The air in the city of Xi'an is becoming more and more solemn day by day, and the number of corpses dying of starvation on the side of the road is also increasing day by day. When Zhu Yuanzhang set a little bit of southern Shaanxi, he sent troops to circle around Xi'an, and many timid people did not dare to stay in their hometown to let Zhu Jun rule them, but abandoned their hometown and fled into the city of Xi'an.

They thought that the imperial court would quickly drive away the thief army as before, so that they could return to their hometown to farm, but this time the thief army firmly occupied southern Shaanxi, and as a result, these people were trapped in the city of Xi'an, unable to move.

After the siege of the city for more than half a year, Xi'an has grain more expensive than gold, and it is not easy for even the rich to eat a full meal at this time, let alone the people from poor families. The bark and grass roots have long been eaten, and even the moss, grass, and leaves have been eaten. If a child is accidentally separated from his parents, he or she will fall into someone else's belly in the blink of an eye. Even if you are an adult, if you dare to drill in a sparsely populated alley, you have to be careful to become someone else's food.

The four rice shops in the southeast, northwest, and northwest of the city all raised the price of grain to 5 taels and 1 bucket or 50 taels and 1 stone, not to mention the poor, even the rich felt that they could not afford it.

At this time, the general of the general army guarding the city of Xi'an was Zhu Jun's old friend, Zhang Fushun, the literati general of the Donglin Party. This person was beaten by Zhu Yuanzhang back then, and later followed Hong Chengchou to suppress the rebel army in northern Shaanxi, and slowly made up for his achievements. When Hong Chengchou went to Zhongfu in Huaxian County last year, he picked up a small life because he was ordered to stay in Xi'an.

Zhang Fushun was sitting in the hall of King Qin's mansion at this time, talking eloquently to King Qin. Zhu Cunshu, King of Qin. It is the eleventh grandson of Zhu Yuanzhang, Taizu of the Ming Dynasty, in the forty-sixth year of Wanli (1618 AD), and is now a fifty-year-old man.

(Note: Zhu Cunshu's curtain was excavated by the state in 1978, according to the tomb of the tomb, Zhu Cunshu died in the second year of Chongzhen, and died childless, but according to the "History of the Ming Dynasty", this person surrendered to Li Zicheng and was named the general of Xi'an.) Li Zicheng brought him into Beijing when he captured it. Later, Li Zicheng lost the battle, and Zhu Cunshu surrendered to the Qing Dynasty...... Cough...... Historical materials should have written Zhu Cunji as Zhu Cunshu...... This book does not want to use the wrong historical data, but the official history can not find out which prince reigned in the eighth year of Chongzhen, and the official history records that Zhu Cunji, the king of Qin Jing, attacked the king of Qin in the twelfth year of Chongzhen. Other words. If I adopt the Circle. The position of the Qin State was empty for ten years from the second year of Chongzhen to the twelfth year of Chongzhen, which is really strange. Therefore, in the novel, the wrong historical records are temporarily used, and the chronicles are not used, that is, Zhu Cunshu is not dead at this time. ）

Zhang Fushun said: "Lord Wang, please forgive the officials for being rude, but the officials are really in urgent need of a batch of military rations, and I also ask the prince to be generous and take out some of the food stored in the palace and distribute it to the soldiers." ”

Zhu Cunshu shook his head and said, "I don't have much food here." ”

"Then, can you ask the prince to give some gold and silver, and the officials will use it to buy grain from the rice shops in the city?" Zhang Fu said in passing.

Zhu Cunshu still shook his head: "This king doesn't have a lot of money......

When Zhang Fushun heard this, he was secretly angry in his heart: You are a dignified Qin prince, there are thousands of hectares of land under your name, your family carves fences and eaves, and wears gold and jade, but you actually say that you have no money? It's shameless.

He thought so in his heart, but said bitterly: "The prince also please understand the suffering of the lower officials, Xi'an Mansion has been besieged for more than half a year, and there is no food in the army. ”

Zhu Cunshu said: "If these soldiers are disobedient, you pick a few out and kill them, and the rest of the people will naturally obey the order." ”

Zhang Fushun complained in his heart, if he used to kill, he could correct military discipline, where would there be soldiers mutiny from ancient times to the present? He said bitterly: "Lord Wang, it is also a helpless move to go down to the official, and now except for you, no one has this ability." The gold, silver, and food in the treasury have been exhausted, and we don't have the support of the imperial court, so we just hope you can lend a hand......"

Zhu Cunshu didn't agree no matter what he said.

In this case, the vassal kings of the Ming Dynasty were not allowed to leave the fiefdom, and they were not allowed to be officials, nor were they allowed to join the army, nor were they allowed to do anything, in this case, the vassal kings had no other hobbies except eating, drinking, and having fun, but these hobbies required a lot of gold and silver, so eight or nine of the ten princes were misers, and they only had the one to make money.

Zhang Fushun's hard persuasion was ineffective, so he had to sigh a long time, walked out of the palace, and went back to the camp to tell him about the lack of food, and several deputy commanders and thousands of household officials were dissatisfied in their hearts. At this time, I heard a report from the soldiers: "General, there is a person named Ma Zhixiong, who represents the Ma family rice line and comes to give us food." ”

"Oh?" Zhang Fushun was overjoyed: "Please come in quickly." ”

It turned out that after Du Shan proposed the strategy of scattering grain in the Ma family, the Ma family felt justified and was afraid that the soldiers would rush into the house to grab the grain, so they planned to open the rice shop and scatter the grain in front of the whole city, so as not to get into trouble. However, the second young man of the Ma family thinks that it is not beneficial to give it to the poor, it is better to dedicate it to the court, and he should make some contributions. After several arguments, the Ma family still adopted the opinion of the second young man and decided to send the grain to the officers and soldiers defending the city.

