In contrast to the temporary return to calm in the western part of the Han Dynasty, people in Qingzhou and Xuzhou felt the suffocating tension when the war was approaching.

Xuzhou Mu Taoqian, who had lived for eight years longer than in the historical record, finally couldn't stand the urging of the years and died of illness half a month ago. Tao Qian's departure made the already tense situation in Xuzhou even more tense.

Xuzhou was originally nominally governed by Tao Qian, but Zhao Xing was supporting him, and the imperial court was very interested in not depriving Tao Qian of his position. Because as long as Zhao Xing supports Tao Qian for a day, other people will not dare to go to Xuzhou to pick up Tao Qian's class, the same reason as Liu Yan did not dare to go to Yizhou to pick up Yizhou Mu.

Now that Tao Qian is hanging, the imperial court can't pretend not to know no matter what, and then sit back and watch Zhao Xing directly send his officials to Xuzhou to serve as the state pastor. The problem is that the example of Beneficial Prefecture is placed, if the Xuzhou Mu appointed by the imperial court is put aside by Zhao Xing again, it will be the face of the imperial court that will be smoked in the end.

When the court in Luoyang was still arguing about whether to appoint Xuzhou Mu and who to appoint as Xuzhou Mu, news suddenly came from the Jin Kingdom: The position of Tao Qian in Xuzhou was held by Chen Qi, the former minister of the Pi State who was highly respected!

was ready to roll up his sleeves and start fighting, Zhao Xingcai didn't have time to talk nonsense with everyone, and directly appointed Chen Qi to Xuzhou to serve as the state pastor.

The news of Zhao Xing's appointment of Chen Qi as the pastor of Xuzhou immediately caused a lot of criticism from the government and the opposition, but it was only limited to the four prefectures and counties that the imperial court actually controlled.

After Chen Jue arrived, the first thing he did was to "join" with Liu Dai, the Mu of Qingzhou, to issue a statement on the recapture of Qingzhou and Xuzhou, which had been occupied by the imperial court for many years for no reason. In fact, this statement is no different from the declaration of war, but it is still righteous and strict, so that people can't find anything wrong.

Since Yuan Shao and Cao Cao sent troops to Qingzhou a few years ago, and Cao Cao, Liu Yan and Yuan Shu sent troops to Xuzhou, one-third of Qingzhou's territory is now actually controlled by Cao Cao, and nearly a quarter of Xuzhou's territory has been annexed by Yuzhou and Yangzhou, and has never been returned to Tao Qian.

At the beginning, after Zhao Xing sent troops to help Kong Rong and Tao Qian drive away several troops that invaded Qingxu, he did not take advantage of the situation to recapture all the occupied territories, mainly because these places were close to Yanzhou, Yuzhou and Yangzhou, and had been firmly occupied by his own forces, and if they were attacked, they would cause large casualties among their own forces.

At that time, the strength of the Jin State was limited, and it was the limit to be able to gain a firm foothold in Qingzhou and Xuzhou, if the support capacity of the Jin State at that time was ignored and a large number of troops were forcibly recruited, it would cause great pressure on the people everywhere, not to mention the development and consolidation of Liangguo, Youzhou, Jizhou and Qingxu in the past few years.

If we disregard our own actual ability to bear the burden of military force, we will eventually fall into a vicious circle and eventually lead to the road of destruction. It is precisely because Zhao Xing understands the power of this, so he has been adopting a steady and steady strategy, while opening up the territory, while developing and governing, and finally it is getting bigger and bigger like a snowball, and now it has reached the point where it can sweep all states.

Since they can sweep through all states, then the civil and military generals under Zhao Xing don't have to look at other people's faces to act, just find a suitable reason, and fight first!

Xiahoudun and Cao Ren, who were entrenched in the west and south of Qingzhou, would not give up the gateway from Qingzhou to Yanzhou just because Liu Dai made a few harshly worded statements, so Zhao Yun had no choice but to send a large army to snatch these portals from Xiahoudun and Cao Ren.

