On the surface, the Qin army's disarmament and military reorganization were done openly and openly, but in fact it was also to attract the attention of the princes of the world, so as to hide other actions secretly.
While the Qin army was disarming and reorganizing, an army numbering 20,000 was divided into several groups and quietly assembled towards Hulao Pass. It was Qin Hao's army that was preparing to support Liu Bei.
This army is all composed of Yuanmeng slaves in prisoner-of-war camps, so even if they are all destroyed on the way to support Xuzhou this time, it will not have much impact on the Qin army.
Although the army has been assembled, due to the need to pass through Yanzhou and negotiations with Cao Cao are still in progress, the army has only been training at Hulao Pass, and the specific departure time has not yet been determined.
This time Qin Hao sent Kan Ze as an envoy to Yanzhou to negotiate with Cao Cao.
Although all states in the world are at war, the situation in Yanzhou is definitely the most chaotic.
Qiao Mao and other three princes joined forces but still lost to Cao Cao, so they led Li Zicheng to Yanzhou, hoping to use Li Zicheng's power to deal with Cao Cao, so that both Cao Cao and Li Zicheng would lose.
What a tyrant Li Zicheng is, how could he be used by the three of them? The princes of Yanzhou wanted to use him to get rid of Cao Cao, so why didn't he use them to enter Yanzhou?
It was under this mutual use that the Yanzhou War broke out completely.
Cao Cao used his own power to fight against the three princes of Yanzhou and Li Zicheng's Ming army. Under the pressure of these four forces, Cao Cao's situation was extremely difficult.
At the most dangerous time, Cao Cao even acted as a bait himself;
In the most difficult time, Cao Cao even adopted Cheng Yutuo's strategy and used human flesh as military rations.
most……
No matter how difficult it was, Cao Cao finally survived, and the situation in Yanzhou changed drastically again. The three princes, Qiao Mao, Zhang Miao, and Bao Xin, all became cannon fodder in the fight between Cao Cao and Li Zicheng.
The forces under the command of Bao Xin, the governor of Jibei, Qiao Mao, the governor of Dongjun, and Zhang Miao, the governor of Dongping, were divided up by Cao Cao and Li Zicheng respectively.
Bao Xin himself died in the battle directly, and Qiao Mao and Zhang Miao came to Qin Hao, becoming the fourth and fifth princes to join Qin Hao after Zhang Yang, Wang Kuang, and Wang Lang, while Kong Rong was the sixth.
Since then, four more princes have disappeared from the world.
When Zhang Yang and Wang Kuang had just surrendered, Qin Hao, in order to reassure them and stabilize the southern region, did not completely seize their military power and still ordered them to guard their original counties.
After winning the Battle of Hetao, Qin Hao naturally lost so much encouragement and directly transferred them to Luoyang to grant them higher official positions, but also deprived them of their military power in disguise.
They were also kind to me.
After Qiao Mao, Zhang Miao, and Wang Lang took refuge, Qin Hao did not treat them lightly and still gave them high officials and generous salaries. Although they certainly did not have the power they had when they were princes, it was quite difficult for them as bereaved dogs.
After Qiao Mao and other three princes withdrew, Yanzhou became the stage for Cao Cao and Li Zicheng. Now Cao Cao occupies the south and central part of Yanzhou, while Li Zicheng occupies the north and east.
Generally speaking, the number of elite soldiers under Li Zicheng became less and less, but Cao Cao faced the difficulties and continued to expand his power. If this trend continues, Cao Cao will definitely be the one to unify Yanzhou.
Although Cao Cao gained an advantage in the war with Li Zicheng, his life was still difficult.
The long-term war turned a large number of refugees into refugees. Of course, Cao Cao also wanted to provide disaster relief, but all his financial and material resources were used to fight against Li Zicheng. He was unable to rescue the victims at all, so he could only let the victims leave Yanzhou, which also made Yanzhou
The foundation is getting thinner and thinner.
Most of the refugees who escaped from Yanzhou fled to Qin Hao's territory. After all, except for the fact that there was no war under Qin Hao's rule, wars broke out in the other three directions of Yanzhou, so there was no other place to go except to join Qin Hao.
.
If this continues, even if Cao Cao defeats Li Zicheng and unifies Yanzhou, he will only end up in a mess and will be unable to participate in the subsequent struggle for hegemony among the princes.
Therefore, Cao Cao naturally wanted to obtain external assistance to speed up the pace of unifying Yanzhou. At this time, Qin Haoxian came to discuss cooperation, which was exactly what Cao Cao wanted.
Luoyang
After Kan Ze returned from his mission, he immediately reported to Qin Hao and said: "My lord, although Cao Cao did not refuse to borrow the passage, my subordinates are on a mission to Yanzhou this time. Cao Mengde has been crying with his subordinates and said that he hopes that the lord will not favor one over another."
, People who patronize Xuzhou ignore Yanzhou and hope that the imperial court will also give Yanzhou some support. Obviously they want to use this borrowing to extort some benefits from the imperial court."
After Qin Hao pondered for a while, he asked: "How much does Cao Cao want to pay?"
"Well...he wants five thousand horses."
"Five thousand horses?"
Qin Hao was stunned for a moment, then snorted coldly: "You dare to ask me for five thousand war horses just for an excuse. Cao Cao really dares to ask for this."
Supporting Liu Bei and delaying Zhu Yuanzhang's unification of Xuzhou was related to Qin Hao's plan to unify Hebei, so Qin Hao had to suffer this loss.
In addition, before the start of the Hetao War, Cao Cao was in the most difficult situation, but in order to support Qin Hao, Cao Cao frugally scraped together 20,000 shi of food and grass to support the Qin army, so Qin Hao also owed Cao Cao a favor.
"That's all, just think of it as repaying Cao Cao's favor, but five thousand horses is too much."
At this point, Qin Hao looked at Kan Ze and continued: "Mr. Kan Ze, could you please go to Yanzhou and tell Cao Cao that the maximum is three thousand horses. If he still wants it, it will cost money, food or supplies."
Come and buy, but it’s only limited to 10,000 horses.”
The Qin army now has an indispensable shortage of horses. Even if the two hundred thousand cavalrymen ride three horses per person, they only need 600,000 war horses at most, and the total number of war horses owned by the Qin army exceeds one million.
Taking out war horses that are temporarily unused in exchange for valuable development resources is also a win-win situation for the Qin army.
"promise."
The matter of supporting Xuzhou is still in preparation, and Li Jing, who went to Beihai to replace Kong Rong, has already arrived in Qingzhou with three thousand elite cavalry.
The Yellow River navy of the Qin Army, with 3,000 elite cavalry, 5,000 auxiliary infantry equipment, and 5,000 powerful crossbows, traveled down the river from Mengjin Ferry, passed through Jizhou and Yanzhou, and finally stopped in the middle of Qingzhou.
Come down.
The two counties of Qingzhou and the 65 counties of the Four Kingdoms were directly divided into two by the Yellow River. The south and part of the central part were occupied by Huang Chao, the north was Yuan Shao's territory, and Song Jiang and Kong Rong were sandwiched between the two.
The place Li Jing chose to disembark was only a few dozen miles away from Beihai County, so after disembarking, he immediately ordered three thousand elite cavalry to take all the supplies and go straight to the Beihai Navy.
At the same time, all the major princes in Qingzhou also knew immediately that a cavalryman had appeared on the land of Qingzhou.