in the winter of 24, an ominous issue would arise: chimei troops, then stationed at puyang, were highly fatigued at the time and wanted to go home. their leaders felt that if they did so, chimei forces would scatter and be unable to be gathered again, and they felt that a clear target needs to be created. they decided to announce that they were attacking the imperial capital chang'an and, divided into two armies, they began to head west. liu xiu, while he had fairly strong troops, chose to stand by and wait for chimei to destroy the gengshi emperor; he used the henei region (modern northern henan, north of the yellow river) as his base of operations for its strategic location and the richness of its soil. the chimei armies rejoined in hongnong (弘農, in modern sanmenxia, henan), defeating every single army that the emperor sent to stop it.