The wind rises at the end of the Ming Dynasty

Chapter 373 Trap
To the north of Fuli Bridge, in the wilderness, the soldiers of the Ming Army shouted loudly, and like a tide, they once again moved towards the Wanmin Army camp at the bridge head to overwhelm them.

In the Ming army formation, Ming army strongmen with red scarves wrapped around their heads and bare upper bodies were waving drumsticks and beating the war drums vigorously.

The thunderous sound resounded throughout the heaven and earth, and finally completely overwhelmed the sound of the cornet among the tens of thousands of people.

The last line of defense of the Wanmin Army finally collapsed...

Hu Dawei was covered in blood, his armor soaked through, and he stood in the pool of blood holding a spear.

After several days of hard fighting, he finally won.

There was no joy of victory in his heart. On the contrary, his heart was filled with indifference.

Victory is just a temporary victory...

From the winter of the third year of Chongzhen to the present, in this nearly ten-year period, the world seems to have never been stable for a moment, and he has never rested for a moment.

Conquering the south and the north, traveling thousands of miles to fight, what he saw and heard along the way gradually made him numb.

But the beacon fire in the north seems to never go out, and the rebellion in the south will never end.

On the battlefield, corpses lay everywhere.

Hu Dawei raised his eyes and looked forward. The Suihe River was flowing eastward, and the red water was rolling eastward. His vision was filled with blood-red color.

They won a rare victory, but no one celebrated or cheered.

All people lowered their heads.

The river wind blew, and mixed with the sound of the wind was the sound of subtle crying.

The end of every war represents a series of life and death farewells.

Looking at the Suihe River filled with floating corpses, a fatigue originating from the bottom of his heart began to spread in Hu Dawei's body.

The world has already changed beyond recognition.

The grasslands of the north have changed hands.

The Mongols from various tribes in Monan actually lowered their heads and were willing to become the slaves of others.

Obviously there is still strength left, it is obvious that we have only lost a few battles, and we can obviously continue to fight.

The pride of their ancestors was all left behind in their minds.

It seems that the Immortal Heaven no longer favors Mongolia.

Now there are also problems within China. There are natural and man-made disasters everywhere. Along the way, there is desolation and devastation everywhere.

The land is cracked due to lack of water, victims are dying of hunger, and refugees are everywhere.

It seems that destiny no longer favors Ming Dynasty.

The more rebellions in the pass are suppressed, the more rebellions occur, and the turmoil becomes more severe day by day.

People become thieves because they are hungry.

If the problem of hunger is not solved, no matter how many campaigns are carried out and how many conscriptions are launched, there will be no way to solve the current problem.

Hu Dawei was in a daze. He felt that his bloody battle here was of no use at all.

For nearly ten years, he killed unknown bandits and killed unknown bandit leaders, but to no avail.

The war has not subsided to this day, but has intensified.

It turned out that Hu Dawei did not waver at all when he was killing the bandits.

The rogue bandits are roaming around, causing devastation to all living beings, plundering everywhere, and poisoning thousands of miles away. They deserve to die.

But the Ten Thousand People's Army is different from the rogue bandits. They will not coerce the people. In the areas they pass, the villages are intact and the people are safe. They only target the wealthy landlords.

After knowing the deeper reason, Hu Dawei could not help but be shaken.

The so-called Ten Thousand People's Army was just a group of hungry people who couldn't survive.

The sound of horse hooves brought back Hu Dawei's thoughts that he had already flown to the sky.

Hu Dawei subconsciously turned his head and followed the sound.

In the field of vision, the commanding knight came galloping towards him, bringing with him the order issued by the Chinese army.

"The military governor has ordered that troops enter Suzhou. The military situation is like a fire. Please immediately lift the siege of Suzhou!"

Hu Dawei clenched the spear in his hand, tried his best to support his tired body, and raised his eyes to look to the side.

Beside him, the servants who followed him all the way to the battle were also exhausted, and their eyes were filled with deep tiredness.

Hu Dawei opened his mouth, wanting to ask for some breathing time for the generals under his command, but the military order with the scarlet seal among the riders made him unable to open his mouth.

After Hu Dawei's expression changed several times, he finally lowered his head.

He loosened his grip on the spear, clasped his hands in his fists, lowered his head, and spoke hoarsely.

"Follow orders..."

Hu Dawei held the military order, and the light military order in his hand was as heavy as a stone.

The commanding cavalry delivering the order had already gone away, and the surviving soldiers and generals around them were slowly approaching.

Hu Dawei looked around at the blood-stained generals, feeling just dull in his heart.

