"That little boy Zheng Zhaoye is coming to beat us."

"Come to fight Laizhou? Why did he abandon Jinan and not fight and come to fight Laizhou?"

"Of course I can't defeat Jinan, even I know." Qin Xuance said for granted.

Dong Ji and his face were stern and said, "Then tell me why he can't defeat Jinan."

Qin Xuance was still afraid of Dong Jihe, so he didn't dare to show off any more, and said honestly: "I don't know."

"He was suffering from the four towns in Jiangbei who refused to do their best. What these warlords were more concerned about was their own nests. At the same time, their food and grass should have been exhausted. Jinan had 40,000 defenders, and the walls were high and the city was strong. If they continued to fight, the morale of the army in Jiangnan would only become more and more chaotic." Xia Xiangwei said: "Laizhou is different. Laizhou has empty troops, but there is more money and food. He encouraged the soldiers of the four towns to come and rob and capture them, which was much easier than holding them to attack Jinan."

Wang Xiao nodded and said, "He can tell that I have money."

He stared at the map and then said, "Zheng Zhaoye probably guessed that we did not conquer Xuzhou, Sizhou, Luzhou and other places. But he couldn't suppress the morale of the army, so he brought troops to Laizhou to rob and capture the robbery. At that time, news about Jiangbei should be spread, and there will be food and supplies, so he can continue to attack Jinan."

Xia Xiangwei said: "And he can solve you first, and there will be no worries at that time."

"It's probably just a calculation like this."

"Then how can we defend?" Qin Xuance said: "Their more than 100,000 troops came over, and there were only more than 2,000 troops we could mobilize."

"Yes, how can I defend it?" Wang Xiao sighed.

"You haven't thought about it?"

"What do you think about it? Can this huge gap be kept?"

"What should I do if I can't hold on?"

"It's just death. Aren't you afraid of death?"

Qin Xuance slapped his head and felt speechless.

Several people in the hall looked at the map and fell silent.

They knew that Wang Xiao might have a decisive plan, but his subordinates could not have any ideas at the moment.

Everyone pondered for a long time, and first Dong Ji and "ha" laughed, walked away with their hands behind their backs, looking at peace. Others thought about it for a while and left their own affairs.

Qin Xuance supported his head and looked at the map. As he looked, his eyes became heavier and heavier, and finally he fell asleep.

Xia Xiangwei always ponders hard.

"How to defeat 100,000 with two thousand people?"

Until night, Wang Xiao raised his head from the official document and said, "Don't think about it, you're in the wrong direction."

"I'll ask the teacher for advice."

"Our opponent is Zheng Yuanhua, not his grandson."

Xia Xiangwei said: "The teacher said that the key to breaking the situation is not Zheng Zhaoye?"

"He has a very naive understanding of war. In his eyes, fighting is to conquer cities and kill the opponents." Wang Xiao sighed: "But you have to remember that war serves economy and politics."

"Students don't understand."

"How did this battle start? The decision is Zheng Yuanhua? Zheng Zhaoye is just a pawn. Zheng Yuanhua is very necessary to attack Jinan? He wants to help Zhou Yu succeed to the throne, so he must get rid of Your Majesty, Your Highness? At the same time, he must also make up his reputation as the monarch. Send troops to fight a battle? One hundred is now, this is the easiest way. So he came? The 170,000 army has a very popular strategy, and in the final analysis, it is still for politics.

For the time being, we can't beat him. Or, what if we can defeat this 170,000 army? Jiangnan has more than 400,000 troops? The financial resources are far better than us. We blocked this wave and he sent another wave. He kept fighting and fighting, but we couldn't get a rest? We tried our best to support it? In the end, we still had to lose at his hands, or both were injured and easily dealt with by other opponents.

So, at the beginning, what I had to do was tell Zheng Yuanhua, one, we are not that easy to fight; two? For political purposes, there is no need to fight with me to the death."

Xia Xiangwei thought about it for a while, and said, "The students still don't fully understand."

"I deliberately broke up with Your Highness, for many reasons? For example, find a reason to lead troops out of Jinan and attack their rear; for example, avoid the fine work of Jinan City? So that we will fall into the hands of others whenever we have any moves; for example, paralyzing Zheng Zhaoye? He felt that I had escaped...

But in Zheng Yuanhua's eyes, even if he knew that all this was played by me, he would think that there was a crack between me and Your Highness. Because he knew that human hearts were fragile and suspicion was inevitable. With this judgment, then the peace talks with Zheng Yuanhua will have a foundation."

Xia Xiangwei was stunned and asked, "Peace talk? But..."

He "but" for a long time but couldn't speak, so Wang Xiao asked, "But what?"

"But we still have an advantage now, and we may not have no chance..."

"In a war, you must remember the purpose of the war at the beginning. We cannot occupy Jiangnan with our existing strength. If we continue this battle, we will lose a high probability. If we win, we will only destroy the existing economy of Jiangnan, even if it is rotten. The situation in the north will not give us more time to establish a heart-to-heart economic system. In other words, if we continue this battle, it will not be beneficial except to win the right to succeed the throne for His Highness.

