Ji Han Grand Commander

Chapter 64 62. Helpless (210)
In the Yiling area, the next morning, the sky was bright. Yesterday, Wu's generals risked their lives to rescue Han Dang, but the result was, as expected, a waste of effort.

After several rounds of losses, the Wu army now has only about 30,000 to 40,000 people left. They firmly occupy the dangerous places and pass cities around Yiling and Yiling, and cannot go out to fight under Lu Xun's orders.

"General, something terrible has happened! The Shu army outside is challenging us to a fight, and... and..."

In the morning, Lu Xun sat in the big tent with a bad look on his face. The messenger outside ran into the tent and reported the urgent military situation to the commander-in-chief with a terrified look on his face.

"Didn't I tell you yesterday that if the Shu army challenges you to a fight, you should just pretend you didn't hear it. No matter how they humiliate you, you must not leave."

Lu Xun didn't even raise his head. In his opinion, the Han soldiers outside the tent were just shouting and cursing a few times, which made them a little unbearable.

"No... no, Grand Commander, I'm not yelling at them... they... they... the Shu army..."

The messenger hesitated and didn't dare to continue speaking, and even a few drops of sweat the size of beans flowed down his forehead.

"What's wrong? It's not yelling? What on earth is it? You can tell me."

"The Shu army... the Shu army... the Shu army brought all our captured generals to the front of the battle line and said they would behead them one by one in front of us..."

When the messenger said this, he looked directly at the ground and didn't dare to say anything else.

"What! How dare the Shu army do this!"

Lu Xun couldn't believe it, so he pushed open the curtain and went outside. Only then did he realize that all the soldiers were whispering to each other, with extremely frightened faces.

Lu Xun climbed up a lookout tower and looked across. He saw the Han army standing solemnly outside the tent. If he had not been guarding a crevice in the cliff that was easy to defend but difficult to attack, the enemy would have rushed up long ago.

"Uh huh!!!"

Looking again, there were several figures kneeling on the ground in front of the Han army, struggling constantly. Lu Xun was naturally familiar with them, as he had seen several of them in the tent yesterday. Now they had become prisoners of the Han army.

On the Han army's side, there were several heads hanging on sacrificial flags, which were also the Wu generals killed by the Han army since the attack on Wu.

"Listen, Wu Gou on the opposite side. If you continue to be cowards in here, we will execute your generals one by one in front of you! Think about it, your generals could have died on the battlefield, but because of your cowardly commander, they could only be escorted to the front of the two armies like prisoners and executed without any ability to fight back!"

A soldier with a loud voice shouted loudly with the iron trumpet that Feng Xi had used before. Faced with this situation, countless Wu army generals and soldiers wanted to rush out and fight the Han army to the death. Even if they died at the hands of the Han army, it was better than living in such humiliation.

"...Grand Admiral, what should we do?"

Zhou Tai also came to Lu Xun's side, but his eyes were only slightly sad and calm. There was no doubt that he was only asking because Lu Xun was the Grand Commander appointed by the Marquis of Wu. If Lu Xun was an ordinary commander, Zhou Tai would have led his troops to withdraw long ago.

"Well... call all the generals who are still here to come to the tent, and I will tell you my plan."

Lu Xun could see the change in Zhou Tai and could only sigh. He ignored the shouting and cursing of the Han army outside and walked into the big tent.

There was a hint of doubt in Zhou Tai's eyes, but he still asked the messenger to call all the generals who were still there to a meeting.

After a while, all the generals came and looked at Lu Xun in silence, hoping that he would say something shocking.

"...I know that you all have strong opinions about me, but we are all fighting for the survival of Jiangdong. I hope you can put aside your grudges and listen to my thoughts."

Lu Xun spoke frankly to the generals, and everyone remained silent, intending to listen to him before reacting.

"Why did I ask you to hold on to the strategic location? It's simply to avoid the attack of the Shu army. As the defenders, we can afford to delay until the Shu army is exhausted and reveals its weakness, then we will have a chance to turn defeat into victory. Now the morale of the Shu army is high, and we have suffered heavy casualties. Generals are also veterans of many battles. Ask yourself, even if we send out our entire army to fight to the death with the Shu army, what are our chances of winning?"

The crowd remained silent. They naturally knew the pros and cons of the matter. They also knew that even if they all died here, it would at most cause some obstacles to the Han army. The Han army could still march all the way to Jingzhou and even Jiangdong with great momentum.

"Then I wonder, Commander-in-Chief, when will the Shu army get tired?"

Ma Zhong broke the silence and asked.

"……I have no idea."

Lu Xun shrugged. This made others look at him in surprise.

"Maybe tomorrow, or maybe we won't have this opportunity until we are escorted to Liu Bei's tent."

"So you're still betting?"

Zhou Tai couldn't believe it.

"It's a gamble. What else? Do you have a better way? Anyway, the result can't be worse than this one, right?"

All the Wu generals were silent. There was really nothing they could do right now, so they might as well follow Lu Xun's instructions and wait patiently for a few days.

……

"Xiu Yuan, you can slow down the offensive for the next few days, so that the soldiers don't have to work so hard and can have a rest for a while."

One day, Old Liu suddenly called Feng Xi into his tent to give him some instructions.

"Uh... Your Majesty, why is this happening? Why do we need to stop the attack?"

Feng Xi didn't know what was wrong with Old Liu. In fact, if he was willing to ignore the losses, he could definitely defeat Wu Jun even if he lost more than 10,000 soldiers. After all, Wu Jun's current land warfare quality was terribly low.

"Alas, Xiu Yuan. War is not only war, but also a game between people. At this moment, our Han army has the upper hand. The King of Wu will definitely send an envoy to ask for peace. We just need to wait for the King of Wu to send an envoy."

"…Your Majesty, we have been fighting with him for so long, and both sides have suffered huge losses. Is the King of Wu really willing to negotiate? And what about the revenge for General Guan?"

"Xiu Yuan. Why did we send our troops here? First, to avenge Yun Chang, and second, to recover Jingzhou. If Sun Quan is willing to withdraw from Jingzhou and send back the murderer who murdered Yun Chang, our Han army can suffer less losses. After all, our biggest enemy is still the thief Cao Wei in the north who usurped the Han Dynasty. We should not waste too much strength on Dongwu."

Liu Bei waved his hand, as if to say, "Young man, I have fought more battles than you have eaten."

Feng Xi was speechless for a while. He finally understood why Liu Bei made so many stupid decisions at this time in history. He thought that Liu Bei felt that he had given Sun Quan a way out, so Sun Quan should give him this face.

Old Liu probably never expected that the person on his side was not Cao Cao, who valued talents, but Lu Xun, who had no martial ethics and was only thinking about killing tens of thousands of his men to prove himself.

In a sense, Lao Liu was just flirting with a blind man. Feng Xi also inexplicably remembered a sentence:

"Old man, the new era doesn't have any ships to carry you, the remnants of the old era."

(End of this chapter)