October 11, 8th year of Chongzhen. Pen @ fun @ pavilion wWw. ｂｉｑUｇE。 ｉｎｆｏ

Jingshi, Qianqing Palace.

Emperor Chongzhen sat on the dragon chair, looking sluggish, and listened to the report of Zhang Fengyi, the secretary of the military department, at the foot of the Nine Folds Dan steps.

“。。。。。。 At the beginning of October, Gao Yingxiang, Li Zicheng, Scorpion Block and other large and small thieves converged to the east, supporting more than 200,000 soldiers, breaking through Zhuyang Pass, wantonly invaded the land of Henan, Henan officials and troops, such as Zuo Liangyu, Chen Yongfu, Luo Ju and other departments, were all invincible, Ruxiang, Lingbao and other places, greatly poisoned。。。。。。 ”

Listening to Zhang Fengyi, who knelt on the ground, didn't dare to raise his head and just whispered the report, the old and haggard voice, Emperor Chongzhen's heart was like frying.

The emperor knew that the land of Henan, which had been traumatized by the war, was about to start the tragic years of war, blood and life.

"Bang!"

Chongzhen punched a fierce fist on the royal table of golden silk nanmu, and shook the delicate Hetian jade inkstone, overflowing with ink.

"Spread my will, Henan Governor Xuan Mo, has no way to control it, is ineffective in suppressing bandits, incompetent, and is removed from his post in Jinyiwei, and Chen Biqian, the imperial history of Jiangxi Province, is appointed as the governor of Henan!"

Chongzhen's sudden burst of shouting made Zhang Fengyi on the ground tremble for a while, and he quickly shut up. The eunuch next to him also hurriedly promised to respond with a frightened face.

"Since I succeeded to the throne, although my virtue is shallow, I have been diligent and diligent, and I dare not slack off, why is the country still so erosive, is it that the sky is tired of it!"

Chongzhen stood up and sighed with a sad face.

Zhang Fengyi on the ground and the eunuchs next to him all turned pale when they heard the emperor's words, and they didn't dare to breathe.

"I, I want to condemn myself。。。。。。

"Your Majesty。。。。。。"

"There is no need to hinder me, the state affairs are so difficult, the people are struggling with life and death, can I be alone in the Jingshi Palace, enjoy this peace and glory? This sin has been decreed, and it must be punished. ”

Chongzhen waved his hand, signaling that Zhang Fengyi underground didn't need to say much, and asked the eunuch on the side to write down the content in a deep voice.

“。。。。。。 However, the civil and military officials, laboring, hungry and cold, deeply remembered, remembered their wind and food, and slept in the open, I could not bear to be alone in the deep palace; Drinking water and eating are coarse, I can't bear to enjoy the sweet will alone; Wearing a strong and stubborn one, I can't bear to embroider alone. Since the beginning of the day, I have avoided living in the Wuying Palace, reducing food and relieving pleasures, not ceremonies, but looking at things in Tsing Yi, and vowing to share the joys and hardships with the civil and military officials in our line. The courtiers and their own cultivation and tempering are tempered, and they save the lives of the people by returning to the heart of heaven。。。。。。 ”

After finishing this sin full of sentimental atmosphere, Chongzhen sat back on the dragon chair with a sad face.

"Your Majesty is worried about all the people, and if you work with the soldiers to work together, you will surely move the heavens, and the next day will make a great difference in the affairs of the state, but you don't have to worry too much."

Zhang Fengyi straightened up tremblingly, carefully comforting the emperor.

"Jiubao, now that the rogue is rampant, Henan is in a military disaster, what do you do as the secretary of the military department?"

Chongzhen didn't want to listen to him with such empty words of comfort, so he asked in a low voice.

"Your Majesty, with all due respect, the trend of thieves is now growing again, and the land of Zhongzhou is full of misery and disasters, but it urgently needs the imperial court to take new measures to cope with the current situation." Zhang Fengyi said hurriedly.

"Tell me more."

"Your Majesty, the thieves are powerful, and Hong Chengchou, the governor of the military affairs of the five provinces of Shanxi and Shaanxi, is afraid that he will be unable to support it alone. Now that there are many streams of Liukou, they are going east out of Zhuyang Pass, and Hong Chengchou is afraid that he will be even more out of reach. Therefore, the minister thought that Lu Xiangsheng, the governor of Huguang, could be transferred to the post of governor of the five provinces, and the prime minister of Zhili, Henan, Shandong, Sichuan, Huguang and other five military affairs, and then draw reinforcements from Liaodong to aid Henan. The formation of "Hong Chengchou supervised the northwest, and Lu Xiangsheng supervised the southeast." "Only in this way can we form a situation of encirclement and suppression on all sides, so that the thieves have nowhere to hide, and only then can the thieves be completely eliminated and the country can be swept away from the great trouble."

