Chapter 448: The Great Beile

Under the walls of Qian'an County, the Transmigrators were making their final rest and reorganization, preparing to head southeast to intercept the enemy forces.

This time, the Later Jin garrison troops under Amin's unified command numbered five thousand in total, with the Bordered Blue Banner's forces accounting for half.

As the Bordered Blue Banner Lord, Amin, for ease of command, had concentrated the majority of his Banner's cavalry into the three cities on the eastern side of the corridor: Qian'an, Yongping, and Luanzhou. As for Santunying in the middle section of the corridor and Zunhua to the west, those were garrisoned by a mixed assortment of Banner troops left behind by the various Banners.

Amin, entrenched at his main base in Yongping, historically, upon receiving battle reports of Ming Army attacks on every front, had long since lost any will to fight. The Second Beile's first reaction was to notify everyone to retreat.

Even though he had dispatched reinforcements toward Luanzhou at the time, those troops merely made a perfunctory show of it under the city walls before withdrawing, with no intention whatsoever of fighting to the death.

At the same time, the Tartar soldiers in cities including Zunhua, Santunying, and Qian'an all withdrew their forces one after another upon receiving Amin's orders.

By seizing Qian'an at the first moment, the Transmigrators had effectively broken one leg off the three-legged stool on the eastern side of the corridor. From a strategic standpoint, the situation was actually beginning to clarify.

First, since the reinforcements from Luanzhou to the south had been blown apart by the TNT, Qian Tieshan no longer intended to go to Luanzhou.

With only four hundred Tartars left in Luanzhou City, in this situation where every second counted, it simply wasn't worth the main force making a trip there. Their commander Namutai had been blown to death; the remnants in Luanzhou were bound to urgently send someone to report to Amin, and Amin would then order them to retreat. These men would eventually return to Yongping, and they could all be dealt with together under the walls of Yongping City.

The real prize in the eyes of the Transmigrators was Amin.

As one of the Later Jin's Four Great Beile, Amin's head, in terms of propaganda and boosting the morale of the Great Ming's army, far exceeded the value of a thousand ordinary heads.

Add to that the thousand-plus elite Bordered Blue Banner Tartar soldiers at Amin's side... the most important objective of the Transmigrators' attack this time was bound to be Yongping City, not anywhere else.

Therefore, when Qian Tieshan received the reports fed back from the two reinforcement-interception squads, his first order was for the 50 team members in the Luanzhou direction to hurry back and rejoin the main force.

He then notified the other squad: let the reinforcements from Yongping come through; we've freed up our hands here and can meet them head-on and strike a crushing blow.

However, the affairs of the world are hard to predict.

At noon, just as the Transmigrators were leading their troops out, preparing to clash with the 400 reinforcements led by the Bordered Blue Banner general Baduli, this fellow actually turned his men around and headed back to Yongping?

The reason was simple: Baduli had encountered routed soldiers.

Those bondservants fleeing from Qian'an were intercepted by Baduli halfway, and from them Baduli learned everything that had happened in Qian'an.

This fellow Baduli, historically, had led his 400 reinforcements to Luanzhou, made a token appearance, and then left. In this timeline, since Qian'an had raised the wolf smoke first, he was likewise dispatched by Amin to see what was going on.

As a result, after encountering those bondservants fleeing for their lives and learning that Qian'an had already changed hands, Baduli lost any motivation to continue his march. As for taking on the Transmigrators head-on... the decision rested with Amin; Baduli did not have the authority to take these few men and fight a pitched battle, especially when the opponent seemed very formidable.

And so Baduli smoothly turned around.

Seeing the Tartar troops that had just passed by now returning to Yongping, the reinforcement-interception squad responsible for monitoring them was dumbfounded and hurriedly reported the situation to Qian Tieshan.

Upon learning this, Qian Tieshan could only shake his head helplessly. In broad daylight, he had no way to stop every scattered deserter; this sort of thing could only be chalked up to bad luck.

The only course for now was to resolve everything under the walls of Yongping City. Qian Tieshan then issued the order: the entire army was to accelerate its advance.

Thus, the main force departing from Qian'an sped along the official road heading southeast straight for Yongping, and along the way, the 50 soldiers from the reinforcement-interception squad also rejoined the ranks.

In later generations, the administrative division of Yongping Prefecture no longer exists; on the map, Lulong County in Hebei is where the prefectural seat of Yongping Prefecture was located. As mentioned earlier, the three cities arranged in a triangle are all roughly equidistant from each other, and the distance from Qian'an to Lulong County is likewise over 40 li.

40 Chinese li is not far, especially for horses running at full speed; it wouldn't even take a single hour.

So, just as the Later Jin Beile Amin was interrogating the routed soldiers Baduli had brought back atop the prefectural city's walls, dust clouds were already rising in the distance—a large force of cavalry was approaching.

The next moment, when the bondservants crouching on the city walls got a clear look at the newcomers, they immediately knelt before Amin, their faces full of panic, and cried out: "Ah! Great Lord Beile, it's this bunch of Green Jacket Army, come from the sea! Those strange-looking bird blunderbusses can fire repeatedly! The great Niru was blasted to pieces by those bird blunderbusses!"

The Four Great Beile appointed by Nurhaci back in the day were above the other ordinary Beile, so subordinates usually addressed all four of them as Great Lord Beile.

Aisin Gioro Amin, 44 years old this year, was the second son of Shurhaci, younger brother of Qing Taizu Nurhaci.

This man Amin had participated in virtually all the campaigns during the Nurhaci era, achieving illustrious battle merits, and was ultimately appointed by Nurhaci as one of the Four Great Beile.

