Wang Yuan did not publish the list of more than 100,000 dead soldiers annihilated in Tongzhou. It is not that the identity of the deceased cannot be verified. In fact, each soldier is equipped with a nameplate engraved with his name and place of origin around his waist, so more than 70,000 of the more than 100,000 soldiers who died on the battlefield can be identified. Except, of course, for those who died in the flames and whose nameplates were burned, and for those whose bodies were broken and could not be verified. Among these more than 70,000 people, in fact, the vast majority were recruits who were forcibly recruited into the army by Li Mao.

The reason why Wang Yuan did not release the list of the dead was actually because he did not want to complicate the situation. Or maybe it's a little tricky. At such times, it is not appropriate to publish the names of the war dead, which will have a negative impact on the people. At this time, letting the living go home for reunion is also an act of catalyzing public opinion to turn to themselves.

Sure enough, after these news came one after another, the local state officials who saw the balance of strength clearly and decided to stand in line immediately made their choice. Chen Bangyan, the Taishou of Chuzhou, located on the bank of the Huainan Provincial Canal, was the first to announce his support for the Chengdu Imperial Court where Wang Xiangguo was located, and issued a crusade against Li Mao, who usurped the throne. Chen Bangyan was single-handedly supported by Cui's and is grateful to Cui's Dade. After the tragedy of the Cui family, Chen Bangyan secretly did some investigation and found some clues under the control of the imperial court. Later, Zheng Qiushan's daughter was named a concubine by Li Mao, and Zheng Qiushan was added to the rank of knight, Chen Bangyan's heart was like a mirror, knowing that it must be the collusion between the imperial court and Zheng Qiushan, and he poisoned Cui Daoyuan and others.

Chen Bangyan didn't dare to be too publicistic before, after all, Li Mao was the emperor of the Tang Dynasty, and in line with the pragmatic attitude of self-preservation, he chose to keep quiet. Later, when the Emperor Taishang was reinstated and announced the fifteen major sins of Li Mao in the world, Chen Bangyan also thought about making a public statement. But he still didn't dare to do it. Because Li Mao recruited troops on a large scale and had many soldiers and horses, it was not clear whether Wang Yuan would be able to withstand Li Mao's encirclement and suppression. But now, Wang Yuan has won a big victory, the opportunity is ripe, and if he doesn't express his position, he will lose the opportunity to stand in line. Chen Bangyan, who has a keen sense of politics, decided to take a decisive side.

Chen Bangyan ordered that all the people of the three counties under the jurisdiction of Chuzhou City be moved into Chuzhou City by Chen Bangyan, closed the city gates, built high city walls, and spread the news of supporting the Chengdu Imperial Court and crusading against the usurper rebel Li Mao.

Chen Bangyan's move was like lighting a fire on the hay. A few days later, the Shouzhou government announced a crusade against Li Mao in support of the Chengdu court. Then, the state capitals of Huainan Province, such as Luzhou and Xuanzhou, all made similar statements.

Soon this momentum spread to Gangnam Province. Jiangning Prefecture, Hangzhou Prefecture and other major state capitals have long been complained about Li Mao's forced conscription of troops and money and grain. After hearing that the states of Huainan Province announced their support for the Chengdu court, they also expressed their support for the Chengdu court and Wang Xiangguo's side. For a time, other small state capitals in the east and west of the Yangtze River also expressed their positions.

In Northern Hebei Province, Hokkaido, on the south bank of the Yellow River, was the first to take a stand. Beihai Taishou Helan Jinming was Wang Yuan's old friend, and he had long been dissatisfied with Li Mao, and he was finally able to make a voice at this time. After that, five or six state capitals such as Pingyuan City, Weizhou and Qizhou also expressed their positions. A fire broke out in Li's backyard.

These state capitals said that they were crusading against Li Mao, but they actually had no power. But they could kill the officials in the city who were sent by Li Mao to recruit troops and collect money and food, and then close the city gates and adopt a blockade policy. In this way, Li Mao's plan to recruit troops and collect money and food could not be implemented. indirectly hit Li Mao's Chang'an court.

In just over a month from late October to the end of November, all parts of the Tang Dynasty announced that they would no longer recognize Li Mao's throne, and there were more than 20 large and small state capitals that clearly expressed their support for the Chengdu imperial court. And the most terrible thing is that most of them are distributed in the densely populated southeast with plenty of money and food, which is a great blow to Li Mao.

