Chapter 340

Although it is said that the main force of the Chechen Khan is still there, Zasaktu Khan is still attacking south along Lu'an Province, and the Lanzhou crisis has not been resolved, but in fact, there is not much that Cheng Shijie needs to do now.

Even if he knew that Zhao Wencai was holding Lanzhou hard and urgently needed support, the problem was that with the 20,000-Ning naval cavalry joining the war, the situation in Lanzhou did not continue to deteriorate, but changed in a good direction.

Unlike Pingdingzhou, in the process of advancing eastward, the Junggar Department slaughtered almost all the Ming soldiers and civilians they encountered, and they could no longer catch the Ming people around, and Zhao Wencai could take advantage of the city wall to guard Lanzhou City, even if he needed support, he only needed to follow the steps.

As for the 80,000 elites of Zasaktu Khan, now that Hong Chengchou's main force has returned to help, if Hong Chengchou can't even deal with the more than 80,000 men and horses of Zasaktu Khan's department, he is not qualified to be the governor of this tripartite.

Therefore, Cheng Shijie can return to the capital now. If all the Mongol army is annihilated, by that time, the gang in the capital will definitely receive the news, and they will destroy the evidence.

Lu Xiangsheng didn't feel that there was anything wrong with Cheng Shijie doing this.

Of course, now Lu Xiangsheng is standing on the city wall, full of emotion, this trip is not in vain, he has witnessed the end of an era.

Yes, the time of the nomads is over, they don't have any chances left.

Even if the Ning Navy only dispatched a few hundred people, that is, a few hundred infantry, and fired hundreds of rockets and shells at tens of thousands of Mongolian troops, the attacking Mongolian army was not only repulsed, but also collapsed. In the face of the rocket artillery and muskets of the Ning Navy, the Mongol army did not have the slightest strength to fight back.

In particular, the rocket artillery of the Ning Navy, a few of them killed or injured more than a dozen people, and if they were lucky, they could kill dozens of people.

However, Lei Shisheng, who was responsible for leading the Tianxiong Army to the expedition, was not in the mood to sigh, the Tianxiong Army was much poorer than Ning Haijun, and it was the first time he saw so many cavalry and so many horses, Lei Shisheng was like a hungry tiger who finally broke free from the cage, rushing to the front, the saber picked up and fell like lightning, bringing up a rain of blood, and it didn't take long to kill a bloody man.

Watching those Mongolian soldiers fall under his sword one after another, Lei Shisheng's heart was full of happiness, and the saber was as bright as a wheel, and the knife saw blood.

Lu Xiangsheng looked at the rocket artillery of the Ning Navy, just like a forty-year bachelor seeing a huge beauty, his eyes were green, he stepped forward and stroked the launch tube of the rocket artillery, and said with a smile: "Cheng Shuai, your cannon is really good, how about selling it to Lu?" ”

"Can you afford to sell it to you?"

This is not that Cheng Shijie is panicking, the cost of rocket artillery is not cheap at all, and now the fire dragon of the Ning Navy has produced three models, although the manufacturing technology is becoming more and more mature, but the range is getting farther and farther, the power is getting bigger and bigger, and the cost is getting higher and higher.

As far as a single four-pack fire dragon is concerned, it is as much as two hundred and eighty taels of silver, and on average, the cost of each rocket shell is as high as more than seventy taels of silver, which is equivalent to the cost of five or six lead bullets.

"How much?"

"Three hundred taels of silver!"

Lu Xiangsheng supported Pingding Prefecture at all costs this time, their original few war horses actually ran to death more than 2,000 horses, if Cheng Shijie made Lu Xiangsheng's money in this direction, it would be a bit unkind.

"It's only three hundred taels?"

Lu Xiangsheng really thought that rocket artillery was more expensive than the Hongyi cannon, and a Hongyi cannon cost more than 1,000 taels to 2,500 taels of silver, but he didn't expect the rocket artillery shells to be so cheap.

"It's only three hundred taels?"

Cheng Shijie said with a smile: "Lord Lu is really wealthy, and he only has three hundred taels of silver, just these few rounds of salvos, I have fired more than 1,000 rockets, which is equivalent to 80,000 or 90,000 taels of silver......"

"So expensive?"

Only then did Lu Xiangsheng realize the difference between ordinary artillery and rocket artillery, although the artillery arrows were light and powerful, they were too expensive compared to the Hongyi cannon or the Franc machine artillery.

