I

Zhang Tieniu kept his promise, and all middle- and low-level officers and ordinary soldiers who had not escaped would be given food to go home.

The prerequisite is to collect their weapons and armor.

This was merciful enough. Zhang Tieniu even wanted to kill all the officers regardless of their positions.

Moreover, there is absolutely no wrong way to kill him!

These officers and soldiers have been suppressing bandits in Guangdong and Guangxi for three years, and the court did not provide them with food and salary. Where did their military food come from?

All of them have bloody hands, and they are all executioners who massacre the people.

Maybe some officers have even done things like killing good people and taking credit for their merits. A whole village is killed, money and food are taken away and put into the pocket, the head is chopped off and used as reward, and then the village is said to have been massacred by rebels.

Some of the officers and soldiers who escaped on the day they captured the city rushed to Shixing County to report the news, and the Shixing defenders went to Nanxiong to report the news.

"Take only a small amount of baggage and evacuate the entire army!"

Lu Qian, the commander-in-chief of Guangdong, was shocked and immediately withdrew from Nanxiong Fucheng, taking the troops from Shixing County with him. They must leave early, otherwise they will be blocked there and unable to advance or retreat, because Zhang Tieniu's advance route is a chrysanthemum.

In fact, Lu Qian's main army had been blocked by Zhang Tieniu.

During the evacuation, Lu Qian was unable to take normal roads and could only leave through the mountain via a path called "Qinghua Trail".

After crossing mountains and ridges, he finally arrived at Wengyuan County. Lu Qian still did not dare to stay and continued to retreat to Yingde County to garrison, blocking Zhang Tieniu's main route south (Wengyuan County in the Ming Dynasty was very close to Yingde County).

The entire northern Guangdong was captured, leaving only one Yingde city.

To the south of Yingde is Guangzhou!

Although there is Qingyuan in the middle blocking the waterway, there is a land official road directly connecting Yingde and Guangzhou.

As long as they capture Yingde, they can directly attack Guangzhou City.

This was not because Zhang Tieniu was so powerful, but because Shen Youlong made a strategic mistake and did not send troops to defend Huguang. As a result, once Shaozhou fell, the main forces in the direction of Nanxiong and Shixing were at risk of being blocked and encircled and annihilated, which scared the commander-in-chief Lu Qian to withdraw from the mountain roads overnight.

Shen Youlong himself actually didn't know how to fight. He relied entirely on his staff for advice, and the specific military matters were left to the generals.

When news of the fall of northern Guangdong came, Shen Youlong's situation became even more embarrassing.

He wanted to shrink the defense line, voluntarily abandon the city, and retreat to the direction of Guangzhou to join forces with Lu Qian, but Fei Ruhe was blocked in Longchuan and could not return.

That one road was blocked by Fei Ruhe's troops.

In desperation, Shen Youlong could only fight tooth and nail, personally leading more than 6,000 old soldiers, as well as the same number of civilians and a large fleet. More than 13,000 people voluntarily abandoned Longchuan City and went to attack Fei Ruhe outside Heyuan City.

There are also 3,000 defenders in Heyuan, which is equivalent to more than 16,000 people. They attack Fei Ruhe's 6,000 people (including civilian husbands) from both sides.

One hundred and thirty miles, marching along the river bank.

Set up camp in the evening.

After nightfall, shadows could be seen outside the military camp, and a large number of civilians transporting food escaped during the night. They were forcibly recruited and did not want to fight at all. How could they not escape such a good opportunity?

Shen Youlong was awakened by his own soldiers. After learning the situation, he did not dare to stop him.

If there is too much noise in the middle of the night, it is very likely that the camp will be blown up, and the officers and soldiers will follow suit.

Those officers and soldiers are also unwilling to fight!

Shen Youlong's advantage is that he knows how to delegate power. He doesn't know how to fight, so he trusts his generals very much. However, this also led to the corruption of military discipline. It took three years to suppress the bandits in Guangdong and Guangxi. In many cases, the rebels were deliberately allowed to go unchecked.

For those generals, by not fighting a tough battle with the rebels, firstly, they can help the rebels to respect themselves, secondly, they can preserve their strength, and thirdly, they can take advantage of the opportunity to make a fortune.

The generals made a fortune from robbery, but the bulk of the soldiers did not get much.

Even the military pay was not enough, and the food was very poor. This is the norm for the army in the late Ming Dynasty. Whichever army can feed the soldiers is an outlier among the outliers.

Shen Youlong can defend the city with his army, but once he leaves the city and the Datong Army is nearby, the soldiers and civilians will make up their mind to flee.

The march continued the next day, but due to the large number of civilians fleeing, soldiers had to be dispatched to transport food, causing the march to become even slower.

Set up camp in the evening.

This time Shen Youlong learned his lesson and placed the civilians in the middle and the soldiers on the periphery, so as to prevent the civilians from escaping at night.

The civilian husband really had no chance to escape, but the soldiers began to run away. The outermost troops were reduced by as much as 60% during the night, and more than 800 people escaped overnight.

In the morning, when the number of people was counted, Shen Youlong and the generals all looked ugly.

The deputy commander in chief is called Shi Wangzheng, a very good name. He took Shen Youlong aside and said quietly: "Supervisor, we can't march like this anymore, otherwise our army may be defeated before we reach the source of the river to fight the rebels."

"What can be done?" Shen Youlong sighed.

Shi Wangzheng suggested: "Immediately pay the soldiers and civilians, and make up for last month's military pay. The supervisor must pay the pay himself!"

"Okay!" Shen Youlong followed suit.

Because he did not know how to fight, and in order to make military generals obey him, Shen Youlong never interfered in specific military affairs.

