Under the cover of darkness, Guo Huai ordered Qin Lang to lead the infantry first, and he led the cavalry to break up the rear. After a night of fleeing, he finally led the troops to withdraw from the battle.
However, the days that followed were not easy.
A defeat and retreat at night would inevitably shake the morale of the army, and because of the obstruction of sight, there were less than two thousand cavalry who actually followed Guo Huai and completely withdrawn from the battle.
The whereabouts of the remaining nearly a thousand cavalry are still unknown.
Guo Huai is not too worried about the cavalry.
Even if some cavalry fell behind and became separated due to the darkness of night, the majority should still return in the end.
After all, the treatment of cavalry is much better than that of ordinary county soldiers, especially those who serve as cavalry in the Wei Dynasty. They are the superior arms. The wives and children of these cavalry are all in Guanzhong, and they have lived a good life. These cavalry are not likely to take risks. Surrender to the Shu thieves.
But the same cannot be said for infantry.
Most of the county soldiers come from the common people who have been recruited to serve. Now that the Three Kingdoms are in full force, the situation is relatively stable and a little better than it was in previous decades, but the people's lives have never been much better.
For those county soldiers, when encountering a truly difficult and desperate situation, surrendering and surviving is their first choice.
The most terrible thing now is that Guo Huai and Qin Lang are still separated. They have no idea where Qin Lang has retreated with his infantry and how many people are left.
Guo Huai could save Qin Lang's life on the battlefield and let Qin Lang lead the infantry to withdraw first, but Guo Huai did not believe in Qin Lang's ability to command troops. He did not think that Qin Lang had the ability to safely withdraw all the five thousand infantry who escaped from the battle circle.
Therefore, after dawn, Guo Huai refused to let the cavalry rest, but turned around and began to look for traces of Qin Lang in the surrounding directions.
If Qin Lang and the infantry troops led by him are found one day earlier, they can withdraw to the Youfufeng Fortress Group one day earlier.
Guo Huai also had his own considerations in doing this.
Since Shu thieves can appear in his rear, Guo Huai cannot trust any of the counties in his rear.
The only place that Guo Huai could still believe was in the hands of the Wei Dynasty was the Youfufeng Fortress Group.
When I rushed into Youfufeng, I spared a little effort and arranged two thousand infantry guards at the Youfufeng fortress group. Now it seems that it really helped a lot.
With two thousand infantry, they used the strategy of being solid on the outside and weak on the inside to guard the fortresses. It was impossible for the Shu thieves to conquer this place in a short time, and now, this place became Guo Huai's last resort and retreat.
To return to the fortress group to fight, although the two thousand cavalry in hand are very important, what is more important is that there must be enough infantry to hold on to each fort. Otherwise, even with the fortress group as a support, once the Shu bandit army invades the territory, The fortress group could not hold on for too long.
After all, within Wuguan, it is almost impossible for the reinforcements Guo Huai can expect to arrive in Youfufeng in a short time.
Therefore, Guo Huai must find Qin Lang as soon as possible, join up with the infantry group led by Qin Lang, and return to the fortress group together. Only in this way can there be a slight possibility of holding on to the fortress group and continue fighting in Youfufeng.
This is the reason why Guo Huai must find Qin Lang first.
Guo Huai was lucky. After only one day of searching, Guo Huai found Qin Lang's location with the strength of his cavalry. He spent another half a day chasing after him and finally reunited with Qin Lang.
Then Guo Huai became depressed.
Yes, Guo Huai thought that Qin Lang's ability and experience were insufficient, and if he retreated at night, his infantry would suffer some losses from getting separated or escaping.
But Guo Huai really didn't expect that when he found Qin Lang, there were only more than 3,300 infantry following Qin Lang.
That’s almost half the number of people missing! ! !
But Qin Lang. Qin Lang really has nothing to say.
Although Qin Lang also felt that he was wronged, he just retreated with this group of infantry, but after retreating, there were only so many people left.
After a night of retreat, Qin Lang only had 4,780 people left, and nearly a thousand Wei troops became separated or escaped in the night.
Given the harshness of Wei's laws, if Qin Lang stopped to rest and reorganize his troops at this time and sent people to search the surroundings, he might be able to collect six or seven hundred scattered soldiers nearby and withdraw them to the pass. These Silijun soldiers would not want to stay. In Guanzhong, after all, his wife and children are all in Guanzhong.
But Qin Lang didn't dare to stop. He didn't know what was going on behind him. Although he evacuated the battlefield under the cover of darkness, the infantry would not march too fast at night. It was less than thirty miles away from Huaili County. If he was attacked by Shu again, If the army catches up and bites it, that will be really troublesome.
Therefore, Qin Lang made a decision not to gather the scattered soldiers around him, but to continue leading his troops eastward.
Similarly, Qin Lang is not a fool. He also has the same worries as Guo Huai, so he does not dare to travel to several counties on the east side of Guanxi. Instead, he chooses to take the path and go as far east as possible along the path.
Then the marching route began to twist and turn.
