All of this constitutes an unsolvable mystery. It also makes the rebels always fearful of the Qimu Island forces.
Kong Youde slowly stuffed the stack of paper into his arms and asked, "Why did the owner of the village tell the officers and soldiers where the grain stand was?"
Chen Sigen smiled slightly: "If you think it is useful, use it. If you think it is useless, burn it with fire."
Kong Youde didn't give up: "To be honest, I'm still a little doubtful about this... Could it be that I'm inviting you to enter the urn?" He wanted to provoke the other party so that he could get some words out of him.
Chen Sigen still smiled slightly: "Is it necessary to invite you to enter the urn?" His expression changed and he sneered, "If so, your head had been spread all over the world a few months ago, so why wait until today?
!”
These words were extremely rude and arrogant. Kong Youde was filled with anger, but he knew that the other party was not talking nonsense, so he suppressed the anger in his heart and said with cupped hands: "Thank you very much, Master Luzhuang. Kong took his leave.
"After that, get up and leave.
After receiving this information, Li Jiucheng and Kong Youde discussed whether they would continue to defend the city for a short period of time. Among the official troops there was the elite Guan Ning Army, among which there were two thousand Yiding who were known to be the most adept at fighting.
They were Mongolian and Houjin soldiers who rebelled against the Ming Dynasty. They were no match for their own side in wild battles. The battle at Beima Town had fully demonstrated that the mounted infantry they had improvised by plundering livestock was no match for the field cavalry.
As a result, a surprise attack on the grain platform to force the officers and soldiers to retreat became their only possible option other than escaping across the sea.
However, now that the rebel activity area has been compressed to Dengzhou, if you want to rob grain in Qingzhou, you must cross the border of Laizhou. This is a very risky thing. There are currently several soldiers led by Sun Yuanhua, Zhang Tao and others in Laizhou City.
Thousands of officers and soldiers were all Shandong soldiers and Nan soldiers who had a red eye with them. If they intercepted them, whether they were going or returning, they would cause serious losses, and the entire surprise attack force might be wiped out.
The two discussed it again and again, and finally decided that it was not too late. Taking advantage of the opportunity that the officers and soldiers had just arrived at the city and had not yet formed an encirclement, and it was snowing heavily, and there were very few people moving in the wild, they dispatched the cavalry to launch a surprise attack on Qingzhou, burning the provisions of the officers and soldiers in one fell swoop.
tower.
The plan was settled, with Kong Youde's retainers as the core, he also secretly mobilized the retainers of various former Dongjiang generals, a total of 600 elite cavalry, and each of them was given a hearty meal, clothing to keep out the cold, and a reward of money.
Each man was equipped with a horse and a mule. He carried six days' dry food and horse supplies with him. Taking advantage of the heavy snowfall, he quietly opened the city gate and secretly marched along the coastline.
It snowed heavily all the way, and the goose-feather-like snow quickly covered the traces of the men and horses. In the cold weather, the officers and men's horses no longer went far away to conduct sentinels. Kong Youde's 600 men and horses
The journey was smooth and we entered Qingzhou territory without any major losses.
Although Qingzhou is the third prefecture in the East, due to the success of Laizhou's city defense battle, the damage suffered in the Denglai Rebellion was much smaller than that of Deng and Laizhou. Except for the fact that it was plundered by the rebel troops who returned to Dengzhou at the beginning.
After passing outside, it was relatively peaceful. It was not like a deserted place with no trace of people. Naturally, the alertness of the officers and soldiers was also much worse.
Kong Youde led the cavalry to suddenly appear in Qingzhou, and broke through a series of grain collection sites such as Zhuqiao and Huangshan Pavilion. They burned tens of thousands of stones of grain and grass transferred by the officers and soldiers. Yang Jin led his army in Qingzhou Road to fight hastily. He was defeated and died. For a time, he had planned to "collect"
The Shandong camp suddenly became chaotic.
This winter was already very cold. In November, it was already snowing heavily. In addition, the sea breeze was biting. The sergeants were exposed to the snow and frost, and their skin was chapped. They suffered from the cold winter. However, the officers and soldiers who entered the suppression campaign did not even have enough winter clothes. Zhu Dadian and Xie Sanbin
He sent people everywhere to prepare cotton clothes and fur coats, and also collected reed mats and liquor to reward the sergeants. He also distributed many silver rewards in an effort to stabilize the morale of the troops.
However, rumors that the grain had been burned suddenly appeared. Before they could find out the source of the rumors, an urgent messenger from Qingzhou had already arrived at the camp.
This was like a bolt from the blue to Zhu Dadian and others - the weather was freezing and the ground was freezing. Tens of thousands of troops were stationed under the fortified city, and they were deprived of food. They were suddenly in a desperate situation where the entire army was annihilated!
After receiving this urgent letter, Zhu Dadian immediately summoned the ministers and generals in the camp to discuss countermeasures. The generals agreed: while there are still four days of food in the camp, break up the camp and retreat to Laizhou, Qingzhou and other places in order to obtain it nearby.
Food. Wait until the food road is restored and march again.
Zhu Dadian was still hesitating - he had worked hard for this siege of Dengzhou. Seeing that the rebels had become a fish in the bottom of the cauldron, suddenly something happened that the food channel was cut off. According to the urgent report from Qingzhou, the rebels
It seems that a group of rangers were sent to attack various grain stations in Qingzhou.
Since the enemy was only making a sneak attack without rear support, it would not last long. There were still four days of food in the camp. If emergency resources could be raised, the situation of besieging Dengzhou could still be maintained. At this time, he thought of the owner of Luzhuang, who had promised to send a
Thousands of kilo of grain is coming, and I can ask him to send several thousand kilo more if I think about it. I heard that he has recruited tens of thousands of people in exile in the Zhaoyuan area, so he must have a lot of grain in stock. Huang County is not far from here...
