The enemy's attack was thwarted, and the crowd in front retreated, and suddenly the already loose queue was crowded, and soon it became a rout, with a large number of weapons and wooden shields thrown on the ground, and the banner also fell. The sound of several salvos of the muskets of the Shence Army was deafening, and in fact, a few hundred people were killed at most, which was only a small proportion of casualties compared to the number of rebels, but after all, they lacked experience to withstand such a high-intensity conflict, and as soon as they were frightened, they had the tendency to scatter. They also have no awareness of the battlefield: such a rout will lead to a worse death. Pursuit and killing are the main source of success.

As expected, as soon as the opposite side retreated, the cavalry of the rear army of the Shence Army was ordered to chase and kill, and the cavalry, armed to the teeth and covered with iron, could not wait to rush forward. The knight on the tall horse quickly caught up with the back of the rebels, slashing and slashing condescendingly, and calmly killing from behind, which was not a battle at all, it completely turned into a massacre.

The smell of gunsmoke mixed with the smell of blood is disgusting, and the chaos on the battlefield is also clear at a glance. Those who fled threw away their weapons and ran around with their lives in limbo. Victory or defeat is already doomed, and a large number of people who have lost military discipline will be unable to recover the defeat no matter how many people there are.

Xue Chongxun kicked the horse's belly and rushed down the hillside with the guards, only to see Yin Ci clenching his fists with excitement on his face and saying: "The traitor can't parry His Majesty's soldiers and horses, the battle situation has been decided!" ”

"The herald ordered the horse team to abandon the cover of the defeated army, quickly maneuver eastward, move across the city of Huazhou to the south bank of the Yellow River, and destroy a qiē ferry and boats." Xue Chongxun said calmly. His cavalry numbered only a few thousand, but the rebel army had tens of thousands of rebels in and around Huazhou, and it was obviously risky to drive straight in now, and the greatest danger was to be surrounded by superior forces. However, when Xue Chongxun saw the situation on the battlefield, he thought that the enemy soldiers had lost their fear, and it should not be difficult to break through directly to their rear road with a quick attack.

Yin Ci immediately agreed with his decision, and ordered the heralds to go to pass the military orders, and ordered the infantry to abandon the artillery charge and advance to occupy the high ground of the original rebels, and the rear army escorted the artillery to move eastward. At this time, the situation has become an all-out offensive.

Cui Qigao saw the range and power of the dragon and tiger cannon, and it was easy to judge that the fortifications of Huazhou City could not resist, and his Chinese soldiers and horses would not stay in the city to defend it, and would definitely find a way to cross the river and escape to Hebei. Now by dispatching cavalry to control the south bank of the Yellow River, they can cut off their rear route. ”

At this time, the cavalry who received the military order had already broken away from the Chinese army, and soon ran away, and the combat strength of the eastward attack was only seven or eight thousand, so Xue Chongxun and the others did not rush to chase the fleeing rebels, but maintained the formation and calmly advanced eastward, and did not encounter any resistance along the way. The uprisings of this era are fundamentally different from the uprisings of the twentieth century, and they cannot confront the elite army at all, and they are simply crushed at the touch of a button.

The scouts reported information from the front, and no organized armed forces were found as far east as the city of Huazhou. So the Shence army slowly approached Huazhou City with a swagger with cannons.

The "decisive battle" in the morning really didn't last for a while, and it didn't even take half an hour from the start of the battle to the division of victory and defeat, and the next time was to flee and chase at the same time. And the Shence army didn't spend almost a whole day fighting, and kept marching.

In the evening, the cavalry herald came to report that a pontoon bridge, dozens of ferries and a group of rebel soldiers and horses were found in the northeast of Huazhou City, and the rebels were routed in a single charge, and then the pontoon bridge was destroyed and all the ferries were burned. At this time, Xue Chongxun's Chinese army was still about ten miles away from Huazhou City, and they did not plan to attack the city overnight, so there was no need to choose night battles with the advantage of long-range weapons. So the army chose a place to cut wood and set up camp.

Yin Ci thinks that the rebels in Huazhou City may make a final struggle to raid the barracks tonight, so they should be prepared. He ordered the soldiers to take turns to rest at night, and to maintain a large number of men and horses ready for war at all times; He also sent soldiers to cut down a large number of trees in the vicinity, and lit piles of bonfires on the crops on the outskirts of the camp, which were illuminated by the fire within a radius of several hundred paces. Deep ditches are dug around, and a large number of open and dark posts are set up to be foolproof.

If the enemy attacked the camp tonight, they would be faced with a fenced musket queue, and it would be much more difficult to attack than in the first battle during the day, when the rebels were on high ground and had no time to dig trenches and set up obstacles to block it, so that they could not rush through, and it seemed unlikely that they would become brave and not afraid of death at night.

But it was a very quiet night, there was no movement for the whole night, so quiet that even the noise of summer insects could be annoying.

