The tens of thousands of residents of Chicago could only watch their homes being ruthlessly engulfed by the flames, they howled heartbreakingly, beat their chests and cried bitterly, the cry shook the earth, and even many red-eyed residents, not knowing whether they wanted to rush into the fire or seek revenge from the soldiers of the special division, roared and charged, but were directly shot and killed by the soldiers of the Chinese Empire guarding in front...... Dozens of escaped church pastors stood silently in front of the burning city, desperately facing the fiery sky, constantly crossing and praying, not knowing whether to call on God to open his eyes and see, or to see off their own city and the souls who had died in the flames.

This tragic scene will never be forgotten by the tens of thousands of residents who stood outside Chicago. And the soldiers of the Chinese Empire in front of them, dressed in gray uniforms and reflected like hellish Shura by the light of the fire, made them shudder and deeply embedded in their minds like a nightmare, so that when they saw the person in gray clothes in the future, they couldn't help but tremble.

At this time, Li Xiucheng suddenly remembered that there were still 3,000 captive American Union Infantry Brigade imprisoned in a cathedral in the northeast corner of Chicago, and he forgot for a while, he must have been hiding in the sea of fire at this time. Someone was sent to check, and sure enough, the entire church was already in a sea of fire, and it was completely impossible to get close.

Li Xiucheng had to sigh. Although he is not a cruel person, but for these foreign soldiers, he has no sympathy at all, he is burned to death, he doesn't care, he didn't think about taking these prisoners away or what, but he was unwilling to release them, which helped him solve his troubles.

But he and Li Jinyang didn't expect that the remaining Chicago residents who watched the fire had secretly regarded them as the devils of hell and the butchers from the Eastern world. Even before long, the nickname "Butcher of Oriental Lee" spread from the ruins of Chicago, and the fame made the crying toddlers in the middle of the United States stop crying immediately.

At this time, the entire Chicago and even the suburbs were already scattered with firewood dust kicked up by the heat wave, and it was inconvenient to be stupid all around, Li Xiucheng just let the special division rest for a day, and the nostrils of the soldiers were already black. At the moment, the special division also ignored the tens of thousands of residents who were still gathered in the west and south of Chicago, and directly reorganized the army, and under the guidance of the guide, marched to Gary, another city with a population of 30,000 in the southeast.

..........

April 24, 1862.

Chicago was captured by 9,500 soldiers of the Special Division of the Second Field Corps of the Chinese Empire, and the city was set on fire, and the entire city of Chicago was reduced to ashes.

All of the 4,000 officers and men of the Union Infantry Brigade stationed in Chicago were killed, 1,000 of whom were killed on the spot, and another 3,000 were captured in the northeast church of the city and then abandoned and burned in the fire.

More than 110,000 Chicago citizens, more than 7,000 elderly, women and even children, were burned to the ground, more than 60,000 lost all property and livelihood, and more than 90,000 were displaced and homeless.

It took 13 days for the whole of Chicago to burn before the flames slowly went out. The 30,000 inhabitants who still refused to leave returned to their former places of residence to find that everything was in ashes.

The fire, which caused tens of thousands of people to lose their homes, also caused the complete disappearance of the city of Chicago, several railroad lines, Chicago canals and docks, as well as dozens of large manufacturing plants and banks, and also caused the entire Federation to lose at least $70 million in wealth.

However, this is only the beginning of the nightmare for the American Union!

On April 27, while the flames of the ruins of Chicago were still raging, Gary City, more than 20 miles southeast of Chicago, was once again attacked and humiliated by this mob from the East, and that night, Gary City was burned to the ground, killing more than 1,300 federal militiamen and more than 800 Gary residents.

On May 2, three towns in Weir County, Illinois, were overrun by the same mob, taking away thousands of horses and burning all three towns.

On May 16, 9,400 soldiers of the Special Division of the Second Field Corps of the Chinese Empire appeared on the outskirts of Springfield, and saw that Springfield was guarded by nearly 20,000 federal volunteers, so they made a detour. The federal volunteers went out of the city to pursue, and after half a day, they found that they couldn't catch up, and when they remembered to go back to the city to defend, they found that the city of Springfield was already a sea of fire, and the enemy army did not fight head-on, but only sneak attack, and after the arson was successful, it had already gone away.

On May 28, the mob from the East reappeared in the small town of Woodhar in northwestern Illinois, a small gold mining town with a high production volume, where soldiers of the Special Division annihilated the 2,000 Federal Volunteers stationed there and robbed them of three tons of gold.

On June 5, the Chinese Empire's special divisions broke through Molindu on the east bank of the Mississippi River, destroyed all the batteries at the ferry, and then crossed the river into Bettendorf, Missouri, on the opposite bank.

On June 17, the Special Division reappeared in the southern border town of Scheuersburg in Wisconsin, crushing the 2,500 Union defenders stationed there and completely blowing up the entire Scheuersburg.

On June 23, after the enemy burned 5 towns in a row, they captured Madison City, an important town in the south of Wisconsin, 3,000 federal defenders and 5,000 militiamen surrendered without a fight, of which 2,000 federal defenders and 1,500 militiamen were tortured and killed, and the remaining 1,000 federal defenders and 3,500 militiamen plus 11,000 civilians in Madison City, a total of 15,500 people became prisoners, and were forced to demolish Madison City by thousands of enemy troops. and demolished kilometers of the railroad across Wisconsin, and the tracks were lifted into Lake Madison.

On June 28, 9,000 soldiers of the Special Division of the Second Field Corps captured the town of Warrens in north-central Wisconsin, and joined up with another group of enemy troops hiding there, Lin Qirong of the Hexi United Army, a total of 1,200 men, who completely burned the town of Warrens on the same day.

And, perhaps in celebration of the liberation of the Hexi Army, the enemy army, which had grown to more than 10,200 men from the town of Warrens on June 28, began an even more ferocious sweep. They set fire to large maple groves in the countryside, slaughtered the dairy cows in the pastures, burned down all the houses and ranch tents they could meet along the Wisconsin River, and slaughtered all the livestock they saw and the people who dared to resist and abuse.

.......

These are all New York Times reports on the war in the Northwest of the Union in the past two months.

The New York Times began a large section of the article, detailing the wreak havoc of the Imperial Chinese Special Division's troops in Wisconsin and Illinois. The editor-in-chief of the newspaper personally wrote that this group of troops of the Chinese Empire had become a disaster for the American Federation. This army of less than 10,000 people completely transferred the whole of America into the abyss of defeat. The three regions of Wisconsin, Illinois, and northern Indiana have been completely destroyed by the army, and the federal government has lost up to $200 million. Moreover, if this continues, Michigan in the north of Indiana and Ohio in the east are also very likely to suffer heavy damage from enemy forces.

And how did the Commonwealth Army of America cope with this time period?

The New York Times discloses in detail.

On May 2, 30,000 federal volunteers traveled by train from Cleveland, Ohio, to Portertown, 20 miles east of Gary City, to find the railroad to Gary City damaged. By the time the soldiers arrived at Gary City, they found it in ruins, and the enemy army had already arrived dozens of miles away in Will County, wreaking havoc.

On May 28, the 45,000-strong Union Volunteer Army rushed to 50 miles north of Springfield to intercept the enemy, but there was no trace of the enemy, who were looting the federal government gold mine nearly 100 miles to the northwest.