After a day of repairs in Nandianzi, at noon the next day, Song Biao led the team to Niujiabao.

Niujiabao was built in the time of the Ming Nuer Gandu Division, when the fort was built, it was dug up a piece of dog's head gold shaped like a bull's horn, so it was called Niujiabao, and then because of the mistake of the tongue gradually called "Niujiabao", it was abandoned during the Tongzhi period, and it has been owned by Liu Tongcang for more than 20 years.

This fort is located in a three-way mouth, built by the mountain, backed by the old Tongling, the west side is the black ditch, the east side is the east fork ditch, the black ditch river in the black ditch flows through the front of Niujiabao, forming a natural moat, the black ditch all the way to the north fourteen miles of the road is Tai'an Village, the black ditch village, the east fork ditch is only two miles long, the north of the ditch is Beidianzi.

Nandian, Beidian, and Heigou add up to 6,000 hectares of land, which is almost equivalent to an agricultural township, and these places are the sphere of influence of Niujiabao, and the Hunjiang County Ya can't control it.

Because it has been the garrison of the Manchu Han Eight Banners Green Camp before, this fort has been repaired several times, built by the mountain, occupies more than 30 acres of mountainous land, can garrison more than 1,000 soldiers, the foundation is compacted, there are two layers of gables inside and outside, the outer wall is about two meters high, the ground is made of stones, the inner wall is four meters high, and the blue bricks are used.

The ancients were very particular about repairing the city and garrisoning, the old Tongling on which Niujiabao relied was not the highest in the periphery, but the terrain was extremely dangerous, as long as this fort was held, the enemy did not want to advance half a step, and the ravine junctions leading to Tai'an Township and Beidianzi on both sides were also in the coverage of Niujiabao's artillery fire, and even only with rifles could firmly guard the intersection leading to the rear on both sides.

In the fort, Hu Dalin and more than 120 brothers squatted on the school grounds, their rifles and ** were also seized by Zhang Yahu, and they were also thrown on the school field, among the more than 100 guns in that pile, only a few dozen were old guns of the Murata 18 type, and the rest were **, there were a lot of big blades and spears, and even the Qinglong Yanyue knife had one, which was estimated to be temporarily snatched from Guan Erye's temple when he went up the mountain to cast his name.

The atmosphere of the Northeast bandits worshipping the second brother is far less strong than that of the Central Plains Xiangma and bandits, and their recognized ancestor is the Bodhidharma Patriarch, which is very strange.

Niujiabao has a total of 14 cannons, eight of which are self-cast clay and bronze cannons, and the other six are old goods bought from Yue himself last year.

Song Biao led the brothers of the horse gang all the way to the school field, calmly and indifferently glanced around the crowd, and then said aloud to the group of bearded men in front of him: "I, Song Biao, am a person of rules, and serving under my command is to follow the rules. I know that beards always have beard rules, and all kinds of black words come out one after another, but you have to understand one thing here, if you want to follow me, you are no longer a simple beard. I have three iron laws, the first one, the subordinates must resolutely obey the superiors, you are now my subordinates, you must absolutely obey my command, I let you go east, no one is allowed to go west; Article 2: It is forbidden to raid homes and houses, burn, kill, and plunder, let alone forcibly destroy women and harass the people; Third, always remember that you are Chinese, and whoever practices China, we will kill him. I give you two choices, those who are willing to follow me, those who are willing to abide by my three iron laws, you will stay and follow me, and I will keep you to find a good way out, those who should be officials should be officials, those who should be military masters should be military masters, and those who can't do anything can go home to farm and become rich peasants. If you don't want to follow me, I'll count out a sum of money and send you out of the stockade, and find a way out from now on! ”

The brethren of the caravan were very excited when they heard this, but the bearded men were different, and everyone had long been accustomed to doing evil, and when they heard such words, they looked at each other, and no one knew whether to go or stay.

