After all, the speed of the movement of the army is much slower than that of the fast horse messenger.

Therefore, after hearing the news that Lin Yangcheng had joined the Kou, as long as the Shen Shuren could immediately judge that this thief was only here to contain his own forces and would not be the main direction of attack, and then immediately make a response and deployment, it would definitely be too late.

The day I got the news, it was April 13. Considering that the absolute speed of the anti-epidemic ship was not as good as that of horseback, the Shenshu people chose to take dozens of personal guards and ride horses along the river. At night, when people are sleepy and tired, they take a boat relay and sleep on the boat.

After such a day and night journey, he had already rushed back to Huanggang County, more than 200 miles away, in the evening of the next day.

Shen Shuren urgently instructed Zuo Zixiong, gave him a night to straighten out his men and get ready, and set off the next day, sailing against the current and rushing to Xiaogan County in Suizhou. Some other generals are also entourage.

And the 2,000 people in the garrison battalion that Shen Lian practiced were also transferred to the direction of Huangmei County at the same time, and they were blocked and cultivated with Zheng Chenggong.

After Zuo Zixiong learned the news that He Jin might enter Kou Xiaogan County, he was also a little anxious along the way, and wanted to urge the troops to march forcibly several times.

There is also a distance of nearly 200 miles from Huanggang to Xiaogan, and if the normal land march has to take four days, it will take more than two days if the army is forced to march or take the water route.

In ancient times, the infantry carried a baggage, and it was qualified to walk fifty miles a day (if it was a yellow robe and the kind of person who did not work, he would only walk forty miles, and if he was less, his acting skills would be too fake, and Chen Qiaoyi would be forty miles to Kaifeng), and he could walk nearly a hundred miles without a heavy burden.

At this time, on the contrary, Shen Shuren was more determined, so that Zuo Zixiong didn't have to worry too much, he must have time:

"He Jin won't come too soon, he will definitely have to delay a few more days after Lin Yangcheng joins the Kou, and then he will make a move on Suizhou's side, so that he can give us time to divide our troops to the east."

Otherwise, I haven't divided my troops yet, and as soon as he comes, he will collide with my main force, and the two sides will directly clash, wouldn't Lin Chengcheng pick up a good opportunity to take advantage of the emptiness behind me?

Between the camps of the thieves, for who picks peaches and who fights a tough battle, it is also very fat and thin, even more powerful than the official army - the official army lost the battle, except for the family Ding, the rest of the losses are still the troops of the imperial court, and you can sell Ye Tian without distress. Every soldier of the thief is his own. ”

Shen Shuren's words were analyzed incisively, which immediately reassured Zuo Zixiong, and Yan Yingyuan and others who accompanied him were also impressed, and sighed that Lord Daotai's mentality of the thief was really accurate. Everyone's morale and confidence have also risen a little bit.

Shen Shuren was secretly proud in his heart: the generals of the official army and the king of thieves, these two treat the capital generously, which is basically equivalent to the difference between the executives of state-owned enterprises and the bosses of private enterprises in later generations.

……

On the evening of 16 April, the Ming army, which had walked for three full days, successfully arrived in Xiaogan County, and the morale and physical strength of the troops were also well maintained.

When arriving at the county seat, Zhang Mingzhen, who had been stationed here before, got the news in advance, and naturally led the army out of the city to greet him, and greeted him until the mouth of the Lishui River - Xiaogan is located along the Lishui River, and after leaving the county seat, he walked down the river for twenty miles, and he could reach the estuary where the Lishui River joins the Han River.

In the Dabie Mountains, many county towns are distributed in this way, and the small rivers flowing out of the Dabie Mountains support a relatively fertile river valley farming area, forming the county seat.

It is impossible for the enemy to come to the upper reaches of the river, because the river will be cut off after walking more than 100 miles upstream, and further north is the lofty mountains. Even if you go over the mountain, you can't bring any weapons, equipment and materials, and it is impossible to attack the city, as long as the city gate is closed and held for a period of time, the enemy will starve to death by himself.

