I

Zhang Tieniu and Liu Zhu's army were looking for bargains throughout the process.

Only the three cities of Hengyang, Leiyang and Hengshan were difficult to capture for a while because Liao Sheng led troops to garrison them. But before the siege was over, Liao Sheng left with his main force, hoping to cut off Huang Yao's food route with a sneak attack.

Then, Liao Sheng's entire army was wiped out, Hengyang's slaves revolted, and the defenders of Leiyang and Hengshan fled.

Zhang and Liu attacked eight cities in a row, and only fought during a surprise attack on Ling County.

In other places, either the officers and soldiers surrendered quickly, or the thieves and bandits fled, having a great time picking up the city for nothing.

However, the missionaries, officials and farmers' associations who were with them all sighed and complained.

Because these eight cities had all been ravaged by bandits, the recovery and reconstruction work was extremely tiring. The villages and towns were in ruins, the land was barren, and the people were hiding in the mountains. It was necessary to recruit refugees to divide the fields for farming, and to recruit immigrants from Jiangxi.

Not only will these eight places not be able to bring in fiscal revenue this year, they will also have to pay Zhao Han to provide food to restore people's livelihood.

The two of them went down the river and headed straight to Chenzhou.

As long as Chenzhou is captured and then Yizhang is captured, they can enter Guangdong and advance east and west together with Fei Ruhe, beating the officers and soldiers of Guangdong without caring about the end.

Setting up camp in the evening, Zhang Tieniu ate his dinner and said, "Old Liu, I don't know if Chenzhou is easy to fight."

"We have to fight some tough battles, and we can't expect to gain nothing along the way." Liu Zhu said.

Zhang Tieniu said: "I also want to have a good time playing two games. Huang Yao and Li Zheng are playing lively there."

"Yes, even Changsha was captured." Liu Zhu said with emotion. He had just received the news two days ago.

Zhang Tieniu smacked his lips and said, "I don't know what happened to that kid Ruhe."

Liu Zhu guessed: "It's probably not going well. I heard that the governor of Guangdong and Guangxi first suppressed bandits in Guangdong in the past few years, then went to Guangxi to suppress bandits, and last year returned to Guangdong to suppress bandits. He fought for several years in a row, and he was Even pigs can become powerful, let alone those officers and soldiers."

The two chatted for a while. After dinner, it was already dark, and Liu Zhu left his job and went to patrol the camp.

In the afternoon of the next day, still several miles away from Chenzhou City, Zhang Tieniu ordered the entire army to stop and set up camp and sent spies to the city to inquire for information.

An hour later, the spies came back, bringing dozens of people with them.

Zhang Tieniu asked doubtfully: "Are these all here to join the army?"

The spy replied: "He came to offer the city."

"Another city for nothing?" Zhang Tieniu always felt strange.

"Not one city," the spy muttered. "They have six cities."

"Six cities?"

Zhang Tieniu was speechless for a moment, and Liu Zhu was also dumbfounded.

In this year and month, is Xiancheng going to do wholesale business?

I saw a man step forward and led dozens of people to kneel down and shout: "Liu Xinyu of Xianghualing, leading the miners, Yao people and tenant brothers, dedicated Chenzhou, Guiyang Prefecture, Yizhang County, Linwu County, Guidong County, Guangxi Yang County, please ask King Zhao Tian to preside over the land distribution!"

Two states and four counties, indeed six cities.

Zhang Tieniu swallowed and asked, "Where is the little overlord who fled south?"

"Dead," Liu Xinyu replied, "More than 30,000 thieves went south and were ambushed by my troops. They were completely wiped out."

Liu Zhu asked curiously: "What did brother do before?"

"Mining." Liu Xinyu said.

The name Liu Xinyu is really not made up, it belongs to a historical figure, and it should have caused a bigger fuss.

Between Guiyang Prefecture, Linwu County, and Lanshan County, there is a "three no matter" zone, which was called Lequan Township in the Ming Dynasty and Jiahe County a few hundred years later.