Early the next morning, the Shence army pulled out the camp and reorganized the army, and the distance between Huazhou City was only ten miles. Xue Chongxun could imagine the destruction scene of an hour later, when the cannons roared and the bricks and earth flew up and down the city. When they were about to leave, they suddenly reported that an envoy had arrived from Huazhou City, saying that they had come to negotiate peace...... I'm afraid it's to surrender.

After waiting for a while, two messengers came to the army. They walked cautiously one after the other, one in front of them holding a scroll of paper in both hands. When he was about a hundred steps away from Xue Chongxun and the other generals, a military general knocked the envoy to the ground and shouted at him to kneel here and surrender the table. The general rudely snatched the document from the messenger's hand and brought it up for him.

Yin Ci took the document first, unfolded it and handed it to Xue Chongxun. Xue Chongxun didn't look at it either, and said, "Ask him, where is Cui Qigao?" ”

A military general repeated it aloud, and the envoy could only reply loudly: "Back to Your Majesty, the traitor Cui Qigao doesn't know where to go, and he didn't enter the city after the first battle yesterday." The criminal ministers and others had no choice but to disobey His Majesty because of their coercion, and now they can only beg for crimes and dare not raise the Huazhou soldiers to be enemies of His Majesty. ”

Xue Chongxun handed the document in his hand to the person next to him, and heard the messenger call Cui Qigao a traitor, and he didn't need to look at it to know that it was a surrender, he said: "Let him go back and pass the word, since it is a begging crime, the rebels in and outside Huazhou City should go out of the city to put down their weapons and surrender, and hand over the four gates of the city defense to the Shence Army." I will go to the city of Huazhou in an hour, and if they have not disarmed by then, I will attack the city immediately. ”

There was no room for negotiation, Xue Chongxun expressed his attitude and immediately ordered the army to set off. The two messengers were also released.

An hour later, the Shence army advanced to the city of Huazhou, only to see that the four gates were wide open, and many horses were pouring out of it, throwing their weapons and turbans on the pile of things on the ground. The officers and men of the Shence Army lined up and waited, and the gunpowder lead bullets were loaded, but they did not go over to drive them away, and quietly waited for the enemy soldiers to disarm. After a long time, a group of men and horses came to the north of the black press, unarmed, probably from the barracks outside the city.

The number of people and horses outside the city is several times more than the number of people in the Shence Army, and Cui Qigao actually coerced so many people and horses from Huazhou, Hebei and other places, in just a few months, the scene is indeed quite terrifying.

When the troops were almost gone, Yin Ci ordered the heavily armed army to go up and surround the crowd and set fire to the piles of all kinds of crude weapons. At first, the soldiers were cautious when they saw so many people, but gradually they became less polite, and they were whipped and abused endlessly when they drove away the crowd. Then the infantry of the Shence Army rode into the city, and soon took control of the city gates, city towers, urn city gates and other important city defense points, and the banner with the word "Tang" written on the city tower was thrown down, fell on the suspension bridge and was repeatedly trampled by the horse's hooves. A new flag was soon raised on the flagpole, with the word "Jin" in large letters on it.

Immediately Xue Chongxun and a cadre of generals swaggered towards the city gate, there were a group of officials and generals kneeling at the city gate without hats, and many people were wearing the official uniforms of the magistrates of the Jin Dynasty, it is estimated that some of them were officials who surrendered to Cui Qigao, the official uniforms of the Jin Dynasty were originally the same as those of the Tang Dynasty, and these people did not even change their official uniforms after moving their "buttocks". In fact, not only the clothes, but also those who were officials, many of whom were officials in the Tang Dynasty and are now officials in the Jin Dynasty.

Xue Chongxun remembered someone, so he restrained the war horse next to a group of Huazhou civil and military officers who were kneeling, turned his head and asked, "Zhou Jike?" ”

In the middle, an official with gray hair but good skin maintenance hurriedly kowtowed: "The sinner is here." ”

Xue Chongxun pointed at him with a horsewhip and asked: "I treat you well, entrust you with the governor of the state capital, you can't defend the land and fulfill your responsibilities, why do you want to take refuge in the traitor, betray the monarch and kill your colleagues?" ”

Zhou Ji bent his body, and looked helpless: "The traitor used the criminal ministers to threaten the whole family, and the ministers were really helpless. This thief occupies my daughter, and uses his wife and children as hostages, and the minister is eager to eat her flesh raw, and he has no heart to take refuge......"

Xue Chongxun interrupted him coldly: "Li Yi's family doesn't have a young wife and children? ”

Zhou Ji was stunned for a moment, and his forehead was covered with cold sweat and his face was covered with loess.

When the army entered the city and came to the gate of the state government, Xue Chongxun turned back to Yuwen and said, "Find out all the people from the Zhou Ji family, and don't let anyone hide." ”Q