Chapter 1558: Understanding and Application

At this moment, Shaoyin suddenly had a flash of inspiration: "Hey! King, can we set up a row of fake camps further ahead from here, to make them stay further away from us, and make them mistakenly believe that we are right here, while in reality, our large team is still behind?"

"If they gather their forces and launch a large-scale charge at us, we can feign a fight and then retreat. Once they come over and discover this is a fake camp, not only can we drain their energy, but we can also take this opportunity to use our true strength to counterattack. Isn't this 'the enemy advances, we retreat'?"

Baifeng looked at Shaoyin with extreme surprise and couldn't help but pat his shoulder: "Not bad, Shaoyin, you've already thought of this? I truly didn't misjudge your talent. Good, let's proceed according to your idea. At that position ahead, arrange a team of men to set up a fake camp; use wood to build wooden sheds in the front and mix in some broken Tents."

"Make the campfires in the back more numerous and larger to create the illusion for them that there are many people here, but there must also be Soldiers stationed here, which will also serve as our first line of defense."

Baifeng then pointed to a direction slightly further ahead: "On these two sides, arrange two teams of men to be stationed, keeping a slightly further distance from the fake camp and staying as hidden as possible. This is our preparation to surround them and catch them off guard."

"Yes! I will definitely arrange it well!"

"Shaoyin, do you have any other ideas? Continue and let me hear them."

Shaoyin scratched his head, pondered for a moment, and then clapped his hands and said: "King, isn't our location close to that river? First, arrange the Cavalry to go all the way up along the river to see what the situation is like upstream. If we can reach the vicinity of their camp, we can arrange for a portion of our men to retreat, build rafts, and then take advantage of the night to go upstream—either to station ourselves or to launch a sneak attack—which could also catch them by surprise. If we can block them in the middle, we can surround the troops they have sent."

"If we can't surround them, we can also go around to their rear and hit their main camp; even setting fires would work. Even if we can't cause huge losses, we only need to go back and forth a few times, forcing them to send men to defend, and after their forces are dispersed, we can then concentrate our strength to fight them head-on. How about that?"

"Oh my, Shaoyin, you are even more talented than I thought. Good, I will leave these matters to you to be responsible for. Let Hun assist you with the Cavalry raids and harassment. Fight a beautiful battle and let everyone see your ability."

Shaoyin immediately performed a respectful military salute and shouted in a very loud voice: "Yes!"

The Soldiers following behind the two of them had been keeping a certain distance, and now that they heard the commotion from Shaoyin, they knew that Baifeng must have assigned Shaoyin an important task.

After the two of them looked around a bit more, they returned. At the same time, Baifeng also explained his preparations to Xuanyuan. He did not say that these were Shaoyin's ideas. Xuanyuan also felt that Baifeng was indeed very thoughtful, so he fully cooperated with Baifeng's preparations.

Currently, the supreme commander of the Huaxia forces is Baifeng. Below Baifeng is Lu, but because Baifeng began to reuse and cultivate Shaoyin, Lu instead began to be in charge of logistics and military discipline. However, for Shaoyin to mobilize troops and execute missions, he still has to go through Lu. Even if it is a direct order from Baifeng, Lu must allocate a set number of troops and provisions to Shaoyin based on the specific situation. Baifeng does not concern himself with such matters; he only manages the general direction.

Baifeng is not biased toward Shaoyin or looking down on Lu. Lu was also brought up by him since he was a youth; back then, for a small Dajian, Lu was also very desperate. It is just that Shaoyin's age is a bit awkward—he cannot be considered completely old, nor can he be considered completely young. If one were to carefully cultivate him, his talent is not as high as Shaoyin's. During the years most suitable for cultivating him, Huaxia did not have enough wars for him to accumulate experience, so Lu is destined not to be as lucky as Shaoyin.

Initially, Baifeng was prepared to cultivate Lu to be the leader of the Huaxia Scouts for intelligence gathering. Over these years, after synthesizing various situations, he is not the best candidate, but this does not mean he should be abandoned. When there is a gap in the succession of Huaxia generals, he is the most suitable candidate.

After this battle, Xiong will basically begin to retire and will no longer lead external combat missions. Yishang is similar to Xiong; both of them have already achieved great enough merit and have high enough status. When it is time to retire, they should retire and give up their positions. Baifeng will not discard them once their usefulness is over; he will still give them honorary status in the military department.

Now that Lu and Zhang are just one step away, they can also show what they can do. Two battlefields are enough to provide great merit, and they are not yet that old, so they can just take over. When they are old and should retire, the young and vigorous generation of Shaoyin will be able to continue to take over, avoiding a gap in talent for Huaxia.

As for who to choose after Shaoyin, that is not something Baifeng needs to consider. The battlefield will explain everything.

Following his idea, Shaoyin built a fake camp about two kilometers away from his current camp. If one were to run forward, it would take more than ten minutes. This distance provides a great deal of room for maneuver for them.

In the fake camp, except for the places where the Soldiers rest, nothing else is prepared. At night, they will not hide in the Tents to sleep, because that position is equivalent to a warning line. One needs to keep an eye on the enemy's movements at all times; how can one sleep?

The campfires were indeed arranged in large numbers, and the people of the Xuanyuan Tribe also joined in under Xuanyuan's arrangement. They would not ask why; anyway, whatever the Tribal Chief said, that is what they would do. They cut down trees and branches together and built sheds. They built a very long stretch, and in the back, they even inserted a second row in the gaps. Up close, it looked incredibly fake, but from a sufficiently far distance, this looked like the appearance of a main camp, and the quantity was also very large. Once the campfires were arranged, as long as the smoke rose, it would be completely impossible to distinguish from such a distance.

The Cavalry was also sent out along the Boshui to see how far they could go. If they saw people from the Xingtian Tribe, they had to turn back immediately, because that would mean the road had been scouted clearly.

Hun did not know about Baifeng's arrangements. When he and Youwei rode over, he discovered that there were already people building wooden sheds in front of him. This situation was a bit strange—it was wooden sheds, not Tents, and they were in the first row. It felt wrong.

They naturally had to build wooden sheds because only the entire Huaxia army could manage to have everyone live in Tents. The number of Tents in the Xuanyuan Tribe was not large, and in order to reduce the burden, they were built on the spot near the stationing area. If there was not enough wood, they would just sleep in the open; there were materials for the sheds, but the people had no sheds.