In Xiaomaoshan, the camp of the Shanghai army, and the big tent of the Chinese army, Li Weiguo was secretly meeting with Hong Jian, a representative of the Taiping Army.

"Lord Li is commanding an army of 20,000 this time, so he has to fight a decisive battle with my Taiping army?" Hong Jian asked straight to the point, he had already noticed the frequent movements of the Qing army recently, and when he learned that Li Weiguo personally led the army to re-enter Xiaomao Mountain, he knew that the situation was grim.

Li Weiguo said with a smile: "Brother Hong doesn't have to be nervous, it's indeed going to be a decisive battle, but it's not me with you, it's Xiang Rong with you, I'm just here to join in the fun." ”

Li Weiguo came to make soy sauce, and he told the truth and told Hong Jian about Xiang Rong's request for the imperial court to approve the siege of Jinling on all sides.

Hong Jian was taken aback, if this was the case, once the Qing army succeeded in encircling it on all sides, it would be a catastrophe for the Taiping army. Tunnel asked: "In the past few months, Xiang Rong has repeatedly launched attacks on our Taiping army, and now his vitality is greatly damaged, and he is no longer afraid, but what are you going to do?" ”

Li Weiguo smiled mysteriously and said: "I just reunited with my wife, and I am enjoying the great happiness of humanity, this Xiang Rong has disturbed my good deeds, but I hate him to death, why don't I give Xiang Rong to your army?" ”

"That's a great thing!" As soon as Xiang Rong said happily, he suddenly thought that the sky would not drop pies for no reason, so he asked rhetorically: "I don't know what conditions Master Li has?" If we can pull out the Jiangnan camp and remove the threat of our army's southern front, our Taiping army will have a good reward and a great reward. ”

Li Weiguo said with a smile: "The conditions are very simple, the second batch of arms of your army will be postponed for the time being. ”

"How can this work?" Hong Jian suddenly got up and said: "The Qing army is surrounded on all sides, and our army is in need of a large number of arms support. ”

"Calm down! Calm down! Li Weiguo motioned for Hong Jian to sit down, and persuaded with an old-fashioned attitude: "Didn't your army negotiate with the British to buy arms from the British in the future?" ”

"The British said they were going to war, and they wouldn't give it to us—" Hong Jian was halfway through his speech, and suddenly he felt a sense of excitement, and then he understood that Li Weiguo knew that the Taiping army was negotiating arms with the British, and he was angry.

He suddenly smiled and said, "Master Li won't be so stingy, right?" We just said it casually to the British, and you don't have to take it seriously, we will continue to cooperate in the future, and the matter of arms will naturally depend on the supply of your lordship. ”

It's strange to believe you!

Li Weiguo snorted coldly in his heart and said: "It's not that I don't want to sell your arms, but the British have suspended the direct export of arms and materials, although I got the arsenal from the British, it is still under construction, so for the time being, even my own soldiers are not enough, so naturally it is impossible to give it to you." ”

Li Weiguo would definitely not give arms to the Taiping Army, after all, once the war broke out, the consumption of weapons was huge, and without the British to provide weapons parts for maintenance, he would have to rely on himself. Li Weiguo needs to give priority to Li Jiajun's weapons security, and naturally it is impossible to sell weapons to the Taiping Army, which involves his own security issues, and Li Weiguo will not give in.

Hong Jian frowned suddenly, there is no doubt that the reason why the Taiping army has recently won successive victories against Xiang Rong's troops and annihilated Xiang Rong's Qing army of 780,000 people, such a major victory depends on advanced foreign guns and artillery, if Li Weiguo does not provide them with weapons and equipment, the consequences can be imagined.

"We can understand the difficulties of adults, but should we also understand our difficulties, so how about we increase the price by two percent on the basis of the existing price?"

The arms Li Weiguo sold to the Taiping Army were already two or three times higher than the market price, and if the price was increased by 20 percent, the profit would be considerable. In normal times, Li Weiguo must have agreed, but at the moment he is not short of money at all.

"It's not that I don't understand you, it's that I don't have any extra weapons and equipment to give you? You're not going to let my soldiers give you weapons, are you? That's impossible! ”

Hong Jian saw that Li Weiguo was serious, so he retreated and asked: "Since Master Li's arsenal has not been built, we don't need weapons and equipment for now, so we can always give us some guns and gunpowder, right?" As far as I know, Master Li has already started hoarding gunpowder, and he also has his own gunpowder factory, which is always okay, right? ”

You've got a lot to know!

Li Weiguo raised his vigilance in his heart, this time, he must go back to "purge the rebellion" again and clear the Taiping Army's lurking "spies" in Su Songtai.

