Three Kingdoms: I switched to Liu Bei, why are you crying, Cao Cao?

Chapter 35 Yuan Shu dispatches troops, secret weapon

In April of the second year of Jian'an, after two months of brewing, turmoil once again arose in the Central Plains.

First, after Yuan Shu proclaimed himself emperor, he sent Han Yin as an envoy to try to form an alliance with Lu Bu.

Originally, Lu Bu had agreed, but under Chen Gui's persuasion, he finally got his daughter back and asked Chen Deng to take Han Yin to Xuchang.

When Cao Cao heard this, he was naturally delighted. He immediately executed Han Yin and met Chen Deng in person.

Chen Deng then found an excuse to report all the matters to Cao Cao, and also said that Lu Bu wanted to seek the position of governor of Xuzhou.

Cao Cao did not comment on this, but recommended Chen Deng as the prefect of Guangling and gave Chen Gui an additional rank of two thousand stones.

After receiving this reward, Chen Deng returned towards Xuzhou.

But this news reached Yuan Shu's ears via Runan.

Yuan Shu had been emperor for over a month at this time. He had been building large-scale projects, living a life of luxury and debauchery, and levying heavy taxes. He had become increasingly arrogant and self-indulgent. When he heard the news, he was furious.

Because he was afraid of Cao Cao's strong army, he took out all his anger on Lu Bu. He ordered his generals Zhang Xun, Qiao Rui and others to join forces with Han Xian and Yang Feng to lead tens of thousands of infantry and cavalry to attack Lu Bu.

When Lu Bu saw this, he panicked. Thinking of the letter Liu Bei had sent before, he wrote a letter himself and sent it to Xiaopei to ask for help.

Yuzhou, Pei County.

It is said that after Liu Bei met Qin Zhen and learned his strategies, he began to recruit soldiers and horses and store grass and grain.

Liu Bei's army already had brave generals like Guan and Zhang.

Not to mention Zhang Fei, Guan Yu is an expert at training troops.

Now with the addition of Xu Shu and Qin Zhen, the army is even more disciplined and orders are enforced.

However, although the soldiers are well-trained, they have never experienced actual combat, so their combat effectiveness is worrying.

So Qin Zhen directly gave Liu Bei advice, asking him to use conquest instead of training.

To put it simply, it means to drag these new recruits who have never seen blood out to fight.

Of course, instead of attacking other cities, we will start with the bandits.

Because Pei County is located on a strategic road and is surrounded by mountains in the northeast, bandits, mountain robbers, and remnants of the Yellow Turbans often gather there.

These bandits were not very powerful, but they were all extremely vicious, so they became Qin Zhen's target for training troops.

All day long he ordered his generals to send troops everywhere and sweep everywhere.

After more than a month, they captured and eliminated more than ten places of banditry and remnant of the Yellow Turbans, seized tens of thousands of coins, thousands of tons of grain, and captured more than two thousand bandits.

The main culprits were all beheaded, and the rest were all sent into the army.

For a time, Liu Bei's army not only improved its combat effectiveness to a higher level, but also received a lot of financial and food replenishment.

After spending some time together, Guan Yu and Zhang Fei gradually came to accept Qin Zhen as their military advisor.

But Guan Yu was fine, but Zhang Fei held his breath and refused to bow his head.

In addition to the changes in the army, Liu Bei also gained other things in these two months.

The most important thing is that people heard that he was recruiting soldiers and many patriots came to join him.

The leader was named Chen Dao, with the courtesy name Shuzhi. He was originally from Runan, but left home and came here because he admired Liu Bei's reputation for benevolence.

Seeing that this man had great martial arts skills, a rigorous character, and knew how to train troops, Liu Bei appointed him as the commander of his personal guards, responsible for training his troops.

In addition, there was a scholar named Liu Yan, whose courtesy name was Weishuo.

This man was a famous scholar in the State of Lu. He had good manners and was good at conversation. He also had the same surname as Liu Bei, so he was valued by Liu Bei.

Because of the shortage of staff under his command, he ordered him to work as a scholar.

With these two people, Liu Bei became more powerful. He was full of confidence all day long and looked forward to doing great things!
On this day, as there was nothing to do in the mansion, he came to the camp after a long absence.

When Xu Shu heard about it, he came to greet him.

The two of them walked into the camp together, and saw soldiers coming and going in an orderly manner, showing that they were already elite troops.

Hearing the shouts and cries of killing coming from the camp, Liu Bei sighed:

"Our army is what it is today thanks to Yuan Zhi's help!"

