Dashun and her vassal kingdom have more than one million troops, but the front-line generals have very high requirements for supplementary soldiers, and the soldiers who can meet the standards of front-line generals are actually very limited, and whether it is soldiers, equipment, and materials, the Dashun court first considers the needs of the Nanjing Theater. For this reason, another general who advocated the battlefield in the Huguang region complained bitterly, and both Li Dingguo and Yu Shenhe said that with their forces, it was completely impossible to expel the Ming army in the south of Huguang; The Yunnan side has relatively few requirements, Gao Yigong and the Guizhou Ming army have been sit-in since the beginning of the war, and it is obvious that neither Dashun nor Nanming intends to invest a lot of resources here to launch an attack, and the attention of both camps is focused on the eastern front.

Because of this, Niu Jinxing became quite dissatisfied with Xu Ping's refusal to take Nanjing, and public opinion in Nanming has been taking advantage of this big fuss. Niu Jinxing had previously ordered the Jiangbei Shun army to cross the river to occupy Nanjing, but this order was immediately canceled by Xu Ping, and later Niu Jinxing wanted to send a small team of soldiers and horses directly under him to Nanjing to plant the flag, but this team of soldiers and horses was also stopped by Xu Ping's subordinates and did not allow them to enter Yingtianfu. Even if Niu Jinxing expressed his willingness to provide additional materials needed for the occupation, it was useless, Xu Ping said that in the current situation, if there were surplus materials, it would be better to use them to supply the army, and Li Zicheng also favored the military's opinion on this issue.

Today, Niu Jinxing came to Li Zicheng and had another thing, the intelligence officers found that Zheng Zhilong and his son Zheng Chenggong had correspondence, and the Prime Minister's Office thought that this problem was very serious, but Zheng Zhilong was the person Li Zicheng named to protect, and Shun Ting had always wanted to use this person as an example for the generals in the south. But now Niu Jinxing found that Zheng Zhilong's usefulness was very limited, and even his son didn't listen to him.

"Put Zheng Zhilong in prison for punishment?" Li Zicheng seemed to be surprised by Niu Jinxing's request: "Why? What crimes? Is it a sin for a man to look at the letters his son gave him? ”

"Zheng Chenggong's letter is not an ordinary family letter." Niu Jinxing felt that Li Zicheng did not realize the seriousness of the problem: "He is a general-level general in Nanming. ”

"Who can be without a father?" Li Zicheng didn't see the problem at all like Niu Jinxing was worried, and King Shun said impatiently: "Blood is thicker than water, Zheng Zhilong is a traitor, but for Zheng Chenggong, he is still his own father, and now he is in his enemy country and can't greet him in person, what's so strange about writing a few letters?" ”

"It's likely that Zheng Chenggong is persuading his father to make trouble." Niu Jinxing said solemnly, the war in the south is deadlocked, and his son is very important, he thinks that Zheng Zhilong will inevitably have different intentions.

"Why? Zheng Zhilong's porter was all chosen by you for him, can he make trouble? Li Zicheng still disagreed.

Zheng Zhilong secretly replied to Zheng Chenggong. Bull Venus has ample evidence at this point.

"It's normal, I haven't seen my son for several years, so it's strange not to reply." Li Zicheng mistakenly thought that Niu Jinxing was worried that Zheng Zhilong would leak northern secrets: "What can he say in the reply?" What is the price of food in Beijing? Rumors on the streets? Zheng Zhilong has been a man with his tail between his legs for several years, and he usually greets the housekeeper you sent three days in advance when he goes out. What could he know? And what can be revealed? ”

In Li Zicheng's opinion, Zheng Zhilong may not know more than an ordinary servant, and Nanming will not be stupid enough to start with him even if he wants to spy on intelligence.

"I'm not worried about this." Niu Jinxing patiently waited for Li Zicheng to finish speaking, and handed over an intercepted letter from Zheng Zhilong: "Zheng thief is rebellious and curses the Holy Dynasty!" ”

"Oh?" Li Zicheng took the letter, frowned and looked at the letter, and finally opened the private letter.

