Daming kill

Chapter 2
In the 15th year of Chongzhen, in 1642, the Ming Dynasty had internal and external troubles.

At the beginning of the year, the Qing army conquered Songshan, killed all the elites of the Ming army, captured Hong Chengchou, governor of Jiliao, and then conquered Jinzhou. The land outside Daming Pass was lost except for Ningyuan, and the last confidence of the entire government and the opposition in fighting against the Manchus was completely shattered.

In March, the peasant army Li Zicheng and Luo Rucai combined millions of troops to besiege Kaifeng, sweeping the Central Plains.

Kaifeng, Daming really can't afford to lose it.

"To the south of the capital, in the world of Henan, Kaifeng is also the city..." This is the evaluation of Kaifeng at that time in "Dreams in Song Window" written by Zhang Han of the Ming Dynasty.

If Kaifeng is lost, the Central Plains will be lost;

But if the Central Plains is not protected, the world will really have a big problem.

On May 18th, under the strict order of Emperor Chongzhen, several groups of 20 Ming troops from the south joined forces in Zhuxian Town, and fought fiercely with Li Zicheng's [-] troops who went south to block the attack.

Although this was an unprecedentedly large force gathered by the Ming Dynasty since the suppression of the bandits, the progress of the Ming army's battle was very unsatisfactory, and there were no achievements for many days.

Not only that, the huge Ming army also began to suffer from severe water and food shortages.

The Peasant Army first cut off the river's flow by virtue of its geographical advantage in the upper reaches of the Jialu River, and then cut off the Ming army's grain road.

The lack of water and food is already a difficult battle.

But the Ming army persisted, showing no sign of giving up or preparing to retreat.

At noon on May [-]th, in an open field behind the Ming army's line, a young man was resting alone under a small tree.

Occasionally, he would look up at the scorching sun above his head.

In these years, Daming suffered many disasters, and the climate was extremely abnormal. Summer often came very early and was extremely hot, while winter was extremely cold.

No one knows what happened, maybe Daming's fate is really coming to an end!
Because of the heat, the young man sat by a tree with his clothes open, fiddling with a wild goose feather waist saber in his hand.

There are knives in the battle area that should be soldiers, but the young man looks at the knives with strange eyes, and his clothes also make it impossible to tell whether he is a soldier or a civilian.

He was dressed in a rough blue shirt with a few patches, and there was an obvious color difference between the jacket and trousers.However, the hair was neatly tidied up, and the bun on the top of the head was tied firmly with a thick brown cloth.

The small tree is not big, and the branches and leaves are not flourishing. Sitting under the tree can't bring much coolness to the young people. At most, it can block part of the sun's exposure. outside.

The young man was about eighteen or nineteen, of average appearance, dark, tall, with broad shoulders.

He was probably very thirsty, and his lips were already chapped.

After touching the shriveled cowhide water bag at his waist, the young man hesitated to take one of the two thick bamboo tubes beside him.

After finding it was empty, I went to get another one, which was still full of muddy water.

But holding the bamboo tube to his mouth, the young man put it down with some reluctance, and finally just touched his lips with his sticky tongue.

Glancing at the huge shadow of Zhuxian Town to the west, and then at a forest in the distance, the young man sighed helplessly and said to himself: "They must think I'm a fool! That's why I'm here Riding horses in all kinds of weather.”

Indeed, anyone who practiced riding in this deadly heat was either a fool or a madman, and the young man looked neither crazy nor stupid.

"Pu Chi, Pu Chi"

At this time, the only mule next to it under another slightly larger tree suddenly snorted a few times, expressing its dissatisfaction with the young man's arrogance.

Ok!Instead of riding a horse, it's a mule.

The young man glanced at the mule, which had green grass to eat but was still unwilling to be lonely, and subconsciously rubbed the inner sides of the two thighs. The grinning expression revealed his unfamiliarity in riding skills and the pain he had suffered.

"Happy! That depression in your place, there's still hellish grass. Brother mule! You are not troubled, who is troubled." The young man complained.

Boom... Boom...

At this time, there was a sudden sound of sparse cannons from the northwest.

The young man frowned and immediately sat up straight to listen.

Hundreds of thousands of troops from both the enemy and the enemy are coming and going here, and any disturbance must arouse vigilance.

But after a while the young man resolved not to pay any heed to the cannon.

With difficulty, he put on the leather thin-soled fast boots, pinned the side shoes to his waist, and then struggled to stand up with the knife.

After stretching his arms and legs a few times, the young man picked up the bamboo tube with water beside him, put on the bamboo hat for the sun, and walked towards the mule wearily.

After generously feeding the mule half a tank of water, the young man hung the knife on the side of the mule, and turned over.

With the sound of yelling, he rode his mule to trot again in this empty land, and kicked up pieces of dry dust.