This brought about two results. The general liked Shen Youlong very much and thought that the governor was a very good official, and he was usually willing to work hard for the governor. However, military discipline was severely degraded and withholding of military pay became commonplace. Soldiers at the bottom could not get paid, so they had to secretly hide some money to compensate for their losses when they robbed villages.

Such officers and soldiers have been suppressing thieves for three years, and they are all veterans. They are not only afraid of Zhao Han, but also afraid of other rebel thieves.

In a word, I don’t want to risk my life!

Shen Youlong called all the generals and announced: "The march is suspended today. You gather the soldiers, and the governor will personally pay them!"

At this critical moment, the military generals also understood the governor. As long as they were not asked to pay, the governor would pay them personally.

The soldiers lined up to receive their pay one by one, and finally there was some joy on their faces.

The effect was immediate, with only more than 300 deserters that night.

On the third day, the march continued.

Not far away, the mountain search team exploring the road ahead came back in a panic and reported: "Superintendent, there are bandits ambushing in the mountains ahead. We saw many anti-bandit flags!"

"How many thieves are there?" Shen Youlong asked.

The spy replied: "I don't know, the little one doesn't dare to get too close."

Shen Youlong was afraid of being ambushed, so he immediately stopped advancing and sent 300 additional soldiers to find out the true situation of the bandits in the mountains.

After struggling like this for an hour, the soldiers came back and reported that the ambush in the mountains was fake and they just planted some flags randomly.

Shen Youlong became more cautious and his marching speed became slower and slower.

After walking a few miles, another anti-traitor flag was found in the mountains. I had to stop and check carefully again. After repeated efforts, I only walked a dozen miles in one day.

Furthermore, morale plummeted, and both generals and soldiers felt that there might be rebels ahead at any time.

After setting up camp that day, Shen Youlong ordered the generals: "Be on guard tonight. The whole army should wear clothes and sleep. Keep their weapons in their hands. Set up many sentries to guard against night attacks by thieves."

The generals immediately went to deal with it and passed on the military orders, causing the whole army to become even more panicked.

This night, many people did not sleep well.

In the middle of the night, a sentry suddenly shouted: "What are you doing?"

Hearing the scolding, more than a dozen deserters sped up and ran toward the mountains outside the military camp.

"stop!"

The sentry was very responsible, and he received an allowance of 300 cents for being sentry tonight.

At this critical moment, we must be generous, otherwise who would be willing to be a sentinel?

"Is there a counter-thief night attack?" an officer rushed to ask.

Another sentry was dozing off. When he heard this, he immediately shouted in a panic: "Enemy attack, enemy attack!"

"Dang-dang-dang!"

A sentry began to sound a warning gong.

All the officers and soldiers suddenly woke up and picked up their weapons one after another. Some were so frightened that they ran away directly. The entire military camp was inexplicably turned into a mess.

After finally calming down, we started counting people at dawn, and there were people everywhere with red eyes and yawning.

That night, more than 200 soldiers escaped, more than 700 civilians escaped, and several ships carrying baggage escaped.

One of them contained a large amount of money, which belonged to Deputy Commander-in-Chief Shi Wangzheng.

Fei Ruhe had been besieging Longchuan for two months. The deputy commander had to find something to do. He extorted wealthy businessmen in the city and got a lot of money. Then, he misappropriated the army's grain transport ship to transport goods to himself. This kind of private use of public equipment is very common.

Especially during the small court period of the Southern Ming Dynasty, a large number of civil servants moved their families south. How could countless wealth be transported away?

The Eight Immortals crossed the sea, each showing his magical powers.

The most powerful civil servants directly used warships and civilian troops to transport their family's treasures. Behind them was the Qing army chasing them. The scene was indescribably weird.

At this moment, Shi Wangzheng was furious. He obtained thousands of taels of silver from Longchuan and had his confidants sleep on the boat to escort him throughout the process.

That bastard henchman was his nephew, and he ran away on a boat at night last night!

Shi Wangzheng was not the only one who was angry. Apparently there were generals who were using public weapons for private purposes and also using grain ships to transport goods.

In order to stop the losses, the generals asked the cargo to be unloaded and asked the civilians to carry the goods on the shore and move the baggage and grain back to the ship. Even if they escape, the civilians won't be able to take away much, unlike the ships that will lose everything if they escape.

Shen Youlong was so angry that he called the generals over and cursed: "How long has it been? You are still so greedy for money. Take out your silver and donate one hundred taels each, and I will give more to the soldiers." Increase the rates!”

This was the only way to punish him. The board fell gently, and a battle was about to begin. Shen Youlong did not dare to offend the general.

The generals in the late Ming Dynasty were indeed of low status, but at the same time they were arrogant and domineering.

A sixth-grade military attache dared to wear first-grade civilian clothes and walk swaggeringly in front of civilian officials, but the civilian officials could only turn a blind eye.

"kill!"

As we walked, there was a sudden cry of killing coming from the mountains ahead.

"Stop the march!"

"Get in formation, get in formation, don't panic!"

After a while, only a few mountain searchers were seen, but they were killed by 500 Datong ambushes. Eighteen of the more than 20 people sent out to explore the road were killed by the Datong ambush.

Shen Youlong was driven crazy. He had to walk along the river bank for more than a hundred miles, and both sides of the Dongjiang River were covered with mountains. There was a possibility of being ambushed along any stretch of the road.

Fei Ruhe only needed to send out five hundred soldiers, constantly creating panic along the way.

More officers and soldiers were sent into the mountain, and the five hundred soldiers immediately ran away. Once the officers and soldiers relax, the fake ambush may turn into a real ambush.

These officers and soldiers are almost suffering from neurasthenia.