Chapter 339

Sixty-eight, The Beginning of Great Chaos

A piece of hot knowledge is that,

Jiang Nan Circuit is about two thousand li away from the two capitals within the pass.

And Jiangzhou and Hongzhou are located in the central position of the vast Jiang Nan Circuit.

According to the eight-hundred-li emergency, which is eight hundred li a day, to calculate.

An urgent military situation transmitted back to the Divine Capital Shenjing Luoyang along the fastest canal and official road takes at least half a month.

This does not count the unexpected delays along the way.

And the Great Zhou dynasty currently uses the ten circuits of the world divided by Emperor Taizong at the beginning of the Gan dynasty,

Above the county and state, there is no specific administrative unit within a circuit, and each state is considered to be guarding itself.

The so-called Circuit Inspection Envoy, Jiedushi, and other positions are not permanently established in other circuits except for the borders.

Or rather, these official positions exist at the moment, but have not yet formed the powerful real-power positions that combine military, civil, and financial administration as in the history of Magistrate Ouyang Rong's previous life.

In short, the administrative unit at the circuit level is currently useless.

The situation of heavy centralization and bloated local government in the Great Zhou dynasty, with heavy internal and light external, has both pros and cons.

The advantage is that a circuit of land is cut into state and county units, each supervising the other, making it difficult to cause chaos, and the rear is stable.

And the disadvantage is that once something happens, the reaction is slow, and there is no one to stand up for it.

Thus, at the moment, the chaos of the northern-returning garrison soldiers in Hongzhou, before the news was transmitted back to the Divine Capital and before the imperial court made a response,

within the window period of nearly ten days for the news to be transmitted back and forth.

Only the chief officials of the Jiangzhou Great Hall and Hongzhou Great Hall themselves made a response.

At the moment, it is this chaotic and panicked situation.

Inside the main hall, Jiangzhou officials gathered, and the atmosphere was silent.

Facing the gazes of Magistrate Ouyang Rong, Hu Fu, and others looking over together.

Wang Wang Lengran frowned and couldn't help but look at Magistrate Ouyang Rong's open and calm expression.

His expression was uncertain for a while,

a moment later, he nodded reluctantly:

"Middle Envoy Hu, please calm down. This official will go and discuss it with the Zhechong generals."

Wang Wang Lengran left the main hall in a hurry.

He went to summon the Zhechong Prefecture generals.

Regardless of anything else, at this critical moment of crisis, the interests of Magistrate Ouyang Rong and Wang Wang Lengran are consistent.

Hongzhou and Jiangzhou are horns to each other, and if the lips are gone, the teeth will be cold.

As the chief and deputy officials of Jiangzhou, once a problem arises in Jiangzhou, it will be of no benefit to either side.

At the entrance of the main hall, Magistrate Ouyang Rong withdrew his gaze. Only then did he have the energy to observe Hu Fu, who had not been seen for a long time, beside him.

I saw this Son of Heaven's private envoy, his black robe disheveled, perhaps because of the hurried journey, his face was haggard, and his dark circles were quite deep.

His palm was still tightly gripped on the hilt of the short saber at his waist, as if it were a stress reaction left over from the night he floated away to escape.

It is also true.

Anyone who experiences this kind of sudden turn for the worse and narrow escape would be frightened and have their heartstrings taut.

It was just that Magistrate Ouyang Rong still remembered the mature and steady appearance of this young eunuch with a glued-on bearded chin when he received Hu Fu at Prince Xunyang Ferry earlier.

Comparing the two, the contrast was quite large.

Magistrate Ouyang Rong pursed his lips.

The Son of Heaven's private envoy is also an ordinary person.

Even if he is an imperial envoy from the Divine Capital Shenjing Luoyang, bearing the majesty of imperial power and bringing his own noble rank.

He is just a mud bodhisattva plated with a layer of gold, unable to protect himself when crossing the river.

Magistrate Ouyang Rong suddenly thought, did Cai Qin and the other garrison soldiers think the same way on the night they started the mutiny and scared Hu Fu away?

In a certain sense, this is a kind of de-enchantment and breaking of the pressure of imperial power.

Producing a kind of refreshing sense of revenge that the crimson-robed officials and the powerful nobles of the Divine Capital are nothing more than this.

Are kings and nobles born with high status?

May I ask which man throughout history can resist this kind of earth-shattering heroic feeling?

Perhaps this is also the reason why most of the mutinies that broke the stable order throughout history finally ended in a violent ending; they couldn't stop and could only go down one path to the dark.

