The Ming Dynasty began from Sarhu

Chapter 375 The troops are approaching the city
"General Man Gui was killed in battle, and the imperial court has no more reinforcements. General Deng, Hequ can't hold out for much longer. What should we do?"

"Nothing else but death in battle."

In February of the first year of Wuding, Man Gui, the sworn brother of the Emperor of Da Qi and the general of Jizhou, overcame numerous difficulties and obstacles and led his army to Shaanxi. When the 4,000 reinforcements encountered bandits, they were like moths to a flame and were destroyed silently.

Seeing that the government army was so vulnerable, Li Xianzhong left 20,000 troops to continue besieging Hequ, while he personally led the main force to the east, preparing to take advantage of the northern expedition of the "Jingnan Army" in the south of the Yangtze River to capture the capital in one fell swoop and satisfy his desire to be an emperor.

The situation was serious. Shaanxi, Shanxi and Henan provinces had all fallen and were wreaked havoc by bandits. The number of bandits snowballed to hundreds of thousands, while Deng Changxiong had only 5,000 men under his command.

On the sixth day of the second month, Wugongkuai ordered his men to carry Man Gui's general's flag and large banner and wave them around Hequ to scare the defenders in the city.

Deng Changxiong discussed secretly with Sun Chuanting and others what to do next now that things had come to this point.

Seeing that Deng Changxiong was determined to die, Sun Chuanting said calmly:
"Man Gui underestimated the enemy and advanced rashly. He was too arrogant. With only two or three thousand men, he didn't take the hundreds of thousands of bandits seriously. It was only a matter of time before he was defeated by them. Currently, all cities in Shaanxi, except Tongguan, Xi'an, and Xianyang, have been captured by the bandits. The emperor must have a new understanding of the bandits' strength and will send more reinforcements."

No one spoke. Everyone knew that what Sun Chuanting said was wishful thinking. The imperial court was already busy with its own affairs and had no time to care about the Western Expedition Army.

"The governor of Xi'an Prefecture sent someone and asked us to provide assistance to Xi'an." Sun Chuanting said cautiously.

"The post road from Xi'an to Hequ has been cut off by bandits. How did the Tangma get to Hequ?"

No one could answer Wang Zengbin's question, and the answer was obvious: this was the bandits' strategy. They wanted the Kaiyuan army to further split up so that they could defeat them one by one.

Perhaps, Xi'an Prefecture was also captured by them, and Tangma was just a bait.

Deng Changxiong was silent for a while, then said to an intelligence officer of the Suoyi Guard, "Go down and interrogate him thoroughly to see what you can get out of this Tangma."

Sure enough, after interrogation by the Suoyi Guards, Tangma, who claimed to be sent from Xi'an Prefecture City, immediately confessed that he was a subordinate of Zhang Zicheng, the Centipede Block. The post roads and post stations leading to the outside world from Xi'an Prefecture City had been occupied by bandits. Since the end of last year, the prefecture city had lost contact with the outside world.

The Suoyi Guards asked the fake Tang Ma whether Xi'an City had been taken. Tang Ma shook his head repeatedly and said that Centipede Block had fought a battle under Xi'an City and many cavalrymen died, so he did not dare to attack again.

At present, all of Shaanxi fell into the hands of bandits. Deng Changxiong was stuck in a dilemma. He was thinking every day about where the Kaiyuan army should break out. Before he could figure it out, on February 10, Zhang Zicheng finally launched a new round of attacks on Hequ County.

Deng Changxiong concentrated all his forces on the east bank of the Yellow River, preparing to deal with the endless influx of refugees. The Kaiyuan army had fought the bandits for so long that they had learned their tactics: they would often send the refugees forward to serve as cannon fodder, exhausting the official army's ammunition and arrows before the bandits took their turn. Sometimes, the refugees were even tasked with tearing down the city walls.

Although Zhang Zicheng's 30,000 troops were not a large number, they were able to quickly gather hundreds of thousands of refugees from the surrounding villages and counties. These refugees washed down like waves, and without long-range firearms, it would be difficult to defend Hequ County.

Deng Changxiong knew that he would die in Shanxi this time, but since things had come to this point, he had nothing to say. After all, the enemy was ten or even a hundred times the size of the Kaiyuan army.

For the Kaiyuan army, this was a hopeless war with no winner on either side.

