Three Kingdoms: My Strategy Simulator

After pondering for a moment and forming his own judgment on the current situation, Guo Jia spoke, asking:

"Master Zikun, how did the Yue tribes appear in Qiantang County? And is it confirmed that the defense line at Mount Fuchun has not been breached?"

Undoubtedly, as one of the top strategists, Guo Jia keenly perceived the contradictions in the situation and questioned Li Ji about them.

"The defense line at Mount Fuchun remains intact, without a doubt," Li Ji replied definitively.

Moreover, with Guo Jia being alone in the army and having no opportunity to leak information, Li Ji did not deliberately hide anything from him. Instead, he showed Guo Jia the military reports regarding Zhao Yun and Guan Yu.

'The situation is much more complicated than I imagined…' Guo Jia's expression became more solemn as he instinctively took the opposing viewpoint and pondered the purpose of the three thousand Yue tribesmen appearing in Qiantang County.

As Li Ji was already leading the main force towards the southern part of Wu Commandery to stabilize the situation, and Zhao Yun's cavalry was patrolling between Qiantang, Yuhang, and Fuchun counties, driving the rebellious Yue tribesmen into the forests, Li Ji knew that being anxious was pointless.

Therefore, Li Ji leisurely brewed a pot of tea, poured a cup for Guo Jia, and asked, "Do you have any insights?"

Guo Jia picked up the teacup and took a sip. The unique fragrance and sweet aftertaste, different from boiled tea, brightened his eyes.

Immediately, Guo Jia took a few more sips before proudly saying, "I have a guess."

"Oh? Tell me about it," Li Ji said.

"Don't forget that we are in a competition," Guo Jia reminded him confidently.

"In that case, how about we each write our thoughts on bamboo slips and then exchange them to read?" Li Ji said with a smile.

"Good!" Guo Jia replied and began writing on a bamboo slip with a writing brush.

Seeing this, Li Ji also took a blank bamboo slip and wrote two words: "Mount Fuchun" and "Yuyao County."

Afterward, Li Ji rolled up the bamboo slip and exchanged it with the confident Guo Jia.

Li Ji opened the bamboo slip written by Guo Jia and saw the three words "Mount Fuchun" written on it.

'Truly worthy of being a genius, able to discern the key point so quickly,' Li Ji thought to himself.

This once again verified Guo Jia's talent.

After all, all the information currently displayed on the surface is that the Yue tribes have a secret route bypassing Mount Fuchun to Qiantang County, while the Mount Fuchun area has been calm for three months.

Furthermore, the group of Yue tribesmen only numbered three thousand, and after being attacked by Zhao Yun's cavalry, it is likely that only a thousand or so defeated soldiers remain.

If it were an ordinary local official, the subconscious thought would probably be to organize manpower to enter the forest to search for the traces of the Yue tribesmen remnants, even at the cost of transferring a batch of soldiers from Mount Fuchun to assist in finding and exterminating the remnants as soon as possible to prevent future troubles.

Even a slightly more intelligent strategist who vaguely sensed something was amiss would only try to strengthen the defenses in the Qiantang County area as much as possible to prevent the Yue tribes from attacking Qiantang County again.

However, Guo Jia was able to determine in a very short period of time that "Mount Fuchun" was the key point, despite the seemingly stable situation and even the military report of Guan Yu's initiative to withdraw from Mount Fuchun, which was not easy.

However, Guo Jia frowned completely as he looked at the second word "Yuyao County" written by Li Ji, completely unable to understand what connection "Yuyao County" had with the attack on Qiantang County.

Especially with the first answer being the same for both of them, the word "Yuyao County" that Li Ji added undoubtedly made Guo Jia feel particularly uncomfortable.

However, Guo Jia quickly recalled all the information he had seen in the army, and there was no mention of "Yuyao County" at all. Even on the map, this small county belonging to Kuaiji Commandery was only marked on the edge.

"Yuyao County, how did you deduce it? And what connection does it have with the Yue tribes?" Guo Jia asked.

However, Li Ji asked a seemingly irrelevant question, causing Guo Jia to be slightly taken aback.

"Fengxiao, what is your thinking habit?"

"Thinking habit?" Guo Jia asked.

"That's right. For example, my habit is to make the greatest possible deduction through known information, which can be said in a relatively popular way: to see one step and calculate ten steps…"

Li Ji first gave an example of himself and then sold Jia Xu, who was staying in Wu County and unwilling to go south with Li Ji, saying:

"In addition, I have a close friend named Jia Wenhe, whose thinking habit is purely to achieve his goals by exerting various influences on human nature."

"It's a pity that Wenhe didn't go south with us this time. Otherwise, Fengxiao and Wenhe would have had some friendly exchanges."

As for the reason why Jia Xu did not go south, Li Ji mentioned it in passing and did not elaborate.

The cunning Jia Xu, whose main characteristic was slipperiness, knew that following Li Ji would likely turn him into a tool, so he stubbornly refused to go south with the army, using the slogan of staying in Wu County to assist Liu Bei and support Li Ji at any time.

