Saving the Ming Dynasty: I can exchange bodies with Chongzhen

Chapter 215: The fragrance of incense spreads through the south of the Yangtze River, and the whole city is filled with blood and knives
"Kill~"

Li Dingguo roared at his subordinates. At this time, he was completely bloodthirsty. He broke into the county government office and chopped down anyone who dared to move.

Swords, guns, blood, and flames, under the light of the setting sun, the tragic scene extended all the way from the county government mansion to the city gate.

Arrows were stuck in the walls, door panels, mud, and corpses.

The person who was running away the moment before fell to the ground the next moment, blood splattering.

Shouts and roars came one after another.

At this point, all the defenders in the county were completely defeated and fled.

Li Dingguo, however, continued to lead his men to hunt down these officials and gentry.

Surrounded by Sun Kewang's large army outside, these "old men" naturally could not escape and could only hide in the mansion and try to put up a final resistance.

Even the city walls could not stop them, let alone their wealthy families. Under the artillery fire, the mansions of bureaucrats and gentry were broken into and people were dragged out. Women and children were gathered on one side, and the young and strong men in the families were gathered on the other side, awaiting trial.

Some officials and gentry wanted to escape and climbed up the wall, but they were quickly knocked down by arrows and stones. With all kinds of wounds on their bodies, blood spurting out, and broken leg bones, they fell screaming, and were caught up by the peasant army and chopped on the neck with knives.

"Run, let you run again..."

The entire Huaining seemed to have fallen into Shura City.

Countless scarlet spots flow.

Officials and wealthy families in the city were dragged out one by one, shouting... and the next moment they turned into cold corpses.

What a wealthy family, whose ancestors once held the highest official rank... At this moment, all of them became the most direct attack, hundreds of thousands of peasant soldiers came, and their strength collided with each other without reservation, and they were all shattered.

At this moment, the peasant army showed their crazy side. In a very short time, they cleared out the officials, gentry and wealthy families in Huaining and took away all their silver, shop deeds and land deeds.

On the one hand, it was because of the previous convention that they could get the silver in time; on the other hand, with the presence of people from the old camp, the malice of the peasant army was suppressed to the extreme, and no tragedy of massacring the civilians broke out.

At the same time, the civil servants of the old camp began to read out the "Prince Xin's" program and posted the misdeeds of officials and gentry outside the county government office.

"When Shi Xiaoyuan, the former salt transport commissioner, was in office, all the young and strong men in his family were slaughtered, and his family property was confiscated. Half of all the land he owned was confiscated, and the other half was distributed to the people."

"The magistrate of Huaining County was corrupt and has been executed on the spot. His body will be hung at the east gate and exposed for three days. All male members of his family will be slaughtered!"

"Mr. Zhang, a private salt dealer, bullied men and women, exploited the common people, and committed all kinds of evil. Half of his family's fertile land was confiscated, and the other half was distributed to the tenants and the common people..."

"Mr. Liu..."

The people, however, were surging in crowds and cheering continuously.

……

In Wuchang Prefecture, Chongzhen was free and asked the old blind man beside him a question.

"Tell me, why do the people prefer to believe the rebels rather than the imperial court?" Chongzhen stamped his feet. "In fact, they prefer to believe the Later Jin rather than the imperial court?"

As the weather turned colder, he suddenly felt that the reed fluff did not seem to be so warm.

The old blind man was silent for a few breaths. "When you ask this question, you have to stand from the perspective of ordinary people like us."

“From the perspective of ordinary people?”

The old blind man nodded and continued, "Are the Later Jin people scary? Are the Tatars scary?"

Before Chongzhen could speak, he shook his head and said, "It's not scary, it's not scary... Because we, the common people, can resist, we can go to the battlefield, even if we die, we are heroes and martyrs, and our wives and children are also honored."

"What is truly terrifying is the imperial court, the corrupt officials, and the collusion between bureaucrats and gentry. They oppress and infringe upon us common people, and even though we are in pain, we cannot complain or resist."

"Otherwise, they would be contemptuous of the court, a troublemaker, a villain, and a criminal. They would be put on the cangue, and not only would they be unable to live, but their wives and children would also become criminals."

"At first we believed in the imperial court, but they treated the people as fools and wanted to crush us like ants..."

The old blind man stopped talking because he knew he had said too much.

Chongzhen stared at the old blind man in a daze and fell silent.

