How else can you choose this?

Anyway, these ministers are very clear that at this time, no one can save them except Yang Qing, the three armies of the Beijing camp, Huang Fei's department, and Cao Youyi's department, these three armies add up to 140,000 horses, all of them only listen to Yang Qing, and this is all the army that the Ming Dynasty can really fight.

If there was anyone in the Ming court who could stop Li Zicheng's army at this time, then there was really no one else but them.

Agree.

Can only agree.

But you can't just agree, you have to sign and draw.

Under the auspices of the prison and the empress dowager, a document called the provisional covenant was drafted by Shi Kefa in the court, and then the various Shangshu and Yang Qing jointly signed, and then the jade seal was stamped and became the equivalent of the holy decree of the prison state religion.

According to this document, the Governor's Office of the Five Armies was changed to the Metropolitan Governor's Office, and the superintendent of the country was also the Metropolitan Governor.

Then Jianguo directly appointed five chiefs, the first to appoint was of course the chief of staff, this chief of staff Yang Qing was in charge, and then the chief of staff was responsible for mobilizing all the troops of the Ming court to block Li Zicheng's army. As for the other commanders, after all, there are no other suitable candidates in Nanjing, and this kind of distribution of interests cannot be left out of Huang Degong and others.

Similarly, after the war, a new cabinet should be formed, the system of the guard should be changed, the General Taxation Department should be established, and the Ming Imperial Bank should be established, in short, the top priority is to resist Li Zicheng, anyway, the military power was handed over to Yang Qing, and those civilian officials did not have the courage to repent, this kind of trivial matter does not need to be too careful, and Yang Qing, who has military power, will not worry about a few civilian officials repenting.

As for possible local revolts......

That will be suppressed when the time comes.

After the exchange of interests was determined, Gong Dingyu and Du Zhizhi were recalled, and Shi Kefa, the first assistant of the cabinet, once again explicitly rejected the holy decree to receive them on the grounds of the edict, and at the same time reiterated the content of the edict that Li Zicheng and his subordinates were not allowed to set foot in Huainan, and asked them to immediately go back to report to Li Zicheng to stop the attack on the towns in Huainan and withdraw all the armies south of the demarcation line to Huaibei.

"Marquis Zhongyong, you are sure that you are going to resist the decree!"

Gong Dingyu said proudly.

"How can the holy decree without the jade seal be used to resist the decree?"

Zhang Guowei said.

"Then you will hand over the jade seal."

Du Zhizhi said.

"The jade seal can only be handed over to Your Majesty, if Your Majesty is willing to return to Nanjing, I will lead the army north to meet Huai'an, and then hand it over to Your Majesty by the prison in the Nanjing Imperial Palace, but the King of Qin must stop at the Qinghe, and the troops under the Beijing Left-behind Division who cross Huai must withdraw to Huaibei."

Yang Qing said.

"Then King Qin can only clear the palace for His Majesty first! Loyal and brave marquis, everyone, I hope that the next time I see you, it will not be on the execution ground! ”

Gong Dingyu looked around and said.

Immediately afterwards, he and Du Zhizhi walked away with the holy decree that was not sent.

Everyone in the Wuying Hall was silently watching the backs of the two, and after struggling to support it for more than a year, this nightmare finally came, but even if they were used to it, they hadn't been peaceful for a few days in more than a year. When Chongzhen arrived in Nanjing, Huguang was still fighting, followed by Gao Yigong's south, and then Zuo Liangyu's rebellion, the calamitous Ming Dynasty was shaking in the wind and rain for a year, and now it is finally about to face the most violent impact, whether it is completely destroyed or Jedi survival depends on this battle.

"Guys, at least we have hope!"

Yang Qing said.

Those civil servants cheered up.

Almost at the same time, Han Zan rushed in at a trot, and shouted at Yang Qing without bothering to salute Princess Kunxing: "Marquis Zhongyong, Ma Shiying, the governor of Fengyang, is in a hurry, the defenders of Qingliu Pass surrendered without a fight, and Yuan Zong's first Qingliu Pass troops are in Chuzhou." ”

"Huh?!"

……

Chuzhou.

"These dog things!"

Ma Shiying stood at the head of the city, looking at the surging enemy troops outside the city with a sad and angry face.

These were his subordinates not long ago!

Behind him, in the city of Chuzhou, there was a complete doomsday panic, the refugees who poured into the city crowded into the streets and alleys, crying and shouting in the stagnant water after the rain and competing to board the small boats, a group of hastily mobilized soldiers ran through them on the stagnant water on the ground, and an official was leading the officials to evacuate the refugees.

"Overseer, this is your army of 50,000!"

Liu Zhaoji, who was dressed in armor, said sarcastically.

Ma Shiying let out a long sigh.

He had 80,000 under his command in Fengyang, and the bank of the Huai River collapsed in a battle, leaving 50,000 to retreat to Dingyuan and the Qingliu Pass behind, and the result collapsed again in the face of Yuan Zongdi's attack, and the last time in Sun Chengzong and others held on to Li Zicheng's defeat and retreat Qingliu Pass, because the defenders surrendered without a fight, broke overnight, and the 30,000 defenders there joined the Shun army together with those who surrendered before and became Yuan Zongdi's vanguard.

I have to say that this is really a tragedy.

This is also a tragedy for Nanjing.

Because the Qingliu Pass was opened, it also meant that Yang Qing's second line of defense was in danger.

Only Chuzhou City remains.

More importantly, Yuan Zongdi's cavalry was put into the salient of Jiangbei.