Ma Zhixiong took his leave after sending the grain to the barracks.

Zhang Fushun was quite happy to receive a batch of grain from Ma Zhixiong, but the Ma family rice store had earned more than half a year's black-hearted grain money, and there was not much grain left, and it was only eaten up in a few days for the 5,000 troops to eat.

The generals and soldiers in the army couldn't help but think in their hearts: what will happen in a few days? It's better to blackmail other rice companies and force them to follow the example of the Ma family and offer food. Once the soldiers had such an idea, they could not be restrained, and in just a few days, the city was full of troops, and the big millet shops were all looted by the soldiers. The boss of Mi Xing resisted a little and immediately killed him on the spot......

There was a great chaos in the city, and once the rice store was robbed, the last way for the people to obtain food was also cut off, and the situation in the city became even more difficult. After a few days, the soldiers had eaten even the grain they had stolen from the rice shop, and they began to eat large households, and the soldiers divided into small groups of 100 people, and selected those families in the city who had many houses and rich families, and sat down in their homes, and did not leave without food, and beat people when they saw them...... It was not until the host's family served food and that they were full of food and drink before they were willing to leave, and the whole city became even more smoky.

At this time, the Ma family naturally avoided a catastrophe, and the army felt his virtue of sending food, so they did not go to the Ma family to harass them, but it made the Ma family and others breathe a sigh of relief.

Zhang Fushun saw this situation in his eyes, but he was powerless to control the soldiers, and if he forcibly controlled the soldiers with military orders, he was afraid that he would immediately provoke a mutiny. In April of the eighth year of Chongzhen, Deng Xi, the chief soldier of Sichuan, provoked the Fancheng mutiny because he could not pay his military salary, and Deng Xi himself died in the mutiny.

On this day, Zhang Fushun was frowning and patrolling the city, and suddenly saw the army outside the city surrounded, and the 30,000 troops of the Zhu army came to the city and blocked the four gates, and he was planning to storm the city...... This time he was so startled that he almost jumped up, and hurriedly gathered all the soldiers, guarded the four city gates, swore that both the army and the city would die, and fight to the death with the thief army.

But seeing that Zhu Yuanzhang outside the city seemed to have given some orders, Zhu Jun galloped out hundreds of fast horses, galloped around the city, stretched his bow and arrows, and kept shooting arrow books into the city.

Zhang Fushun and the second monk were puzzled, so he ordered the soldiers to pick up those arrow books, because the arrow books were shot everywhere, some even climbed over the city wall and fell into the streets, and the people had already picked them up and opened them to read. A soldier snatched the arrow book from the hands of the people and handed it to Zhang Fushun, he picked it up and looked at it, and immediately secretly screamed that it was not good, it turned out that the letter did not drop the book bag at all, in order to let the people understand, the letter was full of the most simple and vulgar words: I am Baishui Zhuba, who has surrounded Xi'an Mansion for more than half a year, in order to do the right thing for heaven and overthrow the corrupt officials and corrupt officials who are rampant with lawless courts. I didn't expect to burden the people, I'm really embarrassed, I will send someone to send some food in to fill the stomach of the people first, and a few days later, when I break through Xi'an Mansion and kill all the officers and soldiers, everyone will be saved.

As soon as Zhang Fushun finished reading the letter, he heard many victims in the city cheering: "Ah, the thief army outside wants to send us food?" ”

"It's great that the thieves would still do such a thing......"

"What thief army? That's the rebel army...... They only kill the officers and soldiers, not the people......"

"Shhh......h

The people cheered, and the sound shook the whole city, but Zhang Fushun was in a cold sweat, and secretly screamed in his heart.

Zhu Yuanzhang outside the city deliberately waited for a long time, and when the people in the city began to cheer, he waved his hand, Li Chushou arranged a large number of grain trucks to be pushed out by the soldiers, these soldiers did not wear armor, did not hold weapons, while pushing the grain down the city of Xi'an, while shouting: "Officers and soldiers in the city, don't let go of arrows, we are here to deliver food." ”

When the officers and soldiers heard them say this, how could they be willing to release arrows?

Only Zhang Fushun exclaimed: "Don't let them send food over and shoot ...... Shoot them ......"

An adjutant general boldly retorted: "General, since they are going to send it over, why don't we take it?" ”

Zhang Fushun was in a hurry: "It's definitely not food, it's a bomb!" ”

The lieutenant was startled, and he glanced at an archer, who was a sharpshooter, and with an arrow he shot through a grain sack, and saw that white brown rice flowed out of the breach.

"It's real food!"

The soldiers and civilians in the city were already hungry, and everyone was moved when they saw the food. No matter how Zhang Fushun roared, no one let half an arrow out. After a while, the Zhu soldiers pushed the grain bags to the edge of the moat outside the city gate, and then retreated.

Seeing that the Zhu army had retreated far away, there was no need to worry about them coming to steal the city, the officers and soldiers did not wait for Zhang Fushun's order, opened the city gate, put down the drawbridge, ran out as soon as they slipped away, and ran back with the grain bag.

Zhang Fushun saw that the stop was ineffective, so he had to sigh bitterly: "It's over, the hot potato has come in." (To be continued.) )