Chapter 142: Preparations for Battle

When the prince heard Zhang Zhimu say that it was a lot of silver, he said: "No, I asked the four of them, and the total amount of silver is five million taels, and there are tens of thousands of taels of gold." There are also countless antiques, calligraphy, paintings, treasures, jewelry. It's a shame I didn't get this large sum. ”

Zhang Zhimu said: "It's a pity, I didn't know at the time, I only knew that they had a caravan out of the city before closing the city gate." Now the snow has long buried the traces of the car, and it is difficult to find it when you go out to find it. The four of them should still have something at home. ”

Wang Gonggong said: "This Fan Yongdou really made you surrender, and led the people to find out all the things worth a little silver in the house." It is estimated that it can be worth two or three hundred thousand taels of silver, but it is still too little. I have promised him that on the way back to the capital, I will take good care of them. Did you really give them a few steel-spring carriages? ”

Zhang Zhimu said: "The car is for them to ride, and when they finish sitting, the prince will sell them for scrap iron." ”

The prince laughed and asked again: "Zhang Dongjia, there is no one now." Let me ask you, you got so many people, aren't you afraid of stabbing your hands? Of course Zhang Zhimu knew that the prince was talking about the descendants of Fan Yongdou and the four of them. Zhang Zhimu said: "Children are not guilty, and they are responsible for the sins committed by their parents." One day when I see the emperor, I will say the same. ”

Wang Gonggong said: "By the way, the emperor has sent a letter, saying that the Qing army has entered the customs from Huangyakou again, and let me hurry up and return to Beijing after handling the affairs here." ”

Zhang Zhimu was actually about to talk about this, and said, "Can the prince help me get 5,000 catties." I want to go south to meet these Qing troops, if we wait for our Ming army masters, I don't know what the people have become by them. ”

The prince was taken aback when he heard this, and asked, "Just with two or three thousand of you, you are going to meet the Qing army?" ”

Zhang Zhimu said: "Of course I won't fight with them, I'll entangle them." Wait for the Ming army to assemble, and then deal with them. ”

Wang Gonggong said: "No problem, I'll figure it out." When are you going to go south? ”

"I want to set off in seven days, and in the name of returning to Yaogang, I quietly turned south halfway." Zhang Zhimu said.

The prince said: "Okay, I will also return to Beijing as soon as possible, and then ask the emperor to fight, and strive to go with you to touch these Manchu miscellaneous pieces." Don't worry, I have more than 2,000 elite brocade guards, and I can definitely do it. ”

Zhang Zhimu said: "It seems that our fate is not shallow, and it is possible to fight side by side with the prince this time." ”

The prince said: "It's a pleasure to be with you, but you have to take advantage of the things that show your face." This time I have the opportunity to let you see my kung fu and save some face for myself. ”

Zhang Zhimu said: "Okay, then use the head of the Qing army to try the knife." ”

On the way back to the inn with Chen Yufeng, Zhang Zhimu said: "Uncle Chen is a good opportunity now, we will meet the Qing army when we go south, these Qing troops now think that they are invincible in the world, and they will not think that anyone dares to provoke them." We took advantage of their unpreparedness and stabbed them. ”

Chen Yufeng said: "Strike while the iron is hot, or train the soldiers, if these soldiers don't die this time, they will all be the material of the officers when they go back." It's that we don't have enough firearms. ”

Zhang Zhimu said: "Yesterday, I asked Mr. Lu to find a blacksmith shop to order the shells of 3,000 crossbow mines, and the prince promised me to help get 5,000 catties**, and we still have 2,000 catties of ** given by General Jiang Bing." Although those ** made some rockets last time, they haven't been used yet. ”

Chen Yufeng said: "Those crossbow mines are all loaded with medicine, but I am not willing to use crossbow mines this time." There were enough musket bullets for a while. ”

Back at the inn, several heads of the kiln gang were waiting for them in Zhang Zhimu's room. Zhang Zhimu saw that everyone was there, so he said, "Since everyone is here, let's have a meeting." I just told Uncle Chen about one of my ideas, and now I am officially asking for your opinions. I have just learned that the Manchu army has crossed the Great Wall from the Yellow Cliff Pass and broken into the interior of our Ming Dynasty, and I would like to lead you to meet these Qing troops. Let's see if you have any opinions. ”

