After defeating the fleet of the Shun army, Ren Siqi did not order the pursuit of those ships that fled in panic, but let the fleet stop in the bay. Pen "Fun" Pavilion www.biquge.info

This place should be Qingdao in the future, and the seaport in front of it is Qingdao Port. The harbor is wide and deep, and it is an excellent natural harbor.

The fleeing Shun army has disappeared without a trace, but there are many figures faintly on the opposite shore.

The situation was unclear, Ren Siqi was unwilling to rush ashore, and ordered to bring up the Shun army prisoners who were rescued on the ship, and he wanted to interrogate the situation on the shore.

For the soldiers of the Shun army who fell into the sea, the Daishan army did not let them fend for themselves in the sea, but fished them into the boat nearby.

The Shunjun prisoner standing in front of him was a young man in his twenties, tall but very thin, his sallow face was full of vegetables, and he looked malnourished.

was brought to Ren Siqi, and before he could be interrogated, he knelt on the deck in panic and kowtowed repeatedly.

"Alright, don't knock. I ask you, where are you from, and whose soldiers are you? Ren Siqi asked.

Through inquiry, Ren Siqi learned that the captive in front of him was a local farmer who had just joined the Shun army for less than ten days. It belongs to the subordinates of Liu Decheng, the defense envoy of Qingzhou of the Shun army.

After Li Zicheng captured Beijing, he sent a large number of officials to various parts of the north. The entire northern region was brought under the rule of Dashun.

But the good times did not last long, and a month later, in a stone, the Shun army was defeated by Wu Sangui, the chief soldier of Shanhaiguan, in collusion with the Qing army, and Li Zicheng was forced to withdraw from Beijing.

After learning that the Shun army had withdrawn from Beijing, the gentry in the north who were interested in the Ming Dynasty raised their minds one after another, killing the officials appointed by the Dashun under the banner of "capturing thieves and restoring sight", and raised troops to rebel.

There were rebellions against the Dashun regime in all parts of Shandong and Hebei, and in Dezhou, the squires Zhao Jiding, Cheng Xianzhen and others launched a rebellion, and elected Zhu Shuaijun, a lieutenant of the Ming clan who fled to the place, as the leader of the alliance, pretending to be "King Ji".

The rebellion soon swept through Shandong and Hebei, and more than 40 prefectures and counties successively killed the officials of Dashun and re-raised the banner of Daming.

The former Ming Dynasty general Li Shiyuan also launched a rebellion in Qingzhou with dozens of people, and Liu Decheng, the defense envoy of Dashun Qingzhou, sent his general Cheng Shuangwei with 500 elite soldiers to pursue and suppress the rebellious Li Shiyuan.

Although Li Shiyuan's department developed to thousands of people in a very short period of time, where was the opponent of the elite Shun army, under the first battle, the whole army was defeated, Li Shiyuan retreated to Jiaozhou Bay with the remnants of the army, and was finally forced to Laoshan by Cheng Shuangwei.

In a short period of time, only a few prefectures and counties in Jiaodong remained in Shandong under the rule of the Shun army, and in order to deter the local government and maintain the rule of the Shun army over Shandong, Cheng Shuangwei decided to exterminate Li Shiyuan. He garrisoned Jiaozhou City, recruited new troops on a large scale, and forced Li Shiyuan to the point that he could not come down on Laoshan Mountain.

This is what Ren Siqi learned about the situation near Jiaozhou Bay through the mouths of the captives.

"What about the local livelihood? Can the common people eat? Are there many displaced people? Ren Siqi asked about the situation of the displaced people again, because he did not want to come thousands of miles to Shandong for the purpose of recruiting the displaced people.

And the captive's answer to the living conditions of the local people is just one word, miserable!

In the past decade or so, the weather has become colder and colder, resulting in a longer cycle of crop growth, but drought in the north has been repeated for many years, resulting in a serious reduction in grain production. In the past, an acre of land could produce more than one stone of grain, but now it would be nice to be able to recover the seeds.

