If I fail to overcome the tribulation, I can only return to the Ming Dynasty and become a prince.

Chapter 336 Zhu Qijun, the eldest son of King Zheng
There was a turmoil in the court because of the opening of the sea ban, but this had no impact on Zhu Zhanji, who had already gone on an expedition.

After leading the new three-guard army to Jiaozhi, Zhu Zhanji delayed for a while in Jianchang Mansion to allow the sergeants he brought to recover and receive the prepared military rations before the army began to march.

It's not that Zhu Zhanji doesn't understand the importance of military speed and speed, nor is it that he intends to delay.

But among the new three-guard army he brought, many of them were indeed unfamiliar with water, and most of them got seasick when they were at sea.

This even includes Zhu Zhanji himself.

Coupled with the already hot and humid environment in the Jiaozhi area, not long after the army landed, many soldiers infected with the disease appeared in the army.

Therefore, after the army landed, it had to take some time to let the sergeants adapt and adjust their status.

Fortunately, before the army set out for the expedition, Zhu Zhanji had reminded his elder brother to pay attention to the epidemic, and gave him a prescription for Marching Powder, which was specially designed to treat diseases caused by acclimatization and dampness and heat, so that Zhu Zhanji was fully prepared. .

Therefore, although many people in the army fell ill, except for a few particularly serious cases, very few died of illness, and non-combat attrition was also very small.

This made Li Bin praise Zhu Zhanji quite a bit, praising him for having the demeanor of a famous ancient general, but Zhu Zhanji was a little embarrassed to say so.

His own family knew his own affairs, and many of the preparations for this expedition were suggested and helped by Zhu Zhanquan. The only preparations he made were those that Zhu Di had taught him.

It's not that he was poorly prepared, but that Zhu Di had been fighting in the north all his life, and his habit of marching and fighting had a very strong imprint of fighting in the north.

This set of things is somewhat inapplicable to combat in the southwest region.

For example, Zhu Di taught Zhu Zhanji that when an army goes on an expedition, it must ensure water sources. When marching, it must ensure that water sources can be found along the way to supply the army.

This is naturally a top priority in the Northland, because the Northland is short of water. If the army does not ensure water sources on its march, even if everyone does not die of thirst, it will greatly affect the combat ability of the soldiers.

But in the Southwest?It's an exaggeration to say that this place will spurt out water if you dig it with a hoe!
The marching path of the army can be entirely along the river bank, and there is no need to worry about lack of water along the way!

On the contrary, the army must consider the issues of moisture and heat and humidity.

Because the new army is equipped with new cotton armor, this kind of armor with an outer layer of tightly beaten cotton is a good thing for fighting in the north. It is windproof and warm, and is perfect for resisting the severe cold in the north. s things.

But in the southwest, cotton armor will become heavy when absorbing water in a humid environment. In addition, it is not breathable, making it stuffy and hot when worn on the body.

Many soldiers were simply not adapted to this combat environment and suffered from heat stroke due to the armor they wore, resulting in a decline in the army's combat effectiveness.

Fortunately, Zhu Zhanjun had given Zhu Zhanji some tricks before, and Zhu Zhanji, who had made preparations, also responded to this problem, but he did not suffer any losses in this regard.

In fact, the impact of the Chen Dynasty's rebellion on the army was far less than the bad and harsh environment in the southwest.

After all, the degree of civilization in the Southwest Peninsula is not very high, and the development of science and technology is naturally limited. Their iron smelting, armor making and military technology are seriously behind the Central Plains.

Facing the new Ming army equipped with flintlock rifles, cotton armor and tiger squatting artillery, the rebels on the southwest peninsula were almost powerless to fight back.

The southwest is hot and humid, and armor is easily corroded. Coupled with the limitations of its own production process, the armor-wearing rate among these rebels is very impressive.

The reason why they were able to fight back and forth with the well-equipped Ming army in the past was mainly because the Ming army was exhausted on expeditions and was not adapted to the local climate and environment.

This is also the main reason why the Southwest Peninsula has been able to deal with powerful countries in the past and in later generations. Their harsh environment has indeed weakened and restricted foreign armies too much.

But correspondingly, once the foreign troops adapt to the local environment, they can be beaten until they can't get up.

This was true for the Ming army, and it was also true for later Western colonists.

