Internal strife was about to break out. He Renlong did not take action because he had no chance to draw the sword. Liu Ziguang moved too quickly. The steel knife was already placed on his neck. The blood on the knife dripped into his collar, making it hot and fishy.
Yes, Liu Ziguang's eyes flashed with anger. He couldn't tolerate He Renlong's attitude of sitting back and watching him being besieged, although from a tactical point of view, this approach was not an exaggeration.
He Renlong saw Liu Ziguang's bravery and did not dare to move. A drop of sweat dripped from the tip of his nose. He saw murderous intent in Liu Ziguang's furious eyes. Even He Renlong, who was known as He Madman, had to give in: "Master Hou,
A humble position…”
Before he finished speaking, a detective horse rushed to report that Wuchang City was attacked by the enemy. He Tengjiao asked He Renlong to quickly send troops to rescue. Liu Ziguang then put away the steel knife bitterly. He Renlong confessed and left in a hurry with his troops.
. galloped into the city for reinforcements.
"Commander, why didn't you kill Gou Ri?" the soldier from the death camp said angrily.
Liu Ziguang returned the sword to its sheath and said, "It's not yet time."
He Renlong Tiejie was riding on his horse with a livid face. The deputy general asked: "General, that man named Liu actually dares to do this to you. Otherwise, let's go back and kill them all and fall on Zuo Mengeng. No one will do it anyway."
Know."
"Can you kill him or can I kill him?" He Renlong pushed the deputy general back with just one sentence and continued to gallop towards Wuchang City with a straight face. No one had ever treated him so rudely, not even Zuo
Liangyu only dared to yell loudly and did not dare to use weapons against him. This Liu Ziguang... must be killed!
Wuchang City was attacked by the navy of the Zuo Army. In fact, this was a strategy arranged by Zuo Mengeng. The purpose was to attract He Renlong to return reinforcements so that he could deal with the enemies in the shipyard. However, the military deployment may not be perfectly arranged. Zuo Menggeng
The army's military orders were not transmitted so smoothly. There was a certain time lag in transmitting the orders step by step from the shore to the naval warships in the river. Therefore, Zuo Menggeng had already been defeated here, and the attack there had just begun.
The navy's steamship fired its giant crossbow at the Yellow Crane Tower on Snake Mountain, and also sent out a number of small sampans to pretend to land, with the sound of war drums and shouts of killing, making a serious appearance, but before He Renlong could return,
City, their feint attack was over, and they withdrew to the other side. Zuo Menggeng's landing force also retreated to Hanyang in despair, leaving He Tengjiao and others confused. After half an hour, they understood that the Zuo army was in a hurry
The reason for evacuation is that the Yangtze River flood peak has arrived.
When the flood peak passed Wuhan, the water level rose rapidly and the flow rate also increased greatly. Old boatmen who had been on the river for many years knew that it was not suitable to sail at this time, so they reduced their troops across the board and returned to Hanyang to wait for the flood peak to pass.
The river is turbulent, and the left army will not attack for the time being. He Tengjiao and others can take a breather. The biggest problem in Wuchang at present is the lack of food. One hundred thousand victims outside the city need food, and tens of thousands of soldiers and civilians in the city also need food. However, the food depot is in Hankou, the Yangtze River
The control of the waterway is in the hands of the left army, and the food supply channel is completely blocked. Even if all the food in the city is looted, it still cannot last for many days.
He Renlong didn't think about this problem when he rebelled, because Nanchang's fans assured him that the court's disaster relief food would arrive immediately, so there was no need to worry about the food problem. There was no trace of the court's food trucks yet, which was why He Renlong didn't want to
The reason for falling out with Liu Ziguang now was that falling out with the imperial court meant that he was being attacked on both sides. He He Renlong was not so stupid. Not only could he not kill Liu Ziguang, but he also asked someone to make peace with him.
Liu Ziguang was also very worried because he had finished shooting the cannonballs and bullets. Although the manufacturing process was not complicated, there was a serious shortage of gunpowder ingredients. Without gunpowder, these weapons were just scrap metal. Although his three hundred men were brave, they were too few to defend.
We have to worry about one thing and lose the other, so now we must rely on He Renlong's troops.
Although the No. 1 boiler in the shipyard was blown up, there were several other small boilers. On the one hand, Liu Ziguang had people repair the No. 1 boiler, and on the other hand, he had people change the pipes of the steam crossbow to the small boilers. He also forced
I asked the shipyard workers to move away the rubble, clean out the arrows and weapons from the warehouse, and fully arm the death battalion with cold weapons. It doesn't matter if the shells are finished, use pig iron to recast eight-pound solid bullets, cast iron balls, etc.
Things were a piece of cake for the shipyard workers. They restarted the smelting furnace and overnight made a mold to cast the cannonballs, along with larger and rough swords and spears. Liu Ziguang wanted to organize the refugees to help him fight the war.
Food was needed to take in the refugees, but the food was all in Wuchang City, so Liu Ziguang took ten soldiers into the city to discuss with He Tengjiao. His subordinates were afraid that He Renlong would plot against him, so Liu Ziguang sneered and said, "He doesn't dare to kill me yet."
As expected by Liu Ziguang, as soon as he entered the city, He Tengjiao came to him with an embarrassed look and asked the Marquis of Zhenwu to give him a face and not blame He Renlong. His words also hinted that Wuchang City was now entirely supported by He Jun, which was not appropriate.
