In order to make Wu Sangui fall to himself, the Zheng family also paid a lot of price. For example, Wu Sangui got more than 2,000 flintlock pistols for free from the Zheng family in one go. These flintlock pistols, old and new, and of different models, some were long-barreled, others short-barreled carbines. In fact, most of these guns are so-called civilian guns. Most of them were recovered from the Chinese in Taiwan and Luzon and were to be sold as second-hand goods to some countries in South Asia, and some of them were new goods to be sold to the Chinese in Taiwan and Luzon, but now they were brought and handed over to Wu Sangui.

Many of these flintlock pistols are actually past their useful life. (The barrel of wrought iron is easy to rust under the climatic conditions of Taiwan and Luzon, and it is very troublesome to maintain, and the common people often do not do a good job of maintaining the guns, so the service life is generally not long) But Wu Sangui likes these things very much. Because of the original things in Wu Sangui's hand, not to mention the three eyes and the like, as long as you have armor on your body, that thing is basically just a sound, but considering the shape of that thing, it is actually not bad to use it as a war hammer. Even if Guan Ningjun holds a precious Lumi gun (just a relatively good arquebus), in terms of performance, whether it is power, accuracy, or shooting speed, it cannot be compared with these old flintlock pistols. Because whether in Taiwan or in Luzon, flintlock pistols are life-saving things, so in many cases, the materials used for civilian guns are even more authentic than those equipped by the model army. So even though it's an old item, it's still very good.

Wu Sangui equipped these guns with his family. In addition, Zheng Sen also planned to send a few instructors to Wu Sangui from the model army to teach them how to use these new guns. But Wu Sangui disagreed. At that time, he said to Zheng Zhihu, who raised this point: "Isn't it just a bird gun, it's not that I haven't used it, and I want to say that your bird gun is much easier to use than a bird gun, I just looked at it, and it will." I took these back, and I will only use them for my own family, and they are all veterans, where do I still need to learn this little thing? ”

Although the Zheng family, who refused, proposed to teach them how to use flintlock guns, the Zheng family's intention of sending these guns was basically achieved, that is, to win over Wu Sangui, and also gave him more confidence in fighting against Li Zicheng and even Jianxuan. However, Wu Sangui still insisted that his army must not be used in field battles with Jiangui. Zheng Sen estimated that if he couldn't repel Li Zicheng first, then not to mention the field battle, even if he fought against Jiancheng under the city, and let him fire artillery on the city to help the battle, he might not be willing. Most of this guy doesn't want to completely tear his face with Jianxuan, and most of them still want to step on two boats.

But then again, at least when fighting against Jiangui, Zheng Sen didn't plan to fight with Wu Sangui. After all, Guan Ningjun is famous for selling his teammates. Although Wu Sangui is a well-known "brave general" in the Guanning Army who dares to fight, this does not mean that he will not play the Dafa of "Friends of the Dead Dao Do Not Die of the Poor Dao". Zheng Sen didn't want to take such a risk.

According to Zheng Sen's plan, Wu Sangui will be responsible for confusing Jian Yan with all kinds of false information and slowing them down. Zheng Sen, on the other hand, led his three regiments to intercept Li Zicheng's army and routed them in the field. Then Zheng Sen's main force turned to the north and cooperated with Wu Sangui to hold Shanhaiguan and repel Jianxuan. As for Beijing, Zheng Sen believes that after suffering a big loss in the field battle, Li Zicheng will take the initiative to abandon Beijing.

……

After deciding to march to Shanhaiguan to force Wu Sangui to surrender, or to force Wu Sangui to fight a decisive battle with himself to solve the problem of retreat, Li Zicheng quickly organized an army to conquer Wu Sangui, he first asked Tang Tong, the general of the Ming Dynasty, to set off with more than 10,000 troops as the vanguard, and he and Liu Zongmin together with more than 60,000 Shun troops to suppress the rear.