However, there is a reason why it is expensive, if the Tianxiong Army has such an artillery, whether it is to deal with the Liukou or to fight the Jiannu in the future, it is simply not too easy to use.

"Cheng Shuai, how about Lu plan to buy two hundred?"

"Two hundred is too little, just eight hundred rocket artillery can't fight two battles and it will be gone, and it's not easy to replenish, at least five hundred!"

Lu Xiangsheng smiled bitterly: "The Tianxiong Army doesn't have so much money!" ”

"If you don't have money, isn't the Tianxiong Army ......?"

Without waiting for Cheng Shijie to finish speaking, Lu Xiangsheng thought that Cheng Shijie had taken a fancy to these war horses, he shook his head and said: "No, this time our Tianxiong Army has scrapped more than 2,000 war horses, and now we urgently need these war horses to replenish, not to mention, these war horses are all high-quality war horses, not the kind of Mongolian horses that are not much bigger than donkeys!" ”

Does Cheng Shijie have a demand for these war horses in Mobei Mongolia? There must be a demand, but it is definitely not as urgent as the Tianxiong Army, in fact, in addition to the Mongolian war horses, the Ning Navy can also obtain high-quality war horses from Europe by sea!

"Cut, Lord Lu, who do you look down on, I don't look down on these war horses!"

At this time, Lu Xiangsheng also found that the war horse of the Ning Navy was different from the war horse of their Tianxiong Army, nor was it like the Hequ horse, nor like the Ilima, this kind of war horse he had never seen, the white war horse that Lu Xiangsheng crossed had the bloodline of the West Pole horse, and it could also be said to have the bloodline of the high-quality war horse in Central Asia, however, compared with the war horse of Cheng Shijie's department, it was not a little bit worse.

The Ninghai horse is tall, strong, has good endurance, strong explosiveness, and is durable and durable.

Lu Xiangsheng said: "Cheng Shuai, your war horse is good, can you sell me some?" ”

"Yes, all the equipment of the Ning Navy, artillery, muskets, and combat knives, you can see it, I can sell it to you, the key is, do you have money?"

"Money!"

At the mention of this money, Lu Xiangsheng smiled bitterly in addition to a wry smile.

Emperor Chongzhen gave him the land of Sanfu to raise grain and grass, and also used the money from the inner treasury to issue military expenses to the Tianxiong army, in all fairness, although the military expenses he got were not as good as the Guanning army, but they were much stronger than the Ning Navy. It's just that these military expenses are used to purchase weapons and equipment in the Tianxiong Army, among which the most expensive asset of the Tianxiong Army is more than 7,000 war horses, and the purchase of these war horses alone is as much as two or three hundred thousand taels of silver.

Lu Xiangsheng said to the soldiers of the Tianxiong Army beside him: "Try to collect the scattered war horses as much as possible, and you can't let any of them go!" ”

Lu Xiangsheng has a soft spot for cavalry, but he can't get enough excellent war horses, so it is difficult to get his wish, and he has bought more than 7,000 war horses before and after, which has emptied his family.

Now the Chechen Khan has all fled, and there are many casualties in the melee, but no matter how you say it, there are still seven or eight thousand horses that are intact, but they have just run away, and these war horses are enough for him to form a considerable cavalry force.

In his eyes, none of the most precious trophies on these war horses would be let go, and Lu Xiangsheng personally led people to collect them.

Cheng Shijie and the officers of the Ning Navy acquiesced to their behavior, after all, if there was no rapid support from the cavalry of the Tianxiong Army, Cheng Shijie would not have been able to hold out until the reinforcements arrived. The Tianxiong Army not only ran away with more than 2,000 war horses on the road, but also calculated the death force on the battlefield, so let them share a part of the spoils, which should be.

Cheng Shijie didn't care about cleaning the battlefield, because everyone in the Ning Navy was already an iron broom, and they were very experienced in cleaning the battlefield, not to mention the blades and armor of the Chechen Khan, they couldn't look down on it, the Ning Navy had better equipment, and the officers and men of the Tianxiong Army were busy grabbing horses and collecting the blades on the ground, however, the soldiers of the Ning Navy were touching the corpses.

When he saw the corpses of Mongol soldiers who had not yet been searched, he dug into his pockets and smiled at every ingot of silver or gold that he took out of his pocket.

Li Dingguo walked over: "General Xiao Yang, we have found a lot of good things from the Tartar camp!" ”

Cheng Shijie smiled faintly: "What good things have you found?" ”

"There is a lot of food, grass and weapons, and ......"

