Dominate the Country

For a Jiangnan celebrity like Qin Dacheng, if he is willing to join the Fu Han Army, it will be the "success" of the Fu Han Army, and it can be used as a banner to wave and shout in front of all walks of life in the country. But it is obvious that Qin Dacheng is unwilling to be this banner. What national justice and the great hindrance of China and foreign countries are not as good as the word "profit", the profit of money and reputation. Chen Ming's initial idea of ​​"threatening Qin Dacheng with Qin Dacheng's mother and threatening his mother with Qin Dacheng" was frustrated as soon as it was implemented.

Even the information received from Qin Dacheng made Chen Ming lose interest in other literati and celebrities in Jiangnan.

The positions of the two sides are different, and they are not sitting on the same place. It is too early to expect these people to really join the army, and it is really disgusting!

"Grand Commander, Director Wei sent an urgent report." At this time, Liu Wu hurried in with a vermilion bamboo tube. Chen Ming's embarrassment was swept away, and his expression was slightly stern. Wei Xiuzhi's urgent report, he and Jiang Tianfang were dealing with the Suzhou Qing soldiers, and suddenly sent an urgent report, which was not good. If Chen Ming remembered correctly, it was Jiang Tianfang who sent the red victory report at this time yesterday.

The difference between red and vermilion is a thousand miles away. And the sender was Wei Xiuzhi, not Jiang Tianfang.

Chen Ming took out a small book from his waist, which was a reduced version of the Thousand Characters, and the order was of course disrupted. As a code book during this battle, the urgent report sent by Wei Xiuzhi was very short, with a total of 33 words: Wu's militia was broken at night, Jiang attacked Hushu in person at dawn, and was shot dead, and Wu's father was exchanged for Jiang's body. The enemy crossed Taihu Lake with 3,000 people, forced Wuxi, and retreated! But the explanation was very clear.

The team broke Wu Xiongguang's militia at night, and then Jiang Tianfang personally led his troops to attack Hushuguan, and was shot dead by the Qing soldiers with a bird gun. Wei Xiuzhi exchanged Wu Xiongguang's father for Jiang Tianfang's body. Moreover, 3,000 Qing soldiers passed through Taihu Lake, threatening Wuxi, the rear of his army, and Wei Xiuzhi had already retreated.

The situation was obviously good, but it was ruined because of Jiang Tianfang's sudden death in battle.

Otherwise, Jiang Tianfang led the Fu Han Army in Suzhou back to Wuxi, and the offensive of the Qing army was not a threat at all.

But Jiang Tianfang, as the leader of an army, died just like that, and things suddenly became tricky.

Liu Wu stood aside, quietly waiting for Chen Ming's instructions. When Chen Ming just deciphered the code, the content really scared him. Jiang Tianfang was killed in battle. This was the first battalion officer-level officer under Chen Ming who died since the Fu Han Army was established.

"Order Chen Antong to quickly take a team to Changzhou. Tell Wei Xiuzhi that if Wuxi cannot be defended, retreat to Changzhou. But Changzhou must be stabilized." The Puxi attack on the large army side has just begun, and Chen Ming does not want to withdraw his troops immediately.

Chen Antong was one of the officers he left behind in Nanjing. He was the battalion officer and director of the military law department of the Fu Han Army Military Police Battalion. Although he was usually impatient with the soldiers, it must be said that Chen Antong's "prestige" was very high in the army.

Chen Ming asked him to go to Changzhou to calm down. As long as the soldiers were not panicked, relying on the strength of the troops, it would be absolutely no problem to defend Changzhou. Although Chen Ming had just expanded his troops, after deducting Jiujiang, Anqing and Yangzhou, he still had more than 20,000 naval and land forces, but he seemed to have spare strength when he was not moving. Once he launched an offensive, facing the increasing number of Qing troops, he once again felt the trouble caused by insufficient troops in this attack.

The army in Huai'an did not dare to go to Baoying to attack Gaoyou Lake, but they could go to Yancheng. Following the ancient salt canal, they could rush all the way to Haimen Hall. Whether it was cooperating with the Guangdong naval and land reinforcements to attack Nantong Prefecture, or directly threatening Taizhou from the peninsula to the west in Fu'an Field, Huang Jie in Jiangbei felt the pressure directly. He clearly told Chen Ming that he did not have enough troops.

If the Qing army units acted alone, they would not have any impact on the Fu Han Army, but if they could have a similar cooperation, like now, the threat would double.

