Chapter 896: Chongzhen's tenth year has arrived, and it's a new year

（0896）

[Today's third update is delivered! ] 】

In the winter of the ninth year of Chongzhen,.

The prophecy of the people in the summer was soon confirmed. The winter of Chongzhen's ninth year was really cold. Since the end of October, heavy snow has begun to fall in Luoyang. At first, people thought that after the heavy snowfall passed, the weather should be clear.

However, in fact, it snows almost every day as if it doesn't stop when it starts to fall. Not to mention that the weather is clear, not even the shadow of the sun is seen, the sky is always gray and gloomy, giving people a very depressing feeling.

When I went out in the morning, it was snowing heavily. When I went out in the afternoon, it was still snowing heavily. When I went out at night, it was still snowing heavily. The road in front of King Fu's Mansion is cleared of snow every day, but if you are not careful, there is half a foot of snow deep, not to mention other places. Zhang Zhun came back from outside every day, and he could take pictures of the snow on his coat.

Because there was so much snow in the city that there was no time to melt, the snow that was cleared was piled up everywhere. Wherever there was open space, there was a high pile of snow. At first, everyone thought it was fun. However, when the front and back of their houses, the front and back, the left and right, were covered with snow, everyone began to feel unfun. Because, if this high snow collapses, they will be buried alive.

There was no way, so the prefect of Luoyang had to organize a large number of manpower to transport all the excess snow outside the city. As a result, the most lively thing in Luoyang City every day is that there are large cars and small cars, which are constantly transporting snow outside the city. Soon, the open space outside Luoyang City was also filled with high snow. Some of them are snowdrifts, and they are even as high as the city walls.

Just when everyone couldn't stand it anymore, one day, the heavy snow suddenly stopped. The people who were fed up with the snow shouted for joy, thanking God for finally letting them go. But soon, they couldn't cheer anymore. Because, they found that although the snow did not continue to fall, the climate was getting colder and colder.

The Luoshui froze, the canals froze, the Yellow River froze, wherever there was water, it was all frozen. In the beginning, only children could walk on the ice, but later, even adults could walk, and finally even cavalry could walk. What's even more exaggerated is that the transport trucks carrying heavy grain can walk around Luoshui unharmed.

The cavalry of the Tiger Ben Army wrapped a thick linen cloth on the horse's hooves, and they could gallop back and forth on the ice of Luoshui, the canal, and the Yellow River. The wide river almost became a training ground for cavalry. Every time the Tiger Ben cavalry trained on the ice, it attracted a large number of children to watch. The Tiger Cavalry was training, and they were skating.

Someone else carried an iron pickaxe, found a place in the ice, and dug a hole in it. As a result, the ice cave had just been dug out, and the fish under the ice couldn't wait to probe, desperately panting. At this time, with a few simple tools, you can fish out of the ice cave. As long as you have enough patience, an ice cave can catch dozens of catties of big fish every day, and there is no problem at all.

So, in this winter, the cheapest meat in Luoyang City is fish. There are fish in Luoshui, there are fish in the canals, there are fish in the Yellow River, there is ice everywhere, and there are places where you can fish. If you don't have money, you will dig an ice cave and catch it yourself. If you have money, you buy it from someone else. There are too many fish caught, the price is terrible, and the big fish weighing *** pounds only costs twenty or thirty yuan. Before, it was simply unimaginable.

Because of this, in this winter, the food in Fuwangfu is mainly based on fish. There is no way, Wanshou Lake is also frozen, and the fish under the ice are desperately jumping to it. Just dig a hole at random, without any tools, and the fish will jump up on their own. Such cheap ingredients naturally can't be wasted.

The chefs of Fuwang Mansion have taken their cooking skills to the extreme, and they have come up with dozens of ways to eat a simple fish, and every meal is not repeated. Their outstanding performance can be regarded as adding a little warmth to the Fuwang Mansion in this harsh winter.

After entering December, the climate is getting colder and colder, so that even Hasqiqige from the Hulunbuir grassland feels a little unbearable. She was originally lively and active, but now she wears a thick fur coat every day and stays in the Fuwang Mansion to roast the fire.

