said that Zhu Hao and Bai Ling broke up after walking out of the valley, Zhu Hao looked at Bai Ling's slender figure who turned away, and thought that such a big beauty slipped away from his hand like this, and couldn't help but feel a little stunned.

The injuries on his body were almost healed, and he thought that there would definitely be a large number of people looking for him outside, so he didn't worry about safety, and it didn't take much effort to meet a group of new army soldiers who came out to look for him, and came to Kaifeng City to see Li Dingguo.

Li Dingguo was naturally very happy to see him arrive safe and sound, and the big stone in his heart also fell, and he hurriedly sent someone back to Xuzhou to report the news. Zhu Hao recuperated in Kaifeng City for a few days, and by the way, he considered the next step.

At present, the situation in the whole of Henan is that Li Zicheng's main force is stationed in Luoyang and controls the entire western Henan area, while Li Yan led his troops to fight in Xuchang, and has also gained a firm foothold, as long as he is given a period of time, he will be able to train with Li Zicheng's forces, and then the whole of Henan will be the territory of the peasant army except for the east of Kaifeng. In addition, Huguang's peasant army Zhang Xianzhong, Luo Rucai and other departments, roughly bounded by the line of Kaifeng and Dabie Mountain, the two major forces fought against each other.

However, Zhu Hao was worried about whether Li Zicheng could succeed, but he didn't want Zhang and Luo to sit big, so as not to cause unnecessary trouble in the future. At this time, the imperial court came down to the will, the siege of Kaifeng has been lifted, Li Zicheng trapped in Luoyang, by the Shaanxi governor Fu Zonglong, Baoding governor Yang Wenyue two joint troops, attack Luoyang, eliminate Li Zicheng, Zhu Hao went south to solve Zhang Xianzhong and Luo Rucai.

This holy decree is exactly what Zhu Hao meant, he has already taken a big advantage, and he doesn't want to fight with Li Zicheng anymore, and now the main task is to defeat Zhang and Luo, and connect Nanzhili and Huguang base areas together.

Li Dingguo also agreed with his strategy, and the plan was decided, Zhu Hao left Li Dingguo to continue to stay in Kaifeng, and wrote to Chongzhen, saying that Li Yan was eyeing the tiger in southern Henan, and Kaifeng City could not be defended. Soon the imperial court replied and asked Zhu Hao to garrison Kaifeng and withdraw his troops after Li Zicheng was annihilated.

After preparing for a few days, Zhu Hao, under the escort of his personal guards and cavalry regiments, urgently marched, bypassed the Li Yan defense area, and went directly to Suizhou, Hubei.

Xiao Maoce has already received the news and made a special trip to Suizhou to wait for the arrival of Zhu Hao and his party.

After everyone met, Zhu Hao had a detailed understanding of the situation of the enemy in Huguang.

Suizhou east to the Huangju area for the new army to control the area, Zhu Hao here defeated He Renlong once left a force of Wang Boda's department, now this army has already gained a foothold in the Suima area, relying on the favorable terrain of Dabie Mountain and the support of the Xuzhou base camp, has expanded to more than 5,000 people, this area is also slowly following the pace of Xuzhou, but lack of some political management talents.

Zhu Hao announced on the spot that this unit would be upgraded to an independent regiment, and the Fifth Division would be established on the basis of the Independent Regiment, and Zhang Huangyan would be appointed as the commander of the Fifth Division, and Shen Chenquan, the former battalion commander who had stayed behind, would be the deputy division commander and head of the Independent Regiment. Shen Chenquan is less than thirty years old, he is one of the few scholars in the new army, and he is also the second graduate of Xuzhou Military Academy, with excellent grades and a stable person. The experience of a scholar enabled him to manage civil affairs on the basis of commanding the army, and only then did he have the achievements of today's Suima area.

Zhang Huangyan and Shen Chenquan hurriedly saluted and thanked them, and expressed their determination.

"Xuanzhu, I arranged for you to be the division commander, not because you are my nephew, but because of your military academy graduation results, but you have too little experience, learn more from Commander Shen. In addition, when there is no war, you hand over the affairs of the army to Lao Shen, and take care of the political affairs here. ”

"Yes, Dashuai!" Both of them answered at the same time.

Zhang Huangyan, who had been looking forward to the military commander for a long time, finally arrived, and was naturally beaming. Shen Chenquan jumped from a battalion commander to a deputy division commander and main regiment commander, and he was also quite satisfied, after all, Zhang Huangyan was Zhu Hao's nephew and a leader in graduating from the military academy.

