Chapter 772: Don't Be Afraid — the Southern Ming Has No Great Generals

Don't be afraid — We are here!

With Zhu Cilang's assurance, Huang Dabao naturally was no longer afraid! Huang Dabao was, after all, a eunuch who had weathered great hardship, having fought his way out of Beijing at Emperor Zhu's side — what scene had he not witnessed? Of course he was not afraid. He went back and made preparations for his own affairs, and on the third day set out with a mournful face. It was not from fear, but from grief over the early death of Princess Dongguo. He was going to deliver the news of her death — how could he set out cheerfully?

Setting out north on the same day as him were Zu Kefa and Zu Zeqing. The former was going to Liaodong to see Dodo; he would first go to Dengzhou, then cross the sea to Liao, where he would be received by Jabusi before proceeding to Dodo's army. The latter traveled the same route as Huang Dabao, carrying Zhu Cilang's peace terms to Ajige.

In addition, a secret envoy from the Northern Provost Office of the Embroidered Uniform Guard would also travel north with Zu Zeqing, disguised as one of his attendants to enter Beijing.

Beijing today was nothing like the past. There were no ordinary Han commoners inside the city, so it was not easy even for the Ming Embroidered Uniform Guard to get in!

Were it not for the Jiale Market House of the Nine Great Imperial Merchants, it would not have been so easy for Emperor Zhu to gather intelligence on the northern Qing!

Now, because of the internal split within the Great Qing, two major factions had emerged — the army within the Pass and the army beyond the Pass — and Jabusi happened to belong to the army-beyond-the-Pass faction, so the Ming had lost its source of intelligence on Beijing.

This diplomatic mission was the perfect opportunity to send agents in again. Inside Beijing there were plenty of twice- and thrice-turned officials, Qing in body but Ming at heart, craning their necks in anticipation of contact from Embroidered Uniform Guard agents!

Moreover, Emperor Zhu had already planted two major chess pieces before leaving Beijing — two thrice-turned officials holding "loyalist certificates."

Luo Yangxing and Guang Shiheng had both kept a very low profile these past two years. They had now joined the Bordered Green Banner and become bannermen, which was how they had managed to keep their Beijing household registration.

Their houses, however, they could not keep — once again could not keep. The last time Dorgon issued the house-seizure order, their houses inside Beijing had been taken. Fortunately, in recent years property prices in the outer city of Beijing were not high, and their salaries were enough to afford them. So they had both bought residences in the outer city — the two of them said their hearts were with the Ming, but before Dorgon's death, they had both been prepared to die as ghosts of the Great Qing.

Because at that time, Luo Yangxing and Guang Shiheng, living in Beijing, truly could not see how the Ming could ever fight its way back.

The Ming now had money, and it also had a wise ruler, and its army was not weak. It could not crush the Qing army, but it could fight them to a standstill, as could be seen from the several Ming-Qing clashes in the past.

But the Ming military's weaknesses were also glaring. First, it had no horses! The ailment of the weak Song dynasty of old was one the Ming now shared as well, though there were still ways to remedy it. Because after the return of the Pingxi and Shuofang feudatories, the Ming had gained channels for buying horses.

Second, it lacked great generals! That was the real headache. The Southern Song had famous commanders like Yue Fei, Han Shizhong, and Wu Jie. But whom did the Ming have? The Wu father and son? They were defeated underlings of the eastern barbarians! Huang Degong, Gao Jie, Li Chengdong? Those three were all brute courage. As for Shi Kefa and Zuo Maodi, they had done nothing but lose battles! Although the battles they lost would have been enough to make Hong Taiji "weep with joy" back when the Chongzhen Emperor was in power, the Great Qing's capital today was far thicker than when it was beyond the Pass! Especially after gaining the two Green Banners and the Nine Banners' garrison commandant yamens, it had actually acquired a certain capacity to absorb Han warriors into its ranks, making up for its manpower shortages.

So in their view, a Southern Ming without great generals would find it very difficult to succeed in a northern expedition — unless the Great Qing itself made a colossal blunder.

And now that colossal blunder had actually come: the Great Qing had split in two, Dodo and Ajige were about to turn on each other as brothers, and an internal feud was clearly on the horizon.

In order to hold Beijing if Dodo or anyone else came attacking, the first thing Ajige did upon returning to Beijing was to order the demolition and relocation of the outer city to strengthen the city's defenses.

Officials of the two Green Banners or booi bondservants originally living in the outer city had to either move into the inner city, or relocate to Yongping Prefecture or Xuanfu. As for compensation — there was none!

Whoever was affected could count themselves unlucky!

