The fierce battle left only countless corpses. Wang Fuchen originally planned to lead a team to attack several times to see if he could seize and destroy a few Hongyi cannons.
But soon he discovered that new troops were arriving from the rear of the Qing army as reinforcements. He smiled bitterly as he thought that he had indeed been tricked by Jiang Quan.
Wang Fuchen violently threw his helmet to the ground. He flew over and took advantage of the opportunity when a Manchurian vest was stabbed by a spear of an infantryman of the Shun Army. He threw the enemy off his horse and then smashed the opponent alive with his hand.
His head, blood and brains were covered with his hands.
Wang Fuchen seized the horse and mounted, changed his machete into a long horse spear and galloped left and right. He picked up the Manchurian's hard bow and fired several arrows. Finally, he opened a gap and rushed out without hesitation.
The remaining soldiers of the Shun army had no other choice but to retreat with Wang Fuchen.
But in the process, more casualties were inevitably caused.
Wang Fuchen felt very depressed. He was trying to find some military exploits so that he could stay in the Dashun Dynasty. Why did he get such bad luck? There were many casualties among the soldiers, but no gains at all!
While he was depressed, there was another sound from the other end of the mountain. Wang Fuchen saw a new Shun Army flag suddenly appeared on the other side of the canyon. That was... He was not very clear about the shape of the Dashun Five Army Flag.
, but some veterans of the Shunjun army under his subordinates had already recognized him and shouted out that he was "the army in the palace".
Accompanying the setting up of the Shun Army flag was a group of bird gunners who emerged. After they quickly fired a volley of guns, they almost didn't take a breath, and immediately fired a second wave of gunfire.
Wang Fuchen was stunned: "How could it happen so fast!?"
The brave and invincible Manchu cavalry are indeed powerful, but in front of the self-made volleys of guns, everyone is equal. Warriors with superb martial arts skills and the most ordinary militiamen can be killed with one shot.
Zhang Guowu then led many soldiers who used self-generated fire guns to attack the Qing army. Finally, a group of three-walled cavalry rushed into the enemy formation and began to harvest.
Wang Fuchen knew Zhang Guowu and knew that he was also Jiang Yu's old subordinate. Seeing the sudden appearance of reinforcements, Wang Fuchen couldn't figure out what was going on, but the morale of his men had been greatly boosted, so he simply turned back to fight against the enemy.
soldiers.
After a fierce battle, the Dashun Army relied on good luck to break through the enemy's counter-ambush and captured many Hongyi artillery pieces.
Wang Fuchen said in surprise: "Zhang Guowu... why are you back? Didn't you go to Kaifeng?"
Zhang Guowu followed a general with a big horse and a golden sword, and whispered: "We have not yet arrived in Kaifeng, and we have already encountered reinforcements from the north when we arrived at Daming Mansion. The King of Jin has already strengthened the river defense force in anticipation of the enemy's opportunity."
The general with the golden sword also clapped his hands, and the rest of his troops continued to chase and eliminate the remaining Qing troops.
This man also said with joy: "We just arrived in Shanxi and killed nearly a hundred real Manchu Tatars. Such military exploits are easy to obtain. Cost-effective, cost-effective."
Wang Fuchen guessed that this person should be a general, because although the troops he and Zhang Guowu brought seemed to only have a few hundred people, their weapons and equipment were very sophisticated, and it was estimated that more reinforcements would arrive near Taiyuan in the future.
The man puffed up his chest and said, "I am Yuan Shitai, and I have been ordered to go north to reinforce Taiyuan."
The number of reinforcements Yuan Shitai brought to Shanxi was not large, but there was a group of elite soldiers who were Yuan Shizhong's personal soldiers in the Xiao Yuan Camp. They were later incorporated into the Yulin Army for training by Li Laiheng, and are now back to fight under Yuan Shitai's men.
The ordnance, equipment and training of this group of Yulin Army soldiers are different from other soldiers. Especially the self-generated fire blunderbuss they use, which is the weapon that Li Laiheng relies on to fight the Qing army in the most unfavorable situation.
