The Ming army issued a war manifesto, which mentioned that 570,000 soldiers were out of Kuidong. This number was proposed by Yuan Zongdi, and was unanimously approved by Liu Tichun and Hao Yaoqi.

"Will there be too many?" Deng Ming was a little worried when he left Xiangyang and headed south. He felt that it would be almost the same to exaggerate the number of troops twice. Four times was already too much. But Yuan Zong's first words were fifteen or twenty times, and he really had the spirit of spreading beans to become soldiers.

"Not much, not much at all, just right." Hao Yaoqi replied.

Like a few days ago, Yuan Zongdi stayed in the rear team to be responsible for the aftermath work. Liu Tichun convened a blasting group to hold a discussion meeting. He Zhen counted the gains from his expedition for the 100th time. Only Hao Yaoqi and Deng Mingxian, who liked to chat, talked.

"Generally speaking, most of them are two or three times the actual force, right?" Deng Ming asked. In his impression, in this era, there were 100,000 people in the army claiming to be 200,000, 200,000 people claiming to be 500,000, and more than 400,000 people claiming to be 1 million may be a normal phenomenon.

"So we have to say a little more." Obviously, Hao Yaoqi thought this was just saying a little more. He had a successful example and said it casually. It was the story of Li Zicheng's Eastern Expedition in the first year of Yongchang: "General Liu (Liu Zongmin) led a front army of 15,000, and claimed to be the leader of 500,000; King Chuang personally took one million behind, but King Chuang had only 40,000 people at that time."

"Ten thousand and fifteen plus more than 40,000, it's better to count 60,000, claiming to be one million.5 million, twenty-five times! Well." Deng Ming nodded. No wonder Yuan Zongdi proposed such a large multiple, and could get the approval of Liu Tichun and Hao Yaoqi. It turned out that they had successful experience: "How do you think about the Shanxi defenders along the way? Do they all think of the King of Rebellion with at least seven or eight hundred thousand people?"

"On the way to the Eastern Expedition, hundreds of thousands of defenders from Shanxi and Zhili provinces surrendered."

"Human heart." Deng Ming sighed.

Although Li Zicheng was bluffing at the time, it was the army at that time, and the people had completely lost confidence in the Ming Dynasty. If it weren't for the Qing Dynasty entering the pass, no one would have fought against the Ming Dynasty's flag until now. Deng Ming is facing the situation that the gentry in Huguang was not willing to obey the Qing Dynasty's rule like the northern scholars, and the green camp in Huguang was far less willing to fight bloody battles with the Ming army for the Qing Dynasty. Perhaps a little bluffing would be beneficial to Deng Ming's advance.

Deng Ming also had another concern. Although this manifesto was mainly written for the gentry, it would definitely fall into the hands of Qing officials. Before, Deng Ming and others dared to go south along the Han River. In addition to having psychological advantages over the green camps in Huguang, they also judged that Huguang Governor Hu Quancai would not risk the collapse of the entire river defense and to draw a large number of troops from the Kuidong front line to encircle their roads, at least not doing this at the first time. In this way, the Ming army would sweep the empty central Hubei for a period of time, recruit surrender and rebel, expand their strength, and even consider showing off their power in front of Wuchang City.

But if the Huguang Governor's Office believes that the Ming army is strong and the main force of the Ming army in Kuidong, he may quickly concentrate his troops to resist, and may even take time to garrison in various places and fight the Ming army in a decisive battle. If Hu Quancai believes that the Ming army in Kuidong has more than 200,000, he will definitely think that this is the Kuizhou army, and the military's subordinates are coming out and leaving Kuizhou to fight in another place. Will he draw all the troops from Yiling, Jiangling and other places back?

If such a thing really happens, wouldn’t it be a bit dangerous? Although the Ming army in Kuidong could take this opportunity to develop eastward, the situation along Deng Ming’s journey will become more serious.

"Sir, I'm too worried. This manifesto will only make the pseudo-officials in various prefectures and counties restless, but they will definitely not scare the thief Hu Quancai." Hao Yaoqi did not care about Deng Ming's concerns at all: "Hu Quancai even had many wooden rafts and bamboo rafts built by the last general. He would not be unclear how many people could come out from Yunyang, and would not have drawn Jiang Fang for just two or two, giving us the Kuidong Army a chance to get out of the cage."

