Hauge raised his eyes again to look at Ningqiang City to the south.

That lonely city was besieged by his army of more than 30,000 people, but he always insisted on it and stopped him on his way to attack Sichuan.

He frowned and asked Luo Luohun on the side, "How many Southern troops are there in Ningqiang City?" ”

"General Hui is Wang Yingxiong's deputy general Wang Xiang's 8,000 men."

Haoge immediately became angry, turned around and said angrily: "It's just such a small city, it's just eight thousand Nanban, and you haven't taken it for more than a month?!" ”

Luo Luohun was extremely aggrieved: "In addition to the southern army in the city, there is also Qin Yiming who is wandering outside the city, and the four thousand soldiers under him are quite fierce...... In addition," he said, pointing to the three watchtower-like buildings next to Ningqiang City, "the kind of thing that the southerners call 'fortresses' is also extremely difficult to deal with, and we have lost quite a few people on it." ”

Haoge people have just arrived in southern Shaanxi, and they have not yet suffered the loss of the fortress, looking at the three fourteen or fifteen zhang square "watchtowers", only when Luo Luohun is making excuses for his incompetence, he secretly scolded the "waste", and said to Wakda: "Order, the army will make food at the time, and I will capture Ningqiang at the time!" ”

"Huh!"

By the time of dinner, Hauge had a gong in his army and returned to his camp in disgrace. More than 30,000 Qing troops, under his command, stormed all day from the morning, and did not make the slightest progress except for the loss of more than a thousand corpses.

Only then did Hauge know that the three "bastions" built against the city were really difficult to deal with - even heavy artillery could not cause too much damage to its low and sloping outer walls, and sent troops to climb the city and storm it, only to find that there were two layers of walls inside! Mo explained that the military guns and artillery were fierce, that is, no one resisted, and he could be tired and half dead just by climbing in......

It turned out that Wang Yingxiong tasted the sweetness of this fortress when he was defending Chengdu before, and he had always liked to defend the city, so he immediately asked Zhu Linmiao to transfer a few Longwei sappers into Sichuan to help.

Later, most of the white pole army was transferred by the imperial court, and he thought that his troops were not strong, so he decisively gave up attacking Hanzhong and transferred the main force back to Ningqiang to defend it.

A few months ago, Zhu Linmiao allocated one million taels of silver for disaster relief in Sichuan, and at this time, the people's livelihood in Shuzhong had improved significantly, and Wang Yingxiong was able to transfer a large number of people to help build the city.

He successively raised the wall of Ningqiang, and built three fortresses one mile away from the city to assist in defense. Unlike the last time he hastily built the fortress in Chengdu, this time he has invested a lot of money, the outer wall of the fortress is made of stone and rammed earth, and the inside is a two-story inner wall, nearly four feet high.

In addition, a while ago, when he won a victory in northern Sichuan, he captured a lot of cannons from the Qing army, plus the imperial court allocated them.

At the same time, he was taught by Zhu Linmiao to leave the most effective white pole army outside the city, once the enemy's siege momentum was too fierce, Qin Yiming led his troops to harass from the periphery, making Jianyu miserable.

In this way, Governor Wang held out in Ningqiang for more than a month, steady as a rock, with less than 300 casualties.

When Dou Chengwu and the reinforcements of the two red flags arrived, Haoge attacked several times without giving up, paying extremely heavy casualties, but he still had no choice but to defend Ningqiang.

In desperation, he had no choice but to resort to the old method - to build a higher earthen wall outside Ningqiang City, intending to attack the fortress from a high position.

He looked at the sweaty soldiers carrying earth and stones outside the city, and his heart was already cold, if he wanted to be able to overpower the defense of Ningqiang City, this earthen wall had to be more than six zhang to form, which was equivalent to building a larger city wall than Ningqiang City. Under the constant harassment of the Ming army, such a large project could be completed in three months at the earliest.

