In September of the third year of Chongzhen, the rebel army led by Wang Zishun captured Hongdong County, but because of the fear of being besieged and cleared by the official army, and after having eaten the sweetness brought by the siege of the city.

The 20,000 rebel army began to abandon the county town of Hongdong and march towards the more affluent city of Pingyang.

Along the road, the displaced people in the territory were forcibly recruited, and nearly 30,000 people gathered in a mighty way and began to approach Pingyang City.

Binh Duong City is surrounded by mountains on all sides, and is located in the middle of the basin, and the city is strong and artillery.

Wang Zishun's army arrived at the beginning of October, faced with the tall city walls, and more than a dozen iron cannons, several days of attack, all kinds of tricks were frequent, but there was no progress, after the death and wounded everywhere, had no choice but to start a long siege without attacking.

Under the city of Pingyang, endless messy sheds blocked the perimeter of the city wall for dozens of miles.

The hungry rebel army with a vegetable face looked at Pingyang City more than a mile away numbly.

The long siege has lasted for more than ten days.

The rebel army that broke through Zhaocheng County and Hongdong County again and again was ruthlessly cleaned up by the defenders of the city under Pingyang Mansion.

The initial siege resulted in more than 5,000 casualties in just five days.

He filled the moat with his life, but he could not climb the high walls or break the strong gates.

On the last day, more than a dozen iron cannons in the city fired in succession, directly smashing into Wang Zishun's camp tent, almost letting the thief head cry out, so far the prince pulled out the camp and retreated, ordered to stop the attack, and so far they have been nested in the back camp, not daring to come forward.

In Pingyang City, although the rebels are approaching the city, except for the uneasy and nervous common people, the officials and rich families in the city are still at ease.

Before, the rebel army attacked fiercely, shouting and killing day and night, and no one in the city was not panicked, but five days later, the rebels left the corpses everywhere under the city, and retreated.

The big merchants in the city wished that this kind of life would continue for a while.

Now the city is besieged, can not enter and exit, more than 50,000 people in the city, people are panicked, the price of various materials in the city is raised, the merchants make a lot of money, one by one happy in their hearts.

Of course, it is still timely to honor the prefect, otherwise if the other party is unhappy, he will be requisitioned by others with an order.

Don't look at the first two days, the Baihuayuan named after the city and the Chunhong Building, because the official was unhappy, and even the money was requisitioned by the prefect, and the group of little ladies with fine skin and tender meat arranged to comfort the group of Qiu Ba.

Pity the group of little ladies who don't have ten taels of silver on weekdays and don't let them get close, so they were ruined by the Qiu Ba.

It can only be blamed on the hostess of Baihuayuan, who is not as good as the owner of Chunhong Mansion, who has the ability and eyesight.

In the night, the prefect's yamen, drums sounded in unison, and the guests expired.

Today is the day when the prefect's newly accepted fifth concubine enters the door.

People with faces in the city came to celebrate, the prefect's new concubine was originally a famous Qingqi person in Baihuayuan, Lu Qingyin, and now Baihuayuan was requisitioned, and the prefect couldn't bear to see Qingli beauty in distress, so he was very benevolent to rescue, and Lu Qingyin, one of the two famous leaders in the city, was collected in the house, and took pity on the jade.

The prefect's acceptance of new concubines is naturally a major event, and it is more important than the rebels outside the city, so all the famous people in the city came to congratulate him in person, except for Zhang Xiahai, the leader of the eight hills.

The house was full of happy guests and smiles.

The prefect of the back hall, Cen Huayan, was hugging his newly acquired concubine, looking at the congratulatory gifts piled up in the room, his eyes shining.

The beautiful woman in her arms forced her face to be happy, and her eyes hid unnoticed sadness and self-pity.

And Zhang Xiahai, who was not present to congratulate, was staying in the room that Cen Huayan had placed in the city at the moment, drinking alone and looking angry.

