I

Before Huang Yao and Sha Dingzhou's main forces started fighting, Chu Xiong was already fighting.

The leader of the Han army in Chuxiong was called Gong Yi. He was a serious Jinshi of the Ming Dynasty and was appointed as a doctor in the Ministry of War in Nanjing. When Zhao Han sent troops to Zhejiang, Gong Yi felt that the situation was not good, and since he was not reused in the Ming Dynasty, he simply ran away and returned to his hometown in Yunnan in advance.

Back in Yunnan, Gong Yi gathered people to give lectures and devoted himself to spreading enlightenment, and his reputation grew.

Mu Tianbo supported the false emperor, went through many campaigns, and invited Gong Yi six times before he invited Gong Yi to be an official. Sha Dingzhou secretly occupied Kunming, listened to the advice of counselor Tang Jiajin, and also respected Gong Yi.

Gong Yi was submissive on the surface and asked himself to be the prefect of Chuxiong because Chuxiong was close to his home.

Sha Dingzhou needed to collect grain and grass, and Gong Yi also cooperated and persuaded the gentry of Chuxiong Prefecture to provide grain, thus gaining Sha Dingzhou's trust.

Who would have expected that when the Datong army reached Yunnan, Gong Yi would be the first to raise troops to respond. Moreover, this is Chuxiong Mansion, not far from Kunming, and its backstab is as lethal as stabbing the chrysanthemum in Shadingzhou.

"Master Fu, the Lu family and the Luo family came to surrender with their local soldiers."

"good!"

The uprising troops led by Gong Yi were all Han soldiers. The Lu family and the Luo family are both chieftain forces of the Yi ethnic group.

There are many Yi people in Chuxiong Prefecture, including the four major families of An, Long, Lu and Luo, and these four families also intermarry with each other. Now, the Lu family and the Luo family came to vote, which was equivalent to drawing a clear line between them and the An family and the Long family.

The Long family is the strongest and is wavering. They neither want to help Sha Dingzhou nor surrender unconditionally to the Datong army.

"Master Fu, we should take the opportunity to exterminate the Yi tribes of Long and An!" Lu Huaichu suggested.

Gong Yi shook his head: "Don't act rashly."

Lu Huaichu's ancestral home was in Jiangxi. In the Ming Dynasty, the salt system was implemented, and Yunnan was also one of the salt-producing areas. Lu Huaichu's ancestors moved from Jiangxi to Kaizhong, Yunnan, and became the first prominent Han family in Yao'an, and their descendant branches also extended to Chuxiong.

There are four state-owned assets for the people, and industry and commerce are the second.

This sentence means that half of the Han people in Yunnan are engaged in industry and commerce.

Moreover, the vast majority of these foreign businessmen come from Jiangxi, followed by Guangdong, Hunan and Sichuan.

Jiangxi is the land of Zhao Han's Longxing. Yunnan merchants who are originally from Jiangxi naturally feel close to it - no matter what, they can take the opportunity to build relationships and preserve their family business as much as possible. After all, many generals of the Datong Army are also from Jiangxi.

Sha Dingzhou's crazy exploitation of Yao'an salt merchants had already angered the merchants headed by the Lu family.

The reason why Gong Yi raised troops in Chuxiong so smoothly was because of the help of the salt merchant Yao An.

Lu Huaichu analyzed: "Sha Dingzhou has a strong military front, and it is impossible for us to compete with him head-on. Now two of the four major surnames in the Yi tribe have been won, and the remaining two families are wavering. We must send troops to kill one family first, and then one family. Come to establish prestige for our army, secondly, stabilize the situation in Chuxiong, and thirdly, share the benefits with the coalition forces!"

Gong Yi thought about it over and over, and finally nodded and said, "That's it!"

As a result, Gong Yi spread the news that he was going to attack Kunming, and led the Han army and the Lu and Luo Yi native soldiers to march eastward in a swaggering manner.

The Yi tribes of Long and An completely let down their guard and even considered whether they could take the opportunity to plunder the city. Anyway, all the defenders in the city had gone to Kunming.

