prosperous age

Chapter 1091 1182 Gathering for Discussion

Seeing the simple city walls of Pegu, both Yu Dayou, Wang Zhao and other generals breathed a sigh of relief.

The first battle in Burma was considered a win.

The telescope was passed among the generals and finally returned to Yu Dayou.

He did not look at Pegu City again, but handed it to his personal soldiers behind him to put away.

"Marshal, the tent has been set up. You can go inside and take a rest."

The personal guard came to report.

"Okay, everyone go to the military tent and rest for a while. No one should dare to scratch the tiger's whiskers today. Everyone can relax for a while."

Yu Dayou said with a smile to Wang Zhao and others.

So, a group of generals followed Yu Dayou to the military tent that had just been set up not far away.

At this time, a fast horse, whipped by its rider, was rushing towards the east gate of Baoshan City.

When the soldiers at the city gate saw this, they rushed forward to try to stop the horse. If the horse was rushing at such a fast speed and hit someone, it would be a serious matter.

But when they got a little closer and saw the big word "Yi" on the man's chest, they quickly turned around and began to drive away the pedestrians in the city gate.

"Get out of the way quickly."

The soldiers in the central army whipped passers-by with their spears and shouted loudly, and they could also hear the sounds coming from outside the city.

"Eight hundred miles of rushing, anyone who stands in the way will die."

After more than ten days of traveling day and night, the news sent from the capital finally arrived today.

Inside the city gate, a team of carriages was about to leave the city gate when they saw that the city gate ahead was under martial law. All the people were stopped and asked to make way for the middle road.

Just when the servant in front was getting angry and trying to force his way in, a fast horse galloped out of the city gate, whipping the horse and shouting to make way.

"Eight hundred miles in a hurry. Fortunately, I didn't go up and get myself into trouble."

The servant took a breath and secretly wiped the non-existent sweat from his forehead.

As the fast horses left, things quickly returned to normal outside the city gate, with people bustling in and out, and it was very lively, with no sign of a war going on ahead.

After all, the Burmese army is still far away from Baoshan City, so there is no need to worry.

The convoy was allowed to pass after only a brief interrogation at the city gate. After all, this was the East Gate, and many dignitaries and their families had passed through here in recent days, all heading for Kunming.

The Burmese army's strength has long been no secret among Yunnan officials.

Many officials and local gentry chose to protect themselves and took their families and rushed to Kunming City in horse-drawn carriages.

It is a symbol of the Ming Dynasty's rule over Yunnan, so you can rest assured once you get there.

After the convoy passed, a soldier walked up to Xiaoqi and asked, "Sir, whose lord is this? There are so many carriages."

"The people from the Lujiang City garrison are also going to Kunming."

The little flag said casually.

"Sir, they said that the families of these adults were sent to Kunming. Is there something wrong ahead?"

A chatterbox soldier spoke up.

"Keep your voice down. Don't be afraid of being heard. If someone hears you, a hat that disturbs the morale of the army will cost you your life."

The little flag was obviously more sensitive. He knew the situation was special at this time, so he quickly shouted and cursed.

"I'm just saying it casually."

"Don't talk about it anymore. If you want to talk, go back to the room and talk quietly."

After Xiaoqi said this, he looked around alertly, and only felt relieved when he found that there was no one around.

However, at this moment, he was still thinking over and over what his soldier had just said.

Yes, if there was no serious problem ahead, why would those big shots send their families to Kunming?

It seems that Baoshan City is going to have a tough battle.

"Father, urgent war report from the Ministry of War."

At this time, in the governor's headquarters in Baoshan City, Li Chengliang also received an urgent war report from the Ministry of War.

Hearing the word "urgent", Li Chengliang naturally put down the other official business in his hands and reached out to take the document from his son Li Rumei.

Li Chengliang now has seven sons, and only the first five are really capable of doing things. The other two are still young and naturally cannot take on important responsibilities, so they stay in the capital.

Li Rumei is the youngest of Li Chengliang's five sons. Naturally, he would not be assigned any military duties and was only asked to do clerical work.

After taking the document and checking that the seal was intact, Li Chengliang opened it, read it quickly, and then his face changed.

"Go, call your brothers over, and send someone to invite Lord Mu and Censor Luo over."

Li Chengliang gave a quick order, then lowered his head and looked at the urgent document in his hand again.

According to the Ministry of War's estimation of Yu Dayou's advancing speed as recorded in official documents, the South China Sea Navy under Yu Dayou's command should have arrived in Myanmar by now, and perhaps even landed at the port.