In the mountains, there are big families with the surnames of Li, Peng, Xiao, He and Chen.

Officials are not allowed in, and don't even think about collecting taxes or anything like that.

If any prefecture or county magistrate dares to send people into the mountains to collect taxes, the bodies of the officials who enter the mountains will not be found.

In particular, the Li family moved into the mountains in the early Ming Dynasty. They moved their entire family to avoid chaos and annexed almost 90% of the fertile land in Lequan Township.

These big clans in the mountains are lawless and ignore the majesty of the imperial court and the lives of ordinary people.

Tenants, miners, and Yao people were miserable.

In the eighth year of Chongzhen in history, miner Liu Xinyu raised his arms and responded to the rebellion by tens of thousands of people. They set out from Chenzhou, captured cities and territories along the way, and fought all the way to Changsha City, almost killing Hunan directly.

After three years of turmoil, the imperial court finally mobilized troops to attack.

You heard it right. It took three years for the peasant army to fight from Chenzhou to Changsha before Emperor Chongzhen finally mobilized his troops to quell the rebellion.

If Changsha City had not been besieged, it is estimated that the court would have continued to stall for time.

In comparison, Zhao Han was targeted by officers and soldiers six months after his rebellion. It was really unlucky!

At this time and space, because of the bandits from Jiangxi, Liu Xinyu did not lead his troops northward, but defeated the two states and four counties in the southernmost part of Huguang.

More than 30,000 thieves such as the Little Overlord and others who were driven away by Zhang Tieniu wanted to flee to Guangzhou. When passing through Yizhang County, Liu Xinyu led more than 10,000 people to defeat them and annihilated them.

After listening to Liu Xinyu's story, Zhang Tieniu was so impressed that he took the other person's hand and said, "Good men, let's fight together from now on. You used to be a miner, and I used to be a baggage carrier. We both came from a poor background, so we must call those Landlords and evil gentry are good-looking!”

Liu Xinyu proudly said: "I have killed all the bad landlords and businessmen in the two states and four counties, leaving only some conscientious landlords and businessmen."

Hearing these words, the missionary officer rolled his eyes. Liu Xinyu has been here for three years, and you can imagine how many evil gentry and profiteers he killed.

I'm afraid, sometimes people kill for money!

Liu Xinyu took Zhang Tieniu and Liu Zhu into the city, and kept talking excitedly: "I have a copy of "Datong Collection", which was brought by merchants from the south. I specially asked the scholar to tell it to me. Zhao Tianwang has done great things and written good articles. I followed the "Datong Collection" and freed the slaves, freed the military households, made prostitutes good, and divided the fields for the common people. Even when dividing the fields, troubles often occurred. You got more, I got less, and there were often fights. I We also formed a peasant association, but sometimes the peasant association was disobedient, and I was so angry that I killed dozens of them."

Another wild fan who advocates Datong theory.

Zhang Tieniu and Liu Zhu were dumbfounded. Until now, they had not fought any decent battles, and they had picked up fourteen cities along the way.

Liu Xinyu's two prefectures and four counties were even more powerful. They even had peasant associations and divided their fields, but it was just a mess.

Entering Chenzhou City, Liu Xinyu kept asking about the situation in Jiangxi.

The more he knew, the more excited he became, and he said with excitement and trembling: "King Zhao Tian is such a great hero, I can't wait to go to Jiangxi to meet him right away!"

Zhang Tieniu said with a smile: "If there is a chance, I will take you to Jiangxi when Guangdong is conquered."

"That's good," Liu Xinyu said happily, "Brother, do you want to attack Guangdong? I have tens of thousands of warriors under my command. They were miners, Yao people and tenants in the past. Killing officers and soldiers is like killing chickens. I will lead the troops to follow my brother and fight to Guangdong together. Go, we will beat the Guangdong officers and soldiers until they cry for father and mother!"

