The food prepared for the officers was quite rich, not only rice and noodles, but also meat and wine, and Deng Ming estimated that Zhou Kaihuang had turned out all the good things that Tan Hong had prepared for him. But Deng Ming was still very dissatisfied with the arrangement, because he found that Zhou Kaihuang actually arranged the position for himself to be the chief among them, which made Deng Ming feel very embarrassed, and secretly complained to Zhou Kaihuang: "Others don't know that I, a child of the clan, am fake, don't you know?" ”

Before Deng Ming pretended to be Han Shizi in order to deceive Tan Hong into leaving the camp, and further afore, when Zhou Kaihuang claimed that Deng Ming was a child of the clan to Tan Wenyu, Deng Ming did not deny it, that was because Deng Ming thought that there was a possibility of infighting at that time and needed to appease people's hearts, and he had already classified this claim as a white lie. While he had won a big victory now, Deng Ming pondered to find an opportunity to tell Li Xinghan and others the truth, and at the same time apologize. But looking at Zhou Kaihuang's current arrangement, it is clear that he still has to let his tricks continue.

"Does he think that the morale of the army is still unstable? Need to continue lying to friendly forces? I don't think so. Deng Ming also muttered a little in his heart, although there were several hours today when Deng Ming's status was close to that of the master of an army, but Deng Ming knew his military level well, and he still didn't have any confidence. There are many people around, and Deng Ming has no chance to communicate with Zhou Kaihuang in private, so he can only hint to the other party with his eyes. Seeing that Zhou Kaihuang insisted on sitting on the lead on his own, and performing a "His Royal Highness" very enthusiastically, Deng Ming was completely empty-hearted: "I don't know the etiquette of this era, is it difficult to ride a tiger now?" Could it be that explaining the truth to Li Xinghan would cause great anger from the other party, so Zhou Kaihuang asked me to continue pretending to be in danger? ”

These many questions made Deng Ming lose his good mood and the opportunity to confess, and also made him worry again. By the time he was gone, the elated officers had already taken their seats. There was originally a deep estrangement between the Ming court zhèngfǔ army and the former army, but at this time they were intimate, not divided into two distinct factions according to the camp, but sat together in a mixed manner, and at the same time they talked loudly, and even some people asked each other about their ancestors, hometowns, and experiences, and started friendship.

While the people in the tent were eating, drinking, and laughing, some people got up one after another to relieve themselves. Due to the cold weather, these soldiers did not leave the tent, but directly unbuttoned their pants and urinated on the ground in the corner of the tent. When they were done, they didn't wash their hands, but fastened their belts and walked back to their seats, sat down and continued to drink. Deng Ming has always been uncomfortable with this unhygienic habit, he has seen a similar scene in Yuan Zongdi's army before, the officers directly solve the problem in the camp tent, and the garbage is still on the ground, all handed over to the guards to clean, and pour some soil shovels outside the camp.

"If one day I lead the army alone, the first thing I will do is to repair the toilet, let everyone go to the toilet to solve the problem, and absolutely no open defecation." Deng Ming felt that he was not in his position, he was not in his politics, and it was not good for him to interfere too much when he first arrived.

After another moment, Zhou Kaihuang suddenly remembered that he had not yet toasted Deng Ming, who was the most noble and personally went into battle to kill the enemy-Originally, he wanted to do this, but as soon as he sat down just now, he was stopped by the person next to him to speak, and now he remembered that this important work had not been completed until he was half drunk.

Another acquaintance of Deng Ming, Zhao Tianba, had other thoughts. Jin Yiwei's position gave him the opportunity to meet Emperor Yongli and other clan relatives, since he saw Deng Ming's appearance, he couldn't help but compare it repeatedly with the current son and other clan disciples, and the more he compared, the more he felt that Deng Ming's expression was too abnormal.

When Zhou Kaihuang came over and asked him to go with him to congratulate Deng Ming, Zhao Tianba was thinking in his heart: "In the past few days, the third prince has not avoided danger at all, as if he deliberately expressed himself in front of everyone to be different from other clan royal relatives, especially his heroic behavior today has been spread through the mouths of everyone, and he will definitely be able to win the respect and love of the soldiers of Sichuan and Hubei!" The imperial court is far away from here, if the third prince is devoted to befriending the officers and soldiers in the Sichuan and Hubei areas...... Well, the third prince is also different from King Han and King Andong, even if he wants to inherit the unification, probably everyone will take it for granted, right? It is the soldiers and horses who broke into the camp, if he is willing to take no blame for the past, and the merit of supporting it is far higher than protecting a few clans, and their previous attack on Běijīng and forcing the Lie Emperor to death may really be able to write it off......"

