Yu Xiang led the Qilin army to march unhindered, and everywhere he went, the common people rejoiced, beat gongs and drums, and ran to tell each other.

There are unconsciously divided into two factions in society, the pro-new faction and the royalist faction.

The new faction is mainly middle and lower class working people, some young people, small and medium-sized businessmen.

The royalists were mainly vested interests in society, large landowners, conservative intellectuals, etc.

The royalists moved north one after another, and many did not want to stay far from their homeland and gathered in Baoding.

Baoding means "forever maintaining the stability of Dadu (i.e., Yuan Dadu Beijing)". After Zhu Di became emperor, he moved the Daning Capital Division to Baoding, responsible for the security and security near Beijing. In the fourth year of Jianwen, the governor Meng Shan strengthened the city wall, built the city with bricks and stones, and built more than 3,700 pheasants at the mouth of the daughter wall. During the Longqing period, Zhang Liewen and other three prefects gradually transformed the earth city into a brick city, strengthened and increased the city tower, starting from the strategic defense, determined the city shape system, the city perimeter is basically square, only the south of the west city is an arc protruding 500 meters, the whole city is shaped like a foot boot, so it is called "boot city".

The city of Baoding is easy to defend and difficult to attack, if there is no fierce fire, forcibly attack the city, I am afraid that there will be heavy casualties. But this is the choke point of the Qilin Army going north, and it must be broken.

Yang Sichang led the imperial army to set up the first line of defense in Baoding, intended to block the northward march of the Qilin army.

Baoding City daughter wall on the mouth, knives and guns stand in a forest, every short distance, there is a red-clothed cannon, Yang Sichang Guang stored grain, fled to Baoding rich businessmen and gentry enthusiastically donated, Baoding defenders amounted to 30,000, he led the troops to defend Baoding, full of self-confidence, that there is no problem to defend a year and a half.

On August 20, the eleventh year of Chongzhen, the Qilin army arrived in Baoding, and in order to reduce casualties, Yu Xiang offered to negotiate with the imperial army.

At the negotiation table, Yang Sichang was as steady as Mount Tai, his eyes were shining, and he had a sense of condescending arrogance. He looked at Yu Xiang carefully, saw that he was gentle and elegant, kind and kind, and then looked at the people around him, Lu Xiangsheng, Liu Guoneng, Li Yan, Liu Xiangzhong and others, all of them were handsome and chic, not like the kind of soldiers who usually saw Zhang Fei. What made him even more curious was that there was still a child-like person sitting next to Yu Xiang, this child looked childish, but he was already very mature and stable.

After a while of greetings, Yu Xiang said, "Lord Yang, when I was impeached before, you were still my sponsor, and I would like to express my gratitude. It's just that I didn't expect that it would be a pity that you and I met each other today. ”

Yang Sichang snorted and said: "It's good to know gratitude, you rebelled and rebelled, and you rebelled against the saints, but you were a rebellious minister and thief, think about it at the beginning, I still tried my best to override public opinion and recommend you, and now I regret it." ”

These words were expected by Yu Xiang, but he didn't want to defend them, so he said straight to the point: "This negotiation is not about discussing right and wrong. ”

Yu Xiang sat up straight, forced to look at Yang Sichang and said: "I will enter King Qin in Beijing this time, if you think of the common people in the world and get out of the way, I can assure you that you will never kill innocents indiscriminately, and will also be amnesty, including you, if you insist on going against the sky, I am afraid that the artillery fire will be ruthless, and in the war, I can only express helplessness for possible accidental injuries." Yu Xiang's words are soft and hard, but they are to the point.

Yang Sichang snorted coldly: "Even if you have a steel gun, but you can't win the hearts of the people, what you do, history will remember it for you." ”

Yu Xiang saw that he said righteously and awe-inspiringly, and he also used history to suppress it, and said with a cold smile: "On the Julu battlefield, you didn't save you when you saw death, which put Lord Lu in danger, and the new guard army risked the annihilation of the whole army, paying 5,325 casualties, and the 5,000 people under Lord Lu's department were almost wiped out, so they killed more than 6,000 Qing soldiers. And Chen Xinjia began to stand still, and then in order to grab the merit, he hurriedly attacked, causing more than 20,000 soldiers to lose their lives, not only that, but he also cut off the head of the Qing people, thinking that it was his own merit, deceived the emperor, promoted to become rich, and you were promoted to the first assistant because of the merit of recommendation. If you do this, you think that people will not know, you can deceive the present long live, but you can not deceive thousands of people who have witnessed the battlefield. ”