Zheng Zhilong said in the letter that he had heard about Zheng Chenggong's war on the Yangtze River, and told his son that he was very worried when he heard that the Nanming Sailor had broken through, and was very relieved after hearing that he had successfully passed the pass, and was very glad that his son was safe and sound and had not been defeated, and also said that he himself was restless in Beijing day and night, lest he heard the news of Zheng Chenggong's defeat, and lived a life of fear, and every time he heard that Zheng Chenggong had made a meritorious achievement, he would be very happy for his son.

"Zheng Thief has resentment, he is happy when he hears that Wang Shi is unfavorable, and he celebrates when he hears that he is lucky to escape." Niu Jinxing and the Prime Minister's Mansion were extremely angry with Zheng Zhilong, and he said to Li Zicheng with a straight face: "Zheng Thief's reverse deeds are obvious, and the minister asks Your Majesty to allow you to intervene and punish his crimes." ”

Li Zicheng read the letter from beginning to end, then read it carefully again from the beginning, and then sighed: "The heart of the beloved son is on the paper." ”

Taking Zheng Zhilong's letter back into the letter, Li Zicheng did not return Niu Jinxing but handed it to a guard, and ordered: "Seal the mouth, and then send it to the south, and attach a note to General Zheng, saying that the widow deeply regrets the demolition of his father's family letter, and let General Zheng rest assured that the two countries have their own masters in the war of war, and the widow will not vent his anger with his father." ”

After the guards left, Li Zicheng said to the stunned Niu Jinxing: "Yes, Zheng Zhilong said that he wants his son to serve Qi Gong well, but what's wrong with this, should Zheng Zhilong teach his son to be a traitor like himself?" At the beginning, he looked down on him when he was so widowed. Zheng Zhilong is saying that he is happy for his son's exploits, does anyone hope that his son will be defeated and killed in the army or ruined? In all dynasties, the benevolent monarchs talked about the filial piety of the father and the son, and the brotherhood and brotherhood, if the widow kills a person because he has the love of father and son, is the widow still a human being? ”

"The widow can understand the loyalty of the prime minister's mansion, but since this matter is harmless to the country, why should he keep an eye on it." In the end, Li Zicheng comforted Niu Jinxing again, and reminded: "The Prime Minister's Mansion should think more about how to select soldiers for General Xu and supplement military resources, this is the most important thing." ”

……

After Ren Hongcheng, the plenipotentiary representative of the Constituent Assembly, arrived at the barracks with the officers of the Provisional War Department, he was immediately greeted by the division commander Yi Meng.

"Doctor Ren, the public servant division is ready for battle, and he can go to Nanzhili to fight the Shun army at any time."

"Commander Yi is commendable," Ren Hongcheng greeted Yi Meng and the other senior officers of the Public Servant Division one by one, and quickly asked, "How is the morale of the army?" ”

"Morale is okay, but it could be better." Yi Meng replied bluntly: "The officers and men of the whole division are very interested in the resolutions of the Constituent Assembly and the provincial secretaries. ”

"Of course, I'm here today with good news." Ren Hongcheng laughed, after the defeat of the Northern Expeditionary Army in Anqing, the provinces under the Southern Ming Dynasty were in mourning, and after the Shun army returned to Jiangnan and surrounded the Chunhua Ming army, the newspapers in the south were even more pessimistic, and many articles felt that peace talks with Beishun should be considered. There are also such voices within the Constituent Assembly, and some people feel that if Li Shun is willing to negotiate peace with Nanming temporarily, then as long as the other side is willing to guarantee that it will not touch Nanming's existing system, it is not impossible to consider forming a relationship similar to that of Jin and Song.

