Liu Xiyao was awarded the head, and after the recovery of Huanggang County.

Shen Shuren spent more than half a month, stop-and-go, besieged and attacked, and slowly recovered the remaining three counties in the northwest of Huangzhou, Huangpi, Huang'an, and Macheng.

The thieves and defenders in these three counties are more than 1,000 people, and most of them are strong men from Xinla, Huangzhou, and there are very few diehard old thieves in Shaanxi who have been wandering for many years, so the will to resist is not very firm.

When they heard that the king was dead, they resisted for two or three days at most and then surrendered. More than half of the time spent in this half month was spent on the march, and the days of the real war were only a few days.

Huangzhou has a rugged terrain, and all counties are located in the Dabie Mountains, along several river valleys. If it is an overland march, it will not be recovered in a month.

In this process, thanks to the Shen family's fleet scheduling ability, troops can be transported back and forth between the Yangtze River and various tributaries, and the progress is so smooth.

In the remote villages in the mountains far from the river, there will definitely be some scattered thieves left, who will fall directly into the grass, and the total number is estimated to be more than 2,000. has to slowly persuade and encircle and suppress, this is the task of Zhang Huangyan and Zhao Yunfan and other magistrates.

The fighting in Huangzhou continued until the end of October.

Shen Shuren finally managed to cross the border, pursued the remnants of Liu Xiyao, and chased them all the way to the territory of Suizhou Mansion next door. In early November, Xiaogan County, which borders the Huangzhou Prefecture with the state capital, was recovered.

It's really not that Shen Shuren wants to be troublesome, but that the thieves won't divide the territory strictly according to the administrative division of your Ming Dynasty.

Theoretically, the distribution of the sphere of influence of the thief king of the five camps of the left was roughly the western mountainous part of Anqing Mansion and Luzhou Mansion occupied by He Jin, the king of Zuojin, Liu Xiyao, the king of Zhengshi, occupied the Huangzhou Mansion, and Lin Yangcheng, the king of the troubled times.

But in reality, the territories of the kings were intertwined. He Jin's main forces were deployed in Suizhou, Anlu and other counties along the water, but he was too lazy to garrison Xiaogan County along the Lishui River next door, so he handed over this county to Liu Xiyao to manage.

The prefectures and counties in the Dabie Mountains are extremely inconvenient for transportation, and the counties along the two seemingly parallel rivers have to rely on the Yangtze River to enter the Yangtze River first, and then enter another river and then go upstream. He Jin is still more short of sailors and ships than Liu Xiyao, and he is too lazy to ask for that kind of lonely enclave.

When Shen Shuren crossed the line, his henchmen didn't think there was a problem. However, Zhao Yunfan and Zuo Zixiong still kindly and tactfully reminded him and persuaded him to pay attention to the laws of the court to avoid being impeached for crossing the border to kill thieves.

Shen Shuren still has the attitude of taking care of everything, saying that he will bear all the consequences, as long as he rescues the people as soon as possible and takes precautions.

……

The words are divided into two ends.

October 25, that is, the sixth day after the recovery of Huanggang County and the day after the recovery of Macheng County. Shen Shuren's report documents were finally sent to Xiangyang.

Early in the morning of this day, in the official residence of the governors of the six provinces in Xiangyang City, Yang Sichang, a 53-year-old pavilion elder, dragged his tired and sick body and began to deal with military and government affairs from three o'clock as usual.

Since he was appointed more than a year ago, Yang Sichang's health has deteriorated a lot, insomnia has become more and more serious, and relying on diet to recuperate and supplement has not been effective.

Every day, if you see a glimmer of light, you will wake up, and it is impossible to fall asleep after sunrise.

He could get up early, but it was impossible for other civil and military officials in Xiangyang City to get up so early. In the silence of the early morning, Yang Sichang had no choice but to look through the military documents of the previous days and ponder the layout on the map alone.

