Ji Qingwen's strategy of delaying time failed, and seeing that he only had ten soldiers under him, facing an opponent ten times his size, he was inevitably a little nervous, and hurriedly ordered: "Hurry, hurry, quickly knock down these people in front of me!" ”

His order was not clear, so Meng Hong immediately asked, "My lord, do you want us to shoot them down with muskets?" Or draw a knife and hack them to death? ”

Ji Qingwen didn't think about it, and said: "Nonsense, they are so far away from us, of course they hit with muskets!" ”

Meng Hong and the other nine soldiers received the order and immediately loaded their ammunition, and there was a burst of gunfire "bang, bang, bang", and seven or eight of Li Zicheng's men were immediately knocked down by muskets, and the team that was originally arranged as neatly as a brick wall was suddenly punched out of several ugly gaps.

These civilians had never seen the power of muskets, and they were immediately stopped by this burst of muskets, and they stood in place at a loss.

After all, Li Zicheng had been a post station servant for a few days, and his knowledge was much more profound than that of ordinary peasants, and he was much richer than those who read dead books.

He had heard of the musket from merchants and bureaucrats from the north and south, and knew that the musket had a long range, great power, and high accuracy, and that the few disadvantages were that it could not be used in rainy days, that is, the rate of fire was too slow. Therefore, in the face of the attack of muskets, only if you are not afraid of sacrifice and rush forward to engage the opponent in close combat can you have a chance of victory, otherwise you can only be killed by the bullets fired one by one.

Therefore, Li Zicheng hurriedly ordered: "Don't panic, don't be cowardly, rush forward in one go, and kill all these eagles and dogs in the court!" ”

Li Zicheng was quite prestigious in this group of people's army, and when he yelled like this, the courage of the hundred or so big men who had been frightened suddenly returned to the shell, and without saying a word, they gritted their teeth and rushed towards Ji Qingwen and them.

This time it was Ji Qingwen's turn to panic.

Although these regimental training under him are well-equipped and well-trained, after all, the number of people is only one-tenth of the opponent's, and if the opponent fights hand-to-hand combat, he will face the dilemma of being ten with one.

So now there are only two ways left in front of Ji Qingwen: the first way is to continue to shoot at Li Zicheng's subordinates, and strive to defeat them before he gets close to him; The second road is much simpler than the first, just two words: "escape"!

As Ji Qingwen, who traveled to the end of the Ming Dynasty and just wanted to be a wealthy man in peace, these two paths were not difficult to choose—I saw that his soldiers fired a volley at the opponent in front of him, and after stopping them slightly, he stepped on his horse, turned his horse's head and retreated quickly to the east.

No matter how fast the people's army under Li Zicheng ran, they only had two legs, how could they outrun a four-legged horse, and they could only watch Ji Qingwen and them run farther and farther, disappearing into a cloud of yellow and reddish smoke raised by the horse's hooves.

Ji Qingwen and they didn't run for long, and they met Chen Wenzhao and Zhu Cunshu who followed closely.

Zhu Cunshu saw that Ji Qingwen was running away with a disgraced face, and he didn't feel a little funny, so he asked: "Brother Ji, you went out to run errands alone, and came back alone, and you didn't miss one thing on your body, but you brought one more thing back......

Ji Qingwen hurriedly asked, "What is it?" ”

"A little more embarrassed!" After Zhu Cunshu finished speaking, he laughed out loud.

However, his joke was too cold, except for him who was amused by himself, none of the rest of the people were laughing with calm faces, which made Zhu Cunshu feel embarrassed after laughing a few times, so he could only put away his smile.

But Chen Wenzhao coughed dryly and asked, "My lord, how is the enemy situation ahead?" Was it discovered by the enemy army, which is why they retreated so hastily? ”

Ji Qingwen nodded: "That's right, it was discovered by the opponent." But it's not a big deal, there are only about 100 elite soldiers on the other side, and the 'breaking general' Li Zicheng has been injured by Meng Hong with a gun! Now is the opportune time to take advantage of the encirclement and suppression. ”

After a conversation with Gao Yingxiang just now, Ji Qingwen has learned that Li Zicheng is now known as "Chuang General", not "Chuang King" in his memory.

As soon as Ji Qingwen's voice fell, Li Yuanyin beside him also said: "As Lord Ji said, there are only about a hundred or so people who can be used by the anti-thieves, and there is no decent equipment in his hands. ”

Chen Wenzhao had also led the army to deal with peasant uprisings in the past, and knew that although the people's army was outnumbered, its combat effectiveness was very weak.

