"Today, we have encountered the first infantry wing of the bandits, and there is no sign of increasing the strength of this bandit compared to the last time we encountered them." Not only the 1st Infantry Wing, but Pu Guanshui's staff officers found that the strength of the two battalions of the opposing army had not increased. The captured officers and men confessed that they had not been replenished since the beginning of the war, and that none of the wounded who had retreated had returned to the unit.

"Yes, the thieves don't have our teaching team, they can't provide a steady stream of reserves." Through the interrogation of the captives, Pu Guanshui had a certain understanding of the setting of the two battalions under Xu Ping. These two battalions rely on their own battalion teaching teams to train recruits, and these two battalion training teams have already been put into battle by Li Dingguo: "A thief is a thief, in the final analysis, they cannot be compared with us, and those wounded soldiers may have been abandoned by the thieves themselves." ”

Pu Guanshui's words caused a silence, and the staff officers of the New Army felt that this was very likely, and they had never heard of the rebels having a complete medical and return system. Although the Guards Battalion founded by Xu Ping had an ambulance team, based on inquiries with many prisoners, the staff officers believed that the team did not contain their seriously wounded, and this information seemed to be reliable.

On the 17th, another snow fell on Henan, but its arrival only allowed the two armies in the battle to rest for a while, and before the snowfall was completely over, the two armies fought again in the trenches in the snow. By the end of the month, 600 officers and men of the Tianyi Battalion, which had suffered the heaviest casualties in the Ming army, had been killed, more than 1,500 officers and men were bedridden, and more than one-third of the soldiers of the other two battalions had lost their combat effectiveness. The strength of the hardest-working engineer team has been greatly reduced, and only 43 people of the Tianyi Battalion engineering team with a quota of 200 people can still carry out civil engineering work. The officers of the engineer corps of the Chizhuo battalion did not close their eyes for two days and two nights, and yesterday they fainted in the trench and were rescued back to the barracks to be treated by military doctors, but they still lost three fingers of their left hand due to frostbite. The Ming army's reserves of lard used as antifreeze had been exhausted, and although people had already been sent to Shandong to urge the goods, the supplies could not be transported in time. The fighting continued to rage, with veterinarians removing grease from dead animals and handing them over to the troops. The soldiers were instructed to use antifreeze sparingly, and the first thing they did when they returned to the camp each day was to try to scrape off the grease applied to their faces and exposed areas and preserve it so that they could be used repeatedly.

"Work hard, brothers, Kaifeng is just around the corner, there are warm houses, hot soups, and hot meals. If I want to Kaifeng for a good year, I will work harder. ”

Not far from Pu Guanshui, a New Army officer shouted to his subordinates, and his words drew bursts of applause.

After nearly two months of struggling to advance through the snow and ice, the morale of the exhausted Forces nouvelles remained as high as ever, and everyone, from the generals to the soldiers, was convinced that victory was at hand. From time to time, the soldiers who were hoarling in the snow slipped because of their weak legs, but they immediately got up and quickly followed the group and continued to move forward. The brethren in Kaifeng were waiting for them to relieve the siege, waiting for the food behind them, and at the same time, a complete rest was waiting for them there, and no one wanted to stay in this wilderness.

Taking advantage of the leisure on the battlefield, Pu Guanshui and a few staff officers sat in a circle, used their own body temperature to warm up the dry food, and then broke it into small pieces and stuffed it into his mouth. Following Huangshi for many years, Pu Guanshui developed the habit of sharing weal and woe with his subordinates, as long as a soldier still ate cold food in the snow, Pu Guanshui refused to stay in his tent and enjoy barbecue comfortably. He softened the hard dry food in his mouth with his saliva, and slowly swallowed it into his stomach. After eating a few small pieces, Pu Guanshui picked up a ball of snow from the ground with both hands, stuffed it into his mouth and swallowed it.

"Your Excellency."

"Your Excellency."

Pu Guanshui and the soldiers share weal and woe, the whole army has always respected him for this, and the soldiers of the new army who walked by Pu Guanshui saluted him one after another, and Pu Guanshui also returned the salute one by one.