"It seems that this autumn has passed, as long as the autumn harvest is not expanded by thieves from all walks of life and robbed of food, then this year's results of the thieves can be consolidated, I hope God bless the Ming ......"

Yang Sichang looked at the battle reports from all sides, and was generally satisfied with the situation so far - at least only looking at the war situation in the three provinces of Hubei, Henan and Anhui, not looking at the entire Ming Dynasty, the situation is indeed improving.

In the Huguang Theater, there are now a total of five forces, and under his dispatch, each of them is advancing and compressing the territory of the thieves.

In the Jingzhou Mansion on the southwest side, there is Fang Kongzhi, the governor of Huguang, stationed in Yiling, relying on the main road into Sichuan, preventing the thieves from spreading into Sichuan.

At the same time, it also forced Zhang Xianzhong's main force to retreat to the north of Jingmen and Dangyang, that is, to the Jingshan Mountains.

This range is roughly equivalent to the vast mountainous area between Jingmen and Shiyan in later generations, including the eastern part of Shennongjia.

Zuo Liangyu, who was stationed in Wuchang in the south, did not contribute to the work for more than half a year, relying on the Yangtze River and the Han River, but it was impossible for the thieves to go south into the Dongting Lake Plain. But Zuo Liangyu is also preserving his strength, and his old boss, the former Shangshu Hou of the Ministry of Households, is not out of prison, so he is too lazy to really work for the emperor.

The Dabie Mountains in the southeast are the least important direction of Yang Sichang's encirclement network, where only a chess player to be tested, Huangzhou Tongzhi Shen Shuren.

Yang Sichang originally didn't expect Shen Shuren to make contributions soon, he just thought that this junior was a little talented, but he needed to work hard and polish it, so he left it there to observe for a while.

Shen Shuren's troops are insufficient, and resources are also lacking, so it would be good to be able to keep the current territory. As for Liu Xiyao and Lin Chengcheng, even if there was no attack by Shen Shuren, Yang Sichang could count on Shi Kefa, the governor of Anlu, to suppress the fifth battalion of Gezuo in the Dabie Mountains and prevent them from entering the plains to wander and plunder.

The difference here is only in whose hands those poor and remote areas in the Dabie Mountains are, and it is impossible for thieves to come out of the mountains.

After the inventory of the southern half of the encirclement net, the rest is the northern one. Xiangyang, in the middle of the north, has Yang Sichang personally in charge, so there is nothing to say.

In the northwest, there is Yuan Jixian, the commander of the Huguang army, who compressed Luo Rucai in Yunyang, and two thieves in the four battalions of Junzhou who were attached to Luo Rucai.

Luo Rucai was basically compressed and retreated to the Danjiangkou and Wudang Mountains in Shiyan in later generations, and he was also unable to gain a firm foothold in the plains.

On the Hubei-Henan border in the northeast, the Henan side is garrisoned by Liu Guoneng, a general who is a thief.

Liu Guoneng's defense area blocked the Fangcheng Pass between Tongbai Mountain and Funiu Mountain, and also blocked the Xinyang Road that crossed Tongbai Mountain from Suizhou Mansion, so it prevented the possibility of Ma Shouying and He Jin of the Fifth Battalion of Gezuo from entering Henan respectively.

In this way, after Yang Sichang's one-year layout, the existence of thieves in the rich areas of the plains has been greatly compressed.

Zhang Xianzhong hid in Shennongjia;

Luo Rucai hid in Wudang Mountain;

Ma Shou should hide in Funiu Mountain;

Ge Li Yan and He Jin hid in Tongbai Mountain;

Liu Xiyao and Lin Chengcheng hid in Yinghuo Mountain;

(Note: Tongbai Mountain, Yingshan Mountain and Huo Mountain together form Dabie Mountain.) Dabie Mountain is bifurcated in a "Y" shape, and the three sides constitute the junction of Hubei, Henan and Anhui provinces. These three sides were taken out separately and were called Tongbai Mountain, Huo Mountain, and Yingshan in ancient times)

As for Li Zicheng, he is still fooling around in the Shangluo Mountains further northwest, between the Nanyang Basin and the Guanzhong Basin.