Zhu Hao saw that both of them were satisfied, and secretly breathed a sigh of relief, to be honest, he was really afraid that Shen Chenquan would not be convinced. He is indeed a little biased, mainly because Zhang Huangyan is a celebrity and has gained a firm foothold in his heart.

"But there is one thing you have to understand, Huguang is far away from Xuzhou, and many times you have to be self-reliant, and you can't rely too much on the headquarters. Your main task is to use this as a base to defend the west and control the east, and to ensure the stability of central and southern China. Zhu Hao said with some unease.

"Understood." Zhang Huangyan and Shen Chenquan also nodded solemnly.

As for Zhang Xianzhong and Luo Rucai in the west, they were calmer. Luo Rucai was originally active in the northwest of Hubei Province, where Li Zicheng in the north and Zhang Xianzhong in the south, which was relatively safe, and he also relied on this favorable situation to steadily develop his forces. Directly exposed to the combined forces of the peasant army, the situation was dangerous.

After Zhang Xianzhong gained a firm foothold in eastern Sichuan, he did not continue to develop in western Sichuan, and also saw the opportunity to re-enter Huguang, and he and Luo Rucai temporarily reached a front line and completed the strategic encirclement of Xiangyang. At this time, Zhang Xianzhong still had some ambitions, and his goal was already very clear, that is, to occupy Xiangyang and be equal to Li Zicheng.

It's just that the entry of the new army into the lake disrupted the plans of the two, and for the new army, which had suffered a big loss, Zhang Xianzhong and Luo Rucai had lingering palpitations. However, these two people saw that the new army stationed in eastern Hubei had no intention of going to war, and they were unwilling to be lonely, so they were much bolder, and even sent three troops and horses to attack Suizhou. Under the command of Xiao Maoce, Zhang Huangyan and Shen Chenquan, the new army successively defeated the peasant army and annihilated nearly 10,000 enemies. Zhang Huangyan also sent out an attack to recover many nearby county seats, if it weren't for the fact that this place was far away from the Xuzhou headquarters, the logistics supply was a little tight, maybe he had entered Xiangyang early.

The peasant army, on the other hand, was overly frightened, and although it put on a posture of attacking Xiangyang after retreating, it did not move for a long time, so as not to attract a fierce blow from the new army.

After analysis, Zhu Hao basically understood Huguang's situation, and it seemed that Zhang and Luo didn't see rabbits and eagles. How to force the two to fight is a problem, after all, the army goes out to fight, and it can't return without firing a shot.

Just when Zhu Hao was distressed about leading Zhang Luo and the others to fight, news came from the reconnaissance force that Zhang Xianzhong and Luo Rucai jointly sent 50,000 troops to approach Xiangyang.

When Zhu Hao heard this, he was overjoyed, and it seemed that these two people couldn't bear it anymore, so he immediately ordered Xiao Maoce and others to come and discuss countermeasures.

He now has a division of Xiao Maoce, an independent regiment and a cavalry regiment of nearly 20,000 people, but the independent regiment is now garrisoned and cannot be moved lightly, and only about 15,000 people can attack.

"Dashuai, according to reliable sources, in more than a year, Zhang Xianzhong's department has grown to 100,000 people, and Luo Rucai also has 60,000 soldiers and horses, but these two people only took out a total of 50,000 people to fight Xiangyang, which is not right." Xiao Maoce wondered.

"It's just a matter of throwing stones to ask for directions, with the current garrison situation of Xiangyang City, let alone 50,000 people, even if 10,000 people can fight it, they are doing this, it is nothing more than testing us, as long as we counterattack in a big way, they will immediately retreat and go to the mountainous area of eastern Sichuan to fight guerrilla attacks with us." Zhu Hao analyzed.

"So what should we do?" Xiao Maoce asked.

"The soldiers are coming. Suima doesn't have to worry about it here, Lao Xiao, you immediately go with the cavalry regiment to relieve the siege of Xiangyang and give me a hard beating, but be careful not to rush deeper, our supplies can't keep up, and retreat immediately after the siege is lifted. Zhu Hao gave the order.

In March of the 14th year of Chongzhen, the second battle of Xiangyang City began, and the two sides were Zhang Xianzhong, Luo Rucai's 50,000 allied troops and the new army's Xiao Maoce's third division and independent cavalry regiment, a total of 13,000 people. Zhu Hao did not go out with the army.

