Three Kingdoms: I am not Cao Rui

"Prime Minister, this is Wu Ziyuan's letter of apology." Jiang Wan presented a wooden box with both hands and handed it towards Zhuge Liang.

Zhuge Liang did not take it, but shook his head and raised his hand slightly to stop him: "Since it is a petition of apology, Wu Yi should submit it directly to the court. Why bring it here for me to see? It is against the system and the law."

Jiang Wan smiled awkwardly: "Prime Minister, Wu Ziyuan said that he wanted you to review it first..."

"If he was really so cautious, why didn't he do anything earlier? Why didn't he besiege the city for nearly four months without taking it!" Zhuge Liang slammed the table with an angry look on his face and looked at Jiang Wan, who also lowered his head.

Wei Yan whispered, "Prime Minister, why don't you let me attack the city on behalf of Wu Ziyuan? Let me lead our troops to give it a try!"

"Shut up!" Zhuge Liang gave Wei Yan a cold look. Wei Yan didn't dare to speak anymore. Zhuge Liang's chest rose and fell slightly. Finally, he sighed, stood up, and walked out of the tent with his hands behind his back. He looked up at the clouds in the sky quietly for a long time without saying a word.

Wei Yan, Yang Yi, Jiang Wan and Fei Yi looked at each other in the tent, not knowing what to say, or rather, no one dared to tell the truth.

As expected, this Northern Expedition will probably end in failure like the previous four.

This Northern Expedition was exactly the same as the previous one in the eighth year of Jianxing.

In the early days, the prime minister's deployment of troops often led to good victories. However, once the Wei army became conservative and turned from a field battle to a confrontation and stalemate, the Han army found it difficult to find a breakthrough.

The current scene is also average.

In this Northern Expedition, the battle at the end of last year was fought very beautifully. In one day, we defeated the enemy generals Wang Chang and Fei Yao and pushed the spearhead to the front of the enemy's base camp.

But after the victory, there was no further progress.

The scouts roughly found that the number of Wei troops gathered near the West Han River was close to 40,000 soldiers, at least more than 30,000, while Zhuge Liang's troops here were only over 20,000. The two sides fought for a long time, and the opposing commander Wei Zhen was extremely restrained, so Zhuge Liang had to follow suit.

If he did not restrain himself, the Wei army would press forward in the field battle regardless of casualties, and Zhuge Liang would not have enough troops!
In other words, it was because Wei Zhen put enough military pressure on Zhuge Liang here that Zhuge Liang did not dare to withdraw his troops for a while, in order to prevent the balance of power from being broken and being pushed all the way to the city of Wujie by Wei Zhen.

In addition, Wu Yi's troops in the rear had been unable to capture the city, and Wang Ping's troops had to deal with the feint attacks and harassment of the Wei army's Qiang cavalry every day. Most of the military forces near Baishui Pass and Fu County in the rear were also withdrawn to Yang'an Pass to deal with Guo Huai's military threat.

Hard to move.

"Gongyan." Zhuge Liang turned and waved towards Jiang Wan.

"Prime Minister, I'm here." Jiang Wan replied.

Zhuge Liang said, "Tell Wu Ziyuan that I will give him another ten days. Don't send this apology letter yet. Leave it with me and give him another chance to make amends!"

"Yes, I understand." Jiang Wan bowed slightly in response.

Several battlefields were originally interconnected. Zhuge Liang was unable to advance against Wei Zhen's army here, and it was futile to rely on Wu Yi in the rear.

After Jiang Wan returned to the siege site of Wujie and told Wu Yi what Zhuge Liang had said, Wu Yi also sighed and had nothing more to say.

Give me ten days...

Did I not want to conquer it in the past 100 days? I couldn't!
After more than 100 days of siege and repeated failures, the morale of Wu Yi's troops was already low. In contrast, Cao Ping, who was surrounded, had less than 2,000 defenders in the city, but their morale was getting higher and higher.

First, with the city as a companion, the defenders were undoubtedly much more comfortable than the attackers. In winter, the soil was hard, and digging trenches, tunnels, and water attacks were all impossible. Siege equipment was also difficult to be effective for a while, so the attackers were in a more difficult situation than the defenders.

