The Ming Dynasty army experienced a crushing defeat and could no longer attack Li Zicheng, and finally had to retreat, and although Li Zicheng repelled the offensive of the Ming army in Henan, it itself suffered a lot of losses, and there was no intention of pursuing it with victory for the time being.

After all, the peasant army is weak in combat and has a huge numerical advantage, but when the soldiers are really waiting for the soldiers to fight, the cost of losses is several times that of the other side, even if the commanders of their own side are wiser.

In addition to the two wars fought by Li Tianyang in the early stage, just after the battle between Deng Xi and He Sanjiang, when the Ming army paid a price of more than 20,000, He Sanjiang's peasant army actually paid nearly 40,000 casualties, which was also a heavy blow to Li Zicheng, the king of Chuang.

While guarding against a possible pursuit, and hurrying slowly, Deng Xi and the others returned to Luoyang in a shorter time than when they were moving forward and the soldiers were exhausted.

Along the way, in addition to gathering the scattered and fleeing army officers and soldiers and reorganizing their morale, Deng Xi put more energy on coercing the displaced people on the road and incorporating them into his own army to make up for the losses of the previous war.

When he arrived in Luoyang, the total number of his troops miraculously returned to the scale of more than 25,000 people, if he didn't know that he couldn't hide Xiong Wencan's previous defeats, I am afraid that Deng Xi would be able to make up for the original losses and other troops.

Of course, in the short time of fleeing and returning, Deng Xi and the others did not have much energy to train these warriors who could be said to be obtained by Lazhuang Ding, and the strength of their army was several times different from when they set off before.

In order to make up for the losses, the leaders and generals under Deng Xi's command, but whenever they met tall farmers, woodcutters and the like, regardless of whether they were homeless or not, whether they had families or not, a few fierce soldiers pounced on this target and pulled it into the barracks.

When the guy who surrounded and pulled the strong man came back to his senses and wanted to reason with the officers and soldiers, he was frightened by the officers and soldiers with all kinds of threatening remarks, and finally obediently tied his hands and arrested.

The only thing they can get from these strong men who have been pulled is some scattered silver money obtained by Deng Xi and them by robbing rich families and bandits along the road, or some worthless things.

Even among the soldiers under Deng Xi's command, some people passed by the assets of a wealthy family, or the yellow flower girl of an innocent family, and randomly planted an excuse for the other party to be a thief, bandit, etc., with a group of soldiers who were at a loss because of the defeat, hoping to get a psychological intelligence comfort.

Li Tianyang himself was also along the way, and once again felt the sorrow from the people at the bottom, which was in response to the famous saying of the Song Dynasty poet Xin Qiji: Xing, the people are bitter; Death, the people suffer!

Touched by Wu Chao a few years ago, Li Tianyang re-examined himself, but to be honest, if he wants to recognize his mistakes and find his original intention, where can he achieve it once or twice through self-reflection, in the case that Li Tianyang doesn't know it, in fact, he still has all kinds of defects.

But in this expedition with the army, along the way, the suffering life of the people of Henan due to natural and man-made disasters, the excessive exploitation of the bureaucrats and gentry, etc., all made Li Tianyang regain his compassion and compassion that had disappeared for a long time!

Only when you have truly experienced and witnessed the tragic and purgatory-like scenes brought about by natural and man-made disasters to a life, a family, and a village, will you understand the preciousness of ordinary life and cherish your seemingly ordinary peaceful life.

And for a big man like Li Tianyang who is in a high position and has huge power in his hands, as long as you have empathy and compassion in your heart, you will not think about letting this kind of thing continue to happen in front of your eyes, he will always want to do something to change something, and it is good to bring a little comfort to this group of poor people.

Even Li Tianyang, whose body and mind had gradually become cold, were infected by these miserable circumstances, not to mention those children in the Hongtang army who were not instilled with positive views by the school since childhood, or those ordinary soldiers who began to carry out ideological transformation after joining Hongtang, who whose hearts are not flesh and blood, how can they endure the anger and sadness in their hearts in the face of this situation.

In order to pull in the strong Ding, indiscriminate looting and other problems, there were many disputes between the Hongtang soldiers and Deng Ximing's army, and even the largest time the two sides had hundreds of people to play a big scuffle.

In this regard, Li Tianyang was powerless except for giving strong reprimands and corporal punishment to the Hongtang fighters who participated in the fight.

After all, this is the territory of Henan, in the territory of Deng Xi's general soldiers, even if Li Tianyang wants to do something, what can he really do!

And Deng Xi also because of Li Tianyang's previous life-saving grace, he didn't come to Li Tianyang to wait for the friction between the Hongtang soldiers and the soldiers under his command, but it was impossible for him to stop the misdeeds of the soldiers under his command, because many of those things were actually instructed by Deng Xi.

In order to keep his position as a general soldier, Deng Xi has already let go of his dignity as a soldier of the Ming Dynasty, and even if Li Tianyang saved his life in the face of interests, he can't stop his crazy behavior of pulling strong men and looting property.

Of course, Deng Xi, who has been mixed in the officialdom for half his life, knows very well that those officials and gentry and rich people cannot be provoked, but those can be bullied by themselves, and when the soldiers under his command choose targets, they have already received his instructions, but there has been no real chaos along the way, except for those unlucky civilian families who have been arrested by strong men, and rich landlords who have no background.

This is the troubled times, a world of naked cannibalism and so on, Li Tianyang silently observed the tragic scenes along the way, the various ugly faces of the government, officers and soldiers and the gentry class, and at the same time carried out a far-reaching interrogation and determination of his heart through these things.

At the same time, in private, Li Tianyang also seized the opportunity to trade ideas with the soldiers at the bottom of Hongtang, and deepened everyone's sense of identity with Hongtang and the in-depth study of Hongmen's core values through on-site examples of officers and soldiers during the day.

On the surface, Li Tianyang's reprimand of the soldiers, but in secret, Li Tianyang encouraged and appreciated the actions of the soldiers, which made the relationship between the Hongtang army and the soldiers under the command of Deng Xi's general army not converged because of the reprimand of the generals on both sides, and the battles became more frequent, which made Deng Xi's whole person have a headache.

(End of chapter)