stubborn thief

Chapter 88 Mule Camp

between seven days.

Jinming Station in Yan'an, Garden Station in Ansai, and Gangu Station in Yanchuan were all attacked.

The ten, twenty, and thirty mile shops in Fucheng and the three counties were all burnt down with a single fire.

The fire spread across the three counties, until it burned into Yanchuan, destroying Wen'an Station and all the express shops to the north.

Yanchuan is not safe.

It was only because of a heavy rain that the people returned to farming, showing a short-lived peace.

Although the land here is still bare, the lives of the suffering people who work in the fields have a lot to offer.

In northern Shaanxi, the common people who are willing to shave food in the fields are not afraid of hard work.

Liu Chengzong's team became huge during the plunder, and nearly [-] good seedlings were recruited.

These people include postmen who can ride horses and shoot arrows, and shop soldiers who are used to running ten miles in three quarters of an hour.

Moreover, more than 300 horses and more than 600 donkeys and mules were obtained.

He didn't disturb Yanchuan's tranquility, and even did a lot of good things.

In several villages in the southern and northern plateaus, the food from Wen'an Yi was used to keep the people alive.

In Jingjiagou, fire kilns and other places, help the people resist taxes, surround and subdue yamen on the spot.

He also spent two days in Wohu Mountain, south of the county seat, digging a canal for the local people.

He is not a great man, and he does these things for two purposes.

First, it is to summarize and improve one's own thinking.

In arid areas and non-arid areas... Liu Chengzong crossed out the non-arid areas in his notebook and wrote the rainfall and arid areas.

To use a different strategy.

In arid areas, the grassroots forces of the court can be destroyed by means of force confrontation, recruitment of scattered grains, destruction of county towns, looting of large households, and raiding of post shops.

In rainy and dry regions, such an approach does not work.

As long as the people see a glimmer of hope, most people will not put their heads on their waists to rebel, and even large loan sharks can gain the support of the people.

Liu Chengzong wrote such words in his notes and further thought about the solution.

Another memory told him that everything should be viewed in two.

In such a situation, it is necessary to do good deeds for the people, such as bulk grain, fetching water, taking the opportunity to resist taxes, repairing canals, and even if it is a thief, it must appear in the eyes of people as a righteous thief.

In this way, as long as they show slightly higher morality than normal people, they can also achieve the effect of destroying the power of the government at the grassroots level and gaining popular support.

Because even if the people escaped the drought, they could not escape the tax collectors and yamen after the drought.

Even if he is lucky enough to avoid all these, where he is, the official army will come sooner or later.

Drought, big households, government and army.

This set of combo moves is extremely powerful, and once beat Liu Juren of Heilongshan to his knees.

Liu Chengzong did not believe that someone could completely stop him.

As long as you can't catch one move, you are either a dead ghost or a rebel.

The second purpose of doing good is much simpler.

He would exchange the horses of the post for the donkeys and mules of the rich peasants.

The horses are so edible that Liu Chengzong could not bear the consumption of rations brought by more than 300 horses.

A soldier can be raised as a son. If he eats one and a half catties every day, no one complains. If he eats two catties, he will be happy.

Horses have to be offered by ancestors, five catties a day is half full, and eight catties are willing to take you to run.

The mule is much more comfortable, eat two pounds of food, and do whatever it wants.

One horse for two mules is very cost-effective for Liu Chengzong.

Soon, the entire team achieved two mules, and the lion battalion became a mule battalion.

Of course, there were still more than 80 horses left. Except for more than [-] officers, the rest of the horses were allocated to postmen who were good at riding horses, and a team of pond cavalry was formed to cover the battlefield.

On the day when the mule camp was completely dressed up, Liu Chengzong assembled the commanders of Geshi and asked each of them to pick up a short stick and tie it around their waists.

The first order of the mule battalion, except for special orders and the wounded and sick, is not allowed to ride pack animals.

Get ready for a short stick if you get caught.

In general, Liu Chengzong lived comfortably in the mountains east of Yanchuan until July.

Anyway, since I had enough food, I would take people on a march in the mountains every day.

Except for the marching army, there is no training such as army formation conversion.

