To achieve immortality, I cultivate using Qi Luck

Chapter 994: Chapter 411: Blundering Through All the Way_2 Chapter 994: Chapter 411: Blundering Through All the Way_2 The tower ships drew closer, and the flag atop the leading vessel fluttered in the wind.

Old Qin couldn’t read, but having seen Chu State ships pass by often, he had gradually come to recognize how the character “Chu” was written.

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And now, on the banner atop the leading tower ship, that very character was inscribed.

“Chu…

Chu army, the Chu army is here—”

A voice, filled with panic and despair, erupted instantly, as Wang Qing from behind Old Qin shouted out.

However, before he could say much more, a sudden gust of wind came from afar.

A powerful force shattered his front teeth and shot through him; an arrow, with Wang Qing’s body impaled, pinned him straight to the ground with a roll.

Wang Qing convulsed a few times; as fresh blood flowed from the arrow wound through his brain, he soon fell silent.

Seeing this, Old Qin trembled in his heart.

The seasoned man instantly understood just as Shangguan had said, the Chu army had indeed struck.

From the river’s frontline, the sight of the densely packed Chu naval vessels left no doubt that their small harbor could not possibly withstand this force.

It could no longer be defended.

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Upon realizing this, Old Qin immediately dropped his short knife and turned to flee towards the rear.

But he hadn’t escaped far when another volley of arrows from the Chu forces, like raindrops, descended once again from behind.

The tiny harbor was suddenly battered by a downpour of arrows.

Amid wails of agony from the harbor, Old Qin had run merely a dozen steps before a severe pain struck his back, followed by a strong force that sent him tumbling over.

Lying on the cold, damp harbor, he looked up at the sky, his mouth twitching slightly as foam mixed with blood flowed out, and he gradually stopped breathing.

Half a “timing” later.

As the last cry of agony subsided, this small port near Jiangnan inevitably fell into the hands of the Chu army.

One by one, Chu soldiers disembarked onto the port, beginning to assemble on the land of the northern bank.

The residents of the harbor were forcibly pulled out, and amid their terror, they were assigned to carry the corpses and supplies from the ships.

Huang An stepped down from the ship, looked at the conquered harbor, and nodded slightly.

Although it was only a small port, as the first victory of the Northern Expedition, it was still a good omen.

“General, two hundred defenders and three hundred civilian workers from Liang within the harbor have all been cleared,”

reported a blood-covered junior officer, who approached inside the harbor and saluted Huang An.

Huang An’s face showed a smile, “Well done, your unit can rest briefly, then leave a detachment to guard the port and await the following troops.

The rest of you, along with me, will continue to advance north before the Liang people can react.”

“Yes!”

The junior officer acknowledged the order and immediately turned to prepare.

A short while later, from the incoming flotilla, five thousand Chu soldiers from the first group of ten leading ships had already hurriedly disembarked and assembled within the harbor.

Seeing this, Huang An left a few officers in charge of arranging for the subsequent troops to disembark and follow up behind.

He then personally led these five thousand vanguard troops rapidly out of the port, advancing northward.

Since last year, just before winter, when the Chu and Liang armies started clashing along the border of Jiaodong and Yangxia, relations between the Two Countries had quickly deteriorated.

And after these engagements, the defeats that Liang’s forces suffered repeatedly, along with the memorials from Liang’s famed general Yan Yunqing, had caused great unrest in the Liang court.

Thus, to relieve the pressure on the eastern borders and support the war to fight Chu for Yangxia County, or rather to protect their own border, Jiaodong County,

Liang began mobilizing resources from across the country to support the eastern front.

However, this support was initially rather restrained and not deployed with full force.

After all, Chu was known as the power only second to Liang among the Nine Provinces, with visible military forces totaling three million.

Such military strength, just based on the figures, was already comparable to Liang.

Chu had only deployed one million troops to Yangxia County thus far, a massive number indeed but only a third of their total military capacity.

This level of pressure was far from Chu’s limit.

If Chu desired, they could always dispatch another million soldiers from within the country to join the war with Liang.

So as long as this million-strong force remained static, naturally, Liang would not dare to fully reveal its “Hidden Cards.”

However, as the year began and news spread, confirmed by reliable sources, that Chu had joined forces with Wei to send troops to Yong West,

Liang finally let go of its last scruples.

The reason was simple.

With a total military force of three million, Chu now had a million in Yangxia County and another million at the Helong battlefield, leaving only a million in the interior of their country.

But this remaining million had to defend tens of thousands of kilometers of coastline and the southwestern border while also maintaining sufficient force to ensure internal stability.

After distributing forces to these areas, the number that could be used against Liang was no longer significant.

Even if Chu managed to pull additional forces together, it could at most produce another three to five hundred thousand troops to target Liang.

This amount of soldiers was not insignificant, but for Liang, the most powerful state among the Nine Provinces, it posed no real fear or threat.

And there was more to consider.

There were over ten million immigrants within the Chu territory needing resettlement, a colossal task and expense.

Without addressing this, did Chu really have the capacity to open a third Battlefield while already engaged in both Yong West and Yangxia?

This was possible thanks to Chu’s years of feigning weakness and releasing false information to the outside world.