Chapter 106: Flight

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The bannermen fell into chaos, but the Green Standard did not.

The moment the cry "The Qing army is defeated" reached him, Li Fuguo knew the situation had turned dire. Those Han Banners bastards had picked the worst possible way to get themselves killed. There was no need to ask — Ming troops really had entered the city!

Unlike the bannermen, who had been scattered and caught off guard by the Taiping Camp and so could not organize any effective resistance, the Green Standard soldiers were all concentrated in the west of the city and had not been hit by the Taiping Camp in the first wave.

Therefore, though frightened, Li Fuguo still managed to give effective orders. In the shortest possible time, apart from the few dozen men Company Commander Wu Er had taken away, he gathered all the remaining Green Standard soldiers in one place.

At first, Li Fuguo had the idea of leading his men in flight, but then he reflected that there were several hundred Han Banners troops in the city. Although the cry "The Qing army is defeated" had reached them, he had not actually seen the Han Banners retreat.

He reckoned the Ming troops who had entered the city had not truly defeated the Han Banners, and that the so-called cry of "The Qing army is defeated" was only a bluff.

As the Battalion Commander of the Gaoyao garrison, Li Fuguo could lead his men in running wild through the city, and he could lead them in helping the bannermen sack it, but he absolutely could not hand the city over to the Ming army.

What was more, there were still several hundred Han Banners lords present. If he really abandoned them to the Ming army, it would not be a matter of losing his own head — it would be the capital crime of having his entire clan exterminated!

At the thought of possible clan extermination, and since he still had not seen the Han Banners come fleeing back, Li Fuguo could only abandon the idea of flight. Gritting his teeth, he ordered his men to follow him in reinforcing the bannermen.

To rouse these already wavering subordinates, he shouted to boost their spirits: "With the bannermen here, the Ming army cannot take the city! Brothers, all who want rank and riches, follow your officer and go take some heads!"

With that, he led from the front, personally taking his personal guards and dashing eastward. Seeing their commander so fierce, the camp soldiers' morale surged, and they followed close behind.

After running half a li toward the east of the city, Li Fuguo looked back and saw that most of his camp soldiers had followed, which further emboldened him. He ran on a while longer and found that up ahead there were still bannermen resisting.

Judging from the shouts and killing cries of both sides, the Ming troops who had entered the city clearly could not finish off these resisting bannermen. He could not help breathing a sigh of relief: as long as the bannermen were not defeated, all was well, all was well...

Just as he was about to lead his men forward to the rescue, he heard someone among the resisting bannermen shout at the top of his lungs: "The company captain has fled! The company captain has fled!"

Li Fuguo was startled at the sound. Looking into the distance, he saw a dozen or so men on horseback galloping this way. As the riders drew nearer, Li Fuguo finally made out their faces. The one in the lead was none other than the company captain, Xiang Guoqing!

Xiang Guoqing also saw Li Fuguo and his Green Standard soldiers, but after only a brief hesitation, he whipped his horse and charged straight ahead without looking back.

"Out of the way! Out of the way!"

Desperate to escape, Xiang Guoqing simply lashed out with his whip at the camp soldiers blocking his path. The personal guards behind him followed suit, and two of them even hurled their scabbards straight into the crowd.

Li Fuguo and the Green Standard soldiers were all dumbfounded. None of them had imagined that Xiang Guoqing, a company captain of the Han Banners, would abandon his own men and flee. As they scrambled to dodge aside, every man cursed him loudly.

Xiang Guoqing's flight spelled misery for the bannermen still resisting. They had already been beaten into total collapse of morale by the Ming troops who had suddenly charged into the city, and now they had lost their backbone — how could they not despair?

"The company captain's run off, so what the hell are we brothers still fighting for! Run, brothers, run!"

No one knew who shouted it first, but in an instant the still-resisting bannermen burst apart like a nest blown open. Many of them had personally watched the company captain they had always revered ride off and flee.

That despair and fury at being abandoned made it impossible for them to go on fighting the Ming troops. Very quickly, the bannermen turned as one and fled toward the west of the city.

Their flight, in turn, threw the Green Standard soldiers — who had only just dodged Xiang Guoqing and his men — into chaos again, sending Li Fuguo into a stamping, cursing rage, yet there was nothing he could do.