Guo Jia, who was still a young man, had obviously not yet realized how treacherous society was, especially with top strategists like Li Ji and Jia Xu, whose words and actions almost had a hundred and eighty tricks.

Listening to Li Ji's trusting description of his and Jia Xu's thinking habits, Guo Jia couldn't help but feel a little moved.

Like a general's fighting style, Guan Yu couldn't defeat the enemy in the first battle, but he could defeat them in the second battle.

A strategist's own thinking habits are also a very important secret, but Li Ji directly said it as if he was facing a trusted person. That feeling of exchanging sincerity for sincerity made Guo Jia hesitate slightly before answering directly.

"Thinking from the enemy's perspective, and then seeking flaws from one's own perspective… Generally speaking, I have this kind of thinking habit."

Li Ji was slightly surprised to hear this.

Being able to develop this kind of thinking habit also shows from the side that Guo Jia undoubtedly has the ability to easily think from the enemy's perspective.

This is abnormally consistent with Guo Jia's previous idea of "anticipating the enemy" to crack the "Four Crossings of the Red River", perhaps this is Guo Jia's thinking habit itself.

'Fengxiao is honest and did not hide anything…' Li Ji secretly compared and found that Guo Jia most likely did not hide anything.

Immediately, Li Ji continued, saying.

"Thinking habits are naturally not absolutely superior or inferior, but Fengxiao may be too focused on considering the enemy's goals, but has overlooked some details."

"Now, you and I both think that the group of three thousand Yue tribesmen is just a prelude, or a test, or a lure, or a diversion, but the focus of the goal must be related to Mount Fuchun."

"Regardless of the details of how the three thousand Yue tribesmen entered Qiantang County, only by occupying Mount Fuchun can the Yue tribes have a real passage from the vast mountains and old forests further south of Wu Commandery to directly enter the southern part of Wu Commandery."

"But, what are the habits of the Yue tribes?"

Li Ji suddenly asked, and Guo Jia blurted out, saying.

"Looting!"

"That's right."

Li Ji said in a deep voice.

"No matter how many Yue people are now eyeing Mount Fuchun, one thing will not change, and that is that the Yue people will only loot the Han people on a large scale and then quickly retreat into the jungle."

Perhaps from the perspective of later generations, the Han people can be said to have suffered from the looting of foreign tribes for generations, appearing weak.

However, the real reality is that those foreign tribes are undoubtedly the weak, while the Han people are the strong in the true sense, so they have always occupied the most fertile land, driving the foreign tribes who could hardly fill their stomachs to the harsh environment where it was difficult to survive.

This is particularly obvious in the Han Dynasty. The "Dinghu Stele Inscription" established by Emperor Xuan of Han directly wrote "All that the sun and moon shine upon, and the rivers reach, is Han land."

This sentence can be said to have directly and forcibly defined all the land that can be cultivated in theory as Han land that can be "since ancient times" in law.

As a result, the martial spirit of the Han Dynasty was formed, no matter how chaotic the internal strife was, they would always kill foreign tribes indiscriminately.

So it is not that the Yue people only loot and do not occupy a territory, but they dare not.

Stealing some advantages secretly is definitely something that the Yue people, who are full one moment and hungry the next, have the courage to do.

However, the Yue people absolutely do not have the confidence to openly seize the land of the Han Dynasty. That is a political correctness that violates the consensus formed from top to bottom in the Han Dynasty.

Even the money that the current Emperor sells official positions and titles to earn is used to quell the Qiang rebellion at the cost of spending money and food to send heavy troops to put it down, which shows the bottom line of Emperor Ling of Han.

Internal strife can be tolerated, but foreign invasions make Emperor Ling of Han unhappy even when playing with beauties.

After being reminded by Li Ji, Guo Jia suddenly realized his previous blind spot.

Guo Jia had previously based his judgment solely on the goal of the three thousand Yue tribesmen's actions, and then concluded that the Yue tribesmen's goal was likely to be Mount Fuchun, which seemed stable and not very useful.

However, once he further analyzed the situation based on the known information about the Yue tribesmen's mode of operation, he suddenly understood the contradictions.

Since the Yue people did not have the confidence to forcibly occupy the land of the Han Dynasty, then directly attacking Mount Fuchun seemed to have become a tasteless thing.

This is like deciding to directly attack the government treasury in order to steal a string of money.

If they really wanted to rob and leave, the wise choice would be not to confront the Han army head-on, let alone the Yue people trying to attack Mount Fuchun, which was heavily guarded.

Under this inspiration, Guo Jia suddenly felt that the previously confusing place became clear, and he murmured.

Furthermore, if a passage truly existed that could both evade the government and allow the Shanyue people to bypass Mount Fuchun and raid the prosperous areas around Qiantang County, then there would be even less need to forcefully attack Mount Fuchun…

In that case, such a passage absolutely does not exist…

Or perhaps we can infer from this that the band of Shanyue came via Kuaiji County, which is why only a small number of Shanyue entered Qiantang County.