Chapter 569: Containment

Qinzhou Guard City.

These past few days had not been easy for Zuo Liangyu.

He and Deng Qi were close friends — comrades who fought side by side, inseparable and intimate.

Ever since the sixth year of Chongzhen, when Zuo Liangyu rescued Deng Qi from the woodcutter's den at Tangyin, their two armies had moved as one, each bringing out the best in the other. When the white banner of Zuo's army appeared on the battlefield, Deng Qi's troops were sure to follow close behind; the Changping Battalion and the Sichuan troops coordinated with flawless precision.

They won battle after battle in Hebei, then quelled bandit uprisings in Henan, earning tremendous merit for the court.

Those were days of pure exhilaration.

The news of Deng Qi's death came so abruptly that Zuo Liangyu refused to believe it at first — he even had the Sichuan soldier who brought the report tied up and beaten.

He thought to himself, what kind of bullshit way to die was that? In ancient times Longzhou was a critical military stronghold, but after the wars ended, Longzhou was nothing more than a small inland town. The centuries-old unified-dynasty city walls had long since crumbled, and the newly built walls were shorter than a spear shaft. Zuo Liangyu reckoned that even if he stood on top and jumped off himself, he wouldn't die.

But then Lu Ding, a Henan stipend student in his retinue, interjected a remark that plunged Commander Zuo into deep thought.

Lu Ding said, "If those Longzhou city walls had been a bit higher, Commander Deng likely wouldn't have run up onto them."

Once the truth of Deng Qi's death was confirmed, the grief of losing a close friend had actually largely dissipated in Zuo Liangyu's heart. What remained was more the sorrow of seeing one's own kind destroyed.

But right now Zuo Liangyu had no time to mourn Deng Qi at all, because Liu Chengzong's relay cavalry had already seized control of Qinzhou's outskirts. He had a premonition: if he kept mourning a little longer, he'd be heading down to join Deng Qi.

"Have I been deceived?"

Zuo Liangyu stared at the map hanging in the guard command post, listening to his own relay cavalry's reports, his brow tightly furrowed.

The situation was extremely dire. The day before yesterday, the western and southern outskirts of Qinzhou had been completely sealed off by the Marshal's Army's relay riders, but his own relay troops, under the protection of his household retainers and picked champions, could still push north to the northern bank of the Wei River, and the official road east toward Baoji remained unobstructed.

It was precisely by relying on this that his men could still make contact with Wang Yuncheng and other officers of the Sichuan troops and order them to shift their garrison to Qinzhou to join forces with Zuo's army.

But today, the northern bank of the Wei River had been completely occupied by the Marshal's Army's relay riders. Even at the Yongchuan River and Maiji Mountain to the east, relay troops were waving signal flags and spears. Zuo Liangyu had already lost contact with the Sichuan troops, and he could no longer reach even the two thousand-household battalions of the Qinzhou Guard stationed north of the Wei River.

Zuo Liangyu sensed something was off. He had never seen anyone use relay cavalry like this.

The purpose of relay cavalry was to raise alarms during a march. Whether temporary or permanent, a single army column was usually equipped with twenty-four relay riders. Even if a battalion split into three columns, that was only a little over three hundred men — they couldn't do much more than that.

How could it be like Liu Chengzong, with relay riders blanketing the hills and plains, throwing up one blockade line after another directly around the outskirts of Qinzhou, doing the work of an encircling army?

Under normal circumstances, the sight of enemy relay horses meant the main force was likely no more than twenty li away. If you didn't want a meeting engagement, you had to keep your distance from the enemy's relay troops.

That was also why Zuo Liangyu had sent his household retainers and picked champions from the mixed cavalry detachment to drive off the Marshal's Army these past few days. But after several clashes, his retainers still hadn't located the Marshal's Army's main force.

By today, Zuo Liangyu had finally caught on. He had been deceived. Liu Chengzong's main force had most likely not been anywhere nearby a few days ago.

After all, the scale of Liu Chengzong's relay riders was simply too bizarre. Qinzhou was not the only place attacked — Zhang Yingchang to the north, Deng Qi, He Renlong, Yang Yanchang, and others had all been struck by relay troops at almost the same time earlier.

The problem was that the Ming army had already calculated all the troops the Marshal's Manor could deploy into Shaanxi for combat. Excluding the surrendered roving bandits attached to them in the south, Liu Chengzong's own elite mobile combat troops numbered as many as thirty thousand. At that troop strength, the relay riders could not possibly have stirred up this much commotion.