Although Hu Quancai was a civil servant, he had been serving Hong Chengchou after entering the pass. Two years ago, he was appointed as the governor of Yunyang and had been in charge of 20,000 troops alone. He was definitely not a scholar who knew nothing about military affairs. The most important thing is that Hu Quancai was very familiar with Zhushan and Fang County's geography.

...

Wuchang, Huguang Governor's Office.

Hubei and Hunan provinces are known as Huguang. The position of governor of Huguang was specially set up by the Qing court to suppress the anti-Qing forces in Hubei and Hunan. The first governor of Huguang, Hu Quancai, was a Jinshi in the second year of Chongzhen and from Shanxi.

Li Zicheng fought fiercely with the Qing soldiers in Yipianshi. After Li Zicheng was defeated, he urgently ordered Yuan Zongdi, Xiangyang to lead the elite troops to the north to defend Shanxi. However, at this time, the former Ming officials in Shanxi had already seen Li Zicheng's strength and knew that he did not actually have a million troops. After Yipianshi's failure, the remaining troops were only 30,000, and Yuan Zongdi's troops who came to help were only 10,000. On the other hand, Li Zicheng's opponent Dorgon had more than 10,000 troops. In addition, Wu Sangui turned against the Qing army and surrendered to the Qing army, the strength of the Qing army was four or five times that of the Shun army.

The former Ming Jin army in Shanxi surrendered to the Shun army when Li Zicheng was in great power. At this time, they followed Wu Sangui and surrendered to the Qing Dynasty in a swarm. A total of more than 50,000 Jin troops transformed from Shun army to Qing army. Later, when the Qing army attacked Shaanxi, almost the former Ming Qin army changed from Shun army to Shaanxi Green Camp.

When the Jin army surrendered to Dorgon one after another, Hu Quancai also organized his elders to welcome the "King Army" in his hometown, and actively provided advice to the Qing court to assist in suppressing the anti-Qing movement in Shanxi - regardless of whether the resisters were under the banner of "Ming" or "Shun".

Later, Jiang Xiang, the former general of Datong, announced the uprising again. This was the third time he changed his flag after surrendering to Li Zicheng from the Ming army to the Shun army and surrendering to Dorgon from the Shun army to the Qing army. Jiang Xiang and his subordinates changed their flag back from the Qing army to the Ming army. Originally, Jiang Xiang was the Dinghai Dinghai decisive needle for the Qing court to suppress the resistance forces in Shanxi, and his flag change naturally led to a sudden change in the situation in Shanxi. Moreover, Jiang Xiang's flag change rate was very high. His flag change first led to the general collapse of Chongzhen's northwest defense line, and the second flag change led to the disastrous defeat of the Shun army's defense battle in Shanxi. Through these two successful flag changes, Jiang Xiang not only had mastered the main army of Shanxi, but also accumulated a huge reputation. For a time, the whole province responded, and believed that if Jiang Zheng did not take action, he would have succeeded.

However, Hu Quancai stood firmly on the side of the Qing court, and fought arduous struggles with all anti-Qing forces wholeheartedly. Finally, the clouds were clear and the sun rose. After Dorgon eliminated Jiang Xiang, Hu Quancai also found his name on the Qing court's merit book. Later, Hu Quancai followed Hong Chengchou to suppress the anti-Qing uprising. A year after Hong Chengchou established the shogunate in Changsha, he believed that Hu Quancai's talent was not limited to picking up the leftovers and filling in the gaps by the commander. He recommended him to the Qing court as the governor of Yunyang and handed over the 20,000 army and the important task of defending the upstream of the Han River to him.

In the past two years, Hu Quancai proved his ability to Hong Chengchou, especially when Hao Yaoqi sneaked into Xiangyang. The governor of Yunyang was not in a hurry to send troops to retake Xiangyang, and did not give the Ming army a chance to break through the cage. Instead, while stabilizing the defense zone, Chen Bing threatened the Ming army's food route and retreat route, forcing Hao Yaoqi to give up Xiangyang and return to Kuidong on his own. When Hong Chengchou left Changsha to conquer Yunnan and Guizhou, Hu Quancai was appointed as the governor of Huguang by the Qing court, responsible for closely monitoring the Ming army in the Kuidong area.

