As soon as Zhang Xianzhong heard this voice, he knew that it was Gao Yingxiang, the "King of Chuang", who was coming, his face was cloudy, and he quickly weighed the pros and cons in his heart, and finally put down the knife a little unwillingly. Pen ~ fun ~ Pavilion www.biquge.info saw him put down the knife, and Li Zicheng also signaled his subordinates to put down the blade. A possible conflict and fire disappear invisibly.

Gao Yingxiang was the right-hand man of the leader of the Righteous Army in the early years, "Zijin Liang" Wang Ziyong, the main general of the 36th Battalion, after Wang Ziyong's death, he became the most prestigious person among the leaders of the Righteous Army, and he was also the leader of the 13 72nd Battalion elected by the Xingyang Conference. When he came out to mingle, he had to talk about the rules, and no matter how domineering Zhang Xianzhong was, he had to give face to the "King Chuang", otherwise he would not be able to get along with the 72nd battalion.

The people who surrounded them parted ways, and Gao Yingxiang walked straight in. He is a middle-aged man of medium stature, his appearance is not good, and he is inconspicuous in the crowd, and anyone who sees him for the first time will never think that this is the leader of the rebel armies from all walks of life, the famous "King Chuang".

Gao Yingxiang usually does not smile, and there is no joy, anger and sorrow on his face. At this time, in order to mediate the two, they put on a smiling face, but no matter how you look at it, it looks like it is squeezed out. He walked between the two and asked, "My brother, what can't we discuss?" Whether it's silver or women, there's not much outside, right? ”

Zhang Xianzhong pointed at Li Zicheng and replied: "King Chuang, I am not an insatiable person, the antiques in this palace will be moved away with him, let him leave these eunuchs and leave them in a hurry, I am not to blame for the past." "In fact, these eunuchs and musicians he doesn't have to be, maybe he gets tired of enjoying the music once or twice, but he doesn't steam steamed buns to fight for breath, at this time it's not the eunuchs who are fighting, it's the face, the knives are all showing, and he can't always admit it at the last moment.

Gao Yingxiang glanced at Li Zicheng and said in a deep voice: "Zicheng, did you hear the words of the Eight Great Kings?" People give him things to you, why don't you hurry up and say a few bright words to turn this matter into a thing? ”

Seeing Gao Yingxiang's tone, it was impossible to have any other choice, Li Zicheng took a deep breath, suppressed the dissatisfaction in his heart, and said: "It's all up to the 'King Chuang', and I don't want anything in the palace." With that, he turned around and left the palace.

Gao Yingxiang glanced at his back, turned his head and explained to Zhang Xianzhong: "My nephew is very arrogant, don't be like him." "Gao Yingxiang's niece is Li Zicheng's daughter-in-law, so she is commensurate with her nephew in private.

Zhang Xianzhong gained face, he was happy in his heart, and he spoke politely: "For the face of 'King Chuang', I naturally won't go to my heart." ”

Outside the palace, Li Zicheng looked back, with both unwillingness and resentment in his eyes. Gao Yigong next to him came up and asked in a low voice: "Big brother, follow Zhang Xianzhong all the way to suffer from the nest, and he is very aggrieved under the hands of 'King Chuang', why don't you divide the troops and do it alone?" Gao Yigong is Li Zicheng's brother-in-law, who has always followed him and is loyal.

"Division?" When Li Zicheng heard this, his heart moved and he pondered.

Since Li Zicheng started his army, several times have changed his master. First defected to Wang Zuohang, the leader of the Liumin Army, Chongzhen for three years, after Wang Zuohang surrendered to Zhao'an, he switched to Zhang Cunmeng, who was nicknamed "not mud", but Zhang Cunmeng also surrendered to the imperial court after the defeat of Chongzhen for four years. In the sixth year of Chongzhen, he led his troops to cross the Yellow River eastward, defected to his uncle Gao Yingxiang, and got the nickname of "Chuang General".

In the seventh year of Chongzhen, Cao Wenzhao, Zuo Liangyu and other Ming troops surrounded Gao Yingxiang, Zhang Xianzhong and other people and horses in Henan, and it seemed that it was a defeat and surrender. Fortunately, at this time, the Tartars entered the customs, and Cao Wenzhao was transferred to Datong to resist Jin, and the Liumin Army was able to break through from Wang Pu, the general soldier of Datong, so there was the later Xingyang Conference and the Battle of Fengyang.

Gao Yigong continued to persuade: "The eldest brother is now strong and strong, and he can become famous without relying on the 'Chuang Wang', so it is better to find a reason to divide the troops back to the west, and not to be loyal to them all the way with the 'Chuang Wang' and Zhang Xianzhong." ”

Li Zicheng nodded and patted Gao Yigong's shoulder heavily, "What you said makes sense, we want people now, we want silver and silver, why send people to the fence?" Without Zhang Butcher and not eating hairy pigs, let's go back to Shaanxi and Gansu, pull up a team of 180,000 people, and let the battalion leaders take a look, and I, Li Zicheng, can also do something. ”

It was the Gao and Zhang coalition forces that attacked Fengyang, and Li Zicheng was nominally Gao Yingxiang's general, but in fact it was also a relatively independent force. After the Xingyang Conference, the coalition army marched all the way east, attacking the city and plundering the land, seemingly united, but in fact, each had its own thoughts, beware of each other, and a conflict in the palace became the fuse of the split of the coalition army, laying the groundwork for the later development of things.

It didn't take long for the coalition forces to have a good day in Fengyang, and bad news came. Hong Chengchou led the main force out of Tongguan, held a conference in Xinyang, Henan, and recalled Cao Wenzhao, a famous general who went to Datong to resist Jin, and prepared to concentrate his troops to encircle and suppress the exile army from all walks of life.

Since Hong Chengchou took over the position of governor of the five provinces from Chen Qiyu and became the main military commander of the suppression of the Kou, he changed the phalanx of his predecessor of "suppressing while pacifying", and implemented "all-out purge" and "suppressing and appeasing with strength, first suppressing and then appeased", with remarkable results. Regarding Hong Chengchou's movements, all the exiled armies were very concerned, including the Gao and Zhang coalition armies on the East Road.

Gao Yingxiang and Zhang Xianzhong had already grabbed a lot of money in Fengyang, and decided to leave Fengyang and avoid Hong Chengchou's edge, but they had different ideas on which way to go, so the two sat down to discuss, and Li Zicheng, who showed outstanding strategic vision at the Xingyang Conference, also participated in the discussion.

Zhang Xianzhong advocated continuing eastward, both to avoid a head-on confrontation with Hong Chengchou and to plunder the rich canal banks.

With a greedy look flashing in his eyes, he waved his arms and said: "'King Chuang', didn't I say that the west is very poor, there is no oil and water, and Luzhou (now Hefei, Anhui), Anqing, Hezhou, and Chuzhou in the east are not stronger than the west?" If you attack one or two prefectures at will, it will be worth half a province of Shaanxi......"

Gao Yingxiang was quite moved, several of their leaders were from Shaanxi, and they knew how poor Shaanxi was, except for the bones and barren fields everywhere, what did they want, he asked Li Zicheng's opinion: "Zicheng, what do you say?" ”

Li Zicheng had already made up his mind to divide the troops, so naturally he would not follow behind as a junior brother, so he replied without hesitation: "It is easy to be surrounded and annihilated by officers and soldiers in one place, it is more appropriate to divide the troops into several ways, since the 'King Chuang' and the 'Eight Kings' want to go to the east, then I will go to the west!" ”