Two months ago, this voice was very loud, and many of the unprepared parliamentarians demanded that envoys be sent to the north as soon as possible, taking advantage of the fact that the Ming army still occupied a large amount of territory to bargain with the Shun court; In opposition to this voice is an across-the-board tax hike to train and arm more troops to fight the Shun army. An important reason for the former is that the Shun army led by Xu Ping looks invincible, and both Xu Ping and these Shun army veterans will grow old and die, these parliamentarians feel that maybe it is a better time for the Northern Expedition to wait for the Shun army, the elite of the world, to be worn out by time, and they want to hand over this important task to the next generation to complete, and accuse the latter of spending more people's fat and people's ointment, and filling more young people's lives into the tiger's mouth of the Shun army's elite.

But this voice continued to weaken with the insistence of the constitutional master in Chunhua, and Ren Hongcheng himself was a little hesitant about whether to negotiate peace, but after these two months, he felt that this voice was really very shameful:

"Tens of thousands of young people are fighting bloody battles on the front line, struggling to resist the attack of the Shun army, and you are actually considering peace talks in the rear? Do you think their families will say yes? ”

Ren Hongcheng had questioned his colleagues in the House of Representatives who were inclined to send peace envoys, and as time went on and the people began to recover from the shock of the Anqing fiasco, the call for support for the soldiers on the front line became louder.

The court believed that raising taxes was not intolerable, and in fact Qi Guogong also held this view, and he remembered that Yang Sichang also told Chongzhen that excessive military spending would not have a devastating impact on the lives of ordinary people. If it is only from the numbers, Qi Guogong feels that what Yang Sichang said may be right, but the Chongzhen Ming Court did not levy a military expenditure of one hundred taels, and the price that the people have to pay is not less than one thousand taels. Even in the previous life of Huangshi, which had no travelers to introduce high-yield crops, Henan and Shaanxi, which had been thousands of miles away because of the rampant conquest, restored production order immediately after being occupied by Li Zicheng, and the hungry people returned to their hometowns one after another, and the output was enough to support Li Zicheng's army; Another reason is that the taxes collected by the Ming court were not effectively invested in the places where they were needed, and the vast majority of them were embezzled by the privileged class who were stripped of their skins, for example, the defenders of Luoyang defected to Li Zicheng because they were starving less than a mile away from the Fuwang Mansion, you must know that even if Xu Ping raised 5,000 soldiers, the food and salary were served as meat, and the waste was only equivalent to the daily consumption of the Zhou Wangfu or the Fuwang Mansion, not to mention the Ming court officials at all levels throughout Henan.

Now whether the people can afford the magnitude of the levy, the votes in their hands can be carefully weighed by the deputies, and whether the money is spent in the right place will be supervised by the Secretary of State.

"We all know the plight of the constitutional lawyers, and every day there is new news from Nanjing." Ren Hongcheng said to Yi Meng that the propaganda of the Shun court, which is actually the "Liaodong People's Observer", has exaggerated and depicted the miserable situation of the constitutional division, but now this propaganda is beginning to have a counterproductive effect, and Nanming's newspapers have gradually turned to silence from the initial lamentation, and recently it has turned into anger, and a large number of reporters are asking whether the Qing Yuan and the Constituent Assembly have done anything to save the Twelfth Division. A few days ago, when the "Liaodong People's Observer" (this newspaper could be published under the Southern Ming Dynasty, of course, the newspapers of the Southern Ming Dynasty could not be published in Liaodong) once again proudly publicized the surrender of more than 100 Ming soldiers to the Shun army, the "Guangxi Daily" issued an extra rebuttal: But there are still soldiers 100 times their size who have not lost their fighting spirit and are still persisting in fighting under the most difficult circumstances.

"The five provincial secretaries have passed a resolution to levy new taxes, in addition to the official military salary, the provincial secretary will double the pension of volunteers, and at the same time give all volunteers new subsidies in addition to military salaries."

"That's really good news." Yi Meng and the officers behind him couldn't help but smile.