Hu Dawei grasped the spear at his side again, gritted his teeth, and issued the military order.

"Crossing the bridge..."

……

"Officers and soldiers are crossing the bridge."

On the north tower of Suzhou City, Li Yan held up a telescope and saw everything clearly.

The urgent reports sent back from the front line had already been seen by him.

Li Yan slowly put down the telescope in his hand.

The telescope in his hand was captured from the Battle of Zhengzhou. He also has a telescope that can see farther away, but it needs to be set up. It originally belonged to Li Xianfeng, the governor of Henan.

Li Yan was now wearing the armor of a Ming army general and a sword. A group of soldiers of the Ten Thousand People's Army on the city wall were also wearing Ming army uniforms and were constantly wandering on the city wall.

On the city wall, there are a large number of people dressed as civilians who are constantly carrying ordnance.

When falsehood becomes true, trueness is also false; when trueness is falsehood, falsehood is also true.

After seizing the telescope from the officers and soldiers in the Battle of Zhengzhou, and knowing that the Ming army had remote observation methods, Li Yan naturally grasped the details to the extreme.

What Li Yan wanted was that the Ming army still believed that Suzhou City was still under their control.

"Everything was implemented according to the original plan, allowing the battalions to let go of the fight and making every effort to prevent the officers and soldiers from going south."

After receiving the military order, the messenger responded loudly, turned around and hurriedly walked down the tower.

Suzhou City had actually been captured by the Ten Thousand People's Army, but the news had not spread.

An army of 300,000 people is enough to completely surround a state city without leaking water.

Even though he had gone through countless storms and battles, Li Yan still couldn't calm down.

The plan went so smoothly that he couldn't believe it. The Ming army on the North Road plunged into the encirclement net he had laid!

Li Yan clenched the railing in front of him and looked at the large Ming army in the distance that was slowly moving south.

From the beginning, Li Yan's main target was not actually Fengyang's Ming army.

The military operation against Fengyang was nothing more than a desperate attempt by the Ming army on the North Road to stand still and plan to go bankrupt. Since Fengyang, the central capital, was captured in the eighth year of Chongzhen, due to the rampant banditry, the Ming court repeatedly strengthened Fengyang's defenses. Today's Fengyang can actually be called a large-scale military fortress.

Intelligence reports indicate that the number of Ming troops gathered in Fengyang has now reached 40,000, and all the mobile troops in the entire Southern Zhili are converging towards Fengyang.

The Ming army in Fengyang is gathering more and more, and it is only a matter of time before it reaches 50,000.

If you want to eat 50,000 Ming troops relying on the city's defense in one bite, this is undoubtedly an extremely difficult task to complete.

Even though Li Yan now has 300,000 soldiers and horses under his command, even if there is the support of nearly 100,000 soldiers and horses from the fifth battalion of Gezuo.

But the risk of besieging Fengyang is still too great.

Li Yan had limited knowledge of the situation in the fifth camp of Gezuo.

Li Yan didn't know whether it was the number of troops or their combat strength.

Everything is based on hearsay and deduced from the information obtained.

The cooperation between Li Yan and the Gezuo Fifth Battalion was a relatively superficial one from beginning to end.

Li Yan had never met any of the battalion leaders of the fifth battalion of Gezuo, and they could not have any friendship.

If Fengyang is really besieged, whether the Fifth Battalion of Gezuo can hold on is a huge question.

With only the soldiers and horses under his command, Li Yan did not have much confidence that he could defeat the Ming army stationed in Fengyang in one bite.

The biggest reason why we were able to win the Battle of Zhengzhou and defeat tens of thousands of officers and soldiers in Henan was because of mental arithmetic but not care.

The main force of officers and soldiers from Henan was on its way to help Luoyang, and they did not expect to encounter their attack.

But today is different from the past. Now the Ming army in Fengyang is aware of their movements, has taken precautions early, and has a strong city and a good location to rely on.

The officers and soldiers in Henan were exhausted from long battles and lacked military pay, so they had a weak will to fight.

But the officers and soldiers in Fengyang were waiting for work. After the arrival of the new Prime Minister of the Ming Dynasty, Hou Xun, he issued a lot of military pay and extremely high rewards. Now the morale of the Ming army in Fengyang is undoubtedly higher than that of the officers and soldiers in Henan. Much more.

Although Li Yan now has 300,000 troops and horses under his command, they are much more than when he captured Luoyang.

But most of these 300,000 soldiers and horses are not very powerful.

Now there are no more than 10,000 armored soldiers in the Ten Thousand People Army, and no more than 50,000 soldiers. The rest are basically strong men.

