Although there is no evidence, King Zhao firmly believes that Wang Xian must be causing trouble, because in the whole world, there is only one person who has the ability to help the prince and is willing to assist the prince.
The situation suddenly became extremely dangerous. From closing the door and beating the dogs, to now being attacked from both sides, His Highness King Zhao and his generals felt unbearable pressure.
"Your Majesty, we must change our plan and attack Beijing immediately. We must capture the capital before the Crown Prince!" Gao Zheng shouted with red eyes.
"How can the capital be so easy to fight?" Liu Qiang shook his head and said repeatedly: "That is the capital that the late emperor built for twenty years! Not to mention that our troops are not enough, even if we add several times more troops, it will not take more than a year and a half.
Don't even think about attacking the city of Beijing!" After a pause, Tian Zihe added: "What's more, after conquering the outer city and the imperial city, and conquering the imperial city and the palace city, it is impossible for us to arrive when the prince leads his army.
It can be done before..."
"Then let's deal with the prince first!" Gao Zheng gritted his teeth and said, "Once the prince dies, it will be up to the capital to spread the message!"
"What if the army from the capital takes the opportunity to attack Tongzhou?" Liu Qiang said with a bitter face: "We are attacked from both sides, how can we win?"
"If that doesn't work, let's go west..." Tian Zihe whispered.
"You fart!" Gao Zheng drew his sword angrily and said, "You want to run away before I can fight you. Believe it or not, I will kill you first!"
"How outrageous!" King Zhao slammed the table to stop the tragic scene of blood splattering on the spot.
"We absolutely cannot leave Tongzhou." This time, Liu Qiang stood aside with Gao Zheng and said slowly: "Only when we are in Tongzhou can we compete with Beijing and reduce the world's struggle to a battle between two cities. Once we leave Tongzhou
, the world belongs to Beijing alone, we are just helpless bandits, with only one way to die..."
"This won't work, that won't work either. Lao Liu, let me tell you, how can we do it?" Chen Kai couldn't help but muttered.
"This..." Liu Qiang suddenly lost his temper and said, "I don't care about it for now..."
In fact, what Liu Qiang was thinking was that we had no chance of winning! From the moment he learned that the merchants from Tongzhou City were heading south en masse with grain and grass, he knew that people’s support was against him. This destiny was really destined for the prince! King Zhao wanted to change his destiny against heaven.
It can only be said that the opportunity has been missed, and this kind of opportunity to change one's destiny is something that cannot be missed and will never come back...
Zhu Gaosui was obviously more sober than the other generals, including Liu Qiang. He already understood that no matter how hard he struggled, the chance of victory was very slim. But the reluctance in his heart surpassed everything else. He was unwilling to admit defeat like this, and he was unwilling to look at the prince.
After ascending to the throne, he became a shameful traitor and was infamy for eternity...
The generals watched His Royal Highness King Zhao's expression change several times, and finally settled on a face full of unwillingness and ferocity!
King Zhao stood up and gritted his teeth and said: "We have decided to fight against the prince!"
Although everyone knew that attacking Beijing was of greater significance, King Zhao resolutely chose a decisive battle with the prince when both options had little hope! Proving that he was stronger than his two brothers was his long-standing obsession.
read!
In any case, a decision was finally made. At least the generals were no longer like headless flies and finally had a direction...
In Jinan City, His Royal Highness the Crown Prince Zhang Fu, Anyuan Hou Liu Sheng, Shandong Governor Chu Yan, Inspector Wei Yuan, as well as the ministers who followed him from Nanjing, completed the ceremony of offering sacrifices to Emperor Daxing from afar, wearing heavy mourning
The kings and ministers held a military meeting outside the mourning hall to discuss the next step.
Similar to the situation in Beijing and Tongzhou, there are also different voices here. Liu Sheng, the Marquis of Anyuan, believes that he should immediately lead his army to the north to destroy the Zhao Wang army in Tongzhou. The British Duke Zhang Fu believes that the prince should stay in Shandong for the time being.
Waiting for the arrival of King Qin's troops from all over the country to launch the Northern Expedition. However, the ministers who followed the prince from Nanjing actually proposed to return to Nanjing, succeed to the throne in Nanjing, and use Beijing as their base...
After the defeat of Jining, the British Duke did not return to Beijing immediately. Although the emperor was in a coma and no one ordered to recall him, more importantly, the British Duke himself did not want to return to the whirlpool, so he stayed in Jinan City.
, watching the situation develop with a cold eye, and remotely controlling the actions of the Zhang family in Beijing.
By the time Zhang Min participated in the rescue, the attitude of the Zhang family had become clear. When Zhu Gaochi went north to Jinan, the British Duke naturally appeared in the team welcoming His Royal Highness. Although he only had a few thousand soldiers in his hands, as the No. 1 Duke of the Ming Dynasty, he had the highest authority in the world.
The leader of the generals, his attitude is that of the generals in the world, no one dares to ignore him.
Therefore, as soon as Zhang Fu opened his mouth, the prince tended to stay in Jinan, but this was obviously inconsistent with Wang Xian's established route. Liu Sheng and Wei Yuan looked at each other, and the latter nodded slightly, then asked Zhang Fu: "I don't know what the time is right, sir."
, what do you mean?"
"Naturally, we will wait until King Qin's army is basically in place." Zhang Fu said expressionlessly. Of course, he didn't want Zhu Gaochi to go north too early. He wanted the general group to come and deal with King Zhao, so as to achieve this great contribution for the new king and consolidate the power of the nobles.
status.