The Qing army's great disorder gave the Ming troops their opening. The Green Standard's arrival had at first put pressure on the Taiping Army, but now, at a glance, the pressure was entirely gone. Led by their officers, the Taiping Army's soldiers roared and charged over.

"Protect the commander! Protect the commander!"

Seeing a band of black-clad Ming soldiers charging this way, Li Fuguo's personal guards rushed forward in fright and surrounded him, desperately driving back the crowd pressing near. At this moment, who could bother telling bannermen from camp soldiers?

The fleeing bannermen, seeing a crowd of camp soldiers not only blocking their path but refusing to let them through, were furious, and in their savagery they simply swung their blades and hacked at them.

That made things far worse — however much the Green Standard feared the bannermen, once someone was swinging a blade at their necks, how could they not see red?

"To hell with your mother!"

Just as the camp soldiers and bannermen were trading blows, several large firecrackers were suddenly hurled into the crowd.

The bannermen, who knew how deadly those firecrackers were, immediately shrank back in terror, while the camp soldiers, who did not know, simply stared stupidly at the smoking objects: what are those things?

With a boom, before the Green Standard soldiers could react, the smoking firecrackers suddenly exploded. With the blast, the iron nails packed inside the tubes shot into the crowd like a goddess scattering flowers.

"Aiya!"

One of Li Fuguo's personal guards took an iron nail straight in the right eye, and the pain made him clutch his eye and shriek.

A camp soldier picket officer was also struck by an iron nail from the blast. The nail pierced clean through his neck.

Ignoring the blood gushing out, the picket officer clutched his neck with both hands and stared across at Battalion Commander Li Fuguo.

He opened his mouth to cry out, but because his windpipe was severed, no sound came — only indistinct noises, and no one could tell what he was saying.

He stood there for a full several dozen seconds before, unwilling to die, he clutched his neck and dropped to his knees, then his body went limp and he collapsed to the ground, twitching uncontrollably.

Having witnessed his subordinate's ghastly death with his own eyes, Li Fuguo felt a chill run down his back, and his legs began to tremble involuntarily.

"Kill the Qing dogs! Kill the Qing dogs!"

Bald Jiang He, who had been chasing and hacking at bannermen the whole way, was now drenched in blood from head to toe, his whiskers matted with flesh and gore, filthy and sickening to look at. He paid it no mind at all, simply swinging the two axes in his hands and charging at the Qing troops.

The Taiping Army soldiers at the very front were all veterans who had fought in several battles. By now they all knew the outcome was settled — the Qing dogs of Gaoyao were dead fish — and they were all the more fired up by having defeated the Tartars' elite Han Banners.

Without needing their officers to lead them, they charged the Qing troops with soaring morale, very much in the manner of beating a drowning dog.

The bannermen were already desperate to flee and did not dare turn back to resist the Taiping Army.

The Green Standard soldiers, meanwhile, had been stunned witless by the thunderclap bombs they had never seen before, and seeing how ferocious the charging Ming troops were, they could not summon the courage to fight to the death.

Without anyone telling them, one after another they stretched their legs and fled west with the bannermen.

Seeing the Ming commander bearing down on them so savagely, the camp soldiers lost their nerve and fell back one after another, not daring to engage the Ming troops. Still, several dozen camp soldiers did not flee in panic.

Instead, they gathered around Battalion Commander Li Fuguo and, led by his personal guards, formed a battle group, resisting the Taiping Army while retreating.

After all, Li Fuguo had risen to the rank of Battalion Commander on the strength of severed heads. After the initial panic and terror passed, the instinct to survive pulled him back to his senses from the depths of fear.

Seeing that most of his personal guards were still with him, and that there were fifty or sixty camp soldiers gathered around him — few in number, but all veterans who had followed him for years, men who might not be worth ten each but were true elites — he judged that although the Ming troops were numerous, apart from those firecracker things of unknown make, their skill in close combat did not seem much greater than his own side's.

With this handful of men, defeating the Ming army was impossible, but escorting him out of the city was not.

If that bastard Xiang Guoqing can run, why can't I!

If I get out of here alive, I swear I'll never let Xiang Guoqing off! (The novel *We Sons of Han Will Never Be Slaves* will have more fresh content on the official WeChat platform, and there is also a 100% lucky draw gift for everyone!

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