"Also, the Constituent Assembly announced that it will issue 10 million taels of war bonds, and this money will be used to buy weapons and train recruits," Ren Hongcheng said to the soldiers in front of him with a smile: "The Constituent Assembly and the Qing Yuan will resolutely support you, and will never negotiate peace with Beishun!" ”

After finishing the news he brought, Ren Hongcheng asked, "What does Master Yi think about the situation in Chunhua, can the Constitutional Division still persevere?" ”

"Chunhua is not a matter of military strength, with Chunhua's 15,000 troops, as well as the sufficient supplies they have transported in advance, it is very possible to hold on for a few more months or even half a year. If Brigadier General Tang can't stand it, it will only be because of the military's morale. Yi Meng and others are also very concerned about the report on Chunhua, judging from the news from Nanjing, Yi Meng and others are worried about the collapse of the military morale of the Constitutional Division, or the loss of control of the officer command system: "It is necessary to help Brigadier General Tang improve the morale of the army, and the best way is to let the officers and soldiers of the Constitutional Division know that the rear and the Qingyuan care about them, and the friendly troops are also eager to relieve their difficulties." ”

"And the significance of their insistence on Chunhua to our army." Ren Hongcheng added that now Chunhua is not only of military significance, but also encourages the people in the rear.

"Yes, Dr. Ren." Yi Meng pointed out that the most troublesome thing now is the isolation of Chunhua inside and outside, and the Ming army has no way to convey their wishes, although it is not the best time, but Yi Meng resolutely asks for battle: "Please order the public servant division to take the lead in attacking, and the last general will definitely be able to open a bloody road and rush in to get in touch with Brigadier General Tang." ”

Ren Hongcheng did not answer immediately but looked at the military managers of the Provisional War Department around him, and they shook their heads at the representatives of the Constituent Assembly together, the Ming army is now unable to carry out a large-scale counterattack, as the Shun army gathers near Chunhua, Zhejiang needs considerable troops to defend, in order to prepare for the Shun army to divide the troops south, and now there is not only the Southern Ming Field Army in Zhejiang, but it is the most effective one.

These officers of the Provisional War Department knew very well that they could never count on assistance from the Jiangxi side in a short period of time, and just before they left Quanzhou, the War Department had received an urgent report: There had been an extremely serious conflict between the upper and lower levels of the First and Second Armies. The contradictions that had been accumulating between generals and officers, officers and soldiers since the beginning of the Northern Expedition became even more acute after the defeat of Anqing. Soldiers repeatedly shouted disrespectful words to the effect of "Qi Gong fooled us into the army with nonsense such as defending his vital interests", and also shouted inflammatory remarks such as "Don't kill human animals" or "Don't fight the world for Huang's illness" - these complaints, which were originally hidden underneath, began to surface after the Anqing fiasco; The First Army and other field units severely criticized the military judges for creating unprecedented confusion in the army, so that the army was inferior to the new army, which had only been trained for three months—and in some respects this was not entirely unreasonable.

These past disputes and recriminations were not news to the Constituent Assembly, and the newspapers had been focused on the fighting near Nanking, but the clashes that had just erupted, though not yet fully understood, had already shocked the Constituent Assembly and the War Office, fearing that if not handled properly, a radical change could occur.

"Zhejiang's Qingyuan election is about to be held," Ren Hongcheng turned back to Yi Meng and said that although the war is urgent, the Constituent Assembly does not intend to continue to wait, they have ordered the end of military management in Zhejiang, and the elections of the Qingyuan and the government at all levels must be held on time no matter what: "The Qingyuan will definitely find ways to send the news to Chunhua, and the public servants must not throw it lightly." ”

As the plenipotentiary representative of the Constituent Assembly, Ren Hongcheng also heard about the affairs in Jiangxi, and the conclusion of the Constituent Assembly after urgent consultations was to make every effort to help Huang Naiming, Jin Qiude and others put an end to the incident; At the same time, they also prayed to God that the Nanming media would not pay attention to the conflict in Jiangxi, at least not to pay special attention to the direction of Jiangxi at this time. Another measure was that the Constituent Assembly was determined to support the Constitutional Division while trying to protect Zhejiang, and if the newspapers of Nanming were not under the control of the government, if they threw out all kinds of bad news one after another, when the effects of the Anqing defeat had not been completely eliminated, the incident in Jiangxi was stabbed, and the Constitutional Division surrendered to the Shun army, the Constituent Assembly did not dare to think about what would happen.

