Chapter 386: Changes in Xi'an (IV)
Lv Changdai, the general of the Green Camp, slowly sharpened his knife in his room. The thin layer of rust on the blade gradually wore away, revealing the pure metallic color.
Sharpening a knife is a technical job. Since metal will rust, the focus of sharpening is on the edge. However, Lu Changdai did not do this, but sharpened all parts of the knife. After sharpening, he slid his fingers over the blade and felt that the place where his fingertips touched was smooth, hard and cold.
This is the kind of knife that can easily penetrate the human body and be pulled out quickly. Even ordinary knife sharpeners cannot achieve this level.
The skill of knife sharpening was taught by his father, who was a general and was very good at sharpening knives. Thinking of his father, Lv Changdai could recall the days when he was helping his father. At that time, every time his father sharpened a knife, it seemed as if he was sharpening himself. All the emotions were expressed in the simple and boring sound of sharpening a knife.
When inserting the knife into the scabbard, there is no resistance. The knife, which has just been sharpened and oiled, can be inserted and removed from the scabbard so smoothly. It took Lu Changdai a long time to suddenly understand why his father felt so refreshed every time he sharpened the knife. He would pull the knife in and out of the scabbard several times.
When he left his residence, the road was already filled with Qing troops. Captain General Lü Changdai went straight to where his troops were. The position of the captain general was lower than that of the Qianzong (garrison commander) who commanded a thousand soldiers in the army. He had about 440 soldiers under his command. At this time, the Qing army was gathering between Wuhu and Liangshan, and the troops were fully staffed. In addition, there were not many battles, so Captain General Lü Changdai had more than 410 people under his command.
The Qing army was quickly assigned tasks. Fucha Fuqing had already carefully built the defense line, from the river defense to the land defense line, including the echelon deployment after the retreat, and the arrangement was perfect. Lu Changdai was not assigned to the first batch of troops to defend. He belonged to the team that would be deployed when the Qing army was about to attack. At this time, Lu Changdai had to wait with his brothers.
Since we are waiting, it is not so urgent. Lu Changdai sent his brothers who are familiar with the network to inquire about the news. Amid the rumbling of artillery on the river bank, a brother who went there ran back to report, "Captain Lu, the artillery positions on the river bank have been destroyed!"
"Oh?" Lu Changdai was a little surprised. The fort on the river bank looked very solid, how could it be destroyed just like that?
The brothers under my command told me about the monsters on the river that were slow to move, but each ship had dozens of cannons installed. The Qing army's riverside artillery batteries were located one after another on the river bank. These ships were probably equipped with iron armor, and the Qing army's artillery shells could not hit them at all. And each ship was equipped with dozens of cannons, and rows of cannonballs were fired at them. The Qing army's artillery batteries would be destroyed as long as they ran away.
It wasn't that the Qing army's artillery was not powerful, but that the enemy was too powerful. They were just destroyed.
At this time, new artillery fire was heard from the east. It should be that the brothers in the east had already started fighting with the Huaxia Army. After this fight, all the infantrymen strengthened their preparations, and Lu Changdai's brothers could no longer move around.
The battle continued, and Lu Changdai received an order to go to the front line to replace the front-line troops who suffered heavy casualties. Lu Changdai's brothers looked nervous. Finally, it was their turn to fight the vicious Chinese army head-on.
Lu Changdai drew his knife and wanted to say something, but he put it back into the sheath. Finally, he just shouted, "Follow me!" and headed to the front line.
The Chinese army launched a fierce attack on the Qing army near the river bank. The Qing army's artillery positions near the river bank were destroyed and completely exposed to the Chinese army's artillery fire. Therefore, the casualties were particularly tragic.
Lu Changdai was assigned to this place. Before he entered the position, he saw continuous explosions in the trenches that had been dug long ago. The Chinese army used a strange projectile cannon to throw shells into the trenches.
The Qing Dynasty's Jiangning General Fu Cha Fu Qing also put a lot of effort into the defense of Wuhu, digging many trenches in this flat area. Some of them were wide enough for four people to walk side by side. At this time, Qing soldiers with missing arms and legs or covered in blood were constantly carried out of the trenches.
Soon, a hoarse voice was heard shouting, "Get out quickly, get out quickly."
This man was a guerrilla fighter. He was not injured, but his body was blackened by the smoke. After he led this wave of exhausted Qing troops out of the entrance, he pointed at Lu Changdai and shouted, "It's your turn! Go in quickly!"
