Jingnan Strategy

Chapter 20 Jingnan War God Cao Guogong

"Tuk Tuk!"

The knock on the courtyard door interrupted Zhu Gaoxu's thoughts and also attracted the attention of the three people.

"coming!"

Wang Xuan has a stupid mouth, so he expresses himself through actions. After hearing the knock on the door, he immediately put down his bowl and chopsticks, walked quickly to the courtyard door, and opened it.

However, when the courtyard door opened, what caught Wang Xuan's eyes was a middle-aged man wearing a white gown and a white otter. Behind him was a eunuch and more than ten soldiers.

"Boy, see the Duke!"

Seeing that the visitor was wearing clothes that could only be worn by a duke, Wang Xuan quickly bowed and bowed, and Zhu Gaoxu and others in the courtyard also heard the word "guo".

"Uncle is back?" When he heard Wang Xuan calling out the Duke, Zhu Gaoxu thought it was Xu Huizu who went to Zhejiang to train troops, so he put down the bowls and chopsticks and walked towards the courtyard gate with Yang Zhan.

However, before he could reach the courtyard gate, the unfamiliar face at the door stopped him in his tracks.

"Who is this man?" As soon as this thought came to Zhu Gaoxu's mind, the eunuch following the man bowed to Zhu Gaoxu:
"Your Highness, this is Cao Guogong, who came to take the exam at His Majesty's command."

"Mr. Cao Guo?" After hearing these three words, Zhu Gaoxu reacted immediately. He took a few steps forward and bowed to the man:
"Young man, I have met Mr. Cao Guo here."

"No, Your Highness!" Seeing Zhu Gaoxu bowing to him, Li Jinglong quickly stepped forward to interrupt his bow and said with a smile:
"I came here to take the exam at His Majesty's command. I will leave after the exam is over. Your Highness doesn't need to pay too much attention to me."

"Can I not care about you...you almost killed me and my father several times..."

Listening to Li Jinglong's words, Zhu Gaoxu couldn't help but complain in his heart. At the same time, he didn't forget to raise his head and look at Li Jinglong carefully.

His attire is the standard for a duke in daily life, and compared to Xu Huizu's tall figure and jade-like appearance, Li Jinglong's appearance is not bad either.

His features are sparse, his gaze is majestic, and his movements have the aura of a Confucian general. Even his stature is relatively tall, probably close to six feet.

As a future opponent, according to Zhu Gaoxu's inquiries in the teaching field these days, many generals did not criticize Li Jinglong, but admired him more.

As for Li Jinglong’s resume, Zhu Gaoxu also knows almost everything.

In the 20th year of Hongwu's reign, he followed General Feng Sheng's Northern Expedition to attack Nahachu.

In the 22nd year of Hongwu's reign, he and Xu Huizu trained troops in Huguang. Xu Huizu was stationed in Changde and Li Jinglong was stationed in Anlu.

In the 24th year of Hongwu's reign, he and Xu Huizu went to Shaanxi and other places to prepare for the border.

In the 25th year of Hongwu's reign, he followed Feng Sheng, Fu Youde, Lan Yu and others to review troops and horses in Shaanxi, Shanxi and Henan.

During this period, Li Jinglong was also appointed by Feng Sheng and Fu Youde to rectify the five guard posts in Taozhou and Hezhou, and put down the Qinghai Fans and Hezhou Qiang people who tried to rebel.

Even Xu Huizu, who was praised by the soldiers in the military training field with him, was far inferior to him in terms of resume.

And judging from the resumes of the two of them during the Hongwu period, Zhu Gaoxu could clearly feel that Zhu Yuanzhang valued Li Jinglong more, so he sent him to local areas many times to train troops and prepare borders to exercise his personal abilities and improve his local power. prestige.

This arrangement shows how high Zhu Yuanzhang has high expectations for his personal abilities, and Li Jinglong has been appointed well so many times and has never made any mistakes.

Judging from these circumstances, Zhu Gaoxu did not underestimate Li Jinglong's qualifications.

Although some people in later generations ridiculed him for being an undercover agent and ridiculing him for his incompetence, during the Battle of Jingnan, Li Jinglong did command well and did not make any major mistakes.

As for the record that was passed down in later generations that the Changyi Gate in Peking was almost breached but was stopped by Li Jinglong out of jealousy, Zhu Gaoxu also remembered it as a false news.

The real situation is that Li Jinglong was about to break through the inner city gate at that time, so he ordered Qu Neng to abandon the outer city gate and instead led a large army to jointly attack the inner city gate.

During this period, Li Jinglong was not jealous of Qu Neng. Instead, when Zhu Di led his troops in the direction of Yongping, he promptly handed over the task of siege to Qu Neng and led his troops to intercept Zhu Di.

In addition, if Zhu Gaoxu remembers correctly, after Li Jinglong was defeated by Zhu Di in Peking, he quickly gathered the defeated army of hundreds of thousands of troops and retreated to Texas to rest and wait for the Baihegou Battle next year.

Zhu Di also tried to pursue Li Jinglong, but did not make many gains, which meant that Li Jinglong reorganized and retreated the defeated army in a short period of time.

With this piece of information alone, Li Jinglong could defeat [-]% of the generals in history.

