Chapter 624: Puzzled

Shen Hao didn't stay in Wu Kai's camp for too long, he asked all the necessary questions, and staying here only delayed Wu Kai's rest time. According to the order, Wu Kai's temporary rest time in the military camp was only one night plus half a day, and he passed after a good sleep.

By the time I got back to my tent, it was past high hour, and there was a musty smell in the tent.

"My lord, Xu Jie, the military inspector, asked to see me." As soon as he sat down firmly, the personal guards came in to report.

"Let him in."

Xu Jie, the head of the inspector in the upper military camp, is an old hand in the inspector. He is from the same town as Shen Hao's adjutant Li Jiang, and he joined the Xuanqing Guard after spending many years in the army. Therefore, under Li Jiang's strong recommendation, Shen Hao sent Xu Jie to the front line to serve as the supervisor.

Not long after, a man of medium build with a heroic face came in from the outside, greeted loudly and stood one foot away from Shen Hao with his hands tied.

"You don't need to be too polite, tell me about your situation."

Seeing that Shen Hao didn't intend to blame him at all, Xu Jie was relieved. Shen Hao arrived in the afternoon, Xu Jie should have come to see him immediately, but Cheng Jinhou called Shen Hao away as soon as he entered the army village. Afterwards, he went to Wu Kai's place again, Xu Jie made several empty attempts, and finally stayed near Shen Hao's camp until he came back.

"Returning to my lord, the situation in the upper camp is very bad. The supervisor died on the fifth day after my subordinate arrived here. After that, three supervisors were added one after another. Two of them died, and now there is one who is seriously injured. I'm in a coma. The subordinates would have been in the same miserable situation as the comatose overseer, but thanks to General Cheng's timely rescue, General Cheng also injured his right arm."

Shen Hao narrowed his eyes slightly when he heard this, there is a lot of information in these words.

"If Cheng Jinhou doesn't save you, you will end up like the seriously injured supervisor? Were you standing together?"

"Yes, my lord, we are standing together. The incident happened suddenly, and the subordinates only felt several gusts of wind blowing in, and then saw General Cheng standing in front of me in a blink of an eye, and the supervisor next to me was lucky." Unfortunately, I just happened to be swept by that strong wind, and now it seems that half of my bones are broken, I am afraid it will be difficult to live."

Let’s not talk about how Cheng Jinhou was touched by someone under the protection of the heavy soldiers of the Chinese army. According to Xu Jie, he and a supervisor were standing together at that time, that is, they were next to each other, but Cheng Jinhou only saved Xu Jie. But did not save the supervisor on the side. Was it on purpose or didn't have time?

Shen Hao is sure that Cheng Jinhou deliberately did not save the supervising army. In other words, he guessed that he would not save him. At this time, the disadvantages of being unwelcome by the supervisors became apparent. No one cares in critical moments, and no one cares about death.

"Someone will often kill Cheng Jinhou?"

"Yes, my lord. Some monks in the barbarians are very powerful. They will disguise themselves as ordinary soldiers and mix with the attacking skirmishers, and when they get close to the wall of the army camp, they will become violent and attack. Some of them run extremely fast, and it is difficult to catch them in advance. Stop it."

"The one defending Cheng Jinhou is a monk from Jingying Mansion? What is his background?"

"There are mainly two people. One is an elder named Wu from the Heavenly Toad Sect, who is said to be at the second level of the Xuanhai Realm; the other is an elder from the Love Flower Valley, surnamed Yuan, who is said to be at the first level of the Xuanhai Realm."

"Hiss!" Shen Hao gasped. It's not that they were frightened by the cultivation of these two elder-level senior monks, but by the abilities of those barbarian monks. Even the dignified guards of the two monks in the Xuanhai Realm were still unable to protect Cheng Jinhou.

"And then? Have the barbarians who attacked and killed Cheng Jinhou been beheaded?"

"There were three left, and two of them escaped after failing to assassinate."

Shen Hao didn't know what to say. No wonder he and Cheng Jinhou didn't see any Xuanhai Realm master showing his face around him when he and Cheng Jinhou arranged formations outside the military village to deal with the corpses. It must be that his face was dull and he was protecting Cheng Jinhou in the dark.

"Is there any other news?"

"And my lord. According to the observations of my subordinates, there is a serious shortage of troops in the upper military camp. Take yesterday's big battle as an example. There were only 6,000 soldiers in the military camp at that time. Nearly 2,000 were lost, and there were even more wounded. The defense line cruising outside was said to be 20,000, but only 15,000 could actually fall on the front line, and they were extremely scattered, often infiltrating and killing with small groups of barbarians. The loss in the field is also huge.

But I heard General Cheng mention before that the next batch of reinforcements will take five days to arrive. If the barbarians make another surprise attack on the scale of yesterday during this period."

He left half of the sentence unfinished, but Shen Hao understood Xu Jie's meaning. I was worried that if the barbarians attacked again, the upper military stronghold would not be able to hold it.

The five days seemed to coincide with the time Wu Kai said earlier. This is not a good phenomenon, because even if the reinforcements come, there is no time to adjust, and there is no room for maneuver to deal with emergencies. This is a big loophole in the eyes of Shen Hao, a layman.

Would Cheng Jinhou not know? What is his plan?

"Is there any countermeasure?"

"Cheng Jinhou didn't say that, even when the people below reminded him of the danger, Cheng Jinhou didn't ask Cheng Jinhou to explain more. He still maintained a tough defensive posture of being strong outside and doing nothing at all, and he didn't mean to shrink his manpower at all."

"Have those monks from Jingying Mansion raised any opinions on this?" The more Shen Hao heard it, the more he felt strange. Would a general known for his stability in the army be so rash and let the loopholes spread without making any adjustments? The people below couldn't influence Cheng Jinhou's thoughts, and the supervisor was seriously injured, so the monks in Jingying Mansion should have words.

But Xu Jie shook his head: "No. The monks in Jingying Mansion basically don't talk to people in the army, let alone interfere with military strategy."

"Did the supervising officer not report this matter before? Or did you dismiss it?"

"The superintendent has mentioned it, and more than once. The subordinates also know good from bad. It is impossible for subordinates to jump out and refute this obvious flaw in military strategy. It's just that Cheng Jinhou ignored it, and after the supervising army sent out the letter There is no news of it."

The supervising army's letter would not be lost forever, and Cheng Jinhou absolutely did not have the guts to go his own way against the supervising army's withdrawal restrictions. The only explanation is that the supervisory army's letter did not achieve the usual results after it was sent out, or that even their own consular supervisory army did not give support.

After this conversation, Haishi passed, and Xu Jie didn't leave until it was almost past midnight.

But Shen Hao didn't feel sleepy at all, and sat in the big tent looking at the topographic map of Jianchuan spread out on the table for a long time without saying a word.

Instead, the three guards outside the tent were talking in low voices.

"Things are looking bad here."

"Hmm! It's not an exaggeration to say that it's in dire straits. I don't know where Cheng Jinhou has the confidence to continue to stick here. Such a huge battle loss may soon wear down the morale of the army."

"Listen, if something can't be done, the best thing is to protect Shen Hao and retreat."