My father is Chongzhen? Then I have no choice but to rebel.

Chapter 144 Chongzhen: I had a dream, I seemed to have hanged myself on Coal Hill!

"Did you tell me what it was?"

Zhu Cixiang asked.

The young eunuch scratched his head.

"Master Li didn't say anything, but seeing how anxious Master Li looked, I thought something important must have happened."

Zhu Cilang instantly realized that something was wrong. Most likely something had happened in Liaodong, otherwise Li Banghua would not be so anxious.

Thinking of this, he raised his leg and was about to leave.

But at this moment, Chongzhen suddenly came over and asked curiously:

"What happened?"

Although Zhu Cilang was anxious to leave, he still patiently explained:
"Father, the Minister of War, Li Banghua, has an urgent matter to discuss with you. I suspect something has happened in Liaodong, so I must go and take a look."

When Chongzhen heard this, his brows immediately frowned.

Because he also knew the importance of the Liaodong war situation to the current court.

Thinking of this, Chongzhen spoke again:

"That's it, let Li Banghua come here! I promise I'll just listen and won't say anything!"

Zhu Cilang looked at Chongzhen helplessly, and then saw that Chongzhen's face was solemn.

In the end, he agreed.

Turning to the young eunuch, he said:

"Go and invite Lord Li in."

After a while, Li Banghua came hurriedly holding two memorials. His voice was heard before he arrived.

"Your Highness, a secret report from Liaodong: something unexpected has happened there!"

Zhu Cilang and Chongzhen looked at each other, and their hearts sank.

At this moment, Li Banghua had already arrived in front of the two of them.

When Li Banghua saw Chongzhen was also there, he was startled at first, then he quickly saluted and said:
"Your Majesty, I, Li Banghua, pay my respects to you!"

"I love you!"

Chongzhen was anxious to know what had happened, so he waved his hand and asked Li Banghua to stand up.

At the same time, Zhu Cilang had already taken the memorial from Li Banghua.

Cough cough cough.
But at this moment, Chongzhen suddenly coughed a few times.

Zhu Cilang reacted and could only patiently hand over the two memorials to Chongzhen:

"Father, please take a look first."

Chongzhen flipped open a memorial, glanced at it briefly, his brows furrowed instantly, and he muttered:
"How could this be?"

Zhu Cilang was so curious that he didn't care about anything else. He quickly snatched the memorial from Chongzhen's hand and began to read it carefully.

Although Chongzhen was speechless, he continued to read the second memorial.

After a moment, Zhu Cilang also frowned.

Because he guessed right!
Liaodong
Something really big happened!
However, what is surprising is that this memorial was not sent by Hong Chengchou, but by the King of Korea.

In the letter, the King of Korea said that he didn't know what was going on in recent times, and the Jiannu people kept invading Korea.

Then this group of Jian slaves neither killed people nor set fires, they simply robbed food and ran away after stealing it, not giving them any chance to react at all.

Whenever they organized an army to fight against the Jiannu, the Jiannu would quickly slip away and never engage in direct battle with them.

In just a few days, they were robbed of tens of thousands of stones of grain and thousands of cattle and sheep.

The King of Korea felt that something was wrong, so he wanted to ask Chongzhen if he knew what was going on.

After reading this memorial, Zhu Cilang's brows immediately frowned.

There is no doubt that Huang Taiji was preparing for the Battle of Songjin!

He originally thought that as long as he cut off the channels through which the eight imperial merchants transported supplies to the Jiannu, he could prevent the Jiannu from obtaining food and fodder.

What he didn't expect was that Huang Taiji would actually plunder food from Korea.

This was beyond his expectations.

I have to say that Huang Taiji is really smart. It seems that this guy is determined to take Jinzhou!
Zhu Cilang was marveling at Huang Taiji's cleverness, while Chongzhen, standing beside him, was so angry at the contents of the second memorial that his face turned red and his neck became thick.

The next second, he threw the memorial fiercely on the table and roared angrily:

"Damn Jiannu, damn Huang Taiji, you've gone too far, I will tear you into pieces!"

