Li Gong, who failed the imperial examination three times, passed the martial arts examination, and led troops in military campaigns for many years, is still only forty-two years old.
Xing'an County has been besieged, and craftsmen are building siege equipment.
The destruction of the city is a matter of time.
Li Gong seemed a little depressed. He wanted to die for the Zhao and Song Dynasties, but for the sake of his family and tribe, he had no choice but to submit to the Ming Dynasty.
"My lord, the magistrate appointed by the imperial court is here."
"What is he doing here?"
"Say it's a labor force."
Li Gong was observing the enemy's city defense. When he heard that the prefect came to the front line to work for the army, he reluctantly turned back to the camp to receive him.
In order to appease Li Gong, Guangxi did not set up a chief envoy for the time being, and still let him serve as an administrative envoy.
However, a Guilin Prefecture was established, which not only included Guizhou, but also included the whole state of Jinghu Road.
The first prefect of Guilin was named Yang Bangyi, who could barely be considered the same year as Ju Ming. However, Yang Bangyi was not admitted in the imperial examination, but was a graduate of the Imperial College through the selection process.
No matter what, as long as you are a Jinshi in the fifth year of Zhenghe, you will be very popular in the Ming Dynasty. After all, you have the status of the prince in the same year!
"I've met Li Jinglue!" Yang Bangyi's attitude was very low. Although he and Li Gong were the same age, Li Gong held a high position and had sufficient seniority.
Li Gong returned the greeting and said, "Thank you for your hard work, Prefect Yang. Come and sit in my tent."
Yang Bangyi held out a wooden box: "This is a gift from His Majesty, please accept it from Li Jinglue."
Li Gong could only turn to the north and bow, thank the emperor from thousands of miles away, and then carefully take it with both hands.
Yang Bangyi smiled and said: "You can open up the summary as much as you like."
Li Gong curiously opened the cover, and inside was a monocular telescope. He had never seen this thing before, and thought it was some fancy thing for fun.
Yang Bangyi reminded: "This object can be stretched or shortened. After a while, put a smaller section in front of your eyes and look at it from a distance. If the scene is blurry, adjust its length."
According to Yang Bangyi's statement, Li Gong used the telescope in confusion.
After a while, Li Gong said excitedly: "This is a sacred object. The scenery of a thousand miles away is as clear as your eyes. Why worry about not being able to wipe out the thieves and bandits in the world?"
Yang Bangyi smiled and said: "Your Majesty specially asked craftsmen to build this for Jinglue."
Li Gong turned towards the north again and said sincerely: "The emperor has been so kind to me, but I can't repay it. I must fight to the death to destroy that fake Chu!"
"This is the drawing of the flat cannon. Two or three people can operate the catapult." Yang Bangyi took out the drawing of the returning cannon.
Guangxi is so remote that not only have I never heard of telescopes, but I haven't even gotten hold of a telescope.
Li Gong was dubious about Hui Hui Pao, so he decided to let the craftsmen make one first to test the effect.
Yang Bangyi was afraid of making this man unhappy, so he said softly: "Your Majesty knows that Jing Lue and Cao Cheng have a grudge. They used to be their masters, but now they are both generals of the Ming Dynasty..."
"No need to say more," Li Gong interrupted, "I won't embarrass him anymore, but I don't want to join forces with him. I followed the Ling Canal to the north to attack Quanzhou, and he went over the mountain to attack Daozhou. See Whoever defeats Yongzhou first? Anyway, from now on, the water in the well will not interfere with the water in the river!"
"Jing Lue's magnanimity is really admirable." Yang Bangyi praised him, but he was a little unhappy in his heart.
The man in front of me has surrendered to the Ming Dynasty, but he is still a warlord.
Li Gong and Cao Cheng are the largest forces in the south. As long as they cooperate sincerely, they can quickly follow the Xiangjiang River to Zhong Xiang's hinterland. However, Li Gong's attitude is to fight alone and is unwilling to cooperate with Cao Cheng.
Of course, it is also beneficial to do this to avoid further friction between each other.
Late April.
Li Gong bombarded Xing'an County with returning artillery, and at the same time used regular siege vehicles to advance, and built a seven or eight-meter-high earthen platform outside the county town.
On the earth platform, arrows rained down.
On both sides of the perimeter, stone bullets fell.
Li Gong's two sons led their troops to ascend first and quickly occupied two sections of the city wall.
The puppet Chu defenders here were obviously much weaker than those over Dongting Lake. Not to mention street fighting, when the Ming army gained a foothold at the top of the city, the defenders began to retreat on a large scale, and the supervisors sent by Zhong Xiang took the lead in escaping. .
After conquering Xing'an County, Li Gong worked non-stop and led his troops to the entire state.
The Chu army in the whole state was conquering the Su rebellion of the Dong people. When they heard that Li Gong was coming to kill them, they quickly withdrew their troops and returned to aid the state city. They were ambushed halfway and were almost wiped out.
Quanzhou was captured, but Li Gong fought with the Su family.
As early as the reign of Zhao and Song Dynasties, the Su family had repeatedly surrendered and rebelled. From time to time, they would go down the mountain to rob Han people, and even plunder the government's wealth.
This time, while Li Gong was occupying the capital, the Su family looted everywhere in the countryside.
In a rage, Li Gong actually trapped and killed the leader of the Su family, and also executed several small leaders of the Dong tribe!
When the news came out, the Dong insurgents across the state became excited and began to plunder the countryside even more crazily. The Han insurgents were angered by this and did not follow Li Gong northward, so they immediately started fighting with the Dong people.
