Chu and Han contend for the throne

Chapter 56
Chen Ping hurried into the big tent of King Han, bowed to Liu Bang and Zhang Liang who were drinking together according to the case, and said, "Your Majesty, brother Zifang, just now Kuai Che went to the big tent of King Wu Rui of Hengshan again!"

"This Fan Yang Kuaiche!" Liu Bang frowned, "What does he want to do?"

After saying this, Liu Bang asked angrily again: "How many princes is this he has found?"

"The fourth one!" Chen Ping knelt down before Zhang Liang, and replied, "First Ying Bu, then Zhang Er, then King Han Xin, and now Wu Rui!"

"Kai Che is nothing more than trying to persuade the princes of all walks of life to retreat. As long as the king treats each other with sincerity and shows the world benevolence and righteousness, the princes of all walks of life will not listen to him. The king does not pay any attention to such small people." Zhang Liang said He is a true strategist and good at strategizing, but he is quite a gentleman, and he acts frankly and frankly. He looks down on the behavior of a villain like Kuai Che.

"Brother Zifang, I don't think so." Chen Ping rarely put forward an opinion different from Zhang Liang's. Kuai Che moved around, secretly instigating the princes from all walks of life to retreat, although it is a villain's behavior, the king cannot take it lightly!"

"This..." Liu Bang looked at Zhang Liang and then at Chen Ping, and his expression suddenly became embarrassing.

Zhang Liang and Chen Ping are the right-hand men who plan strategies for Liu Bang, and they seldom have disagreements, but now on the issue of how to deal with Kuai Che, they have a rare disagreement. It's a difficult situation, should we listen to Zhang Liang and ignore it, or should we listen to Chen Ping and get rid of Kuai Che?

Zhang Liang smiled lightly, and said: "If the king kills Kuai Che, wouldn't he tell the truth?"

Liu Bang nodded lightly. Zhang Liang's words were correct. If Kuai Che had to be killed just because he said a few bad words behind his back, wouldn't it seem that Liu Bang was very heartless and immeasurable?Once this matter attracts criticism from the world's scholars and wealthy families, and even arouses the suspicion of various princes, it will be a small loss.

Chen Ping had a solemn expression, and said, "If Kuai Che is not eliminated, what if he really convinces the princes from all walks of life? At that time, all the princes from all walks of life will advance together and retreat together, and ask the king to allow them to return to the country, so what should we do? Your Majesty And don't underestimate the debater's mouth, Su Qin is vertical, Zhang Yi is horizontal, it's not because of their three-inch tongue!"

Liu Bang nodded again. What Chen Ping said was not unreasonable. If Kuai Che really connected the princes from all walks of life and instigated them to blackmail him Liu Bang, it would be a real trouble. Agree. It will become a disaster, don't agree, once the princes from all walks of life join hands, how can he suppress Liu Bang?

Now that Zhang Liang and Chen Ping have spoken out, it is up to Liu Bang to take his own ideas.

At this time, Liu Bang suddenly began to miss Li Shiqi. It's not that Li Shiqi's wisdom is higher than that of Zhang Liang and Chen Ping, but that Li Shiqi himself is also a debater. Since Kuai Che can persuade all the princes to retreat, He, Liu Bang, can naturally let Li Shiqi lobby the princes from all walks of life, let them put righteousness first, and refrain from doing such inhumane acts.

After thinking hard for a while, Liu Bang finally found it difficult to make a decision, so he had to change the subject: "Let's talk about this later, but the remnants of the Chu army in Xiangzhuang have not moved for the past half month. There is no warning message, do you think the remnants of the Chu army have really escaped into the deep mountains and old forests?"

Zhang Liang said calmly: "If there is no accident, it should be like this."

Chen Ping echoed: "I also think so, with Xiang Zhuang's child's disposition, he will never sit idly by, but the roads to the north, east, and south to break through have been blocked by our army, and the remnants of the Chu army can only be killed." I took the risk of crossing the Dabie Mountain, but I don’t think that the remnants of the Chu army can really cross the Dabie Mountain.”

"It's best if you can't turn it over, let them all feed the snakes and insects!" Liu Bang laughed, "Even if it's really turned over, it's okay, as long as Xiang Zhuang'er stays away from Jiangdong's hometown, it's not easy to clean him up? It's best for Xiang Zhuang'er to lead him." With the remnants of the Chu army rushing into Linjiang, Gu led the army and even Gong Ao to clean it up, then the world will really be peaceful, ha ha."

Linjiang State is Liu Bang's heart disease second only to Chu State, because Linjiang Wang Gong Ao is a stunned young man, this old boy does not buy Xiang Yu's account, nor does he buy Liu Bang's account, the battle of Gaixia, the princes from all walks of life almost All of them came, except Gong Ao, the king of Linjiang, who didn't send troops, and killed the envoy sent by Liu Bang. Liu Bang wanted to deal with him a long time ago.

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After the Chu army left the old camp, they walked west along the canyon and gradually penetrated into the uninhabited primitive jungle.

In this era when the total population is only more than 3000 million, the Dabie Mountains are truly deep mountains and swamps, absolutely no man's land, let alone people inside, even a woodcutter and a farmer can't ask for directions!
And the further you go into the mountains, the denser the jungle will be, and the more difficult the road ahead will be.

Coupled with the steaming fog in the mountains and the cloudy sky, it is easy to get lost!

