On September 29, the 11th year of Kang Mazi in the Great Qing Dynasty, at noon and noon, on the Baishazhou five miles southwest of Wuchang, in a temporary marching tent, next to an ordinary hardwood square table, the armistice negotiations between the Wu army and the Qing army, which attracted much attention, officially started for the first time. The participants were as follows: the chief negotiator of the Wu side was Hu Guozhu, the governor of the Zhongshu Staff of the Pingxi Wangfu and the general of Jinwuzuo, and the left and right deputies were Lu Yifeng, the producer of Zhongshu, and the Zhongshu Fang Xueshi; The chief negotiator of the Qing army was the last of the four auxiliary ministers - the last Taishi of the Kang Mazi Dynasty, and the two deputies were the squire of the Ministry of Rites, Zheerken, and the head of the Hanlin Academy, Fu Dali.

This is destined to be full of hostility, disputes, bargaining and gunpowder negotiations, and even before the negotiations have officially begun, the Wu Jun representatives have launched a psychological contest with the Mites Qing representatives, and the scheming Kupilon has the excuse that his military position is in the north, and he is the plenipotentiary representative of the Mite Qing Emperor to participate in the negotiations, so he asked his seat to sit in the north and face the south, and take the south to be respected, which made the Wu army representatives fall into the psychological disadvantage of being a vassal in the north.

It's a pity that among the opponents of Suppilon, Lu Yifeng, who is the most difficult and cunning and the best at psychological tactics, although Lu Fatzi does not understand ancient feng shui, he has also heard that during the Panmunjom negotiations in history, the representatives of the Volunteer Army and the representatives of the US Army fought over who sat in the north and who faced the south, so Lu Fatzi immediately pointed out that the Qing army was defeated in successive battles and consecutive defeats, and it should be at a disadvantage from south to north, and the representatives of the Wu army who won on the battlefield were qualified to sit in the direction due north on behalf of the victor.

In the face of Lu Fatzi's questioning, Kubilong immediately quibbled that Wu Jun only defeated Aobai, and did not defeat the Mite Qing court, and Wu Jun negotiated with Kang Mazi, the Mite Qing Emperor, as a courtier this time, and should sit on the south side! Lu Fatzi immediately retorted, saying that this negotiation was a fair and just armistice negotiation, not a tribute from the Pingxi Palace, and there was no need to care about the courtesy of the monarch and ministers, and at the same time, until he died, he was still the commander of the expedition to the south appointed by Xiao Mazi himself, and his official title was not deprived, so the defeat of Aobai by the Wu army was equivalent to defeating the Qing court! Therefore, the representative of Wu Jun is qualified and must sit north to south to win!

The two sides insisted on their own words, refused to give in to each other, and quarreled for nearly an hour, and neither side was willing to make concessions in principle, and finally Suppilon was also angry, demanding that the negotiations be ended immediately, until the two sides sent representatives to each other to agree on the direction of the seats and then resume the negotiations! Lu Fatzi did not show weakness, and immediately agreed to Curb Pilon's request to suspend negotiations, and threatened: "Curb Zhongtang, of course you can suspend negotiations, this is also your freedom!" However, during this period, the expenses for the food and living expenses of the captured prince of your army, as well as the food and expenses of the Yungui soldiers who guarded them, must be borne by your army! From today onwards, 5,000 taels of silver will be tattooed every day, and after the negotiation is reached, your army must compensate our army for this expense, otherwise, our army has the right to refuse to release this group of prisoners! ”

"Five thousand taels of silver a day? You're going to grab it! Curb Pilon burst into a rage and said, "How many of our captured princes are Belle?" How much food do you eat in a day? Five thousand taels of silver can buy grain to bury their cells, right? ”

"It seems that the Zhongtang has forgotten that thanks to your economic blockade, the price of food in our Yunnan-Guizhou territory has skyrocketed." Lu Fatzi replied coldly: "The high-ranking captives of your army have fish and meat every day, and the people of Yunnan and Guizhou can't even afford to eat food, and they have to support so many princes and more than 20,000 banner people. ”

"Of course, if Ji Zhongtang feels that the price of five thousand taels of silver per day is too expensive and wants to reduce it a little, of course it can be done." Lu Fatzi sneered and added: "Please set a price in Zhongtang, even if you only pay one tael of silver a day, we will use this two silver to pay for the people's freight, cook's wages, and then buy firewood, rice, oil, salt, sauce, vinegar and tea, please King Kang, Prince Shun, forty-six Belle Beizi and more than 200 generals of your army, as well as more than 20,000 captured bannermen and soldiers, and will tell them truthfully, it is not that we will deduct their food and clothing, but that you old man in Zhongtang will only give them more than 20,000 people a food subsidy of one or two silver a day." ”

"You even have to count the expenses of the flag soldiers and prisoners?" The rat's tail almost stood up in anger.

