The sun of early April has lifted the veil of spring warmth, revealing its fiery face, spewing out enthusiasm and scorching the earth.

When the eastern sky was only showing the whiteness of the fish's belly, the war was already over.

On the land east of Ziyun Mountain, within several square kilometers, burning vehicles, broken shields, weapons, banners, and fallen corpses can be seen everywhere.

No one wins this battle, they are all losers.

Shen Chen lost to the elite of the Yellow Gate Pavilion and lost almost one-third, and almost all of the rest were injured, including Shen Chen himself.

Cao Cao lost and was defeated.

Yes.

He was defeated.

This ambush is already the limit for Cao Cao, it is best to be able to eliminate Shen Chen in a short period of time, once he is supported by Shen Chen, then he himself will have to collapse.

So under the charge of Gan Ning's chariot, Cao Cao's infantry basically dispersed, and he could only lead the cavalry to flee north.

Many people think that since the enemy is strong and I am weak, why should we choose to pursue?

Because the pursuit of the enemy when the army retreats is the best time to expand the results of the battle, the great man once said, "It is better to chase the poor with the remaining bravery, and not to become famous and learn from the overlord."

Fu Jian was beaten to the door of the house by Huan Wen, and when Huan Wen withdrew his troops, Fu Jian still dared to chase him out and defeat the Jin army.

Zhuge Liang came out of Qishan and provoked Sima Yi so much, Sima Yi avoided the battle. As a result, when Zhuge Liang retreated, Sima Yi dared to start the pursuit, is he a psychopath and mentally retarded? ⑧①ZW.?? m

So it's the same thing.

Shen Chen studied the feasibility of pursuing Cao Cao, and decided to pursue it because he thought that he could pursue it.

The pursuit had two strategic objectives.

The first is to expand the results of the war, if Cao Cao's army on the southern front can be disabled, after Guandu starts fighting, his resistance to continue to harass Xu Du in the north will be reduced.

The second is to stabilize the defensive line, only if the strength of Cao's army is weakened, they will not have extra troops to go south to deal with him, otherwise if Cao Cao is allowed to retreat, after ten days and a half months, after he has rested, he will come back to attack Kunyang.

And there are five more reasons why it can be pursued.

First, Cao Jun has been fighting hard day after day these days, and he is extremely tired, and his morale and morale are not very stable.

The second is that the soldiers and horses led by Cao Cao are not his main elite, his main force is now in Guandu, and most of the soldiers under his command are recruited by Li Tong in Runan, and their own quality is worrying, and the will to fight should not be too strong.

The third is that even if Cao Cao sets up an ambush, the intensity will never be as fierce as a few days ago, but it may be because of "one blow, then decline, and three exhaustions", once defeated, it can turn defeat into victory.

Fourth, on the way to the march and retreat, once Cao's army was attacked, the formation could not be completely opened, and at that time, they would encounter Cao Cao's rear army at most, and there was little resistance.

Fifth, and the most important point, that is, Cao Cao was in a hurry to go back to defend Yuzhou to prevent Sun Ce from leading his troops north.

Compared with Shen Chen's thousands of men and horses compared to Sun Ce's tens of thousands, it is self-evident who is more threatening, so it is very likely that Cao Cao himself does not have much will to fight.

For example, just like Zhang Xiu's pursuit of Cao Cao was defeated, but Cao Cao did not annihilate him, but was in a hurry to return to Xudu to defend the north.

Under the threat of a stronger enemy, the threat level of a weaker enemy is not so high, Cao Cao is a very smart person, and it is natural to grasp who is the main contradiction and who is the secondary contradiction first.

Therefore, all things considered, Shen Chen thought that now that Cao Cao could not determine when Yuan Shao would go south and when Sun Ce would go north, if the pursuit delayed him for even one more minute, Cao Cao would have to be frightened for a minute, and the odds of victory were very high.

It's a pity that Cao Cao's military ability is really strong, and when the soldiers are tired and they are still leading second- and third-line troops, they still make arrangements, giving Shen Chen's army huge casualties.

This also made Shen Chen clearly realize that Cao Cao, as a hero who could achieve great things, his personal military ability was undoubtedly a very top existence and should not be underestimated.

By daylight on the second day, Li Tong, Cao Hong, Xiahou Yuan and others had gathered their rout, and there were only more than 16,000 left in the original 20,000 troops, of which 4,000 were either killed or missing, and there were also many wounded, and they returned to Xudu in disgrace.

Shen Chen and Gan Ning also retreated back to Kunyang, and after the war, statistics show that from the time Guanyang sent troops to fight Cao Hong to the present, Gan Ning's troops were originally 7,000 people, but now there are less than 5,000 left, about 4,800 people.

