On the evening of the eighth day of February in the eighth year of Chongzhen, Zhang Yichuan arrived in Lanzhou.
The person who greeted him was Zhang Xianzhong, who conveyed the general's welcome to him, agreed to meet him at the yamen of the Marshal's Mansion in the future, and temporarily settled him in the official room of the General Affairs Department.
At the beginning of the lanterns, the whole Lanzhou was decorated with lanterns and colorful decorations. The soldiers and civilians on the street were all beaming with joy. Zhang Yichuan was greatly surprised by the prosperous scene in the city that he had not seen for many years. He leaned on the railing, holding a wine bottle and asked Zhang Xianzhong: "Zhang Shangshu, Is this city so busy every day?"
Zhang Yichuan and Zhang Xianzhong are old acquaintances. They have almost the same status in Shaanxi Green Forest. They are both leaders of the second generation of bosses. They also have the same surname. They also worked together in the past. For more than half a year, they were brothers, as if they were wearing a pair of trousers. But later It’s a breakup.
Even now, they are still friends who can talk to each other. Zhang Yichuan is very familiar with Zhang Xianzhong's temperament.
People who have achieved their level of career have many common advantages in life and work, such as being able to take on tasks, taking responsibility, being resourceful, and bringing a way out for their subordinates.
The difference is that each has its own shortcomings. For example, Zhang Xianzhong is impatient, speaks vulgarly, sometimes gets nervous and has a short temper, and is still young. If you treat him well, he will always remember it; if you treat him badly, he will always remember it. Remember.
Zhang Xianzhong used to be a border soldier and almost died, but he was saved by Chen Hongfan. Zhang Xianzhong still talks about it to this day. Whenever he thinks about it, he always says: Mr. Chen lives me, Mr. Chen lives me.
In short, he is a relatively muddy person, and has nothing to do with civil servants.
So now Zhang Xianzhong has become Liu Chengzong's Minister of Rites. The sense of disobedience brought by this official position is... very uncomfortable for Zhang Yichuan.
If he, the King of Sweepers, and Zhang Xianzhong's Eight Great Kings are just self-proclaimed, then Zhang Yichuan is willing to sincerely call Liu Chengzong the King of Tricks just by asking Zhang Xianzhong to be the Minister of Rites, which is so outrageous.
"How is it possible that it's so busy every day?"
Zhang Xianzhong doesn't think it's outrageous that he is the Minister of Rites. Why can't I do it?
He glanced at Zhang Yichuan and said with a somewhat complicated attitude: "It's Liangzhou. Two days ago, Li Hongsi, the deputy commander-in-chief of Liangzhou, was demoted to the commander-in-chief, and the entire Gansu Province changed hands."
Zhang Yichuan raised his eyebrows suddenly: "Gansu Border Army, are you surrendering now?"
This news was really shocking to Zhang Yichuan. Since the uprising, although he has experienced hundreds of battles and has fought against the three generals from the east, Chen Yongfu from Henan and others, he has never faced him head-on on the battlefield. Defeat the border troops, especially those in the three northwest towns and five towns.
After all, during the eighth year of Chongzhen, the peasant army leaders were still afraid of the powerful Ming army.
A hero cannot stand up to a pack of wolves. In Shaanxi eight years ago, the peasant army that sprang up was a pack of wolves. But now, when many provinces of the Ming Dynasty have been mobilized, the Ming army is a pack of wolves.
If they weren't afraid, they wouldn't get together and run next door to the Marshal's Mansion.
"What else can we do if we don't surrender? Liangzhou thought that Marshal Liu was bound to win. Last year, he fortified the walls and cleared the fields, burning the oasis into a white field."
After all, Zhang Xianzhong is now from the Marshal's Mansion and knows the inside story much better than Zhang Yichuan. He couldn't help but sigh with emotion when he talked about it. He shook his head and said: "It has been nine months. More than ten thousand Gansu border troops have been trapped in the city. Their supplies have been exhausted. If we don't add One arrow fell."