As for the military intelligence reported by Yu Dayou later, Li Chengliang only read it once, and now he mainly looked at the analysis of the Ministry of War for the second time.

Li Chengliang knew nothing about the navy, so he could only rely on the documents from the Ministry of War to judge Yu Dayou's actions.

Li Chengliang didn't know what his mood was at this time. Logically speaking, having friendly troops attacking Burma from behind seemed to be helping him.

But this also disrupted his previous plan. The plan to lure the enemy deep into his territory was obviously not feasible because he didn't have the time.

Similar to what Wei Guangde thought, Li Chengliang had keenly realized that time was running out. After Mang Yinglong learned that the Ming army was attacking across the sea in the south, he would definitely withdraw troops and return to the capital.

As for whether to continue the offensive against the Ming Dynasty, it is hard to say. The most likely possibility is to fight and retreat at the same time.

In fact, the fact that the Ming army traveled thousands of miles to attack southern Myanmar by sea should have indicated that the Ming court was well prepared.

Otherwise, the Ming army would never have appeared along the coast of Myanmar so quickly.

"Dad, what happened?"

Soon, Li Rusong's loud voice appeared. He was the first to arrive after receiving the news, and behind him was Li Ruzhang.

As for the other two children, Li Rubai and Li Ruzhen, they were not in Baoshan City at this time, but took a special force into Mengding Prefecture and hid there.

"Take a look."

Li Chengliang handed the document in his hand directly to his eldest son and stopped talking. Instead, he thought about what to do next.

When Li Rusong got the document, he just glanced at it quickly and then started shouting.

"This, this, this, isn't Yu Dayou meddling in other people's business? He is so blatantly trying to steal my credit and ruin my plans. This is really despicable."

"Shut up, what nonsense are you talking about."

When Li Chengliang heard Li Rusong's irrelevant words, he immediately scolded him loudly.

Hearing his father's scolding, Li Rusong immediately shut up and dared not say anything more.

"Are you really stupid or just pretending to be stupid? It wasn't long after the Yunnan war broke out that Yu Dayou led the navy to Burma.

Although I don't know how long it takes to go to Myanmar by water, it is definitely impossible that we set out after the crisis here.

I can only say that the Wei Gelao in the capital had already made arrangements to attack Burma from both north and south, and the navy had already set out. To grab the credit, Mang Yinglong should have arrived at Lujiang City, just outside the city. Go and capture him, and I will write your name first in the credit book, and no one can grab your credit."

After being scolded by Li Chengliang, Li Rusong became obedient. His other brother Li Ruzhang did not dare to say much and just stood obediently behind his eldest brother.

  The atmosphere in the hall was a bit depressing. Li Chengliang glanced at Li Rusong and then asked, "If you were me, what would you do at this time?

What you need to do now is to think of a response strategy based on this news instead of cursing anyone here.

An incompetent general drags down the entire army, and only an incompetent general will go on a rampage in the barracks."

Li Chengliang gave further instructions.

After all, he is my favorite eldest son, and this is an opportunity to teach him, which cannot be wasted.

"I know I was wrong, Dad, what do you think we should do now?"

Li Rusong hadn't thought about what his father said yet. He just wanted to listen to his father's orders and do as he was told.

Why waste brain cells when dad is here?

"I came to you for advice, and you asked me."

Li Chengliang said unhappily.

"Hey, I haven't thought about it yet."

Li Rusong said embarrassedly, "But after the navy landed, as the Ministry of War said, the news should have reached Mang Yinglong's ears in more than ten days. We don't have time to implement the plan to lure the enemy."

"Then what do you think we should do?"

Li Chengliang continued to ask.

In a mansion in the east of Baoshan City, Yongchang Censor Luo Rufang had already put on his official robe and was about to go out.

Just now, the Governor's Office sent someone to invite him, saying that the Ministry of War had sent urgent military intelligence and asked him to come over to discuss important matters. Mu Changzuo, the general commander of Yunnan, was also invited.

Faced with such urgent military information, Luo Rufang naturally did not dare to delay and was ready to go out after packing up.

"Master, the East Gate just sent a message."

"what's up?"

Luo Rufang kept walking towards the mansion gate while asking questions.

Outside the mansion gate, a sedan chair was already waiting there.

"Master, the family of the Lujiang City garrison line left the city today and said they were going to Kunming."

The servant whispered beside him.

"Okay, got it. Send someone to keep an eye on it. Once we pass Guangyi, we can just ignore it."

Luo Rufang just answered and hurried out.

During this period, many officials and gentry fled to Kunming with their families. However, because a number of chieftains in Longchuan, Qianya and other places surrendered to Mang Yinglong one after another, and because of the loss of Lu and Liang, he, the censor, had more work to do recently.