Although these warriors experienced brutal siege battles, they survived.

They experienced the baptism of blood and fire, and also received simple training.

But without weapons or armor, if they really went into battle, they would not play a big role.

Although he has armed a lot of soldiers with the weapons and equipment captured from the prefectural guard post, it is still a drop in the bucket for the hundreds of thousands of people under his command. Many of his soldiers are still armed with bamboo spears and wooden guns. gun.

Although the benefits would be huge if they could eat Fengyang's Ming army, the risks would be equally huge.

When there was no choice in the end, Li Yan was unwilling to take such a risk.

Therefore, compared to the Fengyang Ming Army, the weaker Beilu Ming Army is undoubtedly the best choice.

The uprisings in Shandong and Hebei contained most of the troops of the North Road Ming Army and dispersed the strength of the North Road Ming Army.

After several encounters with the North Road Ming Army, Li Yan almost figured out the situation of the North Road Ming Army.

The Ming Army on the North Road was led by Yang Wenyue. As the governor of Baoding, Yang Wenyue did not know how to fight, let alone command.

Most of the time, the Beilu Ming Army fought independently and launched attacks in battalion units.

Most of the Ming army on the North Road were composed of soldiers from Baoding and Hebei towns.

Therefore, although the soldiers in Baoding Town were well-armed, well-trained, and powerful, they were still defeated by the Wanmin Army.

One will be incompetent, exhausting the three armies.

Although Yang Wenyue could not reach this level, he was unable to win despite having a strong army due to his poor command skills.

This is a situation caused by the Ming Dynasty's long-standing tradition of using culture to control military force.

The civil servant supervisor is indeed a person of extraordinary learning ability and outstanding talent.

But more of them are military commanders like Yang Wenyue and Hou Xun who know little about military affairs and have no command experience.

If they want to maintain stability during normal times, they can do it.

But it is undoubtedly difficult to expect them to turn the tide.

It was precisely after seeing this that Li Yan pretended to raise his troops to go south, and asked the fifth battalion of Gezuo to attack Shouzhou to coordinate, and made a posture of attacking Fengyang.

The purpose was to let Yang Wenyue raise troops to rescue him.

Those who walk a hundred paces are half-ninety, and Li Yan did not relax his vigilance.

Yang Wenyue lacked ability, but the generals under Yang Wenyue were many strong generals.

Therefore, when acting, it is natural to make it real.

In the distance, large groups of Ming troops were sweeping in through Fuli Bridge.

Confrontations also began in the northern suburbs of Suzhou.

……

South of Fuli Bridge, Hu Dawei was riding on a war horse, and the front camp had begun to engage in battle with the soldiers of the Wanmin Army.

In the distance under Suzhou City, the Ten Thousand People's Army had given up on the Suzhou City that had been attacking and returned to their respective military camps like the ebbing tide. A large group of Ten Thousand People's Army was swarming towards them.

Hu Dawei raised his telescope and looked at Suzhou City in the distance.

On Suzhou City, the soldiers guarding the city were running around to celebrate, and the top of the city was very lively.

He seemed to be inspired by the arrival of reinforcements.

It's just that this was an extremely normal situation, but Hu Dawei felt inexplicably uneasy in his heart when he saw it.

He looked around, but there was nothing wrong.

Follow-up soldiers are coming from the north of the bridge in a steady stream, and the infantry of the Chinese army are about to arrive on the bridge.

At this time, deputy general Yang Dezheng led a group of cavalry from the side and asked.

"How's the battle going?"

Hu Dawei could only suppress his uneasiness and answer Yang Dezheng's question.

"The Ten Thousand Thieves Army has three camps in the north of Suzhou City. Two camps are near Fuli Bridge, and the other one is the siege camp of the Ten Thousand Thieves Army."

There are two camps close to Fuli Bridge. Before they attacked the Ten Thousand Thieves Army's camp in the north of the bridge, they sent people to support them.

"We should be able to pull out the two camps south of Fuli Bridge today. The defenders of Suzhou City should be able to hold on when they see our arrival. It will be completely late to attack the ten thousand thieves camp in the north of the city tomorrow."

Hu Dawei turned back to look at Suzhou.

As long as the Wanmin Army camps on any side outside Suzhou City are defeated, the siege of Suzhou can be lifted and the initiative of the battle can be regained in their hands.

The battle front was advancing continuously, but it did not eliminate Hu Dawei's uneasiness.

At this moment, a thunderous sound suddenly sounded in Hu Dawei's ears.

Hu Dawei was shocked, and his heart suddenly fell to the bottom.

The sound of gunfire...

It came from the north...