The Great Qin Empire---Qin Li

It is said that when King Wu attacked Shang, eight hundred princes met in Mengjin, among which was the State of Ba. Many warriors of the Ba people traveled thousands of miles to join King Wu of Zhou's team, and followed him from the banks of the Wei River all the way to Dayi Shang in the Central Plains. They sang and danced in the Battle of Muye, and made great contributions to King Wu's attack on King Zhou...

At present, Heifu had the honor to reenact the original scene. After the incident of Wu falling on Zhongli Mountain, the Ba people obeyed Heifu's request and followed him to leave Yidao and march to the southeast.

However, when Heifu and Ling Kui, the county lieutenant of Yiling, arrived at Chanling City with more than a thousand soldiers and three thousand young and strong Ba people across two hundred miles, they found that they had run in vain.

According to rumors, the Chu army that gathered nearly 10,000 people here had long disappeared, leaving only an empty camp. Magpies were circling above, and some Qin soldiers were still collecting the remaining military supplies inside. They were carrying large bags of food and discarded weapons, and walked into the city with laughter.

When the Qin army saw a group of barefoot Ba people approaching noisily, they were very nervous and thought they were enemy troops. So two thousand people immediately set up a battle array outside the city, and it was not until Hei Fu personally rode forward and revealed his identity that their hostility was dispelled.

When Hei Fu passed by the city wall, he found that corpses were still being collected here. The air was filled with the smell of crows that feed on rotten corpses. There were still many floating corpses in the moat. The loess walls of Chanling were incomplete, with traces of fire, and the city gates were also full of arrows. It can be imagined that at the same time as the Battle of Yidao, a fierce battle also took place here.

When he met the county lieutenant Li You and a group of familiar military officers and county lieutenants in the city, he learned what happened here.

It turned out that after learning that the Chu army's main attack was in Chanling, the county governor Ye Teng immediately returned to Jiangling by boat and mobilized local county soldiers to cross the river for support. After all, Chanling's status was much more important than Yidao. This army was led by Li You, the county lieutenant, and there were as many as four or five thousand people. Subsequent reinforcements also came from various counties along the river.

Faced with the rapid increase of Qin's troops and the failure to open up the situation in Yidao, the commander of the Chu army decisively chose to retreat. The Qin army was insufficient in number and did not pursue deeply, so this Mengxia offensive ended hastily.

"What a pity!"

Hei Fu thought to himself that it was a pity. If the Chu army generals had been lucky, they might now face the fate of being attacked by the Qin army and the Ba people, and the number of people killed in the battle would be more than hundreds.

However, he flattered Li You and said, "Fortunately, the county lieutenant came in time and prevented the Chu people from succeeding. Otherwise, if Chanling was lost, Yidao would not be able to be saved. This summer and autumn, Nanjun's preparations for war would be greatly affected, and it would be difficult to send troops to Huaibei to participate in the destruction of Chu!"

Li You shook his head helplessly and said, "Otherwise, although Chanling was not captured in this battle, the Chu people's goal has been achieved."

"I would like to hear a detailed explanation."

Hei Fu made a confused expression, willing to listen to Li You's teachings.

Li You said to everyone: "Anyone with a discerning eye can see that the king is determined to destroy Chu. How could the people of Chu not know this? The reason why he sent envoys to instigate the Yidao Ba people to rebel and then led his troops to attack Chanling was nothing more than to put pressure on Nanjun so that Nanjun could not concentrate on preparing for the war. Now the main force of the Chu army in the south of the Yangtze River is still there. If Nanjun sends all its troops to Huaibei, Chanling, Yidao, and even Jiangling may be attacked by the Chu army again."

Hei Fu understood that although it was still too early for the decisive battle, the struggle between Qin and Chu on the corners had already begun. The King of Chu and Xiang Yan would not sit idly by. They would try to find Qin's flaws. If there were no flaws in Shangcai and Liangsong, they would start with Nanjun, which was off-angle...

