On March 8, the third year of Chongzhen's reign, war horses galloped through Xixiang, Yonghe County.
General Liu of Yan'an Prefecture wanted to defeat the Fenzhou Flag Guard Army and recruit civilians to bury the corpses. At the same time, he searched for the surviving people who were burned and killed by the Banner Army in Fanjiayu, Zaowang Mountain, Chakou Mountain and other places to identify the murderers.
Most people only wanted to watch the fun, but they were more interested in burying the corpses. Some people were more interested.
The cavalryman who delivered the message also knew this very well. Every time he passed the village, he would shout loudly: "Bring your tools and go to General Liu to take care of the food. If you apply, you will be given seven cents of silver and five pounds of yellow noodles!"
The people did not know who General Liu was, but they knew Yin Zi and Huang Mian.
Wow, a strong man with five taels of silver was attracted.
Cheng Yun scratched his head in the valley battlefield and was very dissatisfied with the figure. He complained to his left and right: "My second brother approved one hundred taels. I estimate that I can get fifty taels. Now I only have five taels of silver. Is it appropriate to spend such a small amount of money?" ?”
The subordinates of the baggage sentry were also very distressed: "Commander, in Yan'an Mansion there are always two kilograms of yellow noodles, and there are as many people as there are noodles. This is different from what we thought!"
Someone on the side said: "Is it because we don't have enough money?"
Chengyun waved his hands, crossed his arms and thought for a moment, then pointed at the trembling common people not far away and asked, "Where do they all come from?"
"Seventy-five strong men, eighteen from Anzishan, twenty-four from Sibuwan, and the rest from all over Xixiang. Some villages have one or two, and some villages have no one."
Cheng Yun nodded to indicate that he understood, and simply said: "Cook the porridge first, then have someone dig the hole. I'll tell the general."
He knew what was going on.
It has nothing to do with the amount of money or the lack of money. If you insist on talking about money, it may even be that you are given too much money.
These days, labor hires are divided into two levels according to their technical content, one is a craftsman and the other is a husband.
The market price of industrial silver is three cents per day for a man, and four cents to seven cents for a craftsman depending on the type of work and length of work, regardless of food and accommodation.
For a right-handed job like a husband, the salary level given to a porcelain burner is already very high.
Not to mention that food is so precious these days, five pounds of yellow rice is actually worth more than one penny of silver.
This was supposed to be a gathering of applicants, but only seventy-five people came.
And half of them come from Anzishan and Sibuwan.
Earlier in Yatou Mountain, the three men who were detained and tortured by thieves came from those two villages.
Since there will be more than a dozen or even twenty people from those two villages, it is not a matter of money and food.
It's distrust.
It is said that wealth can be obtained through risk, but there is a difference between risk and risk. The ultimate goal is to live or even live a better life.
And you must first be sure that you are rich before you can take risks.
A group of thieves from other provinces tricked Grandpa into digging a corpse pit and then pushed Grandpa into it. What should they do?
When the guest troops came, they committed petty theft and robbery, not to mention the thieves from other provinces.
After leaving Yan'an Mansion, many things that have never been considered before have to be considered.
Chengyun was filled with guilt and told his second brother that he had only recruited seventy-five men. Liu Chengzong was not surprised. Instead, he smiled and said, "Why are you acting like this? It's already great. Have you found any survivors?"
In fact, even if only one strong man came, Liu Chengzong didn't think it was a bad thing.
Perhaps in Cheng Yun's view, it was important for the people to see them trial and execute the flag soldiers who had committed crimes.
But this is not important to Liu Chengzong.
Chengyun shook his head and said: "They killed everyone, how can there be any survivors?"
Liu Chengzong squinted his eyes and looked into the valley. The unarmed prisoners of the flag army were kneeling on the ground in four square formations. He whispered to Chengyun: "If we send people to look for them again, those people must die. This is much more important than hiring civilians." "
"Must die?"
