Wang Ziyong's opinion is correct, now the thirty-six battalions he led have surrounded Taiping City for more than ten days, and the scouts sent have already reconnoitred all the roads that can be opened nearby, and most of the roads have also been stationed with personnel to guard, if there is an unknown team approaching, they can know at least within thirty miles of the other party.

Although the weather is cold now, and the snow and ice make it difficult to travel on the road, if there is really a rescue, the Shanxi Rebellion Battalion of Wuguo will definitely send troops to the rescue. Wang Ziyong also carefully considered that there were only two possibilities for the current situation, the first was that the army of the Wu State thought that this army could resist the attack of his tens of thousands of troops, and there was no threat at all, so they let it go; The second is that the Shanxi battalion has no feelings for this "official army", and it is completely "other people's children", and even sent them to Taiping to send them to death, this kind of thing he has seen enough before he escapes from the armed army, so when he sees this situation, he can naturally be 100% sure that these officers and soldiers in Taiping City must be treated like this. Sending such a combat-effective and loyal army to the front line, leaving it to be left to the enemy's encirclement, Wang Ziyong felt quite unbelievable, using his existing army to attack Taiping City is not impossible, he is just unwilling to bear heavy casualties, and even if Taiping City is captured, the defenders in the city will definitely suffer heavy losses, this strong army is lost like this, so that he can't help but feel a little sad, if he can directly pull this group of officers and soldiers to his own camp, how good it would be?

From the beginning, he wanted to lure the commander of this army to take refuge in him with a good reward, and sent several envoys to the Taiping City under the banner to "surrender" the other party, but the people did not intend to negotiate with him at all, as long as the envoy approached to a distance of three or four hundred steps, he would be shot by the officials and soldiers on the head of the city, and it was forbidden to approach, and the Taiping City was absolutely fortified and clear, and no one outside the city could enter, so the negotiation channel was completely blocked. Several of his wise men suggested that the city gate should be opened under the pretext of surrender, but they did not intend to accept the surrender at all, anyway, the people in the city did not plan to come out, and those outside the city did not want to enter.

Although Zheng Jiajun's approach seems to leave no way back, but this matter has actually been carefully considered by Xu Wei, in the Wu Dynasty for so many years, there are endless things that come to deceive and even directly open the city gate, if the other party proposes to surrender with himself, seven or eight times out of ten are fraudulent surrender. What's more, the peasant army in front of him that came out of northern Shaanxi had already begun to make chaos a few years ago, and if he had the slightest intention of surrendering in the past few years, he would have already surrendered, and it was impossible for him to suddenly remember to surrender at this time. Besides, although the previous battle with He Yilong caused heavy casualties to the opponent, it did not hurt their vitality, not to mention that tens of thousands of enemies have gathered outside the city now, if you want to wait for a while for the two sides to fight once, the other party said that it is still a little possible, and now the army of tens of thousands of people rushed to the city and suddenly shouted to surrender, even a three-year-old child would not believe it. Based on these reasons, Xu Wei directly closed the door to negotiations between the two sides, regardless of whether you really plan to surrender or not, let's talk about fighting first.

But at this moment, the situation of the Zheng Jiajun is not much better, although the Zheng Jiajun has purchased a large amount of military rations before, but now the snow is falling, and the snow covers the avenue, and the food cannot be sent in at all, not to mention that there are still tens of thousands of enemies waiting outside the city in three layers and three layers outside, even the messenger who delivers the letter can't run in, let alone the mountains of military rations. At this moment, the situation in Taiping City is even worse, because a large number of rebel troops are heading south, and the people around Taiping and Xiangling are pouring into Taiping City with their families. As a group of people who have fled, they carry very little food and even less money. A large number of refugees poured into the city, making the city crowded, and they had to sleep in the streets and alleys without food and clothing, and the cold took the lives of several people every day. Although the situation outside the city is far worse than the situation in the city, Xu Wei is not at all relaxed before there is no way to solve the ration problem, he used to not understand the habit of the gang of people in Dongfang Port who put the purchase of food in the first place all the time, but now, he has completely realized the meaning of those executive committee members who are constantly talking about "not panicking when you have food in your hands", and you can really do whatever you want with food in hand!

