Saving the Ming Dynasty: I can exchange bodies with Chongzhen

In the eleventh year of Chongzhen,
The Dzungar Khanate was a great power that dominated the Western Regions, only inferior to the Qing Dynasty in Liaodong, and it also had an unclear relationship with Tsarist Russia behind the scenes.

When the Ming Dynasty was clearing up Liaodong, Galdan Khan of the Dzungar tribe of Western Mongolia took the opportunity to launch a massive attack on Khalkha. Tushetu Khan and others were caught off guard and refused to fight, but were defeated.

Tsarist Russia took advantage of Khalkha's defeat and used threats and inducements to its upper echelons to force them to surrender to Russia in order to seek protection.

At the initiative of Jebtsundamba Khutuktu, the Khalkha Mongols raised their flags and surrendered to the Ming Dynasty.

The Ming court ordered Huang Degong, Ma Xianglin, Sun Yingyuan, Sun Kewang and Li Dingguo to attack western Mongolia.

At the same time, the princes of the 49 banners of Mongolia south of the Gobi Desert and the kings of the various Mongolian tribes in the north of the Gobi Desert gathered in the capital of the Ming Dynasty to hold a meeting ceremony, officially announcing that the Khalkha Mongols would implement the Ming Dynasty's official system and that the Mongolian north of the Gobi Desert would be officially incorporated into the territory of the Ming Dynasty.

The nobles of Mongolia in the northern desert settled in the capital of the Ming Dynasty and had friendly exchanges with the Ming Dynasty.

The battle began in the summer of the eleventh year of Chongzhen and lasted until the autumn of the eleventh year of Chongzhen. In just over two months, the Junggar troops in Khalkha were completely defeated.

In order to eliminate the threat from the Dzungars and not leave any trouble for his descendants, Li Dingguo killed the Dzungars on the spot after defeating them.

……

In addition, there is another thing, that is, Zu Dashou and Wu Sangui were transferred to Xuan Da.

There were mixed opinions within the Ming Dynasty. Everyone thought Zu Dashou and his followers would disobey the imperial order, but what they didn't expect was that they actually accepted it directly.

But from Zhu Changgan's point of view, it was a bit disappointing.

Originally, it was an opportunity to solve the Liaodong warlords starting with Li Chengliang at one time, but now it seems that it can only be solved bit by bit.

"Prince, Lady Hong is here."

"Husband, I made chicken soup for you, don't forget to drink it later."

"Uh..." Zhu Changgan felt his scalp tingling as he looked at the woman in red outside. He really knew the taste for food. Couldn't he take a few days off?
……

With the pacification of Mobei, the Ming army marched directly westward.

The leader of the Dzungar tribe of the Oirat Mongols at this time was Choros Heduoheqin, who took advantage of the factional struggles in southern Islam to conquer the Tarim Basin.

In order to show off its muscles to the Ming Dynasty, the Junggar tribe sent 80,000 troops directly to the Umuchin grassland in southern Mongolia to demonstrate to the Ming Dynasty.

But the Ming army of 60,000 troops attacked and massacred the Junggar tribe.

The provincial situation was established in one fell swoop. In the next few months, Li Dingguo set out directly from the Ili River Valley, captured Lhasa, killed Lazang Khan, and established the Ming Dynasty regime in Weizang.

Being deserted by his friends and relatives, Choros Heduoheqin committed suicide by taking poison.

His son Choros Galdan succeeded to the throne, but was soon captured by Huang Degong and escorted to Kyoto.

Not only Choros Galdan, but also all his wives were escorted to Beijing.

With the demise of the Galdan family, the entire Western Mongolia fell into complete chaos. Various tribes were trying to usurp power and fight for fame and fortune. It took the Ming army another half a year to completely conquer the Western Regions.

The war and the infighting among the tribes resulted in the massacre of hundreds of thousands of Western Mongolians.

