Chapter 199

Correction to the previous text: Sun Kewang was enfeoffed by the Southern Ming as a first-rank prince, the Prince of Qin.

By the way, I ask for monthly tickets. Given that the author has persisted in completing this work with unwavering resolve, asking you all to cast a few monthly tickets should not be too much to ask.

Zhou Shixiang's blunt assertion that Li Dingguo's dash into Guizhou meant abandoning the anti-Qing fighters of Guangdong and Guangxi finally made Qi Hao unable to keep silent. Greatly agitated, he cried out, "What the Battalion Commander says, this subordinate cannot agree with!"

"Oh?" Zhou Shixiang was not displeased by Qi Hao's heated reaction, but asked, "Why does Company Commander Qi say this?"

Qi Hao panted heavily and said in a muffled voice, "Though I, Qi Hao, followed the Daxi Emperor in my early years, ever since the fifth year of Yongli, when we joined the Ming to resist the Qing, I have regarded myself wholeheartedly as a subject of the Ming.

As far as I know, among the entire Daxi Army, if one speaks of loyalty to the Son of Heaven, there is only the Western Prefecture! Now the Son of Heaven is held in thrall by the Lord of the State.

Though I likewise hold the Lord of the State in respect, I am also dissatisfied with his act of coercing the Son of Heaven. But the Lord of the State insists on having his way, and we are powerless to stop him.

The Western Prefecture, however, opposed it with all his might, and did not hesitate to break with the Lord of the State. This time the Western Prefecture led his troops into Guizhou, it was truly a move made of necessity.

May I ask, if the Lord of the State truly forced the Son of Heaven to abdicate, would there be any hope left of restoring the Ming realm? Therefore, what the Battalion Commander said about the Western Prefecture abandoning the righteous fighters of Guangdong and Guangxi is untrue.

One must understand: if the skin does not exist, how can the fur attach itself!"

"Well said — if the skin does not exist, how can the fur attach itself! Company Commander Qi's words have awakened me. Indeed, the Western Prefecture's move was one of necessity. If the Son of Heaven truly ceased to exist, how long could the rest of us hold on?"

Although he knew that Sun Kewang and Li Dingguo were bound to fall out, and knew that Li Dingguo had truly been forced by circumstance to lead his troops straight to Anlong, deep in his subconscious Zhou Shixiang placed the survival of the Taiping Army above all else.

In his view, if Li Dingguo had not abandoned Guangdong and Guangxi for Guizhou, but instead used Gaozhou as a base and prepared at any time for a third eastward advance, then with the Taiping Army occupying Xinhui and opening a favorable position at the southern gateway to Guangzhou, Li Dingguo could have seized the moment to advance east again and surely defeated the Qing army and taken Guangzhou, then swiftly brought the entire province of Guangdong under control.

By then, not only would the Southern Ming have gained another province, it could also have used Guangdong as a base to march north against the Central Plains.

And the Taiping Army, by virtue of its great merit in taking Xinhui and holding it, could have won the regard of Li Dingguo and even the Yongli court, and gained an opportunity to grow.

But Li Dingguo, for the sake of the Yongli Emperor, had disregarded Guangdong and Guangxi, making the Taiping Army's defense of Xinhui utterly meaningless, and perhaps even dooming the entire Taiping Army to destruction at Xinhui.

This naturally left Zhou Shixiang unwilling to accept it, and so some resentment in his heart was unavoidable.

Yet now, thinking it over carefully: if Li Dingguo truly disregarded Yongli and allowed Sun Kewang to force Yongli to abdicate the throne to him, then the Ming would truly never exist again.

Sun Kewang, coming from the Daxi Army, could never win the support of the Zheng clan of Xiamen, nor of Zhang Mingzhen, Zhang Huangyan, and other forces still resisting the Qing along the Zhejiang and Fujian coasts, nor of the Ming-restoration forces in the Qing-occupied regions.

By then, the various Ming-restoration forces that were nominally united under the Yongli banner would inevitably split apart. Compared with such a consequence, whether the Taiping Army, with only a little over two thousand men, lived or perished was plainly not worth mentioning.

The Taiping Army had indeed been built up by Zhou Shixiang's own hand, and forged with all his heart and effort, yet it was simply too weak and too insignificant. In the great contest between Ming and Qing, it could not even serve as a bargaining chip.

Compared with the fall of the Ming, abandoning or even sacrificing a portion of the anti-Qing forces was, in Li Dingguo's eyes, a helpless choice, but still the best one.