If off-board factors are not taken into account, the banishment of the thieves still looks promising.

It's a pity that Yang Sichang has lived too long, and he has seen countless "off-market factors" over the years that are always just right to disrupt the situation.

So this time he also had a bad premonition, and he didn't dare to expect "accidents don't happen".

This off-board factor is the Qing army that Yang Sichang has been worried about - the last time the official army forced all kinds of thieves to a dead end and forced them to land, the Qing army appeared and destroyed Lu Xiangsheng's department, which led to the instant destruction of the strength advantage of the official army over the thieves, which led to the recovery of these thieves.

Before he went south this time, he persuaded the emperor to endure the humiliation first, negotiate peace with the Qing army, drag Huang Taiji with the snake, and concentrate on freeing up his hands to completely solve the thieves, and then consider the Qing army.

It's a pity that the matter of negotiating peace was blocked by the rumor-clearing official Huang Daozhou, who carried a lot of moral hats of "no peace can be negotiated before recovering the lost territory of Liaodong", so that Chongzhen did not dare to negotiate peace.

Yang Sichang vaguely felt that although Huang Taiji did not immediately attack Daming with all his strength at that time, it was difficult to say whether Huang Taiji would save these teammates who echoed each other when the thieves were beaten to death.

I hope not.

"Alas, if Huang Taiji really comes, I don't know how much loss there will be this time. I folded Lu Xiangsheng last time, is it going to fold Hong Chengchou this time? Well, that's not something we can decide.

Let's think about how to speed up the elimination of the enemy in front of us. If I start a day fast on my side, the risk of being forced by Huang Taiji to fight on two fronts in the future will be one point smaller. ”

Yang Sichang drove those lingering thoughts out of his mind, and then picked up his pen, preparing to write some year-end evaluations for the five besieging generals under his command, and verify everyone's merits and demerits.

It's almost the end of the year, and although the war has not yet been finalized, it is better to report to the emperor about everyone's military achievements.

With a stroke of his pen, Yang Sichang first ranked Yuan Jixian and Fang Kongzhi in the forefront, then Liu Guoneng and Shen Shuren in the middle, and finally Zuo Liangyu at the end.

In addition, he did not forget to mention Shi Kefa, the governor of Anlu, saying that Shi Kefa provided rear support for Shen Shuren and Liu Guoneng and formed a second line of defense. Without Shi Kefa's backing, once Shen Shuren or Liu Guoneng collapsed, the thieves might go east and threaten Nanzhili.

As soon as I finished writing this, a cronie suddenly came in at the door and reported: "Elder Ge, Huangzhou is urgent!" It was the military intelligence sent by Shen Shuren, the same acquaintance of Huangzhou! also sent a head with a letter, saying that it was the 'King of the World' Liu Xiyao! ”

"What? Is this true? How could Shen Shuren have enough troops to eliminate Liu Xiyao? What's more, these thieves are so slippery, once they are unfavorable, they will escape to the mountains, how can they kill the head of the thieves? ”

Yang Sichang was so shocked that the ink-stained brushes fell on the draft, polluting a large area.

But in the next second, the master waved his hand back excitedly, and several personal soldiers came in carrying a wooden box containing human heads. Yang Sichang opened the wooden box with a slight tremor and took a look, and his hands immediately stopped shaking.

He crumpled up the contaminated drafts and threw them into the garbage.

What did you just write! Of course, Shen Shuren must be mentioned on the premise!

"It's really a manufacturable material, I put him in Huangzhou, and I originally expected him to guard the place and not go wrong. This little team training can actually destroy Liu Xiyao! You help me draft a recital, that is, to discuss merit, and suggest that Your Majesty crown Shen Shuren as the prefect of Huangzhou! ”