"It's impossible to enter Kaifeng before the Chinese New Year." Pu Guanshui calculated the time in his heart. He did not intend to prevent his subordinate officers from boosting their morale by fighting until Kaifeng for the New Year, but both he and his staff officers knew very well that more than 10,000 new officers and soldiers and tens of thousands of people had to spend this New Year in this desolate place. Therefore, he asked several staff officers to think about how to make the soldiers have some festive colors in this New Year.

"The lowly has asked the craftsmen to make a hundred firecrackers, and each team can put a few. It can't be any more, it's not more than usual after all. A staff officer shook his head after swallowing the snow ball: "On the day of the New Year, no matter what, we must find a way to let everyone eat hot rice and soup, and the people must also add a meat dish." ”

Another staff officer smiled: "Fortunately, the thieves also want to accompany us to celebrate the New Year in the snow, so I feel a lot more comfortable when I think about it." ”

"Haha, yes."

Everyone laughed. Despite all the hardships, the Forces nouvelles stubbornly continued their offensive as the opponents in front of them became weaker than they were. At the beginning of the war, the two battalions of the guards and the west had nearly 8,000 officers and soldiers, and they have now been reduced to more than 3,000 people: "Rare thieves, I think that the Hou Ye has never encountered such a hard battle." ”

"We are hard, the thieves are harder than us, now it's up to who can grit their teeth and persevere." Pu Guanshui's red face was even more striking in the wind and snow. Xu Ping's lineage guard battalion was on the verge of collapse, and the newly established western battalion was also exhausted, he looked at the west from afar: "You are rare and strange, judging from the previous wars in Liaodong, an overwhelming one-sided victory is rare." Most of the time, both sides will feel that they are about to lose their way in the moment before deciding the outcome of the battle, and this is often the turning point of bitterness, and the enemy will always collapse before us. At this time, if you put in one more team, you can often crush the opponent by virtue of this. ”

On the same day, Pu Guanshui summed it up in the battle log as follows:

On December 17, the twenty-second year of Chongzhen,

At present, our army has suffered heavy casualties, morale is still high, the replenishment of troops has stopped, and the troops can still persist in long-term operations;

The casualties of the thieves are unknown, the morale is acceptable, there is still no sign of replenishment, and they are on the verge of collapse;

Our army will win.

……

"I didn't find any movement in the Chu army, and Zuo Liangyu didn't have time to arrive before the New Year." The staff officers reported to Xu Ping: "General Li has sent a force to reinforce Kaifeng. ”

"King Chuang said that he didn't need this army there," Zhou Dongtian asked knowingly, "Your Excellency won't replenish them to the Guards Battalion and the Xishou Battalion, right?" ”

"Of course not." Xu Ping said casually, and Sun Kewang of Guide Mansion said that he didn't need Kaifeng Mansion to continue to provide him with supplies: "Guide Mansion has just been obtained, does General Sun really need nothing there?" ”

"General Sun is probably all for Kaifeng."

"Probably, but I don't want a famine in Guide." Although the supplies are precious, Xu Ping believes that the money that should be spent still needs to be spent: "The warehouses in Guide are not enough to support so many displaced people for the winter. ”

"General Sun guarantees that there will be absolutely no problem."

"I want it too, but I need to know what his plan is." Defending the territory is a policy that has only been implemented since breaking into the camp, and Kaifeng and Guide are model areas: "Don't use the materials that are prepared to support Guide for those first, and then send an envoy to General Sun." ”

"Can you plan ahead?" Zhou Dongtian asked, if Sun Kewang really didn't need it, then the Kaifeng front line would be much richer.

"Yes."

……

On the last day of Chongzhen's twenty-third year, Haozhou.

The Jiangbei Army stationed here shouldered the responsibility of defending the Invading Army of the Guide Prefecture. The leading guerrilla Yu Shizhong is a native of Songjiang Mansion, and his ancestors also served as a brocade guard. When he first came to Haozhou, General Yu trembled, fearing that the army would invade Nanzhili. However, after staying here for a few months, the movement of the intrusive army in Guide Mansion was very small, and there were only some small-scale exchanges with the Jiangbei Army on the border, and they never invaded the territory of Nanzhili, and General Yu's hanging heart gradually let go, and finally lived a life of singing and dancing like other generals of the Jiangbei Army gathered around Guide Mansion.

