"This, this, this..."
At night on March 22, when Li Zicheng saw the three "loyalty certificates" brought back by Wang Dehua on the Yongding Gate, he was speechless.
How could such an operation happen? Loyal people surrender according to the order... Be loyal and surrender without delay. Be an honest and upright second minister, and you can also be three second ministers listed in "The Biography of Loyal Ministers"!
Emperor Dashun Li Zicheng suddenly felt that his brain was not enough! Speaking of which, Li Zicheng was also quite cunning. When he was engaged in the anti-bandit cause, he did a lot of insidious and cunning things, and even faked surrender. I always felt that I was somehow smarter than Emperor Chongzhen, but now I met a Ming Dynasty Fujun Crown Prince who was obviously more cunning than me...
"Damn it," Li Zicheng was surprised for a while, and then he smiled bitterly, "You actually asked a sixteen-year-old boy to play tricks on you! Fortunately, he is Zhu Youxiao's son. If the two of them had been different, what would have happened? Today!”
Yes, Zhu Cihong wanted to change with Chongzhen, and Li Zicheng was either deceived into becoming a loyal and loyal Ming Dynasty, or he was deceived into becoming a loyal and loyal Ming Dynasty martyr. How can he be a traitor?
"Your Majesty," Li Zicheng's great military advisor Song Xiance also stood up and spoke at this time, "Zhu Cixiang is no small thief, he is a treacherous and righteous thief!"
Since the loyal people at Zhengyang Gate are willing to surrender, then the city of Beijing belongs to Li Zicheng - the Ming Dynasty has almost been overthrown, and Li Zicheng has certainly become the world's orthodoxy. From now on, Zhu Cixiang is a thief.
So Song Xiance immediately identified Zhu Cihong as a treacherous and righteous thief!
"Treacherous and righteous..." Li Zicheng thought for a moment and nodded, "That's right! Zhu Cihong can support the Zhu Thief's endgame in just a few days, and he can also play tricks on his forehead, and he can make people like Luo Yangxing and Gao Yushun When a person becomes a loyal person, he will indeed have treacherous and righteous methods!
It seems that Mingshi’s energy is not exhausted yet! He is a powerful enemy! "
Gu Junen stepped forward and suggested: "Your Majesty, now that Beijing has been won, Dashun will have the status of orthodoxy in the world. The top priority is to capture the Zhu Thief Emperor and his son. They must not be allowed to escape to Nanjing, otherwise there will be a bloody battle between the north and the south." !”
"Well, that's what I think!" Li Zicheng's face turned gloomy. He admired Zhu Cixiang very much, but Zhu Cixiang was still his mortal enemy!
"Your Majesty, the Donglu hurdle must be passed!" Song Xiance reminded, "We must be especially careful about Zhu Cihong and Donglu joining forces. First of all, we should find out whether Zhu Cihong and Donglu are married? If there is indeed a marriage, then we have to Beware of Wu Sangui joining forces with the Donglu. If the marriage is false, then we should seize the key points of Shanhaiguan as soon as possible to prevent the Donglu from advancing westward."
"We have to find out!" Li Zicheng laughed, "What a great man! How many days have he been in power? And he has already made a fool of himself! It's a pity that his strength is not in him but in his forehead! Otherwise, he would have been born ten years earlier. Is there such a thing as the world? Come here! Send an order to Huang Hu and Yi Yihu, telling them to block the way of the Red Thief Prince from the north to the east...
Also, can anyone take a trip to Yongping? I want to recruit Wu Sangui as a lord! "
"Your Majesty," Wang Dehua suggested in a low voice, "Wu Sangui's sister is Zhu Cihong's concubine. I'm afraid he will not surrender... Moreover, Wu Sangui is the leader of the Guan Ning Army, and their Guan Ning Army has long been defeated by the Dongpi If we surrender to Your Majesty, we will inevitably have to march forward for the king and fight to the death against the Donglu."
Li Zicheng laughed: "Well, I know he won't surrender, but I still need someone to check it out to find out whether the Donglu and Zhu families are joining forces to marry. We can't just listen to those officials in Beijing who don't know their loyalty and treachery." Their one-sided words.