Fortunately, Xiang Zhuang had served as a soldier in his previous life and had learned survival skills in the wild. Even without modern tools such as a compass, and without the sun, moon and stars as references, he would not get lost in the jungle.

It seems difficult to find the direction in the jungle, but it is actually very simple. Just cut down a tree, and the general direction can be judged by the density of the texture. The side with less texture is probably the one facing south. side, combined with the mountain topography, you can basically determine the approximate orientation.

However, even if there is no fear of getting lost, this march will be much more difficult than Xiang Zhuang expected.

In his previous life, Xiang Zhuang once traveled through the more dangerous tropical rainforest, but when he entered the mountain, he discovered that a small army going through the jungle and a large army going through the jungle are completely different things!Just because he can lead a small army of more than a dozen people through the tropical rain forest infested with snakes and insects, does not mean that he can lead five thousand Chu troops over the Dabie Mountains.

On this way, the Chu army has been advancing along the gentle terrain of the canyon as much as possible, but the road is still dangerous and obstructed. It can only travel less than [-] miles a day. At this speed, I am afraid that it may not be able to go out in half a month. , and half a month later, the rainy season is likely to come. Once the rainy season really enters, the Chu army will not even think about getting out of the jungle.

Three days have passed in a blink of an eye, but the Chu army has only traveled less than a hundred miles!
Seeing that it was getting dark, Xiang Zhuang ordered the army to set up camp, and asked Wei Liao and Wu She to be invited to his side.

"Phew, I'm exhausting this old man." Wei Liao sat down by the fire, gasping for breath, while beating his old arms and legs. After all, the old man is over 60 years old, even though there are horses on the way, Some people even carried him on his back when crossing the dangerous road, but he was still very tired after walking down the mountain road for such a long time.

In comparison, Wu She, who is in his prime, is much better than Wei Liao.

Xiang Zhuang hurriedly ordered Qin Ji to boil water with the only small iron cauldron in the army, preparing to soak Wei Liao's feet. This old man is his chief think tank, and there must be no accidents.

After resting for a while, Wei Liao calmed down a little, and said, "General, I think it's impossible to go on like this."

Xiang Zhuang nodded, and said deeply, "Yes, there is no road in the mountains, and there are many obstacles and dangers. I can only walk thirty miles a day. At this speed, I don't know when I will be able to cross the Dabie Mountains!"

Wu She also said worriedly: "It's already the first ten days of April, and the rainy season is coming soon."

"It's definitely not going to work like this." Wei Liao thumped his old leg, and said again, "We have to find another way!"

"But military division, what else can we do now?" Wu She shook his head and smiled wryly, "This mountain is high and the road is blocked, we can't conjure up a road out of thin air!"

"Create a big road?" Xiang Zhuang's heart moved slightly when he heard the words, Wei Liao seemed to be also touched, and immediately turned his head to look at Xiang Zhuang, the two looked at each other for a moment, and suddenly burst into laughter at the same time.

Wu She was puzzled by the laughter of the two, and said in a puzzled way: "General, military advisor, what are you laughing at?"

"Sir, if you hadn't reminded me, I really wouldn't have thought of it!" Xiang Zhuang patted Wu She's shoulder affectionately, and then said to Wei Liao, "Military Master, why don't you think that we didn't think of it? In this primeval forest, there are actually Where is the road?"

Wei Liao also laughed and said, "Didn't Li Zuoche say in his "Guangwu Junlue" that a wise man has a lot of worries, and he must make mistakes?"

Wu She still didn't understand, so he frowned and asked, "General, I still don't know what you're talking about? From your point of view, is it possible that we can really create a road in this primeval forest?"

"Really?" Xiang Zhuang immediately pointed to the small river not far ahead, "Isn't that the main road?"

"That's it? This is clearly a small river, how could it be a big road, hiss..." Wu She suddenly understood as he spoke, and said, "General, military adviser, you mean to build a boat and then go down the river?"

"It's too late to build a boat, and the river is too small and shallow to walk." Xiang Zhuang waved his hand, and pointed to the vast bamboo forest not far away, "However, we can make a bamboo raft, and it will take half a day. , we can tie up thousands of bamboo rafts, and when the time comes, we can sit on the bamboo rafts and go down the river directly to the Huai River."

Wei Liao smiled slightly, and continued, "Then go up the Huai River and reach Nanyang!"

"That's right!" Wu Sheji praised, "Bamboo raft, why didn't we think of bamboo raft before!?"

"It's not too late to think about it now." Wei Liao said happily, "Mr. Wu She, it's all thanks to you this time."

"Yes, this time it's really thanks to Mr. Xiang Zhuang." Xiang Zhuang smiled lightly, this time it's really thanks to Wu She.

From the very beginning, Xiang Zhuang and Wei Liao only thought about how to cross the high mountains and how to cross the virgin forest, but they never thought that they could easily pass through the primitive forest by going down the river, and bypass the many mountains by going up the river. Dashan, and this is probably the so-called fixed thinking. Some things are simple to say, but you just can’t think of them if you don’t point them out!

Of course, this is just a simple way of thinking. If there is no moso bamboo in the mountains, even if Xiang Zhuang and Wei Liao think of the shortcut of going down the river, they can only look at the river and sigh, because without the moso bamboo, they can't move forward. With bamboo rafts, the five thousand Chu soldiers can't all jump into the river and float down the river, can they?
(End of this chapter)