scourge the qing dynasty

Chapter 299
After receiving Wang Xu's application for an audience, Fatty Lu quickly canceled his plan to personally lead an army to reinforce Taiping Mansion, and instead sent Han Yuanren to lead an army of [-] troops to Taiping Mansion to help Wang Xu and Li Jiyang guard the west gate of Nanjing City . ——Although Wang Xu didn't mention the purpose of coming in a single word in the letter, since Kang Mazi sent Fatty Lu's only friend in the Qing court to Nanjing, Fatty Lu has more or less guessed the purpose of his visit Some.

Fortunately, although there will be nearly 150 Qing troops approaching the city at the Taiping Mansion, Fatty Lu has already known the skills of its commander, Prince Kang Jieshu. It may not be enough to repel the invading enemy, but it is not a big problem to defend Taipingfu city with all its strength. At the same time, Taipingfu city is only more than [-] miles away from Nanjing city, which is very convenient for reinforcements and retreats.So Fatty Lu doesn't have to worry too much, he can settle down and wait for Wang Xu's visit, while starting to solve two technologies--fixed powder packs and lost-wax casting shells.

In fact, Fatty Lu has been so bad for a long time that it has not been a day or two. As early as when Qujing Nulefeng was camping, Fatty Lu had already discovered the time-consuming and labor-intensive weakness of Wu Jun and Qing Army artillery reloading, and also discovered After understanding the disadvantages of poor accuracy, poor airtightness, and insufficient range of the shells cast by clay mold technology in this era, I understand that the two key problems can be basically solved by using the fixed charge and the lost wax method to cast shells, which greatly improves the firing rate of the artillery. Speed ​​and artillery range.But considering that sooner or later, he will go out of the Wu Jun brigade to fight for himself, so Fatty Lu just doesn't say anything - now that Fatty Lu is in charge of his own family, he will naturally have no secrets in this regard.

Of course, before Nule Peak and Jiqi Mountain, we didn’t talk about returning home, but Fatty Lu had already started to study the material of custom-packed medicine bags in secret, and found that using raw silk, a special Chinese product, as the outsourcing material, can make Selling the cannon to quickly load the fixed ammunition packs to be fired, now that Fatty Lu occupies half of the Silk Town, this technology is naturally much more convenient and faster to use.In just a few days, the raw silk that Cao Xi was going to make clothes for Kang Mazi's family turned into silk, and then turned into thousands of custom-packed medicine bags, which became the accomplice weapon of the fat army to kill the Qing soldiers.

The problem of custom-loading medicine bags can be easily solved as long as you know the principle, but the problem of using the lost-wax method to cast shells is not so easy to solve for Fatty Lu, whose craftsmanship is in a mess. The lost-wax casting method had been invented 2000 years ago, and there were a few craftsmen in Nanjing who mastered this technique, but at most they could only cast some high-precision solid shells, but they were helpless for the hollow blooming shells that Fatty Lu requested.

There are many heroes in the south of the Yangtze River. When Fatty Lu and the Nanjing craftsmen were at a loss, Gao Dejie and Li Guodong who captured Yangzhou City sent a ship to Fatty Lu and sent a young man named Huang Luzhuang to Fatty Lu together—— There is a wooden bicycle made by Huang Luzhuang himself!Seeing the first bicycle in the world, Fatty Lu was so excited that his whole body was trembling with fat. He immediately invited Huang Luzhuang to join him and become the chief craftsman of Fatty's army. Huang Luzhuang, who was the same as Xu Zhengming, told Fatty Lu calmly, He voluntarily came to work as a running dog for Fatty Lu, the only condition is that Fatty Lu must teach him the technology of airship manufacturing!Naturally, the chief craftsman of Fatty Army took the surname Huang, and Fatty Lu kicked the problem of casting high-precision shells to the talented craftsman Huang Luzhuang like a football.

Misfortunes never come singly. What happened yesterday, blessings never come to this day. Ever since Fatty Lu won Nanjing City with [-] Wu Jun as a desperate victory, Goddess of Luck kept favoring Fatty Lu as if she had lost her sight. On the tenth day of the fifth lunar month, Li Tianzhi's army escorted Mu Tianyan to Suzhou City, and Mu Tianyan went to the city to persuade him to surrender, but Ning Yunpeng, the prefect of Suzhou, hesitated and did not reply for a long time.

