stubborn thief

Chapter 631 Freak

Thirteen thousand miles west to Chang'an, to the Balabin Grassland northwest of the Tianshan Mountains.

On the banks of the Tomu River, a birch forest surrounds the Tsarist Russian Fort Kuznetsk.

Twenty years ago, the owners here were still subordinate to the Tatar tribe of blacksmiths from Oirat. They and the Kyrgyz tribe repeatedly defeated the fur collection teams sent by Tsarist Russia from the city of Tomsk.

The Tatars resisted violent oppression and even besieged the city of Tomsk, which once caused the eastward expansion business leaders to give up their plans to build cities in this area.

But the profits from fur were too tempting, and the Stroganov family could not give up this piece of fat meat.

In order to strengthen their control over the Tatars and Kyrgyz people, they made up their mind to mobilize troops from Tobolsk, Tyumen and Tomsk to build this former wooden village.

Most of Tsarist Russia's fortresses east of the Ural Mountains were wooden fortresses.

They rarely burned bricks. At this time, even the Kremlin was built of oak logs and limestone. The few stone churches in the country were built by high-paying Italian craftsmen after marrying a Byzantine princess.

But Mu Zhai does not mean low defense.

Because the era of great turmoil in Tsarist Russia had just ended, many of the troops sent to the east were experienced. In the process of eastward expansion, they already had an effective city-building plan.

They would first build a simple small wooden fort to prevent a surprise attack by the Tatars; then they would build a larger wooden fort outside the small wooden fort, and then pile it high and solid with soil, tree roots, grass ash and other things in the middle. Added polygonal enemy platforms for cross shooting.

After these few processes are completed, the simple wooden fort will become a well-defended fort.

Kuznetsk Fort on the Tomu River is such an artillery fortress.

The cavalry centurion Lewandowski woke up from the stable with a head full of horse manure, took out a flintlock pistol and poured it into his mouth. He drank two drops of the muddy liqueur left over from last night's carnival, and then he said out of boredom. Leaning on the fence, he looked at the wooden castle in the morning with drunken eyes.

He is thirty-nine years old and was born in a small village on the southeastern border of Poland.

When he was ten years old, the army of the Crimean Khanate passed through his hometown and captured him as a white slave.

Although it was indeed tragic to become a slave, Lewando's boyhood was actually quite okay.

After all, the scale of the Crimean Khanate's plunder of Eastern European countries was too huge. Slaves were captured in villages and whole families were captured. There was no need to ask for ransom at all, not to mention that even if ransom was required, small farmers would not Can not afford.

And those years were the time when the Khanate was robbing slaves on a largest scale. There were so many slaves in their hands that it was difficult to sell them all.

As a result, except for the part of their group of slaves who were particularly unlucky to be bought, the rest seemed to have changed their lifestyle.

Anyway, they are all acquaintances, from parents to childhood sweethearts and even the village chief, they are all here.

He spent six years as a slave in the Crimean Peninsula raising horses for the chief. Seeing that he had reached adulthood, adult white slaves could be sold at a higher price. In order to avoid being sold, Levando took the opportunity of the war to escape back to his unaccompanied country. hometown.

At that time, the Kingdom of Poland and Lithuania was waging a war to seize the throne against the Principality of Muscovy. In order to make a living, Lewando joined Lisovsky's hussar regiment as an armed attendant.

Lisovsky was a shrewd, cunning, cruel and warlike leader. He wore the iconic Hungarian lobster plate armor and had huge wings on his saddle. He led a small group of cavalry in the Principality of Muscovy as if they were in uninhabited territory. He was extremely capable of plundering, burning, killing and looting everywhere.

The hussars he led were like a group of madmen, killing everyone they could kill, robbing everyone they could, and burning everyone they could burn.

To be precise, they are a group of bloodthirsty lunatics.

Because after discovering that there was no place to rob in the Principality of Moscow, they turned their heads and continued to burn, kill and loot in the Kingdom of Polly.

Later, this hussars regiment was surrounded by enemies and was soon finished.

Lewando escaped by chance, and his identity changed from slave to soldier to rebel. There were not many options left for him. It seemed that falling into the grass was the only feasible solution.

In this way, he found a stronghold, the Cossack Sechi, to defect to.

When you go out, your identity is given by yourself.

Although he was just an armed squire earlier, Levando claimed to be an officer of the hussar regiment without delay, and thus gained a position in a gang of Eastern European gangsters, responsible for training.

For many years after that, until their gang was disbanded due to their participation in the rebellion, Lewando continued to fight and plunder.

