Diqin Designer

Chapter 234: Wang Ben is coming, a ruthless strategy

Of course, Song Yi also knew that this method of relying on cruel punishment to intimidate the people would not last long, but they had already reached their wits' end, so why should they care about these things?

What's more, these people have already changed. They have forgotten that they are Chu people and are turning to Qin people. They want to be dogs for the Qin Emperor who destroyed Chu. So they didn't kill the Chu people, but the Qin people's lackeys.

Moreover, he felt that all this was the fault of the Qin people. If the Qin people had not forced them into this situation, how could this have happened? If these people wanted to hate someone, they should hate the Qin people!
Song Yi walked into Qiantang County Government, which had become the temporary palace of the King of Chu after it was captured by them during the uprising, and was also the place where they held meetings.

It was too shabby and simple, which made Song Yi very dissatisfied, but it was the early stage of his business and he couldn't do better.

Following a shout of "The general has arrived!", a group of people came out from the county hall. The leader was a young man in his thirties, wearing the robe of the king of Chu. With a smile on his face, he pointed at Song Yi and said to the people following him, "My prime minister has returned!"

Ling Yin was Song Yi's official in the former State of Chu, equivalent to the Prime Minister of Qin. The young man mentioned it deliberately to express his trust in Song Yi and his willingness to entrust important matters to Song Yi.

Song Yi quickly saluted the young man and said, "I, Song Yi, greet the king. I am no longer the prime minister, but if the king wishes, I can serve again!"

The young man laughed happily and welcomed Song Yi into the county government hall. After entering the house, everyone chatted politely about their recent daily life, then fell silent and the door was closed at this time.

Everyone knows that something big is happening, who can really be happy?

Song Yi asked directly: "The king urgently summoned us, what is the matter?"

Due to hatred for the Qin people, there were no tables or chairs in the hall, so everyone sat on their knees.

It's okay to secretly use Qin's things, but if you use them openly, are you still a Chu person? Do you still love Chu? Do you still oppose Qin? At least you have to pretend to have an attitude for the Chu people to see!
The young man kneeling in front of a black wooden table said, "The King of Qin has already sent out his troops, and the commander of the Qin army this time is Wang Ben!"

The King of Qin called himself the Emperor intentionally to distinguish himself from the kings of the six kingdoms. This made the kings and nobles of the six kingdoms feel it was a humiliation. Therefore, they did not recognize the First Emperor's title of Emperor and continued to call him the King of Qin, treating him as one of the kings of the seven kingdoms.

This young man was Xiong Xin, the grandson of King Huai of Chu (Xiong Huai), who was later the King Huai of Chu supported by Xiang Liang at the end of the Qin Dynasty, the Yi Emperor who was murdered by Xiang Yu. Since he and his grandfather were both King Huai of Chu, in order to distinguish them, he was also called "Later King Huai of Chu".

Although the Xiang clan is gone now, Xiong Xin was still found and made the King of Chu. After all, they wanted to fight against Qin and restore their country, and how could they restore their country without a king?
When everyone heard Xiong Xin say that the King of Qin had sent Wang Ben to lead the Qin army, their expressions became solemn. Wang Jian and Wang Ben, father and son, were famous for their military exploits that moved the world. Who doesn't know about them?
Wang Ben once led the Qin army to defeat the Chu army and captured more than a dozen cities of Chu. His father Wang Jian led 600,000 Qin troops to attack Chu, defeated Xiang Yan, captured their king, and completely destroyed the Chu State.

Although the King of Qin did not send Wang Jian, Wang Ben was equally terrifying. Even if Wang Ben was not as good as his father Wang Jian, they were no longer the Chu army of that time. The Chu army of that time could not stop Wang Ben, let alone them now.

Seeing that everyone either frowned or looked solemn, Xiong Xin said again: "I called you all back because of this matter. I want to discuss with you how to deal with it."

Song Yi took a deep breath. He felt a headache at the thought of facing a general of Wang Ben's level. However, the situation had already become like this. What else could he do?

He couldn't ask Taiyi to show his spirit to protect the Chu State and then let Wang Ben die on the road. If Taiyi really had a spirit, the Chu State would not have been destroyed by Qin. Song Yi asked, "My king, does anyone else know this news?"

The news that Wang Ben is leading the Qin army here must not be spread!

The rebel army was already unstable to begin with, and was forced together through coercion. If other people knew that Wang Ben was coming, fear and panic would spread among the rebel army. When Wang Ben really arrived, how many people would dare to fight?
Xiong Xin sighed when he heard this: "The Qin people did not conceal the news that Wang Ben led his troops here. Instead, they spread it everywhere. The Qin people obviously intend to turn this battle with us into their first great victory after unifying the world, to show that their military strength is still there."

Hearing this, one of them was furious and said, "The Qin people don't take us seriously. They think that once Wang Ben arrives, we will be defeated!"

They were angry and unwilling, but this was the fact. It seemed that they really had nothing worthy of the Qin people's respect.

Xiong Xin ignored the man's words and continued, "I have temporarily blocked the news, but it will definitely not last long. Sooner or later, everyone will know about it."

Song Yi said: "This is also a plan of the Qin people. They want to use Wang Ben's name to undermine the morale of our army and make our army afraid to fight. If they want our army not to be disturbed by this plan..."

At this point, Song Yi paused, a ruthless look flashed in his eyes: "We must firmly control our soldiers. I think we should separate the soldiers' relatives and friends from the soldiers and set up a separate camp. With the soldiers' relatives in hand, if they dare not fight..."

Song Yi hadn't finished speaking, but everyone understood what he meant. He was threatening the rebel soldiers with the lives of their families.

If the rebel soldiers deserted the battlefield and dared not fight with the Qin army led by Wang Ben, then their relatives would be killed. We must also make the rebel soldiers understand that your family members are in our hands, and if we are defeated, your family members will die with us.

After hearing Song Yi's proposal, everyone took a deep breath. This method was too cruel. Although they were doing the same thing now, it was not so extreme.

But no one objected to Song Yi's proposal. At this point, what method could not be used? Perhaps with this ruthless method, the rebels could be forced to explode and defeat the Qin army!

Song Yi's method solved the problem of Wang Ben's arrival, the unstable morale of the army, and the soldiers' fear of fighting, but it did not solve the problem that the Qin army was actually stronger than them.

One person said, "When Wang Ben arrives, he will surely attack the city we captured during the uprising. How should we defend it? Should we distribute our forces to defend various places, or gather them in one place?"

"If we spread our forces out to defend various places, our forces will be dispersed. Even if our army dares to fight, they will probably be defeated one by one by Wang Ben. If we gather them in one place, our forces will be concentrated, but once we lose the battle with Wang Ben, it will be difficult to recover."

This is indeed a problem. It is difficult to choose any one of them. Everyone in the hall fell silent for a moment.

Until one of them couldn't stand this silence anymore and said, "It doesn't work if we divide our troops, and it doesn't work if we unite our troops. So why bother fighting? We might as well find a place with many mountains and hide in the mountains so that the Qin army can't find us!"

(End of this chapter)