When the construction site of Lijiazhuang was in full swing, in a tea shop in Beiyao Town, forty miles west of here, there was a group of people who were anxious. (.) The man with a square face and a wide nose, his eyes showed a fierce light, and he slammed the tea bowl on the table: "Li Maozai, Lao Tzu has been waiting like this for a day, why is there no news?"

The young descendant known as Li Maozai hurriedly responded: "Boss Liao, I think something happened in the village that delayed their return trip." ”

"Delaying their trip is a trivial matter, delaying Lao Tzu's itinerary is a big deal!" Boss Liao stared at Li Maozai and said: "This Li Jiazhuang is your kid who instigated everyone to come, Lao Tzu's more than 2,000 brothers are brought from Qingyuan and Conghua, and a day's eating, drinking, and Lazar will cost hundreds of taels of silver, if anything happens, you will have to make up for this money!"

"Boss Liao doesn't have to worry, most of the strong Ding group training on Lijiazhuang was taken to Guangzhou by Li Jifeng, the old guy, and there are only four or five hundred people in the village, how can they do it like a wolf and a tiger? Besides, there are also fellow brothers from Shaozhou Mansion, Zhaoqing Mansion and Huizhou Mansion, and this little Li Jiazhuang must be captured!" Li Maozai hurriedly defended: "Even if the few people sent to Lijiazhuang to listen to the truth can't come back, with Boss Liao's strength, this Lijiazhuang can also be beaten!"

Boss Liao seemed to be in a slightly better mood after hearing this praise, and snorted: "It's best to be as you said, if there is anything wrong, Lao Tzu will be the first to cut you down the sacrificial flag!"

This Liao boss is one of the bandit leaders who gathered people to make trouble in Conghua County, Guangzhou Prefecture in the third year of the Apocalypse, he was originally just a charcoal burner, because of the conflict with the foreman, he killed people in a rage, and then simply entangled a group of outlaws to fall into the grass. In the past few years, although the government has sent troops to suppress it several times, Liao Dabi and his subordinates have been fighting guerrillas in Conghua, Zengcheng, Longmen, Qingyuan and other counties.

Since the fourth year of the Apocalypse, Liao Dabi has led his gangsters to plunder everywhere in Guangdong, picking out the kind of villages far away from the towns, and in a few years, he has become a well-known figure in the green forests of Guangdong. However, in the past, Liao Dabi had always only been active in the area north of Guangzhou City, and this was the first time he went south to do business, and the place where he started was not too far from Guangzhou City, so Liao Dabi did not directly gather people to attack as before, but asked his subordinates to carefully sneak into the nearby area in batches, and also sent people to Lijiazhuang to inquire about the news.

The reason why Liao Dabi bypassed Guangzhou City and specially ran to the south to do it, I have to mention this Li Maozai. This Li Maozai was originally born in Lijiazhuang, and he can be regarded as the bloodline of the Li side branch, but because he has been lazy since he was a child, and he likes to steal chickens and touch dogs, his reputation in Lijiazhuang is not good. A few months earlier, Li Maozai wanted to get some extra money in the ancestral hall's treasury, but he was caught red-handed, and several elders discussed and expelled him from the Li family, beat him and threw him outside the village, and ordered him to leave this place and not come back.

After a period of wandering outside, the resentful Li Maozai accidentally blended into Liao Dabi's bandit team, and after personally participating in several ransacking operations, Li Maozai thought that his chance for revenge had come.

Li Maozai found Liao Dabi and led the crowd to attack Lijiazhuang in Panyu, the reason is also very simple, because the silver vault of Lijiazhuang stores the savings of the Li family for many years, according to Li Maozai, it is estimated that it will not be less than 500,000 taels of silver.

If it were someone else, Liao Dabi might not believe it, but if the object was Li Jiazhuang, it would have some credibility. "Fu Ruifeng" has opened a number of branches in Guangdong Province, and the big business is a well-known thing, coupled with the recent sale of a large number of Haihan goods that are very tight on the market, it is reasonable to make a lot of money. Liao Dabi's subordinates had ransacked a branch of "Fu Ruifeng" in Qingyuan last year, and the harvest was as much as 2,000 taels of silver, if it was the clan silver treasury of "Fu Ruifeng", it was not uncommon to have hundreds of thousands of taels of silver.