When Hu Quancai just received reports from Yunyang, Gucheng and other places, he didn't take it too seriously. According to his experience, the ability of the Ming army along Yunyang was to dispatch one or two thousand people. As long as he strictly abides by the rules and regulations formulated by Hong Chengchou in the past, he moved the people around him to the city, and collected and protected the ships on the Han River, so that the Ming army could not find supplies in the wild and boats on the river surface, and it would take less than two months to return the same route.

The current strategic focus of the court is not Huguang, and Hu Quancai only needs to defend. Even in Huguang, the strategic focus is not in Yunyang, but in Yiling. Therefore, Hu Quancai casually looked at the report on Yunyang and threw it aside, without any intention to send reinforcements. Perhaps Yunyang knew this well and did not make such a request.

However, the subsequent report surprised Hu Quancai. A few days later, Yunyang sent another report with sloppy handwriting and an urgent tone. The letter claimed that the Ming army had dug several walls by attacking the cave, and the city was in danger.

There are many parts of the city wall in Yunyang that were supervised and repaired by Hu Quancai, and he knew very well about the strength of the city defense. Although he had never encountered a hole attack, he also knew that this method of digging tunnels would take a long time to work. The Ming army would need extremely considerable troops to dig several places in one breath... But if the Ming army really had such troops, could Yunyang still have the chance to send the letter? It was impossible to completely isolate the communications inside and outside the city, which clearly means that the enemy's strength was weak.

Hu Quancai did not wait for Yunyang to send more news, and then sent an emergency report to Gucheng, claiming that a large number of Ming troops were coming in a river boat. The guard general was worried that the Ming army would be powerful and would isolate communications inside and outside Gucheng, so he sent this envoy to Xiangyang in advance. The letter claimed that until now, the Ming army's siege operation was still quite powerless, and the defenders were confident that they would hold the city for more than three months, and there was no problem with the food storage in the city.

When I saw the two place names Yunyang and Gucheng, I was on the emergency memorial of Xiangyang. Almost immediately following the military situation of Gucheng, Xiangyang sent an urgent report, saying that Gucheng had troops fled back in Yunyang and that both cities were undoubtedly lost. In the letter, the prefect of Xiangyang claimed that there were no soldiers or food in his hands, only a rope, and I hope that the Governor of Huguang could convey his determination to the court to death for the country.

"It's simply ridiculous!" When Hu Quancai saw the suicide note of the Xiangyang prefect, he couldn't help but pat the table and curse.

The defense of the Yunyang line has been successful. As long as it is done properly, there will never be too much danger. Although the military strength in the Yunyang area is not as strong as Hu Quancai was when he was governor, the three cities have more than 10,000 Qing troops, of which about 3,000 soldiers are. Even if the opponent has a 100,000 army, as long as he guards the city honestly, it is impossible to lose all the frontier positions in a blink of an eye.

"It must have been a traitor's plan." Hu Quancai was thinking hard in the Governor's Mansion, and finally determined that there was only one situation that could explain the current crisis: that is, the Ming army dispatched a very small force as bait to lure the Qing army in the city to attack. The defending general was indeed as greedy as the Ming army hoped, and did not hesitate to come out of the empty city to attack the Ming army's bait troops. In the end, he was killed by the Ming army's ambush, and the city was immediately declared lost.

The more Hu Quancai thought about it, the more he felt that his analysis was reasonable. The last letter sent by Yunyang was obviously a shirk. In the case where the city was definitely not guaranteed, the prefect said that the city was a Ming army attack in order to avoid the court pursuing him for his greed for merit. How could the Ming army dug several places in a few days? The prefect of Yunyang thought that the dignified Governor of Huguang was a fool? I wonder if Governor Hu had been in Yunyang?

