Chapter 16 Chapter Sixteen

The money to buy information will not be wasted - Nurhachi has a firm confirmation of this point; he is usually very frugal, and his clothes have to be mended several times before he is willing to change for a new one; It is the birds and beasts that I hunted by myself, with vegetables; all kinds of utensils in the house are not easy to replace, save as much as you can, and the principle of "only get in and out" is always the principle of silver and property; only the money for buying intelligence He spends a lot of money generously, he doesn't feel bad at all, and the objects are getting wider and wider. up the pipeline.

Therefore, he knew more and more about the Ming court, and became more and more aware of the movements of the "neighbors" of Jianzhou Zuowei; of course, more and more money was spent on this. However, the first reaction he got was advice from people around him—E Yidu, An Fei Yanggu and Shuerhaqi appeared in front of him together, and it was E Yidu who spoke first. Du: "For three years in a row, you have been wearing the same robe for the winter, the hat is frayed, and the saddle is worn out, and you refuse to change it for a new one; but when Zhang Biao came, you gave fifty taels, one hundred Two, the silver is not used as silver; we really can't figure out, what virtue and ability does Zhang Biao have, and it is worth giving him the silver you saved by frugal clothing and food?"

Hearing this, Nurhachi first looked at the crowd with a half-smile, but said without answering, "Do you know why I save money and save money?" After finishing speaking, he fixed his eyes on Shuerhaqi's face. Shuerhaqi saw that he had nowhere to escape, so he braced himself and replied: "Brother wants to get rich through hard work!" Nurhachi asked: "Then what happens when you get rich?" "This..." Shuerhaqi's face turned red, and he couldn't continue speaking. Nurhachi looked at him and sighed involuntarily: "I don't want to be a rich man who is good at accumulating money! The reason why I save and save is to have enough money to use when it is time to use it—— At present, Jianzhou Zuowei has just flourished, and if we want to do business in the future, we will need money, so every penny we can save is one penny, and every penny we can save is one penny!"

When he said this, Shuerhaqi lowered his head, but E Yidu's voice rose: "Because of this, you can't just give Zhang Biao and the others the money you have saved through hard work. !" Nurhachi smiled slightly and said, "If we go to a strange country without someone to guide us, we will get lost—in the past, we knew nothing about the Ming Dynasty, and if no one told us, we would still know nothing. Can we still think of ways to interact with them, or even deal with them? Can we still gain benefits from interacting with them? If we can't find out about Li Chengliang, and don't know his movements, let alone deal with him, Maybe one day I accidentally ran into him, and he swallowed the whole thing! Therefore, the money for buying news for Zhang Biao and the others is actually money for the road. Only after buying the news can we figure out how to take the next step—— — You can’t save a penny of this money!”

Er Yidu slapped his head, and dropped a sentence: "Yes! 'Know yourself and know the enemy, and you will win every battle', you are right, we are confused!" Nurhachi laughed loudly, patted everyone on the shoulder vigorously and said, "I'm very glad that you all came to me directly and said what's on your mind—only brothers who live and die together can speak out without any hesitation. Say, good, great, you are all my good brothers!" As he said that, he added another sentence: "Actually, sometimes, when I have thought about something well, I would wonder whether it was right or not thoughtful, and would always have to think about it several times; It would be great to have your help in thinking—from now on, as soon as you feel that something is wrong, you can come to me and talk to me as soon as possible; if there is anything wrong, the more clearly you can explain it, the better !"

What he said was very sincere, E Yidu immediately laughed and said: "You don't think we are wordy, if you say something wrong, that's fine!" After finishing speaking, several people were about to retreat, but Nurhachi stopped them and said, "I just got a piece of news about Li Chengliang, and I happened to discuss it with everyone..." Li Chengliang is busy dealing with the local barbarians, Taining and other ministries who have repeatedly harassed the border. Even though they all ended in victory, they are too busy to take off their armor for a few days a year due to frequent wars, and the troops under his command are even more Everyone complained.

In the thirteenth year of Wanli last year, the Tuman and Taining tribes committed three large-scale crimes, and countless small-scale crimes. This year, more people have gathered and the momentum is even greater. Of course, the troubles for Li Chengliang were even greater. Just in February not long ago, Yi Kehui, a minister under Tuman's command, gathered 30,000 horsemen including Rabbit, Chaohua, Huada, and some of Tuman's sons to jointly attack Liaoyang; Li Chengliang, who had received the news in advance, He personally led lieutenant general Yang Xie, generals Li Ning, Li Xing, Sun Shoulian and other tens of thousands of people out of the town's border fort to meet the barbarians.

On this trip, Li Chengliang got the help of the right time - the brigade he led traveled more than two hundred miles in Fuye, and when they arrived at the Kekewu Forest, they happened to encounter a heavy snowstorm, and the wind howled for several days. The thunder was loud, and the snow fell on the face, covering all the sounds of their movements; therefore, the barbarians did not realize that Li Chengliang's army was under pressure; after the wind and snow stopped, it was too late to find the enemy's traces, and Li Chengliang personally directed the cavalry to charge , the archer fired an arrow, and when the drums sounded, all the soldiers risked their lives to fight - just like that, they were lucky enough to repel the invading barbarian troops.