From the eighth day of the first month of November, Wang Yuan and Gao Xianzhi led a large army of 140,000 Shence troops to Chang'an City, and Li Mao could not divide his troops to punish these defective state capitals, so he could only defend Chang'an City, strengthen the city defense every day, train soldiers and horses, and intend to hold Chang'an and wait for an opportunity to counterattack.

When the situation is in full swing, there is a city that has to be mentioned here, that is, Yangzhou City. While almost all the state capitals in Huainan Province announced their defections, Yangzhou City, a city favored by Wang Yuan, did not announce their defections. The reason is very simple, Yangzhou Taishou is Shen Zifang, and the two brothers of the Cui family, Cui Yuanrong and Cui Yuanping, are in charge of conscription and grain here.

Shen Zifang and the Cui brothers are well aware of their situation, Shen Zifang went back on his word and took refuge in Zheng Qiushan, and the Cui brothers colluded with outsiders to kill their father and brother, and they had no way back. Even if they were willing to defect, Wang Yuan was afraid that he would not spare them. Therefore, when everyone announced their defection, Shen Zifang and the Cui family brothers were desperately scavenging for money and food in Yangzhou City to serve Li Mao. Because they know that the only hope now is to be able to support Li Mao to defeat Wang Yuan and them, recruit one more strong man, and scavenge one more grain of grain, they will have more hope.

However, what Shen Zifang and the Cui brothers did was contrary to the ideas of the people of Yangzhou. The people of Yangzhou have long been fed up with the forced conscription of soldiers and grain by Shen Zifang and the Cui brothers. Before, they had just resigned themselves, but this time, the silent people were no longer silent, and they chose to fight.

At first, because the people didn't know the roles played by Shen Zifang and the Cui brothers, they thought they were also forced to do it. Many people ran to the yamen of Yangzhou Mansion to see Shen Zifang, trying to persuade Shen Zifang. However, Shen Zifang's answer was that he had thrown dozens of leading civilians into prison with whips and sticks. Shen Zifang openly threatened the people: "Whoever dares to disobey the orders of the government, and who dares to gather people to make trouble again, will be treated as a traitor, and the whole family will be beheaded." ”

The anger of the people can be imagined, but they have nothing to do for the time being, after all, Shen Zifang has soldiers in his hands. There are still more than 1,000 defenders in Yangzhou, plus a total of 2,000 soldiers and horses trained by the government service regiment, and the people dare not speak out.

By mid-November, tens of thousands of Yangzhou disciples who had been captured on the battlefield in Tongzhou and repatriated arrived in Yangzhou by boat. A few days after these people arrived in Yangzhou, the two brothers Shen Zifang and Cui Yuanping and Cui Yuanrong began to arrest these strong men who escaped death again, forcing these people to rejoin the army and fight. This incident completely detonated the anger of the people. What made this anger even more inflated was the amazing secrets and things that the children who had returned home had brought back.

The Cui brothers colluded with Zheng Qiushan to kill their father and brother, and Shen Zifang took refuge in Zheng Qiushan as a tiger. The eldest lady of the Cui family has married Wang Xiangguo as his wife, and Wang Xiangguo vows to avenge the Cui family. The two generals Zeng Guozhong, Qian Gaozhi, the former defenders of Yangzhou City, defected and joined Wang Xiangguo's Shence Army and so on. These things made all the people of Yangzhou see the true colors of Shen Zifang and the Cui family brothers.

Hundreds of strong men who had been promoted to petty leaders in the army gathered on a cold and windy night on November 17 to discuss a plan. That night, the two leaders entered the military camp in Beicheng, Yangzhou, and asked to meet Hu Yibiao, the only leading general in Yangzhou. This Hu Yibiao was originally a lieutenant under Zeng Guozhong. After Zeng Guozhong and Qian Gaozhi led the army north, he was promoted to deputy general and was responsible for the garrison of Yangzhou. Hu Yibiao was shocked when he heard the two people who asked to see him describe the situation of the Battle of Tongzhou, and knew that the two generals, Zeng Guozhong and Qian Gaozhi, had joined the Shence Army after making military achievements.

Hu Yibiao was already dissatisfied with Shen Taishou's behavior, and he was muttering in his heart recently. was forced by Shen Taishou to do a lot of things that harmed the people of Yangzhou, and he was uneasy in his heart. Hearing these things at this moment, I suddenly felt that I really couldn't go on like this.