As a staunch supporter of the Constituent Assembly, Ren Hongcheng secretly vowed in his heart that he would do everything in his power to help the House tide over the difficulties -- not only to keep Zhejiang, but also to keep the constitutional division going, because the Constituent Assembly could not withstand the successive heavy blows. Of course, Ren Hongcheng felt that it was better to keep these troubles secret from Yi Meng, the commanders of the Eastern Front.

……

Half a month later, in Longtan.

"It worked, right?" Ren Hongcheng rushed into Chen Wei's headquarters, and as soon as he heard the news just now, he hurried over.

"Yes......" Chen Wei nodded and was about to speak.

"Great!" Ren Hongcheng rubbed his hands excitedly: "I'll leave immediately." ”

"Wait a minute, Dr. Ren, we only succeeded once, and the previous five times we failed." In the first five defeats, the new weapons caused huge losses, ten people were seriously injured, three others fell to their deaths, and five were uncertain about their fate and death.

"But this time it worked, didn't it?" Without waiting for Chen Wei to answer, Ren Hongcheng shouted: "Load everything immediately, and I'll set off within an hour." ”

"Doctor Ren, wait a little longer," Chen Wei persuaded the plenipotentiary of the Constituent Assembly, whose identity was so important that he could not afford to lose: "Any new weapon will fail many times at the beginning, and one success is unreliable, so wait a little longer for a day or two, not to mention that the distance is much longer than the experimental distance." ”

"The Constitutional Master can't wait any longer." Ren Hongcheng gently pushed Chen Wei to take his hand, and smiled at the division commander of the council division: "In the five experiments in the past two days, so many people have died, and they haven't waited for a long time. ”

"You're too important." Chen Wei pleaded: "If you have three longs and two shorts, who will fulfill the mission of the Constituent Assembly?" ”

"I am important because I have the mission of the Constituent Assembly, and if I don't complete it, I will be worthless, and the sacrifice of two days will be meaningless."

……

Chunhua,

Li Hong sat in the camp and looked at the ground silently, the scorching sun baking the earth like an iron plate. Whether it was injury or health, the 11,000 Ming officers and soldiers who were still alive here have now become much more silent than before. Although the day before yesterday when attacking the outer fortresses of the Ming army, the defenders did not put up particularly hard resistance, half of them quickly withdrew to the main position, and the remaining more than 200 people surrendered to the commando of the Shun army.

And the Shun army used this as an example to shout to the Ming army position near Chunhua for a day and a night: "The princes and generals are not worth exchanging their lives." ”

Li Hong had no intention of exchanging his life for a prince or general, because in the past, he would be looked down upon as a soldier, thinking that he would bully the common people if he did not have the opportunity to eat and eat. But now it is different, Li Hong's father used to be a private school teacher, and later he was recruited to the school as a teacher. A man of his origin was said to never be a soldier, but under the propaganda of the Imperial Court and the Governor's Palace, being a soldier suddenly became an honorable thing, and he was considered a good man to defend his neighbors and his hometown. The wages were high and honorable, and the governor's office promised to help veterans find jobs in the future, so Li Hong volunteered to join the army.

At the training camp, Li Hong was told that the training officers and officers might lash out at the recruits and use all kinds of language to humiliate them in order to stimulate them to redouble their training. But they will never beat people, because all volunteers are serving the country, and beating them is a provocation to the country.

"Serve the country." Thinking of this, Li Hong muttered to himself: After being assigned to the 12th Division, the military judge led the military police to inspect the battalions and told them that they could report any complaints to the military police, and the military judge would definitely handle them impartially. The most important point is that Li Hong remembered that the military judge made it very clear that the most severe military law does not include the death penalty, because all volunteers serve the country, and they should not die at the guns of their own people -- all crimes involving the death penalty must be handed over to the rear criminal prosecution department for handling.