And even if Ningqiang can be successfully captured at that time, there are still two major checkpoints of Guangyuan and Jiange on the way south to Shu, if the southerners are defending like this, it will be difficult to take Sichuan in less than a year.

By that time, Duoduo was afraid that he had already invaded Fujian and Guangdong, and he couldn't help but sigh, "Could it be that God bless him Dolgon?!" ”

……

Li Dingguo jumped off the gangplank, looked back at the huge white-bottomed boat behind him, his stomach churned again, and the feeling of vomiting rushed to his throat, but he was forced to press down.

Deng Shan led someone to meet him quickly, glanced at Li Dingguo's pale face, and hurriedly stretched out his hand to support him, "But General Li of the Swift Battalion?" ”

"It's the last general," Li Dingguo nodded weakly, "who is this general?" ”

"The last general will break the camp Deng Mountain." Deng Shan turned around and beckoned the guards, "Bring ginger tea, General Li should be seasick." ”

"It turned out to be the deputy commander." Li Dingguo hurriedly pointed to the young man beside him, "This is the third brother of the last general, Liu Wenxiu." Then you have to get down on one knee.

Deng Shan had made many great achievements in the previous battle to recover Nanjing, and at this time he had been promoted to one of the two deputy commanders of the Broken Prisoner Battalion, and Li Dingguo's subordinate to the Broken Prisoner Battalion was his subordinate.

Deng Shan held the two of them and said with a smile: "General Li, General Liu, no matter what official position my Daming Field Army, I only salute. ”

"Ah, by the way, the instructor taught him the day before yesterday." Li Dingguo hurriedly saluted a non-standard military salute, "It's that the last general forgot." ”

Deng Shan returned the military salute, took ginger tea from the guards and handed it to the two, "Drink it while it's hot, and specialize in seasickness." The Holy Lord once said that kneeling is too time-consuming, and the battlefield is changing rapidly, so you can't delay the fighter plane because of this. ”

He waited for Li Dingguo to finish drinking ginger tea, then looked at the more than 20 ships moored in the port, and asked, "General Li, have all the men and horses of the swift battalion arrived?" ”

"Back to the deputy commander, nearly 3,000 people who entered Chu to fight came first with the general, and there are still 2,000 people who set off from northern Sichuan, and it will take two or three days to arrive. In addition, the military horses were also specially appointed to drive the war horses, perhaps even later. ”

As soon as Li Dingguo's voice fell, Liu Wenxiu on the side complained in a low voice: "To say that we originally collected 18,900 brothers from the old department, if all of them are transferred to Nanzhi, we can kill the thieves all the way north without the need for the imperial court to send additional troops and horses." However, the military headquarters only selected 5,000 people as the rapid battalion, and the rest were all sent back to their hometowns......"

Regarding the selection of the former Great Western Army, Zhu Linmiao is indeed strict, and he does not want to be a little more habitual. It is better to have a shortage than an abundance, and no one should be allowed to bring down the atmosphere of the Ming army, especially the elite field army.

In addition, he also asked the military headquarters to dispatch more than 400 guidance envoys to the swift battalion to take charge of ideological work. In fact, if it weren't for the rush to use troops at the front line, he would definitely let these people go to the military academy first.

Li Dingguo hurriedly shook his head at Liu Wenxiu, and whispered: "Third brother, don't talk about it." ”

Deng Shan only smiled slightly when he heard this, and said in his heart that he was arrogant enough, and you will know after a while, but not everyone is qualified to enter the camp.

A messenger galloped along the avenue of the wharf and saluted Deng Shan, "Report to the commander, the baggage of the swift battalion has arrived." ”

"Okay." Deng Shan turned around and beckoned Li Dingguo and them, "I will first pick up the wind for the two generals, and then take you to hand over the weapons and baggage." ”

Li Dingguo received an order from the imperial court to let them drop all their swords and armor and hurry to Nanzhili with light equipment. When he heard that he was going to lead the army, he immediately bowed his hand and said: "Commander, don't be busy eating, it's better to take the weapon first before you can rest assured." ”