According to later records: "Among hundreds of thousands of households, four in ten died of smallpox first, two in ten fled to Russia and Kazakhstan, and three in ten were finally killed by the soldiers. Except for women and children who were rewarded, only a few households of the Eleuths who surrendered and were settled here have been replaced by a deputy commander, Angji. Apart from these, there is not a single felt tent within several thousand miles." Zhao Lian's description is even more exaggerated: "Three in ten died of disease; three in ten fled to Russia and Kazakhstan, and five in ten were killed by our soldiers. There was no one left within several thousand miles."

The empty space left behind was filled by a large number of immigrants
In the twelfth year of Chongzhen, the Northwest region was completely unified.

……

In Kyoto, with the unification of the northwest, Zhu Changgan was shocked. He was surprised at first, and then his expression suddenly became dull.

"Main quest: Save the Ming Dynasty Completion: 9999/10000"

"The National Fortune of the Ming Dynasty: 25679 (The national fortune is over . The trend of natural disasters and the cooling of the Little Ice Age has been reversed. It has continued to warm up. The people's lives are still improving. Everything is stable and improving."

"The Ming Dynasty has lasted for 42000 days"

「Modern lifespan bonus: 42000 days」

「Funding reward: 1150684921 yuan」

What do you mean?
its stuck?
Why is the progress not going forward? Doesn't that mean I can't go back?
【Complete the book! 】

……

……

[Anyway, it’s the end, and it’s free, so it’s a good opportunity to talk about Li Dingguo. When I wrote this book, it was because I read the information about Li Dingguo and couldn’t hide my sadness and empathy for him, so I started writing... If you don’t have a stance when writing a novel, what’s the point of writing? ]

A bandit who eventually became the last famous general of the Ming Dynasty.

His life is actually accidental but inevitable.
As mentioned before, Li Dingguo had been displaced since childhood, and the military camp had been his "home" since he was 10 years old.

In the third year of Chongzhen (1630), Shaanxi was filled with starving people and famine. Peasant uprisings in various places gradually spread like wildfire, sounding the death knell for the Ming Dynasty.

Li Dingguo, who was only 10 years old, struggled to survive in this land full of natural disasters and man-made disasters. Born in a poor peasant family, he had no one to rely on and could only eat grass roots and tree bark to fill his stomach. At that time, Zhang Xianzhong led his army passing by.

Seeing that Li Dingguo was handsome and intelligent, Zhang Xianzhong took him to the military camp and raised him.

Eating from the same pot with Li Dingguo were Sun Kewang, Liu Wenxiu and Ai Nengqi. They were all adopted by Zhang Xianzhong and later grew up to become the "Four Generals" of the Dashi Army, fighting for Zhang Xianzhong in all directions.

Among them, Li Dingguo was brave and resourceful, had outstanding military achievements, was known as the "enemy of ten thousand men", and was the top traffic star in the Dashi Army.

Li Dingguo did have some idol qualities. According to historical records, he was "eight feet tall, with broad eyebrows and eyes, a strong torso, and graceful movements." He was known for his tolerance and kindness in the army. He liked dealing with scholars and was proficient in military tactics and astrology. He was more like a gentle and modest gentleman than a reckless warrior.

……

In 1662, Li Dingguo had only five or six thousand soldiers left, stationed in the Jiulong River area (the section of the Lancang River flowing through Xishuangbanna).

The harsh climate and low morale caused this remnant army, mainly composed of people from Shaanxi, to get lost in the sparsely populated border area. The supply of food and medicine was insufficient, and nearly half of the soldiers died of illness.

In desperation, Li Dingguo still encouraged anti-Qing forces in various places to rise up in resistance. At the same time, he sent envoys to Siam for help and inquired about the whereabouts of Zhu Youlang, the last emperor of the Southern Ming Dynasty, from Myanmar.