Zhang Fei and Xiahou Yuan, who were blocking the Jiangdong Army's road to Nanyang, would also not allow Sun Ce to easily cross the entire territory of Yuzhou with his troops, so Sun Ce had no choice but to lead the army to carve out a road from Zhang Fei and Xiahou Yuan's hands.

As an ally of Jiangdong, the Jin State naturally would not sit idly by and watch Sun Ce fall into the north-south attack of the two armies of Zhang Fei and Xiahou Yuan, so he sent Xiong Zhenjun to support Sun Ce. Of course, Han Rong, who was in Yangzhou, would not sit idly by and watch Zhang Fei's army being besieged by the Jiangdong Army and Xiong Zhen's army, so he sent a large army to support Zhang Fei. As soon as Yangzhou's soldiers and horses moved, Liu Biao, who was in Jingzhou, immediately sent a force to Jiangxia to attack Huangzu, which directly threatened the safety of Yangzhou.

The land of Jianghuai, which was originally somewhat intricate, because the armies of all walks of life fell into the battle situation with each other, suddenly became a mixture of wind and thunder, and thousands of horses were together.

The 40,000 Donglai army led by Gao Shun first targeted Cao Ren's department in Laiwu, and Cao Ren also urgently mobilized Li Dian and Yu Ban, two troops responsible for flank cover, to gather in Laiwu, and put on a posture of fighting to the death with the Donglai army.

The Donglai army had 40,000 infantry, while the Cao Ren army had 50,000 infantry, and the two sides were basically equal in terms of strength comparison. Cao Ren's army was the main defender, and Gao Shun's army was the main attack, so Gao Shun's side suffered a little more.

As soon as the two warring sides had already put a large amount of gunpowder into use on the battlefield, they no longer hid their own large firearms, pushing the battle to a fever pitch. When the battle between the two armies was fierce, a mercenary army of 20,000 people was sent to Gao Shun by Zhao Yun, and these 20,000 people were from the prisoner of war camp in Yanzhou, all of them were natives of Sanhan Island.

Gao Shun pushed 20,000 men to the front of the battlefield to attract and consume the firepower of Cao Ren's army, but he himself took 20,000 elite infantry to detour to the south of Laiwu, cutting off the way for Cao Ren's army to retreat in the direction of Yanzhou, and also cutting off the logistics supply line to replenish Cao Ren's army with grain and grass from the direction of Chenliu.

Seeing that the army was deeply caught in Gao Shun's front and rear attacks, Cao Ren immediately commanded the army to break through to the west and withdraw the main force to Mu County, which was considered to have escaped, but still paid more than 10,000 casualties.

Taking advantage of the fact that the Qingzhou Army transferred the main force to Laiwu to fight Cao Ren, Xiahoudun suddenly led an army of 50,000 stationed in Gaotang to seize most of Pingyuan County, and then marched into Jinan and directly threatened Linzi City. The defensive strength of Linzi City was mainly 20,000 Flying Tiger Army, which was not superior, so Zhao Yun secretly contacted Lu Bu of the Jizhou Legion, and the Jizhou Legion sent the Black Mountain Army south to Anping Kingdom and went straight to the back of the Xiahoudun Army.

As soon as the Montenegrin army moved, Zhu Jun, who was originally stationed in Yecheng, immediately took action, and he sent 30,000 infantry to advance westward, guarding behind Xiahoudun's army, intending to stop the Montenegrin army heading south. Yecheng's 60,000 troops dispatched 30,000, and there were still 30,000 garrisoned, but the Xiongwu Army and the Liaodong Army saw the opportunity, so the 60,000 troops of the two armies cooperated with each other to force Yecheng, which made Zhu Jun feel dangerous.

Because the various troops involved in the war were equipped with a large amount of gunpowder, the battles that took place in various places were more tragic than before, and although the overall combat strength of the Jin armies was superior to that of the imperial court, the casualties of the various armies still increased uncontrollably and rapidly.