Li Dingguo's eyes flickered, and he threw Cheng Shijie a "you know" look.

Cheng Shijie was happy: "Good, good, good job!" ”

Although Li Dingguo is not very old, he is already a veteran of the battlefield, and the timing is too accurate, taking advantage of the opportunity of the Tianxiong Army to pursue the main force of the Chechen Khan, Lu Xiangsheng is catching horses, and Li Dingguo sent troops to seize the temporary base camp of Shuoli.

The Chechen Khan and the Zasaktu Khan divided the city of Taiyuan equally, and robbed a lot of gold and silver treasures in the city of Taiyuan.

Cheng Shijie walked down the city wall and came to the battlefield outside the city, what he saw was a group of Mongolian soldiers kneeling on the ground, looking sluggish, these Mongolian soldiers were very afraid, the kind of rocket artillery of the Ming army had beaten them out of their bodies, even if there were thousands of people, there were only dozens of Ming soldiers guarding them, but they did not dare to resist, let alone escape.

When Lu Xiangsheng saw Lei Shisheng coming back, he asked, "Did you catch Shuo Lei?" ”

"No, this thief old boy is running too fast to catch up at all!"

Lei Shisheng said very excitedly: "The last general has beheaded at least five or six thousand levels, and more than six thousand war horses have been captured, and the cavalry of our Tianxiong Army can be expanded!" ”

Lu Xiangsheng was also very happy, his harvest was no less than Lei Shisheng, he grabbed more than 8,000 war horses, adding up to more than 15,000 horses, even if it was divided into half of Ning Haijun, it would be a big profit.

Cheng Shijie said: "Lord Lu, we have occupied the Mongolian camp, our army has cleared out the remnants of the enemy in the Tartar camp, and has captured a lot, I wonder if Lord Lu is interested in going over to see it together?" ”

Lu Xiangsheng said: "Then go over and have a look." ”

In this battle, his troops suffered nearly 1,000 casualties, and the casualties were so large that they had to make some substantial compensation, and there should be a lot of grain, weapons, armor and other things in the Mongolian camp, which were just used to equip their own troops.

Cheng Shijie was also not polite, let Li Dingguo lead the way, and the group hurried to the Mongolian camp.

There were hundreds of corpses lying in the Mongolian camp, apparently after a fierce battle, the Mongolian soldiers who stayed in the camp had been slaughtered, and all the things they had looted became the spoils of the Ming army.

Ning Haijun's ability to collect war spoils is not small, and he has already cleaned up the trophies, a stone of grain, bundles of arrows, a pair of heavy armor, and extremely sharp sabers and heavy swords, which are placed in piles and piles of them.

The quartermaster beside Li Dingguo took the report like a turnover in the account book: "A total of more than 3,900 war horses, 10,072 cowhides, 4,320 pairs of leather armor, more than 5,800 pairs of iron armor, more than 60,000 sharp arrows, more than 16,000 sabers, 2,000 heavy swords, more than 10,000 spears, 43,000 stones of grain, 155,000 taels of silver, iron bones, throwing axes and other ......"

Lu Xiangsheng was overjoyed, punched in his palm, and smiled: "Great, with this batch of weapons and food, our army's combat strength has increased a lot!" ”

"Yes, it's all good things, don't say anything else, let's just say that this cowhide, it can be made into leather armor, the protection is good, and it's lightweight, but it's a ......pity that it's a little less."

Cheng Shijie rolled his eyes and pointed to the cowhide tent: "Ha, I almost forgot, these tents are made of cowhide!" Peel them all off and make leather armor! ”

"It's already picked, how can you let go of such a good thing."

Lu Xiangsheng's smile was even thicker, and his eyes were glued to those weapons and armor and couldn't move away.

Cheng Shijie squatted down, took out a silver ingot from the box, and said: "What a beautiful snowflake silver, dog's day tartar, our good things have been robbed of all by them!" ”

Cheng Shijie put the silver back and asked Lu Xiangsheng: "Lord Lu, how do you divide this silver?" How about a five-five opening? ”

Lu Xiangsheng was stunned, glanced at the box of white silver, as well as a large pile of copper coins and silverware, his expression was flat, and he didn't seem to be very interested.

Lu Xiangsheng was born in Jiangnan, Jiangnan is the richest place in the entire Ming Dynasty, his family is good, he is not short of money, and his immunity to silver is relatively strong.