"It's obvious that Yuanzhi has been working hard lately and is getting thinner day by day. I can't bear it!"

Speaking of Xu Shu, he was originally a famous handsome young man in the area, with a fair face, short beard and elegant manners. But after he entered the officialdom, he became a darker person.

Therefore, Liu Bei felt guilty when he saw this.

However, when Xu Shu heard this, he shook his head and laughed:
"My lord, there is no need to do this. Serving the country is not hard at all!"

"As for our army's current status, it is all thanks to the contributions of the generals and military advisors. How dare I complain!"

Seeing Xu Shu's modesty, Liu Bei smiled and said:
"Yuanzhi is good in every way, except for one thing: he is too humble!"

"Well, since Yuanzhi doesn't mind the hardship, I won't say much!"

As he spoke, he looked into the distance and said:

"Speaking of which, have my second and third brothers offended the military advisor recently?"

When Xu Shu heard this, he laughed and said:

"I know that the Lord is not here to look for the camp, but to find out about this matter!"

"But my lord, rest assured. Since Zixuan took office, the two generals have not caused any trouble. Although Zixuan enforces the law strictly, he has always been fair."

"After more than a month, although the two generals did not say anything, they had already secretly agreed in their hearts."

"Especially the three generals. They haven't been nagging all day long these days. It's clear that they are not as dissatisfied as before!"

"If this continues, it won't be long before the generals and ministers can make peace!"

"That's good, that's good!"

Hearing this, Liu Bei felt relieved.

What he fears most now is the discord between the general and the minister, which will prevent Qin Zhen from doing his best!

Now that Guan Yu and Zhang Fei can live in harmony with Qin Zhen, he naturally put aside a lot of his worries.

Just as I was about to speak, I heard a series of "one, two, one" coming from far away.

Looking up, he saw a young general jogging around the camp gate with a group of soldiers.

Seeing this, Liu Bei looked surprised and said:

"Yuanzhi, what are Tanzhi and the others doing?"

Tanzhi is the courtesy name of Guan Ping, the young general who led the team just now.

Unlike the novel, Guan Ping is Guan Yu’s biological son and is only seventeen years old this year.

Seeing Liu Bei asking, Xu Shu looked back and said with a smile:

"My lord, you may not know that Tan Zhi was just leading the soldiers in a running march!"

"Does a running march need to be practiced?"

Liu Bei was stunned. He had been in the army for more than ten years and had never heard of the running march exercise. The most he had done was the marching formation exercise!

But Xu Shu saw this and smiled:

"My lord, you don't know that this is a method taught by the military advisor. If it is a normal drill, there is no need to practice marching."

"But the method taught by the military advisor requires practice from marching to gathering and marching!"

"Oh? Even walking requires practice?"

Liu Bei suddenly became interested and said:
"But I don't know what the drill is for?" "My lord, I don't know, this method can be very useful!"

Xu Shu smiled and made a gesture of invitation to Liu Bei:
"My lord, please follow me!"

After saying this, he walked towards the parade ground, and Liu Bei hurriedly followed.

After a while, the two arrived at the parade ground, and then they saw teams of soldiers marching in formation on the parade ground.

The officers stood in front of the line, shouting:

"Sir, stand at attention, look to the right!"

Under their orders, the soldiers immediately moved in unison!

Liu Bei looked at this scene and said with delight:

"Are these soldiers all veterans of our army?"

The reason he made such a judgment was that only veteran soldiers could be so orderly, and it would take a long time for the new recruits to form a military formation.

But even if this is a veteran, it is enough to make Liu Bei happy!
People in later generations have watched too much TV and always feel that in this era, when two armies faced each other, they just rushed forward and killed indiscriminately.

Not really!

Except for special circumstances, wars in this era are mostly confrontations between armies and overall confrontations!

Obeying orders and keeping discipline is the only standard for elite troops in this era!

When two armies are fighting, whoever can keep their troops together will win in the end!
Therefore, seeing that the formation of his subordinates was so orderly, Lao Liu was naturally surprised!

However, Xu Shu smiled even more when he heard this:

"You are wrong, my lord. These are our newly recruited soldiers!"

"The youngest of the people on the field has only been in our army for less than half a month!"

"You've only been in our army for half a month and you've already achieved this result?"

Liu Bei was really shocked for a moment!

According to the military training methods of this era, it is not easy to form a formation in two months!

It’s so neat in just half a month?