And Li Maozai's background also adds a lot of credibility to his statement. He has lived in Lijiazhuang for more than 20 years, and he is clear about the situation inside and outside Lijiazhuang.

Although Panyu County, where Lijiazhuang is located, is not the main activity area of Liao Dabi, but thinking that there are hundreds of thousands of taels of silver waiting for him to get it, Liao Dabi feels unbearable this kind of **. It has been a few years since he started the incident, and he has more than 2,000 people under his command, and he can be regarded as a strong party in terms of strength. But after there are more people, the cost also increases, to maintain combat effectiveness, it is also necessary to take money to raise, thousands of mouths to eat, to dress and arm, this cost is not a small amount, and robbing the village is easy to get, but the harvest is proportional to the risk, looting a village is often very limited, most of them can only grab some grain and grass back, and this is the fastest consumption of materials, grab a few thousand catties of grain back and eat it in a few days.

Liao Dabi had already been looking for a more advanced target, but his strength was limited, and he still didn't dare to do this kind of thing for the time being, so he could only focus on some relatively wealthy manor walled castles, and Li Maozai's mention just gave him a suitable target.

According to Li Maozai's account, Lijiazhuang's regimental training has now been taken to Guangzhou City by the boss of "Fu Ruifeng," and the existing local defense measures are extremely weak. However, considering the uncertainties of fighting in different places, Liao Dabi, who was thick on the outside and thin on the inside, still decided to send an invitation letter to his colleagues to attack Lijiazhuang together. Liao Dabi and several other forces agreed that after they succeeded, Liao Dabi's gang in charge would share half of all the money, and the other forces would divide the remaining half.

In order to ensure that nothing goes wrong, Liao Dabi also sent several spies a few days in advance, and sneaked into Lijiazhuang to inquire about the news after disguise, but yesterday it was already the agreed return time, but several spies did not appear in Beijiao Town, this abnormal situation made Liao Dabi slightly uneasy. Although a few days ago, although a village was breached in Shunde County, the little grain and grass property seized was too small to cover the consumption of this operation.

Liao Dabi thought about it for a long time, and finally made a decision, still according to the plan agreed before, and launched an attack on Lijiazhuang two days later. Even if the other party was already alert, Liao Dabi thought that he could still take this Zhuangzi with the advantage of troops. With the few forces that have been agreed on now, the total strength has exceeded 4,000, even if it is enough to attack the county seat, what will be wrong with fighting such a small Zhuangzi with a few hundred mouths?

On April 23 of the first year of Chongzhen of the Ming Dynasty, on May 26, 1628, Lijiazhuang, Panyu County, Guangzhou Prefecture. The reconnaissance personnel sent out separately a few days ago have returned to Zhuangshang one after another, and what can be determined at present is that in recent days, a large number of unidentified people have been assembling dozens of miles north and south of Lijiazhuang, and according to the judgment of the operational command, it should have been the last day or two since the bandit forces launched an attack on Lijiazhuang. Xiao Liang, as the supreme commander of the local area, has also issued an order to enter the first-level combat readiness state.

Early in the morning, the subordinates of the Li family brought a hot breakfast with rice porridge and oil cakes, and after breakfast, the fighters began to enter the defensive positions one after another. On the roof of the tallest building in Lijiazhuang, Li Jifeng's three-story house, a special lookout post is arranged, and from this commanding height, you can use a telescope to see the situation within a radius of seven or eight miles near Lijiazhuang.

The militiamen, who entered the combat position, by order of the squad leader, began the final inspection of weapons. The artillerymen also lifted off the tarpaulin that had been covering the gun emplacement, revealing a swarthy weapon of destruction. In accordance with the requirements of the headquarters, the local people organized a baggage team and an ambulance team, prepared a trolley for transporting war materials and a stretcher for transporting the wounded, and assembled in the village to stand by.

