How fast can the rebel army move? During the day, the cavalry was sent out, and throughout the night, scattered soldiers rushed back to Julu City from various places.

That night, in an open space outside the city, torches were brightly lit, and Guan Yu was gathering men.

In the city, Li Mengxi helped allocate supplies.

When 3,000 men go on an expedition, ten men per tent will require at least 300 military tents.

There are also supplies such as grain and grass, chariots and horses, fire, flags, spare weapons and spare arrows that need to be deployed.

It was busy until midnight, and the supplies were finally allocated. Li Mengxi went out of the city to see how the troops were gathering.

When we arrived at the assembly point, in the dark night, the dark figures were lined up neatly.

Li Mengxi walked over and asked Guan Yu, "General Guan, how many troops have been gathered?"

"More than five thousand eight hundred." Guan Yu replied.

Li Mengxi nodded, and said to Guan Yu, "General Guan, it is best to send out three thousand men, all of whom are familiar with the formation."

A well-versed formation refers to an elite soldier who has gone through a full set of formation training and can serve as an instructor to train others.

In today's army, the most elite soldiers are probably the ones who are most proficient in forming formations, and the two overlap a lot.

Li Mengxi wanted to send out troops to fight. Guan Yu had no objection, so Guan Yu went down to pick up troops.

There are three thousand soldiers in the formation, each of them is equipped with armor, and there are three thousand soldiers in armor. Among the three thousand people, there are five hundred cavalry. Three thousand people, each of whom is equipped with a spear, sword, shield, bow and crossbow, all arms are used.

After a long time, Guan Yu finished selecting the three thousand soldiers. On the other side, Li Mengxi gathered a bunch of armor and weapons and distributed them in time.

At the same time, the newly produced flags were distributed.

In Julu, based on political considerations, Julu used flags. If the flag with the character [Liu] could be used, the flag with the character [Liu] would not be used with the flag [Han]. When we went on an expedition, the considerations were different. Therefore, the newly made flags were all [Han].

】flag.

According to ten people, they hold a spear flag, a hundred people hold a team flag, a hundred people team flag, a team of 500 people, a team of 1,000 people, a commander's flag of 3,000 people, and the total number of various types of flags reaches hundreds.

Furthermore, according to the negotiation methods of the traveling caravans, when the traveling caravans are negotiating with foreign countries, they should set up more flags and less swords and guns. This is to avoid the fear of the villagers and to facilitate negotiations.

Going to Luoyang, the safety was uncertain. Negotiation and intimidation, weapons and flags, I don't know which one has more opportunities to be used. Therefore, five times as many flags were distributed, and the extra flags were carried on chariots and horses to accompany the army.

After a lot of work, the three thousand soldiers were fully equipped, organized, and flags were awarded. They were divided into heavy fleets, tents, food, grass and other supplies were distributed. The marching ranks were drawn up again. The marching preparations were complete and ready to leave at any time.

Onward.

By this time, it was already dawn and Li Mengxi quietly found Zhang Fei.

After pulling Zhang Fei to a quiet place, he took the torch from the soldier's hand, and after shooing away the others, Li Mengxi said to Zhang Fei, "Third General, this time, I intend to send you to go with Xuande Gong. I wonder what the general's intention is?"

"

"Yeah." Zhang Fei nodded in a muffled voice without saying much.

Li Mengxi stared at Zhang Fei and asked, "The general must know that going to Luoyang will bring unpredictable fortunes and misfortunes.

If you ask the general, how can you protect Duke Xuande since fortunes and disasters are unpredictable?"

The breeze blew, and the light of the torch swayed gently. The swaying firelight illuminated the faces of Li Mengxi and Zhang Fei in uncertain brightness.

Zhang Fei frowned and thought for a long time. He scratched his head irritably, "Oh!" Zhang Fei sighed irritably.

Li Mengxi saw Zhang Fei's irritated look and asked seriously, "If I ask, if Duke Xuande is captured and imprisoned as soon as he enters Luoyang, and the general is out with his troops at this time, how should the general respond at this time?"

Zhang Fei may have been a die-hard loyalist to the Han Dynasty, but now, his loyalty is bound to be in a dilemma.

Zhang Fei frowned and looked depressed. He kept scratching his hair, obviously struggling in his heart.

Li Mengxi waited quietly for Zhang Fei's answer.

After struggling fiercely in his heart for a long time, Zhang Fei looked solemn and said, "That's it! If the imperial court dares to arrest the eldest brother and put him in prison, I, Lao Zhang, will raise troops to capture Luoyang and rescue the eldest brother no matter what!"

Li Mengxi looked at Zhang Fei with a murderous look on his face, and he smiled. Finally, in the dilemma of being loyal to the Han Dynasty or being loyal to brotherhood, Zhang Fei chose brotherhood.

This is not because Zhang Fei values ​​brotherhood more, but because today's Han Dynasty court is really not a good one. A not-so-good court is not worth risking the lives of sworn brothers.

Li Mengxi smiled happily and shook his head with a smile, "Third General, if I do what you do, Duke Xuande will probably be dead."

Zhang Fei's eyes widened, "How do you say that?"

Li Mengxi had a half-smile on his face and said quietly, "What kind of place do you think Luoyang is? Just three thousand soldiers and horses want to capture the fortified city of Luoyang. Do you think the city of Luoyang is made of mud?"

Zhang Fei suddenly understood and said hurriedly, "Then I will lead ten thousand troops and leave!"

Li Mengxi shook his head, "Not ten thousand."

"Then I'll take 20,000!"