Gucheng should have also been hit by a similar strategy. Although Hu Quancai didn't know what kind of bait the Ming army had brought, he believed it would be very attractive. Gucheng's defenders clearly saw that the enemy was in great power and took the initiative to go out to the city to fight, which was enough to show the attractiveness of the Ming army's bait. Moreover, Hu Quancai also judged that when Gucheng defenders attacked, they must have come out of an empty city like Yunyang, leaving almost no defensive forces, so they were captured so quickly by the Ming army.

Hu Quancai was clear about the broken city walls in Xiangyang. It was not surprising that the Ming army easily obtained it. When he saw the suicide note of the prefect of Xiangyang, Hu Quancai had already regarded him as a dead person.

Hu Quancai felt that Yunyang could not support the Kuidong Ming army's large-scale deployment. He believed at this time that the Ming army had a maximum of 30,000 people. Before he knew it, Governor Hu had raised the maximum limit of the Ming army's deployment by 10,000.

As for Deng Ming's manifesto, it was simply ineffective for Hu Quancai: "Five seventy-seventy-three thousand, hum! Did you come out of the mountains by eating dirt all the way?"

Hu Quancai also heard of Deng Ming. The Kunming Battle caused a sensation in the world. Hu Quancai learned that there were rumors that Deng Ming was an incognito clan, but Hu Quancai, like the court, sneered at this kind of rumor. If he was really a clan, wouldn't he raise the banner quickly?

Hearing that one of the origins of this rumor was the Governor's Office of Sichuan and Shaanxi. After seeing Deng Ming's manifesto, Hu Quancai sneered and laughed at Li Guoying, who had become a laughing stock in the officialdom: "Governor Li, your royal family is here to my Hunan."

No matter how much he smiles, although Hu Quancai doesn't believe that Deng Ming is a royal family, it does not mean that he will underestimate this person. The person who can deceive Wu Sangui and Zhao Liangdong in Kunming is of course worthy of attention.

"Send an envoy to Yicheng immediately!" Although Hu Quancai felt that such a small number of Ming troops did not have the ability to continue to go south to attack cities and plunder land, in accordance with the principle of lenient observation of the enemy, Governor Hu ordered an envoy to rush to Yicheng quickly and send his own orders to the defenders.

Governor Hu ordered the Yicheng defenders to not fight under any circumstances, otherwise they would be guilty even if they win. After repeated thinking, Hu Quancai believed that since the Ming army could use the trick of seducing the enemy to seize two cities, they might use the same trick to go to Yicheng to cheat, which was also their only way to capture Yicheng. In the order, Hu Quancai clearly told the Yicheng defenders that Yunyang and Gucheng fell quickly because they were trapped in the trick of seducing the enemy. He repeatedly emphasized that if someone dared to go out of the city to meet the enemy, he would definitely be able to do military law.

The envoy arrived at Yicheng before the Ming army arrived and quickly returned to Wuchang, bringing Hu Quancai a reply from the governor of Yicheng. In the reply, the general assured Governor Hu Quancai that nothing in this world could trick him out of the city, whether it was Jinshan, Yinshan or the beautiful woman in the country, was useless. It was because he knew that Governor Hu's general order Rushan that the general told Hu Quancai that he had ordered all four gates of Yicheng to be blocked with big stones, so that even a mosquito could not fly out.

The envoy also proved that the garrison of Yicheng was hung from the city from the basket when he left Yicheng.

"Deng Ming is a man who is a good person to commit fraud. As long as he is upright and not confused by his tricks, he will be powerless." After hearing the messenger's report, Hu Quancai felt a little relieved. Although Yicheng is not big, there are not many troops, and the guards are not as experienced as Yunyang and Gucheng. However, the guards in Gucheng are also very experienced. If they have no experience in fighting formations, they will be timid. If they are timid, they will obey their instructions honestly and will not go out of the city to take risks.

Hu Quancai looked at the map again and decided not to be at a loss this time. Just block the Ming army's way in Yicheng. When the Ming army retreats back to Kuizhou by itself. If the Ming army refuses to go back honestly, Hu Quancai will send a small number of troops to threaten their retreat. If necessary, he can also ask the Henan Green Camp to go south and enter Hubei to suppress this Ming army.

