Text Volume 3 The Road to Empire_Chapter 760 Overseas Turmoil II
The uprising of the brothers Nguyen Phu Binh and Nguyen Phu Kim in Shanxi Province soon attracted troops from nearby counties to suppress it, but after obtaining a large amount of supplies, the peasant rebel army that broke through the local large landlord Nguyen Clan Manor quickly recruited an army of several thousand people.
After repelling this official army, the rebel army led by the Ruan brothers suddenly became famous, and poor peasants from all over the country came to vote, and the rebel army grew to tens of thousands in almost ten days. The county magistrate of the local county was frightened, and hurriedly fled to the capital overnight to ask for help.
As a result, news of the Nguyen brothers' uprising began to spread from the local area to North and South Vietnam, and some poor people who had no food and clothing began to learn from the Nguyen brothers' uprising. Over the years, whether it is Beizheng or Nanruan, in order to repay the loans of the Ming State and strengthen their own armaments, the oppression of the people at the bottom has almost come to an end.
Although the ruling Ruan and Zheng families in both the north and the south knew that this kind of squeezing of the people's power would not last long, in order to maintain their family's status and survival, they could only do such a policy of drinking water to quench their thirst, and could not rest with the people.
Although the Ruan family in the south was in charge of Ruan Fu Lan, his brother Ruan Fu Yu and others also seized a place with the support of the Ming Dynasty and eyed the position of the lord of the country. The situation in the north was even worse, although he had previously defeated the Nguyen army in the south at the Battle of Thang Long Province and restored the situation of confrontation between the north and the south.
However, in order to make the Ming give up helping the Southern Nguyen to attack Thang Long Mansion, Zheng Jie not only acquiesced in the Ming Dynasty's move to include the Gao Ping Mo clan under his rule, but also signed many treaties with the Ming to sell domestic economic rights and interests, and borrowed a military fee from the Ming Dynasty with the North Vietnamese Customs as collateral.
The Yongxian Treaty signed by Zheng Jie and Daming soon aroused criticism from both the government and the opposition, believing that the treaty signed by him was no different from Shi Jingjiao's practice of ceding the Sixteen Prefectures of Yanyun to the Khitan, and they were all taking the rights and interests of the Dayue Kingdom in exchange for consolidating their own power.
Although Zheng Jie's efforts were made to suppress the remarks that compared him to Shi Jingjiao, and for this reason, he did not hesitate to exile and strangle some officials and civilian literati in the court, but the voices opposing him were not only not suppressed, but gradually spread. As a result, the power of the Zheng clan began to gradually shrink in Thang Long Province and some cities that were closer to Thang Long Province, and as for the cities and military towns far away from Thang Long Province, it gradually took on the meaning of several divisions.
Among them, Xuanguang Town in the northwest of Shenglong Province is the most domineering, Xuanguang Town itself is a semi-independent feudal town, and now the protector of Xuanguang Town is Wu Gong, and the title is Shaofu Zongjun Gong. Wu Gongbi was young and vigorous, only in his early 20s at this time, because he was influenced by his father since he was a child, and he did not have much loyalty to the Hou Li Dynasty, which was controlled by powerful ministers.
In addition, he was sent to the Ming army as a hostage of Xuanguang Town, and witnessed the vulnerability of the Hou Li Zheng army under the attack of the Ming army in the Ming army, and lost his awe of the Hou Li Dynasty.
After the war, Wu Gongbi also went to Kunming to meet Hong Chengchou, the governor of Yungui in the Ming Dynasty, and Hong Chengchou was very different during his time in Kunming. This made Wu Gongbi inevitably feel that he who had been recognized by the ministers of the Ming Dynasty might not be able to replace Li Zheng, and it was also appropriate to divide one side from the Ruan family.