Taiping had already sent several people asking for help before they were encircled, and sent letters for help in several directions, Xu Wei was sure that these letters for help must have been sent to the place where they needed to be sent, but the problem was that there was no sign of reinforcements during this time. There are observers he has set up in several directions on the Taiping City Wall, who are responsible for monitoring the situation in these directions. If there were reinforcements coming, then the enemy in this direction would definitely have defensive actions, but during this period of time, these enemies had not made any special moves except for going out to search for grain and firewood, so he could be sure that the Shanxi camp would definitely not send any reinforcements. So this thing is actually very embarrassing now, he is a guest army who came to quell the chaos, for this place can be said to be unfamiliar, the Wu Dynasty has always been known as the "guest army like a tiger", because the place where the guest army fights is not the province, there is no consciousness of defending the territory, most of the time to scavenge the people's fat and ointment to the efficiency is far more professional than dealing with the enemy, Wu Dynasty is not good for the guest army, and now it is very good to be able to enter the Taiping City.

Speaking of Zheng's treatment in Taiping City, the people in the city were grateful to them for defeating the rebels outside the city, and specially handed over the school yard and many vacant lots in the city to them for stationing, and allowed them to demolish the uninhabited houses in the city as building materials to build temporary houses. However, although these places are large, there are still far from enough building materials, and it is impossible to build enough houses for everyone to live in. Now they have received advice from some masons in Taiping City and have begun to build "Diwozi", which is a structure that is half-buried in the ground. Start by digging down from the ground to a depth of about two to three feet to level the ground, and then build a wall along the perimeter of the pit. The building materials used for these walls are mainly excavated during excavation, so the demand for building materials is not large. The height of these walls is not very high, about three feet high, and it is enough to ensure that a person standing at the bottom of the ground cannot hit his head. Then build a roof on the wall, the roof of these nests can be described as strange, but the main common requirement is the same, that is, to block the wind, not let the heat inside quickly escape, to keep the house warm.

The construction time of the nest is not long, the only drawback is that the ground is frozen hard because of the weather, so the excavation took a lot of trouble, and then the ground that needs to be excavated can only be burned first, and the ground is softened before excavation. Fortunately, before the Taiping War, Zheng Jiajun collected a lot of grain from all over the world, so he could use the grain to hire local people to work to help with the construction, which greatly increased the work efficiency. In addition, due to the large number of underground nests built and the mobilization of a considerable number of residents in the city, the workers gradually became familiar with it, and the underground nests were no longer only built to accommodate only two or three people, but a large number of long ground nests that could accommodate about 20 people.

In the nest of the earth is directly used to burn coal for heating, there are not many other things in Shanxi, there is a lot of coal, some places have dug out a lot of coal when digging the nest, you can see all kinds of coal that is dug out and thrown aside everywhere in the city - compared to the thick and hot coal, the Taiping people prefer firewood, coal this thing burns with smoke and dust, the smell is heavy, and it is easy for a family to die inexplicably, so everyone has no good impression of coal. But as a guest army, the officers and soldiers of the Zheng family have no choice, Taiping City has been closed, the enemy army besieging the city has more than 10,000 people, they can cut wood every day outside the city to burn the fire for heating, but the people in the city have no way to chop wood, so they can only choose the coal that they were not willing to use before to heat. Of course, burning coal directly without protection in the dimple is definitely going to be gas poisoning, there are no windows in the dimple, the ventilation conditions are basically zero, and as soon as the door is closed, it is basically pitch black inside, completely impermeable, so it is necessary to ensure that the chimney flue is unblocked. The officers and soldiers of the Zheng family living in the nest did not have ready-made stoves, so they had to use the excavated soil mixed with water to build them by hand, directly built a stove in the wall, and also dug a hole directly in the wall to build a chimney with mud to ensure the safety of fire.

