On March 18 of the first year of Guangde, Qian Qianyi, a great scholar, compiled Zhang Pu at the Hanlin Academy, accepted the edict of the Supreme Emperor, and prepared to go to Jiujiang Prefecture to persuade Yuan Jixian, the puppet governor of Huguang in the Ming Dynasty, to surrender.
Zhang Pu didn't have any hope for this trip. He had long heard that Yuan Jixian was an upright person and was definitely not a follower of people. I'm afraid it wouldn't be a few words of his own that could make him submit to the imperial court. If he wasn't careful, his life would still be saved. in Jiangxi.
However, Qian Qianyi was confident in occupying Jiujiang without any bloodshed. He and Yuan Jixian were old friends. During the former Ming Dynasty, the two served as officials in South Zhili together and had a close friendship.
More importantly, the five major corps of the Qi Army moved eastward along the river and quickly occupied Huangshi, Ezhou, getting closer and closer to Jiujiang Fucheng.
But Zuo Liangyu has become a lost dog. He only cares about his "Qingjun side" and does not dare to turn around and fight the Qi army head-on.
Under this situation, Yuan Jixian, who was stationed in Jiujiang Fucheng, actually had no other way out. Not only the Qi army wanted to attack him, Zuo Liangyu's subordinates also coveted the prosperous Jiujiang Fucheng.
Zhang Pu graduated from the Sixth Grade, and his main responsibilities on weekdays were to compile historical records to record the words and deeds of the Supreme Emperor. Occasionally, he would lecture on classics and history to the young emperor and serve as the emperor's teacher. I didn't expect that I would be assigned such a hard job just after being transferred to Huguang from Liaodong. I also blamed myself for being too talkative at the time and insisting on being in the limelight.
On the 19th, Qian Qianyi and Zhang Pu boarded the ship at Hanyangmen Pier and prepared to set off.
In order to protect Qian and Zhang, the imperial guards sent three people this time, together with four elite soldiers, seven people in total.
The leader of the seven-man group was Wu Xiao, the deputy commander of the Imperial Guard. Li Zicheng had just returned from North Korea. After asking him about the details of North Korea, the Supreme Emperor asked him to go with him to practice. Later, the Qi army captured Jiangnan. There is still a lot of work for Li Zicheng to do.
Wei Zhao, as Wu Xiao's deputy, also traveled together.
The four accompanying soldiers were not included in the night. In addition to Xu Jing and Wan Shao, who had just made great achievements in the Jiangxia War, there were also two from the First Regiment of the Supreme Emperor's direct lineage. Both of them were from Jiangxi and had followed Liu Wei in the Saarhu Campaign. .
When Chen arrived, the riverside was filled with fog, Pei Dahu and Lin Yu came to the pier to see Wu Xiao off.
Before leaving, Pei Dahu stopped Wu Xiaoxia and told him:
"Jiujiang is dangerous. Although the upper reaches of the river have been controlled by our army, Zuo Liangyu will inevitably jump over the wall. It is not sure whether Yuan Jixian is an enemy or a friend. You have to be more careful. The Emperor said that Jiujiang is a key battle to regain Jiangnan. If It will be good if the two bachelors can convince the man named Yuan. If not, you have to protect yourself. Remember, when you go there, keep in touch with the front line in time and night. At the critical moment, those people can save your life... ···”
"I know, I know! Stop rambling, okay? Go to Jiujiang, go to Donglin Temple at the west foot of Mount Lu, find a master named Jing'an, and talk to him about Buddhism! Right? I will memorize all of this!"
Pei Dahu smiled awkwardly.
The reason why Wu Xiao was asked to go to Donglin Temple first was of course not to teach him Buddhism.
Master Jing'an was a hidden stake that Shen Lian left in Jiujiang during his lifetime. He used to have a single line of contact with Shen Lian. After Shen Baihu's death, this person no longer had any contact with the Coin Yiwei.
Even Zhang Dong and Liu Xingzuo don't know what Master Jing'an's situation is now, whether he has stopped eating fast, chanting Buddha's name, and not killing people.
"No one has been to Jiujiang Prefecture, except Li Dingguo. I don't know if that kid Li Dingguo has reached Yinzhou yet. In short, if you find Jing'an, you can get twice the result with half the effort."
Wu Xiao was too lazy to listen to Pei Dahu's ramblings anymore. He turned around and said goodbye to Lin Yu. He smiled at his taciturn old partner and said, "Big man Lin, I always feel unsure when you are not here!"
Pei Dahu said again: "We can't free up manpower, otherwise we will let Lin Yu and you go. The Supreme Emperor has left so many former Ming officials unkilled. The whole Jiangxia Wuchang is a mixed bag, and there are assassins every now and then. Lin Yu is here and can suppress many enemies." "
Wu Xiao knew that if the Supreme Emperor beat four or five of them, he would not need the protection of the imperial guards at all. What they are protecting now are mostly the newly appointed Qi officials. Since the army entered Huguang, the assassination operations against Qi officials have not stopped. It is said that many assassins were sent by Zheng Chenggong, and of course the death of Zuo Liangyu scholar.
Wu Xiao is now increasingly unable to understand the purpose of many of the imperial court's current policies.
For example, the vigorous abolition of private property movement held in Liaodong, Shandong and other places in the past few years has been gradually no longer mentioned since the second half of last year. Even the Supreme Emperor, the initiator of the policy of abolition of private property, has never issued any decree.
This matter was gradually forgotten by people, and no one mentioned it again, as if the Great Purge had never happened.
Furthermore, the court's attitude towards the prisoners of the pseudo-Ming Dynasty has also gone from beating and scolding them at every turn, and executing almost all of them, to now only killing a small number of them. This earth-shaking change is incredible.
