In fact, contrary to these people who flocked to the city, there were also many people in Tanzhou City who were busy going out of the city; Most of them came from poor backgrounds, and most of them were small traders, hawkers, coolies, or travelers who were busy making a living. Others are so-called "outlaws". They who have no overnight food and can only rely on a mixed household registration for a day are almost the result of being reversed by the sudden influx of evacuees and the high prices.

Therefore, although the government has been propagating how the grass thieves lead the beasts to eat people and possess the cannibalistic demons, it can't stop the secret rumors among them: for example, according to the songs and folk songs from the south, these "thieves" and "grass thieves" not only eat people, but also give people food and salt to eat.

Although it is said that if you eat their "heavenly supplement" food, you will fall for their spells and have to go with them, and be sent to fill in the trenches and plug the city, which still sounds quite scary; But as the saying goes, "It's hard to die a thousand times, and it's hard to endure hunger." Instead of slowly starving to death in the city or hanging to death, it is better to go out of the city and have a chance; Maybe there's also the possibility of being a full ghost who dies after being full.

Therefore, these people were also running desperately out of the crowd at the city gate, and the Lang officials and guards guarding the gate were also busy collecting money from the people who poured in, and they had no extra time to interrogate them; Therefore, after the arrival of the rebel army, it was easy to get relevant news about Tanzhou City.

Subsequently, during the short confrontation, some songs from the rebels also began to take the opportunity to circulate and sing in the streets and alleys of the city.

"Welcome the Yellow King, look forward to the Yellow King, the Yellow King will not accept food when he comes."

"Chao Dengtang, twilight bed, the wealthy rob your mother's ......"

"Eat his mother, pass on his mother, open the city gate to welcome the Yellow King. Eat and dress warmly. ”

"Seeking ascension in the morning, seeking harmony in the evening, it is difficult for the poor to survive recently. Open the door early to worship the Yellow King, and discipline everyone is happy."

"Don't take errands, don't pay for food, and don't eat all the Yellow King." +

"Kill cattle and sheep, prepare wine syrup, open the city gate to welcome the Yellow King, and the Yellow King will not pay grain when he comes"

"The Yellow King went down to Jiangling, and the debts were all cleared; The Yellow King takes Xiangyang, and everyone eats pigs and sheep. “

And it all started months ago. As the premise and first task of winning the trust of Huang Chao, Zhou Huai'an needed to formulate a suitable slogan for the rebel army, which represented the most basic style and philosophy.

This is too simple for him, and there will be no shortage of slogans about the countless peasant uprisings that have been rising and dying in China for 5,000 years to resist tyranny and social injustice?

From the beginning of the "rule of three generations" Xia people's "time and death, to you and death!" To the Qin Dynasty, Chen Sheng and Wu Guang's "princes and generals, would you rather have a kind?" There is no way to cut down and punish Qin. The Yellow Turban Army uprising of the Three Kingdoms at the end of the Han Dynasty "The sky is dead, and the age is in Jiazi." ”

and then to the second ancestor who defeated the country at the end of the Sui Dynasty, and was ruled by Emperor Yang of Sui, the first emperor of the ages with great ambitions, and the "Death Song of the Waveless Liaodong"; Or it is the Great Song Dynasty where the happiness index of internal cruelty and external cruelty was blown to the sky, Wang Xiaobo and Li Shun revolted, "I am sick and rich and poor, and now you are equal." ", Zhong Xiang Yang Qi's uprising of "equal nobles and low, rich and poor"; It's not too much along the way.

Don't compare the situation, you need to choose carefully; For example, the slogan of the Huangchao Uprising at the end of the Tang Dynasty, just "Heaven makes up for the equal" and "Seek life for the people" and the like are still too rough and simple, such as how to make up for the average of the world and who will make up for the average, which is not clearly pointed out, and gives people too much room for brain supplementation;

Therefore, it should be more realistic and easy to understand, and it can touch the people at the bottom; The best choice and reference object is undoubtedly the Ming Dynasty of the later generations, because of the bad government and unemployment, unwilling to starve to death at home, and embarked on the road of gathering people to petition with arms, and finally forced the emperor to hang himself on Jingshan - the first person to break the king's way.

So there was "welcoming the Yellow King, looking forward to the Yellow King, and the Yellow King came and didn't pay for the grain." This series of songs and ballads that are easy to sing and easy to understand is out.

