Ruzhou Prefecture City.

The city wall was filled with torches, and soldiers and young and strong people gathered together under the battlements, and the soldiers and the people were all staring at the city in amazement.

Half a month ago, the Huai thieves occupying Kaifeng to the east, and the Guide area suddenly mobilized troops from Xiangcheng to Ruzhou. The Ming army Xu Dingguo's troops in Ruzhou could not resist at all. If they could block the Huai thieves, they would not have fled from Guide to Ruzhou in a hurry.

Baofeng, the gateway to the east of Ruzhou, was successively captured by Huai bandits, and the defenders were either annihilated or surrendered. Now only the capital city of Ruzhou and Yiyang in the west were still in the hands of the Ming army.

Yiyang was also not peaceful. When Zhang Jinyan, the former Minister of War of the Ming Dynasty, heard that King Lu ascended the throne in Nanjing, he returned home with Guo Guangfu, the deputy general, Hao Shangzhou and others gathered in the rebel army and proclaimed himself the governor of Hebei, Shanxi and Henan. He gathered tens of thousands of people and made a big fuss.

Xu Dingguo, who was in "internal and external difficulties", knew that his troops could not resist the large-scale invading Huai thieves, so he sent people across the Yellow River to ask for help from the Qing Dynasty's Henan Governor Luo Xiujin and Wei Hui General Zu Kefa. He even sent people to Henan Prefecture to the west to ask for help from the former Shun Army general Liu Zhong who surrendered to the Qing Dynasty.

General Wei Hui Zu Kefa was determined to rescue Xu Dingguo. He knew very well that once Ruzhou was in the hands of the Huai bandits, the north of the Yellow River would inevitably be occupied by the Huai bandits, and then the road to the north of Prince Ying's army heading south to Jingxiang would be blocked.

However, Zu Kefa is now a clay Buddha who crosses the river and cannot protect himself. The green camp soldiers he put together under his command would burn high incense if they could defend Weihui City. How could they have the energy to rescue Xu Dingguo?

Liu Zhong, who was in Luoyang, heard that Dashun's Huaihou led his troops to restore Xi'an and blocked Shangluo's grain road. Most of Shaanxi was recovered, and Tongguan was occupied by Hu Shoulong, the Taoist who surrendered to the Huaihou, led his troops to occupy him. In panic, he was very regretful of the act of surrendering to the Qing Dynasty. Therefore, after sending people to contact him in Xi'an, he immediately expressed his repentance. At the same time, he killed the three deputy generals who advised him to surrender to the Qing Dynasty, and tied up all the officials appointed by the Qing Dynasty, including the Henan Prefecture and the Luoyang Prefecture County, and took them to Xi'an.

Although Liu Zhong did not openly express his re-sume at this time, he was ready to change his flag in Luoyang City, so it was impossible to send troops to help Xu Dingguo deal with the Huai Army in the east.

Since the death of the Admiral Jin Yuhe in battle, Luo Xiujin, the governor of Henan, had no generals under his command, and there were not many soldiers and horses. He barely supported Huaiqing, Weihui and Zhangde's three prefectures. After receiving the letter of help from Xu Dingguo, Luo Futai, in addition to asking Beijing for help, had a secret trick, which was to send people to Ruzhou to ask Xu Dingguo to send his two sons to Huaiqing as a charity, so that the Qing army in the south of the Yellow River would immediately enter Ruzhou to help Xu Dingguo defend the enemy.

This is a complete lie. Xu Dingguozhen sent his son to Huaiqing, and Luo Xiujin could not send a soldier to the south bank of the Yellow River.

The reason for doing this is that Luo Xiujin hopes to "bind" Xu Dingguo to the Qing Dynasty and force Xu Dingguo to fight with the Huai thieves and restrain the Huai thieves.

Xu Dingguo is not a fool either. Can a 60-year-old general be coaxed by someone at will?

