The news of the Qing court's expansion of the Eight Banners and the destruction of Xi'an City reached Ning Yu's ears almost at the same time, the former generally did not surprise Ning Yu, and the latter gave Ning Yu a greater shock.

"Could it be that Liu Ruhan really made things happen? It seems that the front is a little underestimating him. ”

Ning Yu touched the short mustache on his chin, but there was no expression on his face, he just put down the fold in his hand and drew a large circle on it, glowing with blood red.

Cui Wancai, who was on the side, took the secret report from the Military Intelligence Department, and after reading it carefully, he couldn't help laughing: "This method of attacking the city from the cave ground used by Liu Ruhan to conquer Xi'an was learned from His Majesty, and it seems that this one has studied us a lot." ”

"Hmph, it's been a long time since this happened, but I didn't expect him to be so careful..... Humph......"

Ning Yu still felt a little unhappy, not because of this strategy, but because of Liu Ruhan, who made Ning Yu really feel threatened, in his heart, the Qing court was the No. 1 enemy, and the White Lotus Sect was the No. 2, and he had always been a little wary of this cult, and naturally he didn't want it to get out of control.

Previously, Ning Yu coerced the other party to give up Henan and go to Guanzhong to fight the Qing court to the death, but there was no intention of borrowing a knife to kill people, but Liu Ruhan used his life to pile up a road to Guanzhong, and the ruthlessness of his heart is really extraordinary, this person will definitely be Ning Chu's enemy in the future.

Cui Wancai saw that Ning Yu was still a little unwilling, so he was relieved: "Now even if Liu Ruhan has gained some small profits, but it is also blocked in the lifeblood of the Qing court's northwest army, Nian Qianyao will find him to work hard, and it seems that we can increase our efforts against Sichuan's strategy at that time." ”

"Where is the Ninth Division? Is there any news from the Privy Council now? ”

"Your Majesty, according to the news obtained by the Privy Council yesterday, the Ninth Division has boarded a ship from Yichang and headed westward, and I am afraid that it has reached the Wushan area....... The Qing court now has no sailors in Sichuan, so there is no need to worry, it is just the strength of a division, and I am afraid that it can only hit Fengjie at most, otherwise the back road will inevitably be lost. ”

Cui Wancai introduced the latest situation to Ning Yu, although he is the deputy assistant of the cabinet, but he is still a little different from Ning Zhongjing, he hopes to calm down the war as soon as possible, and then he can devote himself to internal affairs.

Ning Yu pondered for a while, "According to the secret report sent by King Changshan, it seems that the war between the two Cantons may end early...... As long as that plan can be successful, perhaps by November, Liangguang will be in our hands, and then Yunnan-Guichuan will become the next target of our army. ”

From Huguang to Jiangnan, and then to Zhejiang, Fujian and Guangzhou, this is the offensive line set by Ningyu and the Privy Council, and it will basically not change, but after achieving this goal, there have always been different opinions on whether to continue to attack Yunnan, Guichuan or organize a large army to the north.

Most people's ideas are actually based on the Northern Expedition, as long as the Central Plains is occupied, Yunguichuan will naturally go down without a fight, but this idea is completely in conflict with Ning Yu, the reason is also very simple, in Ning Yu's view, it is far from the time to fight a decisive battle with the Qing army in the north, and the key factor in this is the Ma army.

Speaking of which, although it is now an era when firearms are popular in the world, the threat of the Ma army has always existed, so for the current Fu Han army, the biggest weakness lies in the Ma army, the existing Ma army is not a grade compared with the Mongolian horse team of the Qing court, if you rush to the North China Plain, it is easy to be defeated by the Ma army.

Ning Yu is sometimes very bold, but it is all based on his complete control of the situation, and the adventure in the eyes of others is actually a natural thing for Ning Yu, but at the moment, the Northern Expedition is a real risky move for Ning Yu, it is easy to destroy the existing pattern, and if he is not careful, it will be a big rout that can affect the future.

On the one hand, he selected people who were good at riding horses from Huaibei to join the Fu Han Army, and on the other hand, he bought horses through various channels, from overseas to Mongolia and Tibet, which have become channels for buying horses, and the construction of related horse farms is also in progress.

Of course, what Ning Yu wants to establish is not an ordinary horse team, but a modern cavalry that can achieve a wall charge, and this part of the training is not enough to rely on his own people, so Ning Yu in the requirements for Ernst, like a Western professional cavalry instructor is very important, and only has the opportunity to get back to Dachu.