Anyway, he has either been robbed or robbed by others in his life. He doesn't know what a stable life is, and naturally it is impossible to live such a life.

In this way, Levando, who had been wielding swords and guns for most of his life, accepted the employment of the Stroganov family in pursuit of wealth, and rushed to the ice-covered Siberia like a gangster from half of Europe.

The Stroganov family was a salt merchant.

They made great contributions to Ivan IV in the process of conquering the Kazan Khanate and became the richest businessmen in Tsarist Russia. As the Tsar's white-glove leader, they transformed furs, salt, timber, minerals, honey and other resources on the eastern border into become wealth.

In the eastward march led by him, there were actually not many serious Tsarist Russian nobles and their vassal soldiers.

It is completely irresponsible to say that the Tsar sent 800 Cossacks to conquer Siberia in one fell swoop. In fact, more than 800 people starve to death in Siberia every year.

This trip to the Far East belonging to the Stroganov family was a great undertaking that lasted for hundreds of years. The family's prosperity as the richest man in Tsarist Russia continued until the Russian Civil War in the 20th century when they followed the White Army and fled to Europe after their failure. , rest with the country.

Their conquest of Siberia was not easy. It took three generations of kings and many battles to conquer the Kazan Khanate alone. In the final decisive battle, 65,000 troops were deployed on the front line at one time, and later the troops were increased to 150,000.

More than 6,000 military and logistical personnel were hired to flow into Siberia every year, of which less than one-tenth were the shooting corps and other troops sent by the tsar.

Most of them are gangsters, deserters, bandits and bandits like Lewando who were recruited by the Stroganov family.

Together these characters are the Cossacks.

Cossacks are the same thing as Liangshan, the waterfront of Songjiang River.

Sweden's experienced artillery, Poland's senior cavalry, Scotland's mountain swordsmen, Tatar grooms who converted to Orthodox Christianity, and Ottoman fugitive slave sailors are Tiangang Disha.

Ordinary Cossacks are just minions in the imitation water village. Under the command of Tiangang Disha, they carry British-made muskets, cannons made by Shinra, gunpowder made in Bohemia, and rapiers forged in the Netherlands, and paddle boats. Rampant through the rivers of Siberia, building forts and collecting furs.

The weather in Fort Kuznetsk in July is warm, which is a rare good weather in the year.

At this time of year, Tyumen City in the rear will send supplies, soldiers, ordnance... Of course, no one wants any weird ordnance.

This damn place lacks everything except guns and guns, so they want everything.

The messenger from Tyumen City has come and told them that two groups of more than 3,000 troops will pass through in a few days, and they will be able to replenish 24 people. The remaining troops will continue eastward, replenishing troops along the Ob River, Fortress strongholds on the west bank of the Yenisei River and even the Lena River. One of these two groups of troops was to support Centurion Peter Bektorov of Yeniseisk Fort.

Peter is a middle-aged man in his thirties. Before coming to Siberia, he was in the Tsar's shooting army. He voluntarily transferred to the fortress in the Yenisey River Basin. In the past two years, he has become famous in Siberia.

He was a very capable low-level official. He traveled for two and a half years with thirty soldiers and a dozen hunters, making the Buryat Mongols in the Angara River Basin loyal to the Tsar, and also established the Yakutsk Democratic Republic. fort.

Most importantly, they brought back 2,471 sable pelts and 25 mink coats.

His method was simple. He told the small tribes of people in the forest that the west had all surrendered to the tsar. No matter how much taxes the Khalkha Mongols levied on the people in the forest, the tsar would only collect one-third of what the Khalkha Mongols levied.

Then the shamans or elders of the tribe are invited to the fortress and placed under house arrest as hostages to prevent the tribe from refusing to pay taxes.

Then he asked for military support to the west.

A wooden fortress was built, and then the governors, tax collectors, civil servants sent by Moscow, and the mercenaries sent by the Stroganov family arrived to reinforce and expand the fortress.

When they gained a foothold, they began to impose heavy taxes on the surrendered aborigines, and sent troops to attack the tribes that had not surrendered, killing chickens and scaring monkeys.

This process is worth learning from all the officials sent by the Tsar to Siberia.

Another army of more than 3,000 people came this year to deal with Oirat.

It's about coping, not dealing with it.

The exchanges between Tsarist Russia and Oirat can be traced back thirty years ago.

They know Oirat far better than the Marshal's Palace, and they also know better that Oirat is far more powerful than the Kazan Khanate, which has only 20,000 soldiers. It is not an enemy that hundreds or thousands of expeditionary troops can deal with.

