Guo Huai is also a famous general after all. Although he didn't sleep well all night, his mind will not be confused because of this.
After experiencing the setback on the first day, Guo Huai analyzed Wei Yan's strategy of attacking out of the city and burning the Pili Chariot, and made corresponding adjustments to his own Pili Chariot defense strategy.
Actually, to put it bluntly, it's not complicated. It's just an extra cavalry line of defense.
Through memory analysis, Guo Huai discovered that when Wei Yan led his troops out of the city twice to fight, when facing the first wave of cavalry assault, he would always take advantage of the period after the cavalry started to speed up to make adjustments to the marching direction of the soldiers. After avoiding the first wave of impact from the cavalry, they quickly adjusted back and rushed towards the Thunderbolt Chariot defenders.
Wei Yan actually just made a time difference, taking advantage of the few others, slow speed, and easy adjustment to seize the time.
But no matter what, Wei Yan still needs some time to adjust the direction of the formation. If he launches a second attack at this time, Wei Yan will have very little room to make adjustments again.
Therefore, Guo Huai changed his defensive strategy on the first day by adding a cavalry line of defense to ensure that the remaining Pili Chariots were not lost.
As for Wei Yan, when he went out to fight in the city the next afternoon, he still thought that Guo Huai only had a cavalry defense line. After commanding his soldiers to narrowly avoid the cavalry attack, he was preparing to attack the thunder chariot defense line like yesterday.
As a result, when he looked up, Wei Yan saw a group of cavalry rushing out from the right wing of Cao's camp, less than seventy or eighty steps away from him.
At this time, it was already too late to order the soldiers to avoid.
Wei Yan was caught off guard and was directly attacked by the second wave of cavalry and broke up his formation. The thousand soldiers he brought out were divided into two parts.
At this time, Wei Yan knew that the raid was impossible, so he made a prompt decision and quickly broke out with the soldiers who were still with him. He tried his best to rescue the soldiers who were trapped on the other side along the way. The soldiers who could not be rescued had to give up. , and then led the army quickly back into the city.
This time, Wei Yan led a thousand troops to fight, but only more than 300 people returned to the city. They suffered heavy losses. Wei Yan himself was shot by several arrows from cavalry and received a knife on his shoulder. He was unable to lead his troops out of the city in a short period of time. Fighting.
Zhang Xi was also helpless. After all, Wei Yan couldn't blame him for this matter. Wei Yan had tried his best. It was purely because he had no cavalry on his side and suffered a loss.
Guo Huai could even split the cavalry into several parts for use, but Zhang Xi couldn't even get a hundred cavalry on hand.
He had no choice but to continue to hold on until dark, and Zhang Xi continued to send people to deal with Guo Huaijun's mentality.
Both sides were in pain. Zhang Xi was in pain from being beaten during the day, while Guo Huai was in pain from not being able to sleep at night.
After three or four days of tormenting each other, the city wall in Ji County finally became unable to hold up and began to show signs of cracks.
Guo Huai was naturally overjoyed. This meant that in a few days, the city wall of Ji County would be blown down.
As long as the city wall is dilapidated to a certain extent, Guo Huai can use cavalry to enter the city and conquer Ji County even without infantry.
As for Zhang Xi, his mood was naturally getting worse and worse.
Zhang Xi was even thinking that if Ma Chao didn't come again, he would have no choice but to abandon Ji County and retreat to Xi County to join Liu Bei.
But, this is not a good idea after all.
The way back from Ji County to Xi County has basically been occupied by Qiang and Hu cavalry. Once Zhang Xi cannot defend Ji County, Zhang Xi may face the Qiang at any time on the way back from Ji County to Xi County. The Hu cavalry intercepted and killed.
This group of barbarians are neither capable nor willing to fight in a tough battle, but they are more active than the others in pursuing this kind of rout.
After all, a defeated army means a lack of combat power, but at the same time, there is a lot of loot, which is an excellent opportunity to make a fortune.
Therefore, Zhang Xi really cannot retreat. Once he falls in Ji County, Zhang Xi leads his troops to retreat to Xi County, and it is estimated that he will suffer heavy losses.
And there is one thing that Zhang Xi doesn't quite understand.
It was agreed at the beginning that he would quickly send troops to Xi County and Ji County to attract the attention of Guo Huai's Liangzhou Army, and Ma Chao would defeat Guo Huai from the flank. But now that Zhang Xi had been holding on to Ji County for five days, where could Ma Chao go? Already? !
You must know that Zhang Xi led all infantry, and out of caution along the way, Zhang Xi did not march in a hurry. Under such circumstances, Zhang Xi not only occupied Xi County, but also led troops all the way to Ji. county.
Even under the city of Ji County, Zhang Xi created an excellent opportunity to pin Guo Huai firmly under the city of Ji County. Where did you, Ma Chao, lead the cavalry on horseback to die? !
In fact, not only Zhang Xi wants to know this question, but Liu Bei also wants to know.
Since Ma Chao led the Qiang and Hu Yi from Wudu County, the original plan was to detour through the Qiang territory, finally exit Didao, enter Longxi County, then go south from Longxi County, quickly pass through Nan'an County, and enter Tianshui County.
Although it was quite a long way around, Ma Chao was leading cavalry, so in terms of speed, they were definitely faster than the infantry.
Therefore, now that Liu Bei has arrived in Xi County, Ma Chao is still missing, which makes Liu Bei very worried.