Because he suddenly didn't know how to answer. What the old blind man said was true, but it was extremely ironic, so that he felt an inexplicable anger, but didn't know where to vent it.

Annoyance was burning in his heart like fire, and he stood up angrily and wanted to walk out.

At this moment, Lao Han ran in, "My lord, Huaining has been captured!"

"Oh? Come over here with the candy."

Chongzhen looked at Miao Haishi's report, but as he read on, his face darkened.

The whole person was so angry that he cursed, "A bunch of shameless scum, a salt transport commissioner actually embezzled 800,000 taels? He even colluded with so many private salt dealers..."

"You ministers have made mistakes... have made mistakes for the country..."

What Chongzhen actually wanted to say was, "My ministers have misled me."

But because there were so many people watching, he finally changed his mind.

Chongzhen had always felt that the Ming Dynasty suffered because of the problems of those in high positions, the fault of the Ming Emperor, the Prime Minister, and the ministers in the court.

For example, Wen Tiren was capable, smart, knowledgeable, and although he looked like a good person with a clean character, he was cultivating his own clique behind the scenes and spent all his energy and efforts on bullying others and maintaining his own position.

First, he conspired with Zhou Yanru to prevent Qian Longxi from entering the cabinet, and then he brought down Zhou Yanru and became the prime minister himself.

Whether it was rectifying military affairs or rectifying the administration of officials, he did not do anything decent, and the Ming court became even more tilted.

Another example is Zhou Yanru...

But now he feels more and more that the worst ones are the officials in the middle. Their main job is to deceive their superiors and hide the truth from their subordinates. They do everything except good things.

After all, the senior officials in the court still have to maintain some dignity, but these officials in the middle want nothing but dignity.

In the third year of Chongzhen, there was a famine in the northwest. A hundred thousand shi of grain were shipped from the capital, but only twenty thousand shi were left when they arrived at the local areas. By the time they reached the grassroots, not even ten thousand were left. When the people received their grain, there were less than five thousand shi.

The emperor was extremely angry and personally investigated the matter, but in the end he only pulled out a few people who were said to be derelict in their duties and dismissed them, and the matter was left unresolved.

But the fact that things have passed does not mean that Chongzhen has forgotten about it. There was a war in Liaodong and the imperial treasury was empty. The various departments were asked to raise money. The entire salt administration system only handed over a total of 5,000 taels of silver. But now, the Salt Transport Commissioners, who had retired one by one, had embezzled a huge amount of hundreds of thousands of taels of silver. How could he calm down?

"If they are easy to bully, then bully them to death. If they can make money, then make money to death, right?" The veins on Chongzhen's forehead bulged. "Since it's useless to reason with them and have a heart-to-heart talk, then let's not talk about it."

"kill!"

"Tell Sun Kewang and Shi Daoshen that in the following cities, all corrupt officials and the wealthy families who collude with them will be killed."

"Yes!"

After Old Han left, Chongzhen was silent for a long time again. After a long while, he turned around and asked the old blind man:
"Let's continue with the topic we were talking about? Is there any solution?"

The old blind man smiled and said, "Hasn't Prince Xin already made his choice?"

Chongzhen was silent, his eyes burning as he stared at the old blind man's dull eyes.

Yes, he made his choice.

Huang Chao's past deeds tell future generations that there seems to be no better way to deal with class enemies, aristocratic families, and officials and gentry who have been connected for hundreds of years than to destroy them physically.

Before this, Chongzhen had tried it. He tried to cooperate with these people and gave them legal rights to salt, iron and ore, but what he got in return was even worse and the national treasury became even more depleted.

Since there is no other way, we can only express our sincere greetings to them in this primitive and simple way.

……

When the news reached the ears of other rebel kings, they were all excited.

In Wuchang City, there were drums and gongs and firecrackers were set off.

"Prince Xin wins!"

"Prince Xin is mighty!"

"..."

In the eyes of ordinary people, the best proof is that life was no worse than before after Prince Xin’s siege.

Today, the "rebels" who shouted "who would rather be kings, princes, generals, or ministers" have gone a step further and are killing corrupt officials and powerful landlords. Not only will people not be afraid, but will applaud.

They even have a stronger sense of honor.

Before, you could kill my people at will, but now I will let you taste the feeling of being slaughtered.

The thousands of miles of bones should also be buried with you bureaucrats and gentry.