When the tragic news of Emperor Yongli's assassination came, Li Dingguo realized that there was no way to save the situation. He could not help but beat his chest and cry, and was heartbroken. A few days later, he fell seriously ill.

Before his death, Li Dingguo wrote a petition and burned it to tell the heaven: "If the fate of the Ming Dynasty has come to an end, please allow Dingguo to die early and not harm the soldiers and civilians." He also said to his subordinates: "It is better to die in the wilderness than to surrender!"

A famous general, after more than thirty years of military career, left behind only a requiem for his unfulfilled ambitions.

……

The Qing army had twice shattered the ideals that Li Dingguo had guarded so long.

The first time was in 1647, when Zhang Xianzhong's Dashi Army and the Qing Army led by Haoge faced off at Fenghuang Mountain in Xichong. During the battle, Zhang Xianzhong was wounded by a hidden arrow from the Qing Army and died on the battlefield.

Zhang Xianzhong was Li Dingguo's old leader and also his adoptive father.

As early as when the Qing army was approaching Sichuan, Zhang Xianzhong had called together his four adopted sons and said, "The Ming Dynasty's three hundred years of orthodoxy may not end so soon. This is also God's will. When I die, you should return to the Ming Dynasty immediately and do not do anything unjust."

At the critical moment, Zhang Xianzhong put aside his hatred for the Ming Dynasty for more than ten years and ordered his adopted sons to put the overall situation first and unite with the Southern Ming to fight against the Qing Dynasty.

The hatred for his father's murder and the hatred for his nation were irreconcilable. For the next fifteen years, Li Dingguo had been busy on the anti-Qing front.

After Zhang Xianzhong was killed in battle, the situation of the Dashi Army took a sharp turn for the worse.

The four generals, led by the eldest brother Sun Kewang, led the remnants of the Dashi Army to fight and retreat. On the one hand, they tried to get rid of the Qing army that was pursuing them relentlessly, and on the other hand, they broke through the Yangtze River controlled by the Southern Ming army, opened up a passage to the south, and held an innovative "Zunyi Conference" in Zunyi, establishing a strategy of entering Yunnan from Guizhou and cooperating with the Southern Ming court.

The remnants of the Dashi Army chose to march to Yunnan, firstly because Zhang Xianzhong had received assistance from the chieftains of Yunnan during his lifetime and had close relations with the Yunnan soldiers and generals. Zhang Xianzhong had obtained a large number of horses and weapons from the chieftain of Shiping, Long Zaitian, and Li Dingguo and his brothers were also old acquaintances of Long Zaitian.

Another reason was that they learned about Sha Dingzhou's rebellion when they were resting their troops in Guizhou.

Yunnan was originally the territory of Mu Tianbo, Duke of Qian in the Ming Dynasty.

After the fall of the Ming Dynasty, Mengzi chieftain Sha Dingzhou launched a rebellion and captured Kunming.

Mu Tianbo's wife and mother were killed, and he escaped and hid in a corner trembling. Seeing that the Dashi Army was strong and powerful, Mu Tianbo, whose family was broken, had no choice but to hug his thighs and reach a cooperation agreement with the four generals, asking the Dashi Army to quell the rebellion in Yunnan.

After the Dashi Army occupied Yunnan and Guizhou, Sun Kewang, Li Dingguo and others spent more than two years to work hard and abolished the Dashi Kingdom, establishing the political policy of "jointly supporting the Ming Dynasty and restoring the country". The former rebel army raised the banner of anti-Qing and restoration of the Ming Dynasty.

At the same time, the situation in the world changed suddenly. The Qing army was out of reach and had no time to attack the southwest. Wanli's grandson, Prince of Gui Zhu Youlang, established the Yongli regime with the support of Qu Shisi and others, and fought hard with the Qing army in Zhaoqing, Guangdong.

In 1649, Shang Kexi led the Qing army to capture Guangzhou, and Kong Youde led the army to capture Guilin. In one day, Guangdong and Guangxi fell, and the Yongli court was defeated. Like Mu Tianbo, Emperor Yongli became a homeless commander and fled westward to Nanning.

