Zu Gang was stunned for a moment, and immediately understood that Zu Dashou should have asked from the mouths of several other captured subordinates, and he also knew that this kind of thing could not be hidden, so he kowtowed and said, "Obey!" ”

"Big Belle!" When Zu Gang and Zu Dashou walked down the city tower, Ji Bilong asked in a low voice: "Do you think Wu Sangui and Zu Gang will surrender after reading Zu Dashou's letter?" ”

"No!" Yue Tuo said with a smile: "Wu Sangui and they are not muddy, don't say that Zu Dashou is just his uncle, even if it is his biological father, such things must be seen on the spear." Pen × fun × Pavilion www. ｂｉｑｕｇｅ。 infoThis letter will only be useful if we win the battle! ”

"Why do you say that?" Hazar, who was standing aside, asked.

Yue Tuo looked at Hazar, he led the soldiers of the two yellow banners this time, about 5,000 people, and Liu Cheng took out a thousand light cavalry from his cowardly Xue army and handed it over to Hazar's commander, nominally to strengthen, but in fact also meant to monitor. Therefore, Yue Tuo became more and more respectful to Hazar: "General Hazar, you have dealt with the Guanning army very little, and you don't know their details. Like Zu Dashou and Wu Sangui, they are all generals, and their families have tens of thousands of servants and tenants. If this man has nothing, he has few ideas; If you have more money, you will naturally have more worries. Therefore, it is good that these generals of Guan Ningjun have the upper hand, but if the situation is unfavorable, they will think about how to protect their family property, wife and children, and the Son of Heaven will leave it behind. Although I haven't read Zu Dashou's letter, I probably understand what is written, it is nothing more than knowing the benefits and disadvantages, and illustrating the blessings and misfortunes, but how can they know what is the misfortune and what the blessing is without fighting? ”

"I see!" Hazar asked, "Are you sure of victory?" ”

"It shouldn't be a big problem!" Yue Tuo said with a smile: "These people have so many farms, but they are just dogs guarding the household, and my father has sent troops to Guangning to make it look like they are marching into the army, how can they abandon their family property and servants and go south regardless of the curly armor?" Wu Sangui and Zu Gang had no more than four or five thousand people under their command, and they were just used to perfunctory the urging of the officials. They don't know my reality before, and they don't know the situation at home behind them, how can they have the heart to fight to the death with me, and they are sure that as long as the situation is slightly unfavorable, they will retreat back and save their strength, it is not easy to destroy it, if it is to win, why is it difficult? Speaking of this, he smiled at Hazar and said: "We are all defeated generals under His Highness, and it is His Highness's grace to be able to fight again this time. ”

Hazar was stunned for a moment, and then smiled: "Since this is the case, then I will be lazy for a while!" ”

In the Guanning military camp.

"Are you sure it's the big man?" Zu Kuan asked sharply.

"You can't go wrong!" Zu Gang kowtowed to the general: "When the villain was in Ningyuan, he often went to the mansion of the eldest lord, and he has seen the eldest lord many times, and he will never recognize the wrong person!" ”

"This is indeed my uncle's handwriting, I recognize the handwriting!" Wu Sangui shook the letter paper in his hand, unlike Zu Kuan, who was from a humble background and didn't know a few big characters, he could be said to be both civil and military, and immediately recognized that this was Zu Dashou's handwriting. He carefully folded the letter into his sleeve and asked in a deep voice, "How does my uncle look?" How has it changed from the past? ”

Zu Kuan thought for a while and replied: "It's not the same, it's still the same, it's just a little fatter!" ”

Wu Sangui and Zu Gang glanced at each other, it seemed that Zu Dashou should have written this letter with his original intention, Wu Sangui asked again: "Who is the leader of the army?" ”

"It's a Tartar of the East, I seem to have heard others call him Big Belle!"

"Big Baylor? That's Yue Tuo! Wu Sangui's face changed slightly, they and Houjin are old enemies, and the two sides have been dealing with each other for more than ten years, and the opponents are very clear. Wu Sangui asked a few more questions about the other party's appearance, and after confirming that it was Yue Tuo, he asked, "How many men and horses are there in the enemy army?" How is the morale? ”

"The villain was captured, and he didn't see how many soldiers and horses the enemy had? But the armor battle is extremely sharp, when the villain fights with it, even the light cavalry of the vanguard is also covered with iron armor, carrying bird guns, and the steel knives are also extremely sharp, and the soldiers are mostly captives, and the bow and horse are skillful, and the morale is also quite strong! ”

"Well, you can step back and rest first!" Wu Sangui nodded and motioned for Zu Gang to retreat. Zu Kuan stepped forward and said in a low voice: "What is written in the letter?" ”

"It's nothing more than saying that Liu Cheng's army is strong, and he persuaded me to wait for him to surrender!" Wu Sangui sighed: "Brother Kuan, no matter what, we are all eating the court, eating the king's luck, and being loyal to the king, how can there be a reason to surrender without a fight?" ”