Only by ending it as soon as possible can we gain the precious time required for development. Two or three years, with this time of stable and stable development, can we surpass our opponents politically and economically. Therefore, no matter how smooth we play now, don’t be blinded by the temporary situation and remember the fundamental strategic purpose. We strive to achieve results in order to make Zheng Yuanhua understand that we are not easy to fight and gain more bargaining chips for negotiations."

Xia Xiangwei thought about it again and said, "Will Zheng Yuanhua agree to negotiate with us?"

"Yes, what he wants is Zhou Yu who can succeed the throne, what I want is time to hide my strength and keep a low profile, there is no conflict." Wang Xiao sighed and said, "I should have gone to Nanjing to talk to him in person, but once I go, he will kill me, so I have to let my second brother go."

At this point, a trace of undetectable worry flashed through his eyes.

"With a teacher in charge of Shandong, Zheng Yuanhua should not dare to touch Mr. II." Xia Xiangwei pondered, "But can he allow the teacher to develop safely for two years?"

"Why can't it?" Wang smiled and said, "He is better than me in terms of reputation, financial resources, military strength, population, territory, etc. Two or three years later, he should be able to develop better. He still has this confidence."

"In other words, the teacher is confident that he is better than him in two or three years?"

"Yes." Wang Xiao turned his head, looked out the window, and whispered: "What he doesn't understand, I don't even need to occupy those useless cities, because I have high-intensive industries... higher productivity, more efficient production relations, these, he could not imagine..."

But at the end of the night, Wang Xiao looked at the night sky without anyone but still showed a worried look.

"Is it too late? Second brother, you have to do it as soon as possible..."

On that night, Wang Zhu barely ran from Xuzhou to Nanjing.

~~

Zheng Zhaoye left 30,000 people to occupy Qingzhou and waited to meet with the Five Army Camps, and personally led 90,000 troops to fight towards Laizhou.

Perhaps it was because he was defeated by Jinan and wanted to take revenge, or perhaps it was because he was indeed short of food and grass. This time he no longer restricted the military rules, but instead allowed the soldiers to loot.

From Jinan to Qingzhou, from Qingzhou to Laizhou, where the army passed by 300 miles above the land, they killed people, burned houses, robbed and captured corpses, and refugees fled everywhere.

In Zheng Zhaoye's eyes, the fighting spirit of this army finally recovered a little.

During the march this day, Zheng Zhaoye looked up and saw a small hill in front of him, and called someone to ask, "What kind of mountain is that?"

"Sir, it's Heiyang Mountain. After passing Heiyang Mountain, it's less than thirty miles away from Laizhou."

Zheng Zhaoye nodded and said, "Tell Master Yang to send someone to find out if there is an ambush."

"yes."

Zheng Zhaoye was still riding on his horse. After a while, a personal guard came forward and whispered: "Young Master, they went to find food last night and picked a good-looking one to offer it to the young master. They were in the carriage, your son..."

With a "bang", Zheng Zhaoye slapped the guard in the face.

"Young Master..."

"Who is this young master? I dare to put some peasant women in my carriage, but I won't do it yet!"

Zheng Zhaoye is not bad at this, he looks down on others from the bottom of his heart.

When he wanted to come, he would come to Laizhou and Jinan, and choose the best among the officials and relatives to be happy... As for the women who were captured in the countryside? Haha.

A snorted in my heart, the army was walking across Black Sheep Mountain.

The soldiers in front had already walked over and obviously did not encounter an ambush.

Zheng Zhaoye looked up at the mountain, thinking that the name of the mountain also showed a stupid smell...

Several frightened birds flew out of the mountains...

Zheng Zhaoye was suddenly stunned, and the birds in his pupils were getting bigger and bigger...

——Wait, this is not a bird.

"Quick! Spread!"

"boom!"

A loud bang exploded in front, and the fire, shrapnel, and flesh and blood splattered.

Zheng Zhaoye turned his head a little confusedly, only to see Sun Yourong running down from the carriage with his head in his arms, shouting, "We're scared to death, protect our house quickly." Then he rushed to the stroke.

"Boom, boom..."

The shells kept smashing down.

"Attack! Attack me..."

Zheng Zhaoye shouted, and turned over and got off the horse and ran towards the foot of the mountain. A soldier followed him to protect him, but he pushed him away.

"Idiot, don't get together, get out of here!"

He quickly fled to the foot of the mountain and hid near a large stone before he felt at ease. Looking up, he saw that there were still shells hitting down the mountain, and the Jiangnan army was panicked.

——Yang Jia, this idiot, doesn’t know how to send people to attack the mountain; Kong Yourong, that idiot, ran into the crowd, and then watch him be smashed by shells...

Thinking of this in my heart, Zheng Zhaoye became more and more angry.

It’s not impossible to move the cannons to the mountain to fire them, but it’s not easy to say that they can’t hold them after the shooting. It’s far better to put them on the top of the city.

But Zheng Zhaoye understood that the reason why Wang Xiao was able to move the artillery fire to the Black Sheep Mountain shows that he saw through his movements, which was a provocation to him.

"Damn it!"

He looked at him and the shells hit his army one after another. Unfortunately, Kong Yourong was not hit.

Then, Zheng Zhaoye discovered... everyone ran away.
To be continued...