That can't be said, at least Cao Wenzhao shot an arrow at He Huchen but missed.
When Zhang Yichuan heard this, it was a complete fantasy. He instinctively thought... it was fake, right?
It's not that the border troops surrendered to Liu Chengzong for a holiday, but that tens of thousands of border troops hid in the city for nine months.
Because he and Li Hongsi played against each other in Shaanxi, three years ago, and even to a certain extent, half of today's sweepers are thanks to Li Hongsi.
It couldn't even be called a fight back then, it was just a matter of holding him down and beating him.
Li Hongsi had more than a thousand people and about 400 horses, and he drove tens of thousands of people to crawl through the mountains and plains for more than half a month, covering a distance of more than a thousand miles.
It was that battle that caused Zhang Yichuan's tens of thousands of troops to run, scatter, and die. In the end, only a thousand people escaped. But it was also that battle that allowed Zhang Yichuan's civilian army to reborn. , completely eliminated the impact of gathering Wang Zuogai's remaining troops, turning tens of thousands of rabble into thousands of elites who could outrun mules with two legs.
Not to mention anything else, from then on, Zhang Yichuan's subordinates were all small experts in long-distance running, and he was the only one who walked the army.
Today, Zhang Yichuan has grown a lot. If he were to change his place and stand in the same position as before, even if there were still tens of thousands of people, he would definitely not escape with all his heart, but would run for ten days to turn around and defeat Fan.
Although I can’t say that we are guaranteed to win, at least we have a chance to win.
If he were allowed to lead his current subordinates, he would not need ten times the force, but three times the force, and he would dare to fight Li Hongsi head-on.
Even so, the tens of thousands of Ming troops led by Li Hongsi huddled in the city and did not dare to fight. They were so hungry that they ran out of food. This was still too outrageous for Zhang Yichuan.
Not only outrageous, even irritating.
You chased me all over the place like I was invincible. When I met Liu Chengzong, you were submissive. When you saw me, Zhang Yichuan, you bastard punched hard, right?
Zhang Xianzhong obviously saw the strange anger in Zhang Yichuan's eyes, but empathizing with him, he could easily guess Zhang Yichuan's thoughts, and sighed: "It's no wonder that the Gansu border army has no clue. Anyone who meets Marshal Liu will feel in his heart There’s no bottom.”
Not only could he sympathize with Zhang Yichuan's tyranny towards the Ming army, but he could also sympathize with the Ming army's domineering attitude towards Liu Chengzong.
After all, in Zhuanglang Acropolis last year, his Western Camp was forcibly forced to surrender by Liu Chengzong.
Zhang Yichuan heard what Zhang Xianzhong said and asked: "Did the Gansu Ming Army be convinced by the Generalissimo?"
"You can't say that."
Zhang Xianzhong shook his head decisively: "It's up to Hong Chengchou. Li Hongsi tried his best, but...even if Hong Chengchou doesn't leave, they can't win. It's too difficult to plot against Liu or the commander-in-chief."
Zhang Yichuan did not understand or understand these things, but Zhang Xianzhong now had a very comprehensive understanding of the review of the Battle of Gansu, and he simply introduced to Zhang Yichuan with an experienced look: "There is no shortage of good soldiers these days. , the battle was all about food. On the battlefield, the generalissimo made a surprise attack on Jiayuguan. The Ming army in western Gansu was defeated in succession and retreated eastward step by step. By the time they reached Ganzhou, it was a foregone conclusion that they could not win on the battlefield."
"Hong Chengchou was a food supervisor and counselor, so he took advantage of the situation and calculated the general marshal's military rations. While Zhuang Langhe was threatening Hehuang, he was clearing the country in Liangzhou. He even gave two guards of the marshal's mansion a mouthful. You think about it, so many people In nine months, hunger could kill the Generalissimo's expeditionary force across the Qilian Mountains."
