Chapter Fifteen: Planning in Secret

  From Peng City to Daliang, which is the distance from Xuzhou to Kaifeng, in the era of trains and highways, this journey can be completed in three to four hours. However, at the end of the Qin Dynasty, without seven or eight days' time, Liu Bang's army could not reach the area around Daliang. During this period, if the vanguard and rearguard of Liu Bang's army marched at different speeds and lost contact with each other, Li Yuan would not mind giving Liu Bang another profound lesson.

  Main beam.

  The abandoned capital of the Wei State, after being deserted for a long time, welcomed a very strange Qin army unit. This unit carried weapons that were not swords or crossbows, but bundles of long bamboo poles and batches of digging tools such as hoes. Afterwards, these Qin soldiers began an incomprehensible city destruction work.

  The flat road was dug up, the river water that ran through the city was diverted to an underground river, and the collapsed houses were rebuilt. The people of Tongzhou had long been immune to Li Yuan's strange actions, as long as they didn't cause any disturbance, what the Qin soldiers did in a deserted city wasn't something many people cared about. In this chaotic world where survival was already difficult, who had the leisure to pay attention to other things?

  Time is flying away day by day.

  The anxiety of the Qin army's soldiers began to show on their faces, and even Wang She, who had proposed fighting a battle, became uneasy. What if Liu Bang's large army was tightly arranged front and back, and they couldn't find an opportunity to attack? It's not easy to be pursued and killed by tens of thousands of enemy troops.

  When encountering big things, one must remain calm.

  Li Yuan was still arranging the preparations for the Battle of Daliang, and he personally checked and tested every item. This was an opportunity to test his intelligence and technological application, and whether the existing conditions in ancient times could be perfectly combined with advanced ideas depended on how hard he worked normally.

  Daliang, the new garrison of the Qin army.

  Report, urgent report, Liu Bang dispatched Cao Shen, Fan Kuai and Lu Shang as vanguard, leading 5,000 elite soldiers to kill towards Xingyang, the front line has already arrived at Yangwu last night.

  "According to scouts, Yang Xiong, the magistrate of Gongyang, led an army of 30,000 men out of the city yesterday and is marching towards Daliang."

  Years of military career have benefited Li Yuan greatly, the deployment of scouts, the reaction of various forces, the exploration of terrain and geography, the names of enemy generals, interests and hobbies - these seemingly chaotic messages are summarized into the most accurate combat analysis report.

  Wang Shang, Zhou Xing, Gan Houbao and other Qin army generals and department heads looked grave. In front of them was Liu Bang's large army, while behind them were Yang Xiu's troops. Li Yuan's army was in a precarious situation, caught between the two forces. At this suffocating moment, they wished they could go back to being ordinary cavalry officers who only followed orders.

  "Urgent report, rebel smoke has been spotted twenty miles west of Junyi, with an estimated number of five to six hundred! Li Yuan looked at the situation in his hand and a faint smile appeared on his face. He said: "Gentlemen, the enemy's trail has appeared, listen to my orders."

  "Zhou Xing."

  "In."

  "Order you to lead 200 long spear soldiers from the headquarters to ambush in the left alley of Daliang City. When the enemy comes to attack, take the fire on the city tower as a signal, and then lead the army to cover up and kill the enemy. Remember the road signs inside the city."

  "Uncle Gan Houbo."

  "In."

  "Order you to lead 200 long spear soldiers from the headquarters in the right alley of Daliang City, ambush and attack when the enemy comes. When the fire on the city tower starts, join forces with Zhou Xing's unit to launch a surprise attack."

  "King Shang."

  "Order you to lead the cavalry to circle around to the east of the Great River, three miles outside the wilderness, and see that there are enemy troops retreating here, annihilate the remaining enemy."

  "The rest of you, follow me and defend Huaiyin."

  "Agreed!"

  Li Yuan deployed his troops, full of confidence, which boosted the morale of the officers and soldiers. They looked at Li Yuan with a mixture of awe and excitement, ready to die for their commander. The two generals, Zhang and Hu, led the ambush in the city of Daliang, while the most elite hundred cavalrymen were sent to intercept the remaining enemy forces. Meanwhile, Li Yuan himself took on the crucial task of luring the enemy into a trap without any hesitation.

  This is a gamble with one's life!

  In this battlefield banquet where one cannot afford to lose, Li Yuan did not have the qualification to give up. What he had to do was to use a small force to attack a large one, and to stake his life against theirs.

  If Liu Bang's vanguard general was a cautious and far-sighted commander, he would only need to assemble all his troops and then attack in formation towards the east. As a result, Li Yuan's arrangements would be rendered useless, with around 1,000 soldiers facing nearly 5,000 enemies, who were also the vanguard of the Chu army used for attacking and capturing strongholds. The outcome for the Qin army would be to crash into them head-on, suffering heavy casualties and defeat.

  Although there is no exact information to confirm who Cao Can San will send as the vanguard, Li Yuan gambled that Liu Bang would dispatch a fierce general to take the lead in opening up the mountain road and building bridges over the water. After single-handedly killing Ji Xin and defeating Peng Yue, Li Yuan's bravery was enough to leave a deep impression on Liu Bang. The reason why the fierce general is so brave lies in the fact that apart from this one advantage, the general's intelligence may not be sufficient in other aspects.

  Fan Kuai, Liu Bang's brother-in-law, the most trusted and bravest general, among the three generals, Fan was always at the forefront.

  With Fan Kuai's consistent style, plus the anger of avenging Ji Xin, Fan Kuai would not care about any conspiracy or trickery. When encountering an enemy blockade, relying on his own strength to see the true chapter is Fan's necessary choice. As the main general is like this, the arrogant and overbearing atmosphere in the Fan army will only be more severe.

  After all the troops had finished their deployment, Li Yuan led his own army back to Junyi. His expression was calm and unchanged, making it impossible for anyone to detect any changes. In order not to be discovered by the rebel scouts or have military secrets leaked by the civilians, he did not issue any mobilization orders before the battle or transport away the remaining grain and supplies in advance. Anyway, these days only saw troops going out but not coming in, and there was hardly any surplus grain left in the Qin army's warehouses. Leaving some behind could give Fan Kuai the illusion that the Qin army was defeated and retreating.

  "Sound the horn, pass down the order, the whole army has finished cooking and eating, eat your fill and drink enough, fight with the enemy!" Li Yuan stepped up onto the earthen wall of Junyi, gazing out at the setting sun over the weeds growing in the outer city, his heart was also tense. This was Li Yuan's first time as a commander-in-chief, whether he was just talking on paper or could win a thousand miles away, needed to be tested in actual combat. From the lowest soldier to the colonel, Li Yuan didn't know if he could bridge this gap all at once.

  Luring the enemy always comes at some cost.

  To make Fan Qiang fall for it, we still need to put up a symbolic resistance. If we lose too quickly, Fan Qiang won't be foolish enough not to suspect anything. Once he's suspicious, Li Yuan's arrangements in Daliang will all be for nothing.

  Time is passing minute by minute and second by second, and what was bound to come has finally arrived.

  When that bright red color suddenly appeared on the eastern horizon, a huge stone in Li Yuan's heart finally fell to the ground. The vanguard sent by Liu Bang was Fan Kuai, and he had gambled correctly!

  The mighty Qin army was right in front of them, and Fan Kuai hastily raised the banner to proclaim to the opposing Qin forces that they had been defeated by a fierce general named Fan Kuai.