……

When there was no more gunfire in the northwest for a long time, and when smoke began to rise in the direction of the woods, the young man touched his already shriveled stomach, changed his shoes decisively, and led the mule to the north.

He must go back to camp.

Teams that are not in battle have two meals a day, and his stomach can't take it if he misses the meal.

The soft and fluffy cotton-soled shoes make the feet looser and cooler.

After passing through a forest crowded with soldiers enjoying the cool air, the young man came to a huge and chaotic camp.

Disorganized tents of various colors, large and small livestock carts in disorder, mottled and disorderly figures, not even a simple defensive fence, but this place is really a military camp, a large military camp that accommodates thousands of people.

In fact, there is also a pointed wooden fence to defend the northern side of the camp, probably because the southern side of the camp is located behind the line of defense.

But this is still a bit too child's play.

If you look carefully, even in the camp, you can easily see some women in thin clothes and skirts coming in and out from time to time between the tents and simple shacks.

The combination of the difficulty of the battle ahead and the peacefulness of singing and dancing here is unbelievable, but true.

Walking into the camp, walking through the chaos, carefully avoiding the human excrement that might be stepped on at any time, the young man's face was full of helplessness and sarcasm.

Soon, the young man led the mule and approached a relatively independent area.Several tents of different sizes and heights gathered there kept a relatively large distance from other groups of tents and shacks.

At this time, a big soldier wearing a black turban similar to the Chinese aunt's style, a khaki uniform, and straw sandals trotted forward with a smirk.

"Captain, captain... dinner is coming!"

"Has the grass been mowed?" The young man asked sullenly while handing the rein in his hand to the big soldier.

"It's cut, it's cut, I found a forest and cut two big handfuls!" The big soldier hurriedly replied, and at the same time carefully took the rein from the young man's hand.

"That's right. Hey, I'll go find some water and share some with you." The young man nodded in satisfaction.

Amid the joyful expression of the big soldier, the young man took off the bamboo hat again and handed it over, saying, "Return this to you first, and I'll get it from you when you use it next time. Is everyone else in the team here?"

After taking the bamboo hat, the silly big soldier scratched his head and said, "Marsh Chief and Zhao Shichang are not here, everyone else is here."

The young man frowned slightly and let out an "oh", but his eyes were attracted by the crowd gathered in the distance.

"What are they doing?"

"Chief, the captain is beating someone." The big soldier said softly, sticking out his tongue.

After the young man listened, he ignored the big, silly soldier, and walked straight towards the crowd who also wore black turbans and earth-red livery.

Unlike the silly soldiers, many of them had bare, black and rough feet, and they probably didn't have the habit of wearing shoes at all.

It seems that this is not only a poorly trained army, but also a crude army, and it should also be a newly expanded army.

After squeezing into the crowd without even thinking about it, the young man saw that the whistle chief was crackling to clean up the people.

So he stood aside silently.

Glancing at the young man, the post chief continued with a stern face, and ordered a few kneeling soldiers to be whipped with a whip, and at the same time repeatedly warned the surrounding crowd: the consequences for violating military discipline are very serious.

With his tall stature and straight body, coupled with his long, dark face full of bumps, this whistle chief looked very bluffing.

The young man was distracted for a moment, as if he vaguely saw the awe-inspiring Company Commander Zhao back then.

"Why is the whistle chief angry?".

When he noticed that Captain Wang, who was at the post, was also watching coldly from a corner, the young man stopped feeling emotional and squeezed over to ask softly.

"These boys are so busy. They went to the army to steal food and get more water, but they were caught by the army. How can the sentinel be used to it?" Captain Wang scratched and messed up. He answered with a grin of yellow teeth behind his hair.

Watching the two captains at the post talking, the soldiers who had kept a distance away immediately shrank back, but there were also some soldiers who boldly looked sideways.

"This kind of mud-legged person who doesn't know how to lift must be taught a good lesson before he can grow his memory!" Captain Wang sneered and stared at the few soldiers who didn't know how to be awed, and suddenly raised his voice.

The soldiers who were stared at were all startled and timidly turned their heads back.

"That's it! Let's go, we're ready for dinner." The fierce-faced Chief Zhao announced in a thick voice at this moment.

As soon as his words fell, the surrounding soldiers scattered all of a sudden, and even the erroneous soldiers with scars on their backs hurriedly struggled away.

The authority of Chief Zhao is clearly unquestionable.

But Captain Wang was obviously hesitant about leaving, maybe he felt that it would be embarrassing to leave like this obediently!
"Li Ping, come here." Chief Zhao shouted suddenly.

It turned out that the young man was Li Ping, and the whistle chief was Zhao Jin, but the two of them were both younger than when the car accident happened, which was a bit outrageous.

It's really time to turn back the time, and the youth is still the same.

(End of this chapter)