Chapter 7 Chapter 7 Fighting Life

Li Rusong arrived in Ningxia in June. Before he arrived, General Dong Yikui, General Soldier of Ningxia, General Li Wei, General Soldier of Guyuan, Liu Chengsi, Niu Bingzhong, Ma Gui and other generals had confronted Qi Bai several times. However, the city could not be attacked for a long time, and the Hetao tribes kept supporting Qi Bye, the weather is hot and the battle is strenuous, and after a long period of tossing without any specific results, everyone is very embarrassed; when his army arrives, after some self-criticism, everyone will A little bit "knowledge of shame is almost brave", so he attacked more vigorously.

Li Rusong also redesigned the battle method. He planned according to the terrain and terrain. Because the city wall was too high and it was not easy to attack from above, he ordered people to prepare 30,000 cloth bags, filled with soil, and stacked them up for the soldiers to use as ladders to climb up. city ​​walls.However, the Qibai army repelled the attack by throwing cannons and stones from the city; Li Ruzhang was ordered to lead his own army to climb the ladder to attack, but it also failed. The guerrilla Gong Zijing brought a Miao army to assist Nanguan. Growing up in the mountains, he had always been good at climbing and attacking mountain cities, but unfortunately he was unsuccessful, and Gong Zijing was killed in battle.

Embarrassed now, Li Rusong, who has always been irritable and domineering, was thwarted in three consecutive attacks, and couldn't help being furious, cursing in the camp: "It's just a rebel, how can it be an iron wall?" The setback in the siege was a great shame to him, the "Master Li" who thought he had completely inherited his father's general talents. Therefore, after cursing the three-character scripture for more than half an hour, he subconsciously got angry. On the head of others: "Someone must have fished on the spot and didn't go all out, that's why a small Ningxia city can't be captured—"

It is common for the soldiers to fish in troubled waters because they are greedy for life and fear of death, and they don't work hard in battle. This is a common thing. If they are defeated in the battle, he always doesn't care about it; but this time, he lost three games in a row, he thought so , the anger became even greater, and he simply took advantage of the problem and pushed all the responsibility for the defeat to the soldiers: "Come here! Drag all the guys who are not effective in combat to me and cut them down!" As soon as he said that, everyone was taken aback. Niu Bingzhong and Ma Gui, who were one level below him, were even more panicked; Relying on being his own younger brother, he still had the courage to plead with him: "The failure to attack the city is due to the lack of cooperation of the right time and favorable location. Even if the soldiers are weak, it is only a small fault-not to mention that the army is moving at the beginning. , there is no good news yet, it may be bad luck to kill your own subordinates first!"

However, Li Rusong was furious and subconsciously deceived himself and others. He wanted to blame others for the defeat in order to prove his wisdom. How could he accept other people's opinions?Therefore, they insisted on sending people to find out a few unlucky ghosts who "were not able to attack the city" in each battalion, and rectified the law on the spot. After chopping off dozens of heads in one go, his anger still didn't dissipate, but it produced a follow-up effect - people "don't shed tears when they don't see the coffin". The people on duty were fearful and worked hard spontaneously; several generals were also secretly frightened, fearing that they would be the ones to be punished next time, so everyone redoubled their efforts several times to think and attack. way of the city.

With such an agitation, the method was aroused - it was Ma Gui who first thought of it, using water attack. So people were sent to break the dam water, and the water outside the city was eight or nine feet deep. The inside of the city was even worse. In the low-lying areas, whole houses were submerged. When the flood came, his momentum immediately turned from upwind to downwind, so he had to come up with a countermeasure; he sent his adopted son Keli Gai to seek help from various tribes in Zhouhetao; unexpectedly, after Ke Li Gai came out of the water, his whereabouts were immediately revealed. It was discovered that the lieutenant general Li Ning led an army to catch up and wiped him out.

Now, Li Rusong was proud, and calmly deployed to attack the city; and although the Mongolian tribes in Hetao had not contacted Keli Gai, they gathered more than ten thousand riders to Zhang Liangbao because of an early appointment with Qibai; Li Rusong was complacent When the two armies were facing each other, he still killed his own people first--two timid soldiers did not advance but retreated when they started the battle. The two were cut into four sections - in this way, everyone moved forward desperately, killing the enemy army and fleeing in one go. Next, he returned to the army to deal with the worship; because Ningxia City was flooded for many days, originally because of the dry climate, the building materials of the city walls were mainly loess from local materials, which could not withstand the continuous flooding of floods. The area had already begun to loosen, and Beiguan was the first to collapse; therefore, Li Rusong led Xiao Ruxun and other generals to pretend to attack Beiguan with great fanfare, inducing Qiangbai to use the main force to defend Beiguan, but sent another elite troops to attack Beiguan. Nanguan attacked. Due to the weak defense of Nanguan, the troops led by Li Ruzhang and Li Rumei successfully climbed up the city pass with ladders and entered the city. Together with Li Rusong's troops, they defeated Qibai's main force in Beiguan. Army, and the stubborn Qi Bai was wiped out.