The 20,000 bandits remaining in Hequ continued their assault on the county seat. They had no shortage of cannon fodder, but the Kaiyuan troops in the city had run out of gunpowder and arrows by the end of the previous year and, without resupply, were forced to engage the bandits in close combat. Emperor Wuding, it seemed, had gained a new appreciation for the strength of Li Xianzhong and Zhang Zicheng. At their current rate, it wouldn't be long before hundreds of thousands of troops would be at the gates of Beijing, just as Li Zicheng had done in history.

As Deng Changxiong expected, in the last few days before the fall of Hequ County, the bandits on the eastern expedition were invincible and even more powerful than the government army. Cities and passes along the way surrendered one after another. The generals and lieutenant generals immediately regarded Li Xianzhong as their lord and led the rebel army to continue eastward. Some people even acted as guides for the bandits and helped persuade the Ming army officers in front to surrender.

In this way, Li Xianzhong occupied the entire Shanxi province almost without bloodshed. By the end of February, except for Qin Yuji, the general commander of Ningwu Pass, who was still resisting, all other generals had surrendered to the bandits.

The reason why Qin Yuji refused to surrender was very simple. Li Xianzhong's army had to pass through his old nest, Ningwu Pass. Ningwu Pass was not only a famous pass in the world, but also a rich pass. According to the behavior of the bandits, they would probably rob everything here this time.

Unlike other military leaders who have various ways to make money (smuggling, suppressing bandits, and sucking the blood of soldiers), General Qin is an honest man. The subtext of being an honest man is that he has a single way of making money (only collecting bribes), so the army's occupation of Ningwu Pass has a great impact on this Master Qin.

So no matter what, Qin Yuji would never leave Ningwu Pass.

The rebel army encountered a small setback in front of Ningwu Pass, with casualties reaching more than a thousand people, more than the government troops killed all the way from Shaanxi. Most of them were shot to death by Qin Zongbing's servants shooting arrows from the top of the city wall - there was a shortage of ammunition at Ningwu Pass.

In the end, all of Qin Yuji's servants were killed or wounded. Seeing that the rebel army was in a murderous mood, Qin Yuji climbed onto the roof, threw down a torch, and burned himself to death with his entire family of more than 30 people, young and old.

From the 47th year of the Wanli reign to the first year of the Wuding reign, the war lasted for nearly ten years, and the northern regions were completely hollowed out, with the social and economic order completely collapsing.

Across the north, people's livelihoods were in decline, fields were barren, and Hejian Prefecture's harvest this year was less than half of last year's. The North Grand Canal had been damaged many times by war, and half of the grain ships had been looted and burned. Linqing, Jining and other places had long lost their former glory.

The common people lost their crops, the canal workers lost their food and clothing, and the boatmen stopped working one after another. Without food to eat, people naturally became restless. More and more people who could not make ends meet chose to join the bandits or the local Kaiyuan Army.

Emperor Wu Ding's thinking was simple: if he couldn't solve the problem, he would eliminate the person who created it.

Rumor has it that the emperor is preparing to lead the army in person and fight a decisive battle with the bandits in Shanxi, and kill them in large numbers.

However, this rumor is obviously not credible, because the Kaiyuan Army has just experienced a major battle in the capital and currently needs to rest well. It is unlikely that they will immediately engage in a new battle.

The rumor was soon confirmed. On February 20th, Emperor Wuding swore an oath to his troops to go to war at Yongding Gate in the capital. In order to show his importance to this war, the emperor killed a group of captives as a sacrifice to the flag before going to the battle, and performed a soul-calling dance as an archbishop.

The Emperor's prayer went like this:

Have you not seen that when scholars rose up and brave men died, China has since been praised for its benevolence and righteousness. When bandits rioted in the Central Plains, scholars fled in panic and the cowardly people wept.

I wish to emulate the ancient ways, to rekindle my heroic spirit. I bear a sharp iron sword, ready to kill in a moment of rage. To slay an enemy a thousand miles away, I would expend ten weeks of stars. I, like Zhuan Zhu and Tian Guang, share a secret bond. I depart through the west gate in the morning, and return at dusk bearing a head. Weary and restless, I yearn for sleep when the battle cry suddenly blows. The bloody battle rages between heaven and earth, its ferocity horrifying the underworld. I slay a man in three steps, my heart still, my hands unstoppable. Blood flows like waves for thousands of miles, corpses blanket the mountains. The warrior, exhausted from battle, sleeps wearily on the corpses of his enemies.

(End of this chapter)