After being defeated by Deng Ming, Li Guoying did not stay long in Chóngqìng, and soon returned to Baoning, and although the Qing army stationed in Chóngqìng did not return with him, it was only a matter of time before he was evacuated from Chóngqìng. After Wu Sangui left Shaanxi and went to Yunnan and Guizhou, the Qing court's annual allocation to Shaanxi was only 300,000 taels of silver and 300,000 stone of grain, which was not enough for the Qing army to attack Sichuan.

The auxiliaries convened by Li Guoying were captured by Deng Ming tens of thousands, and they also lost more than 10,000 armor, and the baggage accumulated in the past few years was innumerable, which not only made the Qing army lose its offensive ability, but also caused the military income of the governor of Sichuan and Shaanxi to drop sharply. Li Guoying carefully calculated that the Qing army would not be able to recover its original strength within three years. According to Li Guoying's estimate, Deng Minghui would launch an offensive within a year and a half to two years, and the disadvantaged Qing army in Sichuan would not be able to hold Chóngqìng and protect the Jialing River shipping at the same time. In this case, it is inevitable to abandon Chóngqìng, and after returning the main force to the front line of Hanzhong and Guangyuan, the attrition of the Qing army will also be reduced, which will help the Shaanxi Green Battalion to recover its strength more quickly.

Now the one hundred Manchurian Eight Banners have followed Li Guoying back to the Eight Banners, and Zhao Liangdong, Wang Mingde and others have not moved in Chóngqìng. The reason why he did not give up chóngqìng immediately was that Li Guoying felt that it was not good to explain to the imperial court, and last time Shunzhi allocated an additional batch of military funds to Li Guoying, asking him to drag Deng Ming as much as possible, but not only did he not attack Chengdu, but he lost his troops and even Chóngqìng was in danger. Not long ago, Li Guoying wrote an understatement in a light-hearted manner, saying that there was an epidemic in the army, the soldiers suffered great losses, and the weather was very hot in the summer, and the Qing army's lack of food and wages coupled with the epidemic disease led to low morale. The governor of Sichuan and Shaanxi planned to give the imperial court a few more vaccinations according to this line of thought, and then justifiably withdraw from Chóngqìng, still placing the main force in Hanzhong, and then personally sitting in Baoning.

Today, Běijīng sent a messenger to deliver the message, Li Guoying was also a little apprehensive after hearing the news, and he didn't know how the imperial court would react, but Li Guoying estimated that even if he was punished, it would not be very heavy, at most a few verbal reprimands. Compared with the oceanic ministers of the Qing army in Yunnan, Guizhou, Huguang, Nanjing and other places, the appearance of the Sichuan-Shaanxi Green Battalion is not bad, there is no loss of land, and the defeat did not lead to the capture of the civil and military officers, with Wu Sangui, Hu Quancai and Lang Tingzuo in front, Li Guoying will not be paid special attention to by the imperial court.

After the messenger walked into the yamen, Li Guoying recognized the person at a glance as the imperial guard who had returned to Běijīng with those works of Deng Ming last time.

The holy decree is very simple, there is not a word of blame in it, but it is just that Li Guoying should stick to the chóngqìng and not give up lightly. This request really made Li Guoying feel full of sāo, but he still had no choice but to receive the order.

"Your Excellency the Governor, please." After reading the holy decree, the envoy immediately said that he wanted to talk to Li Guoying in private, and after letting the unrelated personnel leave, the imperial guard immediately said to Li Guoying: "The emperor knows the difficulties of the governor, and now the governor is facing the main force of the Deng thief, and the imperial court is also worried about Sichuan here. Therefore, the imperial court has made a proposal to allocate 1 million taels of silver and 1 million stone of grain to the governor every year from next year, and after the harvest in Jiangnan in the second half of this year, it will also allocate a batch of urgently needed grain to the governor as appropriate, the amount is still not good, but the silver and grain will not be less than 500,000. ”

"Your Majesty." Li Guoying's surprise was not trivial, and Běijīng suddenly increased the military expenditure allocated to Sichuan and Shaanxi to more than three times the original amount, and this kind of attention to Cheng Dù greatly surprised Li Guoying.

"The court wants to know, is there anything else your Excellency needs from the Governor?" The envoy asked, "The emperor personally asked the lowly to take the message, and I wonder if the governor is sure to keep the chóngqìng after these additional salaries." ”

"Wechen has confidence." Li Guoying immediately replied that in order to enter Sichuan, he had basically squeezed out Shaanxi's inventory, and the taxes that could be increased were basically increased. But if Běijīng can fulfill his promise, then Li Guoying can expand the size of his army by at least 50,000 men, and with these troops, holding Chóngqìng is not an impossible goal.

