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Under the Yuezhou City, there was a sound of gold ringing, and the left army retreated like a tide again, leaving only corpses and bloodstains on the ground.
Jin Shenghuan's tens of thousands of troops attacked Yuezhou City for two days, but the city was still impregnable. The left army could not even reach the top of the city, and more than a thousand corpses were dumped under the city.
The troops sent to sweep out strategic outposts were attacked by Su Jin's cavalry, and more than a thousand people were lost.
At this time, Jin Shenghuan received another news. Ling Zhan, who had taken the road to Jingzhou to pursue the Daxi Army, had turned back with an army of 10,000 and crossed eastward via Huarong Road, preparing to rob his retreat.
Tens of thousands of left troops suffered losses, made no progress, and were in danger of being attacked from both front and rear, so the morale of the army was inevitably a little unstable;
But as soon as night comes, bursts of singing will come from around the camp. The songs all have accents from the Xiangyang area. Some are as lingering and pathos as a lover's whisper, some are as sentimental as a loving mother calling her son, and some are like children's night calls. Crying like a heart-breaking cry...
Hearing such singing, tens of thousands of Zuo soldiers were aroused to a strong homesickness. Since they were driven into the army by Zuo Liangyu more than a year ago, everyone retreated from Wuchang, walked to Jiujiang, and headed for Anqing. There was no peace and stability. Good people turned into soldiers and bandits, looting and killing everywhere, almost losing their true nature.
On such a night, I suddenly hear the songs of my hometown. I think of the stable life in my hometown, my white-haired mother, my former lovers, and my weak children. The good side of human nature is brought out by the singing, and I feel inexplicable. Sadness suddenly penetrated my heart.
This made the morale of the left army extremely low. Jin Shenghuan knew that if this continued, the army would definitely have no fighting spirit and would collapse without a fight, so he sent a large number of troops to expel the "singers" outside the camp.
But the problem is that if there are too few people sent out, it will not be able to do the job, and the singers can penetrate everywhere; if too many people are sent out, they will be tormented and unable to live in peace.
Just when Jin Shenghuan was suffering from a headache, news of an incident in Henan reached Wuchang, which made Zuo Liangyu, who was preparing to increase troops in Yuezhou, hesitate.
Here's the thing. After Li Zicheng moved his main force to fight in Shaanxi, the troops remaining in Henan were already relatively weak. However, for some reason, Hong Niangzi's six or seven troops moved to Kaifeng to fight, making the Dashun army from Xiangyang to Luoyang even weaker.
At this time, two landlords in the Runing area, one named Liu Hongqi and the other named Shen Wandeng, each organized hundreds of landlord armed forces, defeated the Dashun troops who stayed in Ruyang and Luoning counties, and occupied Ruyang and Luoning City.
Because the Dashun Army has always attacked the officials, gentry and landlords everywhere too harshly. Officials, gentry and landlords everywhere were naturally extremely hostile to the Dashun regime.
Liu Hongqi and Shen Wandeng easily overturned the rule of the Dashun regime in Ruyang and Luoning. Just like a torch thrown into a haystack, the fire that instantly ignited gave hope to the oppressed government, gentry and landowners everywhere.
So they organized themselves one after another and launched a fierce counterattack against the Dashun regime. In a short period of time, a single spark spread like a prairie fire, and Yiyang, Yichuan, Xin'an, Mianchi and other counties were overthrown by armed landlords.
The Ming army in the Yunyang area also took the opportunity to counterattack and captured the city. The Dashun regime's rule in Henan suddenly became precarious.
At this time, Li Zicheng was dividing his troops into several groups in Guanzhong to mop up the remnants of the Ming army in northern Shaanxi, Hexi, and Hanzhong. The rebellion in Henan was temporarily out of reach.
Zheng Siweigang, the general of the Dashun Army who stayed in Xiangyang, took advantage of Zhang Xianzhong's abandonment of Jingzhou and headed west to Bashu, while Zuo Liangyu and Qin Mu were busy fighting against Yuezhou, so he sent his deputy Meng Changgeng to seize Jingzhou. Unexpectedly, his own backyard caught fire. Runing The spark ignited by Liu Hongqi and Shen Wandeng continues to spread. The situation intensified, and seeing that even Luoyang was in danger, Zheng Siwei had to quickly mobilize his troops north to suppress it.
As a result, half of Xiangyang's defenders were taken away. Only more than 10,000 people remained. After Zuo Liangyu received the news, he was shaken by the idea of continuing to increase troops in Yueyang to fight Qin Mu.
From a strategic perspective, there is no Xiangyang. Wuchang cannot be defended. This is one of the reasons why Zuo Liangyu did not even dare to stay in Wuchang after Li Zicheng captured Xiangyang and retreated to Jiujiang and Anqing in one breath.
Moreover, most of Zuo Liangyu's soldiers were from Xiangyang. They all wanted to go back to Xiangyang after being away for more than a year.
Now was the best time to recapture Xiangyang. The lieutenants of the army asked Zuo Liangyu to send his troops north. Zuo Liangyu himself was very moved. The unfavorable battle situation in Yuezhou also made him realize that it was difficult to defeat Qin Mu and occupy Huguang. .