Fortunately, the people of Luoyang have received enough food and prepared enough firewood, so that there is no large-scale starvation or freezing death. However, the occasional freezing of people to death is still unavoidable. Zhang Zhun received a report that every morning, corpses would be carried out of the city.

Because of the sudden coldness of the climate, all military activities around Luoyang seem to have slowed down. In December, it stopped completely. Heaven and earth are like a huge ice cellar, everyone is frozen in it, and it is very difficult to move.

Before the arrival of winter, many people were speculating about what kind of move the Tiger Army would make. In particular, Hong Chengchou, Yang Sichang, Sun Chuanting and others are speculating about the next move of the Tiger Ben Army. They envisioned a lot of possibilities, and based on those possibilities, they made certain deployments. However, the actions of the Tiger Ben Army were greatly unexpected by them.

Since October, the four cavalry battalions of the Huben cavalry have been active in the surrounding areas of Luoyang. Their swaggering actions, mighty and undisguised, made the surrounding officers and soldiers very nervous, for fear of being attacked by the cavalry of the Tiger Army.

In particular, Yang Sichang's Huguang army, which had suffered a blow, was even more timid. For this reason, they abandoned Ruzhou and retreated to the Nanyang area. Later, Yang Sichang felt that Nanyang was not safe, so he simply continued to retreat until he retreated to Xiangyang, which was a little relieved.

After a false shot, the cavalry of the Tiger Ben Army advanced along the north bank of the Yellow River to Huaiqing Mansion, Weihui Mansion, Zhangde Mansion, Daimyofu and other places, sweeping away the officers and troops along the way. In these areas mentioned above, there is basically no main force of the official army stationed, and there are only some sporadic local regimental exercises. In the face of four battalions of Tiger Ben cavalry, the only thing they could do was to be invincible and flee quickly. If you run a little slower, you will be cleaned up by the Tiger Army.

As a result, it only took a month, and by November, the Tiger Army had completely taken several prefectures on the north bank of the Yellow River under their control. In this way, the area under the control of the Tiger Ben Army on the north bank of the Yellow River has been further increased, the room for maneuver has also been increased, the strategic depth has also been increased, and the integration of resources has become more convenient.

Subsequently, the cavalry of the Tiger Army returned to Luoyang and continued to attack and advance towards the surrounding areas of Luoyang. With the autumn wind sweeping away the leaves, they quickly cleared the remnants of the officers and troops in the surrounding area of Luoyang. By the end of the year, there were no more officers and troops in a radius of 300 miles around Luoyang, except for Tongguan. The officers and troops of Yanshi, Gongxian, Xingyang, and Zhengzhou all retreated to Kaifeng City. The officers and troops in other places retreated to Tongguan or Nanyang.

At this point, basically, in the north of Henan Province, close to the Yellow River, except for Kaifeng, other areas have been under the control of the Tiger Ben Army. In these areas, the Tiger Army formed a city defense army and appointed local officials, marking the official inclusion of these areas in the territory of the Tiger Army. The Yellow River has become the "inland river" of the Tiger Army.

The situation around Luoyang is encouraging. Relatively speaking, the atmosphere in Kaifeng City is about to die. In just two months, Li Yan successfully surrounded Kaifeng. By the end of the year, the strength of Li Yan's army had reached 50,000, which was basically the same as the number of defenders in Kaifeng.

The name of the Tiger Ben Army is really unstoppable, and after Li Yan played the banner of the Tiger Ben Army, a large number of people immediately came to take refuge. By November, the strength of Li Yan's army had exceeded 30,000. Among them, there are no less than 3,000 elites who are more capable of fighting.

In the heavy snowfall, Li Yan's army braved the severe cold and took the initiative to attack, successively capturing the nearby Kaocheng, Yifeng, Chenliu, Tongxu, Weishi, Lanyang, Zhongmu and other places, and dispersed all the surrounding officers and troops. Subsequently, he led his army north and completely surrounded the city of Kaifeng.