However, this time the military achievements were not as good as in the past. Tens of thousands of people traveled thousands of miles, and only 900 of the first achievements could be reported. The places the army passed were desolate and uninhabited places, and there were very few good people who could be killed to pretend to be meritorious. For Li Chengliang, the "harvest" of this trip was really unsatisfactory! For Nurhachi, no matter who wins or loses on both sides of this battle, and how much the first effort is, it is good news-as long as Li Chengliang's attention and the army are stumbled by people from other tribes, it is a great opportunity for him to strengthen himself Chance!

"Li Chengliang is only a small victory this time, Tumen Khan's subordinates will make a comeback again - at this time, Li Chengliang is busy dealing with them, and will not divide his troops to find trouble with us!" He explained to everyone in an orderly manner, and analyzed with confidence: "He is a steady person, he will not easily take the risk of being attacked by the enemy, and he will try his best to avoid dealing with enemies on both sides at the same time-he is accustomed to Unite with the secondary enemies as much as possible, eliminate the main enemy, and then deal with the secondary enemies that were originally united; the second best way is to try not to conflict with the secondary enemies, and concentrate on destroying the main enemies first. Then turn the gun around and eliminate the secondary enemies! Now, Tumen Khan and Wuliangha Sanwei are his main enemies, and Jurchen is his secondary enemy; not only our Jianzhou Zuowei, but every Jurchen All of them are thorns in his eyes, just like Wang Gao and A Tai, he will not make any of the Jurchen ones stronger-but now the heavens have given us a chance, and the two of them will fight each other to the death When no one cares about us, we have a chance..."