When the good news was reported to the imperial court, of course there was a lot of jubilation in the court. The ministers first attributed the main reason for the victory to the "sage" of Emperor Wanli, and made a lot of nasty memorials, followed by the narrative. Li Ruhe's contribution to enlisting the generals; Li Rusong received the most "advancements and promotions", and he was promoted to the governor, and Shiyin Jinyi commanded Tongzhi. In addition to these, the ministers from the Wanli Emperor to the Manchu Dynasty all began to inflate themselves, thinking that the military strength of the Ming Dynasty was extremely powerful, and they were full of confidence in Li Rusong's combat ability. He's the son of a general, and eliminating the foreign bandits is simply a matter of getting something out of his bag.

As a result, the attitude towards "North Korea's request for help" has also undergone a great change. More than ninety-nine percent of the ministers believe that Li Rusong should be sent to North Korea to lead an army to drive the "Japanese pirates" back to Japan. , not only protecting the vassal state, but also gaining prestige in foreign lands, so that the "Japanese pirates" will also submit to the Ming Dynasty just like Qi Bai, and never dare to move around again. Of course, Emperor Wanli's attitude is also about fighting - he is still a young man, and his blood is easy to boil. When he hears that there is going to be a war, his first reaction is excitement. So he decided to go on a personal conquest; what's more, he has always had the habit of "rejoicing for great achievements", and exaggerated words such as "great victory" and "showing power" came to his ears together, making his heart even more dizzy , overjoyed; therefore, he personally dictated the imperial edict and issued it to Li Rusong: "You are what my heart is for, and I will do my best to serve you on the battlefield, to show off the prestige in foreign lands, and to prosper the civil and military virtues of tomorrow's dynasty— —”

He gave Li Rusong the title of "Admiral of the Ji, Liao, Baoding, and Shandong armies", ordered him to go directly from Ningxia to Liaodong, and promised: "On the day of success, there will be another reward!" On the one hand, he also personally selected Song Yingchang, the Minister of Qiu Department of the "Main Warfare" as the Liaodong Economic Strategy, who was responsible for assisting the Korean War. Let him bring as many weapons, new-style firearms, and cannons as possible; before setting off, he also issued a personally dictated encouraging edict like Li Rusong's: "May you go here and win the flag, so as to comfort my heart——"

