Chapter 186 Picking Peaches

During this period of time, Li Xianfeng, the new governor of Henan Province of Kaifeng Prefecture, can be said to be like sitting on pins and needles. Such a thief army led by Xiao Tianjian has been swimming around in the middle of eastern Henan for more than a month, repeatedly breaking through the county, which is as uncontrollable as a flood and beast, and Kaifeng Mansion has few troops at present. Liu Zeqing's troops in the east were also ordered to leave the Fengfu. Chen Yongfu, the deputy general of Kaifeng, also led his troops to Luoyang to assist in the defense, so that there were few useful soldiers in Kaifengfu. Although there were still more than 3,000 soldiers guarding the city, it was not enough to defend the city. How could he have the strength to stop the one wandering around Kaifeng? The army of thieves!

For this reason, Li Xianfeng sent people to Nanyang many times and asked Xiong Wencan to ask Xiong Wencan to quickly order Zuo Liangyu to lead his troops to destroy the Xingtian thief army on the road. As a result, Zuo Liangyuyang violated the yin and followed Xing Tianjun's buttocks around Henan. In the name of collecting food and salaries, he refused to do his best to pursue him. The attacking bandit army makes the Xingtian Thief Army more and more powerful.

Finally, until the beginning of April, Li Xianfeng learned that Qi County had been broken by the thief army. This time, the thief army stopped and stopped running east and west. If he was left, Li Xianfeng guessed whether Kaifeng Mansion was the next target of the thief army, so he panicked and ordered Chen Yongfu, who was still in Luoyang, to hurry up. He led the troops back to Kaifeng to strengthen the garrison of Kaifeng Prefecture. In addition, he personally sent people directly to Zuo Liangyu's army and went to Nanyang Prefecture to find Xiong Wencan, and urged Zuo Liangyu's speed army to go to Qi County to fight a decisive battle with the thief army to ensure the safety of Kaifeng Prefecture.

Because of the pressure of many factors, Zuo Liangyu finally chose to gather parts to catch up with Qi County and fight with Xiao Tianjian. However, the result of the decisive battle disappointed all the officials. When he learned the news that Zuo Liangyu lost and almost the whole army was destroyed, the whole Central Plains was shocked again.

When Xiao Tianjian led his troops to Kaifeng Mansion, Liu Zeqing learned the news early in Yanshi that he no longer dared to approach Luoyang. Instead, he put out the banner of returning to Kaifeng and immediately turned around and ran in the direction of Kaifeng. Of course, this man did not dare to lead his troops to block the Xing Tianjun army, but simply found an excuse to leave Yuxi. It's just a place of right and wrong.

In mid-April, Xiao Tianjian led his troops to pass outside Kaifeng City. Under the order of Xiao Tianjian, the soldiers of each battalion passed under the city of Kaifeng in a parade. Under the eyelids of the officers and officials in Kaifeng City, they were scared to the people in Kaifeng. He was afraid that Xing Tianjun would suddenly stop and launch an attack on Kaifeng Mansion.

But who can know that now Xiao Tianjian's army is actually a foreign strong and middle-aged. At this time, the ammunition and grain are basically run out, and there is not enough strength to launch an offensive against Kaifeng Mansion.

This trip, Xiao Tianjian led his troops back to western Henan. It can be said that he was carrying out an armed parade. The whole army swaggered back to the city of Ruzhou through Zhongmou, Zhengzhou, Xinmi and Dengfeng, and the defenders along the way could be said to have no one when they saw the Xingtian Army of such a scale. Exceptionally, he chose to give up resistance and opened the gate and surrendered to Xing Tianjun. Only Zhengzhou refused to surrender because there were still thousands of troops stationed in the city. Xiao Tianjian did not intend to use troops in Zhengzhou at present. Therefore, after capturing Zhongmou, he casually removed the city wall of Zhongmu County and returned to Ruzhou outside Zhengzhou.

At this time, an army trained by the Xingtian Army, which is trained in a modern military training method, has demonstrated its strong and unparalleled combat effectiveness. In addition, the generals of the army know very well why they are in the Xingtian Army, which makes them have The clear goal is to dare to fight hard, and the current army of the Ming Dynasty has been left far behind by them. Therefore, although the Ming army seems to be strong, it has completely become a paper tiger. In front of the army of the Xing Tianjun, it can be said that it is basically vulnerable. After more than two months of anti-encirclement and suppressing war, several officers and armies have been defeated. In the hands of Xing Tianjun, Huang Degong's department and Zuo Liangyu's department were basically wiped out by Xing Tianjun. Sun Yingyuan's department suffered great losses. Even He Renlong, Zu Dabi and Li Guoqi in Shaanxi also suffered great losses. Only Liu Zeqing did not fight with Xing Tianjun because he always avoided the war. Face-on confrontation, so he was able to preserve his strength, but Liu Zeqing was afraid of fighting and fled back to the Kaifeng Mansion, so that by the end of April, there was no official army in Henan who could fight against the Xing Tianjun.

After learning the news that Xiao Tianjian led his troops to return to Ruzhou, Sun Yingyuan, who led his troops hurriedly retreated to the Runing Mansion without waiting for Xiong Wencan to give orders. Zhang Renxue, the general of Henan, learned that most of the Xing Tianjun army had returned to Yuxi in Baofeng, and did not hesitate to lead his troops to withdraw from Lushan, which had just been recovered by him. In the county, he ran to Kaifeng Mansion without looking back.