In the evening of the same day, Li Tianzhi's army scouts accidentally hijacked a courier outside the city, and found a letter from the Zhejiang Qing army to Ning Yunpeng from the courier. After arriving in Jiaxing, they rushed to the city of Suzhou for rescue within a day at the latest.Li Tianzhi resolutely gave up the surrender plan and commanded the fat army to attack the city overnight. He never thought that the fat army's artillery had just begun to charge and reload, and Ning Yunpeng, who had made up his mind, had already opened the city gate and led the entire city's soldiers and civilians out of the city to surrender.Fatty's army entered the city smoothly.After Hutu received the news of the fall of Suzhou, he had no choice but to abandon the northward rescue plan and instead went eastward to reinforce Songjiang Prefecture, which was relatively minor in this era. Suzhou officially fell into the hands of the Fatty Army.

So far, the fat man's army has basically controlled the Jiangning, Zhenjiang, Changzhou and Suzhou prefectures in Jiangsu, as well as the most prosperous area in the south of Yangzhou mansion and Taiping mansion in Jiangxi. It's only a matter of time.The most important question before Fatty Lu was how to stop the Qing army from counterattacking to gain time to digest and completely control this most affluent land in the world—a land that is really fat and oily.

Of course, no matter how lucky you are, if you want to expect the Qing court to ignore Zhu Yuanzhang who is entrenched in Nanjing like the Yuan Dynasty treated Zhu Yuanzhang, that is a good thing that you can't even think about. Fatty Lu had this opportunity. Since he arrived at Taiping Mansion on the eighth day of May, Jie Shu commanded Luzhou Qing Army and Anqing Army, and launched three sieges against Taiping Mansion City in ten days.Fortunately, Wang Xu, the defender of the Fatty Army, was a reliable leader in battle. With his strong city and strong soldiers, he repelled the Qing army's attack three times. Jieshu suffered heavy casualties and lost his vigor.

On May [-]th, after waiting anxiously for many days, the beleaguered Wang Xu and his party finally arrived in Yangzhou. At the same time, it was probably to express their goodwill. The two deputies that Kang Mazi sent to Wang Xu this time were also carefully selected. One is the first-class bodyguard Soetu's younger brother Suo Mintai who was once favored by Fatty Lu, and the other is Kang Mazi's confidant bodyguard Wu Dan who has never had any grudges with Fatty Lu. Wang Xu and Suo Mintai, who are close, will not clash with Fatty Lu like Cao Yin and Li Xu, and spoil the big event.Fatty Lu was overjoyed when he heard the news, and hurriedly ordered his cousin Qin Yong and his confidant Wang Shaobo to go to Zhenjiang to meet him, and asked repeatedly to treat each other with respect and courtesy.

On May [-]th, when Wang Xu's fleet arrived in Zhenjiang, Wang Shaobo and Qin Yong went to the pier to greet them. Afterwards, Wang Xu, Suo Mintai, and Wu Dan were also very happy. Wang Xu even took Wang Shaobo's hand and asked, "How is San Hao's younger brother? I don't know if he has lost weight after a long absence?"

"Back to Mr. Wang, the student's host is not very good." Wang Shaobo confessed again, telling Wang Xu honestly: "Not only is the host not very good, but he also suffered from a little illness, so he sent the student and General Qin to Zhenjiang to welcome him. Mr. Wang, otherwise, the host originally planned to come to Zhenjiang or Yangzhou to meet Mr. Wang in person."

"Brother Sanhao is sick?" Wang Xu hesitated, and quickly asked, "How is the condition? Is there a doctor?"

"Of course the doctor invited him, and Zhu Fangdan, the master of the master, is the number one genius doctor in the world." Wang Shaobo replied worriedly: "But the master has a heart disease, and even the master doctor Zhu is helpless."

"What's wrong with San Hao?" Wang Xu asked again with concern.

"This..." Wang Shaobo hesitated for a moment, and then said in a low voice: "I was scolded by the second prince. Our master has made great achievements for the prince, but the second prince did not reward the master for his merits. Instead, he sent letters insulting and threatening. , gave birth to heart disease."

Wang Xu is an honest man, and he was overjoyed when he heard this. When he peeked at Wu Dan and Suo Mintai, he found that the two confidant guards of Kang Mazi were also very happy. Wang Xu hurriedly said to Wang Shaobo: "Sir Mr. Bo, then let's not delay, let's go to Jiangning City immediately, since your body is unwell, Sanhao Brother, I should go to Jiangning City to visit as soon as possible."

