Mantra

Chapter 223
Through Xian Hongye's interpretation of the Yaowang Handbook, I quickly learned the truth of the incident and Zhao Gong's life experience.

On a rainy and snowy night in the 17th year of Chongzhen in the Ming Dynasty, "Zhao Gong", the youngest of the three Zhao brothers, bid farewell to his elder brother, carried a kitchen knife on his back, and took the official seal of the court, and left the city of BJ, which was about to be chaotic, and went south to the Nanming court. and go.

Different from his elder brother and second brother, Zhao Gong chose the most thorny and bumpy path in life, because at that time the north was completely occupied by Li Chuang, the news was not clear, and the Manchu Qing was staring at him outside. Zhao Gongquan traveled on his two legs, sometimes avoiding intruders, sometimes avoiding Qing soldiers. In troubled times, he suffered all kinds of hardships, and he didn't know if he could make it to Nanjing alive.

But even so, Zhao Gong, who wanted to serve the imperial court, went south without hesitation. Relying on his superb kitchen knife skills and unpredictable spell-eating skills, he blazed a trail of blood and finally arrived at the Under the city of Nanjing.

But at this time, he wanted to cry but had no tears.

It turned out that due to complex reasons such as lack of news and obstacles to military disasters, when Zhao Gong rushed to Nanjing City, it was more than a year later, and Nanjing City at this time was no longer the sacred "imperial capital" in his mind. "Are.

During the year when Zhao Gong was advancing hard, the pattern of the world changed again. Li Zicheng defeated Shanhaiguan and retreated to Guanzhong. The Manchu Qing took the opportunity to go south and captured Nanjing. Banners, the army of King Qin disappeared, and the prosperity of the past was also replaced by the Eight Banners of the Qing Dynasty and the bones of the dead.

It was really a big hit.

Seeing that the emperor was captured and the imperial city fell again, Zhao Gong, who was loyal to the Ming court, was heartbroken. He lost his mind and wandered several times, almost sinking.

But Zhao Gong is different from ordinary cooks, because of his background in the Confucius Temple of Lu Cai and the special court background of the Zhao family, this young man values ​​"the principles of ethics, loyalty and righteousness" more than anything else. He always believes that the reason why the Zhao family has been able to have more than a hundred years of glory and food and clothing since the ancestor Zhao killed the chicken is all due to the country's favor and reward. Now that the country is in trouble, he can't just sit idly by.

So, with firm confidence and purpose, Zhao Gong re-emerged from the decadence and resolutely embarked on the life path of "anti-Qing and restoring Ming".

During the continuous war in the late Ming Dynasty, Zhao Gong ran from east to west, defected to Wu Risheng, He Tengjiao and other Ming court righteous men, important ministers, shrouded in horse leather, and fought north and south.Finally, he settled down with Li Dingguo, a famous anti-Qing general.

At that time, Li Dingguo was a veteran general of the Southern Ming Dynasty. He firmly controlled the Yunnan-Guizhou area and had a solid rear base. The most important thing was that Li Dingguo admired Zhao Gong's "loyal man" very much, and specially recommended him to practice under Sun Kewang. Gradually grew up in the war, and gradually honed from a royal cook of the palace to a general who can lead troops to fight and be able to act alone.

At that time, Zhao Gong had his own private soldiers. Although his core strength was only more than 100 people, he was respected by the enemy because he dared to fight tough battles and had a tough style. The two fought all the way, and successively made military exploits in Guangxi, Hunan and other places.

Because Zhao Gong was born as a cook, the army he led was called "Pao Zhongying", and all the soldiers under him were called "Pao Bing".

These soldiers are as strong as their own leaders. They play the mainstay role in the army. They often rush there when they encounter difficulties. To describe them in a more vivid way, these people are like the fire brigade of the Southern Ming Dynasty, acting on the move. role.

Zhao Gong at this time, after seven or eight years of hard work, finally had the stage and foundation to display his ambitions.

However, as the Battle of King Qin became more protracted, Zhao Gong became more and more disappointed with the court's "current affairs" and his own future.

It turned out that the government of the Ming Dynasty was very chaotic at this time, and Emperor Yongli did not have much real power. In the court, loyal and virtuous officials like Li Dingguo and Bai Wenxuan could not be reused. He could only watch as Daming's situation went from bad to worse, and the haze of internal strife rolled in.

At the right time, Zhao Gong was the general under the command of the powerful minister Sun Kewang. He knew that this person was up to no good, and Zhao Gong was grateful for Li Dingguo's kindness, and secondly, he didn't want to dance with a mediocre person who was domineering, short-sighted, and disregarded the overall situation. , so in the few years after having a team, Zhao Gong has been looking for an opportunity to transfer out and get out of Sun Kewang's jurisdiction.

He did this because firstly, he didn't want to join forces with traitors, and secondly, he didn't want to be buried with his brothers when Sun Kewang was destroyed.

With such thoughts in mind, Zhao Gong waited for an opportunity, and finally found the opportunity to be transferred from the tiger's den and go out to avoid disaster.

At that time, the Miao man chieftain in northwest Guizhou launched a rebellion, and Guizhou was Sun Kewang's "logistics base". Facing the fire in his own backyard, Sun Kewang couldn't sit idly by. After careful consideration, he had to send troops back to the army for rescue.

Seeing the opportunity, Zhao Gong took the initiative to invite Ying, and then took the "Paozhong Camp" and a thousand recruits to the northwest of Guizhou overnight to "put down the rebellion".

Zhao Gong broke away from Sun Kewang's control. On the one hand, he revised the book Li Dingguo, telling Sun Kewang that he had overstepped his power and snooped on the throne.

Years of combat experience let him know that in troubled times, land and food are the most important. As long as he has land, even if he can't hope to turn against his grandson, he can also use the northwest of Guizhou as the foundation and imitate Sichuan's "Kuidong Thirteen Families" to recuperate. , the driver figure changed.

For the sake of the "great cause" in the future, Zhao Gong understood that the chieftain's rebellion must be put down and his own territory must be established.

With the belief of winning, Zhao Gong led his troops out of Guiyang overnight, crossed Qianxi, Jinsha, Renhuai, and then detoured ZY, Xishui, and finally met the rebellious chieftain army near the ridge of Furongchuan in Dalou Mountain meet.

When the two armies met, Zhao Gong was startled when he saw the Tusi army flags all over the mountains and plains.

The scale of the Miaoman chieftain's rebellion far exceeded Zhao Gong's estimate. According to Zhao Gong's estimation, the coalition forces of the chieftains in these places were at least 1, and there were muskets aided by the Qing soldiers. The ordnance is more than ten times that of Zhao Gong's army.

At this time, in Zhao Gong's hands, except for the cavalry of the "Paozhong" battalion, there were only more than 1000 newly recruited skirmishers, which had no great combat effectiveness. .

But even so, Zhao Gong still did not retreat, and he had no way to retreat.

Zhao Gong must be a battle-tested veteran. After the initial shock, he quickly calmed down and analyzed the situation between the enemy and ourselves.

Zhao Gong soon discovered that although the chieftains had many soldiers and horses, their formations were scattered and their banners were not neatly arranged. Obviously, they were not ready for a big battle.Zhao Gong's keen sense of war immediately made him understand that the enemy must be crushed before the enemy's formation is completed, otherwise, when the chieftain's soldiers and horses are lined up on the mountain ridge, there will only be a dead end.

In an instant, Zhao Gong didn't have time to recuperate, he immediately got on his horse and raised his saber, and drove the army away, using heart-pounding tactics, and went straight to the center of the rebel camp.

A gamble of life and death has begun!

(End of this chapter)