Chapter 72—The Camel and the Straw (5)
Is it that he Chen Kai can't hold the knife, or is your Tong Guoqi floating!
Hearing this, these officers all decided that Tong Guoqi was crazy, and they needed to explain what was going on in the military to this guy who had a problem with his thinking.
Problems such as the rout of the army, the time is too short, and the soldiers are not attached can be put aside for the time being, the most important thing is on the bright side, the matter of weapons and equipment, the Ming army must be armed to the teeth, Chen Kai, as a civilian official who made his debut in the manufacture of weapons, is the most important part; And they, as well as those family members, soldiers and domestic slaves of Tong Guoqi, have knives, and most of the other officers and soldiers have picked up a wooden stick that is not very straight as a spear on the road, not only do they have no time and energy to sharpen it, but even the size ranges from three feet to six feet, not so much a spear, but a crutch. As for the horses, armor, and bows, there are none!
With such a gap in weapons and equipment, even if they have twice the strength, can it be possible for the soldiers to bite the iron armor of the Ming army with their teeth? It is estimated that they will not even have a chance to speak at that time, and on the way to the charge, they will be beaten into hedgehogs and sieves by the bows and arrows and fire guns of the Ming army.
What is it called giving away people's heads? This is the most typical gift-giving head!
They couldn't understand how Tong Guoqi's brain, which had been calculating a last resort before, suddenly cramped, but these days, he had indeed accumulated some prestige. After all, if it weren't for him, they might have been transported to Qiongzhou by now to the Great Demon King Aphrodisiac Cai.
It is precisely because of this that when they heard that the Ming army was catching up, they did not leave Tong Guoqi and disperse in a hurry. However, this loyalty has passed rapidly over time. To put it bluntly, there is Guangxin Mansion in front, and no one wants to follow such a madman to the moment he dies before dawn.
However, at this moment, Tong Guoqi is still the same as the wisdom bead in his hand. He explained in detail with them his style since he fled from Xincheng County, instead of oppressing people with the posture of an official.
According to Tong Guoqi's analysis, there are 2,000 green battalions in Guangxin Mansion, and Quzhou is where Prince Zheng's army is located. If the Ming army was only a small force, they would never dare to enter the territory of Guangxin Mansion, and they would not be guilty of provoking the Eight Banners Army for a group of routs. But now it is different, the Ming army has a thousand soldiers and horses, although it is not much, but with the level of the Guangdong and Jiangxi governors, there is still the confidence to defeat the green battalion of Guangxin Mansion head-on, and they also believe that they can solve them before the arrival of the Eight Banners Army. In this way, it is absolutely not enough to just climb over that mountain and cross the boundary monument. And Guangxin Mansion probably didn't dare to provoke thousands of elite Ming troops. More things are better than less things, the officialdom understands the truth, there is no reason why it will not work when you get to Guangxin Mansion.
In this case, all they can rely on is the two thousand defeated soldiers to save themselves. Otherwise, their fate could only end in exhaustion after crossing the mountain, and the Ming army that caught up with them was killed one by one at the bottom of the mountain, or in the mountains and forests.
"Of course, this officer also understands that with the current state of our army, there is no chance of winning the field wave battle." said a nonsense in everyone's hearts, but the word "but" immediately reunited the morale of the army.
For more than an hour or so, a Ming army of about 1,000 people followed the banners of the Ming army. It is a mountain col with a large number of hills on both sides. From a military point of view, this is a good place to set up an ambush, but the Ming army is extremely arrogant, and they swagger through it without even sending a horse.
Compared with the rout discovered earlier, they do have reasons for arrogance. Moreover, after crossing the mountain in the distance, they entered the territory of Guangxin Mansion, and they didn't even pay attention to the green camp of Guangxin Mansion, let alone those remnants of the defeated army.
The Ming army swaggered forward, and I don't know which crow's mouth muttered a sentence "This terrain must be carefully ambushed", which touched Murphy's law, and suddenly, I saw a group of Qing troops rushing out of the distance Hulala, and at the same time, a large number of flags also emerged from the mountains and forests on both sides, and the shouts of "His Royal Highness Prince Heshuo Zheng of the Qing Dynasty led the Eight Banners Army here, and those who came quickly surrendered" The shout was even louder.
Although, the Qing army that came out in front was at most a group of foot soldiers wearing green camp uniforms, there was no banner, and there were no cavalry, and the flags on both sides seemed to be in the wrong shape and the height of the flagpole when they looked closely. But the Eight Banners Army is the Eight Banners Army after all, and the invincible prestige is still not a joke. During this time, I saw that those arrogant Ming troops turned their ranks almost instantly, shouting "ambushed" and "the real Tartars are coming", while dropping their weapons and flags, and retreating.
Everything happened so fast, and these low-level Fujian Fubiao officers, like their subordinates, watched all this happen in amazement, it was too smooth. However, compared to these uninformed goods, the governor who was not arrogant or discouraged still sent a Qing army led by the captain of his original personal soldiers, each holding a simple flag made of green camp with a wooden stick, and continued to "chase" in the direction of the Ming army's escape.
