C132

The fire gradually began to die down, and by the time it had completely extinguished, nearly two hours had already passed. On the narrow abandoned road, corpses that were charred black were piled up like mountains. The pungent smell from the smoke drifted away with the wind for a few miles. The warriors of the White Horse Camp above the mountain forest covered their mouths and noses as they coughed nonstop.

Gongsun Xu, who was standing high up in the sky, had also used a silk cloth to cover his face. With his hands behind his back, he quietly watched as groups of captives passed by. Many of the prisoners had their faces burned black, many of their clothes and hair burnt away, their bodies covered in large blisters, and even half of their faces and limbs burnt black. They struggled to move, but no one knew how long they could last.

"There were less than five hundred casualties in our army. It was a complete victory!" Zhao Yun replied in a low voice, his expression showing no joy of victory.

"Five hundred people died and injured this many people despite having the advantage?" Gongsun Xu shook his head and asked: "Have the captives been counted?"

Zhao Yun looked at the mountain of corpses and sighed: "There are more than thirteen thousand of them, and less than forty percent are unharmed! "My lord, although this fire attack is ingenious, it truly does harm the heavens and the earth!"

"Zi Long is right." Gongsun Xu nodded his head in agreement, but his eyes remained unmoved. He said in a deep voice, "Later on, bury the dead properly, and then find a few experts of the way to do some great legal affairs here."

Zhao Yun opened his mouth as if he wanted to say something, but in the end, he shook his head and did not speak.

Gongsun Xu seemed to have seen through Zhao Yun's thoughts, he turned and said sternly: "Zi Long, you have always been righteous, I am not opposed to that. But is there any difference between using your blade to kill people and using fire to kill people? If we didn't use fire today, we wouldn't have only lost over five hundred men. "As the saying goes, if beasts don't fight, I'm afraid ten times the number of casualties would be possible!"

Zhao Yun bowed: "Master is right, but when I look at the tragedy that is happening all over the place, for a moment, my heart does not know what to say."

Gongsun Xu held Zhao Yun up, patted his shoulder, and said in a deep voice: "I am waiting for my ambition to fight for the Under Heaven Family and give this people a peaceful and prosperous world, so I am definitely going to compete with the dukes of different places. In the future, there will be even more tragic battles waiting for us, I hope Zi Long will not keep this matter at heart."

"Lord, please be at ease. This general knows what to do."

"Pick a group of uninjured prisoners, and they will stay here" Gongsun Xu looked left and right, and pointed to a large piece of empty ground not far away, and instructed: "Dig a few holes there and bury the corpses.

could not find tens of thousands of coffins, and if he died, he could bury them in the ground, and not allow the wild beasts to gnaw on their bodies or turn them into bones, which was already a pretty good treatment for the dead.

"Here!" Zhao Yun solemnly promised as he quickly walked towards the group of captives.

Gongsun Xu waved for Gongsun Jia to bring the warhorse back to the Galleon.

Just then, a group of people rushed over from the direction of Galleon. There were around seven to eight hundred of them, with Gongsun Zan and Zhang Yan at the front.

Gongsun Xu jumped down from the mountain rock and walked over to welcome them with quick steps.

Under a large tree at the side, Xu You and the other two had already vomited until their faces were green and their limbs were weak. At this time, they mustered their courage and followed behind Gongsun Xu.

Gongsun Zan was still more than ten steps away from them, asking loudly, "Zi Min, how is the battle situation?"

Gongsun Xu said loudly: "Yan Liang has already been reprimanded, of the forty thousand troops, more than twenty thousand have died, and more than thirteen thousand have been captured. Our army has about five hundred dead and wounded."

"What?" Even though Gongsun Zan was already prepared in his heart, he was still shocked.

Zhang Yan was even more shocked, his jaw dropped, wasn't this too outrageous? Could it be that Yan Liang was leading 40,000 pigs? Even if it was 40,000 pigs, it would still take a lot of effort to kill as many as half of them!

When they got closer, they saw the tragic, charred corpse that had died on the abandoned path, and immediately understood what had happened.

Zhang Yan sighed: "Yan Liang is known as the number one general of Hebei, I never thought that he would actually be so careless, and actually send tens of thousands of people to such a dangerous place, what a disreputable reputation!"

Gongsun Zan shook his head and looked at Xu You who was behind him.

Xu You hurried forward to pay his respects: "Xu You greets Marquis Jin, Zhang."

Gongsun Zan took two steps forward to help Xu You up, and said with a smile, "Mister Zi Yuan, please forgive me. The reason Yan Liang successfully stepped into the trap this time is all thanks to Mister's contributions.

Zhang Yan was slightly startled, and only now did he realize that he had forgotten Xu You's role. With this person secretly helping Gongsun Xu, it was no wonder that Yan Liang had stepped onto this road of no return.

"Thank you, Master Hou." Xu You thanked him respectfully and sent Xu Hao and Xu Yang up to pay his respects.

Gongsun Zan sighed: "As expected of the heroic youths, please rise."

Xu You modestly replied: "Master Hou is too kind, these two vermin do not learn anything, in the future, I hope that Master Hou and General Zimin can teach them more."

Gongsun Zan nodded his head, "Since Mister Zi Yuan has said so, then let them temporarily follow me as personal guards."

"Thank you, Master Hou." Xu You was extremely happy. Once Xu Hao and Xu Yang became Gongsun Xu's personal guards, it would be as easy as pie for them to become outstanding people in the future. Furthermore, Gongsun Zan's actions were a clear sign of trust, how could it not make Xu You happy?

