The Jibei Army was indeed very loyal to Xiang Yu, even if it was not particularly enthusiastic about encircling and suppressing Feng Zhongjun, not long after the informant and surrender letter of the old general Ding Guding had just been sent to Jishui, Tian Jiao, the general of the Jibei Army, followed with 5,000 troops, and joined the Western Chu Army on the east bank of Jishui, which further expanded the strength advantage of the Western Chu Army.

But it's okay for Feng Zhongjun, Jishui is a large river after all, the water is deep and the river is wide, and the civilian boats around Lu County have also fled before, and in a hurry, the Chuji coalition army can't collect enough boats to launch a rush to cross, so Feng Zhongjun can still rest temporarily on the west bank of Jishui, and he doesn't need to flee for his life like a lost dog immediately, and the Chuji coalition army can only collect boats while watching Feng Zhongjun rest on the other side.

During this period, of course, the old general Ding Guding felt tormented, for fear that Feng Zhongjun would not listen to his warnings and insist on taking the risk to the west, and he was even more afraid that his letters would have the opposite effect, making Feng Zhongjun think that he was lying and threatening, and further strengthened Feng Zhongjun's determination to flee west.

Feng Zhongjun was still tormented as before, and he set off to evacuate after resting until five o'clock that night, so that even if the sentry soldiers of the Western Chu Army found that Feng Zhongjun's main brigade had left, there was no way to confirm the direction of Feng Zhongjun's retreat, and after the situation was reported to General Ding Gu Ding, General Ding was left with only the method of praying with his palms together, "Don't be stupid!" Don't forget to go west! Don't go to cheap Zhou Lan's little shaft! ”

In the end, it was not until the morning of the next day that the scouts of the Western Chu army, who had crossed the river in small boats to investigate, sent accurate news, reporting that Feng Zhongjun's main brigade had chosen to flee north, and fled to the Yuanxiang Xiaolu, which was subordinate to Pingyuan County, Jibei County, and did not flee west back to Dongjun.

Confirming this situation, of course, the old general Ding Guding was full of joy, dancing with his hands, and he just wanted to drink and celebrate on the spot, but Tian Jiao, the general of the Jibei Army on the other side, was furious, and scolded angrily: "The Han thief raised by the servant girl still dares to wander around the land of our Jibei, is it really easy for our Jibei Army to bully?" ”

"General Tian is angry, General Tian is angry." Ding Gu smiled and comforted: "The Han thieves insist on wandering around the land of Jibei, which will cause you certain losses, but for your army, it is actually a good thing. ”

"General Tian, have you forgotten? In Feng Zhong's thief army, how many Han thieves and important military ministers and family members did he take? Ding Gu pointed out again: "Even Xiang Kang, the only son of the traitor at present, and his princess, are now in the ranks of Feng Zhong's thief army, General Tian, you and the old man have joined forces to capture them, how happy should the king of Jibei be?" How should our King of Xichu be happy? They are happy, will there be less reward for General Tian? ”

After thinking about it carefully, he found that this was indeed the truth, and Tian Jiao turned his anger into joy, and hurriedly nodded and said: "What General Ding said is very true, such a good opportunity is in front of us, we must not miss it." Don't waste time, the main force of the thieves has been withdrawn, let's hurry to cross the river. ”

"We can't waste time, but before rushing to cross, we'd better make arrangements in advance, so that we can be more sure of completely annihilating the Han thief army in Jibei." Ding Gu said again: "If the old man is not bad, the Han thief fled to the north, he must want to escape to the plain and cross the river to the west, if we just blindly chase, it will really let the Han thief escape across the river, so before that, please ask the general to help and make a key arrangement in advance." ”

"What are the key arrangements?" Tian Jiao asked.

"There is a waterway from Luxian to Licheng, which is convenient to contact, and from Licheng to the plain is connected to the galloping road, and it is also very convenient for fast horses to send letters." Ding Gu proposed: "The old man thinks, General Tian, you might as well immediately send someone down the river by boat, and then go to Licheng to abandon the boat and change horses, and hurry to the plain to give an order, so that your plain defenders can immediately evacuate the local boats, leaving no boat or boat to meet the enemy, so that even if the Han thieves are lucky enough to escape to the plain before us, there is no way to find a boat to cross the river, and completely become a turtle in the urn, let us catch if we want, and kill if we want!" ”

"Brilliant plan! That's it! ”