He closed his eyes and drew out his knife. The smooth feeling made the last obstacle in his heart seem to be removed. He opened his eyes, took a few steps forward, and stabbed the guerrilla through with one knife. The guerrilla's body stiffened, and he looked at Lu Changdai's face with shock.
Although it was a bit strenuous, Lu Changdai pulled the knife out of the guerrilla's body smoothly and stabbed it again. After pulling out the knife again, Lu Changdai slashed at the guerrilla's neck. The blade hit the cervical vertebrae and failed to cut it off. Lu Changdai kicked the guerrilla, whose neck was bleeding wildly. He threw down the knife and ran towards the river not far away.
With a leap, Lv Changdai jumped into the river amid the panicked shouts behind him. At this moment, Lv Changdai felt extremely happy.
A dragon gives birth to a dragon, a phoenix gives birth to a phoenix. A mouse's son will dig holes. In the Green Camp, the son of a captain-general has to serve in the army, but it is not easy to become a captain-general. Especially for someone like Lu Changdai who has no background.
Falling into the river, Lu Changdai felt as if he was sinking into the river under the rushing current. But he knew he couldn't swim around. He then tore open the straps of his outer armor and struggled out of it.
Sure enough, without the armor, the upward buoyancy dragged Lu Changdai upward. Just before he almost ran out of breath, Lu Changdai emerged from the water.
Every time his father sharpened the knife, Lv Changdai followed his father to do this boring work because he was afraid that the couple would kill Lv Changdai's mother after sharpening the knife.
Only when he saw the relieved look on his father's face, Lv Changdai would feel relieved. Because his father was able to climb to this position because his mother was spotted by a guerrilla and sold her body to the guerrilla, and only then did he become a captain. Every time his father was murderous, he had to sharpen his knife to vent it. When his father pulled the knife into the sheath, Lv Changdai always felt trembling. So was it pulling a sharpened knife into a sheath, or pulling a sharpened knife into a human body?
In Lü Changdai's generation, another guerrilla fell in love with Lü Changdai's wife. In the end, the guerrilla succeeded at the critical moment when it came to who would take over Lü Changdai's father's position.
As luck would have it, this guerrilla is actually the son of that guerrilla.
Walking downstream along the river, Lv Changdai never thought that he would really be able to kill his enemy and benefactor one day. Before, Lv Changdai thought that he might let go of this grudge. Until he received a letter from his hometown, "Lv Changdai's son was born." Lv Changdai had not been home for more than a year. And ten months ago, this guerrilla went back...
As soon as he climbed ashore, the Chinese army that was already guarding the river bank came forward and captured Lu Changdai. Lu Changdai did not resist at all and let the Chinese army capture him. If possible, Lu Changdai still wanted to live. At least before returning to his hometown and killing someone, Lu Changdai did not want to die.
The capture of a Qing army captain who claimed to have surrendered was really strange. Even Lei Hu heard about it.
Lei Hu was even more surprised when the interrogation documents were delivered to him. After reading the contents, Lei Hu understood why the General Staff was so concerned about a captain who only commanded 440 soldiers.
The captain named Lv Changdai proposed a suggestion, which was to use a quick breakthrough and build a camp to block the Qing army and implement an encirclement and annihilation war. As the captain of the Qing army, Lv Changdai told a lot about the arrangements within the Qing army. As for why this happened, Lv Changdai explained that in order to build these fortifications, the Eight Banners of the Qing army desperately drove the Green Camp soldiers to work. Lv Changdai and his men participated in the construction of many defense systems.
Lei Hu was half-believing and half-doubting. Fu Qing was very cautious in his use of troops and did not recruit civilians on a large scale. The civilians only built the outer parts that could be seen by the naked eye, and the more critical parts were built by the Qing army. If this thing is real, it will be very valuable.
Although there was no need to call a small Qing army leader who was roughly equivalent to a battalion commander to question him personally, Lei Hu convened a meeting of the headquarters for this purpose.
Compared with the importance attached by the Huaxia Army, the Qing Army did not care about the fact that a captain killed a guerrilla and then jumped into the river.
Such matters between men and women have always been the core of gossip. If Lu Changdai didn't tell everyone about the things in the head family, some people would know about it. When Jiangning General Fu Qing asked about it, naturally someone told Fu Qing about it.
Fu Qing initially thought that Lu Changdai was too strange. Even if his wife was slept with, it wouldn't be a big deal. Besides, Lu Changdai had achieved his goal. He had been rewarded and became a captain. It was not until he heard that Lu Changdai's wife in his hometown had lost a baby in her belly more than a year after Lu Changdai left home that Fu Qing sighed. The anger in his heart subsided a lot.
