In July, just after the end of the financial war, the Nanzhili market slowly stabilized in the fluctuations, but the war situation was a little confusing.

Hong Chengchou was very mysterious after going south, no one knew where he was, and no one knew what his strategy was.

Yang Chao braked from June to July with static, and he didn't even wait for Hong Chengchou to make a move.

On the contrary, through the Jiangxi side and even the Beijing side, at the same time received the news of the retreat of the Qing army in Jiangxi.

It was not the whole army that retreated, but a small part of the Eight Banners was transferred to the north.

Tan Tai in Nanchang, Jiangxi Province led 10,000 Eight Banner soldiers to withdraw to Beijing, and the Heluo Hui of the General also withdrew to Beijing with 10,000 Eight Banner soldiers, and only 10,000 elite Eight Banners remained in Jiangxi.

"Went to Shandong!"

Yang Chao was very concerned about the movements of these two Qing troops, and finally sent back the news from Beijing, Diao Erdou heard and determined that Tan Taibu was transferred to Linqing, Shandong, and Heluo Hui was transferred to Jining Prefecture.

Originally, Dolgon deployed 30,000 Eight Banners in Shandong, and now there are 50,000 directly, so it can be said that the main force of the Eight Banners is basically here, Yang Chao can't help but believe that the Qing army intends to attack Jianghuai from the southeast of Shandong.

Since ancient times, guarding the river must guard the Huai, the Jianghuai is lost, the direction of the Yangtze River is a thousand miles of loopholes, it is impossible to rely on the boat to block the bank of the river, Yang Chao doubts whether it is because of the failure of Haoge, so that the Qing army is completely determined to attack the south of the Yangtze River from the upstream, although there is a saying that the Jinling must defend Jingxiang, but the Qing army has no advantage in the navy, and the occupation of Jingxiang is just to occupy the advantage of the upstream, and can go down the river. It also makes sense for them to abandon the attack strategy of going down the Yangtze River, and in comparison, they still fight directly along the canal south from the Jianghuai, which is more suitable for the Eight Banners.

But Yang Chao always felt that something was wrong, because this was not a strategy at all, this was simply a plan to fight for strength, crushing from north to south, knife to gun, nothing false. If this is the kind of strategy, what do you want Hong Chengchou to do, there is no need for Dolgon to let Hong Chengchou out of the mountain.

"Order Li Wuliu to test it out and see if Shandong Eight Banners is really the main force. Don't be fooled by their use of false flags, if it is a group of green battalion soldiers under the banner of the Eight Banners, and the real Eight Banners soldiers are hiding in the shadows, then they will be passive. ”

Yang Chao thought about it, and let Li Wuliu attack tentatively.

"Let Jiang Yang go out of Haizhou to attack Yizhou. Li Wuliu went out of the direction of Xuzhou to attack Yixian, if the Eight Banners were bluffing, after taking the two places, he would continue to advance to the hinterland of Shandong! If it is really impossible to attack, immediately retreat to the same place and garrison. ”

Yang Chao gave orders one after another.

Even Jiang Yang of Haizhou was transferred, this Jiang Yang was one of the hundred households of the Thousand Households in the East China Sea, and later because of his meritorious defense of Haizhou, he was promoted to a thousand households after the Battle of Haizhou, but after Yang Chao rescued Haizhou for the second time, he still chose to follow Yang Chao.

It's not that Jiang Yang doesn't want to be a thousand-household official, but because his military position was borrowed.

The military attache of the Ming Dynasty was hereditary. Passed down from father to son, but military households are not forbidden to participate in the imperial examination, and some of the children of officers in the imperial examination are not very willing to accept official positions, so the imperial court has introduced a policy called borrowing, that is, military attachés who become officials after the imperial examination, if there is no son, or the son is too young, he can temporarily lend the military position to close relatives such as brothers or nephews.

But if his son reaches adulthood, the brother and nephew must return the position.

Jiang Yang's hundred households were borrowed from Zhongju's elder brother back then. But his nephew is gradually becoming an adult, and his position still has to be returned, but Jiang Yang is a little reluctant to hand over Qianhu back, and he wants to leave it to his son. After thinking about it, when Yang Chao's army arrived in Haizhou for the second time, Jiang Yang cooperated with Li Wuliu to defend the city, so he expressed this idea and took refuge in Yang Chao.

Yang Chao agreed without hesitation, this Jiang Yang is still a reliable person. At that time, Yang Chao expanded the army, so he directly appointed Jiang Yang as the general manager of Qianhu, and let him recruit these military households to his subordinates, after Li Wuliu's strict training, and equipped him with a group of officers, he was a veteran.

After that, Li Wuliu hit Xuzhou, but Jiang Yang was responsible for guarding Haizhou, and this time he was also ordered to attack.

