The fourteenth year of Yongli in the Ming Dynasty, the seventeenth year of Shunzhi in the Qing Dynasty, November 22, Jiujiang.

Twenty days after the Battle of Gaoyou Lake, Deng Ming's vanguard once again arrived in Jiujiang, an important town in Jiangxi, and the generals of the army were Major Ren Tang and Zhou Kaihuang, with more than 5,000 vanguard soldiers and horses, almost all of them were Ming soldiers except sailors, and a small number of accounts brought by quartermaster officers.

In order to cover people's eyes, Jiujiang pretended to declare martial law, but the reaction on the shore was completely different. Long before the appearance of the sailors waving the red flag, a large number of gentry were waiting by the riverside, and Dong Weiguo, the political envoy of Jiangxi Province who was sitting in Jiujiang, shouted loudly at the civil and military officials in the yamen that "those suspected of being with Deng will be killed without mercy and will be killed," but he turned a blind eye to the delegation of the gentry who were not a few miles away from the city.

After discovering the gentry welcome group, Ren Tang took a part of the soldiers and horses to abandon the ship and landed, brazenly waved red flags on the shore, and then ordered the army to beat drums and march in unison. At the same time, the Ming army even erected the captured Son of Heaven and the imperial robes of the Nine Dragons, and marched proudly until the city of Jiujiang, where Dong Weiguo swore to live and die with him, and ended the march in the deafening cheers of the onlookers and the people.

In front of the defenders of Jiujiang and the people around him, Ren Tang commanded the army to carry out a continuous formation change, and the unprecedented neat performance further mobilized the audience's feelings, and some imprudent people even shouted "Long live".

"My lord," a green battalion commander on the gate of Jiujiang City muttered to the general guard, "This long live has been shouted, I'm afraid it's inappropriate, right?" ”

"Huh?" The guard general had been carefully appreciating the Ming army's review before, and the dazzling performance made the guard general fascinated, and when Ren Tang's drill was over, he couldn't get enough of his gaze back: "What nonsense? This is obviously a loyal and righteous person, seeing the former emperor's reliance and dragon robe falling into the hands of thieves, regardless of the arrogance of the thieves, crying bitterly and shouting 'Long live the first emperor', don't talk nonsense if you have bad eyes. ”

Today, when Ren Tang took the Ming army off the ship, he also let the Ming army wear the best military uniforms, and more than 2,000 Ming soldiers were all brand new military uniforms for review.

Designing military uniforms was originally a major hobby of Deng Ming, as an art student, he was instinctively full of the pursuit of beauty, as early as on the way to Dongchuan with seventeen horses, he had conceived a new style of Ming army uniforms in his mind more than once, but at that time he had no money and no manpower. When he was rampant in Jiangnan this time, Deng Ming took advantage of the developed textile industry in Jiangnan to hand over the design patterns and workmanship requirements of military uniforms to Jiang Guozhu, and let him be responsible for supervising the construction.

In terms of specific design, Deng Ming mainly copied the style of the French army in the Napoleonic period in the previous life, and when he used to observe the oil paintings of the Napoleonic era, the military uniform of the French army gave him a great impact, but of course the color of the jacket was changed to the traditional red of the Ming army, and then put on the armor or there was a big difference from Deng Ming's impression.

The cost of these military uniforms was so expensive that Jiang Guozhu secretly smacked his tongue, but Deng Ming didn't feel distressed if he didn't spend his own money, and Jiang Guozhu was distressed but didn't dare to complain.

The last time they left Nanjing, all the 8,000 Ming soldiers were given a set, and more than 1,000 sailors were given sailor uniforms designed for them—these sailors generally did not need to wear armor or helmets, so they could use tricorne hats, which looked a bit like that of a modern army—but like the infantry, these sailors also regarded their new uniforms as treasures, and carefully put them away, saying that they would wait until they returned to Sichuan to wear them to their mother-in-law or the neighbor's eldest girl.

For more than a month before the siege of Gaoyou, Deng Ming also collected all the cowhides and sent them back to the rear to make high-waisted leather boots, but due to the rush of time, Deng Ming only received more than 3,000 pairs of boots, and the remaining cowhides could only be processed after returning to Sichuan. The three thousand pairs of leather boots in his hand Deng Ming were handed over to Ren Tang and Zhou Kaihuang in an ancient way, and like all the nouveau riche, the treasure in his hand can be taken out as quickly as possible to show off in order to bring the greatest satisfaction - Ren Tang, Zhou Kaihuang and Deng Ming have a very strict nouveau riche complex, after throwing the dice to defeat Zhou Kaihuang and become the chief director of the military parade, Ren Tang gave each of the Ming soldiers who landed a pair of leather boots.

Now the Ming soldiers standing in front of Jiujiang City had shiny leather boots on their feet, and although many of their feet had been worn out by the new boots, all the soldiers raised their chins high, and their faces had expressions of invincibility - it was clear that they also had nouveau riche complexes deep down in their hearts.

"The armor is not unified, which greatly affects the appearance of the army." After the parade stopped, Ren Tang observed his army with a critical eye, and the armor of the vanguard of the Sichuan army was definitely enough to be proud of the whole country, but now compared with their military uniforms, this armor has become a shortcoming of the army. Although he had not seen the gorgeous oil paintings of military uniforms in modern armies, Ren Tang's love for beauty was also stimulated by Deng Ming, and he silently recited in his heart: "We must let the Admiral design a new helmet and armor, and then quickly manufacture them to equip the standing army." ”

Looking at the military uniforms on the Ming army, looking at his subordinates, the guards sighed

tone, compared to the enemy, not to mention the ordinary green battalion, even his own soldiers look like Hanako.