Stationed in the north of the city of Maozhou is Yu Dong, a famous general of the Bianjun army. Since arriving in the territory of Nanzhili, General Yu's life has deteriorated, and the generals in Jiangbei are very unkind to him, and Nanjing does not regard him as his own, so he is kicked around like a ball by civil and military forces from all over the country. After Sun Kewang gained a firm foothold in Guide Mansion, Haozhou was surrounded by the army on three sides, and Yu Dong was awarded the post of commander of Haozhou and sent to Haozhou to assist the Jiangbei Army in defending it.

At the beginning, Yu Shizhong was more polite to Yu Dong out of the psychology of sharing hardships. However, as time passed, Yu Shizhong judged that the Chuang camp in Guide was too weak to launch an attack, and the new army's attack on Kaifeng would obviously force the Chuang camp to draw limited forces to defend Puguanshui, so it was even less likely to pose a threat to Nanzhili.

With the same mentality, the Jiangbei Army became less and less serious about Yu Dong, and his words became more and more ruthless. Today, Yu Shizhong complained impatiently to a few subordinates: "What does this Yu Dong plan to go back to Henan, it's not a matter for Lao Lai to be here." ”

"yes."

"That's right, my lord."

Yu Shizhong's words stirred up a thousand waves with one stone, and his subordinates also echoed it. Even more good people reported to Yu Shizhong, and Yu Dong also recruited a literati as his adviser a few days ago.

Yu Shizhong frowned and said: "There will be a scribe who defects to Yu Dong, a lost dog, there are really such eyeless people in this world." ”

The subordinate sold a pass, and when everyone looked at him with a blank eye, he said with a smile: "It's Wu Wei and Wu Side." ”

"It turned out to be Lou among men! Haha, haha. ”

A burst of wild laughter broke out among the officers of the Jiangbei Army.

In the first year of the Apocalypse, Wu Wei became a master under the governor Wang Sanshan, and in the same year, the Lu'an Rebellion broke out, Guiyang was besieged for half a year, and Governor Wang died; In the fourth year of the Apocalypse, Wu Wei was recommended to enter Beijing to work under Yang Lian, and Yang Lian was dismissed before long. After the two owners were killed one after another, Wu Wei was regarded as an ominous person. couldn't get along in the north, Wu Wei returned to the south, and served as a master and a shogunate for several county orders in Fujian, but those county orders all fell for various reasons. After Huangshi went south to Fujian from Changsheng Island, Wu Wei heard that Wu Mu was a celebrity personally promoted by Wei Zhongxian, so he tried his best to drill the camp, and finally successfully bowed to the young Wu Zhong as his uncle in the seventh year of the Apocalypse, but Xizong died half a year later, Wei Zhongxian fell, and Wu Mu committed suicide by throwing himself into the water.

Dotting on his increasingly empty savings, and then looking at his mother who needed to be supported and his wife and young children at home, Wu Wei turned his heart on and went to the northern border to look for a job. After several ups and downs, in November of the second year of Chongzhen, he was put into the curtain of Liu Ce, the governor of Baoding, and on the day when he got the first money given to him by the owner, Huang Taiji entered the customs in a big way......

After Liu Ce's tragic death, Wu Wei lost his job again. He was originally a person who read poetry and books, and he had been up and down in officialdom for nearly ten years, and it stands to reason that it was easy to find a job as a shogun, but when others heard about Wu Wei's resume, they shook their heads and refused to accept it, and even the small landlords in the countryside were unwilling to ask him to be Mr. Accounts, and the mean people even nicknamed him "Lu among the people". For more than 20 years, in order to support his family, Wu Wei has done all kinds of work in order to support his family, telling stories and singing operas, moving grain and transporting bricks.

