1,000 wounded and 800 self-inflicted. This is the general law of warfare in the era of cold weapons, and of course this refers to the law under the condition that the combat strength and morale of the two sides are similar.

With the low morale of the Ming army before, coupled with the field battle of infantry against cavalry, although this war eliminated 1,800 or 900 Tartars, the number of losses of the Ming army was about this number. However, the Ming army that won the victory, because it controlled the battlefield, so except for the Ming soldiers who died on the spot, the other wounded people were treated one by one.

According to the assessment of the military doctors, about 1,000 people will be able to return to the army after recovering from their injuries, and 400 to 500 seriously injured will have varying degrees of disability. The field hospital, established under the new regulations, handled all the wounded with great efficiency and quickly housed them individually.

After Zhu Youzhen ascended the throne, he attached great importance to surgical medicine and military medicine, which was finally rewarded after the end of this war. After seeing that the wounded had been properly accommodated, the officers and men of the Liaodong Army finally dispelled some of their fears of being wounded. And Chongzhen went to inspect the field hospital after the combat meeting, and promised the wounded soldiers that even if they lost their combat ability after recovering from their injuries, the imperial court would arrange their future lives, which made many seriously injured soldiers who confirmed that they might be disabled also relieved.

In the past, the night wails of wounded soldiers at the end of each battle would demoralize an army for several days. However, after the Battle of Luanhe, the soldiers of the Ming army did not hear this terrible wail again. The optimism of the wounded who were transported to the rear early the next morning caused many Ming officers and men to leave behind a lot of burdens.

It was on this morning that Zu Dashou and other Liaodong generals realized that in addition to the family members who had been raised by their side for a long time, the ordinary soldiers under them had surpassed themselves in their loyalty to the emperor after this battle. This loyalty is not out of reverence for the imperial power in the past, but a real allegiance to Chongzhen himself.

If it is said that Zu Dashou and other generals still had some pride in their achievements when Chongzhen ascended the throne, they thought that without them resisting the Houjin army on the Liaodong front, the imperial court would not be able to sit back and relax in the capital. If the imperial court wanted to fight their crooked ideas, they would set up a stall to see who could come to Liaodong to command this army to resist the attack of Houjin.

The careful thinking of these Liaodong generals quickly disappeared after the new army successively won the victories of Fengzhen and Shimen, and the emperor personally rushed to the East Route Army to supervise the battle, not only won the victory of Luanhe, but also won the military heart of the Liaodong Army.

They dared to fool the civil officials sent to Liaodong by the imperial court before, completely because they felt that these civil officials did not know the actual situation in Liaodong, and they were unwilling to put down their shelves to appease ordinary soldiers, but they just blindly put pressure on the righteousness of the imperial court, which made the military and people of Liaodong extremely disappointed in the imperial court.

Therefore, as long as they instigated the army slightly, those civilian officials had no choice but to compromise with them, and could only rely on them to govern the military and civilians in Liaodong. It is precisely because they feel that they have these capitals that Zu Dashou and other generals in western Liaoning dare to enclose land outside the Guan, absorb Liao people as their own tuntian, and collude with some illegal businessmen to smuggle all kinds of materials to Houjin.

Once they realized that the imperial court still had an army in their hands that could withstand the Houjin, and that the emperor could drive the Liaodong army to fight on the battlefield and win the victory, they became dispensable in front of the emperor, and these generals immediately gave in to Chongzhen.

What's more, this young emperor is not only not easy to fool, but also has a hard heart. At least Zu Dashou felt that he would not dare to openly fire at his own deserters on the battlefield, otherwise his soldiers might mutini on the battlefield. Zu Dashou even thought that Chongzhen ordered Wu Xiang and other fleeing generals to attack the Tartar camp on Jinshan, and probably didn't think about letting them all survive, but Wu Xiang was lucky, and the surrounded Tartars had no desperate plans at all, so they chose to flee and break through.

Unlike the military officials who immediately surrendered to the emperor when they realized that the situation had changed, the civil officials such as Wang Zaijin and Wang Zhichen, who had always been uneasy, did not feel at ease when they received the news of the victory in this battle, but became more worried.

This concern was not only that they were afraid that the young and vigorous emperor would overestimate the Later Jin army because of his easy victories in a row, and eventually cause the Ming army to encounter an even greater setback.

There is also an unspeakable uneasiness, that is, the way in which the emperor mobilized the courage of the Ming army in Liaodong to fight, which is neither the righteousness of the monarch nor the moral doctrine of Confucianism, Chongzhen has this kind of thought that seems to be detached from the way of the sage, so that Wang Zaijin, Wang Zhichen and other civil officials are extremely worried that Chongzhen will become another deviant Zhengde emperor.

No, it should be said that what Chongzhen is doing now is going further than Emperor Zhengde. After all, Emperor Zhengde was just tired of the cumbersome etiquette system, and in general, he was still extremely in awe of the sage's learning.

However, Chongzhen's behavior was different, and the young emperor, after ascending the throne, did not follow the custom of holding a sutra feast to receive the teachings of the sages, but instead established the Royal Academy of Sciences, an institution for the study of sideways. If it weren't for the fact that the Royal Academy of Sciences did not belong to the official institution established by the imperial court, but was an institution without a name set up by the internal government, it is estimated that it would not have been established in the first place.

