Ruan Fuping stood on the hill outside the north gate of Thang Long Mansion, looking at the situation on the battlefield below the mountain with a bloodless face, tens of thousands of righteous troops had completely lost their organization at this moment, and were driven around by three officers and soldiers, among which the officer army in the middle had almost killed half of the battlefield, pointing directly to the hill where he was standing.

On the Red River to his left, two large ships flying the flags of the sun, moon and stars were swimming on the river and firing artillery bombardment at the rebel positions on the riverbank, which was also the first place where the rebel array collapsed. And just half an hour ago, tens of thousands of rebels were still attacking towards the north gate of Thang Long Mansion with great momentum, and Ruan Phu Binh, who was sitting here watching the battle at that time, never thought that he would be defeated.

The guards and advisers who were guarding him anxiously persuaded him, "... General, the defeat has been achieved, we can't stay here for a long time, let's retreat first, and then make plans after retreating to Shanxi. Stay in the green mountains, I'm not afraid of no wood to burn..."

Ruan Fu Binh, who has been gentle and elegant since the uprising, can no longer hold back his temper at this moment, he turned around and flew up and kicked over a guard next to him, and shouted viciously: "Who the dares to say back, Lao Tzu will kill him now." Now that the battle situation is undecided, who dares to disturb the hearts of our army? Give me an order, order all the departments to resist me, and if anyone dares to evacuate the battlefield without authorization, kill! ”

Looking at the great general, whose eyes were full of blood, these strategists and guards suddenly did not dare to persuade again, but no one dared to leave to give orders. At this time, the battlefield has almost completely lost its organization, and some of the rebels who have just joined the gang have begun to run away, and at this time the orders are sent to the various departments, and they don't know who to go to give the order, even if they really find those rebel leaders, how many people will be able to obey the order?

Ruan Fuping looked crazy at this time, but he still had reason in his heart, seeing that his subordinates around him did not move, he immediately pressed the sword in his waist and shouted loudly: "Bastard, what are you doing here, hurry up to the West Gate to transfer the subordinates of the two generals, Chen Guangyou and Huang Faren, and let them contain the officers and troops of Thang Long Mansion out of the city from the side, the total number of these officers and troops is not more than 10,000, as long as the two generals Chen and Huang can let us take a breath here, we can at least gather most of the men and horses to retreat." If we don't have these horses, even if we retreat to Shanxi, can we still hold Shanxi? ”

Nguyen Phu Jin, who was walking up the hill from the other side, happened to hear his brother's roar, he glanced at the chaos under the mountain, and then gritted his teeth and stepped forward and said, "What else are you sending, why don't you hurry up and give the order for the general?" ”

The guards around Ruan Fuping finally came to their senses, and suddenly several people got up and ran down the mountain, looking for mounts to convey Ruan Phu Binh's military orders. After watching these guards leave, Ruan Fuping focused on his brother and asked with vigilance: "You are also here to persuade me to flee?" ”

Ruan Fujin, who originally had this intention, looked at his brother, who was already on the verge of anger at the moment, but did not dare to put forward the idea of retreating, so he could only grit his teeth and clench his fists and said: "General, before the two generals Chen and Huang come back to help, please let me take the Shanxi pro-army down to kill for a while, so as to delay for some time." ”

Ruan Fuping looked at his brother for a long time, then nodded and said softly, "Okay, you can go." Don't be discouraged, as long as the two generals Chen and Huang come back to help, those officers and soldiers will inevitably retreat. Although the gunboats of the Ming people are fierce, they cannot go ashore after all, as long as we can survive today, we can always find a way to deal with them. Protect yourself and don't rush too far ahead. ”

Ruan Fuping's last two sentences of entrustment were almost as thin as mosquitoes, but Ruan Fujin still heard it, and he was greatly moved in his heart, and after saluting and retreating, he couldn't help but look back and said: "Brother, if the situation is really irreparable, you should retreat, at least there are still people in Shanxi who will support you." ”

Ruan Fuping was very dissatisfied when he heard this, and when he wanted to reprimand his brother for disturbing the morale of the army, he found that his younger brother had turned around and went down the mountain, and his words were finally muffled in his throat and could not spit it out.

When the herald's guards and brothers had left, silence fell back on the hill, and the strategists and other guards did not dare to step forward to persuade the general to run away. While Ruan Fuping was anxiously watching the development of the battle situation under the mountain, he was thinking back to the past few days since he sent troops to Shanxi.

It should be said that although he was delayed for a few days by the Ming people with stratagems, Ruan Phu Binh did not take it to heart at that time, thinking that this gave him time to reorganize the troops and strengthen his control over the rebel army. And just when he went south to Shenglong Mansion, he was also overwhelmed along the way, and a small group of rebels nearby came to vote one after another, which strengthened his strength.

When he arrived in Thang Long, it was not the resistance of the official army that could delay the movement of the rebels along the way, but the abundant rain of the season and the collection of local food supplies for the army. Shanxi to Thang Long Fu is only a short 150 miles, but this large army of the righteous army has traveled for nearly 20 days, and the average daily march is less than seven or eight miles.

Ruan Phu Binh was also helpless about the slow movement of the army, after all, the large army in his hands expanded too fast, and the descendants who really rebelled with their brothers were less than one-tenth of this army, and the rest were all forces from all sides, some were peasant rebels like them, some were ruffians and mountain bandits in the past, and some were small and medium-sized landlords who joined the rebel army in order to prevent them from becoming the target of the rebel army.