As for the war elephant, the biggest weapon relied on by the rebels in the Southwest Peninsula, there were many ways to deal with it even in the cold weapon age, not to mention that the military has now entered the firearms age.

The Tiger Crouching Cannon is set up and one round of rapid fire can put the elephant into a violent state and start attacking indiscriminately without distinguishing between friend and foe. On the contrary, it will cause more damage to the rebels.

Although elephants look scary, they are indeed scary when they charge. After all, the largest land animal is astonishing in both physique and strength.

But like all large animals, elephants are also very easily disturbed. Fire, loud noises, etc. can easily frighten elephants and then go into a state of madness.

Although the Southwest Peninsula has a tradition of domesticating elephants since ancient times, it is obvious that this kind of domestication cannot change the instinct of the creature. At most, it can make it get used to certain things.

However, the Ming Dynasty has just begun to enter the firearms era from cold weapons. The Southwest Peninsula saw the Ming army's firearms when Mu Ying conquered Yunnan and the British Duke conquered Annan. They expected them to train elephants for firearms. This is undoubtedly an idea. too much.

Not to mention artillery, it is difficult for animals to adapt no matter how hard they are trained.

Loud noises and strong fires are all very irritating to animals. It may be okay in normal times, but in an environment full of chaos like the battlefield, it is really difficult to keep animals calm. .

This is also the reason why the only animal that has been widely used on the battlefield for thousands of years and is still active even in the age of firearms is the horse.

Therefore, when the war elephants could not be relied upon to fight against the Ming army, it was easy to understand why the rebels retreated.

The counter-rebellion army led by Zhu Zhanji was advancing at an almost overwhelming speed.

If Li Bin hadn't been considered a veteran and a bit mature and prudent, Zhu Zhanji had also been repeatedly warned by Zhu Zhanji when he arrived to be careful about the complex terrain in the southwest and not to rush forward to avoid the enemy setting up an ambush. Go forward faster.

But there is no necessary connection between defeating the rebels, recovering lost territory, and pacifying the rebellion in the southwest.

Defeating the main force of the rebels only prevented them from gathering into one group. The defeated troops scattered in the countryside could still cause a lot of trouble to the Ming army, even more trouble than when they gathered into a group.

After all, this thing is like flies. When they clump together, you can knock them down with a stick, but if they fly apart, hitting them with a stick will have no effect.This is also the main reason why insurgency continues in the Southwest because it is difficult to eradicate it effectively.

Speaking of which, it is actually some reserve and self-restriction of the Central Plains dynasty. It is impossible for the Western invaders of later generations to resort to genocide and other methods to kill these local people and not dare to rebel.

For the Central Plains dynasty, which was deeply influenced by Confucian culture, they hoped to get local people who sincerely surrendered, rather than killing all the locals and then moving people from the Central Plains area to engage in immigration and colonization.

The kindness of the Central Plains Dynasty can indeed play a lot of roles in many cases. After all, reputation and influence are long-term things.

But relatively speaking, in a short period of time, we have to deal with various rebellions that are emerging one after another.

As for recovering the cities occupied by the rebels, this can indeed effectively control the scale and influence of the rebels, but eradicating the rebels from a piece of land is still a long-term matter.

Zhu Zhanji had anticipated this situation. After all, Zhu Di, Zhu Gaochi, and Zhu Zhankun had all told him about this issue before coming. Even Li Bin found some veterans who had been to Southwest China before to give Zhu Zhanji some advice. Zhanji talked about some local issues.

Therefore, Zhu Zhanji was actually quite aware of the situation he was facing, and was prepared to spend time fighting wits and courage with the rebel forces hiding in the countryside.

Anyway, now he only relies on local supplies and does not rely heavily on the Ming Dynasty for logistics. In addition, food and wages are all shipped in by sea. In addition to the consumption of firearms, Zhu Zhanji now relies on local supplies. The force is even considered self-sufficient.

Because of this, after defeating several more tangled armies of the rebels and recovering a large city occupied by the rebels, Zhu Zhanji's advance slowed down.

He simply stationed himself in the city, divided his troops into small groups and dispersed them. At the same time, he recruited a large number of locals as auxiliary troops to assist the Ming army in fighting, as well as suppress and appease the local people, so that they would better obey the Ming Dynasty. 's rule.

