After the bribery in Liuzhou was exposed, no one knew how depressed and condensed the atmosphere in the Weng family was in those days. How many times did Weng Zengyuan, who was gentle and elegant in the past, lose his temper in those days, and then most of the dark waves under the calm surface of Changshu calmed down at once.

Time went unhurriedly to the next month. The second cabinet is really coming to an end, and the atmosphere in Beijing is getting more and more low-pitched. Li Hongzhang has lost ten pounds these days!

This is not because of excessive pressure, but he suddenly discovered that since last month, there have always been guys of unknown origin on their way to work, on their way home, and around Mao'er Alley, swaying and swaying.

Li Hongzhang let all the actions he was secretly preparing stop. He's scared! What the fuck is this?

NSA? No way. If it were someone from the National Security Bureau, the emperor would definitely give him a greeting.

If it weren't for the ...... of the NSA, the matter would have been even greater. This is someone on top of themselves. And he is a person whose strength has completely surpassed himself.

Since Li Hongzhang got rid of his ties with the Huai army, his military strength has been sharply reduced, and his personal force is even worse. Even ordinary brigade commanders and battalion commanders are not included. These people also have old departments that have been discharged from the army, and if they say hello, someone will come to sell their lives. But what about Li Hongzhang? Even the bodyguards at home are hired by the Beijing Dart Bureau, and they are clean and make people forget the huge pro-military department in the Huai Army.

The person who is eyeing him now is completely crushing Li Hongzhang in terms of personal force, and Li Hongzhang's bodyguards can't catch the opponent's feet at all, just like a sharp sword hanging over his head at all times, like a man's back. Li Hongzhang's ten catties of meat were lost because of this.

Li Hongzhang naturally ordered to stop all small movements. He didn't want to plunge headlong into the trap himself, and he was not the only one who would suffer when the time came. Li Hongzhang, who is 65 years old. It has long been without the strong adventurous and fighting spirit of 'who wrote history in 10,000 years, looking for a seal eight thousand miles away' in the prime of life.

And as soon as Li Hongzhang turned off the fire, things were simple. Five first and second candidates. Zhang Shouyan, Li Hongzhang, Li Ying, Huo Guangzheng, Yan Jingming, the latter two are too flawed, Huo Guangzheng is too young, Yan Jingming is too limited, and he simply accompanies the prince to study. Li Hongzhang wilted, and Li Ying seems to have always been very self-aware, he is the most honest of several people, and he has really not made any small moves all the time. And Zhang Shouyan is the one who secretly crushed Li Hongzhang.

Four opponents. Li Hongzhang was regarded as Zhang Shouyan's biggest enemy. He expected that Li Hongzhang would not be restrained at a critical moment, but an old and cunning person like Li Hongzhang, if he wanted to do bad in secret, how could he stop or definitely find evidence. Zhang Shouyan's idea was to startle the snake!

As a result, the effect is obvious!

Li Hongzhang wilted, and at the beginning of the month, Zhang Shouyan was successfully determined as the next cabinet first assistant, and Li Hongzhang was replaced as the third cabinet deputy assistant.

Xinqin is about to enter a new era, Fan Debang. The Duke of the Great Qin, the most top-level existence among the civil and military nobles of the Manchu Dynasty, and one of the few hereditary princes and nobles in China, is about to withdraw from the first-line stage of politics. He will go to Congress as Speaker!

Vanderbang, who is almost seventy years old. is one year older than Li Hongzhang, but his physical energy is not as good as Li Hongzhang. Especially in the second half of this year, he knew that he was going to withdraw from the political center. In the past, the solemn face of the whole day became a little more relaxed and serene, and the person became happier. But people are also getting older.

Many politicians have such a situation, and they have left their positions. People get old much faster. Vanderbang is just a little faster.

This is the end of an era. Although China's military ministers are still the 'heroes' who came out of the founding war, it is also an irreversible trend that fresh blood is slowly injecting into the DPRK and China. Even Liu Xian will soon be fifty years old, and the ages of the other founding heroes are also clear.

Li Ying's position also moved forward several times, and his age was not young. Zhang Shouyan was not won this term, and the next term should not be thought about, and in 1899, two terms later, let him compete for the position of the first assistant of the cabinet, and he did not have the ambition and energy. When the time comes, he will also retire.

Sitting in a small cubicle at home, there was wine and food on the small table in front of him, and Li Ying was the only one in the whole room.

Now his expression is not as flat as when he was outside, and his temperament is not as pampered and unfazed as when he was in the Yamen. Li Ying is very quiet now. From a distance, a person is like a corpse, exuding a rich 'extreme quiet'!

"Miscalculated! Miscalculated! ”

After a long while, Li Ying raised his hand and drank the wine in the wine glass. But soon, the whole person became lifeless.

Li Ying's heart is just like his current person, he wants to die! He felt particularly heartwarming and heart-stopping.

He does not fight, does not rob, does not intrigue, An An completes his work in a divided manner, shows his ability, Li Ying uses his performance to make himself stand firm in the cabinet and establish prestige in his subordinate departments.