The "Exploration" docked at the Shawan waterway had quietly left before dawn, not to avoid the battle, but to patrol the Shawan waterway and the Pearl River around Lijiazhuang to prevent the opponent from launching a large-scale river-crossing offensive from an unexpected position, although the possibility of the bandits being able to organize such an offensive was very small, but the command believed that it was better to prevent it from happening.

At about ten o'clock in the morning, the lookout post found that about seven or eight miles to the northeast, a team of about 1,000 people appeared, heading towards Lijiazhuang. About ten minutes later, another larger team appeared at the same distance to the west, also in the direction of Lijiazhuang.

"The opponent has appeared!" Xiao Liang did not have any fear on his face when he said this, but was full of excitement: "Send a telegram to the Guangzhou Office and our reinforcements, informing them that the enemy has appeared and our side has entered a combat state. ”

"It will take at least a day or more for reinforcements to arrive here. Chen Yixin responded: "When they contacted last night, they were still thirty or forty nautical miles away from Dawanshan Island, and it seemed that they couldn't catch up with this battle." ”

"It's not necessarily a bad thing to have fewer people to share the credit. Xiao Liang picked up the military hat on the table and put it on his head: "It's our turn to perform, let's have a good fight!"

"That's a must!" Chen Yixin also straightened his military uniform, and then strode out of the command headquarters.

According to the division of labor discussed by the two, the fourth company of the Haihan militia led by Chen Yixin in the north of Lijiazhuang was the main defensive force, while Xiao Liang was led by a platoon of militia subordinate to the Guangzhou Office, and the coordinated defense with the Li Jiamin regiment was very likely to be the west side of the opponent's main attack direction. As for the east and south sides, because the terrain was not suitable for the attacking side to deploy the troops, only a small number of armed personnel were arranged as observation posts to prevent sporadic sneak attacks by the other side.

Compared with the relaxed self-confidence of the Haihan officers, the Li family father and son were as restless as ants on a hot pot at this time. Although they all knew very well that the strength of the Haihan army was far above that of the bandits, they still had some irrepressible panic when it came to the end.

Even Li Jifeng, who was old, couldn't help but ask again: "Third child, the combat power of Haihan's gang is really as strong as you said, right?"

Li Nai smiled bitterly: "Dad, you have asked this eight times today!"

"Oh, yes, my father just wants to make sure......" Li Jifeng also felt a little out of shape, and took the words over.

"Dad, with the Haihan militia here, it is impossible for those bandits to get a bargain!" Li Nai obviously has much more confidence in the Haihan militia than his father.

Although Li Nai did not go to Annam to witness the performance of the Haihan militia on the regular battlefield, he was extremely impressed by the amphibious landing live-fire military exercise held on the anniversary. With the lethality of Haihan's weapons and the combat capability of the Haihan militia, Li Nai did not think that the rabble of rogues would be able to resist the firepower of the Haihan militia on a frontal battlefield, even if the difference in strength between the two sides was ten times, it would not be able to change the situation.

"That's very good!" Li Jifeng paced back and forth in the room a few times, and then heard He Qiang report outside the door: "Master, the Haihan officers have all set off!"

Li Jifeng walked quickly to the door and asked, "The thief has appeared?"

"Probably appeared, just now Lieutenant Xiao and Lieutenant Chen have left the headquarters and went to the north and west separately. He Qiang bowed and responded.

"That must be a thief appearing!" Li Jifeng also stepped out of the door: "Third child, come with me to the front of the battle to watch the battle!"

"Dad, be careful!" Seeing this, Li Nai hurriedly chased him out.

Compared to the defending side, the attacker who has traveled a long distance is obviously not so easy. Li Maozai touched his empty stomach, and could only use the spear in his hand as a crutch to move forward, in order to save a little body.

In order not to show traces in advance to alert the target, Liao Dabi and his party camped in a wild place about fifteen miles away from Lijiazhuang last night. And the breakfast is also shabby, the wild vegetable porridge is so clear that it can almost show the shadow of a person, and each person has a small plate that is not even enough to put the bottom on, Li Maozai took it and poured it into his mouth.

