Overall, the 22nd year of Jian'an was still peaceful. Although the three princes were tense, they always maintained restraint and there was no war. Until the end of the year when Xiangyang City was completed, when Cui Zhouping, Ma Liang and Yiji were responsible for the overall settlement of Jingzhou, it was obvious that Jingzhou had another bumper harvest this year, and a large amount of grain was transported to Xiangyang.

At this point, Xiangyang has abundant food and grass and is equipped with troops. Even if he is besieged, he is not as worried about food and grass. According to Liu Yi's plan, as the central city of Liu Bei's forces in the Jingzhou area in the future, Xiangyang City will not only have strong defensive capabilities, but also one of the economic centers. However, when Xiangyang City may face war at any time, it will naturally not be able to open trade. Therefore, the shops established in the city are temporarily open to the people of Xiangyang who live in the city.

I was unable to spend this year with my wife and children. The atmosphere of my age made Liu Yi feel a little lonely. Even though Guan Yu invited Liu Yi to his home for the New Year, he was a guest after all and could not find the warm and comfortable feeling at home.

"You said..." Walking side by side with Pang Tong on the somewhat desolate street, Liu Yi frowned and said, "When will this battle be finished?"

"It shouldn't be too long." Pang Tong thought, "Cao's army has actually increased a lot of troops in Nanyang. According to Master Wu's wishes, we hope that our army can start a war with Cao's army first so that they can take advantage of the situation to attack Hefei."

"The key is here." Liu Yi sighed. It has been almost a year since the negotiations. Dongwu is urging Liu Bei to take action quickly, but the problem is that if Liu Bei takes action and Dongwu does not attack Hefei, but runs to stab the knife in the back, it will be a foe from both sides.

It took both sides a year to make a difficult negotiation. This issue of trust is the key. After all, after the last incident, Liu Bei's reputation for Jiangdong may be reduced. Even if both sides now have the intention to build the alliance again, there is a gap in this issue of trust, and it will not be easy to build it again. Now Liu Bei stationed 30,000 troops in Xiangyang, but the total number of troops in Jiangxia, Jiangling, Yueyang and Changsha is as high as 50,000, which is because he is worried that Dongwu will stab the knife in the back again.

After all, when Lu Su died and Lu Meng took office, his attitude towards Liu Bei's group was completely different from that of Lu Su.

If Lu Su was still there, the problem would be much simpler.

Pang Tong nodded. Fa Zheng has been busy all this year in order to persuade Sun Quan to fight against Cao with all his might. But until now, Fa Zheng has never suggested that Liu Bei attack. Obviously, Fa Zheng also felt that Jiangdong is still not very reliable now and does not want to take risks. Pang Tong can still trust Fa Zheng's judgment.

"Bo Yuan, Shi Yuan!" Sun Qian led two guards to find Liu Yi and Pang Tong, hurried forward and said to them: "Follow me."

"What's the matter? We just ate it." Liu Yi looked at Sun Qian in a hurry and said in confusion. This year has just passed, and it's normal for everyone to walk around each other, but they really can't eat it anymore. Liu Yi feels that he has gained a lot of weight during this period.

"?" Sun Qian glanced at Liu Yi blankly and said, "Lord is urgent, what is Bo Yuan talking about?"

What does it have to do with me just now?

"Ah...haha, it's okay, go quickly." Liu Yi smiled awkwardly, and then urged Sun Qian to leave quickly.

In the yamen, Guan Yu had arrived, and there were two generals transferred from Shuzhong and Yang Ren. As the top generals in Shuzhong, Liu Bei attached great importance to these two people. After all, Guan Yu, Zhang Fei and Zhao Yun were not young, and although Ma Chao surrendered, he was in poverty and came to surrender. Liu Bei didn't dare to let go. The most important thing is that these two people were young, like Wei Yan, Guan Ping, and Liu Feng, who were trained by Liu Bei as the backbone of the future Liu Group. Since he was going to take action this time, Liu Bei specially transferred the two people.