When the two entered the territory of Shandong, they were attacked head-on by the Eight Banners, and almost all the Eight Banners went into battle, and the 50,000 elites of the Eight Banners were concentrated in the Lunan area, and Li Wuliu and Jiang Yang were all defeated and returned to their original places.

"Fifty thousand eight flags are all true!"

After getting this result, Yang Chao was even more confused.

Could it be that the Qing army really planned to attack from the north to the south, this is Hong Chengchou's strategy?

Although it is not clear about the conspiracy, after confirming that the main force of the Qing army is in Shandong, Yang Chao still wants to take Jiangbei as the center of gravity of defense, and only many men, Lu Mo and Xie Fei are left in Jiangnan, and all other armies are transferred back to Jiangbei to garrison.

"Too passive!"

In the face of this military situation, Yang Chao found that he was extremely passive, and the Qing army could attack more places than he could, and he could not fortify everywhere, which would put too much pressure on the troops.

The best way to deal with it is to attack instead of defending, that is, to occupy the initiative in the war, and if you take the offensive yourself, it is time for the Qing army to guess where it will attack from.

However, judging from the current situation of Yang Chao, there is no condition to take the initiative to attack, Yang Chao is still working hard to train his troops, and intends to train his 300,000 troops to at least the level of the Han army in the Qing army, before fighting a decisive battle with the Qing army.

Because of its strong military strength, the Qing army could take the offensive tactically and always occupy the initiative, which made Yang Chao feel more and more that the form was unfavorable to him.

"Since the Qing army is in Shandong, Jiangxi is bound to be empty at this time, is it possible to try to attack the enemy in Jiangxi. If we can capture Jiangxi, we will completely eliminate the threat of the Qing army to our flank. If we occupy Jiangxi, our department will be able to connect with He Tengjiao in Hunan, and we will only need to face the enemy in Hubei, and the strategic situation will be greatly improved. ”

Yang Chao pondered repeatedly about the military situation.

But Jiangxi Jin Shenghuan and Wang Tizhong have 200,000 mercenaries, judging from their battle situation with the Ming army, they still have a certain combat effectiveness, the core of these two Jin Shenghuan is Zuo Liangyu's elite, and Wang Tizhong's core is Li Zicheng's elite, there must be fierce generals who can fight, it is not so easy to deal with.

Moreover, Yang Chao knew that the small court had been persuading these two people, and he heard that the situation was very optimistic.

Jin Shenghuan and Wang Tizhong had a very stiff relationship with the civilian officials sent to Jiangxi by the Qing court.

The fundamental reason is because of money, Jin Shenghuan and Wang Tizhong extorted a batch of gold and silver treasures by force when they captured Jiangxi, and became nouveau riche; Zhang Yutian, the governor of Jiangxi appointed by the Qing court, and Dong Xuecheng, the governor of Jiangxi, were blushing. Alarmist and coerced them into offering money.

And Jin Shenghuan and Wang Tizhong have heavy troops in their hands, and their strength is getting bigger and bigger, so they have also become domineering. Especially when most of the Jiangxi Eight Banners were called back, it was impossible for the two to hand over their property.

However, the civil officials did not give up, and Zhang Yutian sent official tickets to chase them for 300,000 yuan, and threatened to impeach them.

The Qing army in Jiangxi was extremely conflicted with each other, and the Fujian court wanted to take advantage of this. Zheng Zhilong also notified Yang Chao, hoping that Yang Chao would cooperate, that is, if these two people were anyway, he hoped that Yang Chao would lead his troops into Jiangxi, drag 10,000 Eight Banner soldiers, and give these two people a chance to act.

Previously, Yang Chao had been rectifying the interior, negotiating trade matters with Nassau on the one hand, and solving financial problems on the other, so Yang Chao had never taken measures against Jiangxi, and now he planned to attack Jiangxi. Zheng came out with the news.

Yang Chao has no reason to refuse, if Jin Shenghuan and Wang Tizhong can come over anyway, Yang Chao will send troops to eliminate the Eight Banners entrenched in Nanchang, and the whole Jiangxi will be alive, and there is no need to attack one city and one pond by himself, and the situation will be reversed in an instant.

Therefore, Yang Chao continued to stand still and waited for news from the imperial court.

At the same time, psychological warfare begins with Dorgon.

Yu Jiye had already arrived in Beijing, and according to Yang Chao's instructions, he made a big show along the way, waving the banner of the Ming envoy. At first, the Qing army did not stop them, but soon they announced that they were going to negotiate with the Qing court to exchange Haoge for the news of Zhu Cihong.

As a result, Dolgon quickly took action, and although he did not kill Yu Jiye, he had people detain him in Shandong.