Clad in a suit of light armor, with an ordinary face, distinguished only by a pair of sharp eyes, Amin now rested both hands on the battlements, paying no heed to the bondservants' howls, silently observing this audacious Ming Army force below.

The Ming troops in green jackets were not many, numbering five hundred, only a third of the city's garrison.

He first glanced at the banners below, and then, seeing these Green-Jacket Soldiers dismount one after another and switch to spare horses, Amin atop the wall nodded: "This bunch of Ming troops from the sea is indeed different from those usual Ming dogs."

Judging by the timeline the routed soldiers had just reported, it seemed that almost the moment the battle for Qian'an ended, these men had rushed non-stop straight for Yongping, completely unlike ordinary Ming armies that called for friends and dilly-dallied. To use a phrase from later generations, their "subjective initiative" was very strong, and their desire for battle was surging.

The Great Lord Beile now believed eighty percent of what the bondservants had said: if these few men below the city didn't have some special methods, it was absolutely impossible for them to have completely wiped out the 400 Bordered Blue Banner elites inside Qian'an City.

Therefore, this strange Ming army, each man with two horses, looking utterly out of place among their peers, was either insane or truly had something to rely on—fire lances capable of firing bullets in rapid succession.

Having finished his assessment, Amin, standing atop the wall, turned his head and asked: "Does anyone know the background of this Cao Zong?"

The reply was a dead silence.

Although there were surrendered officials and officers from Yongping City on the wall besides the Tartar soldiers, when it came to a Fujian Assistant Regional Commander from a distant jurisdiction, these northern officials truly had no clue. The Great Ming had Two Capitals and Thirteen Provinces, and Deputy Generals numbered at least several dozen; who could know that many? They didn't have WeChat.

"Interesting." After uttering this somewhat nonsensical remark, Amin's expression suddenly darkened, and he waved his hand: "You lot, get down from the city wall."

The several surrendered Ming officials and officers from Yongping Prefecture, upon hearing this, hurriedly bowed their heads in salute and descended the gate tower in silence.

Turning around and looking at the remaining Eight Banners men before him, Amin shed the angry expression he had deliberately put on moments before: "The army's morale and fighting spirit are already broken. We won't engage this Cao Zong today. Even granting that his fire lances are formidable, he has only a mere five hundred men; he can't besiege the city."

Having said this, Amin turned his head to look at Baduli: "The troops from Qian'an are gone. Send men to Luanzhou City, Santunying, Zunhua, and the other places to relay my order: all units are to exit the passes by the nearest route and return to Shenyang."

"Aye!"

Amin continued issuing orders: "All of you go and make preparations. In half an hour, we will leave the city and head for Lengkou Pass."

"Aye!" The various Niru and Jalan commanders of the Bordered Blue Banner standing before Amin all placed their hands on their chests and accepted the order.

"Also." Amin's gaze turned fierce as he spoke: "These surrendered people in the city can no longer be taken with us, and by rights, they should all be slaughtered. But there's no time for that now. Everyone, remember to prepare torches when we leave; we might as well send them off with a fire."

"Heh heh, the Great Lord Beile is most wise!" The group of Tartar officers all broke into malicious grins.

The reason Amin had no fighting spirit whatsoever was exactly as he had said earlier: "The army's morale and fighting spirit are already broken."

Why was the morale of the Eight Banners troops, who had always roamed and raided at will, broken? The answer was simple: they had plundered their fill.

On this incursion past the passes, the Banner Lords, who had originally been so hungry their eyes glowed green and had endured years in the bitter cold, suddenly discovered that every single one of them had become a man of great wealth.

The prosperous Jingji Area of the Ming state not only had many towns filled with riches but also countless country estates and forested gardens belonging to princes, high officials, and imperial relatives.

During these months spent in Ming territory, the newborn Later Jin Group, under the leadership of Huang Taiji, had plundered on a massive scale. The entire bandit organization, from princes and Beile at the top down to the common soldiers, had all filled their bowls and basins to overflowing, their pockets greasy with loot.

Now, these spoils of war had already been taken back to Shenyang for distribution along with the main army's northward return. So, these days, what Amin heard every day in Yongping City were these garrison Banner troops' anxious concerns for their homes—"How many bondservants were divided up, how much silver, how much cloth and silk..."

From that moment on, Amin, who had managed troops for many years, understood one thing clearly: his lads could no longer fight; their minds had already flown back to Shenyang.

This was also the reason why Amin ordered a retreat the moment he saw signs of the enemy today: he had wanted to leave for a long time. Whether it was the Transmigrators or some other Ming army that arrived under the city today, all he really needed was an excuse.

Just as the Great Lord Beile had finished making arrangements and issuing orders, a wave of startled cries erupted on the city wall—two strange birds flew over from below the city, wobbling as they climbed higher. Upon reaching the height of the wall, they even hovered briefly in place for a few seconds, ultimately stopping several dozen meters above the city, becoming two black dots.

"They're probably some kind of spying mechanism, a watchtower. Don't panic. All of you, go ready the horses."

As expected of the Later Jin's Grand Beile, a veteran of a hundred battles — Amin gauged the Great Frontier's purpose in the first moment.

After seeing the city-wall images the drone transmitted back on the screen, Qian Tieshan and the others finally let out a breath of relief: racing at full speed, they had still made it in time — the Tartar army hadn't managed to flee and was still inside the city.

Judging by that many-stars-circling-the-moon formation, Comrade Amin was likely right among that circle of Later Jin Nobility atop the wall; Qian Tieshan's side had already marked the three most probable individuals, placing cursor symbols above the three men's heads in the computer's facial-recognition system.

The next step was to formulate a temporary battle plan.