stubborn thief

Tingkou Town, Bingzhou.

It is the only way from Xi'an Prefecture to Qingyang and Pingliang Prefectures.

Pack mules were moving in a winding manner, and horses and carriages were rumbling. Boatmen on both sides of the Jing River were shouting orders as they loaded and unloaded vehicles loaded with military supplies onto the boats.

On the small hills beside the shore, each hilltop was planted with a flag indicating the road. Teams of soldiers armed with swords and spears, dressed in armor, marched in long snake formations that kept splitting and combining according to the terrain, and hurried northward with their flags rolled up.

The huge northern expeditionary army of the Marshal's Office was like a flash of lightning, almost blocking the official road from Xi'an to Qingyang. As a result, it split on the northern plateau of Tingkou Town and spread northward in five routes along the official roads and paths between the hills and ridges.

The logistics grain route was also divided into three routes here. Depending on the road conditions, the grain and supplies were transported in batches from the official road using donkey carts, from the mountain ridge road using mules, and from large and small boats on the Jing River waterway to the northern city of Qingyang and the northwest city of Pingliang.

Liu Chengzong's military headquarters was temporarily stationed here.

Listening to the chaotic shouting of people and the neighing of horses, and watching the huge smoke and dust rising above the river valley, shrouding the distant hills in a hazy haze, Liu Shizi was very satisfied with this expedition.

Despite the chaos in Tingkou Town, Liu Shizi was still very satisfied with the initial situation of this march.

Because from Xi'an Prefecture to the north, through Yaozhou to Bingzhou, the mountains and plateaus are all north-south, there are many people walking on it, and the road is smooth.

The ten battalions of soldiers and baggage were lined up in a column on the plateau. The mule carts took the official road, and the soldiers took the small roads with light luggage. They walked very comfortably.

But once you enter Bingzhou, the road becomes difficult to travel on. Not only does the terrain become higher and start to climb, but the mountains gradually become east-west. All the roads on the plateau converge into one place. For more than a hundred miles to Changwu County, this is the only easy road that can accommodate baggage vehicles.

Binzhou, Ningzhou and Jingzhou belong to the three prefectures of Xi'an, Qingyang and Pingliang. In this marginal area connecting the three prefectures, even the official road has not been repaired for more than ten years.

The road was bumpy due to years of disrepair, and was covered with potholes. After the snow melted, the ground was covered with mud, which made the vanguard of the clan camp very busy. They had to build roads through mountains and bridges over rivers. The report that Jin Chanzi sent to Ren Quan'er was full of curses and doubts.

How the hell can there be trees growing on this official road?

The reason why Jin Chanzi was made the vanguard was that he had been active in this area in the past, jumping back and forth between mountain paths and rivers, and leading Han Fanqiongzong through all kinds of mountain roads.

However, the large army was marching, carrying numerous baggage and carriages. After all, it was different from the hundreds of people he had relied on his legs to move back and forth in the past, so many roads were impassable.

Besides, the world has changed. In the past, this place was a Feng Shui treasure land for the roaming Jin Chanzi, because the poor road conditions could effectively delay the advance of the government troops. It is possible that all the trees on the official road were planted by his people.

But now he is a government soldier.

But the morale of the clan camp is still good.

The people from Han Fan and Su Fan were supervising the new recruits from Qin Fan who were filling the pits and making tracks in the front. They all thought that they would be freed after dealing with Qing Fan, so they threw all the dirty work to the people from Qing Fan.

The Marshal's Office has a mature system of royal family management that ensures that everyone goes where they should go.

Those who are brave and willing to achieve fame and honor immediately can join the clan camp as soldiers, those who are intelligent and want to become officials can enter the Rites Office as clerks, those who have committed many evil deeds can be hung on trees, and those who are not qualified to climb trees will be given to Zhou Taimeng and the Eastern European gangs to play with.

Or being played with.

Anyway, it all leads to the same destination, it's all a one-way ticket.

This time, thanks to the increase in experience and the good organization of the newly formed field brigade, although the number of troops exceeded 30,000, and even the number of manpower including baggage transportation was close to 40,000, Liu Chengzong felt very comfortable in command.

Like an arm using a finger.

Of course there were problems, such as the slow marching speed of several battalions and the congestion of troops and supplies in Changwu County.

But these were not commands from Liu Chengzong. Even if the roads were blocked, each battalion had pre-arranged garrisons. While letting the horses and mules graze, each battalion was also training in long-distance marching and battalion defense. The situation was very optimistic.

As for those battalions that marched slowly, they were mainly the reinforcement battalions of the two brigades. Their marching speed was extremely slow, only half of the Marshal's Army's field marching regulations.

This is a problem with the organization of the reinforcement battalion.

