"General, let's go." Gao Ran persuaded that he had seen the current situation clearly, unless a team of men and horses descended from the sky and stopped the pace of Cao's army, and then the Jizhou army could reduce its losses.

The Cao army outside the city had tens of thousands of horses, which was far from being comparable to the army in the city.

Ma Chao's first reaction when he got the news was to flee immediately, the disparity between the enemy and us was huge, and he resisted to the death, because he didn't know, Ma Chao clearly remembered Jia Rong's advice before leaving, and after gathering the soldiers and horses, he immediately ran away, and he didn't even say hello, this is not that Ma Chao is not kind, the situation on the battlefield is changing rapidly, and if he is not careful, he will die, not to mention that Ma Chao also shoulders the lives of tens of thousands of soldiers, and the responsibility is heavy.

The speed at which the Xiliang army gathered, if Wen Chou and Gao Ran were here, they would definitely be surprised, and in just a few moments, the cavalry and infantry were ready, and the cavalry wrapped the infantry in the middle, in case the situation changed, they could react at any time, and began to retreat in an orderly manner.

It wasn't until he walked out of the plain county town that Ma Chao breathed a sigh of relief.

Ma Chao escaped, but the Jizhou army in the city suffered, the Cao army entered the city with 30,000 soldiers and horses, and the two sides were in full swing in the city, the Jizhou army that had just woken up and the Cao army who were like wolves and tigers.

Seeing the continuous deaths and injuries of the soldiers under his command, Gao Ran felt the corners of his eyes constantly beating, grabbed a soldier and said, "What about the Xiliang Army?" ”

It is said that in such a while, the Xiliang army should have heard the news and came to support, so that the Jizhou army can also have more soldiers to withdraw from the city, and the current situation, if Ma Chao leads the army to join the battle, it is not impossible to influence the battlefield situation.

"The villain just went to explore the military camp of the Xiliang Army and found that there was no one anymore." The soldier replied truthfully.

Gao Ran let go of the hand that grabbed the soldier, and his heart was full of mixed feelings, and the motivation to support him to fight may be the reinforcements of the Xiliang Army, but he didn't expect that this pillar had fled without righteousness.

"Withdraw." Gao Ran said to Wen Chou.

"Withdraw." Wen Chou shouted loudly.

The Jizhou army that withdrew from the city was only more than 5,000 people, and most of them were wounded, and the attack of the Cao army at night surprised them at the same time, and at the same time, they did not have much combat power.

After only an hour of walking, Wen Chou met Ma Chao, and was about to step forward to scold, but was caught by Gao Ran, and the current situation is that the Xiliang Army and the Cao Army are stronger than them, if there is any conflict, the unlucky Jizhou Army is still the Jizhou Army.

"General Ma is not in the city, why is he here? The changes in the city just now, I guess General Ma also knew about it, right? Gao Lanpi said with a smile.

Ma Chao naturally heard the meaning of Gao Lan's words, as a military general, he didn't want to be looked down upon, but this was still a little insignificant compared to the lives of the soldiers under his command, and he would never understand the importance of a low-level soldier if he didn't enter the Xiliang Army.

"The things in the city, this general also has something wrong, but the city is in chaos, this general is also a last resort, I hope the two generals can see clearly, I will definitely tell King Liang according to the truth after I go back, no matter what kind of punishment, Ma Chao is willing." Ma Chao hugged his fists.

The earnestness between the words did not make Wen Chou Gao Lan feel anything, and his gaze at Ma Chao became a little hateful, you are a member of the Xiliang Army, you have not lost the soldiers and horses, and you will naturally be rewarded after you go back, and the Jizhou Army has suffered countless losses, after the two of them went back, they were not only punished, the fall of Pingyuan County meant that the Jizhou Army completely lost control in Qingzhou, and Yuan Shao ceded Zhuo County to the Xiliang Army before.

In the past, the Jizhou army may be a little unconvinced, and the Cao army is a long time, but the current situation does not allow Yuan Shao to be presumptuous, Cao Cao's soldiers and horses will only be more than Yuan Shao, not less, Cao Cao occupies more places, it is easier to provide supplements for the army, how can he be afraid of Yuan Shao's revenge.

After Ma Chao returned to Chang'an, after telling everything that happened on this trip, he went back to rest, running around the battlefield repeatedly, which made him excited and a little tired at the same time.

There is no need for Ma Chao to tell him, Jia Rong has already learned about a series of changes in Qingzhou through intelligence, but he didn't expect Yuan Shao's shili in Qingzhou to be completely disintegrated so quickly, and after Qingzhou was in Cao Cao's hands, it was not only Yuan Shao's strength that was weakened.

Jia Rong rubbed his head, let's talk about it later, the most important thing at present is to develop its strength as soon as possible, let Xiliang Bank blossom and bear fruit in the entire land of Shenzhou, and let the money in the hands of the princes continue to move closer to Chang'an.