"Yes, they must die. If the people come in large numbers, they will die. If the people come in small numbers, these people will also die. Even if the people don't come, they deserve to die for what they did."
"But I heard people say that they are quite capable of fighting."
Liu Chengzong always kept his voice low. He looked at the prisoners: "It doesn't matter whether you can fight or not. You have never been a soldier. If you have a knife in your hand, you can run out and kill whoever you want and sleep with whoever you want." Whose, are there people in this world who don’t want to do whatever they want?”
Liu Chengzong was a soldier, and he knew what others thought.
Everyone has a violent dark side in their hearts. Some are suppressed by reason, and some are suppressed by rules. This is especially true for people who hold knives.
It is especially difficult to restrain behavior under conditions where one can act arbitrarily.
In fact, in his mind, he did not want to kill those who could be convicted, but to find ways to kill those who could not be convicted.
If you can't kill them all, let the remaining people climb the fort wall.
If Master Huo can't be beaten to death, there will be other masters. If Master Huo can't be beaten, there will be the prince.
Letting these people live is the greatest insult to the soldiers of the Lion Battalion and to those soldiers who have abided by military discipline for a long time.
In fact, Liu Chengzong had no experience in executing so many people, and he struggled internally for a long time. In the end, he even wanted to find a reason for them to survive.
Not found.
First of all, the responsibility of these people for massacring civilians has been informed by Wei Qian'er's Tangqi to several sentry commanders, and through these sentry commanders, the news spread in the Lion Camp.
Secondly, they were not a small team plundering privately, but an organized and routine massacre led by a commander. They were a completely animal-like force.
If they can get a second chance, can the soldiers of the Lion Battalion temporarily leave the team, go out to slaughter a village and grab some aunts, and then run back and kowtow to admit their mistakes?
Even habitual criminals can be forgiven, why can't you forgive your old brother who has been with you through life and death?
They are soldiers. If you say Emperor Zhu Ming is not good and overthrow him, the brothers will all agree, but the generals in the country are not enough for more than 4,000 brothers.
Tomorrow we will attack a guard unit again. The brothers will form a phalanx and go to eat cannons in the faces of the officers and soldiers. The good court that has been established will no longer be seen. Those flag soldiers will be happy and then work for you, but your old brothers can't?
Will that work? Okay, just be a thieves who harm the people; no, you, the general, should be laid off first, and brothers can find someone who can do it.
Chengyun is full of thoughts. It has been so exciting since he was born. Every day he can have new questions and learn new knowledge.
Yang Yao came back with his left shoulder exposed. He was injured a lot when he rushed into Chen Qianhu's formation.
Four arrows were pierced into the armor, all with armor-piercing conical heads. After piercing the armor, they made four small holes in the chest and abdomen.
His shoulder was also wounded by a spear. The spearhead penetrated through the gap in the chest armor and scratched the shoulder armor, making a long gash on his left shoulder.
He had just received medicine from the baggage team doctor, but he was very energetic and was still riding a horse. He wandered over with an excited look on his face and said, "General, the spoils of war have been counted. These people are too rich."
1,700 people seized more than 5,700 pieces of armor and more than 4,000 weapons of various types.
Yang Yao reported this number and shocked Liu Chengzong. He had never seen so many armors during the war.
After asking carefully, I found out that it was a statistical problem, and the armor parts were all counted as one piece, because these people were not dressed neatly, and the red coats were also included.
But even so, they do have a lot of armor. Everyone has a helmet and a coat, and there are nearly a thousand pairs of remaining armor.
There are more than 800 pairs of crotch armor and chain mail to protect the chest and back, and nearly 100 full armors.
Weapons are even richer. There are 700 spare daggers with a single foot length, 1,200 waist knives, thousands of shields and spears, more than 200 fire blunderbuss and three-eyed blunderbuss, and 133 bird blunderbuss. .