"Okay, let's go together!" Zhang Tieniu said, patting his chest.

Liu Zhu quickly interjected: "We don't need so many soldiers. All the tenants will be sent home to farm. We only need three thousand elite soldiers to select the miners and Yao people."

Liu Xinyu smiled and said: "There are more than three thousand miners."

"Then select five thousand elite soldiers." Liu Zhu said.

"Five thousand is five thousand, when will we send out troops?" Liu Xinyu asked.

"Select five thousand elite soldiers and train them for a few days before leaving." Zhang Tieniu also came to his senses and reminded, "No robbery is allowed along the way. If you don't obey orders, you will definitely be punished by military law!"

Liu Xinyu smiled and said: "Brother, don't worry, my soldiers are very obedient. Those who disobey will be killed long ago!"

Liu Xinyu is strong and strong. Although he is not tall, he looks extremely fierce.

Coupled with the full beard, he looks like a killer at first glance!

Mid July.

Zhang Tieniu and Liu Zhu led 4,000 regular soldiers and more than 5,000 grain transport troops to enter Guangdong along the mountain trade road.

In fact, there were still many peasants and soldiers, but they stayed to garrison the new city along the way.

Every time a city is picked up for free, two to three hundred peasant soldiers must be divided.

With a total of fourteen cities, there were simply not enough farmers and soldiers, so we had to assign food transporters and civilians to defend the city.

As for Liu Xinyu, he led an elite force of 5,000 miners and Yao people, and asked 3,000 tenant soldiers to help transport grain.

Along the business road, over the mountains and ridges, we soon arrived at Lechang County, Guangdong.

At this moment, Shen Youlong was confronting Fei Ruhe and mobilized a large number of troops to go to the eastern front. The remaining troops were mainly stationed in Nanxiong and Shaozhou (Shaoguan) to prevent the Datong Army from fighting out from Meiling.

As for Lechang, there are really not many defenders. There are less than a thousand people in full force.

Before arriving at the county seat, Zhang Tieniu saw many round houses built like fortresses. He asked curiously: "What kind of houses are these?"

Liu Xinyu replied: "Hakka enclosure building."

"I'm afraid this place will be difficult to manage. There are castles everywhere." Zhang Tieniu smacked his lips.

There are also many Hakka buildings in Guangdong, such as Louxia Village in the east of Lechang City. There are a total of seventy-two enclosed buildings in this village alone and some surrounding areas.

An enclosed building is a fortress, its main purpose is to guard against bandits.

The work of the peasant associations here also needs to be adjusted in its methods.

In many places, an enclosed building represents a large Hakka family. Both the clan fields and the surrounding buildings are publicly owned, and the clan members farm the family's fields as tenants. The rent for the fields is relatively low and returns to the commonwealth, so there is no severe economic oppression.

Of course, the clan is very powerful and the clan leader holds the power of life and death.

In addition, clansmen who have been separated for a long time cannot farm the land. These people lived a miserable life. They wanted to be oppressed but were unable to do so. They had no choice but to move to Huguang and Jiangxi and go to the mountains to cultivate wasteland.

Zhang Tieniu only cares about fighting, he doesn't need to think about these issues.

When they arrived outside Lechang City, the magistrate got the news and quickly climbed up the tower to check.

Including the civilians who transported food and civilian officials accompanying the army, as well as Liu Xinyu's troops, there were a total of 18,000 people.

The magistrate was dumbfounded. There were less than 1,000 garrison troops in the city. What the hell was he doing?

That night, the magistrate took the money and ran away.

The next morning, Zhang Tieniu sent people to fill in the moat. Suddenly the city gate opened wide, and the chief secretary and Dianshi led two teams of government officials to surrender.

"Damn it, you picked up another city for nothing. Can't you fight with real swords and guns?"

Zhang Tieniu was actually a little depressed. This was the fifteenth city he had picked up.