But in any case, when this method of reorganizing and surrendering troops to protect the canal on the spot was adopted, this method was still effective, and once these troops were reorganized, with new officers to control them, they quickly radiated far more than their previous combat effectiveness, which is a very strange phenomenon, if you have to explain this phenomenon, it can only be said that these soldiers were only soldiers for the imperial court to eat, but after surrendering to the Dazhong Dynasty, they agreed with the rule of Dazhong, turned to be willing to serve Xiao Tianjian, plus the officers who were assigned to them to command them were also Xiao Tianjian's old subordinates, these officers were familiar with the way of commanding troops, and they were also very good at promoting Xiao Tianjian's ideas.

The reuse of these troops soon curbed the momentum of the water pirates on the canal and the bandits on both sides, forcing some of the bandits and pirates to give up plundering along the canal, either fleeing far away, or surrendering to the Dazhong army, so that when Xiao Tianjian captured Linqing, the situation of water piracy on the canal was basically contained, and the safety factor of the transport fleet was also greatly improved when sailing on the canal.

After Linqing was captured, Xiao Tianjian led his troops to immediately force the next target, which was Dezhou, an important town in northern Shandong.

Dezhou is also an important military town, is the gateway to the north of Shandong, has always been a place where soldiers must fight, it stands to reason that the Ming court should also attach great importance to here, Shandong political envoys will naturally not despise the defense here, but at this time, Shandong political envoys have lost their management ability, and the Ming court is now even the Beijing division is too busy to take care of itself, Texas, a military town, has become a place where no one cares.

In fact, there are still some defenders in Texas at this time, but these people have now become officers and soldiers that no one cares about, and the guards first fled with their families when they heard the sound, and the remaining officers and soldiers naturally no one wanted to fight with the Dazhong Army in Texas, so Xiao Tianjian originally planned to let go in Texas, but before he arrived in Texas, a general in Texas first took the soldiers and horses, went out of Texas City, greeted Xiao Tianjian, and rushed to surrender to Xiao Tianjian.

As a result, Xiao Tianjian took Dezhou City lightly, and he didn't even enter Dezhou City, so he left dozens of officers to be responsible for the reorganization of Dezhou troops, and he himself led a large army, passed around the city, and swooped down the Grand Canal to Cangzhou in Hejian Province.

Just when Xiao Tianjian led the troops to gradually open the Grand Canal, the war in the Guanning area had reached the point of erosion, and the Jiannu army besieged Ningyuan City for about a month, and finally broke through this desperate city, almost slaughtering the soldiers and civilians in the city, and nearly 50,000 soldiers and civilians in Ningyuan City, regardless of age and age, were almost all slaughtered after the Jiannu army broke through the city.

Originally, although Ningyuan City ran out of ammunition and food, but at the insistence of Hong Chengchou and others, even if it relied on eating dead human flesh, it could still hold on for some time, but Xia Chengde, the deputy general of Songshan who guarded the south gate of Ningyuan, could not hold on, seeing that the grain and grass were cut off, and the reinforcements were also defeated by the Jiannu army, when all hope was gone, Xia Chengde was unwilling to die for the Ming Dynasty, and on April 15, Xia Chengde sent his cronies to sneak out of the city at night and contacted Jiannu, saying that he was willing to surrender and could be an internal response for Jiannu.

So after learning the news, the slave chief Taiji immediately waved his army to attack the city, Xia Chengde really gave up resistance at the south gate of the city as promised, opened the city gate and put in the Jiannu army, so that Ningyuan City was broken, and the soldiers and civilians in the city were almost slaughtered by the Jiannu army.

This is a desperate struggle, Hong Chengchou and his generals, this time in Ningyuan City for the Ming Dynasty to make the final struggle, and changed the course of history, Hong Chengchou disappeared after the war, failed to be captured by Jiannu, naturally it is not a traitor, the city of Guanning generals, almost all died in battle, only Xia Chengde and a small number of his cronies because of the defection to Jiannu, meritorious service, only to avoid a death, was the slave chief continued to be awarded the post of second-class A Lazhangjing, stay in the Han Eight Banners inlaid with red flags Shi Tingzhu to listen to the order.

This time in the battle of Ningyuan, although Jiannu's ability to attack the fortification has improved a lot, but under the stubborn resistance of the Ming soldiers and civilians in the city, although their artillery fire almost destroyed the walls of Ningyuan City, but they still failed to successfully capture Ningyuan City, and finally under the door of Xia Chengde, a traitor, they took Ningyuan City, which illustrates a problem, as long as the soldiers of the Ming Dynasty are determined to die, even if Jiannu's artillery is sharp, they cannot destroy their will, which Ningyuan's defenders do is quite singable and crying.

However, in this battle of Jiannu, they also showed strong flexibility, they surrounded Ningyuan, and defeated Yang Guozhu and Tang Tong's reinforcements under the command of Zhang Ruolin in the way of besieging the city, and annihilated the 20,000 or 30,000 Ming troops guarding Ningyuan, and also annihilated more than 30,000 reinforcements under Yang Guozhu and Tang Tong, almost all the strength of the Guanning army was consumed outside Shanhaiguan.

After taking down the Jiannu army after the slaughter of Ningyuan City, he immediately waved his army south under the leadership of Huang Taiji, and the soldiers arrived under Shanhaiguan, at this time the Ming general who sat in Shanhaiguan was Wu Sangui's father Wu Xiang, and his command was basically the soldiers he pulled up single-handedly, but compared to the soldiers on hand in his heyday, this time it was much inferior, Wu Sangui led his troops into the customs last year, and took away a large number of their old Wu family, as a result, in the battle of Yanggu County, the whole army was in the hands of Xiao Tianjian, together with Wu Sangui himself, was also killed by artillery on the Yanggu battlefield and became a victim of the Ming Dynasty.