Listening to Zhang Xianzhong's statement, Zhang Yichuan was confused. There was nothing more terrifying than running out of food.
The peasant army can withstand food shortages better than the official army, but this is actually largely an illusion.
They don't have the endurance of the official army, but the official army is an army with extremely high control. If they run out of food, the commander will lose control. However, these rebels are already in a state of lack of food and have no control at all. The elected leader does not need to be appointed by anyone. Being a leader depends on one principle - being able to harvest food.
But now Zhang Yichuan has no choice. In this winter, his men and horses have increased, and now they have expanded to three battalions. They must fight to Henan.
But Zuo Liangyu and the others blocked him in front, which gave him the idea to fight out with the Marshal's Mansion. However, hearing Zhang Xianzhong talk about the vast magical powers of the Marshal's Mansion made him feel as if he had been completely subsumed by the Grand Marshal. It doesn't hurt either.
Zhang Yichuan thought about this and recalled the days when he was catching locusts in the Qinling Mountains. He couldn't help but wonder: "Now that it's like this, how come the Generalissimo's army resisted for nine months and surrendered the Gansu army?"
"At first I was very confused, thinking it was because Hong Chengchou ran to Ningxia, which affected the morale of the army. But then I figured it out and realized that Hong Chengchou couldn't win even if he didn't run."
Zhang Xianzhong scratched his temples under his hair scarf: "The commander-in-chief is not only a commander-in-chief, but also a prodigy. We thought that Gansu and Qinghai were the corners of the world, and that there was nothing outside Jiayuguan Pass. But, That is also the commander-in-chief’s territory, and the commander-in-chief’s baggage team is the Wala Tatars.”
"ah?"
Zhang Xianzhong nodded seriously. This was also a shocking thing for him: "Not counting other livestock, there are 50,000 lambs alone."
"ah?"
Everyone in Zhang Yichuan was dumbfounded.
To be honest, this news shocked him far more than Liu Chengzong's capture of the entire Gansu.
As a native of northern Shaanxi, the Mongols were no strangers to him. Even after Liu Chengzong moved to Qinghai, the peasant army in northern Shaanxi briefly took the lead due to the Shen family brothers and reached a relatively in-depth cooperation with the Mongolian soldiers outside the country. Large areas of northern Shaanxi were invaded. change.
Two of Zhang Yichuan's more relied-upon subordinates were involved in the alliance back then. They both had their heads shaved, and now their hair is relatively short.
Because of this, Zhang Yichuan has a better understanding of what Mongolia is like now. It is very easy to find Tatars to borrow troops. As long as they have some prestige in the mainland, they can send someone to talk to the noble leader on the north side of the border wall. Which city should we attack together? How many men should I send? , how many people do you send, after the city is destroyed, the wealth will be divided equally and belong to me, we will negotiate immediately.
As for hundreds of lives lost in the war, it doesn't matter. No one cares if you are crazy about being poor.
You can even go directly to the Mongolian nobles to ask for people, bring in a thousand men and horses, and smash the city open. As long as you have wealth, livestock, money and food, it doesn't matter if the soldiers don't return it.
But want to borrow food from the Tatars? Impossible. You are almost starving to death. Where can I get food for you?
Zhang Yichuan swallowed: "The commander is so sweaty...is it true?"
They had heard about it a long time ago, but their attitude was similar to that of the imperial court. No one believed it, thinking that it was just a small tribe in Qinghai shouting for fun. After all, to the people south of the Great Wall, those Mongolian giants north of the Great Wall Sweating is the same as shouting. Today this one is sweating profusely, and tomorrow that one is sweating profusely. Anyway, no one obeys anyone, and no one listens to anyone else.
The gold content is the same as Zhang Yichuan, the sweeping king. He is more or less a king, but no one takes him seriously.
