Everything seemed to be as expected by Zhao Kuo.
Lian Po became more and more impressed by Zhao Kuo's magical power.
A wise man never needs to say anything, so the story of "stealing the talisman to save Zhao" was repeated again.
On the eighth day after Zhao Jun was surrounded, Lord Xinling summoned his retainers to urgently discuss the strategy of "stealing the talisman". Hou Ying, the retainer, came up with a plan: to avenge Wang Zhiruji for killing his father, and then invite Ruji to steal the talisman at night.
Lord Xinling heard this and followed his words.
On that day, Lord Xinling sent three thousand guests to search for the land of Daliang. At dusk, he found traces of Ru Ji's enemy in the wine shop. He then ordered the guests to cut off his head three times and offer it to Ru Ji.
Ru Ji looked at this, then she burst into tears like rain, kowtowed to Lord Xinling in the north, and said: "Since I have avenged my father's murder, as long as your Majesty has given orders, I will not be disrespectful to you."
The envoy of Lord Xinling informed that Lord Xinling wanted to go north to rescue Zhao, but he was not interested in what Qin wanted to do, and secretly asked Ruji to steal the king's tiger talisman.
Ru Ji responded to his words and stole the tiger talisman at night and took it to Lord Xinling.
Lord Xinling, Lian Po and other retainers went out overnight and tricked the roosters and dog thieves into opening the city gate and rushed to the Wei-Zhao border. (The story of stealing a talisman to save Zhao is so deeply rooted in the hearts of the people that I will briefly mention it here. They are all basically the same. If I write too much, I am afraid you will say that I am short on word count.)
On the tenth day after the Zhao army was besieged, Lord Xinling and his men rushed around for two days before arriving at the center of the Wei army. They corrected the King of Wei's order to replace Jin Bi. After the handover, he led his troops to turn around. Because Lian Po was there, Lord Xinling never made things difficult for Jin Bi and allowed him to return to Wei.
When Jin Bi returned to Daliang, the king of Wei knew that the tiger talisman had been stolen. However, the front line army had already moved out or was fighting the Qin army. The king had no choice but to let Lord Xinling do what he did. He also used Jin Bi to transport grain and grass, and commanded 20,000 sharp soldiers to serve in Lord Xinling's army in case of emergencies.
From this point of view, King Wei was not entirely undesirable. At least it's not as dirty as "I'd rather treat foreign invaders than domestic slaves", but it's quite a bit like "brothers are jealous of each other within the wall, and they are protected from outsiders".
Of course, King Wei did not do it all for Lord Xinling. Although the 20,000-strong army and General Jin Bi were a compromise, it also had the effect of adding sand and sharing the credit.
Even this act of mixing sand is a bit obvious.
But even so, Lord Xinling couldn't refuse. After all, he was the one who was wronged first. Now the King of Wei not only justified his lie, but also sent more soldiers. Regardless of whether the army knew about Lord Xinling's "stealing the talisman", in the eyes of many Wei soldiers, the image of King Wei was undoubtedly much taller than that of Lord Xinling.
Being able to hand over almost all of Wei's wealth to Lord Xinling is enough to make soldiers who don't know the truth admire them.
What's more, now that Lian Po is on his side, Lord Xinling also needs Jin Bi, a "one of his own" who knows military skills, to balance with Lian Po, a general of Zhao State.
Overlooking this little incident, Lord Xinling finally had 120,000 Wei troops in his hands. Then Lian Po was promoted to the chief general of the army, Jin Bi was the deputy general, and Lord Xinling was the military governor.
Lian Po naturally refused to say anything, but he let it go. Little did he know that this term was the beginning of his own crisis.
Immediately, for the sake of concealment, Lian Po led the Wei army north along the Dan River, preparing to quietly cross westward and land between the Xuans and Jiepai Ling, and penetrate directly behind the Qin army's encirclement.
Until now, Zhao Jun had been surrounded for twelve days...
According to previous predictions, the Zhao army had already run out of ammunition and food. Therefore, Lian Po's troops moved quickly. In just one night, 120,000 troops had crossed the border and entered Shangdang territory.
But even so, Wei Jun still arrived a little late! The Qin army's final encirclement and annihilation battle began three days ago.
That's right, after Bai Qi received reinforcements from the 30,000 troops mobilized by King Qin from Hedong and Hanoi, he decisively launched a tentative offensive against the remaining Zhao army.
After this battle, the Zhao army's weak combat power was immediately and completely exposed to the Qin army.
Of course, the fundamental reason for the sharp decline in the Zhao army's combat power is naturally due to the adulteration of the one hundred thousand young men. Even if these one hundred thousand young men followed the army and had experienced major battles (battles of barriers and pursuits), they were also considered to have heard of it. After getting over the smell of blood, but becoming a monk halfway is not as good as those regular soldiers who fought with the barbarians and confronted the Qin army.
Despite the geographical advantage, the weak Zhao army still could not stop the Qin army.
Such a visible decrease in combat power was due to another reason in the eyes of the Qin army - lack of food!
That was due to the rapid decline in morale of the Zhao army after the Zhao army was short of food, and the physical strength, fighting spirit, and morale dropped sharply, resulting in a reduction in combat effectiveness.
Of course, if you look carefully, it is not difficult for the Qin army to find that although the Zhao army they killed was also a little sallow and thin, it was by no means to the point of being broken.
Even Zhao Jun's appearance of sallow complexion and thin muscles was due to Zhao Kuo's deliberate control of the soldiers' eating.
Although the Zhao army had been surrounded for twelve days, food transportation to the rear had been cut off fifteen days ago when the Qin army captured the Hanwangshan camp.
In other words, Zhao Jun had not replenished his food supplies for at least fifteen days. According to the general military rationing system - during the march, each battalion only carries food for the day, and the main camp of the Chinese army carries three to five days of food and grass. The Zhao army has long been out of food - this is for the general to have absolute control over the troops below.
Therefore, the Qin army's judgment was not without purpose.
However, what they didn't know was that Zhao Kuo knew from the beginning that he would be severely surrounded. Therefore, Zhao Jun prepared enough food and grass from the beginning. The rations carried by each battalion alone were enough for three days, and five days' worth of rations were stored in each fort. And in the main camp, there is food for seven days.
After careful calculation, when the Qin army launched the attack, it was when the fortress's food reserves were basically exhausted. Therefore, after the Qin army broke through several fortresses, they found that there was not much rations left in them, and they immediately confirmed their judgment more and more. In fact, sergeants quietly gave out rations every evening.
Of course, this ration is not much, it is only enough for the soldiers in the fortress to have one meal a day. It's not that Zhao Kuo is stingy, no one knows when the Wei army will arrive. More importantly, if all the soldiers under his command are well fed, Qin Jun will not be able to tell if he is crazy.
Of course, such compensation will naturally have a certain impact on military morale.
But on one, two, and three days, an endless stream of food was distributed and no further reduction was made. Zhao's soldiers immediately stopped worrying too much about the food problem - although they were not full, they were You won't starve to death - that's enough.
Compared with the problem of food, the soldiers of Zhao Jun were obviously more worried about the health of their general Zhao Kuo.