"If the Banner Soldier Prisoners are treated the same as the Green Battalion Soldiers, of course we can not count the silver." Lu Fatzi replied with a smile: "The lowly rank can immediately report to the prince, and ask the prince to treat the banner captives the same as the Han captives, and send them to the mines to do hard labor, and give one pig food every day, each person can not mine five hundred catties of ore per day, and there is not even a meal of pig food!" At that time, we will also report to the Qing court, explaining that it is not us who want to do this, but what you asked us to do. ”

"Scoundrel! You total scoundrel! He couldn't help but roar and yelled: "Lu Yifeng thief, don't think that you are majestic now? Wait until our Qing court and Wu Sangui's old thief reach a negotiation, be careful that you die without a place to be buried! ”

"Old thief, what did you just call my father-in-law?" Hu Guozhu, who had been smiling and watching Fat Lu toss and curb Bilong, suddenly changed color, stood up and shouted with a blushing face: "Old thief of Kubilong, you have a kind of insulting my father-in-law again!" The entourage of the Wu army in the back also changed color together, and they drew their swords one after another, so frightened that the Qing army entourage behind Ji Bilong and others also drew their swords one after another, and the military tent was choking, and the already tense atmosphere suddenly became even more tense.

"Your Excellency, your Excellency, you have something to say, you have something to say." Fu Dali, who had a better temper, hurriedly came out to play a round, stopped everyone and said to Hu Guozhu: "General Jinwu, I'm really sorry, he made an unintentional mistake in containing Zhongtang, and he inadvertently said a word of disrespect to the prince of Pingxi in anger, and I hope you have a lot of adults, don't take it to heart." There is also you in the middle of the court, we are here to negotiate a truce with the prince of the peace west, not to intensify the contradictions, the lower officials are bold, please apologize to General Jinwu, this matter is over. ”

"General Jinwu, the old man is unintentionally gaffe, he definitely didn't mean to insult the prince of Pingxi, I hope General Jinwu will forgive me." He also knew that he was at a loss, so he had no choice but to apologize honestly.

"Humph! Unintentional mistakes? I'm afraid that you are behind your back, all of you are insulting our prince like this, right? Hu Guozhu snorted coldly, and warned with a blue face: "There is another point, we have spoken first, since we have already made up our minds to follow the prince to raise troops to clear the king's side and kill the ministers and worship, we have already put life and death out of the way, if Zhongtang insists on threatening us with words such as settling accounts after the autumn and settling accounts after the fact, we don't mind clearing the king's side again and killing another group of Korean and Chinese annihilators!" At that time, the consequences will be all the responsibility of you in the middle of the court! ”

If Wu Laohan annihilated the excuse that he deliberately sabotaged the armistice negotiations and played the banner of Qingjun's side again, the fate of Ao Bai and the fate of Ao Bai's whole family would be his fate and the fate of his whole family. Over there, Fu Dali hurriedly played a round again, and said in a pretentious manner: "General Jinwu misunderstood, Curb Zhongtang didn't mean that, Curb Zhongtang just hoped that Lord Lu would be cautious in his words and deeds, and if he didn't move, he would take our Eight Banner prisoners as prisoners and threaten them, worried that after those prisoners were released, it would be unfavorable to Lord Lu's career, it was a good intention, and there was absolutely no threat." ”

At the end, Fu Dali proposed again: "General Jinwu, Lord Lu, Lord Fang, since both of us have to sit in the north and have a reason to sit in the right position, then we should simply take a step back, and instead of sitting in the north-south direction, we will sit in the east-west direction instead." The title of the prince of Pingxi has a western character in it, so I invite the generals of Jinwu to sit in the west, and we to sit in the east, how about it? ”

Although Fu Dali's proposal seems to take a step back, but the direction of the seat was put forward by the Qing army negotiators first, and now they are forced to change the previous proposal, which is equivalent to compromising with the Wu army, and the momentum has weakened, Hu Guozhu and Lu Fatzi and others of course have no objections, they all sat on the west side of the square table, and the stolen chicken and rice were helpless, so they had to sit in the east and start formal negotiations with the Wu army representatives. However, it did not take long for the contradictions between the two sides of the negotiation to intensify again, given the huge difference in the terms of peace talks between the Wu army and the Qing army.

