Of course, Liu He understands the huge benefits brought by Tian Kai's rebellion, even if he did not have the strategic vision to look at the world when he returned to Youzhou, but after these years of personal experience and experience, especially with the assistance of Guo Jia and others, his strategic wisdom is not inferior to Guo Jia and Li Ru and others.

From a strategic point of view, if Tian Kai does not fall to either side of Cao Cao and Yuan Shao, then his existence will become a huge bait, always leading the eyes of Yuan Shao and Cao Cao to Qingzhou, and even Liaodong Gongsun Du wants to fight Tian Kai's idea. In this way, it was just convenient for Liu He to calmly lay out in the north, strengthen himself step by step according to the established steps, and make all preparations for attacking Gongsun Du.

Going deeper, no matter whether Tian Kai and Guan Jing are willing to take refuge in Liu He now, as long as they have their own ideas and ambitions, and are unwilling to be subservient, they will definitely have conflicts with careerists like Yuan Shao and Cao Cao, and the result will be fighting back and forth and consuming each other. This kind of dog-eat-dog consumption is naturally happy for Liu He. Wait until Liu He cleaned up Gongsun Du in Liaodong, and then sent a large army south, just enough to easily drive the weakened Yuan Shao out of Jizhou, and the weaker Tian Kai was afraid that he would not dare to think anything wrong under Liu He's coercion.

After some deliberation, Liu He gave orders to Zhang He, Tai Shici, Xian Yufu and Xian Yuyin.

The Jicheng Command Office ordered Zhang He, the commander of the Youyan Army, to dispatch 10,000 soldiers and horses to immediately and secretly go to Wupu Pavilion in Anping, Jizhou, and prepare to reinforce Gaoyi or Nanpi at any time; Ordered the Zhenwei battalion commander Tai Shi Ci to pay close attention to the movements of the Yuan army in the south of Jizhou and the development of the war in Qingzhou, if the Yuan army continued to send a large number of troops to Qingzhou, Tian Kai could not support it, Tai Shi Ci could lead the Zhenwei battalion to the south, launched a feint attack on the Yuan army stationed in Handan, and forced the Yuan army that attacked Tian Kai to come back.

Order the Zhenwu battalion commander Xian Yufu to prepare for both support and reinforcement of Tian Kai, if Tian Kai can withstand it, Xian Yufu does not have to lead the army into Qingzhou. only need to contain Yuan Jun in Jizhou and express solidarity with Tian Kai; If Tian Kai could not withstand the double pressure of Yuan Jun and Cao Jun, he could directly send troops to Pingyuan County and launch a limited-scale surprise attack on the Yuan army besieging the city.

Ordered Xian Yuyin, the chief general of the Liao army, to immediately create a big momentum in western Liaoning, creating the illusion that Youzhou was about to send troops to attack eastern Liaodong, forcing Gongsun Du to focus on the area from Changli to Xihe on the western front, reducing the pressure on Kong Rong in Beihai, so that Kong Rong could provide more support to Tian Kai.

However, when it was said that these orders of the Jicheng Command were still on the way, Kong Rong sent 5,000 infantry to reinforce Tian Kai and finally arrived in Pingyuan County. This time, Sun Shao not only came to reinforce Tian Kai with soldiers and horses, but also brought a batch of grain and grass military materials. The confidence of the Tian Kai soldiers who defended the plain was greatly increased.

When Tian Kai saw Sun Shao, he no longer doubted Liu and his attitude of supporting him to stick to Qingzhou, and he was worried that Guan Jing, who was defending Gaotang, would not have enough defensive strength, so he asked Sun Shao to leave only 2,000 soldiers and horses for himself, and then send the other 3,000 soldiers and horses to Gaotang.

As mentioned earlier, Sun Shao is not simple, he did not adopt Tian Kai's suggestion, but put forward a bolder suggestion. Sun Shao analyzed that if Yuan Shaojun made a bigger move in the next step, he would definitely take the plain as the first target of attack, so he suggested that Tian Kai transfer all the more than 6,000 soldiers and horses left by Guan Jing to guard Gaotang back to the plain. And Gao Tang's defense was taken over by the 5,000 soldiers and horses led by himself.

