Southern Ming Rebel Army

Chapter 322 Beheading

Zheng Chenggong stationed his troops in a fortified city. The army attacked for three consecutive days, but lost more than 6,000 of the 35,000 infantrymen. All efforts were in vain. The morale of Zheng's army was low, and the soldiers were afraid of fighting.

The generals in the army urged them to retreat first and hold the camp under the protection of the navy to wait for reinforcements from King Zhou. Seeing this, Zheng Chenggong was furious and said angrily: "I have come a long way to Huguang, but have not achieved any great success. Now I only have Ezhou City, how can I stop them? We will fight again tomorrow. I will never stop until Ezhou is captured. Use ropes to mark the boundary. Anyone who retreats beyond the ropes or shrinks back without order will be killed!"

After Zheng Chenggong finished speaking, he stood up and said loudly: "Tomorrow the whole army will go to the battle, and you will go up first. If you are lost in the battle, I will climb the city wall myself!"

The generals did not dare to refute, knowing that Zheng Chenggong was determined, they could only bite the bullet and obey the order.

After the generals withdrew, Chen Yonghua persuaded Zheng Chenggong: "Guo Xing, now that the Zhou army has won, Duoduo can no longer change the situation. Why do you force the city and hurt the generals?"

Zheng Chenggong glanced at Chen Yonghua, then retracted his gaze and said calmly: "Our army is strong in the navy, but our infantry is weak. If we cannot win this battle, even if we defend Fujian, it will be difficult to stop others from coveting us."

The next morning, at daybreak, Zheng Chenggong stood in front of the army, wearing armor, holding a long sword, with a resolute look on his face.

Zheng's army attacked Ezhou again with great force. When Ezhou city was in danger, Bolo ordered the Mongolian cavalry to attack Zheng's army with light cavalry. Even so, Zheng Chenggong still did not stop attacking the city. The battle lasted until dusk. When both armies were tired, Zheng's 800 iron men took the opportunity to climb onto the city wall.

As soon as the Iron Man Army entered the city, they killed the Green Camp soldiers without them having any chance to fight back. In that dusk of blood and fire, the Iron Man Army was like the light of dawn. They were clad in heavy armor and held sharp blades in their hands. They were invincible and invincible.

Zheng Chenggong was in the army, looking at the tower from afar, and saw that the Iron Army had just climbed up the city wall and killed the Green Camp soldiers without any chance to fight back, like a tiger descending from the mountain, unstoppable. Zheng Chenggong was overjoyed and ordered the soldiers who followed him to quickly climb the city wall.

Generals Liu Guodong, Shi Lang and others had also climbed onto the city wall. For a moment, the morale of the Zheng army was boosted, and it seemed that they were ready to attack the city in one go.

Seeing the situation was urgent, Bolo personally led the soldiers of the Bordered White Banner to fight fiercely with Zheng's Iron Man Army on the city wall. The two armies clashed and the sound of killing shook the sky.

However, the Qing army was defeated by Meng Jun and retreated to Ezhou in the rain. Before they could rest, Zheng's army arrived again. After four consecutive days of siege, the Qing army was already exhausted. After continuous losses, Bolo saw that the situation was not good and hurriedly ordered Duoduo to be moved to the carriage, and then led the cavalry to escape from the city.

In the end, Ezhou City fell into the hands of Zheng's army.

On the way out of Ezhou City and fleeing to Wuchang, Duoduo was full of anger. He pointed at He Luohui and said, "You said that Ezhou City was strong, why did you panic?"

He Luohui bowed his head and said nothing, but Bolo spoke up: "Prince Yu, it is meaningless for our army to be trapped in Ezhou. Fighting with the pirates in Ezhou will only cost the lives of the Eight Banners. It is better to return to Wuchang and regroup."

Duoduo knew that it was time to regroup, but Bolo was just comforting himself. There were 80,000 soldiers who went out from Wuchang, but only 10,000 returned to Ezhou. When they escaped from Ezhou City, there were less than 7,000 soldiers and generals, not even one in ten survived. At this time, Duoduo felt the same as Xiang Yu after the Battle of Gaixia - he had no face to face the elders of Jiangdong.

………………

Zhou army camp.

Meng Jun strolled in the military camp. Along the way, the generals saluted and greeted him. Meng Jun nodded and smiled in response.

At this time, Meng Jun had already received the military report that Zheng Chenggong had captured Ezhou. Meng Jun could see Zheng Chenggong's pride between the lines.

To be honest, Zheng Chenggong's capture of Ezhou was really beyond Meng Jun's expectations. Meng Jun had always believed that Zheng's infantry had low combat effectiveness, but he did not expect that he could actually force Duoduo to flee Ezhou.

Meng Jun said with some emotion: "If Zheng Zhilong had one-third of Zheng Sen's courage, he would not have ended up like this."

"Zheng Zhilong has a strong business aura. He always decides things based on the pros and cons. He is really two extremes in this country." Gu Yanwu said slowly while accompanying him.

Then Gu Yanwu looked at Meng Jun and said with some emotion: "Since the Jiashen Day, wherever the enemy cavalry went, they all surrendered. The order to shave their heads was issued, and the whole city was filled with arrogance. The people of Jiangnan, many cities, moved the world with their death. Only then did we have heroes like you, who showed their unyielding spirit and repeatedly defeated stubborn enemies. Your Majesty, after this battle, the offensive and defensive will be changed!"

Meng Jun took a deep breath and said, "Duoduo has been defeated. The army can rest for a few more days and then march north to seize Wuchang. If Duoduo is wise, he will withdraw from Wuchang."

Gu Yanwu asked hesitantly: "My king, if we take Wuchang, the land of Huguang still has the King of Jin..."

Meng Jun was silent for a while. After pondering for a long time, he slowly said: "Times have changed. Let's wait until the Qing army withdraws from Huguang."

Having said that, in his heart, Meng Jun silently said: "In this world, I can only trust myself, because I can complete your unfinished cause in history for you, and I believe I can do better than you."

At night, Meng Jun stood in the camp under the starry sky, looked up at the bright stars, took a deep breath of the cold air, his nose was filled with the scent of grass and blood.

Meng Jun looked around, feeling a little happy but also a little confused. He defeated Duoduo, and the situation in the world had been completely changed. During the four years in this world, Meng Jun felt that his previous life seemed like a distant and unattainable dream.

This world has completely changed him. After the war, tens of thousands of Qing soldiers surrendered. How to deal with these surrendered soldiers caused heated debate among the generals at the military meeting.

Some said they could be incorporated, some said they should be sent to the mines in Ma'anshan to do hard labor, some said they should all be beheaded. Of course there were also those who objected that killing prisoners was a bad omen.

After a rough screening, it was found that there were 12,000 surrendered soldiers from Wu Sangui's army, more than 6,000 surrendered soldiers from the Green Camp, more than 3,000 surrendered soldiers from the Han Army Flag, and more than 4,000 slave soldiers from Liaodong.

Meng Jun decided to move all the slave soldiers and Wu Sangui's surrendered troops to the Ma'anshan mine to serve hard labor. Most of these Han army flags were the vanguards of the Qing court's attack on cities and plundering of land after entering the pass, and many of them had committed numerous blood debts.

Meng Jun ordered Bai Yongfu to escort the 3,000 Han army flags to a hillside north of the camp and kill them all.

At the command, three thousand heads fell to the ground in an instant.

Being in a high position, there are some decisions that he needs to make, whether they are right or wrong.

Glorious victory, in this world, he has no one to share it with, no one knows what the world would be like without him. Meng Jun whispered: "I am just a speck of dust in history, maybe I don't exist!"