In February of the seventh year of Yongli, seeing the messenger being beaten back with sticks, King Li Dingguo of Xining completely gave up on his sworn brother. However, it was inevitable that the two sides would meet at war, so Li Dingguo chose to withdraw from Yongzhou Prefecture and go south to Guangxi.

Not long after Li Dingguo left Yongzhou Prefecture, Dingyuan General Dorobel Tunqi, who took over the Nikan Commandery Seal, took over Yongzhou Prefecture again after taking over Hengzhou Prefecture that Li Dingguo had abandoned in the twelfth month of last year. At this point, the Southwest Ming Army

After the great counterattack in the sixth year of Yongli reign, only the two prefectures of Chenzhou, Baoqing and Jingzhou were left in Huguang Prefecture.

Next, Li Dingguo led his army across the Longhu Pass between Yongming County, Yongzhou Prefecture, Huguang and Gongcheng County, Leping Prefecture, Guangxi, passed south through He County in the east of Leping Prefecture, and reoccupied the important town of Wuzhou.

Wuzhou's strategic location is extremely important. It is not only the eastern gateway of Guangxi, but also the bridgehead from Guangxi to Guangdong. Li Dingguo took a short rest in Wuzhou and then moved his army eastwards.

Compared with the last time he attacked Guangxi, the former East Route Army no longer existed. Li Dingguo's then deputy generals Feng Shuangli and Ma Jinzhong did not return to the army after the Battle of Hengyang. They took away nearly half of the East Route Army's troops, making

This time Li Dingguo entered Guangdong, only more than 40,000 people were left in his army.

However, the illustrious reputation of the two famous kings had already spread throughout the two vast areas. The anti-Qing forces in Guangdong and Guangxi were all deeply inspired and responded one after another and cooperated in the fight.

When Li Dingguo invaded Guangdong, Wei Yingdeng, the Prime Minister of the Song Dynasty in Cenxi County, Wuzhou Prefecture, Guangxi, crossed the border between the two provinces and invaded Luoding Prefecture to the west of Zhaoqing Prefecture, and launched an attack on the state city and the two counties of Dong'an and Xining under his rule.

The offensive; Zhou Jintang, Ye Biao, Shi Shangyi, Xiong Chaozuo, Wang Han, Deng Yao and other troops along the western Guangdong coast also assembled more than 200 large and small warships, planning to enter the Xijiang River directly from Jiulongkou, and then upstream to Zhaoqing

Fucheng joined Li Dingguo; in addition, the anti-Qing armed forces in the Qingyuan Mountains of Shaozhou Prefecture also sent envoys to contact Li Dingguo, preparing to cooperate with Li Dingguo's army to attack Guangzhou from Conghua County south.

The situation in northwestern Guangdong was excellent. By March 14th, Li Dingguo's army entered Guangdong and took over Kaijian County, Fengkai County and Deqing Prefecture. Then they went down the river and waited until March 25th.

, the army has arrived under Zhaoqing Fucheng.

Zhaoqing Fucheng has always been a strategic location. When it was first built, it was because Nong Zhigao rebelled against the Song Dynasty. After the famous general Di Qing put down the rebellion of Nong Zhigao, he built the city here to shield Guangdong. Later in the Ming Dynasty, from the Hongwu Dynasty to Chongzhen

During the dynasty, it was built and built several times. Even two years ago, the Qing army built another building shortly after they captured Zhaoqing Prefecture.

At this moment, the city has reached a scale of 2,800 meters in circumference. The city is two feet, five feet and five inches high, with turrets at each corner. There are gates and roads throughout the city to ensure that all aspects of the city are protected.

The defenders can quickly respond. Open four gates, the east gate is "Qingyun", the west gate is "Jingxing", the south gate is "Nanxun", and the north gate is "Chaotian". All four gates are shielded by the moon city. In addition to this,

In addition, the Qing army also built 6 forts, 148 huts, and 2 Shuicheng forts on the city. They demolished the houses within 4 feet of the city and added and repaired battlements. It was not only stronger, but also stronger than ordinary ones.