When they were bound by it, the harder they were suppressed, the wider the world was when they broke the old order and struggled out.

"Is Magistrate Ouyang Magistrate Ouyang Changshi not worried about something happening in Hongzhou?"

Walking out of the main hall together, Hu Fu saw Magistrate Ouyang Rong's expression and couldn't help asking.

"Worried, but being anxious is useless."

Magistrate Ouyang Rong shook his head: "There are many things that make me worried; I can't be anxious all the time, or I won't even eat."

Hu Fu was silent for a while, rubbed his face, and nodded: "That makes sense."

"By the way."

As if remembering something, Hu Fu touched his waist saber and said calmly:

"Many thanks to Magistrate Ouyang Magistrate Ouyang Changshi for the saber gifted that day."

Magistrate Ouyang Rong's eyebrows raised slightly, hearing some overtones.

He looked left and right, then took Hu Fu to a deserted place on the other side of the long corridor and asked: "What happened that night?"

Hu Fu sighed and told in detail about being saved by Su Li Qian after being awakened that night.

"Commandant Su doesn't speak much, but he is meticulous. If he hadn't opened the net, I wouldn't be able to see Magistrate Ouyang Magistrate Ouyang Changshi today."

Hu Fu's tone was filled with emotion.

Magistrate Ouyang Rong listened quietly to the end.

He suddenly asked: "The envoy only brought a waist saber and fled in the night; what about the official documents, seals, and other items? And what about your followers?"

Hu Fu's face was embarrassed, "This... it is my uselessness; I fled too hurriedly, making Magistrate Ouyang Magistrate Ouyang Changshi laugh..."

"It's not a joke, just a worry... Forget it, things have come to this; let's talk about something else."

Magistrate Ouyang Rong shook his head and asked:

"Can the envoy still remember if there were any subtle abnormal actions before Cai Qin's attitude changed?"

Hu Fu frowned and thought for a while, gnashing his teeth in hatred:

"It's all the fault of those local petty officials, short-sighted and disregarding the overall situation... Since Raozhou, all the way, they have been setting up strict soldiers to guard the checkpoints.

"It was also from that time that Cai Qin and the others were startled, and the subsequent situation worsened."

"Wait, you said where?" Magistrate Ouyang Rong interrupted and asked: "Raozhou?"

Hu Fu nodded: "That's right, Raozhou."

Magistrate Ouyang Rong was silent.

Hu Fu observed Magistrate Ouyang Rong's narrowed-eye expression and asked: "Is there anything different about this state?"

Magistrate Ouyang Rong asked back: "When Hu-my lord passed through Raozhou, did you ever see the newly appointed Raozhou Commandant?"

"Raozhou Commandant?" Hu Fu frowned and said:

"That day when I went to the Raozhou Great Hall to ask for an explanation, there were many people, and I only remember that Raozhou Registrar Zhao; I didn't pay attention to the small Commandant.

"Why does Magistrate Ouyang Magistrate Ouyang Changshi ask this? Could it be that you are saying this person has a problem?"

Magistrate Ouyang Rong pursed his lips and did not speak, not mentioning Li Li Zhengyan.

There were no outsiders here, and the tall Hu Fu sat quite decadently on the stone bench in the long corridor, sighing somewhat:

"By the way, there is also that Commandant surnamed Du, who is also a bit wrong. Ever since he came..."

"Surnamed Du?"

"That's right."

"What is this person like?"

Hu Fu described it carefully. After Magistrate Ouyang Rong finished listening, he closed his eyes and sighed: "What is this person's accent?"

"He speaks with a Chang'an official accent." He had long been in the Shenjing Luoyang palace, coming into contact with the empire's elites, and was used to hearing Chang'an official speech.

Magistrate Ouyang Rong said softly: "Among the northern-returning garrison soldiers, most are local lads from Hongzhou and Jiangzhou, speaking the Wu-Yue dialect, with a flat tone."

Hu Fu hesitated: "But I see that in the South, there are not a few who speak the official accent; I didn't pay attention at the time."

"But even if they speak the Chang'an official accent, they will have a little bit of it, more or less. Think about it, is this Commandant Du like that?"

Magistrate Ouyang Rong stood with his hands in his sleeves, lowered his eyes, and asked:

"Is this Commandant Du's Chang'an official accent exceptionally standard?"

Hu Fu was stunned for a moment, and in his mind, he vaguely remembered the muffled voice of that dull young man in the felt hat...