In fact, this is not Liao's stinginess, it is really a lack of food and grass, so he has to do it as a last resort. They set out from Qingyuan half a month ago, and made a detour to the west to avoid Guangzhou City, traveling more than 400 miles, and the thousands of catties of grain and grass they brought had already been eaten. If it weren't for robbing a few villages and getting some grain and grass along the way, this team would probably have to beg for food before they could conquer Lijiazhuang.

Of course, the other bandit teams from Huizhou, Shaozhou, and Zhaoqing were not much better off than them, and the march of hundreds or thousands of people to fight across states and provinces was too complicated for these reckless guys. Accommodation arrangements, food and grass allocation, determination of marching routes, and liaison between the front and rear during the march...... When these bandits embarked on the journey, they realized that wanting to conquer the world was far from being as simple as guarding the mountains and robbing passing merchants. The march route of just a few hundred miles has worn out at least one-third of the combat effectiveness of these bandit troops.

However, the bandits will naturally remember all the hardships they suffered on the way on the head of the target this time, and after breaking this Zhuangzi, they must grab enough books. Therefore, although there were constant complaints in the team, no one stopped, scolding and scolding and continuing to move towards the destination with red eyes.

But Li Maozai's heart was vaguely feeling a little uneasy, the place where he camped last night was actually already Lijiazhuang's sphere of influence, if nothing else, after setting off today, he should be able to see the people of Lijiazhuang working in the nearby fields, but all the way was a field without people, and the farmers who used to work in the fields were all gone. There are still five or six miles away from Lijiazhuang, but none of the people sent to the village to inquire about the news a few days ago still appeared, and Li Maozai couldn't help but wonder if these people were arrested after being discovered by the Li family. If he was really arrested, wouldn't Li Jiazhuang have been prepared for a long time?

Thinking of this, Li Maozai decided to remind Liao Dabi to be careful, so as not to fall into Liao Dabi's trap. After listening to Li Maozai's report, Liao Dabi, who was riding on a gelding, sneered and replied: "Do you think Lao Tzu didn't find out that something was wrong? Hundreds of households in Zhuangzi, there is not even a living person within a radius of ten miles, either it is a living ghost or people have already taken precautions! You still keep saying that there is no strong man group training on Lijiazhuang, and you kid will take the lead in charging into battle later!"

Li Maozai swallowed a mouthful of saliva with great difficulty, and secretly regretted that he had too much to mouth, and if he found that something was wrong, he just hid to the side early, why did he go out of this way, and let Liao Dabi transfer his resentment to his head. If Li Jiazhuang had already gotten the news, then most of the Li family militia would have been lying in ambush in the village and waiting for this gang of bandits to attack. Liao Dabi didn't know how powerful the Li family militia was, Li Maozai was a Haihan arquebus that he had seen with his own eyes, and the equipment was probably better than that of the Ming official army, and the instructors who trained them were also sent from the Haihan base camp on Qiongzhou Island, and they learned all the tactics of the Haihan people, which was said to be very powerful. Don't say that this bandit with Liao Da's nose, even if the official army comes, I'm afraid it will be difficult to get a good deal.

These bandits don't even have a few bows and arrows, how can they deal with the arquebuses that kill people a hundred paces away? They still have to charge into battle against the muskets of the militia group, isn't it that they die quickly enough? Li Maozai secretly calculated the pros and cons in his heart, and silently considered how to avoid this disaster.

According to the prior agreement of several bandit forces, Liao Dabi and a bandit from Zhaoqing Mansion joined forces to attack the west side, while Lai Dingji of Shaozhou Mansion and Zhang Weichong of Huizhou Mansion were responsible for attacking the north of Zhuangzi. In addition, there was also a water bandit from Xinhui County in the south, who came from the south by boat and launched an offensive from the side of the Shawan waterway to the south of Lijiazhuang. And the only vacated Lijiazhuang is not far to the east of the Pearl River, even if the people of Lijiazhuang escape outside, they can't escape too far. Being able to unite multiple forces in this offensive and use this tactic of encircling three and one, Liao Dabi believes that he has reached the peak of his personal battle history