??? After Wang Huan agreed, without the slightest delay, Wang Yingxiong, who had thick bandages on the inside of his two thighs, called over, and briefly explained the general situation, and the governors of the three provinces heard that Wang Huan was going to attack the Qing army with 2,000 men at hand, and his face turned white.

Immediately, the old man claimed that he wanted to rush back to Zhaoqing, and would rather have his head cut off by the emperor than go to death with Wang Huan.

Wang Huan patiently watched him call, and when he was tired and stopped, he told him that he couldn't go, someone had to go to Changde, this person wanted to block Yinxi to be trustworthy and prestigious, and it was best to be a court official.

Of course, Wang Yingxiong didn't want to go, but he didn't have a choice, Ma Wannian tied two pieces of cowhide on his legs to relieve the pain of friction, and then couldn't help but say, helped him get on the horse, sent a sergeant of a hundred people to escort him, went directly to the official road, and left.

When Wang Yingxiong left, he looked at the eyes of Wang Huan and others, full of regret and incomprehension, he regretted the loss of a general who could be relied on, it would be difficult to find such a general who dared to fight in the future, and the positions of the governors of the three provinces, the scholars of the Jianji Palace, and the cabinet ministers were mostly over.

In his eyes, Wang Huan was already a dead man.

However, Wang Hua didn't have the consciousness of a dying person at all, and he didn't feel Wang Yingxiong's eyes at all, and when he sent away this sad governor, he immediately ordered the whole army to prepare and rush to Xinhua!

To get to Xinhua, you must pass through Baoqing Mansion, because the city of Baoqing Mansion is surrounded by the Qing army, you have to go around a circle and avoid the Qing soldiers besieging the city from the periphery, fortunately, the cavalry is fast, and it is too late to walk a little more.

The most taboo of rapid marching is chaos, in the high-speed gallop, it is easy to disrupt the system, will not find the soldiers, the soldiers can not find the generals, there are those who can't keep up with the team, there are accidental injuries, and there are those who are afraid of the war and desert, running and running, people will be less and less unconsciously, the ancient army marched to the place, and the number of ten stops will go to three stops, which shows the negative effect of such a pursuit of speed marching.

In order to prevent this situation, the Kuizhou army marched in a unit of 100 people, the squad leader was responsible for the centurion, the centurion was responsible for Wang Huan, one less person, Wang Huan only asked the centurion, and Wang Huan led the team to run in the front, Li Dingguo finished at the rear, and ensured that the Kuizhou army as a whole would not be scattered, more than 2,000 people were like a rolling torrent, the sound of hooves rumbled and whipped forward, and on the vast land of the lake in summer, they ran towards the wolf smoke of Baoqing Mansion City.

Along the way, the group of refugees coming from the opposite side kept appearing, these people panicked, carrying burdens and carrying bags and rolls to help each other, children crying and women screaming, stumbling on the official road, seeing the huge smoke and dust raised by the Kuizhou military horse team from a distance, they all avoided the roadside in a panic, and when they saw the banner of the Ming army, they looked stunned.

The Kuizhou army of the white-armored angry horse passed in front of them, and the knights immediately carried arrows, the tiger and leopard battle flag hunted and fluttered, and the iron armor was murderous, like a dragon and a tiger, and it had a military prestige that could not be desecrated, which made the people of Baoqing Mansion, who were accustomed to seeing the decadent soldiers of the Ming Dynasty, have the illusion of heavenly soldiers descending to earth in a trance.

The cavalry rushed by, the wind rolled up the placket, and the power that made the earth tremble was so great that it easily made these people who had suffered so much deeply feel the sense of security that they had not felt for a long time.

I don't know who led the head, but he was subdued by the military intimidation of the Kuizhou army, knelt in the dust on the side of the official road, and shouted "Long live" while shedding tears. One person knelt down, two people knelt down, three people knelt down, hundreds of people knelt together, and the people scattered in the mountains and wilderness cried and laughed, watching this group of solemn galloping Ming troops disappear into the dust.

"Mother, who are they?" A child hid behind the woman in fear, looked at the back of the cavalry on the official road, and asked softly.

"Child, they are the officials and soldiers of the imperial court, and they were sent by the emperor to avenge us." The father beside him looked tired, but his eyes were full of hope, and he clenched his fists and said happily: "How many years, I haven't seen such a powerful official army, Daming Zhongxing is hopeful, hopeful!" ”

The woman knelt beside the man, pulled the child with tears in her eyes, and said, "It would be good to ask the heavens to bless them and drive away the tartars." ”

The child is young, but four or five years old, combing a pigtail, wearing an old clothes that he has obviously picked up, with big eyes like pink carvings and blinking, very cute, it is the age of innocence, but he already has an understanding of the hardships of life, listening to his parents say this, he raised his little face and shouted seriously: "Mother, father, when I grow up, I will also be an official and soldier, and I will also kill the Tartars!" ”

When the parents heard this, the father hurriedly reprimanded: "What kind of officer and soldier? Are we still less of the scourge of the official army? Our family was robbed and defeated by the official army, and the official army is worse than bandits! ”

The child was puzzled for a moment, and asked aggrievedly: "However, my father and mother just said that the official army is killing Tartars, why is it not good?" ”

Father was speechless, raised his eyes to look at the direction where the Kuizhou army disappeared, slowly stood up, and said slowly with confused eyes: "The official army just now is not like an ordinary official army, well, yes, it's different, at least it looks different." ”

Seeing that he couldn't explain clearly, the child's innocent face had a confused expression.

