Chapter 699: Undying Merit and Renown

Hong Chengchou was grinding his teeth to dust in Ningxia Garrison City.

He faced a deadly situation: besiege a point to strike the reinforcements.

Besiege a point to strike the reinforcements is no brilliant stratagem — it is an open scheme anyone can see through at a glance. The opening move is to attack what the enemy must rescue, banking entirely on the willing taking the hook.

Because if you besiege a point and they don't come to rescue it, then it's not "besiege a point to strike the reinforcements."

The problem right now is that among the three garrisons of Ningxia, before battle had even formally begun, one garrison got surrounded on the far bank of the Yellow River due to a marching issue. Would Hong Chengchou rescue them or not?

Hong Chengchou had to rescue them.

This required no deliberation. If he let Zhang Yingchang's Right Garrison sink deep into heavy encirclement, refused to send aid, and thereby caused its annihilation — leaving aside the loss of a third of his forces — he would be unable to fight the rest of this war. The crux was that two great commanders, Cao Wenzhao and Zuo Liangyu, would no longer be loyal and deferential to him.

Not that that bastard Zuo Liangyu had ever been particularly deferential to him anyway.

At this moment, Hong Chengchou was filled with nothing but regret.

The truth was, he had made Zhang Yingchang the vanguard because, in his heart, he wanted the Right Garrison to earn some merit and prestige before the battle began.

To be honest, Lord Hong the Commander now felt that the court's intelligence on Liu Chengzong was a complete pile of dog shit.

Even the assessments from the commanders around him who had faced Liu Chengzong in battle — Cao Wenzhao, Bai Guang'en — were also a pile of dog shit.

The official dispatches all talked about how ferocious Liu Chengzong was, how he scared off sea bandits one moment and subdued the northern caitiffs the next.

Bai Guang'en nattered on all day about rockets, rockets, but the moment you brought up Liu Chengzong himself, he'd just say the man was like a bear, brave and fierce.

Cao Wenzhao was a great commander who had properly fought Liu Chengzong, yet the moment he opened his mouth it was all about how the Lion Army was brilliantly disciplined, their equipment razor-sharp, their martial bearing a match for Guanning.

"A match for Guanning" was no disparaging phrase, especially coming from the mouth of someone like Cao Wenzhao.

Because he himself had been among the first batch of the Guanning Army. When that force was founded, crack troops and fine officers were drawn from the Nine Border Garrisons to form a new army. After consolidation and training, its battle strength and martial bearing were indisputably the finest of all the border forces.

Hong Chengchou had listened to him quite seriously at the time, but now all he wanted to do was curse their mothers. Not one of you said that Liu Chengzong was cunning!

Actually, Zuo Liangyu had said it.

And Hong Chengchou had heard it, but it did no good.

He had calculated that Liu Chengzong, marching out from Xi'an, would need three days for his vanguard to exit the border and ten days for his main force.

Zuo Liangyu warned him that Liu Chengzong was habitually cunning, and he had taken that advice to heart, recalculating with two days for the vanguard and five for the main force.

Then he rushed Zhang Yingchang out in a flurry, wanting to set an ambush. The very next day, the man smashed a fist right into his face, perfectly delivering a counter-strike.

Let's be fair here: Hong Chengchou felt that if Zuo Liangyu didn't like to talk, he'd best keep his mouth shut.

If he hadn't made that sound, Zhang Yingchang would still be in Ningxia Garrison City preparing arms and provisions, not having marched out in a frantic rush.

If everyone had been besieged inside the garrison city a couple of days later and gone straight into city-defense mode, wouldn't that have been a good thing?

A clever clogs is the bane of a petty wit, but all schemes that treat the opponent as a normal person are useless against a colossal idiot.

And now, even knowing full well that Liu Chengzong had encircled Zhang Yingchang and turned the situation into "besiege a point to strike the reinforcements," he still had to dispatch troops to rescue him.

"Besiege a point to strike the reinforcements" is very easy to break.

First, the point can hold out, and the relief force arrives quickly.

Second, the point can hold out, and the relief force attacks what the enemy must rescue.

Cao Wenzhao requested battle: "Commander, allow your subordinate to lead troops to rescue Commander Zhang's unit."

Hong Chengchou said nothing.

He was thinking.

Had he known he would clash with Liu Chengzong's main force so quickly in the south, he should have sent Zuo Liangyu out from the very start. Zhang Yingchang and Cao Wenzhao back home would never have had their loyalty doubted.

Now that Zhang Yingchang was surrounded, was it appropriate to send Cao Wenzhao with troops to rescue him?