Lu Chengxiang said: "When is Mr. Zhang going to act?" We're a little prepared. ”

Zhang Zhimu said: "My idea is to start acting in seven days. In the name of returning to Yaogang, we moved with the caravan, and turned south on the way. Mr. Lu, will your business be finished in seven days? ”

Lu Chengxiang said: "No problem, we will prepare the things to go back in seven days." If you don't leave, you will have to do it for another 70 days. ”

Zhang Zhimu said: "This time, Mr. Lu will be in charge of the caravan, and I will leave you a hundred musketeers and two hundred infantry, and you will lead them back to Yaogang with the caravan." I think the safety on the road should be fine. No one dares to touch us yet. ”

Lu Chengxiang said: "Leave me fifty musketeers is enough, and then bring two hundred infantry, this is also a terrible caravan." You can bring as many people as you can. This time, there were hundreds of people in Zhangjiakou who walked with us. In fact, there are basically no problems along the way, why don't I follow you, get you food and grass, and send someone to bring the caravan back. ”

Zhang Zhimu said: "Mr. Lu should go back to Yaogang as soon as possible, I can rest assured that you are at home." There are a lot of things for you to go back this time, so many people, horses, whether there is enough feed, whether people live or not, you have to go back to help worry about it. ”

Mr. Lu said, "Okay, let's split up. You guys need to be well prepared, I've already arranged for a few blacksmith shops to start making the crossbow shell, and it will be done in a few days. ”

Ouyang He said: "Can you ask for a map from the garrison, so that we can have a direction for our march." ”

Zhang Zhimu said: "Tomorrow, I will ask the garrison Li Qing to see if I can get a map." If not, he has a map, so let's draw one. ”

Li Zhi said: "The two intelligence stations have been searched, and there is not much oil and water. I have already handed over the house to Mr. Lu. We should first send someone to take their liaison offices in Datong and Kill Hukou, so as not to have too many dreams at night and let them run away. ”

Zhang Zhimu said: "These things are no longer important, let's hand over the people and intelligence to General Jiang in Datong, and let him send someone to deal with this matter." Your intelligence department is following us. In the past few days, we must try to gather as much information as possible about the southward journey. I am ready to let Li Jing lead people to take the first step to fight the front station, so that our brigade will not blindly advance. It is estimated that Meng Si'er and they have already been in place for a long time, and they may be able to provide some useful information. Li Jing: You can also contact them when they go out. ”

Chen Yufeng said: "Let Li Wei's people do it themselves, they are familiar with these things." It's a pity that there is no fierce fire oil here, otherwise..."

Lu Chengxiang said: "There is fierce fire oil, we got a lot of it from the Mongolian soldiers last time." ”

Chen Yufeng said: "That's going to be great. We can also make a little more oil mines, which are more useful than explosive mines. ”

Zhang Zhimu said: "I think we used the best way to deal with the Mongolian cavalry last time, and we can tie more **bags and make more ***, which will be convenient to use when the time comes." ”

Ouyang Hua said: "Our attack this time is to take advantage of our small number of people and the fact that we are not discovered by the enemy. He said that the car tent we brought this time must be small, and it is best to have two horses per person and travel lightly. The tent is enough to warm up at night, and everyone is equipped with leather clothes and pants to avoid frostbite. In addition, you should also learn from the Mongolian soldiers and bring more dried meat, so that you can last a few days without food, and eat this thing to fight hunger. ”

Lu Chengxiang said: "One person and two horses, you have to buy some horses." The horses we captured were almost all back to the kiln. ”

"I'll see the garrison Li Qing tomorrow and talk to him about this. Let's see if you can buy a horse that will be ready to use right away. Zhang Zhimu said.

Early the next morning, Zhang Zhimu came to the garrison yamen and saw that Li Qing was the only one here.