Now Wu Xiang can be described as embattled, he can't count on the reinforcements of the Beijing Division, he knows the situation of the Beijing Division better than anyone else, there are only less than 30,000 soldiers and horses left in the Beijing Division of the Ming Dynasty, these soldiers and horses are already seriously insufficient to guard the Beijing Division, and there is no support for him at all, and after hearing the news that Ning Yuan was broken, the Guanning soldiers and generals under his command are also panicked and their morale has declined, although after he rushed to Shanhaiguan to sit in the town, he also collected a group of defeated troops under Yang Guozhu and Tang Tong, and slightly strengthened some troops, But most of these generals are already frightened birds, and they can't compete with the Jiannu army at all.

Not long after the defeat of Yang Guozhu and Tang Tong, Wu Xiang got another news that shocked him, the left army of the Xingtian Army was let go of Juyong Pass by Zhou Yuji, the general of the Beijing camp, and drove straight into the territory of Jizhou Town behind him.

At this time, Wu Xiang walked into a strange circle that his son only faced in history, outside the pass is the surging army of Jiannu, wanting to break through the pass, and behind him in the pass is the Ming Dynasty's sworn enemy Xingtian Army, which is also eyeing Shanhaiguan.

After the city of Ningyuan was broken, the Jiannu chieftain Taiji made Dolgon the vanguard, and the commander of nearly 80,000 Jiannu troops arrived outside the Shanhaiguan first, sent a messenger into the customs, and handed it to Wu Xiang with Huang Taiji's handwritten letter, persuading Wu Xiang to surrender and surrender to their Qing Dynasty, Huang Taiji even did not hesitate to make Wu Xiang the king, trying to impress Wu Xiang to make Wu Xiang surrender to him.

On the other hand, Wu Xiang also received a handwritten letter from Lu Xiangsheng in advance, in his heart Lu Xiangsheng earnestly urged Wu Xiang to defend Shanhaiguan, and in the letter he stressed the importance of Shanhaiguan to the Han people, and advised Wu Xiang to focus on the overall situation, let go of the old grudges with Great China, it is best to lead the army to surrender to the Great Chinese Army, and join forces with the Great Chinese Army to build slaves outside the Guan, and save the Han nation in danger. As long as Wu Xiang surrenders, after the Dazhong Dynasty enters the Beijing Division in the future, he can ensure the safety of Wu Xiang's family wealth and family, and ensure his Wu Xiang's future glory and wealth, as long as he surrenders to the Dazhong Army at this time or leads the troops to defend Shanhaiguan, then he is the national hero of the Han nation!

On the one hand, he controlled the entire Liaodong Provinces, and had more than 200,000 troops in the Jiannu army, and the soldiers pointed directly at the Shanhaiguan where he was sitting, and on the other hand, it was the Great China and North Korea that had already controlled most of China.

This is a very difficult thing to decide, comparing the strength of the two sides, the strength of Jiannu and Xiao Tianjian seems to be comparable, compared to the people, Jiannu and Xiao Tianjian seem to have similar strength, of course, at this time, it is obvious that Jiannu's troops are stronger, and the threat to him is also greater, but in terms of hidden strength, Xiao Tianjian's manpower and material resources and even the total strength are stronger than Jiannu.

In terms of combat power, both sides are characters he can't afford to provoke, after Jiannu raised troops, starting from the wild boar skin generation, to the current Huang Taiji generation, the two generations have been outside the pass for decades, these decades, they two generations of Jiannu led the department and the Ming official army repeatedly fighting, the Ming official army can be said to be in their hands repeatedly defeated, and gradually squeezed out of Liaodong, over the years, Jiannu is to send troops to break through the pass, to the pass to plunder, but the Ming has never had a little way for them, the governor changed again and again, killed one after another, but the situation in Liaodong is becoming more and more erosive, until today the entire Guanwai has been occupied by Jiannu, so Jiannu is undoubtedly a terrible existence in the eyes of these Guanning generals in the Ming Dynasty, psychologically, Wu Xiang is very afraid of Jiannu outside the Guan.

As for Xiao Tianjian, although Wu Xiang did not directly fight with him, but he also understands the history of Xiao Tianjian, Xiao Tianjian first raised troops in Fengxiang Mansion in Shaanxi during the seventh year of Chongzhen, and later entered Shanxi to gradually sit on the basis of Yangcheng County, so many years gradually from a small army of displaced people, to now control the entire hinterland of the Central Plains of the Ming Dynasty, and occupy Shanxi, Henan, Huguang, Jiangxi, Nanzhili, Zhejiang and other provinces, control tens of millions of subjects and huge territory of the Ming Dynasty, and then now began to attack Beizhi, Shandong, at present, there is basically only one coastal area left in Shandong that has not been occupied by him, and the canal is basically about to be attacked by him to Tongzhou.

And the Xingtian Army created by his command, now it should be called the Great Chinese Army, for the Ming official army, it is undoubtedly a nightmare one after another, countless famous generals of the Ming Dynasty, have folded their wings in front of the soldiers and horses under his command, over the years, there are countless Ming officers and soldiers annihilated by him, how many generals died in the hands of his Xingtian Army, even his beloved son Wu Sangui, last year was ordered to enter the customs to suppress him, also died in the hands of his Xingtian Army.

If Jiannu is the cause of the decline of the Ming Dynasty, then Xiao Tianjian is the one who buried the Ming Dynasty with his own hands, and he Wu Xiang can't afford to provoke these two parties, and Wu Xiang can't make up his mind about who to choose to take refuge for a while.