In terms of internal slogans, Zhou Huai'an mainly declared this to the students of the training center.

"There was the Tangwu Revolution in the past, and there was the Yellow King's Storming Revolution in the past. This is the number of days that came into being, and it is also the basic reason why I entered the WTO. ”

"We are the Ding Qi of the new dynasty that has changed the world to get rid of this rotten and corrupt Tang Dynasty."

Therefore, now on the Yuelu Mountain outside Changsha City, Tanzhou, it can still be said that faint singing from the camp under the mountain can still be heard.

And on the side of the monument of King Yu on the top of the hill that was cut down, it has become the commanding height of the righteous army to observe the movement in the city, so it is deliberately piled up into a small high platform and built a watchtower with cut wood.

"Cao Lion...

Standing on the high platform watchtower, Wang Chongyin, the left wing general and military master, said to Cao Shixiong, the left general and cruising envoy of the same party.

"After listening to these songs, I thought of the monk again. It's really an unusual genius. ”

"It's a pity that he has some heart sickness and depression in his heart, and he has repeatedly shirked his reluctance to participate in this pioneering cause."

Cao Shixiong also sighed a little.

"Otherwise, I'm afraid it's very useful. I've tried my best to protect him, and it's good to be on my left flank. ”

"Why bother with Meng (Kai) Feihu on the back road, doing that thankless job?"

"If he really has a lot of use in the north, those people around Huang Wang are afraid that they will have heart disease and trouble again."

Wang Chongyin shook his head a little helplessly.

"Under the disharmony between the two phases, the Yellow King can only make a trade-off, so that people can't see it. After all, he is still young. ”

"It's better for us to come over and work together after we don't go all the way out of Jiangxi and play some situations alone."

In the middle of their conversation, I saw the cheers and commotion in the distance, and some large objects were transported by ship along the Xiangshui River from the rear. Then it was assembled into a tall catapult machine outside the city of Tanzhou; This is also the siege equipment that the monk built and managed for the rebels.

Although it was quite hard and troublesome to march on the road with this thing, and seriously dragged down the journey; But once you encounter this kind of fortified city, you will feel that this kind of hard work and drag is worth it.

Hengyang City, which had been surrounded and planned to attack for days, was unexpectedly bombarded by this thing; And the whole city was so shocked that it didn't even need the routine attachment (driving the hungry people to be miscellaneous cannon fodder) to flood the city, and just a face-to-face rush had already been taken down.

This made the generals of the Righteous Army, who were once accustomed to relying on human lives to squeeze the sea of corpses and blood casualties, and then look for fighters and flaws after the weakened officers and soldiers, were still a little unable to adapt and accept it for a while.

However, the second-route soldiers, who rushed to the command of the deputy chief Shang Rang, were on the upper echelons, and there were more people who were rejoicing; Fortunately, this time the void monk was not able to be involved, otherwise, with his endless means and skills, this kind of opportunity and good thing that can be won easily in one go, wouldn't it make him more in the limelight and grab the credit.

Of course, in the eyes of most rebel generals, the task of protecting the back road is more like a disguised punishment and exclusion; Because according to their past lessons, the people who are responsible for the back road often represent great risks and troubles; Not only is there not much credit for the first defeat of the enemy and the benefits of priority division and disposal of the gains, but it is not certain when it will be entangled or caught up by those wild dog-like officers and soldiers, and the regiment will mean that the entire team will be lost or scattered, which is also a common thing.

And now, although the rebels have occupied a piece of Lingnan's territory, in the hearts of most people, they are still better at eating wherever they went to fight in the early years, and they are better at eating in a different place after eating; On the contrary, teaching them to calm down and learn to govern the place and maintain temporary order like the government is a difficult and painful thing to do.

。。。。。。。。

At this moment in Guangzhou, Zhou Huai'an, who was talked about and boycotted, was assisting the nominal left-behind envoy in Guangzhou, the left army envoy and rear wing general Meng Wei of the General's Mansion, to deal with some personnel turmoil and chaos. This sudden civil upheaval originated in the areas occupied by the rebels.