At that time, Emperor Yongli needed a warm man, and he had no choice but to ask Sun Kewang from Guizhou for help.

Sun Kewang was willing to serve, but he did not want him to stay under his nose and pay homage to him all day, so he welcomed Emperor Yongli to Anlong Qianhu City in Guizhou and settled him there. To show respect, he deliberately changed the name of "Anlong" to "Anlong".

According to historical records, "since entering Guizhou, the king has no land or people." After Emperor Yongli attached himself to Sun Kewang, he completely became a mascot and raised the banner of anti-Qing in the rear. Except for Li Dingguo, few generals really took him seriously. They were obsessed with holding troops and pursuing their own little calculations.

However, Sun Kewang did not just shout slogans. In 1651, this anti-Qing armed force, mainly composed of the former Dashi Army, marched north and began a desperate counterattack against the Qing army.

In 1652, Li Dingguo led his troops from Guizhou to Hunan and captured Jingzhou and Wugang in one fell swoop.

The Qing army in Hunan thought that the Yongli regime had long been on the decline, and they were completely panicked by the sudden appearance of such a powerful army. In a desperate situation, General Shen Yongzhong, who was in charge of suppressing Hunan, asked for help from Kong Youde, the King of Dingnan in Guangxi.

Kong Youde was an old general of the Ming Dynasty. He had shaved his head and surrendered in Liaodong. When he led troops to attack the Southern Ming Dynasty for the Qing Dynasty, he occupied the entire Guangxi within a year. Kong Youde relied on his seniority and had a bad temper. He had been rejected when he asked Hunan to borrow money, and he and Shen Yongzhong blocked each other.

Now that Li Dingguo attacked Hunan, Kong Youde not only did not send troops to rescue, but instead gloated over the disaster, thinking that the Ming army was far away from Guangxi. He usually bragged to his subordinates in the mansion, boasting about his amazing military skills in western Guangdong and talking about poetry and distant places.

Shen Yongzhong was isolated and helpless, so he had to flee northward with his soldiers. As Li Dingguo won victories along the way, except for a few isolated counties such as Changde, Yuezhou, and Chenzhou, which were still under the control of the Qing army, almost all of Hunan was recovered by the Southern Ming army.

The disaster immediately fell on Kong Youde himself. Due to the large-scale retreat of the Qing army, Guangxi was surrounded by the Southern Ming army.

In June of that year, the invincible Li Dingguo led his elite troops out of Hunan and headed straight for Quanzhou in Guangxi. Quanzhou was only a stone's throw away from Guilin, but Kong Youde was so confident that he stayed in the city all day and never sent troops back to defend Guilin. It was not until the Qing army in Quanzhou was annihilated that Kong Youde was shocked.

Kong Youde personally led his army to fight, intending to defend Yanguan Pass in Xing'an County. Yanguan Pass is a major transportation route in Guangxi. It has undergone many repairs in the late Ming Dynasty. The city walls on both sides are connected to the mountains, making it easy to defend but difficult to attack. However, what Kong Youde never expected was that Li Dingguo quickly broke through this dangerous pass with overwhelming force, and the defenders were defeated, with "floating corpses covering the river."

After several defeats, Kong Youde had no choice but to flee back to Guilin. Outside the city, Li Dingguo's army arrived and surrounded Guilin. It took only four days to break through the city gate and rush in.

Kong Youde, who was once called the chief traitor of Chongzhen, could only sigh to the sky: "It's over!"

When the city was broken, Kong Youde burned down the treasures he had looted over the years and the rear hall where he lived, and then committed suicide with his family.

Before his wife Bai hanged herself, she entrusted her young son to the guards in the palace and advised: "If he can escape successfully, let him be ordained as a novice monk. Don't learn from his father to become a thief and end up like this." The child failed to escape from the city, but was detained by the Ming army and executed a few years later. As a result, Kong Youde had no offspring.