Self-generated fire guns, also known as flintlock guns, are not technically difficult. The main problem is that the craftsmanship of the Huguang Ordnance Institute is not up to standard. Although Li Laiheng has long absorbed some missionaries from Wuchang as consultants to the Ordnance Institute, he has never been able to
To overcome the technical problems of the fusillary device, large-scale production has not been possible.
Recently, the iron casting factory under Geng Yingqu's name began to use some hydraulic forging hammer facilities for forging, which gave the people of Huguang a break and was able to transfer more manpower and material resources to the production of fusilier devices.
The production scale of the difficult self-generated firearms has only slightly increased. A batch of newly produced flintlocks have been sent to Kaifeng from Wuchang, Suizhou, and Xiangyang. First, they will be equipped with the Yulin Army, and secondly, they will be equipped with the Third Army under the jurisdiction of Li Shiwei of the Imperial Army.
division to increase its firepower.
These self-generating fire cannons under Yuan Shitai's men soon opened Wang Fuchen's eyes. Not only could they make fire by themselves, but the lead bullets they loaded were much heavier than ordinary bird cannons. They were more powerful, had a faster rate of fire, and more importantly
It is also easy to load and is not easily affected by the weather. In winter, it is many times more convenient and faster than ordinary bird guns.
Wang Fuchen could not help but exclaim: "This is truly a divine weapon in the world!"
Yuan Shitai did not say much. The rest of his troops came from Hebei to Shanxi and gathered in the Lengquankou area. At this time, they were quickly transferred to the outskirts of Taiyuan. Together with the king's assistant ministers and Zhang Guowu's subordinates, there were more than 1,500 soldiers in total.
.
The number of reinforcements was not very large, but it showed that the 100,000 elite soldiers gathered by King Jin in Kaifeng had finally begun to be mobilized.
Yuan Shitai's troops, under the guidance of Wang Fuchen, drove back to Taiyuan first to rush for reinforcements. At this time, the Qing army was also digging trenches near Taiyuan to attack, and it seemed that they intended to cut off internal and external transportation and establish a long-term siege.
However, because Chen Yongfu actively participated in the battle, the Taiyuan defenders would send out raids to harass the Qing army's civil engineering operations every day, and at night they would send troops to set fire to destroy the trenches. This made Ye Chen's trench-digging operation in an attempt to trap Taiyuan not only full of flaws, but also very inefficient.
.
Without any effort, Yuan Shitai rushed into Taiyuan City with reinforcements.
Chen Yongfu had long fortified the walls and cleared the fields, demolishing all the houses in the gates outside the city to prevent them from being used as cover when the Qing army attacked the city. He was experienced in defending the city. Since joining forces with Jiang Gu to defend Taiyuan last year, he had already defeated two large and small sieges by the Qing army.
More than ten times.
Yuan Shitai had also been promoted to the rank of general at this time, but like Jiang Quan, he was a local general, and unlike Jiang Quan, he was not already a marquis, and his status was not comparable to that of Chen Yongfu, the military general in the palace.
Zhang Pili is the general of Yulin Army in the palace, Hao Yaoqi is the general of the first division, Miao Lichen is the general of the second division, Li Shiwei is the general of the third division, and Chen Yongfu ranks last, the general of the army in the palace.
The commander of the fourth division.
Moreover, his fourth division has not yet brought all its troops to Taiyuan. A considerable number of elite troops are still left in Kaifeng by Li Laiheng.
But even so, Chen Yongfu, as the most elite general of the Central Army in the field army of the Five Armies, naturally has a higher status than the two local generals, Jiang Yu and Yuan Shitai.
Moreover, Dashun adopted a right-wing policy, and Chen Yongfu could also control Shanxi Jiedushi Han Wenquan and Shanxi direct commander Li Ruoxing.
After the King of Shanxi personally welcomed the arrival of Yuan Shitai's reinforcements and listened to Wang Fuchen's explanation of the battle situation, Chen Yongfu did not criticize Jiang Quan for instigating a rebellion. Instead, he carefully observed the self-made firecrackers brought by Yuan Shitai and sighed in the same way:
"With the Dashun Army having this magical weapon, there will no longer be any accidents in the Central Plains of Dingding."