There is no way, the difference between the armistice terms issued by the two sides is too huge, the Wu army asked the Qing court to compensate the military expenses of 30 million taels of silver, 3 million stones of grain and grass, and the Qing court only gave 500,000 taels and 100,000 stones of grain and grass; Wu Jun demanded that the four provinces of Sichuan, Biyuan, Huguang and Guangxi be placed under the direct jurisdiction of the Pingxi Palace, and that the appointment of civil and military officials of all sizes should be decided by the Pingxi Palace, but the Qing Dynasty demanded that Wu Jun withdraw from all occupied provinces except Yunnan and Guizhou, and the local management of Yunnan and Guizhou provinces was only given to Wu Laohan the right to appoint local officials below the fourth grade, and the appointment of officials above the fourth rank must be reported to the Qing Dynasty for approval.

In addition, the price of the prisoner issue is even more huge, Wu Jun asked the Mite Qing court to redeem all the Manchu captives with five million taels of silver, and asked the Mite Qing court to unconditionally return Wu Shilin, the second grandson of Wu Lao Han and his daughter-in-law Princess Jianning, but the Mite Qing court did not want to give a penny, and asked Wu Jun to unconditionally release all Han and Manchu prisoners, and asked Wu Lao Han to send his eldest grandson Wu Shifan back to the capital as a hostage, and then he could return Wu Lao Han's second grandson and daughter-in-law. And the only clause that the two sides did not dispute was to hand over the murderer of Wu Yingxiong, Ao Bai's family.

Obviously, the Mites Qing court was playing with the idea of asking for a sky-high price and paying back the money on the ground, and planned to bargain with the Wu army little by little, so as to delay time, and take advantage of the favorable situation in which the war machine of the Mite Qing court was gradually in full swing, to force the Wu army to make huge concessions, and exchange the minimum price for the preparation time - even no cost at all, as long as the time dragged on to a certain extent, the Mite Qing court would not need to negotiate with the Wu army. And after Lu Fatzi saw through the evil intentions of Kubilong and the others at a glance, he immediately gave Hu Guozhu and Fang Xueshi a look, and called the two to the corner of the tent.

"Uncle, Mr. Xueshi, the dog is stalling for time." Lu Fatzi lowered his voice and said: "They deliberately pushed the price so low, they planned to wait for reinforcements from other provinces to be transferred to Huguang, stabilize their position first, and then really negotiate with us, take the opportunity to kill the price and reduce losses." ”

"yes, I think so too." Hu Guozhu nodded lightly, and then lowered his voice and asked, "Is there a way to crack it?" ”

"Put pressure on them." Fat Lu whispered in Hu Guozhu's ear: "It's ...... to threaten them like this." ”

Soon, Hu Guozhu returned to the negotiation table, did not sit down, and said directly: "Ji Zhongtang, in view of the huge disparity between our two sides in terms of the amount of compensation for military salaries, grain and grass and the price of redeeming prisoners, our Pingxi Royal Mansion has decided to immediately end the negotiations today, and ask you to reconsider the amount of compensation and come up with a negotiation amount that can show sincerity. You can send an envoy to discuss the specific time for the resumption of negotiations when you have considered it maturely. ”

"Well said." He couldn't wait for Hu Guozhu to delay time, so he immediately stood up and said with a smile: "General Jinwu, I hope you can also reconsider the issue of compensation for money and grain and the exchange of prisoners, our Qing court does not want the war to resume and the lives will be ruined, and we are still very sincere in negotiation." ”

"Rest assured, the lower officials will definitely report this matter to the prince truthfully." Hu Guozhu nodded vigorously, and suddenly added: "By the way, Ji Zhongtang, regarding the injury and illness of the prisoners of your army's Eight Banners, we have to explain it in advance here." ”

"General Jinwu, please speak, the old man listens." A bad feeling suddenly rose in the face of the suppilon.

"That's right." Hu Guozhu smiled and said: "When the soldiers of your army were captured by our Yunnan and Guizhou army, most of them were wounded, and the injuries were very serious, but our Yunnan and Guizhou are notoriously poor places in the world, lack of medical treatment, and the injuries and conditions of your army prisoners are also powerless, so there are often serious illnesses and deaths of your army prisoners, so we hope that the Zhongtang can end the negotiations and take these prisoners back to the north for treatment as soon as possible - otherwise, the time will drag on for a long time. Even if we reach a negotiation with us, I am afraid that we will not be able to take many prisoners back to reunite with their families. ”

Kubilong's old face began to turn pale, and Erken and Fu Dali were also pale, and they all understood Hu Guozhu's voice. Over there, Lu Fatzi came up and said with a smile: "But please rest assured, according to the estimation of Zhu Fangdan, the master of the lower officials, although the injuries of the prisoners of your army are very serious, the mortality rate is not very high - on average, only about 1,000 people die of illness in ten days, and more than 20,000 prisoners of the Eight Banners can probably last more than 200 days, so we must not be too anxious, if something happens in a hurry, we will feel guilty." ”

"Shameless!" Curb Pilon couldn't help but scold.

