Sun Yingyuan and Zhou Yuji knelt outside the palace for a whole day and night, and it was drizzling in the middle of the night in the cold night, the clothes on their bodies were soaked through, and their faces were blue from the cold, but they still had no complaints.

The generals of the Tianwu army who wrote to and from the palace did not dare to persuade each other, nor did they dare to intercede for them, everyone was not stupid people, and knowing that the generals would only make the crown prince more unhappy.

In the afternoon, Zhu Cihong walked out of the palace and saw that the two were still kneeling there, and there were two more people beside him, Chen Yuanyuan and Zhou Yuji's wife Liu Yingzhao.

Although Liu Yingzhao is a female general, good at riding and shooting, and can hold a bow for hundreds of stones, she is not a violent woman with five or three coarse coarseness, on the contrary, she has a delicate appearance, a slender figure, and a heroic and chivalrous image.

When the four of them saw Zhu Cihong appear, they hurriedly bowed down, and because of kneeling for a long time, their bodies were already frozen and stiff, and they almost fell to the ground.

Sun Yingyuan bowed and said: "The minister is guilty of making claims, please punish His Highness!" ”

Zhu Cihong stood with his hands in his hands and said, "How to punish?" ”

Sun Yingyuan said: "If the official is dismissed, His Royal Highness can apologize for his crimes with death!" ”

Zhou Yuji also said: "The minister is the same, a mistake is a mistake, I just ask His Highness not to implicate the minister's family." ”

Zhu Cihong looked at him and said, "Implicate your family? Zhou Yuji, in your heart, is this palace the kind of person who will repay you? ”

Liu Yingzhao's face was shocked, and he hurriedly said: "Your Highness is angry, my husband is straightforward and can't speak, please forgive me." ”

Zhu Cihong frowned and said, "Shut up and let him speak!" ”

Liu Yingzhao hurriedly shut up and stabbed Zhou Yuji with his left arm, signaling him not to talk nonsense, Zhu Cihong, who saw this small action, smiled secretly.

Zhou Yuji said: "Your Highness is not that kind of person, but the ministers are too careful." ”

Zhu Cihong sighed secretly, it seems that he is not only afraid of killing the enemy, but even his own people are afraid in their hearts, which is not a good thing.

After all these years of conquest and killing, Zhu Cihong obviously felt that his mentality had changed a little, and his murderous intent became heavier and heavier.

It is important to have a hard iron and bloody hand, and it is also very suitable for governing troubled times, but if the world is unified, and then start to govern the country and continue to kill like this, I am afraid that it will become Emperor Yang of Sui.

Zhu Cihong secretly made up his mind, he had nothing to do to practice piano, chess, calligraphy and painting to cultivate his sentiments, of course, the iron blood still had to be iron-blooded, people still had to be killed, the Ming Dynasty had not yet been unified, the greedy ministers and ink officials were rampant, and there was also a group of moths active in the south of the Yangtze River.

Zhu Cihong looked at Sun Yingyuan and Zhou Yuji and said, "If you do it all over again, what will you do?" ”

Sun Yingyuan said: "If you come again, the minister will first suggest to His Highness to go to Nanjing to supervise the country, and then listen to His Highness's decision." ”

Zhu Cihong nodded, stepped forward and said, "Get up, go back and take a bath and rest for one night, and set off tomorrow, the army will go south!" ”

Sun Yingyuan and Zhou Yuji are both loyal to the country in history, no matter how many times the enemy surrenders, they resolutely choose to die in battle, and their character is not to be said.

Sun Yingyuan was the first person to follow him, his loyalty is undoubted, Zhou Yuji is upright and loyal, both of them have their own thoughts, and they are also considered for the country, not against military orders.

Zhu Cihong will not replace the two of them because of his own selfish interests, if that is the case, then he will have no available people in the future, and some are also a group of Yang Shicong and the like.

I am not afraid that the generals have thoughts, but they are afraid of supporting the army for their own selfish interests, as long as they can obey the military orders, serve the country loyally and bravely, and be upright, everything else is a trivial matter.