They have the intention of cultivating and the idea of ​​continuing to win over. In short, these two people will not have a low status under Liu Bei's command in the future.

"Lord!" Liu Yi and Pang Tong bowed to Liu Bei.

"Bo Yuan, Shi Yuan, let's take your seat first!" Liu Bei nodded and signaled the two to take their seats.

Liu Yi found that Fa Zheng was back, and the two had not had many opportunities to meet each other and the relationship was not deep. Liu Yi nodded slightly to Fa Zheng as a greeting. Fa Zheng, he heard from Pang Tong that if he had a temper, it would do whatever he wanted, but if he didn't like him or wanted to plot against him, he would be vengeful. In the past two years of Shu, Fa Zheng had dealt with many people who ridiculed or despised him when he was under Liu Zhang's command. In the past two years of Shu, many families were destroyed, and at least half of them were from Fa Zheng.

Of course, there are also factors in which these gentry members themselves are not clean and want to take advantage of Liu Bei’s unstable foothold and use some tricks in secret.

For such a person, Liu Yi doesn't want to get into evil, and he just causes trouble for himself, but he doesn't want to get too close. He knows that the sentence is wrong and gets messed up.

"Lord, I wonder what happened?" Pang Tong looked at Liu Bei and asked.

Liu Bei signaled to the waiter beside him. The waiter handed a slip of the scroll to Liu Yi and Pang Tong to watch, and smiled and said, "This is a secret letter from Xuchang. The young mansion Geng Ji, the imperial physician Ling Jiben, Si Zhi and Wei Huang and other loyal and righteous people risked their lives to send it. They said that Cao Cao is now in Nanyang. They want to plot to rescue His Majesty in Xuchang and ask us to raise an army together to support the Han Dynasty!"

"An opportunity!" Liu Yi and Pang Tong's eyes lit up when he heard this. This is a good opportunity.

but……

Liu Yi looked at Liu Bei: "Cao Cao is in Nanyang? Is the lord possible? "

Pang Tong, who was standing by, smiled and said, "Although it may not be possible to believe it all, since last year, Nanyang suddenly became martial law. The detailed works sent by our army almost always go without returning. Now it seems that this letter is not false!"

"But... what big thing can these people accomplish?" Guan Yu frowned.

Geng Ji, the Shaofu doctor, Ling Jiben, Si Zhiwei Huang, listen to these leaders. Is one of them related to leading the troops? Such a few people gathered together and felt like they were delivering vegetables to Cao Cao.

"It doesn't matter whether they accomplish great things or not. The point is that Cao Cao is in Nanyang!" Liu Yi said with a smile.

"Yes." Pang Tong agreed, "Besides, although these people have no military power, they are all prominent clans. It is not difficult for them to gather some people under their command. Moreover, they have a wide connection. If they really take action, it will definitely have a great impact. Cao Cao has begun to move the capital this year, and he is obviously worried about this."

Moving the capital is a big deal. Although Cao Cao had decided to move the capital as early as the 20th year of Jian'an, the progress was quite slow. The emperor is still in Xuchang. Obviously, these people in the court also saw that once the emperor was moved to Yecheng, they would have no chance. Therefore, after visiting Cao Cao to Nanyang, this incident occurred.

Although Cao Cao foresaw a problem, he obviously did not expect these people to drag him down at this time.

Liu Yi squinted his eyes and looked at the direction of Nanyang on the map, and suddenly looked up and said, "Lord, I think it's a great time to occupy Nanyang!"

Once there is a problem in the rear, Cao Cao will definitely not be interested in fighting. At this time, if Liu Bei sent troops from Hanzhong and Xiangyang, a big battle will inevitably be inevitable. Although it is impossible for Cao Cao to give up Nanyang to ensure stability in the rear, there will definitely be restraints. At this time, if the Eastern Wu can seize the opportunity to attack Hefei, Liu Bei will stand on the side with sufficient troops, food, and can afford it, and have high combat power, and it is possible to eat Nanyang.

