Li Zicheng is already thinking about the success of the issuance of banknotes, Lanzhou has succeeded, and the next step is to expand the use of banknotes, Gongchang, Taozhou, Longnan three prefectures, the closest to Lanzhou, and the same belongs to Gansu Province, but these three prefectures are mainly agriculture, the people have just solved the problem of food and clothing, but Xining Mansion is more prosperous.

In fact, the current Xining Province is more in need of paper money circulation than Lanzhou.

Therefore, Li Zicheng planned that the next city to use paper money would be Xining, and if it was to succeed, it would be promoted to Sanchuan Prefecture between the two prefectures, then Gongchang, Taozhou, Longnan Prefecture, and finally Suzhou, Ganzhou and Liangzhou in the Hexi Corridor.

As for the Haibei Prefecture north of the West Sea, the Huizhou Prefecture to the north of Lanzhou Prefecture, and the newly established Hexi Governor's Mansion, there is no hurry, these areas are sparsely populated, there is basically no industry and commerce, and the demand for paper money is not strong.

After the banknotes are smoothly rolled out in the prefectures and counties, the circulation function of gold, silver and copper will be gradually canceled, and all banknotes will be used.

There was no shortage of food in the Mandate of Heaven's Governor's Office, and after the issuance of paper money, the problem of military salaries was basically solved, and Lanzhou and Xining accepted a large number of displaced people, the population increased sharply, and the source of soldiers became more abundant......

Everything was ready, and Li Zicheng was ready to expand the army on a large scale.

He first asked Shen Dao to expand the infantry, five infantry and 1,000 households, all of which were expanded to the establishment of "battalions", each battalion had jurisdiction over 5,000 households, 5,600 soldiers, and the corresponding thousand households were renamed "battalions", which were the third and fourth battalions respectively...... The seventh battalion, the commander is still a guerrilla general!

All the original auxiliaries of each battalion were upgraded to combat soldiers, and the newly recruited soldiers were temporarily used as auxiliaries and began to receive formal training.

The number of rifles in Xining was seriously insufficient, and the Xining Firearms Bureau temporarily stopped the production of artillery, concentrated all its efforts to make guns, and had just been promoted to an auxiliary soldier for soldiers, temporarily borrowing the rifles of their companions for training.

In order to prevent the army from losing its combat effectiveness, new recruits and veterans, and soldiers and auxiliaries must be trained separately and organized separately, and they must not be mixed until the end of the training and training!

The 1,000th and 2,000th households were also renamed "battalions" and small-scale expansion was carried out, because the number of war horses was seriously insufficient, and each battalion temporarily governed 3,000 households.

The first battalion of Liu Yunshui is a thousand-household soldier and two thousand-household auxiliaries; The second battalion of Li Guobu is two thousand soldiers and one thousand auxiliary soldiers, and the soldiers only have 1,600 war horses.

After the expansion of the army, the total number of soldiers in the seven battalions exceeded 32,000, and the number of new auxiliary troops alone reached 15,000.

Li Zicheng still has tiger cavalry and wolf cavalry on hand, and his eyes are on Helan Mountain, taking advantage of the opportunity of the Ming army to encircle the thieves and conquer the "Alxa Left Banner", and the Hexi Governor's Mansion will be more complete!

He immediately sent an order to Wang Junzhuo of Shaliucheng and Gao Yigong of Yonggu City, telling them to prepare, and after the new yuan, they would send troops to Helan Mountain!

On this day, Li Zicheng was thinking about sending troops to the Alxa Left Banner in his study, Wang Anping sent back a message, Chen Qiyu was tightening his pockets, and the main force of thieves was trapped in the deep mountains of Qinling.

The army is not a bird or beast, and if it has been trapped in the mountains for a long time, how can it have enough food?

Li Zicheng fell into deep thought, he originally thought that taking advantage of the opportunity of the Tartars entering the fortress, the imperial court was eager to rescue the Jingshi, which gave the thieves a chance to live, but now it seems that this judgment is obviously wrong.

The Tartar has long since returned to Shenyang, and Chen Qiyu's pocket is still there, and the scope of the thieves' activities is getting smaller and smaller......

Are thieves really out of the woods?

If the main force of the thieves is destroyed, will the imperial court be transferred to attack the Mandate of Heaven Army?