"Are you ashamed?" Lu Fatzi immediately retorted, sneered and said: "Curb Zhongtang, before Aobai's killers killed our Pingxi Wangfu prince, Aobai's annihilation party was already scattered, how could a few killers sneak into the heavily guarded prison unknowingly, and curb Zhongtang was in the capital, did he really not hear of it?" If you do the first year of junior high school, we can't do the fifteenth? ”

He was speechless again--although he had a weak surname, and from beginning to end, he was ridden on his head by Ao Bai and Xiao Mazi in turn, but he was not stupid, and the truth of Wu Yingxiong's death, he actually had doubts for a long time, but it was not his own business, and he did not dare to openly express his doubts. Xiao Mazi killed Wu Yingxiong and broke the root of Wu Laohan's annihilation first, and now Wu Jun killed Manchu prisoners and coerced the Qing court to reach a negotiation as soon as possible, and Ji Bilong naturally had no face to forcibly accuse Wu Jun of being unkind.

"There is one more thing you can rest assured." Fang Guangchen's eldest son, Fang Xueshi, was not a good thing, so he came up and said with a smile: "If Xia Guan is not mistaken, you seem to be a person with a yellow flag, right?" For the sake of your face, we will do our best to rescue the soldiers with the Yellow Flag, and the limited medicine will also be given priority to the soldiers with the Yellow Flag, and we would rather let the other Qing soldiers of the Seven Banners die first if they are seriously injured, rather than let the soldiers with the Yellow Flag have an accident first-how about it? Curb Zhongtang, our Pingxi Royal Mansion is very righteous, right? ”

"Also." Hu Guozhu added in a gloomy voice: "Regarding this matter, our prince will also use six hundred li to expedite the Ming Fa to report to the imperial court, explain the situation to the emperor and the kings of the Eight Banners, and tell the emperor and the kings of the Eight Banners to know - it is definitely not that our Pingxi Royal Mansion deliberately let the prisoners die of illness, but that the negotiation time is too long, which has led to the unfortunate death of many Eight Banner soldiers." ”

When encountering three hooligans like Hu Guozhu, Lu Fatzi and Fang Xueshi, Ji Bilong is really a show and meets soldiers, and it is unreasonable. In desperation, he gritted his teeth and replied: "Thank you for the kindness and care of the three adults, and thank you in advance for all the families of the soldiers of the Yellow Banner, and also ask the three adults to treat the captured soldiers of the Eight Banners equally, and don't let them suffer any misfortune - in this way, the old man will go back and discuss, how about we negotiate here again at noon tomorrow?" ”

"It's good to say, all listen to the orders of the middle hall." Hu Guozhu smiled and bowed his hand and politely agreed. The three of them didn't speak, but they left the account together as soon as they gave up their hands, and hurriedly returned to Wuchang City to discuss again. And Lu Fatzi didn't hesitate, he immediately pulled Hu Guozhu and Fang Xueshi's hands, and said quickly: "Uncle, Mr. Xueshi, go quickly and go back to our camp." ”

"What's the hurry?" Hu Guozhu replied with a smile: "Let's discuss it first, sort out a general content, and then report it to my father-in-law." ”

"Uncle, they gave us a big gift, and you haven't seen it yet?" Fat Lu asked eagerly, "Uncle, Mr. Xueshi, have you noticed?" Is there something missing from the negotiation treaty between them? ”

"What's missing?" Hu Guozhu and Fang Xueshi were both in the same place, and then suddenly came to their senses, and shouted in unison: "There are fewer prisoners of the green battalion!" ”

"That's right!" Lu Fatzi slapped the table and said with a cruel smile: "The Mangou Emperor is only willing to spend silver to redeem the Mangou captives, but ignores the Han captives of the green battalion soldiers who refuse to submit to us and are sent to the mines to do hard labor. ”

………………

In the evening of the same day, taking advantage of the lack of wind in the sky, the Wu army's airship team, which was only enough for the three take-offs and landings of the airships, was dispatched again and flew over Wuchang City. On the leaflet is a picture of a Han slave wearing the uniform of a green battalion soldier carrying a heavy ore on his back, crawling on all fours, and a passage is accompanied by a text - Han green battalion soldiers, your master intends to redeem the banner soldiers with silver, and let your companions who refuse to surrender open mountains and mines for us, do you still want to sell your lives?