As soon as Tian Jiao heard the great joy, he hurriedly wrote a letter on the spot, arranged for the messenger to go east by boat, and rushed to Licheng and the plain at full speed to give an order, so that the Jibei County soldiers in the plain would immediately evacuate the local boats, and not leave a boat for Feng Zhongjun to cross the river. At the same time, Tian Jiao also wrote an urgent military report to Wang Tiandu of Jibei, reporting to Tian Du the movements of Feng Zhongjun and the response strategies adopted by his own army. Ding Gu smiled smugly beside him, and said to himself: "Feng Zhongpifu, you probably never dreamed that the old man would have such a hand." This time, the old man will see how you are still escaping! ”

After quickly sending a messenger to the plain to give the order, the Chuji coalition army used the hastily collected ships to launch a rush to cross, and opened the road as soon as possible to launch a pursuit, but the Feng Zhongjun Xu Cisuo who stayed at the Jishui Ferry was very tenacious, Leng took advantage of the geographical advantage to resolutely hold the Jishui Ferry, and the Jishui was too wide and deep, and the follow-up army was too slow to invest, and the Chuji Coalition Army launched two strong attacks and rushed to the crossing, but was repelled by Feng Zhongjun head-on, and never directly broke through the Jishui defense line that Feng Zhongjun hastily established.

In the end, it was only after the Shen Shi of the day that Feng Zhongjun's rear team, which had completed the task of blocking, took the initiative to abandon the ferry position and went north at full speed to chase the main force of the army.

At the same time, relying on the precious time gained by the army behind the palace, under the condition of very bad road conditions, the main force of Feng Zhongjun, who was marching at full speed, had also withdrawn nearly fifty miles to the north, and once again opened the distance of the pursuing troops.

Yuanxiang is close to the Yellow River, there is also a small civil wharf on the bank of the Yellow River, originally Feng Zhong and Li Shiqi also planned to fight for the direct crossing of the Yellow River here, but unfortunately, because of the impact of the war, the population of this area of Yuanxiang has been greatly reduced, and the number of ships has also been greatly reduced, plus most of the civilian ships have left the port to fish at noon, so when Feng Zhongjun arrived at the Yuanxiang wharf, he just collected a dozen or so civilian boats that could only take a few people, a drop in the bucket, and did not carry Feng Zhongjun's soldiers and Han army families across the river at all. Not to mention the construction of a pontoon bridge on the wide surface of the Yellow River.

Seeing this scene, Feng Zhong and Li Shiqi had no extra choice, and they didn't even have time to pay attention to the Yuanxiang township soldiers who were hiding in the soil enclosure, so they could only quickly lead the army to continue north, rushing at full speed to the direction of Gaotang (then Xiangting level) further north, and continue to strive to cross the river in Gaotang to get rid of the enemy's pursuit.

On the evening of the same day, the Chuji coalition army, which had no burden of old and weak, also pursued to Yuanxiang, and after asking the local people about the movement of the Han army, for the sake of prudence, Ding Gu asked Tian Jiao to arrange a messenger with a letter ordering to rush to the plain by boat overnight to deliver the order, so as not to delay the previous messenger on the road, and failed to send the order to evacuate the ships at the plain wharf to the defenders of the plain before Feng Zhongjun arrived on the plain. Then just rested until it was dark, and the Chuji coalition army immediately set off north and continued the pursuit.

At this time, one of Feng Zhongjun's hidden advantages was finally reflected, that is, because Feng Zhongjun usually loved the soldiers very much, and won the hearts of the army, although he had traveled thousands of miles, Feng Zhongjun's cohesion was still very strong, no matter how tired and tired Feng Zhongjun was, Feng Zhongjun's soldiers were still gritting their teeth and holding on, even if the marching speed decreased, it was not very obvious.

The situation on the side of the Chuji coalition army is completely different, needless to say, the Jibei army has no deep hatred with Feng Zhongjun, except for a very small number of fanatics who are looking forward to promotion and fortune, most of the soldiers are unwilling to pay the price of complete exhaustion and chase for their lives, and their morale is not high enough, so the speed of the march has naturally been greatly affected.

The situation of the Western Chu army is more complicated, the marching distance is not below Feng Zhongjun's, and the decline in physical strength is also very serious, plus the old general Ding Gu Ding is not as much as Feng Zhong loves soldiers like a son, and he has won the hearts of the army, so as the pursuit distance is getting longer and longer, even if there is no burden of the old and weak women and children in the army, the pursuit speed of the Western Chu army still decreases significantly, and no matter how the old general Ding and his cronies and generals shout and scold, there is no way to restore the pursuit speed to its peak state.