He calmly and clearly saw the living space and opportunities he could grasp in the cracks between several forces, and based on this confirmation, he made a plan for the future: "At this juncture, Li Chengliang can't take care of it." We also don't care about Nikanwailan—this is a great opportunity for us to go to Erhun and capture Nikanwailan!" As soon as Nikan Wailan was mentioned, his voice rose, and the rage of revenge that burned in his chest sparked again: "Three years have passed, and I have never forgotten that Nikan Wailan killed my grandfather The enmity with my father, now——I finally got my chance!" Compared with three years ago, the strength of Jianzhou Zuowei has expanded by more than ten times. It is not too difficult to march long distances to attack Erhun. In addition, the collection of intelligence is sufficient and reliable, and the threat of Li Chengliang is missing. Except for the Zhechen Department blocking the way, Erhun was almost in his pocket. Therefore, Nurhachi seemed to draw up a plan to attack Erhun with confidence. The first step, of course, is to remove obstacles on the main road leading to Erhun. This time, he decided to learn Li Chengliang's strategy, narrow the scope of the war, and concentrate on accomplishing the goal; for some minor towns and small tribes, he tried not to disturb them, but only attacked a few obstacles on the road that must be passed; In May, he led his troops to attack Boyi Hunzhai in Hunhe River, and successfully conquered them; two months later, he led his troops to attack Tuomohe City of Zhechen Tribe, but unfortunately encountered a thunderstorm and had to return; He waited until after the thunderstorm to set off again, but unexpectedly, it went surprisingly smoothly—Tuomohe City did not resist his actions, and when he arrived at the base of the city, he spoke words of appeasement, and Tuomohe City surrendered automatically. Once the two cities are together, there will be no obstacles on the road that must be passed through - the other parts that he refuses to let him pass by can be detoured, and the difficulties caused are not very great, and he does not want to impose another burden on them. He wanted to fight, so he took a detour and attacked Eerhun by himself. Eerhun City is located on the bank of the Hun River, close to Fushun, and has always regarded the distance as a natural danger, so the city's defenses are not very strong, and it is not expected that Nurhachi will detour for thousands of miles to attack. It was quickly captured. Unfortunately, Nikan Wailan left the city long before Nurhachi's army arrived because of something, and he searched the whole city but could not find him. Standing tall on the tower, Nurhachi personally supervised the sergeants under his command to search carefully in the city. However, even though he searched every place in the city, even if he searched every small latrine, he still didn't find anything outside Nikan. Lan; unexpectedly, when he turned his head, he saw a team of more than forty people fleeing far outside the city. The leader was wearing a felt hat on his head and a blue cotton armor on his body. It looks like Nikanwailan. "Where to go..." Immediately, he uttered a yell, jumped down from the tower with a "tiger" sound, jumped onto the horse's back with a flick of his body, clamped his legs, and the horse galloped wildly, and he rushed out single-handedly to chase after the group of people. It was too late when it was clear that the man wearing the felt hat and the green cotton armor was not Nikan Wailan—he had already rushed into the crowd, surrounded by more than forty people, and his feathered arrows flew like arrows. Shooting came like a torrential rain, and more than forty knives, spears and spears stabbed at him at the same time. He waved the long spear in his hand to push away the random arrows, resisting the oncoming attack - the combination of more than forty cavalry formed a strong and fierce combat body, but the long spear in his hand danced superbly, surrounded He rushed back and forth in his combat body, the sharp spear tip was like a silver dragon, splashed with bright red blood after a few flips, and an enemy knight fell off the horse with his head in a different place. However, at the same time that he took a life, a long arrow pierced his chest from behind. Fortunately, the direction was deviated, and it was close to the shoulder and not in the heart; After drawing the bow and arrow, he had just drawn the bow when he was stabbed in the leg and slashed in the back. He couldn't care less about it, and shot eight people down in a row, and then rushed to kill again. During the fierce battle, he was wounded and bloody, but his heart became clearer. Seeing himself surrounded by himself, with no help, these forty people would not retreat easily. In addition to fighting them hard, There was no other way out; thus, he gritted his teeth, took a deep breath, and let out a loud shout, the spear in his hand danced impenetrably, silver light and blood light intertwined, the courage in his chest Sparks were sparked and turned into a daunting and fierce murderous aura... When these forty or so people were all defeated, he was still riding straight on the horseback, holding a spear, turned the horse's head and walked slowly back to Erhun City; The war horses were all stained red with blood. And when the blood-man and blood-horse dyed red slowly walked back to Eerhun City, almost everyone who saw it was frightened; Get off the horse, apply medicine and bandage the wound, count the number of people, there are more than 30 wounds on his body, the most serious parts are all penetrating, and they are dangerous! However, Nurhachi himself didn't take these injuries very much in his heart; after wrapping up the wounds, but after resting for a while, he thought that his spirit had recovered, and he was absolutely competent to deal with things that didn't require a lot of effort, so, He sent people to arrest all those related to Nikanwailan, and he personally interrogated them. All he wanted to know was the whereabouts of Nikan Wai-lan, and there was nothing else to interrogate. Therefore, this "interrogation" ended soon; but after tracking down the whereabouts of Nikan Wai-lan, How to proceed in the next step has to be carefully calculated. "Escaped into Mingbian—then we have to deal with Ming Dynasty!" Under the entreaties of Shuerhaqi, E Yidu, An Feiyangu and others, he lay on the bed to recover from his injuries. However, his body rested, but his spirit continued to work; his mind kept turning , can't stop for a moment. He carefully recalled his experience of contacting the Ming Dynasty several times in the past. He stayed in Li Chengliang's residence for six years. The experience of negotiating with the governor's yamen, and even the various information about the Ming Dynasty bought by spending a lot of money in the past few days-these are all of great reference value for him to consider the method of dealing with the Ming Dynasty now; , He simply closed his eyes, thinking about every detail carefully. When he opened his eyes, he knew all the steps in his chest, and proceeded step by step without any difficulty... First of all, he escorted out nineteen Han Chinese among the people he had captured who were related to Nikanwailan, and beheaded them in the city of Erhun for public display; Pull out the arrow and insert it back into the wound, and order them to send a message to the magistrate of the Ming Dynasty who took in Nikan Wai-lan, asking them to escort Nikan Wai-lan out immediately, otherwise, he will deal with it in a tough way, that is, march straight in, Hunt Nikan Wailan! On the other hand, he sent someone to secretly bring gifts to them, and sent someone who can speak well to say: "Nikan Wailan is not from the Ming Dynasty, why bother to cause unhappiness with the left guard of Jianzhou because of him?" What? Although the strength of Jianzhou Zuowei is not strong enough to fight against the entire Ming Dynasty, it is more than enough to attack Fushun with the strength of the troops currently stationed in Erhun City—a lifetime of war, my lord Leaving aside their wealth and lives, is the imperial court going to blame them first, thinking that the adults are not good at governing the border? It is better to hand over Nikanwailan and make friends with Jianzhou Zuowei; Gong, wouldn’t it be a good thing to take advantage of this opportunity to get in touch with each other? The emperor of the Ming Dynasty knew that the adults and Jianzhou Zuowei turned their fight into friendship, and they would be very happy to be promoted to the officials of the adults!” These words are deeply in line with the knowledge of Ming Dynasty officials, and they really touched the hearts of those border officials, so they said: "It is true that Nikan Wailan is with us, but he claims to submit to the Ming Dynasty and wants us to hand him over. It’s really unreasonable to leave it to you, you should catch him yourself, we will never stop him!” However, Nurhachi was skeptical about these words: "Could it be that you want to lure me into the city and catch them all?" Unexpectedly, this time the other party was really sincere, and sent an envoy to deliver a message: "You don't have to come in person, just send a small group of people. Nikan Wailan can't run away with his bare hands!" Therefore, Nurhaci sent Zhailong to take forty people into Fushun to arrest Nikanwailan; this mission was completed very smoothly, and when Zhailong returned, he personally knelt down in front of Nurhachi and presented Nikanwailan's head. And Nurhachi also kept his word and immediately retreated back to Jianzhou Zuowei, and made a petition to pay tribute to the Ming Dynasty. The Ming Dynasty also followed the usual practice, giving eight hundred taels of silver and fifteen pieces of python satin. The official status of Jianzhou Zuowei was established.