"Chen Li Yan."

"Chen Luohu."

Li Zicheng was sitting on the golden chair in the middle of the imperial tent, and the two summoned generals came in, and when they saw Li Zicheng sitting in the middle, they knelt in front of the chair, signed up loudly, and then bowed down.

"Lin Quan, Huzi, get up."

Li Zicheng bowed in the chair and said with a smile: "Get up quickly, sit down!" Let's discuss the big things. ”

"Yes, thank the emperor for the throne!"

Under the throne, there are two rows of chairs facing each other, and the upper seat on the left is Liu Zongmin, the Marquis of Ruhou's army, seeing Li Yan come in, Liu Zongmin just nodded, and then smiled at Luo Hu.

At the top of the chair on the right sat an old peasant-like figure, with a dark complexion, a short and thin body, and a face full of deep wrinkles.

Seeing Li Yan seeing him, the man showed a gentle and kind smile on his face, stood up, stretched out his hand to hold Li Yan's hands, and said with a smile: "Lin Quan, we haven't seen each other for a long time." ”

"How is Zehou?"

"Don't call it that, the good brother is also rusty!"

Listening to Tian Jianxiu's words, Li Yan had no choice but to laugh. It's in front of Li Zicheng. So he doesn't take the official position given by King Chuang seriously, and the top and bottom of the army, that is, the surname is benevolent, although he has never studied, but he has the style of a Confucian general.

Looking at it, Liu Zongmin and Tian Jianxiu sat opposite each other on the left and right, Liu is the forward general, Tian Jianxiu is the general of the commander, and he is a person who is qualified to lead the whole army when Li Zicheng is not there, surnamed Zi and Shun Wencun, sincere and kind to people, speaking of the army, Liu Zongmin is more afraid, and Tian Jianxiu is more loved, when it comes to prestige, Tian Jianxiu is actually above Liu Zongmin.

These two people are there, plus Liu Fangliang and other generals are also there, Niu Jinxing and Song Xiance, the two civilian officials are also there, Li Yan suddenly found that the meeting in front of him may not be extraordinary, but a heavyweight military discussion that will determine the recent movements of the army.

"Lin Quan and Huzi have arrived, Erhu, let's talk about it."

"Yes, Your Majesty!"

was named by Li Zicheng, Liu Tichun hurriedly stood up, looked around left and right, and said to everyone in a hoarse voice: "The situation in Huaiqing is not good......

It is now the beginning of November, according to Liu Tichun's report, Duoduo went south around mid-October, and the previous route was to go straight to the south, and as soon as the Huaiqing War was launched, the route was changed.

This was discovered by Liu Tichun's little Liu Ying spies, and when explaining the matter, Liu Tichun kept looking at Liu Zongmin.

Of course, Ruhou's face is not very good-looking, blue and red.

Several generals who supported Huaiqing's war in front of Liu Zongmin were also very embarrassed.

Li Zicheng leaned on the royal chair and sighed heavily.

Only Song Xiance, Li Yan and others looked as usual, but their eyes were also full of worry.

Of course, they were against the Huaiqing War, but now the two divisions of the main and deputy armies were squeezed out in the army, and even if they were opposed, it was only a few words, and Li Yan saw it clearly, but he didn't dare to say it deeply, so the Huaiqing Battle was still launched as scheduled.

Of course, the battle report that came back in the early days of the war was very smooth, and the Qing army's Huaiqing general and deputy general were killed, and the Shun army began to besiege Wei Hui.

But as soon as Duoduo arrived, the Shun army was broken through almost in a few days.

The 100,000 army, including 20,000 to 30,000 elite soldiers, although it is much worse than the standard of the old battalion, but its strength is far above the ordinary Ming army military town.

In less than ten days, the Shun army in Huaiqing and other places was almost wiped out, and the remnants fled all the way to Shaanzhou.

"Now the king of Yu in the east has gathered a large army and pursued Shaanzhou." In the end, Liu Tichun said in a dumb voice: "The Shaanzhou garrison is all remnants of the defeated army, and the emperor has ordered to join the garrison near Tongguan and retreat to the gate together." ”

"Ma Shiyao of Tongguan, how many soldiers are there?"

Someone asked, and everyone present turned their heads very uneasily.

The questioner is Liu Fangliang, the general of the camp, except for Liu Zongmin and Tian Jianxiu, he and Li Guo are on the same level. Li Guo is Li Zicheng's nephew, Gao Yigong is his uncle, they are all relatives, Liu Fangliang can lead the army alone, completely relying on his own ability.

"Seven thousand!"

This time it was Li Zicheng who personally spoke, and this Dashun Emperor was already full of dark clouds. Seeing him like this, Liu Tichun bowed and quietly retreated.

"Alas!" Liu Fangliang shook his head and said, "Ma Shiyao is a good man, but seven thousand soldiers are too few. ”

The people present have been fighting for several years or more than ten years, and they know that what Liu Fangliang said is reasonable. Even literati like Niu Jinxing know that the defeated soldiers who retreat to Tongguan will be of little use in three or five months.

Just lost the battle, it would be good not to drag down the defenders, at most carry and lift, do some chores, if you really want to go into battle to kill the enemy, it can only be Ma Shiyao's 7,000 soldiers and horses.

That's a lot.

If 70,000 or 100,000 people were guarding Tongguan, it would be impossible for the Qing army to break through the gate in a short period of time.

Outside Tongguan is a narrow valley road, the army marches very difficult, the water leans against the mountain, the enemy army is also difficult to detour, can only attack head-on, there are tens of thousands of elite soldiers, no matter how strong the Qing army is, it can also be held for a long time.