If you practice this for a year or two, you can go anywhere in the world.
Seeing Liu Bei's surprise, Xu Shu also exclaimed:

"This is the beauty of the military advisor's method. With this method, we can take shape in a few days, and start practicing the military formation in half a month!"

"After that, we will conduct combat drills, and we will be able to form an army in three months!"

"And if you use this method to train soldiers, they will act when ordered and stop when forbidden. Once the formation is formed, you only need to give an order, and the formation will be completed within ten breaths!"

"Speaking of military training methods, from ancient times to the present, there has never been such an effect!"

Liu Bei listened to this and nodded repeatedly:

"The military advisor's method of training soldiers is unheard of!"

He looked at the military formation on the field and couldn't help asking:
"So, our army is now capable of fighting?"

Xu Shu smiled and said:

"If it's just training, it's not enough to fight."

"But now, with the military advisor's strategy of training through conquest, even the new recruits in our army are no longer afraid of blood."

"We only need to fight one or two tough battles to be called elite!"

After hearing this, Liu Bei couldn't help but admire Qin Zhen for being so knowledgeable.

On the battlefield, the reason why new recruits have low combat effectiveness.

First, they are easy to scatter once a fight breaks out. Second, they have never seen blood, so they will be afraid!

Combining Qin Zhen's two methods together basically solved the biggest problem for new recruits.

All it takes is one real battle to instantly transform into a veteran.

It has to be said that this method of training soldiers is extremely effective and incredibly efficient.

Thinking of this, he wondered again:

"It's strange, if the military advisor's method is so effective, why hasn't it been implemented in Cao's army?"

Xu Shu knew Liu Bei would ask this question, so he could only shake his head and sigh:

"Zixuan wanted to implement it, but in the early days he was overwhelmed with work, he had to make plans and handle military affairs, so he didn't lead the troops."

"After that, the Yellow Turban Rebellion was subdued, and Zixuan settled the people and implemented military farming."

"Later, when he finally took command of the army and was about to implement the plan, Chen Gong rebelled. After Zixuan suppressed the rebellion, Cao Gong no longer allowed Zixuan to lead the army."

"That's why this method has only just come to light!"

"Fortunately, this is the case. Otherwise, I would have been unable to sleep or eat well!"

Compared with Xu Shu's sigh, Liu Bei was secretly rejoicing.

Fortunately, Cao did not use Qin Zhen to train his troops, otherwise, Cao's troops would be able to directly crush all the princes in the world!

As for why Cao did not use Qin Zhen to lead the troops, he did not want to ask more.

It's nothing more than fear that Qin Zhen will rebel like Chen Gong!

Chen Gong's rebellion alone was enough to cause such great harm.

If Qin Zhen rebelled, no one dared to imagine the consequences!
After all, Qin Zhen has no big family background to tie him down, and he can rebel whenever he wants with his wife and children!
However, Cao Cao was afraid of this, but Old Liu was not, because he believed in his own vision!

In his opinion, Qin Zhen is a kind and noble man!

If Qin Zhen rebelled, the reason would most likely be his, not Qin Zhen's!

Old Liu doesn't have any good qualities, except that he trusts his subordinates. He is not worried about letting Qin Zhen hold the power.

Thinking of this, he felt even more fortunate that he had picked up such a great bargain, and asked again:
"Speaking of which, I came to the army today but didn't see the military advisor. I wonder where he is?"

But as soon as he asked, Xu Shu shook his head and smiled bitterly:
"Not to mention the lord, even I have never seen it!"

When Liu Bei heard this, he felt nervous and said:

"Does Yuan Zhi know where the military advisor has gone?"

Seeing this, Xu Shu knew that Liu Bei was concerned about Qin Zhen's safety, so he hurriedly said:
"Don't worry, my lord. Zixuan should be in the city. He has been in the forge recently, seemingly supervising the making of a sharp weapon."

Hearing that Qin Zhen was not missing, Old Liu breathed a sigh of relief, but then he was surprised:

"What weapon is the military advisor supervising the construction of?"

"I do not know either!"

Xu Shu shook his head and said:
"He only said it was a secret weapon, but he didn't say anything about what it was or what it was used for!"

"Secret weapon?"

Liu Bei muttered, and quickly raised his head and said:
"Yuanzhi, let's go take a look!"

Seeing Liu Bei like this, Xu Shu laughed and said:

"That's exactly what I wish for. With my lord here, I'm sure Zixuan won't be able to hide it!"

As he said this, he led Liu Bei towards the city.

(End of this chapter)