Consider this: Bai Guang'en is a brave and skilled warrior, so when he mentions Liu Chengzong, he only sees his bravery and skill. Cao Wenzhao hails from Guanning and disciplines his army with strict order, so he sees the Lion Army's brilliant discipline and Guanning-like bearing.

So, that you, Grand Commander Zuo, only see Liu Chengzong's cunning... what does that say?

Lord Hong the Commander felt that guarding against him was absolutely the right call.

He couldn't have a situation where only five battalions remained in Ningxia — one his own guard battalion, four Zuo Liangyu's battalions — and if Cao Wenzhao were defeated again, Zuo Liangyu would truss him up... Heh heh!

Not that Zuo Liangyu was a bad man. He just had too many angles and couldn't stomach grievances. In practice, he treated people with tremendous personal loyalty.

He bore no ill will toward Hong Chengchou and would absolutely never harm him.

"Then better not to rescue. At a moment of survival or ruin, you must not waver in indecision."

Zuo Liangyu was very fond of Cao Wenzhao's reckless ways. The reason he always mocked him was simply that Cao Wenzhao was not his subordinate but a colleague of equal rank.

In Ming military dispatches, the two of them were listed side by side as the bravest fine commanders under heaven — similar rank, similar merit. It was either you're first and I'm second, or I'm first and you're second.

But Zuo Liangyu now comported himself like a great general, so Cao Wenzhao's way of acting — still like an overgrown brigade commander — irked him.

He thought to himself: a man can't be lucky every time. If you charge in to break a siege like a reckless fool again this time, you'll surely die.

Zuo Liangyu first clasped his fist to Hong Chengchou, then gestured to Cao Wenzhao, and only then said: "Either we don't rescue — our two garrisons and one battalion, all the various forces in Ningxia, swear an oath before the gods and defend Ningxia to the death... Or we rescue."

Zuo Liangyu had spoken very rapidly at first, but here he suddenly choked.

He wasn't embarrassed, though. He swept his gaze around at Hong Chengchou and Cao Wenzhao. Having looked, he still hadn't recalled what he meant to say, so he looked over Ding Zizhen, Bai Guang'en, Feng Ju, Cao Bianjiao, and the rest one by one — still no words.

Only then did he shake his head, sigh, and say: "Forget it. I thought it through in a full circle. Liu Chengzong has no place we could attack that he must rescue."

Indeed, there was none.

Where could they strike to achieve the effect of besieging Wei to rescue Zhao? Nowhere.

Strike Gansu? Taking the southern route past the border wall, they'd run straight into Liu Chengzong's army on the way. Strike Guyuan? They couldn't bypass him. They couldn't possibly go strike Xi'an, could they?

In truth, Hong Chengchou and the others were all waiting for his next words at this moment.

Because defending Ningxia Garrison City — every guest commander in the city knew — was pure bullshit.

They had assembled thirteen battalions of men, but there was no grain and no pay. What they relied on was the guest commanders' own guest armies, living day to day with rock-bottom expectations.

Besides, no grain and no pay wasn't really a problem for the guest commanders. They were just waiting to fight. Once men died in battle, the grain and pay would be enough.

To talk about defending to the death at a time like this was absolute nonsense.

At this thought, Zuo Liangyu's fighting spirit surged again. He raised a hand, paused it in midair, and said: "If we rescue, then both garrisons and the guard battalion — all nine battalions — sally forth together. Abandon Ningxia Garrison City entirely and charge over with everything to save Zhang Yingchang."

"Ha!"

Before anyone else could speak, Ding Qirui of the Central Garrison Defense Battalion behind Cao Wenzhao let out a laugh: "If the Liu bandits have no intention of besieging a point to strike the relief force, and they launch a surprise attack on our Ningxia Garrison City, what then?"

Ding Qirui had thought this remark would checkmate the whole assembly, musing to himself that then the grand commanders of the various garrisons would all become homeless curs.

But Zuo Liangyu paid it no mind at all and said offhandedly: "Then let them have it. We'll go to Yansui, strike his Yan'an Prefecture, strike his Xi'an Prefecture — let him be the government army, I'll go be a roving bandit!"

Ding Qirui was about to laugh at this speech too, but to his surprise he saw the others sunk in silent thought, and some even nodding to themselves in secret. It suddenly dawned on him... weren't these three garrison grand commanders all homeless curs to begin with?

And Ding Qirui himself was the proper Defense Circuit of Ningxia.

In this room full of men, among the nine-battalion colonels, in truth only four — Hong Chengchou, Ding Qirui, Ge Rulin, and Zhou Yijing — were stationed in the territories their official posts belonged to.

All the rest were wild dogs who had fled here!

The crux of it was, Hong Chengchou, from his position as Supreme Commander of the Three Frontiers, had firmly roped in this pack of wild dogs, which also meant... he was now little different from a wild dog himself.