Xu Wei turned his head to look at the situation in the city, and from time to time someone came out of the nests to select a few pieces of coal from the coal pile, and then walked back to the nests and closed the doors. He took a deep breath, and the air was inhaled into his lungs with a cold breath, making him shiver and exhale several puffs of white heat.

"It's strange that the winter seems to be getting colder and colder in the past few years." Someone next to him said that Xu Wei didn't need to turn his head to know that the person who spoke was Zheng Zhihu. The chief general of the Zheng family army has been eager to go out of the city and fight with the enemy since he entered Taiping City, at this moment Zheng Zhihu is wrapped in two layers of cotton jackets, and a set of battle armor is covered outside.

However, the real Zheng Zhihu did not gain weight at all, on the contrary, he lost a lot of weight. Originally, it stands to reason that he, the commander, should have privileges in the army, not to mention anything else, the men in the army would cook some meat from time to time at the beginning, but he rejected his behavior of opening a small stove, he insisted on sharing weal and woe with the soldiers around him, eating the same meals, and even when digging the ground, he took the soldiers to work together. Even the fur fur he brought at the beginning is not worn now, in order to reflect his attitude of sharing weal and woe with the Zheng Jiajun brothers, who are also from Fujian. But he came to the north to eat steamed buns and flatbread every day, and he was very unaccustomed to eating, and he really lost a lot of weight during this time.

"Yes, the winter has been a lot colder in the past few years, and I heard that it has snowed in the state this year, and I don't know if it's true." Xu Wei nodded and said, looked at the continuous enemy tents in front of him and sighed and said, "Now that we are surrounded, how does the second master of the python think we should deal with it?" ”

"You are a military advisor, you have the final say," Zheng Zhihu tightened his neckline and shrugged his shoulders and said, "Anyway, I will fight whatever you say, you have led soldiers, I will only use my strength to die." ”

"Where?" Xu Wei hurriedly said, "Second Master, this is the posture of leading the troops, wherever you rush, the soldiers will follow you, but you also have to pay more attention to your own safety!" We are now in a foreign land, so many brothers rely on you, the battlefield is not long-sighted, if there is a slight mistake, can you teach us how to be good? ”

"What do you mean," Zheng Zhihu was a little reluctant to listen, "Then I still have to shrink my neck on the battlefield and not keep my head?" I, the leader of the troops, don't come out, so I still let the brothers below go to the front to die? I've always led my troops to charge in front of me in war, and now if I hide behind, do I want to say hello when I go out? I can't afford to lose this man! ”

"That's not what you mean, don't listen to it." Xu Wei hurriedly defended, "This is not to ask you to be a turtle with a shrunken head, it means that you should pay more attention to your own safety when you fight......

"Good, good! I won't fight with you," Zheng Zhihu felt dizzy when he heard this kind of topic, and hurriedly stretched out his hand to interrupt him, "If I don't talk to you scholars, I won't win you, I'll just be careful." ”

As he was talking, he suddenly heard a cannon in the camp of the chaotic army in the distance, and saw a lot of people coming out of the tents in the distance, and as the crowd gathered more and more, a human wall was soon formed outside the city wall, and then flags began to be erected in the camp in the distance, with various names on them. Soldiers with flags lined up in front of the formation, and soldiers belonging to these factions quickly approached the flags.

Although the distance was very far, Zheng Zhihu and Xu Wei could clearly see that they were holding weapons in their hands, seeing this situation, everyone knew that the rebel army was preparing to launch an attack, and Xu Wei didn't care that Zheng Zhihu was in front of him, and shouted loudly at the soldiers of the Zheng family army who were hiding from the wind under the city wall, "Quickly call all battalions to bring weapons to the city!" The rebels are going to war! ”