"Don't say anything! There is an imperial tomb here, and if it is lost, we will all lose our heads. My Lao Zhu has not treated the brothers badly since he came, as long as the thief army is repelled this time, all the missing salaries and silver will be made up, and all the brothers will be rewarded with five taels of silver! Fengyang stayed behind and Zhu Guoxiang shouted.

Zhu Guoxiang's promise provoked his own soldiers to applaud loudly, but the other soldiers watched coldly. Although the imperial court paid a batch of military salaries after the last mutiny, those big heads were divided among the officials such as Zhu Guoxiang, and those soldiers only got some life money that was stuffed between their teeth, so they didn't believe Zhu Guoxiang's words at all.

Because Fengyang had no city to defend, after seeing the peasant rebel army, on the 19th day of the first month, Zhu Guoxiang, who stayed in Fengyang, led and commanded Yuan Ruizheng, Lu Chengyin and other 5,500 people to go out of the city to snipe.

When the battle began, and the peasant rebels approached with 1,000 men and tried to attack, the Ming army began to turn and flee. Then the entire Ming army began to collapse, and the main force of the peasant rebel army was also pressed down.

In the ensuing battle, Zhu Guoxiang, who was left behind in Fengyang, was killed, 4,000 Ming troops were killed and fled, and the remaining Ming troops knelt on the ground and raised their hands to surrender. Fengyang will no longer have the strength to go out of the city to fight.

In the early morning of the 20th, the fog was so thick that I couldn't see my fingers. The peasant rebels deployed an offensive strategy under the city. The inner part of the city that had previously been infiltrated also vigorously cooperated. At night, the peasant rebels launched a fierce attack.

At this time, the defenders also sent the existing peasant rebels to the drum tower and reported to the commander, but the commander thought that this was demagogic and reprimanded the reporter.

But before the words fell, the defenders were in confusion, and before they knew what was going on, they saw the soldiers kneeling down one by one and begging for mercy. Ridiculously. They did not know where to surrender, and at this time the main force of the peasant rebels had not yet entered the city.

In this way, Fengyang lost the opportunity to resist. It didn't take long for peasant rebels from outside the city to pour into the city. Fengyang, known as the central capital, fell into the hands of the peasant army in this way. The remaining 3,000 or so defending Ming troops in the city had no time to fight back, and they were all annihilated.

Only the tomb supervisor Yang Ze and a few other officials escaped from the city, and only a very small number of the gentry in the city fled to the east and south of the city.

After Zhang Xianzhong entered Fengyang, he dug up Zhu Yuanzhang's ancestral grave with resentment towards the Ming Dynasty. Set fire to the hall of Zhu Yuanzhang's ancestral tomb and the Longxing Temple where Zhu Yuanzhang once became a monk. A total of nearly 600 yamen of the governor and government offices, 67 drum towers and Longxing temples, and more than 20,000 private houses were burned down.

After that, he killed 41 officials, including Cheng Yongning, the commander of the peasant rebel army, as well as 66 people and more than 60 eunuchs.

In addition, the peasant rebels also opened the prison and released the prisoners, as well as the "sin clans" (clan prisoners) who were imprisoned inside the high walls. And the prefect Yan Ronghuo hid in prison. Change into prison clothes and pretend to be prisoners. Hopeu fooled through. In the end, he was found out by the peasant rebels, and he was beheaded after the twenty days of the cane under the hall. He's really dead, and he's dead, and it's ugly!

Then the peasant rebels began to plunder the city. Because the people of Fengyang are extremely poor, the concentration of wealth is also quite amazing. A total of millions of gold and silver treasures were plundered, and more than 600,000 stones of grain were plundered. A large number of female dependents of clans, eunuchs, gentry and families were humiliated, which made Zhang Xianzhong and them also have a good time.

In addition, although Fengyang's Ming army was vulnerable. However, its weapons and equipment are quite sophisticated, that is, most of those weapons and equipment are stored in the warehouse, waiting for the officials to guard and steal from them, and basically they are not issued to the soldiers to defend the city.

And now all this is cheaper for the peasant rebels. They seized more than 6,000 mules and horses. There were more than 4,000 head of livestock, more than 600 iron armors, and more than 10,000 leather armor and cotton armor, and it was difficult to carry the artillery to defend the city, but more than 20 artillery pieces such as tiger squat guns were captured, and more than 800 fire guns such as eagle guns, three-eyed fire guns, and bird guns were captured. In addition, countless weapons, gunpowder, etc. were seized. The equipment of the entire peasant rebel army was immediately raised by several grades.

The peasant rebels also opened warehouses to release grain to attract the poor people in the vicinity, and with the subsequent arrival of a large group of people, the peasant rebel army gathered in Fengyang soon exceeded 150,000.

Zhang Xianzhong also sat on the "dragon chair" and played the banner of "Guyuan Zhenlong Emperor", revealing for the first time the ambition of overthrowing the Ming Dynasty and changing the dynasty. This also made Zhang Xianzhong the second giant who was only the second giant in King Gao Yingxiang.

On the sixteenth day of the first month, Zhu Dadian and Zuo Liangyu, who had received the news from the Runing Army, immediately left behind the remnants of Xuzhou, and regardless of the retention of Xuzhou, they came towards Fengyang at full speed.

After entering Guide, Zuo Liangyu's department was abnormal, and the whole army strictly abided by military discipline and did not harass the Guide Prefecture at all. When his department passed through the city of Guide Mansion, Zuo Liangyu also deliberately entered the city to kowtow to the old lady Hou to say goodbye.

And Yang Yipeng, the governor of Fengyang, was in a hurry, sending messengers everywhere to transfer troops for help, and even the Cao soldiers who were far away in Linqing on the Grand Canal did not let go. I just want to keep Fengyang.

But then came a bad news, Fengyang was lost. So Yang Yipeng, who was as dead as ashes, stayed in Huai'an's own governor's yamen and stayed behind closed doors, waiting for the arrival of his own fate.

After receiving the urgent report from Fengyang, the eunuchs guarding Nanjing and the Nanjing Sixth Division sent a large army on the 19th, and gathered 14,000 troops to rush to Fengyang at the expense of horse damage.

As for Wu Shigong's Runing Army, after resting for two days, they joined up with the 2,000 auxiliary regiments that arrived later, and the whole army of 10,000 moved south on the 16th of the first month.

The Runing Army did not go straight to Fengyang, they followed the path of the peasant rebel army. After a slight curve, the Runing army marched more than 200 miles all day on the 20th day of the first lunar month, and suddenly appeared in Yingzhou at night.

At this time, there were only some peasant rebel army guerrillas and local green-skinned scoundrels looting in Yingzhou City, and they scattered in a hurry when they saw the sudden appearance of the Runing Army. The Runing army regained the city of Yingzhou without blood.

As long as Yingzhou City was held, it would block the way for the peasant rebels to return to Runing Mansion again, and it was only at this time that the Runing Army was completely relieved of the safety of Runing Mansion.

In the original history, Zhang Xianzhong's troops conquered Fengyang on the fifteenth day of the first lunar month, but now due to the continuous fire fighting of the Runing army, they have been delayed for five days. But the result of the fall of Fengyang has not changed, and the only thing that has changed is to let those Fengyang officials celebrate a Yuanxiao Festival in their lives. This really makes people sigh: "The inertia of this history is really powerful!" (To be continued......)