After all, Nanyang has relatively independent terrain, but in terms of logistics supply, Cao Cao is definitely not as good as Liu Bei. If it takes a long time, the cost of logistics transportation of Cao Cao will definitely be several times higher than that of Liu Bei. Even if Cao Cao lives in Jiuzhou, if he needs to transfer grain from a further distance, the transportation cost will be in a geometric increase. However, if it is close, Xuchang is in chaos and Luoyang does not have much ability to support it. Runan still has to deal with Jiangdong. This is really a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.

Pang Tong nodded and said, "Yes, since Cao Cao achieved Nanyang, the people of Nanyang have suffered from corvee labor. As long as our army occupied two or three cities and carried out benevolent policies, why worry that the people of Nanyang will not help the lord?"

In fact, Cao Cao imposed heavy taxes on Nanyang, and personal emotional factors were not the main thing. The most important thing was that Nanyang was an enclave for Cao Cao. If Nanyang wanted to guard against Liu Bei and Sun Quan, he had to station heavy troops. Most of the food and grass needed must be recruited from Nanyang locally, which could reduce the demand for logistics. In addition, Cao Ren and other generals were always worried about the deaths of Cao Ang, Dian Wei and others. The people of Nanyang were suffering from corvee labor, so their perception of Cao's army was naturally not strong, and the cracks between the two sides continued to deepen under this situation. It can be said that under Cao Cao's rule, the people in Nanyang had the lowest hearts and the most fierce resistance.

Before, when Guan Yu attacked Xiangyang in the north, there were a large number of gentry in Nanyang. The powerful gathered militia and uprising to respond to Guan Yu. Unfortunately, after Guan Yu captured Xiangyang, he was no longer able to advance north. These uprisings were quickly destroyed by Cao's army, but many people took advantage of the war to flee south to Xiangyang for asylum. Now that Liu Bei's northern expedition, let alone conducting benevolent government, he treats the people of Nanyang equally and treats the people of Jingzhou. For the people of Nanyang, it is all benevolent government.

Moreover, what Liu Bei lacks the least is money and grain, and he is most qualified to implement benevolent government in Nanyang.

Before, it was because of the treacherous relationship between the three parties, and the Cao army in Nanyang had many soldiers and a wide range of generals, and was strong, so it was difficult to fight to the death. Now that we have this opportunity, it is really appropriate to move troops at this moment.

"The 18th day of the first lunar month..." Liu Bei thought of the time agreed with Geng Ji and others, and looked at Liu Yi and others, "There is the Jiangdong..."

"You can only transfer the troops in Xiangyang, and in addition, Guan Ping led his army from Shangyong to send troops to Zhuyang and attack Nanyang. The troops in Jingzhou should not be moved lightly." Fa Zheng smiled and said, "I went down to lobby Sun Quan. When Sun Quan saw that our army was cautious in defense, he naturally did not dare to attack rashly."

Now in Jingzhou and Jiangxia, Wenpin is guarding various ports tightly. It is not easy for the Jiangdong naval army to come here. On land, Zhao Yun guards Changsha and fights on land. Even if there are few soldiers, there are probably not many people in the Jiangdong army who are Zhao Yun's opponents, and Sun Quan can only advance north!

"Good!" Liu Bei slapped the table and made a decision. There was not much time left for them at the moment. They had to prepare before the agreed date and then send troops north. If Nanyang could also be taken into account, Xuchang, Luoyang and Guanzhong would be within Liu Bei's attack range. The most important thing is that Nanyang is easy to defend!

At this moment, Liu Bei ordered people to hurry to Jiang Shangyong and ordered Guan Ping to send troops. At the same time, Fa Zheng went to Dongwu again, preparing to join forces to deal with Cao Cao.
Chapter completed!