Late Ming sea owl

Chapter 268 Death of Zheng Zhilong

Wang Mengxiong's guess was absolutely correct. Just as Zheng's Marines were fighting hard in the southeast of Xiamen City, the four gates of the city wall were already opened, and countless pirates, in groups of dozens, poured out of the city like headless flies.

The Huiyou Company had limited manpower, and although they had deployed scouts outside the city, they were unable to take any measures in the face of such an unorganized and undisciplined rout.

While Lin Hai sent someone to inform Xu Letian, he also ordered Yang Lu and Yang Ce's troops to rush to the various ferry crossings to the west and north of Jiahe Island to capture the pirates who wanted to swim out of Jiahe Island.

At this time, the Zheng Army Marines, who were fighting hard, began to collapse after seeing the fire in the city. The pirates either fled for their lives or simply knelt down and surrendered. The Army Department quickly controlled the battlefield.

The Guild Company did not allow the surrender of pirates to be killed at will, and those pirates who knelt down and surrendered basically saved their lives. On the contrary, those who chose to escape were either killed on the spot by the Army Department or chased by the cavalry of the Vanguard Bureau.

The advantage of cavalry was once again demonstrated. Even if a cavalry-less army won a battle, it would be difficult to expand the victory. On the contrary, a side with only infantry would often face heavy losses after a defeat.

When two armies fight face to face, the casualty rate will never be too high. Large-scale casualties usually occur during the pursuit.

Seeing this, the pirates who were assigned by Wang Mengxiong to guard the rear surrendered collectively. Wang Mengxiong himself was also tied up and handed over to the Army Department, and then was escorted to the Central Army by Wu Guoyi.

This guy is quite stubborn. He is a rebel general of the imperial court and knows that he has no chance of survival if captured. When he saw Lin Hai, he refused to kneel down.

The two guards in charge of escorting him kicked him in the knees. Wang Mengxiong, who was tied up, bent his knees, but still struggled to stand up straight. He stared at Lin Hai and shouted, "Kid, if you want to kill me, then kill me. If you want me to kneel down, no way."

The two guards were furious and were about to break the man's legs, but they saw Lin Hai smiled and waved his hand, saying to Wang Mengxiong nonchalantly: "You are quite tough now, why didn't you dare to fight in the first place? When you saw Lin's banner, you hid in the city like a turtle."

"Bullshit, I advocated going out of the city to fight from the beginning. It's a pity that the young man surnamed Zheng didn't listen to me, otherwise it would be you, Lin, who would be the prisoner now."

Wang Mengxiong was still being stubborn. He actually felt a little regretful at this moment. If he had known that Lin Hai's siege skills were so sophisticated, he would not have suggested that Zheng Zhilong use defending the city to wear down the enemy's morale.

The most infuriating thing is that the Marines, who had been trained so hard, were finally betrayed by Zheng Zhilong, and this team never got a chance to fight Lin Hai's troops in a fair fight.

Thinking of this, Wang Mengxiong became even angrier, and then began to curse Zheng Zhilong loudly, wishing him a miserable death.

"Where is Mr. Zheng now?" Lin Hai asked when he saw that he was unhappy with Zheng Zhilong.

"If I knew, I would have told you long ago." Wang Mengxiong paused, then continued, "This guy probably wants to swim out of Jiahe Island. Quickly send the navy to catch him..."

"Take this fellow away and keep him under good guard." Seeing that asking more questions was futile, Lin Hai ordered his personal soldiers to take Wang Mengxiong away, and then sent someone to invite Magistrate Cao to come over.

Jiahe Island is under the jurisdiction of Tongan, and Lin Hai wants to invite the county magistrate Cao Lutai to come and enter the city with him.

He had already known that Zheng's army had carried out a massacre in Xiamen. In order to avoid misunderstanding, he decided to bring the civil servants into the city with him.

It was so difficult to be a military general in the Ming Dynasty. You had no say in the bureaucratic system. Even if you stood upright, you had to worry that your shadow might tilt.

For this reason, Lin Hai had no choice but to give up the property of Zheng Jun in Xiamen. This amount should not be small, after all, Zheng Jun must have looted a lot on Jiahe Island this time, and also massacred Xiamen City. When they fled, there must be a lot of things they didn't take away in time.

Fortunately, the harvest from the raid on the nest in Wanggang has far exceeded expectations, so there is no need to be too greedy here. It is better to leave a good impression of being incorruptible to the officials and gentry in Fujian.

After Cao Lutai was invited, Lin Hai ordered the Third Bureau of the Ministry of the Army to enter Xiamen City.

It was another night of crying. The second massacre was taking place in the city. Countless houses were burning, and the flames illuminated the hellish world.

The streets were covered in blood and scattered broken arms and limbs. Almost all the wells were filled with corpses. The charred trees were hung with human heads with their eyes wide open. There was even a crushed baby in the middle of a millstone...

