Chapter 94 – Planning for Jiangxia's Downfall, Liu Mang Go Back to Present to Find Medicine
Translated by Bloodfalcon, Edited by Krayto
Under Huangzhou city, within a few days after Lu Bu's duel, Lu Bu’s army and Jiangxia's army has been skirmishing more than 10 times.
Jiangxia's army are depended on two things to resist Lu Bu’s army.
The first by fortifying their defense wall and 5,000 naval units, forming a horn-shaped defense formation. Lu Bu’s army themselves cannot use cavalry attacks due to the land being very wet, dampening their impact.
So Lu Bu is deploying only infantries, resulting in very little progress.
“Damn, has Jiangxia become our roadblock?!” Lu Bu slammed his fist on the table. Being a borrowed knife for Sun Ce’s army has made Lu Bu unhappy and now Huang Zhong's forces are blocking his advance.
Chen Gong who stood on the side, also wrinkled his brow. Now that Lu Bu has defeated Huang Zhong, Jiangxia's army has been on the defense the entire time.
Actually due the the longbow men in camp, Lu Bu’s army can defeat Jiangxia's army but cannot completely crippled and annihilated them.
They have too many ways to escape, they can directly retreat using the river and plan for comeback next time. Lu Bu’s army currently consist of only land-lubbers for their naval units.
Huang Zhong's Longbow division is as strong as the Bing Province Heavy Cavalry and Formation Breaker.
Chen Gong observed that even though the Longbow division only had 3,000 people, all of them are aces in archery trained by Huang Zhong himself.
So, it can be said whenever they division launched their arrows, it would be as if Huang Zhong himself is shooting at Lu Bu’s army. That will cost many casualties in Lu Bu army.
“Should we ally ourselves with Sun Ce army?!” Actually there is another method to annihilate Jiangxia's army.
It is to contact Sun Ce’s army, form an alliance with them, and together they form a two-prong attack on Huang Zu. Lu Bu’s army through Jiangxia land road and Sun Ce’s army from the river.
“We cannot form an alliance with them!” Lu Bu shook his head. He had been coerced to be a borrowed knife by Sun Ce to kill Huang Zu. If they requested to ally with them, doesn’t that mean that Lu Bu is incompetent? That would be a big shame and Lu Bu would not allow that.
Moreover, if they did ally together, who will be the leader of the alliance?! Lu Bu or Sun Ce? And based on Lu Bu who requested the alliance, then Sun Ce would be de facto leader.
Plus if they conquer Jiangxia, then he had offended Liu Biao and if they went Xinye after Jiangxia, and since Xinye is currently under Liu Biao, they would meet a dead end no matter where they went.
Lu Bu started to feel a little regret that he did not kill Huang Zhong directly a few days ago. At this juncture, if they do not ally with Sun Ce, they will be deadlocked in Huangzhou city, as their grain and provisions start to deplete.
“How about we storm them?!” Zang Ba voiced his opinion. Zang Ba now has no division to lead, so he became Lu Bu's personal guard. “Formation Breaker as vanguard, and then use 10,000 soldiers to maintain pressure. Coupled with Bing Province Heavy Cavalry, we can destroy them in one blow!!!”
Zang Ba's idea is very good but according to current circumstances, it cannot be used. An Injury of 1000 or even 800 soldiers for defeating the enemy is currently unacceptable by Lu Bu.
Lu Bu's army only has 30,000 troops, so no matter if they win or lose, Lu Bu cannot stomach those casualties. Furthermore, Jiangxia is not their destination, so how can they afford to lose so much right now?
Isn't this what Sun Ce hoped for? For knotting an alliance with Lu Bu’s army he could control his cavalry units? Suddenly Liu Mang shouted out “I have an idea!!” making all of people present look toward Liu Mang, embarrassing him a little.
“Oh? Hanyang, what can you add to this discussion?!” Lu Bu looked at Liu Mang. Although Liu Mang is not a counselor, sometimes when Chen Gong is stumped, Liu Mang always came up with some very good solutions.
“This is just an assumption!” Said Liu Mang while all eyes in the room were looking at him.
Lu Bu continued “Even if it is an assumption, just say it! Since all of us are stumped, if you have an idea even if it's just an assumption, we would appreciate it!”
Liu Mang then continued “The one who is blocking us currently is Jiangxia's army, if it was a normal army, they are no match for us.
But currently they have leader who is very formidable, Huang Zhong, isn't that correct?!” Asked Liu Mang.