Zhang Xianzhong nodded seriously and said: "It's true. The Khan's Court is in the North Courtyard. Do you know where the North Courtyard of the Northern Protectorate of the Tang Dynasty is? Forget it, I won't know when I see you like this."
Zhang Yichuan was confused when he heard this. He really didn't know where Beiting was, but he didn't want Zhang Xianzhong to look down on him. He rubbed his neck and said, "Why don't I know? It's far away!"
"Disrespectful, disrespectful, does the Sweeping King know about Beiting?"
If he hadn't been curious about the Wala Tatars earlier, Zhang Xianzhong really wouldn't have known about it. He smiled and said: "The Marshal's Beiting Khan Court is looking for someone. Since the Sweeping King knows about Beiting, do you want to go and have a look? Go over and give the armor to War horses, there are sheep to eat and battles to be fought over there.”
This is Zhang Xianzhong’s purpose in directing the topic to Oirat today.
As long as Zhang Yichuan goes to Tianshan, he won't be able to come back for at least two or three years. These two or three years will be the time for me to lead the troops to dig up Fengyang's ancestral tombs.
Zhang Yichuan almost agreed.
To be honest, if the logistics are sufficient as Zhang Xianzhong said, not to mention Zhang Yichuan, his eldest brother Gao Yingxiang would be willing to go - the conditions are too good to be believed.
What really made Zhang Yichuan hesitate was not that Beiting was too far away. He wondered: "That's the Marshal's Khan's Court. Don't worry about calling us there?"
When Zhang Xianzhong saw that the silly boy had been moved, his words changed and he quickly said: "What's there to worry about? It's the Khan's Court. The commander-in-chief wants to be the emperor, so the focus must be on the Central Plains, but then The other side is really enjoying the blessings, but it’s just that the tribes in the west are fighting. As for the Tatars, you beat me and I beat you all day long. When the Han people get there, they are their own people."
"Except for our old Zhang, no one in the entire Marshal's Mansion will tell you about such a good thing. The Marshal's brother has been sent there, and a training guard has been set up in Qinghai. He plans to train for a year. You The Sweeper King’s men are all veterans, so they don’t need to practice at all, they can just drive over in the summer.”
Zhang Xianzhong patted Zhang Yichuan on the shoulder and said: "Your soldiers are thin and weak. They ate mutton for two years in the past, but when we reach the Central Plains, we will have strong soldiers and horses. Then a brigade commander will be indispensable without you."
"Stay now. What position can the commander give you? Be a general like my subordinate Feng Shuangli? Or be a civil servant like me and be the minister of etiquette?"
Just this sentence made Zhang Yichuan wake up quickly.
Zhang Xianzhong's reputation is not small, but he has a bad reputation among the peasant army. At that time, he returned to the Marshal's Mansion with only two battalions, and eventually became the Minister of Rites.
Zhang Xianzhong's family knew about his family affairs and knew that he had been seized of power, but for Zhang Yichuan... Zhang Xianzhong still held the official position of Xiying brigade commander. Now if our sweeper king voted for the commander-in-chief, then Zhang Xianzhong, the minister of etiquette, , is it time to abdicate and give way to talents?
The reputation of the Sweeping King among the peasant army is much better than that of the Eight Great Kings!
Although the reasoning process was completely wrong, Zhang Yichuan got a correct answer: Zhang Xianzhong wanted to deceive himself into Beiting!
Zhang Yichuan narrowed his eyes: "Eight Great Kings, are you afraid that I will defect to the commander-in-chief's house and take away your official position as Minister of Rites?"
"hiss!"
Zhang Xianzhong took a deep breath, widened his eyes, and was speechless for a long time: "You, you..."
The more this happened, the more Zhang Yichuan felt that he had guessed what Zhang Xianzhong was thinking. Instead, he simply got up and went out. When he walked to the door, he turned back to Zhang Xianzhong and said, "Just wait and see, I will surrender to the commander-in-chief and take away the Minister of Etiquette from you." official position!"
good afternoon!
(End of chapter)