Gong Yi led his troops to retreat westward at night and rushed for dozens of miles to attack the Long clan chieftain.

As early as the fifth year of Jiajing, this place had been transformed from its original land. However, the Yi people were dissatisfied and caused various troubles. In the ninth year of Jiajing, they had to remove the exiled officials and let the Yi chieftain be the local magistrate here.

Most of the time, the prefect of Chuxiong was named Long.

Before the Long family had time to gather their troops, Gong Yi led his army to attack, and he was unable to resist in a hurry. The wealth accumulated by the Long family for more than two hundred years was divided up by Gong Yi and his people. The Han army officers and soldiers, accompanying merchants, and the leaders of the Luluo and Yi ethnic groups all had a share.

For a time, the morale of the coalition forces was greatly boosted.

Chieftain An was frightened and quickly led his native soldiers to surrender and followed Gong Yi to attack Kunming.

At this moment, Huang Yao's army was approaching Yiliang City, and Sha Dingzhou led tens of thousands of troops to fight.

Gong Yi led a ragtag group of people and soon arrived in Lufeng. The Han people in Lufeng City spontaneously responded to seize the city, and worked together to kill the soldiers defending the city.

Now that Lufeng has been conquered, Anning lies ahead, and Kunming is dozens of miles northwest of Anning.

…

Yiliang Mountain Area.

A fast horse came galloping towards him. Sha Dingzhou was shocked when he heard the news and murmured to himself: "How could Lu Feng be lost so fast?"

It's simple and unpopular.

Although Sha Dingzhou attracted Han gentry, he was only limited to the area around Kunming. Farther away, the Han people were exploited to no extent. The Han people in various states and counties had long been waiting for opportunities to rebel.

After thinking about it, Sha Dingzhou called his confidants and ordered: "Go back to Kunming immediately and inform the mistress to move the goods. Move straight south and wait in Xinxing Prefecture (Yuxi). I will ambush here and then go to meet up." .”

The Mu family in Yunnan had three hundred years of savings and countless gold and silver treasures. Even if Sha Dingzhou had to run away for his life, he had to take these treasures with him.

A few days later, the Datong army captured Yiliang.

Sha Dingzhou did not go to save him, but stayed at the lion's mouth. It would be best to have an ambush. If the ambush fails, we will fight the Datong Army in the mountains.

But Huang Yao's army seemed to be tired from the battle and actually stayed in Yiliang City. Sha Dingzhou waited lonely in the valley.

"How far ahead?" Zhao Mingzheng asked.

Wang Feng replied: "After leaving this valley, you can see Haimu Mountain."

Zhao Mingzheng said: "Before leaving the mountain, let me know and rest until dark before leaving."

The Datong Army has mountain troops and local guides like Wang Feng. How can it be possible for the Datong Army to fight head-on honestly?

Among the remnants of Yunnan soldiers, two hundred who were good at mountain climbing were also selected to join Wang Feng in a surprise attack with the mountain troops.

Their marching route was impassable for the army and baggage. More than 3,000 people carried dry food and water, but they walked directly on flat ground in the mountains and headed directly over the mountains towards Kunming.

Estimating the time, Huang Yao's army dispatched and marched slowly to the lion's mouth.

Then, they stopped again and sent a mountain search team to the valley to inquire about the situation. The mountain-searching team suffered six casualties, confirming that there was an ambush in the valley, and the two sides began to confront each other.

"Headquarters, the Han army only has more than 10,000 people. I will lead the troops out to lead the battle!" Tie Hu took the initiative to ask for a fight.

Li Achu also said: "General headquarters, gather all the soldiers from the camp outside the valley. We have an army of 70,000 or 80,000. There are only 10,000 or 20,000 Han soldiers. We fight four or five to one. Are we afraid that we will not win this battle?"

Sha Dingzhou shook his head and said: "Don't be impatient, the Datong Army is not that easy to deal with. Our army will guard the valley, occupy the terrain advantage, and wait for the enemy to attack and die. At this time, do not show off, or fools will give up the advantage." Fight through the terrain.”

These local soldiers and generals were a little unhappy.