When Yang Bangyi got the news, he was so angry that he slammed the table: "This Li Gong simply doesn't prioritize. Even if we want to punish the murderer, we should kill Zhong Xiang first. How can he join the army now that he is being held back by the Dong people?"
…
On Cao Cheng's side, he bribed the garrison who was planning to rebel against Gupoling, and quickly broke through the pass and entered Jianghua County in Daozhou.
The city of Daozhou has been captured by the Han rebels, and the defenders of Jianghua County are panicking. Cao Cheng promised to save the lives of the defenders, and the puppet Chu troops in Jianghua County directly opened the city and surrendered.
Cao Cheng also reneged on his promise and not only beheaded the surrendered defenders, but also killed all the altar masters and religious envoys in the city.
The Han, Dong, Yao, and Miao armies cooperated tacitly in Daozhou and specifically captured and massacred Manichaean leaders.
Including those merchants, gentry, gangsters, and monks who exploited fish and meat under the banner of Manichaeism, the coalition forces of all ethnic groups also killed each one on sight. They also ransacked their homes and devoured their property, and also took away the female dependents of these people's homes.
The situation in Daozhou was extremely chaotic, so he was not in a hurry to go north to fight against the Prime Minister, but directly started to take revenge in Daozhou and divide the stolen goods.
Without the Ming Dynasty's new army in Hubei and Jiangxi, just relying on these people to fight Zhong Xiang, it is estimated that there will be no results until the end of time.
Cao Cheng also knew that this was not the answer, but he could not control the situation, and many rebel leaders did not listen to him at all.
Instead, it was the miners' rebel army from the Guiyang Prison next door. They did not divide the money they stole from the Silver Mine Supervisor, but collected it and used it as military expenses. After executing some notorious people, several groups of rebels joined forces and quickly killed them.
To the east is Chenzhou.
…
Wugang.
Yang Zaixing returned to his hometown and raised troops. He led his clan members and occupied Chengbu Village.
There is another Miao rebel army that is besieging Guanxia Village.
Yang Zaixing led his troops to set up an ambush in the north of Tangjiu Mountain. The Chu troops stationed in Wugang City, whether they wanted to rescue Guanxia Village or retake Chengbu Village, would always run into their ambush point.
They had been lying in wait in the mountains and forests for seven or eight days, but not a single Chu soldier was seen.
"Those people don't dare to come, let's fight them." Yang Zaixing muttered.
The Wugang garrison was not a direct descendant of Prime Minister Zhong. It was not a strategic location and was surrounded by ethnic minorities.
The guard is a local, and the altar leader sent by Zhong Xiang has been bribed and corrupted.
To put it bluntly, they are just armed landlords and gangsters, dressed in a Manichean cloak.
Thousands of allied forces from all ethnic groups arrived outside Wugang City one after another. The defenders were so frightened that they hid in the city and did not dare to come out. All the surrounding fortresses were abandoned by them.
Although these insurrectionary armies of various ethnic groups fought bravely, most of them were not even able to stand in formation.
Don’t even know how to attack a city!
In other words, Yang Zaixing followed Cao Cheng, and his headquarters still had a fighting position to speak of.
Yang Zaixing also raised troops, although they were not large in number.
"General, there is a Han rebel army coming to surrender, and they also have craftsmen who can build artillery carriages and ladders!"
"Please!"
When they saw the rebels building siege equipment, the defenders in the city finally couldn't sit still and gave up hope of Prime Minister Zhong's reinforcements.
One evening, taking advantage of the opportunity for the rebels of all ethnic groups to return to camp, the defenders organized a death squad of hundreds of people, trying to leave the city and destroy the equipment built by the rebels.
The sudden attack caught the rebels by surprise.
Yang Zaixing mounted his horse and rushed towards the enemy with more than a dozen of his own soldiers - this was all their cavalry, only sixteen in total.
The rebels there have been killed and dispersed, and hundreds of death squads are burning siege engines.
Seeing Yang Zaixing rushing towards him with more than a dozen cavalry, the enemy general immediately divided his troops to organize defense and at the same time accelerated the speed of setting off fire.
Yang Zaixing only wore a half-length leather armor. He rode on horseback and fired two arrows in succession, hitting two enemies accurately. Then he raised his spear and knocked over one of the men. He then charged in through the enemy's unready formation. More than a dozen cavalry followed Yang Zaixing.
Enter the formation.
The enemy general was a former bandit who pretended to have converted to Manichaeism, but now he has hundreds of troops under his command.
He rushed forward confidently, but he didn't even see Yang Zaixing's movements clearly. He felt a sharp pain in his chest and then his whole body flew back.
"kill!"
Yang Zaixing rode through the formation and found that one of his sixteen cavalrymen had been lost in the process.
In anger, he turned his horse around and charged again without waiting for the cavalry to form.
The enemy's formation was not arranged in the first place, and the attack was already in chaos. Now Yang Zaixing charged forward on his own, rushing left and right, killing more than ten people in a row, and was so frightened that the remaining enemies collapsed on the spot.
The morale of the defenders in the city dropped to the bottom.
That night, the altar owner and the emissary chose to abandon the city and escape.
Not only did they escape, but they actually wanted to take away their belongings. The copper coins were too heavy and they had to give up. They took away only gold, silver and treasures, and quietly escaped from the water gate in a boat.
The guard was on the tower. When he heard Minato's movement, he immediately knew what was going on. He didn't try to stop him, but followed suit and slipped away with his family and belongings in the middle of the night.
When the soldiers heard the news, they fled in panic and even opened the city gate to escape.
The next day, Yang Zaixing led his troops into the city, easily captured Shantang Village, and directed his troops towards Shaoyang further north.