Even though Lin Hai had fought in several bloody wars, he still couldn't help but feel like vomiting when he saw the inhuman scenes before him.

He took a deep breath, called the messenger over and ordered, "Go tell General Jiang Bai that the third division will immediately control the four cities as sentries. Any pirates who are committing violence will be killed without mercy!"

"Yes, I have received the order!" The messenger responded and pulled the reins to turn his horse around to deliver the order.

"Wait a minute, my lord general, there might be a large group of bandits in the city..." Viper said from the side. Of course he would not call him the commander-in-chief in front of Magistrate Cao.

Lin Hai knew what he meant and immediately interrupted him with a wave of his hand, saying, "It's okay. We have personal soldiers here to protect the safety of me and Magistrate Cao."

Cao Lutai was on his horse, crying like rain. This young county magistrate, who had been an official for less than two years, had never thought deeply about how the words "massacre" in history books were so heavy...

"So heartless, so heartless! I am unworthy of being an official..." Cao Lutai burst into tears, and his hands holding the reins began to tremble uncontrollably.

"Mingfu, how can you be blamed for this? If it weren't for your local soldiers, I'm afraid Tongan County would be like this." Lin Hai consoled him and continued, "If anyone is to blame for this, it can only be blamed on the incompetence of the military commanders. Now that I have been appointed as the guerrilla commander of Penghu, the incident today will never happen in Zhangzhou and Quanzhou in the future."

"Damn pirates, how dare they take human life so lightly!" Cao Lutai was still upset, and said to Lin Hai with a grin: "Lin Yourong, please be sure to capture the bandit leader Zheng Zhilong. I can't get rid of the hatred in my heart until this beast is dead!"

"Don't worry, sir. I have already issued an order that Zheng the thief must be found alive or dead! He will not be allowed to escape..."

That night, Lin Hai stayed up all night, waiting for news of whether Zheng Zhilong had been captured alive or killed. However, he still got nothing until dawn.

This person seemed to have evaporated from the face of the earth. No one saw him on the water or on land. Lin Hai had no choice but to catch up on his sleep. The battle lasted for half a month, and as the commander, he was exhausted.

What Lin Hai didn't expect was that Zheng Zhilong neither went west nor north. He swam from the southeast of Jiahe Island to Lieyu Island, intending to go through Kinmen and then swim back to the mainland.

This is a rather long escape route, requiring a considerable distance to swim across the sea, and it is in the direction of the open sea with high winds and rough waves. Zheng Zhilong had expected that the west and north would be the main defense directions of the Tongan fishing soldiers, so he carefully chose such an escape route. This was because he was good at swimming and was young and strong. If it were an old man like Yu Zigao, he would not be able to swim across anyway.

In the evening of the next day, Zheng Zhilong was about to swim to Kinmen Island. He already saw hope of escaping.

Suddenly, a voice came over: "Zheng Yi Guan, you bastard, I finally caught you, it's really God's will!"

The voice sounded so familiar that Zheng Zhilong was frightened out of his wits. He looked up and saw that it was indeed Li Guozhu, and next to him was Xu Letian, both of them were standing on a small fishing boat.

There were dozens of men on the boat whom Zheng Zhilong did not recognize. They were the Tongan fishermen led by Xu Kejun.

When Lin Hai returned to Dongfan from Japan this time, he brought Li Guozhu with him. Afterwards, he took a ship from the Navy Department to Xiamen. Since last night, he has been searching for Zheng Zhilong with Xu Letian.

The fishermen from Tongan searched the west and north sides of Jiahe Island near the land for six or seven hours and captured countless pirates. Unfortunately, not only did they not see a single hair of Zheng Zhilong, they also did not hear any useful information about him.

In desperation, Li Guozhu suggested going to Kinmen to try his luck, but he didn't expect that he actually caught Zheng Zhilong this time.

At this time, Zheng Zhilong was surrounded by only a few close confidants, including his cousin Zheng Zhipeng. Even Zheng Zhipeng's younger brother Zheng Zhiwan was nowhere to be seen.

The fishermen on the boat dragged Zheng Zhilong aboard with a fishing net. Xu Letian drew his knife and prepared to cut him open on the spot.

"Wait a minute!" Li Guozhu stopped Xu Letian, "Brother, don't rush to do it."

"Brother Shi, do you want to do it yourself?" Xu Letian said as he handed the knife to Li Guozhu.

Li Dan was killed directly by Zheng Zhilong, and Xu Xinsu could only be considered to have died indirectly at the hands of Zheng Zhilong, not to mention that Li Dan was Zheng Zhilong's adoptive father. If Li Guozhu wanted to do it himself, Xu Letian would naturally not be able to compete with him.

"I think we should take this fellow to Brother Lin first and see how he will deal with him..."