All of them nodded their heads. Huang Zhong is not only a very powerful general but he is also very capable in leadership and strategy. “That being the case, then I have a method against this veteran!” Said Liu Mang.
“You have a method against this veteran?!” What Liu Mang said is correct.
However currently from all Intel they obtained, there isn't a method against this veteran, because they have too little information on this veteran.
At the beginning of the turbulent times, when Lu Bu started his debut, Huang Zhong did not appear at all. Whether he was afraid to fight or defending his property, we currently do not know.
“I do not know if this message is accurate or not. But I got a message that Huang Zhong is not Huang Zu's men. He is Liu Biao's foster son, Liu Pan's men. And also Huang Zhong has a son named Huang Xu, his only son and his son currently has a serious illness! We can begin our approach from his son!!!” Liu Mang speaks his mind.
“Huang Zhong has a son who is currently ill?!” Chen Gong was in charge of Lu Bu’s intelligence Corp, but due to his intelligence gathering prowess has being severely compromised, he did not know anything about Huang Zhong.
He thought Huang Zhong fell from the sky therefore had no information on him, but Liu Mang knows!
Chen Gong never asked where he got that information, because Liu Mang brought Lu Bu a lot of unexplained things. Like warhorses, armor, spears and meat buns.
Why Liu Mang knows this information? It is because he has been reading kongming.net, Wikipedia and baidu.com.
But again, that information is only a conjecture because those sites also did not have a clear information about Huang Zhong's son, Huang Xu, his disease, and death year. If Huang Xu is dead now then all of his knowledge will amount to nothing.
TL: It is really written like that kongming.net, Wikipedia and baidu.com
“Let's say for argument's sake, we know that information, but what use is it to us?!” Zang Ba is really confused.
Are we supposed to go to Jiangxia and kidnap Huang Zhong's son?! “I need to know what kind of disease that Huang Xu has now so I can cure it!” Said Liu Mang.
He is unsure what Huang Xu's disease is, but from all historical records, he knew that Huang Xu's disease is some kind of pneumonia. This kind of disease is incurable in late Eastern Han Dynasty but in present time, it can be easily cured. If Huang Xu has this disease, then it is good, he can cure him completely by a lot of therapy.
“Creating chaos in the enemy's heart!!” Chen Gong did not care whether Liu Mang can treat Huang Zhong's son illness or not, what he needed is to lower the enemy's morale.
Can you imagine what Huang Zhong's face would look like when Lu Bu's army told him that we can cure his son? As a father he will be very excited. With Huang Zhong excited like that, what would Jiangxia's army think when watching Huang Zhong?
Huang Zhong being like that, will obviously set an internal strife in Jiangxia. “The only uncertainty is whether his son is still alive or not!” Liu Mang shook his head. If Huang Xu is dead, everything would be in vain now.
“He is still alive!!” Said Lu Bu, while closing his eyes and tried to recall the duel a few days ago. “Eh?! Honorable father-in-law, how do you know?!” Liu Mang is really confused.
How can his father-in-law know about Huang Xu? He is pretty sure that he conveyed the message about Huang Xu just now but how can Lu Bu say with certainty that he is still alive?
“Not only still alive, but he is still in his camp!” Lu Bu added his information. How could Lu Bu know this? Because when Lu Bu was dueling, Lu Bu smelled Huang Zhong.
Lu Bu as a fighter naturally has a heightened sense of smell and at that time, Huang Zhong's body smelled like herbs.
Lu Bu originally thought that Huang Zhong is a drug addict, being contaminated with smelly herbs. But due to Liu Mang's information just now, he is sure that he cooked medicinal herbs for his son to drink.
And Huang Zhong definitely has been exposed to drugs for a long time, if not how could he have this odor? “Okay then, now that we have determined our method to attack, please rest for today! Tomorrow is the beginning of Jiangxia's fall!”
Chen Gong said with a smile. It is already late, and all of them needed to go to rest. Liu Mang stayed until everyone left.
“Anything else?!” Said Lu Bu while looking at Liu Mang, Lu Bu also needed to rest.
“Ah! I need to go back there!” Said Liu Mang.
“Go back?!” Lu Bu pointed his finger to the sky, “There?!”
“Yes” Liu Mang nodded, his CD button wad already lit up in green, so he can make another trip to the present.
“Then go!” Lu Bu already unraveled his cloak, to take a rest. Seeing Lu Bu not command Liu Mang anything, Liu Mang took his leave.
When he almost at the door, Lu Bu's voice come from behind “Stay safe, be careful!!!”