After Li Dingguo defeated Kong Youde, the morale of the Southern Ming army was greatly boosted. In the following months, Li Dingguo sent troops to recapture the entire province of Guangxi.

The remnants of Kong Youde's defeated troops fled all the way to Wuzhou, which borders Guangdong. Shang Kexi and Geng Jimao, who were far away in Guangzhou, were stunned. They ordered the front-line troops not to confront Li Dingguo head-on, and to withdraw to Zhaoqing to wait and see.

If Li Dingguo had stayed in Guilin at this time, he would have been able to recover Guangdong and Guangxi in due time. Unfortunately, Sun Kewang was short-sighted. Upon learning that the Qing Dynasty had sent Prince Jingjin Nikan to lead the Eight Banners elite troops into Hunan, Sun Kewang, who was eager for quick success, ordered Li Dingguo to lead the army northward, thus missing the opportunity to seize Guangdong.

Nikan was the grandson of Nurhaci. He participated in the battles between the Qing army and the Dashun and Hongguang regimes of the Southern Ming Dynasty and made outstanding contributions. He did not take the Southern Ming army seriously at all. Moreover, he followed Haoge into Sichuan and defeated Zhang Xianzhong's main force. He could be said to be an enemy of Li Dingguo.

Enemies are extremely jealous when they meet.

In November 1652, Nikan led his elite troops into Hengzhou Prefecture, where they met Li Dingguo's army head-on.

Li Dingguo first sent a 1800-man army to pretend to fight Nikan, then retreated to lure the enemy deeper. Nikan thought that the Southern Ming army was vulnerable and Li Dingguo was just a figurehead, so he immediately became complacent and rushed forward with his brothers.

Li Dingguo saw that Nikan underestimated the enemy, so he came up with a plan. He ordered the soldiers along the way to pretend to be defeated and turn around and run away when they encountered the Qing army. He also ambushed heavy troops in the dense forest twenty miles away in advance.

Nikan was addicted to the pleasure of chopping melons and vegetables and chased for more than 20 miles until he came into Li Dingguo's ambush range.

Seeing that Nikan had fallen into the trap, Li Dingguo ordered the entire army to attack. The sound of killing shook the sky and thousands of arrows were fired.

The Qing army was caught off guard and was beaten by the Southern Ming army. In the melee, Nikan himself fell off his horse. Because his gorgeous prince costume was too eye-catching, he was immediately stabbed into a hornet's nest by the Southern Ming soldiers and died on the spot.

After the battle, the soldiers cut off Nikan's head and presented it to the emperor. As the saying goes, "A brilliant oriental pearl is inlaid on a helmet, and a thousand gold coins are enough to buy the king's head." The Qing army dared not fight again, and hid in Changsha, leaving Li Dingguo alone.

Defeating two Qing princes consecutively within a year was a great victory that the Southern Ming regime had never achieved before, and Li Dingguo became famous.

Huang Zongxi, who was wanted by the Qing Dynasty many times while in Jiangnan, praised: "Li Dingguo defeated two famous kings in the battles of Guilin and Hengzhou, and the whole world was shocked. This has never happened since the Wuwu year of the Wanli reign (1618)."

After the great victories in Guilin and Hengzhou, Li Dingguo led his troops eastward and proposed a plan to join forces with Zheng Chenggong's army in Xiamen, Fujian and anti-Qing forces in Guangdong to attack Guangdong.

At this time, the Southern Ming army was scattered all over the place. Its strength was not weak, but it had been weakened by long-term internal strife and had failed to establish a unified alliance, which allowed the Qing army to defeat them one by one.

Li Dingguo believed that seizing Guangdong could reverse the decline of the Southern Ming Dynasty.

