Ming Dynasty man

Chapter 150
Two days later, Shen Zheng and Zhang Ao packed the food into carts, and conscripted hundreds of civilians to push the carts. When everything was ready, Li Jing led his troops to set off.

Halfway through the journey, Gao Qi sent someone to send news that the rebel army had invaded Zezhou, but the official army Cao Wenzhao had blocked the rebel army's retreat, and at the same time personally commanded a troop to pursue Zezhou.

However, the rebel army made some adjustments in Zezhou and turned towards Lingchuan.

Halfway through the journey, the vanguard of Gao Yingxiang's troops met Gao Qi's troops. I wondered if Gao Yingxiang's men had taken the wrong medicine, so they attacked Gao Qi's troops without asking any questions.

However, although Gao Yingxiang's troops are large and powerful, most of them are old and weak women and children. Only two or three out of ten soldiers are truly capable of fighting, and their weapons and equipment are far inferior to those led by Gao Qi. After the initial panic, they quickly organized and inflicted heavy damage on Gao Yingxiang's troops. After World War I, more than [-] enemies were killed, more than [-] were captured, and military supplies, food, and money were little.

After Gao Qi won the victory, he immediately gave way to the road leading to Lingchuan, allowing the rebel army to flee in the direction of Lingchuan.

Now Gao Qi has sent a part of his troops to follow and monitor the rebel army, to prevent the rebel army from fleeing into Henan.

The other department guarded the captives. Because of the large number of captives, Gao Qi did not have enough food, so he asked Li Jing whether to escort the captives back to Hongshanling.

After reading the letter, Li Jing said with a smile: "That's right, Gao Qi knows my heart well, and he didn't give the rebel army the food and grass in one pot. This battle was fought beautifully."

Turning to the sender, he said, "Go back and tell Gao Qi that it's a long way back to the mountains, and bring the captives to me. In addition, tell Gao Qi to let his troops move closer to me."

The messenger was ordered to get on his horse and gallop away.

"Er Leng!" Li Jing said to Liu Er Leng beside him: "You lead the 500 people from the headquarters to advance lightly, so as to prevent the rebel army from attacking us after occupying Lingchuan. If the rebel army comes, you only need to block it. Take the initiative to fight!"

"Yes!" Liu Er was taken aback and left with fists in his arms.

"Let's go, let's follow." Li Jing waved to Hutou.

Zezhou City.

Not long after the rebel army led by Gao Yingxiang abandoned the city, Cao Wenzhao led his troops into the city.

For Cao Wenzhao, the battle was a bit too easy, but it was also a bit depressing.

It was easy because the rebel army was completely vulnerable to Cao Wenzhao. Since Cao Wenzhao was transferred to suppress the bandits, he had never lost a single battle. Later, the rebel army ran away when they heard Cao Wenzhao's name. .

I said I was depressed because Cao Wenzhao didn't have many troops, only 3000. Compared with the rebellious army, this force is too small. The total number of the rebellious army is at least 20. Not ten days and a half months can't be cut down, not to mention that the rebellious army is not without any combat effectiveness.

Therefore, Cao Wenzhao can only nibble away bit by bit, destroy a little today, and wipe out a little tomorrow. If he had 3 people in his hand, he would have wiped out this gang of rebels long ago.

What also made Cao Wenzhao most depressing was that while he was fighting against the rebel army, he also had to clean up the mess for the rebel army, otherwise his cavalry would not be able to provide enough supplies.

Cao Wenzhao had a thousand cavalry under his command, and these thousand cavalry were transferred from outside the pass, known as Guanning Iron Cavalry.

There were more than [-] Guanning iron cavalry, most of them were in the hands of Zu Dashou. Cao Wenzhao was transferred to Shaanxi to suppress bandits, so he brought over a thousand Guanning iron cavalry from his department.

Feeding cavalry is different from feeding infantry, because cavalry not only needs food for people, but horses also need food, and they eat more than people.

As for Guan Ning's iron cavalry, it consumes more, because each of these cavalry has two horses.

Although the officers and soldiers also rob things, they can’t rob things blatantly and with great fanfare after all. If you want to feed 1000 people and [-] horses, you can’t solve it by robbing, and you have to rely on the local government.

So Cao Wenzhao fought against the rebellious army while organizing local governments to raise military pay and food.

To say that Cao Wenzhao and Guan Ning's iron cavalry are really good, they didn't fall behind after tossing like this, and they chased the rebellious army wherever they went.

However, since entering southern Shanxi, Cao Wenzhao and his cavalry have been a little overwhelmed.

Because most of the southern Shanxi area is mountainous, the formation of the cavalry cannot be deployed during the war. Especially after entering Zezhou, there are more and more mountains and forests, and the terrain is even worse. In many places, the cavalry cannot pass at all.

Originally wanted to rely on the cavalry and horses to quickly detour to intercept, but found that some roads were difficult for people to walk, let alone horses. Many cavalry fell off their horses for no reason. After careful inspection, they found that the legs of the horses were actually broken.

After entering Zezhou City for inventory, nearly a hundred war horses were actually lost.

What kind of cavalry are cavalry if they can't fight on horseback?
Cao Wenzhao was worrying about how to solve this problem, and something that gave him a headache came again.

The scouts who had been sent out reported that the speed of the rebel march had increased.