Once Ma Chao fails to arrive at Tianshui County as planned and launch an attack on Guo Huai's Liangzhou Army, then Liu Bei will have no choice but to use his main infantry force to fight Guo Huai.
Although it is not impossible to win, due to the restraint of arms, even if Liu Bei wins in the end, the price he pays will not be small.
This will seriously affect Liu Bei's next plan. At that time, Liu Bei is not sure whether he still has the time to compete with Cao Hong to seize Chang'an.
Therefore, Liu Bei was also very anxious, not knowing where Ma Chao was, while Fazheng and Pang Tong also frowned and analyzed the current situation.
Now that Liu Bei has established his own Huangluo umbrella in Xi County, the strategic purpose of the Liu Bei Group's Northern Expedition has been completely exposed. In about ten days and a half, Cao Hong should know that Baoxie Daokou Liu Beijun is just a suspect.
At this time, Zhao Yun and Chen Dao will be under great pressure.
Previously, they just asked Zhao Yun and Chen Dao to lead the white soldiers to show off at Baoxie Road under the banner of Liu Bei. If it didn't work, they could retreat to Baoxie Road and show off their bluff.
But once the real direction of the main attack is exposed, and Zhao Yun and Chen Dao are discovered to be suspects, they will definitely be violently attacked by Cao Hong.
Before, Cao Hong didn't know the truth and didn't dare to rush into Bao Xiedao for fear of being ambushed. But once Cao Hong learned that Bao Xiedao was just a suspect, he would definitely lead his army to pursue him.
At that time, in order to stop Cao Hong's army, Zhao Yun and Chen Dao probably had no choice but to burn down the plank road and retreat to Hanzhong.
Once the troops of Zhao Yun and Chen Dao are repelled, Cao Hong can march westward to Liangzhou without any worries to rescue Guo Huai. It only takes about ten days of marching time.
In other words, if Liu Bei cannot defeat Guo Huai's Liangzhou Army within a month and achieve the end of Longshan, then once Cao Hong is allowed to occupy the Longshan Pass and create a gap for Cao Wei's reinforcements, then Liu Bei's Northern Expedition will It may also be in vain.
The key to completely defeating Guo Huai within a month lies in Ma Chao.
But there is no news about Ma Chao until now. What is going on? !
If Ma Chao doesn't come within these ten days, then Fazheng and Pang Tong will have to advise Liu Bei to fight Guo Huai regardless of casualties.
As for Ma Chao, Ma Chao is also in a hurry now.
This is a rare opportunity for Ma Chao to return to Liangzhou.
Although the current situation has made Ma Chao understand that he is unlikely to become the warlord who separatizes Liangzhou again. Cao Wei will not allow it, and Liu Bei will not allow it either.
But Ma Chao understood that if the Liu Bei Group wanted to establish itself in Liangzhou, his position in the hearts of the Qiang and Hu people was also an indispensable part.
Now that he has returned to Liangzhou, Ma Chao can still use his prestige among the Qiang and Hu people to seek Dangdang, the governor of Liangzhou. If it is too late, he will really have no chance.
Another one. After finally fighting his way back to Liangzhou, Ma Chao still has a deep hatred to avenge!
Ma Chao had always had a grudge against him when he was kicked out of Liangzhou after being jointly opposed by Liangzhou's powerful forces.
But if you insist on saying that Ma Chao has always hated these powerful people in Liangzhou, that is not true.
Liangzhou has its own way of survival that belongs to the powerful people of Liangzhou. Whoever allows them to survive will be the one they will join.
When he was able to separatist power in Liangzhou, these powerful people also joined him, but later he did some things that were not authentic. In the end, he failed to defeat Xia Houyuan and was driven out of Liangzhou.
If you really want to say that you are not willing to give in, Ma Chao must be willing. These Liangzhou old cousins, especially the people from Tianshui County, are really not loyal enough. They will fall to whoever is stronger, and there is no sense of friendship at all.
But when it comes to hatred, Ma Chao really can't do it. After all, everyone has been here like this over the years. If you want to survive in that world, you have to become more practical.
but! ! !
There is a saying but! ! !
Ma Chao absolutely hated the Tianshui Zhao family.
There have been many cases of powerful people in Liangzhou forming alliances and attacking each other, but everyone more or less kept a certain bottom line and never said they wanted to kill the whole family.
The Tianshui Zhao family actually killed his entire family, wife and children, forcing him to be alone and had no choice but to seek refuge with Liu Bei to survive. Ma Chao never dared to forget this grudge.
Over the years, Ma Chao has also reflected on his own actions. He allowed Wei Kang to surrender and then killed Wei Kang's family. This was indeed something he did wrong, so he was driven out of Liangzhou by the powerful Liangzhou forces. This was somewhat of retribution. .
But now, the Tianshui Zhao family has killed her family. If she hadn't been young, she might not even have any blood left. Shouldn't the Tianshui Zhao family also pay the price? !
Therefore, during Liu Bei's Northern Expedition, Ma Chao was actually the most active.
Returning to Liangzhou and becoming the governor of Liangzhou is one thing, killing the Tianshui Zhao family and avenging his wife and children is another.
Ma Chao was really anxious. He could not wait to appear in Tianshui County immediately, attack Guo Huai, and advance into Ji County.
However, Ma Chao did encounter some unnecessary troubles, and this trouble was really caused by him.
(End of chapter)
