Rule the Ming Dynasty Alone

Chapter 240 The third civil servant who was knighted for military merit

Thang Long City, Bao Guang Palace.

Li Sicheng dispatched his last personal guards yesterday to stop the army led by Wang Yue from going south. While he was walking back and forth waiting for the latest military information, he unexpectedly learned that the Ming army from the east had entered the city.

Kill!

Even though he was in the palace at the moment, he could still hear the sounds of killing coming from the North City Gate.

"How can this be?"

"You Xiangguo has opened the city gate to welcome the Ming army into the city!"

Li Sicheng's eyes were still on the northern front, but he found that the Ming army had already entered the city, and he was stunned.

Not to mention where this Ming army came from, the defenders of the royal city not only did not fight bloody battles for him, but instead opened the city gate to welcome the Ming army.

Things changed so quickly that he was not mentally prepared at all. The empire that he had always thought could compete with the Ming Dynasty collapsed at a speed visible to the naked eye.

No, this can't be true?

Li Sicheng did not expect that the empire he was so proud of was so fragile, and he hoped in his heart that it was all a dream, but the closer and closer shouts of killing let him know that the Ming army had already reached the palace.

The Li Dynasty, which only occupied the eastern front of the Indochina Peninsula, was not as powerful as he had imagined, and the Ming Dynasty, which owned two capitals and thirteen provinces, was not as weak as he had imagined. This time it was just his arrogance.

When Li Sicheng learned that You Xiangguo had betrayed him, he immediately hated Ding Rui and gritted his teeth: "Damn it! Ding Rui, I will definitely cut you into pieces!"

"Your Majesty, the palace can no longer be defended. What should we do now?" The commander who reported the report had his helmet running away and looked very anxious.

Li Sicheng never expected that his royal city would be so vulnerable, and he suddenly fell to the ground: "It's over, it's really over!"

The most terrifying thing about the Ming Dynasty this time was not the military attack, but the political polarization, which was intended to fundamentally subvert the Li clan's Annan legal status.

Boom!

After rounds of collisions, the palace door was finally knocked open.

kill!

The Ming Dynasty's army suddenly rushed into the palace with swords like tigers descending from the mountain.

"Capture King Annan and get a big reward!"

Wang Shouren, who had just turned seventeen, took over the leadership of the vanguard. The childishness on his face slowly disappeared, and he shouted like a young general.

The Ming army was not satisfied with its pay, but was invincible if it was fully paid.

The Southern Jiangxi Army has been highly criticized since its establishment, and even faced difficulties from the governor of Jiangxi because of excessive military pay. However, their strength and value were proven in the encirclement and suppression of the southern Jiangxi bandits.

This time he was transferred to Lianzhou, Guangdong by the imperial court to join the Guangdong soldiers in the expedition against Annan. Wang Hua, the governor of southern Jiangxi, served as the commander of the Eastern Front Army. It can be said that it was unstoppable along the way.

Especially in this conquest, the Gannan Army acted as the absolute main force, and they took most of the heads. On the other hand, the Guangdong Army only served as a auxiliary.

"kill!"

The officers and soldiers of the southern Jiangxi army had already tasted the sweetness of their military exploits, and they rushed into the palace and started killing immediately.

Nowadays, military merit is the most important thing in the imperial court. Whether it is for personal career or to earn more bounties, they have enough reasons to let Fenyong kill the enemy.

There is no longer much defense here, and now that the palace's defense is weak, they naturally cherish this opportunity to finally win military glory.

puff!

When Wang Shouren saw that one of his attendants wanted to set fire to him, he immediately drove his horse forward and beheaded him. His young face was spattered with blood.

After more than half a year of military life, he has already become a qualified soldier. If we want to create a peaceful and prosperous age for China, we cannot do without soldiers to defend the territory, and we need soldiers to fight for the country.

Now Annan actually ignored the authority of the Ming Dynasty. Since he was killing the people on the southwest border of the Ming Dynasty, he naturally wanted to use military force to promote the strength of the Ming Dynasty.

Wang Shouren didn't bother to wipe the blood off his face, but he didn't see any trace of Annan King Li Sicheng, so he led his people to occupy the palace's treasure house.

Faced with the last desperate resistance, the Ming army did not need to pay attention to the regulations not to ride horses in the palace, but another massacre broke out here.

"We surrender!"

The remaining guards of the palace dropped their weapons and surrendered to this invincible Ming army.

Wang Shouren quickly took control of the palace, but many times things would not go smoothly, but some unsatisfactory things would inevitably happen.

"Young General, King Annan has escaped!" A thousand households had already searched the entire palace, but they came back helplessly to report.