Although the resistance of the local people is still strong, after a series of measures, it has to be said that the situation has been improved to a certain extent.

At least Zhu Zhanji can feel that the content about rebel attacks in the battle reports he receives is decreasing, which is undoubtedly a good trend.

This made Zhu Zhanji couldn't help but thank Zhu Zhanqi in his heart for helping him come up with these ideas. If he had to do it by himself, it would probably mean that the army would push them all the way, so he would not pay attention to these details.

Although he was grateful, Zhu Zhanji was also becoming more vigilant towards Zhu Zhanyu.

After all, it involves fighting for the throne. Even if Zhu Zhanjun does not fight, his identity, status and abilities will be the biggest obstacle to Zhu Zhanji's future succession.

To use an analogy, this feeling is like Li Jiancheng and Li Shimin. Even if Li Shimin no longer wants to compete for the reserve, Li Jiancheng will still regard him as his biggest competitor.

In front of that supreme position, what does brotherhood mean?Even if they are close relatives, are there many examples of brothers, fathers and sons killing each other for the throne since ancient times?

Although Zhu Zhanji has not yet reached this stage, there is no problem in naming Zhu Zhanchun as his number one competitor.

After all, it is Zhu Di who is currently sitting on the throne who really decides who can succeed. Zhu Zhanji can see that Zhu Zhanquan woke up from eight years of slumber and then showed various abilities and abilities that were superior to him. After becoming talented, his status as the emperor's grandson has begun to waver.

Not to mention anything else, just adding Jiuxi to Zhu Zhancheng is an obvious hint.

It's just that Zhu Zhanjun really doesn't want to fight, but Zhu Zhanji has to fight.

This made Zhu Zhanji have to lament that the friendship between the two brothers may never be the same again.

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When Zhu Zhanji lamented that the brotherhood was no longer what it used to be, Zhu Zhanyun didn't think about this.

In other words, he doesn't need to think about this, and he doesn't have time to think about it.

Because after ten months of pregnancy, his two concubines gave birth to two children for him, one boy and one girl. It happened that he had both children.

Nowadays, all Zhu Zhanjuan's energy is focused on his two children, and he doesn't have that much thought about competing for money or not.

Although according to the rules, these two are both concubines, but for Zhu Zhanjun, who is almost nine hundred years old, it is not easy to have two descendants. Who cares whether you are a concubine or not!
They are all our own children, and it is not too late to love them.

In order to celebrate that he finally had a child, Zhu Zhanquan even issued an edict to exempt King Zheng from all taxes this year.

Not only that, he also held a grand banquet in Fugang and invited the whole city to eat on flowing water banquets for three days.

Such an exaggerated style even attracted Zhang's opinion, reminding him not to favor the concubine too much to avoid conflicts between concubine and concubine in the future.

However, Zhu Zhanjun was completely unfazed by this, and just told Zhang Shiming that he had already made arrangements for these matters, while Meng Qinglin also said that he had no idea about it.

Seeing that both of them had this attitude, Zhang didn't know what to say, so she could only let them go.

As for her two children, she herself had no time to love them, so how could she dislike them?
You must know that this is the first grandson of the Zhang family, and the No. 1 Qi generation among the Zhu Di lineage designated by Zhu Yuanzhang as "Gao Zhan Qi Jianyou".

Because of this, Zhu Zhanju's first son must also have the character Qi in his name, so his name was also named Zhu with the character Qi in his name.

And this person is also very particular. According to Zhu Yuanzhang's regulations, his children and grandchildren must be named in the order of metal, wood, water, fire, and earth. He himself is gold, Zhu Di's generation is all wood, and Zhu Gaochi's generation is all wood. Fire, Zhu Zhankui's generation is earth, while Qi's generation is metal.

This is why later Baozong was Zhen, and Emperor Jingtai was Yu. They both had names next to gold letters.

So in the end, even though Zhu Zhanquan was now King Zheng and the most outstanding prince in the Ming Dynasty, he could only name his son with half a word.

But even so, he still tormented all the officials in the palace and asked them to think of a good name for his son, and named him Zhu Qijun.

Jun means weight, and is also used to regulate musical rhythm and state power in ancient times. It is a word with a very good meaning.

(End of this chapter)