After Yuan Shao took over as the state pastor, he secretly ordered the senior cadres to ban the Cao family and the Xiahou family in order to blackmail Cao Cao.

Although Cao Cao developed well and resisted the attack of Dong Zhuo's forces, Yingchuan County was very badly damaged, the population decreased a lot, and many local clans had moved to Jingzhou, and the economy and people's livelihood were hit very hard, and it was difficult to recover in a short time.

Chen Gong, Zhang Miao and others advised Cao Cao to temporarily focus on forbearance and temporarily accept Yuan Shao's moderation, so that he could deal with Gongsun Zan with peace of mind and buy time for development; At the same time, he sent someone to contact Gongsun Chan to state the fact that he was forced to be helpless, hoping to get Gongsun Zhan's understanding.

There was no better option for the time being, so Cao Cao had to take this suggestion.

Gongsun Chan is not bordering Cao Cao's forces now, and if he can make friends, he will make friends, Cao Cao has this attitude, which has made Gongsun Chan very satisfied, how can he refuse his kindness?

Cao Cao succumbed, and Yuan Shao did not have the strength to eliminate him, so a temporary stable situation was formed.

Yuan Shao actively organized the defense of Gongsun Zhan, adopted Feng Ji's suggestion, focused on stability, and temporarily avoided a hard confrontation with Gongsun Zhan, whose cavalry was not something that Yuan Shao's existing cavalry could confront him.

After losing Shansang County, Yuan Shao ordered Fengji to organize a defense line with the Vortex River, and the main forces of Gao Gan retreated to Qian County, south of the Vortex.

Xu Yu suggested evacuating the families and people north of Peiguo and Liang, where population was the greatest resource during the war years, but Yuan Shao refused on the grounds that it would cause unrest.

Gongsun Zhan's rebellion activities had a very good effect, and the clans in the remaining counties of Peiguo secretly contacted Gongsun Zhan, hoping that Gongsun Chan would take over the northwest counties as soon as possible, and they could also enjoy Gongsun Zhan's benevolent policies.

The king of Liang and Xiangguo, after Gongsun Chan took over the three counties from Cheng Lian, the boundaries bordered, so they sent people to actively contact Gongsun Zhan; Due to the precedent of Pei Guo before, they also hoped to get rid of the control of Yuan Shao and Yuan Yi and join the power of Gongsun Zhan.

However, Gongsun Zhan did not dare to go too deep, for fear of being surrounded by Yuan Shao's forces, so he asked the people of Liang to wait with peace of mind, he wanted to seize the territory of Peiguo north of the vortex first, and then join forces with the outside to seize Liang State.

Gongsun Kang was very supportive of Gongsun Zhan's plan.

In the spring of the second year of Chuping, Gongsun Zhan and Gongsun Kang felt that the situation was very favorable to them and that they had to expand their territory as soon as possible, so they took the initiative to launch a war and prepare to seize the northwestern counties of Peiguo and Liang.

Gongsun Zhan's plan was simple, that is, to use the mobility of cavalry to quickly surround Yuan Shao's army.

The war first started in Peiguo.

Yangyi stayed in Qi County to prevent Yuan Shao's counterattack.

Gongsun Kang led 10,000 cavalry, along the north bank of the Wushui River, starting from Shansang County, and went straight to the opposite bank of Qian County, dividing Gaogan's forces into two halves.

Located on the south bank of the whirlpool, Qian County is the ruling center of Gao Gan and the important place of garrison.

Liu Yi led 10,000 infantry, and the counties were under the control of the senior cadres, because the senior cadres stationed here were few officers and soldiers, and with the support of the local clans, everything went very smoothly.

At the same time, Gongsun Chan personally led 10,000 cavalry from Hengxian County to raid Suiyang County; The minister of Liang Guoguo in the city led his troops to open the city gate and welcome Gongsun Chan into the city.

Yuan Yi was stationed in Gushu County on the south bank of Suishui, and he was glad in his heart, fortunately he was not stationed in Suiyang County; Secretly, this is the big clan is too unreliable.

After six days, Liu Yi received Peiguo Jianping, Taiqiu and other five counties, and then, Gongsun Kang sent 5,000 cavalry to seize Chen Guobu County, and he himself personally led 5,000 cavalry into Jianping County, which cut off Yuan Yi's retreat.

Yuan Yu was trapped in Gushu County, although he had many soldiers, but mainly infantry, he would never dare to go out of the city, otherwise he would be pursued by cavalry, and there was only a dead end.

Now Yuan Shao is very conflicted, should he go to the rescue of Yuan Yu in Gushu City? If you don't save it, it's 20,000 infantry, and if Gongsun Chan gets it, it will greatly strengthen Gongsun Chan's strength; If they do not come to the rescue and let them all die in battle, it will greatly damage the morale of the existing officers and soldiers; If he went to the rescue, he would easily be pursued by Gongsun Zhan's cavalry, and his existing cavalry was no match for Gongsun Zhan's cavalry.