After Zhao Tianba, who was born in Xiying, moved this suspicion, he began to worry about the impact that this matter would have on the most staunch supporters of the Yongli Imperial Court, the Jin Domain, and the more he thought about it, the more unpredictable he felt, and after being interrupted by Zhou Kaihuang, he found that he was only thinking nonsense, and he had been leaving Deng Ming aside for a long time, and hurriedly gathered his mind and toasted Deng Ming loudly with Zhou Kaihuang.

"Today, Rì was able to win a big victory, thanks to His Highness's strategy, luring that Tan thief out of the camp, and then killing them and fleeing away." Zhou Kaihuang was a little drunk, and complimented loudly: "Your Highness is really like a god with soldiers, and it is effortless to come up with such a plan......

Deng Ming's face was flushed when he heard these words, he used to play a real-time strategy game and was always killed by his friends to lose his armor, seeing that Zhou Kaihuang said too much, he waved his hand again and again, and explained: "This is not a plan I came up with. ”

"Hey, who didn't come up with it if His Highness came up with it?" Zhou Kaihuang asked strangely: "I don't see anyone giving advice to His Highness." ”

"It's ...... Well, it was Emperor Chengzu's ploy. "The history of the late Ming Dynasty is always too sad to read, but Deng Ming once read some records of the early Ming Dynasty with great interest, and Emperor Chengzu was Zhu Di.

After the death of Zhu Yuanzhang, the Taizu of the Ming Dynasty, his eldest grandson succeeded to the throne in Nanjing and was called Emperor Jianwen. Zhu Yuanzhang's other son, Zhu Di, rebelled, and Zhu Di moved the capital from Nanjing to Beiping at that time, and changed Beiping to Běijīng. Deng Ming felt that Zhu Di became very brutal after becoming the emperor, but before he sat on the throne, he was a generous and generous person, and he was a hero on the battlefield, full of tricks.

Zhu Di rebelled, marched south from Beiping, and was defeated by Sheng Yong, the general of the southern army of Emperor Jianwen, in Dongchang. Zhu Di retreated to Beiping, but was blocked by Wu Jie on the way, and he won easily by using stratagems. Deng Ming remembered this story when he was in a predicament today, so he gave it a try.

Seeing that the curious eyes of everyone in the camp were on him, Deng Ming told them the history he had seen: "...... Emperor Chengzu only had more than 4,000 soldiers and horses around him at that time, but Wu Jie, who blocked Chengzu, had 20,000 soldiers and horses, and he camped on the road, blocking the only way for Chengzu to return to Beiping. Emperor Chengzu felt that if he broke through the siege, he would definitely kill and injure many people, so he let the army ambush first, and he only rushed to Wu Jie's camp with dozens of guards and asked to meet Wu Jie. After Wu Jie appeared on the camp wall, Cheng Zu told him that he hoped to put a way out of his life for the sake of his kindness. Wu Jie was very happy when he heard this, and immediately urged the whole army to go out of the camp, divide into several ways to attack, and copy in all directions, and must arrest Emperor Chengzu. Unexpectedly, he was led into the ambush circle by Emperor Chengzu, but as a result, Chengzu won more with less, and Wu Jie suffered a fiasco. ”

After telling this story, Deng Ming sighed lightly, today's encounter made him think that Wu Jie was probably ready to be hunted and arrested, worried that Zhu Di would run away, and let this great credit fall into the hands of others, just like Tan Hong's expression today. When he was in front of Tan Hong's camp today, Deng Ming was very nervous - if Tan Hongzhen gave him a boat, it would not be able to end the battle. When Zhu Di shouted to Wu Jie's camp back then, would he also be worried in his heart - what if Wu Jie really gave way to his fifty or so soldiers?

Zhu Di Rong horse's life, the heroism on the battlefield still made Deng Ming quite admirable, he has seen a lot of records about this story, when he explained, the camp tent gradually quieted down, Zhou Kaihuang listened attentively, and the wine woke up a lot.