His face was suddenly shocked.

Looking at Hu Fu's expression, Magistrate Ouyang Rong already knew the answer.

Between the two in the long corridor, the atmosphere fell into silence.

It was night.

The night was as cool as water, in the Yinbingzhai, inside the inner room.

Magistrate Ouyang Rong, who couldn't sleep, turned out of bed, covered the bare-backed Ye Ye Weilai with a quilt, put on his clothes, and sat at the desk, spreading out a map.

Magistrate Ouyang Rong also took out a bunch of keys from Longcheng, and a felt hat left behind by a "Prince Xunyang Passerby."

The keys and the felt hat were pressed onto the map with complex markings; the dense small characters on the map seemed to have been annotated a lot by the owner.

Under the lamp, Magistrate Ouyang Rong leaned back in his chair, rubbed his face, and muttered to himself:

"Is the target only a Hongzhou..."

The next day, Magistrate Ouyang Rong came to the Jiangzhou Great Hall and immediately learned a piece of news.

Wang Wang Lengran had discussed with the generals overnight and decided to send troops to reinforce.

A Zhechong Prefecture has only 1,500 soldiers in service, about five regiments.

And this time, the reinforcement to Hongzhou was led by Yang Xin, the Zhechong Commandant of the Jiangzhou Zhechong Prefecture, with 900 soldiers.

Only 600 people were left to guard Jiangzhou.

900 elite soldiers skilled in riding and archery marched majestically out of the military camp north of Prince Xunyang City.

Magistrate Ouyang Rong, Wang Wang Lengran, Hu Fu, and others watched them leave with different thoughts...

The following month.

Except for the imperial court's late, expected order for the states of Jiang Nan Circuit to join forces to suppress the rebel army, detailed news about Hongzhou also arrived one after another.

At first, it was Hongzhou Grand Governor Zhu Zhu Lingxu, who, as soon as he received Cai Qin's petition, discussed with the generals to advance and suppress Cai Qin,

and ordered Luan Luan Xingjun, the Zhechong Commandant of the Fourth Zhechong Prefecture of Hongzhou, to be the general, leading 3,000 soldiers to suppress Cai Qin.

At the same time, he ordered the Jiang and Fu states nearest to Hongzhou to send troops to intercept.

Because of the advice of Magistrate Ouyang Rong and Hu Fu, the soldiers of the Jiangzhou Zhechong Prefecture led by Yang Xin set out early and happened to meet with Luan Luan Xingjun's main force, combining 4,000 troops.

And the reinforcements from Fuzhou reacted slowly compared to Jiangzhou and were still on the way.

4,000 government troops against 1,500 garrison soldiers, mainly focusing on "the advantage is with me," and the morale was greatly boosted.

Luan Luan Xingjun's army didn't have time to wait for the Fuzhou reinforcements and arrived at Qianshan first,

but Cai Qin set up a fake array of dummies at the foot of the mountain, but quietly headed toward Fuli, on the border of Hongzhou and Fuzhou.

At night, Luan Luan Xingjun's army realized it, but fearing an ambush, retreated to the south of the city and waited until dawn to chase.

By this time, Cai Qin's army had reached Fuli and fought fiercely with the 500 reinforcing Fuzhou government soldiers on the Fushui River. The Fuzhou government army collapsed at the first touch, fled in panic, and Cai Qin went straight to Fuzhou.

There were no soldiers in Fuzhou city, and the officials fled one after another.

After Cai Qin's army entered Fuzhou city, they distributed wealth and rice, selected and recruited strong men, and within a day, they gathered from all sides, obtaining several thousand people.

Cai Qin then divided his troops to guard the city, calling himself the Military Commissioner.

The next day, Luan Luan Xingjun led his army to arrive and stationed outside the camp city. Cai Qin used fire arrows to ignite the thatched cottages outside the city, the fire spread to the government army's camp tents, Cai Qin's army killed their way out of the city, launched a sudden attack, wiped out nearly 300 government soldiers, and returned to the city.

At night, the people in the city assisted in defending the city, women held drums and beat the watch, and Cai Qin concentrated 300 large boats in the city, filled with supplies, and went down the river.

By dawn, the government army knew Cai Qin had left and chased in a panic, not even eating breakfast; when chasing, everyone was hungry and tired.

At this time, they saw Cai Qin's army boats lined up under the embankment, and a few teams of soldiers on the shore discovered the government army coming and hid in the embankment slopes.