It was not only the green battalion in Jiujiang that was unbalanced, but the cavalry of the three walls also urged Deng Ming all day long after seeing the equipment that the infantry had gotten, where was their new uniform? However, Deng Ming, the cavalry's military uniform, has not been fully designed, so he can only take the sketch to the knights of the three walls first, but what makes the knights of the three walls feel comforted is that the admiral has not yet designed a new helmet for them - a golden bronze helmet, and there is a big red tassel decoration behind it - inspired by the helmet of the Roman consul in the movie Deng Ming has seen, he has always felt that the long and wide arc-shaped red tassel is very stylish, and it can definitely play the role of a peacock to open the screen and attract the attention of many people of the opposite sex for the warriors. The materials are all ready-made, and the brass in Deng Ming's hand is not only enough to make helmets, but also to replace the swords of officers and cavalrymen with beautiful copper grips - expensive weapons not only have a decorative effect, meet the aesthetic needs of art students for military uniforms, but also improve the pride of soldiers, but whether the copper helmet is suitable for the needs of the battlefield will not be known until the sample comes out.

The three walls are fortunately because there is hope, but the auxiliaries of the Ming army are relatively lost, according to Deng Ming's order, the auxiliaries recruited by the Ming army along the way are all counted as brave and brave, not soldiers. Because Deng Ming planned to greatly improve the social status of the Sichuan army, and there would also be very high allowances and treatments, if these auxiliary soldiers who had just joined the army were all counted as Sichuan soldiers, Deng Ming's finances would be in big trouble, and he thought that this would not be fair to Sichuan Tongxiucai. The auxiliary soldiers did not have much complaint about this before, because the status of the auxiliary soldiers in the Qing army was similar to that of livestock, although there was only one name of righteousness in the Deng Ming army, but the food treatment was very good, and they were not oppressed too much. But it is human nature not to be satisfied, and the more they learn about the various treatments of Sichuan soldiers, the more aggrieved these auxiliaries feel, and Deng Ming even claimed that they can only enjoy the treatment including military uniforms and leather boots after returning to Sichuan to become Tongxiucai and enlist in the army at the next call-up.

In the battle of Gaoyou Lake, twelve auxiliaries were involved in the war because they were overexcited, left the safe area, and had to take up arms to fight against the Praetorian Guards and were wounded, although they were all slightly injured, but at one time everyone felt that these guys were too unlucky, and if they didn't run around, they would never have bumped into the Praetorian Guards who broke through; But now in the eyes of the 30,000 auxiliaries, these dozen guys are all lucky people who are very lucky, because these wounded have bravely resisted, and the most important thing is that they are wounded, Deng Ming recruited them as Sichuan soldiers out of the consideration of boosting morale, and now they will enjoy the same treatment as other soldiers.

After the Ming army set up camp, the gentry group came to visit Ren Tang and Zhou Kaihuang with large bags of gifts, many of which were specially arrived from Nanchang, and the two majors called by these gentry were very happy.

Although Deng Ming only gave them the rank of major, many of the generals in the Green Battalion did not command as many troops as they commanded, so this general deserved it. Moreover, after the Battle of Gaoyou, Deng Ming also told the three majors that he intended to establish a new, larger establishment; At present, the largest unit in the Ming army is the team, with an infantry team of 200 men and a cavalry team of 100 men, and the newly established battalion will have three teams under its jurisdiction, and the major will be the commander of the battalion.

This formation is not much different from that of the Green Battalion, and 600 elite infantry or 300 armored cavalry with such luxurious equipment would be commanded by at least one guerrilla even on the Qing side, so now the three majors have begun to regard their ranks as guerrillas.

Further, Deng Ming also revealed to the three that he was considering a larger establishment, and that the name of that establishment would be "regiment", and Deng Ming had plans to set up a standing infantry regiment of 1,800 men and a standing cavalry regiment of 900 men in Chengdu, both of which would have three standing battalions under their jurisdiction. After learning the news, Zhou Kaihuang, Ren Tang and Mu Tan privately discussed that they would each take the position of commander of the standing cavalry battalion, and persuaded Deng Ming to send Zhao Tianba and Li Xinghan to take charge of the standing infantry battalion.

After congratulating the Yangtze River Admiral on his victory at Gaoyou Lake, the gentry began to inquire about trade, and Ren Tang and Zhou Kaihuang said that Deng Ming had given clear instructions on this matter, and that the Ming army would continue to trade with these "Ming-minded" people, purchase local products and military supplies from them in accordance with the principle of fair trade, and provide samples and quotations, so that they could freely purchase the goods brought by the Ming army from downstream.

In addition to the smuggling trade, Ren Tang also said that the Ming army needed the assistance of the gentry and local tyrants to say goodbye to the soldiers and soldiers of the Sichuan army -- most of the Zhejiang soldiers in the Sichuan army had family affairs, but many of the soldiers from Sichuan were still singles. Ren Tang said that as a Jiangxi native, he would never let the girls in his hometown suffer, not only the bride price was preferential, but also the marriage etiquette would be meticulous. All in all, Ren Tang needs the local snakes to help him find some good girls who are innocent, hard-working, and willing to marry in Sichuan.