Lianzhou City, Li Laiheng's Linguo Mansion.

When the new emperor ascended the throne, of course, he had to reward the old ministers, and Li Laiheng's title was directly promoted from earl to duke.

The generals went in and out of the Duke's Palace, spreading Li Laiheng's orders throughout the army.

The deputy brigade commander of the Qiongzhou Mixed Brigade, Army Colonel Zhong Wenxin held the battle plan in his hand and saluted: "Your Excellency, I obey your command. ”

Li Laiheng said in surprise: "Your troops are stronger than me, are you serious?" ”

Zhong Wenxin: "This is what the Führer meant, and it is also our expectation. Your Excellency is a hero to the Han Chinese, and we are all honored to have you as our commander. ”

Propaganda warfare consists of two parts, one is propaganda against the enemy, and the other is propaganda against one's own side, and the focus of this is to create war heroes.

There are not many people who can be promoted as heroes at the end of the Ming Dynasty, and Li Laiheng must be the best among them.

Chuang Ying was stationed in Lianzhou for 10 years and was the pillar of the Ping Domain in Hainan. Li Laiheng's record can be seen by everyone, except for the Nanyang New Army, the most capable of fighting is his troops.

Li Laiheng used his bloody battles on the battlefield again and again to reverse the view of the Southern Ming Army on breaking into the camp.

Soldiers are most practical in making food in a trench, raising their swords against a common enemy, looking after each other's backs, helping each other in hand-to-hand combat, saving each other's lives on the battlefield, and even sharing the same woman after a battle.

Chongzhen hanged by the coal mountain? That's what kind of is that on the front line.

Zhong Wenxin's Qiongzhou Brigade greatly exceeded the normal brigade-level establishment, and in order to strengthen his command force, the rear headquarters of the expeditionary force left behind in Hainan strengthened the command, intelligence, and logistics staff of the Qiongzhou Brigade.

Zhong Wenxin sent a liaison group of three staff officers and 10 soldiers to Li Laiheng's command to coordinate joint operations.

After straightening out the command structure, Zhong Wenxin put on a military hat and walked out of the Linguo Mansion. He looked up and saw that the weather was clear and cloudless, just in time for the march of the large corps.

Zhong Wenxin is a native of Hainan and has served in the Nanyang New Army for more than 10 years. There has always been a problem with the officer corps of the Federal Army, because the pace of expansion is too fast, and the construction of the officer corps is difficult.

Like Zhong Wenxin, who was only a captain battalion commander three years ago, and became a lieutenant colonel last year, Qiongzhou Brigade Chief Andrei broke his leg because of a training accident, and Zhong Wenxin was promoted to colonel and deputy brigade commander with the most seniority as the regiment commander, temporarily commanding the whole brigade.

There are also many officers like him in the Federal Army, who have no problem controlling troops below the regimental level, and even perform very well, but they have no confidence in commanding a combined brigade-level combat detachment to fight independently.

This can only be solved by constantly fighting, gaining enough combat experience in the war. Before that, there was a talented general tie like Li Laiheng, who joined the army in his teens and fought on the battlefield for decades, so he could avoid many detours.

Li Laiheng has been studying the new army in Nanyang recently, and I have to say that some people are geniuses, although they have never gone to military school, but in actual combat, they can obtain sufficient nutrition.

Li Laiheng knew the Tatars, the Ming army, and the terrain of the theater, and with him under his command, at least he could avoid the occurrence of vicious mistakes to the greatest extent.

Zhong Wenxin rode out of the city, the Qiongzhou camp was in the east of Lianzhou, this brigade had been trained in Leizhou for a year, and after replenishing the battle damage, it was now fully equipped.

The brigade has six full-fledged infantry battalions, one cavalry regiment, and one field artillery battalion, including one 12-pounder artillery company, one baggage battalion, one engineer battalion, and several newly built independent mountain infantry companies, with a total of 10,000 men in this reinforced brigade-level detachment.

Li Laiheng mobilized in Lianzhou, he had 1,500 combat troops reinforced on the Bobai front, and another more than 4,000 people, of which 2,000 cavalry, the rest were infantry. The organizational structure of the camp was still continental, with horses as the main force in the field, and infantry as a relatively minor task.

Xie Yuanbian, the governor of Guangxi, went all out to get a logistics force composed of 350 garrisons, archers, and sailors from Hainan, and this force escorted 8,000 people to Lianzhou.

Therefore, the total number of troops assembled in the Lianzhou battalion exceeded 24,000, and this was a desperate effort to put together the resources captured from all over Guangdong and the whole province of Hainan, and the people of Hainan paid a great price during this period, and only by completely defeating the enemy army could the burden on Hainan be lightened.

Three days later, the army was deployed.

The first objective of the Lianzhou battalion was to eliminate the threat on the left flank before attacking north.

The Qiongzhou Brigade sent 1 infantry battalion, reinforced 2 mountain infantry companies, and 2 howitzers, with the cooperation of Li Laiheng's 1500 infantry, to the northwest into the mountains and attack Lingshan County, Qinzhou. Leading the way for this force were the remnants of the original Lingshan County Defense Army.

Li Laiheng drew cavalry; Zhong Wenxin formed a brigade-level detachment with 4 infantry battalions, a Hainan hussar regiment, and 2 6-pounder artillery companies, with nearly 10,000 troops.

