Lu Xun burned more than forty of Liu Bei's camps, and the fire stretched for about 700 li, hence the name.

History

In July of the first year of Shu Han's Zhangwu era (221), Liu Bei personally led a Shu Han army of more than 700,000 men to wage a large-scale war against Wu. At that time, the border between the two countries had shifted westward to the vicinity of Wushan, and the Three Gorges of the Yangtze River became the main passage between the two countries. Liu Bei dispatched generals Wu Ban and Feng Xi to lead more than 40,000 men as the vanguard, captured the gorges, attacked Wu's territory, and defeated the Wu army's Li Yi and Liu Ah departments in Wudi (present-day Badong, Hubei), and occupied Zigui.

In order to prevent Cao Wei from taking advantage of the opportunity to attack, Liu Bei sent Zhenbei General Huang Quan to station on the north bank of the Yangtze River, and sent his retainer Ma Liang to Wuling to fight for the local tribal leader Shamoko to rise up to fight with the Shu Han army. Sun Quan, faced with a strategic attack by the Shu army, rose up to fight. He appointed Lu Xun, the right protector and general of Zhenxi (镇西) as the governor, and led Zhu Ran (朱然), Pan Zhang (潘璋), Han Dang (韩当), Xu Sheng (徐盛), and Sun Huan (孙桓), among other tribes***50,000 men, to the front line to defend against Shu's army, while at the same time, sending an envoy to Cao Pi to claim the title of minister and make amends in order to avoid two-front war.

Lu Xun took office, through the two sides of the strength, morale, and terrain conditions of careful analysis, pointed out that Liu Bei army is strong, high and dangerous, the sharpness is full of, eager to win, the Wu army should be temporarily avoided the Shu army's front, and then wait for an opportunity to break the enemy, patiently persuade the Wu generals to give up the demand for an immediate showdown. They decisively implemented a strategic retreat, and retreated all the way to the line of Yidao (present-day Yidu, Hubei) and Xiaoting (present-day Ancient Back of Yidu North, Hubei). Then stop retreating there and turn to defense to curb the continued advance of the Shu army. It also concentrated its troops and prepared for a camera duel. In this way, the Wu army completely withdrew from the high mountains and steep ridges, leaving the Shu army with hundreds of miles of mountainous terrain where it was difficult to spread its troops.

In the first month of 222 A.D., Shu Han's naval forces of Wu Ban and Chen Shi entered the Yiling area and set up troops on both sides of the Yangtze River. In February, Liu Bei personally led the main force from Zigui into the intimidation, established a base camp. By this time, the Shu army had already penetrated 200-300 kilometers into the territory of Wu, and its eastward momentum was halted due to the beginning of being blocked by the Wu army. As the Wu army held the strongholds and refused to fight, the Shu army had no choice but to set up dozens of camps in the hundreds of miles from Wuxia, Jianping (north of present-day Wushan, Sichuan Province) to Yiling. In order to mobilize Lu Xun to go to war, Liu Bei sent the former Ministry Governor Zhang Nan to lead part of the troops to attack Sun Huan, who was stationed in Yidao. Sun Huan is Sun Quan's nephew, so all the generals of the Wu army asked for troops to rescue him, but Lu Xun knew that Sun Huan had won the hearts of all the soldiers, and the city of Yidao was strong and well-fed, so he resolutely refused to divide his army to assist Yidao, avoiding the behavior of dispersing and prematurely depleting the army.

From the first month to June, the two armies were still at odds. Liu Bei, in order to quickly engage the Wu army in a decisive battle, had frequently sent men to the front of the battle to challenge them with insults, but Lu Xun all composed himself and ignored them. Later, Liu Bei sent Wu Ban to set up a camp with thousands of men on the flat land, and ambushed another 8,000 men in the valley in an attempt to lure the Wu army into battle and wait for an opportunity to annihilate them. However, this plan still failed. Lu Xun's refusal to fight undermined Liu Bei's strategic intention of relying on his superior strength to seek a quick decision. The generals of the Shu army gradually became disorganized and slackened, and lost the active superiority. Jiangnan in June, is at the time of the scorching summer season, the heat is aggressive, Shu army generals do not win their suffering. Liu Bei has no choice but to transfer the water army to the land, the military camp set up in the mountains and dense forests, relying on the streams and rivers, troops rest, ready to wait until after the fall and then launch an attack. Due to the Shu army is in the Wu territory of two or three hundred kilometers of rugged mountain road, far from the rear, so the logistical support is difficult, and coupled with Liu Bei hundred miles of camps, the troops scattered, thus providing Lu Xun implementation of the strategic counter-attack to take advantage of the opportunity to provide.