With the relay troops causing this kind of uproar now, it couldn't possibly be that five hundred main-force soldiers had been split into two hundred and fifty columns, each with twenty-four relay riders, each relay post with five riders, adding up to a total force of thirty thousand, could it?

Just as Zuo Liangyu was thinking this, a household retainer suddenly came to report: from the east, in the direction of Baoji, several Liaodong riders had broken through the Marshal's Manor relay troops' blockade line and were outside the trench requesting entry to the city.

Liaodong riders?

The Liaodong troops were Wang Yuncheng's men.

The Sichuan troops, like Zuo Liangyu's own Changping Battalion, were now few in number but highly mixed in faction. They included not only the Sichuan government soldiers who had marched out with Deng Qi, but also the White-Pole Troops of Shizhu absorbed after Zhang Fengyi's death, the Liaodong soldiers who had retreated to Zunhua after the Jisi Incident, supplemented by Henan troops and surrendered Shaanxi and Shanxi roving bandits.

Zuo Liangyu was overjoyed. "Verify their identities and let them into the city at once!"

Not long after, Zuo Liangyu received two bedraggled Liaodong soldiers at the Qinzhou Guard's official residence. A household retainer reported at his side, "Commander, they set out as a party of twelve. Only five made it into the city. Three were wounded by gunfire and have been placed in the northwest small camp; a medical craftsman has already been summoned."

As he spoke, the retainer handed over a three-eyed gun, saying, "This is a weapon they captured from Liu's bandit relay horses."

Zuo Liangyu could tell at a glance — that was indeed a Marshal's Army three-eyed gun.

In a vast country like the Great Ming, no single type of weapon had only one standard form, and the three-eyed gun was no exception. It came in several versions: generally longer in the north, shorter in the south; longer in the east, shorter in the west; longer in government manufacture, shorter in civilian make.

In the south, for example, this thing was used for hunting, rituals, signal cannons, and defending against thieves. A barrel of six inches was not considered short.

In the northwest, where one had to defend against bare-chested Mongol brutes galloping wildly on horseback, length was not the most critical factor. The requirements were light weight and greater sturdiness, able to blast out eight or nine pellets in one shot and guarantee that some lead would hit a man. So it had to be short and thick.

But in Liaodong, length mattered a great deal. If it was too short, never mind whether it could wound a man — it couldn't even bolster your own courage. You'd be better off trading shots with a bow and arrow.

Liu Chengzong, of all people, made his three-eyed guns even longer than the Liaodong ones.

Zuo Liangyu gave it only a single glance, then told his retainer to set the three-eyed gun aside. He questioned the Liaodong soldiers, "How are your men? How far have they advanced?"

"Reporting to the Commander, Liu's bandit relay horses are everywhere. We dared not take the Qingshui route and could only follow the river west from Chencang in Baoji. Midway we were ambushed by their relay troops. General Wang had no choice but to turn back to Baoji and sent us to break through and bring word to the Commander."

"That's not right."

Zuo Liangyu frowned at these words and shook his head repeatedly. "No, no, that's not right. The bandits' main army is not over here."

This Liaodong soldier who had broken through had alerted him: the road from Qinzhou to Baoji was difficult to travel by water on the Wei River; troops and horses could only advance along the narrow riverside path. But Liu Chengzong had a large force, and breaking into Guanzhong would require rapidly concentrating his troops, so seizing Qinzhou held no meaning for Liu Chengzong.

Qinzhou's only significance lay in the fact that his own army was stationed here.

Liu Chengzong wouldn't commit tens of thousands of men to a frontal assault on Qinzhou Guard City just to beat him to death here.

Zuo Liangyu judged others by his own standards. Right now, every Ming army unit was being harassed by the Marshal's Army's relay riders. Every city along a thousand-li battlefront believed the Marshal's Army was eyeing it with predatory intent. What did this situation mean?

It meant no one dared to move. Everyone wanted to request reinforcements from friendly forces. But in that case... this Long Mountain defense line was as good as empty. Liu Chengzong could cross it whenever he pleased.

"Longzhou — after you left, who is defending Longzhou?"

The Liaodong soldier lowered his head and said nothing. Deng Qi had been driven to his death — who else could be defending Longzhou? In any case, they had all withdrawn.

After thinking it over, the Liaodong soldier said, "Magistrate Hu Erchun."

Zuo Liangyu raised his hand as if to say something, but in the end nothing came out. He simply walked back to the table and rapped it lightly twice with his fist.