The Chu people's plan could be said to be half successful. Nanjun, which was separated from Chu by a river and had a jagged border, must first consider its own safety. So Li You changed his original plan. He decided to leave 20,000 people in Nanjun to guard against Chu when he sent troops in the autumn, and only take 10,000 people to Huaibei to join the main army.

This means that the county soldiers of Jiangling and Yingxian, as well as the soldiers of the counties along the Yangtze River, will not go out to fight.

"In this way, staying in the county or along the Yangtze River is likely to end up as an idle job."

Hei Fu secretly remembered Li You's plan, and then when Li You asked him about the situation in Yidao, he took Li You to the dilapidated city head and pointed at the 3,000 Yidao Ba people who were surrounded by the Qin army vigilantly a few miles away.

Li You looked at the Ba people sitting back to back and was a little surprised: "I just planned to relieve the danger of Chanling and sent people to Yidao to help. Who would have thought that you would put down the rebellion first, and also recovered the local Ba people and forced them to fight for Qin? How did you do it?"

Heifu also told everything that happened in Yidao in the past half month. When he heard that they persuaded the Yidao tribes to kill the chief culprit Fan Qin in Wuluo Zhongli Mountain, Li You couldn't help but applaud: "Well done! The crux of the rebellion of the Ba people lies in the leader. Once Fan Qin dies, it will naturally collapse."

Li You greatly admired Heifu's ability and means, but Heifu said that he just thought of the idea, mainly because of the lobbying of Ba Zhong, the son of Widow Qing...

"Furthermore, the lower officials induced the Ba people to follow me here, in addition to wanting to help the county lieutenant to get out of the siege, there is another reason!"

Hei Fu bowed to Li You and said coldly: "County Lieutenant, the Ba people rebelled and killed the county magistrate and county lieutenant of Yidao. Although they attributed all the crimes to Fan Qin and his tribe, many of them had the blood of Qin people on their hands. Now they are hindered by the situation and have surrendered again under the persuasion of Ba Zhong. They may rebel again because of a small matter one day. If we leave it alone, it may be difficult to convince them."

"You mean..."

Li You was shocked and lowered his voice and said: "Burn all the young and strong people!?"

Hei Fu didn't know whether to laugh or cry. What was Li Junwei thinking?

This method was not unfamiliar to the generals of Qin. More than 30 years ago, after the Battle of Changping, under the pressure of food and military merit, Bai Qi killed all the Zhao soldiers who surrendered to him on the grounds that "the Zhao soldiers were rebellious and if they were not killed, they might cause chaos"!

The young and strong men of the Yidao Ba people are all here, and the Qin army has at least five or six thousand of them, which is absolutely superior in terms of numbers and equipment. If they really suddenly rise up and kill them all, it is not too difficult to do so with deliberate calculations.

This is a way to wipe out the whole family. It looks very tempting. If it is really done, although it can make the Yidao Ba people unable to recover from this, there will be many troubles in the future.

First of all, Heifu's reputation will be ruined after this. He vowed to let the Ba people follow him to Chanling, but he broke his promise and killed them all. From then on, every Ba person will hate to eat his flesh alive.

Secondly, the Yidao Ba people were hit hard, but what about the hundreds of thousands of Ba people in Ba County, Nan County, and Qianzhong County? Can they be exterminated one by one with this method? Obviously impossible, and it is also contrary to the conciliatory policy adopted by the Qin State. If this matter gets out, I am afraid that the Ba people on the Qin-Chu border will surrender to the Chu State.

So Hei Fu smiled and said, "That's not what I meant. I just thought that if we want to regain the people of Ba, it's not feasible to just appease them and give them concessions. We need to give them a beating from time to time. It's a pity that the Chu people retreated so quickly that the people of Ba didn't see them being defeated. But now that a large army has gathered here, why not take this opportunity to let the military officials lead the soldiers to perform martial arts in the suburbs of the city to show the strength of Qin to the people of Ba, so that these ignorant and remote barbarians can know the power of the Qin army! Then we can take advantage of the situation to force the rulers to hand over the murderers who participated in the killing of Qin people and soldiers, bring them to justice, and give justice to the innocent souls!"