"Wu Jie, like Ping'an and Sheng Yong, was the only general in the Southern Army at that time, and he was a veteran general who had been on the battlefield for a long time and had attacked many times, and Emperor Jianwen relied on him very much. After Emperor Chengzu swept through Hebei and defeated Li Jinglong, all the officers and soldiers fled when they heard the news, only Wu Jie stuck to Zhending, so that Emperor Chengzu was helpless, and he kept harassing běijīng during the period, not only was he able to successfully attack and harass, but he was able to retreat every time. Wu Jie can also be called courageous and knowledgeable, but it's a pity that he is greedy together, and the end is a fiasco. ”

Although Tan Hong is also a veteran soldier, he still can't be compared with Wu Jie, a general in the early Ming Dynasty who has fought for many years, Deng Ming is very glad that Tan Hong doesn't know this story, and then said: "Tan Hong hasn't read this history, which is really our luck." ”

"I see!"

"No wonder Your Highness has a clever plan!"

"Homeschooling, it turned out to be homeschooling." After a moment of silence, Zhou Kaihuang advocated for Deng Ming again.

Zhou Kaihuang's remarks aroused approval, and everyone nodded yes, it turned out that this trick was initiated by Zhu Di, and it was natural for Deng Ming, as a child of the clan, to play this trick handy.

When Zhou Kaihuang was spitting around, Deng Ming had been thinking about whether he should pull Zhou Kaihuang outside the camp to discuss the issue of impostor. Zhou Kaihuang's trouble like this made the dissatisfaction in Deng Ming's heart continue to increase, and now he has begun to get a little angry: "It is said that the best way to deal with it is to tell them the truth immediately after defeating Tan Hong, and sincerely apologize to them, after all, we lied, isn't there any one among so many people who can understand our hard work?" It's better now, but if you continue to cheat even harder, how will it end in the future? ”

Zhou Kaihuang said that Li Xinghan's group are all Wanxian soldiers, and Yuan Zongdi's station is in Dachang, maybe Zhou Kaihuang doesn't care about one day the scam is exposed, anyway, they will not be stationed in the same place in the future. Thinking of this, Deng Ming felt that Zhou Kaihuang was really a guy who didn't care about it, and maybe he would become a friendly army on the battlefield in the future, so he wouldn't be afraid of leaving sequelae for deceiving people?

Deng Ming couldn't continue to brag about Zhou Kaihuang's rambling bragging, seeing that many people looked concerned about Zhou Kaihuang's judgment of "family learning", Deng Ming began to pave the way before explaining his identity, and when everyone in the camp nodded yes, he resolutely shook his head and denied it: "That's not right, I just read some books and know more about this truth of Emperor Chengzu." ”

"You can read." An officer who had already drunk too much interjected stupidly. The person who said this sentence was also not mindless, and as soon as he said it, he felt that something was wrong.

This sentence was immediately reprimanded by many people in unison: "Confused, can Your Highness still be illiterate?" ”

After the scolding sounded around, the officer was full of shame and stood up to apologize to Deng Ming.

In this era, there are too few people in the army who can read, for example, Tan Wen's army doesn't know who else is literate except for the master, even the commander Tan Wenwen's literacy is also very limited, and most of the paperwork has to be done by the master. A young and literate scholar like Deng Ming, an officer who had never seen it before, blurted out such a sentence.

Everyone's reaction made Deng Ming dumbfounded, and he asked tentatively in surprise: "You should all be literate, right?" ”

In Deng Ming's view, all the people present were officers, especially Zhou Kaihuang and a few of them, who were either guards officers who were the lords of the first army, or middle-level officers with considerable prestige, and Zhao Tianba was a messenger sent by zhōngyāngzhèngfǔ. But Deng Ming's questioning caused a wave of denial. While everyone shook their heads, they also felt that Deng Ming didn't know anything about the situation, whether it was Zhou Kaihuang, Zhao Tianba or Li Xinghan, none of the people present were literate. The young Sichuan people who have grown up in the chaos of these ten years of war are familiar with war and death, but they know nothing about words and history.

Hearing everyone praise him for his breadth of knowledge, Deng Ming suddenly remembered that he had previously claimed to Yuan Zongdi that he was an amnesiac scholar, so he had to postpone his plan to confess to Li Xinghan and reimagine how to tell a convincing origin. Deng Ming also glanced at Zhou Kaihuang with some humility, but fortunately, he didn't see any doubts on Zhou Kaihuang's face. Deng Ming estimated that the other party had not realized that his expression tonight was contradictory to his previous statement, but how to make up for this flaw also gave Deng Ming a headache.