Therefore, the main threat to Xiaogan still comes from the shores of the Han River.

The enemy wants to flow through these two counties from Suizhou County, Anlu County and other places that are still occupied by the enemy? Water March, Arrival? After the water flows into the estuary of the Han River, it marches along the Han River to the mouth of the Lishui River, and attacks Xiaogan along the water against the river.

Zhang Mingzhen is also well aware of this situation, so he only left a few hundred elite soldiers to guard Xiaogan County, and then organized the people to strengthen patrols in the near future, ready to assist in defending the city at any time. And the main army can be transferred out, and go out to the mouth of the Lishui River to join the soldiers.

"Is there any news of the He Jin Thief Army?" After Shen Shuren met him, he simply washed his face and hurriedly asked about the military situation.

Zhang Mingzhen got the opportunity to perform for the first time, and he seemed to be quite well prepared, and immediately reported in detail:

"Lord Daotai, sure enough, during the day today, I found out that there was a thief ship appearing? On the surface of the Han River at the mouth of the water river. The boats are very small, should they be from? Swim in the water, come ashore when you get here, are you still there? Encamped at the mouth of the water river.

It seems that he is ready to march steadily and by land for the last time. The last general thought that it must have been the adult's killing of Liu Xiyao last year, which made them realize that the adult's sailor warship was powerful, so they didn't dare to march by water to save effort. ”

Shen Shuren nodded: "Yes, he is worthy of being a cadre who has dealt with Haikou for many years, and his scheduling is very thorough." How many enemy forces have been detected? ”

This question is a little embarrassing, and Zhang Mingzhen can't investigate deeply, so he can only reply with rough information from a distance:

"Yudaotai, at that time, the scout took a rough look at the scale of the new camp set up by the thief army, and it was divided into five or six villages, and a total of thirty or forty thousand people could be stationed, but the last general didn't know if it was a bluff.

According to the previous understanding of the enemy's situation, the total number of the fifth battalion of the left is about 100,000, of which only 30,000 are under the command of He Jin, and there are many old and weak, and the number of elite soldiers does not exceed 7 or 8,000. It is really incomprehensible that such a large battalion has been set up all of a sudden.

Therefore, before the adults came, the last general told the soldiers about this, telling them that this was the enemy's bluff to stabilize the morale of the army, and the morale was still quite high, and no one doubted it. ”

"There is a camp that can accommodate 30,000 or 40,000 people?" Shen Shuren was also quite surprised when he heard this latest information.

Bluffing is common, but bluffing so fake it seems too unusual.

He pondered for a moment and sighed: "The art of war is false, and the truth is false, it shouldn't be as simple as bluffing, there must be something else hidden." Let's just be careful tonight, and tomorrow we will send troops to explore the truth. ”

……

In addition to leaving 2,000 people in the eastern part of Huangzhou to guard against Lin Yang, the Shenshu people also left a few hundred people in each of the other important points to guard the city or monitor the dangerous trails that crossed the Dabie Mountain, adding up to about 1,000 people.

Therefore, on the side of the Xiaogan battalion, at best, it will gather 5,000 troops.

If you want to increase the number of people, you need to pull more strong men, or further adapt the old and weak thieves who were assigned to Tuntian after the captives returned. None of this can be solved overnight.

Huangzhou Prefecture has a total population of more than 200,000 and 8,000 regular army soldiers, which is already quite tight.

After all, according to this ratio, less than 30 people raise a soldier, and 100 million people in the Ming Dynasty cannot raise an army of more than 3 million. At the peak of the Ming Dynasty, it could barely afford to raise two million military males, and not all of them were regular soldiers.

In the early morning of this day, Shen Shuren planned to send his own cavalry troops, led by Zuo Zixiong, to the upper reaches? Carefully probe in the direction of the mouth of the water.

There are not many cavalry of the Shenshu people, there are no horses in the south, and the imperial court has not given the Shenshu people war horses before, so before the fight against Liu Xiyao last year, there were only two or three hundred people on horseback, and some of them were officers.

