Chapter 269
"Hello, Mr. Gao, I am Ma Haitao, the judge of Xinghai, and I am also a disciple of Dean Yang."
"Nice to meet you!"
Gao Jie was a little unbelievable. When had he been called "Sir"?
In the Ming Dynasty, the word "Sir" still referred to a learned elder or an honorific title for an adult man with status. This was the first time in Gao Jie's life that he was called "Mr. Gao!"
Ma Haitao can be regarded as a prominent figure in Liaodong. He is not only the judge of Xinghai City, but also Yang Qingyun's personal student. Xinghai City and Zhenhai City both belong to the special cities of Liaodong. In Cheng Shijie's plan, this city The administrative level is the same as that of Jinzhou and Haizhou.
Yang Qingyun, like Chen Zilong, was an official who enjoyed the rank of fifth-rank magistrate of the Ming Dynasty, and even served as a member of the Liaodong Management Committee.
Not to mention him, even those who have the reputation of being a scholar or a scholar are not qualified to be addressed as sir in front of Ma Haitao. They can only call themselves students.
And what about Gao Jie? Before he took refuge with Cheng Jialong, Gao Jie was just a bandit, and at most he was a relatively good one among the bandits. How many untouchables like Gao Jie were there in the Ming Dynasty? Although he is one of the three generals under Li Zicheng, the problem is, let alone him, even if Li Zicheng is in Liaodong, who will look at him seriously?
However, Gao Jie gained the protection of Cheng Jialong, the eldest son of the Cheng family, with his property worth nearly half a million taels. The first task Cheng Jialong gave him was to recruit craftsmen and cast steel statues.
But it is precisely because the steel statue in Jinzhou City is about four feet, three feet and nine inches high, of which the base is about one foot and six feet high, and the statue is about two feet, seven feet and nine inches high. Of course, this is just a design drawing. The Liaodong Administrative Committee even set aside a total of eight or nine hundred acres of land in the southern part of Jinzhou City as the construction site for this statue.
To be fair, Mrs. Xing is Gao Jiexian's wife. With Mrs. Xing's help, Gaoji's Gaoji Labor Service Company is now becoming more and more famous and has more and more employees. Although Gao Jie was white, no one looked down upon him. After all, he was a disciple of Master Cheng. Since he had no official position, he had to be called sir.
"Mr. Gao, please bring your people and follow me!"
Cheng Shijie built the huge Farmer's Four Sages Square in Zhenhai City, which also attracted the attention of Yang Qingyun. He also wanted to build the Medical Four Sages in Xinghai City. This project naturally fell to Gao Jie's construction team.
As for the hundreds of thousands of taels of silver used to build the square of the Four Sages of Medicine (Huang Emperor, Qi Bo, Qin Yue Ren (Bian Que), and Zhang Ji are the "Four Sages"), in Yang Qingyun's view, this is not a problem at all.
Gao Jie has now become a member of the Liaodong Management Committee, the magistrate of Xinghai City, and the honored guest of Yang Qingyun, the dean of Liaodong Medical College. This is something Gao Jie did not expect.
Ma Jingtao introduced Gao Jie to Yang Qingyun of Xinghai, and Yang Qingyun informed Gao Jie of the needs of Xinghai’s establishment and the doctor’s Four Saints Plaza.
Xing, who was following Gao Jie, took a pen to write down Yang Qingyun's needs.
Opportunities are fair to everyone, the key is to see whether they can seize them. Of course, some people are good at seizing opportunities, while others create opportunities when there are no opportunities.
Han, who is located in Shunhe, Macheng, is a person who is good at creating opportunities. When Cheng Shijie saw Han's daughter Zhang Lian'er, Zhang Lian'er was already dying.
This scene made Cheng Shijie feel familiar. Yes, when Cheng Jiayue was seriously ill, Cheng Jiayue was also like this. This Zhang Lian'er opened his mouth and was almost speechless.
