After completing the siege of Wuchang City, Zeng Zhilin did not rush to attack the city, but sent people to shoot a large number of surrender leaflets and letters of surrender written to Yang Shouzhong into the city with a crossbow, hoping that the defenders in the city, especially Jiedu, would enable Yang Shouzhong to recognize the situation, give up resistance, and surrender Kaicheng. This will reduce unnecessary sacrifices and save your own time.

Regarding Zeng Zhilin's persuasion, Yang Shouzhong was actually in a dilemma. Perhaps he had limited knowledge of the Beiping Army, which was the main force of the Zhou army, and learned about it largely through rumors. However, after the successive defeats in the two major battles on land and water in the past two days, he already has a direct and profound understanding of the combat strength of the Beiping Army, and understands that his confrontation with it is basically a matter of hitting an egg with a stone. Not only did they have no chance of winning, but they probably couldn't hold out on to the distress messenger they sent to send the distress letter to Hongzhou or even closer to Jiangzhou. In this regard, accepting the conditions of the Zhou army to surrender Kaicheng is a wise choice in the current situation.

can be used as a festival envoy to guard one side, as an old minister who is favored by the Jiangnan court and trusted by the lord of the country, the word "surrender" is indeed difficult to say. Moreover, when he appointed himself as the envoy of Jiedu a few months ago, the lord of the country asked him in person to guard Wuchang, the first important town along the river. Now that the lord's earnest entrustment is still in his ears, he will give up Wuchang City, how to be worthy of the trust and trust of the lord. What's more, the day before yesterday, because the other party failed to fight to the death at Baisha Beach and failed to effectively stop the Zhou army's naval warships, he dismissed the official positions of the deputy commander of the infantry army and the commander of the naval army, and put them in prison to wait for participation. Now he has surrendered without a fight, and he has spread the word of ruin, which is very unsightly to his face and reputation. In this respect, surrendering without a fight does not seem to be a good option.

After thinking about it for a long time, it was difficult to make up his mind, so Yang Shouzhong had to invite several of his henchmen and advisers to the back hall study, hoping to hear their opinions. In this regard, the opinions of several strategists are very unanimous, that is, "surrender". In the eyes of several of them, if the overall situation has been decided today, the Great Monday will unify the world is the trend of the times and the expectations of everyone. As the saying goes, "those who know practice are handsome", there is no possibility of success if you go against the general trend of the world. Thinking that Li Yu was stupid and incompetent, he was afraid of offending the Great Zhou, and he would lead the Northern Expedition to recover the land of Huainan to resist the killing of Lin Renzhao, the general of the Zhou army. Now, in the face of the surging Zhou army, they are vainly trying to take advantage of the danger of the river and the flesh and blood of the guards in various places to resist the thousands of ships and sharp firearms of the Zhou army. Such a self-righteous and self-destructive Emperor of the Great Wall does not deserve the loyalty of the Temperance Envoy at all. Moreover, the surrender of Kaesong at this time not only saved this ancient city from war**, but also saved the lives of 20,000 soldiers and hundreds of thousands of people in the city, which is a great thing. The world will only praise your merits, but how can they remember the humiliation of surrendering the city. What's more, in the battle of Baisha Beach and the battle on the river two days ago, our Wuchang defenders also fought hard with the Zhou army, and the soldiers and warships suffered heavy losses, and the words "surrender without a fight" were impossible to talk about. As for the two generals who were imprisoned, Jiedu only needed to be appeased and supported in the future, and it was too late for the two of them to be grateful to Dade, so how could they be resentful.

Although the persuasion of several confidants and advisers did not make Yang Shouzhong surrender on the spot, it also made the balance in his heart tilt significantly towards the surrender side. It was only because of the foolish loyalty to the monarch of this era, especially the courtiers of a secessionist regime like Jiangnan who had been established for nearly 30 years and had a relatively stable regime, that it was difficult for them to make up their minds to surrender after the last day. Therefore, after sending off the three staff members, Yang Shouzhong sat alone in the study, continued to fight with his own thoughts, weighed the pros and cons over and over again, and tried to convince himself of the most difficult decision.

Yang Shouzhong had a confrontation with himself in the study of Jiedu Mansion, but Zeng Zhilin outside the city did not have the patience to wait. According to the plan, he must arrive in Qiyang before the 16th day of the third month of the lunar calendar, and conquer Jiangzhou before the 20th day of the third month of the lunar calendar with the middle route army of the starling brother Xu Shao'an. It took two days to take the waterway from Wuchang to Qiyang, which means that he only had less than two days to take Wuchang City, otherwise he might miss the day of joining the starlings, and eventually affect the smooth progress of the entire southern expedition. Therefore, in order to increase the pressure on Yang Shouzhong in the city, and in order to save time when he had to attack, on the second day of the siege of Wuchang City, that is, early in the morning of the thirteenth day of the third lunar calendar of Jianlong, Zeng Zhilin concentrated the large and medium-caliber artillery of all his departments at the west gate of Wuchang City. At the beginning of the morning, with his order, hundreds of artillery pieces of various types and calibers roared together, drowning the western city wall of Wuchang City in smoke and flames in an instant.

Although the shelling lasted only five minutes, hundreds of artillery pieces poured thousands of shells onto the western wall of Wuchang City. The violent explosions, the thick smoke of gunpowder, the flames rising into the air, the scattered shrapnel and rubble, the corpses and severed arms of the defenders at the head of the city, and the city gate tower that collapsed soon after the bombardment began, not only made the soldiers and people in the entire city tremble, panicked, and no longer have the fighting spirit, but also made Yang Shouzhong, who was still hesitating whether to surrender or not, make up his mind as quickly as possible. So, less than half an hour after the end of the shelling and Zeng Zhilin's order to project the letter of surrender to the city for the second time, the four gates of Wuchang City were opened, and a group of officials and generals from Ezhou in the south of the Yangtze River came out of the West Gate under the leadership of Yang Shouzhong, holding the official seal account book, and surrendered to Zeng Zhilin to offer the city.

After the army entered the city, Zeng Zhilin went out to calm the people on the one hand, and appeased a group of local officials led by Yang Shouzhong on the other. Of course, pacification is pacification, as an important node in the conquest of Jiangnan, and the surrounding prefectures and counties have not yet been controlled by the Zhou army, the possibility of Jiangnan troops from Jiangzhou or Hongzhou rushing to retake the city still exists, and Wuchang City will obviously not be guarded by local officials as it was when Jinghu was pacified. Therefore, the military and political dignitaries in Ezhou, including Yang Shouzhong, and their families were all sent across the river by Zeng Zhilin to Kaifeng to be settled by the imperial court. This was originally the proper meaning of the question, plus Zeng Zhilin allowed these people to take away their assets and slaves, and strictly ordered the soldiers in charge of escorting them not to harass or exploit them on the road. Therefore, despite some reluctance in his heart, Yang Shouzhong and other Ezhou military and political dignitaries still dragged their families across the river. In addition to the 5,000 elite soldiers who were in good health and had families in the local area, the remaining 15,000 people of the original Jiangnan Army in Wuchang City were all paid travel expenses and repatriated to their hometowns as ordinary people.

On the 14th day of the third lunar month of the third year of Jianlong, after leaving a number of civil and military officials of his own side, a battalion of the "Flying Dragon Army", two regiments of the "Security Army", and 20 ships of the First Fleet of Jiangfang to defend Wuchang City, Zeng Zhilin led the main force of the Western Route Army of the Southern Expedition to continue to go down the river and go in the direction of Qiyang.