Chapter 859: What? The Great Qing Is Gone! (One)

The project to build a dam and besiege the Qing army's great camp on the south bank of the Yellow River soon got underway in full swing. In less than half a month, the area around the Henan great camp had turned into an enormous construction site.

A huge encampment capable of housing over two hundred thousand people had already been thrown up around the south-bank great camp. Palisades, trenches, and camp walls—everything was in place, and nothing was done carelessly. Nor was it one single sprawling camp, but dozens of separate fortified camps, with military camps and laborer camps interspersed together—and not just randomly mixed, but with each regiment-sized military camp watching over a laborer camp of three thousand men.

Between every camp stood its own palisade and wall, and passageways were left open for infantry and cavalry to move through. Seen from a distance, it was a city built of soldiers and civilian laborers!

And between these camps and the Qing army's Henan great camp, the rough outline of a dam had already loomed into view!

Along the top of the sandbag dam, quite a few Ming soldiers carrying firelocks patrolled back and forth.

Countless laborers had already gone up onto the worksite, some using handcarts, some carrying loads on their shoulders or with shoulder poles, piling sandbag after sandbag along one side of the dam. The number of people taking part in the construction was beyond counting, and they were also well organized and in perfect order. And so this dam, shaped like a crescent moon and built encircling the Qing army's Henan great camp, was "growing" at a speed visible to the naked eye.

And farther off, team after team of mule- and horse-drawn carts and Han peasants pushing single-wheeled barrows came streaming in without end. The carts and barrows were all piled high with sacks of grain, large and small!

These carts, barrows, and laborers had all been hired by Feng San's men, who had led mounted parties out to the villages and stockades scattered throughout Kaifeng Prefecture!

Feng San himself was a Henan man, and he had served as Regional Commander in Runing and Nanyang for quite some time. Under him were a group of old Henan brothers, some of whom still had a bit of standing in the localities of Kaifeng Prefecture—though by now the territory of Kaifeng Prefecture was long past being the domain of the scholar-officials; it was the various great and small local strongmen who called the shots.

And these strongmen, who had managed to entrench themselves at the grassroots level of Kaifeng Prefecture through such chaotic times, were certainly no good men. Nine out of ten had made their way by licking blood off a blade, so they all knew the names of "Red Lady of Rooster Mountain" and "Feng Sanlang of Rooster Mountain."

When Feng Sanlang's men came to their doors, spoke the underworld cant, and announced their master's name, who would not show a little face? Besides, Feng Sanlang was now an official of the court, a Regional Commander of the Great Ming, representing the royal army!

How many years had the people of Henan been longing for the royal army? Now the royal army had finally come—and what was more, a royal army that had grown rich!

A rich royal army did not use men for nothing, nor take the common people's goods without payment. Its discipline was strict, and most important of all, it could fight and kill—even the Tartars feared it!

How could the people not welcome such a royal army? How could they not support it? How could they not greet it with baskets of food and pots of drink? Anyone who did not welcome it must surely be a Han traitor, the very thing the royal army hated most...

And the royal army truly had money—copper cash and silver were hauled in cartload after cartload... Even if you did not love the royal army, could you not love money?

So in less than half a month, the hundred thousand laborers Feng San had promised were all assembled, and along the way they had also brought in several hundred thousand shi of millet, dried grass, and bean cakes—enough to feed the great army under Yan Yingyuan and Xu Er'me for quite some time.

With manpower enough, wages enough, and provisions enough, how could the work not go fast? With one or two hundred thousand men throwing themselves into the labor with sleeves rolled up, how could this siege dam not grow by day and by night?

The weather had already turned warm, and the Yellow River was beginning to thaw. It looked as though before long, the Henan great camp would be soaking in water!

Chen Tai and Tuhai watched from the second story of the Henan great camp every day as the Ming army built the dam to besiege them, and of course they could guess what the other side was thinking.

Chen Tai looked at the scene of one or two hundred thousand men at work, shook his head, and said: "Linzhou, from the look of it, this time it is not us releasing water to drown the Nikans, but the Nikans releasing water to drown us... What are we to do!"

"Commander," Tuhai said, his brows tightly knit, "our Henan great camp is not afraid of being soaked, is it?"

"Afraid... it should not be afraid..." Chen Tai said. "But the grain stored in the Henan great camp is limited after all... Once the rice and grain are eaten up, we are finished!"