Of course, from the perspective of the bannermen, this is nothing. According to the system, the banner masters nominally have the power of life and death over banner slaves. There are only so many people in the Eight Banners of the Qing Dynasty, and studying is not something that everyone can do. It is not uncommon for banner slaves to pass the imperial examination and be harassed in the street by the penniless banner masters.
If the incompetent banner slaves wanted to advance and join the Eight Banners Army, they had to do some things. Therefore, the wives of ordinary bannermen in the Eight Banners never left the house since they married into the family. There was a reason for this.
If they were sent to the banner owner, it could be said that they were voluntary. But if they were spotted by the prince of the Aixinjueluo family on the way and taken away directly, what else could the banner slaves do but accept their fate?
After putting this matter aside, Fu Qing continued to discuss the war. Although the Huaxia army was very fierce and the artillery was very powerful, the Qing army still resisted.
The Qing army commanders did not care about this minor conflict. As long as they were not particularly unfriendly to women, they had all encountered similar things. It was just that this guerrilla fighter had bad luck and went too far. Or at least he should be compensated for doing such a thing. However, the Qing army was facing the fierce attack of the Huaxia army, and each of them was in danger. Perhaps the guerrilla fighter who finally got a vacation just wanted to have some fun.
The military meetings of both sides lasted until late at night. The Qing army decided to continue to hold on and consume the Huaxia army. At the same time, the Qing army in East and West Liangshan was also prepared to guard against the Huaxia army's cannon and ship raids.
It was dark and everyone went to sleep. The next morning, the battle started again.
Lu Changdai slept soundly that night. He woke up in the morning, feeling suffocated and hungry. The Chinese army always treated prisoners well, so Lu Changdai was not afraid. After he went to the bathroom, he asked for food. As expected, he was given a hot meal.
Soft mashed potatoes, gravy, and some spicy side dishes. The whole meal was quite filling and I was full. Just after a short break, someone came to see Lu Changdai. What he asked was the battle strategy proposed by Lu Changdai, which was to go up the river.
At this time, Lu Changdai had no intention of raising his status, although he thought that this might allow him to get better treatment. However, Lu Changdai felt that the meal was beyond his imagination, so he told the visiting Chinese soldiers, "That's what I heard from the senior officers in the Eight Banners Army. They ridiculed at that time that if we went upstream, built camps in sections, and intercepted the government troops, the government troops would have no way to stop us. Now the government troops have built camps in the north and south Liangshan, and you can't break through."
"How could they tell you?"
Lu Changdai scratched his chin. "At that time, I was just leading my brothers to dig the soil, and those people were standing on a high place talking. I just heard it. They didn't want to tell me."
"Then why are you telling us this?"
Lu Changdai told the truth, "I told you, you will be nicer to me."
The Huaxia Army staff officer who came to question asked a few more questions, and when he saw nothing new, he went back to report. After the leaders of the headquarters listened to the report, Lei Hu frowned and said, "Are we too cautious?"
Yu Qian hesitated. Gong Yu and other scholars had indeed proposed similar battle ideas. However, what the scholars said was not from their own field investigations, nor was it because the scholars themselves had no combat experience. What these scholars said was all from history books.
So even though Yu Qian heard it, he didn't really take it seriously. Although the Chinese army had fleets that could go upstream, these fleets required a lot of supplies and logistical maintenance. Once they rushed forward, the large number of gaps left behind would give the enemy the opportunity to cut off their way westward along the Yangtze River.
Moreover, the large-scale battles with hundreds of thousands of troops made Yu Qian feel that those numbers were not reliable at all. After all, Yu Qian had participated in many battles with Qian Qing, let alone hundreds of thousands of people. A battle with tens of thousands of people was already a battlefield with a huge span.
Besides, what do so many people eat and drink? The unfamiliarity with the local climate alone can cause most of the troops to suffer from vomiting and diarrhea, and lose their combat effectiveness. As the branch chief of the Fujian Campaign Command, Yu Qian knew very well how much effort the Huaxia Army had spent on transporting materials such as solid alcohol in order to provide fuel for the fire.
Seeing Yu Qian so hesitant, Lei Hu wanted to ask but didn't. He turned around and asked the chief of staff, "Are there any troops that can cut off the Qing army's retreat?"
The Chief of Staff had also joined the Ministry of Rites. After a moment's hesitation, he replied, "This... requires someone from the Ministry of Rites to lead the army."