"Good!" The envoy then asked, "The emperor still wants to know how much food and salary will be given to the Governor, so as to ensure that the Governor will quickly exterminate the Deng thief?" ”

"Wiped out quickly?" Li Guoying was stunned again when he heard this, he knew that although Deng Ming was happy in Sichuan and Huguang, Běijīng's attention was always in the Yunnan-Guizhou area, followed by Jiangnan and Fujian. It was precisely because he was very clear about the strategic focus of the imperial court that Li Guoying was so surprised when he knew that Běijīng had greatly increased the allocation to Shaanxi, but listening to the tone of the envoy's words, it seemed that as long as Deng Ming could be eliminated quickly, Běijīng would be willing to provide more supplies.

"Yes, the emperor means within two years, faster is of course better." The messenger replied without hesitation.

"Why did the imperial court pay so much attention to Sichuan all of a sudden?" Li Guoying's heart was full of doubts, Sichuan was sparsely populated, and Běijīng always thought that even if he was controlled by the Ming army, he would not make any big trouble; And Hunan is rich in rice, if it is occupied by the Ming army, it will be endless, Guizhou can not only cover Hunan, but also threaten the Yongli court, which has only one breath left, is naturally the most important battlefield; There is Zheng Chenggong in Fujian, and if he does not eliminate the Zheng family's army, the southeast tax-paying area will be threatened, and of course it is extremely important: "Sichuan? Is it worth the effort of the imperial court? Moreover, the money and grain are not for nothing, and if you give more to Sichuan, you will naturally give less to other places. As the governor of Sichuan and Shaanxi, Li Guoying certainly hoped that the more things the court would give, the better, but the doubts in his heart could not be explained.

"Your Excellency the Doge." Seeing that Li Guoying didn't speak for a while, the messenger urged.

"I'm afraid it's hard to exterminate Deng Ming in two years." Although Li Guoying wanted more supplies, he finally decided to tell the truth: "Deng thief plundered more than 100,000 people from Nanjing and Huguang, millions of stones of grain, countless armor and weapons, and his military will hardly worry about it within two years." If you want to exterminate Deng Ming, you need to divide the army into four routes, two main and two biases: one way from Guangyuan to the Sword Pavilion to attack Chengdu from north to south; Walk all the way to the Yangtze River, and then attack Chengdu from south to north along the Min River. These are the two main roads. There are also two partial divisions, one road in the east, going to Jianzhou, echoing the two armies of the north and south, and not letting Deng Ming have room to move around; The other way to the west, cutting off the retreat of the thieves who could not escape Jianchang. The two main roads need more than 30,000 armor to be able to break the main force of the thieves head-on, and the two auxiliary roads also need more than 15,000 armor, which is enough to protect themselves and drag the thieves. In this way, all four ways can ensure that nothing goes wrong. ”

The imperial guard took out a pen and paper and recorded in detail what Li Guoying said: "You just need to wear 90,000 armor, right?" ”

"Yes." Li Guoying saw that the other party did not give up immediately, and his heart was even more strange: "The people's livelihood in Sichuan is withering, and all the military rations have to be transferred by us from Guanzhong. In my opinion, it is better to expand the warehouse in Chóngqìng first, reserve military rations, and fight in Tun to gradually recover Sichuan. ”

"Hmm." After listening to Li Guoying's account of Sichuan's roads, the situation of warehouses in various places, and the shortage of manpower, the imperial guards finally realized that Běijīng's wish could not be realized.

"The remoteness of western Sichuan is a small trouble after all." Li Guoying still didn't figure out why the imperial court put on a drive to kill Deng Ming first at any cost, and he persuaded: "As long as you consolidate Chóngqìng and limit Deng thieves to western Sichuan, it will be easy to eliminate Deng Ming after the imperial court exterminates the anti-thieves in Huguang, Yunnan, and Fujian." It is very easy for the imperial court to allocate 1 million taels of silver and grain to Sichuan and Shaanxi every year, and after a few years, when Guanzhong is restored and the city of Chóngqìng has been consolidated, it may not be necessary to do so much. ”

"The words of the Governor will be reported to the emperor," the envoy was noncommittal about Li Guoying's establishment, and he did not have the right to make a judgment on it, but since the envoy realized that it was unlikely to be possible to quickly suppress Deng Ming by force, he told Li Guoying another matter: "The imperial court intends to re-issue the reward for Deng Ming, which is about 50,000 taels of silver, ten future bannermen, and Han people carrying the flag; As for the thieves around Deng Ming, as long as he can see Deng Ming's head, he will not blame him in the past and supervise Sichuan. ”