Two days later, an emergency letter from Anlu Mansion (the Ming Dynasty was called Chengtian Mansion because it was the birthplace of Emperor Jiajing, and the Qing Dynasty was called Anlu Mansion) flew into Wuchang, bringing a bolt from the blue to Governor Hu - Yicheng, which blocked the four gates, was said to have been captured by the Ming army.

"It's only two short days!" Hu Quancai was furious after seeing the report. According to time calculations, it was probably because his envoy had just left, and the Ming army arrived at the city and captured Yicheng the next day, and did not delay the third day at the latest: "What kind of idiots are my subordinates? I told them not to leave the city, they just wanted to leave the city! Two days! Just let a pig go to guard. As long as the pig doesn't open the city gate itself, it can be at least ten days, eight days, right?"

The situation became increasingly urgent. Anlu Mansion was much more empty than Xiangyang Mansion. Not to mention the lack of combat experience, there were not many soldiers and generals there, even those without combat experience. Hu Quancai knew that he had to send troops to Zhongxiang, the city of Anlu Mansion. If the Ming army invaded Anlu Mansion, it would shock the entire Hubei, and the court might also blame him.

Hu Quancai ordered Huangzhou and De'an to immediately concentrate the troops in Wuchang. At the same time, he ordered the garrisons from all over the Anlu Prefecture to no longer stay in the original defense zone, and all of them had to rush to the prefecture city to meet as quickly as possible. Although Anlu Prefecture was empty, each county had at least one or two hundred combat-capable soldiers. They did not need auxiliary soldiers to marching in the prefecture. They could reach Zhongxiang at full speed. These combat soldiers generally had armor and weapons. With such a short distance, they would not lose their equipment. In this way, even if Zhongxiang had not reserved many military weapons, there would be no pressure.

After concentrating the soldiers from various counties, towns and even post stations into the city, Hu Quancai was expected to be able to gather two or three thousand equipped soldiers. He also ordered the city to mobilize urgently, prepare a large amount of wood, stone, tinder oil, and recruit the people to assist in the defense. Don’t think about going out of the city to counterattack, and immediately block the city gates.

As soon as the messenger who sent the letter left, Hu Quancai added another order, asking the counties to send troops to send troops, and sent people to escort the silver stock to the city.

This has two purposes: First, since all counties have lost their defensive ability, the Ming army can take it down by sending a small team of soldiers, and these things are not as safe as going to the prefecture city; Second, there must be a brave man under heavy rewards. Hu Quancai ordered Anlu Mansion not to be stingy, and immediately posted a notice to set the reward: If the Ming army really comes to attack the big city, the people in the city will be rewarded with one tael of silver every day as long as they work hard to transport earth and stones to the city. If the defenders dare to come out to invest in wood and stones in the Ming army that attacked the city, they will reward two taels of silver each time (if they lean out, their hit rate will be much higher than hiding behind the battlements). Kill a Ming soldier who climbed the city and immediately rewarded ten taels of silver.

"Move some silver to the top of the city, and someone will reward you immediately after making merits." In his heart, Hu Quancai was tireless to teach the Anlu Prefect how to defend the city. The officials in Zhongxiang and other places who had always been located in the rear had no war experience, which really made Hu Quancai feel at ease. In theory, such preparations were to have 100,000 Ming troops attacked and could not be taken for a while, which was enough to win time waiting for Wuchang to send reinforcements. However, after Yicheng's lesson, Hu Quancai also had some doubts about his judgment.

"Forget it, forgot." Hu Quancai felt that in case, he would not wait for the troops from all over the country to gather in Wuchang before setting off together, but instead sent some of the green camps in Hanyang and Wuchang to Anlu Mansion City to assist in the defense.

When the Hanyang General heard the order to come to the Governor's Office of Huguang, Wuchang, he was also recruited by a young scholar named Zhou Peigong.