If Yangzhou and Zhenjiang were both under serious threat, could Chen Ming still lead the army to sweep Songjiang and Suzhou Prefecture? He could only return. If this pincer situation was not broken as soon as possible, as the Qing army arrived and gathered more and more militias, the Fu Han Army's Nanjing defense circle would be under greater pressure, and the situation would eventually reverse, with the Fu Han Army switching from offense to defense and the Qing army switching from defense to offense.

At that time, it was time for Chen Ming to leave Jiangnan.

"Let the frontline troops speed up and take Huating within five days!"

...

"Let Fu Liang fight hard and take Wuxi. Within five days, this general will march to Jingkou."

Inside Hushu Pass, Jiangning General Rong Bao shouted excitedly. Chen Ming wanted to take Huating within five days, and he wanted to march to Zhenjiang within five days, just because the Suzhou Qing army really got a big bargain. The Fu Han army retreated after a battle at Hushu Pass, leaving all the civil and military officials in Suzhou confused. It was not until Wu's father saw the portrait of the killed Jiang Tianfang that he could tell at a glance that this man was the bandit chief who wanted to skin him alive, and the Suzhou Qing army finally figured out the reason for the Fu Han army's retreat. It turned out that the bandit general that Wu Xiongguang commanded to kill with a shotgun was their leader.

Now those who were jealous of Wu Xiongguang really got jealous of him. The huge loss of the militia group is nothing. With this achievement, even if Wu Xiongguang is left alone, he is still a meritorious official of the Qing Dynasty.

Now Rong Bao also gained confidence, and many civil and military officials of the Suzhou Qing army also gained confidence. They want to besiege Wei to save Zhao, and march to Zhenjiang, which will definitely force Chen's army to abandon Songjiang and return to their home nest quickly.

This is an absolutely great achievement.

And the risk is not great. Because the whole Jiangnan knew that the main force of the Fu Han Army had gone to Songjiang, Suzhou Prefecture, that is, the area north of Yangcheng Lake, had suffered a disaster. As for the Changzhou Fu Han Army that had defeated them before, it was obviously a detachment. The Qing army was defeated because the Qing soldiers did not pay attention and were caught off guard. And now their leader was unexpectedly killed in battle. In the eyes of the military and political officials of Suzhou, this Fu Han Army has turned from a hard bone into a boneless fat meat.

…

In Suzhou City, a middle-aged man in his thirties dragged his tired body back home. This is a very simple house, the area is less than eleven of the Wang residence in Dantu, but even such a simple house, the monthly rent is as high as three taels of silver. It happened that Wang Zongquan's family encountered robbers on the way to escape. The lives of the five members of the family are still there, but their belongings have been robbed.

Wang Zongquan now writes for others on the street. His business targets are mainly those who are in the army. In the chaos of war, family letters are the most important. Wang Zongquan is not short of business, but the money he earns from writing for others is obviously not enough to support a family of five mouths and rent.

Wang Zongquan's eldest daughter and youngest son are at home with their mother. Wang's health is not very good. She was frightened during the escape. His eldest son Wang Zhizheng is an apprentice in a pharmacy in Suzhou. Because Wang Zhizheng has read books and can recognize words, he is also smart and thorough, and the landlord is a guarantor, he was lucky enough to be selected by the pharmacy last month. The two sides signed a three-year contract. There is no salary, but at least there is one mouth left for the family.

Wang Zongquan hated the Fu Han Army very much. If it weren't for the Fu Han Army, his family would still be living comfortably in Dantu. The eldest daughter's wedding date is set in July this year. Now the whole family is busy preparing a dowry for their daughter. The Wang family is a small landlord family with one or two hundred acres of land. In Jiangnan, such a family is considered a gentry.

Now, everything is over.

But slowly, Wang Zongquan no longer hated the Fu Han army. He was now more busy making money and more grateful that his family had escaped into Suzhou City early. Although Wang Zongquan had not left Suzhou in recent days, he had heard about the miserable situation of hundreds of thousands of refugees being locked up outside the city.

"Dad, sit down and rest, the soup and rice will be ready in a while."

The sixteen-year-old eldest daughter brought Wang Zongquan a bowl of water. The Wang family did not eat dry rice at night. They only had dry rice in the morning because they had to prepare food for Wang Zongquan's lunch. As the pillar of the family, Wang Zongquan had two dry meals a day. The rest of the Wang family had one dry meal and two thin meals.

"Boss, have the soldiers left the city?" Wang sat up, but did not get out of bed. The room was humid and hot, and even with all the windows and doors open, people could not feel a trace of wind. Wang, whose face was slightly pale, had clear sweat on her forehead. She was weak, but she could not stand the stuffiness.

"Dad, can the soldiers fight back to our hometown?" The seven-year-old son asked expectantly.