Zhang Zhimu said: "I'll look for you this time." There are two things in total. Yesterday I heard the prince say that it is still a secret decree, and tens of thousands of Qing troops have broken through from the Yellow Cliff Pass into the pass, and I want to meet these Qing troops. First, I want to ask for a map from you, otherwise we will not be able to march with a black eye, let alone a war; Second, I want to buy some horses, because we want to travel lightly and carry less tents, so that we need at least two horses each, and I wonder if we can buy a horse that can be used right away? ”

After hearing Zhang Zhimu say that he was going to meet the Qing army, Li Qing was stunned for a moment and said, "Since Zhang Dongjia is so righteous, I will do my best to help you." I'll give you two copies of the map, one large one that you can hang up at the garrison, and one smaller one that you can look at while marching. War horses? I can transfer horses from my cavalry to you, and you can buy new horses for me, and I will say that I want to change the horses, and let my cavalry train again, and it won't take much time for them to train horses. How many horses do you think you're going to use? ”

Zhang Zhimu said, "I want 4,000 horses, and I will send you the silver in the afternoon." It will also be done according to the method of Wang Shichang and me. ”

Li Qing hurriedly said: "It's not necessary here, Zhang Dongjia." We are friends now, and I will never ask for your silver. ”

Zhang Zhimu said: "I just said that we are friends, you are not kind. Be polite to me, since we are all friends of Wang Shichang, we are not outsiders. After you return to Beijing, you will take advantage of these few merits to go back and spend some money to get a good errand, maybe I will have something to find you in the future. ”

In fact, Li Qing is going back to Beijing, he needs to get some silver before leaving, originally after reading Wang Shichang's letter, he thought that he could get some silver from Zhang Zhimu now. But as things continued to develop, he found that this Zhang Zhimu was not the person Wang Shichang said at all, he was definitely a man with hands and eyes. Even the emperor gave him face, and his small garrison was not in the eyes of this person at all. So he had already dispelled the idea of getting some silver from Zhang Zhimu, and this time Zhang Zhimu gave him silver, he didn't dare to ask for it.

But when Zhang Zhimu came over in the afternoon, he still gave him two taels of silver for each horse as promised. This time, he should have been given a total of 8,000 taels of silver, and Zhang Zhimu exchanged it for 800 taels of gold and brought it in several wooden boxes.

This time, the horses selected by Zhang Zhimu were all medium horses, fifteen taels of silver for each horse, and a total of 60,000 taels of silver for buying horses. Li Qing was very happy at this time, the court urged to ask for silver every day, but no one bought it and immediately went to get the silver. This time, when he left, he helped the court get another sum of silver, and the court was also happy, and he also made a sum this time, can he not be happy!

Zhang Zhimu took people to directly pull all the silver to the garrison yamen at one time, and just went through the formalities such as horse introduction. Zhang Zhimu said: "I will put all the money here, and I will come to you tomorrow and go directly to Lama." I don't care what you do with the new horse. ”

Li Qing said: "Okay, tomorrow I will personally bring someone to accompany you to pull the horse, and I will send someone to rush over to the new horse." ”

Before Zhang Zhimu left, Li Qing ordered someone to carry a big bag. Garrison Li Qing said: "This is the map, one large and one small. This is specially made by the imperial court, and there are not many people assigned to each garrison yamen. ”

Zhang Zhimu didn't expect everything to go surprisingly smoothly. Taking advantage of the fact that the city gate was not closed, Zhang Zhimu, Chen Yufeng, and Ouyang He and Li Jing went out of the city together, and came to Liu Yun's residence, Zhang Zhimu first went to see the soldiers who participated in the battle. These soldiers are now highly motivated by the fact that they have been winning battles. Zhang Zhimu talked to them about these battles, and they were all very interested and had a deep understanding of the battlefield. Zhang Zhimu was very happy about this. One of them proudly said to Zhang Zhimu: "As long as we have sufficient ammunition and adopt cooperative tactics, we are absolutely sure that we will be one to ten." ”

Zhang Zhimu said: "It is true that the combat effectiveness is coordinated. If you can't handle a few people with a musket alone. But if you work in groups of three, you can deal with thirty people. That's where tactics come in. In this way, Zhang Zhimu went around the whole circle, and Zhang Zhimu was also very happy to see everyone's high morale.