After Zuo Liangyu urgently gathered generals and discussed with his staff, he made a strategic plan to abandon Huguang and seize the opportunity to seize the four prefectures of Jingzhou, Wuchang, De'an, and Xiangyang;
Once the strategic policy was determined, he could not wait. He still had 80,000 troops in Wuchang, so he decided to leave 10,000 troops to guard Wuchang, and he personally led 70,000 troops north to attack Xiangyang. At the same time, Jin Shenghuan was ordered to withdraw to Wuchang as soon as possible, and then divide his troops to attack Jingzhou westward.
In order to achieve an unexpected effect, Zuo Liangyu ordered a tight seal on the news to prevent Qin Mu and Zheng Siwei from noticing his actions in advance. Moreover, he also used a cover-up trick to lead his army north to attack Xiangyang, saying that he was going to increase his troops in Yueyang.
It was not known whether his deception could be hidden from Zheng Siwei, but he was immediately detected by the spies of the Bachelor's House, and the accurate news spread to Yuezhou like lightning;
Ma Yongzhen failed to report to Qin Mu and immediately made new adjustments to the battle situation. It seemed that Ling Zhan had no time to get behind Jin Shenghuan. Ma Yongzhen immediately ordered him to turn around and go west to wait for an opportunity to capture Jingzhou. The army in the city and Su Jin's cavalry quietly prepared to pursue Jin Shenghuan one after another.
That night, Jin Shenghuan sent 10,000 cavalry to attack the city overnight to cover up his withdrawal. However, in the middle of the night, when his tens of thousands of troops had just left camp and walked two miles away, Su Jin's 10,000 cavalry appeared like ghosts at the foot of Yuezhou City. , launched a surprise attack on the 10,000 left army troops who were attacking the city.
Ma Yongzhen sent his troops out of Yuezhou City at the same time. The 10,000 leftist troops were left at the bottom, and they were unhappy at first. Then they were attacked by Su Jin and Ma Yongzhen from inside and outside. They collapsed in an instant and scrambled to flee north.
Ma Yongzhen and Su Jin led their troops in hot pursuit, driving the 10,000 defeated troops towards Jin Shenghuan's army. Night fighting was the strength of Qin Mu's army, because they often drank pine needle water and conducted night fighting training.
Most of the other armies suffered from night blindness and were not used to fighting at night. Jin Shenghuan's tens of thousands of troops were no exception. In order to cover up their actions, they withdrew tens of thousands of troops in the dark and did not dare to light torches. They moved extremely slowly in the dark. Now it was better. After walking a few miles, I immediately heard that the siege troops under Yuezhou City had collapsed.
Jin Shenghuan was shocked and quickly ordered the army to set up battle formations on the spot. As a result, in a panic, the first thing that greeted him was not the attack of the Qin army, but the defeated troops all over the mountain. Under the fierce hacking of Ma Yongzhen and Su Jin , as soon as the ten thousand defeated soldiers saw their own troops, they were like a child waiting to be fed when he saw his mother, and he immediately "thrown himself into the arms". Ma Yongzhen and Su Jin led their troops into Jin Shenghuan's formation, and the tens of thousands of left troops who were in panic were immediately overwhelmed and routed.
During the day, Jin Shenghuan was still on the offensive side. No one expected that the situation would suddenly change. At this moment, there was no suspense in this battle. If Jin Shenghuan did not withdraw his troops or withdraw during the day, he would have to face the dilemma of being chased by the Qin army. , but there might still be a fight, and it would definitely not end like this, but he just wanted to play cunning and evacuate without anyone noticing in the middle of the night. It was really a mistake for his cleverness.
Ma Yongzhen, who detected the news in advance, made him lose all his underwear. From midnight to dawn, after a fierce pursuit, half of the nearly 60,000 Zuo troops surrendered, and some fled. Jin Shenghuan was left with less than 8,000 troops.
But their nightmare was far from over. Ma Yongzhen's infantry temporarily stopped to clean the battlefield and take prisoners into custody, but Su Jin's 10,000 cavalrymen refused to let go of Jin Shenghuan.
The strange thing is that Su Jin didn't seem to intend to eat Jin Shenghuan's eight thousand remaining soldiers in one fell swoop. He just clung to the back and kept attacking, taking a small bite and retreating. Jin Shenghuan was a little lucky at first, but he soon became desperate;
Because he found that he had become a living creature that was taken back by the lioness to feed her children. The lioness did not bite him to death immediately, but just used him to practice the skills of pouncing and biting prey, so that the lion cub would be faster. The ground grew.
This was indeed what Su Jin paid attention to. Qin Mu valued his cavalry very much. Now that Jin Shenghuan's eight thousand remnant soldiers were as panic-stricken as a bereaved dog, it was a good opportunity to train in actual combat;
Su Jin was not willing to miss this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Ten thousand cavalry drove eight thousand remaining soldiers, and sent thousands of men and horses to attack from time to time, just like a little lion practicing to bite its prey...
.(To be continued...)
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