So far, the encirclement and suppression of the Xing Tianjun organized by Xiong Wencan in the eleven years of Chongzhen basically ended in the fiasco of the officers and soldiers. At this time, the reputation of Xing Tianjun can also be said to be powerful. A large number of rebels in the area of Henan began to move closer to the Xing Tianjun and chose to belong to Xiao Tianjian's wing. Next, there are as many as five or six Rebels with more than 5,000 people alone. Even the Gezuo Fifth Battalion, which is active in the west of Anhui, after learning the news of the victory of the Central Plains Battle of the Xingtian Army, also sent people to Ruzhou City to contact Xiao Tianjian and express their willingness to unite with Xing Tianjun to fight against the court. To some extent Shang also showed their attitude and expressed their willingness to accept Xiao Tianjian's command to a certain extent.

At this time, Luoyang City has basically become a ripe peach on the big tree of Xing Tianjun and can finally be picked.

After May, Xiao Tianjian once again made certain adjustments to his soldiers and horses under his command in Ruzhou City. Through the collection of the elites and soldiers who surrendered, as well as the captured weapons and horses, he ordered the three commen divisions of Luo Li, Li Shuanzhu and Liu Bao to expand again. Each division was expanded to five barracks, one artillery battalion, and one Dissatisfied with the cavalry battalion, a battalion, and a strengthened engineering team, the main combat force of each combat division reaches about 10,000, so that it forms a more powerful independent combat group. The main generals of these divisions are also officially renamed Dutong, each with two deputy commanders. The original officers are based on this period of Each performance has its own promotion, and Zhao Erlu also became the deputy capital as he wished.

At the same time, he ordered to expand a guard division under his direct jurisdiction based on Liu Yaoben's teaching camp. He temporarily led the commander of the guard division. Liu Yaoben, Situ Liang and Zhao Tietou temporarily led the deputy general and set up an additional deputy capital. Usually, Liu Yaoben was the first deputy commander in military affairs and presided over the daily affairs of the guard division. Zhao Tietou and Situ Liang cooperated.

In this way, coupled with Yan Chongxi's military strength in Jinnan, Xing Tianjun has expanded to a large-scale military group with a regular army of nearly 50,000, and the reserve battalion is close to 50,000. It has the military strength to compete with the Ming Dynasty.

So far, the whole area of western Henan, including many prefectures and counties in the east of Henan, have become the control of the Xingtian Army, while the court's effective rule over Henan is only the southern part of Henan and the northern part of Henan. In addition, Kaifeng, Luoyang and Guide have already reached the control of Henan. On the verge of collapse.

On May 15, after completing the replenishment of materials, Xiao Tianjian finally took Luo Rucai to gather the troops of the Guards Division and a division under the jurisdiction of Li Shuanzhu, as well as some soldiers and horses under the jurisdiction of Luo Li, as well as a large number of new reserve battalions, with a total strength of 30,000, and began to gather around Luoyang. Zone.

On May 17, the two war camps under the jurisdiction of Li Shuanzhu quickly conquered the Yan Division east of Luoyang City in two days, completely wasolating Luoyang City, and finally completed the general encirclement of Luoyang City.

By this time, the officials and even the officers and soldiers in Luoyang City have already panicked. Due to the long-term military action of the Xing Tianjun around Luoyang City, the government of Luoyang can no longer extract food from the surrounding people as before, plus the consumption of officers and soldiers inside and outside the city and the people in the city. Frequent consumption has led to a large-scale grain shortage in Luoyang City. At present, in Luoyang City, the price of just a bucket of rice has risen to a few taels of silver and a bucket. Even so, it is priceless, and there is no place to buy it. What's more annoying is that in fact, there is not really no grain in Luoyang City. There is no grain. It is the treasury of Henan Province and ordinary merchants and ordinary people, but in Luoyang City, there are still some people who have a lot of grain. Among them, many rich families have a lot of grain, and the most abundant grain is the Fuwang in Luoyang City. Only in the granary of Fuwang's family, all kinds of aging grain are hoarded with more than 100,000 stones. There were so many, but Fuwang, the old bastard, not only refused to open the warehouse to take out food as usual, but also took advantage of this time to make a fortune and hoard the old grain in the granary in the city. It was sold at a high price, almost squeezing out the property of the people in the city.

Because of the lack of food, the officers and soldiers inside and outside the city are extremely corrupted by military discipline. In order to get food, the military generals indulged their officers and soldiers to the people inside and outside the city, and also took away the last bit of food left in the hands of the people to meet their needs, so that Luoyang City was almost Every day, a large number of people are starved to death, and even a large number of people are eating each other in the city. On the black market, there are people selling human flesh in private, and some gangsters kill people at night to get food.

Nowadays, Meng Hui, the new governor of Henan, no longer wants to eliminate Xing Tianjun and drive Xing Tianjun out of the jurisdiction of Henan Prefecture. Since Xing Tianjun attacked Ruzhou last year, he expected that Xing Tianjun would come to fight Luoyang City sooner or later. Originally, he still expected Xiong Wencan's ability to turn the tide and mobilized the officers and soldiers. Solve the trouble of Xing Tianjun, but now the officers and soldiers have been defeated under the front of Xing Tianjun. Even if Xiong Wencan has the ability, he can't rescue Luoyang City. It is difficult for a skillful woman to cook without rice. Xiong Wencan has not many officers and soldiers to call.