After watching the soldiers, Zhang Zhimu called the cadres together and held a meeting. First of all, Zhang Zhimu spoke highly of this battle, and then told everyone about the decision to prepare to go south to meet the Qing army. Zhang Zhimu asked Liu Yun strangely: "I said, why didn't you react to this matter?" ”

Liu Yun said: "What's the reaction, what you have decided, let's just fight." The Qing army didn't have two heads, and they also shot one eye. If we have a reaction to them with a musket, then we can go home and pick up the child. As soon as Liu Yun finished speaking, these military cadres burst out laughing.

Zhang Zhimu also followed suit, saying: "It's good to have high morale, but don't underestimate the enemy." It is estimated that there were 100,000 Manchu troops entering the customs this time, but there were many puppet troops among them. There were no such men in the Manchu Qing Dynasty. ”

Li Wei asked: "What is a puppet army?" ”

Zhang Zhimu saw that he had missed his mouth, and hurriedly said: "Just those Han troops who surrendered to the Manchus and came back to fight for the Manchus." ”

Liu Chenghuang said: "These puppet soldiers are too hateful, and they will kill one after another in the future." ”

The other cadres also responded in unison, "Yes, see one and kill the other." ”

Zhang Zhimu said: "Actually, those junior soldiers don't have many crimes, in the army their generals surrendered, and they dared not obey orders." In the future, as long as there is no crime of killing a good person, it will also be treated differently. There is no forgiveness for those who aid the abuse. ”

Zhang Zhimu spread out the small map, found the Huangyakou more than 30 miles north of Jixian County, and said to everyone with his finger: "The Qing army entered the customs from this division of troops, defeated the Ming army, made peace in Jixian County, and occupied Jixian County." These beasts were inferior to the Manchu Qing Dynasty, killing countless people, and destroying all the houses they passed. They are not yet capable of entering the Ming Dynasty, and this time they are mainly looting people. The coach of their team is Nurhachi's seventh son, named Abatai. This person is brave and good at fighting, and has made great contributions in many wars against the Ming Dynasty. ”

When Zhang Zhimu said this, these cadres put away their smiling faces and listened carefully to Zhang Zhimu's explanation. Seeing that everyone was very serious, Zhang Zhimu continued: "We don't want to fight with them this time. If we fight hard, they will have more than 100,000 people, squatting there for us to cut, and they will also tire us to death. This time, first, we were a strange army, and they were defenseless against us, and second, they did not understand us, so they would inevitably underestimate the enemy, thinking that we were the same as the Ming army, and even because we were not regular troops, they were inferior to the Ming army. So as long as we find the right opportunity to make a move, it is best to give him a vicious tiger to dig out his heart, directly hit his command center, and get rid of this Abatai, and their army is in chaos. For the rest, we can defeat them individually. ”

Ouyang He looked at the map and said, "We should follow the official road, go straight to the direction of Beijing, and then go directly south, to the direction of Tianjin Wei." At this time, where the Qing army arrived, we decided the direction on the spot. ”

Zhang Zhimu said: "My idea is that Li Jing's special forces will act three or four days in advance and stand in front. They are specially equipped, and they can spend the night in the field without bringing a tent, and one person can ride in pairs. Just send the information back at any time. If something happens, we will be prepared later. ”

Li Wei said: "We don't have many crossbow mines. ”

Zhang Zhimu said: "Just about to talk about this, Mr. Lu has brought over the crossbow thunder shell in the past few days, and your crossbow thunder men are responsible for charging *** mines." In addition, we also captured a lot of oil oil from the Mongolian army last time, and made another batch of oil mines. I think that sometimes the fire oil mine, the effect of attacking the camp and setting fire is better than the explosion mine. ”

Li Wei said: "That's good, our crossbow mines have not been used for the past few times." ”

This meeting was also attended by the heads of the newly formed cavalry and infantry, who had never attended a meeting of this rank since they were all junior officers before. This was the first time to participate, and they didn't speak all the time. But in the end, they couldn't help it, the captain of the cavalry team was also with Liu Chenghuang, and they were summoned by Chen Yufeng from Lingshui Wharf, he said: "Mr. Zhang, give us a little task this time, almost all the tasks last time were covered by the musketeers, and it was not our turn to do anything, so if it goes on, my soldiers are not easy to bring." Seeing others receiving awards for meritorious service, my soldiers jumped in a hurry. Behind the scenes, we are all said to be incompetent as officials. ”