In his heart he thought: This is bad. The bandits are going to break through from Longzhou.

But just at that moment, a disturbance suddenly erupted within the city. Moments later, the commander of the Qinzhou Guard came rushing into the official residence like a gust of wind. "Commander! A large force of bandits is approaching from the west of the city — an endless sea as far as the eye can see! They intend to press the city!"

Zuo Liangyu no longer bothered pondering where Liu Chengzong was. He merely dismissed the Liaodong soldiers to rest, ordered his personal attendants to gather his armor and weapons, and hurried toward the city wall.

Before he even ascended the wall, he could already see the billowing dust clouds rising west of the city.

Soon, Zuo Liangyu saw, stretching west along the Xi River, countless cavalry and infantry formations advancing in majestic array from the Xikou area. The booming of drums drew near from afar. Hillsides, terraced fields, riverbanks — every place was blanketed by banners and flags.

The ferocious, overwhelming display made Zuo Liangyu, still donning his armor atop the wall, narrow his eyes. His heart pounded with apprehension. He wondered: Had he judged wrong?

Could annihilating his own unit really be that important to Liu Chengzong? Important enough to ignore the undefended Longzhou and come smash himself against his Qinzhou Guard instead?

It defied all common sense.

According to Zuo Liangyu's thinking, Liu Chengzong should already be in Long Mountain by now. The real business was crossing the danger zone into the Guanzhong Plain two days later. In a small place like Qinzhou Guard, was it worth mobilizing this many troops?

This vast, surging host of soldiers and horses, the military banners stretching from earth to sky — the sight of several thousand men in mighty array was enough to make anyone's heart quail.

But Zuo Liangyu was not afraid. He had seen formations even larger than this. When those eastern Tartar slaves charged his positions at Songshan and Xingshan, their posture was even more terrifying than this. So what?

In the end, didn't they still slink away dejectedly, burn their dead, and get the hell out!

But when a household retainer handed him a telescope and Zuo Liangyu looked through it, he discovered something bizarre.

On the largest banner, he saw five characters shining bright and clear: Grand Commandant of Henan.

Zuo Liangyu wondered what the hell a Grand Commandant of Henan was. The Great Ming had no such official post — Henan did not have a Grand Commandant.

And why did it feel so familiar, as if he had heard of this official somewhere before.

In this tense atmosphere of an army bearing down on them, the soldiers on the wall were all busy arranging defenses. Rows of guard battalion troops pushed various siege-defense equipment back and forth above and below the wall. Zuo Liangyu furrowed his brow and racked his brains, then suddenly clapped his hands, startling the officers beside him.

Zuo Liangyu's worried frown vanished completely. He laughed and cursed, "Damn it, I remember now!"

Grand Commandant of Henan of the Marshal's Headquarters — it was Zhang Yichuan, the Sweeping King, who had gone over to Liu Chengzong.

Luo Dai, a Mobile Corps Commander beside him, saw Zuo Liangyu suddenly relax and asked, "Commander, what is it?"

Zuo Liangyu handed over the telescope and pointed with a laugh toward the western outskirts of the city. "Who do you think is coming? I only knew when I saw the banner — it turns out to be our old acquaintance from Henan, Zhang Yichuan. He's been given the title Grand Commandant of Henan, all dressed up like he's somebody. I thought it was that fellow townsman of yours coming in person!"

Luo Dai was from Yan'an Prefecture, a fellow townsman of Liu the Lion. However, he had been transferred to Jiliao early on and had no dealings with Liu Chengzong. Later he followed Jiliao Deputy General Xu Dingguo to fight in Denglai, and was subsequently transferred to Henan, which was when he joined up with Zuo Liangyu.

Now, hearing that the one outside the city was Zhang Yichuan, Luo Dai was equally astonished. He raised the telescope and studied the military formation to the west again and again, clicking his tongue in wonder. "Haven't seen him in a few months, but Zhang Yichuan's formation actually looks quite impressive."

Truth be told, as the name Zhang Yichuan spread along the city wall, it seemed to weaken the enemy formation outside by several degrees.

They had fought Zhang Yichuan many times in Henan, and every time they had sent him fleeing with his tail between his legs. Now, hearing this name, the veteran Ming officers on the wall felt their panicked minds settle. Observing the enemy formation again with a calm eye, they could easily discern the true strength and weakness behind the so-called Grand Commandant of Henan's array.

The troop formation was indeed quite intimidating, but that was merely the visual and auditory effect created by the abundance of men, horses, banners, and drums. Once people calmed down and looked more carefully, they saw many infantry but few cavalry, and no mule-mounted riders in sight — these were definitely not Liu Chengzong's troops.