Because of the struggle between the members of the Donglin Party and the Eunuch Party, Chongzhen was given an extremely relaxed environment when he ascended the throne, and the young emperor also changed the Liangjing Guozijian into two universities in addition to the move of establishing the Royal Academy of Sciences. Whether it is the Royal Academy of Sciences or the transformation of Guozijian into a university, these two institutions are not the existence of the Ming Dynasty that can influence the situation of the court, so no one is willing to risk angering the emperor to oppose it.

But when the Royal Academy of Sciences was associated with the university, it was as if something had changed, and it had a great impact on the young scholars. Although this kind of influence is mostly within the group of scholars in the north, it is enough for the emperor to use to spread his voice to fight against the clear gossip officials who influence public opinion in Shilin.

An emperor who has won the support of young scholars and won the allegiance of the army, if he is a person who refuses to settle down, then it is not a good thing for the court that is now divided by party strife.

It was at this moment that Wang Zaijin, who was still in the military department, could no longer regard Chongzhen as a young emperor who still needed the assistance and guidance of his old ministers and was not very mature in his thinking. Chongzhen, who has only been on the throne for more than two years, has successfully voiced his voice and is a court opponent that civil officials need to take seriously.

After Wang Zaijin, Wang Zhichen and others crossed the river, their actions in front of Chongzhen were obviously much more cautious than before, and they also faintly had a little meaning to regain the power of operational command. Although Wang Zaijin and Wang Zhichen had the title of commanding the Ming army on the Eastern Road, they were too far away from the front line, so when the emperor arrived at the Eastern Route Army, he easily took away the military power of the two.

When Chongzhen won the battle of Luanhe with the Eastern Route Army, the idea of the two wanting to take back the command of the army and separate the direct connection between Chongzhen and the army can only be said to be impossible to realize. However, Wang Zaijin was unwilling to continue to stay in the rear this time, and he had to follow Chongzhen's side, which also made Zhu Youzhen have to agree.

On the morning of 3 December, Zhu Youzhen marched to Wuzhong'an in the north with the 1st and 2nd Guards Divisions, the 3rd Battalion of the Liaodong Army, and the artillery regiment that had finally arrived at Luanhe.

In the afternoon of the same day, this army and the two battalions of He Kegang, who had set out yesterday, met at Wuzhong'an. Zhu Youzhen learned from He Kegang that when they arrived at Wuchong'an last night, the Horqin Department led by Oba had retreated to the west again, and the camp established by the Ming army in Wuchong'an had directly fallen into their hands.

Less than an hour after they occupied the camp, the main force of the Tartars withdrew from the east to Wuchong'an, and because the Ming army occupied the camp in dangerous terrain, the Tartar army made a detour from the north of the camp and continued to retreat directly to the west. Due to the darkness of the sky and the unfamiliarity with the geography, He Kegang ordered his subordinates to guard the camp and did not send men and horses out of the camp to intercept him.

Looking at He Kegang, who knelt in front of him and pleaded guilty to himself, Zhu Youzhen stepped forward and gently helped him, before he said with a smile: "Your task is just to monitor the movements of the Horqin Department and seize the Wuchongan region, I don't remember asking you to block the main force of the Tartars."

Now that you've done your job, I have nothing to blame you for. As for judging the situation, whether or not to make a decision to attack beyond the mission, that in itself is your authority as a front-line commander, and I don't think you have anything to bear. Now you still continue to tell us where the main forces of the Tartars have retreated, and how many troops have you sent to follow and monitor? ”

Although He Kegang made the decision not to attack last night, he was still a little afraid of how the emperor would react after knowing his decision.

It wasn't until Chongzhen simply skimmed over this matter that He Kegang's mood relaxed, and after relieving the worries in his heart, he answered the emperor's questions more smoothly.

The Ming cavalry, who had arrived at Wuchong'an with the main force of Wunag last night, repaired in the Ming camp for a night, and then continued to reconnoiter to the west at dawn. Soon after Chongzhen's army arrived at Wuchong'an, the army sent back news that the main force of the Tartars had stopped at the Ninja Pass.

The detailed map from Wuchong'an to the Ninja Pass was quickly found by the staff officers, and after careful observation for a while, Zhu Youzhen pointed to a village 5 miles away from the Ninja Pass and said: "The 1st and 2nd Guards Division, as well as the three battalions of Zu Dashou, Zu Dale, and Wu Xiang, will continue to advance with me and camp here tonight.

Da Sima and He Kegang led the rest of the armies to settle here, and Da Sima was stationed in Wuchong'an to supervise the transfer of military supplies in the rear, and He Kegang would bring the men and horses of the battalion, the baggage troops and the 12-pounder guns of the artillery regiment to come to make peace with us tomorrow. ”

Although Wang Zaijin had a different opinion and wanted to exchange tasks with the emperor, Chongzhen flatly refused. In Zhu Youzhen's view, it is okay for Wang Zaijin to do strategic planning and logistics management far from the front line, but letting him go to the front line to command the army to fight is a bit like catching ducks and putting them on the shelves.

To some extent, Chongzhen's own performance in personally commanding the army for the first time was better than Wang Zaijin's previous command of the Ming army on the Eastern Road.

Of course, this is also related to the fact that civil officials such as Wang Zaijin and Wang Zhichen would rather appoint private staff to handle official affairs than listen to the generals to express their opinions.

This is not only manifested in the fact that the civilian officials seized the military command power of the Ming army, but also because these civilian officials regarded the battle plan as a war game for the civilian staff, and few civilian officials were willing to listen to the different views of the generals on the strategic plan.

Whether it was for the safety of the Ming army or his own safety, Zhu Youzhen did not plan to let Wang Zaijin interfere in the next operational command of the Ming army on the East Road.

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