But if his son doesn't give him away, Xu Dingguo's life is not easy. The Huai thieves coming from the east are very capable of fighting, and they are not able to resist the Henan thieves he pieced together. If he can't defend Ruzhou, Xu Dingguo probably has to explain this, and there is no chance to make a comeback.

The only thing that made Xu Dingguo feel at ease was that there were still some food and grass robbed in Ruzhou City, so that the Huai bandits would not surround the city, and the food would be cut off in the city.

But Xu Dingguo was still confused about how long he could hold on and whether he could wait until the Qing soldiers returned from the south. He had no idea. His general idea was to be a monk and hit the bell for one day.

Under the city of Ruzhou, a group of more than two or three hundred Huai cavalry drove thousands of Ming troops from Rushui River south of Ruzhou to the city of Ruzhou in one breath.

When chasing these Ming army defeated soldiers, the cavalry of the Huai Army seemed to be catching a cat and a mouse, and only drove the Ming army to the city without killing people. But if the Ming army ran slowly and asked them to chase them up, the saber in their hands would still be swung without hesitation.

With the threat of the Huai Army cavalry, the Ming army in Ruzhou City did not dare to open the city gate to meet their own people. They only dared to put down hanging baskets from the city and pulled up the defeated soldiers crying and opening the door to put them in.

Many defeated soldiers hugged their heads and cried after being pulled up to the city, and were in a state of terror.

Xu Er'an, the eldest son of Xu Dingguo, found the officers among the defeated soldiers and inquired in detail about the loss of Jia County. When he learned that Jia County was conquered by Huai thieves for a long time, Xu Er'an and others were shocked and speechless.

Jia County is the gateway to the east of Ruzhou, and the Huai bandits in the east are the enemy of the Xu army, so Xu Dingguo stationed more than 5,000 troops in Jia County. So many people guarded Jia County but were defeated by Huai bandits for a long time. How can it not be shocking?

Xu Dingguo also frowned. He knew that the Huai thieves could fight because he was driven from Guide to Kaifeng by the Huai thieves and drove all the way from Kaifeng to Ruzhou.

In addition, he also heard that the Huai thieves defeated the army led by Prince Su of Manchu in Shandong and killed tens of thousands of heads of Manchu soldiers.

Xu Dingguo was also a veteran of the Ming Dynasty, of course he didn't believe it. He believed that the Huai thieves defeated three or four thousand Manchu soldiers at most, but even so, the result of this battle was shocking.

But if you can fight, it is impossible to capture Jia County, which is guarded by 5,000 people in half a day, right?

No matter how bad the soldiers in Jia County are, no matter how chaotic they are, they are still five thousand people, not five thousand pigs!

Only facts are in front of you, and the panic and yelling defeated soldiers under the city are evidence.

Xu Dingguo's forehead was black and his cheeks kept twitching. He was over 60 years old and had no choice but to face the situation in front of him.

The Huai thieves advanced westward with great fanfare and had already arrived in Ruzhou. Obviously, it was not something that Xu Dingguo could solve. Depending on the situation, the Huai thieves were determined to occupy all the prefectures and counties on the north bank of the Yellow River.

The rescue in the city continued, and the reliable hanging basket could pull up several defeated soldiers under the city. Seeing that Ruzhou was prepared, the Huai bandits and cavalry were farther away from the defeated soldiers and fired arrows and guns at the defeated soldiers under the city wall, killing the defeated soldiers screamed at the base of the wall.

On the other hand, the defenders on the city did not even have the courage to open the city gate and let their people come in. They only took the bow and arrow into the city in horror.

In the night, how many can you shoot?

A brave officer shouted to open the city gate and let people in, but the generals who had already been scared by the thieves would let them do this without hesitation.

The reason is very good. What you can see in the morning are these two or three hundred Huai thieves and cavalry, but who knows if there are a large group of Huai thieves hidden in the night and just wait for the city gate to open and then come to kill them immediately?