Cheng Shijie immediately became anxious: "Military doctor, come here and cure her!"
The biggest difference between the Ning Navy and other armies of the Ming Dynasty is that it has sufficient military doctors and medical staff. There are health workers in the establishment above the post. As for Cheng Shijie, he is accompanied by a team of more than 40 doctors all year round. , of course, following Cheng Shijie now is Ning Haijun's cavalry chief, a medical team of more than 200 people.
As two experienced doctors stepped forward to check on Zhang Lian'er's condition, one of them checked and replied: "Reporting to the commander, her problem is not serious, she is just hungry!"
"Are you just hungry?"
"Yes, I won't diagnose mistakes in my humble job!"
"Okay, great!"
Cheng Shijie hurriedly asked someone to set up a pot. Ning Haijun's field march rations usually included three or four kilograms of dried meat, fifteen or sixteen kilograms of fried rice, compacted flour cakes, and dehydrated steamed buns.
Because dry steamed buns or flour cakes will not deteriorate in a short period of time, but the taste is very bad. Cheng Shijie is not like ordinary soldiers. The half-month ration he carries weighs more than 30 kilograms, with a small amount of salt, fried rice, In addition to fried noodles, cakes and steamed buns, there are also some dried fruits, dried milk and tea leaves.
When Mrs. Han saw that Cheng Shijie cared so much about Zhang Lian'er, she took the initiative to stay in front of Cheng Shijie. She let her son Zhang Yuan look after her sister, while she built a stove for Cheng Shijie and looked for firewood.
Whether it is fried noodles or fried rice, you can eat it without fire and add water. Cheng Shijie considered that Zhang Lian'er was too young and had been hungry for a long time, so he cooked a pot of rice porridge in a pot.
When the rice porridge was cooked, Mrs. Han fed Zhang Lian'er and drank a bowl. After eating a bowl of rice porridge, Zhang Lian'er wanted to drink another bowl. Cheng Shijie said: "Okay, we can't let her eat more. Otherwise, your stomach will be broken!"
Listening to Cheng Shijie's words, Zhang Lian'er was a little unhappy, her lips raised, and she didn't even look at Cheng Shijie.
Cheng Shijie took out a one-tael silver coin and said with a smile: "Lian'er, I will do a magic trick for you!"
Cheng Shijie threw the silver coin into the sky, caught it with both hands, then made fists with both hands, stretched it out in front of Zhang Lian'er and said: "Guess which hand the silver coin is in. If you guess right, I will reward you with a steamed bun. If If you guessed wrong, I will reward you with a can!"
Han looked at this scene and wanted to laugh. Could this be considered magic?
Isn't this a reason to reward his daughter with canned food?
Mrs. Han knew about canned food, which could be stored for one or two years without spoiling. Whether it was the fruits or various kinds of meat inside, she hurriedly gave her son a wink.
Zhang Lian'er's expression was broken, and she secretly said in her heart: "Although I am young, I am not stupid, right?"
She pointed at Cheng Shijie's left hand and said: "It must not be here! Then it must be in the right hand!"
Cheng Shijie did not expect that little Zhang Lian'er would be so quick-witted. Cheng Shijie did not have any silver coins in his right and left hands. In fact, there were no silver coins in either of his hands.
Cheng Shijie stretched out his left hand: "You guessed it right!"
Cheng Shijie took out a 400-gram can of fruit and handed it to Zhang Lian'er.
Zhang Lian'er took the can and bit it with his teeth.
"Stop biting, I'll break your teeth!"
Cheng Shijie opened the can for Zhang Lian'er and watched Zhang Lian'er eating the can with a doting look on his face.
Ning Haijun's military doctors began to examine the health of the old, weak, sick and disabled bandits. The originally abandoned village, Shunhe Village, became a huge refugee camp.
To be fair, although Ning Haijun did not fire a shot or an arrow in this battle and forced more than 10,000 people under He Jiuyi to surrender, in fact, Ning Haijun did not take any advantage. These more than 10,000 prisoners were all He is a big eater. Although Ning Haijun claims to have half a month's rations, on average he can only last for half a month instead of being full.