Being cast aside as a discarded piece is certainly an unpleasant feeling, and Qi Hao understood it deeply. That day when Li Dingguo was defeated at Xinhui and retreated in haste, had not he, garrisoning Jiangmen, been cast aside as a discarded piece as well?

Yet he had never borne any resentment toward Li Dingguo for it. From the ninth year of Chongzhen, when he had followed the Eighth Great King at Fengyang, he had carried his head in his hands and sold his life for twenty years.

A man who had crawled out of mountains of corpses and seas of blood naturally understood clearly what mattered and what did not. With the westward retreat route already cut off by the Qing army, how could he blame Li Dingguo for abandoning him?

The fact was already so. The urgent task was not to blame this one or that one, but to find a way out for the Taiping Army — at the very least, to produce a plan of response.

Whatever the decision, it would at least settle the hearts of the commanders, who had already fallen into panic. At this critical juncture, what was needed was not some immortal, but a decision!

Zhou Shixiang pulled himself together and ordered the map he had made with his own hands to be spread on the table, and had all the commanders gather around.

"I know everyone is fearful now, but our Taiping Army has never relied on others since the day the camp was raised.

This time, whether we live or die, it is our own brothers' affair. Better to rely on ourselves than to beg others.

Since no reinforcements are coming, and the situation has placed our army in a death trap, then let us seek life within death. If we truly die, there is nothing more to say.

But before we die, we must drag as many Qing curs down with us as we can!"

"We await the Battalion Commander's orders!" The commanders all roused themselves.

Zhou Shixiang gestured over the map as he continued, "Looking at the overall situation between the enemy and us, the Prince of Anxi has abandoned Guangdong and Guangxi, which has thrown our Ming into a predicament of attending to one thing and losing another.

First, the court's lines of communication with us and the other forces still resisting the Qing in Guangdong have been severed, and the sea route by which the Zheng clan of the Fujian-Zhejiang coast could enter Guangdong has also become unusable.

Strategically, this creates a passive pattern in which east and west cannot support each other and each fights alone. Second, the fall of Guangdong and Guangxi will create an even more favorable situation for the Qing army to attack Guizhou and Yunnan.

Furthermore, after the great battle between Anxi and Sun Kewang, one of them must lose. Who that loser will be, I dare not say rashly, but I believe it is more likely Sun Kewang who loses.

As the saying goes, a just cause enjoys abundant support while an unjust cause finds little. Sun Kewang, out of ambition, coerces the Son of Heaven, and out of envy of Anxi's great merit in twice felling famous princes — these are things all under heaven know.

So in terms of popular support, Sun Kewang holds no advantage. In terms of timing, outside there are Qing armies watching like tigers, and within there are comrades slaughtering one another — where does Sun Kewang have any favorable timing?

And looking at terrain, Sun Kewang's forces are mostly concentrated on the Hunan front.

If he rashly withdraws troops to block Anxi, he would first weaken the anti-Qing strength on the Hunan front, and second lose the initiative and fall into a passive response — terrain is not even worth discussing.

If Sun Kewang loses, then we cannot but worry about the Qing armies on the Hunan front sweeping south in force."

"If I were Shang Kexi, at this moment I would certainly seize the opportunity of Anxi's main force shifting away and the Ming forces in Guangxi being weak and isolated.

On one hand, I would memorialize the court requesting the Qing armies on the Hunan front to move south; at the same time, I would muster the main Qing forces of Guangdong and push toward Guangxi at full speed.

By then, even if Anxi succeeds by luck, snatches the Son of Heaven from Sun Kewang's hands, and defeats Sun Kewang, with Guangdong and Guangxi entirely lost and only Yunnan and Guizhou remaining, how could he withstand the Qing wolves and tigers closing in from all sides?

It may well be said that the Ming will perish in this very moment."

At this point, Zhou Shixiang sighed. He had analyzed the history he knew to the commanders as thoroughly as he could.

What remained was beyond what he could know, and beyond what he could influence. Precisely because of this, his gambling spirit was roused.

Damn it all — he would stake this second chance at life and gamble once, not for himself, not for the common people, not for the Ming, but only for the parents, wife, and children who had died!

"But none of this has happened yet, because our Taiping Army is still in Guangdong, still nailed right under the Qing army's nose!

So long as Xinhui does not fall, Shang Kexi can forget about freeing his hands to push west in full force! So long as he cannot push west in full force, we can mend this leak in the heavens!"

With that, Zhou Shixiang slammed his fist on the table, jarring the tea bowl on it so hard it tipped.