Li Mengxi still shook his head, "Twenty thousand people are not enough. Even with 20,000 people, there is no chance of winning the siege. Moreover, our army does not have enough food and grass to support an expedition of 20,000 people."

Zhang Fei's eyes widened, "What's going on? I can only wait for my eldest brother to die? If this doesn't work, I have to follow the city!"

Li Mengxi laughed again and said to Zhang Fei, "That's the crux.

Third General, do you think that if you were the Emperor of the Han Dynasty and you wanted to harm Duke Xuande, you would let Duke Xuande’s three thousand soldiers and horses enter the city?"

Zhang Fei's brows knitted into a knot. He understood that if the imperial court was really malicious, the troops would not be able to enter the city.

Zhang Fei wanted to say that it would be better not to let the eldest brother enter the city.

However, Zhang Fei knew Liu Bei's character. Liu Bei knew that he was in danger but still insisted on going to Luoyang. When the time came, he might not be able to stop him.

Zhang Fei scratched his head and scratched his head in thought. He thought for a long time but couldn't come up with a solution. He looked at Li Mengxi and saw Li Mengxi's calm expression with a smile on his face. Zhang Fei couldn't help but ask, "Oh Xi'er! Stop being so mysterious.

, tell me what to do quickly! Tell me quickly!"

Zhang Fei stretched out his big hand and pressed Li Mengxi's shoulder, shaking him vigorously so that Li Mengxi could come up with an idea quickly.

Li Mengxi broke away from Zhang Fei's hand and said in a deep voice, "The method to crack it is simple.

Since three thousand soldiers and horses are not enough to attack the city, then we can find more soldiers and horses.

The general may ask, where can one go to find soldiers and horses if he is unfamiliar with the place?

One word - coercion.

What is coercion?

How did the Yellow Turban wrap up hundreds of thousands of people? How did the Yellow Turban wrap around people, so we will wrap up in the same way.

So, maybe the general understands?"

Zhang Fei's eyes lit up when he heard this.

Seeing Zhang Fei's sudden realization, Li Mengxi continued, "How the Yellow Turban coerces the people... I don't know.

It can be expected that in order to coerce the people, at least it is necessary to know how many villages there are in the countryside, how many manpower there are, and how many people need to be sent to drive them around.

Among them, the general needs to make a big plan when the time comes.

As soon as the general arrived at the outskirts of Luoyang, he went without stopping and sent people to inspect every place in detail.

The detailed information includes the need to find out the distribution of villages and manpower; as well as the gathering places of granaries, arsenals, horse farms and other materials; also, the need to find out the geographical details, find out the difficult and dangerous places, and also find out the locations such as Gouhe Bridge Village.

Important transportation points include finding out where the passes and cities are, where the imperial troops and horses are gathered, and the movements of the imperial troops and horses must be known at all times.

As the art of war goes, if you know yourself and your enemy, you can fight a hundred battles without danger. If the general can find out the details of Luoyang's surroundings, the matter will be fifty percent successful."

Then, after a pause, Li Mengxi pondered for a while, and then said, "Intelligence inspections are difficult and cumbersome, and our soldiers are not familiar with the place, which makes it even more difficult.

If we can have local Luoyang soldiers as guides, we can do twice the result with half the effort."

Zhang Fei was still thinking after hearing this, how could there be soldiers from Luoyang in the army? Luoyang was too far away from Julu.

The next moment, I heard Li Mengxi say, "Fortunately, we do have local soldiers from Luoyang in our army.

General, do you still remember Lu Zhi? Lu Zhi was captured and imprisoned, and Dong Zhuo took over the military power. Dong Zhuo was a narrow-minded man, and he persecuted Lu Zhi's old troops. At that time, we rescued no less than two hundred people from Lu Zhi's old troops.

Lu Zhi hurriedly sent out troops from Luoyang, and most of the troops in the army were local soldiers from Luoyang.

I had asked about it at night and found out that among the more than 200 Lu Zhi's old men who were rescued at that time, 90% were people from Luoyang and its surroundings.

I have organized this Luoyang army into one unit, and when the general arrives, he can use the soldiers from this unit as his guide."

As he spoke, Li Mengxi frowned and added, "Lu Zhi's old troops are, after all, outsiders, and the people from Luoyang are not as reliable as the Zhuozhou soldiers. Therefore, the general should be careful and careful not to let him notice the evil intentions of our army. When Zhang Jiao's incident was leaked,

We have to raise troops in advance, and we must take precautions based on the lessons learned from the past."

Zhang Fei nodded cautiously.

Afterwards, Li Mengxi continued to say, "After the general was able to conduct a detailed investigation of everything around Luoyang, there was still a problem. The problem was that the information collected by the scouts was huge and complicated, and it was difficult to sort it out. Therefore, a lot of information could be compiled on the map for use."

Clear and distinct.

In the previous imperial examination, several people were selected as good draftsmen. This time the general left, and these people were handed over to the general to take him away with him.

In addition, in addition to drawing maps by himself, the general can also purchase goods along the way, or after arriving in Luoyang, he can immediately send people to Luoyang City to purchase goods.

If you are afraid that it will be inconvenient to act secretly after the troops arrive in Luoyang, you can send people to disguise themselves and enter the city before the army arrives, which will make things easier.

Presumably, Luoyang is a land of natural treasures and abundant goods, so it is not impossible to buy maps."

When talking about sending people to sneak into the city to purchase maps, Li Mengxi thought of something else. He said, "The general can also send reliable people... Send the old man from Julu Huangjin to leave the army and infiltrate the city.

If things come to a head, it will be of great use to infiltrate the city and work carefully, either as an internal response or to kill the city gates."
To be continued...