Lu Xiangsheng pondered for a moment: "Cheng Shuai, Lu has a reluctant request, I don't know if Cheng Shuai can agree?" ”

"Lord Lu, please speak."

Lu Xiangsheng pointed to those weapons and armor, and said: "The silver and property all belong to Cheng Shuai, and half of the war horses are given to Cheng Shuai, and these weapons and armor belong to us, how about it?" ”

Cheng Shijie said: "How can this be done! ”

Lu Xiangsheng said sincerely: "I also know that this is not fair, like these exquisite weapons and armor, you can't buy them with money, but we still have to encircle and suppress the Liukou, and we will inevitably have to fight with the Tartars, our equipment is inferior, so the Tianxiong Army needs these weapons and armor and strong bows and arrows, so Cheng Shuai will suffer a little loss." I also asked Cheng Shuai to fulfill Lu's heart to serve the country. ”

Cheng Shijie was stunned again, he originally wanted to say that you don't take a penny, and it would be too much of a loss to take these weapons and armor, but he didn't expect Lu Xiangsheng to be completely wrong, and thought he wouldn't.

Cheng Shijie arched his hand and said, "Lord Lu's loyalty is admirable, and these weapons and armor are also a waste in my hands, so they should naturally be given to Lord Lu." It's just Lord Lu, after you fought a battle, there were many dead and wounded, don't you take a little silver as a compensatory service? ”

Lu Xiangsheng felt that it made sense, so he said, "That...... Then ask Cheng Shuai to give me a little more silver as a pension for the disabled soldiers. ”

After speaking, Lu Xiangsheng's white face turned a little red, probably thinking that it was a bit too much to take equipment and money again.

In fact, relatively speaking, Cheng Shijie is really not short of money now, not to mention, he is also disgraceful, although I don't know how much silver Li Dingguo has hidden, but it will definitely not be less, the figure reported by the quartermaster of the Ning Navy should have a lot of moisture. In addition to these silver, Cheng Shijie also detained the belongings of Wu Fu, the governor, Xie Zhiliang also copied the home of the prefect of Pingding Prefecture, as well as the escaped gentry, and got 60,000 or 70,000 taels of silver, if you count Wu Fu's belongings, Cheng Shijie only in Pingding Prefecture, harvested no less than 600,000 taels of silver.

Not counting the soldiers killed, only the loss and consumption of weapons and equipment, Cheng Shijie actually did not lose money.

Cheng Shijie said: "Lord Lu, Cheng thinks that we should divide it like this, the more than 155,000 taels of silver, Cheng takes 105,000 taels of silver, and Lord Lu takes the 50,000 taels of silver to compensate the casualties of the Tianxiong Army, as for all the blades and armor, all the iron armor, bows and arrows, spears, knives and other equipment, all to the Tianxiong Army." Cowhide and cowhide armor, Cheng is not welcome. ”

Lu Xiangsheng shook his head and said, "How can this work?" ”

Cheng Shijie pointed to the rifleman beside him and said: "The musket equipped by our Ning Navy has a long range, if it weren't for the fact that the supply did not keep up this time, the Tartars would not have had a chance to fight with our Ning Navy in close combat, so in the future, our Ning Navy will gradually eliminate the iron armor and replace it with a cowhide armor with slightly inferior defensive capabilities!" ”

Lu Xiangsheng also took a step back, dividing the war horses equally, Cheng Shijie also knew his own affairs, he really did not lack these thousands of war horses, after Liaoyang opened the mutual market, in less than a month, Jiannu sold more than 40,000 war horses to Ning Haijun.

What Cheng Shijie lacks is not war horses, but people, soldiers who are good at riding horses.

In this way, everyone takes what they need, and everyone is happy.

After Lu Xiangsheng left, Cheng Shijie called Li Dingguo and whispered to his ear, "How much silver have you hidden?" ”

"Time is pressing, and I really don't have time to hide too much, so it's just more than 7,000 taels of gold, and 60 boxes of silver, and each box is only 3,000 taels."

"I'm grass!"

Cheng Shijie opened his eyes: "How did you transport the silver away in such a short period of time?" ”

"I didn't get it away!"

Li Dingguo kicked open a piece of cowhide, and the leather under the cowhide was densely packed with large boxes.

"You're the real six......"

……

On the other side, Shuo Lei retreated with the remnants of the Chechen Khan in the direction of Kuku and Tun, and he also understood that the reinforcements of the Ming army arrived one after another, and if they continued to fight, they would definitely suffer more losses, this time they went south, and they had lost forty or fifty thousand young men, so to speak, the Chechen Khan had been greatly injured.