Because of these rogue bandits, the dry food that the more than 6,000 of them carried with them could not last more than a few days.
However, Ning Haijun's discipline was strict. Cheng Shijie ordered Ning Haijun's officers to provide their own dry food to help the bandits. They did not complain and resolutely carried out Cheng Shijie's order.
As more and more Ning navy officers took out their dry food bags, took out the dried meat from it, took out their knives, chopped it up and threw it into the dried meat pot. Soon, the water vapor rising from the hundreds of large pots was The strong smell of meat made the gangsters salivate even more, and they pushed forward uncontrollably, and the scene began to become chaotic.
When the soldiers of Ning Navy saw that the refugees were making a commotion again, they got angry. They swung the sticks in their hands so loudly that they roared in the wind and cursed angrily, asking them to maintain order.
After getting along with each other for so long, the refugees seem to have figured out the temperament of these Ning Haijun soldiers, and know that they may look fierce on the surface, but in fact, as long as you don't run away, attack them, or deliberately cause riots, they will not make things difficult for you. , very talkative.
All the gangsters shouted: "Come on, sir, please share the food quickly!"
"We're all so hungry!"
"Master Jun, do you want to starve us to death and save some food?"
"That's right, we're going to starve to death!"
"Master Jun, please do your best, we will kowtow to you!"
Facing the heavily armed Ning Haijun cavalry, these bandits did not dare to fight hard, but played the bitterness card.
Cheng Shijie stood up, looked at the bandits and said: "Don't mess around, line up quickly to get the food! Women, children, the elderly and the sick come here in front, and the strong men go over there, hurry up..."
As Cheng Shijie finished speaking, hundreds of Ning Navy officers repeated Cheng Shijie's words in unison.
Regardless of whether these bandits understood or not, these Ning navy officers began to carry out sticks.
"Your fucking ears are stuffed with donkey hair, young and strong are at the back!"
"Go back to your team, I'm talking about you!"
"Are you going back?"
"If you don't go back, I'll have you thrown back!"
As General Ning Haijun entered the scene, the current order immediately improved. Cheng Shijie was now giving Ning Haijun's soldier rations to the rogue prisoners, and the cavalry's ration bags were filled with the best food, including rice. It also has fragrant and soft rice and thick noodle soup.
Not to mention that bandits like them have never eaten these things. Even landlords and rich people can only eat these good things during the Chinese New Year.
There are also some young gangsters who want to shamelessly pretend to be sick, but it is not easy for them to hide it from the eyes of the Ning Navy cavalry officers. Once discovered, they will be punished.
Until Cheng Shijie announced that if he found anyone jumping in line randomly, he would not be given food, and he suppressed those dishonest guys.
Ning Haijun's soldiers distributed food quickly with their hands and feet. Children, the elderly, women and the sick each received a bowl of rice and a ladle of broth, while the young and middle-aged each received a bowl of thin paste made from fried rice, bread, dried meat and wild vegetables. These refugees were all very hungry. Not afraid of being burned, he raised his head and poured it down his throat. As a result, he was so hot that his whole body twitched. Even so, he couldn't bear to spit it out, but stretched his neck to swallow it hard.
Seeing their horrible eating looks, Cheng Shijie shook his head speechlessly.
Cheng Shijie looked at Zhao Wencai and said, "Where are our troops?"
"There are still more than six hundred miles away from us. According to their speed, I'm afraid they won't be able to transport the food!"
Cheng Shijie said: "Send a cavalry back and inform Yuan Shiliang and Meng En that they can ignore the cannons for now, but the food must be transported up as much as possible, and refugees can be recruited along the way. There are many people and strength. This commander can prepare two hundred troops for this battle." Wanshi of food, don’t worry about them consuming it on the road!”
Han bravely asked: "Commander, what are you going to do with us?"
