Wu Yuewang's statement Deng Ming couldn't refute, and he also appreciated the other party's opinion on the infantry: "That's right, the infantry should be able to participate in hand-to-hand combat, but Lieutenant Wu must know how precious those firearms are, right?" ”

These more than 100 guns were captured, and Chengdu did not have the ability to produce qualified guns on its own for the time being, and in today's battle, the soldiers commanded by Wu Yuewang were accustomed to naturally throwing the guns at the enemy position and then drawing daggers for self-defense. "In the past, many crossbow machines were thrown like this, and today they are thrown out as stones, and they also let the firecrackers fight with short soldiers on the front line, which is a double waste of precious resources of our army, I will not pursue it this time, but we must pay attention to it next time." According to the report after the incident, many of the firecrackers that were thrown out were trampled on by the follow-up troops, and Deng Ming had ordered to pick up all these equipment and try to repair them, but it is estimated that like Huguang's single-man crossbow machine, there are only a few that can be repaired, and basically one is broken and one is missing.

Fortunately, another batch of muskets were seized from the Manba Banner, and after a brief inspection, it was believed that even if the quality was inferior to that of the Praetorian Guard, the gap was limited, and it could be used to equip the troops, which could be regarded as making up for the loss of equipment. Deng Ming instructed Li Jinge in Chengdu to send the firearms to the blacksmith shop for study if they could not be repaired, so that Chengdu could produce its own firearms and equipment as soon as possible.

Wu Yuewang was ordered to retreat, and Deng Ming then summoned a group of subordinates in succession and deployed specific tasks to them, so that the Ming army could prepare for the eastward march and Yuan Zongdi to attack Li Guoying. While the Ming army was making preparations, more interrogation reports were sent to Deng Ming, and soon Deng Ming had a further understanding of the overall scale of Li Guoying, and some of the captured Shanxi officers even heard about Zhao Liangdong's southward movement.

"The intelligence is very confusing, as if Li Guoying once ordered Zhao Liangdong and Wang Jinbao to reinforce Chongqing, and they also brought 10,000 or 20,000 armor, but some of the auxiliaries confessed that Sun Sike used all the ships for his own use, and did not see any ships going up the Jialing River to pick up Zhao Liangdong - even if there were a small number, thousands of captured auxiliaries came from Chongqing, and they all confirmed that there were no ships going up."

This information further supported Deng Mingxian's decision to attack Li Guoying.

Sun Sike in the west had a large number of ships and could quickly cross the Jialing River and return to Chongqing, and with 3,000 Han and Eight Banners and 2,000 Sichuan and Shaanxi Green Battalions, Deng Ming did not think that he could take Chongqing quickly. The castle was built on a mountainous terrain with the Yangtze River and the Jialing River as moats, making it difficult to storm or blast, and even if it could break through the walls, it would have to be taken down by street fighting, and the success rate and the cost required discouraged Deng. If you pay too heavy a price for conquering Chongqing, you can only watch Li Guoying leave, and the Ming army will lose the ability to attack in the short term. And if you fail to win it quickly, you may also encounter Zhao Liangdong and Li Guoying's attack, which will be a worse situation.

And Li Guoying in the east has no strong city walls to rely on, and there is not enough food and grass, so no matter how you look at it, it is an easier target. Since Sun Sike has collected all the ships for his own use, although he doesn't know when Zhao Liangdong will arrive, he will definitely not be able to do it soon, which will give Deng Ming more time to attack the isolated Li Guoying.

Until this moment, Deng Ming still didn't know anything about the previous battle between Yuan Zongdi and the Qing army, so he estimated the strength of the two armies at 10,000 Chengdu soldiers plus 5,000 soldiers from Wanxian County, and the other side was Li Guoying's side of the 8,000 Ganshan Green Battalion and 7,000 Shanxi Green Battalion. The Qing army has an absolute advantage in the number of unarmored soldiers, and this is also a force that cannot be ignored if there is a melee, in addition, Li Guoying also has the advantage of fighting on the inside line, and has a great chance to break the Ming army on both sides. The advantage of Deng Ming and Yuan Zongdi is that they can carefully observe Li Guoying's movements, and do not give the other party a chance to ambush him, and in order to prevent them from being broken by each one, Deng Ming planned to build a small number of troops to stay in Wanxian, and then lead the main force to join him by boat, and then engage Li Guoying.

"Chongqing's military tun is more impressive than we imagined." The captured Shanxi soldiers confessed that the scale of the Qing army's offensive was about 100,000 people, but they did not see a military camp in the west of Chongqing when they passed through Chongqing, and they did not see Deng Ming's ships passing by the Yangtze River, so Deng Ming judged that Li Guoying's army was placed on the north bank of the Jialing River to avoid reconnaissance by the Ming army, which was also part of Li Guoying's strategy of bullying the enemy: "After annihilating Li Guoying's main force, we joined up with the Yasukuni Guild, plus the second wave of the capital, and also had an advantage in the face of Zhao Liangdong and Wang Jinbao; Li Guoying's military tun was prepared for tens of thousands or even 100,000 troops, and he brought all the people to Wanxian, and these crops were prepared for us. ”

After harvesting Chongqing's crops, it will be able to encircle Chongqing for a long time without Chengdu having to bear too much military supplies, and without these grains, Deng Ming believes that Chongqing will not be able to hold on for a long time - the harvest is imminent, Deng Ming estimates that Chongqing's warehouses are about to bottom, as long as there is no grain in the warehouse, Zhao Liangdong will also starve after arrival.