After detaining Yu Jiye. Yang Chao also allowed Diao Erdou in Beijing to spread rumors and detain Dolgon as an envoy to the Ming court for negotiations, which was an ulterior scheme, because the envoy planned to exchange Haoge for Zhu Cihong.

As Yang Chao expected, this made the old magnates in the Eight Banners grab Dolgon's pigtails again, and they blamed them one after another. There was even an old guy, an important minister in the Huang Taiji era, who went to Shandong in a group to meet the envoys of the Ming court.

Seeing that Dolgon couldn't stop him, he could only let Yu Jiye enter Beijing.

But he never negotiated with Yu Jiye, and it was those old magnates who put pressure on him, so Dolgon reluctantly expressed his position, saying that Zhu Cihong was the emperor of the Ming Dynasty, how could he easily give it up, Haoge was captured on the battlefield, which damaged the prestige of the Eight Banners, how could he exchange the emperor of the Ming Dynasty for a defeated general.

The trouble for Dolgon made Yang Chao very happy, and he finally got back the game and avenged the one that was used by Dolgon.

But Dolgon soon made Yang Chao disgusted.

He sent someone to inform the small court of Fujian, saying that Yang Chao wanted to exchange Haoge for Zhu Cihong, and asked the little emperor of Fujian, Zhu Cihuan, if this was the meaning of the Ming court, if so, the Qing court planned to negotiate with the Ming court on this, and Yang Chao was just a military general, and they couldn't trust Yang Chao.

Where did Zhu Cihong dare to let Zhu Cihong come back, when he came back, what should he do as an emperor.

This is like the Southern Song Dynasty Emperor Zhao Gou never dared to take over the Huiqin Erzong from the hands of the Jin State, because the two old emperors came back, how should he deal with himself, abdicate and make way for Xian? Apparently impossible!

At that time, the Jin Dynasty continued to scare Zhao Gou with the release of the two old emperors, and Yue Fei, the general under Zhao Gou, also shouted all day long to welcome back the two first emperors in the Northern Expedition, under internal and external pressure, Zhao Gou finally chose to kill Yue Fei, otherwise he really called Yue Fei to Huanglong Mansion to rescue the two emperors, he estimated that the emperor could not do it, and his life would be explained.

There is also a precedent in the Ming Dynasty, Ming Yingzong was captured in response to Wara, Yu Qian ignored the emperor's capture in Beijing, and shouted loudly "The people are your society, and the second monarch is light" not only did not agree to the conditions of Wara's surrender in exchange for Ming Yingzong, but let Yingzong's younger brother Emperor Jing succeed to the throne in Beijing, and finally after Ming Yingzong was released, he imprisoned Emperor Jing and killed Yu Qian.

Zhu Cihuan felt that if his brother Zhu Cihong came back, his ending would not be much stronger than Emperor Ming Jing, and Ming Yingzong was only one person at that time, and Yang Chao was standing behind Zhu Cihong.

So Zhu Cihuan immediately sent a holy decree to Nanjing, asking Yang Chao to immediately deport Haoge to Fujian, where he planned to sacrifice prisoners to the ancestors and ancestors.

Zhu Cihuan's reason is also very legitimate, capturing Haoge, the son of the former emperor of the Manchu Qing Dynasty, is indeed worth burning paper for Zhu Yuanzhang and said.

But Zhu Yuanzhang's mausoleum is in Nanjing, which prisoner did you sacrifice in Fujian, so Yang Chao immediately wrote a letter, expressing his hope that the emperor would come to Nanjing and offer prisoners in Taimiao and Xiaoling.

But where did the little emperor dare to come to Nanjing, for which the Zheng family gave Yang Chao three million taels of silver every year.

So the plan to exchange Haoge for Zhu Cihong began to quarrel between Yang Chao, the Ming court and the Qing court, first Yang Chao made Dolgon uncomfortable, and Dolgon used the little emperor of Fujian to disgust Yang Chao, and Yang Chao used the status of Nanjing City to disgust the little emperor.

A good strategy ended up being disgusting to each other.

And Dolgon took advantage of this to have a reason to tell the old magnates of the Qing court, saying that it was not that he Dolgon did not want to talk, but that the Ming court had no sincerity at all, and obviously just wanted to deceive himself into releasing Zhu Cihong, and this deal could not be done.

But the old magnate still did not give up, hoping to let go of the useless Ming Dynasty emperor, let this emperor go back to fight with another emperor, the Qing court just took advantage of the fisherman, and could also use this to save the prince of the Qing court, why not.

Dolgon, on the other hand, came up with the reason that it was not cost-effective to exchange the emperor for the generals of the defeated army, and he was very happy with the old magnates.

Yang Chao also watched happily, but he didn't find that under the lively surface, the real conspiracy, the real threat, was slowly approaching! (To be continued.) )