The city has the effect of better utilizing artillery.

Zhaoqing Fucheng is the western barrier of Guangzhou. After passing here, you can go down the river and pass through Sanshui County to reach the city of Guangzhou. Li Dingguo was bound to win, and divided his troops to capture Sihui County, which is northeast of Zhaoqing Fucheng.

, and Guangning County in the northwest of Sihui County, made a gesture of taking all the northern part of Zhaoqing, and he launched a strong attack on this city only the next day.

Zhaoqing City faces the river in the south. Just like Liu Wenxiu did when he attacked Baoning last year, Li Dingguo commanded his troops to attack the east, west and north sides of the city. The army ants attacked the city, and the forts and artillery on the city walls were still bombarding the defenders with all their strength.

From a high position, they shot with bows and blunderbuss from a distance, and rolled logs and stones from close range. However, the Ming army, which came like a wave, showed no fear in the face of casualties, and just blindly attacked fiercely. This was just like the ferocity of the attack on Baoning.

, which only made the Qing army exhausted.

Xu Erxian was here to assist in the defense. Even the forts and huts were built by him and the prefect Zhang Zhibi. He was not unfamiliar with this. However, the Ming army's offensive was too fierce and did not give the Qing army any chance to breathe.

It's like a group of monsters who don't know what pain and fear are.

"It's so cruel. No wonder he killed King Dingnan."

He had seen such face-to-face encounters when he was in Dongjiang. The Qing army, or the post-Jin army at that time, also had the Dongjiang army. The former may be due to the barbaric nature of the Yi and Di, while the latter is more about the barbaric nature of the Yi and Di.

Hatred and hunger.

The Ming army in front of him was obviously not like those he had seen before. As for why, he had guessed some of it based on experience. However, this was not something he could dismantle by trickery. At this moment

Only by fighting to the death can we have a chance of survival. Otherwise, if Li Dingguo is really allowed to reach Guangzhou City, it will be too late!

On the city wall, the Qing army was still fighting to the death. On the inside of the city wall, a group of Qing troops wearing armor, holding sharp axes, shields and knives were lined up in two rows. The auxiliary soldiers handed each of these Qing soldiers well-made porcelain bowls.

Then the auxiliary soldiers behind held wine jars and poured wine one by one for the Qing soldiers holding bowls.

The wine pours from the jar into the bowl, and the subsequent wine pushes the wine in front, just like the back waves of the Yangtze River are always pushing the front waves, pushing the wine high, and then falls back into the bowl. Here,

There were quite a few splashes outside, but no one wiped them away. They just watched silently as the drinks were refilled, that's all.

"Soldiers, we all came from Liaodong. Following the court and the old prince, we lived a good life in the prosperous land of Guangdong. Just like the porcelain bowl we use for drinking now, who used it in Liaodong?

So exquisite? But now, the thieves outside are trying to take away all of this... As long as Zhaoqing falls, Guangzhou will definitely not be safe. By then, our parents, wives, children, and the gold, silver and jewelry we have accumulated over the years will

, even our lives, must be left in the hands of those old thieves outside!"

Most of the Qing soldiers had never experienced the pastoral and happy life in Liaodong where men farmed and women weaved. They were all the younger generation of Liaodong Han people, and their memories were mostly about the hunger and surrender during the Dongjiang Town period.

After the Qing Dynasty, the Qing Dynasty followed the massacre, killing and looting. Today's good days are all achieved by killing Han people. Just like the city of Guangzhou, if it weren't for that guy named Chen Kai who was nosy, there would definitely be more

The more you kill, the more gold and silver you can get.

All of this is built on such a basis. When the Ming army comes back, especially those who are former bandits, they will inevitably feel fear. What's more, with Kong Youde as an example, there are three sides of the Ming army at this moment.

During the siege, the Taotao River in the south of the city was left alone in front of them. No one dared to hope for the possibility of survival. They already had the intention of fighting a trapped beast.

"Kill the old thief! Kill the old thief!"