"Quick, let the soldiers below stop rubbing, hurry up and clean up the battlefield, and grab all the weapons and flags. The thieves were just startled by the sudden appearance of the Eight Banners Army, and when they reacted, they would definitely catch up, we don't have much time, hurry! ”
Tong Guoqi's shouting order was like the morning bell of the ancient temple, once it crashed into their ears, it made them seem to be enlightened, and they reacted immediately. After these days of running-in, the officers have gradually become proficient in driving the soldiers, and they quickly put away the flags and weapons dropped by the Ming army. It's a pity that the shoes of this group of Ming soldiers are probably glued to their feet with fish maw glue, and not a single shoe has been left behind.
This is a strange thing. There is also a strange thing that the flags and weapons dropped by the Ming army turned out to be the Qing army, to be precise, Fujian raised the standard, which not only did not have the one-foot five-foot spear and new firearm used by Chen Kai's supervision, but also did not have the rattan cards used by other troops. As for the lancet and lancet, these things are the same style for the Ming army and the Qing army, and the difference is not nothing, but no one has this leisure now.
"This official thinks that it must be the thieves who are preparing to change into the banners, trumpets and weapons of the green battalion to deceive Guangxin Fucheng after annihilating our department, it must be so!"
"The master of the Fu army is clever, I admire it so much."
In another burst of compliments, Tong Guoqi humbled the two armies, and immediately praised the performance of the officers and non-commissioned officers under his command. It was precisely because of their superb acting skills that they scared off this chasing army, and it was they who used their actions to resolve this crisis. In addition, he also said that he would write to the imperial court and ask for their commendation.
The Ming army fled, the threat of death was lifted, and now there was a possibility of further promotion and wealth, and the officers were ecstatic. Of course, they did not forget the governor in front of them, and they expressed their willingness to fight under Tong Guoqi for the rest of their lives.
The upper and lower groups were harmonious, but it didn't take long for Qiang Qiang to clean up the battlefield, and the Qing army sent by Tong Guoqi rushed back. In the words of the captain of the old pro-soldiers, they chased for a while, bluffing the Ming army. However, in the back, the speed of the Ming army's escape began to slow down gradually, and they suspected that someone in the Ming army had already reacted from the initial shock, so they hurriedly retreated.
"In this case, while the thieves have not yet fully reacted, our army should get out of danger as soon as possible." Caressing the long beard under his chin, Tong Guoqi felt more and more the importance of a feather fan in the eyes of the admirers.
In the next few days, they crossed the mountains, appeared on the banks of the Luxi River, collected some fishing boats near the left, cut down a large amount of bamboo, and made bamboo rafts to make them down the river with the convenience of water power. This was much faster than they had walked, and soon they turned into the Baita River and entered the boundary of Anren County.
This is the boundary of Raozhou Mansion, fortunately, the current Anrenzhi County had served in Fujian before, and when he saw Tong Guoqi, he sent some grain and grass. However, this is not Tong Guoqi's destination, his trip is to rush to Guangxin Mansion, according to Chen Kai's analysis, he can only have a way to survive if he goes there. Then, after only a few days of rest, the army went up the Xinjiang River.
Their next stop was Guixi County, which was located at the western end of Guangxin Province, and Fucheng was located in the east-central part of the province, and needed to follow the Xinjiang River through Guixi, Yiyang, and Hekou Town, which later became the seat of Leadshan County, and then continue east to reach Guangxin Fucheng.
However, when they arrived in Guixi County, they were stopped by the local government. Although these officers and soldiers of the Fujian Green Battalion were very uncomfortable, Tong Guoqi showed an attitude of understanding. After all, this is Guangxin Mansion, Jianchang Mansion in the south has fallen into the hands of the Ming army, and Quzhou Mansion in the east has the Eight Banners Heavy Army Group.
Guixi County had made a promise that it would report to the Guangxin Mansion and the Jiangxi Governor's Yamen, but Tong Guoqi never intended to hand over his life to those Jiangxi civil and military forces who had been filthy earlier. So, while expressing his understanding and leading his subordinates to temporarily settle down in the newly built military camp outside the city, he immediately sent his cronies to submit a letter to Prince Zheng in Quzhou, to the Manchu court to ask for guilt, and to write a letter to the people in the capital asking for help.
These, it is not the court and the clansmen who can really decide his life and death, but His Royal Highness Prince Zheng, who is only twenty-five years old - he is indeed responsible for the loss of Xincheng County, but he can also escape back to the Qing army-controlled area with a green battalion of more than 2,000 people. He has both merit and demerit, whether the merit is greater than the demerit or the excesse, the key is whether he is still useful in the eyes of the Qing court. And the opinion of the front-line commander-in-chief can basically decide all this. Even if there is no meritorious service, as long as the front-line commander thinks that he is still useful, he will have the opportunity to make meritorious contributions.
The content of the letter was something he had already thought about on the road, which was nothing more than emphasizing that his Fubiao could assist in the defense of Guangxin Mansion, implying that it could play a role in covering Jidu's flank. But......
"Chen Kai is definitely using me to maximize the results. I can't listen to him all, and I'm sure I'm still dead end. ”