……

With Yongzhou to Xinhua, take the official road for nearly 400 miles, the Kuizhou army discarded the baggage, the whole army only brought weapons and dry food, day and night, it also took six days, this is because the Kuizhou soldiers are a single horse, no horse can be replaced, the day travel about seventy miles has reached the extreme of the mount, no matter how fast it is not impossible, but in this way, there must be horses overwhelmed and exhausted to death, without horses, the Kuizhou army walks on two legs, it is unimaginable passive.

However, the Kuizhou army is like this, and Li Maozu's Qing army is the same, and the Qing army is mostly foot soldiers, so when Wang Huan stood at the head of Xinhua City, Li Maozu and others were still trekking on the official road of Baoqing Mansion.

Xinhua County, belonging to Baoqing Mansion, registered in the register of only 1,000 households, the population is not more than 5,000, even in the late Ming Dynasty population reduction era is also a small county, the county seat is built in the mountains of western Xiangxi, the side of Meishan, surrounded by mountains on all sides, is a basin.

Although the county is small, but it is very critical, the official road of Baoqing in the south and Changde in the north, it extends from the broken earthen wall of the county seat, in peacetime, the people here are doing the business of merchants from the south to the north, the teahouse inn, the Goolan horse line, it is also prosperous, the county has an inspection department on the side of the official road, the oil and water are very sufficient, so the Xinhua county order and the position of inspection, a seven-product and a nine-product, although it does not enter the stream, it can make people grab their heads.

However, at this time, the county order has long been gone, the gate of the county government is open, and there is not even a ghost to be found, the table is crooked, as if it has been a thief, and the inspection department on the side of the official road, not to mention, there are not even rats in the small courtyard.

The people in the city, except for those who couldn't run, had already fled up the mountain with their families, and the earth city had become an empty city.

Wang Huan stood on the city wall, caressed the loess wall, and felt that the military disaster was really fiercer than the tiger, leopard and jackal, it was difficult to build a city to the sky, but it was easy to destroy a city.

The sound of iron leaves sounded in his ears, and Wang Huan looked sideways, but it was Li Dingguo who went to the city.

"My lord, the last general has inspected the city, the circumference of this county is only four miles, the city wall is an earthen wall built during the Chenghua period, the wall is one foot three feet high, the wall is rammed by loess, the material is very poor, many places have collapsed, and even the ladder can jump in." Li Dingguo's eyebrows have become habitually locked during this time, as if he will not unfold, and his face seems to have aged a lot: "The city has four gates, east, west, north and south, there is no moat, there is not even a moat, it is open on all sides, and it can be deployed to attack the city. ”

Wang Huan smiled faintly and said: "As expected, if the magistrate of the Ming Dynasty can pay attention to the affairs of the official family, it will be strange, is there anything to gain in the city?" ”

Li Dingguo sighed helplessly, and said: "There are ten rooms and nine empty rooms in the city, and all that is left are some old, weak, sick and disabled, there is no one on duty in the official office and county office, there is not a single rice in the official warehouse, which can starve to death of mice, as for the arsenal, the last general also took people to see it, all of them are some broken copper and iron, which are useless. There were some bows and arrows, but they couldn't match our mountain-destroying crossbows, but the only catch was to find some lime bottles to defend the city, and twenty large barrels of black powder, which were hundreds of catties in total. ”

"Oh?" The corners of Wang Huan's mouth grinned, as if he had known it for a long time, and said happily: "How is the gunpowder good?" ”

"The color is dry, and it will be fried at one point." Li Ding National Road.

When Li Dingguo searched the whole city, he had already heard a lot of information from the remaining population in the city, and at this moment he came one by one in an orderly manner: "It turns out that this Xinhua county is a large county that manufactures fireworks and firecrackers in several nearby state capitals, and Xinhua firecrackers are famous far and wide, and many merchants also make a special trip from other places to buy firecrackers and sell them during the Chinese New Year, so there are many businesses that manufacture fireworks and firecrackers in this Xinhua County, and even this county Yali also openly sells gunpowder for profit. ”

Wang Huan blinked his eyes and said: "Then hurry up and look for it again, open all the shops in the city, and find out all the gunpowder they are hiding, anyway, the merchants will run away when they look for it, and no one will know about borrowing some of their gunpowder." ”

Li Dingguo agreed, turned around and wanted to go down, but turned his head back and asked with a strange expression: "Uh, my lord, did you already know that there would be so much gunpowder storage in Xinhua County, so you decided to rush here?" ”

Wang Huan smiled wickedly, waved his hand in a tall manner, and motioned to Li Dingguo to hurry up and do something without saying a word.

Li Dingguo was stunned and admired in his heart, secretly thinking that the adult really knew astronomy and geography, and even knew the firecrackers and fireworks that were the specialties of a small county town thousands of miles away.

Wang Huan secretly shouted lucky, how did he know that the special gunpowder firecrackers of Xinhua County, which are almost not marked on the map of this era, are because he has inadvertently seen a court painting of the Ming Dynasty in later generations, which is a picture of the Lantern Festival in the court of Ming Xianzong, which is marked with large pictures and words, the palace people used the fireworks and firecrackers offered by Xinhua County to entertain the emperor's scene, and deduced that since Xinhua County can produce fireworks for the royal tribute, it must be such a large county, so as soon as he came here, he asked his subordinates to collect it as soon as possible, and sure enough, he found gunpowder.

The exterminating bullets carried by the Kuizhou army were only two per person, and the total of 2,000 people was only 4,000, which was definitely not enough for defense, but with the thousands of catties of black powder in Xinhua County, Wang Huan was sure that Li Maozu's 30,000 people would be left under Xinhua City.

Next, it's time to think about how to dig a pit so that the Tartar can jump into the explosives pit.

Wang Huan thought about it, and the sly smile on the corner of his mouth became more and more insidious.