Due to logistical constraints, the Forces nouvelles only brought one base of ammunition this time. Xiao Maoce thought that the Zhang Luo coalition army would collapse at the first touch, but he didn't expect that Sun Kewang, the general who led the team, would fight bloody and fight to the death.

What surprised Xiao Maoce even more was that Sun Kewang got a batch of muskets and artillery from nowhere, although they were all old-fashioned firearms, they still inflicted heavy casualties on the Ming army defending the city.

The firearms units of these peasant armies can compete for a while even against the superior weapons of the new army, and it turns out that Sun Kewang has some brains: Isn't your new army powerful in firepower and has a long range of muskets, so I got hundreds of wooden carts, each carrying a huge iron shield with a thickness of five inches, to cover the charge of a large number of infantry.

This recruitment worked wonders, negating the firepower advantage of the new army by more than half. Despite the overwhelming superiority of the artillery of the new army, which inflicted great casualties on the peasant army and the shield wagons, the final battle still had to be resolved by the infantry.

As a result, although this particular vehicle moved slowly, it still caused some problems for the Novauvelles, and more than half of the bullets fired at the shield vehicle were blocked. In order to overcome the negative psychology, some soldiers of the new army shot desperately, and also indirectly consumed a large amount of ammunition.

Seeing that the peasant army had broken through half the distance of the Nova line with this strange tactic, and that it would take a few minutes to neutralize the range advantage of the Nova muskets, the cavalry units played a key role.

Zhou Da, who was watching from the wall, saw that Xiao Maoce was a little embarrassed, and hurriedly ordered the cavalry regiment to attack the enemy's left and right flanks.

The sound of rumbling horses' hooves continued to sound, and groups of cavalry launched a group charge towards the unprotected infantry on the two flanks of the peasant army.

Sun Kewang had already expected that most of the musket team would be placed on his two wings, but one thing he didn't expect was that his musket team was several levels inferior to the new army in terms of quality and equipment.

The two sides looked at each other, and the cavalry of the new army rushing to the front were knocked to the ground by the old-fashioned firearms. But this little buffer was also overshadowed by the high-speed charge of the war horse, Zhou Da saw that the casualties were not small and did not hesitate, but continued to command the charge with a blank face, he knew for many years that only by rushing into the enemy formation in one go could he achieve victory.

The reality was cruel, the musket team of the peasant army only had time to release two rounds of guns, and the cavalry of the new army had already rushed into the formation, and where the soldiers passed, a bloody storm was immediately set off!

Countless soldiers who were still busy drugged their muskets were cut down to the ground in a single shot, and some of the peasant soldiers who were far away did not dare to delay when they saw this, and turned around and fled.

In this way, the formation of the peasant army was immediately in chaos, and it was undoubtedly terrible to be broken by the cavalry, and in front of the high-speed charging war horses, the infantry, especially the infantry without strict training, were simply lambs to the slaughter! This also explains why the Manchu cavalry often annihilated the Ming infantry several times their own with a few casualties.

Although the ratio of infantry cavalry on both sides is ten to one, it is one-sided: one cavalry of the new army can even kill more than a dozen infantry in one charge!

Two cavalry rushed into the formation from the left and right flanks, like two dragons covered with steel thorns, stirring up the peasant army.

It is worth noting that the shield cart of the peasant army forward is still desperately moving forward, and the peasant army general who commands the charge does not care about the chaos in the rear, staring at the blood-red eyes like a gambler, as long as he rushes into the infantry formation of the new army, he can win back a city!

An ideal is an ideal after all. Just when the shield car had almost eliminated the firepower advantage of the new army, Xiao Maoce did not retreat, but ordered to stop shooting. The former military academy played a role at a critical moment: after some observation, Xiao Maoce saw that although the shield car of the peasant army was strong, it was slow, and the firepower that could cover it was relatively weak!

"Listen to me! All lie down, crawl forward, follow the array, and prepare to throw grenades! Seeing that the shield car in front had entered within fifty meters, Xiao Maoce suddenly ordered loudly.

Some of the soldiers in front of the formation did not understand the meaning of this order for a while, but the inertia of the soldiers made them obey the order mechanically, and the rows of soldiers in the front lay down one after another, crawling forward.

"Thirty meters away, listen to my orders, first company, drop bombs!"

"Second company, bomb dropping!"

As the commander who led the team gave an order, batches of grenades were dropped into the infantry group of the peasant army behind the shield cart, and a continuous explosion suddenly sounded!