Tsarist Russia's method of dealing with the Oirat was to act like a fly that fell into the pot, while sending officials to negotiate peace with the various chiefs of the Oirat tribes. The condition was nominal surrender to the Tsar, and there were no other conditions.

On the other hand, small teams were sent into the north to deal with the small tribes who were Oirat tribute people and ask for their furs.

When necessary, they can open the city of Tyumen as a trading post and provide it with old muskets, handicrafts, food and information about the Kazakh Khanate in exchange for furs.

Although in the past thirty years, small strongholds in Tsarist Russia were often looted and burned by the Oirat, the private exchanges between the Tyumen government and the nobles of the Oirat tribes have not been interrupted.

Because the two sides are not life-and-death enemies at all, Tsarist Russia’s goal is the furs and minerals in northern Siberia, while Oirat’s number one enemy has always been the Kazakh Khanate.

There was no major conflict of interest between the two parties, and furs were not scarce for Oirat.

As for the so-called surrender to Moscow Tsar Mikhail, to the nobles of Oirat, it is the first of the three biggest jokes in Oirat.

For Oirat, in this bizarre era, weirdos appear every year.

The second of their three biggest jokes is that Tiancong Khan Huang Taiji surrendered to Shenyang.

These two jokes are far more funny than Liu Chengzong, the Khitan Khan who surrendered to Qinghai.

Chahan Khan in Moscow six thousand miles away, Tiancong Khan in Shenyang five thousand miles away, and Khitan Khan in Qinghai three thousand miles away, three freaks who have nothing to do with the Mongols, all feel that they are the only real people in the world. sweat.

After the earliest confrontation between Tsarist Russia and the Oirat Alliance, they have been adhering to a calm attitude, accumulating strength and waiting for the opportunity.

Especially after Batur Hutaiji became the leader of the Oirat Alliance, Tsarist Russia was very happy to see him as the leader.

Because although Batur Hutaiji looks like a tiger, he is actually a moderate among the Oirat nobles who is more moral and focuses on production rather than war. In the official documents of Qiu Ming during this period, he will be called the "Sheepherd Prince" '.

This peaceful situation lasted until last year.

Last summer, many tribes that had been paying tribute to Tsarist Russia for a long time failed to hand over their furs on time.

And when Tsarist Russia's tax collection team went to their settlements, those small tribes had already wrapped their livestock and ran away, and they didn't know where they went.

It seems that they don't plan to hand over any more furs in the future.

This situation once made the governor of Tyumen think that there was smallpox in the east.

However, between the winter of last year and the spring of this year, reports were sent from villages with few garrisons between the Tomu River, Ob River and Yenisei River. In the cold wilderness, there were scattered Mongolian cavalry looking from a distance. Scout their situation.

Things got even weirder this summer.

Someone on the upper reaches of the Ob River saw Oirat soldiers using a small boat with wheels to travel across the river.

The Tsarist Russian officials who went to Ili discovered that many nobles in Oirat were missing, and there were many soldiers with exquisite muskets around the shepherd prince.

This is an unusual signal.

But in actual interactions, it seems that Batur Hutaiji did not intend to go to war with Tsarist Russia. He was indeed gathering troops, but the direction of the troop gathering was to the west... and the Kazakh Khanate in the west was also planning to send troops to Oirat.

The Russians were confused.

On the one hand, they mobilized troops from the rear to strengthen the fortresses along the river, and on the other hand, they frantically tried to figure out what Oirat wanted to do.

It was not until three days ago that officials returned from Oirat, passed by Kuznetsk Fort, and told the 300 garrison troops in the fort, including Lewando, that the crisis was resolved.

The leader of Oirat, Batur Hutaiji, had already sent troops westward to attack the Kazakh Khanate. Those troops were not prepared for them.

This good news caused the frightened garrison in Kuznetsk Fort to celebrate. People were so drunk that they were dizzy. Even if there were not enough wine glasses in the fort, they could not be troubled at all.

For example, Lewando simply poured the wine into the barrel of his pistol and drank more vigorously.

As for the bit of wine flowing out of the fire door, who cares? As long as you drink it fast enough, it won’t flow out at all!

However, just when the garrison of Kuznetsk Fort thought it was a peaceful summer, several fast horses broke the tranquility in the fort.

"Tomsk Fort is surrounded. Thousands, thousands of enemy troops surround the castle. There are muskets, artillery, and bombs that have crossed the fort wall!"

　good afternoon!

　　(End of this chapter)