Seeing Xu Letian's confusion, Li Guozhu went on to explain: "The Zheng bandits have caused such a commotion in Fujian that they might be able to surrender their captives to Beijing. Now is the time when the new emperor ascends the throne, and Brother Lin has been recruited. If we can use this opportunity to show our face in front of the emperor, wouldn't that be a good thing?"

"No, I don't want to let this guy live one more day, so I'll kill him here!" Xu Letian still refused. At the same time, he was afraid that the longer he stayed, the more trouble he would have, and the intermediate link of surrendering the prisoners would be uncontrollable.

After all, there is Huang Mingzuo. It would be no fun if Zheng Zhilong escaped from prison like Wang Mengxiong did. At this time, Xu Letian did not know that Huang Mingzuo's son had been kidnapped by Li Kuiqi.

"Brother, we can't just focus on personal vengeance. If my second brother wasn't here this time, how would you and I be able to avenge our father?" Li Guozhu said, "Have you forgotten your father's last words? From now on, all of you brothers will join the Huiyou Company, and everything will be decided by my second brother."

Xu Letian finally relaxed after hearing this: "In that case, let's follow Brother Shi's advice. Let's not announce that we have captured Zheng thief alive yet, and see what Brother Lin has to say. If he allows us to avenge this private vendetta, it won't be too late to kill Zheng thief later."

That night, Li Guozhu and Xu Letian took Zheng Zhilong to Yuandang Port, and then Xu Letian went to Xiamen City to meet Lin Hai.

When Lin Hai heard that Zheng Zhilong had been captured, he was surprised and happy. At the same time, he was also surprised that Li Guozhu and Xu Letian did not kill Zheng Zhilong on the spot.

Xu Letian knelt down with a plop, and cried sadly: "Brother, I have an unwelcome request. Brother Li Shi and I have an irreconcilable hatred with that thief Zheng. Please allow us to kill that thief Zheng with our own hands, Brother Lin."

"Brother Letian, what are you talking about?" Lin Hai quickly helped Xu Letian up, "Why wouldn't I allow you to do that?"

Xu Letian then repeated what Li Guozhu said, and then he expressed his own concerns. After hearing this, Lin Hai laughed and said, "My elder brother has thought it through very carefully, but in order to let you take revenge with your own hands, I, Lin, would rather not have this opportunity to offer the prisoners."

"Brother Lin is truly a righteous man!" Xu Letian was so moved that his eyes welled up with tears.

"Just find a place to kill the thief secretly and leave the head to me. Then you can say that you killed him during the pursuit." Lin Hai patted Xu Letian's shoulder and said, "Go ahead. I am busy with military affairs here, so I will not go with you brothers."

Xu Letian left with great gratitude, and the next day he secretly took Zheng Zhilong to Tongan. That night, he beheaded him in front of Xu Xinsu's cenotaph. Li Guozhu and Xu Yilong watched the execution.

When Xu Letian returned to Xiamen City with Zheng Zhilong's head, the pirates on Jiahe Island had basically been captured. Most of them surrendered voluntarily, and Zheng Zhilong's cousin Zheng Zhiguan was also captured.

After cross-examination of Zheng's army generals such as Zheng Zhipeng and Zheng Zhiguan, Lin Hai confirmed Xu Xinsu's guess before his death that Wang Mengxiong was indeed rescued by Huang Mingzuo.

Also, the reason why Zheng Zhilong was able to break through the city of Xiamen guarded by Yu Zigao was because the old thief Huang Mingzuo arranged an internal response.

After obtaining this definite evidence, Lin Hai immediately discussed with Cao Lutai and led his troops directly to Haicheng Yuegang to arrest Huang Mingzuo.

Normally, this matter should be reported to the Fujian Governor Zhu Yifeng, who would then order the arrest of Huang Mingzuo. However, Lin Hai was worried that the news would leak out, so he decided to arrest him first and report later, and at the same time dragged in the civil servant Cao Lutai to endorse his overstepping of authority.

However, Lin Hai and Cao Lutai were still a step too late, and Huang Mingzuo's entire family had already disappeared.

It turned out that the old man had long anticipated that Zheng Zhilong would definitely not be a match for Lin Hai, and that his affairs would sooner or later be exposed, so after meeting Li Kuiqi that day, he directly sent all his family members to Haojing.

As for himself, he simply shaved his head, put on a monk's robe, and went to a temple with a fake certificate of ordination that he had prepared long ago in his arms.

This temple is located in Jinhua, Zhejiang, and its name is Lutian Temple. A former deputy envoy of Fujian Sea Route retired to this temple to study due to mourning for his father.

This man's surname was Zhu Dadian, his courtesy name was Yanzhi, and his nickname was Weihai. He was a Jinshi in the 44th year of Wanli. When he was in office in Fujian Haidao, he accepted a huge bribe from Huang Mingzuo.

This Zhu Dadian is not an ordinary corrupt official. He is much bolder and more capable than ordinary corrupt officials. Huang Mingzuo is unwilling to lose his power completely, so he decides to bet on him again.

(End of this chapter)