The cavalry outside the city fired for a while, perhaps because they didn't want to waste the arrows, so they retreated some. This made the defeated soldiers crying and screaming at the city like a general amnesty, one after another. However, every time a defeated soldier was hung, the morale of the Ruzhou defenders became more sluggish, especially the wailing sounds of the injured soldiers were particularly harsh at night and heartbreaking.

The defeated soldiers who were pulled up to the city might have wanted to save themselves some face, and exaggerated the strength of the Huai bandits, saying that there were tens of thousands of people, and they were countless times more fierce than the Manchu soldiers. This rumor immediately made the defenders even more panic.

In this tense atmosphere, the sky gradually became brighter and as the vision became clear, the Ming army standing at the top of the city finally saw clearly outside the city. It was really just two or three hundred Huai thieves and cavalry, without a large group of people hiding!

Suddenly, the Ming army on the city became uneasy. Some generals began to shout to go out of the city to eliminate the two or three hundred bold Huai thieves in order to increase the morale of the army. Otherwise, if the soldiers were in such a sluggish manner, the Huai thieves would probably have gone down half a day like Jiaxian when they arrived.

"Taiwan, send troops out of the city, otherwise the morale of the army would not be raised!"

"There are only a few people in the Huai thieves. We also have cavalrymen. We sent the city to defeat them in one fell swoop, so as not to think that there is no one in our Ruzhou!"

""

The valiant generals advocated that they could not leave the city, but the bold generals yelled to leave the city.

Xu Dingguo was also in a conflict. Although he knew that there were only two or three hundred cavalrymen in Huai robbers under the city, the situation was clear. The large group of Huai robbers had already driven from Xiangcheng. Without the gate of Jiaxian, they must have rushed towards Ruzhou Prefecture City. I am afraid that on the way here, if the troops were sent out of the city to fight, if the large group of Huai robbers arrived, the consequences would be unimaginable.

Thinking of this, Xu Dingguo was shuddered, but seeing the ardent sensation of Qiu Zhan's subordinates, he shook his mind when he looked at the sluggish morale on the city wall, and knew that the army must be sent to fight, otherwise the morale of the army would be irreversible at all.

"So quickly and quickly!"

After the General General spoke, the generals who were asking for battle were all overjoyed and shouted that they wanted to grab the credit. At this time, they heard the General General General say, "Be careful after leaving the city. When you see that the situation is wrong, come back immediately!"

"Don't worry, boss!"

A general who had been a bandit for several years and had only become an official of the Ming Dynasty for only half a year responded loudly like a copycat before, and then he clicked his troops and rushed out of the city gate.

There are more than 800 Ming cavalry in Ruzhou City. These more than 800 cavalry are also the capital of Xu Dingguo. He led dozens of Xu family relatives to snowball. Looking at which family in Ruzhou can have so many cavalry in addition to him, Xu Ding!

Soon, eight hundred Ming cavalrymen who were used to burning, killing and looting the Huai cavalry in Kaifeng, Guide, Nanyang, and Ruzhou shouted and killed at the location of the Huai cavalry. They screamed, and they looked so brave.

After discovering that hundreds of cavalry suddenly appeared in Ruzhou City, the two or three hundred Huai Army cavalry were not afraid at all. Instead, everyone was excited and had a long-awaited smile on their lips.

The commander of this cavalry was Zhang Shiyi, a general under the former Shandong general Liu Zeqing. This man knew Xu Dingguo's details very well, so he smiled at his subordinates happily and said, "Let's make another contribution before Zhang Shuai arrived!"

"Make another contribution!"

The cavalry of Zhang's army responded with a loud bang, and did not take the Ming army in Ruzhou who had left the city seriously at all, because compared to the Henan thieves who were recruited by Xu Dingguo, these are the regular soldiers of the former Ming Dynasty!
Chapter completed!