weaving

There is a village thirty miles south of Kaifeng City called Daguantou Village.

Daguantou Village is close to Liujia River in the east and a highway from Kaifeng to Tongxu in the west. Originally, there were more than 200 households and more than 1,000 people in the village. However, due to successive years of drought and locust disasters as well as wars, most of them have fled their hometowns. Now there are only more than 200 elderly and weak people left.

Thousands of soldiers from the Tengshe Camp, led by General Wei Zhice of the Yongyi Army, are now stationed here.

This place is located in the south of Kaifeng City. Thirty miles to the north is Yuwangtai, and about twenty-five or twenty-six miles to the northwest is Xinchengji where Zhang Cheng's headquarters is located. Twenty miles to the west is Xianggong Temple, the base of Chen Zheng's White Tiger Camp.

Zhuxian Town, where the coalition forces of Chuang Cao were located, was only twenty miles away from here. It would only take a few hours for cavalry to advance quickly, and even a large infantry battalion could arrive in half a day.

Daguantou Village is located on a plain and there are no mountains around that can be used. There is only a mound nearly ten feet high on the south side of the village. On the east side of the mound, near Liujia River, there is a large pit with a radius of more than ten feet for water storage.

Therefore, Wei Zhice set up his camp here, included this large earthen mound into his camp, and at the same time dug soil from the nearby earthen pit to build the camp wall. He also brought water from Liujia River and stored it in this large puddle, forming a large water bubble in the camp to solve the water supply needs of the soldiers.

In accordance with the needs of defense, Wei Zhice not only set up the main camp of the central army in the south of Daguantou Village, but also built a side camp on the main road west of the village. At the same time, he built another small camp in the north of the village, surrounding Daguantou Village on three sides.

In this way, they not only expanded the front of their own camp, increasing the scope and difficulty of the enemy army's siege, but also protected Daguantou Village tightly in the middle, so that the more than 200 elderly and weak people remaining in the village were spared the suffering of war.

The three camps here, big and small, are the same as Daguantou Village, and outside the village, just like outside the big camp, there are flower hedges and ditches alternating, making it completely impossible to pass through. This is also to prevent the enemy army from breaking through other camps directly if one camp falls.

In this way, even if the enemy army broke through one camp with all their strength, they would still have to continue attacking Daguantou Village and continue to face the flower hedges and trenches outside the village, as well as the thick reinforced village walls.

Wei Zhice was originally a court student. He was a rare all-round talent in both civil and military affairs. Naturally, he was well aware of the importance of "the people's will".

At the same time, he also remembered the advice of Earl Yongning: "This time we marched into Henan to suppress the bandits, not just to relieve the danger of Kaifeng, nor to compete with the bandits for a state or a prefecture, but in fact it is a competition for the 'hearts of the people'. Whoever can win the 'hearts of the people' will be able to achieve the final victory."

Especially the last sentence of Yongning Bo: "If I cannot make my Yongyi Army the people's favorite in Henan, then I must make all those who are not loyal to me disappear from this world completely. In this way... my Yongyi Army will be the only 'people's favorite'!"

In fact, Wei Zhice still felt that Yongning Earl's idea was too cruel, but he could not find better words to refute it, nor could he find a better way to solve this problem.

Now he is following the instructions of Earl Yongning and trying hard to win the hearts of the people in Henan...

The central cavalry of the Tengshe Camp arrived at Daguantou Village first, but did not enter the village. Instead, they patrolled and guarded outside the village. They did not enter the village until Wei Zhice led a large team to arrive, and then they personally walked into the village.

As soon as he entered Daguantou Village, he first distributed grain, then looked for the oldest man in the village and asked him to temporarily take charge of the affairs of the village. He also solemnly declared that his army would never take a single cent from the villagers.

  In fact, everyone knew that there was not a single grain of rice left in Daguantou Village, not to mention those poor villagers who were so skinny that they looked like skin and bones. How could there be any valuable items to loot?

As the saying goes, "A man who receives favors from others shall be grateful to them; a man who eats from others shall be grateful to

Since Wei Zhice led the Teng Snake Camp to arrive, although they could not eat the best food every day, at least they had three meals a day. Even if they only had porridge for breakfast and dinner and only had a black steamed bun for lunch, they still felt that the life of a god was just like this...

  Even some old men in the village went to find Wei Zhice, hoping that he could take those dozen boys away. Even if joining the army would be life-threatening, it was better than sitting and waiting to die in this village which was like a tomb of the living dead!