The reinforcement battalion was full of gunners. Their firearms and ammunition took up the carrying space of the mules and horses, and they were also equipped with armor, which greatly slowed down their march.

In the organization of the Ming army, whether it was Qi Jiguang's infantry or Sun Chengzong's chariot camp, the firearms operators were not wearing armor, which was a compromise in which defense gave way to logistics.

Although this made it easy for the Ming army's firearms and chariot camps to be surrounded and killed by the big bandits, it also ensured their mobility, enabling them to arrive at the battlefield on time and build chariot barriers to hold the battle line.

However, the various camps of the Marshal's Office did not recruit new soldiers or uniformly equip them with equipment. As the war progressed, surrendered troops and peasant armies from various leaders continued to replenish the camps, and there were always more soldiers than the number of troops, and more armor than soldiers.

Originally, Liu Chengzong's solution to this situation was to take advantage of the large number of mules and horses and add more light chariots to each unit to increase the carrying capacity of heavy guns and rifles.

There has been no problem.

But he had little experience in commanding large troops, and he had only led troops of more than 20,000 men three times.

The first time was from Xining to Gansu. It was very smooth. Although there were no roads outside the Great Wall, the hard road surface of the Gobi Desert created favorable conditions for the Marshal's army's large number of chariots and cavalry to move quickly.

Moreover, in the vast desert and Gobi of the northwest, commanders are required to be familiar with the routes and find water sources, but this has little impact on command.

The second time was the Eastern Expedition. The first time he commanded a large force, and although he also did not bring any logistics, he encountered problems of command failure and improper placement.

This time, there was no problem with Liu Chengzong, the problem was the road conditions.

The heavy carrying capacity of the reinforcement battalion did not cause any problems during daily drills in the Guanzhong Plain, but problems arose when they went on the northern expedition according to those road conditions.

This time they were moving from low to high, and almost every step was climbing a slope. Normally, the animals were already doing heavy work, not to mention they had to carry the soldiers' armor and guns. As a result, more than sixty mules and donkeys died in the two battalions in four days.

When the animals died, the soldiers had to pull the carts, and as a result, the carts went slower and slower. Not to mention the infantry's speed of 80 miles a day, even the artillery's speed of 60 miles a day could not keep up.

Liu Shizi was puzzled at first. Why were the two reinforcement battalions lagging behind? Could they be rebelling?

But I thought that it wouldn't be necessary. The lieutenant commander of the First Brigade's reinforcement battalion, Tang Tong, was from Jingyang. Even if he wanted to rebel, the Second Brigade's reinforcement battalion would not rebel. The lieutenant commander there was Ah Liu from Yongning, who was a helpless person.

Later we found out that we were moving really slowly. The cannons had to be pulled by people, and eight people were no match for a donkey.

What a useless aid. By the time you two get to the battlefield, all the people on the front line will be dead.

When they reached Tingkou Town, Liu Chengzong ordered them to go straight to the garrison in Xindi and wait for mules to be dispatched from the rear before continuing their march. There was no need to rush if they went slowly, as the road would be smooth after this section.

After passing Changwu County, it is easy to go northwest to either Qingyang or Pingliang.

The border of these three prefectures happens to be the confluence of the Malian River, Pu River and Jing River. After passing here, going to Qingyang is up the north-south plateau, and going to Pingliang is into the Jingshui River Valley. Not only is the road easy to travel, but there is also fodder and dry food prepared along the way.

In comparison, Pingliang Prefecture prepared more dry food, and Qingyang Prefecture prepared more fodder.

Of course, these were not given for free. Liu Chengzong only had the authority to arbitrarily conscript labor in his base in Qinghai.

This is not possible in Pingliang and Qingyang, as the people have to prepare food and pay for it with money.

Of course, the most crucial areas are Pingliang and Qingyang. Under the governance of Jiang Yingchang and Ju Sirang, people own land, which gives him the opportunity to spend money.

In Qinghai, if you walk two miles with silver in your hand, you might get robbed, let alone buy things. The only thing he could do was to do corvée labor.

Although Liu Chengzong's large group of troops were moving slowly in Tingkou Town, the vanguard of the clan camp had already entered Pingliang City together with the Tang soldiers and began to transmit Tang reports from the front line to the shogunate headquarters.

The first Fengtang report was a report from Wang Wenxiu, saying that a group of more than 400 surrendered generals and soldiers, led by Ningxia guerrilla Liu Fangming and commander Ma Xiantu, had participated in the Ningxia mutiny and fled to Bancheng to knock on the gate and surrender, and were pursued by Zuo Liangyu's troops.

Yang Yanchang, the commander of the second border wall, had already let it into half of the city.

Liu Chengzong read the report and nodded secretly, thinking that the fully automatic general was safer.

Half of the city is on the north side of the second side wall, with a side wall in the middle and the Red Castle on the south. If the surrendered generals are placed there, there will be no problem even if it is a fake surrender.