The casualty rate of the soldiers in Huangmenting was even greater, reaching 9 out of 10, and the casualty rate reached 1 third, leaving only 1,900 of the 3,000 people.

In half a year, they have lost more than 3,000 horses.

But the results were also remarkable.

In the battle of Yexian, they eliminated more than 2,000 Cao troops, and in the battles of Kunyang and Wuyang, they killed and captured more than 3,000 Cao troops, and beheaded the Kunyang defender, Cao Cao's chief Shi Liu Dai; Wuyang guarded the general, and later Cao Wei light car general Wang Zhong.

Linying ambushed Xiahou Yuan and killed hundreds of people. Fighting Cao Cao again, attacking the city for days and the battle of Ziyun Mountain last night, the casualties and missing of Cao's army have been close to 10,000 people, which is a great loss for Cao Cao, who is currently in urgent need of guarding against Yuan Shao, Sun Ce and others.

After Cao Cao went back, because of the defeat in the attack on Kunyang, all kinds of messy things came up, and Xu Du himself had an undercurrent, a bunch of trivialities, which made him very headache, so he could only sit in Xu Du first to stabilize the situation.

And the last time he attacked Shen Chen, Cao Cao thought that he was too hasty and didn't solve many problems.

Therefore, it is also necessary to immediately rest the team and adjust the state of the soldiers.

It's just that although he really wanted to try to attack Shen Chen again after reorganizing his troops and horses, due to Sun Ce's threat, he had to send Li Tong back to Runan to guard against Jiangdong.

At the same time, Xiahou Yuan was stationed in Xiangcheng and Cao Hong was stationed in Linying, and Manzhong was transferred from Xincai to Dingying, and the southern defense line was reconstructed.

Now for Cao Cao, it is already a great headwind, internal and external troubles, and enemies on all sides.

Henan itself is the land of four wars, Nanyang has not been pacified because he can't control the lower half of his body, Yuan Shao's army is about to go south, and Jiangdong is in danger of sneaking up on Xudu, which makes him anxious and tired of coping.

But it's not entirely without good news.

Zhong Xuan in Guanzhong wrote a letter to help him persuade Han Sui and Ma Teng to send protons to Xudu to submit to Cao Cao. At the same time, he also sent 2,000 war horses, which helped him increase the number of cavalry by 2,000.

This matter has a certain strategic significance for Cao Cao, that is, at least he is worried about Yuan Shao, Liu Biao, Sun Ce, and he does not have to worry about the princes of Guanzhong coming to get involved again.

It's just that the top priority now is to deal with the threat of Yuan Shao and Sun Ce, and the temporary stability of Guanzhong can only be regarded as better than nothing, and it is not as important as two thousand war horses.

However, if the fact that Guanzhong is stable and has 2,000 war horses can only be regarded as a small piece of good news, then another piece of news is great joy.

In June, an incident reached Xu Du, which made Cao Cao so happy that he dreamed sweetly for several days.

Sun Ce has been assassinated!

At the beginning of last month, Sun Ce really went out hunting alone as Guo Jia expected, but was attacked by Xu Gong's doormen, although he did not die at the time, but not long after he returned, he died of serious injuries.

There was panic within Sun Ce's forces.

Zhou Yu, Zhang Zhao and others immediately responded, first keeping the mourning secret, and then united with the four generals of Jiangdong and other generals and strategists loyal to the Sun clan to support Sun Quan, who was only nineteen years old, and inherited his position in front of Sun Ce's spirit.

It wasn't until the end of May that the news came out, and for a time the entire Jiangdong was shaken, and Sun Quan, who had just succeeded to the throne, was suddenly in the midst of internal and external troubles and faced huge challenges.

You must know that Sun Ce was able to pacify Jiangdong by relying on his murderous nature to forcibly make countless small princes in Jiangdong submit.

But who are you, Sun Quan, who also want us to be obedient?

As a result, there were countless people who did not obey Sun Quan's orders, those who seized the localities, and those who fled north.

Not only those external forces in Jiangdong County, but also within the Sun family.

For example, Sun Fu and Sun Wei of the clan, both of whom are Sun Jian's nephews and Sun Quan's cousins, both have the intention of rebelling and seizing power.

There is also the Lujiang Taishou Li Shu appointed by Sun Ce, he was respectful and respectful when Sun Ce was there, and as soon as Sun Ce died, he immediately had the idea of rebellion and secession, and he almost ignored Sun Quan's orders.

Therefore, the current Jiangdong can be said to be in a mess.

After learning the news, Cao Cao almost laughed and immediately transferred Li Tong from Yang'an to Xiping.

