Chapter 11: Thousand Miles of Raid (2)

The army quickly passed through Jinzhuping, winding towards Baihu Pass, entered Nanjinkou, and arrived in Yiling Prefecture the next day.

Huya Mountain and Jingmen Mountain stand on the Yangtze River. Huya Mountain belongs to Yiling Prefecture and Jingmen Mountain belongs to Jingzhou. The water flows rapidly and the boats must surround the mountain to avoid it. Therefore, when the boat passes Jingmen Mountain, it must dock northward and move southward when approaching Huya. In the past, this was Xisai of Chu, which strangled the throat of Bashu. It is known in history as the "first pass of Xisai in all Chu".

Huya Mountain is located at the east entrance of the Three Gorges of the Yangtze River, with a tiger-ya beach with silver and bleakness underneath; it is located across the river from Jingmen Mountain. Li Daoyuan of the Northern Wei Dynasty said in "Shui Jingzhu. River Water": "The river water is east again, crossing the tiger-ya teeth of Jingmen. Jingmen is in the south, and the upper and lower opens, and it secretly penetrates the southern mountain, with a gate elephant; the tiger-ya teeth are in the north, with red stone walls, white text, similar to the tooth shape, and is named after objects. These two mountains are the western pass of Chu." The text vividly depicts the topography and landforms of Jingmen Mountain and Huya Mountain. When it comes to Huya Mountain, there is also an interesting mythological story! According to legend, in ancient times, a lion flew from the Goddess Peak of Wushan, and a tiger flew from Huangshan, Anhui. In order to compete for the mountains and rivers, they fought each other and were discovered by Xia Yu, and threw out an iron chain to lock them. From then on, lions and tigers were located in the north and south, so they were commonly known as "green lions vs. white tigers".

When the boat arrived here, it first avoided the tiger's teeth and went south, then avoided Jingmen and went north, and it was rushing across the river, hanging thousands of feet. The boat could not advance without riding the wind and rushing. "The Jiang Fu" of the Jin Dynasty said: "The tiger's teeth are erect and broken, and the Jingmen is erect and magnificent."

Zuo Liangyu led 5,000 troops northwards around Huya Mountain, followed the river to reach the ancient battlefield, the Qingting Pavilion, and the Qingting Pavilion was first named after the Three Kingdoms period. Liu Bei attacked Wu and "soldiers on Yidao". This was built with a beautiful shape. The pavilion rafters were carved into the shape of both tigers and dogs and animals, which was called Qingting. It was named Qingting Pavilion. The Qingting Pavilion has been a place that must be fought for by military strategists since ancient times. There have been more than a hundred wars of all sizes and large in history, and the "Battle of Yiling" in Wu and Shu happened here.

Qianting County is an alluvial plain, leading from the east to the west and facing the Yangtze River. The battlefield ruins that have been built for more than a thousand years have long been buried in the loess. This is a rich land. The county magistrate of Qianting County is already sixty years old. According to the current imperial system, he should retire and go home to enjoy a peaceful life, but a policy is not so easy to promote at once. Therefore, the magistrate of the ancient county is still serving as his parents' official for the people of Qianting.

Zuo Liangyu didn't talk nonsense to the ancient county magistrate, and directly ordered him to send someone to lead his subordinates to cross the river with the token given to him by Xiong Tingbi to contact Zheng Nansheng, the general of Yidu. While ordering him to collect ships from the county, and when Zheng Nansheng's news came out, the army immediately rushed to cross the river.

Qianting County is too small, and can only collect about 100 ships at once, and they are all small boats. It takes up to 500 people to cross the river at a time, and it takes ten times to cross 5,000 people. This will take another day. Zuo Liangyu was anxious, but he had no choice. Without a boat, he could not get through it.

Cao Hu and the guide who were sent to contact the river in the evening rushed back with fatigue in the morning of the next day. Not only did they bring news to Zuo Liangyu that they could cross the river, but also Zheng Nansheng, the general of Yidu, also came with him.