The five central and left sides of the Pingyang Guard Station are nominally 5,000 soldiers, but in fact less than 3,000 people can be recruited and transferred into battle, excluding the 1,000 men and horses who fell into Hongdong County before, Zhang Xiahai has less than 2,000 people on hand.

When the Ming Dynasty's guards arrived in the Chongzhen year, they couldn't bear to look at them directly, and all the original guards became hired farmers who farmed the land, and the top-down officers of the guards became landlords.

The military households are fleeing to death, and they are exploited at all levels, and they can't survive, so how can they still have the ability and strength to follow them to the battlefield.

After Zhang Xiahai was transferred to the command of Pingyangwei, he tried his best to correct the bad habits of the guard, but unfortunately the Pingyangwei that was rotten to the root was no longer able to recover.

Fortunately, in my spare time, I practice the whole column from time to time, and the guard can still save the last bit of vitality.

But even so, relying on less than 2,000 military households to deal with the tens of thousands of rebels under the city is still like hitting a stone with an egg.

Fortunately, after Zhang Xiahai arrived in Pingyang City, several major merchants in the city, led by the Kang family, not only contributed money and goods, but also gathered more than 2,000 Ding together to help defend the city.

It is a big crime for people to possess firearms privately, but Zhang Xiahai eats other people's food, and the Kang family even gave him dozens of firearms in Pingyangwei, Zhang Xiahai can only pretend to turn a blind eye.

Relying on the firearms supported by the Kang family, plus the original 100 old firearms of the guard, and finally more than 10 iron cannons used to defend the city.

Under the command of Zhang Xiahai, the rebels under the city were defeated one after another, and now they dare not come within a mile of the city.

But after all, the rebels are entrenched outside the city, and now they can't enter or leave, how can they continue like this?

Two days ago, Zhang Xiahai personally visited the prefect Cen Huayan and Kang Shounong, the head of the Kang family, hoping to take the soldiers in the city out of the city to fight and deal a heavy blow to the rebels to solve the current predicament.

I don't want the prefect Cen Huayan to flatly reject his proposal, saying that the anti-army thieves are too powerful and cannot be easily confronted, and Kang Shounong, the head of the Kang family, is also reluctant to shirk it.

After being rejected, Zhang Xiahai felt a burst of discouragement and resentment in his heart, and in frustration, he hid in his residence alone and drank alcohol.

There are many anti-soldiers, but they are a group of rabble, all of them are rebel people who can't even find all weapons, how can they withstand the rush of well-equipped sergeants?

Although Zhang Xiahai had the intention to lead people out of the city alone, half of the city was made up of large families in the city, and relying on his own guard army of less than 2,000 people, Zhang Xiahai had no confidence in his heart.

So Pingyang City is like this, inside and outside the city, facing each other unharmed.

Such days lasted until the end of October, when the impasse was broken.

It was the rebel army led by Wang Zishun who broke the deadlock.

The rebel army besieged the city for nearly a month, more than 20,000 soldiers, consumed more than 20,000 catties of grain every day, besieged the city for a month, no progress, food was not enough to supply the army, plus the weather was dry and cold, there were no houses to settle in, and some people froze to death every day.

Seeing that the situation was turning for the worse, Wang Zishun could no longer hide.

At the end of October, Wang Zishun commanded the rebels to storm the city again.

This siege is different from the past, Pingyang City has four gates, the prince Shun let his generals, respectively, lead people, four gates to attack, regardless of casualties, only hope to be able to capture Pingyang Mansion City within ten days, enter the city to settle down.

The rebel army attacked fiercely, and the fighting was fierce at the city gates everywhere, and the rebels still had a tricky mentality before, such as escorting unarmed homeless people to the city, but Zhang Xiahai's cold-blooded artillery bombardment shattered the rebels' tricks.

After a lapse of half a month, the rebels who were bent on capturing Binh Duong Province made a comeback.

The officers and soldiers who were paralyzed by the long siege were slow to react and were almost captured by the rebels.