At the end of the Ming Dynasty, the fiscal revenue of Guangdong Province was almost ten times that of Guangxi Province. With abundant fiscal revenue and material supplies, it could support the Southern Ming Army in its operations. In addition, after the recovery of Guangdong, the Yunnan-Guizhou-Guangxi region controlled by Sun Kewang and Li Dingguo, the Sichuan-Hubei border region controlled by the Thirteen Families of Kuidong, and the coastal regions of Fujian and Zhejiang controlled by Zheng Chenggong and Zhang Huangyan would be connected, changing the previous situation of lack of coordination and fighting independently.

The ideal is full, but the reality is very skinny.

The strategic plan that Li Dingguo had painstakingly planned did not receive any response. In the first attack on Zhaoqing, Li Dingguo fought alone and encountered stubborn resistance from the Qing army. As there was no news from Zheng Chenggong's army in Fujian and Hao Shangjiu's army in Chaozhou, Li Dingguo had no choice but to withdraw to Guangxi.

In March 1654, Li Dingguo once again sent troops to Guangdong, leading an army of tens of thousands equipped with elephants and cannons, and arrived at the city of Xinhui in June of that year.

Xinhui is a gateway to the southwest of Guangzhou with numerous waterways. Both the Ming and Qing armies knew that this battle was related to the overall situation of Guangdong.

The Battle of Xinhui lasted for half a year. Li Dingguo chose the method of long-term siege. The army successively adopted tactics such as digging tunnels, bombarding the city with cannons, and cutting trees to fill trenches to attack the city, but they were all resisted by the Qing army. The Ming army outside the city was plagued by plague due to long-term fighting, and the Qing army in the city ran out of food and grass due to the long siege.

After several months of the battle, the soldiers and civilians in Xinhui could only dig rats and catch sparrows for food, or eat duckweed and straw sandals. In the twelfth month, the Qing army still refused to surrender, but instead ordered the massacre of civilians for food. "They captured people for food, and the remains of more than 10,000 people were scattered on the ground." After the battle of Xinhui, "half of the people in the city starved to death, half were killed for food, and half of their children were looted." It was like hell on earth.

Other Southern Ming troops never came to support, and the Qing reinforcements had successively captured the two Guangzhou counties that Li Dingguo had previously recovered. Li Dingguo was at a loss and had to retreat again.

From then on, Li Dingguo was no longer able to advance eastward.

As the plan to recapture Guangdong and unite the eastern and western armies failed, Li Dingguo knew that the Southern Ming armies were simply unable to unite and fight the enemy together, but what made him even more heartbroken was the strife among brothers.

Among the four generals of the Dashi Army, Ai Nengqi was killed by a poisonous arrow from a local chieftain when he attacked Yunnan in 1647. After occupying Yunnan and Guizhou, Liu Wenxiu and Li Dingguo led troops outside all year round and fought against the Qing army in various places.

Sun Kewang has always been jealous of talented people.

Liu Wenxiu's campaign in Sichuan was not as successful as Li Dingguo's. After several victories, he was defeated by Wu Sangui and had to retreat to Guizhou with his remaining troops. Sun Kewang took the opportunity to remove Liu Wenxiu's military power and put him under house arrest in Kunming.

Liu Wenxiu had lost the battle and was already depressed. He just wanted to be alone, but he didn't expect his eldest brother to be so heartless as to directly dismiss him from his post.

What Sun Kewang was more afraid of was Li Dingguo. He had always been unfriendly to his second brother who was good at fighting.

In 1648, when the Dashi Army was still marching towards Yunnan and Guizhou, Sun Kewang personally planned the Yanwuchang Incident.

Sun Kewang ordered all the camps to gather at the military parade ground on April 1 for review. On that day, the flag and drum officers followed precedents when raising the marshal's flag, and there was nothing wrong with it. However, Sun Kewang took the opportunity to fly into a rage and blame Li Dingguo.

