The Eight Banners of the two Niu Lu who attacked the gap were almost completely annihilated, and the Mailer Ezhen Li Rate, who commanded the attack, entered the quicklime and couldn't open his eyes at all, and was escorted by several guards and fled.

The speed of the defeat and retreat of the Eight Banners was really fast, and the Eight Banners sent by Duoduo to prepare for the second batch of soldiers to enter the city had not yet approached the gap, and the Qing army in front retreated in an uproar, mixed with the green battalion soldiers who had been defeated before, and the Ming army was chasing and killing like a wolf and a tiger in the back.

Seeing this situation, the second batch of Eight Banners soldiers, who were confused, had no choice but to protect Li Shutai and retreat, and this attack could only be stopped.

The two Eight Banners of Niu Lu attacked the city, and less than a hundred of them came back alive, and all of them were injured, which made Duoduo furious. But seeing Li Shutai's swollen eyes like two peaches, he couldn't punish him anymore, so he could only order Li Shutai to heal his eyes, and then vent his anger on the opposite side of Sizhou City.

Dozens of red-coated cannons fired at the Sizhou city wall again, and the sound of "rumbling" cannons spread for dozens of miles, echoing on both sides of the Huai River.

From Sizhou to the east, the Huai River becomes wider and wider, and joins Hongze Lake at Guishan. Because the Yellow River seizes the Huai River into the sea, the silt sediment makes the Huai River no longer have an estuary, can only flow into the Hongze Lake, which was a small lake 80 or 90 years ago, and now has become a large lake with a undulating radius of hundreds of miles. At this time, the area of Hongze Lake was much larger than that of later generations, and it was also one of the largest lakes in the entire Ming Dynasty.

At this moment, on the lake east of Guishan, there are more than 100 flat-bottomed sand boats moored, the flags on the boats are waving, and the deck is full of soldiers, which is the water camp of the Pingnan Army. On one of the larger sand boats, Wu Ping stood on the deck, listening to the faint sound of cannons coming from Sizhou, more than ten miles away. The little slave that Chen Yue once bought in the human market has now become the deputy general of the water battalion, in charge of hundreds of boats.

At this moment, Wu Ping came to Hongze Lake with the fleet, and he was ordered by Chen Yue to lead Jin Shenghuan's troops to retreat from Sizhou.

Sizhou is located in the plain, there is no danger to defend the city and the city is small, basically it can't be defended, Chen Yue naturally knows this truth, and while sending Jin Shenghuan to defend the city, he has already prepared to receive the retreating men and horses.

It was certainly not feasible to retreat by land, and the south of Sizhou was all plains, and it was impossible to avoid the pursuit of the Qing cavalry. Fortunately, Sizhou is on the north side of the Huai River, and the Bianhe River flows through the city into the Huai River, and there is a water gate at the east gate of Sizhou. From the water gate to lead the people and horses out of the city, along the Huai River into Hongze Lake, no matter how powerful the Qing army is, there is nothing to do. Hongze Lake has a river lock at Qingqingkou, which is the same as the canal, through which the fleet can move between the Hongze Lake canal. The defenders of Sizhou could retreat to Huai'an or Yangzhou.

Now that the fleet has reached Guishan, and further west it will enter the Huai River, which is likely to be discovered by the Qing army, for the concealment and safety of the retreat, Wu Ping ordered the fleet to temporarily stop in the lake, and sent small boats into the Huai River to get in touch with Sizhou.

In the city of Sizhou, the situation has become more and more dangerous. Since the Eight Banners of the two Niu Lu soldiers were booby-trapped by the gap trap, the Qing army was like going crazy and attacked Sizhou City endlessly. The red-coated cannons tirelessly fired at the city day and night, and the green battalion soldiers and captured men launched a fierce attack on the city wall from three sides, causing more and more casualties on the defenders.

Now the first battalion of the 3,000-ping Southern Army of Jin Shenghuan's family has lost more than 1,000, because they fought the tough battle with the Qing army. The casualties of the Ming army in other departments are also quite heavy, after some counting, the loss of the kung fu army in a few days has exceeded 3,000 people, and the Zhang brothers of Xuyi surrendered to the Qing army, and the original 20,000 troops are now only more than 10,000.

In addition, the city wall has been bombarded with holes, there are several gaps of more than ten zhang or even dozens of zhang, all relying on the blockade of dozens of tiger squatting cannons in the Pingnan army, as well as the death battle of the army in the city, so that the Qing army did not break through the city, but in the eyes of the discerning people, the loss of Sizhou has become a foregone conclusion, only in the morning and evening of time.

In this case, the morale of the troops in the city was fluctuating, especially those who did not belong to the Pingnan army system, and the huge casualties had destroyed their morale, and if it had not been for the Governor's Office announcing early in the morning the punishment of those who surrendered, the families of those who surrendered would have been severely punished, and perhaps some people would have left the city to surrender long ago.

However, there were not only soldiers under the rule of the Ming Dynasty such as Huaiyang Fengyang in the city, but also guest troops such as Li Qifeng, Hu Shangyou, and Han Shangliang, whose homes were far away in Sichuan and Shaanxi, and the imperial court was beyond the reach of the whip.

Jin Shenghuan ordered these troops to be closely monitored to prevent them from fornicating with the Qing army outside the city.

But when the battle is like this, it is only a matter of time before they surrender to the enemy, and in these years, no country's court is as important as their own lives and glory.

Just when Sizhou was in danger, the people sent by Wu Ping entered Sizhou and told Jin Shenghuan that the fleet had arrived and asked him to prepare to retreat.

When Jin Shenghuan summoned the generals in the city and told them the news, the generals suddenly let out bursts of cheers, and the doubts in their hearts were suddenly swept away, it turned out that they were not used as cannon fodder, and Pingnanhou was still thinking about everyone!

There were more than 10,000 troops in the city and more than 30,000 people, and it was not easy to retreat in a hurry. If the whole army rushes forward and retreats, it will inevitably give the Qing army an opportunity.

Jin Shenghuan ordered that the people should be withdrawn first, then the local army, and finally the Pingnan army. Then, according to the actual situation, the order was formulated, and Liu Zhaoji was asked to pacify and supervise the entire evacuation, and for the soldiers and civilians who did not obey the management, the soldiers could be directly killed. Sizhou gave the Qing army heavy casualties, according to the brutal nature of the Eight Banners Army, if the Ming army withdrew, the Qing army would definitely slaughter the people, so Chen Yue had a life, and the safety of the people must be guaranteed.

The people's heart is the heart of the army, and most of the soldiers of the Pingnan Army are the sons of Lianghuai, and only by caring for the people will they be supported and loyal by the soldiers. Although Jin Shenghuan was a little puzzled by Chen Yue's "woman's benevolence", he could only obey his fate.

Although the other generals had a lot of subtleties about the people withdrawing before themselves, since the Pingnan army stayed until the end, they had nothing to say. In this case, the casualties that remain at the end are the greatest.

In view of the fact that it was impossible for the responding ships to evacuate everyone at once, Jin Shenghuan also ordered that all the wooden doors and doors in the city be gathered to make a simple raft, and the Huai River would not flow rapidly, and Sizhou could be evacuated by relying on the raft.

In the early morning, just as the Qing army was routinely bombarding the city, it suddenly found that a long fleet of ships suddenly sailed from the east and leaned against the canal outside the city of Sizhou.