A letter was issued from the imperial court to crusade against Liu Biao. When Cao Cao led his army south to Jingzhou to start a war, it still took some time to prepare. However, the mobilization of a large army from the northern front of Yizhou to the south to quell the rebellion is urgent and cannot be delayed at all.

Although the southern part of Yizhou is located in a remote area, and there are barbarians and alien tribes living together, it is the rear of Yizhou after all, which can not only provide a large number of war materials, but also provide high-quality soldiers. If the Sima family loses the southern part of Yizhou, it is tantamount to having their legs cut off, and they will be very sad in the future.

In order to quickly recapture the land of the four counties in the south of Yizhou, Sima Yi urgently transferred 60,000 people from Yan Yan's department, who were originally stationed in the north of Yizhou, to the south of Yizhou, and at the same time recruited troops in the counties under his actual control, and gathered another 100,000 troops, which he gritted his teeth and threw all of them to the eastern front of Yizhou, preparing for the final decisive battle with Liu Biao's subordinates Huang Zhong and Li Yan in Jingzhou.

Yan Yan received Sima Yi's order, did not dare to slack off, and marched day and night with a large army, and in less than a month, he rushed from Langzhong to the northern Mumi area of Yizhou County, and stationed in the north of Lagu and Tanyu Mountain in Nanshan, and the target was directly aimed at Kunze.

This place, named after the grass, grows everywhere a grass called Mumi, which can detoxify. The locals all said: "The mountains are born and pasture, can detoxify, the flowers are prosperous, the birds are eaten by mistake, and the black beak is poisoned, so they must fly to the Mumi Mountain in a hurry, and peck the herd to detoxify." "Mu Mi is located in the upper reaches of Tushui, at the west side of Tanyu Mountain, at the entrance to the north end of Nanshan Valley.

Stationing the army in such a place with mountains, rivers and valleys is enough to see that Yan Yan's marching army is also extraordinary.

Yan Yan was born in Shu and enlisted in the army for many years, so he knew the harm of the rebellion of the southern barbarians, and he was also familiar with some of the methods used by the barbarians to make trouble. In Yan Yan's view, although the barbarians are powerful, they do not understand military affairs and the art of war, as long as they see a large army attacking, they will inevitably carry the looted wealth, and flee from the occupied city into the cottage tribe located in the deep mountains and dense forests, and will never dare to fight in the city. Yizhou County is the richest place among the four southern counties, and it is also the center of the south, as long as you capture important cities such as Kunze and Dianchi in one fell swoop, it is equivalent to completing half of the task.

Yan Yan adopted the strategy of going straight to Kunze, and did not care about the situation in Yongchang and Qiqi and other places, which was also in line with the art of war, but he misestimated the strength of his opponent. Now stationed in Kunze and Dianchi is not a rebellious Southern Barbarian native, but the Southern Route Army led by Tai Shici. Without waiting for Yan Yan's army to arrive at Mu Mi, Wang Lu, who was active in the Yelang area, had already led the right army and horses back to Kunze in advance, while Gan Ning left 10,000 soldiers originally from the Qinghuai Army to stay in Buwei, and he himself led 15,000 foot soldiers to detour through Mu Mi, as if he wanted to cut off Yan Yan's army's back road.

With a calculated and unintentional army, with an army of 70,000 to deal with Yan Yan's 60,000 tired divisions, Tai Shici had absolute confidence and certainty to keep Yan Yan at the foot of Tanyu Mountain this time.

After Yan Yan asked the army to camp in Mu Mi'an, he sent fine work and secret agents to Kunze, Tonglao and Guchang to reconnoitre. A few days later, Xizuo and the secret agents returned one after another to report, saying that at present, Kunze, Tonglao and Guchang are all guarded by barbarian soldiers, and the people entering and leaving the city are very closely checked, as long as they see Han people, they must be strictly questioned, and even ask the people in the city to come forward to claim them. Among the meticulous works and secret agents sent out by Yan Yan, there are a few who are still detained because of their lack of experience in dealing with them, and they don't know when they will be released.

After listening to the reports of the meticulous work and the secret agents, Yan Yan realized that the rebellion against the Nanban entrenched in Kunze and other places this time was not a small fight, so he paid attention to it and deliberately formulated a set of plans to feint and attack Kunze and then set up an ambush halfway to attack Tonglao and Guchang to come to the rescue of Kunze's barbarian soldiers.

Yan Yan was busy here, and Tai Shici was not idle.

At present, Kunze is garrisoned by a heavy division and a light division of the Qinghuai Army, with a total strength of 10,000 troops, and one division each stationed in Tonglao and Guchang, with a number of 5,000. The remaining 10,000 men were stationed separately in the six cities south of the Kunze-Guchang-Tonglao defensive line, with 3,000 troops stationed in Dianchi, 2,000 troops stationed in Yu Yuan, 2,000 troops stationed in Lianran, and the rest garrisoned with 1,000 troops each.

Although there were few garrisons in Kunze City, Wang Lu rushed back in time with 25,000 men, so now there were nearly 40,000 people in the city, and the 60,000 troops defending Yan Yan were enough. But passive defense is obviously not Tai Shici's style, and it can't achieve the combat goal of completely annihilating Yan Yan, so Tai Shici and Li Ru decided on a strategy of "capturing the thief and capturing the king first" after some discussion.

Tai Shici's specific arrangement was to use Kunze City as a bait to attract the main force of Yan Yan's department, and then send the troops of Tonglao and Gu Chang to attack and harass on both flanks, providing cover for the Ganning department that was secretly sneaking day and night. If Yan Yan was in Kunze, then when he heard that Mu Mi had been attacked, he would definitely lead the army to rescue him, so Tai Shi Ci went out of the city, followed behind Yan Yan, blocked him in the valley of Nanshan, and formed a situation of closing the north and south with Gan Ning.

In order to dispel Yan Yan's doubts about the southern Lagu, Tai Shici specially sent a group of 5,000 Jiaozhi soldiers, led by Wang Lu himself, to ambush there, and when Yan Yan led the army to pass by, the ambush soldiers rushed out and hit a few times indiscriminately, and then pretended to be defeated and scattered directly. In this way, Yan Yan would think that the methods of the barbarians were nothing more than that, and he would not be wary of Nanshan Lagu in the future, and it would naturally be easy to fall into the trap reserved by Tai Shici.

Both sides have their own calculations, and everything seems to be going according to their own assumptions.

Yan Yan personally led an army of 50,000 from the narrow Nanshan Valley to Kunze, and the army marched very cautiously all the way, divided into three parts before and after, and maintained a sufficient warning distance between the end and the end.

When the 50,000 army marched to the middle of the valley, it was ambushed by the Nanban soldiers, but unfortunately this ambush was more like a farce organized by a rabble. As soon as the two sides engaged, the Nanban soldiers immediately showed signs of weakness under the fierce counterattack of Yan Yan's army, and after struggling to support for a while, they were defeated.

Seeing the barbarians gradually fleeing away, Yan Yan immediately ordered the troops to stop the pursuit and continue to maintain a solemn formation and advance slowly. Yan Yan was worried that this group of brutes was using a strategy to lure the enemy into depth, so he was extra cautious.

However, to Yan Yan's disappointment, the army never encountered any resistance after that, and walked out of Nanshan Lagu very smoothly, only a few dozen miles away from Kunze City.