Seeing that the brothers in the village were silent and did not give Biao Ye face, Hu Dalin hurriedly shouted: "Brothers, we have a good opportunity!" Don't you still know Biao Ye's ability, scare your mother's crotch shit and pee, there are a few heroes in this world who are more powerful than our Biao Ye? From now on, as long as we follow our Biao Ye, even the court will take the initiative to recruit us, and we will be on the road! ”

As soon as the words fell, a tall young man suddenly stood out from the group of bandits squatting on the ground, twenty-four or five years old, almost one meter eighty-five or more tall, standing in the crowd is very majestic, this person is also dignified, with good facial features, but there is a red spot the size of a silver round on his left cheek, which should be a birthmark born with him.

He stepped forward and hugged his fists with Song Biao and said: "Master Biao, you are a real hero, a master on the rivers and lakes, the little leopard is willing to follow you, from now on, as long as you give an order, you can beat it, the small one will cut off his head for you, if you can't beat it, the small one will cut off his head to him, there is no other word." ”

As soon as he finished speaking, more than 20 people immediately stood up in his body, and they hugged their fists and said, "Master Biao, the little ones are willing to follow you!" ”

Song Biao glanced at it and saw that these people were all holding roughly the same Shandongfang dialect, and they should be fellow villagers who defected to Liu Tongpao together, so he immediately said: "Okay, you just follow me, I will definitely not treat you badly." ”

The leopard hugged his fists again and said, "Thank you for your appreciation!" ”

At this time, Hu Dalin quietly approached and said to Song Biao: "Master Biao, these twenty or so people used to be Shandong Xiangma, and they only defected to Liu Tongcang as the cannon head last month. ”

Hearing this, Song Biao also looked at the leopard twice.

Hua Leopard and others together, one after another, there were groups of brothers who got up and liked, Liu Tongcang led the team to pursue Song Biao without a cannon, the two artillery teams stayed, these two groups of people have more than 50 people, all of them are often in the village to practice firing artillery, because it is usually under the control of Hu Dalin, which is to immediately go forward.

The shopkeeper of the Nandianzi Inn was also in the crowd, he was the head of the line in the Niujiabao village, that is, the big spy in charge of intelligence, of course he knew that Song Biao's gang was still very good, and he took so many croton laxatives, and in the end, he didn't care, so he took people ashore early.

He is a big spy, and he has more than a dozen spies under him, and some spies are outside, and he doesn't dare to come back now.

One hundred and twenty-seven people, in the end, they were basically willing to continue to follow Song Biao, including those female bandits, a few really didn't want to be bandits, they were originally forced, and some were too old and just wanted to stop, so about a dozen people took the opportunity to receive a severance pay and left.

Waiting for the people to be gathered, Song Biao didn't say a word, first let Zhao Tingzhu be responsible for registering everyone's name, where the person, what name must be registered clearly, this matter is very taboo, generally people who go up to the mountain to be bandits will not tell others their real names and surnames, all of them are nicknames.

Song Biao is not forced, just give a name, and then reconfirm it when the situation stabilizes.

Since most of the people were willing to follow along, Song Biao asked the shopkeeper to be responsible for preparing the noon dinner, burning a sumptuous meal, and finding a way to kill two pigs and a dozen chickens, while he asked Hu Dalin to lead the way, inspect the entire Niujia Fort to see the layout of the entire fort, and personally count the warehouses in the fort.

At the moment, he really has no shortage of money, no shortage of food, no shortage of guns, just a shortage of people and ammunition.

The problem of ammunition was easy to solve, as long as the brethren's rifles were temporarily replaced with Murata Type 22, and then we could find a way to find firearms and ammunition that could be used for a long time.

Liu Tongpao has been in Niujiabao for 20 years, and the management of the fort seems too casual, far from the kind of militarized camp that Song Biao requested, but this foundation is still very solid, especially the abundant surplus wealth, leaving Song Biao with 40,000 quintals of rice and 1,400 acres of land. Over the years, the fort has been built and repaired several times, and a deep well more than 20 meters deep has been dug to solve the problem of drinking water for the brothers.

Suddenly, he occupied such a good territory, with the foundation of his own career, Song Biao was naturally very satisfied, he knew that starting from Niujiabao, he would no longer be a rootless weed, he had his own territory.

He knew that all his great deeds would begin here.