To be honest, Tian Kai is still relatively kind, he has more than 11,000 soldiers under his command, and he was divided with Guan Jing at that time. He only needed 5,000 people, and handed over the remaining 6,000 people to Guan Jing. It's just that this time he wanted to divide the 5,000 infantry brought by Sun Shao into two cities to replenish his troops, but he was not very clever. Five thousand soldiers brought by Sun Shao. They had never cooperated with Tian Kai's soldiers before, and they would only obey Sun Shao's dispatch if they were to separate. Not only will it not have the effect of increasing the amount of defensive strength, but it will bring a crisis to Tian Kai because of the problem of poor coordination between the two armies.

Although Tian Kai was a little skeptical of Sun Shao's ability, he also agreed with Sun Shao's judgment on the direction of Yuan's main attack, considering that Pingyuan County was close to Bohai County, and it would be more convenient in case the army was defeated and retreated, so he agreed to Sun Shao's request and let Sun Shao lead the army to Gaotang County to replace Guan Jing.

Two days later, Sun Shao led his army to Gaotang County, located on the east bank of the Yellow River. What does it mean to say the East Coast? Because this section of the Yellow River suddenly turned a big bend 100 miles upstream, from west to east to south to north, and then slightly bent to the northeast in the lower reaches of Gaotang, resulting in a unique protruding terrain in Pingyuan County.

After Guan Jing learned of Sun Shao's intention, he left more than 1,000 people for Sun Shao, and then led 5,000 soldiers to rush to the plain for reinforcements.

As a result, the number of troops defending the plain county increased to 10,000, while the number of troops left behind in Gaotang remained at more than 6,000, the difference was that the main force defending Gaotang became soldiers in Beihai.

Soon after Guan Jing led his army to the plains, Chun Yuqiong rushed to Huangxian with an army of 10,000 and a large number of siege equipment, merged with the Gaolan army that had arrived earlier, and then attacked Pingyuan County again.

Gao Ran was ridiculed by Tian Kai last time, and he was full of strength in his heart, seeing that Chun Yuqiong had brought many siege weapons, so he took the initiative to ask Chun Yuqiong to serve as the vanguard of the attack on the plains. Chun Yuqiong distributed half of the siege equipment to Gao Ran, and ordered him to lead 10,000 elite infantry to launch a fierce attack from the direction of the west gate of the plain county town.

The 10,000 Qingzhou soldiers defending the county town of Pingyuan saw that Yuan Jun had moved his true character this time, although they were a little panicked, but they saw that the main generals Tian Kai and Guan Jing did not show their timidity, so they hid under the cover of the city wall according to the prior arrangement and kept firing arrows at the city, and drove down the Yuan army who had climbed to the top of the city with spears and hook inlays.

The siege lasted for several days, and many soldiers died at the hands of arrows and blades every day...... Both the offensive and defensive sides paid a lot of price, including more than 4,000 casualties of the Yuan army and nearly 2,000 casualties of the Qingzhou soldiers, but the county town of Pingyuan was still in the hands of Tian Kai and did not change hands.

Gao Ran made a mountain sound in front of Chun Yuqiong, and as a result, the siege was frustrated, so he hated the stubborn Tian Kai even more, and he suggested that Chun Yuqiong put all his troops into the siege battle, and launched an attack on the plain county town from the three directions of the north gate, the west gate and the south gate at the same time, leaving only the east gate for Tian Kai to retreat.

Chun Yuqiong did not take Gao Lan's advice, and he ordered his troops to temporarily stop attacking Pingyuan County, and prepare to wait for Cao Cao's troops and horses in Yanzhou to capture Gao Tang before launching a follow-up attack on Tian Kai. In Chun Yuqiong's view, if Gao Tang is lost, it will definitely greatly deter Tian Kai and force Tian Kai to re-examine the situation, and then maybe he will be able to take the plain smoothly without fighting.

