Just as Ma Chao urged the 10,000 foot soldiers behind him to retreat in the direction of Yangping Pass, the 20,000 soldiers led by Cao Hong were already approaching Ma Chao, and Cao Pi, who had originally fled all the way back, also led the army to turn over and kill back at this time.

When he came out of the customs, he was already worried that Cao Pi might have an ambush, but when he saw Cao Pi's face, he couldn't suppress his revenge no matter what......

After bringing the 5,000 iron cavalry on his side to the open place on the left, Ma Chao made a mistake in his heart, the 10,000 Hanzhong infantry given by Zhang Lu was not a strong general, and at this time he was about to be attacked from both sides, and he had already messed up, after Ma Chao led the cavalry to one side, and then wanted to command the 10,000 foot soldiers, he found that it was already impossible to do anything, and at this time Cao Hong and Cao Pi were both close to the front.

Ma Chao knew that if he led his 5,000 cavalry back to Guanzhong at this time, most of the 5,000 cavalry could be safe, but the 10,000 foot soldiers who could go back must be less than one in ten, thinking of Zhang Lu's hesitant look when he sent troops, Ma Chao knew that once he threw these 10,000 foot soldiers here, then his trust in front of Zhang Lu would also come to an end, so Ma Chao immediately made a decision and led the cavalry directly to the Cao Hong formation, which had fewer troops.

According to the judgment of Cao Pi and others, there must be only one Cao Pi in Ma Chao's eyes, so Cao Hong didn't expect Ma Chao to come straight to him first, so he didn't dare to be ambiguous, so he had to leave all the elite soldiers by his side, in case Ma Chao couldn't resist before he was killed.

Cao Hong's 20,000 soldiers, almost all of them were foot soldiers, Ma Chao led 5,000 cavalry under the impact, the formation was a little scattered, and for a time did not get close to the 10,000 Hanzhong foot soldiers, Ma Chao ordered the people under his command to go to pass the order, only to teach the 10,000 foot soldiers to retreat quickly to Yangping Pass.

But when Ma Chao rushed and killed in Cao Hong's array for a while, when he looked back, his heart was cold, and he saw that the 10,000 Hanzhong foot soldiers who could have been evacuated in an orderly manner according to his instructions were chased by Cao Pi's army, one by one, like headless flies, regardless of things, and some actually fled in the opposite direction of Yangping Guan, and the result was naturally that they were killed by Cao Pi's army.

"What a rabble!" Ma Chao couldn't help but be very disappointed when he saw that he took the risk to block Cao Hong's army, and only got the result, knowing that if he resisted Cao Hong here again, he was afraid that Cao Pi would point his troops at Ma Chao after the 10,000 foot soldiers were killed.

So, Ma Chao waved his hand, and the 5,000 cavalry followed behind him and withdrew in the direction of Yangpingguan, no longer caring about the Hanzhong foot soldiers who were running in all directions.

Not long after, Ma Chao led the army to retreat to the Yangping Pass, at this time I saw Zhang Lu, who was supervising the battle at the city gate, had a gloomy look on his face, obviously very unhappy with the result of Ma Chao's battle, seeing Ma Chao retreat, and the 10,000 foot soldiers were only more than 2,000 astute people who fled back, and the rest were either killed by Cao Pi and led the army, or Cao Pi fell in a hurry, Zhang Lu waved his hand, and then retreated into the pass, and then closed the gate tightly, as if it had never been opened.

"General Meng Qi, do you know that there are only less than 50,000 foot soldiers in my Hanzhong, and this campaign only killed two or three thousand Cao troops, while our army lost as many as eight thousand. If General Meng Qi leads the troops like this, I'm afraid it will be ......"

Obviously, Zhang Lu was very dissatisfied with Ma Chao's expedition, and after Ma Chao returned, he summoned him to discuss with Yan Pu and Zhang Wei in front of the hall, and he was already very dissatisfied.

"Chao lost control of his emotions before the battle, and he wanted to take the head of Cao Pixiang, so he was impulsive and fell into Cao Hong's ambush, but Cao Hong had already been intercepted by us, and the Hanzhong sergeant was obviously negligent in practice on weekdays, so he was at a loss in front of the battle, if I intercepted and killed Cao Hong, those sergeants obeyed my orders and did not flee in all directions, and today's losses will definitely not exceed the number of thousands!"

Ma Chao is a temperamental person, and he naturally can't take all of Zhang Lu's reproaches in his arms, although he knows that saying so will definitely make Zhang Lu unhappy, but he still retorts.

"Ma Chao, you are not in a good war, what is the reason for putting this responsibility on my Hanzhong army? If I lead my troops out of the customs, even if I can't kill that Cao Pi, I definitely won't end up with such a big loss! ”

As soon as Ma Chao said that the training of the soldiers in Hanzhong was insufficient, Zhang Wei was the first to retort that Zhang Wei was responsible for the training of tens of thousands of troops in Hanzhong.

At this time, Zhang Lu did not speak again, Ma Chao looked at it, and knew that Zhang Lu was mostly concerned about his defeat, so he watched coldly and did not say anything to persuade him, so Ma Chao did not argue with Zhang Wei again, but was silent, not knowing what to think in his heart.

In the end, Zhang Lu listened to Yan Pu's words and did not go out of the pass, but prepared a lot of grain and grass and things to resist the siege in the pass, and then everyone dispersed.

Ma Chao returned to the mansion stupidly, chilling, he thought that this year, Zhang Lu had become his confidant, and he didn't want to just fight, so Zhang Lu's attitude towards him was exposed, obviously, Ma Chao from Liangzhou could not become a henchman like Yan Pu and Zhang Wei, he was at best just a sharp knife in Zhang Lu's hand, once Zhang Lu thought that his blade was not as sharp as he had seen before, then he was under Zhang Lu, and even an ordinary henchman general was not as good as it.

Naturally, Ma Chao thought of Fa Zheng, who came to meet with him that day, and the letter written by Liu Feng, and then sighed, he knew that Liu Feng or his subordinates must be watching his battle today, and after this battle, Ma Chao didn't know if Liu Feng would be as eager to join his command as before, and he didn't know if he really joined Liu Feng's camp one day, whether he could still become a general in his own right.

Just when Ma Chao was thinking about the future in a very chaotic way, and wanted to sit in his study and study the art of war of the ancients in order to calm down, a letter sandwiched between a stack of books on his desk caught his attention.

Originally, there was no letter here, so Ma Chao's heart moved, and he quickly took out the letter, and then tore it open......