Zhou Kaihuang swallowed two glasses of wine again, his voice became louder, and he patted Li Xinghan on the shoulder and shouted: "Brother Li, the two of us can be regarded as friends in trouble, and it is not appropriate to hide it from you......" Halfway through his words, Zhou Kaihuang suddenly stopped and looked at Deng Ming: "Your Highness, I think it's better not to hide it from Li Qianzong and them." ”

"I've thought so for a long time, and I should have told the truth a long time ago." Deng Ming said in his heart that although he didn't understand why Zhou Kaihuang suddenly changed his mind, this idea was very suitable for Deng Ming's spleen. Deng Ming nodded heavily, and secretly sighed: "It should be better for Brother Zhou to explain for me, otherwise I don't know how to defend myself, why do I have to deceive for so long...... Well? If he wants to tell the truth, why does he still call me Your Highness? ”

Without waiting for Deng Ming to understand this truth, Zhou Kaihuang, who had received approval, first quieted everyone down, and then looked around in a mysterious way, and then said loudly to everyone in the camp: "Everyone knows that His Royal Highness is actually not Han Shizi, right?" ”

Everyone nodded, and immediately some people guessed that Deng Ming was the first line of King Anton, and Li Xinghan and other Sichuan people hoped that this rather heroic son of the clan was a descendant of the King of Shu who had lived in Sichuan for generations, so they secretly guessed that he was the queen of the King of Shu.

"It's not King Andong, it's not the King of Shu, it's not the King of Qin......" Zhou Kaihuang's voice became louder and louder, and everyone's appetite was also raised higher and higher by him, except for Deng Ming, who had just calmed down his heart and raised it again, and a sense of foreboding surged in his chest.

"His Royal Highness is the descendant of the Lie Emperor, and the third prince is also!" Zhou Kaihuang said the answer triumphantly. Except for Zhao Tianba, everyone's faces showed an incredible sè without exception, and they let out countless exclamations one after another - Yuan Zongdi's subordinates were no exception, this effect made Zhou Kaihuang feel very satisfied, and his chest was raised high because of pride.

"Why did His Highness come to Sichuan?"

"Why did His Highness go to the army of the Duke of Yasukuni?"

Immediately after the exclamation, many questions rang out, and everyone looked at Deng Ming while asking questions, eagerly seeking answers.

When Zhou Kaihuang announced the answer, Deng Ming was as surprised as everyone else, what was stronger than most people was that he didn't shout, and when a large number of questions came to him, Deng Ming was stunned, and he couldn't say a word.

"When did Your Highness come to Sichuan?" Li Xinghan also asked loudly: "Where has His Highness been for so many years?" ”

After the initial shock, Li Xinghan's first thought was that Zhou Kaihuang was lying. He glanced at Deng Ming first, and felt that the blank expression on the other party's face confirmed his judgment, and then he looked at another guy who should know the inside story - Zhao Tianba, the latter's calm appearance made Li Xinghan a little skeptical of his judgment - maybe the third prince didn't expect Zhou Kaihuang to really tell the truth? But if he can't get a reasonable explanation, Li Xinghan can't dispel his suspicions.

At this time, Zhou Kaihuang was in a good mood, and felt that he was really in the limelight at the dinner, and when everyone looked at Deng Ming, he observed the surprised expressions on everyone's faces with a chūn face, and the more he looked at it, the happier he became, and he didn't notice a pair of hateful eyes thrown from Deng Ming's direction. Deng Minghe, who had eased up a little, laughed a few times, if he didn't know that Zhou Kaihuang's martial arts were far above him, he really wanted to knock the other party to the ground with a stick.

"Okay, you're going to open up the wilderness for a week, if you don't force me to death, it's not over." Deng Ming scolded in his heart, and now his mind was in chaos, and he didn't know what to do at all, so he continued to kick the ball to Zhou Kaihuang, and pointed at the perpetrator with his hand and replied vaguely to everyone: "It's up to Zhou Qian to say it." ”

In the name of Deng, since Zhou Kaihuang dared to blow the conch so much, then he must have a way to lie. Deng Ming had always felt that he was still a little impatient—this confidence was gained from deceiving Yuan Zongdi into believing that he was a scholar. But now Deng Ming must admit that his brain is completely insufficient, so he can only hope that Zhou Kaihuang will be able to make his own words come true.

But to Deng Ming's surprise, Zhou Kaihuang not only did not shoulder his own responsibility, but instead asked Deng Ming in surprise: "How can this lowly position know?" Your Highness, you haven't told me again! ”