However, when the crop yield decreases, the taxes to be paid are not less at all, but more and more. The expulsion and salary were so heavy that the people could not raise their heads. This year's tax has been paid, but the government still has to collect the next year's tax in advance, and the tax in many places has been collected for 30 years in Chongzhen.

What to do if you can't pay your taxes, you can only sell the land left by your ancestors and become tenants of the landlord's family. But even if there is no land, the poll tax and labor still weigh you down, and many people have to drag their families and families, flee their hometowns, flee into the mountains, and become homeless.

According to the captive, there are tens of thousands of displaced people in Laoshan Mountain to the north.

To add insult to injury, the Manchu Qing outside the Guanxi invaded many times and plundered Shandong several times.

Just two years ago, Dolgon broke through with tens of thousands of Qing soldiers, and the Ming troops everywhere did not dare to resist, so they could only close the city and defend themselves. The Gyeonggi area had already been ruined by previous robberies, and the Qing soldiers ransacked Shandong, broke through the city one after another, killed thousands of feudal officials, looted millions of gold and silver, and hundreds of thousands of Shandong people were taken hostage to slavery outside the Guan.

The invasion of the Qing soldiers caused more displaced people, and in order to avoid the Qing soldiers, the people in the central part of Luzhong dragged their families and fled to the shore of Jiaodong.

According to the captives, the life of the homeless people is very miserable, and in many places the bark of wild vegetables and trees can only eat Guanyin soil, and the phenomenon of cannibalism is not uncommon.

In this Jiaozhou Bay area, it is better, after all, relying on the seaside, relying on the fish and shrimp that are impacted by the waves, you can also feed some people. The faint figure on the shore that Ren Siqi saw was a homeless person picking up fish and shrimp.

And this captive was one of the exiles, and he joined the subordinates of Cheng Shuangwei of the Shun army for the sake of stuttering.

Through the interrogation of the captives, Ren Siqi gained a detailed understanding of the nearby forms. There are many displaced people, and it should be easy to recruit.

However, before recruiting the displaced people, there is a problem that needs to be solved, and that is how to deal with the two forces in the vicinity.

Cheng Shuangwei's army, with 500 elite soldiers, 2,000 newly recruited troops, and 1,000 newly established sailors, had just been defeated by themselves.

The rebels, or the Li Shiyuan Department of the Explanation Army, had thousands of soldiers, all of whom were composed of displaced people and were entrenched in Laoshan Mountain.

Looking at the coast in the distance, Ren Siqi thought for a long time and decided to stay at sea without moving. After all, although there were more than 20 ships brought this time, there were only more than 400 soldiers.

A large fleet of his own fleet broke into Jiaozhou Bay, and the forces of both sides would definitely react. Just wait for their reaction.

Ren Siqi didn't wait long, as soon as it was slightly dark, a small boat rowed over from the foot of Laoshan Mountain in the north, and a messenger was led onto the deck.

The man who came was a man in his forties, tall and burly, whose height was only comparable to Xiong Er in the Daishan Army, with a dark face and a full beard, standing there imposingly.

But when they saw the majestic appearance of the Daishan Army, the people who came were also shocked, and they stood on the deck for a long time without moving their feet.

After being appointed as a guerrilla in coastal defense, Ren Siqi's subordinates naturally became regular officers and soldiers, so they purchased Zanxin military uniforms according to the Ming army's system, and purchased armor for the generals, and the entire army took on a new look.

On the deck, two rows of elite pikemen stood in two rows, sharp spears in their hands. Under the stern, sixteen Japanese warriors stood in two rows, guarding the staircase leading to the stern. Looking up at the stern, two rows of musketeers lined up in a swallow shape, and at the head of the swallow character stood a young general, who was Ren Siqi, a guerrilla general of the Ming coastal defense! (To be continued.) )