Thinking of this, Li Weiguo said with a smile: "Since you all know, then I won't hide it from you, gunpowder can be given to you, but it is only one million catties, and the price will be increased by thirty percent." ”

Hong Jian scolded Li Weiguo in his heart for asking for too ruthless and shameless, but the Taiping army did need a large amount of gunpowder, although Jinling City had begun to concentrate manpower and material resources, but the quality was far inferior to the gunpowder provided to them by Li Weiguo, so Hong Jian had to endure being slaughtered by Li Weiguo, and replied with a smile: "No problem!" ”

After negotiating the matter of gunpowder, the two returned to the topic.

Hong Jian asked: "I don't know how your two armies will cooperate with each other this time, as long as our army uproots the Jiangnan camp and the Jiangbei camp, we can make appropriate concessions to Lord Li." ”

Li Weiguo thought to himself, you have uprooted the Jiangnan and Jiangbei camps, and the rest is the Jiangdong camp of the other party's Laozi.

"I wonder what concessions your army will make?"

Hong Jian said with a smile: "If the Jiangnan camp and the Jiangbei camp are removed, there will be only Lord Li's Jiangdong camp left, and then the imperial court will inevitably have to rely on Lord Li. ”

Li Weiguo said: "Yes! However, after your army uprooted the Jiangnan battalion, it is estimated that it will attack Jiangxi and Zhejiang, Jiangxi can belong to you, but Zhejiang must belong to me. ”

Hong Jian also understands military affairs, and guessed Li Weiguo's intentions, so he smiled and said: "Lord Li, rest assured, Zhejiang is the strategic rear of your army, and our army will not dare to go deep alone. ”

"That's good!"

Li Weiguo smiled, you don't need to talk to smart people. Anyway, the two sides are now in a relationship of mutual use, and it is beneficial for both sides to be at peace for the time being.

Next, the two negotiated on how to cooperate with each other, and on the premise of satisfying their respective interests, the two reached an agreement and agreed to break the Jiangnan camp first.

Li Weiguo wants to pit Xiang Rong, in addition to taking revenge on Xiang Rong, more importantly, although Xiang Rong and Li Weiguo are one of the Jiangnan Road Qincha and the other is the Jiangdong Road Qincha, but the two garrisons are not far from each other, both south of the Yangtze River.

If Li Weiguo wants to claim hegemony south of the Yangtze River, he will not allow a powerful military force to appear around him, which is not in line with his strategy, is an obstacle, and a stumbling block, and will never be allowed.

There can only be one powerful force in the area south of the Yangtze River, and that is Li Weiguo; There can only be a strong army, and it is the Li family's army.

This is the fundamental reason for the tragedy of Xiang Rong, he will be killed by Li Weiguo.

Sure enough, on the night when Li Weiguo arrived at the Jiangdong camp in Xiaomaoshan, Xiang Rong sent a special envoy to give orders.

At this time, Xiang Rong had been appointed by Xianfeng, responsible for organizing the Four Route Army to encircle and suppress the Jinling Taiping Army, not only Li Weiguo, Qi Shan, but also Shengbao and Jiang Zhongyuan, the four of them had to temporarily listen to Xiang Rong's dispatch and cooperate with the Taiping Army from all sides.

According to Xiang Rong's operational deployment, Li Weiguo will take the lead, and his main force will leave Xiaomao Mountain, march to Longtan Town, and attack the Taiping Army headquarters in Jiuhua Mountain head-on, attracting the attention of the main force of the Taiping Army. When the main force of the Taiping Army went to Jiuhua Mountain, Xiang Rong sent troops from Xiaolingwei, received Qishan to cross the river, and then sent troops to Yanziji. In order to contain the Taiping army in the direction of Jinling and make it dare not send troops to intercept the Qishan Department crossing the river, Xiang Rong ordered Jiang Zhongyuan's troops in the direction of Moling Pass and Shengbao's troops in the direction of Puzikou to send troops to Jinling to contain the Jinling defenders.

The whole deployment looks perfect, but in fact Xiang Rong wants to trap Li Weiguo, he ordered Li Weiguo to take the lead to attract the main force of the Taiping Army, in order to consume and weaken Li Weiguo's Shanghai army, Xiang Rong and Li Weiguo's ideas coincide, and he also wants to use the hands of the Taiping Army to eliminate the Shanghai army and then dominate Jiangnan.

Li Weiguo had already guessed Xiang Rong's intentions, deliberately shirked the lack of troops, and did not dare to take the lead. Xiang Rong's envoy then threatened Li Weiguo that if he did not comply, he would transfer the artillery of the Shanghai Army to Xiang Rong's army. Li Weiguo naturally refused to hand over his artillery team to Xiang Rong, so he agreed to Xiang Rong's plan and decided to send troops to Longtan Town.