At once, the officers all clamored eagerly to seek battle.

Liu Chengzong they had never seen, so they could not fight recklessly; but Zhang Yichuan they had seen plenty — they would beat the Sweeping King!

Zuo Liangyu examined the banners and estimated the troop strength from the formation. There were quite a few children, old men, and old women mixed into the ranks. Looking only at combat troops, he estimated two small battalions of two thousand men each. He said to Luo Dai, "Zhang Yichuan has improved — he knows to conceal his troops. I heard he recruited nine thousand soldiers last year, yet now there are only four thousand here. Lead the infantry out of the city and hit him once, to boost morale."

Luo Dai, hearing this, put on the helmet he had been holding, clasped his fists to receive the order, and asked, "Pursue or not?"

"Hmm…" Zuo Liangyu first shook his head, then paused. "Who doesn't know the Dashing Army's three-axe routine of feigning defeat and turning the tables? Still, pursuing for two li would be fine — see what skills he's learned from following Liu Chengzong."

Having said this, Zuo Liangyu added another warning: "But don't rush out of the city. First send the household retainers' picked vanguard and the scout cavalry out to have a look around. Only sally forth if there are no ambushing troops nearby."

Meanwhile, on the other side.

At Twenty-Li Post outside the city, halfway up the hillside, a blue-luo double-tiered canopy marked the Futu Summit command post. On the opposite riverbank, at the foot of Chuankou Mountain without exception, squads of soldiers carrying heavy rocket cases on their backs were scaling the slopes to construct preset launch positions.

Near the canopy, Zhang Yichuan stood with arms akimbo directing his men to bury steel-wheel landmines beneath it. In the fields further west, Liu Yiyong, the Chief Drill Instructor of the five Henan battalions and on his first battlefield, was directing the artillery troops to conceal general cannons and Frankish breech-loaders in the open country. The entire rear of the army was bustling with feverish activity.

Once the artillery was in place, Zhang Yichuan rode over to find Liu Yiyong. Raising his telescope toward Qinzhou Guard city, he frowned and muttered to himself, "Why haven't they come out yet? Is Grand Commandant of Henan not as appealing as the Sweeping King? They couldn't possibly think I'm an imperial court Grand Commandant, could they? Should we… raise the Sweeping King banner again?"

Liu Yiyong was also feeling uncertain in his heart. After all, although he had grown up in the Children's Camp and had been taught a whole set of military principles, battle case studies, and drill manuals by those generals and mobile corps commanders at New City Academy, this was in fact his first time on the battlefield too.

But hearing Zhang Yichuan's words, he quickly waved his hand and said, "That won't be necessary. They know it's you, so they'll definitely be on guard against the Dashing Blade feigned retreat. Even if they didn't know it was you, seeing this loose and disorderly formation, they'll probably come out to fight soon enough."

"If they come out, we'll blast them once and blunt their edge. If they don't come out, we don't need to panic either. We're not the main force anyway — just tying down their attention is enough."

Zhang Yichuan was quick to follow good advice. Hearing that a fight was not absolutely necessary, he felt much relieved. He had a psychological scar from Zuo Liangyu, and not having to hold the front line as cannon fodder was the best outcome.

But for him, this was not the most important matter. Zhang Yichuan glanced left and right, saw no one else nearby, and sidled up to Liu Yiyong to ask, "Brother, what message did the Marshal leave? You've been hiding it for two days. We're on the battlefield now — can you tell me?"

Before the troops set out, Liu Chengzong had sent Liu Yiyong a letter ordering Zhang Yichuan to advance on Qinzhou, but it also contained other instructions. He was not to tell Zhang Yichuan at the time, and as a result, the Grand Commandant of Henan had been restless and uneasy for the past two days. He asked what the message was, but Liu Yiyong would not say.

This time, however, Liu Yiyong did not refuse him again. Instead, he went over to the canopy area, near the banners and drums, to find the water clock. Estimating that the time was about right, he turned back to Zhang Yichuan, took out the letter from his bosom, and said with a solemn expression, "Commander Zhang, the Marshal has an order."

"To Grand Commandant of Henan Zhang Yichuan: By this time, I have already led the army into Fengxiang Prefecture in Guanzhong. I order your division to advance and besiege Qinzhou Guard. Dispatch messengers westward to call friends and rally allies. Once I capture Baoji, set out at once for Guanzhong!"