Lu Xun saw that the morale of the Shu army is frustrated, gave up the land and water and attacked the Wu army's combat policy, that the time is ripe for a strategic counterattack. He wrote to Sun Quan, the king of Wu, and said, "At the beginning of the war, the concern was that the Shu army was advancing on land and water and going straight down the river. Now, the Shu army had left their boats on land and camped everywhere, and there would be no change in their deployment. This will have the opportunity to take advantage of, break the Shu army, when there is no difficulty. Sun Quan immediately approved Lu Xun's plan to move from defense to counterattack.

Lu Xun, on the eve of a large-scale counterattack, first sent a small force to conduct a tentative attack. This attack failed to work, but it made Lu Xun from the search for the enemy's method - fire attack Shu army camp method of operation. Because at that time Jiangnan is the hot summer season, the climate is hot, and the Shu army camp are built by the wooden fence, and its surroundings are full of woods, thatched grass, once the fire, will be burned into a piece. After the start of the duel, Lu Xun ordered the Wu soldiers to hold a thatched grass, take the night to raid the Shu army camp, and set fire to the wind. At once, the fire was so fierce that the Shu army was in great disorder.

Lu Xun took advantage of the situation to launch a counterattack, forcing the Shu army to retreat west. Wu general Zhu Ran led his army of 5000 to break through the front of the Shu army first, plunged into the rear of the Shu army, and Han Dang's department into the encirclement of the Shu army in Zhuoxiang (today's Yichang West, Hubei), cutting off the retreat of the Shu army. Pan Zhang's troops attacked Feng Xi's troops and broke them. Zhuge Jin, Luo Tong and Zhou Yin, together with Lu Xun's main force, attacked the Shu army at Xiaoting. Sun Huan's troops defending the Yi Road also took the initiative to attack and engage in battle. The Wu army progressed well and soon broke more than 40 Shu army camps and used the water army to cut off the connection between the two sides of the Yangtze River of the Shu army.

The Shu generals Zhang Nan, Feng Xi and the indigenous tribal leader Shamo Ke were killed in battle, while Du Lu and Liu Ning dismounted their armor and surrendered. Seeing the total collapse, Liu Bei fled to Ma'an Mountain, northwest of Yiling, and ordered the Shu army to surround the mountain and defend themselves. Lu Xun concentrated troops, surrounded on all sides, and annihilated tens of thousands of Shu army. So far, Shu army routed, most of the dead and wounded and scattered, car, boat and other military supplies lost. Liu Bei took the night to break through the siege to escape, traveling to Shimen Mountain (now northeast of Badong, Hubei Province), was pursued by the Wu general Sun Huan Department, was almost captured, the rear-guard general Fu Tong, etc. was killed. After relying on the post staff to burn the equipment abandoned by the routed soldiers to block the mountain road, only to be able to get rid of the pursuers, escaped into the city of Yong'an (also known as Baidi City, present-day Fengjie, Sichuan Province, east).

At this time, Huang Quan, the general of the Shu army, was defending the north of the river against the Wei army. After Liu Bei's defeat, Huang Quan's path was cut off by the Wu army and he had no choice but to surrender to Cao Wei in August.

After Liu Bei fled to Baidi City, Wu generals Pan Zhang and Xu Sheng advocated pursuing the attack and expanding the battle. Lu Xun, fearing that Cao Wei would take advantage of the opportunity to fish in troubled waters and attack the rear, stopped the pursuit and took the initiative to withdraw his troops. In September, Cao Wei really attacked Wu, but because Lu Xun had prepared for it, the Wei army finally returned without success. In April of the next year, Liu Bei, annoyed by the defeat at Yiling, fell ill and died in Baidi City. The battle of Yiling ended this way.