Tuhai thought for a moment, then said: "If we abandon the Henan great camp now, I fear it will ruin the Imperial Uncle! The Imperial Uncle probably never imagined that the southern army's skill at building dams and waterworks was so formidable..."

Chen Tai sighed: "A miscalculation! How did we not think of it? These past few years they have done nothing else but dig canals and build dams at home... If Imperial Ama were still here, he would certainly have thought of it!"

Dodo's craft in war was first-rate, but he did not consider problems thoroughly, and in recent years he had been busy with affairs beyond the passes, so he did not understand the abilities of the Southern Ming's peasant laborers—he had no interest in matters like digging canals and building dams, so he had never studied how vast the Ming dynasty's Yellow River and Huai River engineering works were.

Tuhai said: "Commander, it seems the Central Plain can no longer be held... But we still must not abandon the Henan great camp, because once we abandon it, the Ming army building the dam will lose its restraint."

"Right, right!" Chen Tai said. "We must hold the Henan great camp to the death. The Imperial Uncle will surely come to rescue us."

Tuhai paused, then said: "But the Imperial Uncle may not know the situation here at the Henan great camp... It has been some days since we last sent out dispatch riders."

These days the Ming army's black-musket mule soldiers were prowling outside the Henan and Hebei great camps, and the cavalry Chen Tai and Tuhai had in hand was limited, so of course they did not dare casually send them out to their deaths.

"Then what is to be done?" Chen Tai had no more ideas either.

"How about this... Commander, give me three hundred horsemen. I still have a hundred-odd horsemen of my own. I will take a force of over four hundred horsemen and charge out together. Some should be able to get away."

"Good, good," Chen Tai nodded repeatedly. "Linzhou, you must be careful. If you truly cannot break out, then come back. We have twenty thousand troops, and the grain can hold out for at least a year. Even if the Henan great camp cannot be held, there is still the Hebei great camp to defend."

"This subordinate understands. If I cannot fight my way out, I will return, and we will hold out to the death together!"

Holding out to the death meant waiting to die... Tuhai still had imperial favor unrequited, so of course he was unwilling to wait for death. In fact, these past days he had been sending trusted men out every night to scout the ground, and had long since found a route of escape. The reason he asked Chen Tai for men was simply to have those several hundred horsemen draw the attention of the Ming cavalry while he slipped away with his trusted followers.

Four hundred cavalrymen sortieing at night would be a grand spectacle, certain to draw the attention of the Ming cavalry, and then Tuhai could seize the chance to escape.

He had already prepared three horses per man for himself and a few trusted followers, along with ample dry rations and horse fodder—enough to run for three days and three nights without stopping... Nine chances out of ten, he could make it to the Imperial Uncle and weep and plead before him!

The only question now was where the Imperial Uncle was. He should have already led his troops through the pass, right?

The place where the Imperial Uncle Dodo had quartered his troops was called Renqiu, located within Hejian Prefecture. Although it lay at the center of Northern Zhili, it was a rather enclosed place. To the north of Renqiu was Baiyang Lake, to the east the Jade Belt River, to the west the Hutuo River, and the Hutuo and Jade Belt Rivers met south of Renqiu. So once the ice on Baiyang Lake, the Hutuo River, and the Jade Belt River melted, Renqiu became a fairly enclosed spot.

This enclosed place, being close to the water-rich Baiyang Lake, was a rare fertile and lovely spot in an age so often afflicted by drought. Not long after the Qing army entered the pass, it had been enclosed and seized by the Plain Blue Banner, and Hooge had built a great manor here—but no sooner was the manor finished than he was killed in the "Battle of Blood-Flowing Stream" by no one knew whom.

And it was in Hooge's manor that Dodo received Tuhai, travel-worn and arriving by a roundabout route, and heard him recount the perilous situation of the Henan and Hebei great camps.

Again "water-soaked cities," again foreign-horse cavalry... and in such numbers! Clearly they meant to besiege the point and strike the relief force!

Tuhai had finished speaking. In the great hall, a crowd of Manchu baturu all turned their eyes toward Dodo.

Right now someone at Tianjin is besieging the point and striking the relief force, and someone at the Henan and Hebei great camps is also besieging the point and striking the relief force. What are we to do? Whom should we relieve? Make up your mind at once!

Dodo sighed: "Now that His Majesty is besieged at Tianjin, We as Imperial Uncle cannot ignore it... Very well, let us go fish him out!"