Opposite the Qing army, Xu Erxian shouted loudly, and the Qing army became even more angry. Seeing this, Xu Erxian did not hesitate, took a bowl of water and wine, and took the lead in drinking it. And those Qing soldiers also followed suit.

He drank the wine in one gulp, and immediately heard the crisp sound. The Qing soldiers who had drank the wine dropped their porcelain bowls to the ground...

The Ming army's offensive was still fierce. Gradually, the Ming army climbed up the city battlements and started fighting with the Qing army on the city wall. At this time, Xu Erxian led the Qing army to the top of the city and did not bother.

The Ming troops were the first to attack, but they allowed the Qing troops to tie ropes to the battlements during this tense battle of city attack and defense.

The next moment, Xu Erxian gave an order, and the Qing army shouted loudly. They crossed the battlement by pulling the rope, and then lowered down the city along the rope.

"Killing the old thief!"

After getting off the city, the Qing army quickly launched an attack on the Ming troops who were attacking the city. They were dead soldiers, and they had no intention of returning alive after they left the city. They killed people with swords and shields, and chopped ladders with axes. The purpose of the Qing army was very clear, which was to kill people.

The Ming army's siege equipment was destroyed, thus cutting off the Ming army's offensive.

On one side, they were still struggling to attack the city, putting all their energy into climbing ladders and shooting Qing troops from below the city, while on the other side, they were completely exchanging lives for lives. Li Dingguo naturally looked at the score.

The Ming Dynasty quickly sent cavalry reinforcements. Soon, all the dead Qing soldiers in the lower city were killed by the Ming army, but before that, more than a hundred ladders of the Ming army were also chopped to pieces by the Qing army.

Li Dingguo thought he could conquer the city at once, so he only built a batch of ladders and started siege operations. Unexpectedly, the Qing army had such skills, which disrupted his rhythm. However, the siege equipment was destroyed by the Qing army.

, although the Ming army was fierce, they could not climb the city wall with bare hands, so they had to withdraw their troops and return to the camp.

The Qing army had rich combat experience. Seeing that the strong attack was ineffective, Li Dingguo took a short rest and ordered his soldiers to use sacks of soil to build a wall, plant trees to form a fence, use playing cards as cover, and use firecrackers to snipe the Qing army.

In doing so, he was apparently trying to consume the effective strength of the Qing army and turn an urgent attack into a delayed attack. However, in fact, Li Dingguo was secretly organizing manpower to dig tunnels behind the walls that the Qing army could not see, and excavating tunnels leading to the interior of Zhaoqing City.

typical!

The exchange of fire between the top of the city and behind the wall continued. Although Xu Erxian could not see the movement behind the wall from the top of the city, the Ming army's continuous movement of earth to reinforce the wall was clearly in front of him.

Seeing this, he ordered the defenders to hold on and continued to shoot at the Ming army on the city, while digging trenches behind the city wall.

The Qing army's artillery was bombarding the Ming army's earthen walls, but the earthen walls piled up so quickly that the solid artillery shells caused minimal damage to them.

As time went by, the Ming army's excavation gradually became effective. Under the ground, as the excavation deepened, a few days later, the Ming army dug under the city wall.

The Ming army's excavation continued, and the Qing army also completed digging the trench on the other side of the city wall. A large group of Qing troops stood ready in the trench, just waiting for the Ming army to connect the tunnel and the trench.

Standing in the trench, the Qing army's breathing became louder and heavier as the sound of the Ming army digging earth and rocks became louder and heavier. I don't know how long it had passed, but the tip of a shovel protruded from the soil and the trench was close to the city wall.

On one side, it was like a resurrected corpse extending its arms towards the world. When it was retracted, there was a hole, accompanied by a series of exclamations.

Next, the excavation did not stop. In full view of the Qing army, the Ming army slowly dug in, but they still refused to poke their heads out to see what was going on outside. Finally, a hole was dug for the soldiers to rush in.

, but at this time, what rushed out was not the assault warriors of the Ming army, but a group of Ming soldiers holding cards, and they were completely on the defensive.

"kill!"

