Meng Xianli continued: "If His Royal Highness is unwilling to go to see the emperor, the last general is willing to risk death to go, as long as it is for the good of the old prince, whether it is dead or alive, whether it is success or failure, the last general will also be released!" Speaking of this, Meng Xianli didn't know that he was touched by his words, and his voice was a little choked.

Unexpectedly, Zheng Yu laughed loudly and said: "Hahaha, you said it soundingly, but isn't it actually the word 'surrender'?" And I have to go to the court by myself, what? Do you want to betray us and others, and then make a contribution in front of the emperor, so that you can be promoted and make a fortune in the future? ”

Meng Xianli was thinking about the old prince Zheng Gui, but he didn't expect Zheng Yu to comment on him like this, and hurriedly explained: "No, no, it's not like this. The father of the last general worked in the Lingnan Palace, and the last general has been the guard of the palace since he was a child, and no one in the court has ever seen or said a word, where can there be any ideas from the outside of the palace? ”

"Humph! According to what you say," said Zheng, "if you have met the people of the court and spoken a word to them, you will have the idea of betrayal?" You have fought so many battles with the imperial court, have you not even captured a single official and military prisoner? Didn't even ask them a word after they were caught? ”

Zheng Yu's words are picking bones in hard-boiled eggs, since there is no truth in his words, naturally there is no way to refute them, so anxious that Meng Xianli's face turned red.

Zheng Yu still couldn't stop talking: "You see, your words are inconsistent and absurd, and you can't listen to a single word of what you put forward to negotiate with the imperial court." It's just that you don't want to go to the great disaster with us because you see that our army is no longer powerful. That's it! In that case, you should go to the imperial court, and I will not stop you. You, let me go! Get out of here! ”

Hearing this, Meng Xianli, a seven-foot man, could no longer hold back his agitated emotions, and cried out in mourning: "Your Highness, you, you, how can you say this about me?" ”

"Humph! Why can't I say that about you? Get out of here, don't get in the way of eyes, hands, and things in front of me! Zheng Yu scolded.

Meng Xianli suddenly stopped crying, his eyes flashed, and he "violently" pulled out the sharp blade on his waist, and his two eyes stared at Zheng Yu.

Zheng Yu was stunned by his eyes, and hurriedly asked, "You...... You...... What do you want to do? ”

Unexpectedly, Meng Xianli said: "The last general grew up in the Lingnan palace since he was a child, and His Royal Highness drove me away, so I have nowhere to go, and I have no place in this world." Anyway, I'll just die, and I'll continue to serve the old prince under Jiuquan! ”

After that, Meng Xian Liping raised the treasure knife in his hand and wiped it at his throat.

When the generals on both sides saw that he was about to commit suicide, they hurriedly stepped forward to snatch the weapon in his hand. However, this Meng Xianli was determined to die, and he shot hard and fast, and slashed his neck into a bloody blur with a single knife - I saw that the blood flowing from his superior carotid artery was like a torrent stream, and there was a convulsion around him, and he was already dead.

Zheng Yu was stunned by this scene.

Even if this Zheng Yu was a little dull, from Meng Xianli's performance of fighting to the death, he also knew that this person definitely did not have the slightest intention of rebellion - there was no doubt that he was wrong to blame him.

However, Zheng Yu knew that he was now the supreme commander of the Lingnan Army, and if he admitted in public that he had made a mistake, his already low prestige in the army would plummet, and his already not very strong credit would be completely bankrupt, so he could only say stiffly: "Hmph, this Meng Xianli is really a traitor to the Litong Imperial Court, and now that he has been exposed by me, he has committed suicide and apologized." Okay, God has the virtue of a good life, and for the sake of him who was also born and died for the Lingnan Palace, you should bury him well, and his family should not be implicated. ”

With that, Zheng Yu walked quickly through the crowd, as if he had lost a battle and fled, and walked away from this stormy and ruined temple.

After this turmoil, no one in the Lingnan Army finally dared to oppose Zheng Yu.

