When Chongzhen's team arrived in front of the west gate of Jizhou City, there were already hundreds of people who returned behind them. And on the avenue in the distance, after seeing the emperor's banner before, the people who had slowed down a little, saw so many people following the emperor back to Jizhou City, and suddenly stopped from time to time, turned their heads to look behind them.

Among these people, an old man with a white cloth wrapped in his head and a grandson sitting on a large wheelbarrow gritted his teeth and thought for a long time, and finally couldn't help shouting to the eldest son who was leading the donkey in front and the younger son who was pushing the cart behind: "Stop the big pillar, turn the car around, and we should go home and not leave." ”

The old man sat on a double-roped wheelbarrow, a large unicycle unique to the north, pulled by a donkey in front and pushed by a person in the back, and an arched mat was installed on the top, which could carry thousands of pounds of goods at a time. The old man sat on the right side with his young grandson in his arms, and on the left side was a pile of cages, an older couple pulling a donkey in front and a younger couple pushing a cart in the back, followed by several half-grown children with sad faces.

Hearing the old man's words, several children suddenly smiled, these teenage children may have been more excited when they first went out, but after walking down the 3 or 4 miles, they already felt that their legs were a little insensitive, and then they felt that this trip was really not fun.

However, unlike these children's happy appearance when they heard that they were going home, the middle-aged man pulling the donkey in front of him suddenly turned back with a sad face and said, "Dad, haven't we already talked about it?" First go to Uncle Sanniang's house in the countryside of Shunyi to hide, and then come back after those eastern Tartars leave.

I heard that the Tartars in the east were very fierce, and even the army of the imperial court had hundreds of thousands of people killed in their hands. As for those officials in Jizhou City, the son felt that it was also for nothing. With the lives of our family, we can't count on these officials. ”

The old man who was still sitting on the wheelbarrow with a weak breath just now, but he was holding his grandson with one hand and patting the wooden block on the car with the other, and scolded his son with a full expression: "You elm pimple, didn't you just see that the emperor came to Jizhou City?" With the emperor here, how can there be anything wrong in this Jizhou City?

If Jizhou City is in danger, will the emperor still come? Even if those Tartars surround Jizhou City, the army of the King of Qin in the world will continue to come to the rescue of Jizhou City. Hurry back quickly, your third uncle's family is not as good as ours. Let's go to the whole family, what will we eat this winter? What to drink? It's not as good as your own kennel. Looking back, I don't believe it, these Tartars can still grow three heads and six arms, and even the emperor's army can't stop it? ”

In the old man's reprimand, the middle-aged man pulling the donkey finally turned around hesitantly. With this family as an example, more than a dozen families on the side suddenly turned around and walked back.

Those who can flee with their families are at least those with some family background. If you run out and don't even have food and clothing, you don't need to run, and it doesn't seem to make the difference between being hacked to death by Tartars and dying of cold and starvation in exile. Besides, Jizhou is so big, the Tartar may not be able to find him, but at this time, running out and freezing in the wild for a night is a life gone.

These people abandoned their family business and fled, but they were really not confident in whether the imperial court could keep Jizhou City, as long as there was such a little hope, they were unwilling to leave their homes. And the arrival of Chongzhen made these people who fled out inexplicably give rise to a little hope, and the confidence that the Ming Dynasty would drive the invading Tartars away.

It is this hope and confidence that has once again brought these people back to Jizhou City. Even for these families with some family backgrounds, it is a luxury to be able to resume their previous lives after a flight. It is good to be at home for a thousand days, but it is difficult to go out for a while, which seems more real in this era.

The clan and township party atmosphere of self-defense has made the exclusion of foreign population, which has become a norm in the Ming Dynasty. Just as these Jizhou people had previously rejected refugees who had fled from the Zunhua region, they were also excluded once they had gone elsewhere.

It's okay to have relatives and friends to go to, at least there is a place to stay. Refugees who have no relatives or friends to flee to often become the targets of local treacherous people. Therefore, the people of Daming are unwilling to flee their hometowns until they are forced to do so.

Zhu Youzhen stopped outside the urn outside the west gate of Jizhou City, and did not enter the door immediately. He looked at the crowd gathered behind him, and suddenly turned his horse's head and ran to the end of the procession, in front of the people who were following closely behind him.

Zhu Youzhen's body leaned forward, and asked gently to the people closest to him, "You came back with me, but do you have anything to say to me?" If you have something to say, say it quickly, the weather is cold at night, and if you don't hurry up, it's not fun to sleep in the wilderness. ”

Although Chongzhen's actions shocked a large part of the people, there were still some young people who looked at this young man very gently, and he was not as vicious as the officials he had seen in the past, so he dared to ask.

"Are you really a saint?" "Sage, can this Jizhou City be saved?" "Sage, you still can't leave when you come..."Lian Shanxiang was trying to go up and isolate the emperor from these people, these people are not the people of the capital, God knows if there are any Houjin spies here.