After destroying Liu Xiyao, he finally collected hundreds of uninjured war horses, so that Shen Shuren could make up a cavalry force of 500 people while satisfying all the officers above the general level to ride horses.

Unexpectedly, the enemy army also thought of him. Not long after the 500 cavalry of the Shenshu people went out on patrol, the army of thieves also left the camp and marched southward.

The two places were only forty or fifty miles apart, and they would soon meet each other when they walked in the opposite direction. Fortunately, the generals of the Ming army under Shen Shuren were all looking forward to the telescope, and they climbed high and looked at it from a distance of nearly twenty miles.

The number of enemy troops under black pressure cannot be faked, and I am afraid that there are really tens of thousands of people. After seeing this truth, everyone changed color a little.

"Go back to camp first! Adhere! "Shen Shuren is not stupid, the hero does not suffer immediate losses, he flashed immediately after the reconnaissance, Zuo Zixiong protected him closely, and the horse never left him.

After a while, the thief army also discovered the Ming army who was out of the camp to provoke, and immediately divided the cavalry troops to chase after it, but fortunately, the Ming army began to turn the horse's head more than ten miles in advance, and it could not catch up with the camp when it returned to the camp.

The vanguard of the thief horse team did not know whether to live or die, and when they saw that the Ming army was embarrassed, they wanted to take advantage of the situation to cover up and follow into the camp.

Fortunately, Zhang Mingzhen, who stayed behind, has been guarding the camp and has strict military discipline, and when he saw the smoke and dust in front of him, he asked all the firecrackers to go up to the earthen wall and wooden fence, and the crossbowmen were also waiting for him.

The Shen family's firearms and military discipline drills in the past few months have shown their value at this moment, and the officers did not let them take the guns first, and after all the friendly troops entered the village safely, the enemy cavalry rushed to the front and opened fire according to the order.

After a few rounds of guns, the rogue cavalry stopped at a shallow pace, leaving dozens of corpses and immediately retreating - although there were tens of thousands of rogue thieves, the cavalry only accounted for a few thousand, and it was impossible to rely on cavalry to attack the camp, so there was no need to die in vain.

After the two sides confronted each other nervously for half an hour, the main forces of the thieves arrived one after another, waving flags, all of which were big flags with the word "He", which made people unable to understand why.

After watching for a while, the Sinking Tree Man noticed a detail. He hurriedly pulled Zuo Zixiong and Zhang Mingzhen and asked, "You see, these congratulatory flags, the colors seem to be different, some are pure white, and some are a bit of burlap earthy yellow, and these are just two colors, could it be ......"

Zhang Mingzhen listened, and he was still a little confused.

Zuo Zixiong has been in Huangzhou for a year, and he knows more about the enemy, so he immediately understood what Shen Shuren meant:

"What does Lord Daotai mean is that there may be more than just Zuojin King He Jin's people here? And the men and horses of Geli Yanhe Yilong stationed in Xinyang Mansion, Henan? Erga joined forces to commit crimes? ”

When these words were spoken, the faces of all the generals changed slightly, if this is the case, the disparity between the enemy and us is a bit big.

The enemy on the other side really didn't leave much time for the Shenshu people to reflect. After a while, among the thousands of troops on the opposite side, the waves cracked and gave way to two lanes, and the two mighty and powerful generals dressed in big clothes came out of the crowd, more than a mile away from the Ming army camp, and let the scolding fighters come out to spread the word.

"Ge Li Eye, Zuo Jin Wang has joined forces with 100,000 troops to this point! The dog officer surrendered quickly, but he couldn't die! The soldiers on the other side, don't give your life to Chongzhen's dumb dog officer! ”

When Shen Shuren heard this, he finally paid attention to it in his heart, and he was also a little unwilling: Why don't you play cards according to the routine? Shouldn't you give me some more time to level up monsters, and then you guys will come up in batches and send them one by one? How did they suddenly join forces together! There is also the cultivation of Lin who is restrained in the rear! It's equivalent to three together!

What are the Ming armies in other directions doing? How can we carry so many enemies in Huangzhou?