It is said that on the night when Wang Zuojiao and others led the people to surrender, Zhang Heng, the most recently used personal soldier around Hong Chengchou, the governor of Shaanxi, was ordered to carry the news of the surrender of the thief army in Ningxiang County, with torches, riding fast horses, and rushing to Shilou overnight to report the news. Pen, fun, pavilion www. biquge。 info

A group of people first went north out of the Nanchuan River Valley, and then turned to the south, quickly south to the stone building, more than 40 people are wearing armor, holding guns and knives, carrying bows and arrows, all of them are Shaanxi Hong Chengchou from the Fubiao in the selection of elite soldiers.

Although it is a night road, on the ground west of Luliang Mountain today, the city is dilapidated, the villages and towns are barren, and there are few people.

There was nothing along the way, but it was very smooth, more than two hours, more than 100 miles.

When the sky was light and not bright, the group rushed to the north bank of the Beihun River, about twenty miles north of Shilou County.

The Beihun River, also a tributary of the western section of the Yellow River, originates in a valley in Luliang Mountain, then flows from east to west and finally into the Yellow River.

However, this Beihun River is a very small tributary, before the great drought in Shanxi, it has been cut off for many days, but during this time, because of the heavy rain in mid-May, there is suddenly a water source, and it began to flow in a hurry.

It's just that the riverbed and both banks have been dry for a long time, and although it has rained heavily for a few days, the amount of water in the Beihun River is only a flash in the pan.

By the time Zhang Heng took his men to the north bank, the water of the Beihun River was already wading on foot.

When he arrived at the north bank of the Beihun River, seeing that he was not far from Shilou County, Zhang Heng ordered his brothers to dismount and rest.

After all, he galloped all the way for more than 100 miles, even if a person could bear it, the war horse under him should always rest and drink.

A group of people and horses drank and ate by the river, rested for more than half an hour, looked at the sky, it was past the end of the day, the east was white, and then gathered on the horse again, riding a horse and wading across the river.

Zhang Heng and others, who thought that they would go all the way smoothly in the future, had just crossed the Beihun River to the south bank, and found that there was a team of hundreds of people in the distance, which was along the upper reaches of the Beihun River, over a small hill, and came from southeast to northwest, only a few hundred steps away.

Zhang Heng, who was in the lead, was hesitant in his heart, guessing the identity of the other team, but suddenly heard a shout from the team, and ran south.

Zhang Heng heard it clearly on his horse, and the other party shouted: "The officers and soldiers are here!" ”

In this case, there is no doubt that the team that meets head-on is a thief army!

As soon as Zhang Heng thought of this, he immediately made a decision and shouted: "Brothers! That's a thief patrol! Don't let them run! ”

Zhang Heng has the former Shaanxi general soldier Zhang Guoxing's Shaanxi soldiers, Zhongde's five Yongning Prefecture soldiers, and Shaanxi Fubiao Zhong's soldiers, all of whom are old in the elite of the army.

Because everyone knows that if they are let go back and attract a large number of thieves and soldiers, will there be a way for dozens of them to live?

Therefore, as soon as Zhang Heng gave an order, dozens of people slammed the horse's belly together, patrolled the fleeing thief army, and chased away.

Although the number of the thief army patrol was twice that of Zhang Heng's department, they were all foot soldiers, and they couldn't run the speed of the war horses at all, and in less than a quarter of an hour, Zhang Heng and the others had already chased behind those thieves.

This part of the thief army only fled south at this time, leaving their backs to the enemy one by one without reservation, and therefore one by one they quickly became the target of Zhang Heng's cavalry.

The distance was only twenty or thirty paces, and there were almost no arrows, but after three rounds of arrow rain, there were only a dozen of the hundreds of thieves running in front.

At this time, Zhang Heng and the others no longer needed to use bows and arrows, put away bows and arrows, replaced them with spears, and stabbed more than a dozen thieves who were still fleeing from behind to the ground one by one, leaving only two alive in the end.

Zhang Heng himself and his subordinates, most of whom were veterans, needless to say, tortured and interrogated them, and soon learned the information around Shilou County from the mouths of the two remaining thieves.

It turned out that on the afternoon of the second day after the fall of Shennanyu, many thieves who escaped from Shennanyu fled over the mountains and mountains to Guangwuzhuang, the throat of the western foot of Luliang Mountain.

The place where Guangwuzhuang itself is located is an open area surrounded by mountains on three sides in the southeast and north, and it is Shikou to the east over Luliang, and from Shikou to the east, through Shimen Pass, it can lead to the Shanxi hinterland plain on both sides of the Fenshui River.

And the reason why it is said to be a choke point is because to the west of it, there is only a valley that is wide and narrow, that is, the upper valley of the Beihun River, and on the only valley road, there is a Xialong Pass about ten miles away from Guangwuzhuang.

This Xialong Pass is also easy to defend and difficult to attack, and it is extremely steep.

Therefore, when Hong Chengchou took more than 3,000 elite soldiers from Fubiao in Shaanxi Province to Liulinbao in the north, Zhang Zongheng, the envoy of Shanxi, took the Zhenxi camp under his command, in addition to sticking to Shilou County, all they could do was to send a group of men and horses to set up camp at the entrance and exit of the mountain road near Shilou Mountain leading to Xialongguan and Guangwuzhuang, build fortifications, and prevent the thieves stationed in Guangwuzhuang from breaking through and escaping.