Above the restaurant,

Li Zicheng, Lao Huihui, Li Wanqing and other rebel kings looked at the scene downstairs with different eyes.

"Prince Xin's actions are indeed the style of a leader." Old Huihui looked excited, "I just wonder how his health is?"

Li Zicheng, however, took a sip of wine and did not speak for a long time. Until Niu Jinxing whispered something in his ear, he stood up suddenly and asked, "Is this true?"

"Really? When Li Yan was delivering the letter, he was intercepted by my people."

The old Huihui couldn't help but ask, "King Chuang, what happened?"

"Oh, it's just a small matter. One of my advisers actually wants to join another master. This is really beyond my expectation." Li Zicheng smiled and stood up. "You guys continue to watch. I will go and deal with it."

……

In the next half day, all the gentry in Huaining City were slaughtered.

After defeating Huaining County, Sun Kewang did not let his troops stay for too long. Except for more than a thousand people who were necessary to maintain order, the rest of the troops set out again and headed towards Taihu County.

The next morning, a war broke out again outside Taihu County.

Taihu County made more preparations than Huaining. They blocked the entire city gate with stones, so that several rounds of artillery fire failed to blast the gate open.

Only a corner of the city wall was blown down.

Tens of thousands of peasant soldiers rushed onto the outer city wall defended by 5,000 people. This ancient city instantly turned into a meat grinder. On top of the city wall, the government troops were like reefs among raging wolves.

Being swept away by the mad crowd.

It is undeniable that when facing death, these corrupt officials, gentry, and wealthy people burst out with astonishing fighting power.

A large amount of rolling stones and golden juice were thrown down from the city walls, and even boiling water poured down.

Even with artillery and bows and crossbows, the peasant army suffered heavy casualties. However, Sun Kewang had previously followed Zhang Xianzhong, so seeing this only aroused his ferocity and he ordered all his subordinates to concentrate their artillery, arrows, bows and crossbows.

While shooting towards the city wall, they organized people to continue rushing upwards.

Li Dingguo's fighting ability is by no means in vain.

This fierce general who left his mark in history, who once defeated Kong Youde into despair and left him powerless to fight back, and forced Kong Youde to kill his concubine with a knife and then set himself on fire, finally showed his powerful fighting ability at this moment.

He took a huge shield and held it against the rocks and boiling water. Half of his body was covered with blisters, but he still didn't care.

He climbed up the city wall using the ladder.

For a tough guy like Li Dingguo, once he lands, it is his home court.

He synchronized the giant shield and swung the horse-slaying sword in his hand, but before he could kill, he heard the sound of crossbow arrows. It was too late to dodge, but he did not retreat but advanced.

He grabbed a person and used him as a shield and ran towards the crossbowman.

Boom~
The two sides collided, and before the archers could get up, he swung his sword and chopped off the heads of the four archers.

Song Dingguo did not miss this fleeting opportunity. He turned the cannon on the city wall and fired a shot at the other side of the city wall.

Then, the city wall on the other side also collapsed.

This shot directly disrupted the deployment on the city wall. A large number of peasant soldiers rushed in through the newly cracked city wall. The officials and gentry wanted to organize people to resist, but after only a few rounds of fighting, they fell into complete despair.

For a moment, the cry of killing shook the sky, and thousands of people rushed into the city like sharp arrows.

Too many people.

Speed ​​is of the essence in war. Li Dingguo ignored his own injuries, wielded the broadsword in his hand, and led his troops forward towards the city.

Anyone who stood in his way would be chopped in half by the sword, with blood and flesh splattering everywhere, and his face dyed blood red, like a god or demon.

In less than one morning, they had destroyed all the private salt dealers, the big grain transport operators, and the troops in collusion with officials and gentry in Taihu Lake like a whirlwind.

Next comes the reckoning!
The bodies of these bureaucrats, gentry, and wealthy families in Taihu County were thrown into Taihu Lake.

The blood dyed the mud beside the water red...

……

Chapter 2 is here!

ps: I saw a book friend saying that Li Dingguo couldn't find so many people to shoot arrows, so 10,000 people shooting at the same time was a bit exaggerated. As mentioned before, Sun Kewang and Li Dingguo joined forces, with a total of 120,000 people. If the arm strength is not enough, one in 12 will be enough. If the accuracy is not good enough, volley shooting will make up for it.

(End of this chapter)