"Hurry up and pay respects to General Zimin, you will be his subordinates in the future. If you continue to act as you have done in the past, don't blame me for punishing you severely!" Xu You forced Xu Hao and Xu Yang to kowtow to Gongsun Xu and pay their respects, then laughed and said to Gongsun Xu: "This second son of mine is too mischievous, I hope that the general will discipline him, if not, we can just kill him!"

Gongsun Xu helped the Xu Hao brothers up, and said with a smile, "Mr. Zi Yuan is too serious, as long as the two of you Young Masters join our army, you will definitely become a useful person in the future."

Xu You bowed and said: "General, thank you for your trouble. I will thank you first."

Gongsun Zan waved his hand: "Alright, alright, since we are already on the same side, why are you being so courteous? Since the dust has settled, let us return to the Galleon. "

"Here!" Everyone agreed in unison as they jumped on their warhorses to prepare to return to Galleon.

Zhang Yan deliberately fell back a few steps and pulled Gongsun Xu to the side, then whispered: "This battle is simply too tragic, I'm afraid it will harm my people's merits, why not do some superfluous things and kill my soul?"

Gongsun Xu nodded his head: "That's true, that's also what I plan to do. I was even talking about this matter with Zi Long just now."

Zhang Yan raised his head to look at the sky, and said with some emotion: "Leave this matter to this old man. This is this old man's usual practice, I've learned quite a few things from my foster father (i.e. Zhang Niu Jiao) in the past."

"Thank you, foster father."

"Alright, you guys go back first. This old man wants to see where the altar is built." After Zhang Yan finished speaking, he bid his farewells to Gongsun Zan and strode up the mountain with the guards.

After Xu You mounted the horse, he cupped his hands and said: "Master Hou, General Zimin, please take Yan Liang's corpse and see if you can persuade Zhang He and Tian Feng to surrender."

"Zi Yuan is right." Gongsun Zan nodded in agreement, and asked Gongsun Xu: "Zi Min, where is Yan Liang's corpse?"

Gongsun Xu pointed to a small stream hundreds of steps away: "I was originally prepared to bury Yan Liang on the spot, so I had his body moved to the small stream there to be cleaned up.

An hour later, the large group returned to the Galleon, which immediately attracted Zhang He and Tian Feng's attention.

Tian Feng looked at the captives with their heads covered in dirt, and sighed: "It's all over! Completely finished! Who was it that had come? It was actually so useless! "It has only been a short while since the smoke came up, and so many captives have been captured!"

"Seems to be." Zhang He's brows tightly knitted, as he stared at the person in front of the group of captives, and could not help but exclaim: "It seems to be Yan Liang!"

"What?" Tian Feng was shocked, he immediately rubbed his eyes, and realised that the person being carried was indeed Yan Liang, his face immediately turned pale white.

Zhang He muttered: "Yan Liang has always been a brave man, and I also know some of his abilities. Even if Youzhou Army were to use Fire Attack, he would not be completely wiped out! "

Tian Feng said as his brows knitted together, "There is a high chance that Yan Liang took his great army and entered the dangerous grounds. He simply did not have any chance to retaliate and was defeated by the fire attack! This fellow, alas! How could he be so careless? Knowing that Yan Liang's entire army had been annihilated, the Lord would definitely not send any more reinforcements. Jun Yi, our future is bleak! "

Zhang He sighed, his expression worried. Gongsun Zanfuzi did not attack Gao Yi, so it was likely for the sake of ambushing the reinforcement troops! Now that Yan Liang, who came to save them, had been completely annihilated, Gongsun Zan was most likely going to do something next. How could a small army of over ten thousand men be able to hold off the huge army of over a hundred thousand men outside the city?

Tian Feng suddenly pointed at the ground beneath the city, and cried out in astonishment: "Jun Yi, they're carrying Yan Liang over here!"

Zhang He whispered: "Brother Yuan Hao, could it be that you want to subdue us?"

Tian Feng was startled for a moment, then nodded in agreement: "What Jun Yi said is very possible, if Gongsun Zan were to come and subdue us, what does Jun Yi think?"

"What does Brother Yuan Hao think we should do?" Zhang He asked instead of answering.

Tian Feng shook his head and sighed: "Jun Yi, I don't even need to say it, or else you would know the current situation. Once Gongsun Zan attacks the city, I'm afraid that the Galleon won't be able to hold on for half a day!"

Zhang He's expression did not change, and asked softly: "Brother Yuan Hao, you mean surrender?"

"Ever since we pledged our allegiance to Yuan Shijun, we have never truly been trusted by Yuan Shijun. And this old man dares to assert, that Yan Liang coming to save me this time was Ju Shou's idea, not Yuan Shijun's original intention! We don't have families living in the Qinghe County, if Gongsun Zan really came to recruit him, then we can discuss further. "

"As Brother Yuan Hao says." Zhang He nodded sadly, then smashed his fist against the city wall. In his heart, he did not want to surrender, but due to the circumstances, if he resisted, the entire city would be buried along with him, and more importantly, what Tian Feng said was right, Yuan Shao did not trust these Han Fu's old tribe.

Just then, Tian Feng suddenly called out: "Xu Ziyuan? Why is he here? "

Zhang He looked up, who was the scribe who was riding behind the group of people carrying Yan Liang?