Luo Yangxing and Guang Shiheng, the old pair, were just such unlucky ones. Early this morning they had gone into the city together to look at houses.

Houses were not hard to find, because many of the nobles of the Plain Blue and Plain White Banners who had originally lived inside the city had "abandoned their houses and fled" — giving up their Beijing household registration and their courtyard houses within the Second Ring Road to run back to the Northeast!

So the banner commandant yamens of the Plain Blue and Plain White Banners had large numbers of empty houses available for rent.

Luo Yangxing and Guang Shiheng, these two "must-have buyers," now did not buy houses at all, but rented two adjacent small courtyard houses as temporary shelter — they would just squeeze in for now! The two of them had, after all, stayed behind in Beijing as meritorious rearguard officials for Zhu Cilang. Once the northern expedition succeeded, would they need to worry about not having good houses to live in?

After viewing the houses, they returned together to Luo Yangxing's residence outside the city, intending to have a couple of drinks together and savor their bright future. But the moment they entered, they ran into a eunuch from the palace, who had come to summon Luo Yangxing and Guang Shiheng (their residences outside the city were also next to each other), these two idle loafers, to the palace to discuss matters.

The one summoning Luo Yangxing and Guang Shiheng to the palace was the Prince Regent Ajige. The reason Ajige had thought of Luo Yangxing and Guang Shiheng was that Zu Zeqing, whom he had sent to Wuhan to see Zhu Cilang, had returned, bringing with him a new draft of the "North-South Peace Treaty."

In this draft, Emperor Zhu proposed obtaining the lands west of the Grand Canal in Shandong and south of the Daqing River, as well as the territories of Kaifeng, Guide, Henan, and Ruzhou in Henan Province.

This was taking advantage of the Great Qing's internal strife to carve off Great Qing territory!

Before Luo Yangxing and Guang Shiheng had even approached the Hall of Martial Valor in the Forbidden City, they heard Ajige's loud voice speaking Manchu that was very hard to understand.

"This Emperor Zhu certainly knows how to scheme, actually thinking he can take so much of our territory without spending a single soldier! Bah! If he has the ability, let him come and fight! I'm not afraid of any Shi Kefa, Zuo Maodi, Wu Sangui, or Zhu Cijiong — not one of them can fight, all of them are good-for-nothing wine sacks and rice bags!"

Luo Yangxing and Guang Shiheng had no idea why Ajige had thought of them, and felt somewhat guilty — they were Qing in body but Ming at heart! So upon entering the Hall of Martial Valor they wanted to find a corner to hide in. But the moment they entered, they saw Zu Dashou, Zu Zeqing, Sun Zhixie, Jin Zhijun, Zuo Maotai, Chen Mingxia, Feng Quan, Zhang Xuan, Liu Yuyou, Wu Weihua, and a whole crowd of traitorous twice-turned officials.

These twice-turned officials had basically all learned Manchu and could understand what Ajige was saying. As soon as Ajige finished speaking, they all vied with one another to speak up and declare their positions.

"The Imperial Uncle Prince Regent speaks truly!"

"Indeed, the Southern Court has no one who can fight. Our Great Qing has elite troops like the sea and fierce generals like clouds!"

"The Imperial Uncle Prince Regent is even more divinely skilled in the art of war..."

Luo Yangxing and Guang Shiheng glanced at each other, thinking: Ajige is feeding everyone a reassurance pill!

What the Ming sought was only a bit of territory in Henan and Shandong, so it would not threaten the Great Qing's foundations. And the reason the Ming would settle for a small advantage was precisely that it had no fine generals or fierce warriors; even with many troops and ample grain, it could not bring its advantages into play.

To be honest, Ajige's words did seem to have a certain logic to them!

On the Southern Ming side, there truly was no one who could match the two brothers Ajige and Dodo in command ability and generalship!

"Your Highness, Shanghai has arrived. You may soon set foot on the soil of the Great Ming Empire."

On the same day that Zu Zeqing arrived in Beijing, a massive fleet consisting of five Western great sailing ships and five Chinese-style ten-thousand-bus great bird ships was slowly entering the busy Wusong River. In the lead was a large four-masted sailing ship with a full 800 tons of carrying capacity — the very "Flying" that Ji Kun had bought at a high price. In a cabin in the sterncastle of the Flying, Li Shaoyou, who had been drifting overseas for a long stretch of time, was speaking in French with the short, scrawny, dark Prince de Condé.

This prince looked downcast and listless, holding a coffee cup in his hand, while his gaze was fixed intently on Li Shaoyou's new bride — a black-haired, green-eyed Bavarian beauty with an angelic face and a devilish figure.

(End of Chapter)