Qin Lang was not from Guanzhong, and all the county soldiers under his command were from Sili, and none of them were familiar with the terrain. In order not to alert others, Qin Lang did not even dare to make too much noise along the way. Even the guides were temporarily arrested. Hunters in the mountains are at most familiar with the nearby terrain, but they don't know the way if they are three hills apart.
Along the way, even if the escaped Wei soldiers wanted to return to Jian, they would not be able to find the troops led by Qin Lang. After all, even Qin Lang himself did not know where his next destination would be.
Guo Huai was able to find Qin Lang simply because he was lucky! ! !
During this march, Qin Lang also made a big mistake - he did not boost the morale of the army as much as possible while withdrawing the troops.
After all, the Wei army was defeated, and the morale of the army was already low, and Qin Lang was walking blindly. Sometimes he would reach the dead end at the foot of a mountain without knowing where to go, and then withdraw after finding that there was no way to go. This made the morale of the army, which was originally low, It became even lower.
For two consecutive nights, there were deserters in the army. These deserters did not think that Qin Lang's ability could lead them back to the pass.
There is no way, who makes Qin Lang join the army seriously for the first time. He has no prestige in the army at all.
When deserters appeared on the first night, Qin Lang didn't notice at all. When he set off again the next morning, Qin Lang discovered that there were hundreds more people missing from the army.
At this time, Qin Lang did not make any immediate move to encourage military morale. In other words, Qin Lang did not know how to encourage military morale in this situation. He chose to let it go.
Therefore, more deserters appeared that night, and this time, deserters appeared on an almost large scale and in an organized manner.
Therefore, when Guo Huai led his cavalry troops to join Qin Lang on the afternoon of the third day, he counted the number of infantry and found that only 3,300 were left.
Guo Huai's arrival stabilized the morale of the remaining infantry, but Guo Huai had no way to chase back the soldiers who ran away.
Guo Huai didn't have this time either.
He had already wasted nearly three days in retreating all the way. Taking a small path back to the Youfufeng Fortress Group had to avoid the county seat, and the detour required was longer and took more time.
Guo Huai didn't want to be beaten by the Shu thieves who broke through the fortress group, leaving him with no way to retreat. Therefore, Guo Huai also had to seize the time and return to the Youfufeng fortress group as soon as possible.
Therefore, Guo Huai could only accept the facts and did not send cavalry to collect the nearby Wei army. After resting for the night, he led his troops directly to the east.
And when Guo Huai led his troops to take a detour all the way back to Youfufeng Fortress Group, he got good news and bad news.
The good news is that the Youfufeng Fortress Group is still in the hands of the Wei Dynasty.
The bad news is that the west side of the Youfufeng fortress group has been surrounded by Shu thieves. No one knows how long the two thousand Wei troops in the fortress group can hold out.
In fact, Guo Huai came at the right time. If he had come one day later, Guo Huai might not be able to escape You Fufeng.
At Jiang Wan's suggestion, Wu Yi led the remaining Northern troops to pursue him overnight, but did not give Guo Huai enough time advantage.
In other words, Wu Yi could return directly to Lantian County along the highway, rest in Lantian County for two days, and then send troops to surround the Youfufeng Fortress Group.
It would save a lot of time than if Guo Huai led his troops to take a detour and take a small road to retreat to the Youfufeng Fortress Group.
In these days, after all, the main roads are more suitable for marching. The small roads are too complicated. Walking alone is okay, but marching is a waste of time.
In addition, Guo Huai and others were not familiar with the terrain and had taken many detours. Therefore, even with Guo Huai's ability to lead troops, when he led the remaining soldiers to the vicinity of the fortress group, Wu Yi had actually led the leading troops to besiege You Fufeng. The fortress complex lasted two days.
At this time, Wu Yi also made a mistake - he was careless.
When Wu Yi arrived at the outskirts of the Youfufeng fortress group and discovered through reconnaissance riding that Guo Huai did not withdraw to the fortress group before him, and that there were still only two thousand Wei troops defending the fortress group, Wu Yi breathed a long sigh of relief.
If you rush to the fortress group before Guo Huai and establish an encirclement defense line, the rest of the things will be much easier to handle.
In Wu Yi's view, the current situation is actually very clear. He and his army have arrived in front of the fortress group, which means that the main Wei army led by Guo Huai has been defeated. In this case, the people in the fortress group The two thousand Wei troops had no foreign aid and insufficient strength, so there was no possibility of holding on.
Therefore, in order to avoid further increase in casualties, Wu Yi adopted the method of besieging the fortress group, using force to overwhelm others, and using persuasion to surrender, to persuade the Cao Wei defenders in the fortress group to surrender.
After two days of such a stalemate, Wu Yi sent people to persuade him. In fact, the Wei army in the fortress group had been shaken, but they had not really made up their minds.
As for Wu Yi, he was not in a hurry, because he also got the news that the main force of the Northern Army led by Feng Xi and Zhang Nan only had about a day's march from the Youfufeng Fortress Group.
Wu Yi thought that when his main army arrived and the Youfufeng fortress group was surrounded by more than 30,000 troops, he would not believe that the Wei army in the fortress group would continue to hesitate.
Therefore, Wu Yi still adopted the strategy of only besieging but not attacking.
And this gave Guo Huai a chance.
(End of chapter)