Wang Dehua, go back and tell Luo Yangxing, Gao Yushun and Guang Shiheng that they are the most loyal and loyal people in your life. As long as they are willing to submit to E Dashun sincerely and tell the truth whether the Crown Prince Zhuthi and the daughter of the auxiliary king of Donglu are married, E Dashun will make them Zhongyi Bo, Zhong Shun Bo and Zhong Liang Bo. If they dare to deceive, I won't spare them! "
Wang Dehua kowtowed quickly and said: "Your Majesty is truly unparalleled in benevolence and righteousness, and his virtue is worthy of heaven and earth."
Zhu Cihong's false statement on the Yongding Gate Tower has almost become a worry for Li Zicheng. If he can't find out, even the emperor will feel uneasy!
…
On March 22nd, it was almost dusk.
In Zhili territory, on the west bank of the Grand Canal, on the city wall of a large town called Wangqingtuo, in a temporary watchtower, Cao Huachun and his adopted son Cao Wenbao stood on it, both wearing military uniforms, each with one hand. Monocular telescope, looking north intently.
This watchtower is extremely crude, it doesn't even have a roof to protect it from wind and rain, it's just four big logs supporting a platform. But standing on it, you can still see all the situations around Wang Qingtuo.
Wangqingtuo is not too close to the canal, not too far away, about twenty or thirty miles away. This was not a big town, but it became developed because of the birth of Cao Huachun during the Chongzhen period. By the 17th year of Chongzhen, Wangqingtuo was the largest town between Tongzhou and Tianjin Acropolis.
The main reason why Wang Qingtuo was able to rise was the Cao Huachun family's year-round management. Over the past decade or so, the area around Beizhili has gradually become turbulent, so safety is more important to merchants traveling from north to south than favorable transportation conditions.
Wang Qingtuo's Cao family was a powerful force that had produced eunuchs and general soldiers in the capital camp! Naturally, the management of the lair will not be ignored, so after many years of management by the Cao family, Wang Qingtuo has become an impregnable fortress!
In the past few battles at the entrance to Lu Chou, Wang Qingtuo's place has never been broken!
This is enough to attract wealthy landowners and businessmen from hundreds of miles around to move here. Therefore, although Wangqingtuo is a town, it is more prosperous than several nearby counties.
However, this prosperous place in troubled times seemed to have come to an end in March of the seventeenth year of Chongzhen... It was not necessarily the end, but it was definitely a crossroads of success and failure.
As the ancestor of Wang Qingtuo, Cao Huachun and Cao Damun came back on the evening of March 18th. He only brought a dozen servants and not much luggage with him, and he came covered with travel. As soon as they entered the town, martial law was immediately declared. In addition to the elite members of the Cao clan and the Cao family's servants, all the members of the Cao family were armed. Every household, rich or poor, had to provide help, and the rich households had to contribute extra money.
So when the dust raised by the large army of troops marched in appeared in the northwest sky, Eunuch Cao Huachun gave an order and summoned two to three thousand strong men.
Inside the wall of Wang Qingtuo, the noisy two or three thousand strong men had barely formed an array, dozens of rows lined up. Although these young men were just a mob, they were dispatched there with the backbone of servants that the Cao family had raised for many years. After spending some time, they finally had some appearance. The people in the first row were all the housekeepers of Lao Cao's family, and each of them had a turtle-dove-footed fire blunderbuss! These are not just fake products to fool the imperial court. They are all made in Guangdong and made by Zheng Zhilong as a gift from Eunuch Cao. Even the fire blunderbuss and gunpowder are all high-quality products!
Over the years, when the Tatars entered the country, Wang Qingtuo relied on these really effective firecrackers to ensure peace!
However, it's not that those Tatars really can't defeat Wang Qingtuo, but they are unwilling to sacrifice dozens or hundreds of lives for a small town. After all, there were only a few of them, and they still wanted to grab a handful and leave. When they saw hard walnuts that were hard to chew, they would of course choose to give up.
But Li Zicheng was different. After entering Beijing, he was the master of the world... Would he still allow a stronghold loyal to the Ming Dynasty to exist under his nose?
Therefore, in the small town of Wang Qingtuo, people's minds are at a loss now... Most people are eagerly looking at Eunuch Cao to take the lead, so that everyone can surrender to the Da Shuntian soldiers together!
Cao Huachun's adopted son Cao Wenbao first put down the telescope in his hand, turned to look at his eunuch father, his voice was a little trembling: "Dad, they are a team of armored cavalry!"
Eunuch Cao frowned: "Is it from Dashun or Daming?"
"I don't know," Cao Wenbao shook his head, "It's too far away and I can't see the flag clearly..."