During the civil turmoil, Liu Ziguang laughed and said that General He was a sweet-tempered man, so how could he be in trouble with him?
With Liu Ziguang's understanding, He Tengjiao invited He Renlong out. He Renlong said sincerely that the afternoon battle was to ensure that Wuchang City was not lost, so he did not rush for reinforcements. He also said that Zuo Mengeng was so scheming that he was really afraid.
Having fallen into his ambush, Liu Ziguang certainly didn't care, so the two reconciled and sat down pretending to be humble to each other.
Liu Ziguang took advantage of the situation and proposed the idea of recruiting disaster victims into the army. Selecting young and strong people among the 100,000 disaster victims to help defend Wuchang can also build dikes to prevent floods and reduce the possibility of disaster victims rioting. It can be said that it kills three birds with one stone. He Tengjiao stroked his beard
After thinking for a long time, he asked: "How can the victims help in the prevention if they are not trained?"
Liu Ziguang said: "It's just to defend the city. You will always hit people with bricks. When I was in Jinan, I used private volunteer teams. The key is that we received the emperor's order to come to provide disaster relief. Since we distributed food to the victims,
, it is better to let them support themselves, and at least 20,000 people can be selected from the 100,000 victims, so that our military strength can compete with the left army."
"But how to deal with food? The food in the city is only enough for seven days." He Renlong objected. He was afraid that his soldiers would starve. To be honest, he didn't care whether the refugees outside the city lived or died.
"Eat whatever you can. If the food is not enough, I will eat horse feed. As long as I have something to eat, I cannot starve the victims to death. Otherwise, how can I live up to the emperor's grace and the emperor's earnest instructions." Liu Ziguang said categorically. After hearing his words, He Tengjiao brushed his teeth.
He stood up and said seriously: "Master Liu is of great righteousness, please accept me."
Since Liu Ziguang raised the matter of feeding the victims to the level of a political issue, it was hard for others to say anything. After discussion, they decided to spend some money to buy food nearby. The food in the city was also purchased at a high price and distributed uniformly. The same was true for noodle shops like Cai Linji.
The target of the acquisition had a few bags of flour hidden in his home, but the government took away a few taels of silver.
Recruitment flags were erected at the refugee gathering point outside the city. He Tengjiao and other local officials came to the scene in person. Liu Ziguang also changed into a brand-new military uniform to accompany him. He also recruited troops for the purpose of strengthening He Tengjiao's power. At least Governor He who represented the imperial court could not be
A polished commander must have soldiers and civilians at his disposal so that he can play the role of a governor. It is not possible to always rely on He Renlong's thousands of people.
As the saying goes, when the recruiting flag is raised, there will be people who eat food. This is true at all. As soon as the recruiting flag was raised, hungry people flocked to the army, scrambling to get food to serve as soldiers. He Tengjiao is indeed an excellent civil affairs official. Good words.
He appeased the people and turned the recruitment event into an ideological education conference. He told the hungry people that being able to eat depends entirely on the emperor's grace. If Zuo Liangyu was still in charge, you would not be able to eat a grain of rice. Now Zuo Liangyu
Yu's soldiers and horses are on the other side, and they will come to grab food at any time. It depends on you whether you can keep your job. In this way, the hungry people are even more courageous to fight for the first place. They originally complained about Zuo Liangyu's tyranny and caused floods.
After that, the Zuo regime basically sat back and ignored the victims. Governor He finally got a mouthful of food for everyone, how could they let them take it away again?
Among the 100,000 disaster victims, there are 30,000 useful men. They are further divided into young and middle-aged men who can fight and organized into three battalions and ten sentries. Each battalion has 3,000 men. The extra sentry is regarded as the governor of He Tengjiao.
The guards, the battalion officers and commanders of the third battalion were all sent by Liu Ziguang. The simple spearheads and bamboo poles made overnight by the shipyard were weapons. Military uniforms were not available for the time being, and armor was even more unthinkable. But in any case, almost
Overnight, the balance of military power on both sides of the Taiwan Strait changed dramatically. The city walls of Wuchang were filled with soldiers. In this way, He Tengjiao and Hou Xun felt confident. The only one who was unhappy was He Renlong, and He Tengjiao had something in their hands.
The soldiers would no longer rely on him, so He Renlong's hatred for Liu Ziguang deepened.
In addition to the victims who were organized into an army, the remaining 20,000 men were organized into civilian teams, ready to fight against floods at any time. Flood peaks were everywhere, the river water rose sharply, and there was a danger of flooding the city at any time. There was no systematic hydrological monitoring these days.
There is no scientific weather forecast, everything is based on one step at a time.
Liu Ziguang was still stationed at the shipyard. He brought the strongest battalion of the hungry people under his own organization, armed them with armor and weapons discarded by the left army, and also searched for dead horses on the battlefield to make broth for them.
The soldiers in this battalion are all young people in their teens and twenties. When they heard that their commander was Liu Ziguang, the famous Marquis of Zhenwu, they all burst into tears with excitement. Liu Ziguang stood on a high place and shouted:
"Brothers, are you willing to follow me and beat up that little brat Zuo Liangyu?"
The young soldiers shouted: "Yes!" The sound was so loud that it drowned out the roar of the rolling river.
Liu Ziguang was very satisfied with the effect. He jumped down from a high place, walked up to a soldier, patted him on the shoulder and asked: "Why are you willing to follow me?"
It was the first time that the soldier was so close to the hero. His breathing became rapid with excitement, and he loudly replied: "Follow you and you will have meat to eat!"