The purpose is to monitor all officials, so naturally, he dare not relax his investigation of these officials and gentry at this time.

We must find out how many people in these families are secretly colluding with Myanmar.

Especially with the fall of Luliang, if someone who had connections with Mang Yinglong took this opportunity to go to Kunming, in the worst case scenario, when the Burmese army was at the gates of the city, they would use Luliang's trick to defraud the city, and then Luo Rufang would be blamed for his death.

While Li Chengliang and Mu Changzuo were busy fighting foreign wars, Luo Rufang's work focused on internal cleansing and tracking down those families that had already rebelled.

Although this possibility is very small, we still have to take precautions.

Previously, the Censorate had sent people to check on the officials and their families who had fled to Baoshan City and other places, and found nothing unusual.

However, monitoring the whereabouts of these families is still the responsibility of Luo Rufang. It can be said that such surveillance will not stop until the war is over.

However, because these families did not stay in Baoshan City, at least they could be guaranteed that nothing would happen in Baoshan City, so naturally they would not care too much.

Since they are all people who have been through the process before, Luo Rufang is more confident about these families.

What he was most worried about were actually the local chieftains. Only they would have the possibility of treason. For the Han people, it was hard to understand why they would abandon the Ming Dynasty and join foreign vassal states.

As those who needed to be monitored left, the Censors were freed up to send more personnel to monitor the local ethnic minorities, which was actually a good thing for them.

  No?

Luo Rufang walked out of the house, got into the sedan chair, and ordered, "Hurry up and go."

Two bearers immediately lifted the sedan chair and ran towards the Governor's Mansion at great speed. Behind the sedan chair, a long-time attendant and four yamen runners also followed quickly.

When Luo Rufang arrived at the place, Mu Changzuo had already come in. He had already read the urgent report sent by the Ministry of War.

In Mu Changzuo's opinion, this was a good thing, so he naturally sat there calmly.

Seeing Luo Rufang rushing over, he smiled and said, "Lord Luo, you are usually faster than anyone else, why are you behind me today?"

In fact, even though Mu Changzuo was the general of Yunnan and could ride a horse, he, like other military officers, was accustomed to riding in a sedan chair.

Today, he heard that there was an urgent report from the Ministry of War, so he abandoned his sedan chair and rode here directly. Naturally, he arrived a little earlier than Luo Rufang.

"Some matters have been delayed. Please excuse me, General."

Luo Rufang had no intention of joking with Mu Changzuo. He just bowed and said lightly, then quickly walked up to Li Chengliang.

"Censor Luo, please take a look."

Li Chengliang handed him the urgent report from the Ministry of War and said indifferently.

The position of Censor is really unpopular among officials, after all, he is the one who reports on others.

But when the officials saw them, they had to greet them with a smile.

But that was only in peacetime. Wartime was naturally a different matter.

Li Chengliang was the Left Commander-in-Chief of the Right Military Governor's Office, not a permanent official in Yunnan, so naturally he would not curry favor with the Yunnan Provincial Censor.

"Hiss, hey, this is a good thing."

At the beginning, something serious had happened to Luo Rufang, and the court wanted to punish them. After all, it had led to a war, and officials would definitely be implicated.

But after quickly reading the urgent report in his hand, Luo Rufang found that it seemed to be good news.

Because it did not belong to the military system, Li Chengliang's arrangements would naturally not be explained in detail to Luo Rufang. Even Mu Changzuo would only let him know some information because some matters required his cooperation, but that was just a glimpse of the whole picture.

But even with this incomplete information, Mu Changzuo, after all, was a military commander, so he had some guesses.

After all, tens of thousands of people have entered Mengding. Without his permission, how could this large army be allowed to be mobilized at will in Yunnan?

Therefore, Mu Changzuo understood Li Chengliang's current mood, but no matter what, he had already taken it out.

The credit belongs to everyone.

As for the fault, it naturally fell mostly on Li Chengliang and had little to do with him.

Luo Rufang had no idea about the situation, so he was very happy. With the navy coming from the south, the powerful Burmese army in front of them would inevitably need to send a force to support them. Wouldn't that give the Ming army a chance to catch their breath?

"Commander-in-Chief Li, the navy has now attacked southern Myanmar. I think this is a good opportunity to consolidate the defense line and wait for an opportunity to counterattack and retake the lost territory."

Immediately, Luo Rufang began to talk and put forward his analysis.

After he had said a few words, Li Chengliang interrupted him with a wave of his hand and turned to Li Rusong and said, "Rusong, unfold the map."