"What the eldest uncle said is that the eldest lord's letter is strange, I can't believe it!" Zu Kuan shook his head: "How can there be such a coincidence in the world, if you don't meet it sooner or later, you just met it here, you and I are all elite soldiers, and we are not afraid of them when we work together to fight with the thieves." ”

"Hmm!" Wu Sangui nodded: "Let's fight first, and then we'll see!" ”

On the morning of the third day, they heard the front sentry warning that the enemy was approaching, and hurriedly occupied a high place to prepare for the battle. Seeing that the Guanning army had occupied the high ground, Yue Tuo's army did not panic, and began to line up after retreating slightly, and also erected fences and long cards in front of the formation to prevent enemy conflicts, obviously all of them were veterans who had been in battle for a long time.

At this moment, a westerly wind blew, and the wind raised the dust and blades of grass on the ground, making the sky take on a strange grayish-yellow color, adding a bit of solemnity. Zu Kuan looked at the direction of the wind, jumped on his war horse and said to Wu Sangui: "Uncle Chang, the enemy's foothold is not stable, I will lead the cavalry to the conflict first!" You're on the battlefield to make a move! ”

"It's okay, Brother Kuan, pay attention!" Wu Sangui nodded, Zu Kuan shouted, and took advantage of the tailwind to lead hundreds of horsemen to pounce on the enemy's right flank, while the Guanning army in other directions maintained a suppressive posture and did not move forward. The defenders on the right flank have not had time to erect a fence, only a dozen sets of long cards for blocking arrows, seeing the cavalry of the Guanning army rushing over, hurriedly returning fire with bows and arrows and firearms, due to the relationship of the headwind, most of the arrows were not shot, only a few cavalry fell off the horse with arrows, these cavalry are the elite soldiers raised by Zu Kuan for many years, not chaotic at all, some of them fought back with bows, some rushed to the ranks of the enemy, and the fierce hand-to-hand combat began at once.

"Good guys!" Yue Tuo glanced at the right wing and said with a smile: "It is worthy of being the place where the elite of the Ming Kingdom gathers!" Come, send the order down, so that the cattle are in a formation and fight, and the soldiers who retreat will behead their oxen and their foreheads, and those who will retreat will behead their armor and their foreheads; The true retreater of the Jiala is to cut the solid mountain and the forehead is true! ”

"Big Belle, please let me go and oversee the battle!" Suppilon said in a deep voice.

"It's okay!" Yue Tuo looked at the battle situation on the right flank, and suddenly asked Zu Dashou on the side: "This should be a recruited Mongolian soldier, right?" ”

"Not bad!" Zu Dashou looked at it: "This should be Yiding recruited by Zu Kuan, who has always been famous in the army for daring to fight!" ”

"It's good to be Mongolian, I have a way!" Yue Tuo smiled and said, "Ji Bilong, you go to the back camp to get more silk, gold and silver utensils." ”

The fierce battle on the right flank has been going on for a while, the wind is gradually weakening, Zu Kuan's cavalry attack is gradually becoming weaker, the right flank is the rest of the yellow flag, although the most elite white armor soldiers are mostly picked into Liu Cheng's escort army, but there are still a lot of veterans left, these embers of the former Huang Taiji experienced dismounted horses lined up in a dense row, the outermost row inserted the tail end of the spear into the dirt, pointed the tip of the spear diagonally upward, the second row raised the spear above the head, from the shoulders of the first row, A dense line of barriers was formed, and the men behind calmly fired at the enemy knights with bows and arrows, and although from time to time someone fell, someone immediately made up for it from behind, and never let the enemy cavalry break through the ranks. Zu Kuan saw that he could not break through the ranks of the enemy, and was about to give the order to retreat, when he suddenly saw more than a dozen ownerless horses running out of the ranks of the enemy army. Several Mongol cavalrymen stepped forward to hold it as a trophy, but they immediately let out a cry of ecstasy.

"What's going on?" Zu Kuan looked over in surprise, and saw that dozens of cavalrymen had already fought for those horses, and he quickly got the answer, a horse was lassoed by the cavalry, and the leather bag on the horse's back fell to the ground, revealing all kinds of gold and silver utensils and silk.

"Damn it, you've fallen for the treacherous tricks of the Tartars!" Zu Kuan immediately understood that this was a trick of the enemy army, and he hurriedly shouted: "You are not allowed to take property privately, otherwise military law will be involved!" But he has never been strict in governing the army, and these Mongols regard military law as nothing, and Zu Kuan sees that he is extremely lenient in his brave and good fighting face, and how can he control the troops in a hurry on the battlefield, seeing that more and more people turn around to fight for the property on the horse, and some even kill each other.