The leaflets fell lightly, but the morale of the defenders of Wuchang fell to the ground, and countless soldiers of the green battalion began to think deeply, they were determined to give their lives to Mangou, and in the end after being accidentally captured by the Wu army, Mangou refused to even take out the money to save them home, and only cared about their Mangou soldiers, is it necessary for them to die for such a ruthless and unrighteous master?

"Lu Yifeng dog thief! It's this dog thief again! Here we go again! Although Wu Jun's leaflet did not have half of Lu Fatzi's name printed on it, as soon as they saw this leaflet, Tu Hai and Yue Le, who had already suffered a big loss under Lu Fatzi's trick, immediately concluded that this ironclad was Lu Fatzi's handiwork again!

"What kind of bad luck has happened to us in the Qing Dynasty?" Under the hatred, Yue Le raised his waist knife and slashed the leaflets, shouting as he chopped, "Why did you end up with a robber and scoundrel like Lu Yifeng?" Such a shameless trick can be figured out, does this clearly drive a wedge between our Manchu and Han relations and shake the hearts of our military! ”

"Dashuai, we have found a new kind of Wu Dog flyer!" At this time, a herald rushed in and held a new flyer in front of Tu Hai with both hands, Tu Hai took it and took a closer look, his face suddenly changed, and he hurriedly greeted: "Lord An, look at this new flyer!" ”

"Don't look!" Yue Le roared angrily: "I don't even bother to read any leaflet printed by Lu Yifeng's dog thief!" ”

"Lord An, you'd better take a look, this flyer is related to you." Tu Hai said with a wry smile.

"Something to do with me?" Yue Le was shocked, and hurriedly grabbed the new flyer, only to see that an adult man in a dragon robe was printed on the flyer, with two lines of words, one line of words: The emperor is out of the palace, and Gyeonggi is the battlefield! The other line of words is: Prince Yue Le, the destiny of heaven, change the Yuan Yongzheng, the world admires!

"Lu Yifeng! Dog thief! Shameless dog thief! Lao Tzu fought with you! I'm your eighteenth generation ancestor, you're going to pit me to death! Even the emperor's name, you fabricated it for me! ”

At the same time that the unlucky An prince was roaring and roaring at the head of Wuchang City, the sky was getting dark, and the Wu army's river reclamation team and covering team also began to assemble Hou Ming, and it was also at this time that Lu Fatzi hurried to the tent of the Chinese army commander and suggested to the old thief Wu Sangui who was issuing orders there: "Grandfather, according to my grandson-in-law's opinion, we can't just fill in the moat of the east gate of Wuchang, we should ask the soldiers to work harder and fill in the moat of the south gate." ”

"Do you need it?" Wu Lao Han asked rhetorically: "We have confirmed that the east gate of Wuchang is the main battlefield, and we have confirmed that the groundwater on the south gate of Wuchang is abundant, and it is difficult to dig tunnels to reach the city, so why waste troops?" ”

"Grandfather and grandson-in-law are also for the sake of prudence." Lu Fatzi insisted: "Son-in-law believes that only filling the moat of the east gate of Wuchang is not only not conducive to the deployment of our troops when we are attacking the city, but also is likely to be discovered by the full dog Our tunnel siege tactics, it is not as good as filling the moat of the east gate and the south gate together, not only can we attack the east gate and the west gate of Wuchang at the same time when attacking the city, but also can play a role in diverting the attention of the full dog and covering the tunnel tactics of our army." In addition, after filling these two sections of the moat, the problem of tunnel leakage can also be greatly improved. Even if the miners make a mistake and dig in the wrong direction and accidentally dig to the south, there is no danger that the river water will fill the tunnel. ”

"Then fill in the southern moat." In line with the fact that he didn't have to dig the tunnel himself, and seeing that what Lu Fatzi said was quite reasonable, Wu Laohan agreed to Lu Fatzi's strong request and ordered: "Let Yang Fengxian's infantry team also dispatch, together with Yu Hualong's team, and at the same time fill the moat of the south and east gates of Wuchang." ”

The generals of the Wu army present agreed, and when Wu Laohan was about to say a few more words to Lu Fatzi, Lu Fatzi gave up his hand and hurriedly said: "Grandfather, grandson-in-law still have urgent matters, and I want to go to the military workshop, so I will leave first." ”

"Stinky boy, just run away after speaking, what's so urgent?" Wu Laohan scolded with a smile, waved his hand and said: "Since you are in a hurry, then you should go quickly, pay attention to rest, be busy day and night, don't be tired." ”

(To be continued)