The military rules and regulations of the Yongyi Army were very strict. No matter where they went, they were required not to harm the civilians in the slightest. In their usual dramas, they always performed scenes of poor civilians being bullied. They all felt the same way and did not like bullying or harassing civilians from the bottom of their hearts.

Moreover, although most of the Yongyi Army were from the military households of Xuanfu, the army has been continuously expanding over the years, and now almost half of them are from poor people in the capital, Henan and other places. How could they deliberately bully them?

People tend to follow the crowd!

The environment in which people live determines their cognition and behavior. For example, the subordinates of generals such as Zuo Liangyu and He Renlong were habitual offenders who plundered the people and killed innocent people for credit. After all, all the soldiers in the battalion did this, so everyone thought there was nothing wrong with doing so. And if you did not keep in line with everyone, you would probably be the next target of being killed for credit.

Most of the soldiers in the Yongyi Army have become accustomed to the constraints of strict military laws and regulations, so in such a group, the soldiers all abide by the rules, and no one is willing to be the first to challenge the strict military orders.

Now, Wei Zhice naturally agreed to the request of the elders of Daguantou Village. In this way, his Tengshe Camp and the remaining 200-odd villagers became one family.

This will not only help Wei Zhice to defend the camp, but these people can also become propagandists of the Yongyi Army in Henan in the future, and spread the benevolence and righteousness of the Yongyi Army everywhere.

Ever since these dozen half-grown children joined the Tengshe Camp, the attitude of the people in the village towards Wei Zhice and his men has completely changed. They not only took the initiative to ask to help dig trenches and repair the village walls, they even picked up hoes and shovels and said that they would fight to the death with the bandits if they broke into the village.

Wei Zhice's camp was extremely large. Its east side was close to Liujia River, and two walls were built around Daguantou Village on the south, west and north sides. Between the two walls were two flower hedges and a deep trench.

Outside the outer wall of the village, there are four flower hedges, three deep trenches and two thick low walls. These deep trenches are connected to each other. They look criss-crossed and disorderly, but in fact they are connected in all directions, just like the traffic trenches of later generations.

There are many short ramps on the inside of these deep trenches, allowing the soldiers hidden in the trenches to rush to the ground at any time to stop the enemy. At the same time, many thick wooden boards are laid on the deep trenches to facilitate the soldiers on the ground to move back and forth.

Wei Zhice also built a three-meter-high sturdy wooden platform on the mound in front of his central military camp tent to observe all movements in the entire camp's defense circle.

…………

On May 20th, the sky was clear and cloudless. Looking around, the earth was a quiet green.

At noon, some scattered bandit cavalry began to appear to the west of the Tengshe Camp in Daguantou Village. They rode slowly in groups of three or five, sometimes stopping to look into the camp across the flower hedge and trench, sometimes galloping away, and sometimes talking to each other.

From the 9th hour onwards, more and more bandit cavalry came galloping over. From afar, hundreds of cavalrymen were riding their horses, making rumbling sounds as they stepped on the ground. The scene was extremely shocking.

"It's finally here, what's supposed to come!"

Wei Zhice looked very calm, neither excited nor worried, and even his tone was calm: "Pass the order, all camps should be on alert, eat in advance, and make every effort to prepare for the battle."

"Yes." After receiving the order loudly, the middle-ranking officer Yu Deshui next to him immediately ordered his personal soldiers to deliver the order to each camp.

With a calm expression, he raised the telescope again and looked to the west. He saw teams of bandits and cavalry constantly appearing in the flying dust. Although they were far away, their attire was vaguely visible.

"Looking at their attire, they should be soldiers from Shaanxi. I didn't expect that this fight against bandits would end up being a battle between us and the soldiers from Shaanxi. Don't you think it's ridiculous?"

At this time, the governor Qin Dazhong put down the telescope in his hand and said with a heavy face: "The court is incompetent and treacherous officials are in power, so loyal officials and generals cannot give full play to their abilities. Instead, they are controlled by the thieves everywhere and end up being defeated and killed.

The good situation in the eleventh year has been destroyed today. Two Shaanxi governors have been defeated, and countless Shaanxi soldiers have surrendered to the enemy. These elite frontier troops, who were raised with the national treasury, have become the gravediggers of the national dynasty today. Who could have imagined this? "

"Fortunately, we have the Earl of Yongning. Otherwise... even if the great Ming Dynasty did not perish at the hands of bandits, it would have been slaughtered by the Liaodong Tartars." The words of Zheng Youjin, the captain of the left infantry, were powerful and resounding.

Wei Zhice remained silent after hearing this.