Shut down

This reward is already on par with Zheng Chenggong and Li Dingguo's heads, and it is just a killing, Li Guoying asked tentatively: "If you can capture Deng Ming alive, will it be doubled?" ”

Under normal circumstances, the reward for capturing alive is higher than that for killing, but the envoy hesitated when he heard this, and said to Li Guoying: "The imperial court does not plan to announce this matter to the world, the governor just knows it, and the emperor means that as long as Deng Ming is dead, not alive." If the thieves around Deng Ming captured him and brought him to the Governor, the Governor would execute him on the spot and send his body to the imperial court. ”

"The emperor understands." Li Guoying nodded, he guessed that Běijīng's attitude towards Deng Ming had something to do with the drawings he had handed in, but the governor of Sichuan and Shaanxi also knew what to ask and what not to ask: "Weichen obeys the order." ”

"Probably next month, the imperial court will order the establishment of a full city in Chóngqìng." The envoy threw out another astonishing news that after only one province was pacified, a full city would be established in the provincial capital, and the Eight Banners would be garrisoned from Běijīng. But now Sichuan is far from pacified, and Chóngqìng is not the provincial capital of Sichuan: "Wait until you recover the whole of Sichuan, and then move to Chengdu." ”

"Got it, I'll start preparing right away." Li Guoying agreed without hesitation that since he wanted to build a full city, then the hundred banners of Baoning were ready-made garrisons of the Eight Banners, and Li Guoying planned to send someone to Chóngqìng tomorrow to draw a plot of land to build comfortable houses for the Eight Banners to live in, and fence them with a strong castle.

Since the Manchurian Taijun is going to be permanent, and there will be the Taijun's family members coming, it is definitely necessary to provide more abundant daily necessities. Although this was not required by the imperial court, Li Guoying, like other governors, attached great importance to the quality of life of the Manchurian Taijun, not only what the Manchurian Taijun wanted must be there, but also what they did not expect was also thought of for them in advance. This is even more troublesome than Mancheng, which makes Li Guoying feel troublesome: "But it is not difficult to arrive with a hundred garrisons and eight banners, and a special fleet will be assigned to transport melons, fruits, vegetables, and silk to chóngqìng." Li Guoying thought in his heart.

"The one hundred Manchurian Eight Banners sent last time are temporarily stationed in Chóngqìng Mancheng," the envoy confirmed Li Guoying's guess, but he had the following text behind him: "chóngqìng, that is, the Sichuan Garrison Eight Banners are set to be 1,000!" The difference will be sent from běijīng within the year. ”

"One Thousand Garrison Eight Banners......" Although Li Guoying realized that Běijīng attached great importance to the Sichuan battlefield, he never expected to attach importance to this point, at the beginning of the Manchu Qing Dynasty, the number of garrison eight banners in each province was limited, except for 4,000 stationed in Nanjing, the others were only hundreds, and Hangzhou was so important that it was only 500 garrison eight banners. The presence of 1,000 in Chóngqìng means that it will be the military center with the most garrisons outside of Běijīng and Nanjing, but it is not even the provincial capital of Sichuan.

…… June, Chengdu.

Twelve thousand Ming troops boarded the ships and prepared to set off, and this time Deng Ming mobilized 8,000 armor soldiers, 2,000 sailors, and 2,000 auxiliaries. The 8,000 soldiers recruited by the armor had been intensively trained some time ago, and 1,000 of them could now recognize about 100 commonly used words. In addition to these 12,000 soldiers, Deng Ming also brought a hundred cavalry with three walls, and more than 200 war horses were transported on board with the cavalry, who would serve as Deng Ming's direct guard.

Now is the time when the farmers are busy, and Deng Ming did not hype up this expedition, but in addition to the civil and military officials in Chengdu, there were also several business house owners who came to see him off.

"After I leave, the affairs of the capital will be handed over to you." Deng Ming briefly said to Liu Jinge, Yuan Xiang, Zhao Tianba and others that Deng Ming took away a thousand standing troops on this expedition, and among the five majors, Zhou Kaihuang, Ren Tang and Mu Tan were taken away. Zhao Tianba and Zhou Kaihuang stayed in Chengdu and continued to train Tong Xiucai, and if the Qing army came to attack them, they would have to shoulder the responsibility of commanding the army.