When Zhu Cilang saw Chongzhen's expression, he knew that what was written in the second memorial must be more important than the first one.

So he immediately put down the first memorial and picked up the second one.

When he opened it, his brows furrowed even deeper.

As expected, this memorial was written by Hong Chengchou!

Hong Chengchou first briefly explained the current situation in Liaodong, then changed the subject and talked about another thing.

According to information obtained by Daming Yebushou in Liaodong, Huang Taiji had quietly withdrawn a group of troops in recent times.

But don't get me wrong, those who retreated were not the elite troops, but the auxiliary troops who were half workers and half farmers.

Moreover, these people did not return to Shenyang, but retreated to Yizhou (now Yixian County!)
Although Yizhou is not very famous in history, it occupies a very important geographical location at this time!
In March of the 13th year of Chongzhen, Huang Taiji, in light of the previous setbacks in his attacks on Ningyuan and Jinzhou, learned from his mistakes and carefully formulated a long-term combat plan.

This is what is called "a long siege to force the enemy to surrender."

He immediately sent Prince Zheng Jirgalang, Doroberel Dodo and others to lead a large army to build Yizhou City.

Yizhou City is located on the banks of the Daling River between Guangning and Jinzhou. The terrain here is flat and open, and the land is extremely fertile, suitable for growing crops.

More importantly, this place is only over a hundred miles away from Jinzhou, and it can be reached in just half a day if you march quickly!

As long as a city is built and farmland is cultivated here, it will undoubtedly be a frontline offensive position quietly established around the Jinning defense line.

Once the offensive is launched on Jinzhou, Yizhou City will become an ideal logistics support base.

At that time, all kinds of materials and troops can be continuously transported to the front line, providing sufficient support for the war in the front.

Now Ye Bushou discovered that the Jiannu had intermittently gathered no less than 50,000 people in Yizhou to grow grain!
Most of these 50,000 people were Han people abducted from the Ming Dynasty, so they were naturally experts in farming.

Since the beginning of spring, large tracts of land in Yizhou have been planted with crops, totaling tens of thousands of acres.

In addition, food is continuously transported from Korea and Mongolia. I heard that the Jiannu are also thinking about transporting food from Japan. Although there is no conclusive evidence yet, we have to be on guard!
After reading the memorial, Zhu Cilang's expression did not change much, but his look had become solemn.

It has to be said that he underestimated Huang Taiji.

The current situation is completely different from his impression of the Ming Dynasty.

He had just killed the eight imperial merchants and cut off the Jiannu's food supply.

As a result, the Jiannu turned around and looked for compensation elsewhere, robbing Mongolia, Korea, and even planting their own crops. In short, they were determined to fight to the end!

It seems that the Battle of Songjin will not end so easily. The armies of both sides will have to fight head-on to end this war!
But the question is, how to win this war that has already been lost in history?

Continue to use Hong Chengchou's turtle fighting strategy?
This method seems to no longer work!

Because the Jiannu already had other ways to obtain good things, they no longer needed to rely on the eight imperial merchants of the Ming Dynasty.

Even though this may come at a great cost, it is nothing compared to breaking through the Jinning defense line!
Of course, the Ming Dynasty could also continue to transport food and supplies to Liaodong and continue to confront the Jiannu, but it should be noted that compared with the Jiannu, Li Zicheng and Zhang Xianzhong are currently the most troublesome problems for the Ming Dynasty.

Although Zhu Cilang seems to be not very concerned about Li Zicheng and Zhang Xianzhong, in fact he checks the intelligence about Li Zicheng and Zhang Xianzhong almost every day.

The number of their troops is increasing at a crazy rate almost every day.

It was 30,000 a few days ago, 50,000 today, and 100,000 in a few days!
They just captured a city yesterday, killed more than a dozen Ming Dynasty officials today, and will kill a few Ming Dynasty princes tomorrow.

This kind of thing happens almost every day all over the Ming Dynasty.

Although these armies were of mixed quality, mainly composed of farmers and disaster victims, and their combat effectiveness was not strong, their numbers were simply too large.