Song Yingchang, who received the edict, was of course so touched that he fell to the ground and cried bitterly, and vowed to return to settle the chaos and report the Long En of Emperor Wanli; I forgot what I said, and only the illusion of "great victory" in my heart remained. The picture that floated in front of my eyes was the army of the Ming Dynasty led by Song Yingchang and Li Rusong, sweeping across the entire territory of North Korea like a gust of wind He killed, chased, and captured the Japanese soldiers until nothing remained—then, all the prisoners were escorted to Beijing, where they kneeled down in black and filled the square at his feet. "The ceremony, full of majesty and majesty - all kinds of scenes, made him feel elated and overjoyed, and he kept talking to Concubine Zheng non-stop. "I like fighting the most. One man is in charge, and ten thousand men are invincible. Do you think you are arrogant? It's a pity that I can't go by myself-well, but I personally sent these two people to go, it's the same; Song Both Ying Chang and Li Rusong are very good at fighting, and if I send them there, they will be my substitutes, to fight for me! When they come back from a big, big, big victory for me, I will be even more prestigious—— " Concubine Zheng Guifei had neither concept nor opinion on the matter of "fighting", so she just followed his words and flattered him to please him: "Long live Lord's sageness, needless to say for a long time? Now with the addition of prestige , Isn’t that the first person in the ages? Well, think about it, Chen Qie—hey, in order to protect the subordinate country, send out a large army to show off the power of foreign lands, Chen Qie has never heard of it, nor seen it in the book ——It’s such a bit of luck, after serving Lord Long Live, I met him in person!” After a few words, of course, Emperor Wanli opened his mouth so happy that he almost smiled to his ears, so he immediately stretched out his hand, hugged and hugged into a ball, and shouted in his mouth: "I heard that Japanese and Japanese are as short as Is it half the height of ordinary people? This time I always taught them to see my martial arts—” The illusion in his heart expanded even more, and the source of his happiness was not his ignorance of the strength of the Japanese army, but his self-expansion. Therefore, for a long time, his emotions were extremely excited; Song Ying Before Chang and Li Rusong's armies had even moved out, he thought that his "prestige" had already conquered the whole of Japan. However, Nurhachi, who has had many combat experiences and has a basic understanding of war, can't immerse himself in "ignorant self-satisfaction" as happily as he does—because he can see clearly, his mood is very disturbed. The situation is not good for Jianzhou Zuowei, or even the entire Liaodong. Although the Japanese navy army was defeated, and the army that occupied a large area of ​​land was attacked by the Korean rebels, it began to show fatigue after coping, but after all, it was the winner and still had Strong combat capabilities; and as he expected, after the Japanese army occupied Pyongyang, they had already crossed the Tuman River... The unit that went deep alone was the second army led by Kato Kiyomasa, who has always been stubborn and militaristic; Arrived at the northernmost Xianjing Road, then crossed the Dumanjiang River, rushed into the territory of the "wild Jurchen", and was heading towards the goal of Wuliangha... Hearing all kinds of news, he was worried and frowning. Although Wuliangha was still some distance away from Jianzhou Zuowei, it was already within the range of Liaodong rather than North Korea. Moreover, the Japanese army attacked unscrupulously, and the intention was obvious. That's right, after taking Wuliangha, don't you still want to get involved in the whole Liaodong?However, the general sent by the Ming Dynasty was Li Rusong—he didn't believe that Li Rusong would have any great ability to deal with the Japanese army! Therefore, he was very troubled in his heart; one night, he tossed and turned and couldn't fall asleep. He thought about the whole night, but couldn't think of anything specific. A flash of inspiration suddenly flashed in his heart: "If Hu Lun's four tribes and Jianzhou are combined, at least one hundred thousand people can be gathered to deal with Japan together, and there should be a chance of winning—" As a result, he immediately jumped up and murmured to himself: "Perhaps, I can put aside my personal grievances, find Nalin Bulu, and invite him together—" He thought of the story of "five chopsticks are constantly broken", and his heart immediately became alive; however, after a while of in-depth thinking, he had to put all these thoughts into a long sigh: "Nalin Bulu is an ambitious man. But a person without foresight—and someone who’s ‘daring to fight privately but not to fight publicly’, as you can tell from his attitude towards the Ming Dynasty—he will not unite the power of all the Jurchens to fight against Japan, even he In order to be the co-lord of the Jurchen, he also drew Japan as a backing, and used the Japanese army to defeat other tribes—being the co-lord of the Jurchens while being a Japanese slave—he has this kind of personality!” He has a thorough understanding of Nalinbulu—until the latest information, it was still showing that Nalinbulu was actively preparing to deal with Jianzhou Zuowei. He not only united Hada and Huifa, but also tried his best Or buy, or conquer some other small tribes, five or six tribes have already been controlled by him, and the current strength has doubled compared to a year ago; however, he has never had any problems with North Korea and Japan. Showing more than a little bit of caring attitude... He also heard that Nalinbulu drew a huge circle on the square in front of Yehezhai, with the words "Jianzhou" on it, and every day he would practice soldiers and horses in the square, causing people to trample on it. The land that symbolizes the founding of the state! All of this made him unhappy, and his mood was completely sunk in an invisible shadow, and he couldn't be cheerful; therefore, on this day, after thinking about it, he came to a pessimistic conclusion: "The worst situation is that Jurchen these few days After a great battle, the soldiers were exhausted, and then the Japanese army took advantage of the situation——Secondly, Nalinbulu went to seek refuge in Japan, and wiped out our Jianzhou in one fell swoop—” He couldn't help but let out continuous sighs from the bottom of his heart, but fortunately his nature was full of the spirit of struggle, pessimism was pessimistic, and sighs were sighs, but he was more active and worked harder to do two things, that is, to collect Intelligence and drill troops. "Even if there