Listening to Zhang Fengyi's words, Chongzhen's eyes lit up.

This Lu Xiangsheng, because of his outstanding military exploits, Emperor Chongzhen actually had a deep impression of him.

He vaguely remembered that Lu Xiangsheng was a native of Yixing, Changzhou, with the word Jiandou, the number Jiutai, and the Jinshi during the Apocalypse. He was appointed as the head of the household department, promoted to a foreign officer, and later released as a daimyo prefect. In the second year of Chongzhen, Xiangsheng recruited troops to join the Weijing Division, participated in politics with merit, and served as a deputy envoy. This person is quite familiar with military affairs, and has reorganized the military equipment of the three prefectures of Daimyo, Guangping, and Shunde, and built a "Tianxiong Army" that can be the elite of the Ming army. In the sixth year of Chongzhen, Lu Xiangsheng led the Tianxiong army and successfully suppressed the army of the thief Ma Hui and the Chaotian King who entered Hebei from Shanxi. In the seventh year of Chongzhen, because he successfully exterminated nearly 400,000 rogue troops near Yunyang, Lu Xiang was promoted to the imperial history of the right capital, Fuyunyang, and then promoted to the governor of Huguang.

"This Lu Xiangsheng is a man with outstanding military achievements, and I have heard that this person is good at encouraging soldiers with loyalty, and his subordinates are willing to serve the dead, which is really a rare general." Emperor Chongzhen let out a long breath, and then ordered loudly: "The strategy of the nine buds, I have it!" Now Lu Xiang was promoted to the head of the military department, and was appointed as the governor of the five provinces, and the soldiers of the five provinces were all subject to his control, and he was allowed to draw troops and horses from Liaodong as reinforcements, and at the same time gave Shang Fang a sword, so that he could act cheaply. Limited to half a year, it is limited to exterminate the rogues in Henan and the southeast! ”

"The emperor is wise, and the ministers obey the holy will."

.。。。。。。

When Lu Xiangsheng, who was promoted to the governor of the five provinces, quickly rushed from Huguang to Henan, and joined up with Chen Biqian, the governor of Henan, and Zu Dale, Zu Kuan, Li Chongzhen and other troops and horses drawn from Liaodong, Li Xiao also led a total of more than 6,000 soldiers and horses of the Chifeng Battalion, and hurriedly went south to Tielong City, Shanxian County.

Now in the Chifeng battalion, after expansion, there are already two general soldiers and horses, Li Xiao left one general soldiers and horses and artillery troops to hold on, but took the other general soldiers and horses, together with Lu Mi's men, cavalry troops, and rampant troops, to Iron Dragon City.

Before leaving, Li Xiao arranged that Chifengwei and other matters would be temporarily ordered by Chen Zilong, and assisted by Xu Xiuqing, the governor of Chifeng City, and the two promised to receive the order.

In fact, in real history, Liukou did not invade Shandong this time, and was eventually defeated by Lu Xiangsheng, the military affairs of the six provinces of the governor, and retreated to Shanxi and other places in Shaanxi. However, what worried Li Xiao was that his Tielong City was only separated from Henan by the Yellow River, and if the enemy did not follow the historical route and led the people to invade the north, it would be difficult to hold on to the more than 6,000 soldiers and horses of the Tielong Battalion alone.

This is the reason why Li Xiao rushed to help.

However, there was one circumstance that made him secretly glad.

That is, at the end of February this year, Zhang Xianzhong was in Tielong City, Shanxian County, and after being severely injured by himself, he was already greatly injured, and now he should still be licking his wounds in Shaanxi, so it is impossible to join forces with Gao Yingshen and others to go east. Li Xiao estimated that the main thieves and soldiers of Gao Yingshen, Li Zicheng, Scorpion Block, Lao Huihui and other bandits who invaded Henan this time should be much less than the number of rogue invasions in history.

Li Xiao's intuition was correct, because in fact it was true.

