Chapter 189 How can the mountains and rivers be stable? VII

Most of Li Zicheng's troops were gathered by hungry people and rebel soldiers, which were called "bandits" by Li Yan. They rebelled just for a meal. Except for Li Zicheng himself who dreamed of becoming an emperor, the others had no great ambitions.

Therefore, every time they captured a city, these people could not resist the bad nature of looting, which made people dissatisfied. This is why Li Zicheng was not successful despite his great power.

Li Yan offered Li Zicheng a plan to rectify military discipline, strictly prohibit killing and looting, distribute land equally and exempt taxes, and treat the people well. Li Zicheng valued him very much, so he listened to him in everything. As soon as this method of managing the army was introduced, the most obvious thing was the overwhelming support in the city of Kaifeng, which had just been captured.

Li Zicheng followed Li Yan's method and took advantage of the situation to appease the exiled poor people, giving them food and oxen, allowing them to cultivate their own land and use the surplus food for military purposes. This won him a lot of praise from the hungry people, which was a great success.

Li Yan also composed many catchy songs and had his men pretend to be businessmen to sing them, such as "Eat his mother, wear his mother, open the gate to welcome King Ke, and when King Ke comes, don't pay any food"[Note], and so on. For a time, King Ke's reputation as a benevolent and righteous army that did not kill or plunder spread throughout the world.

This wave of public opinion caused the hungry people to look forward to the army of Prince Yan day and night, and even feared that they would not come. Some of them had already organized themselves before Prince Yan's army arrived, killing officials and rebelling, waiting for Li Zicheng to come here and recruit them directly. In

just a few months, Prince Yan's army had expanded by tens of thousands of new soldiers.

He was in a strong position and would not care about the thousands of people of Hong Niangzi. If he did not value Li Yan, he would have forgotten this inconspicuous group of miscellaneous artisans.

Now Li Zicheng only had eyes for Li Yan, who was unparalleled in talent and Xiao Hao, who was unstoppable in bravery.

Shi Zhixuan was a thorn in his heart. The appearance of this man always made him feel humiliated, as if he was reminding him all the time that he was a bandit leader who had not received much education.

Therefore, Li Zicheng would not see Shi Zhixuan if he could avoid it, and he was even unwilling to talk to him.

There were also many happy events in the past few months. Li Yan and Hong Niangzi finally got married and got married in the camp. They officially became husband and wife, and everyone in the army celebrated their lovers finally getting married.

Xiao Hao also took advantage of Li Zicheng's expansion of the army to recruit elites. He not only incorporated the Jianghu artists under Hong Niangzi, but also included many Jianghu heroes with some martial arts skills.

He wanted to train an elite army, so he had to select them carefully, rather than have too few, so his cavalry battalion seemed insignificant compared to Li Zicheng's tens of thousands of troops.

Xiao Hao knew that quality was more important than quantity, and every time Li Zicheng urged him to increase his troops, he just laughed it off and didn't say much.

He had already touched upon certain rules of the system, so he naturally wouldn't jump outside the rules. To Xiao Hao, organizing and managing the army was a piece of cake. He didn't teach them Tian Ce's martial arts, but he still taught them gun skills. There were no moves or fixed routines, and every move was based on practicality on the battlefield, striving to find the opponent's weakness and kill with one strike.

In this way, even members who have never had contact with spearmen before can quickly master the secrets of defeating the enemy.

In addition, improving their cultivation and internal strength is what Xiao Hao wants to do secretly.

People around him soon discovered that the soldiers in Xiao Hao's camp seemed to be distancing themselves from them at a speed that was neither fast nor slow.

Not only in terms of military strength, but also in temperament.

The cavalry under Xiao Hao are always serious and quietly busy with their own tasks - even if tasks such as brushing horses seem extremely boring in the eyes of outsiders. This

group of soldiers are always the first to wake up every morning. They practice spears and riding, practice seriously, stand guard calmly, occasionally drink but do not make noise, and are upright and kind.

——Soldiers should be like this.

Everyone has such an idea in their mind.

But at the same time, they think this idea is ridiculous.

They are all rebels and bandits, so who is more noble than who? Does it mean that if they look like soldiers, they are regular soldiers? Didn’t the official army also fall into their hands?

But still, I can’t help wanting to be one of them.

Everyone knows that King Qian has a mysterious and low-key team, and those who can join this cavalry are the elite among the elites. They are a group of people who symbolize glory in the entire army.

It seems that as long as they are there, there is an indescribable sense of security, and they feel that they can be invincible.

If fighting under the King of Qi in the past was like walking on a plank in the air with a refusal to admit defeat, trembling with fear; then their existence is like having two extra steel ropes on the plank to hold on to for balance. Even without support, one can still walk, but as long as one sees them, one feels at ease and can move forward. Kaifeng

fell, and the Ming court was shaken. Sun Chuanting was ordered to lead the army to suppress Li Zicheng, commanding 100,000 troops to the east through Tongguan, and dispatching troops from all directions to attack. He also encountered a militia captain who turned against the government on the battlefield and surrendered to the government, exposing the location of the militia's elite troops and the militia's families, and even the location of the main camp. Sun Chuanting took the right remedy and was unstoppable.

The invincible army of King Yan soon fell into a tough battle.

In order to avenge the fall of the city, Chen Yongfu, the deputy garrison commander of Kaifeng, shot Li Zicheng's left eye blind with an arrow, and Li Zicheng was almost captured by them.