"Master Wang, are you not in a hurry for such a little time?" Shaobo Wang said with a wry smile: "The students and officials from Zhenjiang have already prepared for Lord Wang and the two guards in the city..."

"No, please don't." Wang Xu hurriedly waved his hands and said seriously: "My good brother knows my temper. Last time in Qujing, I just asked him to treat me with pancakes and green onions. It's the same this time. We still Hurry up on the road, and go to Jiangning City to eat pancakes and green onions from the three good brothers." Over there, Suo Mintai and Wu Dan were also very honest and resolutely refused Wang Shaobo's hospitality, and insisted on rushing to Nanjing. Wang Shaobo had no choice but to let Qin Yong take the Get on the team, escort Wang Xu's boat upstream, and rush to Nanjing to meet Fatty Lu.

At noon on the second day, Wang Xu's boat arrived at the Lion Rock Wharf in Nanjing. Fatty Lu led Han Daren, Gao Hongchen, Hu Tongchun, Quan Jie, Xie Dong and others to welcome them to the wharf in person. It is a must to hug and salute, full of emotion.Suo Mintai, who had been greatly favored by Fatty Lu, also kowtowed in front of Fatty Lu very honestly, saying that he was benevolent. Conveying his greetings to Suo'etu for himself, Suo Mintai agreed, and sincerely invited Fatty Lu to visit the capital when he had time, and to be a guest at his home in Hesheli.

Surrounded by stars like the moon, Wang Xu entered Nanjing City, and then came to the former Liangjiang governor's office where Fatty Lu stayed. Jiangning City has just experienced war, and in just one month, the streets are as bustling as ever, businesses and travel are thriving, the people live and work in peace and contentment, singing songs, and officials all over the world should really set the example of the three good brothers."

"Brother Zi Zhuan has won the award, but I really don't dare to be a younger brother." Fatty Lu hurriedly humbly said, "Speaking of which, it's all thanks to Mr. Xie Dongxie. Without his full assistance, how could Nanjing City have recovered so quickly?"

"Xie Dong?" Wang Xu frowned slightly, turned his thin face to Xie Dong, who had been cursed by Kang Mazi countless times, and said with a smile, "Master Xie, you really made it hard for me to be an official. , You take a Jiangning City to repay the life-saving kindness of Sanhao Xiandi—a low-ranking official who also received Sanhao Xiandi’s great kindness, but because of this, he was not slandered and slandered by the young villains."

Xie Dong was more honest than Wang Xu, his face was flushed red by Wang Xu's words, and he didn't dare to say anything.Fatty Lu hurriedly smiled and smoothed things over and said, "Brother Zizhuan must not say that. Brother Xie also turned to the light and chose wisely. Besides, under the circumstances at that time, if Brother Zizhuan and Brother Xie were allowed to get along with each other, I firmly believe that Brother Zizhuan would also I will definitely not watch my brother's 30 troops starve to death under the city of Nanjing, and I will definitely try my best to help my brother."

"That's not necessarily true." Wang Xu said with a smile: "Although brother Yu is not talented, he also knows the distinction between public and private. At that time, if Brother Yu was in this Jiangning City, the more than 4 troops of the three good and virtuous brothers would not be able to enter this place." Jiangning City is gone."

"Really?" Fatty Lu smiled slightly and asked: "Brother Zizhuan, since you are so clear about public and private affairs, then you and I are now our own masters and enemies to each other, why did brother Zizhuan come to this Nanjing city? Reminiscing about the old days with my brother?"

"I'm here to save my virtuous brother!" Wang Xu replied decisively, "I'm also here to save my [-] soldiers!"

"Rescue?" Fatty Lu smiled, and asked back: "Brother Zizhuan, is there anything I need to save? The little brother is now sitting in a strong city, with sufficient food and wages, and there are several friendly troops on the periphery that are ready to respond at any time. I really don't know what the danger is." .”

"Brother Sanhao, don't laugh too early." Wang Xu replied with a smile: "My dear brother Sanhao was heavily besieged by hundreds of thousands of my Qing army, and the news was blocked. He must not know that the main force of our Qing Dynasty in Shaanxi and Gansu has already Did you successfully break through under the leadership of Lord Doro?"