Liu Wenxiu, who was standing by, quickly stepped forward to help his second brother out of the siege: "This was a temporary mistake on the part of the West Mansion. I hope you can forgive me, big brother."

Li Dingguo was kept in the dark at first. When he found out that Sun Kewang was deliberately making things difficult for him, he asked him, "Are we still brothers?"

Sun Kewang was making a fuss unreasonably and insisted that raising the general's flag was a mistake and that he wanted to punish Li Dingguo with a stick.

Li Dingguo was furious and asked in public: "Who dares to hit me?"

The other generals of the Dashi Army had no choice but to act as peacemakers and asked Li Dingguo to reluctantly accept the blame, saying: "Otherwise, if we break off from now on, we will all be scattered and everyone will be taken advantage of."

In order to take the overall situation into consideration, Li Dingguo had to endure the humiliation and beating by Sun Kewang fifty times. Afterwards, Sun Kewang pretended to hug Li Dingguo and cried, saying that this was to make the Dashi Army have a unified command, so he had to wrong his second brother.

When Li Dingguo and Liu Wenxiu led their troops to fight against the Qing Dynasty, Sun Kewang, who was living in Guiyang, had the ambition to replace Emperor Yongli.

Sun Kewang planned the "Eighteen Gentlemen Prison" and executed eighteen loyal ministers around Emperor Yongli. The Yongli court was completely reduced to a vassal state, existing in name only.

In desperation, Emperor Yongli asked Li Dingguo for help.

When annihilating Kong Youde's troops, Li Dingguo said to his subordinates: "Cao Cao and Sima Yi have the talent to suppress rebellions. They have experienced hundreds of battles, defeated strong enemies, and supported weak rulers. If they want to be remembered for generations, it is just like taking something out of a bag. But because of a momentary thought, they plotted to usurp the throne. It is really like exchanging gold for dead iron. They will be cursed by future generations. It is not worth it."

Emperor Yongli knew that this was a loyal minister.

In 1656, Li Dingguo, who had just returned from the front line, led his troops to Anlong to pay homage to Emperor Yongli. This was the first meeting between the emperor and his subject.

Emperor Yongli was deeply moved and said to Li Dingguo: "I have long known your loyalty and righteousness, and I regret that we met so late."

Afterwards, Li Dingguo asked Emperor Yongli to move to Kunming, Yunnan.

Sun Kewang was very angry, and the consequences were serious. The brothers finally turned against each other. In 1657, Sun Kewang sent troops from Guiyang, with a total of troops, to attack Yunnan, demanding that Li Dingguo and Liu Wenxiu hand over Emperor Yongli.

In Kunming City, Li Dingguo and Liu Wenxiu only had the remaining remnants of the anti-Qing army, with a force of less than 30,000.

Zhang Xianzhong's adopted sons met again at Jiaoshui, thirty miles away from Qujing (located in eastern Yunnan Province). This time, they were rivals.

Sun Kewang had been arrogant and domineering for many years and was unpopular. Naturally, his former Dashi Army officers and soldiers were unwilling to work for him and defected to his side one after another. Li Dingguo was outnumbered and at a loss, but he won miraculously.

When Sun Kewang was deserted by his friends and relatives, he had nowhere to go. He and his remaining ten men came to the Qing army camp in Wugang and surrendered to the Qing court, his long-time rival and the murderer of his father. This was the place where Li Dingguo first won victory when he entered Hunan to fight against the Qing.

After Sun Kewang surrendered, he reported the strengths and weaknesses of the three southwestern provinces to the Qing court, which put the Yongli court, which had just experienced an internal conflict, in danger.

In February 1657, the Qing dynasty sent three armies southward. Wu Sangui set out from Hanzhong, Shaanxi, and entered Guizhou via Shu; Zhuobutai marched to Hunan and attacked Guizhou via Guangxi; Luo Tuo and Hong Chengchou marched from Hunan directly to Guizhou. Hong Chengchou also selected Han people familiar with the geography of Yunnan and Guizhou from among Sun Kewang's surrendered officials as guides.