As a result, Wu Gongbi actively moved closer to Kunming, not only sent a large number of Xuanguang Town's military generals to Kunming to study, but also invited military advisers from Kunming to help him train the army, and his insincerity to Thang Long Mansion was also revealed. But for Wu Gongyi's actions, Zheng Jie was at a loss.
On the one hand, Tuyen Quang Town is in danger of mountains and rivers, and it is difficult for the Zheng clan to attack Tuyen Quang Town without mobilizing a large army, but if a large army is mobilized to attack Tuyen Quang Town, the Zheng clan is worried that Nam Nguyen will join other feudal towns to attack Thang Long Province. The Zheng clan's current prestige can be said to be in extreme decline, if it were not for the occupation of Thang Long Mansion and the control of the Li royal family, it may be difficult for the Zheng clan to continue to control the power in the north.
On the other hand, the attitude of the Ming Dynasty was subtle, and Lin Yueshan, the envoy of the Ming Dynasty stationed in Shenglong Mansion, was unwilling to give a clear answer to Zheng Jie's temptation, which made Zheng Jie's dare not risk raising troops to attack Xuanguang Town.
Therefore, in such a situation, the large and small feudal towns of Nguyen and Zheng in the north and south were actively expanding their armaments and wars, but no one dared to provoke a war first, and the result was that the people in various parts of Vietnam could not stand it and launched an uprising. After the Nguyen brothers' uprising, a local peasant claimed to have been sent by the Nguyen brothers to lead everyone to kill officials and rebel, and a passer-by quickly responded by surrounding them, saying that they would follow them to attack the county government.
Although the Nguyen and Zheng regimes in the north and south did not appear to be in decline at the end of the dynasty at this time, and the officials and generals in various places still had some ability, they could not withstand the outbreak of peasant uprisings one after another, which made nearly two-thirds of the rural areas under the control of Nguyen and Zheng large or small rebel armies appear in addition to the major cities under the control of Nguyen and Zheng and some cities divided by feudal towns.
At first, Zheng Jie did not intend to deal with the Ruan brothers immediately, although the slogan of the Ruan brothers was to fight the imperial court, but the first thing this rebel army dealt with was the landlords outside the city who colluded with the Ming people. Such a scene can be described as killing two birds with one stone for Zheng Jie, whether it is the rebel army or these landlords who hook up with the Ming people, he is not distressed if anyone dies.
However, after winning several victories, the Shanxi rebels won the refuge of many down-and-out literati and small landlords, and Ruan Phu Binh, who had already occupied Shanxi, accepted the advice of the strategists and created a trick of sacrificing swords to gods on the road. It is claimed that an old man sent Taizu Li Li a sword with him, and when he left, he also gave him a message, asking him to expel the mad Ming, help the Li family, and rebuild Dayue.
Nguyen Phu Binh took advantage of the reputation of Taizu LĂŞ Le to gather people's hearts, and took the lead in issuing a call to expel the Ming people to retreat and defend themselves, which immediately aroused the response of the rebels from all over the country, and there were countless rebels who defected to his name for a while, and the land of Bac Ninh also surrendered to Nguyen Phu Binh.
It was only at this time that Zheng Jie really became nervous, and then Ruan Phu Ping openly regarded the Zheng family as a traitor who coerced the monarch to betray Da Yue, and said that he would expel the Zheng family from Thang Long Mansion Yunyun. Only then did Zheng Jie regard the Ruan brothers as the primary enemy he faced.
In late August, at the urging of the Ming envoy Lin Yueshan, Zheng Jie's troops led 5,000 men and horses to attack Shanxi. Located on the south bank of the Red River, Shanxi is a strategic point to control the middle and upper reaches of the Red River, and it is also a place where it can directly threaten Thang Long. With a city wall of two inner and outer walls, and surrounded by the Red River, it is a place that is easy to defend and difficult to attack. If it weren't for the harsh oppression of the Zheng clan over the years, this place would really not be able to be conquered by a group of peasants.
