thief reinforcements to prepare a little in advance, we will die in vain if we go down the mountain and sneak attack. ”

"Fart!" Ji Bu scolded angrily: "Uncle Zhou is an immortal, can he predict anything? How could you guess that we were going to rob the camp tonight? ”

After that, Ji Bu turned to Xiang Zhuang to continue to persuade, and strongly persuaded Xiang Zhuang to adopt his own suggestion, taking advantage of the opportunity that the Han army reinforcements would definitely be unprepared, and Xiang Zhuang felt that Ji Bu's words were reasonable, and second, he was unwilling to be beaten so passively, and after thinking twice, he still agreed that Ji Bu would personally lead 4,000 troops down the mountain this night to sneak attack the Han reinforcement camp closest to Jinjiling.

Then the situation naturally needless to say, at the time of the third watch, the 4,000 troops led by Ji Bu had just touched the gate of the Han army camp, and they were immediately shot by the Han soldiers who were on strict guard with random arrows to cry and cry for their mother, and then immediately after, after the two Han army ambushes outside the camp in advance were killed, Ji Bu's army was left to flee for his life, and the Han army ambush resolutely pursued and killed, and killed Ji Bu's army with heavy casualties, and finally only more than 1,000 people fled back to the Jinjiling camp in embarrassment.

In this situation, of course, the most surprising thing was not Xiang Zhuang who agreed to Ji Bu's sneak attack, but the generals Zhu Jishi, Li Shang and Fu Kuan, who led the Han army reinforcements, as early as when Ji Bu led the army to attack the Han army's reinforcement camp, Zhu Jishi and others had already exclaimed, "Uncle Zhou knows divination?" How could we have known a few days ago that the Chuji Thief Army would come to attack our camp tonight? ”

After exclaiming, Zhu Jishi, who was still older than Uncle Zhou, inevitably muttered again, "No wonder you can become the general of our Han Kingdom, there is indeed a set." ”