The two leaders frankly told Hu Yibiao that the people could not bear it anymore and were about to launch a riot against Shen Zifang and the Cui brothers and other officials. Because Hu Yibiao has soldiers and horses in his hands, he will inevitably become an opponent, and the intention of the two of them here is to ask Hu Yibiao whether he chooses to be an enemy with hundreds of thousands of people in the city, or like Zeng Guozhong, Qian Gaozhi and other generals, abandon the darkness and turn to the light. Wang Xiangguo has made it clear that he wants to break the bodies of Shen Zifang and the Cui family brothers into thousands of pieces, and if Hu Yibiao is willing to do this for Wang Xiangguo, it will be a great achievement. The two also told Hu Yibiao that the people of the city were ready to do it tonight, and if he Hu Yibiao was unwilling, he could kill them now to inform. But whether he could resist the wrath of the people of the whole city, he asked him to weigh it himself.

Hu Yibiao was still a little hesitant, but when he followed the two to the bank of the canal in the city, he saw that the people were gathering in the dark, so he didn't hesitate anymore. He understood that the reason why the people had come to him to tell him the truth was because he had more than a thousand soldiers and horses guarding the gates of the four cities. The people were worried that Shen Zifang would come to find them after they ran away, otherwise they wouldn't need themselves at all.

In fact, another reason why the people actually asked Hu Yibiao to persuade him to do it together was that they didn't want to have too many casualties. After all, Hu Yibiao had more than 1,000 heavily armed soldiers, and when the conflict broke out, the people were afraid that they would have to pay a huge price to succeed, so they came to persuade Hu Yibiao to join the gang. Otherwise, with Hu Yibiao's usual actions, the people wouldn't mind even slaughtering him together.

The riot began on the fourth watch. A gong on a stone railing bridge on the canal sounded like a fuse of the first bucket of **, and in a moment, the sound of gongs in the east and west of the canal and in the streets of the city clanged loudly. In the dark alleys, countless torches were lit, and countless people gathered and began to rush along several main streets from all directions to the Yangzhou Mansion.

Originally, there were only a few thousand people who knew that there was going to be an incident tonight, after all, in order not to leak the news, they couldn't tell all the people in the city. Most of these thousands of people are strong men who have escaped death on the battlefield. But after the gong sounded throughout the city, as soon as the awakened people of every household learned that they were going to riot and resist, men, women and children immediately got up one after another, and rushed into the street one by one with sticks and sticks, wooden forks and mallets, and joined the angry crowd. Among them, there were even some old men and women who were trembling and unsteady in walking, holding wooden sticks in their hands and panting and shouting with their leaky mouths, moving with the crowd. It can be said that all the people are soldiers, and all the people are in trouble.

Shen Zifang was woken up in the warm quilt. When he heard that the people had rioted and began to rush towards the mansion, Shen Zifang was stunned.

When the concubine in the bed heard that the people were rioting and were about to storm the palace, she immediately cried, blaming Shen Zifang for not doing good things and annoying the people, and asked Shen Zifang to quickly pack up the gold and silver and flee with her.

Shen Zifang, who was furious, almost broke the neck of the crying woman with a slap, and immediately went out of the room after getting dressed, and ordered the regimental training soldiers and horses stationed in the government office and the officials to organize the defense immediately. These people are all the people raised by Shen Zifang in order to forcibly requisition grain and grass and strong men. Most of them are idlers and ruffians on the streets, and the price is that these people do not have to go to war as soldiers, and they can have no worries about food and clothing. There were also more than 1,000 of these people, and they were originally stationed in other places, but during this time, Shen Zifang smelled that something was wrong with the atmosphere, so he arranged for them to be stationed in the government to prevent accidents. Sure enough, it came in handy today.

The Cui brothers, who also lived in the mansion, also came in rags, and hurriedly asked what was wrong after seeing Shen Zifang.

Shen Zifang scolded coldly: "What can it be? It's just a rebellion for the people. What kind of climate can it become? just took the opportunity to kill a group of fierce people, and the Diao people didn't know the height of the sky during this time, and they took the kindness of their officials as weakness and bullied. ”

The three of them hurried to the outer hall of the mansion. When they saw the torches and crowds of people outside from the wall, Shen Zifang was speechless in fright. He didn't dare to say anything big anymore, there were probably tens of thousands of people gathered in the palace square, and it was still increasing, this was not an ordinary rebellion, this was a riot.