Seeing this, the Jurchen officers on the right flank immediately ordered to beat the drums, and the soldiers marched like a wall, and suddenly overwhelmed the Mongol soldiers who were still attacking, and the Jurchen cavalry behind the battle also jumped on their horses to pursue, Zu Kuan saw that the situation was not good, so he had to lead the remaining cavalry to flee, leaving only corpses and scattered belongings everywhere.

"Uncle, it's all because I don't govern the army strictly on weekdays, and I fell for the tricks of thieves!" Zu Kuan's face was flushed, and he was ashamed of himself.

"I can't say that, that Yue Tuo is a famous general in the east, and there are many losses in the Guanning army, victory and defeat are common things in soldiers, and I will find it back next time!" Wu Sangui hurriedly persuaded.

"So what should I do now? The thieves are really good at fighting, and Yue Tuo is so treacherous, I'm afraid you and I won't be able to please you this time! Zu Kuan came back after losing for a while, and he had no idea for a long time, so he asked Wu Sangui.

"Don't be afraid, it's just a small setback, we occupy the high ground again, even if the captives come to attack, we are not afraid, until it gets dark, we will withdraw our troops overnight, we have a lot of cavalry, not afraid of Yue Tuo's pursuit!"

Wu Sangui comforted Zu Kuan a few words, and suddenly saw a horse rushing out from the enemy formation on the opposite side, heading straight for his own formation. The knight did not have a weapon in his hand, but rode his horse and waved at the Guanning army on the high ground, and when he was about a stone's throw away, the man jumped off his horse and shot an arrow at the Guanning army on the high ground. After the shot, the man did not return to the formation, but took more than ten steps back and led the horse to stand, as if waiting for something.

The soldier picked up the arrow and found that the arrow had been broken, and a strip of cloth was tied to the shaft of the arrow, so he hurriedly picked it up and sent it to Wu Sangui and Zu Kuan. Wu Sangui took off the cloth strip and saw that a few lines of words were written on it in messy handwriting: Wu and Zu Er General Mingjian, General Zu is my friend, I have descended to King Liu, and you and others are generally Ming generals, why bother to kill each other? King Liu cherishes you very much, and if you are willing to surrender, there is no need to talk about wealth and wealth. If you are not a friend, why should you be an enemy? As a last resort, the prisoners should be released as a sign of goodwill. The last inscription is written with the word Yue Tuo, and the handwriting is the same as the previous one, which should be written by himself.

"Uncle, what's written on it?" Zu Kuan asked.

"It was written by Yue Tuo, he said that he had no grudge against us, he didn't want to fight with us, and he said that he would return the captives to us!" "To give us back the captives? Is this serious? Zu Kuan had a suspicious look on his face. Wu Sangui nodded: "It shouldn't be fake, this guy is going to attack the heart, it's so powerful!" ”

Sure enough, as Wu Sangui expected, after a while, the dozens of Mongolian cavalry and their war horses and weapons that had just been captured were returned to the opposite formation, and even the bodies of the war dead were sent over one by one. In the end, the officer also gave five hundred taels of silver and a pair of jade, only saying that it was given by Zu Dashou. Wu Sangui and Zu Kuan couldn't refuse, so they had to accept it in the end. After giving the gifts, the enemy troops on the opposite side retreated.

"What do we do now?" Zu Kuan looked at the strict formation of the enemy troops not far away, and asked Wu Sangui.

Wu Sangui looked at the soldiers around him, all of them had no fighting spirit on their faces, and it would definitely not be good to catch up. Of course, the most important thing is that Yue Tuo said something in his heart in the letter - "If you are not a friend, why be an enemy?" "Even if you don't go to Liu Cheng's side to disarm and surrender, there is no need to kill the other party, when Cheng Zu was martyred, how many of those loyal ministers of Emperor Jianwen had a good end? What's more, I can't beat others.

"Let's quit too!" Wu Sangui said in a low voice: "Write a letter to Lord Xiong, and say that the Liu thief is extremely strong, and our army is outnumbered, so we have to temporarily retreat, and wait until the army arrives, and then add a crusade!" ”

Tianjin.

"Tell your lord, this is the wealth obtained in the treasury of Tongzhou and Tianjin!" Xu Xianming respectfully presented a book to Liu Cheng, Liu Cheng took the book, and asked while reading: "How is the matter of collecting military taxes?" ”

"I'm afraid it will take more than ten days, and my scribes have just finished counting the rosters in the treasury, and the property in them is very different from the booklets, and many of them are in deficit, and they can't spare people for a while!"

"The deficit must be strictly investigated, a piece of cloth, a grain of rice is not less!" Liu Cheng said sharply: "Remember, we are not rebels, let alone anti-thieves. We are the rebels on the side of the Qing monarch and the Yasukuni disaster. Those silverfish rats that ate people's fat and people's ointment, they all caught me and checked them out little by little. ”