The throne of the first assistant of the cabinet, he also wants to go to it very much, and he doesn't want to push it out at all. Regarding the intrigue between Li Hongzhang, Zhang Shouyan and others, colliding and suppressing each other, Li Ying believes that the emperor sees it in his eyes, his 'silent cultivation', does not complain about being tired, strictly abides by his duties, and the emperor also sees it in his eyes, which is Li Ying's policy and few expectations for the throne of the first assistant to the cabinet.

Li Hongzhang is too famous, and he is really talented; Zhang Shouyan is talented, gentle and peaceful, majestic or not strong, but he is extremely 'harmonious', and he is a relative of the emperor, and his friendship for many years far exceeds his own. Not surprisingly won, Li Ying couldn't have the last laugh in the battle for the first assistant of the cabinet.

So he came up with this trick!

But ......, the agency is too smart. Although Li Ying was not injured this time, on the contrary, he also received many rewards and banquets from Liu Xian, accompanied by play, and won the evaluation of the word 'kindness' in the civil and military affairs of the Manchu Dynasty, but Zhang Shouyan had the last laugh, Liu Xian seemed to have no reaction to the stumbling between the courtiers, intrigues, and party attacks!

Li Ying is about to vomit to death!

……

Siam Chiang Mai, Chengnan Street.

The prosperity of Siam in the past has become a thing of the past. The Taiping army's shells and ploughs left almost all the houses here in ruins and ruins.

But this kind of terrain is particularly uncomfortable for the Taiping army.

In the ruins, no amount of troops could put on a posture, but the stragglers advanced just as the Siamese army intended. They had long known that a head-on confrontation was no match for the Taipings. Therefore, shooting has become an auxiliary means in urban battles, and bayonets and gunpowder bags and grenades are the main means of fighting between the two armies these days.

This is a very common incident of friction between the Taiping army and Siam.

In the past three years, Siam's army has been strengthened to 100,000 men, and they have received the support of Britain, France, and the United States, although Siam does not dare to favor the West in its policies and positions, and treats Chinese merchants and Chinese living in Siam equally. But the Siamese Army has always challenged the Taiping Army.

This time, the Siamese army attacked Chiang Rai Province and was defeated, and was directly killed by Shi Dakai to see Chiang Mai.

A group of stragglers of the Taiping Army stared intently ahead, and they did not dare to be negligent in the slightest. After the street fighting in the city in the past few days, too many Taiping troops have fallen unnecessarily during the war.

After being surrounded by the Taiping army in Chiang Mai, the Siamese soldiers also mustered up the last bloody bravery, and their performance was even more vicious to death. Weapons of mass destruction such as gunpowder packs were used by them in advance.

Although the Taiping army used large-caliber mortars in siege warfare early, because there were still many people in Chiang Mai, the Taiping army did not bomb indiscriminately. Shi Dakai even gave a clear order to minimize the accidental injury to the people.

But the Siamese army didn't care. Especially after the city was broken, even though the Siamese soldiers defending the city felt that the offensive and defensive battle in Chiang Mai was doomed to defeat, they became completely mad and pulled out the people in the city to act as a shield for them.

In yesterday's battle, the Siamese soldiers first lured the troops of two squadrons of the Taiping Army to pursue with a small force of men and horses, and then drove a large number of civilians to block them during the pursuit, while they themselves hid behind the ruins of the wall and shot without hesitation.

Only two hundred of the four or five hundred Siamese escaped safely, and the Taiping army of two squadrons also lost a third.

Now the Siamese people in Chiang Mai have changed their attitudes and are not helping each other. There are also a few people who take the initiative to lead the way for the Taiping army. Chulalongkorn took back control of Chiang Mai 15 years ago, and this battle broke the hearts of the people of Chiang Mai against Chulalongkorn and Siam.

In addition, the Siamese soldiers have now learned to use mines, fill large explosive packs or clay pots with gunpowder and bury them in the rubble, and when the Taiping army arrives, the lethality of the lead cannot be underestimated.

"Bang Bang ......"

Several gunshots rang out. The stragglers detachment immediately crawled to the ground. Siamese soldiers are very ordinary in cold shooting, but their marksmanship is very average.

But suddenly, a Taiping straggler jumped up from the ground, and he seemed to sense something ...... "landmine". However, before the words fell, a loud bang broke out in the open space next to him.

Scattered like a rain of rubble, the skirmish looked like he had been strafed by a machine gun in a later war, and countless small bloody eyes burst out of his entire body.

The person was thrown out by the shock wave and died without hitting the ground.

"Blow up the broken wall." The Balladeer Captain's eyes quickly looked around, and he immediately yelled at his men. The finger pointed to a broken wall twenty or thirty meters in front of the right.

Gunpowder is not a rare item, Chiang Mai, as the second largest city in Siam after Bangkok, and has been stationed with heavy troops for a long time, so the reserves of gunpowder here must be extremely sufficient. But what about the leads?

Whether it is a gunpowder fuse or a fuse, if it is too long, it will not only be troublesome to bury, but also very unsafe. In particular, the gunpowder fuse may be extinguished by itself when it burns in the bamboo pipe.

Therefore, when the Siamese soldiers planted mines on the battlefield, they would not put the distance too long, and a distance of more than ten or twenty meters was enough. And the one who was lying in ambush by the mine lead was probably also a wounded or a diehard. (To be continued......)