When Zheng Jun arrived at the north of Shanxi City by boat, he found that in just one month, the Ruan brothers had built countless fortifications around Shanxi City, from the Red River embankment to the north gate of the city, five miles from the Red River embankment to the north gate of the city.
Although the rebel army led by the Nguyen brothers lacked armament and equipment, their morale was extremely high, while the Trung army, although armed with arquebuses and artillery, was the rainy season in northern Vietnam in August and September, with an average of one day of rain every two days.
So at the beginning of this battle, Zheng Jun had the advantage, but when Zheng Jun broke two fences in a row and was about to break through to the north gate in one go, it suddenly began to rain heavily. This heavy rain suddenly made Zheng Jun's musket and artillery lose its sound, and the Ruan brothers, who were continuously repelled by Zheng Jun, saw this scene and immediately pulled out their Shuntian sword and shouted to everyone: "This is the manifestation of Taizu, help us crusade against the traitors, if you don't go up at this time, when will you go..."
This kind of heavy rain weather is actually not suitable for combat, large raindrops hit the face, people can't even open their eyes, not to mention that the red soil of Vietnam becomes slippery and sticky as soon as it is wet by the rain, and it will fall on a heel if you can't go far, so the commander of the Zheng army planned to withdraw his troops and retreat to the north shore barracks at the first time.
But for these rebels who were still working in the fields a few days ago, they did not have this concept of collecting troops in the rain at all. Hearing the shouts of the Ruan brothers, and vaguely seeing the Zheng army on the opposite side in the rain curtain, everyone's morale suddenly went up. They thought that Zheng Jun was frightened by Taizu's spells, and they were all fleeing one by one.
The rebels, who basically had no protective gear, were much more flexible than the heavily armed Zheng army in such a rainy day. Moreover, most of these rebels were from peasant backgrounds, and with many years of experience in working in the rice fields, there was no obstacle for them to walk in such muddy fields. On the other hand, Zheng Jun's side, because of the heavy armor and slippery feet, soon lost his formation under the pursuit of the rebels and turned into spinning tops that fell to the ground one by one.
The weapons in the hands of the rebels are basically spears, and a few are rudimentary versions of sharpened and burnt bamboo, such weapons may not be very powerful in the battle, but in such a mud melee, the Zheng soldiers who poked the ground with spears were taken advantage of.
As the rebels easily eliminated the soldiers in the rear of the Zheng army, their courage suddenly came to their senses, and they began to stride after the Zheng soldiers who could not even walk steadily, either two against one, or three or five against a small team. The bravery of these rebels soon turned the retreat of the Zheng army, which was still somewhat orderly, into a total rout. The soldiers of the Zheng army began to lose their organization, discarding the weapons in their hands, and some even took off the armor on their bodies.
Of the 3,000 soldiers who crossed the river to attack, only 500 or 600 of them were able to escape back to the north bank of the Red River. Although the Nguyen brothers halted the attack after driving the Zheng army across the river, the Zheng army fled to the lower reaches of the Red River overnight. A few days later, Thang Long received the bad news.
Although Zheng Jie was angry and executed the generals who had fled back, the defeat in Shanxi greatly shook his prestige in the Later Li Dynasty. Li Shenzong, who was originally hiding in the palace and did not ask about the world, began to meet with court officials continuously, as if he wanted to push the court to recruit the Ruan brothers.
The Zheng clan was able to control Thang Long Province and then rule the whole of North Vietnam, one by force in their hands, and the other by relying on the status of the Li royal family. When the force in the hands of the Zheng clan was not enough to suppress the careerists in various places, others could naturally eliminate the Zheng clan in the name of the Li clan and enter the Thang Long Mansion.
Zheng Jie immediately realized that compared to the crisis of Da Yue, the crisis of the Zheng family was obviously more urgent. If Li Shenzong really bypassed him and recruited the Ruan brothers, then the Zheng family would probably have the disaster of dying in the clan.
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