The front line between Longtan Town and Jiuhua Mountain is the battlefield that Li Weiguo and Hong Jian secretly agreed.

Knowing that Li Weiguo had marched into Longtan Town and Jiuhua Mountain, Hong Xiuquan ordered Wei Changhui, the king of the North, to lead 200,000 troops to garrison Jiuhua Mountain to block the Shanghai army from continuing to advance.

Xiang Rong was overjoyed when he got the news, and wanted to sit and watch Li Weiguo and Wei Changhui fight to the death, preferably Wei Changhui and Li Weiguo would lose both, and then Xiang Rong would pick up the cheap.

It's just that Xiang Rong couldn't imagine that Li Weiguo secretly hooked up with the Taiping Army, and the 200,000 troops brought by Wei Changhui, the king of the North, were mostly old, weak, sick and disabled, and their combat power was not strong, so they just made a show for Xiang Rong.

Xiang Rong wanted to calculate Li Weiguo, but he didn't know that he was being calculated by Li Weiguo, and at this moment Li Weiguo had already dug a big hole, just waiting for Xiang Rong to jump in.

On the other side, Hong Xiuquan ordered the Yiwang Shi Dakai to lead the elite of the 150,000 Taiping Army to the south along the Qinhuai River and feint to attack Jiang Zhongyuan's troops in the direction of Moling Pass, forcing Jiang Zhongyuan's troops not to dare to send troops and defend on the spot.

As a result, when Shi Dakai led the army to pass through Fangshan, only 50,000 troops were left to continue to advance towards Moling Pass, banners were everywhere, bluffing, and the other 100,000 troops crossed Fangshan from the Fangshan trail and raided the Qing army in Mellow, and it was decided in a battle.

Mellow town is located in the rear of Xiaolingwei side, is the back road of Xiangrong Jiangnan Daying, the money and grain from Jiangxi and Zhejiang and other places are transported to Xiaolingwei Jiangnan Daying through the mellow town, mellow town is lost, the back road of Jiangnan Daying is broken, and it suddenly falls into a crisis.

Xiang Rong was about to watch a good show, but when he learned that Mellow Town was lost, he was immediately shocked and hurriedly led the army back, intending to recapture Mellow Town.

Shi Dakai was brave and strategic, and sent 10,000 Taiping troops to march to Xiaolingwei, but was deliberately defeated and returned after being fiercely counterattacked by Xiang Rong's troops. Xiang Rong thought that the elite main forces of the Taiping Army were all in Jiuhua Mountain, and the one who appeared in Melhua Town must have only been a partial division with only 10,000 troops, so he personally led 30,000 main forces to pursue the victory, wanting to recapture Mellow Town in one go.

As a result, Shi Dakai set up an ambush halfway, and the elite of the 100,000 Taiping Army wiped out Xiang Rong's 30,000 main forces in one fell swoop, and Xiang Rong fled back to the Jiangnan camp in embarrassment. Unexpectedly, Shi Dakai led the army to pursue the victory, and 20,000 Taiping troops were also dispatched in Tianjing City to attack the Xiaoling Weijiang South Camp, Xiang Rong was forced to ask Li Weiguo for help, and as a result, Li Weiguo refused to reinforce on the grounds that there were 200,000 Taiping troops in Jiuhua Mountain who could not get out, and Xiang Rong's remnants guarded the Jiangnan camp for three days, and finally ran out of ammunition and was completely annihilated by the Taiping army, and Xiang Rong died in battle.

The Taiping army broke the camp in the south of the Yangtze River, Xiang Rong died in battle, the previous plan to suppress the Taiping army on all sides failed, Qishan, Jiang Zhongyuan and Shengbao took the lead in withdrawing their troops, and Li Weiguo launched a "crazy" attack on the Taiping army of Jiuhua Mountain under the banner of revenge for Xiang Rong, as a result, the Taiping army of Jiuhua Mountain was "defeated", Wei Changhui was forced to retreat, abandoned the Jiuhua Mountain defense line, and gave Longtan Town to Li Weiguo.

When the news came out, the imperial court vibrated and dismissed Qishan Jiangbei as the minister of the camp on the grounds of disadvantage, Jiang Zhongyuan and Shengbao were demoted, only Li Weiguo avenged Xiang Rong, defeated Wei Changhui, the northern king of the Taiping army of Jiuhua Mountain, and made a meritorious contribution to the recovery of Longtan Town, and left him as the minister of the Jiangdong camp, and at the same time the court decided to let Li Weiguo be responsible for the reconstruction of the Jiangnan camp.

In this way, Li Weiguo, who was both the Jiangdong camp and the Jiangnan camp, became the only minister south of the Yangtze River, and the general military and political power.