Luan Luan Xingjun thought Cai Qin was cowardly in the face of battle and drove his troops to attack.

Unexpectedly, Cai Qin's army killed their way out from the boats all the way, and killed their way out from the embankment slopes all the way, attacking from both sides, killing from noon to dusk, and the government army was defeated.

Luan Luan Xingjun led his army to retreat in defeat and fell into the marshes.

Cai Qin's army chased, Luan Luan Xingjun, Yang Xin, and other generals died in the chaotic army, about 1,000 soldiers died, and the rest surrendered to Cai Qin's army.

Cai Qin inquired of the surrendered soldiers, learned that Hongzhou was empty, immediately led his army to cross the Fushui River north, and bypassed the mountains to attack Hongzhou...

The news of the series of defeats of Hongzhou Luan Luan Xingjun's army spread rapidly, and the original scene of singing and dancing in Prince Xunyang City, a major water transport route in Jiang Nan, was completely broken.

Unlike the astonishment, trembling, and sweating of Wang Wang Lengran, Hu Fu, and others.

After Magistrate Ouyang Rong finished reading the battle report, besides frowning, his first reaction was surprise.

Is this kind of troop movement, as if moving one's arm, a strategy that a previously unknown border guard could have?

But once he thought of the "Commandant Du" described by Hu Fu, and the figure of a certain Raozhou Commandant vaguely appearing behind him.

Magistrate Ouyang Rong pursed his lips and fell silent.

"It's not just organization, but also thinking, this kind of clear and concise thinking... there is a master."

He frowned in confusion.

Sure enough, a few days later, another piece of bad news came back:

Hongzhou Grand Governor Zhu Zhu Lingxu realized too late that Luan Luan Xingjun had been defeated, hurriedly asked for reinforcements from neighboring states, closed the city gates, and selected strong men to defend, but helplessly the whole city was panicked and had no will to hold.

In mid-July, Cai Qin's army of six or seven thousand people had arrived at the foot of Hongzhou city, and the sound of killing shook the sky.

Thanks to the fact that the soldiers were from Hongzhou.

Cai Qin's army comforted the residents outside the city with kind words, did not disturb or invade them at all, and gained the support and help of the people of Hongzhou, and Hongzhou city was crumbling.

Seeing that there were no more reinforcements, Hongzhou Grand Governor Zhu Zhu Lingxu surrendered and offered the city.

Cai Qin's army entered the city and did not commit any crimes,

at the same time, they treated Zhu Zhu Lingxu, who had not harmed the families of the 1,200 garrison soldiers at all, with great hospitality,

but turned around and captured the Training Envoy Yuan Gongsi and Zhechong Registrar Shi Qi, who had insisted on the delay, and they were all caught, their bellies cut open, and executed in the street, and the people cheered one after another.

Cai Qin's reputation shook, and more than ten thousand people in Hongzhou city were willing to follow.

In this summer of the second year of Tianyou, a batch of northern-returning garrison soldiers who initially had only 1,500 people used their actions to tell the Empress in the distant Shenjing Luoyang imperial court, and all the people in the world, one thing:

They should have been recruited and pacified, not surrendered.

The news of Hongzhou's fall spread back to Jiangzhou city.

A very straightforward and hard logic was placed in front of everyone.

1,200 of the 1,500 northern-returning garrison soldiers had returned home, so what about the remaining 300 Jiangzhou garrison soldiers?

The next target of Cai Qin's army was almost obvious.

Jiangzhou Prefect Wang Wang Lengran hurriedly summoned the officials of the Jiangzhou Great Hall, followed the suggestions of Magistrate Ouyang Changshi Magistrate Ouyang Rong and Middle Envoy Hu, collected materials on a large scale, guarded Prince Xunyang City, and at the same time waited for reinforcements from neighboring states.

Throughout the end of July, Hongzhou was quiet, and it was unknown whether they were preparing or waiting for something.

But everyone knew that a great chaos was brewing in Hongzhou.

Just as the storm in Hongzhou was about to sweep through Jiang Nan Circuit.

A piece of news from the western border of Lingnan Circuit, a thousand li away, came, pouring oil on this fire again:

On July 25th, the former Meizhou Prefect, current Raozhou Commandant, and Duke of England Li Li Zhengyan was granted death by the Son of Heaven's private envoy "Hu Fu" for the crime of conspiring to rebel in Guizhou Prefecture, Lingnan Circuit.

The world was shocked.