These words still restored some confidence to many generals.

After cheering up the generals under his command, Feng Ziqi began to arrange for the troops to retreat on the spot.

They wanted to retreat while the main forces of the Southern Navy had not yet returned south and formed a complete encirclement of Chongke City.

At the same time, not only must people be successfully evacuated, but also have to carry a certain amount of ammunition, baggage, gold and silver, etc.

If it is only a two-handed retreat, it is estimated that halfway through the retreat, the troops will have to disperse.

But even so, there are many things that they can't take with them.

A large amount of grain and grass in reserve, ammunition, some of which could not be taken away, could not be taken away, and finally burned in pain, and they could not stay in place cheaply.

At the same time, the First Machine Bureau could not be taken away, although Feng Ziqi took away hundreds of technical backbones, some core, easy to take away machinery and equipment, but most of the workers and more machinery and equipment could not be taken away.

Therefore, the first machine bureau also has to destroy the tune, and it can't be left to Lin Ziran.

The retreat of the troops, the destruction of materials and equipment, were carried out simultaneously, and it began secretly in the evening of the same day, taking advantage of the darkness of the night.

However, during the day the next day, they still did not retreat, but continued to make sneaky preparations.

It was only after the night that they began a large-scale retreat.

The defenders in the city were going to retreat, and the Southern Navy outside the city was actually slightly aware of the news during the day, and made certain preparations for it.

In the evening, although the other side's large-scale operation took advantage of the night, it still did not hide from the South China Navy.

Sensing that the enemy was trying to escape, and at the same time, the observers also saw that when they had just entered the night, when they had not carried out large-scale artillery bombardment, explosions had occurred in many parts of the city, and when a fire broke out, the Southern Navy had already taken swift action.

Part of the units of the Fifth Army launched an attack on the city directly from several directions.

At the same time, Lin Ziran urgently gave the main force led by Zhang Hanqiu to the south to intercept the retreating forces of the enemy.

However, Lin Ziran did not let the troops outside Chongke City intercept the retreating troops of the enemy army, but let them leave.

This is because if the enemy forces take the initiative to retreat, the Southern Navy will be able to avoid subsequent large-scale siege operations.

Although it is already safe to take Chongke City, if the enemy army really does not retreat, but resists stubbornly, its own strong attack will suffer a lot of losses.

Now that the enemy forces have taken the initiative to retreat, then the follow-up South Navy will be able to defeat them directly in the field.

After all, Zhang Hanqiu's department in the north still has two cavalry armies under his command, and it is not so easy to successfully escape under the interception of so many cavalry, even if he escapes, he will have to shed his skin if he does not die.

Now the troops of the Fifth Army are carrying out a rapid attack on the city, mainly to be able to quickly control the city, so as not to be too badly damaged by the enemy.

Feng Ziqi led the army to retreat on his own initiative, and the Fifth Army was also very cooperative, not forcing too hard, but quickly focusing on controlling Chongke City and avoiding too much damage to Chongke City.

As a result, after one night, more than half of Chongke City had fallen under the control of the Fifth Army, including the location of the First Machine Bureau.

However, the First Machine Bureau was the first place where the defenders in the city carried out destruction, so much so that in the past half a month or so, the artillery of the South Navy's artillery has not given up large-scale artillery bombardment and destruction of the First Machine Bureau, and only a ruin remains.

Fortunately, after all, the other party was in a hurry, and it was only a part of the soldiers who took the sabotage action, and they did not destroy all the machinery and equipment one by one, but took the simplest and most simple way to directly blow up the factory.

In this way, although many machinery and equipment have been damaged, many of the equipment are still in good condition, and some of the damaged equipment can also be restored through repair.

Although it is impossible for this first machine bureau to resume production in a short period of time, there is still a chance to recover.

Lin Ziran can still accept this.

Well, it's better than the entire First Machine Bureau being completely destroyed beyond repair.

After another day passed, Feng Ziqi's troops had basically retreated except for some of the broken rear troops, and the Fifth Army also initially controlled the entire Chongke City, and in the evening, the last group of Zisheng troops still in the city had about 3,000 people and announced their surrender.

At this point, the entire Chongke City was declared to have completely fallen under the control of the Southern Navy.

However, at this time, the situation in Chongke City is no longer the focus of attention of both sides.

Now the focus of the two sides has become whether Feng Ziqi's remnants can successfully escape.

After Feng Ziqi ordered the troops to retreat, they had already retreated first with the core main force of the Third Division at night, and in order to avoid being intercepted by the main force of the Southern Navy on the northern front, they did not directly choose to march in the northwest direction, but marched westward.

This way of retreating, the troops under Feng Ziqi were actually divided into multiple batches, the first batch was the Third Division and the Ninth Division, another main force under his command, in addition to the remaining more than 8,000 cavalry troops.

The total strength of this group is about 30,000.

These 30,000 people are already the only main force under Feng Ziqi's command, and they are all troops with good combat effectiveness and loyalty.

Other troops are inferior, such as the 20,000 men in the second batch and the 20,000 men in the third batch, which are slightly inferior in terms of combat effectiveness and loyalty.

Theoretically speaking, Feng Ziqi withdrew more than 70,000 people in total, and the Southern Navy also watched them retreat and did not intercept them.

But in fact, Feng Ziqi himself knew very well that it was impossible to bring these more than 70,000 people to Youshang County.

The Southern Navy is stupid, and they won't watch him enter Youshang County with more than 70,000 remnants, and they will definitely intercept it halfway.

Considering the large number of cavalry in the Southern Sea, Feng Ziqi is actually very pessimistic about the prospects for retreat along the way!

Among these more than 70,000 people, it is already a success to be able to successfully evacuate to Youshang County with 20,000 or 30,000 people.

Well, that is, the first batch of retreating troops that he personally led, including the 3rd Division.

As for the other two batches of troops, if nothing else, they will be cut off by him on the spot!

Moreover, in fact, Feng Ziqi didn't expect these troops to exert much combat effectiveness to break off!

However, even if these broken troops paddled casually, or even did not fight, they directly surrendered to the South China Navy, which would still delay the South China Navy for a while.

And having this little time is enough for Feng Ziqi.