The sky was already dark, but the cold wind was still bleak, and from time to time there was a slight "squeak" of wheels across the ground in the distance. Pen × fun × Pavilion www. ｂｉｑｕｇｅ。 ｉｎｆｏ

Carrying a group of envoys from the Kou army, who were not lightly injured, the carriage drove through the streets and alleys at a high speed, the horse's hooves were hurrying, the horse's nose made a loud cry, and a breath of white air was spewed, and with the whip raised, there was a low neigh, and more than a dozen masked black-clothed men rode their horses, closely guarding both sides of the carriage, and galloped quickly towards the city gate.

The towering city gate in the morning fog in the distance is faintly recognizable, the black-clothed man who is the leader of the horse let out a scream, and the city gate in the distance slowly opened as if he had received an order, and a group of black-clothed people kept moving, escorting the carriage and rushing directly out of Fengyang City, and ran out of more than ten miles in one breath before stopping.

The man in black turned over and dismounted, opened the curtain of the carriage door and saluted with a fist: "You are frightened, the lower official is ordered by the prefect to rob the prison and send you out!" ”

"This lord, I don't know what happened in Fengyang City!" One of them, a strong man with a beard, looked at the man in black and asked with his fists clenched.

Thinking of being almost beaten to death by the jailers, the group of Kou army envoys who were paralyzed in the carriage had palpitations, there was nothing happier in this world than to live.

The masked black-clothed man at the head said with a deep sigh: "Zhang Tanghuai conspired with Chen Jinghao, the general manager of Qian, to rebel, and suddenly led the troops to attack the mansion, and the prefect evacuated by luck, when I arrived, you have been captured, time is pressing, this letter is also to be handed over to Zhang Dashuai, he will attack the city in the future, and our department will respond from the inside, but I hope that Zhang Dashuai will not forget the original agreement!" As he spoke, he handed over a letter.

"It's easy to say, it's easy to say, today's great grace, Jiang is unforgettable!"

The strong man with a beard named Jiang Zhi respectfully accepted the letter and carefully tucked it on his chest while thanking him with a thousand thanks.

It's a fluke to be able to leave Fengyang alive, how can you pull the life-saving benefactor to ask this and that, under the explanation of the masked man in black, the cause and effect are also clear,

"There is another thing, I don't know whether to talk about it or not." The man in black said with a little hesitation.

"Please, but it doesn't hurt." The life-saving benefactor has something to say, and the envoys of the Kou army naturally attach great importance to it.

"I got a secret report a few days ago that the rebel army Li Zicheng and Gao Yingxiang seemed to have secretly met with the imperial court envoy."

"Is that true?" Jiang Zhi asked with a look of astonishment.

Frankly speaking of the words of the man in black, Jiang Zhi did not doubt that in addition to the preconceived trust in the life-saving benefactor, there is also a very important reason, that is, the Kou army has always had a tradition of surrendering, and it can't be defeated, Zhao'an surrenders, and surrenders when tired, of course, most of them are just fraudulent surrenders, and Yang He, the right attendant of the military department who came to Zhao'an, and Chen Qiyu, the governor of the five provinces who surrounded the main force of the Kou army in Chezhou Gorge, have a record of surrendering, especially Zhang Xianzhong is a professional household who surrendered by fraud.

Took the imperial court's salary, quiet for a few months, wait for the rumors to pass, change to a place with few officials and soldiers, and rise up again, in fact, this is also a helpless thing, at that time, natural disasters everywhere continued, the people fed on people, the local officials were overwhelmed, and the court could not help the people to resume production and farming, and they could not survive and could only return to their old business, so that later the governor Hong Chengchou, who was responsible for encircling and suppressing the Kou army, and the fierce man Lu Xiangsheng, regardless of whether the Kou army surrendered or not, were killed.

So when the man in black said about Li Zicheng and Gao Yingxiang's possibility of a secret conversation with the imperial envoy, Jiang Zhi did not doubt it.

"The prefect also learned about it by chance, and he didn't pursue the certificate deeply!"

Faced with Jiang Zhi's question, the man in black said slightly apologetically, obviously he didn't seem to be completely sure about this news.

Jiang Zhi stroked his beard and groaned all over his face, obviously this information was quite important, because the army led by Li Zicheng and Gao Yingxiang was rushing towards Fengyang.

After thanking the men in black for their kindness, one of the envoys of the Kou army, who was relatively lightly injured, stepped forward, took the reins of the horses from the men in black, and with a low neighing of the horses, the carriage carrying the envoys of the Kou army galloped towards the place where Zhang Xianzhong was stationed more than 100 miles away.