The expansion of Xiliang Bank was at the moment when the war of the princes had just been extinguished, after the war, neither Yuan Shao nor Cao Cao did not want to offend the Xiliang Army, but in the face of the establishment of the Xiliang Bank, Cao Cao still implemented a series of measures, one of which was to form a bank belonging to Cao Jun, named Yanzhou Bank, which also opened the Bank of Xuzhou in Xuzhou, the Bank of Yuzhou in Yuzhou, and the Bank of Qingzhou, in short, the bank under the rule of Cao Jun, like mushrooms after a rain, rose from the ground.

Cao Cao also followed the example of the system in the bank, moving out the set of the Xiliang Army, printing paper money, etc.

But who do merchants trust more, not to mention the merchants who run around the counties of the Han Dynasty, that is, the families in the city, it seems that under Cao Cao's high pressure, after buying some banknotes, he quietly bought some Xiliang Bank banknotes with other money, for no other reason, some businessmen are under Cao Jun's policy to accept Cao Jun's banknotes, but secretly they don't, you take money to buy things, it's not an uncle at all, and it depends on the face of the merchant, unless you take out the banknotes of Xiliang Bank, or cash.

However, when the banknote you took out was from Xiliang Bank, the merchant immediately changed his face, carefully checked the banknote in his hand, and accepted it with confidence, and the guest became the uncle.

Such a situation soon spread in various cities, and the establishment of the bank under Cao Cao indirectly provided an opportunity for the development of the Western Liang Army.

Cao Cao repeatedly wanted to destroy the Xiliang Bank in the city, but finally endured it, and when Xun You went to Chang'an to form an alliance with the Xiliang Army, Jia Rong had a Cao army that could not stop the development of the Xiliang Bank for any reason, and if it was found, the covenant would be invalid immediately.

On the battlefield of Qingzhou, the appearance of the Xiliang Army once made Cao Cao angry, but in the end, the performance of the Xiliang Army made Cao Cao's treacherous plan succeed, but his anger against Jia Rong was reduced a lot.

Roughly the same as in history, when Zhang Song came to Cao Cao's rule, the treatment he received was very different from that of Chang'an, and even when Cao Cao received Zhang Song, many ministers looked at him and pointed at him, obviously amused by Zhang Song's appearance, and completely looked at him as a monkey.

Faced with such a situation, Zhang Song was already angry in his heart, how to say that he was also a person who was received by King Liang in Chang'an.

After Cao Cao came forward, he was not very interested in Zhang Song, and there were a lot of disdainful words between his words, the ancients attached importance to talent, but also attached importance to appearance, like Pang Tong, talented, but he could never be reused, because his appearance was too bad.

Then Zhang Song did not give up and went to Liu Biao and Yuan Shao's account, but they were all looked at, and Zhang Song decided to set off for Chang'an again.

Time flies, in a blink of an eye, two years have passed, the ninth year of Xingping, is destined to be an extraordinary year, although Liu Biao became the emperor, changed the year name, but the princes did not buy it much, for Liu Biao to give the title, is also noncommittal.

After two years of recuperation, the Xiliang army has achieved unprecedented development, the standing strength is still 150,000 people, Chang'an Luoyang has been built incomparably prosperous, the population of the two cities combined, and now there are 600,000 people, every time the market is opened, the traffic is busy, the pedestrians rub shoulders, so lively.

In the past two years, although the princes have also had some small frictions, they have not moved much, and there are no tens of thousands of soldiers and horses, and the people have achieved a short period of peace.

In the craftsman's workshop, Jia Rong stared at the things in front of him with blazing eyes, and could not move away, after seeing this thing from the hands of an artist who walked the rivers and lakes, Jia Rong immediately organized talents to conduct research, coupled with the advanced knowledge of later generations, and studied the gunpowder, which Jia Rong had forgotten.

However, the production of this kind of explosives, the danger is a little high, a few days ago, there was a package of explosives exploded, that momentum, directly overturned a hut where the explosives were researched, or Liang Wangfu came forward, explained, only to stop the speech.

After two years of recuperation, the Xiliang army will definitely use force, with the help of gunpowder, it will become easier to seize the city, no matter how strong the city gate is, can it withstand being bombarded by several bags of gunpowder together, Jia Rong seems to have seen the princes trembling under the power of gunpowder.

The research of gunpowder began immediately, and Jia Rong naturally hoped that the power of gunpowder would be as great as possible, and the stability requirements were also very high, and it was best to study gunpowder that could explode in water.

These things Jia Rong said are a bit ahead of their time, anyway, the craftsmen don't understand that gunpowder can explode in water.

This is also Jia Rong taking care of them, otherwise it would be more difficult for them to let them study the pistol grenade.

The development of gunpowder is very simple, but the power is worth the test, with the formula of later generations, the power must have increased dramatically, but will the ancients understand this.

This time, Jia Rong aimed at Jizhou, although Yuan Shao has not made any moves against the Xiliang Army, but such an enemy is around, it always makes people feel a little uneasy, if they can remove Yuan Shao of Jizhou, and then occupy Jizhou, it is of great significance to the development of the Xiliang Army, unlike Liangzhou and other places that are barren themselves, Jizhou has always been the Han Dynasty's grain Dazhou businessmen are very many, but it is also a family of families, Yuan Shao IV and the name of the third duke, just to be able to win over the family, As a result, Jizhou was easily controlled in his hands, and he got benefits under Yuan Shao, and the family naturally would not make trouble.