It's like a snowball that gets bigger and bigger!
And this happened despite the resistance of Zuo Liangyu and more than 20,000 border troops. If it weren't for their resistance, Henan might have been completely occupied by Li Zicheng by now.

Simply put, the Jiannu are like acne growing on the surface of the Ming Dynasty. Although it is painful, it will not be fatal in the short term.

However, Li Zicheng and Zhang Xianzhong are cancers growing within the Ming Dynasty. If they are not eradicated as soon as possible, they will sooner or later kill the Ming Dynasty!

Therefore, to save the Ming Dynasty, we must first cut off the surface acne and inhibit its growth, then concentrate our efforts on eliminating the internal tumor, and finally try our best to remove the surface acne.

Only in this way can we truly save the Ming Dynasty!
Therefore, the Ming Dynasty must win the Battle of Songjin!

After winning the Battle of Songjin and completely driving the Jiannu back to their homeland in Liaodong, a part of the border troops and other troops were dispatched to encircle and suppress Li Zicheng and Zhang Xianzhong.

This is Zhu Cilang’s next plan!
To be honest, Zhu Cilang did not actually have much hostility towards Li Zicheng, Zhang Xianzhong and others, and sometimes he even understood them quite well.

After all, if the Zhu family could provide them with enough food to eat, they might not necessarily rebel.

If he had traveled through time as a commoner, a petty official, or a rebel, he would have rebelled against the Zhu family without hesitation!
Damn the Zhu family!
I can't even afford to eat! What are you waiting for if you don't rebel?
After all, everyone knows that the Ming Dynasty was already rotten at the end of the year. The difficulty of saving the Ming Dynasty is comparable to conquering the world all over again!
But who would have thought?

He happened to travel through time and space and became Zhu Cilang!
What can he do as the ruling figure at the top of the pyramid of the Ming Dynasty?
Is he going to rebel against himself?

This is obviously impractical.

He had no reason and no power to overturn all the memories and responsibilities that this body possessed and carried.

Because this body's innate mission is to save the Ming Dynasty.

His mission after traveling through time was to save the Ming Dynasty! Therefore, he could only use his own memories and knowledge to save the current Ming Dynasty!

Just when Zhu Cilang came to his senses, Chongzhen was still angry.

Although Zhu Cilang had a lot on his mind, everything actually happened in the blink of an eye.

Then, Zhu Cilang heard Chongzhen grumbling and cursing:

"These damned Jiannu people, it seems they really want to fight the Ming Dynasty to the death!"

"I will not let them off easily this time!"

Li Banghua stood aside, with his head lowered, not saying a word.

Because he knew in his heart that Chongzhen would not listen to anything at this critical juncture, so he decided to wait until Chongzhen's anger subsided a little before expressing his opinion.

Before that, he'd better just be a wooden man.

Coincidentally, Zhu Cilang thought the same.

So even after coming to his senses, Zhu Cilang did not say anything, but stood quietly by and listened to Chongzhen cursing the Jiannu.

Of course, Chongzhen was the emperor after all, so he couldn't say anything too harsh. The most he could say was "kill the entire nine clans" or "peel off the skin of the daylily".

After a long while, Chongzhen finally stopped and sat down at the stone table, drinking tea.

It’s obvious that he was tired of scolding!

At this moment, the eunuchs and palace maids serving around were so scared that they knelt on the ground, trembling.

After all, if the emperor is angry, they are often the ones who suffer.

Zhu Cilang didn't want these eunuchs and palace maids to continue to be frightened, and the next words were not suitable for them to hear, so he simply shouted at them:

"All of you go down! Only Fang Zhenghua will be left to serve!"

When the eunuchs and palace maids heard this, they felt as if they had been pardoned. After expressing their gratitude, they left.

For a time, there were only four people left in this huge Imperial Stables: Zhu Cilang, Chongzhen, Fang Zhenghua and Li Banghua.

Zhu Cilang pondered for a moment and said:

"Although something went wrong, it actually has little impact on the subsequent plan. As long as the Ming navy can completely wipe out the Jiannu navy, the Guanning cavalry can penetrate directly into the Jiannu rear."