In a day of ice and snow, facing the siege of Li Yan's army of the Tiger Army, the scene inside Kaifeng City was indeed miserable. A large number of refugees were frozen to death. Because there were so many people who froze to death that there was no one to bury them, they were discarded in their place. In this way, Kaifeng City is full of people who have froze to death.

Zhu Gongqi, the king of Zhou, and Yu Yinggui, the governor of Henan, can only cry out in vain in the face of such a scene. Yu Yinggui regretted it even more. knew this, so he desperately took King Zhou and broke through to Jiangnan. Now, it was freezing and snowy outside, and even if they wanted to, they couldn't run. If you run out like this, you will definitely freeze to death.

In this cold winter, in the Central Plains, if the bones were hard enough and not afraid of the cold, they could barely launch military operations, but in Liaodong, all military operations stopped. Here, the cold has dominated everything, and no matter how hard the bones are, it is useless. No matter how hard the bones are, here, they may be frozen and cracked.

Heavy snow fell one after another, completely covering the entire eastern part of Liaodong. The shallowest snow is five feet deep, and the deepest snow is more than ten feet. Under such circumstances, it is simply impossible to start a war, and it is good that people can survive. In fact, the first task of all the people in Liaodong, whether Han Chinese, Tatars, or Koreans, is to survive this cold winter.

In the Korean direction, the Sino-Korean coalition led by Lu Xiangsheng and Li Jue, before the onset of winter, had successfully conquered the Dingliao Right Guard (Phoenix) and further forced the Tartars back. However, the actions of the Sino-North Korean coalition forces ended only here. Because, when the snow comes, the road is impassable, and it is impossible to walk at all. It is not uncommon for patrol soldiers to be eaten alive by heavy snowstorms because they accidentally get lost.

The remnants of the Tartars retreated to the ridge of Changbai Mountain, trying to resist stubbornly. But soon, they retreated all the way to Liaoyang. Because, this winter is indeed too cold, if they are stationed in Changbai Mountain, they will freeze to death. Although their ability to withstand the cold is indeed good, much stronger than that of the Han people, they still retreated in the face of the cold winter of Chongzhen's ninth year.

In the southern direction of Liaoning, Yue Tuo withdrew from Deli Yingcheng and moved to the position of Gaizhouwei. In this way, the Tiger Ben army occupied the city of Deli without blood, and by the way, recovered all the jurisdiction of Fuzhou Wei. The jurisdictions of Fuzhou Wei and Dingliao Right Wei are connected. After the Tiger Ben Army recovered these two guards, the lands of southern Liaoning were completely connected.

By the end of the year, the Huben army was in southern Liaoning, and had controlled all the lands of Jinzhouwei, Fuzhou Wei and Dingliao Youwei, and had a firm foothold in southern Liaoning. The strength of the Tiger Ben Army in southern Liaoning is also gradually increasing. It is no longer possible for the Tartars to fight back against this area. Yang Tinglin, the prefect of Liaoyang, can also take office.

However, due to the impact of severe cold weather, the Tiger Ben Army's operations in these areas were all stopped. Both military and other operations have been temporarily suspended. If it is not necessary, all the people will hide in the house and wait for this cold winter.

The weather is indeed too cold, and the entire Bohai Bay is full of drifting ice floes. These ice floes are only the size of a palm, but the big ones are as big as a tabletop, and some are even like a small mountain. These ice floes pose a great threat to the coming and going ships. They are blown by the north wind, constantly drifting back and forth on the surface of the sea, and they are whatever they hit.

As a result, the Tiger Army had to reduce the frequency of ship activity in the Bohai Bay. Even if you are going to send out a ship, try to use a large ship, at least a large ship of the third fortune ship or higher. The collision resistance of a large ship is okay, but the small boat is not. If a small boat like the Cangshan Boat hits the top of the ice floe headlong, it must be the result of breaking and sinking.