Now it is indeed a problem for the 12th Division, and recently more and more deserters have been caught by patrols when trying to escape, and most of them will not resist, because until this day these deserters have only been imprisoned by Tang Desheng and have not executed a single person. Tang Desheng declared to the officers and men of the Constitutional Division that he would act strictly in accordance with military law, and ensure that every person who volunteered to serve the country would receive a fair trial in the rear, if in the end they were charged with treason; Or they could be confined if they showed repentance, and the judge said they could be commuted to disobey military orders.

This undoubtedly greatly reduced the danger of desertion for deserters, but everyone agreed that Division Commander Tang was not a brutal person, and every time Li Hong pondered the idea of fleeing in his heart, he would always feel a little sorry for Division Commander Tang if he left like this.

"Sent to the rear for trial, does Senior Commander Tang really think that we can still break the siege?" Li Hong lightly tapped the ground in front of his feet with a gun a little bored, and he felt that some people were right: it was not worth dying in this foreign land for two taels of silver a month; What does it have to do with the promotion and wealth of officers who win battles and our soldiers?

Li Hong pondered until his train of thought was interrupted by the exclamations around him, and a large number of soldiers poured into the streets from the houses, pointing to the northern sky and shouting.

Together with his companions, Li Hong also walked under the scorching red sun, looking up at the red cloud floating from the sky: "Is it the catastrophe?" He thought to himself.

When the red cloud drifted over the Shun army's position, Xu Ping and all the generals of the Shun army under his command looked up like the soldiers, and many soldiers had already fallen to their knees and began to pray. Xu Ping also looked at this omen in horror, and repeatedly asked himself in his heart: "What is the will of heaven?" Is this a sign from heaven? How's that for good luck? ”

A few hours later, when Hongyun finally stopped in the sky over Chunhua Town in the evening, Tang Desheng also knelt in the middle of his subordinates and prayed sincerely: "If the Heavenly Lord really does not abandon the villain, dare to ask for three more days of nectar......

A thick cable was thrown overhead, and then the Ming soldiers heard a voice falling from the sky: "Find a place to tie it tightly, drag us down!" ”

"The immortals have descended to earth!"

"The immortals have descended to earth!"

No one went to fulfill the requirements of the gods, and the excited Ming soldiers rushed to tell each other.

……

There was a commotion in the middle of the night, and finally understood the request to bolt the airship firmly, and when Ren Hongcheng stepped on the ground again, Tang Desheng looked at him suspiciously: "Doctor Ren, it's really you!" ”

"It's me, I'm not an immortal, and there won't be any immortal pretending to be me." The crew of the airship was hastily trained, and the airship itself was also assembled in Longtan, and it was forcibly flown to this Chunhua without being fully overhauled and unclear about the wind flow, and it was naturally quite bumpy along the way. On the way when the crew adjusted the altitude to find the direction of the wind, Ren Hongcheng was scared half to death by countless bumps, but every time he would comfort himself desperately in his heart: "I still have to be the secretary of state, one day I will run for governor, maybe I can also run for the first assistant, I will not die here." ”

As a result, after finally arriving in Chunhua, the people below made a fuss for a long time and no one went to tie the cable, and Ren Hongcheng and his gang were almost blown away by the wind again.

Ren Hongcheng was accompanied by an officer from the War Department, who had binoculars and a map intending to observe and record the deployment of the Shun army, but he vomited in the air and was now in a state of confusion when he was carried down by several airboat crews.

"What is Dr. Ren doing here?"

"On behalf of the Constituent Assembly, I would like to express my gratitude to General Tang and to all the officers and men of the Constitutional Division." Ren Hongcheng held Tang Desheng's hand tightly, waved it a few times, and after letting go of his hand, he almost fell under his feet - when he was in the air, Ren Hongcheng didn't vomit less, but he relied on his tenacious will so he could still stand and speak: "I brought more than 50,000 letters, most of which are letters from the officers and soldiers of the Constitutional Division. ”

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