Because the composition of the team was too complicated, the military discipline of this rebel army began to deteriorate, and the rebel army, which was originally quite supported by the people, gradually alienated them. In addition, the rapid expansion of the number of troops led to the lack of logistics supply, so the already corrupt military discipline could not restrain these newly joined the rebel army.

While they marched towards Thang Long Province, many of the rebels did not focus on fighting the official army, but instead focused on raiding the villages surrounding the marching route. The actions of these black sheep not only greatly damaged the reputation of the rebel army, causing some ordinary people who were originally opposed to the Zheng family's excesses and miscellaneous taxes to throw themselves into Thang Long Mansion again, but also caused a split within the rebel army.

The leaders of the rebel army, represented by Nguyen Phu Kim, hated the rebel troops who brutalized the people, and thought that the leaders of these rebel troops should be arrested, tried in front of the people to restore their reputation, and then their subordinates should be disrupted and placed in other units with better military discipline.

However, Nguyen Phu Binh, who had already given himself the title of general, was carried away by the good situation in front of him, and he believed that the most important thing now was to attack Thang Long Mansion as soon as possible and replace the Zheng clan, rather than stop and rectify the military discipline that restrained the army. It's not too late to talk about this kind of thing when the Thang Long Mansion is captured, and as for the grievances suffered by those people, they should be patient for the overall situation, and they can't run out to add chaos to the rebel army. As for those people who can't bear the grievances outside and have to smear the reputation of the righteous army in public opinion, they are obviously spies sent by Zheng Jun, and they should be severely suppressed.

In addition to this reason, Nguyen Phu Binh also has a reason in his heart that is not humane. With the situation of the Righteous Army in good shape, seeing that the bright future has begun to beckon him, who is the real leader of the Righteous Army at this time has become very important to him.

Although the Shanxi Righteous Army was led by their Ruan brothers, his younger brother Ruan Phu Jin, who lived and died with the soldiers on the front line every time he was in battle, had a much higher reputation than him among the front-line soldiers. Most of the leaders of the rebel army who followed his younger brother to ask him for military discipline this time were close to his younger brother, and those leaders who were asked to punish him were basically loyal to his cronies. Therefore, he always felt that this was a forced palace by his younger brother Nguyen Phu Kim to cut off his wings in the army, so he naturally beware of this younger brother.

Ruan Phu Binh's psychology of gaining and losing, naturally caused many contradictions within the rebel army, and the army's actions naturally became even slower. However, even so, when he reached the north of Thang Long Province, his men and horses had risen from 50,000 at the time of departure to more than 70,000 troops.

Thang Long Province also has another nickname in the mouths of the local people, which is Hanoi. The reason for such a name is not only that Thang Long Province is located on the Red River, but also because there is a small river leading to the Red River in the south of Thang Long Province, plus there are many lakes around it, it seems that the city is not built on the river, but surrounded by rivers, so it is called Hanoi.

Thang Long Province was surrounded by rivers on the south and east sides, making it difficult to launch a large army attack. There are many lakes and rice paddies to the west, and during the rainy season, it becomes a swampy area, and it is also difficult to garrison large groups of men and horses. Only outside the north gate of Thang Long Province, although there is a huge lagoon connected to the Red River, because there are many hills, it can still line up a large group of people to attack.

So Nguyen Phu Binh concentrated the main force at the north gate, and put some of the rebels who defected to him late at the west gate, forming a pattern of attacking on both flanks. He later ordered the Bac Ninh rebels to attack Hai Duong in an attempt to sever the connection between Thang Long Province and Yong Xian, thus turning Thang Long Province into an isolated city.

However, although the weather gradually improved, and the sunny days began to increase, the rebel army failed to capture the city in the ten days of fighting under the Thang Long Mansion, and today ushered in the artillery bombardment launched by the Ming people from the river, which shook the array of the rebel army whose morale began to decline in one fell swoop, and finally the Zheng army in the city seized the opportunity to go out of the city to counterattack, forming the current situation of imminent complete rout.

At this moment, Ruan Fuping could only clench his fists and pray secretly, hoping that there would be a miracle like the previous battle for the defense of Shanxi, otherwise once he suffered a big defeat here, the brilliant ideals he had planned before would eventually turn into ashes.

In Nguyen Phu Kim's prayers, the heavens seemed to favor him again, and when Nguyen Phu Kim joined the battlefield with the most capable Shanxi pro-army, relying on the personal prestige he had cultivated on weekdays, he launched a counterattack with many retreating rebels, and finally blocked the invincible middle army of the Zheng army on the battlefield.

Just as Ruan Fuping looked at the southeast of the battlefield with wide eyes, he finally saw a troop shadow appear on the edge of the southeast of the battlefield. The appearance of this unit not only boosted the momentum of the rebels on the battlefield for a while, but even the actions of the Zheng army seemed to have slowed down.

However, just as the guards around him were cheering and shouting, Ruan Phu Binh's face became more and more serious, and a kind of uneasiness came to his heart. The reason for this uneasiness is that the army in the distance is too calm, not at all as if it has come to the rescue of a friendly army that is about to collapse.

(.=)