As Li Kaifang's troops successfully broke into Jubaomen under the response of Bai Zetang in the city, the Taiping army divided its troops and rushed to the rest of the city gates, and the west of the Shuixi Gate and the Han West Gate were successively captured by the Taiping army, and the Taiping troops outside the gates swarmed into the city, and the Qing army that blocked the gap outside the Yifeng Gate was quickly dispersed under the internal and external attacks.

Zhang Bingyuan, the leader of the regiment training in the city, saw that the momentum was not good, and led people to retreat to the inner city to continue to hold on, but was intercepted and killed by Li Kaifang's Taiping army halfway, and Zhang Bingyuan was killed by dozens of knives, which was considered a cheap Confucian traitor.

Lin Fengxiang and Li Kaifang, who controlled the south gate and the west gate, continued to clear the remnants of the enemy in the city for two ways, attacking all the way to the direction of the drum tower, searching and killing all the way from Jinchuan Gate to Shence Gate, and pointing directly to the small camp through Chengxian Street.

A group of young guards led by Su Ji followed the men's battalion and rushed to kill, but they were assigned to attack the front line of Huangjiatang. When Su Ji led a group of excited and screaming young soldiers to the streets of Huangjiatang, he saw a Lanni top official sedan chair fleeing in panic surrounded by a group of Qing soldiers. Kill me! ”

There were only more than ten Qing soldiers and sedan chair men who were in the official sedan chair, and when they saw a crowd of red girls coming, they threw down the sedan chair and fled in all directions, only one official stayed, helped out the people in the sedan chair, and fled on their backs. That official carried one person, how could he escape Su Ji's group of young soldiers with strong skills? After escaping not far away, the two were caught up by Su Ji and others, and they chopped over with knives, and the two of them died there in a pile.

Su Ji stepped forward to take a closer look, and the person carrying the official was wearing an ordinary robe, but it was not an official uniform, and he couldn't help but feel a little angry, and he said that it was not the big official who was killed. At this moment, the young army that caught up with them caught a few soldiers who had escaped, brought them over and questioned them, and a few soldiers said that the person sitting in the sedan chair was Lu Jianying, the governor of Liangjiang.

After hearing this, Su Ji was overjoyed, he didn't expect that a poor boy who asked for food in the past would one day let him kill a governor of Liangjiang? In retrospect, it was as if he was still in a dream. After more than a dozen of his subordinates took Lu Jianying's body back to report their merits, Su Ji continued to rush forward with his men and horses.

Nanjing City is the ancient capital of the Six Dynasties, the city wall is divided into the inner city and the outer city, the inner city is the original imperial palace, the same as the Beijing City, the inner city is the place where the Manchurians, the flag people, and the garrison of the Eight Banners can live, and the people of Nanjing also call the inner city the full city. After the Taiping army broke through the outer city, they quickly swept away the Qing army in the outer city and surrounded the city.

Nanjing is full of the old city of the original Ming Dynasty imperial palace, so the city wall is extremely strong and the fortifications are complete. Because the Taiping army carried out the policy of indiscriminate killing of the banner people wherever they went, the banner people in the city knew that they could not be spared, so they had to fight to the death with the Taiping army, so the battle against the whole city was unprecedented. Li Kaifang, Lin Fengxiang, Luo Outline and other departments successively arrived at the city, surrounded by attack, cannons, firearms like no money towards the city bombardment, followed by the organization of several strong attacks, but the city banner people frantically counterattacked, even the sturdy women all went to the city wall to fight with the Taiping army, the old people and children also shouted on the city wall, the Taiping army launched three consecutive strong attacks, were defeated, 2,000 people were killed, the corpses of both sides accumulated corpses and the city level, the head of the city wall was soaked in blood.

Xiao Yungui, Zuo Zongtang, and Hong Yuner led the main force of the Taiping Army to enter the city from Zhengyangmen and Chaoyangmen, and the main force of 20,000 Taiping troops rushed to the city with 3,000 catties of cannons. Li Kaifang, Lin Fengxiang, Luo Xuan, and others caught it, reported the situation of the siege, and said whether they could persuade the bannermen in the city to surrender.

Xiao Yungui was a little embarrassed, looked at Zuo Zongtang and Hong Yun'er around him, and saw that Hong Yun'er was also a little unsure, seeing that even the old people and children were guarding the city at the head of the city, it can be seen that the banner people are defending the city with the determination to die, according to the tactics of the art of war for three missing one, leaving a glimmer of life for the enemy is the gist of breaking through the fortified city, otherwise it will be a tragic situation of killing one thousand enemies and losing eight hundred.

Hong Yun'er said with a unbearable face: "Do you want to, do you want to promise the flag people, and those who surrender will not die?" ”

Xiao Yungui was also a little moved, looked at Zuo Zongtang and said: "Sir, this inner city is difficult to fight, if you surrender one or two, you can also reduce the damage of our army, I don't know what Mr. wants?" ”

Zuo Zongtang twisted his beard and said lightly: "The king of the West is determined to overthrow the Manchu Qing Dynasty and restore the Han system, the king of the West himself has said that tangible braids are easy to cut, and invisible braids are difficult to cut. ”

Xiao Yungui was stunned for a moment, and muttered: "When the Manchu Qing Dynasty went south, most of the Han elites who dared to resist in China were killed, and those who survived were those who endured humiliation and stole their lives. ”