Therefore, according to Zheng Yu's ideas and deployment, all the Lingnan troops stationed in various places were assembled and quickly moved to Wenzhou Mansion in Jiangnan Province, and if they wanted to open up the joints here, they could reach the boundary of Fuzhou in Lingnan Province through Wenzhou, and they could be regarded as escaping from the encirclement of the imperial court.

However, Meng Xianli's death still caused a great impact in the Lingnan army, and many generals were already cold, leading their own troops, some left the brigade to find a way out of the south, some disbanded on the spot and fled to the countryside, some found a high mountain and river and fell into the grass, and some simply surrendered to the imperial court.

Such a large-scale action of the Lingnan Army certainly could not escape the eyes of the imperial court.

The battle report came from all directions to the ears of the emperor who was sitting in the "Qingya View" of Jinling City, and the experience of leading the army for decades told him that the Lingnan Army had now reached the point of exhaustion, and its current action was the last battle of all hopes.

But the more such an enemy army, the more can not underestimate the enemy, throughout the ages, how many wars are won when the kettle is broken, the last battle is won, the emperor Zheng Rong himself, as a very outstanding general, will never allow this to happen.

Therefore, according to the intelligence that the Lingnan Army was advancing to the south, Zheng Rong ordered the forbidden army stationed in Wenzhou and Zheng Xin's headquarters stationed in Quzhou to strengthen and consolidate the defense, and strictly prohibited unauthorized actions to attack the Lingnan army, and not even a rabbit could be released into Lingnan.

He also ordered Zheng Sen, the second son of the emperor who was fighting in mobile warfare, to call up elite soldiers and strong generals, find and follow the main force of the Lingnan Army all the way, and wait for an opportunity to start a skirmish battle with the opponent, trying to delay the footsteps of the Lingnan Army and buy time for the final decisive battle.

Zheng Sen, who was responsible for containing the Lingnan army, was good at cavalry combat, relying on the hundreds of cavalry he brought from Youyan Road to gallop across the Jiangnan Plain, and would constantly attack the left and right flanks of Zheng Yu's army. In order to move south quickly, Zheng Yu was too late and unwilling to organize a decent counterattack, so he could only let his army be repeatedly attacked and harassed by Zheng Sen's troops.

At the same time, the main force of the forbidden army stationed in Jinling City also began to move and prepare for action, but for a while the exact movement of the Lingnan Army was not known, so it only slowly moved south and did not advance at full speed.

In this way, when the Lingnan Army arrived in Wenzhou, the original army was only 40,000 or 50,000 scattered people, and its morale had also fallen to the lowest point, and it was already a situation of inevitable defeat.

However, the so-called "trapped beasts are still fighting", and now in front of Zheng Yu, as long as he defeats the imperial court officers and troops stationed in Wenzhou, he can enter Lingnan Road, and he will be able to reach the safe place in his mind. So as soon as Zheng Yu arrived at the destination, regardless of the fatigue of his soldiers, he immediately waved his army to storm Wenzhou City.

Now is different from the past, the imperial court has long guessed Zheng Yu's intentions, and knows that his southward movement is nothing more than an attack on Wenzhou and Quzhou. The two cities were chosen, and the imperial court simply strengthened the defenses of these two cities at the same time, and when Zheng Yu attacked, he was facing such a fortified city that had been prepared for a long time.

And Zheng Yu's military talent is very ordinary, and he is not good at attacking cities, let alone what is the key point of a big city, at the beginning, even a small county town in Shanyin, he was not able to capture it with overwhelming troops. Today, in the face of this Wenzhou city that has been waiting for a long time, he is even more at a loss, attacking three times in a day, but he has not shaken the defense of Wenzhou City, and can only wait for tomorrow to attack again according to the city.

That night, Zheng Yu summoned the generals under his jurisdiction again and spoke impassionedly, but the scene of Meng Xianli's self-killing on the spot a few days ago was still vivid, how could it arouse their fighting spirit. Zheng Yu's one-man show generally talked for half an hour, and even he was bored, so he hastily ended the meeting and strictly ordered that Wenzhou City must be taken tomorrow.