"Then we can create the appearance that the Guanning Iron Cavalry is about to attack Shenyang. The Jiannu will not retreat, but at least they will send troops to stop the Guanning Iron Cavalry."

"In this way, the pressure on Jinzhou will be less."

Chongzhen had calmed down at this moment. Upon hearing this, he said in a cold tone:
"This will indeed divide the Jiannu's forces, but it still won't resolve the war in Liaodong. Even if the Jiannu fall for this trick, with half of their forces going to stop the Guanning Iron Cavalry, the other half can only retreat to Yizhou at best."

"Yizhou is only a little over a hundred miles away from Jinzhou. Therefore, the threat to the Jinning Line of Defense still exists. As long as the Jiannu are willing, they can encircle Jinzhou again at any time. In this case, wouldn't it be a futile effort?"

Li Banghua stood aside without saying a word. He knew in his heart that what Chongzhen said made sense.

Under the current circumstances, even if everything goes well, the Jiannu can only retreat to Yizhou at most, and will have to make a comeback next time.

But if that were the case, their plan would be like a joke and would not be able to effectively attack the Jiannu.

If we want to solve the problem once and for all, we must take Yizhou City!
In this way, the Ming Dynasty could not only obtain a large amount of fertile land and population, but also obtain a strategic city, and defeat the Jiannu, and perhaps even force them back to Shenyang.

It's easy to say, but very difficult to put it into practice!

First of all, attacking a city requires five times more manpower than defending it. If the Jiannu really retreated to Yizhou, their military strength plus logistics would be almost 200,000.

In other words, the Ming army needed one million people to capture Yizhou.

Of course, this is just an assumption. In actual operation, it certainly won’t require so many people, and Yizhou cannot accommodate so many people.

The scene at that time will most likely be a fierce battle outside the city first, and then the next strategic plan will be carried out.

All in all, this thing basically doesn't work.

Zhu Cilang pondered for a moment and suddenly said:

"I originally planned to split my troops into two groups. One group would take the sea route from Shandong to harass the Jiannu's rear and force them to retreat."

"Hong Chengchou held his ground at the Jinning defense line all the way."

"But it seems we need to send another force. This force will go from Xuanfu, bypass Mongolia, and head straight for Yizhou."

As soon as these words were spoken, Chongzhen and Li Banghua were shocked. Their eyes widened as if they had seen a ghost.

Li Banghua couldn't pretend to be a wooden man anymore and quickly spoke out to dissuade him:
"Your Highness, this is absolutely impossible! This method is too risky. The troops and horses are already exhausted after the long journey, and attacking the city is simply impossible to succeed!"

"Besides, a team like this is probably mainly composed of cavalry. How can they bring siege equipment? How can they attack this city?"

"Although the Mongolian prince Abunai has already raised the banner of restoring his country, the actual rulers of Mongolia are still the Jiannu. If the Jiannu knew about this, I'm afraid this team would be completely wiped out before they even reach Yizhou!"

"Therefore, I ask Your Highness the Crown Prince to reconsider!"

Although Chongzhen was extremely anxious, he felt that what Li Banghua said made sense and nodded.

"Lord Li is right. This is absolutely impossible!"

In their opinion, this is simply asking for death, and they will never allow such a thing to happen.

Zhu Cilang looked at the two people in front of him, and suddenly he became quiet, his eyes became deep, and he muttered to himself:
"Not long ago, I had a dream. It was so real, it was exactly like the future."

"In my dream, the Ming Dynasty suffered a crushing defeat in the Battle of Songjin. 130,000 elite troops were wiped out, leaving only 30,000 remnants to retreat to Shanhaiguan."

"From then on, the Ming Dynasty never recovered and was no longer able to resist the Jiannu."

"Immediately afterwards, Li Zicheng swept through the country unstoppable, and only three years later he captured the capital."

"On the day the city fell, you, my father, hanged yourself on Coal Hill and sacrificed your life for your country. This fulfilled the ancestral tradition of the emperor guarding the country's gates and the king dying for the country, and you didn't bring shame to our great grandfather."