Li Xiao led the army to Tielong City, after the total soldiers and horses of the Chifeng Battalion converged with the Tielong Battalion, the total strength has reached more than 12,000 people, Li Xiao secretly said, with this force, it should be enough to hold the city.

Zu Wan'er, who was in the Iron Dragon City, was very happy when she saw Li Xiao coming, and she was very restrained for a while.

After Zu Wan'er came to Shanxian County, she immediately crossed the river and went to Yucheng, Henan on the other side, wanting to see her father, Zu Dale, the chief soldier, but unexpectedly learned that Zu Dale had been ordered to go to Kaifeng to discuss the suppression of bandits, so he had to go back.

It's just that Li Xiao has too many military affairs to arrange in order to deal with the possible attack of the enemy army, but he doesn't have much heart to linger with Wan'er, which makes Wan'er feel a little lost.

What Li Xiao didn't expect was that he had only been in Shanxian for a week, and was studying with a group of craftsmen, when he was using the crucible to make steel, a soldier came to report that Lu Xiangsheng, the governor of the five provinces, had come to Iron Dragon City in person.

"What, Governor Lu came to Iron Dragon City in person? Can you come with the other generals? ”

When Li Xiao heard the report, he was taken aback.

"Chief soldier, Governor Lu only led more than a hundred personal guards to come, and there was no other entourage."

"Oh?"

Li Xiao waved his hand to let the sergeant retreat, and then glanced meaningfully at Wu Liang, the director of Iron Dragon City on the side.

"From the student's point of view, Governor Lu must have come to invite Lord Li to send troops, Lord Li, you want to only protect Tielong City, I'm afraid you can't." The two walked to a secluded place, and Wu Liang said to Li Xiao with a smile.

Li Xiao sighed lightly: "Mr. Wu is right, the prestige of our army's good fighting has been spread for a long time, and it is natural that Governor Lu wants our army to go into battle to fight the thieves." It's just that this soldier is thinking, this Lord Lu came to my Iron Dragon City, I'm afraid it is not as simple as wanting our army to send troops. ”

Soon, Li Xiao led a group of generals out of the west gate of Tielong City to welcome the arrival of Lu Xiangsheng and his party.

When Li Xiao and the others came to the city gate, they immediately saw from a distance that a group of guards with bright armor, waving a big "Lu" red background and black flag, surrounded by a person dressed in red and looking like a Confucian general in a second-grade civil official uniform, and quickly rode their horses.

Li Xiao said secretly, this person is the mighty and loyal Lu Xiangsheng at the end of the Ming Dynasty.

"Phew!"

Ten steps away from Li Xiao, the general who looked like a civil official turned over and dismounted, and then walked slowly towards Li Xiao with a smile.

Li Xiao saw that this Lu Xiangsheng, although he was born as a civil official, was tall, especially his shoulders were quite broad and conspicuous, with a fierce face, the wrinkles on his face were like knife carvings, and under his forehead, there was a pair of bright Danfeng eyes, and two thick eyebrows went straight into the sideburns, adding to the majesty. And his three locks of clear hair dancing in the wind made him show the unique style of a scribe, and the whole person looked like a standard Confucian wise general.

With a sound of brushing the ground, Li Xiao led the crowd to kneel on the ground and salute with fists.

Dressed in stainless steel armor, he carried a bow on his back and a quiver full of heavy arrows from alfalca, his appearance was quite majestic, and there was a dignified and murderous atmosphere.

Military generals wear armor, carry bows and arrows, and pay homage to officials, which is the highest etiquette for military generals to meet civil officials in the Ming Dynasty. On the same day, Xiong Tingbi took office in Liaodong, and it was under the visit of a group of Liaodong generals dressed in this way that he took up the post of Liaodong Economic Strategy with high spirits.

Now, Li Xiao, the commander of Chifeng, has also expressed his loyalty to Lu Xiangsheng, the governor of the five provinces, in this way.

"The last general, Li Xiao, see Lord Lu."

"General Li is exempt from courtesy, please get up quickly."

Lu Xiangsheng laughed loudly, and after a little support, Li Xiao got up.

Lu Xiangsheng helped Li Xiao up, looked Li Xiao up and down, and then said with a smile: "What a General Li soldier, if he is a majestic tiger general, I heard that General Li killed Liukou in the south and attacked the Tartars in the north, and he is really a young hero who is not born in the Ming Dynasty." ”

"Master Lu praises falsely, why does Li Xiao be restrained."