In western Liaoning, after the Tiger Army occupied Yizhouwei, it once fought with the Tatar cavalry for a period of time, and the battle was once very fierce. However, with the onset of the harsh winter, both sides had to temporarily suspend military operations. As a result, the originally lively western Liaoning region, whether it was Jinzhou City or Guangning City, was completely quiet.

The situation in Beizhili is also silent. Both the official army and the tiger army are preparing for winter. Basically, several prefectures in Beizhili have been infiltrated by the Tiger Ben Army. Hejian Mansion is completely under the control of the Tiger Army, and there are people in Baoding Mansion and Zhending Mansion who belong to the Tiger Army. In Zhuozhou, Hao Linyong is forming a *** legion, preparing to attack the Beijing Division,

In the south, Zheng Chenggong's fleet did not go north, perhaps because they felt that it was too cold in winter, or because their forces could not be freed up for the time being. When it is cold in the north, the climate in the South Seas is very pleasant. There is information that the Dutch and the Spaniards have recently clashed again, the details of which are unknown.

In ***, the first batch of gold and silver excavated on Sado Island has been sent back. Although the amount is small, it is a stable income. In the future, with the continuous strengthening of excavation technology and excavation efforts, the amount of gold and silver excavated will definitely continue to increase.

The Marines are on Sado Island, working hard to establish a logistics base, hoard supplies, and prepare a full-scale attack. Dorgon has arrived in Dewa Province and is in contact with the local royalist forces. In terms of the general direction, the situation is still relatively smooth. Of course, it will take time to really set off a storm in ***.

For the Tiger Army, there is another good news in December, that is, the first batch, a total of six Dragon God ships, was launched. These large guys with a displacement of up to 600 tons and equipped with red-coat cannons were completed and launched, marking the further strengthening of the strength of the Tiger Ben Navy. However, it will have to wait until the official service, and it will have to wait until the first month of next year. At that time, Zhang Zhun will definitely personally preside over the service ceremony.

On the side of the imperial court, the officers and troops gathered near Tongguan have not made any major moves. According to intelligence, there are different opinions within the official army. Some people advocate continuing to exterminate the Shaanxi Liukou, get rid of their own worries, and then turn back to deal with Zhang Zhun. Some advocated negotiating with the Shaanxi Liukou, negotiating peace, and then concentrating the main force to deal with Zhang Zhun. Some people are even naïve, hoping to join forces with Shaanxi Liukou to deal with Zhang Zhun together.

Emperor Chongzhen may also be very entangled, not knowing what to do. King Fu's whereabouts have been unknown for a long time, and reports from the front line have not yet been found, but no body has been found. Many discerning people know what is going on, however, no one has pierced this layer of window paper. Because, piercing this layer of window paper comes at a price. The imperial court could no longer afford to pay this price.

In fact, Emperor Chongzhen really wanted to think about it, and immediately dispatched an army to besiege Luoyang and teach Zhang Zhun a lesson. However, he also knew that at this time, it was absolutely impossible to capture Zhang Zhun alive or kill Zhang Zhun. Since Zhang Zhun can't be killed and he can't be caught, the siege of Luoyang by the official army seems to be of little significance.

Luoyang is a fortified city, and it is easy for the Tiger Ben army to attack, but it is difficult for the official army to recover it. If you don't get it right, the only remaining 300,000 troops in the imperial court will all be buried. The situation reached such a grim point that Emperor Chongzhen had to begin to think carefully about whether to send the crown prince to Nanjing to supervise the country.

In addition, there is unconfirmed information that many of the horses, cattle and sheep of the Horqin tribe, as well as some remote herdsmen, have frozen to death. The Tumut tribe and the Harasan tribe secretly bribed the people of the Horqin tribe and seized their herdsmen, horses, cattle and sheep. When Zai Sambu and found out, he was furious, but he was helpless.

Of course, Zhang Zhun is happy to hear such news. The heavier the opponent's losses, the more beneficial the Tiger Ben army will be. It is believed that after this winter, the Horqin tribe will be basically removed from the prairie.

In the heavy snow, Chongzhen's ten years have arrived.

It's a new year again.

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