One thing to say, Cao Xiu sometimes does things, which is indeed quite lacking in morality.

He knew that Gao Tanglong was just a scholar, who was good at governing politics and did not know the art of war, but he only left him 2,000 soldiers and asked him to stick to Shangcai and collect the defeated soldiers. This is basically equivalent to giving up Gao Tanglong directly.

Cao Xiu never thought that Gao Tanglong would be able to return to Shangcai alive.

Cao Xiu is quite unkind, but Gao Tanglong does not regret it.

Gao Tanglong has Gao Tanglong's insistence, let him abandon the land and flee for his life, he can't do it, let him ignore the life and death of the soldiers, he can't do it.

Gao Tanglong really doesn't understand military affairs, but he understands people's hearts, and he knows how important it is to hold on to hope in such a situation of defeat and flight.

Gao Tanglong is a Confucian with his own values and persistence, and he is also a true Confucian who is willing to practice his own values and persistence.

Therefore, Gao Tanglong stayed in Yingyang without complaint, with 2,000 soldiers, while holding the city, while collecting the defeated troops who fled to Yingyang from all over the country.

As for Cao Xiu's eagerness to rush back to Shangcai, Gao Tanglong did not mean to complain about Cao Xiu.

The important geographical location of Shangcai, even if Gao Tanglong doesn't understand military affairs, he will always look at the map.

Therefore, Cao Xiu was in a hurry to rush back to Shangcai to hold on, Gao Tanglong still understood, that place really couldn't be lost.

It's just that Gao Tanglong is also a little worried about the ability of the enemy commander, since he can force General Cao Xiu to this point, will he just leave Shang Cai alone?!

You must know that after Gao Tanglong led the troops to Yingyang, Shangcai was really just an empty city.

Regarding this point, in fact, Lu Xun, the coach of the Eastern Wu Army, did not think of it, but thought of it, but did not do it.

Because of the sudden appearance of the Wei army in Yingyang, Lu Xun could not determine how many troops Cao Xiu had left behind in Runan, and whether there were enough troops left behind in other counties like Yingyang.

Although this situation is unlikely to be extrapolated from the information obtained before the war, Lu Xun must take into account that he is already fighting in Runan, and it is an away battle for the Eastern Wu army, so he cannot take it lightly.

No one dares to say that intelligence is 100% accurate, especially when playing away from home, you have to think a little more.

Moreover, for Lu Xun, the biggest task at present is to kill or capture as many soldiers of the Wei army as possible on the line from Ruyin to Yingyang.

As long as Cao Wei's defensive forces are completely defeated in this battle, then when he attacks other counties in Runan next, Lu Xun will have enough troops at hand to push all the way.

And if before the start of the operation to encircle and suppress Cao Xiu, Lu Xun divided his troops to attack other Runan counties, and there was no enough certainty that he could directly attack Shangcai, and if there were more troops, there would be a loophole in encircling Cao Xiu.

Therefore, after thinking about it, Lu Xun decided to adopt a more conservative approach, first solve Cao Xiu, and then take advantage of Cao Xiu's defeat to attack the rest of the counties in Runan.

And this gave Cao Xiu the opportunity to lead his troops to march in a hurry and rush back to Shangcai.

The journey back to Shangcai from Yingyang is closer than the distance from Ruyin to Shangcai, and Cao Xiu can directly withdraw his troops back to Shangcai, and the counties along the way are still under the control of the Wei army, but Lu Xun sent troops from Ruyin, and he had to fight one county after another, and it was impossible to bypass these counties and fight Cai directly.

In this way, Cao Xiu still rushed ahead of Lu Xun and led 13,000 soldiers back to Shangcai, and at this time, Lu Xun had already broken the three counties of Xincai, Pingyu and Baoxin, and was only separated by one Ruyang County from Shangcai.

Cao Xiu was very glad that he rushed back to Shangcai before Lu Xun, but the problem is still very serious.

After Lu Xun joined the three-way army of Xu Sheng, Ding Feng, and Sun Sheng, the total strength had reached more than 50,000 people, while Cao Xiu only had 13,000 defenders at hand, and it was a defeated army that had just experienced a major defeat, and the morale of the army was very low.

Although it is said that Shangcai is the nest of Cao Xiu for many years, all kinds of city defense measures are very strong. But even the strongest walls need to be guarded by soldiers.

A defeated army is a defeated army after all, even if it is protected by the city wall, in the absence of sufficient combat will and morale, Cao Xiu does not dare to guarantee that his more than 10,000 soldiers can still hold Shangcai in the face of nearly four times the enemy's siege.

For this reason, Cao Xiu arranged for Cai Chengfang while hurriedly repairing two letters.

One letter was for Jiang Ji, hoping that Jiang Ji would persuade Jia Kui to make a little noise in Guangling County as much as possible, and force the Eastern Wu Army to divide troops to go to Guangling County to rescue.

At this time, Cao Xiu didn't know the predicament Jia Kui was facing, and he was still wondering, could it be that Jia Kui was so cautious, seeing that he was defeated, he was still standing still on the border of Pengcheng State, and he didn't have any ideas in the face of Guangling County, which was empty in defense? !

Cao Xiu himself has no face to write to Jia Kui again.