"How to be! Li Xiao, you destroy the thieves in the south and attack the Tartars in the north, which is really a rare tiger general in my Ming Dynasty. Lu Xiangsheng stared at the tall and majestic Iron Dragon City in front of him, and said with emotion: "Li Xiao, you can build such a majestic city with the strength of one person, it's really not simple." Ben Governor asked himself, if Ben Governor had been in your place, how could he have achieved this? ”

Li Xiao laughed out loud, and the greetings with Lu Xiangsheng were even more affectionate.

"Governor Lu has worked hard from afar, please go into the city with the last general to rest." Li Xiao made a respectful gesture of welcome.

Lu Xiangsheng nodded in agreement, and then together with Li Xiao, he crossed the moat suspension bridge and entered the city from the west gate of Iron Dragon City.

Along the way, Lu Xiangsheng saw that in this iron dragon city, the planning is well organized, the streets are wide and straight, the black smoke of the blast furnace can be seen in the distance, the sparks of the frying furnace are splashing, the water hammer is flying up and down, the forging and smelting field is clanging, and all kinds of craftsmen are shuttling back and forth in the city like ants, carrying raw materials and finished products, and can't help but be amazed.

"Li Xiao, you are not only a famous general of this dynasty, but also a rare material for governing the world! Ben Du has seen many smelting sites, but none of them are as large as yours in Iron Dragon City, and the iron making is so sophisticated and efficient. ”

"Hehe, Iron Dragon City has some fruits, how can it be included in the green eyes of the governor." Li Xiao laughed: "Li Xiao's subordinates are all guarded by the army, and there is no imperial salary, but they just rely on the production of some steel, talk about equipping the army, and pay for the daily expenses of the soldiers." ”

"That's what the Governor admires!" Lu Xiangsheng suddenly looked emotional, and said loudly: "Li Xiao, you have received such elite soldiers, fought in the south and the north, and made great achievements, but did not cost the country a penny, such a merit, I know who can do it!" ”

Li Xiao was a little embarrassed by Lu Xiangsheng's praise, and hurriedly changed the topic: "The last general is shallow and short-sighted, and he really doesn't deserve such praise from adults." Not far in front is the mansion of the last general in the Iron Dragon City, please follow the last general to rest and sit down. ”

"Okay, this governor is here, there are indeed some important matters, and I want to discuss it with General Li." Lu Xiangsheng said with a smile.

Li Xiao heard him say this, so he asked Wu Liang to take Lu Xiangsheng and a group of guards to rest elsewhere, and after he changed into the regular uniform of the military attaché, he and Lu Xiangsheng entered the living room and sat down as guests.

"Lord Lu, this is the best West Lake Longjing tea sold by the merchants, please taste it."

After the subordinate brought the tea, Li Xiao waved his hand to let him retreat, and filled a cup for Lu Xiangsheng with his own hands, and then filled it to himself.

Lu Xiang lifted the tea lid, blew off the tea foam, took a sip, and nodded slightly: "Yes, this tea tastes pure, fragrant and sweet, but it is a good tea." ”

Without waiting for Li Xiao to speak, Lu Xiangsheng took another sip, then put down the teacup and sighed: "I only sigh that now the state affairs are declining, and thieves are rampant. ”

After Lu Xiangsheng finished speaking, he looked at Li Xiao, who was pretending to bow his head and drink tea, and asked in a low voice: "But I don't know what General Li thinks about the situation in Henan?" ”

"Oh, the last general is thinking, with the wise command of Lord Lu, my Ming official army, I will be able to successfully exterminate the Henan thieves in the coming day."

"Alas, Li Xiao, this governor didn't come to your Iron Dragon City to listen to you Li Xiao say these polite words. You tell you the truth, what do you really think about the situation in Henan, and even the situation of suppressing bandits in the whole country, and this governor wants to hear you tell me the truth. ”

Li Xiao groaned, holding the teacup in his hand, and a solemn look appeared on his face.

"What, is there anything that Mr. Li has to say? Rest assured, in this room, out of your mouth, into my ears, no matter what words you Li Xiao utters, this governor will forgive you for the innocence of those who speak. Lu Xiangsheng's face was full of expectation.

Li Xiao put down the teacup, straightened up, and solemnly arched his hand to Lu Xiangsheng and said, "Since the adults want to hear Li Xiao's sincere words, then the general will tell the truth." (To be continued.) )