Chun Yuqiong did this, but he couldn't say that he was wrong, but since he could think of Cao Cao's soldiers and horses, he shouldn't let Gao Ran launch a siege battle a few days ago with a fluke mentality. As the main general, the most taboo thing is hesitation and swaying from side to side, and Chun Yuqiong is just such a person.

In Chun Yuqiong's waiting, Xiahoudun led 10,000 soldiers and horses to finally come to the south bank of Jishui, fifty miles east of Lu County, Xiahoudun only needed to lead the army to cross Jishui and travel another eighty miles to the north, and then he would come to the outside of Gaotang County, where Sun Shao was stationed. However, in addition to the arrival of Xiahoudun, the five thousand cavalry led by Xian Yufu also appeared in the country north of Pingyuan County, as long as Xian Yufu was willing, he could appear under Pingyuan City in half a day.

The situation in the plains suddenly became confusing because of the simultaneous appearance of two forces, one south and one north.

When Tian Kai learned that there were thousands of Youzhou cavalry moving near the plain, his confidence was greatly increased, and he encouraged his soldiers and said: "The reinforcements sent by Lord Taifu have arrived near the country, as long as we hold the city and do not come out, the Yuan army will retreat in less than half a month!" ”

Chun Yuqiong learned that there was an abnormal movement in the direction of the Bohai Sea, and hurriedly withdrew his troops to the west for twenty miles, retreated to the territory of Huangxian, and then sent people back to Yecheng to report to Yuan Shao, and did not dare to send troops to attack the plains for the time being.

Although the Youzhou cavalry that appeared in the north of the plain only had a few thousand horsemen, if it went straight to the rear of the army led by Chun Yuqiong and cut off the grain and grass and back road of the Yuan army, the consequences would be unimaginable. Although Chun Yuqiong had never faced the ferocity of the Youzhou cavalry, he did not have the courage to challenge such a strong opponent as the Youzhou cavalry.

After Yuan Shao received the battle report from the front, he scolded Chun Yuqiong and Gao Ran for being incompetent, and he couldn't capture a small plain county town with an army of 30,000. Yuan Shao wanted to continue to increase troops to the plains, but this time he was dissuaded by Tian Feng, Xu You, and Xin Ping at the same time, and Guo Tu was still in Changyi, so no one questioned it.

Xu You suggested to Yuan Shao that he continue to put pressure on Cao Cao in Yanzhou, and let Cao Cao send troops to capture Gaotang County, and the two sides would send troops to attack Tiankai together. Tian Feng thought that Cao Cao would not agree to such a request, so it was better to take advantage of the fact that the casualties of the troops were not large, and quickly withdraw to Jizhou, and not to try Qingzhou again for the time being. Xin Ping continued to suggest to Yuan Shao that he move the administrative office to Jinyang, so that he could not worry about the safety of the nest and could allocate more troops to the Qingzhou war.

Yuan Shao was a little dizzy by the opinions of several strategists, and he now had a feeling that it was difficult to ride a tiger. If Chun Yuqiong was allowed to lead the army to withdraw to Jizhou as soon as the cavalry of the Zhenwu battalion on the Bohai side appeared, it would inevitably seem that he was timid and afraid, but if Chun Yuqiong was allowed to attack the plain desperately, in case the 20,000 soldiers and horses of the Zhenwu battalion poured into the nest and blocked Chun Yuqiong in the plain, it would not be the loss of thousands of dead and wounded soldiers, but the 30,000 main forces that would not return.

After thinking about it, Yuan Shao felt that he was so passive because of his insufficient troops in Jizhou, he did not listen to the persuasion of several strategists, and sent fast horses to Jinyang immediately, and let his nephew Gao Gan lead 20,000 soldiers and horses to Yecheng for reinforcements.

Yuan Shao's idea was that since the Zhenwu battalion dared to make trouble north of the plain, he would mobilize more troops to deal with the Zhenwei battalion left behind in Gaoyi, forcing Xian Yufu to return to Jizhou, so as to alleviate the threat faced by Chun Yuqiong in the direction of the plain.

In a word, Yuan Shao still doesn't want to let go of Tian Kai and doesn't want to give up the territory of Qingzhou. (To be continued......)