Seeing the carriage go away, the black-clothed man at the head ripped off the mask, it was Han Yu's brother Zhang Tanghuai with a sneer.

From the beginning, without saying a word, he was captured and imprisoned, and whipped to death these envoys of the Kou army.

and then to the drama-like robbery, and then sent these people out of the city, set up a counter-plan, and everything developed step by step according to Han Yu's plan.

Moreover, before Zhang Tanghuai set off, Han Yu specially instructed many times that the news of Li Zicheng and the others conspiring with the imperial court must not be true.

This is also Han Yu's understanding of Zhang Xianzhong's character, Zhang Xianzhong is tall, very brave, known as the nickname of Yellow Tiger, but also suspicious by nature, if Zhang Tang Huaiyan's news is true, it will attract suspicion, if it is only said that there is no verification, only occasional news, Zhang Xianzhong will be convinced.

Han Yu's purpose is to drive a wedge between Zhang Xianzhong, Gao Yingxiang, and Li Zicheng.

As for why the three people who are not together at all are separated, it has to start from the original time when the cattle man Hong Chengchou led the elite to gather in Henan, intending to encircle and annihilate the main force of the Kou army.

Because he heard that Hong Chengchou was leading the troops, the 36th Battalion of the Kou Army, who was frightened, immediately held a joint meeting.

The combined forces of the leaders numbered hundreds of thousands, almost ten times the size of the Ming army, but the focus of the discussion at the meeting was not to jointly resist Hong Chengchou, but to flee for his life.

The most important reason why I don't dare to fight is that I don't look at the large number of Kou troops, which look dense and very scary, but there are only one or two soldiers who can fight, and seven or eight servants, that is to say, the number of Kou troops is basically composed of military families and families, and only one-tenth of the strong soldiers who can fight.

If it is okay to gather crowds to fight small-scale officials and troops in small cities, and fight with the elite led by Hong Chengchou, it is completely looking for death, the Kou army has proved this with countless lives and blood, plus there are fierce generals like Cao Wenzhao in the Ming army, and there is also a strong army like Ning Tieqi, so that many Kou troops will tremble when they hear Cao Wenzhao's name.

Although the leader of the 36th Battalion wanted to escape, he needed to make a plan to escape.

Because if everyone ran to the side, it was very likely that they would be chased by the Ming army all the way, so in the end it was decided to divide the troops into three ways, but there was an endless debate about who went where.

Everyone was red-faced, and finally decided to use the method of drawing lots, and in addition to Zhang Xianzhong, who came to Fengyang, there were also Li Zicheng and Gao Yingxiang, which Han Yu naturally knew, and later secretly rejoiced that the first to rush to Fengyang City was Zhang Xianzhong.

But later, Han Yu also guessed why only Zhang Xianzhong was the first to attack Fengyang.

First of all, Han Yu is very concerned about the fact that Zhang Xianzhong's account in the eighth year of Chongzhen is probably not only more than 10,000 people, but from the map, there is a long distance from Henan to Fengyang, Anhui.

In Han Yu's opinion, in order to capture Fengyang before Gao Yingxiang and Li Zicheng, Zhang Xianzhong is very likely to reluctantly discard the bottles and cans that have been robbed for many years, and place the families of the soldiers who are too weak to march long distances in a certain place, which is also the reason why Zhang Xianzhong came to Fengyang City first, and it can also explain why there are only more than 10,000 people in the subordinates, and these Han Yu quickly got accurate information from the meticulous work who was tortured.

Although Zhang Tanghuai, with the help of Han Yu, an unknown prophet, repelled the blind and arrogant siege army very dangerously, and hijacked the prefect Yan Rongxuan, who planned to use the appeasement strategy, it can be said that he completely controlled the military and political power of Fengyang, but when Gao Yingxiang, Li Zicheng, and Zhang Xianzhong met under Fengyang City, the real crisis of Fengyang City really came.

And what's worse is that Zhang Xianzhong, a person who will be avenged, has suffered so many losses in Fengyang City, and he will not let Zhang Tanghuai go if he says anything.

Of course, Zhang Xianzhong will never be merciful and let everyone in the city go, there is almost no suspense in the city being broken and slaughtered, so Han Yu has no second way except to help Zhang Tanghuai defend Fengyang, and persist until Hong Chengchou, the governor of the five provinces, or Zuo Liangyu, the general soldier, rush to help.

It's just that the Kou army hasn't joined forces yet, but there is a big trouble in Fengyang City.

The trouble can be summed up in two words: lack of food.