The second reason is that they have a deep hatred for the Shu army. Now the fighting force in the city has dropped from 5,000 to 2,000, only 40% left. Everyone has comrades and friends who died at the hands of the Shu army, so they are united in hatred of the enemy.

The third is various promises of promotion and wealth.

Cao Ping is the nephew of General Cao Zhen. Although he is his cousin, who dares to say he is not his nephew? During the more than 100 days of defending the city, Cao Ping shared the hardships with the soldiers and enjoyed a very good reputation among the soldiers. With Cao Ping as a guarantor, the officers and soldiers were willing to believe his promise.

Finally, it is a comparison of military strength.

This is a very simple truth. Everyone saw Zhuge Liang's army marching towards Xiabian from the city. After several months, the army still did not return, and Wu Yi did nothing under the city, which showed that the Wei army in other places was still exerting its strength. Not to mention that Zhou Duo occasionally burned mountains and set fires to remind the city that there was still such an army in the north.

Within these ten days, Wu Yi launched three attacks, all of which were blocked by Cao Ping.

When Jiang Wan came to the front camp from Wujie again, Zhuge Liang saw Jiang Wan's unhappy face and sighed a little tiredly: "I guess there is still no progress in Wujie."

Jiang Wan shook his head and said, "Prime Minister, there is no progress in Wujie, but I came here from Wujie this time and brought some other news."

Zhuge Liang raised his eyebrows: "What news?" Jiang Wan bowed apologetically: "Prime Minister, Li Pushe has arrived from Baishui and is waiting outside the tent. Should I call him in?"

Zhuge Liang was so wise that he guessed what Jiang Wan meant in an instant. His tired face flashed with a hint of loneliness, and he sighed again, "Please ask Li Pushe to come in."

"Yes, sir." Jiang Wan bowed, turned around and went out, then led the Shangshu Pushe Li Fu in.

"I pay my respects to the Prime Minister." Li Fu bowed and said slowly, "Prime Minister, I came from Baishui on the orders of Your Majesty to announce the decree to you."

Zhuge Liang was about to stand up and kneel to receive the order, but Li Fu took two steps at a time and came to him to support him:
"Prime Minister, His Majesty said that the Prime Minister does not need to perform formalities when receiving an imperial decree."

"Sun De." Zhuge Liang turned his head to look at Li Fu: "Your Majesty, are you in Baishui now?"

Li Fu nodded gently: "The Prime Minister is right. Your Majesty is in Baishui and arrived on February 20th."

After saying this, Li Fu presented the edict to Zhuge Liang with both hands, with a hint of apology on his face.

Zhuge Liang said nothing, took the imperial edict, unfolded it, and slowly read it silently.

All of these were unexpected.

Li Fu looked at Zhuge Liang's frowning brows and couldn't help but blurt out: "Prime Minister, there is really a lot of discussion in the court, so..."

"Sun De, you don't need to say more. I have seen the decree." Zhuge Liang looked up and exchanged glances with Li Fu, then calmly looked at Jiang Wan: "Gong Yan, take Sun De to the tent to rest first, and then call Wei Gong, Wen Wei, and Wen Chang together."

Li Fu had already told Jiang Wan the purpose of his visit. Jiang Wan could not bear to see the Prime Minister's desolate expression, so he hurriedly bowed and walked out with Li Fu. It was not until half an hour later that he entered the tent with Wei Yan, Yang Yi, Fei Yi and others.

This is time for Zhuge Liang to be alone and calm down.

Seeing the four most capable people in the prime minister's office enter the tent, Zhuge Liang did not delay and immediately repeated the contents of the imperial edict brought by Li Fu.

Everyone was shocked.

"Prime Minister, Your Majesty, this is..." Yang Yi's eyes widened, and he looked at Zhuge Liang in disbelief: "This is the first time something like this has happened!"

Fei Yi also looked worried: "Prime Minister, please understand. I think there must be a traitor in the court. Otherwise, why would Your Majesty be in this state?"

Wei Yan on the side said sinisterly: "If the Prime Minister has military orders, I will obey them!"

Zhuge Liang sighed again in front of everyone: "I am right, and your majesty is also right. It is not yet known which path is clearer, and even I cannot guarantee this 100%."

