On September 25, Xiao Ruxun led his troops to Pingjiang, at this time, the vanguard army had captured Tongcheng, and when Xiao Ruxun entered Tongcheng on the 28th, the vanguard army took Chongyang.

Hardly any decent resistance was encountered.

The obstacles in front of Wuchang Mansion were pulled out little by little, and the road to Wuchang Mansion gradually became smooth.

On 28 September, Li Hualong convened a military meeting in Yangzhou Prefecture.

Through more than ten days of emergency dispatch and emergency shipbuilding, he has gathered more than 1,000 guards and renovated more than 200 ships that can be used for battle, all of which can be described as "remarkable results".

Of course, there is no problem with the reconstruction of warships, and the craftsmen of the Ming Dynasty are still relatively honest.

But the dispatch of guards is debatable, and the military households of the Ming Dynasty are far from being so honest.

So Li Hualong was so irritable that he was about to kill.

"It's been five days! It's been five days! According to the list, there should have been at least eight thousand soldiers! But now there are only a thousand people! A thousand people! There are still so many old and weak! There are only five or six hundred people who can go to war! How does this call the Governor to enter the army and fight?! ”

Li Hualong had already put his psychological expectations very low, he felt that there would be at least one or two thousand in the next five days, and five or six thousand soldiers could fight, so maybe there would be the strength of a battle, and then wait and see, maybe there would be more troops.

After all, according to the number of people on the books, there are 5,600 people in one Wei, not to mention other places, and the Yangzhou area is also running to 50,000 in minutes.

As a result, only more than 1,000 people came here, and after five days, more than 1,000 came.

The rest are all on the road, as soon as they go to ask, they are all on the road, which is still trying to deal with it, and some simply say that the preparation is not completed, and they need to delay for some time, and they don't want to come to war at all.

The soldiers sent to herald and inquire came in waves, and the tone of the command became more and more eye-catching, but the news that came back was not optimistic.

In the past few days, the naval division of the Zhennan Army launched two attacks again, once again destroying the coastal defense positions that he had set up with great difficulty, and also lost three or four hundred men and horses, and the morale was further depressed, and there were even timid and war-weary soldiers in the Shenji battalion.

Li Hualong felt that he could not continue to indulge these people no matter what.

"Supervisor, Nanzhi has not been in war for a long time, this is really an irrepressible thing, there is a shortage of soldiers in various places, and it is not a day or two that the military households flee and hide seriously, and the lower officials and others have repeatedly written to the imperial court and have not been properly dealt with!"

The prefect of Yangzhou foresaw Li Hualong's fury, so he quickly took himself out.

Then a group of bureaucrats in Yangzhou Prefecture also picked themselves out one after another, eliminating hidden dangers in the bud.

Li Hualong didn't know how these people were careful, but he also knew that it was indeed not the fault of these people, and if he wanted to say anything, all the officials were at fault, and they couldn't all be counted on the heads of this group of people.

But now, if you don't use some ruthless means, I'm afraid you won't be able to gather more soldiers and horses, Xiao Ruxun's side doesn't know how long it will take to fight Wuchang, whether Wuchang can hold it is still a question, if you can't eliminate the water division in front of you as soon as possible, Li Hualong really has no choice.

But it is not a simple matter to eliminate the sailors, these Jizhen soldiers can't even do the most basic boat operation, Li Hualong has the heart to send Jizhen soldiers to attack, but these soldiers who vomit wildly when they get on the boat can't be used at all, which is also the reason why Li Hualong is eager to recruit and transfer the guards.

Even if these people are weak, they can at least be able to operate boats, and they can be regarded as a force, right?

If he forcibly drove the soldiers of Jizhen, not to mention such a stupid thing as attacking the enemy with my shortcomings, the resentment of the army alone was not something he could ignore.

"The Governor has decided to personally take people to the guards to urge the soldiers and horses, and you must also scatter out to urge the soldiers and horses, and the Governor will give you a warrant, if you encounter delays, you can be executed together if you do not cooperate with the guards and commanders who try to escape the battle!"

Li Hualong sacrificed his magic weapon.

Officials were taken aback.

This is really going to be ruthless, but with such a cruel method, I don't know how angry and resentful it will be!

Li Hualong, can he really be so ruthless?

Looks like he can.

No one doubted that Li Hualong did not dare to do this, in fact, Li Hualong also did this, after the meeting, he took people out of the city, and went directly to Wei, the closest to Yangzhou, and directly found the local Wei commander, and asked Wei to send troops.

He didn't reveal his true identity at first, but pretended to be a herald officer, and the commander of the guard didn't believe him because his age was not right, and he was too vain and wrongful to him, saying that the equipment was not enough, and that the soldiers were needed to go to the autumn harvest when the farm was busy, and it would take a few days to delay.

Li Hualong's face suddenly darkened, and without saying a word, he revealed his identity, which frightened the commander of the guard so much that he fell directly to the ground and couldn't get up.

"My Ming Dynasty has reached this point today, and a single military general can kill half of the rivers and mountains! It's all infested by moths! Deceive the superiors and subordinates, do all kinds of evil, I, Li Hualong, will kill you moth for the court today! ”

Li Hualong pulled out his sword, stabbed the guard commander to death with a sword, and then looked at the rest of the thousands of households with murderous eyes.

"Do you want to die or live?"

As soon as these words came out, those thousand households immediately left the command and envoys, and each went to gather their own people, but when they came back, Li Hualong was shocked to find that not only was there a big difference in numbers, but even two thousand households and four hundred households had escaped.

This one Buddha of Li Hualongqi ascended to heaven and two Buddhas out of his body, and he almost didn't draw his sword to kill all these people.

"Overseer! It's not that we don't want to gather people! But this is the case, our status is low, and we can't change anything at all, and please let the overseer see it! Please also ask the overseer to be clear! ”

The few officers who stayed behind and didn't run knelt down and kowtowed.

Li Hualong only felt extremely sad in his heart.

Of the 5,600-strong guards, there were only more than 1,000 people in front of him, all of whom were old, weak, sick and disabled, few young and strong, and more than seventy percent of those who had escaped and had their accounts concealed, basically having no combat effectiveness.

In this way, it is indeed difficult to be undefeated against the original Japanese invaders.

He can kill a guard commander and gather a thousand people, but he can't change the situation of the collapse of the entire guard system, he is like this, and the others are even more powerless to change.

Freezing three feet, not a day's cold, it is too late to remedy it until the end.

A few days later, on October 3, Li Hualong's scattered troop commissioners brought back more than 5,000 guards and more than 30 heads.

They really tried their best, killing a lot of people, but they didn't find many people.

It's not that they don't want to come, but they really don't.