"My mother and sisters also died for their country, and several of my brothers are now in exile. I, the crown prince, was also kidnapped and handed over to the rebels. The Ming Dynasty has fallen."

"The Ming Dynasty's 276-year reign is gone just like that."

"Later, the Jiannu invaded the country and defeated Li Zicheng, becoming the masters of the world. They carried out the Three Massacres of Jiading, the Ten Days of Yangzhou, the hair-shaving and the changing of clothes. The whole country was flooded with blood, and the people suffered unspeakably."

"A few hundred years later, China was bullied by the great powers and was called the 'Sick Man of East Asia' and 'China Pigs'. Millions of people were killed or injured!"

"I do not want the Ming Dynasty to face this future. I want to change all of this. Therefore, the Ming Dynasty must win this battle, no matter what the cost."

As soon as Zhu Cilang said this, Chongzhen and Li Banghua were stunned instantly, their faces full of shock!

Even my body couldn't help but tremble.

Only Zhu Cilang dared to say this. If anyone else dared to say this, they would be chopped into meat sauce immediately.

In comparison, Fang Zhenghua was much calmer at this moment. After all, he had already known about this matter.

After a moment, Li Banghua came back to his senses, forced a smile, and said:

"Your Highness, this... all of this is just a dream after all. Don't take it seriously."

"How could our Ming Dynasty, once prosperous, be destroyed by Li Zicheng?"

As soon as these words came out, Li Banghua immediately realized that something was wrong. The prince could say such words, but could he?
Just when he wanted to change his words, Zhu Cilang shook his head and said:

"You don't understand. That dream was so real, as real as if it were something that would happen in the future."

"So I'm just going to treat it as something that's going to happen. I'm going to change everything!"

"If anyone tries to stop me, I will kill him, no matter who he is!"

When saying the last four words, Zhu Cilang emphasized them very strongly, which made Li Banghua's hair stand on end.

He was not only shocked by Zhu Cilang's words, but more importantly, he felt that the prince in front of him was simply crazy, actually saying such treasonous words in front of Chongzhen.

Because Chongzhen had just stopped him.

To put it mildly, this behavior is disrespectful to elders. To put it bluntly, it is no different from attempting to usurp the throne.

For a moment, Li Banghua felt uncomfortable all over and subconsciously looked at Chongzhen beside him.

But looking at Chongzhen standing aside, he didn't seem angry at the moment. Instead, he looked like he was trapped in some strange state and couldn't extricate himself.

Just when Li Banghua was wondering if Chongzhen had been angered by Zhu Cilang's words, Chongzhen suddenly muttered to himself:
"Actually, I've had a dream like this before."

When Li Banghua heard this, he was speechless.

No?

What the hell is going on today?

First it was the prince who dreamed, then it was Chongzhen who dreamed. Are you two having a dream competition here?
Even Zhu Cilang looked at Chongzhen with some surprise at this moment.

But Chongzhen said regardless:
"Not long ago, on my way to Shandong, I had a nightmare. I dreamed that the Ming Dynasty suffered a crushing defeat in the Battle of Songjin, and Wu Sangui retreated with 30,000 men to Shanhaiguan. Many things happened afterwards."

"The generals either died in battle or surrendered. Later, Sun Chuanting also died in Shaanxi. From then on, the rebels were no longer hindered and marched straight into the capital with unstoppable force."

"On the day the city fell, I personally killed the Queen and several princesses, then hanged myself on Coal Hill. As for what happened after that, I don't know."

At this moment, if we were to ask who is the most speechless person, it would undoubtedly be Li Banghua.

He once suspected that the emperor and the prince, father and son, were deceiving him with a lie in a dream?

After all, how could a father and son have the same dream in this world?
But then again, the Emperor and the Crown Prince shouldn't have to make things so difficult for a Minister of War, right?

Once an imperial edict comes down, how dare he disobey?
At the same time, Fang Zhenghua on the side looked at Zhu Cilang thoughtfully.

In his opinion, the Crown Prince should have confessed to Chongzhen that he was the reincarnation of Zhenwu Emperor, so His Majesty knew all this.

But he was obviously wrong.
(End of this chapter)