The pacification officer Qin Dazhong was different from He Biao. He was originally just a soldier from an ordinary military household. He was promoted and reused by Zhang Cheng because he learned to read quickly and was very calm and capable. Therefore, he was very loyal to the Earl of Yongning, almost to the point of "only knowing the Earl of Yongning, but not the emperor" in his heart.

At this moment, after listening to Zheng Youjin's words, he nodded solemnly and said, "Yongning Earl is a star from the sky who came to the world to save the people of the world. We are fortunate to follow Yongning Earl's command. We should do our best to assist Yongning Earl, end the chaos in the world, and return stability to the people."

Also accompanying Wei Zhice was Ji Donglai, a thousand-man cavalry commander in the rear. He was originally a thousand-man cavalry commander in the mobile camp of Tang Xiancheng, the Xuanfu guerrilla. Later, he followed Tang Xiancheng to join Zhang Cheng's army and was incorporated into the Tengshe Camp, where he continued to serve as a thousand-man cavalry commander.

The system of the Yongyi Army is different from that of other military towns in the Ming Dynasty. The thousand-man commander in the Yongyi Army is equivalent to the title of guerrilla in other places. This is not only reflected in terms of pay and food, but also in status and combat effectiveness.

Therefore, Ji Donglai was very satisfied with Zhang Cheng's arrangement. Moreover, when fighting against the Jiannu in Liaodong, he witnessed the combat effectiveness of the Yongyi Army. Which soldier does not admire the strong?

Since joining the Yongyi Army system, Ji Donglai has been studying hard to learn to read every day, always trying to remember military rules and regulations, and vowed to repay Yongning Earl's kindness with practical actions and to create a future for himself.

At this moment, he said: "Qin Zhenfu's words really hit the nail on the head. In my opinion, in this world, apart from our Lord, no one else can turn the tide and save the collapsing building!"

Wei Zhice also turned around at this time and glanced at Ji Donglai, his eyes full of surprise and doubt. He did not expect Ji Donglai to be able to say such words as "turn the tide when the building is about to collapse". He could not help but secretly think in his heart: "It seems that... the military academy of the Lord is really effective. These warriors are almost being taught to become Confucian scholars, and they speak in a literary way."

"General, the enemy troops are coming."

The voice of the middle officer Yu Deshui interrupted Wei Zhice's thoughts. Yu Deshui continued, "To the south... to the south, there are so many bandit troops."

"hehe."

Wei Zhice held up the telescope and looked for a while, then chuckled and said, "That's good. Now brothers don't have to worry about not having a fight. Looking at the bandits' posture, they should be enough to give us a hard time."

Zheng Youjin couldn't help but ask, "General, what you mean is that this is the main attack direction of the bandits."

"Well, I'm not completely sure yet. But looking at the bandits' posture, it should be almost certain."

Wei Zhice then said to Zheng Youjin and Ji Dong: "You should also go down and prepare. I estimate that the battle may start in the afternoon."

"Here!"

…………

At noon, the sun hung high in the sky, scorching everything on the earth. Waves of heat came, making people feel sticky and uncomfortable.

Liu Zongmin, the number one general in the rebel army, had already arrived outside the Tengshe Camp of the Zhuang Yongyi Army. He rode his horse from the west to the north, then circled back to the south, and made a complete circle around the Tengshe Camp.

"Damn, the government troops from Xuanfu are indeed a little different. They are built like a turtle formation, which is really hard to attack."

Liu Zongmin glanced at Tong Shoushan who was speaking, then turned to Li You and asked, "How long will it take for Zhang Nai's firearms camp to arrive?"

"It's not far ahead, but it may take another day or two to reach the whole place."

Liu Zongmin's face was still as livid as usual. He said coldly, "Order all the generals to deploy in the south, west and north, and set up camp five miles away from Xuanfu Army. This must be done within one hour."

"Yes." Li You agreed loudly and immediately arranged for the messenger to rush away.

…………

It turned out that Liu Zongmin was not confident in Luo Rucai's coming to attack at a critical juncture. He was afraid that Luo Rucai would not risk his life and thus delay military operations.

He always believed that Luo Rucai was not convinced of Li Zicheng, especially after he knew that Li Zicheng was determined to conquer the world and become emperor. Although Luo Rucai looked the same as usual, Liu Zongmin always felt that what he thought in his heart was different from what he said and did.

Therefore, he asked Li Zicheng to personally lead the army to attack Daguankou. The King of Rebellion originally wanted to lead the army himself, but he couldn't resist Liu Zongmin, so he agreed. (End of this chapter)