Li Zicheng was immediately relieved, even if these thieves are destroyed, new thieves will breed, as long as natural and man-made disasters are still there, it is impossible to eradicate the thieves!

However, just in case, he still sent military orders to all battalions, asking them to step up their training, and before the recruits have formed combat effectiveness, they must not mix with veterans, and they must not affect the combat effectiveness of veterans.

The Firearms Bureau in Xining is also very busy, and all workshops are running at full capacity, producing rifles and bullets at full capacity!

On 26 November, Wang Anping sent back another message: The main force of the thieves had broken through the Carriage Gorge on 20 November and broke through to Henan, Shaanxi, Shanxi, and other places.

The content of this message sent back by Wang Anping is very brief, and the details are not known for the time being, such as whether they will use the strategy of deception again, whether the army of the imperial court will continue to chase and kill, and how Chongzhen will react if he knows about it, and so on.

For Li Zicheng, the main force of the thieves broke through the carriage gorge, which was enough for the time being, as long as these wandering thieves were not destroyed, the imperial court would be blindfolded by them for the time being, and directly ignore the Heavenly Mandate Army.

However, a few days later, Wang Anping sent back a message: the thieves were surrounded in the narrow carriage gorge that day, and took the initiative to ask to surrender to Chen Qiyu, but Chen Qiyu did not allow it, so they spent a lot of money to bribe Wang Pu, the chief soldier of the Beijing camp next to Chen Qiyu, Chen Qiyu did not resist the pressure, so he accepted the surrender of the thieves.

After Chongzhen learned of the situation, he immediately dismissed Chen Qiyu, the governor of the five provinces, and returned to Beijing in Jinyiwei.

Li Zicheng narrowed his eyes, Chen Qiyu was dismissed and arrested, he didn't care very much, if Chen Qiyu was gone, there would be a Zhang Qiyu, as long as the thieves were not destroyed, the court would definitely not give up!

But history did not turn a corner here, Gao Yingxiang and Zhang Xianzhong still escaped from the carriage gorge safely!

Li Zicheng picked up the message again and read it word by word, and his heart didn't move, the thief left the carriage gorge and fled to Henan, Shaanxi, Shanxi, half of the north of the Ming Dynasty, and the miasma was about to be filled again.

Not only the imperial court, but even the governor of the three sides, Hong Chengchou, I am afraid that he will not be able to deal with himself for a while and a half, and the agreement between him and the Heavenly Mandate Army may have to be maintained for a while.

The thieves escaped, buying a valuable time for the training of the Providence recruits.

……………………………………………………………………

For a few days, it was all cloudy wind roaring, and the dead branches and leaves were flying all over the sky, obviously showing signs of snow, but there was always no snow, Li Zicheng frowned, if there was no heavy snow to leave the moisture in the air, tomorrow's food would ...... The Mandate of Heaven Army has greatly expanded its army this year, relying on sufficient food, and if the grain is received next year......

"Destiny Khan ......" Namu Zhong draped a large one on Li Zicheng's body, and then stood beside him, watching the dark sky at the door.

"Namu Zhong, let's go back to the back room, it's ......cold outside" Li Zicheng put on his coat and grabbed Namu Zhong's waist with one hand.

"Heavenly Mandate Khan, it's still early ......" Namu Zhong glanced at Li Zicheng, and bit his silver teeth lightly, Heavenly Mandate Khan is good at anything, it's just ...... I want it in the daylight, and it's even more ...... than the Mongols If you let the other sisters know, won't you say that you are deliberately seducing him?

Li Zicheng smiled, and sure enough, he said: "Namu Zhong, anyway, it's cold, and there is no official business during the day, let's go to the kang to warm up!" ”

When he woke up, the sky was already bright, and he could see a silvery world from the window, Li Zicheng was overjoyed and turned over, "Namu Zhong, it snowed last night?" ”

"Hmm!" Namu Zhong nodded slightly, she had already woken up, worried about waking up Li Zicheng, and she didn't get up.

"Namu Zhong, let's get up and take a look!" Li Zicheng couldn't help but say, lifted the quilt, didn't need Namu Zhong to serve, hurriedly put on his clothes and pants, and made Namu Zhong roll his eyes.

