Whether it was the Qing court in Beijing or the Qing army in Huaiyang, after confirming that Deng Ming appeared in Shandong, they all believed that the main force of the Sichuan army followed Deng Ming. The navy that escorted the Sichuan army was probably the main fleet of the Fujian army, and Zhang Huangyan's Zhoushan navy was likely to be involved. The Qing court knew that Deng Ming and Zheng Chenggong had a close relationship, and they felt that Zheng Jing might have inherited the good relationship between his father and Deng Ming, so the appearance of the Sichuan army in Shandong was understandable.

When the Qing court was suspicious, Deng Mingzheng commanded the Shandong uprising army to besiege Weixian. This was the first county he had attacked since he landed. However, the progress was very slow. As Gong Yong predicted, the uprising army composed of bandits and heroes was very difficult to command. Their morale was fluctuating and the military discipline was close to nowhere, which gave Deng Ming a headache.

Deng Ming brought a Sichuan Army blasting team, but in order to train the Shandong Uprising Army, he did not let his own blasting team go, but trained the Shandong Uprising Army. After just watching the demonstration of the Sichuan Army, many heroes patted their chests and expressed their full understanding. Then they immediately rushed to attack the county town, without intending to spend too much time practicing.

As a result, the first attack on Weixian was a disaster. The rebel army was helpless in front of a simple trench and was killed by the county Ding who was defending the city wall. Then an inexplicable collapse occurred. The attackers threw down their soil buns and excavation tools and retreated one after another. Hearing the cheers and laughter from the city wall, Deng Ming couldn't help but shook his head and sighed: "Is this training of the army, or is I helping the green camp in Weixian to train the army?"

After returning to the camp, the heroes involved in the attack and the offensive troops behind them began to accuse each other fiercely, and almost staged internal strife and military struggle in front of Deng Ming. Deng Ming came out to smooth things over and barely comforted the excited people, but several Shandong heroes could not swallow the tone of being scolded, and wanted to show off in front of the Duke of Baoguo. The next day, he actually went to attack the county town by himself.

After learning that hundreds of heroes had gone to war without authorization, Deng Ming and his guard were so surprised that they could not speak. Needless to say, the Sichuan Army or the Kuidong Army, even Zhang Huangyan's volunteer soldiers could not have happened. Other heroes who had known about this did not dissuade them. Some of them followed them to see if they could break the city, while the remaining part sneered and waited to see jokes - most of these people were responsible for filling the trench yesterday. After being scolded for being incompetent, they retorted, saying that the people who were preparing for the war in the back row were cowards - this was obviously a tactical arrangement, and the people in the back row did not take the lead, not because they were timid.

When Deng Ming arrived, several heroes had already rushed up the ladder. They planned to run across the trench on the ladder first, and then set up the ladder to climb up the city wall.

Two of them were knocked back by Ding Yong, who was temporarily organized in Weixian, with stones. The remaining people were lucky and rushed to the city wall without any resistance. This was not because they were well prepared for combat. These heroes did not expect to hide and pretend in advance, so the intention of attack was completely exposed to the eyes of the defenders from the beginning. However, there were not many green camps in Weixian, and most of the defenders of the city walls were strong men pulled from the city. When these strong men saw the heroes with red cloth on their heads, shirtless, and knife in their hands, they were so scared that they ran home.

However, after the ladder was put on the city wall, he found that the ladder was not high enough. The county magistrate of Weixian did not expect to use fences and adobe bricks to raise the battlements. Instead, the heroes had a wrong visual analysis. The hasty attack launched due to anger also lacked preparation time, so there was a problem with the length of the ladder.

Seeing that they could not climb up the city, the heroes on the ladder had to retreat and began to dig soil and stones on the ground to try to get a platform out. However, before they could make the ladder, the green camp in the city arrived after hearing the news and even killed a few escaped men to warn them. When the hail-like stone fell from the city, the attack failed without any suspense.

"If we continue to fight like this, we will help Weixian train a bunch of elite soldiers." Deng Ming shook his head in his eyes.

Deng Ming was even more shocked by the mobilization of several mountain kings in front of the formation when siege. He heard those people shouting: "Get into the county town, one person will divide a big girl" to boost the morale of the minions. What's even more terrifying is that this was heard by the defenders on the city.

"I didn't break the city today. I really don't know if it was a bad luck or a lucky one." Deng Ming sighed.

There are mixed fish and dragons in the rebel army in Shandong. Many of them are indeed bandits. Some of the heroes from cities and young heroes are formerly unlawful people. If they are allowed to break through the city, Weixian will probably suffer.

Deng Ming did not bring a large number of direct troops. Although the rebel army was afraid of the force of the Sichuan army, they would never understand the policies and military discipline of the Sichuan army. If they wanted to encourage them to risk their arrows and stones to attack the county town, the call of the mountain kings to wash the city was definitely more appealing than Deng Mingqiu's unblame request.