Cheng Shijie smiled faintly and waved his hand: "Incorporate them all into military households and let them join Ning Haijun's farming. Hey, after this battle is over, our Ning Haijun will probably have hundreds of thousands more military households!"
Han said solemnly: "There are many of us, but like this..."
"But what?"
"This will require a lot of food. Do you have that much food to feed us?"
Cheng Shijie smiled, pointed at Qiao Siniang behind Zhao Wencai and said, "Are you...Qiao Siniang?"
"Commander, do you still remember your humble position?"
"We are one of the few female generals in the Ning Navy. How could I not remember her?"
Cheng Shijie said: "Tell her, does this commander have that much food?"
Qiao Siniang looked at Mr. Han and said, "How many of you are there?"
"There are hundreds of thousands of us!"
"Haha, let alone hundreds of thousands of people, even if there are millions of people, we still have enough food. The worst we can do is sell less food and make less wine..."
Qiao Siniang told Han: "Our commander-in-chief has reclaimed 80 to 90 million acres of land in Liaodong and planted tens of millions of acres of high-yielding potatoes, sweet potatoes and corn. I dare not say that there are too many to feed the people of several provinces." question!"
This is not Qiao Siniang's bragging. Now the main forces of Ning Haijun are in Luzon to clear out the Luzon natives. It is difficult to kill all the millions of natives in Luzon by killing alone. Now the natives have learned the lesson and started to go to Luzon. Running in the deep mountains and forests of Luzon has greatly reduced Ning Haijun's clearance efficiency.
However, in order to implement Cheng Shijie's plan, Liu Qingsong began to think of a damaging move, which was to transport the grain from Luzon. He was originally planning to replace Liaodong's tax revenue and transport it directly to Tianjin by sea, and then transfer it to the capital.
However, due to Cheng Shijie's current needs, Luzon's grain transport ships began to dock at Wusongkou and then transferred to Jiangnan. From now on, once the grain supply in Luzon decreases, famine will definitely occur. Once there is a famine, this is comparable to using a knife. The clearing efficiency of the light cannon is much higher.
Although the way of doing this is a bit cruel, the problem is that Cheng Shijie is willing to do what Ai Gong said, the sin is in the present and the merit is in the future.
Only when the Chinese in Luzon become the absolute majority and the natives disappear, can Luzon, like the two capitals and thirteen provinces in the Central Plains, forever become the territory of the Ming Dynasty.
After finishing their first meal, the bandit prisoners began to quiet down, and Han and Qiao Siniang were used by Cheng Shijie to reorganize the bandit prisoners.
They were just like the military households in the Liaodong field. Ten households were divided into one household, and ten households were divided into one hundred households. These bandits were organized into thirty-five full hundred households, totaling 3,260 households. Three households, with a total of 10,579 people.
The real reason why Cheng Shijie chose to let Han come forward is because she is a woman. Women have a strong affinity and can reduce trouble when doing statistical work.
In addition, when Ning Navy officers do these things, they have great talent but little use, but Han does not have this problem.
Zhao Wencai said: "The fighting ability of the rogue bandits is very poor. We can definitely defeat ten of them one by one! Now that their main force is concentrated in Macheng, should we work together to wipe them out?"
"I have never doubted the combat effectiveness of our Ning Navy officers. It is not difficult to defeat them. But the problem is that we have too little food."
Cheng Shijie sighed and said: "The terrain here is very unfavorable for our cavalry. Once these bandits run into the Dabie Mountains, we can only watch them escape!"
"The general is in a hurry!"
“Who doesn’t want to make great achievements?”
Cheng Shijie said: "But there are still opportunities, don't be discouraged!"
…
In Macheng, there are endless waves of people everywhere outside the city. This is the Eight Kings, one of the four main forces under Gao Yingxiang. The big flags embroidered with the word "Zhang" on each side can clearly explain their identity.