Zuo Zongtang nodded and said in a deep voice: "Yes, now the Manchus regard themselves as Chinese orthodoxy, but the Manchus are always a minority, and I Han people are thousands of people, but they are willing to bow down to be slaves for more than 100 years, and the Manchus rely on their arrogant heart, on the other hand, my Han people have been used to being slaves and maids for more than 100 years, and they no longer have the spirit of the Han and Tang Dynasties who offended me and forced the Han and Tang Dynasty to be punished even if they were far away." Speaking of this, Zuo Zongtang pointed to the inner city and said: "The tens of thousands of banner people in that city, to be honest, have never been masked with us, and they have no grudges against us personally, but they are banner people, and they are the banner people who originally ruled us, but we need their lives!" Why is that? It's just because the king of the west wants to oppose the Manchu Xinghan, and he can't talk about benevolence and righteousness at this moment. ”

Zuo Zongtang looked at the Taiping soldiers around him and said: "These soldiers are all good sons of the Han family, but they still lack contempt for the banner people and the Manchu people, and they lack the spirit of the Han people who look down on the world when I was in the Han and Tang Dynasties!" On the other hand, the banner people have always looked down on us Han people, if these flag people are let go today, they will think that we Han people are still easy to bully, if we are soft in this battle, the prestige of the flag people is still there, and the flag people we killed in the past will be killed in vain. At the beginning of our army, I thought that at the beginning of our army, we would definitely kill the banner people without the prestige of the master, let the Han people regain the spirit that they had lost for more than 100 years, and tell them who is the master of this land! If you want to kill the flag, the flag people will be afraid when they see our flag, and they will not have the courage to fight us! After the world is settled, it is the time to spread benevolence and righteousness and appease them, instead of turning to benevolence and righteousness when they see that the banner people are resisting fiercely. Did they talk about benevolence when they slaughtered the rebels everywhere? When you oppressed the Han people, did you talk about benevolence and righteousness? When you entered the customs, did you talk about benevolence and righteousness? ”

Xiao Yungui's heart was shocked, and he understood Zuo Zongtang's words, and it was not surprising why Zuo Zongtang, who usually loved the people, would say such a thing, he was always a Han person, and he loved the Han people. Although it may be unfair to the innocent people who were killed, the reality is like this, without this unfairness, more people may suffer from injustice, and Zuo Zongtang has now joined the Taiping Army, what he is doing is to expel Hu Nu and restore the Han family's rivers and mountains, how to let the banner people remove the prestige of the master, how to reshape the prestige of the Han people, it seems that killing is inevitable. Just like Zuo Zongtang said, let go of these banner people and allow them to surrender without killing, the banner people will only think that they are resisting strongly, these Han people are afraid, so they let them go, and according to others, they will not think that the Han people are benevolent. This kind of benevolence and righteousness of the sons and daughters of China seems to want to be bullied by the world, so they think that the Chinese are easy to bully, and it is still like this in later generations, treating the benevolence and righteousness of the Chinese as weak and deceitful, and what Zuo Zongtang wants is not this kind of weak benevolence, he wants the benevolent government of the strong.

After figuring out this section, Xiao Yungui looked at Hong Yun'er, although the four-eyed sister was still a little unbearable, but she also silently agreed with Zuo Zongtang's statement, if the Taiping army did not have the courage to confront the former master, defeat would not be far away. At that moment, Xiao Yungui took out his long knife and shouted: "Tell the soldiers of the whole army, let these Qing demons in the city wash their necks and wait for death, and tell these Qing demons that if they dare to resist my Taiping Holy Soldiers, there is only one way to die!" The whole artillery team has been transported here by this king, and even if all the shells are exhausted, the inner city will be captured! When the generals heard this, their faces turned red, and no one mentioned the matter of surrendering again, and after receiving orders in a loud voice, they all arranged for war.

The Taiping army brought all kinds of artillery into the city, hundreds of artillery pieces of all sizes surrounded the inner city, and they were fired day and night, and all kinds of newly developed shells were also used.

Although the soldiers and people of the Inner City Banner resisted very fiercely and tenaciously, they could not withstand the huge manpower and artillery superiority of the Taiping Army. Xiao Yungui also sent recruits from various armies to the battlefield in turn, using wheel tactics to consume the Qing army, and at the same time tempering the new army's will to fight. In this way, the fierce battle in the inner city lasted for several days, and under the continuous attack of the Taiping army, some people died of exhaustion while guarding the city.

As the bannermen and people in the city became more and more tired, the food, gunpowder and various garrison utensils in the city became scarce day by day, and an atmosphere of despair enveloped the city.

On the fifth day, the Taiping army concentrated artillery fire on a city wall, and the city wall here collapsed, and the Taiping army took the opportunity to wave the army and storm and break through the city wall in one fell swoop. The Taiping army broke into the inner city, the commander of the Qing army, Jiang Ning, the general Xianghou, killed himself, the deputy commander Huo Long, and the governor of Jiangnan, Fuzhu Longa, was killed in battle, and the rest of the Qing generals were killed by the Taiping army. The Taiping army killed more than 8,000 people in this battle, wounded nearly 10,000 people, more than the total number of casualties in all previous battles since the division of the army in Changsha, it is because the Taiping army hated the banner people, began to hunt and kill the flag people in the whole city, and posted a notice cloud, but there are those who capture the flag people, the reward is five taels of silver. So the Han people in the city rose up to hunt down and hunt down the bannermen, and almost all of the more than 20,000 bannermen were killed, and the Taiping army in the west hall of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom fully occupied Nanjing after paying the heavy price of 20,000 casualties.