This apex of Xuyi serves as the protrusion of Nanjing's underwear, the east is the water network barrier with Yangzhou as the core, and the west is the mountainous area that stretches from Hefei to the northeast to Xuyi, and the nearest pass from Nanjing in this mountainous area is Qingliu Pass. The loss of Qingliu Pass means that the triangular protrusion has been opened, and Yuan Zongdi's 10,000 cavalry can attack Jiangbei at any time even if they can't open Chuzhou, and even if they can't open the Yangtze River, they can even attack Jiangbei at any time, and even attack the Yangtze River to create panic.

"All thieves, all thieves!"

Ma Shiying said hatefully.

Of course, he understands why his subordinates surrendered so simply, after all, these guys also want to follow Li Zicheng to wash Jiangnan in blood!

They were all refugees from the north.

These bastards were one of the main forces attacking Jiangyin in history.

Of course, it's useless to talk about that.

Ma Shiying stood on the city wall of Chuzhou and watched his former subordinates, killing him like a dragon and a tiger, and then they followed along the Guanma Avenue that led directly to Qingliu Pass, and the torrent of cavalry was surging, and even the cannons of Qingliu Pass and Fengyang Linhuai Pass were pushed out behind these cavalry, at least more than 70% of them were the siege army under him before, so they began to aim their cannons at him.

"Tiger Squat Cannon Ready!"

Liu Zhaoji held the binoculars and looked at the enemy artillery that was being pushed outside the city and said.

"Solid bullets?"

Zhuang Zigu, who was beside him, asked.

"Blossom bomb, this day is over!"

Liu Zhaoji gritted his teeth and said.

Under the city wall behind them, eighteen twenty-pound tiger squat cannons that looked like copper water tanks, or twenty-four-pounder mortar cannons, gradually raised their muzzles on the base of square thick oak, and then the artillerymen next to them carefully opened the wooden boxes one by one, took out spherical flowering shells from them, truncated the fuses according to the numbers shouted by the officers on the city wall, and loaded them into the fuse holes, and quickly loaded the cannonballs into the cannons that had been loaded with propellants, and the soldiers behind pierced the silk medicine bags in the medicine room.

"Put!"

Zhuang Zigu roared.

All the mortars erupted in flames.

Eighteen shells flew straight into the sky with the smoke trail of the fuse, instantly swept over their heads and continued to fly high into the air, flying four miles away, and then reached the apex of the trajectory and continued to drag the smoke trail down, but two of them exploded in the air before they could land, and the enemy troops who were pushing the cannon below were stunned, and they all raised their heads to look at the two fireworks in the sky.

The next moment another sixteen shells fell.

The cannonballs with fuses bounced up in the dirt splashes, exploded in the crowd, harvested the surrounding lives with the power of the explosion and scattered shrapnel, one of which exploded right next to a carriage loaded with gunpowder, and the power of the explosion overturned the carriage and detonated the gunpowder at the same time, dozens of people around were instantly blown away in the firelight, and a black pillar of smoke rose in the green like a magic dragon, and the enemy soldiers who were not blown up around were scattered in terror.

There was cheering on the city walls.

"Go on, blast their arrogance down first!"

Liu Zhaoji said.

He is not worried about the supply of ammunition, there is a water transport support behind Chuzhou, although the cavalry of the Shun army will attack the water transport line, but at this time, it is summer, and the water net here will wrap the horse's hooves.

However, he was short on troops.

One of his corps was stationed in two places, in fact, there were only three brigades in Chuzhou, and there was another brigade in Liuhe, he was originally the reserve of this triangular salient, which was to be blocked after any of the three points around him were broken through, and now he could only use three brigades of 15,000 men to meet nearly 100,000 enemy troops, including the surrendered Fengyang army.

And there are 20,000 main forces of the Shun army.

It's a daunting task.

At this time, a brocade-clothed guard rushed against the fleeing crowd, and then dismounted under the city and hurriedly rushed up the city wall to salute him and said: "General Liu, the superintendent of the state religion, Nanjing changed the capital of the five armies to the capital of the capital, the state of supervision is the governor of the capital, the loyal and brave marquis is the chief of staff of the capital governor, and all the armies in Jiangbei and Daming are directly under the jurisdiction of the capital and are transferred by the chief of staff. The chief of staff of the Marquis of Zhongyong ordered that the second army of the Beijing camp must defend Chuzhou to the death, and those who retreat will be beheaded, and there is a notice to all armies of the provisional covenant of the prison of the country, and Ma Shiying, the governor of Fengyang, will be dismissed and returned to Nanjing to be punished. ”

After speaking, he handed Liu Zhaoji the official document of the General Staff of the Metropolitan Governor's Mansion and the temporary covenant covered with a jade seal.

He said so much on purpose.

Several generals who were attracted by what he said put their heads next to Liu Zhaoji, who opened the provisional covenant with a puzzled look on his face, and consciously began to read the contents of it, and when he finished reading the composition of the cabinet, those generals had already shown surprise, and when he finished reading the reform of the Wei system, Zhuang Zigu slapped his companion on the shoulder......

"Madamn, we're finally getting through!"

He said excitedly.

Ma Shiying stood by with a gloomy face, looking at the smiles on the faces of these generals.

"Ma Gong, this is a private message from the Cabinet Department to you."

The brocade guard handed him a letter and said.

Ma Shiying took the letter, didn't read the contents, just shook his head with a wry smile, and then took the letter and walked down the city wall where cheers had already sounded.