Zhu Cihong can use people with poor character such as Yang Shicong and Wu Weiye, how can he not tolerate Sun Yingyuan and Zhou Yuji, and the two of them are not young, and they will only use them to expand their territory for more than ten years at most.

At that time, the younger generation of the Tianwu Army who followed him to fight in the south and the north will grow up, and the more than 5,000 orphans who have been brainwashed since childhood will also grow up and become a new generation of magnates around Zhu Cihong's rule.

At that time, Zhu Cihong was upright and in his prime, leading a vote of magnates of the same age to continue to expand his territory.

On the eighth day of the first month of February, tens of thousands of Tianwu troops marched south, accompanied by a large number of officials from the East Palace.

Wu Weiye and the others were full of excitement on their faces, they could finally go to Jiangnanlang, and they wanted to gather with a group of literati and ink writers on the banks of the Qinhuai River to dance and write ink, chant poems against each other, and swim along the riverside with courtesans, thinking about it was a little excited.

After Zhu Cihong went south, Chongzhen issued the third edict since he ascended the throne, bitterly stating his mistakes, so that the great disasters continued, and Shaanxi was full of thieves, and even killed the king of Qin.

At the end of the edict, Chongzhen expressed his introspection, indicating that the imperial court would strengthen the rectification and disaster relief of officials, and allocated 10 million taels of silver from the treasury to Shaanxi and Henan to the two hard-hit areas of Liukou for disaster relief, and took out 10 million taels to rebuild Beizhili, Shandong, and Liaodong.

At the beginning of March, news came from the Central Plains battlefield, Sun Chuanting led the Qin soldiers to attack Lantian, Li Zicheng personally led 10,000 cavalry to meet the battle, after a day of bloody battle, the Qin soldiers regained Lantian, Sun Chuanting's generals He Renlong and Gao Jie captured Li Zicheng's subordinate General Guoyi, and also cut off Li Zicheng's Chinese army, almost captured Li Zicheng alive.

At the same time, Huang De's Tianwu army cooperated with Sun Chuanting to capture Shangluo, attacked Li Zicheng's old camp in Shangluo, captured his baggage, and killed thousands of his family members.

All of a sudden, the Central Plains battlefield was red all over the place, and the good news continued to enter the Beijing Division, and the officials of the Beijing Division were also jubilant, Chongzhen was even more overjoyed, and rewarded the officers and soldiers of the three sides of Shaanxi again and again, and ordered Sun Chuanting to pursue the victory and eliminate Li Zicheng in one fell swoop.

After the imperial court became rich, the popular uprising in Shaanxi took a great turn for the better, especially under the strong conquest and suppression of Sun Chuanting and Huang Degong, Li Zicheng's subordinate composed of displaced people immediately collapsed, and everyone rushed to throw down their weapons and run to receive relief food from the imperial court.

Li Zicheng had to lead thousands of old battalions to re-enter Shangluo Mountain, waiting for the opportunity to make a comeback, and no one in the world could break into the king's right in terms of escape technology......

Zhu Cihong, who was on the way south, was still very excited after getting the battle report, and after the Qin soldiers were tempered by the Liaodong War and the Eight Banners Army, their combat effectiveness had improved a lot, and it was no longer a problem to deal with Li Zicheng.

After careful consideration, Zhu Cihong ordered Huang Degong to lead the Tianwu army back to the division and enter Nanjing to divide the fields together.

Shangluo Mountain is surrounded by mountains, stretching for thousands of miles, and it is extremely difficult for officers and soldiers to search and arrest, rather than letting Huang De power consumption in Shaanxi, it is better to transfer it back, after all, the Tianwu Army is a guest army in Shaanxi, and the supply of grain and grass has to look at the faces of local civilian officials.

Huang Degong also complained for a long time, the local government is fucking poor and crazy, and the grain and grass for the Tianwu Army is not as much forage as the horses are fed, and this battle is really aggrieved.