Anyone who is familiar with the Supreme Emperor knows that killing is the true nature of the Supreme Emperor.
But now, the Supreme Emperor seems to have become a different person, and he doesn't like killing people much anymore.
The Supreme Emperor also issued an edict that all surrendered troops and generals who are willing to join Da Qi will be properly accommodated by the court.
Some prestigious Nanming officials and the Supreme Emperor had to personally receive them and have long talks with them. Some representatives of the soldiers and middle- and lower-level civil servants were very dissatisfied with this setback. This was considered a blatant betrayal of the Da Qi system - fortunately, these people were very few in number, accounting for less than 10% of the total number of civil servants and generals.
"No matter what, as long as the people live and work in peace and contentment, it is the best." Wu Xiao comforted himself in this way and did not go into details.
~~~~~
Everyone took a fishing boat and went down the river from Hankou. People were most bored on the boat. Qian Qianyi held the poems he carried with him and studied them carefully. Zhang Pu was like an ant on a hot pot, walking back and forth in the cabin all day long.
The fishing boats and even canoes on the rivers around Wuchang Prefecture were all requisitioned by the army - with money, of course - and Wu Xiao and the others searched for a long time before they found this broken boat in a fishing village covered with weeds near Hankou.
Compared with the painted boats and book boats that I rode in the south of the Yangtze River before, this old and broken boat in front of me was really unsightly.
However, the situation was critical and they could not care about anything else. The two civil servants had no choice but to take this ship.
"My little brother, my bones are almost falling apart due to the bumpy boat and carriage, but you still have the strength to move around. I admire you!"
Zhang Pu was sent to Jiujiang this time, and he was very angry. However, he could not complain to the Supreme Emperor, so he vented his anger on Qian Qianyi.
"Brother Mu Zhai, this time you lobby Duke Yuan, but it's up to you. You have to shoulder the important task. Yuan Linhou has the deepest friendship with you. Even if you piss him off, he won't kill you out of anger."
Qian Qianyi smiled slightly and replied: "Don't worry, little brother Tianru, if you miss the Emperor's errand and delay military and state affairs. According to the laws of Qi, for such crimes, no matter whether the culprit is the master or the slave, he will be executed!"
Zhang Pu is only in his early twenties this year, and of course he doesn't want to have his head chopped off by the Supreme Emperor at such a young age.
There were some corpses of Ming soldiers floating on the river. Many villages on both sides of the river were burned by fire, and it was dark in the distance.
Wu Xiao refused to look at these tragic scenes. He turned around and asked Li Zicheng what he had seen and heard in North Korea in the past six months.
Li Zicheng is twenty-two years old this year. He is no longer the refugee child who begged for food for his sister under the clock tower in Xi'an Fucheng.
"The North Koreans bullied the weak and feared the strong. When the reinforcements entered Hwanghae Road, they stopped. When our troops withdrew, the Koreans started to cause trouble again, and it went on like this endlessly."
Wu Xiao was quite shocked when he heard this. He had heard someone say that the King of North Korea, who was Lord Lingyang at the beginning, was entirely helped by the Supreme Emperor's troops and efforts.
"This bastard has completely forgotten how we helped him back then."
The other guards began to curse Li Hui, calling him a renegade and a clown.
Wu Xiao asked everyone to step back: "I remember that the son of the North Korean king, their crown prince, is still under house arrest in Shenyang. The emperor's meaning is very simple. If the king of North Korea makes any more provocative actions, the emperor will directly confer the crown prince of North Korea as the new king of North Korea. King, bypass Li Hui.
~~~~~~
There was no words along the way. After the Qi army verified the identity of the fishing boat along the way, they immediately let it go and provided fresh water to Wu Xiao and the others. Food and other supplies.
When approaching Jiujiang, Wang Zengbin specially asked more than fifty cavalry to accompany the ship on the shore to protect Qian Qianyi's safety.
They learned from the chief officer of the Qi army along the line that Zuo Liangyu had marched into Jiujiang Fucheng three days ago, and that Zuo's army was blocked outside the city wall by Yuan Chengxian for two full days. Zuo Liangyu didn't want to spend too much energy in the strong city of Jiujiang. After all, his goal was Anqing and Nanjing. After the bluff attack, Duke Kunshan led thousands of ships, large and small, and led the "Jingnan" army, which was a mixed bag of fish and dragons, crowded in the Yangtze River channel and slowly sailed towards Anqing.
Although Zuo Liangyu's army was in peace and far away from Jiujiang, there was no peace at all on the river.
There cannot be a vacuum in power. Now that Zuo Liangyu is gone, someone else will soon take over. The people who will succeed Zuo Liangyu in managing this area are not the government troops, but a group of river thieves.
Some of the Ming army's defeated soldiers also stayed to occupy the mountains and become kings, specializing in robbing the money of merchants coming and going.
Wu Xiao didn't pay any attention to these little thieves who robbed the road and grabbed money. On the night just after they passed Huangshi, a dozen river bandits were divided into two boats. They put torches on the bows and shouted at Qian Qianyi and others to pay for the passage.
Until the short flint gun in Wu Xiao's hand exploded, half of the head of the river bandit who rushed to the front was blown off. The river bandits were so frightened that they turned around and fled.
On March 15, after more than ten days of hard work and several brushes with death, Wu Xiao and others finally arrived in Jiujiang Fucheng.
Everyone went ashore. In order to avoid attracting attention, Wu Xiao divided the people into two groups, one group was led by Li Zicheng, and the other group was led by him.
As soon as everyone stood up to leave, they suddenly heard someone shouting from behind;
"You guys are so sneaky, but you are spies of Qi!"
Lewen