Strict orders are strict orders, facts are facts, the morale of the Lingnan army was frustrated, and they hurriedly went south to attack the city without preparing heavy equipment, and after the Tianzun sect leader Wen Honghui left, there was less blasting and siege methods, and there were also capable cavalry led by Zheng Sen on the periphery who were constantly attacking and harassing.

Unless there is a miracle in such an army, there is no reason to storm the city.

Sure enough, the miracle did not happen.

After attacking for a whole day, Wenzhou City was still immovable.

Zheng Yu realized more and more clearly that if he continued to attack like this, it would be another ten days and a half months, and Wenzhou City would still be Wenzhou City, and he would not be himself.

So Zheng Yu had an idea—since the imperial court had a heavy army in Wenzhoutun, it must be empty elsewhere—and wanted to gather the remaining army and prepare to turn to attack Quzhou. At this moment, the Lingnan army was exhausted, and the war had not made any progress for several days, which made the officers and men angry and resentful, and most of them did not want to travel long distances immediately.

Zheng Yu only said that the attack on Wenzhou Chengyuan was just a false shot, and the real target of the attack was actually Quzhou, but it was not announced in public for the sake of secrecy.

The generals are already full of resentment against Zheng Yu, where are they willing to listen to his nonsense?

Zheng Yu had no choice, so he could only persuade them one by one to make the generals believe that they were all grasshoppers tied to a rope, and only by acting in a group could there be a glimmer of life. Only then did the generals reluctantly agree, withdraw their troops from the city of Wenzhou, and go to Quzhou instead.

In the process, it was delayed for another whole day.

However, the imperial court was unwilling to delay any longer.

Zheng Yu wanted to attack Quzhou, but Zheng Xin, who was guarding Quzhou City, came by himself.

It turned out that after the emperor had made it clear that Zheng Yu's main attack direction was in Wenzhou, and regardless of whether he was attacking by force or feint, he immediately ordered the emperor's eldest son, Zheng Xin, to lead capable men and horses, starting from Quzhou and joining forces with Zheng Sen on the periphery of Wenzhou, to attack Zheng Yu from the northwest.

The army brought by Zheng Xin was a newly recruited soldier and horse in Shanshan Road, although it was a newly trained soldier, the combat effectiveness was not very strong, and it was also a little unaccustomed to the humid and rainy, cold and hot weather in the spring in the south of the Yangtze River. However, the people of the northwest have the valuable quality of loyalty and honesty, hard-working and hard-working, after Zheng Xin got the order, he picked and selected 5,000 elite soldiers, immediately set off from Quzhou, picked up shortcuts, small roads and hurried forward, walked in the hills and mountains in the south of the Yangtze River for two days, and then arrived outside Wenzhou, and met with his second brother Zheng Sen.

Seeing that Zheng Yu was about to set off from the camp, the formation was unstable, and it was an opportunity to take advantage of it, so they discussed with each other, and immediately lit up the elite force of 3,000 infantry and 500 cavalry, and rushed towards Zheng Yu's headquarters.

Zheng Yu was taken by surprise, and his 40,000 or 50,000 men were defeated by the enemy army of less than 5,000 people, so he had to give up the plan of immediate transfer, and first hold on to the camp that had not been completely demolished.

Zheng Xin and Zheng Sen also felt that they could not use many men and horses in their hands, so after a small victory, they gathered their troops, and took advantage of the opportunity that the Lingnan Army now lacked the strength and willingness to break through Wenzhou City in one fell swoop, and made a good deployment before making a decision.

That same night, the army that followed Zheng Yu south from Jinling City also happened to arrive at the outskirts of Wenzhou, and the general who led the army was Zhang Long, a confidant of Emperor Zheng Rong. He led 50,000 troops under his command, which was the main force of the imperial court in Jiangnan, and it was mighty and had the potential to wipe out the remnants of the Lingnan Army in one fell swoop. However, although his troops were strong, he also knew his identity, and as soon as he arrived in Wenzhou City, he hurriedly got in touch with Zheng Xin and Zheng Sen.