After three days and three nights of escaping, Shuo Lei looked at Kuku and Tuncheng in the distance, and finally could take a breath, of course, just to take a breath.

At this time, before Shuo Lei had time to count the losses, he saw the ground shake slightly, and the thunderous sound of horses' hooves sounded, shaking everyone's heartstrings.

Shuo Lei looked back in shock, only to see a torrent of cavalry rapidly pushing over from a distance, the battle flag, the battle robe, fiercely branded on the hearts of all the Mongolian soldiers, making them tremble.

"Jiannu Eight Banners, why are they here?"

No one answered Shuolei's question, because Huang Taiji almost with Cheng Shijie front and back, when Cheng Shijie arrived in Pingdingzhou, Huang Taiji also occupied Kuku and Tun, when he sent a sentry to the south, to investigate the movements of the Chechen Khan and Zasaktu Khan, after learning that the three tribes of Mobei Mongolia, of which the Tushetu Khan was annihilated by Cheng Shijie in Miyun, almost the entire clan was lost, and more than 16,000 survivors, the old, weak, sick and disabled, took refuge in the Dajin Kingdom.

Then, the Chechen Khan was storming the city of Pingdingzhou defended by Cheng Shijie, however, Shuo Lei was too wasteful, and it was more than ten times the advantage, but it couldn't gnaw on the small Pingdingzhou.

At that time, Duoduo and Dolgon, including Dai Shan, suggested to Huang Taiji that they should lead the elite of the Jiannu Eight Banners to the south, and now that the Hutuo River has been frozen, they can follow the Hutuo River all the way directly to Yuxian in the north of Pingding Prefecture, which is only fifty kilometers away from Pingding Prefecture, that is, one hundred miles, and a surprise attack can reach the north of Pingding Prefecture.

This proposal Huang Taiji was very tempted, however, the problem was that Huang Taiji was also frightened by the rocket artillery of the Ning Navy, according to Jiannu's reconnaissance, there were no less than 100 Ning Navy artillery in Pingding Prefecture, and Jiannu, who had already seen the power of Ning Navy's artillery, began to shake in his heart.

It wasn't until Shuo Lei bombarded Pingding Prefecture with the captured artillery of Taiyuan Mansion that Huang Taiji realized that Cheng Shijie didn't carry many shells, and his shells ran out. Huang Taiji decided to go south, cooperate with the Mongolian army, and kill Cheng Shijie, however, before he had time to start the operation, he received information that in the direction of Datong Town, Shen Mingyu had sent reinforcements to Pingding Prefecture.

In this case, Huang Taiji naturally thought that even if Cheng Shijie couldn't hold Pingdingzhou, he would definitely retreat, even if he left a palace, Cheng Shijie wanted to run, Shuolei had no chance to catch up with Cheng Shijie, in Huang Taiji's heart, he didn't think at all that Cheng Shijie wouldn't run.

In fact, Cheng Shijie guarded until the arrival of the Tianxiong army, and as a result, a burst of rocket artillery bombardment by the Ning Navy led the troops under Shuo Lei was defeated, according to the intelligence fed back from the scene, the artillery of the Ning Navy was more powerful, in this case, the lesser of two evils, Huang Taiji decided to swallow the remnants of the Chechen Khan under the command of Shuo Lei.

Now there are three roads in front of the Mongol army of the Chechen Khan, either surrender, fight to the death, or turn south, but the problem is that the Tianxiong army or the Ning navy in the south are not soft persimmons, they would rather face the Jiannu Eight Banners than be bombed.

The Mongol soldiers looked desperately at the centurion and the thousand-year-old, but saw the same pale faces. Now they really have no way to go to heaven and no way to enter the earth, what should they do?

Jiannu Eight Banners, as well as the Mongolian left and right wing corps, one east and one west like a wall forward, in front of Huang Taiji, two yellow flag elites, as well as Han artillery, especially the artillery placed on the snow, under the sun, the black hole of the barrel, people palpitate.

After Huang Taiji's elite of the Eight Banners advanced to a distance of about a mile from the Mongol army, the large army stopped, looked at the terrified Mongol army with indifferent eyes, and waited for them to make a choice.

Is it a battle, or is it a surrender?

PS: When I wrote until about ten o'clock last night, there was a power outage, there was no update, I woke up at six o'clock in the morning this year, hurriedly coded the word, and there was still one at night. This chapter is from yesterday.

(End of chapter)