"Ezha succeeded in breaking through?" Fatty Lu was a little surprised, thinking that the old traitor Wu would go out in person, why did Ezha slip away?Han Daren, Gao Hongchen and other generals next to him were all taken aback. Gao Hongchen couldn't help shouting: "What are you bragging about? Our prince surrounded your Shaanxi-Gansu main force in Baoning for nearly two months. How could the old dog Eza break through? "

"General Hong Chen doesn't believe it?" Wang Xu smiled, took out a memorial from his bosom, and said with a smile: "This is the memorial written by Lord Dorothy. After it was sent to the capital, the emperor sent eight hundred miles to catch up with Brother Yu The boat, bring it to ask the three good brothers to give it to the purpose."

Fatty Lu winked at Xiao Erlang calmly, and Xiao Erlang hurriedly stepped forward to take the memorial, and passed it to Fatty Lu. When Fatty Lu took it and looked at it, he found that the memorial was indeed from E Zha Written in my own handwriting, it says crookedly how the main forces of the Qing Dynasty broke through from Shaanxi to Gansu.It turned out that the Baoyi army led by Tong Guogang adopted Zhou Peigong's strategy, attacked the Wu army's convoy by surprise, and burned the new firearms Wu Guogui sent to Tao Jizhi. He also got in touch with Eza, who had been relying on killing people for food, took the opportunity to break out to the west with all his strength, crossed the Bazhong Mountains and joined forces with the Packed Army in the Taiping Hall, and has now withdrawn to Ziyang County, Xing'an Prefecture.

"This is also called breakout?" Fatty Lu laughed, and while handing the memorial to Han Daren, Gao Hongchen and the others, he said with a smile: "Why didn't Lord Doro dare to write in the memorial how many troops successfully broke through? Trapped in Baoning Mansion for nearly two months, and crossing the Bazhong Mountains where there are so many mountains and no food or city, even if our lord doesn't send troops to chase after him, [-]% to [-]% of the people will die of starvation and exhaustion on the way, right?"

Wang Xu was silent. In fact, Wang Xu had already seen the strangeness of this memorial. Since E Zha did not dare to write how many troops successfully broke through in the memorial, it proved that the main force in Shaanxi and Gansu must have suffered heavy casualties. There may be less than 1 trapped troops alive to break out of the siege, and the reason why Kang Mazi showed this memorial to Fatty Lu himself must be to create some psychological pressure on Fatty Lu and to give him a better chance to fight. Fatty Lu made a bold move.

"Ha." Han Daren also laughed, and laughed: "General, if the last general suffers a big defeat in the future, he must learn from Lord Doro to write the battle report like this. Tell the general in the battle report that the last general's entire army has successfully broken through!"

"If it were me, I would definitely add one more sentence - the end will kill countless enemies!" Gao Hongchen also laughed and echoed.

"Dare!" Fatty Lu threatened: "Look if I don't peel your skin!" Before he finished speaking, the hall was full of laughter, Wang Xu, Suo Mintai and other Qing officials were all extremely embarrassed, and secretly regretted doing so. Backfired.

"Brother Sanhao, don't be too happy too soon." Wang Xu quickly changed the subject, and said seriously: "Let's not say that part of our Shaanxi-Gansu main force in the Qing Dynasty broke through, even if the entire Shaanxi-Gansu main force of the Qing Dynasty was wiped out and How is it? The strong city of Hanzhong is still in the hands of our Qing Dynasty, and there are more than [-] green battalions, flag soldiers, and Mongolian soldiers in Shaanxi and Gansu. The main force led by your prince is still deeply trapped in the Shaanxi-Gansu battlefield. Brother Sanhao, you are in a tight siege Among them, surrounded by enemies on all sides, reinforcements cannot be counted on. Brother Mihao, don’t you think about yourself, don’t you think about the soldiers under your command?”

"Listen, Mr. Wang wants to recruit us?" Gao Hongchen said arrogantly: "So what if we are surrounded by enemies? Want to take back Nanjing City and use a knife to speak? Your Lord Kang's outstanding letter was written by Brother Wang Xu How long have you been in the Taiping Mansion? Why don't you see him coming to Nanjing City to fight us?"