First, the relationship between the two is not good, everyone knows this, Cao Xiu has already bowed his head once, and he doesn't want to bow down a second time.

Two. This time, Cao Xiu was defeated again, and he had to rely on Jia Kui to send troops to relieve himself, and Cao Xiu felt a little too embarrassed for this kind of thing.

Therefore, asking Jiang Ji as an intermediary is the best way.

And the second letter, Cao Xiu wrote to his friend Wang Ling.

Cao Xiu hoped that Wang Ling could assign another 5,000 soldiers to himself to help him guard Shangcai.

After all, once Shangcai is lost, the Eastern Wu army will control the passage to Yingchuan County, and at that time, Yingchuan County will face pressure from both Shu and Wu.

Therefore, holding Shangcai is actually reducing the pressure on Yingchuan County.

Although Cao Xiu also knew that he had just lost the 10,000 county soldiers sent by Yingchuan County to support him, there were not many county soldiers in Yingchuan County at this time.

But Cao Xiu can't help it, he has to defend Shangcai, and it's better to ask his friends for soldiers than to ask Jia Kui.

Cao Xiu really didn't expect Jia Kui to help him much, he could send troops to Guangling to attract the Eastern Wu army to divide his troops, that was already the limit, after all, it was a little too far away.

But Yingchuan County is still very close to Runan County, and Cao Xiu also feels that Wang Ling will not refuse his request.

Then Wang Ling directly rejected Cao Xiu.

It's really not that he Wang Ling doesn't give face, and it's not that he can't see the situation in Runan County now. Cao Xiu didn't know that the current situation in Yingchuan County was actually not much better.

Now the Shu thieves have gathered 90,000 people in Nanyang County, and they are besieging Wancheng, but Danfan has divided his troops into 20,000 troops, sent troops from Xinye, and came to attack Yingchuan County, Wang Ling has to be so anxious that he jumps.

The standing army of Yingchuan County has a total of 20,000 soldiers, and he has already lent Cao Xiu 10,000 troops, if he lends another 5,000 people, he will rely on 5,000 Yingchuan County soldiers to resist the attack of 20,000 Shu thieves, what good thing do you want? !

Therefore, in this case, Wang Ling would never dare to lend troops to Cao Xiu again.

Moreover, Wang Ling is not the kind of mediocre general who only looks at the eyes and does not look at the future, he must take into account the battle situation in the entire southern part of the Central Plains.

90,000 Shu thieves attacked Wancheng in Nanyang County, and judging from the military newspaper, General Cao Zhen's counter-attack plan also seemed to have encountered a setback, and Guo Huai in the right Fufeng area had taken a defensive position.

If Sima Yi can no longer withstand the strong attack of the Shu thieves, and Wuguan is attacked by the Shu thieves. You must have enough troops at hand to deal with the terrible situation after the fall of Wancheng.

Once Wancheng is lost, then the only person who can block the Shu thieves from marching into Luoyang in the first time is Wang Ling, who is in Yingchuan County.

Therefore, now Wang Ling, who is seriously short of troops, is thinking about how to conjure up more troops. As a result, you Cao Xiu wrote a letter to say that he had suffered a big defeat, and the 10,000 Yingchuan soldiers suffered heavy losses, not to mention, and asked me to borrow another 5,000 people?!

Wang Ling didn't reply to the letter and broke off his friendship with Cao Xiu, which can be regarded as a representative of a good temper and good recuperation.

But no matter what, Cao Xiu's defeat, the 10,000 soldiers lent out will definitely not come back, the most troublesome is Cao Xiu's side, if Shangcai loses again, Yingchuan County may face the situation of Shu and Wu armies.

Then it is all the more necessary to have enough troops.

For this reason, Wang Ling also began to write letters.

Wang Ling has a lot of letters to write.

The first letter was addressed to the Son of Heaven in Luoyang.

Cao Xiu was defeated, and Yingchuan lost 10,000 county soldiers, so he had to give an explanation to the Son of Heaven. Calling the local county soldiers to fight is not a big deal, Wang Ling has this right, but it is not good to call Cao Xiu to fight in Huainan, it is out of the jurisdiction to fight, and it is good to say that he has won, but now that he is defeated, Wang Ling must plead guilty to the Son of Heaven.

It's a matter of attitude.

The second letter was sent back to Cao Xiu, informing Cao Xiu of his current predicament, not to mention borrowing troops, he was now in a predicament of insufficient troops.

The third letter was written to Sima Yi in Wancheng.

Tell Sima one thing - if Wancheng can't hold it, he must give him a signal in advance, so that he can have the opportunity to send troops to meet Sima Yi and block the passage of Shu thieves north into Luoyang.

Fourth. It's not one letter, it's seven or eight letters.

This is written by Wang Ling to the families of all over Yingchuan, and asked these families to gather in Xuchang together.

There's no way, the troops are not enough, I can only think of a way to Yingchuan from these families, but where there are many families, defending Yingchuan is also protecting these families.

At the time of Chengping, your family enjoyed the benefits of Great Wei, and now that Yingchuan is in trouble, you should come up with something somewhat, right?!

Don't really want to fool Wang Ling casually, don't forget, he is the nephew of Situ Wang Yun of the Great Han Dynasty, and he is also a big family.

It's all a fox on a hill, and no one should talk to anyone about fasting.

(End of chapter)