Three Kingdoms: My Strategy Simulator

Such is the fickleness of the world.

Liu Qi watched Sun Qian, who was surrounded and flattered by many members of the Jingzhou aristocratic families, a bitter expression on his face, but he did not reprimand them.

After all, Liu Qi was kind-hearted, and he also knew that it was his father and son who had let Jingzhou down.

His late father was blinded by greed and ambition, causing the deaths of tens of thousands of Jingzhou soldiers in foreign lands, including the relatives of many Jingzhou elders and the demise of many members of the Jingzhou aristocratic families.

In recent days, Liu Qi had not only been tormented by the matter of avenging his father, but also by the pain of not knowing how to make amends to Jingzhou on behalf of Liu Biao.

Relatively speaking, if he could hand over Jingzhou to Liu Huangshu, who practiced benevolent governance, it might not be a bad thing to explain to the elders of Jingzhou.

Liu Qi sighed faintly, his gaze then falling on Liu Pan, Wen聘, Huang Zhong, and others who were still standing beside him, and said.

"You don't need to worry about me, you can talk to Sun Gongyou more. I have had several contacts with Liu Huangshu, he is a benevolent and virtuous ruler, broad-minded, kind-hearted, and a wise lord."

After saying that, without waiting for Liu Pan and others to react, Liu Qi turned around and went down the city tower, saying.

"Although Yuan Shu has retreated, we need to be vigilant in case he returns. The defense of Xiangyang City will depend on Zhongye's hard work for a while longer."

Watching Liu Qi's somewhat lonely figure disappear at the corner of the city tower, Wen聘 felt a complex emotion in his heart and could only bow to see Liu Qi off.

Liu Pan, Huang Zhong, Kuai Liang, and others were also filled with emotion.

Based on Liu Qi's actions alone, it could be seen that Liu Qi could also be called a generous lord, but it was a pity that he was born at the wrong time, and the situation did not give Liu Qi more opportunities.

And the complex hearts of the people in Xiangyang City undoubtedly had a limited impact on the situation outside the city.

After more than a month of continuous defense, the available soldiers in Xiangyang had also been greatly reduced, with only more than 10,000 combat soldiers remaining, and many of them were injured.

It was more than enough to defend the city, but it was undoubtedly beyond their ability to go out of the city to fight.

For Xiangyang today, all they could do was take a rare rest while waiting for the battle between the Liu and Yuan families outside the city to determine the winner, and then decide the ownership of Xiangyang, and even the entire Jingzhou.

Li Ji, who chose to land in Yicheng, did not rush to advance towards Xiangyang when he learned that Yuan Shu had given up continuing to besiege Xiangyang and had retreated ten miles to re-camp.

While using Yicheng as a place to store grain and coordinating with the fleet of 10,000 sailors to ensure the transportation of supplies, Li Ji also chose to send out a large number of scouts to investigate the intelligence of the Yuzhou army in detail.

For a time, in the hundred-mile plain south of Xiangyang, the two sides' scouts took the lead in engaging in reconnaissance, pursuit, escape, and厮 杀…

The number of scouts lost by both sides each day ranged from a dozen to as many as twenty or thirty.

And this also allowed the intelligence of both sides to gradually become clear under the investigation of the scouts.

The number of Yuzhou troops remaining was slightly higher than Li Ji had expected.

Even though Yuan Shu had contained some of Yuan Shu's forces in the two directions of Shouchun and Wancheng, and the long siege had also consumed a lot of Yuan Shu's forces.

However, Xiangyang was after all close to Nanyang Commandery, and Yuan Shu already had a considerable foundation in Nanyang Commandery.

This allowed Yuan Shu to take advantage of the situation to regain control of most of Nanyang Commandery, and constantly conscript young men from Nanyang Commandery to replenish his forces. In addition, with the strong support of a large number of aristocratic families, Yuan Shu was also constantly replenishing his forces, and his current strength was still as high as more than 110,000.

Even though these more than 110,000 troops were mixed with a lot of water that might not even be as good as the county soldiers, this number was almost twice that of the Yangzhou army.

'As expected of the famous Yuan family, which has been a high-ranking official for four generations. The accumulation of Wu Commandery over the years is only the starting point for the other party…'

Li Ji couldn't help but sigh.

Li Ji also understood that the paths people take are not the same or fair from beginning to end, and cannot be replicated.

Not everyone can be a Skull King.

However, Li Ji would help Yuan Shu to become a Skull King smoothly.

After reading through all the latest intelligence of the Yuzhou army, Li Ji picked up the letter sent back from Wu Commandery.

Liu Bei's autograph.

Two-thirds of the content was almost all about caring about Li Ji's recent situation, and then the remaining one-third mentioned whether reinforcements were needed and the arrangement for Sun Ce.

Compared with Yuan Shu, who had almost emptied all his troops, Yangzhou undoubtedly still had considerable surplus strength.

However, in Li Ji's opinion, 60,000 combat soldiers were enough to lay the foundation for the situation in Jingzhou, and there was no need to go to great lengths to continue transferring more troops.

Under the "military household system," the proportion of troops that Yangzhou could mobilize was slightly higher than that of normal prefectures and counties.

Relatively speaking, Yangzhou's operations were also larger.

Yizhou and Yingzhou both needed to station 5,000 troops to maintain the situation, lest something go wrong.

On the Shouchun side, Li Ji also secretly increased the number of troops, increasing the number of available troops in Guan Yu's hands to 30,000.

Adding in the troops secretly assisting Zhang Zhao, Zhang Hong, and Yu Guo in controlling Jiaozhou, as well as the sailors who maintained various ships and the troops that maintained the stability of Yangzhou's internal security, the actual number of troops raised by Yangzhou had reached 150,000.

It was the popularization of Lin邑 rice, coupled with the backing of a gold and silver mountain, that allowed Yangzhou to officially enter a stage of worry-free money and food. Otherwise, even if Liu Bei was directly pulled to squeeze oil, Yangzhou would not be able to easily support as many as 150,000 troops.

However, continuing to transfer military household soldiers to increase the number of troops, even if there would be no pressure on money and food, the reduction of young men would undoubtedly affect the stability and development of Yangzhou as the base.

Of course, even though Li Ji had considerable confidence in managing Jingzhou, he declined Liu Bei's proposal to send more reinforcements.

However, considering that it was better to be prepared, he still prepared to write back suggesting that Liu Bei could move 20,000 troops to the Chaisang camp in case of emergency.

In addition, what Li Ji was quite concerned about was the disposal of Sun Ce.

With Li Ji's letter in front, Liu Bei would naturally not really kill Sun Ce.

However, in order to silence the public, Liu Bei had to appear furious and threw Sun Ce into the dungeon on the spot.

Of course, nominally he was thrown into the dungeon, but in reality, Liu Bei specially arranged a "luxury single room" for Sun Ce.

Except that he could not move freely and contact outsiders, it was almost the same as arranging a sick room for recuperation.

Being able to do this, Liu Bei undoubtedly looked at Li Ji's face, otherwise, as long as he killed Sun Ce or handed Sun Ce over, then Liu Bei would instead be kind to Liu Qi, and entering Jingzhou would become more logical.

After all, Liu Bei is benevolent… extremely loyal and righteous is true.

In his eyes, the great cause of restoring the Han Dynasty is only important under certain special affections.

If he could exchange it for a state, Liu Bei would not hesitate to throw A斗 high, let alone Sun Ce. (End of this chapter)