Zhang Xianzhong was a hero who made Emperor Chongzhen want to eat his flesh and drink his blood. In fact, Zhang Xianzhong also made the gentry all over the world itch with hatred.
There was no way, Zhang Xianzhong was too cruel to the gentry. Every time he attacked a place, Zhang Xianzhong would find someone to collect a list of the local gentry's big families in advance, and then arrest the people according to the list. After catching the people, they would torture them and force them to reveal their money and belongings. The hiding place, in fact, the gentry who fell into the hands of Zhang Xianzhong would suffer the same fate if they confessed or not. Zhang Xianzhong would also torture and kill them.
If other bandits had attacked Macheng, these gentry, officers and soldiers would have run away long ago. However, the problem is that they encountered Zhang Xianzhong. They also knew what Zhang Xianzhong was like and would not end well if they surrendered. They could only resist with all their might. .
Fortunately, the equipment under Zhang Xianzhong was not good and there were not many artillery. It was very difficult to blow down the city wall.
Macheng is located in a "sanguan" zone. The people have always been strong and strong, and there are many armed bandits, large and small, so the city wall is fairly strong. After Zhang Xianzhong's attack for more than half a month, Macheng still failed to be captured.
Zhang Xianzhong was not in a hurry. Because his troops arrived so quickly and it was a lean time, there would definitely not be too much food in the city, and the officers and soldiers in the city would not be able to hold on for long.
Precisely because there is not much food, even if it is captured, the city will not be able to feed Zhang Xianzhong's hundreds of thousands of horses. Of course, two-thirds of his hundreds of thousands of horses were recently brought here. The real The number of troops in the old camp of Shaanxi was only over 54,000.
In order to obtain more food, Zhang Xianzhong asked his adopted descendants Li Dingguo, Liu Wenxiu, and Ai Nengqi to each lead a group of troops to search for food around them.
What Cheng Shijie encountered was one of Sun Kewang's troops.
In fact, Sun Kewang, Li Dingguo, Liu Wenxiu, and Ai Nengqi all followed Zhang Xianzhong and did not attack. When He Jiuyi did not report his whereabouts to Sun Kewang for a day, Sun Kewang realized something was wrong.
Then, Sun Kewang sent his general Feng Shuangli to lead 300 cavalrymen to look for He Jiuyi. As a result, they discovered the arrival of Ning Haijun. Seeing that Ning Haijun was armed to the teeth and the military formation was extremely strict, Feng Shuangli did not dare to fight Ning Haijun and retreated directly. , report the situation to Sun Kewang.
When Zhang Xianzhong heard that an army cavalry had arrived in Macheng, Zhang Xianzhong did not bother to attack Macheng. Instead, he directly asked thousands of bandits to surround Macheng. Zhang Xianzhong led hundreds of thousands of troops towards Heshun where Ning Haijun was located. Come from the village.
Heshun Village is located in the southeast corner of Macheng, at the southern foot of the Dabie Mountains, about ninety miles away from Macheng. Since most of Zhang Xianzhong's troops were refugees, the march was slow, and it took three and a half days to reach Heshun Village over a mountainous road of more than 90 miles.
Zhang Xianzhong was not surprised that the officers and soldiers were pursuing him. He had dug up the ancestral graves of Lao Zhu's family and destroyed the Fengyang Imperial Tomb. If the officers and soldiers did not pursue him, Zhang Xianzhong would be surprised.
Hundreds of thousands of rogue bandits flocked to Heshun Village like locusts. The first ones to appear were Zhang Xianzhong's elite troops. Among the many rogue bandit armies in the world, Zhang Xianzhong was actually the strongest. Why did Lao Huihui and Li Zicheng include the rogue bandit leaders? Gao Yingxiang, they couldn't get enough of Zhang Xianzhong.
Gao Yingxiang only has more than 10,000 cavalrymen under his command, and their technical levels vary widely, while Lao Huihui has more than 20,000 cavalrymen. The number of cavalrymen is about the same as that of Zhang Xianzhong. But the problem is that Lao Huihui's men are mainly herdsmen, but Zhang Xianzhong's 20,000 cavalrymen are More than half of the remaining cavalry were Ming frontier troops who could not survive.