Treating the scholars of Huguang well was a strategy set by Hong Chengchou back then. Hong Chengchou pretended not to see the behavior of Huguang gentry's private communication with the Ming army. He also held a large number of poetry meetings in Changsha and other places, and local officials also actively attended, striving to make the gentry in Huguang feel that it seemed that the Ming army was full of bandits and poor mud legs. No matter whether the name of the Beijing court was "Ming" or "Qing", the officials of the court were the same kind of gentry, scholars, and scholars.

As Hong Chengchou's subordinate, Hu Quancai watched with his own eyes how these measures helped win the loyalty of the gentry of Huguang to the Qing court bit by bit. The younger generation of scholars gradually began to participate in the imperial examinations of the Qing court. Although the older generation of gentry was in the past, they all stayed in the door, instead of spending money and effort to organize the rebel army like before, or even personally participated in raising funds and raising grain and transported them to the Ming army.

This Zhou Peigong was a scholar who participated in the imperial examination in the Qing Dynasty. He served as a guest in the Governor's Office at a young age. His parents both died, so he did not have to worry about the attitude of his elders towards the Qing Dynasty.

For these young scholars, Hong Chengchou set a policy to make lenient contributions. If a young scholar observes a certain battle, the merit book of the court will definitely be written with the praise of this person. Although this contribution can be refused, if there is any chance next time, the Jingliu Mansion will give another one, one after another. Hong Chengchou believes that such preferential treatment can gradually make scholars stand on the side of the Qing army in the war. Moreover, most young people like to brag about a few words. Hong Chengchou is willing to give them some merits that can be used to brag, so as they talk, they regard the Ming army as bandits.

Although Hong Chengchou is gone, his policies are still implemented by his old subordinates.

Zhou Peigong was a benchmark among the young scholars in Huguang and was one of the most active members of Huguang who were close to the Qing court. Hu Quancai was interested in cultivating him so that everyone could see the benefits of cooperation with the Qing court. This time he and the General of Hanyang went to Anlu Mansion together.

"This governor has been in Yunyang for many years and knows everything about the grass and trees there. Since the thieves come from there, their troops..." Hu Quancai thought for a while, stretched out four fingers, and shook it in front of Zhou Peigong: "It is impossible to exceed 40,000, and more than 30,000 of them are auxiliary soldiers carrying food and grass, otherwise the thieves would not be able to walk that far mountain road."

After the Ming army sent troops, the number of people along the way would increase, but Hu Quancai still believed that the Ming army had limited troops and would never reach one-tenth of the manifesto. As long as the Hanyang General arrived in time with reinforcements, it would be no problem for Anlu Mansion to hold on for one or two months. The Ming army in Kuidong advanced so quickly that Hu Quancai believed that they could not carry heavy siege equipment such as cannons, towers, etc. with the army.

"The last letter sent by Yunyang Prefecture said that the thieves attacked everywhere and had dug several places to the city wall." After learning that Yicheng had fallen, Hu Quancai re-examined the battle report he had thrown aside. In addition to the letter from Yunyang, several letters also mentioned the remarks of some defeated soldiers who escaped, including the Ming army using the attack.

"How is that possible?" General Hanyang was ordered to lead three thousand elite soldiers to reinforce Anlu Mansion at night. He smiled disapprovingly and said, "How could it be done so quickly?"

"Of course it is impossible. But this governor thought that this was probably the thief's plan to lure the enemy. They dug around and caused panic for the defenders. The defenders were not careful, so they hurried out to the city to attack their mounds, and instead fell into the thief's plan." Hu Quancai had been unable to understand why he and the Yicheng defenders said so clearly, and the other party would still go out of the city to fight. Later, he suddenly realized that the Ming army must not use temptation, but created a tense atmosphere, making the defenders think that going out of the city to counterattack was a necessary measure.

Hu Quancai reminded: "When I go to Anlu this time, no matter what tricks the thief has, even if they are close to the wall, they will not even set up a shed. Even if Deng Ming is lying shirtless by the suspension bridge, you are absolutely not allowed to leave the city. As long as the troops from Huangzhou Prefecture and other places arrive, the Governor will personally rush to Anlu and meet with you."—

Monthly clicks are still the first in history, but the clicks on the week and Sunday are somewhat downward. Readers often speak and discuss in the book review area. This day, 7,000 words are published in advance.
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