Gao Changgong set out from Wuguan and went to Shang County and Shangluo, but he did not attack the county seat, and his army brought a lot of baggage, which was enough for him for a month. Of course, most of the baggage was Cao Jun's military flag and camp tent, because Gao Changgong would disguise himself as Cao Jun in a few days.

In fact, there is no difference between Cao Jun's costume and Zhang Yijun's costume, because everyone uses the costume of the Han Army. The Han Dynasty was still red, and the military uniforms were all red. It's just that everyone has some differences in armor, but not all soldiers can wear armor.

It took seven or eight days for Gao Changgong to finally come to the Meridian Valley, and the first county first found a valley, hid the horses here, only a few horses, and then entered the Meridian Valley with a large number of supplies.

After entering the Meridian Valley, Gao Changgong threw out all the flags, and then sent people to the front to reconnoitre. Gao Changgong also specially warned those who went to reconnoiter not to hide their figures, and to let the defenders of Hanzhong discover them.

The meridian road is hundreds of miles long, and the road is difficult, it takes at least ten days for the army to pass, but it only takes three or four days for the scouts to pass.

After those scouts left Meridian Valley, they immediately went west to reconnoiter in the direction of Chenggu. Chenggu is forty or fifty miles away from the exit of the Meridian Valley, and it will take two days to get there. When they arrived outside Chenggu County, these investigators were discovered by the local people.

The local people saw Cao's armor and immediately notified the defenders of Chenggu. Compared with Cao Cao and Zhang Yi, Hanzhong is much poorer, and their soldiers basically have no armor, so when a soldier wearing armor appears, it is particularly eye-catching.

Chenggu's defenders immediately went out to find the soldier that the people said they were. After a day's search, the soldiers found a small camp with three or four tents, and about a dozen armoured troops. There were fifty or sixty defenders who came out, and they immediately attacked more than a dozen people.

But it's a pity that these people under Gao Changgong are the elite of the elite. When the cavalry was selected, in addition to horsemanship, it also required a very strict combat test and cavalry and archery test, which was definitely the best of the best. The soldiers of Hanzhong were not even elite, and as soon as they fought with the cavalry under Gao Changgong, they were immediately at a disadvantage. Fifty or sixty people were pressed and beaten by more than a dozen people, and they had no power to fight back.

In less than a quarter of an hour, more than twenty of the Chenggu defenders died, and the others fled quickly when they saw that the casualties were too great. The cavalry did not pursue, but began to pack up their things and retreat in the direction of the Meridian Valley. Their purpose has been achieved, and now it is time to retreat.

Sure enough, after the cavalry had walked for three hours, a full five or six hundred defenders came from the direction of Chenggu. They followed the trail left by the knights all the way to the Meridian Valley. As soon as these saw that it was the Meridian Valley, they immediately panicked, the Meridian Valley was Guanzhong, and it was Cao Cao's territory! They hurriedly went deep into the Meridian Valley and found that a large number of Cao troops were passing through the Meridian Valley, and they were all two-thirds of the way through.

These people did not dare to slack off, and hurriedly returned to Chenggu and reported the news to Nan Zheng.

When Zhang Lu received the news, he was also stupid. You must know that Cao Cao pacified the north and became the largest prince in the world, and he was in the limelight for a while.

Zhang Lu summoned his subordinate officials and asked, "Now that Cao Jun suddenly appeared in Meridian Valley, I don't know how we should deal with it?" ”

Yan Pu, as the first strategist under Zhang Lu, couldn't help but ask first: "Lord, I don't know how many Cao Jun there are?" ”

Zhang Lu handed the military report of the Chenggu garrison to Yan Pu, Yan Pu took the military report and looked at it, and couldn't help but be surprised: "Thirty thousand? How is this possible? How was Meridian Valley able to pass through so many armies? ”

Zhang Lu said: "Even if one person has passed alone, he can always come over." ”

"But they can't carry their baggage!" Yan Pu said clearly: "Cao Jun may be a suspicious soldier!" ”

Zhang Lu asked, "How sure are you?" ”

Yan Pu replied: "There is no need to be sure, the road in the Meridian Valley is steep, and it only takes one general to lead three or five thousand people to block all of Cao's army." It's just that I suspect that Cao's army may have attacked from other places, with Meridian Valley as a suspicious army, and his army must have taken several other paths. ”

Zhang Lu's younger brother Zhang Wei said at this time: "Then station a large army on all roads, no matter which road they take, we can block them." ”

Zhang Lu looked at his younger brother and frowned and said, "If we let the Cao army lose too much, will the Cao Gong send more troops to attack me?" ”

"Does my brother still want to surrender?" Zhang Wei said: "You must know that my brother has not made any contribution to the imperial court over the years, but has helped Liu Zhang cut off the road in Shuzhong. ”

When Zhang Lu heard this, he immediately stopped talking. Indeed, as Zhang Wei said, he really hasn't done anything like this over the years. After Liu Yan entered Shuzhong that year, he filmed Zhang Xiu and Zhang Lu attacking Hanzhong, in order to let them block traffic and cut off the connection between Shuzhong and the Central Plains. After capturing Hanzhong, Zhang Lu killed Zhang Xiu again and blocked traffic according to Liu Yan's instructions. As a result, many officials were unable to take up their posts in Shuzhong, including Xun You, who avoided Dong Zhuo.

Since it was decided, Zhang Lu said, "Then who will go to Meridian Valley?" ”

Zhang Wei said: "Let Yang Bai go to Meridian Valley, I will go to collect Chen Cang Road, Yang Ren will guard the Bao Slope Road, and Yang Ang will go to guard Luogu Road." ”

Yan Pu did not raise any objection to this arrangement, now Cao's army was able to walk these four roads, and Cao Cao's army could not pass at all on the Qishan Road further west, because it was leading to Liangzhou, which was now Han Sui's territory. If Cao Jun dared to go to Liangzhou, he would inevitably clash with Han Sui.

Why didn't Zhang Wei arrange someone to guard Yangping Pass? Because Yangping Pass is in the west of Nanzheng, on the Golden Bull Road (the introduction of the Golden Bull Road in the previous article is wrong, the Golden Bull Road is the road connecting Hanzhong and Shuzhong, and the five roads connecting Hanzhong are Qishan Road, Chencang Road, Xiegu Road, Luogu Road and Meridian Road). Only attacking from the direction of Shuzhong or Wudu County needs to pass through Yangping Pass, and you only need to go through the Scattered Pass to take Chencang Road.

Because he didn't know which way the Cao army came from, Zhang Lu asked the four generals to go out to defend with 5,000 people, and Nan Zheng only left about 4,000. But Zhang Lu is not worried at all, because as long as the four roads are defended, Hanzhong will have peace of mind.

Zhang Lu never thought that Zhang Yi would attack him from Shangyong, because Shangyong's road was too difficult to walk, and it was impossible to transport supplies at all. But Di Qing was stunned to transport the supplies to Shangyong little by little, and had already accumulated enough resources to launch a surprise attack. Just after he sent 20,000 troops, Wei Yan, who had been lurking, discovered their army movements, and quickly sent people back to Shangyong to inform Di Qing.