Li Fu was the Shangshu Pushe of the small court of the Ji Han Dynasty. According to the system of the Ji Han Dynasty, all the decrees of the court were issued by the Xiangfu, and the Shangshutai had almost no administrative tasks and was almost like an empty shell. In addition, Zhuge Liang never interfered with the selection of Shangshutai out of respect for Liu Chan, so this Shangshu Pushe Li Fu was also a confidant of Liu Chan.

Liu Chan sent Li Fu to the front line and told him three things.

First, the expedition started in October of the 11th year of Jianxing, and now it is February of the 12th year of Jianxing. After more than four months, Wujie has been under siege for a long time without success, and the prime minister is confronting the Wei army at the front line without fighting, so there is a lot of discussion in the court of Chengdu. Liu Chan rarely came out in person and held a court meeting with his ministers to suppress the voices of criticism in Chengdu.

Second, Guo Huai's army outside Yang'an Pass increased to 20,000. This was obviously because the Wei army divided some of the troops from Yong and Qin states and assigned them to Guo Huai's subordinates, or the Wei court sent reinforcements. There were only 5,000 soldiers available at Yang'an Pass. The troops originally belonging to the Xiangfu and belonging to Baishui, Jiange, and Jiameng Passes were transferred to Yang'an Pass. The garrisons in Baxi County and the Han-Wu border could not move. Forced by the situation, Liu Chan personally led 10,000 imperial guards to the north and stationed in Baishui to prepare for emergencies.

Third, Liu Chan suggested that Zhuge Liang withdraw his troops to preserve the military and national strength. However, Liu Chan also clearly stated in the edict that if Zhuge Liang had a better strategy and plan, the decision would still be made by the prime minister as before.

Yang Yi sighed and said, "I know that Your Majesty and the Prime Minister are good friends, but other officials in the court may not know the deep affection between the Prime Minister and Your Majesty."

"Your Majesty is in Baishui now, and you are not good at commanding the army. If you lead the troops to fight or encounter other problems in the army, it may not be good." Yang Yi arched his hands towards Zhuge Liang and said, "Prime Minister, why don't you follow the edict and withdraw the troops back to Baishui? This will benefit both Your Majesty and the Prime Minister, and the Prime Minister can also help Your Majesty to command the army calmly."

Yang Yi's words were obscure, but who couldn't understand the meaning?
Obviously, Yang Yi thought that Liu Chan, contrary to his usual practice, personally led his troops to Baishui, which showed that Liu Chan and the court officials lacked trust in Zhuge Liang's ability to lead troops, and that they intended to seize Zhuge Liang's military power.

As for Zhuge Liang, the Northern Expedition could be postponed, after all, this war was a small victory for the Han Dynasty. But if His Majesty took this opportunity to seize the military power, regardless of others, the future of Yang Yi, the Prime Minister and Chief Secretary, would definitely be affected!

With Yang Yi in the lead, Wei Yan was unwilling to fall behind. He bowed and said to Zhuge Liang, "Prime Minister, the fortress of Yang'an Pass is so high that even birds cannot cross it. Nearly 10,000 soldiers there are enough to defend it. Let alone Guo Huai's 20,000 soldiers, even if it's 30,000 or 50,000, it will definitely be difficult to capture it in less than a year or two. I was once the commander of Yang'an Pass, and I know the situation there."

"Prime Minister," Wei Yan said earnestly as he took a half step forward while bowing his hands. "Just now, Yang Changshi said that if the Prime Minister returns, both sides will benefit. However, I do not think so. Why don't you send me to Baishui with 10,000 reinforcements to support Wu Ziyuan? Wujie City has been under siege for a long time, and the Wei soldiers in the city must be exhausted. I can take it down in one go!"

"Wen Chang, what are you going to do?!" Zhuge Liang was really angry for a rare time. He grabbed the inkstone on the table and smashed it at Wei Yan's feet. Some of the thick ink still in the inkstone flew all the way, covering the ground in front of Wei Yan with ink spots.

Wei Yan was puzzled for a moment, staring at Zhuge Liang with wide eyes: "Why is the Prime Minister so angry? I am also concerned about the war! It would be a pity if we don't use the reinforcements we have?" (End of this chapter)