"With the 30,000 troops of the Duke and the Marquis now, is that enough?" Wei Yuan asked.
"Of course it's not enough." Zhang Fu shook his head and said: "King Zhao's army is said to be one hundred thousand. Even if there are many false claims, it is still only fifty thousand. Our troops are far inferior to the enemy's army."
Before Zhang Fu finished speaking, Liu Sheng laughed and said: "I have good news for you. Shandong Commander Liu Xin, Qingzhou Guard Commander Liu Jun and others have mobilized a 60,000-strong army and will arrive in Jinan soon!
In this way, coupled with some miscellaneous troops, we can actually piece together an army of 100,000!"
"They..." Zhang Fu frowned and said unhappily: "Although they have been recruited, their attitude is unpredictable and I may not be able to rely on them."
"Hey, what you said is so chilling." Liu Sheng shook his head and said with a half-smile: "Since you have accepted the recruitment, you are the army of the imperial court. Now is the time to employ people, so why should we distinguish between them?" As he said,
He looked at the prince and said seriously: "Your Highness must rush to Beijing as soon as possible, otherwise, things will change if it is too late!"
"Well..." Zhu Gaochi was told what he was thinking. The emperor passed away but the prince was not in the capital. This was the source of trouble! He had been taught countless lessons throughout the dynasties. Of course, he did not want to follow in the footsteps of his predecessors. He just wished he could fly with wings.
Go to Beijing. What's more, Wang Xian has already written to tell him that Liu Xin, Liu Jun and others can be trusted. The balance in the heart of His Royal Highness inevitably tilts towards Liu Sheng and others. "Indeed, they can at this time
Coming to King Qin shows that loyalty and filial piety are commendable and should not chill the hearts of righteous men."
In order to take care of Zhang Fu's face, His Royal Highness the Prince smiled and said: "Besides, to say the least, with the British Duke and Anyuan Hou here, I have nothing to fear!"
"Your Highness is right." Seeing the prince's attitude, Zhang Fu could only take a step back and changed the topic: "This kind of military strength is barely enough, but what about the food and grass? Shandong has been in war for a long time, and nine of the ten houses are empty. How can there be such a supply of food and grass?
A hundred thousand troops?" The guard sighed and said: "The so-called troops and horses have to move forward with food and grass first. If the food and grass problem is not solved, how can we advance the army?"
"That's right..." The prince and others nodded with deep understanding.
"Now there is no need to worry!" Chu Yan, who had been silent for the whole time, said with a smile: "Our troops and horses have not moved this time, and the food and grass are already waiting in front!"
"Oh?" Zhu Gaochi looked at Chu Yan in surprise: "What's Mr. Chu's clever move?"
"Reporting to Your Highness, I have reported today that within a few days, dozens of Tongzhou grain merchants have gone south with a large amount of grain and grass. Now they have gathered in Dezhou, eagerly waiting for Your Highness!" Chu Yan said calmly: "These grain merchants
I am willing to donate food and grass to His Highness for free, which is enough to support an army of 100,000 for a year!"
"What?!" Not only the prince and others, but also Zhang Fu were shocked! This was God helping the prince! And it was definitely a blow to King Zhao!
"Is this true?!" The prince suddenly stood up and looked at Chu Yan tremblingly, showing a very rare loss of composure.
"It's absolutely true. How dare I deceive His Highness with such a thing?" Chu Yan said sternly: "It's just that Your Highness was so sad when he first heard the bad news the day before yesterday that he never had the chance to report it!"
"Haha, great!" Zhu Gaochi rubbed his hands excitedly and said, "Sure enough, these grain merchants are all heroes of the country, and I will definitely reward them generously!"
"The destiny of the Ming Dynasty is indeed your highness! The people are just waiting for the king!" Now even the group of people who originally wanted to return to Nanjing became more enthusiastic. After all, no one is stupid, they know
Now that he has a chance to win, he would be stupid enough to turn around and return to Nanjing. Of course he has to go to Beijing to reap the fruits of victory!
Zhang Fu, a city like this, immediately understood that everything was under the control of Wang Xian, Liu Sheng and his group. It can even be boldly guessed that the ups and downs in the past six months were all due to Wang Xian's layout, and little by little changes
It became what it is now.
Wanting to understand this, he sighed secretly, no longer insisted on his opinion, and instead smiled and said: "It seems that I have worried too much. Since it is His Highness Tianzhu, we have nothing to worry about, so we immediately raised our troops and headed north.
That’s how to conquer rebellion!”
"What the British Duke said is absolutely true." Seeing that the British Duke also changed his attitude, Zhu Gaochi was very pleased and immediately said: "I would like to ask the British Duke to be the commander-in-chief and mobilize the troops and generals to fight against the rebellion!"
As soon as the prince said this, Liu Sheng and others looked unnatural. Although Britain deserved to be the commander-in-chief, we were not all on the same page after all. Who would want him to lead?
Fortunately, the British Duke was very clear-headed. He shook his head and declined politely: "I would like to thank Your Highness for your trust. However, I am not the best candidate for this matter. For the sake of the overall situation, please take back His Majesty's orders."
The faces of Liu Sheng and others looked better now, and they said to themselves that you know the truth. Liu Sheng was secretly proud that the British father was not the best candidate, so the best candidate could only be himself, not anyone else!
"Oh?" Zhu Gaochi looked at the British Duke and asked slowly: "In the British Duke's opinion, who is the suitable candidate?"
The British Duke looked at Liu Sheng, then moved his eyes away from him, and finally fell on the prince. He said calmly: "His Highness must conquer it personally."