The two of them cleaned up neatly, didn't wash, and opened the door directly, Li Feng was already rolling on the snow, and her mother Sun Mengjie shouted while chasing: "Feng'er, come back quickly, if you get wet again, you won't have to change your clothes......"

"Jie'er is saying that Feng'er's clothes are not enough?" Li Zicheng took Namu Zhong's little hand and appeared outside the door.

"Sir!" Sun Mengjie put down Li Feng and was about to come over to salute, but was pulled by Li Zicheng, "This is at home, how can there be so much etiquette?" ”

Li Zicheng hugged left and right, held Namu Zhong and Sun Mengjie in his arms, watched Li Feng staggering on the snow alone, and said with a smile: "Jie'er, don't be angry, Feng'er knows my mind best!" ”

"That's what the gentleman said, that snowfall brings fresh water?" Sun Mengjie obediently leaned on Li Zicheng's arms, her little face was flushed, and she had obviously been out for a long time.

"Yes, the snow last night was really not small, so much precipitation is enough to water next year's crops!"

Namu Zhong smiled: "It's still goose feathers and heavy snow, and it doesn't look like it's going to stop at all......"

"A little more is better," Li Zicheng said: "Lanzhou is short of water, the heavier the snow, the more rain will be left!" ”

At this time, Xiao Li Feng fell on the snow and cried unconsciously.

Li Zicheng pointed at Li Feng's head with his finger, "I cried with such a little frustration, and I didn't ......have the demeanor of a father at all."

Sun Mengjie got out of Li Zicheng's arms, grabbed Li Feng up, and said softly: "It's cold outside, Feng'er should go home first...... May! ”

As soon as Li Feng heard this, he stopped doing it, and grinned again, "Feng'er won't go back......"

Li Zicheng laughed, "That's right, yes, like his father!" ”

Sun Meng glanced at Li Zicheng and said angrily: "Feng'er is still young, if you catch a cold...... she hugged Li Feng back.

Li Zicheng was still waiting to see the snow scene with Namu Zhong, and he didn't want a personal soldier to run over from the front, and when he saw Li Zicheng, he hurriedly bowed and said: "I've seen the Metropolitan Governor, I've seen the second lady!" ”

"Get up, what's the matter?"

"A message from the Han Qing Bureau," the soldier said, "The Governor of the Metropolitan asked his subordinates to pay close attention to the thieves' information, and his subordinates got the information and rushed over immediately......"

"You did a good job," Li Zicheng let go of Namu Zhong and took the message, there were two messages, both of which were very brief, obviously passed on by the flying pigeon.

On the first message, Wang Anping told Li Zicheng that one of the main forces of thieves, Gao Yingxiang, rushed to Henan and was chased and killed by Zuo Liangyu, and there was Cao Wenzhao in Shanxi, so they had to turn back and go to Huguang, and now they have arrived in Yunyang.

On another piece of information, it was Zhang Xianzhong: Another branch of the main force of thieves, Zhang Xianzhong's department, first rushed to Shaanxi, was beaten by the new governor of the five provinces, Hong Chengchou, and turned around and went to Sichuan.

Li Zicheng thought silently, Gao Yingxiang went to Huguang, he didn't know what was going on, but Hong Chengchou took over from Chen Qiyu and served as the governor of the five provinces, his task of suppressing bandits was heavier, and he might have to put down the Heavenly Mandate Army for the time being.

Also, since Zuo Liangyu defeated the thieves and watched the thieves go to Huguang, why didn't he chase after him? Just kick the thieves out of their own territory and you're done? Could it be that the armies of the provinces of the imperial court are all fighting on their own?

Such a major issue naturally cannot be judged in terms of a single battle, but for the Heavenly Mandate Army, it is a good thing after all.

But Zhang Xianzhong went to Sichuan, which made him a little uneasy, Sichuan is the place where he has long been preparing to go on the expedition, if he is beaten to pieces by Zhang Xianzhong, will he have to clean up the mess again?

However, there must be someone who is more anxious than him, thieves are rampant in Huguang and Sichuan, and the south of the Ming Dynasty is also going to be a miasma, can Chongzhen sleep?

Thinking of this, Li Zicheng smiled and said, "Namu Zhong, tell Lian'er, buy more meat, and have a good year this year!" Looking at Namu Zhong's hesitant appearance, he added: "This is the first time Namu Zhong has been with me for Xinyuan, and he must not be cold." ”