Upon hearing this, Cao Wenzhao scolded angrily: "Damn it, are these people made of iron? My three thousand elites are exhausted after chasing them here. Don't they need to rest?"

The scout hurriedly said: "Commander Qi, it's not that the rebels deliberately speeded up, they were beaten to escape!"

"Being beaten to escape? Fuck, apart from our army, the nearest guards are only the soldiers and horses from Weihui Mansion and Zhangde Mansion. They have never been ordered, so how dare they cross the border to Shanxi? Even if they can come, it depends on their ability How could you make the rebels escape?" Cao Wenzhao said angrily again.

The scout hurriedly said: "I don't know who did it. I chased halfway and saw corpses all over the place. I saw that they were all rebels in uniform. The people who fought with the rebels did not leave any traces."

Cao Wenzhao frowned and said, "Can you estimate how many rebels are dead?"

"There are at least 2000 people!" said the scout.

Cao Wenzhao asked suspiciously: "More than 2000 people died, and the opponent didn't leave any traces. How did you fight this battle? Could it be that the commander-in-chief sent a group of people here in advance? But the commander-in-chief has the most capable fighters in his hands. Who else in this army can have such powerful means?"

Cao Wenzhao pondered for a while, then called the soldiers around him and said: "You take my token and run to the commander-in-chief, report our situation here to the commander-in-chief, and then ask the commander-in-chief if there are any troops sent Pursue the rebels."

The commander-in-chief Cao Wenzhao was talking about was naturally Hong Chengchou, this commander-in-chief was not that commander-in-chief.He is just a general, but Hong Chengchou is the governor of the five provinces. For a general at the general level like Cao Wenzhao, Hong Chengchou's men don't know how many people he has.

"Yes!" The soldier took the token, turned and left.

Not long after the soldiers left, another scout came to report.

Cao Wenzhao ordered someone to call the scout in and asked, "Where are the rebels now?"

"We are attacking Lingchuan, but my subordinates found that there is still a group of rebels near the rebels. It seems that the posture is aimed at the rebels. The rebels attack Lingchuan as if they are forcing them." The scout replied.

"How many people are there in this team? Where are they?" Cao Wenzhao asked.

"There are more than 1000 people. They are stationed in the south of Lingchuan, blocking the direction of the rebels entering Qi County." The scout said hastily.

After hearing what the scouts said, Cao Wenzhao couldn't help being puzzled: "Is it really Wei Hui's men?"

The scout hurriedly said: "It's definitely not an official army. The villain sees that the troops are all wearing civilian clothes, and none of them are wearing armor."

"All in civilian clothes? What kind of weapon?" Cao Wenzhao asked hastily.

"It's all firecrackers." The scout said.

"It's all firecrackers?" Cao Wenzhao pondered deeply.

Cao Wenzhao couldn't be more clear about the quality of firecrackers in the Ming Dynasty. Even the three-eyed firecrackers equipped by his thousand Guanning cavalry often had various malfunctions, let alone other troops?

In addition, the three-eyed firecracker is not easy to manufacture, and inner guards like Wei Huiwei are not equipped at all.Moreover, the quality of ordinary firecrackers equipped by the inner guards is far inferior to that of the frontier army, so that soldiers would rather use bows and arrows than firecrackers.

The team mentioned by the scout just now must be the group of people mentioned by the previous scout.

Wearing civilian clothes, it must not be an official army, but if it is not an official army, how can there be so many firecrackers?Moreover, more than 2000 rebels could be wiped out with only firecrackers, and the rebels were forced to attack Lingchuan. How was this battle fought?Who are these people?

Cao Wenzhao frowned and thought for a while, then turned around and waved to the soldiers around him and said, "You guys go out and find out for me, what is there at the junction of Lingchuan, Hui County, Henan County, Qi County, and Lin County? power."

"Yes!" Several soldiers beside Cao Wenzhao hurriedly responded.

Generally speaking, it is best to ask businessmen about things like inquiring about local forces, because when doing business, businessmen mostly need to know what the situation is like in the place they are going to. They know which roads cannot be taken and which places they should not go.Otherwise, if you rush into the bandit's den, let alone doing business, I'm afraid you won't even save your life.

The common people rarely go to understand the situation in other counties.You must know that there are no communication tools such as TVs and telephones at this time. The transportation depends on walking, and the communication depends on shouting. As long as the common people are not idle, they rarely travel far. Some people have never left the house they live in. county.In other words, what they know about the situation in other counties is basically hearsay.

There are four counties under the rule of Zezhou, namely Gaoping County (where the state government is located, sometimes Gaoping County is also called Zezhou), Qinshui County, Yangcheng County and Lingchuan County.

Cao Wenzhao is now in Gaoping County, west of Lingchuan, less than a hundred miles away from Lingchuan.

Apart from Lingchuan, the nearest county in Zezhou to Henan is Gaoping.

If a businessman goes to Henan to do business, he must have some understanding of the situation in Lingchuan and the counties bordering Lingchuan.

Cao Wenzhao's soldiers went out for a long time, and finally came to Cao Wenzhao's tent with a few people dressed in common people's clothes.

"Commander Qi, the rebellious army attacked the city, and most of those merchants and wealthy households have already abandoned their homes and fled. It was very difficult for me to find these people." A leader of the guards said with his fists clasped.

After finishing speaking, the leader of the soldiers shouted to those people: "I still don't see my commander in chief!"

(End of this chapter)