"Daniel Zhang, Zhao Liangdong, Wang Jinbao, Sun Sike." After all his subordinates dispersed, Deng Ming gently repeated the names of the four enemy generals when he was alone, and shook his head gently: "Am I fighting Lord Wei's righteous brothers?" ”

Although the Ming army made every effort to adjust and try to attack Li Guoying as much as possible, the Ming army still could not move a single step for two days: the camp needed to be reinforced, the contact with Yuan Zongdi and the reconnaissance of Li Guoying were all in progress, especially the large number of prisoners needed to be held and disposed of. The Ming army moved quite quickly, but it was only two days later that the 14,000 captured Qing troops began to be evacuated in batches.

Mo Huaizhong, the commander of a Shanxi Green Battalion, followed the general all the way from Datong to Xi'an, and then went down the river to Chongqing, and did not have time to rest long before participating in the offensive against Wanxian and was deployed in the rear defense. The day before yesterday, under the command of Sun Sike, he ran east and west for dozens of miles of mountain roads, and then engaged the well-fed Ming army, and the friendly troops were quickly defeated, and Mo Huaizhong was also surrounded with his own troops. At one time, Mo Huaizhong planned to fight to the death with his brothers in a desperate situation, but when the officers of the Ganshan Green Battalion came to persuade the Ming army to surrender with a sad face, and loudly promised Deng Ming that they would never kill prisoners, the Shanxi Green Battalion, which was starving and weak in hands and feet, finally lost its fighting spirit and surrendered to the enemy with a fluke mentality, hoping that the enemy would keep its promise and give them a way to live.

The Ming army did not kill them, and the generals were all picked out by the Ming army. After meeting Tan Hong, Deng Ming realized that the generals may not have any prestige among the auxiliaries, but for the soldiers and soldiers, the status of these benefactors is irreplaceable, so Deng Ming invited the generals of the Shanxi Green Battalion to have a full meal, and allowed them to keep their mounts, swords and cloaks, this posture made many Shanxi Green Battalion generals think that Deng Ming was trying to win them over.

Several generals in Shanxi Green Camp are all fighting with heaven and man, but Deng Ming did not force them to make a decision immediately, but said that he would invite them to Chengdu as guests. According to Deng Ming, if they did not give up, he wanted to invite them to work in the Senate in Chengdu - in order to appease the 2,000 captive Shanxi Green Battalion armor and personal soldiers, Deng Ming thought it necessary to treat their benefactors well, and if more Shaanxi Green Battalion were captured, he should do the same.

Although it is not clear whether the senator in Deng Ming's mouth is equivalent to the general soldier or the deputy general, after a little temptation, the Shanxi Green Battalion immediately realized that they guessed correctly, the Senate is composed of generals under Deng Ming, even if it is not the former Chengdu general soldier, it is also the general guard of the key passes such as Jiange and Jiangyou. Although the generals of the Shanxi Green Battalion have not yet decided whether to surrender or not, they have secretly decided to go to Chengdu to talk about it, and there is no need to kill Chengren immediately.

Today, when Mo Huaizhong was escorted onto the ship and sent to Xuzhou, his benefactor was still on the shore, and seeing that the benefactor was safe and sound, his officers and personal soldiers were also a lot more relieved, and they did not make trouble but cooperated with the Ming army to command the prisoners to board the ship - they all knew in their hearts that if the trouble would bring trouble to the benefactor, and according to the practice and general logic, if the officers and personal soldiers openly said that they did not care about the life or death of the old commander, then the general would have no value in wooing. Just as the Qing court had intended for Feng Shuangli, it was only when his subordinates were submissive that King Qingyang could be treated kindly, a kind exchange that both sides had in mind.

The Ming army was indeed not as murderous as Han Baqi said, Mo Huaizhong and his colleagues and subordinates were not subjected to any abuse, not only could they eat enough but also live in camps. After boarding the ship, the Ming army only sent a small monitoring detachment, and let the prisoners take charge of their own internal management - anyway, there were Ming warships all around, and the prisoners on board had no weapons, and their generals were also in the hands of the Ming army, so if they were smart, they would not be in trouble.

The hundreds of prisoners on this ship stayed below deck, while Mo Huaizhong stayed on the ship with the Ming army officer in charge - as an officer, the Ming army not only did not tie him up and monitor him, but allowed him to stay on the deck of the ship to watch the scenery on both sides of the strait, and the accompanying Ming army officers who were ordered to board the ship to monitor the captives would even answer the questions of Mo Huaizhong and others, explaining to them the surrounding geography and the customs of Chengdu and Xuzhou.

When going upstream, from time to time there are cargo ships and the Ming fleet pass by, after the Ming army resumed control of the river, a large number of Ming merchant ships that were stagnant in the Qijiang River rushed south, and the sailors of each passing merchant ship would give a loud cheer to their trade road defenders, when a group of salt merchants' salt ships passed, the escort shopkeeper also personally beat drums on the side of the ship, and the fellow tent men beat gongs on the side.

After seeing so many merchant ships, Mo Huaizhong and his colleagues were very shocked, because when they came out of Datong, they were told that the Deng Ming bandit gang in Chengdu was just a stream of bandits, just like the Yudong thieves. What should the bandits look like, Shanxi Green Camp still knows in their hearts, but after encountering the Ming army this time, they are completely different from the bandits. And now they saw the cloud-like warships that covered the river, and the merchant fleets that connected to the sky and the ground.

As for the appearance of the sailors on the merchant ships, it was even more surprising to the Green Battalion, and when they were in their hometown, the elders rarely cheered them so warmly.