Fortunately, Zhang Xiahai arrived in time, commanded the defense of the city, and personally brought his own soldiers to rescue the emergency, so that the rebels were driven out of the city.

Even so, half a day later, the crisis in the city was resolved, and Zhang Xiahai learned that in just two hours, more than 1,000 people were killed and wounded in the city, and the rebels were also killed or wounded three or four times.

As soon as the rebel army retreated, Zhang Xiahai hurriedly commanded the defenders to rearrange the city defenses.

Half an hour later, the rebel army, which had suffered three or four thousand dead and wounded, attacked again, and the two sides fought again.

The defenders fought back again, after which the rebels once again left the corpses behind and evacuated the city.

For the next three days, the two sides continued to fight.

More than 20,000 rebels under the prince were killed, and only 13,000 remained. The defenders of the city also suffered 2,000 casualties.

Seeing that this kind of attack and defense continued, it was precarious, so he had no choice but to stop the offensive.

And in the city, after the force defending the city was cut by half, the prefect Cen Huayan also became anxious.

Overnight, I asked Zhang Xiahai to come to the house to discuss.

Zhang Xiahai hurriedly arrived and found that not only the prefect Cen Huayan, but also the same governor, the official pusher, and Kang Shounong were all in the hall.

However, in just a few words, Zhang Xiahai's face changed suddenly, he never thought that when there were still 4,000 people in the city before, he proposed to kill out of the city five times or three times, but several people refused, and now the battle has reached more than 2,000 people, and the prefect in front of him actually wants to lead people to sneak attack the thief camp overnight.

This is to send yourself to death!

Zhang Xiahai suddenly changed color, and he was ready to get up and refuse.

But Cen Huayan gave a death order, and Zhang Xiahai had no choice but to gather people in a hurry.

In the middle of the night, the city gate suddenly opened, and a thousand officers and soldiers went to the thief camp with black lights and blind fire.

The rebel army camp, the prince did not expect that the other party would dare to steal the camp in the middle of the night, and the precautions were unknown.

So when Zhang Xiahai led people to kill suddenly, for a while, the battalion was killing and shouting continuously, and everyone was shocked.

Zhang Xiahai knew that if he killed the enemy, he might die in the tiger's mouth if he was not careful, so he only led people to set fire to the chaos, not seeking to kill more thieves.

The prince was hurriedly escorted out of the camp by his own soldiers, and the whole camp was in chaos, with raging fires everywhere and all kinds of noisy sounds, and when he finally gathered his men and soldiers to kill the enemy, he found that the scene was already chaotic, and there was no distinction between the enemy and me in the panic, and the traces of the officers and soldiers were scattered and difficult to find.

The two sides fought for most of the night.

Zhang Xiahai saw that there were still three hundred officers and soldiers left in the gathered under his command, and decisively ordered to evacuate.

And when everything calmed down, Wang Zishun found that only the 5,000 brothers who had come from Shaanxi all the way were left in the camp.

Wang Zishun didn't need to check to know that the others must have taken advantage of the chaos to flee everywhere, the rebel army was originally composed of a group of displaced people without cohesion, how could they expect the other party to be as disciplined as officers and soldiers.

The military advisor beside him spoke out cautiously at this moment: "King, if you stay under Pingyang City any longer, I'm afraid it's useless, why don't you leave and find him out?" ”

Wang Zishun looked at the devastation in front of him, and then looked at the brightly lit city wall in the distance, and finally turned around coldly, took the remaining more than 5,000 people under his command, packed his bags, and went away into the distance by night.

At this point, the Battle of Binh Duong came to an end.

Wang Zishun only had 5,000 men left, and after disappearing from the city of Pingyang, he disappeared without a trace.

And the defenders of Pingyang City only had more than 1,000 people left, and the Weisho army under Zhang Xiahai's name was almost wiped out.

The elite families in various large families are also greatly injured.