Liu Chengzong just tried his best to imitate his elder brother's example, and reiterated to his subordinates some precautions that his elder brother had taught him in the past.

Because in the field of military training, Liu Chengzong will also arrange people, but he is not familiar with real military training.

Cao Yao knew how to practice, but this man was too lazy to practice. He felt that training the peasant army was a thankless effort. Sooner or later, these people would die, and if they survived a few battles, they would be familiar with the war.

When the time comes, it will not be too late to teach again, so as not to waste your feelings, and work hard to teach people well.

This has led to a gap in the cognition of the mule camp on military issues.

The purpose of Liu Chengzu's words and deeds is to teach Liu Chengzong the mistakes that ordinary people commonly make.

Liu Chengzong also studied very well.

But Liu Chengzong doesn't know the mistakes that most people don't make.

He was only busy recording the terrain of mountains and rivers, so that he could fight guerrillas in the future.

By the way, I also took the old brothers in the team who have never been out of their hometown Shili to see the historical sites, ancient stone carvings, Helian Bobo's Baijima Temple and the cemetery.

They walked along the Qingjian River to the southeast until they reached the Snake Curve and saw the rolling waves of the Yellow River.

Further north is Yanshui Pass.

There was a ferry in the Qin Dynasty. From there, the entire team could cross the Yellow River and enter Shanxi in just half a day.

Under the existing regulations of the imperial court, the officials and troops in Shaanxi could only seek out thieves from Shaanxi, and if they fled to Shanxi, they had to be suppressed by Shanxi.

These ferries along the Yellow River can be used as bridges for their back and forth flow.

But the problem facing Liu Chengzong now is that the reason why this place is called Yanshui Pass is because the imperial court set up a pass here.

A commander-in-chief is stationed.

Liu Chengzong did not dare to lead the team to approach, but only brought a few people to watch from a distance on the mountain.

This situation is much better than most places in northern Shaanxi. Perhaps because of the convenience of transportation, not only are there sufficient troops, but judging from the smoke, the soldiers can eat twice a day on time.

Occupy the pass, have enough troops, and have enough to eat.

Such officers are very capable.

Liu Chengzong didn't want to provoke them, but he didn't expect that tigers are harmless, and people are harmful to tigers' hearts.

On the evening of July [-], the mule camp was resting in the mountains, and the Tangqi, who was on post outside, quickly reported the news by retreating and waving the flag.

Some officers and cavalrymen turned from the official road to Yanshui Pass, and they seemed to be reporting military information. So far, the movements of the officers and troops have not been found.

Immediately after the second news from Tangqi came back, a villager who had been helped in Jingjiagou, Yanchuan County risked his life to report that a troop was stationed in the west of the county.

This force, led by a guerrilla general named Lu, was spreading his subordinates in four villages to beg for food.

It is said that this official army came once ten days ago. Because the post station and the express shop were all destroyed, they thought that Yanchuan had been captured, so they retreated.

This time, they brought more food and grass, but they didn't have many mules, so they still had to rely on Yanchuan County for supplies.

The county government has been troubled by monk Wang for a year, and there is no support for their village, so they can only beat the people's ideas.

The people came to report the letter, which greatly pleased Liu Chengzong.

In my heart, I cried out that the food was not scattered and the water was not in vain.

But he didn't expect the people's next sentence, which made him almost faint: "Tiger general, go and annihilate them, and if you rob the village, there will be nothing left."

The world is so magical.

I'm a thief, the biggest thief in Yan'an. It is reasonable for you to invite me to kill people and set fire to them.

Can you let me exterminate the official army?

It's obvious that I'm the one who's going to be killed, but what's the matter?

Cao Yao patted Liu Chengzong and said, "Don't listen to his nonsense, we should run away."

"But brother Cao, this official army is here to find us. If you are lucky, you can escape by hiding in the mountains. If you are not lucky, you will be caught up. You still have to fight them."

Liu Chengzong analyzed: "While the grains are scattered, concentrate your troops to destroy some of them. Even if they can't be destroyed, make a sneak attack and then run away."

He had a hunch that after Li Bei chased Lao Huihui, the second marathon in northern Shaanxi during the Chongzhen period was about to begin.

(End of this chapter)