"Quick, go and give Hu Yibiao an order, and tell him to lead troops to reinforce quickly." Shen Zifang shouted.

The people began to attack the government. The door of the lobby of the government was tightly closed, and seven or eight iron bolts were put up, and they could not be opened for a while. Many people began to climb through the walls on both sides. The regimental training and the officials took bows and arrows at the top of the wall and shot dozens of people at the time. But this aroused the anger of the people, a group of people carried a log and slammed the door desperately, and more people hurriedly threw torches into the front yard of the roof of the mansion and the Tang Dynasty. Eventually, a fire broke out in the lobby, and several of the buildings were on fire, crackling and burning.

Shen Zifang and the Cui brothers had to retreat to the wall of the second entrance with their people to defend. Ordered the round gate to be blocked with stones and trees as a second line of defense. The people rushed in and launched a fierce assault on the second reassurance. The wall of the second entrance is very low, it can't be defended at all, many people climb over the wall and fight with the regimental exercises, the regimental training officials are small, and dozens of them are quickly killed.

"Why hasn't Hu Yibiao, this bastard, come yet? What is this bastard doing? Shen Zifang almost fainted in a hurry, and shouted and scolded.

A catcher flew over to report: "Shen Taishou, Hu Yibiao said he was not coming." ”

"What? What does this bastard say? ”

"Hu Yibiao said, Taishou you and the two sons of the Cui family have done a lot of injustice, harming the Cui family and the people of the city, and he has decided to take refuge in Wang Xiangguo. Let the two sons of Taishou and the Cui family take the initiative to surrender. If he doesn't bring troops to arrest you, it's a matter of love. ”

Hearing this, Shen Zifang, Cui Yuanrong and Cui Yuanping looked like earth. The Cui brothers grabbed Shen Zifang's arm one by one and shouted, "What should I do? What to do? ”

Shen Zifang scolded angrily: "How do I know? What else can I do? Run. Escape through the back door. ”

"Yes, yes, back door, back door." Cui Yuanping and Cui Yuanrong pulled their legs and ran back, Shen Zifang rushed into the bedroom, his concubine was hurriedly dressing, and Shen Zifang took off her clothes in two.

The concubine shouted, "When is it, are you still thinking about doing something?" ”

"Do your mother's business." Shen Zifang took off her clothes and put the concubine's red jacket on her body indiscriminately.

The concubine was stunned and said, "What are you doing?" ”

Shen Zifang didn't say a word, grabbed a handful of jewelry from the dresser and inserted it on his head, reached out and pulled a gauze towel on his head, grabbed a handful of rouge gouache and wiped it on his face, and then covered his beard with a handkerchief, raised his feet and ran out.

"Phew, it turned out that I was pretending to be a woman and running away. You shameless. The concubine understood, covered her chest and scolded with a sneer.

In normal times, Shen Zifang would fan her with two mouths. Now Shen Zifang has no time. He ran briskly along the corridor towards the back door, and when he came to the backyard, he happened to see the two Cui brothers coming to the back door and desperately pulling the lock.

Shen Zifang lowered his head and ran forward quickly, took out the key and opened them, the Cui brothers didn't recognize who he was for a while, and they didn't have time to care about this, as soon as the door opened, they couldn't wait to rush out the back door. The back door connects to a narrow alley, which is unexpectedly empty. The Cui brothers ran quickly towards the entrance of the alley, and Shen Zifang followed behind with his head and face wrapped. When they reached the entrance of the alley, a group of people with torches had just rushed from another street entrance. The Cui brothers were so frightened that they hurriedly rushed from an alley in the oblique stab, but Shen Zifang was seen by the people and had no time to flee after the Cui brothers.

"Stop, what are you doing?" The crowd of people made a noise and rushed quickly.

Shen Zifang pinched his throat and pointed sharply at the alley where the Cui brothers fled and shouted, "Shen Zifang, they ran away from here." The slaves also came to arrest them. Chase after it. ”

Shen Zifang likes to listen to music on weekdays, and she also likes to sing songs with her voice pinched and pretending to be a woman, but she didn't expect it to come in handy today. Although the voice was unpleasant, it did not arouse the suspicion of the people. More than a dozen people rushed over, and sure enough, they saw a few figures in the alley and flew immediately