Obviously we have more troops, so we should rush out to fight. Is it possible to wait for the enemy to continue to increase troops?

After a day of confrontation, Huang Yao still showed no sign of attacking. Instead, he established a tight camp outside the valley.

Sha Dingzhou was worried about the safety of the rear and was afraid that the Mu family's property would not be able to be transported away. He called a few of his favorite generals over and said, "Tiger will come out of the valley tonight to attack the camp. Achu, you lead five thousand troops and go over the mountains from the south to see if you can capture Yiliang again. If you can capture Yiliang, don't think about it." Defend the city and burn the enemy's food and grass in the city!"

The "rebels" in Chuxiong Mansion moved too quickly and completely disrupted Sha Dingzhou's deployment. He knew that it was impossible to gain a foothold in Yunnan and had already made up his mind to lead his troops to defect to Vietnam.

But before going south, the Datong Army must be beaten up, otherwise they will definitely be followed and pursued all the way.

That night, Iron Tiger led the local soldiers and warriors to attack the Datong military camp in the dark. They were discovered as soon as they got close. Hundreds of soldiers were killed and injured, and the iron tiger almost turned into a dead tiger.

The night attack failed, and Sha Dingzhou could only wait. Maybe a surprise attack over the mountains in Yiliang could burn the food and grass of the Datong army.

…

Zhao Mingzheng and Wang Feng led their troops to travel day and night, bypassing Ming Lake (Yang Zonghai) and heading straight to Kunming.

They rested in the mountains a few miles southeast of Kunming City, recovering their strength while waiting for dawn to steal the city.

However, something went wrong in the middle of the night.

Wan received a summons from Sha Dingzhou in the evening and immediately led people to transport the Mu Mansion's treasures.

Sha Dingzhou sent 5,000 soldiers back to escort them, but it was impossible for those soldiers to carry the goods, and there were not enough vehicles to transport the goods.

As a result, five thousand chieftain soldiers were dispatched, arresting people everywhere to serve as husbandmen, and collecting all the livestock and vehicles in the city.

Although they were arrogant and unreasonable at first, the chieftain soldiers were at least following military orders. Gradually, it turned into large-scale robbery, and the chieftain soldiers began to burn, kill and loot in Kunming city.

A large number of people in the city fled. In the chaos, the city gate was opened because the soldiers guarding the city also went to rob.

"Captain, I met some people at the foot of the mountain, saying that Kunming has been in chaos." The sentry who went down the mountain to inquire about the news came back with a few Han people.

Those people finally escaped from the city and were planning to take refuge in the mountains. Unexpectedly, they were caught on the way into the mountains.

Seeing Zhao Mingzheng at this moment, everyone was so frightened that they quickly knelt down and begged for mercy.

Zhao Mingzheng said: "Don't be afraid, fellow citizens, we are the Datong Army, specially here to destroy Sha Dingzhou. What happened in Kunming City?"

These common people cannot answer this question. Until now, they still have not figured out why the chieftain soldiers suddenly attacked civilians.

But one thing is certain. There was chaos in Kunming City. Even the soldiers guarding the city gates had joined in the robbery. The people in front of them took advantage of the chaos and ran out of the city gates.

"General, this opportunity cannot be missed, please send troops quickly!" Wang Feng was very excited when he heard this.

Zhao Mingzheng said: "The whole army set off immediately and rushed to Kunming as quickly as possible."

Three thousand Datong troops and 200 Yunnan remnants seized the opportunity and went down the mountain overnight. When we arrived two miles outside the city of Kunming, we saw flames rising into the sky. We didn't know if the chieftain soldiers had set the fire or if the gangsters in the city were taking advantage of the fire.

Mu family headquarters.

A Han official was pleading: "Mother, there is chaos in the city, please send troops to suppress it quickly!"

But Wan Shi smiled and said: "If we don't let the soldiers enjoy themselves, how can they be willing to follow me? We have to leave Kunming anyway, and it has nothing to do with us whether the city is in chaos or not. Don't worry, I will take people with me early tomorrow morning. We are going to the south, and then you can just put up notices to calm the people."

This woman is really cruel and has no regard for the life and death of the people at all.