Although Emperor Chongzhen issued a holy decree before, the original Shanxi township soldiers, as well as the Shanxi Zhenxi guards who had been collected one after another, were unified and trained into the new Zhenxi Battalion, but he had not yet had time to provide the Zhenxi Battalion with imperial court-style weapons and equipment.

Not to mention that there are no muskets and artillery, even the standard iron armor, Qi knives and new-style cymbals and large-brimmed helmets uniformly produced and deployed by the Armament Institute cannot be made for each person.

If it weren't for the fact that Wang Chengen, the chief soldier of Shaanxi, came to reinforce Shilou with some ordnance and baggage not long ago, the weapons and equipment of the western battalion of this town would only be the spears, bows and arrows, leather armor and wooden shields that were originally equipped by the Shanxi township soldiers.

To put it bluntly, this kind of equipment is basically the same as the rogues they need to face.

Now counting the imperial court standard weapons provided by Wang Chengen, the chief soldier of Shaanxi, to the Zhenxi camp, there are only more than 1,000 people in the Zhenxi camp who have a little bit of the appearance of the imperial court economic battalion soldiers.

If it weren't for the fact that Hong Chengchou had spent more than half a month before, specially urging the Zhenxi Battalion to intensively drill the infantry's spear array, then he wouldn't dare to go north with confidence.

Even so, before he went north, he also issued a strict order not to allow the Zhenxi camp to act rashly and take the initiative to attack the thief army in the direction of Guangwuzhuang.

But what Hong Chengchou and Zhang Zongheng, who were in the stone building, didn't expect was that people didn't hurt the tiger's heart, but they couldn't stop the tiger from eating people.

As a group of rebellious soldiers in the camp of the Shennanyu thief army fled over the mountains and mountains to the vicinity of Guangwuzhuang, the "Zijinliang" Wang Ziyong, who was stationed here, quickly figured out the situation in Shennanyu.

Previously, when the fire on Luliang Mountain was full of fire, Luo Rucai, the leader of Cao Cao's camp under Wang Ziyong, had already begun to persuade Wang Ziyong to lead his troops to break through.

It's just that Hong Chengchou was sitting in Shilou at that time, and the elite men and horses under his command were very strong, and after Wang Ziyong sent troops to try, he never made up his mind, and then the heavy rain came, the mountain fire was extinguished, and Wang Ziyong also calmed down the mind of leading the army to leave, after all, Wang Jiayin has always been good to him, and he also has a lot of gratitude to repay.

Later, after the news that Shimen Pass was broken by the official army and Shikou fell into the hands of the official army, in addition to Cao Cao and Luo Rucai, all the thieves such as "Ground-grabbing Tiger", "Xing Red Wolf" and "Not Touching the Mud" came to persuade Wang Ziyong to make a decision and withdraw immediately.

After all, there is only one Luliang Mountain between Guangwuzhuang and Shikou, although the mountain is high and the road is dangerous, and it is difficult for the army to climb over, but the straight-line distance of less than sixty or seventy miles in total still makes these thieves under Wang Ziyong's command feel afraid.

Later, when the news of the fall of Shennanyu came, especially on the night of the second day, after the news that Wang Jiayin, the king of Hengtian, and Wang Er, the left prime minister and military adviser of the "righteous army", had died in Shennanyu, Wang Ziyong himself finally made up his mind that he could no longer stay in this place.

Because although Guangwuzhuang has the natural danger of Xialongguan to the west, it can be called a one-man pass, but Guangwuzhuang to the east, there are several mountain roads leading to Shikou and Shennanyu.

In particular, the one leading to Shennanyu, because it is the rear of the army, so in the few months when the king of Hengtian entrenched in Shennanyu with men and horses, he has never built any dangerous passes, on the contrary, in order to facilitate the communication between the two places, the second prime minister of Zuo also sent people and horses to properly repair the mountain road leading to Guangwuzhuang, but all the dangerous places that may affect Shennanyu's control of the direction of Guangwuzhuang have been eradicated and flattened.

As a result, after the fall of Shennanyu, the small actions taken by each other because of suspicion or fear of being suspicious at this time cheapened the officials and troops of Lu Xiangsheng's department, and also made Wang Ziyong, Luo Rucai and others worried, and soon decided to abandon Guangwuzhuang and go out of Xialongguan.

On the same day that Hong Chengchou garrisoned outside Ningxiang County and decided to accept the surrender of Wang Zuohang and others, Wang Zuohang, the "Zijin Liang", led a large number of thieves under his command, and suddenly poured out from the direction of Xialong Pass.

Ordered to guard the exit area of the valley west of Xialong Pass, the more than 1,000 people and horses under the command of Pei Shize, the general of the Zhenxi battalion, relied on the camp fortifications built before, although they gave a large number of casualties to the thief army, but they were still outnumbered, and after resisting for an hour or so, the men and horses under his command finally collapsed because of heavy casualties.

Except for Pei Shize, who fled back to Shilou County with more than a dozen people under the cover of his personal guards, the rest of the people were all killed.

Including Pei Shize's two younger brothers, Pei Shirun, the capital of Zhenxi Ying, and Pei Shichun, the general manager of Qian, who had just served for a short time, also died in the chaos.

In this way, just as Hong Chengchou led his men and horses to receive the surrender of Wang Zuojiao's thief army in Ningxiang, Shilou County suddenly fell into a crisis of loss.