It is precisely because of these objective reasons that he retreated north to Gaotang, and the main force of Feng Zhongjun was never caught up by the enemy, but unfortunately, Gaotang was farther away from the Yellow River, and the number of civilian ships on the civilian docks was even less, and Feng Zhongjun and the Han army's family had no way to cross the river directly in Gaotang. Therefore, Feng Zhong had no choice but to arrange for Wang Fang, the old man of the young marshal's army, to lead two thousand troops to the north lightly, rush to the plains to cross the boat in order to cross the river, and then just take a short rest, and immediately continue to go north with the main force and the family of the Han army.

In order to boost morale and boost the morale of the army, during the period of going north from Gaotang, Feng Zhong also let his own soldiers keep shouting in the army, loudly proclaiming: "Don't worry, the plain is galloping, there are countless boats of all sizes on the dock, as long as we reach the plain, we can cross the river by boat immediately, and then we can be safe." The brothers worked hard, and the old father-in-law and sister-in-law Qiu also worked hard, and when we crossed the river in the plain, we could rest assured. ”

This kind of propaganda still had a certain effect, fantasizing about the bright prospect of crossing the river to get rid of the pursuit, and the soldiers of Feng Zhongjun and the family members of the Han army also forgot their fatigue and fatigue, and they all cheered up and gritted their teeth and persevered, marching north at their fastest speed.

Of course, there are naturally some different voices among them, at least Han Cheng, the king of Han, who has been forced to get out of the car and walk, couldn't help but whisper to Han Xin next to him: "When you reach the plain, you can cross the river immediately?" To put it nicely, if the Jibei thief army in the plains takes the first step and evacuates the ships on the Pingyuanjin wharf, then we will be in big trouble. The river is big, there are no boats to cross the river, and even if you want to build a pontoon bridge, you can't build it. ”

"Let's hope not." Han Xin sighed in a low voice, and Han Cheng subconsciously touched the package on his back again, becoming more and more determined to run away alone when he saw that the situation was wrong.

Han Cheng's words became a prophecy, in the afternoon of the same day, when the two thousand front team led by Wang Fang, the old man of the young marshal's army, rushed to the city of Pingyuan County, he immediately saw that there were few boats on the Pingyuanjin wharf, and the Yellow River was full of large and small civilian boats fleeing in a hurry, and some Jibei soldiers were still shouting loudly on the wharf, forcing the remaining ships to leave the wharf quickly.

Seeing this scene, Wang Fang roared wildly, and immediately rushed over with the army, in a vain attempt to stop the rest of the civilian boats from escaping, but unfortunately, before Feng Zhongjun rushed to the dock, the last civilian boat had already fled downstream, and the Jibei soldiers who drove the civilian boats away also ran away, and rushed to the direction of the plain city gate not far away.

"Piff! Kill all these horsemen for me! ”

The success was down, and Wang Fang, who was completely mad, didn't even blink his eyelids, and immediately took Feng Zhongjun to chase after the Jibei soldiers who drove the civilian ships away, and his steps were fast under the rage, Leng was directly under the city gate to catch up with those shouting Jibei soldiers, and the Jibei soldiers guarding the city gate hurriedly closed the door, Wang Fang rushed into the city first, brandished the steel knife of Shiling Pavilion left by Xiang Kang back then, and cut down many gate soldiers one after another, and the Feng Zhongjun soldiers behind were also full of anger, pouring into the city like a tide.

Seeing that Feng Zhongjun directly entered the city, the plain guards of the Jibei Army who were in a hurry also hurriedly organized troops to intercept them, but because the main force of the Jibei Army had already advanced west to aid Zhao, there were only more than 2,000 defenders in the entire plain city, and they were stationed in various parts of the plain city, not to mention, and a part of the army was assigned to evacuate on the official ships on the dock, and the defenders were even more empty. And when he rushed in front of Feng Zhongjun with the army, Feng Zhongjun's soldiers immediately vented their monstrous anger on him, and with just one charge, they broke down the hundreds of soldiers around him, and then hacked him to death in the melee, and broke him into pieces!

Seeing that the main general was killed, the rest of the Jibei soldiers immediately dispersed, and rushed to the east gate of the plain to escape for their lives, and the Jibei army stationed in various parts of the plain city heard the news, and also opened the city gate to flee for their lives, Feng Zhong's army was like a bamboo, and directly rushed into the plain official temple, and killed the plain county order three times and two times, and took the plain county seat in one fell swoop.

It is useless to take the plain county, because the Jibei army has already issued an evacuation order, and the Pingyuanjin wharf, which was originally densely populated with boats, is already empty, and there is no half of the raft in sight, plus there is an official ship of the Jibei army driving an official boat on the river to block and intercept, from this moment on, there is no longer even a fishing boat to return to the plain wharf to return to the port, even if Feng Zhongjun's front team accidentally takes the plain county, it can only look at the spacious Yellow River and sigh at the river, and it is insurmountable.