After two fruitless attacks on Guangdong and a civil war with Sun Kewang's troops, Li Dingguo was already exhausted.

The remaining soldiers in the three southwestern provinces were no longer able to resist the Qing army's offensive. Under the guidance of the local chieftain, the Qing army attacked Anlong via the southern route.

Upon hearing the news, Li Dingguo personally led 30,000 soldiers to rescue. Li Dingguo had a good command and had a chance to win, but a sudden forest fire and a strong north wind blew on the battlefield, and the fire spread to the Southern Ming army.

God did not bless the Southern Ming. Li Dingguo had no choice but to retreat again and again, burning bridges and cutting off roads. After this retreat, Li Dingguo's last elite troops were almost completely lost, leaving only remnants of the defeated army, and 200,000 to 300,000 military and civilian families in the rear were all killed by the Qing army.

The three Qing armies finally joined forces in Qujing and headed straight for Kunming. Emperor Yongli once again embarked on the road of exile, fleeing all the way to Myanmar for refuge.

When Emperor Yongli was fleeing, Li Dingguo was still fighting desperately.

In 1659, Li Dingguo led his troops across the Lujiang River (now the Nujiang River) and regrouped at Mopan Mountain. He originally planned to take advantage of the deep terrain here to ambush special forces and spread mines everywhere, taking advantage of the Qing army's underestimation of the enemy to annihilate Wu Sangui's troops who were approaching step by step.

Unfortunately, Li Dingguo's subordinates defected and told Wu Sangui the truth. Wu Sangui was so frightened that he ordered the whole army to stop advancing and dismount to search for the ambush troops of the Southern Ming.

Li Dingguo's plan failed, and the original deployment was completely disrupted. The two armies soon engaged in a melee. Even though the Southern Ming army fought bravely, it was completely at a disadvantage. The grass and trees on the mountains were all stained red with blood. Li Dingguo tried his best to save the nation, but it was difficult.

In order not to disclose the whereabouts of Emperor Yongli, Li Dingguo deliberately chose another route to evacuate, and constantly engaged with the Qing army, persisting in fighting guerrilla warfare for three full years.

During this period, Li Dingguo submitted a series of memorials to Emperor Yongli but received no response.

He didn't know that Emperor Yongli had been held hostage by the Burmese king and was a prisoner, with his life in danger at any time. When Wu Sangui's army arrived at the Burmese border and claimed to cross the river and massacre the city, the Burmese king was terrified and offered Emperor Yongli. At that time, the wandering emperor was surrounded by only two or three palace maids and a lame guard.

In 1662, Wu Sangui submitted a petition to the Qing court, requesting that the Yongli Emperor be executed in Yunnan. In order to curry favor with the Qing court, Wu Sangui even wanted to behead the Yongli Emperor and his 12-year-old prince.

On the contrary, the two Manchu generals who went on the expedition with Wu Sangui could not bear it and persuaded him that Yongli had once been a king and that his body should be left intact.

On April 15, Zhu Youlang, the last emperor of the Southern Ming Dynasty, was strangled to death with a bowstring by Wu Sangui, completely ending his nearly twenty years of escape.

The last flag of anti-Qing resistance collapsed.

A few days later, Li Dingguo learned the sad news and followed the Ming Dynasty with his unrevenged national and family hatred.

Later historians believed that Li Dingguo’s death marked the end of the anti-Qing struggle of the remaining members of the Dashi Army.

After Li Dingguo passed away, his subordinates were leaderless and fled for their own interests when disaster struck. Many of them surrendered to the Qing Dynasty. Even Li Dingguo's son Li Sixing accepted the rank of governor-general awarded by the Qing Dynasty and forgot his father's last words.

An era, in the midst of turmoil, is coming to an end... (End of this chapter)