"The Ministry of Rites branch will be built on the company." Lei Hu said, and it was hard to tell what his attitude was. After hesitating for a moment, Lei Hu ordered: "Let's do it this way. Let the Ministry of Rites cooperate with the navy to break in here and cut off the Qing army's communication."
Yu Qian was refreshed. At this time, it was the turn of the Ministry of Rites to lead the army. In this Henan-Hebei campaign, the assault troops formed by the Ministry of Rites showed amazing combat effectiveness.
The headquarters gave the order and the troops immediately took action. Yu Qian had a lot of work experience at this time, and he arranged the work calmly. The work of the Ministry of Rites was not complicated. In Yu Qian's view, it was just to tell the truth and do practical things.
When recruiting commandos, first look at the proportion of members of the Ministry of Rites in the unit. Those with a larger proportion will be given priority.
Even within this army, ideological work must be carried out. The basis of ideological work is to tell everyone what kind of battle we are going to fight.
When they heard that the troops were going to cut into the area between Wuhu and East and West Liangshan, and cut off the Qing troops in the two places, the troops only understood this at first. Seeing that everyone was in high spirits, Yu Qian quickly told everyone about the situation that they might not have expected.
"The Qing army is not stupid. If we cut off their connection, they will attack us from both sides! Our position may not be complete by then, and we will have to face the siege of hundreds of thousands of Qing troops in front and behind. The reinforcements of the troops will also be limited. At that time , everyone will have to exert their fighting will. Many of us may not be able to come back alive!"
This was the truth, Yu Qian said it sincerely. Everyone who heard it also understood what kind of situation they were facing. Many people were shaken.
The members of the etiquette department in the army took on their responsibilities at this time. The members of the etiquette department in each battalion and company stood up and shouted to the troops: "If you are afraid of death, you can leave now! Leaving now is not considered deserting. Comrades, please understand that if you desert on the battlefield, you must follow battlefield discipline."
After these words were spoken, some people looked shaken and seemed to be about to stand up. But in the end, no one left the team.
Yu Qian was touched, but she also understood why. If she left now, she would not die in this battle, but once she chose to leave, she would be branded as a coward for the rest of her life. Not only would all her previous achievements be in vain, but she would also never be able to hold her head up high.
At this delicate moment, Yu Qian shouted to the troops: "This battle is not about throwing everyone into the wolf's den to die!"
After finishing the main point, Yu Qian began to tell all the soldiers about the arrangements made by the Huaxia Army Headquarters for this invasion. Not only did he tell the troops how the superiors had designed this battle, but he also told the troops about the daily training content and tactics that would be used.
As the story went on, the hesitation on everyone's faces began to fade. When you know what you want to do and whether you can do it, the fear brought by the unknown will dissipate.
Finally, Yu Qian said, "After returning, each unit must explain this clearly to everyone, and make sure that the comrades know what they are to do on the battlefield. Now each unit will go back to hold a meeting. Tomorrow, we will prepare for action."
That evening, Yu Qian called a meeting of the ritual departments of the troops participating in the operation. As soon as the meeting started, the ritual teams handed in applications from soldiers from various troops to join the ritual departments.
Yu Qian was stunned, while the team members said excitedly: "Branch leader, now the soldiers have no other requests, just request to join the Ministry of Rites."
"Did you explain it clearly?" Yu Qian asked quickly.
"We've said everything that needs to be said. What tactics to use and what situation to face. We've made it clear!" Everyone hurried to explain.
"Branch head, we are not deceiving the comrades. The comrades really want to join. We have said that joining the Ministry of Rites means taking on more responsibilities, not getting promoted or getting rich. We have emphasized this several times, and everyone knows it!"
Yu Qian didn't want to dampen everyone's fighting spirit at this time, and he had to trust his comrades in this matter. Finally, Yu Qian could only say: "Those who have applied before will take the oath before departure tomorrow. As for those who have not applied before, they will be considered for investigation and preparation."
The next day, the troops assembled. On the periphery, there were hundreds of soldiers jumping and shouting. Yu Qian went over to ask and found out that these people were either from the logistics troops or new recruits. After the troops discussed with the Ministry of Rites, they kept these people.
However, many of these soldiers came over and insisted on going to the battle with the troops. Yu Qian did not support these people this time. He shouted at them: "What is the duty of a soldier!"
"Obey orders!" some soldiers responded. Some were so anxious that they could not say anything.
"You chose to leave the army. That was your own choice. The army ordered you to stay. That's the army's order! As a soldier, you must obey orders! This is the order from me as the branch chief!"