After the encirclement and reinforcements failed, they were able to gather hundreds of thousands of troops without letting the defeated army turn into a rout and be harvested by the enemy. This kind of thing is relatively rare in the entire history.

In the subsequent Battle of Baigouhe, Li Jinglong commanded it well and almost let his cheap dad get his lunch several times.

If it weren't for Zhu Gaoxu in history who took a beating, wore a double armor weighing ninety kilograms, led his lone army into the battle, and killed Qu Neng, a fierce general of the Ming Dynasty at the same time, the battle of Jingnan would have been put down.Because of this, Zhu Gaoxu has always been worried that his abilities are not as good as those of his predecessor.

If he couldn't be like Zhu Gaoxu in history, wearing ninety kilograms of double armor and leading his troops to penetrate hundreds of thousands of Southern troops and rescue Zhu Di, the Jingnan Campaign would probably turn into Jianwen's counterinsurgency.

Thinking of this, Zhu Gaoxu looked at Li Jinglong with a hint of sympathy.

When the founding fathers of the Six Kingdoms were dead and the most capable Song Sheng was still unable to play, Li Jinglong actually went against Zhu Di, the most capable player in the Ming Dynasty at that time. However, he failed to win and was described by the civil servants as a fool and a scapegoat. This Duke Cao Guo...

"Huh?" Li Jinglong looked at Zhu Gaoxu's eyes and felt something was wrong.

"May I ask the Duke, are you taking the exam now?"

Upon noticing the change in Li Jinglong's eyes, Zhu Gaoxu immediately withdrew the sympathy in his eyes and respectfully asked about Li Jinglong's school entrance examination process.

In this regard, Li Jinglong did not hide it, but directly took out a test paper:

"This is the test paper that His Majesty has written for Your Highness. After you have answered it, please just ask Your Highness to answer another question from me."

After that, Li Jinglong handed over the examination paper, and Zhu Gaoxu also took it with both hands, opened it and looked at it briefly.

The examination paper issued by Lao Zhu has about thirty questions, ranging from military ration storage to marching consumption, to the use of Tangqi and Butang on the march, the layout of the camp, and how the two armies should form their formations against the enemy, and how to attack the cavalry with infantry. , how to appease soldiers and other topics.

It can be said that these thirty questions from Lao Zhu are specifically designed to deal with middle and lower-level generals.

As long as the answer to these thirty questions can be answered and used in actual combat, the person who answers the questions can at least lead an army of guards.

"It seems that my grandpa has a very high estimate of my starting point..."

Looking at this examination paper, Zhu Gaoxu felt a little confident.

A person like Zhu Yuanzhang would not take aim without reason. Since he asked such a question, it seems that he already thinks that he has the potential to defend one side.

If I can answer this exam well, I might be able to return to the north before the end of the year and guard the frontier with my cheap dad.

Thinking of this, Zhu Gaoxu turned sideways, stretched out his hand and said, "Sit down in Cao Guozheng Hall for a while, and come out after I finish answering in the study."

"Okay." Li Jinglong nodded slightly, walked to the main hall, and sat down.

Yang Zhan and Wang Xuan hurriedly boiled water and prepared tea, while Zhu Gaoxu went to the study room, where he grinded slowly and prepared blank sheets of paper as answer sheets.

Time passed bit by bit, and Zhu Gaoxu quickly became immersed in the world of answering questions. At the same time, in order not to leave Zhu Yuanzhang with Zhu Gaoxu's vulgar thoughts, he thought carefully before writing every time, and tried not to leave any dirty ink on the paper.

In addition, because he was good at calligraphy in his previous life, he also picked up calligraphy practice more than four months after coming to this world. Although I can't say that it can be compared with the calligraphy skills of dance and calligraphy, the handwriting is still good.

Zhu Yuanzhang answered all the test questions one by one. After he completely answered 32 questions, he breathed a sigh of relief and twisted his sore right wrist.

"call……"

After blowing on the ink stains on the answers to the last question, Zhu Gaoxu waited for a moment before sorting them out, stood up and walked out of the study.

He glanced outside the house. Compared to before he entered the study, the sun was now closer to direct sunlight, and it looked like it was already noon.

"Mr. Cao Guo, the boy has finished answering, please read the paper."

Zhu Gaoxu's exit did not surprise anyone, but his calmness made Li Jinglong look at him with admiration.

"Haha... His Majesty said that he would grade the papers himself." Li Jinglong stood up and took all the papers without giving them a second glance.

He handed the scroll to the eunuch in the palace, then bowed and said:
"Your Majesty, Your Majesty has one last question left. This question does not need to be written. All you have to do is say it and let the father-in-law in the palace write it for you."

As Li Jinglong said, the eunuch who took the scroll also sat back in his seat, and a table had been placed in front of him by Yang Zhan and Wang Xuan, with paper, pen, and inkstone on it.

Zhu Gaoxu glanced at it, then slowly raised his hands and bowed: "I dare to ask Mr. Cao Guo, what is the strategy proposed by the emperor's grandfather..."

Seeing Zhu Gaoxu's calm and unhurried appearance, Li Jinglong appreciated him even more, and at the same time told Zhu Gaoxu the topic:

"The strategy given by His Majesty is...to reduce the feudal vassal."

(End of this chapter)