Therefore, in the face of today's situation, he is not afraid of how strong the combat effectiveness of the people's army can be, but he is worried that these brothers under his command will be the first time to go into battle, and they will inevitably be a little timid in the face of a crowd of opponents.

However, Chen Wenzhao listened to the military report brought by Ji Qingwen and Li Yuanyin, saying that the main force of the people's army was only more than 100 people, and a stone hanging in his heart suddenly fell to the ground, so he discussed with Ji Qingwen, "My lord, since the number of opponents is not large, why don't we send out the whole army and annihilate them all?" ”

This remark is exactly what Ji Qingwen wanted: "It's okay, that is, we have to move quickly, and we can't let Li Zicheng and Gao Yingxiang run away." It's not as good as this, our army's actions are much faster than the guards of the Qin Palace, it's better for our army to take the first step, and the Qin prince will lead the army to keep up quickly, how about it? ”

His suggestion was unanimously agreed by Zhu Cunshu and Chen Wenzhao.

So Chen Wenzhao ordered the two hundred regiments to dismount, complete the equipment, line up the team, and take out some dry food and water to quickly replenish it, then took the lead, walked at the front of the team, and led the brothers to stride in the direction of Li Zicheng, the county seat of Yuzhong.

This Chen Wenzhao is very arrogant, and even Ji Qingwen, as a benefactor, often contradicts him. Therefore, he is not pleasing in the hearts of everyone, and even Ji Qingwen is sometimes angry when he looks at him.

However, today, seeing Chen Wenzhao commanding the team to act in such an orderly manner, so neatly, and so cautiously and thoughtfully, the resentment that Ji Qingwen had accumulated on him suddenly disappeared, and he immediately dismounted and chased after him.

…………

Over there, Li Zicheng saw that Ji Qingwen had not yet fought with him, so he retreated, as if he was setting up a suspicious formation, perhaps setting up an ambush and wanting to lead him into the cave, so he quickly ordered his more than 100 brothers to pack up the dead and wounded companions, and not to pursue the officers and soldiers for the time being.

But Gao Yingxiang felt that this was an excellent opportunity to capture the minister of the Qincha, and he couldn't easily slip away from his hands, so he immediately rejected Li Zicheng's order and personally led the army to pursue in the direction of Ji Qingwen's escape.

At this time, Li Zicheng was still a member of Gao Yingxiang's "Chuang Wang", although he felt that his uncle's order was too hasty, he still decided to follow his orders, endured the pain from the injured shoulder, and reluctantly followed Gao Yingxiang to act together.

Sure enough, Gao Yingxiang rushed to lead his soldiers to pursue a distance of only two or three hundred paces, and saw that a group of people and horses on the opposite side were also advancing towards him at a rapid pace.

Gao Yingxiang read books for a few years when he was a child, although he didn't read anything famous, but he pronounced a pair of eyes as short-sighted, and he couldn't see clearly what kind of people were coming in front of him, and how many people were there?

However, Li Zicheng's yellow and clear eyes had excellent eyesight, and after taking a look, he said to Gao Yingxiang: "Uncle, we have been tricked, the people and horses who came over there are neatly dressed, and it seems that they are the soldiers and horses of the imperial court, and the number is about two hundred, which is twice as many as us!" In my opinion, why don't we retreat to Yuzhong County first, meet with the team of the 'Eight Great Kings', and then discuss how to deal with this group of officers and soldiers? ”

After chasing for a few steps, he retreated back in fear of the enemy, and had to ask the "eight kings" to fight together.

When Gao Yingxiang thought of this, his face suddenly felt a little unbearable, and he gritted his teeth and said, "What are you afraid of the officers and soldiers doing?" The officers and soldiers are all some bad breeds who bully the weak and are afraid of the hard, when did we fight the officers and the army with less to win more? ”

Li Zicheng hurriedly persuaded: "I see that this group of officers and soldiers seems to be very elite, very different from those I encountered before, I'm afraid it will be difficult to deal with." Uncle, you are a person who wants to achieve great things, but you can't be angry for a while and hurt your life! ”

"What? What did you say? At the moment of the great enemy, you actually said such unlucky words! Gao Yingxiang put on the posture of "King Chuang" and "uncle", and counted Li Zicheng, the "general" and "nephew".

Li Zicheng heard this, although he was dissatisfied, he knew that now was definitely not the time for internal strife and quarrel, so he had to reluctantly admit that he was quick and had no malice, and helped Gao Yingxiang to straighten out the team, but secretly prepared to retreat.