Sima Rui and their battle was quite smooth and beautiful, this battle not only completely defeated Sima Deren, but also captured a large number of military supplies, which can be said to be a lot of gains. Sima Deren saw that the general trend had gone, so he had to shrink the army, form the original three large battalions on the left, center and right into one large battalion, and retreat to Xiangyang City, a hundred miles away. This Xiangyang city is to hold the throat of this area, the city is high and deep, and the terrain is steep and easy to defend and difficult to attack. Stationed here, he ordered the magistrates to raise food on the one hand, and waited for reinforcements on the other hand to facilitate the resumption of the war.

Xie An and the others won a complete victory, and they couldn't help but repel Sima Deren's attack, and they played a majestic style, and since then they have been very powerful. Back in the barracks, Sima Rui ordered the soldiers and civilians to celebrate for two days, and arranged a banquet in the city, at the beginning of the banquet, he called Wang Daolin and Wang Qiang to him, and then he asked loudly: "The five hundred heroes who fought with Wang Daolin that night stood up" After these people heard this, they immediately stood up, Sima Rui looked at the only ten people, so he shouted loudly: "The five hundred heroes who fought with Wang Daolin that night, please stand up." "After waiting for another half day, no one stood up. It seems that there are only these people. Sima Rui counted carefully, and there were only twenty-three people. Tears fell suddenly, and he choked up and said, "Thank you, I, Sima Rui, thank you." After speaking, he bowed deeply to several people.

When these people saw it, they immediately said loudly: "Swear allegiance to the prince to the death." Sima Rui was overjoyed and immediately ordered the wine to be served, and he personally poured a large bowl of wine for everyone, and these people were moved to tears one by one. This meeting amazed Xie An and others. When these people had finished drinking, he announced that they were specially named "Twenty-Three Warriors". Wang Daolin, who led the troops this time, was named the marshal, and Wang Daohe and Wang Qiang were the generals. He also named Liu Yuying as a general. Hearing this title, Wang Daolin resolutely accepted it, he said: "Thank you for the prince's love to me, I myself think that this marshal is incompetent, and I hope that the prince will choose another virtuous one." Xie An also said: "This marshal belongs to you, do you think, who in the army can lead 500 people against the enemy and defeat them to the ground? Therefore, only you can have this honor. When everyone heard this, they immediately said loudly: "Congratulations to the marshal" Wang Daolin immediately thanked him. Subsequently, he was rewarded for meritorious deeds, and the army marched to Xiangyang City after a three-day break.

Xie An and they took advantage of the victory to pursue, recovered the surrounding Duchengfu County, and soon came to a place called Shangcheng only forty miles away from Xiangyang City, and captured Xiangyang City in one go according to Sima Rui's intentions, and was completely defeated by Sima Deren. However, Xie An disagreed, he said: "Although we Suo won the victory in this war, Sima Deren only lost nearly 40,000 people, and he still has tens of thousands of horses in his hands, and several of his generals have not yet appeared, especially the two people Gu of Circulation and Wang Lao Wu, it is even more difficult to deal with, who is sad to ensure that the two of them have no terrifying means? Forcing them to be in a hurry, if the dog jumps over the wall in a hurry, it will be difficult to deal with it." Sima Rui also felt that it made sense when he heard it, so he had to stay here for a while, waiting for news from Hu Da and Xiaolin.

So what happened to Hu Da and Xiao Lin? It turns out that they are also in trouble. After burning down Sima Deren's granary, Xiaolin and Hu Da said goodbye to Wang Daolin and them, and then set out on the road to Xuchang. It is thousands of miles away from here to Xuchang. They were hungry and thirsty for the night, and the two walked for more than a month and finally came to Xuchang, Xuchang is the capital of Wei after all, where Cao Cao and his descendants have been operating here for decades, the buildings here are neat and the streets are wide and incomparable to other cities, coupled with the majestic palace buildings, which opened the eyes of the two. Not to mention Xiaolin, even Hu Da was amazed. Then they inquired about Zhao Guokai's home, and someone told them that Zhao Guokai's home was behind the Xuchang Mansion, and its scale was not much worse than that of the Mansion. Both of them were very surprised, Xiao Lin hurriedly asked: "Why can Zhao Guokai's home be more beautiful than the government office?" This person smiled when he heard it and said, "Are you from afar?" Xiao Lin hurriedly said: "Yes", the person said: "This is not over?" Zhao Guokai's father Zhao Lei was originally the prefect of Xuchang, and their hometown was in Chengdu, although his father was an official in Xuchang, but his reputation was particularly good and the officials were fair, but they were officials for generations, and later his father bought a house behind the government office, do you say that his family's house can be won again?"

Xiao Lin was speechless when he asked in one sentence, and at the same time, Xiao Lin suddenly felt how bad they would be this time. If ordinary people could say something, but his father turned out to be an official of the imperial court, if such a person wanted to leave here with him and embark on the road of confronting the imperial court? What is this not a pipe dream? Hu Da also felt that things were difficult to do, but the matter was man-made, and only by taking Zhao Guokai's family away could he completely sever his connection with the imperial court, and only then could he be able to protect his family. Xiao Lin said goodbye to this person and went to the back of the mansion.

When they came to the street behind the government, they saw that the street was very smooth and wide. In the distance, I saw a boxy mansion standing there, and there were two family members with sticks in their hands outside the gate, Hu Da and Xiao Lin looked at it, and they didn't walk over directly. He just stopped in the distance for a moment, and then quietly left. The two of them lived in a small shop, and the two of them sighed for a long time, feeling that it was difficult to pick up Zhao Guokai's family. Xiao Lin asked Hu Da: "If you have such a mansion, are you willing to live a life of exile with others?" Hu Da thought for a while and said, "Unless he is a fool." Xiao Lin nodded, but what should we do?

Just when the two of them were worried, they heard the sound of a horse team outside, and the sound was getting louder and louder, from far to near, Xiao Lin felt very strange, it was already late now, what were so many horse teams doing? He wanted to see what was going on, so he quietly opened the window, and it was already completely dark at this time, Xiao Lin saw that there was no one in the yard, so he jumped into the yard with his feet on the ground, like a dexterous cat, and then jumped into the yard from the window, and then climbed up the roof with both feet, and looked forward on the back slope, and saw a pair of horses with more than 100 people on the street galloping forward, and the soldiers on the horse were bright and bright, and the bright steel knives shone in the cold light against the moonlight. At this time, Hu Da also came to the room, he looked at it and said, "It seems that he went to Zhao Guokai and their house." Could it be that something really happened to their family?" his words reminded Xiao Lin, who said in a low voice, "Follow me." The two of them ran forward quickly.

After running a long way, there was a wide avenue in front of him, and after crossing this avenue, he arrived at Zhao Guokai's home. saw that these soldiers quickly dispersed when they arrived here, surrounding Zhao Guokai and his family. Two officials walked up the steps, came to the gate of Zhao's house, and slapped the knocker with their hands. Just three or four taps, the door was opened. Immediately a dozen or so soldiers came up, and they came up and knocked the man who opened the door to the ground, and the man cried out loudly, "What are you doing?" One of them aimed at this man was two punches, and the man who was struck by these two blows bent down, and then begged for mercy: "My lord, spare my life, my lord" and the man at the head said: "Son, if I ask you anything, you will tell the truth, if you dare to deceive me, then I will unscrew your head and feed it to the dogs." Did you hear that?" the man nodded in fright, and then stammered, "I heard it." ”

(End of chapter)