After having Western cavalry instructors, Ningyu can establish a real modern cavalry school in Nanjing or elsewhere, and implement the Western cavalry system and training methods in an all-round way, not because Ningyu admires foreign countries, but in the construction of cavalry, the West is now surpassing Mongolia.

In the history that Ning Yu knew, more than 100 years later, the battle of the British and French forces at Bali Bridge was almost a typical case of the duel between Chinese and Western cavalry. Unfortunately, in this battle, several encounters between the Qing cavalry and the allied cavalry were all defeated, and on a larger scale, the British and Indian cavalry charged in a group of several hundred men and defeated thousands of Mongol cavalry.

At that time, the Mongolian cavalry was the strongest cavalry in East Asia, but it was almost destroyed in front of the Anglo-French cavalry, but strictly speaking, the combat performance of the Mongolian cavalry was not bad, because the Anglo-French army fought almost all the traditional cavalry in the process of colonial expansion, and the performance of the Mongolian cavalry was even better than most of the traditional cavalry.

But the problem is that in the face of European-style modern cuirassiers, whether it is Mongolian cavalry or Mamluk cavalry, it is difficult to resist the intensive charge of cuirassiers, especially when the number is more, the power of European-style cuirassiers is more and more outstanding, it is worth mentioning that cuirassiers do not rely on firearms, in fact, they are still traditional swords.

The mystery of this lies in the fact that the combat movements of the European-style cuirassiers are more scientific and efficient than those of other traditional cavalry, mainly through the combination of actual combat experience and calculation, constantly rationalizing and standardizing, and eliminating all superfluous actions, so as to achieve the highest killing efficiency, and its discipline is almost outrageous, while the Mongolian cavalry with loose discipline is difficult to compare.

Therefore, in Ning Yu's vision of the future Northern Expeditionary Army, at least 5,000 European-style cuirassiers are needed in order to defeat tens of thousands of Mongolian cavalry, and in the future military map, the number of cuirassiers must reach at least 30,000 people, so as to meet the needs of future wars.

Of course, these are all later words, and at present, Ning Yu is most concerned about the big battle that happened in Liangguang, he looked at the cliff sea on the map, and he was a little worried, but he didn't know if the sea breeze in this season would affect the plan this time.......

On 22 August, the 2nd Brigade of the Praetorian Guard Division of the Fuhan Army officially boarded the ship and will be escorted by the Fujian Navy Division all the way to Yahai to prepare for the landing. There were nearly 300 civilian ships transported this time, although they were all small and medium-sized sand ships, but they were enough to meet the needs of the Fu Han army.

Of course, there was no such thing as a so-called landing operation in these years, and in fact, the Qing troops in Liangguang were still concentrated in the area east of Guangzhou Prefecture, and were facing the threat of the Third and Sixth Divisions. However, even if it is intercepted by the Qing Army's naval division, the Great Chu Fujian Naval Division will have enough confidence to face it.

At the end of August, the South Seas were relatively calm, and the monsoon did not have too serious an impact on the southbound fleet, which made Qiu Ze, the commander of the Fujian Naval Division, breathe a sigh of relief, but when he thought of the enemies he might encounter on this trip, his face became a little more gloomy.

Speaking of today's Da Chu Water Division, in fact, it is also born from the Qing Army's Fujian Water Division, Qiu Ze himself was a fierce general under Shi Shibiu's command back then, and he was also quite valued by the Shi family, but later did not think about it, Qiu Ze is also a Fujianese, when he visited relatives in his hometown, he inadvertently offended his colleagues in the army for some reasons, so that Shi Shibi was ruthless at that time and completely idle it, which made Qiu Ze's fighting spirit turn into a bubble.

After Shi Shibiao died of illness, the newly appointed commander of the Navy Yao Tang was not interested in Shi Shibiu's original group of subordinates, and he personally brought a group of henchmen, but it was replaced by Qiu Ze's position, and then there was a big battle between the Fujian Navy Division and Zhu Yigui, the Fujian Navy Division suffered heavy losses, and Yao Tang also died, Qiu Ze took some people and directly drove the boat to join the Fu Han Army.

Therefore, Qiu Ze was holding his breath in his heart, he was full of hatred for those so-called colleagues back then, so this fight was likely to be a good opportunity for him to take revenge. Of course, for Qiu Ze, the reason why he has such a detailed background is actually because he has prepared a secret weapon a long time ago.