It rained heavily, and the gloomy weather was just like the gloomy mood of the militia in King Yan's camp, with dark clouds pressing down on the top.

"The only way now is to temporarily withdraw from here and flee to Xiangcheng to avoid the enemy's sharp edge." Li Yan thought hard.

Li Zicheng was also a little irritable, and said angrily: "If it weren't for the betrayal of the Four Heavenly Kings, we wouldn't have been caught by Sun Laoer!"

Li Yan shook his head slowly: "Many soldiers in the army have already thought about surrendering. They have suffered heavy losses and dare not fight against the government troops anymore. Even if they are forced to go to the battlefield, they will not be able to form an army."

Li Zicheng felt it was a pity. Zhongyuan had almost been taken into his pocket. It was really hard for him to withdraw at this time.

But Sun Chuanting had a hundred thousand troops under his command, and even the old members of the Tianxiong Army. That group of desperate troops was the same army that killed the old king.

Li Zicheng was very worried that he would follow the same fate as the old king.

Once the Tianxiong Army met the enemy, they would hold on to the enemy and fight to the end. They could not escape without losing a layer of skin. Li Zicheng barely saved his life by losing one eye, and he was very jealous of them.

"Or we can go into battle lightly, leaving behind some hungry civilians who would affect the march, to buy time for the army to retreat."

Li Yan immediately rejected this plan. He couldn't openly rebuke the idea of ​​the King of the Chuang, so he frowned and pondered: "If our arrangements are leaked, the government troops will soon attack here, and we must make thorough arrangements to retreat safely. It has been raining heavily in recent days, and the roads are muddy and difficult to walk on. If we seek an opportunity to counterattack, it is not completely impossible."

Li Zicheng was delighted when he heard this, and immediately raised his ear and asked, "What good plan do you have?"

Li Yan kept the words on his lips, but he couldn't say them for a long time.

The method is simple, find a team of elite cavalry to cut off the food supply to the rear of the government troops.

The enemy has already penetrated deep into the hinterland, and the long journey has led to a long battle line. Once the food supply is cut off, the front will not be able to supply, and the only way is to withdraw the troops back to clear the food supply, and then the crisis will be solved.

But this team of people is not easy to find.

Because this team of people not only has to avoid the eyes and ears of the government troops, but also has to face the danger of being surrounded and suppressed after successfully cutting off the government troops' food supply.

Once they leave, they will be an isolated army. No matter whether the government troops are angry or withdraw, they will be in a dilemma of being attacked from all sides.

This is a road of life and death, an absolutely hard battle.

If successful, the army's predicament will be solved immediately; if not, the army will just fight with the government troops again, suffer losses and continue to retreat, and their sacrifice will be meaningless.

For this group of militiamen, such a mission is tantamount to ordering them to die. They fought and rebelled just to survive, and no one would be willing to accept it. Instead of asking them to die, it is better to ask them to surrender directly.

But the reason why Li Yan came up with a countermeasure is because it can be used.

This person is about to come out.

Li Yan knew that Xiao Hao's troops had always been a special team outside the King's army. They did not belong to King. Although they usually acted with King's army and outsiders also spread rumors that they were under King's command, they were actually an independent team.

Li Yan was unwilling to let Xiao Hao lead his men to die, so he could not tell them about this plan no matter what.

However, the longer he remained silent, the more pressure King's eyes became, and Li Yan was sweating on his cheeks.

Just when Li Yan decided to give up this idea and told the King that he had no idea for the time being and needed to find another way, Xiao Hao's voice rang out from outside the tent:

"I have a plan that can save the soldiers from danger."

Li Zicheng smiled. He had two trump cards that could decide the outcome of the battle, and they never let him down at any time.

Xiao Hao had seen their recent conversation clearly from outside the tent, and he thanked Li Yan for considering his intentions.

"I am willing to bring two thousand elite cavalry to buy temporary peace for the ordinary people in the army."

Xiao Hao and Li Yan knew very well that at this time, no one dared to go to battle except his Tiance cavalry.

It is true that King Yan has many people under his command, but most of them are ordinary poor people, the hungry people, then the militia families, then the militia, and finally the cavalry and elite.

Their fighting power is not at the same level as the well-trained elite troops under Sun Chuanting.

A large number of ants can bite an elephant to death, but it also requires the ants to be united and work together to obey.

Xiao Hao does not serve King Yan, he is just doing what he should do at this moment.

What those hungry people look like has left a mark in his heart, whether it is a girl who is as haggard as a woman, or an old woman who cooks the bones of her own children on the roadside, they will join King Yan's army not because they are capable of taking up arms, but because they are all looking for a way to survive and a kind of shelter.

When the King of Yan could not protect them, he might choose to let them stand in front to block the steps of the government troops and retain strength for his elite, but Xiao Hao would not do that.

If he let the people who should have been protecting him go to die when he encountered a disaster, what else would the army do?

He held the Hengjiang lock in his hand and said word by word: "Alas, if you, the corrupt official, dare to bully the weak people of our people, first ask the long gun in my hand!"

Li Zicheng smiled cordially. He had also fought for so many years and knew what Xiao Hao meant. Although it was a pity that this general was lost, it was better than being wiped out before his great cause was accomplished like the old King of Yan.

He asked concernedly, "How can two thousand be enough to accomplish anything?"

Xiao Hao looked at him calmly, curled his lips and smiled, "Two thousand is enough to establish the military spirit."