"General Hong Chen, it may be difficult to take back Jiangning City with Lord Kang's army alone?" Wang Xu asked slowly: "But what if we add the [-] troops of General Zhejiang Laita? What about the [-] bannermen and Mongolian soldiers that were urgently conscripted? Is it enough?"

"If you have the courage to transfer troops from Zhejiang, then you can come." Han Daren said with a sneer: "The [-] troops of Prince Jingnan are watching the tigers in the middle of Zhejiang. If you transfer troops from Zhejiang, do you still want Zhejiang? ?”

"Benefactor, I have a memorial here too." Suo Mintai stood up, took out a memorial from his sleeve, and said with a smile: "This memorial was also delivered from the capital when we were on the road. It is a kindness." Please look over the memorial that you can never expect."

Fatty Lu pouted, Xiao Erlang stepped forward again, and passed the memorial in Suo Mintai's hand to Fatty Lu. When Fatty Lu opened it, he was surprised to find that it was Fan Chengmo, Governor of Fujian who was imprisoned by Geng Jingzhong A memorial to Kang Mazi, and it is stated at the beginning that this memorial was entrusted by Geng Jingzhong to Fan Chengmo.When I took a closer look at the content, Fatty Lu's fat face turned pale—Geng Jingzhong actually wanted Fan Chengmo to intervene in the decisive battle between the Geng army and the Qing army, to ask the Qing court for a peace truce, and to promise that only Taizhou and Wenzhou in Zhejiang And the three prefectures of Chuzhou, and even the Hengzhou and Jinhua prefectures that have already controlled half of them, Geng Jingzhong also said that they could refund them to show their sincerity in seeking peace.

"General, what's the matter?" Han Daren saw Fatty Lu's complexion was not right, so he hurriedly came up to read it together, but after quickly reading it, Han Daren's expression changed, and he exclaimed, "Geng Jingzhong is crazy?"

"General Han, of course King Jingnan is not crazy." Wang Xu said with a smile: "Here, Brother Yu can tell San Hao a secret. There are two reasons why King Jingnan asked the court for peace. One is that Zheng Jing Feng Xifan, the running dog of the traitor, perfidiously captured Prince Jingnan’s Tingzhou Mansion, Prince Jingnan was furious, and the covenant with the traitor Zheng Jing was about to be broken.”

"The second reason." Wang Xu added with a smile: "It's because of you, dear brother Sanhao. After hearing the news that you have broken Jiangning, King Jingnan immediately understood that if he insists on attacking Zhejiang now, not only will he not If you get a little bit of benefits, you will be a shield for you, the good brother of the three good brothers, and hold back General Laita and Governor Li Zhifang's Qing army for you. You will lose all your troops and get nothing, so Prince Jingnan is very smart. He chose to take the opportunity to seek peace , and has already ordered Zeng Yangxing to stop going north—this was admitted by Prince Jingnan to Master Fan Chengmo.”

Fatty Lu and Han Daren looked at each other, and thought together: "Oops, it seems that we still underestimated Geng Jingzhong too much. This bastard is far smarter than we thought, and he can even consider this."

"No!" After the shock, Fatty Lu quickly calmed down and came to his senses, "It's not right. If Kang Mazi believed in Geng Jingzhong's sincerity in seeking peace, he would definitely not let Brother Zizhuan continue to go south to surrender, and he would directly fight with Geng Jingzhong." Jingzhong made a peace talk, and then sent troops back to attack me! And Geng Jingzhong, the current anti-Qing situation is very good, he will not be so stupid as to spit out what he eats!"

"Understood! Geng Jingzhong must be imitating Brother Lu's plan to divert the tiger away from the mountain to the old traitor Wu, pretending to make peace with Mangou, trying to use Lu Brother and me as bait, luring Zhejiang Mangou's main force to go north, and then taking the opportunity to annex it. Zhejiang! Kang Mazi suffered a loss once and was fooled once, so he refuses to believe anything!"

Thinking of this, Fatty Lu folded the memorial in his hands, pretended to be thinking for a long time, then stood up and said with a smile: "Brother Zizhuan, Brother Mintai, Master Wu, you have worked hard from afar, let's talk about other things slowly, little brother prepare I have a little tea and light food, and I will clean up the dust for you. And Brother Zizhuan, I know you like pancakes rolled with green onions, and my younger brother specially prepared a plate for you—I bought it with my own salary, it’s clean."

(End of this chapter)