is no chance of winning, we must fight a hard battle with all our strength—" This is his outlook on life, which cannot be changed no matter how difficult it is, no matter how powerful the opponent is... And the bad mood will eventually turn around. When the end of autumn and winter comes, although the threat of the enemy army has not been relieved at all, the problem of war is still a heavy pressure on the heart, but there are joyful events in life. . The Mongolian sister was pregnant at full term and was almost in labor. On October 25, she gave birth to his eighth son. Including his daughter, this is the eleventh time he has been a father, but the joy of welcoming the arrival of a new life still fills his heart deeply; His spirit was lifted, and there was a spark of hope that could not be named. Since men are not allowed to enter the delivery room, he is also embarrassed to wait outside the delivery room, but he is worried about it, so he has to find some reason to walk around in the corridor from time to time. His heart tensed for a while, and finally he waited for a cry of "Wow--"... "Congratulations to Lord Baylor, you are a strong man!" It was a long time later when the child was brought to him, everything was settled, the little body was completely wrapped in the "candle bag", only a small red face was exposed, he could see it at a glance , with a square head, big ears, and a thick face looks like his mother, and the facial features on his face are like his own, and he cries loudly and has strong bones, which makes him overjoyed to see. He took it with his own hands and gave him a hug. Of course, the more he looked at it, the happier he was. He wished he could run out immediately to show the congratulatory guests crowded in the hall, and he even wanted to show it to all the people in Jianzhou; he had to be too busy Panting Zaqing was distracted to stop him: "Master Baylor, it's snowing and it's cold. The baby has just left the womb, so you can't take it outside—you can go out and say hello to the big guy by yourself, and you have to wait until the day of the full moon." Put on a banquet, and invite everyone to come and see the newborn baby!" When she said this, Nurhachi of course came to his senses immediately, gave her the baby with a sly smile, asked the mother again if she was safe, and then strode to the hall to greet the congratulatory guests. In fact, most of the so-called "guests" are their own people; Dongguo heard that Tian's younger brother came with He Heli, and E Yidu's wife is Nurhachi's sister-there are close relationships between them. It was even more lively; and because the visitors were not outsiders, and it was such a happy event, the children were allowed to join in the fun in the hall, the whole room was full of people, adults and children chattered and laughed. Yes, the atmosphere is great. When Nurhachi appeared in the hall, Daishan and several children of different ages were surrounding Dongguo, pulling her clothes and hands, asking questions non-stop. As the eldest sister, Dongguo was very patient. The thirteen-year-old Chu Ying thought she was an adult, and squeezed into the adult's talking circle next to Bayara. The adults were talking in twos and threes. The topics were nothing more than wars and giving birth to sons, which he had never experienced. But listened with gusto. As soon as Nurhachi appeared, the situation changed immediately. Everyone stopped talking and crowded around him, congratulating him with one voice. E Yidu's loud voice played the best role, and he yelled so loudly that he almost couldn't finish all the happy words by himself. No one blames him or dislikes him—everyone's heart is as happy as him... Of course, Nurhachi himself was a hundred times or a thousand times happier than anyone else, but on the surface, he tried to downplay it as much as possible, and even kept his smile moderate; , he even showed an unprecedented level of humility and condescension, while saying repeatedly, "I dare not be that," and adding a few words: "Don't ruin this child's blessing——" For some reason, he was so worried about the birth of this child that he even changed his attitude unconsciously; he didn't realize it at first, but after a while he suddenly realized something, thinking that a childhood memory surfaced. thought: When he was a child, he was often praised by many people because he was smarter and braver than ordinary children in many ways; however, his grandfather and mother not only did not show off, but often privately warned him not to be complacent. The person smiled and thanked: "There are still many things that this child should learn and hone! Your good words, just don't ruin this child's blessing——" Thinking of this, he couldn't help sending a knowing smile to himself; there is no parent in the world who doesn't love their children - after becoming a father himself, this understanding is even more profound. Children are the continuation of their own lives, and they themselves are the continuation of their parents' lives—from ancestors to descendants, and they are passed on in the middle! A wonderful feeling quietly rose from the bottom of his heart and spread to his whole body. That night, he couldn't sleep no matter what. The voice that had lingered in his heart since he was a child rose to his ears again, and he clearly heard himself talking: "I am the son of heaven! I was born to stabilize chaos in Anbang!" The story of the celestial girl who swallowed vermilion fruit and became pregnant was repeated in my heart—over the years, the sense of stability and solidity connected with the ancestors in spirit has become stronger; moreover, another voice began to emerge: "I not only want to The ancestors fought, and the children and grandchildren must fight—” The newborn baby brought him the feeling of being connected by blood, making the blood flow faster in his whole body, and the cognition in his heart was clearer. In this regard, he is lucky - since he was a child, the legend of the birth of the ancestors and the blood of the ancestors brought him a sense of mission that belongs to innate talent, and it has firmly taken root in his heart; Growing up has gradually become the ideal and belief in his heart, making the goals he wants to pursue and accomplish in his life very clear and firm; and he has never hesitated or doubted; he often said to himself: "struggle is an ideal, a belief , a mission—" And welcoming the birth of a new life gave him a new understanding in the feeling of blood and pus in water: "Struggle is also my duty and obligation-children and grandchildren are the continuation of my life, and I should lead Lead their future on the broad road!" As a result, the courage to fight in his heart doubled again; in contrast, Emperor Wanli never had his luck.