When he first crossed over, Deng Ming once slandered that the Ming army would not fight if they left the waterway, but now Deng Ming is not at all better than Yuan Zongdi and them, and he is extremely dependent on water transportation. If a soldier marches along the land, a soldier needs at least two or three auxiliaries to help him carry equipment and rations, and this is still when there are cattle and vehicles, and if there is a lack of transport, the need for auxiliaries will be greater; But if you advance along the waterway, as long as there are boats, the dozen sailors can carry the equipment and living materials of hundreds of soldiers, and they can also take these soldiers with them.

Along the waterway can save a lot of manpower and will not interfere with Chengdu's production activities.

After giving a final explanation to the Wenwu who saw him off, Deng Mingyou looked at the bosses of those commercial houses, all of whom were salt merchants in Chengdu without exception.

"Rest assured, this expedition, I will definitely open the trade route of Huguang for the salt merchants of the capital." Deng Ming assured them again.

In peacetime, Sichuan, which is rich in natural products, exports large quantities of grain to Yunnan, Guizhou and Shaanxi, but Huguang is different, Hunan is a major rice exporting province, and the grain output of the Jianghan Plain is also very considerable, so there is no demand for grain from Sichuan. However, in addition to grain, Sichuan also exports bulk commodities to Huguang, and the world-famous Shu brocade and high-quality stone salt have a large share. Even during the war, Huguang still needed salt from Sichuan, such as Yuan Zongdi, who had been stationed in Daning, and almost all of the goods smuggled into Huguang were salt in exchange for grain and cloth urgently needed by the Ming army.

But now Yuan Zongdi did not pay much attention to the production of salt, because the Ming army had seized a large amount of land in Hubei, and now the Ming army in Huguang was most concerned about how to produce more grain. Most of the Ming army, including Yuan Zongdi, focused on self-sufficiency in daily necessities, as long as the salt was enough for the Ming army to occupy the area. As a result, the amount of salt smuggled into Huguang in the past year has not only not increased, but has greatly decreased.

Only Deng Ming is different, he has no idea of self-sufficiency at all, since many things are difficult to produce in Chengdu by himself, the shortage of manpower makes it impossible for Deng Ming to allocate manpower in all walks of life. In addition to plundering and blackmail, external goods can also be purchased, and if they want to be purchased, they must be exchanged for exports. Now Deng Ming was unable to resume the production of handicrafts such as fù brocade, so he started the idea of exporting salt.

Recently, Deng Ming personally intervened and concentrated the large amount of manpower released after the disbandment of the army on the production of salt, and the salt produced in Chengdu in the past month was enough for the people here to eat for half a year.

A large number of salt that has just been produced is mostly loaded on the warships of the Ming army, Deng Ming also deliberately chose the best quality batch, and when passing by Daning, he also plans to ask Yuan Zongdi, if Yuan Zongdi has rich salt in his hands, and the quality also meets the requirements, Deng Ming also plans to buy some.

The salt merchants who came to see him off also had high hopes for Deng Ming's trip, and now the production capacity of Chengdu's salt industry is far greater than the local demand, even if Deng Ming called a large number of temporary salt workers back to the army, it would be useless, and the supply was still twice as much as the demand, and if the Huguang market could not be opened, the salt merchants' production capacity would be wasted -- it was already being wasted.

"Victory!"

"Go straight to Wuhan!"

The owner of the salt shop who came to see him off was dressed in coarse cloth and personally held a banner with some crooked and twisted large characters, which were the handwriting of them and their salt workers.

Huguang has millions of households, and it is also connected to many provinces, as long as Deng Ming's trip is successful, forcing Zhang Changgeng to sign the alliance under the city again, these salt shop bosses who have only been in the industry for a year will know that their good rì will arrive. Chengdu's current salt constant will certainly not be able to meet Huguang's needs, and it will probably be necessary to leave Chengdu and go to Xuzhou to develop the salt industry, which has long been abandoned due to the war.

"Admiral! We must let the people of Huguang eat our salt. The owner of one of the salt shops excitedly told Deng Ming that Lu Huan, at Deng Ming's instigation, went all out to expand production, and not only did he not repay any of the large loans he had owed to the bank, but he also owed even more debts -- all the wages of a large number of salt workers in the past month or so had been paid with loans. The patches on Lu Huan's clothes were beaten and beaten, and as the owner of the salt shop, he was so poor that he couldn't afford to eat anything but salt.

"Don't worry, Boss Lu, not only will the people of Huguang and Jiangxi eat your salt, but they will also be able to eat your soy sauce in the future." Not long ago, when Deng Ming persuaded Lu Huan to expand production, he described to him the bright prospect of upgrading the industry and making not only salt but also soy sauce.

"Let's go! Bingfa chóngqìng. After boarding the ship, Deng Ming ordered loudly.