The main reason is that after the rebel army began to advance northward, those officials who had been assigned to the local areas or something, although there were still some uneven and uneven appearances of dregs, but because of this, there were all kinds of people who were worried and worried about the future, and even self-disrupted; Some people have even begun to consciously abandon and abscond.

Although it is true that most of them are not doing very well, it is not an exaggeration to describe it as a vegetarian corpse or a more and more helper; But it also represents the authority and credibility that the rebels have built up over the course of several months; Therefore, the consequences and troubles caused by their personal abandonment of duty or disorderly behavior require time and energy to clean up.

This burden is completely pressed on the troika, the only "half bucket of water" known as "knowing a little bit about everything" - Zhou Huai'an; Fortunately, the cruel exploitation and unscrupulous oppression of the previous government rule have greatly expanded the psychological tolerance of ordinary people and the degree to which they tolerate mistakes; And under normal circumstances, no matter what they do, they will not do anything worse than what the previous government did, or how strange it is.

Normally, in addition to some ridiculous pretentious and nouveau riche style show-offs and demonstrations, there are some sporadic incidents of bullying men and women to satisfy their personal desires; Or that there is not enough time for them to amplify the negative effects to a certain point, or to a tipping point where they cannot bear it. Therefore, Zhou Huaian still has the opportunity and room to make up for and adjust.

As his deputy and chief bookkeeper, Chai Ping, who still has ideals and a sense of justice, has become the best person to lead the team to take specifics. Almost every once in a while, there will be a trial, and then one or several severed heads will be brought back, or some people who have been tied up in a variety of ways. But it also comes with a disguised benefit.

Because of the positions that were subsequently used to fill these temporary vacancies, Zhou Huai'an's previous hundreds of manpower carried and selected in the process of rectifying the logistics affairs of the rebel army and gathering military resources were really useful; It just so happened that after most of the work was completed, they were in a state of idleness with nothing to do, which could be used to cash in on Zhou Huai'an's promise to help them and find a way out.

According to the previous plan, Zhou Huaian planned to eliminate most of them and join the army to do things; Although most of them only have the level of a small official, and they do not have the vision and pattern of governing a place; However, there are a large number of people, and after practical training, they are quite familiar with the situation at the grassroots level, and the worst is that they are higher than the previous rebel dispatch officers who were blind-eyed.

Until then, many of them had been merely bookkeepers and stewards of merchants in the city. Even the humble origins of a fellow or even an apprentice. Because he didn't want to be conscripted by the righteous army to do hard and heavy labor, he took refuge in Zhou Huai'an, who was recruiting people to do things, and obtained the qualification to be exempted from labor and a certain status treatment. It is only unsatisfactory in terms of special level and professionalism, which is the result of being taller among the short.

This is also because of the heritage of Guangzhou City itself as a thousand-year-old port, otherwise if it were in other places, even these part-time talents who could read and count would not be able to extract much.

Therefore, Zhou Huai'an can completely decompose and refine the functions and powers such as county orders, county officials, and county lieutenants, and turn them into the content that several individuals or small groups are responsible for; Although this efficiency is lower than that of a person's arbitrary authority, it also ensures a certain sense of fault tolerance on the premise of increasing labor operating costs.

In this way, with the six to eight cadres under the county and the plural council offices in the township, the rudimentary structure of a grassroots political power has been built, and there is also a set of preliminary institutional prototypes for internal mobility and room for growth.

First of all, the 11 counties under the jurisdiction of the Guangzhou Governor's Office, including Nanhai County, Panyu County, Zengcheng County, Sihui County, Huaiji County, Huameng County, Xun'an County, Bao'an County, Qingyuan County, Xunwei County, and Zhenyang County, began to be piloted; Then it will be pushed to Duanzhou, Xinzhou, Enzhou and other places on the plain of the Pearl River Delta. At the very least, it is necessary to initially grasp most of the eastern areas of Lingnan Province, which are relatively rich in population and have a large number of plain areas.

It is also quite advantageous to him in the present situation; He just needs to find a way to get rid of Lin Yan, who gradually showed that he likes pleasure and has a tendency to neglect government after the army left, and stayed behind as a deputy envoy and a transfer salt and iron official and political partner; The other one who came to stay behind was the envoy Meng Wei, who was focused on paying attention to the war at the front and the specific control of the army at the rear, and basically did not pay attention to the "trivial things" that happened in the operation of these places.

(End of chapter)