A few years ago, Wu Wei came to his hometown Yu Shizhong to fight the autumn breeze, but General Yu didn't even let him enter the camp gate. Wu Wei, who was not yet fifty years old at the time, no longer had the appearance of a scribe, his face was densely wrinkled like a spider's web, his back was bent like a bow, and he had to use crutches to stagger along. Imagining the appearance of Yu Dong and Wu Wei seeing each other, Yu Shizhong laughed happily: "Unexpectedly, Lu among the recruits is a curtain soldier, Yu Dong, a Henan guy, really doesn't know whether to live or die." ”

The Jiangbei Army in Haozhou is in full swing preparing for the New Year. While the general was talking and laughing with his officers, someone came in to report that the dead were to be buried and that they were going to be given a monument. Due to the practice of seeking good fortune, this kind of funeral should not be carried out in the first month, so it must be completed today anyway. An officer stood up in response, ready to supervise the work, Yu Shizhong jumped up from his seat and said, "Brothers, I will personally go and give them a ride." ”

A small number of soldiers of the Jiangbei Army were seriously injured in the border clashes and died after returning to the camp, and their bodies had been put into coffins. There were also some wounded and sick people who had not recovered from the winter and had gathered around the cemetery. After Yu Shizhong arrived, he personally picked up a glass of wine: "Brothers, I will give you a strong trip in the future." ”

When they heard this, the surrounding soldiers scooped up the wine, grabbed the wounded and sick, and poured it down their throats. A few of the most seriously wounded and sick lay motionless, while most of those who could still speak and move began to cry, and a few of them begged for mercy: "General, the villain is not seriously ill, and he can still rise up and fight for the general." ”

Yu Shizhong's face sank, and an officer behind him jumped out and pointed at the nose of one of them and scolded: "What are you crying about, after eighteen years, you are a good man again, touch you underneath, are you still a man?" ”

After the toast, the soldiers threw the sick and wounded into the coffins one by one, shoved their struggling arms into them, and then covered the boards and began to hammer nails. A young soldier of the Jiangbei Army struggled particularly violently, his thigh was inflamed because of being shot by the bow and arrow of the intruding army, and several people finally pressed him into the coffin. The young soldier desperately crawled out of the coffin, tears and snot running all over his face. The young soldier crawled out hand and foot on the ground while crying indistinctly: "Today is the New Year, let me die after the New Year!" It's the New Year today, let me die after the New Year......"

An officer couldn't stand it anymore, he stepped forward, kicked it down fiercely, kicked it in the young man's face, and the nosebleed spurted out violently, making the young soldier's face full of tears and snot red: "Xia Abing! Are you still fucking human? Do you have to die in the first month of the new year, and deliberately let the brothers be unhappy for a year? ”

The officer scolded and kicked the young soldier to death, and then ordered his men to gasp angrily: "Put him in!" ”

After being stuffed into the coffin again, the soldier woke up, banged the four walls of the coffin, and cried hoarsely: "My lord, it's okay, I'm not seriously injured, I can be fine." "Several soldiers pressed the lid of the coffin, and another knocked nails on deaf ears. The officer who was still angry stood next to the coffin and scolded: "The king of Hades wants you to die for the third watch, who can keep you until the fifth watch?" If there is a kind, one person will do things and one person should be responsible, don't drag us down. ”

"Send the brethren on their way." Yu Shizhong shouted in his mouth and spilled a glass of wine to the ground.

The soldiers carried the coffin into a large pit that had been dug. In the coffins that had been nailed to the ground, there was a continuous sound of fingernails scratching, kicking of legs and feet, and faint cries, mixed with the sound of firecrackers. There were some gaps in the simple coffin, and the people inside would not breathe for a while.

Yu Shizhong shouted again: "Entering the ground is safe, and the brothers will go all the way." ”

The Jiangbei army quickly put all the coffins into the pit. Just as he began to fill the coffins in front of him, suddenly there was an angry shout from a distance, which even overwhelmed the sound of firecrackers, and the herald who made the shout rode straight in front of Yu Shizhong, and shouted wildly regardless of etiquette: "It's not good, it's not good, the thieves have attacked our camp!" ”

Before Shi Zhong could understand what he said, another Jiangbei officer with a disheveled hair galloped over, shouting in a neighing voice: "Oh no, the thieves are coming here to kill." ”

The Jiangbei army was in chaos all of a sudden, and some soldiers who reacted quickly ran away, and Yu Shizhong shouted angrily: "What are you panicking, our big camp is strong and sturdy, and the thieves will definitely not be able to attack it for a while." ”

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