Compared with this, Liu Shizi was more curious about Hong Chengchou. What on earth did this guy do in Ningxia that angered the people and heaven? Not only did he cause the border soldiers to mutiny, but even local high-ranking officials such as the guerrilla general and the commander-in-chief came to him.

Half an hour later, Wang Wenxiu from Pingliang sent another letter.

The newspaper reported that Yang Yanchang ordered his subordinate Xiao Guangdou to abandon half of the city and put all the generals and surrendered officers inside the border wall, intending to gather troops to go out of the border, launch a defensive counterattack, and leave the pursuing Ming army in half of the city.

Liu Chengzong was shocked when he saw the news, thinking that something was wrong. When Yang Yanchang heard Zuo Liangyu's name, he didn't just run away, but he actually had the courage to fight a defensive counterattack and even wanted to keep him in half of the city.

The question is, is Zuo Liangyu so easy to beat?

Among all the Ming army commanders inside the Great Wall, Liu Chengzong could rank Zuo Liangyu as the best in terms of combat effectiveness.

There is no other reason. Zuo Liangyu, this old hand, knows how to preserve his strength. At present, his and Zhang Yingchang's system is the most complete.

Zhang Yingchang had never met Liu Chengzong at all, while Zuo Liangyu was already an old veteran who had escaped from the lion's mouth several times.

The key is that Yang Yanchang's courage came at the wrong time.

First of all, Zuo Liangyu’s troops did not intend to go south to seize Shaanxi, they were just chasing the mutinous rebels.

Secondly, when Yang Yanchang made this plan, he did not know that Liu Chengzong in Xi'an had already launched an expedition to the north.

  Liu Shizi looked through the defense map and found that at this moment, the nearest reinforcements to Yang Yanchang were in Pingliang, three hundred miles away. Why are you so aggressive?

"Don't let Zuo Liangyu kill him!"

Liu Shizi likes Yang Yanchang quite a bit, after all, they are old friends.

Originally, he wanted to place Yang Yanchang as a lieutenant general in one of the two brigades directly under the central army so that he could know him well.

But Ren Quaner told him about the situation in the Yan'an camp. Yang Yanchang was an automatic general in that camp, and his capable subordinates who were on the same side as him were Liu Chengzong's uncle Liu Xiangshan and brother Liu Chengguang.

When Liu Shizi was a child, he studied at home with his father. Later, he went to Mizhi with his father at a very young age. He was not very close to his elder uncles and brothers of the same generation at home.

But after all, they are blood relatives, and there are not many of them. Besides, if they didn't join him early on, they would have their own opportunities when the time came to support the king.

Yunshun, Jiachang and other eight people who brought honor to the family, Chengchang died of illness early, Chengjia and Chengshun died in Liaodong when they followed Yang Yanchang to serve the king, Chengyao was still alive but he was young, just a boy who was still in school.

Chengguang followed Yang Yanchang and joined him. It was not all a bad thing that he could lead troops to fight.

However, Liu Chengzong definitely cannot let Chengguang stay by his side, because he is just a captain, and the gap is too big. Seeing Chengguang by his side every day will make people anxious, which will make people resent him in their hearts.

It is better to release it and put it in a place where it is easy to make merit, get some credit, and exercise yourself to move up.

After all, if he were placed in the central army, he would probably have no chance to make any achievements.

That is why Liu Chengzong assigned Yang Yanchang to Wang Wenxiu's Longxi Brigade and sent him to guard the border wall.

Anyway, in Guyuan, there is no need to worry even if the second border wall is breached. The Qingshui River Valley is between two mountains, and the Ningxia soldiers will be beaten out if they come in from there.

But Liu Chengzong never expected that Yang Yanchang was so brave. As soon as he found an opportunity to fight, he would rush out and beat the enemy.

As soon as Liu Chengzong saw the news, he hurriedly sent someone to reply to Wang Wenxiu, asking him to send reinforcements to support the border wall.

In addition, orders were also sent to Zhang Zhen and Ding Guodong of the Yanqing Brigade, asking Zhang Zhen to guard against the Yansui direction and to transfer Ding Guodong to attack the Ningxia rear guard from Huanxian three days later to cut off the connection between Ningxia and Yansui.

At the same time, Liu Shizi was praying in his heart that Zuo Liangyu would not be fooled as his troops had not yet been deployed to the expected position.

The outcome of a small skirmish at this time would not be beneficial to the overall situation and would also allow Hong Chengchou to prepare in advance.

After all, it was so far away, and all he could do was pray while marching.

The next morning, Liu Chengzong was stationed in the wilderness between Changwu County and Jingzhou. Just as his troops set out, he received a report from the front line forwarded by Wang Wenxiu.

fight.