There were twelve light artillery pieces weighing less than a hundred kilograms, with ninety-four shells and three hundred and thirty-two kilograms of gunpowder.
There were also 244 war pack horses, 69 dead horses, 134 large animals such as oxen, donkeys, and mules, 34 carts, and 170 shi of fodder.
The property is worth one thousand two hundred and seventy taels of silver, and six hundred and sixty bolts of silk, brocade and silk.
To be honest, Liu Chengzong felt like it was like celebrating the New Year.
Yang Yao slung his left arm, waved his right hand in front of him, and said: "General, don't worry about anything else. Let's divide the dead horse into two. The fire soldiers under my sentry have sharpened their knives and are ready to pick the lead. It’s stewed.”
It suddenly brought Liu Chengzong back to the time when he was a soldier in Yuhe Fort, making him laugh.
He stretched out his hand and asked, "Why, did the other commanders see you in a miserable state and asked you to come and tell me?"
Yang Yao didn't have anything to be embarrassed about, he just smiled with a raised face.
Liu Chengzong said: "In this case, you send someone to notify the eight sentry soldiers. First, each of them will take two dead horses back from the baggage post and hand in the horse skins. The soldiers can't rest these days and are ready to make dried meat."
"Haha, okay, I'll go right away!"
"etc."
Liu Chengzong stopped Yang Yao and said: "The baggage post should calculate the money awarded to the sergeants after the war. After calculating, if the weapons and armor are not enough, the captain will lead them to the Yantou Mountain Works Post to purchase them at the price."
"Do you still have to buy it?"
"Nonsense, there are good and bad weapons and armors, and those that need to be repaired need to be repaired. If you don't buy them, how can you divide them? But it's okay. Soon everyone will experience a sudden wealth."
Liu Chengzong turned his head and looked in the direction of Huojiabao. Yang Yao understood instantly, laughed and rode away.
Watching his leaving figure, Liu Chengzong felt that this was the best time for the Lion Camp.
Without external influence, they had enough time to figure out how to distribute the spoils and reward the soldiers. Even Liu Chengzong considered several times whether it was time to set military pay for the soldiers.
But he didn't dare.
Military pay is calculated on a monthly basis, and it doesn't matter if it is not specified. Once the military pay is established, it will naturally strengthen the cohesion of the army, but when the military pay cannot be paid, the destructive power is also quite strong.
After all, the core force in his hands is more than a thousand border troops from the three sides of Shaanxi, and everyone has suffered enough from the lack of pay.
In the imperial court, you are owed wages, but in your Lion Camp, you are still owed wages. How can this be done?
On the third day of the siege of Huojiazhuang, the soldiers of the Lion Battalion were extremely happy.
No matter where the sentries stationed their camps, the fire soldiers were busy without touching the ground. Captain Cao was especially busy that afternoon. He hired hundreds of helpers from the work posts and did a lot of work.
The other seven camps had only a few earthen stoves, but his battalion's artillery posts had fifteen stoves, five of which were used to stew horse meat soup, and the remaining ten were used to bake sesame cakes.
Cao Yao finally had the opportunity to show off his cooking skills, instructing the cannon sentry soldiers to cook more than 4,000 horse meat, which attracted other sentry soldiers to be pushed to the cannon post by Pao Ze to learn this kind of cooking from Beizhili. craft.
Commander Cao had not been so excited for a long time. He was talking about everything from Anda's tribute to the weakening of the horse administration, and then from the weakening of the horse administration to the slaughter of a large number of horses bought back from the mutual market.
The petty officials who made money for the court by dismembering war horses, horse officials, horse traders in the capital, Taipusi veterinarians, horse inspectors, and even officials from Taipusi Temple, officials from the Ministry of War, powerful families in the capital, and General of Yingliao Town.
He said: "We can make donkey meat, but why can't we make horse meat? People in this world are greedy for the court. Do you think we are greedy? But if you become an official, will you be greedy? There can't be a court."