Wang Shouren couldn't help but frown, but he knew that this was not a good result.

This time, the Ming Dynasty wanted to overthrow Annan's regime and establish a new royal family that was close to the Ming Dynasty. But if Li Sicheng escapes, there is no guarantee that he will come back one day, which will affect the Ming Dynasty's layout of Annan.

In the west of the city, a disguised team was hurriedly leaving the city.

Li Sicheng was sitting on a carriage. When he learned that the city had been destroyed, he had already forgotten his vow to live and die with Thang Long City and wanted to lead his troops to escape to save his life.

Now that Tokyo has been occupied by the Ming army, he decided to flee to Xijing Hue City.

As long as he can successfully escape to Xijing, he can gather all his men in the name of the Emperor of Li Dynasty and use his remaining strength to deal with the Ming army.

Although the Ming army is very powerful, but now it has reached the hinterland of Annan, its supplies will be affected to some extent, but it is not conducive to long-term war.

On the other hand, he is the orthodox dynasty of Annan. As long as he makes good use of the public opinion offensive, he can force the Ming army away step by step like his ancestors did.

At that time, at worst, they will pretend to be soft to the Ming Dynasty, and this land will definitely be continued to be ruled by the Li family.

Call!

When the coachman saw someone blocking the way in front of him, he immediately tightened the rope and stopped the carriage steadily.

"Your Majesty, where are you going?" Right Prime Minister Ding Rui had already appeared here, but he stopped Li Sicheng's path and asked with a smile.

Li Sicheng knew that You Xiangguo had betrayed him, and now he still wanted to block his way. He immediately grabbed the car curtain angrily and walked out and asked: "Ding Rui, are you really planning to rebel?"

Although he had known that these aristocratic families had different intentions, he never expected that they would be instigated by the Ming Dynasty so easily, and he felt very resentful at this moment.

If we had known this earlier, we should not have sought expansion eastward in these years, but would have wanted to get rid of all the Ruan, Zheng, Ding and other aristocratic families.

"Your Majesty, I just want you to stay so that I can explain the whole story to the Ming Emperor!" Although Ding Rui is over fifty, he is still very strong and has an amiable smile on his face.

Li Sicheng knew that the matter could not be explained clearly, or that the Emperor of Ming Dynasty would never listen to his sophistry, and that staying would only lead to death. Li Sicheng immediately ordered angrily: "Rebel! Come and kill this thief!"

Because the escape was too hasty, he only took more than twenty royal guards with him this time, but not even the concubines and princesses. It's just that these twenty-odd palace guards seemed very loyal, even if they wanted to kill dozens of thieves blocking the way in front of them.

"Haha... If that's the case, then don't blame me for not being friendly!" Ding Rui waved his hand lightly when he saw that Li Sicheng couldn't see the situation clearly.

As a well-known family in Annan, although Le Li, who came from a rough background, took the lead, his own heritage cannot be underestimated, and he naturally has a large number of followers.

call out! call out! call out!

Countless archers had appeared on the roofs on both sides at some point. They had already nocked their arrows, and with Ding Rui's gesture, they moved away easily.

A large number of arrows were shot from the roof, killing more than 20 palace guards indiscriminately.

puff! puff! puff!

The palace guards on the street had no shelter and had no place to hide in the face of the arrows shot down. However, they all fell to the ground after being hit by arrows. Many of the guards were shot directly into hedgehogs.

Li Sicheng discovered that there were a large number of ambushes on the roofs on both sides, and he shrank back into the car very cleverly, but he knew that this time it was probably more serious than bad.

drive!

After realizing the danger, the groom immediately tried to drive out of the encirclement.

puff!

But the carriage had just walked two meters when an arrow shot through his neck without any bias. The whole person suddenly fell to the other side, and the carriage lost control.

puff! puff! puff!

A group of guards rushed out from behind Ding Rui. Facing the palace guards who were already in chaos, they immediately harvested the lives of these guards.

Li Sicheng's carriage was stopped directly. Li Sicheng, who was hiding in the car, had nowhere to escape and was quickly taken out by Ding Rui's son.

"Let me go! Let me go!"

Li Sicheng was no longer the aloof King Annan, but became a prisoner in the blink of an eye. He struggled continuously and then begged for mercy from Ding Rui: "Ding Xiangguo, as long as you let me go, I can...make you king. How about making the southern region your fiefdom?”

"Your conditions are really tempting!" Ding Rui stepped forward and said with a slight smile.

Li Sicheng immediately saw the hope of a comeback, and hurriedly said: "You have no words to say, then..."

puff!