Yu Xiang pulled the stone egg beside him. Zi said: "Today I specially brought this little soldier here, he is a witness to this battle, killed five Qing soldiers, participated in the burial of the corpses of Qing soldiers, his descendants will definitely remember the battle of Julu, and make the facts public, how should history write about you at that time, if you are evaluated?" ”

Yang Sichang is famous for being able to speak, although he is not a witness to the battle of Julu, but for Chen Xinjia to kill the Qing soldiers, he was suspicious, just pretending not to know and ignoring, today after Yu Xiang said this, he roughly knows the ins and outs of the matter, but he still said with a look of not admitting it: "The battle of Julu, the military department Shangshu Chen personally led the troops, and the old man did not participate, the merits of the merits, and he has his own long live judgment." And that's not what we're talking about today, and I'm determined to hold my ground and never take a step back. ”

Yu Xiang stood up when he heard him say this, pointed at Yu Yang Sichang and said in an unquestionable tone: "This war, the lives and souls are all because of you, and the deadline for you is the day after tomorrow. ”

Yu Xiang paused, and a cold light radiated from his eyes.

Yang Sichang's heart sank, feeling that Yu Xiang was not a lie, and before he could speak, Yu Xiang got up, left the negotiation table, and left with a group of people.

Yang Sichang sat at the negotiating table, dumbfounded, this was not a negotiation, but an ultimatum. The reason why he agreed to come to negotiate was because of the 100,000 troops he led, the most effective of which was Xuandabing, but these soldiers were Lu Xiangsheng's old department, and he was worried that the soldiers would defect to the battle, so they did not bring them to the front line.

After repeated measurements, Yang Sichang decided to defend Baoding and never back down, and he wanted to let Yu Xiang's army suffer when besieging Baoding.

But he was wrong, and soon, two miles away from Baoding City, more than two hundred large mounds were piled up, and on each mound there was a red-coated cannon. And the red-coated cannons on Baoding City can't hit such a long distance at all.

Yang Sichang also wondered what kind of moth Yu Xiang was doing with the red-clothed cannon erected so far away, because the imperial army led by Yang Sichang would not go out of the city to meet the battle at all. He never expected that the range of the red-coated cannon of the Qilin Army was much longer than that of the red-coated cannon of Baoding City.

On the 24th day of August in the 11th year of Chongzhen, 200 red-coated cannons fired at once, and the fierce artillery fire destroyed the red-coated cannons at the head of Baoding City. When the red-coated cannon at the head of Baoding City did not play any role, it was devastated.

The red-coated cannon then slammed into the gates, which were quickly destroyed.

In the earth-shattering shouts of killing, the Baoding Mansion that Yang Sichang had high hopes for was taken down in this way.

Yang Sichang originally intended to live and die with Baoding, but his generals forcibly stuffed him into a carriage and abandoned the city.

After the Qilin army occupied Baoding Mansion, it quickly posted a notice to appease the people, and all the surrendered troops were reorganized, basically there were no soldiers who refused to surrender, and in this battle, the Qilin army suffered 500 casualties, and the imperial army suffered 2,000 casualties and 15,000 people. Countless grains were seized, providing material support for the Qilin Army to continue the Northern Expedition.

Yu Xiang did not stay in Baoding Mansion at all, but made the army day and night, and attacked quickly, Yu Xiang was worried that Chongzhen would send the army of the Guanning defense line to come to the capital to rescue, so that the north gate of the Ming Dynasty would be opened, and the Qing soldiers would drive straight into it without any obstacles, and the Ming Dynasty would fall into a situation of no return.

Yang Sichang's army fled to Gaobeidian and was overtaken by the cavalry units of the New Guard, Yang Sichang's army had 10,000 men, while the Qilin army cavalry was only about 2,000 people. Yang Sichang was so happy, this was too bullying, two thousand people dared to bite a team of more than 10,000 people. He simply stopped running away, and made up his mind to eat the 2,000 cavalry of the Qilin Army.

But he was wrong again, the cavalry took advantage of fighting and running, and they were all riding and shooting immediately, and the imperial army could not get close at all, because of the fire of the unicorn army. The gun shot too far away. A battle is defeated, and this time the cavalry showed no mercy, no mercy, for the resisters, all shot to death, this is the order issued by Yu Xiang, Huairou policy, not applicable to the diehards, otherwise, they use this as a bargaining chip, bargaining.