However, it was different from what Liu Chengzong imagined, and also different from Yang Yanchang's plan.

His plan of asking Xiao Guandou to give up half of the city and trapping the Ming army inside was quite brave.

But the Ming army was braver. The general leading the troops was named Xu Yong, a guerrilla general under Zuo Liangyu.

It was no longer a question of whether Xu Yong had fallen into the trap or not.

When he saw the half of the city that Xiao Guandou had given up, he didn't even look at it. He just thought that the Marshal's army's city defense troops were afraid of him, so they rushed towards the side wall with Zuo Liangyu's flag.

They directly used Yang Yanchang's plan, blocked him at the Great Wall, and started to attack the city.

For two consecutive days, Liu Shizi walked from Jingzhou to Pingliang City, revisiting the old place and reading the newspapers sent by Yang Yanchang and Wang Wenxiu.

The fighting on the front line was intense. On the evening of the previous day, Xu Yong led his troops to patrol outside the city wall, looking for weak points.

The next morning, taking advantage of the fog in the Qingshui River, they crossed the shallow ditch outside the wall and began to chisel the city wall.

When the digging was halfway done, the defenders were transferred over, the two sides fired at each other, and the attackers retreated; they moved to another place and continued digging.

Just like playing whack-a-mole, they used hammers here and chisels there to move the defenders back and forth along the shallow ditch.

By the evening, this guy started challenging Yang Yanchang across the ditch again, wanting to have a fight in the open.

Seeing that the defenders on the border wall did not respond, he camped halfway under the city that night. However, he led his troops away secretly before the second half of the night, leaving Yang Yanchang, who had gone out of the city to attack, empty-handed.

Just as they got out of half the city, Xu Yong turned around and came back with his cavalry to lure the enemy.

Not until they saw the artillery team on the west bank of the Qingshui River did they understand what Yang Yanchang was planning. So they did not rush forward to attack and instead led their troops north.

Liu Chengzong laughed at Yang Yanchang in his heart.

Although Yang Yanchang did not suffer any loss in this confrontation, he was confused when his plan could not keep up with the changes. Xu Yong completely seized the initiative and led him by the nose.

"Marshal, this Captain Yang is a disgrace to our country. He is so stupid that it makes Old Zhang worried!"

The Minister of Rites read the Tang report and was very dissatisfied with the results. He shook his head and said, "It's not Zuo Liangyu who is coming. Why should we be afraid of him?"

Liu Chengzong shook his head and smiled, "This is good, at least it can paralyze Hong Chengchou. If we use a large force to annihilate Xu Yong's forces, and let Hong Chengchou start to deploy defenses, it will be difficult to attack Ningxia, which is not good."

Just then, another urgent report arrived.

This time Liu Chengzong took the letter, read it again and again, with a sarcastic look on his face, and handed it to Zhang Xianzhong: "Look, Hong Chengchou came to apologize and wanted to negotiate peace with us."

Zhang Xianzhong was amazed. He took the letter and read it. He frowned and said, "He said something nice. Ningxia was hit by a disaster, but he still had the nerve to ask the Marshal to borrow food. What right does he have to negotiate peace with us?"

"You are right. He has no right to negotiate peace."

Liu Chengzong pointed casually on his horse and said with a smile: "Send someone to put this letter into a gift box and have Prince Su send someone to deliver it to the court. Hong Chengchou, as the governor-general, actually wanted to negotiate peace privately without the emperor's permission!"

"Ok!"

Zhang Xianzhong nodded repeatedly, savoring this operation endlessly, and immediately said, "Whatever the Marshal wants to reply, the Li Ya will write it for him right away."

This sentence left Liu Chengzong stunned.

He paused, as if thinking about something, then he rode his horse to clear the official road and led Zhang Xianzhong to the nearby mound, saying, "He sent this letter to negotiate peace, but it was fake, and it was really a test."

"Calculating the time, the letter was delivered just as Xu Yong withdrew from the border wall. This means that Xu Yong failed to catch up with Liu Fangming, so he sent someone to inform Hong Chengchou, and he had already written the letter and sent it here."

"He knew that I must have learned about the Ningxia mutiny from Liu Fangming, but I don't know if I had captured the governor Wang Ji before, or got the news of the Ningxia mutiny from somewhere else."

Liu Chengzong raised his hand and pointed at the letter in Zhang Xianzhong's hand: "So I use this letter to try my luck and see if I can give him time to clear the military settlements before fighting again. On the other hand, the main purpose is to test my position."

"Write a letter tomorrow and tell him that I am in Xi'an and I am very angry about him sending his generals to attack the border wall. We will send it off after we reach Red Castle in three days."

Liu Chengzong grinned silently: "I let him see the letter in the morning and see me in the evening of the next day!" (End of this chapter)