Take right now, for instance — Hong Chengchou nodded repeatedly at Zuo Liangyu's general assault plan.

He saw nothing wrong with it. Rather than sending one garrison's troops to pour more fuel on the fire, better to have all nine battalions sortie together. If they could pull Zhang Yingchang out, that would be best; if not, then fighting a decisive battle there wouldn't be bad either — at least they'd gain one more garrison's worth of troops.

As for what to do after pulling Zhang Yingchang out, Hong Chengchou felt that when the chips in his hand were so few, there was no need to think too far ahead.

Ding Qirui, Ge Rulin, and Zhou Yijing, looking around at the circle of guest generals all intent on a full-force sortie, found themselves in a position of being completely swept along.

Ding Qirui still wanted to argue on principle and proposed leaving one battalion to hold the garrison city, but this suggestion was clearly not going to be accepted by the others.

Because leaving one or two battalions in Ningxia was utterly useless.

The walls of Ningxia Garrison City were enormous — just to man every crenel with one soldier required two battalions of troops.

Adding in rotation shifts for the defense, at least four battalions were needed to form a viable defensive force.

And leaving four battalions behind meant only one garrison's worth of men could go out to the relief.

Hong Chengchou held absolute leadership authority over the three civil officials; their objections were summarily suppressed. The entire Ningxia Garrison City stirred into motion at once. First, Bai Guang'en, under Cao Wenzhao's Central Garrison, led troops forward to scout the path and plan the route.

The remaining battalions mustered their forces, each carrying as much field rations as possible, while the headquarters battalion escorted critical supplies such as gold, silver, and household registers. They then set out in sequence toward the eastern bank of the Yellow River, and from there advanced in a vast, mighty column toward Lingzhou to carry out the relief.

But it was still that same old saying: a clever man's schemes cannot break a fool's defense.

Liu Chengzong reckoned that with the wisdom and valor of men like Hong Chengchou, Zuo Liangyu, and Cao Wenzhao, they would most likely have Zhang Yingchang hold fast while staging a "besiege Wei to rescue Zhao" maneuver from somewhere else.

And that "Wei" was surely the Central Garrison, so he too launched his troops from Hongsibu. He didn't bother with Ren Quan'er's Second Brigade at all and advanced directly from Hongsibu toward Ningxia Garrison City.

Just as over twenty thousand Ningxia Garrison troops were crossing the Yellow River east of the garrison city with great fanfare, beacon fires along the southern border wall blazed one after another all the way to Ningxia Garrison City.

The beacon fires on the border wall had already been lit the day before and had died down by daylight; now they were burning again.

The place in the south where the beacon fires ignited was called Mingshazhou Fort, which belonged to the Ningxia Central Garrison, over two hundred li from Ningxia Garrison City.

While the Ming army in great pomp was moving from the west bank to the east bank of the river downstream.

The Marshal's army, vast and mighty, followed the Red Willow River out of Yingpan Gully, bypassed Mingshazhou Fort, and crossed the Yellow River from the east bank to the west.

The fort commander had gone back to the Central Garrison before the battle to tally up his landholdings. The officer left in the fort was the Assistant Battalion Commander Han Jiajue.

The moment Han Jiajue saw Liu Chengzong's Ningxia Chief Regional Commander's retinue, he ordered the troops inside the fort to lay down their arms and come out of the city, then took two men with him and went three li out to receive them.

Han Jiajue was a hereditary guard officer, famed throughout Ningxia for his martial skill, and was hailed for valor alongside Li Xuemu of Ningxia Garrison City and the brothers Bao Yongcheng and Bao Yongming of the Rear Garrison.

Stationed as he was at Mingshazhou, a critical choke point, by all rights he should have defended it to the death.

But the timing was unfortunate — his superior, Ding Kongying, had run home to calculate his landholdings, figuring out how much grain tax his family's fields would owe under the newly compiled tax code.

Han Jiajue, on the other hand, had it simpler. His entire clan, over a hundred people, owned more than four hundred qing of land, but it was all west of the Yellow River — precisely within the area where Hong Chengchou was seizing land.

Over four hundred qing of ancestral property had been confiscated by Hong Chengchou into government hands in the blink of an eye, without so much as an explanation.

It was nothing more than a supreme commander bringing a bunch of guest troops to forcibly enclose land by arms, and what's more, stripping away the private fields and private property that the Chongzhen Emperor himself had decreed with his own golden words. Are you still an official of the court? What difference is there between you and rebels!

That alone, however, would not have been enough to make Han Jiajue turn traitor. The main thing was that Liu Chengzong simply had too many troops.