The battle broke out, and the card players of the Ming army stood shoulder to shoulder and resisted the ambush of the Qing army. Then, hand-to-hand combat broke out, and the soldiers of both sides fought hard in the trenches and tunnels, and all of them took out their milk.

The strength came, but for a while there was nothing that could be done to defeat the opponent. It only increased consumption.

It is a taboo for military strategists to fail to make a surprise attack, which is a taboo for military strategists, especially since the Qing army in the city was well prepared. Even if the Ming army was alert and withstood the first round of ambush, the Qing army still had the upper hand in terms of geographical location. On the surface, the Qing army had an advantage.

, the exchange was very unfriendly to the Ming army. However, Li Dingguo had 40,000 troops, while Xu Erxian's garrison only had a few thousand men. If this continues, Li Dingguo will definitely not be the first to fail!

Xu Erxian asked Shang Kexi for help overnight. In Guangzhou, Pingnan, and Jingnan, the two vassals were also closely observing the battle situation in Zhaoqing, and had already prepared a large army to support them. They only waited for the veterans of Li Dingguo Division to tire. Unexpectedly, it only took a few days.

, Xu Erxian was almost unable to hold on to Zhaoqing Jiancheng, which really broke Shang Ke’s expectations.

"The old thief is so ferocious!"

Kong Youde and Yin Jian were not far away. Shang Kexi walked back and forth in the hall many times, but the anxiety in his chest could not be dissipated.

"Is it Chen Kai that the prince is worried about?"

After the battle at the end of last year, Geng Jimao has been in poor health and is completely unable to govern. In addition, he was defeated twice by Chen Kai. The first time he lost nearly a thousand vassal soldiers, and the second time he lost three or four thousand vassal soldiers.

The Qing court was extremely dissatisfied with the young prince's commanding ability, and simply issued an order to let Geng Jimao recover from his illness.

While recuperating, in the past few months, the Qing government has transferred three to four thousand green battalion troops from the north to supplement the Jingnan vassal troops. There are soldiers from Beizhili, Shanxi, and Shaanxi.

If the Qing government had not had a strong financial background to rebuild the two towns, Huizhou Town and Xin'an Town, they might not have been able to afford it.

However, the Qing court could no longer trust Geng Jimao, the defeated general, in commanding these Qing troops, and handed them over to Pingnan King Shang Kexi. Even the reestablished Jingnan Domain was temporarily commanded by Shang Kexi.

At this moment, Lian Decheng, who was ordered to attend the meeting, asked. In fact, based on Chaozhou's detailed report, Chen Kai disappeared with Zhong Chong and Qiao Qi. For that guy who always has new tricks to torment them, it was quite gratifying to see it at this moment.

With the look on his face, Lian Decheng naturally thought of this person immediately. But in response, Shang Kexi shook his head.

"There are one thousand infantrymen in Zhongchong Town and five hundred cavalrymen in Huaqi Town. Chen Kai brought these things over, and I am willing to accept them. I am not just worried about Chen Kai, because the imperial court in southern Fujian

Jin Li was sent to put great pressure on Zheng Ni. Zheng Ni could not march westward in a big way. Chen Kai's few men and horses alone were not enough to deal with us. Not to mention, he only set out with the 1,500 soldiers.

, must be up to something else."

"After much thought, I have concluded that Chen Kai and Liancheng Bi will most likely join forces to enter Jiulongkou with their navy, and then try to meet up with the original thieves through the Xijiang waterway. In this way, they can avoid the heavily guarded town of Guangzhou. By then,

, once the two armies join together, with the fierceness of the original thief and the cunning of Chen Kai, that will be the most fatal thing!"

Hearing the song and knowing the elegant meaning, Lian Decheng certainly understood what Shang Kexi was referring to, and immediately asked for orders to use his own troops to intercept it. However, Shang Kexi did not agree with this. Since Li Dingguo's army came to attack, he had to bring the main forces of the two vassals with him.

To fight, only a few hundred cavalry were promised.

In addition, he clicked on a location on the map and told Lian Decheng clearly that he would set up an ambush here. As long as the Ming army dared to come, they would be able to catch them off guard.
Chapter completed!