Of course, this is the assumption of the Shun army on the premise of ignoring the Qing army's artillery.

"I think Yulin and Yan'an can't go." Li Zicheng's demeanor was very depressed, the battle of Huaiqing was his arrangement, but it attracted a strong enemy, this matter is extremely regrettable when I think about it now, but there is no way. He said slowly to everyone: "People are going to come directly to fight Tongguan, once Tongguan is lost, the troops will come to Xi'an within three days, and if the pass is lost, it is useless for us to win in northern Shaanxi, and we will be copied by others." In my opinion, how about the army not going north and turning to Tongguan? ”

This arrangement is related to the life and death of the entire Shun army.

In the past two or three months, all arrangements have been made for a decisive battle in northern Shaanxi, and the deployment of grain, grass, military resources, and personnel has been transferred to northern Shaanxi. Li Zicheng and the generals of Shaanxi all gritted their steel teeth and made up their minds that they must give the Qing army a decisive battle in northern Shaanxi.

Give the Qing army a ruthless battle, and the Shun army can win a big victory, and the whole situation will be different.

A while ago, it was a great retreat, but this is like a person retracting his fist and smashing it back, this punch, of course, is much more harmful than a slap that disperses the power.

It's just that the previous arrangement has to be abandoned, and even Li Zicheng himself is depressed, not to mention ordinary soldiers.

"Want a ball?" Everyone was speechless for a while, only Liu Zongmin said with red eyes: "First defeat that Laoshi Ziyu King, and then turn back to fight the Dongyu in Yan'an!" ”

He's not unusual, he's always been so scrappy.

"That's all there is to it."

Liu Fangliang and Yuan Zongdi glanced at each other, both saw the helplessness in each other's eyes, the two generals got up together, hugged their fists and said: "Your Majesty, let's give the Tartars a powerful battle in Tongguan, defeat the enemy in Tongguan, and then go north to meet the enemy in Yan'an." ”

"Good!" Li Zicheng turned to Niu Jinxing and asked, "What does the prime minister think?" ”

Niu Jinxing hurriedly bowed down and said with a smile: "The emperor personally recruits, the soldiers serve the order, the supply of grain and grass is all on the minister's body, the minister must urge the local officials to transport grain and grass, if there is not enough, it is the minister's sin." ”

"What do you think?"

"For today's plan, I can only return to Tongguan to meet the enemy."

Compared with Niu Jinxing's flattery, Song Xiance's tone was also a lot more sluggish. Recently, King Chuang has been more and more rigid and self-serving, and many things are only discussed with the Shaanxi generals, and his opinions are not very easy to listen to.

That is, the gods and gods are weird things, and you can still listen to him for a word or two.

Song Xiance has been in the rivers and lakes for a long time, and he already knows in his heart that something is wrong, but he has always had a plan to get out, and he is not too afraid.

"Yufeng, what do you think?"

Bypassing Li Yan, Li Zicheng asked Tian Jianxiu directly.

"Let's listen to the emperor."

Tian Jianxiu replied first, and then said, "I want to hear what Lin Quan has to say." ”

He recommended Li Yan like this, it was still the same as when everyone got along in harmony before, but he didn't know that before and after Li Zicheng ascended the throne as emperor, he had been extremely repulsive and distrustful of foreign forces, especially after killing Luo Rucai and Yuan Shizhong, the traces were even more obvious.

Li Yan is also among the objects of suspicion, that is, Tian Jianxiucai, who is like this good old man, has no mustard at all, which is completely different from Liu Zongmin and others.

"Oh, too." Li Zicheng smiled reluctantly and asked Li Yan, "How is it, Lin Quan, what do you think?" ”

"The minister has no objection, at this time, only by defeating the enemy from Tongguan can he say anything else."

Unexpectedly, Li Yan, who has always had unique opinions and even sometimes insisted on what he had seen, did not have any objections this time.

Listening to Li Yan's words, Li Zicheng breathed a sigh of relief, but at the same time, he was quite surprised.

Song Xiance's eyes flashed, and then he nodded slightly, obviously appreciating Li Yan's move.

However, Liu Zongmin and Niu Jinxing both showed disappointment, Li Yan has been slipping recently, and it is much more difficult to catch his mistakes.

"In that case, let's all go and prepare, the army is on its way, and there are really a lot of things to do."

In the previous marches and battles, except for the fight against Wu Sangui, Li Zicheng had no bottom in his heart and was uneasy, and he was even more uncertain about this time.

It's not that Duoduo is so strong that he can't do anything, it's really something that was originally prepared, and suddenly overthrowing it all over again, there is a kind of unease in his heart that is difficult to resolve.

When the generals heard Li Zicheng's words, they all got up and prepared to leave and go back to the camp to prepare.

Everyone was speechless, Luo Hu had been listening, his status was comparable to Li Shuangxi and Zhang Nai, and it was slightly higher, but in front of these generals here, his qualifications were only observers.

At this time, seeing that everyone was about to go out, Luo Hu couldn't help but stand in the middle, hugged his fists and said: "Your Majesty, the minister has something to say!" ”

"Xiaohuzi also has suggestions?"

Luo Hu's stubbornness is probably a headache for Li Zicheng. However, he regarded Luo Hu as his own nephew, although he knew that this confidant would definitely have nothing to say at this time, but he still sat down, smiled bitterly, waved his hand, and said: "If you have something to say, just say it." ”

(To be continued)