Ding Rui stepped forward and stabbed Li Sicheng's body with a knife.

Li Sicheng held his wound and took two steps back, with a look of disbelief on his face: "You...why are you like this? I...I can make you king!"

"Compared with your little deceptive tricks, I believe more in the title of King of North Vietnam promised to me by Ming Ting. You'd better go to hell!" Ding Rui's lips raised slightly, looking a little proud.

Li Sicheng's body fell heavily to the ground, but he knew that his Li Dynasty was over. He really shouldn't provoke the terrifying dynasty next door for Li Guangdu.

It's just that it's too late, and the country his grandfather built will be destroyed in his hands.

Luck finally came to the Ming Dynasty. Not only was Li Sicheng killed, but also the prince of the Li Dynasty, Li Chu, was captured. However, he took control of the orthodox inheritance of the Li Dynasty in one fell swoop.

The east-route army led by Wang Hua successfully took over Shenglong City, and also passed the news here to Wang Yue, who was heading here.

Wang Yue's northern army had just defeated the main force led by Li Renxiao. When he learned that the eastern army had captured Thang Long City and killed Li Sicheng, King of Annam, his morale immediately increased.

Since the main force of the Le Dynasty was defeated and the three armies gathered in Thang Long City, the small forces throughout Annam chose to surrender.

The news of capturing Thang Long City and beheading King Le Cheng of Annam spread back to the country. This great victory in the first year of Hongzhi brought joy to the whole country.

When Junqing arrived at the palace, Zhu Youtang was also very excited and surprised.

He had thought that it was the Shield Battalion that made the first contribution, and he had thought that Wang Yue led his troops to capture Thang Long City, but he never thought that it was the East Route Army led by Wang Hua that took the lead in seizing the city and killing Annan King Li Sicheng.

Now getting rid of the Li dynasty will undoubtedly completely open the window for Ming Dynasty to enter the Indochina Peninsula, and Ming Dynasty will take another step towards becoming the world's textile center.

In the next half month, the regime of the Le Dynasty changed.

After all, the Li Dynasty was an agricultural society. Although years of conquests allowed the Li Dynasty to expand its territory, this was based on the people bearing heavier taxes.

Now that the Ming Dynasty's army captured Li Dynasty, it did not arouse much resistance in the country. On the contrary, many people hoped that the new regime could imitate the Ming Dynasty's light tax policy.

Although there are inevitably still remnants of the Le Dynasty in various places, many local governments have chosen to sever ties with the Le Dynasty, including the city of Hue that chose to submit to the new regime.

In the new regime, Ding Rui will be the king of North Vietnam, but Zheng Gonglu will be the general of North Vietnam, and the Ming Dynasty will build a dock and a new city at the estuary.

The territory in northern Annam has been redefined. The lost territory previously occupied by the Le Dynasty was assigned to the Southern Kingdom of Laos, and the new boundary between the two countries was redefined.

A month later, the capital offered prisoners.

A long line of prison cars escorted the royal family and generals of the Li Dynasty into the capital. Behind them were boxes of seized gold and silver jewelry. This time, King Annan's treasure house belonged to the Ming Dynasty.

"This time we really show off the prestige of our Ming Dynasty!"

"Isn't that right? We should have dealt with Annan's gang of thieves a long time ago!"

"If Liu Daxia's gang of treacherous ministers hadn't stopped them, how could they have become so arrogant?"

"Speaking of which, the Annan files haven't been found yet. Liu Daxia really deserves to be executed prematurely!"

When the people in the capital saw the team entering the city, seeing the Li royal family reduced to prisoners and carts of gold, silver and jewels, they suddenly waved their fists with pride and pride.

As for Liu Daxia's group of civil servants who once intended to protect Annan, thinking about the humiliation suffered by the people on the southwest border in recent years, they just wanted to get rid of them quickly.

Zhu Youtang left the matter to the Ministry of Rites, and was not enthusiastic about this formality of prisoner sacrifice. He seemed to be more pragmatic in dealing with the Li Dynasty prince and rewards based on merit.

The crown prince of the Li Dynasty, Li Chu, escaped death and will be imprisoned in the prison of the Ministry of Punishment. The reason why he chose to keep the prince of the Li Dynasty alive was more out of a political need.

This move would not only leave the Annan Li clan without an undisputed legal heir, but also serve as a trump card to threaten Ding Rui and Zheng Gongdao, thus helping to protect Ming Dynasty's interests in Annan.

It is worth mentioning that Wang Hua, who was invited by hundreds of civil and military officials and had the most merit, was named Xinjian Bo, becoming the third civil servant in the Ming Dynasty to be knighted for military merit.

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