Wang Zongquan held the bowl in one hand and touched his son's head with the other hand, "How can it be that easy. Many soldiers have left the city. Today, I have written thirty or forty letters to my family." Each letter to my family cost three or five yuan, and Wang Zongquan's pockets were heavy with copper coins. "But if Chen Ni could be defeated so easily, they would not be able to fight to the south of the Yangtze River."

"There is too much water in Suzhou, and the water network is dense. Now it is the plum rain season. The enemy's artillery can't be dragged over, and it happened that the leader was killed by Wu Juren, so they retreated. If it were their old nest, hundreds of cannons would be lined up in a row. How many lives would it take to take it down?"

Wang Zongquan shook his head and sneered. What kind of character are the soldiers in Suzhou? Wang Zongquan, who came to Suzhou City for refuge for two or three months, knows it very well. The Green Camp here is really bad, just like his hometown. If they were so determined to take Zhenjiang at the cost of lives, they might as well take control of Wusongkou first. I heard that now there are full ships of saltpeter and sulfur being brought to Chen Ni for trading every day.

The Fu Han Army publicly purchased saltpeter and sulfur at five times the price. If it was finished gunpowder, it would be even better.

The expectant face of Wang Zongquan's youngest son dimmed again, and even Wang sighed a long sigh.

"Dad, mother, elder sister, younger brother, I'm back."

Wang Zhizheng's voice suddenly sounded outside the room. Wang Zongquan stood up suddenly, and Wang's body leaning against the head of the bed tensed up. The boy who walked in from the door was not the fifteen-year-old Wang Zhizheng, holding a few doses of medicine and a greasy paper bag in his hand.

Five sets of medicine, ten meat buns, a string of money, the things Wang Zhizheng brought home made Wang's younger brother very happy. But Wang Zongquan, Wang, and Wang's eldest sister all looked heavy. They remembered clearly that Wang Zhizheng signed the contract to be an apprentice without any salary, so what happened now?

"I don't know either, the shopkeeper gave it to me. These five prescriptions are for nourishing the body, and my mother should drink one prescription every other day, and one prescription can be boiled three times." Wang Zhizheng actually knew the reason. The shopkeeper of the pharmacy had no intention of hiding it from him. Not only him, but also the other four apprentices who entered the pharmacy with him, as well as the original apprentices, assistants, and doctors in the pharmacy, were all requisitioned by the government.

If the government troops were to fight in the battlefield, there would inevitably be injuries, and the doctors in their pharmacy would be needed. As for apprentices like Wang Zhizheng, they just happened to follow the army to help out.

Wang Zhizheng didn't dare to tell the truth to his parents. If he told the truth, his parents would not let him go back to the pharmacy. But he had signed the contract. Unless he escaped from Suzhou City, Wang Zhizheng could not get rid of the "power" of the pharmacy. And the Wang family, who were all on the verge of bankruptcy, where could they go after leaving Suzhou? His mother was sick.

In Suzhou City, there were all kinds of gossips, which were complicated. Many of them described the Fu Han Army as completely unrecognizable, like monsters and demons; while there were also rumors that the Fu Han Army was praised as a flower, very good, kind to people, not killing civilians, not looting and raping.

Although Wang Zhizheng was young, he was quite opinionated. He didn't believe in any rumors, and he believed that he was following the army. Their doctors were used to save the dying and the wounded, not to charge into battle. Wang Zhizheng felt that the danger was small. He concealed it from his parents. It saved his parents from worrying.

At dawn the next day, Wang Zhizheng, wearing a straw hat and a raincoat, followed the owner of the pharmacy and walked out of Suzhou City slowly. He didn't know that this trip would completely change his fate and set him on a glorious road he had never thought of.

Sometimes, people's fate is like this.

When the Qing army's large forces gathered in Wuxi one after another, Chen Antong sat quietly in the cabin on the canal from Zhenjiang to Changzhou. He was as cold and serious as the expression on his face, like a stone statue without emotion. In fact, he didn't need emotions, because he was a sharp knife for Chen Ming to control the army, and the blood dripping from the blade never stopped. This was also the most profound impression left by the military police on the entire Fu Han Army.

Of course, the military police were not the Jinyiwei of the former Ming Dynasty, nor were they the former Ming Dynasty's things and factories. They were the military law department, strictly enforcing military laws and regulations, and not allowing personal feelings. Although they killed a lot of people and punished even more people, which shocked the Fu Han Army, no one thought the military police were evil and sinful.

Chen Tongan was a very gentle person at home, but now he is cold and serious, which means he has entered the working state.

The commander-in-chief Jiang Tianfang of the Changzhou Fu Han Army died. Whether the team will be "insolent" now, whether anyone will be "insolent", all awaits his arrival.