Zuo Liangyu ordered people to welcome Zheng Nansheng into the county government office of Qianting County, and the ancient county magistrate of Qianting County was accompanied.

Zheng Nansheng, the general of Yidu, is the most dark man in his forties. His cheekbones are extremely high and his eyes are flashing. He keeps looking at Zuo Liangyu. Zheng Nansheng thought that such a major military operation would at least send a vice general who had been instructed by experience, and at least he had to be a deputy general. But he never thought that Xiong Tingbi actually sent him a guerrilla general, and he looked a bit like a white-faced scholar. Compared with Zheng Nansheng's dark skin, Zuo Liangyu was too white.

"Are you Zuo Liangyu's left guerrilla?" Zheng Nansheng had the title of genius general, so he naturally looked down on Zuo Liangyu's guerrilla.

"It's Zuo Liangyu!" Since he belongs to the same camp, he has a request to be with others. Even if Zuo Liangyu has any dissatisfaction with Zheng Nansheng, he can only keep it in his stomach now.

"I have received a secret order from Governor Zhu, and your men can follow me to cross the river!" Zheng Nansheng didn't say anything, and turned around and walked out of the county government.

Zheng Nansheng was obviously a little arrogant when he did this. Cao Hu, who was standing behind Zuo Liangyu, has been following Zuo Liangyu for nearly two months. He has already developed respect for Zuo Liangyu. How could he see the master general being humiliated and want to speak, but was stopped by Zuo Liangyu. Cao Hu is a naughty man, and among the thieves, he is the adopted son of the thief. Apart from the thief, he is the biggest. When has he been treated so coldly? Subconsciously, he has transferred Zheng Nansheng's disdain for Zuo Liangyu to himself.

"Cao Hu, retreat! Everything must be put first of all!" Zuo Liangyu shouted coldly at Cao Hu.

Cao Hu looked at Zheng Nansheng's back and retreated angrily to Zuo Liangyu's left back.

At this time, we must not have any conflicts with Zheng Nansheng. Zheng Nansheng is the disciple of Zhu Xieyuan, the governor of Sichuan. Originally, the governor of Huguang was also Zhu Xieyuan. Because Zhu Xieyuan was busy with the suppression of bandits in Sichuan, he also had to guard against the Tibetan Bahan of Wusizang (Tibet). If the Ming Dynasty was a solid piece, no one would dare to ambition for the time being. But now the Ming Dynasty is divided into two and on the verge of civil war. Such a good opportunity, the ambitions of several evil wolves around were naturally stimulated. Zhu Xieyuan and the army of Zang Bahan had already had a few battles with each other, and both sides were damaged. Otherwise, how could Zhu Yinglong leave tens of thousands of well-trained Sichuan troops without using them, but instead use refugees to form troops to fight in the south?

Zuo Liangyu is a smart person, how can you not see Zheng Nansheng's thoughts? Although Huguang was controlled by Wei Zhongxian, most of the officials were actually appointed when the emperor was alive. Wei Zhongxian could only carefully replace officials. People have seven orifices in the center of the earth. For Beijing, the mountains are high and the emperor is far away. For Nanjing, they are also far away. Most of the officials here were once the subordinates of Zhu Xieyuan. Zhu Xieyuan was in Sichuan and could not help but care about them. In order to save themselves, they had to surrender.

At Wei Zhongxian's feet, as long as Zhu Xieyuan comes, they may immediately rebel against Wei Zhongxian. Zheng Nansheng is different. Although he is holding the salary given to him by the Nanjing court, he actually does things for Zhu Xieyuan. Zhu Xieyuan is loyal to that court, so he is loyal to any court. Originally, Zhu Xieyuan led his troops to recover Huguang. Now Zhu Xieyuan has removed the title of governor of Huguang and asked him to cooperate with another young boy. The credit for recovering Huguang was snatched by him, the young man. It is already very good for him to do this.

