Chapter 172: Chapter 131: Observing the Wind Direction_3

Translator: 549690339

Later, Lu Yuan began to think that Xinhua County was unlikely to hold on until his rescue, it was probably done for. So he simply upped his expense allotment and recruited an additional hundred men.

Thus, after supplementing the prefecture troops and county soldiers, they now numbered two thousand. After selecting another three thousand sturdy village braves, Lu Yuan had a five-thousand-strong army.

The massive army had been assembled, but he didn’t immediately order a departure.

Firstly among the county soldiers, many new ones had been supplemented, they varied greatly in quality and desperately needed training to familiarize the new soldiers with the battlefield. Not to mention those three thousand village braves, they were all a disorganized mess, unable to even stand in a proper formation.

Of the five thousand-strong army, only the thousand Prefecture troops personally led by Lu Yuan, having been trained for almost half a year, seemed barely presentable.

With such troops, going out to fight a war would only mean sending them to their death, wouldn’t it?

Of course, the rebels everywhere now were none other than the Miao people.

These Miao people were originally commoners, albeit somewhat fierce. But when it came to the quality of soldiers, it was probably only equivalent to the three thousand village braves selected by Lu Yuan. It shouldn’t be much better than that.

He stood a high chance of success in leading his five thousand soldiers to rescue Xinhua county.

“But since we are all the government’s administrative divisions, why should I be desperate to rescue them?”

One day, after concluding the training of new soldiers, Lu Yuan had such thoughts in his mind when he dismissed again the messenger that Prefect Cui had sent to urge him to deploy his troops.

Although he had made up his mind to take advantage of the chaos during the rebellion of the Poison Sect to reap considerable benefits.

But how prudent was Lu Yuan?

Previous conjectures were just that, conjectures.

Without personally seeing the changes in the situation, he would not recklessly lead his troops to quell the rebellion, he would definitely not be the one to stick his neck out.

So Xinhua county should be saved, but not now.

At the very least, he had to wait until Marquis of Wuan, Bai Mengyang, arrived at Dongting Prefecture and took charge of the overall situation in the county before he could mobilize his troops.

By that time, how the situation was in the county, whether the court was winning or losing, whether the rebellion was big or small, they should become clear.

Then as the army leader of five thousand troops, Lu Yuan could decide his course of action based on how the situation evolved.

One could advance or retreat, that was the art of using soldiers.

What?

What if Xinhua county can’t hold out until then, and gets taken by the rebels?

Well, if it was taken, it was taken!

Afterall, the territory doesn’t belong to Lu Yuan, it belongs to the court. If it’s gone, it’s gone, he doesn’t care.

Maybe if Xinhua county is breached, it could further stimulate the prefecture, allowing them to lift restrictions on his authority, and permit the expansion of the army?

Having come to this world and become a general, Lu Yuan felt that if he didn’t play this hand, he wouldn’t be doing his painstakingly achieved position any justice.

Moreover, Lu Yuan had a very compelling reason for not deploying his troops.

The local military preparedness was lax, the prefecture soldiers were newly formed, and the county soldiers were too disorganized for war, hence more than half were disbanded. The remnants were village braves and a militia.

This mess of a situation is such that, who could take it, prepare the military equipment, and dare to lead them onto the battlefield.

Otherwise, if the rebellion is not successfully quelled and this five- thousand- strong army is lost.

At that time, it won’t be the small county town of Xinhua that is surrounded, but Shaoyang Prefecture directly besieged by the rebels.

One must know, the Miao Rebel Army that surrounds Xinhua county now is said to number in the thousands.

Five thousand against ten thousand, double the strength. Considering the well-known ferocity of the Miao barbarians, who would dare put the existence of his army on the line?

The moment you dare to take on this responsibility, Lu Yuan won’t say a word, he’ll immediately deploy the troops.

And naturally, that’s not gonna happen in reality.

Even Prefect Cui Changqing doesn’t dare to take this responsibility at this moment. It’s not that he fears the responsibility, but he is mainly worried that if this war is lost, Fu City would be affected.

The result would be not just his death but losing Fu City, that would indeed be a great sin.

So whoever comes along, Lu Yuan puts forth this recourse, to silence them.

In fact, the effect is quite noticeable.

At least, Prefect Cui, though urgent, also understands the severity and has not dared to directly command him to send out his troops.

Obviously, he also realized that the newly formed rebellion-quelling army was indeed not very combat-ready.

In the meantime, Lu Yuan continued to train his troops while watching the wind direction outside.

Under normal circumstances, for the officials of the Da Yue Royal Court, the fourth year of Hongdao should have been a good year.

Because at the end of last year, Jinghai Country had been destroyed and pacified.

The financial deficit that had been engulfing the royal court, was suddenly filled in parts, leading to a significant improvement in the royal court’s financial situation this year.

However, this joy did not last long.

Because right after that, on the twenty-third day of the second month in the fourth year of Hongdao, news came from Dongting Prefecture that Wuyang

Marquis Li Gui, who had been suppressing the prefecture, was assassinated by Thief Shu false Emperor Li Xiong and the Poison Sect.

This rebellious faction, the Poison Sect, had somehow birthed a Primordial Being.

Without even waiting for the royal court to digest the shocking news of Wuyang Marquis being assassinated unexpectedly, on the twenty-fifth day of the second month, more news came from Dongting Prefecture.

In less than two days after the assassination of Wuyang Marquis, there was a massive Miao rebellion in the ten Prefectures in the prefecture.

According to the news sent by local prefectures and counties, there were at least thirty to fifty-thousand rebels within their boundaries, and in some areas as many as a hundred-thousand. The total number of Miao rebels within the prefecture was astonishingly five to six-hundred-thousand.

Naturally, the court officials did not believe this number.

The entire Miao population in Dongting prefecture, including men, women, elderly and children, was barely over a million. How could there be so many hundreds of thousands of rebels?

Would they have even pulled the women onto the battlefield?

That’s too exaggerated.

No matter how fierce the Miao people were, they would not be so fierce as to have their women go to battle.

It was customary for local officials to exaggerate the number of bandits to cover up their own faults. The officials in the court were all promoted from the lower ranks and naturally they deeply understood this.

Even though there might not be five-hundred to six-hundred thousand, even after halving and halving again, there should still be a hundred and two-hundred thousand Miao rebels.

And that was enough to scare the officials.

Even if these were chaotic people and not long-trained soldiers, given the natural ferocity of the Miao people, a hundred to two hundred thousand rebels would already be a terrifying number..