The Former Qin forces under Fu Rong…

The Former Qin forces under Fu Rong capture the important Jin city of Shouyang (in modern Lu'an, Anhui) in October.

Fu Jiān, seeing a possibility of a quick victory, leaves his main force at Xiangcheng and leads eight thousand light cavalry to rendezvous with Fu Rong while dispatching the captured Jin official Zhu Xu as a messenger to try to persuade Xie Shi to surrender.

Instead, Zhu advises Xie Shi that fact the Former Qin force has not entirely assembled and that he should try to defeat the enemy’s advance forces.

Xie Xuan and Liu Laozhi, leading five thousand elite troops to engage the Former Qin advance force, scored an unexpected victory, killing fifteen thousand of the enemy troops.

In November, the Former Qin troops encamp west of the Fei River; the numerically inferior Jin forces halt east of the river, unable to advance.

Xie Xuan sends a messenger to Fu Rong, suggesting that the Former Qin forces retreat slightly west to allow Jin forces to cross the Fei River, so that the two armies can engage.

Most of Fu Jian’s generals oppose this plan, but Fu Jiān, planning to attack the Jin forces as they cross the river, overrules them.

Fu Rong agrees and orders a retreat but the Qin army, its morale low, panics when Zhu Xu manages to broadcast the false information that their retreating force has been defeated.

The retreat becomes a rout, and the generals Xie Xuan, Xie Yan, and Huan Yi cross the river to launch a major assault.

Fu Rong attempts to halt the retreat and reorganize his troops, but after becoming unhorsed, he is killed by Jin troops.

The Jin army continues their pursuit, and the entire Former Qin force collapses.

In the ensuing retreat, beset by famine and death from exposure and harried by the Jin army, the Former Qin force loses an estimated seventy to eighty percent of its strength.

The battle is considered one of the most significant in the history of China.