After this failure, all the bandits finally realized that even if Deng Ming and the Sichuan Army could beat Zu Zepu to a halt, the city walls of the county were still an insurmountable barrier for the rebels. So they suppressed their enthusiasm for breaking the city and turned around to humbly ask the Sichuan Army for blasting skills. But at this time, due to concerns about the problems that arise after the city was broken, Deng Ming was not so enthusiastic about training the Shandong Rebels' blasting technology.

"We must find a way to turn these members of the rebel army into veritable rebel soldiers, and don't just think about robbing the house." Deng Ming asked the blasting team to slow down the speed of teaching skills, first let the rebel army practice the ability to dig the tunnel around, and don't hand over gunpowder to them immediately.

At the same time, Deng Ming ordered the guard to visit nearby gentry with his famous posts, trying to find some collaborators who could help him maintain social order after the city was broken.

I just heard that after Deng Ming landed, the nearby gentry and powerful people gathered their servants to protect themselves. After Zu Zepu's defeat, these gentry realized the strength of the Ming army and began to send food to Deng Ming, hoping that the Ming army would not rob their clans and villages.

Xia Jiexia Juren is a native of Weixian County. He usually lives in a house in the countryside. When he just learned that the famous Baoguo Duke appeared on the ground in Shandong, he distributed food like other gentry and gathered the tenants to protect himself. Zu Zepu was defeated and the rebel army led by Deng Ming surrounded the county town, Xia Jinshen personally came to Deng Ming's military camp on behalf of the surrounding gentry to ask for the people.

"How is our army's appearance?" Deng Ming asked straight to the point after seeing Mr. Xia who was personally escorting ten trucks of food.

"Magnificent, you are really a heavenly soldier in the royal army." Xia Jie immediately praised.

"This is a deceptive statement." Deng Ming shook his head and smiled, "How can I not know the surrounding military camps? They were just a group of mobs. When they attacked Weixian yesterday, they were still yelling to wash the city."

"With the Duke of Bao, you will be able to keep a safe city." Xia Jie carefully observed Deng Ming's face.

"I don't have this confidence," Deng Ming still shook his head: "My army has not arrived here yet. I can't control these thousands of heroes at all. I can guess what they will do when they enter the city. Now I didn't immediately let my subordinates participate in the siege, because I was afraid that they would harm the elders in the city and slander the imperial court and the royal army." Deng Ming stared at Xia Jie for a while and asked sincerely: "Does Xia Juren have any good plans to teach me?"

"Duke Baoguo is merciful." Xia Jie finally confirmed Deng Ming's true attitude, knelt down on the ground and raised his arms and shouted: "Duke Guoguo, these are thousands of jackals, tigers and leopards. If they are allowed to break Weixian, they will inevitably suffer the creatures in the city."

When he walked past the surrounding military camp, Xia Jie recognized several famous thieves. He immediately reported the names of these people: "Duke, these people usually kidnap votes and rob relatives, and they did everything they could. When Yu Qiye was uprising, they did not participate. They just heard that Duke Bao defeated Zu Zepu, so he went down the mountain to grab a bid."

In Xia Jie's words, Yu Qi himself never gave up on the idea of ​​revenge. Many Yu Qi's comrades were also thinking about this matter, so they did not harm the countryside. But some people took advantage of the situation to rob. The reason why many gentry did not support the Yu Qi Uprising was not only because they did not like the strength comparison between the rebel army and the Qing court, but also because in their eyes, many members of the rebel army belonged to the robbers who should be suppressed.

"The order of a tyrant is better than that of no order." Deng Ming murmured to himself.

Yu Qi would definitely take in those local gangs who followed him to fight with the Qing army. Deng Ming could not kill these people now, and it would not even be easy to eliminate them from the rebel army. However, in addition to slandering the Ming army, these people are also extremely unreliable alliances. Once the situation is wrong, they can go to absent without hesitation, and may even turn against the rebels and kill the rebels in exchange for forgiveness from the Qing court.

Although the order of the Qing court was cruel and unkind, if Deng Ming could not even maintain such a hierarchical order, the gentry in Shandong would not support the Sichuan Army. Now there are many eyes to observe what the Ming army did in Weixian. If Weixian was plundered by chaos, the gentry in Shandong would completely turn to the Qing court and support Zu Zepu to fight the Ming army.

If Weixian, a small place, could resist the Sichuan Army's offensive for a long time, it would greatly damage Deng Ming's prestige, and would strengthen the determination of the Qing army to resist in Laizhou and Dengzhou, and would eliminate the good situation of Sichuan Army's victory in Jiaoshui River.

"We cannot draw troops from Jiangnan. Shandong is just a secondary battlefield for us. We must use the least force to achieve the greatest results."

In order to achieve this goal, Deng Ming should follow the principle of taking the minority of the two evils, and ignore the wishes of the gentry represented by Xia Jie, the bigger the trouble in Shandong, the better. However, Deng Ming was not so cold-blooded that he could not make such a decision, so he fell into a dilemma.
Chapter completed!