The strength of the troops of the line Guoan is only slightly more than twice that of Li Yuanyin in Qinzhou, the castle of the Ming army is very stable, Li Yuanyin constantly sends his two righteous brothers to lead the army to attack, and the main force of the line Guoan is gathered in the north of Qinzhou City, and the Ming army strongholds on the more periphery are unable to attack.

The attack order was simultaneously issued to Deng Yao in the Fangcheng area, Zhou Jin of Qinzhou Military Reserve Dao in Dafeng Fort, and Yuan Lijun of Zuojiang Dao in the 100,000 mountains, these independent garrisons were not many, even if they were mobilized after the autumn harvest, there were only a few hundred soldiers who could be used for battle, and the Lianzhou battalion hoped that their troops would use their familiarity with the terrain to attack the outer positions of the line Guoan.

Between the two delta plains of Qinzhou and Lianzhou was a hilly area with an elevation of several tens of meters, which had little impact on the march.

Li Laiheng had some infantry garrison strongholds along the line, and at the forefront was Pingyin Fort by the Dafeng River. There were 800 veterans of the Ming army general Dong Fangce and 500 infantry of Li Laiheng to defend it, and the task of this unit was to cover the main force with all its might.

The official road between Qinzhou and Lianzhou was less than 100 kilometers, and two days later, the troops who broke the siege arrived on the left bank of the Dafeng River.

From Pingyinbao to the Qinzhou battlefield, there are two ridge lines, west of the Dafeng River, which is the occupied area of the line Guoan.

The width of the river varies from about 100 to 300 meters. It is not difficult to cross the Dafeng River, and Zhou Jin gathered a batch of bridge-building equipment in Dafeng Fort in Haikou.

More than half of the sailors left behind in the Chinlian Leiqiong area converged at Fort Gale and the 400th sailors drove into the river on sampans hidden in the tributaries of the left bank, and one reinforced battalion rushed across the river to establish a bridgehead, and the engineer units immediately erected a pontoon bridge large enough to pass the six-pounder guns.

After the vanguard troops of the Guangxi Green Battalion broke and fled in front of the coalition stragglers, and after the infantry opened the passage, Li Laiheng threw in his cavalry and charged in the direction of Qinzhou, and the horse team raised smoke and dust in the sky, looking from afar, like a long dragon.

In the evening of the same day, under the setting sun, the knights who broke into the camp immediately stood in the mountains 7 kilometers northeast of Qinzhou, and Li Laiheng's banner was waving in the wind.

Li Yuanyin saw the big flag in the telescope and was silent for a long time. Elders, the grievances and grievances of Gao Jie, Li Chengdong, and Li Guo on the battlefield in the Central Plains are a thing of the past, and now, Li Yuanyin and Li Laiheng are comrades-in-arms who fight side by side.

In the early morning of the next day, facing the red morning glow, shining bayonets drove out of the hills, and in a very short time, along the left bank of the Qinjiang River, they formed six phalanxes, and as many as 3,000 cavalry deployed along the Qinjiang River.

The sun shone silver on their breastplates, cotton armor, and ties.

Li Laiheng's personal guards and cavalry were all riding tall horses, wearing full-coverage armed helmets, and their visors had been lowered, so they could only see a cold look. It was a god-killing army that fought from the Loess Plateau to the South China Sea, and each of them had hundreds or even thousands of lives in their hands.

The bleak autumn wind blew, and the military flag made the sound of hunting. This is the promise of Shou Xuan to all the Ming troops, to defend the city, you are not alone.

The city of Qinzhou welcomed the friendly troops with a salvo of artillery, and the 100 cannons on each fortress were fired one after another, and the sound of long live resounded in the city.

Line Guoan withdrew from the siege of Qinzhou as quickly as possible, and shrunk into a group in the camp, and the enemy's position was in the northwest of Qinzhou, between the Qinjiang River and the Yuhong River.

The engineering unit built a pontoon bridge in the east city of Qinzhou, and two days later, the whole army arrived on the Qinjiang Plain.

There is no suspense in the decisive battle.

The Qiongzhou Brigade formed a central front and spread out three battalions with a length of 500 meters, and the other battalion was behind the horizontal line in columns.

Li Yuanyin's troops were on the left flank, and Li Laiheng's troops were on the right flank, with a total of 3,800 cavalry.

The rest of the divisions and part of the defenders of Qinzhou attacked the enemy's outlying positions on all sides.

Occupy Lingshan and cut off the enemy's retreat along the Qinjiang River to the Hengzhou area, and the detachment pressed from behind.

Li Yuanyin supported the attack with 50 city defense guns, and the field artillery advanced with the infantry line.

The battle continued until noon, when the security forces of the line country collapsed, and the Tatars fled to Nanning in the upper reaches of the Yuhong River, where they had the only remaining retreat.

The coalition army occupied the camp, captured all the enemy's baggage and artillery, and then Li Yuanyin, Li Yuantai, and Li Jianjie commanded all the Ming troops except Li Laiheng's cavalry to pursue the Nanning area.

Qinzhou threw all their forces into pursuit, except for a few hundred remaining troops, and everyone who could use their weapons pursued them to the front line.

Just after the autumn harvest, the enemy's supply routes were full of grain along the road.

The Qiongzhou Brigade left the Lingshan detachment to support Li Yuanyin, and the rest of the troops withdrew to Lianzhou.

The next target, Yulin.