In this way, he only needs to guard against Shen Chen and Zhang Xiu in Nanyang, and he doesn't need to think about the issue of Jiangdong going north.

I have to say that some people may really be the children of destiny.

Many people say that Liu Xiu is invincible.

But Cao Cao is not bad.

Occupying Yanzhou, a land of four wars, there are enemies everywhere, even if they coerce the Son of Heaven to order the princes, they are only slightly stronger.

On the eve of Guandu, his situation was very bad. Yuan Shao in the north and Liu Cousin Sun Ce in the south all wanted to come to him for trouble.

As a result, just when he was anxious, the four counties of Jingnan rebelled, and Liu Biao was forced to go to the south to quell the rebellion.

Three enemies are directly one less, and the pressure drops sharply.

And just as Yuan Shao went south and Sun Ce went north, Sun Ce was assassinated again, which suddenly turned the hell difficulty into a difficult difficulty.

By the time it was time for Guandu, although it was difficult to fight, Xu Yu sent information, and turned the difficult difficulty into an easy difficulty.

Compared with the old unlucky Uncle Liu Huang, Cao Cao's luck can be said to be a real fate, not much worse than Liu Xiu.

It's just that when Cao Cao was happy, the situation in the north also began to become critical.

Yuan Shao's main force had already reached Liyang in April, and after Cao Cao beheaded Yan Liang and Wen Chou, and retreated to Guandu, his main force crossed the Yellow River and launched an offensive in two ways.

One way is to cross the river from Liyang, occupy Baima, Yanxian, Fengqiu, and camp troops in Yangwu County, north of Guandu, only forty or fifty kilometers away from Guandu.

The other road was from Huojia County in Hanoi County, that is, the later Xinxiang City River crossed, led by the general Han Meng, south to the old city to the area of Jiluo Mountain, harassing Cao Cao's rear.

Jiluo Mountain is located in the north of Mi County, belongs to the west of Guandu, and goes south to Xinzheng to Yingchuan, which almost threatens the safety of Xudu.

Cao Cao heard that Yuan Shao's main force had arrived in Yangwu, and hurriedly returned north to Guandu to prepare to meet the enemy, and at the same time sent Cao Hong to atone for his crimes, and led a part of his men and horses north to Jiluo Mountain to meet Han Meng, who was attacking by a partial division.

In history, this matter was completed by Cao Ren, but now that Cao Ren is dead, Cao Cao has lost his right-hand man, and Cao Cao can only be guilty of meritorious service.

At the same time, Liu Bei also crossed the Yellow River with Yuan Shao and arrived at the front line of Guandu.

In April, he received Shen Chen's advice from the people sent by Shen Chen suggesting that he ask Yuan Shao to resign and go south to find Liu Biao to form an alliance.

So in May, Liu Bei officially explained this to Yuan Shao, and in June, he arrived in Runan.

"Brother Shen!"

"Hmm!"

Shen Changqing walked on the road, and when he met someone he knew well, he would say hello to each other or nod his head.

But it doesn't matter who it is.

There was no superfluous expression on everyone's face, as if they were very indifferent to everything.

on this.

Shen Changqing is used to it.

Because this is the Demon Suppression Division, it is an institution that maintains the stability of Great Qin, and its main responsibility is to kill demons and monsters, and of course there are some other side jobs.

Arguably.

In the Demon Suppression Division, everyone has a lot of blood on their hands.

When a person is accustomed to seeing life and death, then he will become indifferent to many things.

When he first came to this world, Shen Changqing was a little uncomfortable, but over time he got used to it.

The Demon Suppression Division is huge.

The people who can stay in the Demon Suppression Division are all powerful masters, or people who have the potential to become masters.

Shen Changqing belongs to the latter.

Among them, the Demon Suppression Division is divided into two professions, one is the town guard and the other is the demon exterminator.

Anyone who enters the Demon Suppression Division starts with the lowest level of demon slayer.

Then step by step, he is expected to become a town guard.

Shen Changqing's predecessor was a trainee demon slayer in the Demon Suppression Division, and he was also the lowest level of the demon slayer envoys.

Have memories of the predecessor.

He is also very familiar with the environment of the Demon Suppression Division.

It didn't take long for Shen Changqing to stop in front of an attic.

Unlike other places full of slaughter, the attic here seems to stand out from the crowd, and in the bloody Demon Suppression Division, it presents a different tranquility.

At this time, the attic door is open, and there are occasional people entering and exiting.

Shen Changqing only hesitated for a moment, and then stepped in.

Access to the attic.

The environment has changed in vain.

A burst of ink fragrance mixed with the faint smell of blood came to his face, making his brow furrow instinctively, but quickly stretched.

The smell of blood on everyone's body in the Demon Suppression Division is almost impossible to clean.