However, he was soon stopped by the emperor, Chongzhen sat up straight on the horse, tried his best to let more people see him, and then said: "Yes, I am the Ming Emperor Zhu Youzhen, I came to Jizhou naturally to keep Jizhou City, I not only want to keep Jizhou City, I also want to drive those Houjin robbers out of the Great Wall, so that everyone can live and work in peace and contentment." If I don't drive those Tartars out of the Great Wall, I won't return to Beijing. ”

With Chongzhen's dialogue with these people on the road, the people near the west gate of Jizhou City also gathered when they heard the news, these people are very worried these days, although several troops were transferred from the direction of the capital, and the local gentry also contributed money and food, and recruited many people to build fortifications.

But whether it was an official from the capital or a local gentry, no one ever told them whether this Jizhou city could be defended or not. However, the refugees who fled from Zunhua brought rumors that the invasion of the Tatars was brutal and ferocious, and the officers and soldiers were not opponents at all.

The news brought by these refugees made the people of Jizhou, who were already frightened, even more panicked, and many people simply abandoned their homes and left under the pressure of day by day. And the fleeing trend of the people greatly shook the confidence of the local defenders of Jizhou to defend the city. Even the new army in the capital, under the atmosphere of Jizhou City, began to become nervous.

Now the people of Jizhou have heard of the arrival of the emperor, and they are full of confidence to make remarks, not only to keep Jizhou City, but also to drive the Tartars out of the Great Wall. No matter what they were doing, they all left it behind at this moment and ran outside the west gate, wanting to hear what the emperor had to say.

When Mao Yuanyi, Cui Chengxiu, Jiang Dejing and other officials and gentry in Jizhou City received the news and squeezed out of the west gate to greet the emperor, they saw a young man wearing bright yellow leaf armor, standing on a wagon with various boxes strapped, and giving a speech to the thousands of people surrounding the truck on three sides.

The onlookers listened attentively to the emperor's speech, and even the coughing sound was rarely heard, and on the periphery of the crowd, there were people who kept gathering. Under the wagon where the emperor stood, a circle of sergeants maintained order on the scene.

When Mao Yuanyi and the others saw this unexpected scene, they all looked at each other and were speechless for a while. It was about less than 100 meters from the gate of the urn city to the place where Chongzhen was standing, but this distance was already full of people, and Mao Yuanyi and the others did not dare to order the sergeant to clear the way at this time, so they could only put down their bodies and slowly squeeze through.

A few sergeants with big shoulders and round waists squeezed a gap in front, Mao Yuanyi and other officials took the opportunity to follow, and in the complaints of those who were squeezed away, Mao Yuanyi and others finally approached the outside of the carriage where Chongzhen was.

Lian Shanxiang, who was guarding the emperor's side, had already recognized Mao Yuanyi and the others who were walking through the crowd. Under his instructions, the imperial sergeant who surrounded the carriage let go of a small opening and let Mao Yuanyi and others enter. Mao Yuanyi and the others, who had entered the inner circle of the sergeant's defense, had time to prick up their ears and listen to what the emperor was saying when he stood in the carriage.

“… Jiannu invaded the border this time, and the Jurchen Tartars were only 1 or 20,000, and the Mongolian Tatars were about the same number, and the two combined were less than 30,000.

At present, the number of soldiers and civilians inside and outside Jizhou alone has reached 70,000 or 80,000, and reinforcements from Shanxi, Baoding, Shandong, and Henan are still rushing over. If all the reinforcements arrive, we will need at least 15 or 60,000 horses, more than five times that of the Houjin Tartars.

Zunhua is thousands of miles away from Houjin, and there is one less of these Tartars, and there is no place to replenish them. But we're different, even if we lose a few men, we can continue to pull men from the rear...

The more we fight, the more men we have; The more Houjin fights, the fewer people there are. We are fighting on our own soil, and wounded soldiers can be sent to the rear to be cared for. Houjin is an intruder, and if they are injured, it will be a dead end...

We are fighting to defend our families and our own property, and Kim is a gang of robbers who want to rob wealth. So our war is a just war, and Houjin's war is an unjust war...

Although the Jurchen Tartars and the Mongol Tatars entered the customs together to rob, not all Mongols were willing to work for the Jurchen Tatars. The Jurchen Tartars defeated the Mongol tribes in Liaodong by force and killed their parents and brothers, wouldn't they be worried that these Mongols would rebel?

Therefore, as long as we, the Ming army and the people, are united in eating a few Jurchen Tartars today and a few Jurchen Tartars tomorrow, there will be chaos inside these Tartars, and there will be no more forces to invade us.

With so many reasons for these Tartars to lose battles, why should we not fight for victory, drive them out of our homes, and defend our families? ”

As the emperor continued to wave his hand and speak, the people around him were fascinated, and a relaxed expression appeared on their faces, and they applauded in response to the emperor's statement, as if Jizhou City was indestructible at this moment.

Mao Yuanyi, who was watching from the sidelines, suddenly felt that the warm scene in front of him suddenly disappeared, and the gloomy and failed atmosphere that had surrounded Jizhou City before.