In the end, Yang Sichang was captured alive because he could not escape.

The cavalry corps consisted of 2,000 men, captured 5,000 soldiers, and expanded to an army of 7,000 men at once. It turned out that the imperial army was not a hardcore royalist, and they had long envied the treatment of the new guards.

After these soldiers were reorganized, they fought more desperately than before in order to make meritorious contributions. Without any suspense, the 7,000 Qilin army conquered Zhuozhou, Daxing County, and Fangshan County with a devastating force. The imperial army was defeated and retreated, and mutinies continued. At the beginning, the 7,000 army had become more than 12,000 people, and Zhuge Shanzhen was the commander-in-chief of this army.

On September 10, the 11th year of Chongzhen, the Qilin Army arrived in Wanping County. This was the last line of defense of the royalists, and Chen Xinjia personally commanded it. Because there is no one available in the imperial court, the few generals are outside, and they will not be able to come for a while.

This time, Yu Xiang did not give the imperial court the slightest chance to negotiate. Besiege but not attack.

On September 20, the follow-up infantry and artillery teams led by Yu Xiang arrived. The water in Wanpingwei is impassable. Attack Wanping with absolutely superior forces.

At the end of 21 September, more than 200 red-coated cannons opened fire at the same time, shaking the heavens and the earth.

Chongzhen was in the palace, as usual, the sun was rising, and it stands to reason that the courtiers had already arrived, but there was no one in the court.

In the past few days, the number of people who went to court has been decreasing day by day, and none of them have come today. Since the siege of Wanping by the Qilin Army on September 10, the courtiers have sent people to urge them for various reasons, under the pretext of not coming to the early court, and even if they came, they were still hanging their heads and not saying a word.

Chongzhen really wanted to pull them out one by one and behead them, but at this juncture, if he made a mutiny in the capital again, wouldn't he be destroyed again? Besides, the saying is not to blame the public, these courtiers seem to have an appointment, and they will not come to the early dynasty.

Although the officialdom is in chaos, what I didn't expect is that the common people are still leisurely, as if they are nothing, those who do business do business, and those who open restaurants open restaurants, as if whether they fight or not has nothing to do with them.

It turned out that the people of the capital had already known that wherever the Qilin army went, it did not disturb the people at all, and the local security was much better than when the imperial army was there.

Not only that, but the rumors that Yu Xiang harmed the people at the beginning were also self-defeating.

During the Northern Expedition of the Qilin Army, they brought back those who had been captured by the Qing soldiers, and they returned to their hometowns to rebuild their homes.

After these people returned to their hometowns, they truthfully told their relatives and friends about the original situation, and these news soon spread throughout the capital, and the common people realized that they had been deceived at the beginning, and the people were kind, and they soon supported the Qilin Army one-sidedly.

Those courtiers all felt that they were deceived, but Chen Xinjia was still the secretary of the military department, and with the army, everyone just dared to be angry but did not dare to speak, but they did not make an appointment with the early dynasty to protest.

Xue Zunxian was thinking about Xue Li at home, and he got the news these days that Xue Li had made great contributions in the Qilin Army, Xue Zunxian was worried about the emperor's investigation, and sighed in his heart: "I didn't expect this unsuccessful son to stand in line at a critical time, I am ashamed." ”

Just when he was thinking a lot, a house slave came to report: "My lord, Gonggong Liu has come to urge the early dynasty." ”

"Tell Father-in-law Liu that I'm sick and can't go, don't let him in! By the way, I went to the kitchen to see, breakfast is ready, let the kitchen be sharp, I am hungry. Xue Zunxian commanded.

The house slave answered, ran out of the door, saw Liu's father-in-law, and said with a sad face: "My lord hasn't eaten for several days, and now he can't get a drop of water, I'm afraid that I won't be able to survive, and I really can't go to court today." Before Gonggong Liu could speak, he squeaked the door, closed it, and tied it up. The slave hurried to the kitchen again, urging the kitchen to hurry up and get breakfast.

Gonggong Liu was so angry that he was about to vomit blood, and now he is not even allowed to enter the house, and he is afraid that he may not enter the house even if he is invited into the house. I had to shake my head and go back and report it truthfully.