As soon as Li Zicheng's army set off, it was targeted by the scout cavalry of the Model Army. Li Zicheng naturally noticed these scouts as well, and according to custom, he sent his own cavalry to try to expel these Ming scouts. However, Li Zicheng's move was not successful, and the war horses of his cavalry were too inferior in speed and endurance compared with the war horses of the reconnaissance cavalry of the Model Army. This is not only a matter of the breed of the war horse, but also the feeding method of the war horse, the gap in the level of nutrition.

The horses of the model army were fed with grains such as beans and wheat, and even luxury goods such as eggs. However, their opponents are far from such conditions, their food is scarce for people to eat, and the war horses and other things have to rely on grass to maintain to a large extent. In fact, according to the standards of the model army, those war horses of the Shun army are poor if they are lost to the logistics department as horses.

In addition to the difference in horses, the difference in equipment between the cavalry of the two sides is obvious. The scout cavalry of the model army belongs to the light cavalry, and the war horses are not armored, but the soldiers are equipped with lighter leather armor, although the defensive power cannot be compared with the plate armor of the heavy cavalry troops, but there is still a certain defense against swords and arrows. Especially for the arrows fired by the cavalry's horse bow, it is basically immune. In addition to leather armor, they were equipped with smaller iris shields (these shields were usually carried on their backs to protect against arrows when retreating and held in their hands during battle) and sabers made of crucible steel. Most of their opponents were not armoured, and the quality of their weapons was far from being comparable to that of the model army, and in some small-scale clashes of cavalry between the two sides, there were even frequent incidents where the sabre in the hands of Li Zicheng's scout cavalry was cut off by others.

In the end, the level of training of the soldiers on both sides also differed greatly. Relying on sufficient food supplements, the cavalry of the Model Army were well nourished, all of them were in very good physical condition, and they had to train almost every day, so they also had a clear advantage over Li Zicheng's cavalry in terms of physical strength and technology.

Such an advantage brought about a situation that made Li Zicheng very depressed, but there was no good way, that is, he was never able to drive these "Ming army scouts" away from the vicinity of his army. If he sent a large group of cavalry, those Ming scouts would scatter, so that these cavalry could not catch and catch up. If he disperses the cavalry in his hands, he will be defeated by those "Ming Army Scout Cavalry" who rely on their horses, good equipment, good technology, and each of them.

Because the reconnaissance cavalry was suppressed, Li Zicheng's grasp of the situation on the march dropped a lot. As a result, the marching speed of his army was greatly reduced. After leaving Beijing, for fear of being ambushed, Li Zicheng's army marched no more than 40 miles a day. After walking for four whole days, they arrived at the Xianghe, which was only more than 100 miles away from Beijing. Their opponents, the three regiments of the Model Army, had already arrived at Xianghe a day earlier.

On the morning of 3 April, at the location preset by the staff officers of the Model Army, on a relatively open plain, Li Zicheng's reconnaissance cavalry, which had been suppressed, finally encountered a large force of the Model Army. Zheng Sen ordered the light cavalry units under the 1st Cavalry Regiment to attack Li Zicheng's reconnaissance cavalry. The well-trained light cavalry of the Model Army easily defeated Li Zicheng's scout cavalry and pursued them all the way to Li Zicheng's main force.

"Seeing these cavalry of ours, Li Zicheng definitely didn't dare to retreat, he could only fight a decisive battle with us." Standing on a high slope, Zheng Sen looked at Li Zicheng's army and said.

After receiving such a sudden blow, Li Zicheng did not panic, after all, he was also an old man, and the 60,000 troops around him were also his old troops. So the Shun army quickly put up a defensive shelf. Ready for battle.

Liu Zongmin led more than 10,000 soldiers to guard in front, while Li Zicheng led the rest of the troops to retreat a little. Li Zicheng remembered that when they came from the official road just now, they passed through a deserted village with no people. It's only two miles away. Today, on this plain, this deserted village is a rare point of support. In the case of not fully understanding the strength of the enemy army, take control of this deserted village first, advance can be attacked, retreat can be defended, and the subsequent battle will be much calmer.

At noon, Li Zicheng's entire army retreated to the vicinity of the village and relied on the village to set up a position. Soon after, the main force of the Model Army also appeared in Li Zicheng's field of vision for the first time.