"Qiu Junmen, will we meet the sailors of the Qing army along the way?"

Guo Ding'an, the commander of the Praetorian Guard, talked politely, saying that they did not belong to the same system as Qiu Ze's sailors, and he was somewhat curious.

On land, the Praetorian Guard has never been afraid of anyone, even if this trip is likely to face the siege of the Qing army's 60,000 troops, Guo Ding'an did not panic too much, after all, the enemy who can defeat them on land has not yet appeared. But when they reached the surface, they quickly felt panic, because it was no longer under their control.

Qiu Ze's mentality still hasn't recovered, he doesn't dare to be careless about the people of the Praetorian Guard, and hurriedly said: "Back to General Guo, it is unlikely that my sailor will encounter the Qing army's sailor on this trip, after all, they don't know our whereabouts, but when we return home, I'm afraid that we will be intercepted by the Qing army's sailor." ”

Hearing Qiu Ze say this, Guo Dingan relaxed slightly, he was not afraid of death, but he was afraid of such a nesty death, and said with a smile: "Qiu Junmen is polite, I have heard of your name for a long time, but it is not simple!" ”

Qiu Ze heard Guo Ding'an say this, but he thought that his act of surrender was disgraceful, and his old face turned red at the moment, and he sighed: "The general really made fun of his humble position, and his reputation for humble duty has long been rotten to the ditch." ”

"What is the truth of Qiu Junmen's words?" Guo Dingan had a smile on his face and said sincerely: "The last general is really not secret, Qiu Junmen's name is heard from His Majesty, it is said that the scale of the sailor in the future will become very large, and the emperor admires Qiu Junmen's talent, as long as Qiu Junmen works hard, the future is limitless!" ”

Qiu Ze was a little flattered when he heard that the emperor actually paid so much attention to him, he knelt on the deck and kowtowed a few times in the direction of Nanjing, and said loudly: "Long live the emperor, the humble position will never live up to the emperor's kindness!" ”

I have to say that after Qiu Ze took refuge from the Qing court's sailors, he has not been so happy, especially after being affirmed by the privy envoy Ning Zhongyi and the emperor one after another, which made him completely let go of the worries in his heart, and instead devoted himself wholeheartedly to the upcoming battle.

The sailor went all the way for a few days, but he arrived at Yahai rain or shine, and the journey went smoothly, and he did not meet the sailor of the Qing army, which made Qiu Ze quite fortunate in his heart, not because of others, but because there were so many civilian ships, if they were targeted by the Qing army, it would be easy to bite a big bite, and the losses would be extremely heavy at that time.

After this battle, Prime Minister Lu Xiufu committed suicide by jumping into the sea with the young emperor, and more than 100,000 soldiers and civilians who accompanied him also jumped into the sea to commit suicide, which is really emotional."

Guo Ding'an has read the book, of course he knows the allusions that happened here, looked at the sea area, and said firmly: "It's just that the last general thinks that there is only one death when it comes to the end, but death can't just jump into the sea and die, but you should fight with them, even if you hit it with your fists and bite it with your teeth, you have to bite off a piece of meat!" ”

Qiu Ze looked at Guo Ding'an's firm face, and couldn't help but sigh slightly, such a character is rare in the Qing army, but it seems to be everywhere in Ning Chu, since everyone has the heart to die generously, how can they worry about big things?

Maybe after a long time, he Qiu Ze will also become the second Guo Ding'an, just like biting off the flesh of the Qing army's sailors in this upcoming naval battle.

Soon, the civilian ships gradually approached the dock, the Qing army stationed here only one Tangxun, stationed Qing soldiers only a few dozen, when they saw these ships appear, they had already run in the opposite direction, maybe the nearest Xinhui, or Guangzhou, but these are irrelevant.

Before Guo Dingan got off the boat, he looked at Qiu Ze and said in a low voice: "This trip is difficult, please take care of Brother Qiu." ”

Qiu Ze also replied with a salute and said with a smile: "Speaking of hardships and dangers, you are not far behind, I hope that after this battle, we can drink the celebration wine!" ”

As more and more soldiers of the Fu Han Army and a supply landed on the shore, the fleet of sailors led by Qiu Ze also embarked on the return journey, and for Qiu Ze, the real test had just begun.