Fortunately for him, the defense line of the Vortex River presided over by Feng Ji was very stable and was not attacked by Gongsun Zhan, but the territory on the other side of the Vortex River was lost.

However, what made Yuan Shao even more ugly was that Liu Mi, the king of Liang, announced his support for Sun Zhan, the state pastor appointed by the imperial court, and reprimanded Yuan Shao and Yuan Yu for being selfish, exploiting the people, attacking the scholars, and waging war for personal gain, and claiming that the state pastor was a rebellion.

Yuan Shao was angry, and he couldn't care about face, so he ordered the king of Chen and the prime minister of the state and their families to be escorted back to Runan County and strictly guarded, for fear that the incident between Liang and Peiguo would happen again.

However, this move provoked continuous denunciations of Yuan Shao by the imperial court, Dong Zhuo, Gongsun Zhan and the royal family, which made Yuan Shao lose face.

Dong Zhuo was very satisfied with the situation in Yuzhou, praised Gongsun Zhan, and announced that he would exempt the land controlled by Gongsun Zhan from three years of taxes and restore people's livelihood; and ordered Niu Fu to give Gongsun Chan the necessary support.

This move greatly boosted Gongsun Zhan's confidence and raised the morale of the officers and men.

Only 5,000 cavalry were left to garrison the west side of Gushu County, which made it impossible for Yuan Yi to leave the city. Gongsun Chan firmly believed that if the siege continued, within two months, the city would inevitably be in chaos due to the exhaustion of food; Other cavalry were deployed in the southern part of the Liang state, ready to deal with Yuan Shao's reinforcements.

Feng Ji, Xu You and others made suggestions and thought of many ways, but they were all rejected by Yuan Shao; In particular, Xu You suggested peace talks with Gongsun Zhan, rescued the besieged 20,000 soldiers, and used the vortex water as the boundary with Gongsun Chan to maintain peace and stability, which was reprimanded by Yuan Shao; Yuan Shao understood that his war with Gongsun Chan was a battle of life and death, and defeat meant death until one side was out, and Gongsun Chan now had the upper hand and would definitely not negotiate peace with him.

Yuan Shao wanted to concentrate his forces on a decisive battle with Gongsun Zhan, but was stopped by Feng Ji and others, and if the decisive battle failed, there would be no chance to turn over.

The war in Gushu County attracted the attention of the people of the Central Plains, and it was very uncomfortable for Yuan Shao to save or give up.

In March, the food in the city was basically exhausted, Yuan Yu was anxious, if he didn't come up with a plan, let alone the soldiers, even the big clans in the city would rebel, in desperation, he asked the county magistrate in the city to let him go out of the city to negotiate with Gongsun Zhan, willing to surrender to Gongsun Zhan, in exchange for the officers and soldiers a way to live, in this way, at least for the Yuan family to save a little face.

Gongsun Zhan readily agreed to Yuan Zhi's request to surrender, announced that he would not kill a single person, and would treat the surrendered officers and soldiers and people kindly, even if Yuan Zhi would not kill him, he would let him go south.

Gongsun Kang suggested that Yuan Yi be sent to Luoyang, and it would be better for the imperial court to deal with it, but Gongsun Chan directly refused.

Gongsun Zhan, who grew up in a border county, attaches more importance to practical interests, and does not value those false names, Yuan Yi's military and political talents are mediocre, even if he is released to Yuan Shao, it will not play a great role, and killing him will also affect his prestige among the scholars, and the gains outweigh the losses.

According to Gongsun Kang's suggestion, Gongsun Chan selected 10,000 infantry from the 20,000 people who surrendered in Gushu County, and the remaining infantry, those who had a family to return to their families, and those who did not have a family were concentrated to implement the military cantonment; This is when Gongsun Kang was in Liaodong, he saw Sun Cheng organize the military tun, so he applied what he learned and learned from it.

Gongsun Zhan praised Gongsun Du's suggestion, since the war, the population of Liang State has been seriously lost, especially in the three counties of Hengxian and Xiayi, the population has basically been plundered by Lu Bu and Cheng Lian, and the land is all barren, with these retired soldiers farming, at least 40,000 officers and soldiers can be provided with military rations next year, which will greatly reduce his financial pressure.

As for Yuan Yi, Gongsun Zhan asked for a thousand war horses from Yuan Shao, and then let him cross the Vortex River alone; The Yuan family finally saved a little face.

Gongsun Zhan has gained a firm foothold in Yuzhou and has a stable base, but for the time being, he is unable to continue the attack, and he must digest the territory he occupies now; And Yuan Shao is also unable to counterattack, what he needs is stable development; Cao Cao nominally accepted Yuan Shao's management, but he monopolized Yingchuan County and became a force of his own; So far, Yuzhou has formed a three-legged situation, and no one can help anyone.