Therefore, he did not immediately order the troops to retreat, but asked the generals to return to their respective camps temporarily and guard the camps to wait for orders.
After the generals resigned, Zhu Dadian immediately sent people to Laizhou and asked Sun Yuanhua to send people to raise a batch of food in Laizhou City and transport it to the camp to stabilize the morale of the army. He continued to discuss with several important staff, and estimated that he might encounter
We were trying to think of some solutions to deal with various difficult situations. While we were discussing, we suddenly heard the firing of cannons in Dengzhou City, and bursts of cheers.
Zhu Dadian frowned and asked:
"Why all the noise?!"
For a moment, the noise in the city seemed to spread to the camp, with people shouting and horses neighing, and there was chaos. Jin Guoqi, the commander-in-chief of the Liao army who was in charge of the Dengzhou aid campaign, and the commander-in-chief, Jin Guoqi, suddenly came into the tent and said hurriedly:
"My lords, please mount your horses quickly, the situation is not good!"
"Why are you so alarmed? Tell me quickly!"
"For some reason, all the battalions learned that the food route was cut off, and the soldiers started clamoring to leave. The generals could not hold them back and were being dragged away by the rebels. Now the battalions are frightened and are collapsing. The situation is extremely critical. Please hurry up, sir.
Mount your horse, just in case."
Zhu Dadian forced himself to calm down: "Go quickly and issue a strict order. The people and horses in each camp are not allowed to panic or move. They must stay calm and guard the camp. Anyone who dares to abandon the camp and flee will be killed without mercy!"
"Yes, follow the order!" Jin Guoqi turned around and left.
While Zhu Dadian was anxious, Zu Dashou came on horseback with a group of soldiers, dismounted in front of Zhu Dadian's tent, hurriedly bowed his hands and saluted, and said loudly:
"My lord, please move the camp immediately! The rebels have rushed out of the city, please lord, please leave quickly!"
"The rebels have become a fish in the bottom of the cauldron, don't worry." Before he finished speaking, he could only hear the rumble of artillery in the city - the rebels in the city rarely fired artillery these days, but now they suddenly started firing intensively, and the shells were roaring and flying.
Moving towards the main camp, the chaos in the camp increased.
Just as Zhu Dadian was about to speak, the sound of war drums, trumpets, and conch shells suddenly sounded from the enemy camp. Then, there were the sounds of thousands of troops galloping and shouts of killing. Everyone could hear it: the rebels in Dengzhou City were already in full force.
They went out to charge towards the camp. Zu Dashou urged: "Please move the camp quickly before we make any further calculations."
The day after Kong Youde's successful sneak attack, Li Jiucheng received a message in the city from the emissary sent by the owner of Luzhuang that the sneak attack was successful. He was skeptical at first and did not take any action. However, he ordered his generals to be more vigorous and vigorous.
Be ready to go out of the city to fight at any time.
On this day, it was suddenly reported that people in the officers and soldiers camp were shouting and screaming. It was a mess. I knew that something had happened in the camp. It was probably that the news that the food road had been cut off had reached the camp. Li Jiucheng himself was a former Liaodong general, so he knew that something had happened in the camp.
He knew Guan Ning's behavior very well and knew that this must be General Guan Ning running away in a critical situation. He laughed evilly and said: "God is really helping me!" He immediately ordered the whole city to beat drums and fire cannons, and sent many soldiers all over the city.
Shout: "The food supply route for officers and soldiers has been cut off!"
Then he fully clothed himself, personally led some elites as the vanguard, and led 30,000 infantry and cavalry to attack the camp, hoping to take advantage of the chaos to defeat the main force of the Shandong camp in one fell swoop.
At this time, the Guanning camp, which had the strongest combat power among the camps, had already begun to flee, and the remaining troops from the towns in Sichuan, Hebei, and Shandong also fled. For a time, the camps were in chaos and scrambled to flee. Zhu Dadian, Xie Sanbin and others
He was held hostage and helped onto the horse's back, and together they beat the horse and fled.
It was snowing and the ground was freezing cold. Most of the troops in Guan Ning were cavalry and had already fled first. Most of the troops in other towns were infantry. It was almost impossible to move on foot in the snow. When the rebels caught up with them, they suddenly fled like birds in fear.
There was no resistance. The rout and pursuit continued into the night. Many officers and soldiers were killed and captured, and countless more were scattered in the chaos.
Zhu Dadian and others were almost caught up by the rebels during their escape, and they had the idea of committing suicide several times. The most critical time was when all the soldiers around him were scattered. Fortunately, at this time, a cavalry group under the banner of Qimu Island was
Suddenly appeared, a row of muskets fired over, killed the rebels, and captured them.
Zhu Dadian was in shock. He saw that there were only more than a hundred people on the other side. The leader was just a young officer. Fan Yangli wore a thick felt on his head, a cotton robe, and a cloth belt around his chest and waist. The one hundred riders around him, all
They were all dressed in the same attire as him, with a gun on their back and a sword on their waist. Although they were not wearing armor, they looked heroic and very brave.
"Little man Huang Ande, please give your regards to the adults!" Hearing that the rescued person was the governor of Shandong, the visitor immediately rolled off his saddle and dismounted, came to Zhu Dadian's horse and saluted with a thousand salutes, "The adults are frightened!"
"It doesn't matter." Zhu Dadian felt relieved when he heard that the other party had a Shandong accent, and forced himself to calm down, "Thanks for the help, warrior!"
"My lord, please feel at ease. Lord Sun has personally led General Zhang to meet you from the front. I will escort Lord Zhu there!"