What's worse is that when Feng Zhongjun's main brigade stumbled to the plain dock with the Han army's family, the Chuji coalition army had also pursued to a position less than ten miles away from the plain, and saw the empty plain wharf, and after listening to Wang Fang's report of lying on the ground and crying, Feng Zhong himself was of course like a lightning strike, and Feng Zhongjun's soldiers and Han army's family members were even more crying and beating their chests constantly, "It's hard work, it's completely hard work." ”

Only Li Shiqi barely kept calm, and after wiping away the cloudy old tears from the corners of his eyes, Li Shiqi said to Feng Zhong: "General Feng, things have come to this point, it is useless to regret and regret, fortunately, we accidentally took the plain county, let's take the city to avoid it for the time being, let our soldiers rest for a while, and then find a way to break through." ”

Feng Zhongjun nodded, and gave the order to enter the city very helplessly, during the period when Feng Zhongjun's soldiers and Han army's family members cried and entered the city, Han Cheng also made up his mind, and whispered to Han Xin next to him: "You can't enter the city, entering the city is a dead end, the Western Chu thief army and the Jibei thief army are about to chase after us, we will not be able to come out when we enter the city, take advantage of the hurry now, the two of us have a small goal, and there is still a chance to escape." ”

Han Xin hesitated for a moment, his selfish mind still prevailed, and after nodding, he took the opportunity of Feng Zhongjun's soldiers and Han Jun's family members to mix into the city, and quietly left Feng Zhongjun's brigade with Han Cheng, and fled quickly to the east.

When the situation was reported to Feng Zhong, Feng Zhong had no choice but to sigh and say: "Everyone has their own aspirations, let them go, for the sake of living and dying together for so long, I hope they can escape smoothly." ”

Feng Zhongjun's soldiers and Han army families had just entered the city, and before they even had time to pull up the drawbridge at the south gate of the plain, the Chuji coalition army had already pursued to the plain city, and the result was needless to say, seeing that the boats on the plain pier had been evacuated in advance, Feng Zhongjun was forced to flee into the plain county to hide, of course, the Chuji coalition army was thunderous, very happy, and the old general Ding Guding laughed wildly, "Feng Zhongpiff!" This time, how do you run away? Lao Tzu doesn't have to attack the city, just by besieging the city, trapping can trap you to death completely! ”

Ding Gu and the others laughed wildly outside the Plains City, but Feng Zhong's heart was like a knife in the Plains City, and there was only one thought in his heart, "What should I do?" What else can I do? Trapped in the city, there is no way to collect the ferry, even if it rushes out, it does not cross the big river, and after a slight delay of two days, the remaining Xiang Yu thief army and Jibei thief army will definitely come to reinforce, and I am afraid that I will not even be able to hold the city at that time. And food, how much time can food support? ”

Complete despair to complete despair, when things came to this point, Feng Zhong of course had no way back, and he could only quickly arrange for the army to guard the four gates of the plain, send and escort the family of the Han army to the Pingyuan County Temple to rest and protect, and hurry up to count the food and weapons in the city, and prepare to defend the city for a long time, even if he was exhausted to the extreme, he did not dare to lie down and rest a little.

Maybe it's the endless road, when Feng Zhong was busy arranging to defend the city, Li Shiqi suddenly stumbled in front of him, brandishing a simple slip, and yelled like crazy, "Giant deer!" Giant deer! General Feng, we still have to save, Julu has an army to save us! ”

"Mr. Li, what do you mean by that?" Feng Zhong asked suspiciously: "Julu is the capital of the thief army of the Zhao State, so the reinforcements that came can save us?" ”

"It's not the Zhao State Thief Army! It's the army of our Han King! Our Han King's army is about to hit the giant deer! ”

Li Shiqi finally shouted out a smooth sentence, and then quickly showed the slip in his hand, and roared excitedly: "It was found by the old man in the Pingyuan County Temple just now!" The Zhao State Thief Army only sent someone to send the news to the Jibei Thief Army yesterday that our Han King's army has set off from Julu to the north and marched towards Julu! In a few days, it will be able to hit Julu City! ”

"Heavens! It's true?! ”

Feng Zhong roared excitedly, snatched the slip with his hand, and almost smashed the slip directly, and then took a closer look at the military emergency report sent by the Zhao State to the Jibei army, and saw that it was indeed written that the Zheng Bu Department of the Han Army was pulling out the giant deer, Feng Zhong cried directly and cried wildly: "Heaven will not kill me!" Heaven will not kill me! From the giant deer to the plains, all the way is a gallop, if they can contact our friendly forces, they can rush from the giant deer to the plains to save us in four or five days at most! ”