When Zhang Zhimu heard this, he laughed with everyone for a while, and said, "This time, no one can be idle." We are facing more than 100,000 Qing troops, and there will be no idle soldiers. ”

After the meeting was over, Chen Yufeng and Ouyang He hung up the big map again and carefully studied the terrain everywhere. Chen Yufeng is very familiar with the terrain near Beijing, and he used to move there a lot when he used to dart. But I haven't been here further north, so fortunately, there shouldn't be any major problems in this section. Ouyang He is more concerned about where there can be a suitable place to set up an ambush, and now he attaches great importance to the use of **, because this thing is used well, and it is too problematic.

Zhang Zhimu and Chen Yufeng discussed: "Mr. Lu said that it is okay to give him 50 musketeers and 200 infantry to return to the kiln gang, I think it is a bit less, right?" ”

"Along the way, there are no bandits who dare to touch us, these people are just helping Lao Ludian. The convoy and camel team that went back this time were indispensable, and these people were enough. If there weren't such a large caravan, these people wouldn't have been able to use it. Chen Yufeng said.

Listening to them, Ouyang He came over and interjected: "We still have two hundred steel spring carriages left, and you have to give ten to the prince, and we will take forty to the south, and Lao Lu's caravan will use one hundred and fifty, and the rest will have to use ordinary carriages and camels to transport goods." ”

Zhang Zhimu said: "It seems that this is the only way. ”

The prince made a confession for three days in a row, counted the fines and confiscated property, and finally completed it. That night, Zhang Zhimu had a meal of wine with Wang Gonggong and Garrison Li Qing, and the wine was almost drunk, and Wang Gonggong said: "I'll leave tomorrow, I've been getting along with you two very happily these days, and I'm really a little reluctant." ”

Zhang Zhimu was already very familiar with these two, and said, "Come on, don't make it sour." Didn't you say that you should go back and ask the emperor for orders to go on the expedition with me? ”

The prince said: "That's right, I went back to pay the errand, so I asked the emperor for his life." ”

Li Qing didn't say much, but when he said something, Wang Gonggong agreed very much, he said: "I have never heard of a businessman like Zhang Dongjia, it is simply too benevolent." The carriages he sent were all laid out in a circle with mats made of ura straw, and they were also laid with leathers, saying that they were for the prisoners' daughters. It made them almost as if they were going to get married. ”

Wang Gonggong said: "Yes, Zhang Dongjia is so benevolent and righteous, it is too rare. But we're in trouble, before we go to the city, I have to get them out of the car and tie them up, otherwise if we enter the city like this, I'll be the one who ties them up first. ”

Zhang Zhimu said: "Actually, their families are innocent, except for Fan Yongdou and a few businessmen, their families don't know. Whatever fault they have, they are all implicated. If you can make them suffer less, let them suffer less. ”

Wang Gonggong said: "Zhang Dongjia, you are too good, you will suffer in the shopping mall in the future." ”

Zhang Zhimu said: "Okay, don't talk about it. My ten carriages, how about letting the prince go around the capital if he is fine? ”

When the prince heard the joy of Gaga, he said, "Alas, I know what a merchant is." Zhang Dongjia is a lot of things. Do you want to sell your carriage in the capital? ”

Li Qing also coaxed and said: "Prince, you can't do this for him in the capital in vain." ”

Zhang Zhimu said: "Of course, it can't be done in vain. Then, he shouted to the door, "Bring something here." Li Jing brought in something wrapped in red silk from outside. Zhang Zhimu took it, handed it to Wang Gonggong and said, "Open it and take a look." ”

The prince muttered, "What baby? He opened the silk and was shocked when he saw an old face in the mirror from the mirror. He screamed strangely and said, "Oh, Zhang Dongjia, you want to kill me with this treasure." ”

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By the way, I recommend "Memories of the Southern Song Dynasty", similar to this article, it is also a "technology flow" through the novel, but it takes place in the Southern Song Dynasty, Yashan, Anti-Yuan, Restoration, and European World Wars.