There are many factions in the army. For example, this southern expedition to Huguang is like a messy army and a mob. In time, this army has grown up in the war, and only obeys the orders of a certain person and only does things for a certain person, then a new faction has emerged. Zheng Nansheng is obviously a chess piece left by Zhu Xieyuan's Sichuan Army in Huguang. As for how many chess pieces there are, only Zhu Xieyuan himself knows that if he devotes himself to loyalty to the court, it is absolutely nothing!

It is enough to see from Zheng Nansheng that he was dissatisfied with the court, but Zhu Xieyuan is still loyal to the court now. The problem is easy to see that the court did not send Zhu Xieyuan, the authentic governor of Huguang, to recover Huguang. Not only did he exempt his governor of Huguang, but he also sent another person to reorganize his army to recover Huguang. What does this mean? It shows that the court does not want Zhu Xieyuan to have too much power and wants to cut power. Invisibly, it aroused suspicion of the direct generals under Zhu Xieyuan like Zheng Nansheng, believing that the court might have to cut their commander's power.

This is the case. When Zhu Xieyuan announced his allegiance to Emperor Chongzhen in Beijing, it caused discomfort from the following generals. Moreover, Zhu Xieyuan was recommended by the King of Shu. Although the King of Shu had no ambition, many of the people under the King of Shu were moved. Especially after Wei Zhongxian established a new court in Nanjing, some generals even encouraged the King of Shu to support his troops and establish himself, and had a country of Tianfu. He could take Guanzhong to the north, Yunnan and Guizhou to the south, and two lakes to the east, and there were natural barriers to the mountains and steep mountains. However, he was jointly suppressed by the King of Shu and Zhu Xieyuan and secretly executed several people. Zhu Yinglong, who was far away in Beijing, had no idea about these.

What made the generals in Shu most dissatisfied was that the Beijing court used Li Yingqi and Lu Xiangsheng to suppress the bandits in Shaanxi. In this way, Zhu Xieyuan, who was governor of Sichuan, Huguang and Shaanxi, was invisibly undermined. Huguang was a concession for Zhu Xieyuan to Wei Zhongxian in Nanjing. At that time, the king had not yet entered Sichuan. He didn't know which court was orthodox and dared not rashly declare his loyalty to which court, so he turned a blind eye to Wei Zhongxian who captured Huguang. At that time, once a conflict arose, he either supported the King of Shu to establish his independence, and the other way was to support the Beijing court. In fact, the King of Shu had a high prestige in Shu. When it came to loyalty, the first was the King of Shu and the second was the court.

When a large army fights, the military discipline is the primary focus. There is no strict military discipline. Even if victory is successful, it is only temporary. The first batch of 500 people were led by Cao Hu on board. After boarding the ship, they were orderly and there was no one who talked or talked casually. After seeing this, Zheng Nansheng's face changed slightly, and then he returned to his indifference. There was no big change on his dark face.

Zuo Liangyu and Zheng Nansheng were the second batch of boarding the ship. All the five thousand troops boarded the south shore within one day. Zheng Nansheng led the way in front, and Zuo Liangyu's five thousand troops set up camp outside Yidu City. Zheng Nansheng had already ordered people to prepare food and grass. In order to be cautious, when the army was tired, Zuo Liangyu still ordered Cao Hu to send more than a dozen scouts. In the past, this place was a territory, but now it is different. There is no mistake in being cautious and careful.

To be honest, Zuo Liangyu did not trust Zheng Nansheng, the general of Yidu, but when Zheng Nansheng proposed to act with him and only brought only fifty personal soldiers, he thought about it and agreed immediately, mainly because Zheng Nansheng was familiar with the situation here. If he didn't know, he could ask him anytime. He had to pull his tiger skin to sing a big show along the way, and it would be even more seamless with him.
Chapter completed!