The sound of hoofbeats rose at the mouth of Yingpan Gully. The vanguard force here was already emerging along the Red Willow River, while the troops behind were still trudging through the mountain gully with heads down, sending up towering clouds of dust that filled the entire ravine.

With just this one tiny fort of Han Jiajue's, a garrison of a little over three hundred, what was there to defend?

Anyway, to the south were separatist rebels, and to the north were also separatist rebels — and damn it all, rebels who had seized his family's land. Weighing two evils, better to let Liu Chengzong go north and deal with Hong Chengchou.

Han Jiajue showed no fear when he met Liu Chengzong. He saluted with utmost deference and recounted their connection.

He said he was the Assistant Battalion Commander of the Ningxia Central Garrison, had once fought under General He's command in his early years, and was a fellow townsman and schoolmate of the Marshal's Palace's Communications Commissioner.

The connection was a bit distant.

General He referred to He Huchen; the Communications Commissioner was Lin Wei, a licentiate from the Central Garrison and the consort of a township princess of the Qing princely fief.

Their so-called schoolmate relationship just meant they had once studied together at the Central Garrison Guard School.

But how close or distant the connection was didn't really matter — it was just a pretext. If the relationship had truly been close, he would have defected long ago and wouldn't have waited until today.

Liu Chengzong said with a beaming smile: "A schoolmate, then, is one of our own. Reassure your troops — once the campaign is over, everything will remain undisturbed as before. Those with valor and strategic talent will receive other important assignments."

But just as the troops inside the fort were all outside being received and reorganized, Liu Chengzong saw a column of thick smoke rise from within the fort.

Someone was still inside the fort, and had lit the wolf-smoke beacon.

This terrified Han Jiajue: "This... Great Marshal, all the troops in the fort came out."

Liu Tichun, serving as a guard officer, led Zhang Yong and a squad of Feathered Forest cavalry charging into the fort. Not long after, he came back out and reported: "Marshal, there was one man hiding in the fort. By the time we got there, he was already dead on the beacon platform — suicide."

"The fort soldiers identified him. This man is called Sun Zuochang, a government student of the Ningxia Central Garrison."

Also a government student of the Central Garrison.

Liu Chengzong looked toward Han Jiajue. Clearly, this Sun Zuochang was also a schoolmate of Lin Wei's.

A complex look of sorrow flickered in Han Jiajue's eyes: "He... he was a fool."

"Indeed a fool."

Liu the Lion showed no intention of blaming Han Jiajue: "If he lit it, he lit it. The whole of Ningxia is ablaze with beacon fires — the garrison city can't attend to any of them. One more beacon makes no difference."

He shook his head and said: "If he couldn't serve as a prefect to civilize the masses, why commit suicide? A true fool."

Han Jiajue couldn't help but be taken aback. Although his own words calling Sun Zuochang a fool were somewhat disingenuous — in truth, he thought the man's act was utterly heroic.

But still... he was nowhere near as unflappable as Liu Chengzong. He could never have imagined that Liu Chengzong, the rebel leader he had never met before, would bear absolutely no grudge against either him or Sun Zuochang.

In fact, he even rather admired them.

Throughout their conversation, the army never halted its march. Only after emerging from the Red Willow River Valley did they split into multiple columns, heading west straight for the riverbank. The vanguard collected civilian boats and built pontoon bridges, while the rear guard crossed directly via the iron-chain bridge, the pontoon bridges, or ferried across on boats.

Just then, a reconnaissance soldier came sprinting over: "Grand Marshal, across the river, Guru Taiji's Daur troops have surrounded Date Garden Fort. They sent a man to report that Ming officers Li Xuemu and Wang Fengshui incited them to rise up and attack you, Grand Marshal, but they have already been captured!"

"Furthermore, Guru Taiji also reports that his scouts relayed that this morning, a battalion of troops from Ningxia Garrison Town crossed the Yellow River eastward, and the remaining garrison is also gathering military supplies. At this moment, the garrison town is empty."

Liu Chengzong clapped his hands and shook his head, looking toward Han Jiajue: "Record one merit for Guru Taiji. You see, the beacon fires are no hindrance to me. You will remain here, holding my command arrow, and persuade others on my behalf. The Three Frontiers of Shaanxi are my foundation — any talented man willing to follow me will be given important posts."

"When the great army arrives, a lone man of feeble strength cannot stop it. Those who fight to the death lighting beacons are men of loyalty and righteousness — they are dutiful men whom I will not blame. If everyone under heaven simply attended to their own duties, I would not have raised troops in the first place."

"But let people ponder this: if death is certain, should you — these government students, warriors accomplished in both pen and sword — die like wild weeds, or follow me into battle, die on the field fighting the Eastern Brigands, and seize glory that lasts ten thousand generations!"