It can be said that this is Zhang Xianzhong's capital for traveling across Hubei, Henan and Anhui. If this cavalry were to press forward, it would definitely be a troublesome force on the plains. According to their experience, if so many cavalry were to charge forward, even the most powerful officers and soldiers would be frightened to the point of peeing, and they would collapse after a slight charge. .
It was a pity that they encountered the Ning Navy cavalry this time. Although the Ning Navy cavalry was weaker than the Jian Nu cavalry, with two or three times the numerical advantage, they could rely on their equipment advantages to kill the Jian Nu cavalry. Defeat and retreat.
Facing Zhang Xianzhong's amateur cavalry with mixed skills and poor equipment, Ning Haijun's cavalry phalanx remained unmoved.
Sun Kewang pointed to the dark-skinned Ning Haijun cavalry formation and said: "Father, this is the official cavalry!"
Zhang Xianzhong looked at Ning Haijun's cavalry. At this time, Ning Haijun's cavalry was like a copper wall. No matter how cold the wind blew, it would not move at all even when powerful enemies came from the wild.
Zhang Xianzhong pondered and said: "Child Chongzhen, are you finally willing to let this fierce tiger out? Ning Haijun is indeed a world-famous strong army. No army can match this military discipline alone!"
Li Dingguo, Zhang Dingguo still sneered: "What's the matter? No matter how strict the military discipline is, can it defeat our army of hundreds of thousands?"
At this time, although Zhang Dingguo was very brave and resourceful, and had made many military exploits, he had made a big name among the bandits in just a few years, and was known as the "enemy of ten thousand people".
But after all, Zhang Dingguo was young and vigorous. He didn't take Zhang Xianzhong's words seriously. Is it great to have strict discipline? If we can win the war by being disciplined, why should we train? Why not just practice discipline every day?
Obviously, Zhang Dingguo has not yet realized the importance of discipline to an army. He has to wait until he has suffered a lot before he realizes this, cleans up military discipline, and achieves great military exploits.
"Dingguo, don't underestimate the enemy!"
Zhang Xianzhong glanced at his favorite general and the second of his four adopted sons, and said calmly: "However, Dingguo's words are not unreasonable. No matter how strict his military discipline is, he will face tens of thousands of me." The attack of the army will definitely lead to defeat. However, Ning Haijun actually dared to confront our army in the wild, which is commendable for his courage."
Zhao Wencai looked at the more than 20,000 cavalry in front of the rogue formation. Judging from the appearance of the horses, Zhang Xianzhong's cavalry looked messy. But the problem was that these cavalry were all veterans who had killed people and seen blood. They were not like other The army of rogue bandits was roaring, shouting to fight and kill. Instead, they were as silent as Ning's naval cavalry, waiting for the order to attack.
Zhao Wencai looked at Cheng Shijie and said: "Commander, Zhang Xianzhong's soldiers are quite interesting. No wonder they can kill the Ming army to a rout!"
"What, are you scared?"
Cheng Shijie looked at Zhao Wencai and said, "You're not even afraid of these rabble, are you?"
"The handsome man is joking!"
Zhao Wencai smiled faintly and said: "The general is just thinking about the commander-in-chief. There are hundreds of thousands of bandits here, and the commander-in-chief wants to prepare the land for rewards!"
"It's only 1.8 million acres of land, but I still have it!"
Cheng Shijie continued: "Brothers, don't worry, I have plenty of land. Even if the land is gone in the future, don't worry that I won't reward you. If there is no land, I will lead you to grab it!"
"I am willing to die for the commander-in-chief!"
Six thousand Ning navy cavalry roared, the sound so loud that it soared into the sky.
"I will trample them to death!"
Zhang Xianzhong roared with a ferocious expression.
(End of chapter)