Liu Chengzong ate horse meat on fire, watched the cannon sentry preparing smoked horse sausage, and finally looked at the impassioned Cao Yao, shook his head and smiled.
They always want to find a path suitable for this era and this country. In the process, there may be collisions of various ideological trends and attempts at various systems.
He knew that Cao Yao's decent statement was suitable for a small country with few people. In fact, the idea of a desperado who occupies a mountain and became king was not advisable, but he didn't mind Cao Yao thinking about it.
In fact, in another memory, this land tried almost every system on earth in a short period of time more than two hundred years later.
People must first know what is wrong before they can look for what is right, and then they can walk firmly and tenaciously along the right path.
At least now, his sentry commander, his soldiers composed of border troops, and his auxiliary troops composed of a small number of border troops and a large number of hungry people all know that Ming's plan will not work, so they will firmly follow him.
On the fourth day of the siege of Huojiapu, the villagers who had dug holes to bury the corpses the previous day brought back broken silver and grain. They brought more people with them. This time, nearly 300 people were employed, and the work efficiency was greatly improved.
However, the work process was a bit strange. After digging enough soil to bury the body, the farmer was extremely resistant to continuing to dig the hole.
They thought the pits were meant to bury them.
Fortunately, after two days of identification, the prisoners divided into four teams already included forty-six traitors and evildoers. Liu Chengzong gathered the people, escorted the prisoners of the fourth team to the pit, and held them in front of the remaining three teams. In front of them, the charges were read out one by one.
The civilians who were recruited were dumbfounded when they heard their crimes, and some even trembled unconsciously.
After all, among those who were assigned to the fourth team, only one had a bad temper and often killed people after quarrels. The people he killed included a date vendor in Fucheng, Fenzhou, and a woman passing by in Dongxiang whose bracelet he robbed. , and there was also a turtle man who had scolded him in a brothel.
The others were all guilty of exterminating families, cutting off people's hands and feet, and torturing them. They were also guilty of robbing women to sleep, locking the door after waking up, and setting fire to them.
Realizing what was about to happen to them, the prisoners in the fourth team struggled violently and even cursed. However, they had already been tied up with ropes and held by sergeants, leaving them unable to fight back.
Liu Chengzong gave them a chance. If they could identify five guilty persons among the innocent, they would be temporarily exempted from the death penalty and could atone for their sins by attacking the city in subsequent battles.
After a brief period of chaos, the newly formed fifth team had seventeen criminals, and the fourth team had eighty-five more criminals.
Ten by ten, they were read out one after another, and then the spearmen carried out the execution.
Those in the front are still struggling, those in the back continue to read, and some still want to identify.
Some of the civilian husbands had seen government executions, but they had never seen such executions. Every one of them was so frightened that their legs were weak, but there was a little man who was not doing his job well and turned around and ran towards the mountain.
Wei Qian'er's Tangqi hurriedly chased him, but before he could climb up the mountain, the little man came back again, panting and running back with a blue flower cloth package on his back and a sword, bow and arrow hanging on his waist.
His movements were very stupid when he ran, and he was obviously not a martial artist, so even the servants who drew their swords and held their bows had no idea of shooting him.
As he got closer, he was even more frightened and trembled all over his body. He gritted his teeth and forced himself to bleed before moving forward.
When he walked up to Liu Chengzong, his salute was very awkward, as if he wanted to say a blessing before he bowed down.
"General, I want to surrender to the army."
This beady voice is clearly that of a young aunt.
Liu Chengzong's eyebrows were twisted into a strange shape, and his eyes were one big and one small. He looked at her carefully for a moment, and he admired her courage in his heart, so he asked: "Girl, did your family treat you as a man when you were a child?"
The little girl dressed in men's clothing was not embarrassed by being discovered. She shook her head gently: "Please, General, let me join the army. My name is..."
She raised her head high, with unbearable tears in her eyes, and said word by word: "Fan Sanlang."
