Chapter 4: Seeking Life in Death

  The Ming army in Songshan's large camp was now completely disorganized and chaotic.

  After Wang Pu led his army out of the main camp, Miyun General Tang Tong indeed did not leave Wu Sangui's expectation and first led his army to retreat in the direction of Ningyuan.

  Wu Sangui, Ma Ke and Wang Tingchen, who had received intelligence about the message, immediately withdrew their troops. Li Fu Ming, the commander-in-chief of Xuanfu, and Zhao Wu Zhu, the deputy commander-in-chief of Datong, also retreated with their troops. The six town garrisons simultaneously retreated, and it was a sudden retreat. The Ming army officers and soldiers were not mentally prepared for this at all, and in their haste, they triggered a large-scale chaos.

  By the time news reached Hong Chengchou's headquarters, it was already too late.

  The Qing army was well-prepared for this, and upon receiving the news of the Ming army's overnight retreat, the slave leader Huang Taiji made a decisive decision to order Dorje to lead the army in pursuit, and personally led the Eight Banners Army to surround Songshan City. As a result, Hong Chengchou could not leave Songshan City, unable to stop the withdrawal of the Six Towns General, and lost his last chance to turn the situation around.

  The retreating Ming army was defeated and trampled to death in large numbers under the pursuit of Dorgon's troops, and those who escaped were intercepted by layers of Manchu ambushes along the way. In the end, more than 50,000 people were beheaded, and countless others drowned in the sea. Only Wu Sangui and Tang Tong managed to escape with their lives, while the Qing army suffered only a few hundred casualties.

  ■■■

  Low-lying land.

  Xiao Qi hurriedly approached Wang Pu and excitedly asked: "General, the Jian Nu camp is almost empty, can we attack now?"

  Xiao Qi didn't know Wang Pu's intention of deploying troops and thought he was going to take advantage of the emptiness to launch a surprise attack on the Qing army's main camp.

  "Are we going to kick up a fuss?" Wang Pu shook his head and said in a low voice, "No, our goal is not to kick up a fuss."

  "What was that for?" Xiao Qi asked in surprise.

  Wang Pu did not respond, and in a low voice, he ordered: "Pass the order to the whole army to lead their horses on foot, bypassing Jian Nu's large camp from the side. Tell our brothers to be extremely quiet and not to disperse!"

  "General, you can rest assured."

  Xiao Qi took orders and left.

  In less than a moment, the household troops lurking in the low-lying area came out in a line, leading their war horses. The soldiers behind tightly held the horse tail of the soldier in front to prevent dispersal. Under the pitch-black night sky, this thousand-strong household troop was like a group of ghosts from hell, silently bypassing the Qing army's camp from the side.

  At this time, the Qing army had already come out in full force, and all the troops that could be sent were sent to the front line, leaving only a small number of old, weak, sick and disabled soldiers to guard the main camp. In addition, hundreds of thousands of Ming army's main forces had already been defeated, so the Qing army did not send any scouts to patrol around the main camp at all, they completely did not expect that a small group of Ming army would bypass them from their side.

  In fact, only Wang Pu, this time-traveler, would make such a crazy decision: to sneak into the rear of the Qing army and launch a surprise attack on Shengjing.

  It wasn't until they had walked for over ten miles that Wang Pu ordered Xia Qi to light a torch to lead the way, and then ordered his servants to mount their horses and gallop eastward like a whirlwind.

  At dawn, Wang Pu led his army to the banks of the Daling River and ordered them to rest in place. He also had Xiaogui bring over Big Whiskers and Scarface, both of whom were former bandits with exceptional martial arts skills and a fierce temperament. Two years ago, Wang Pu had led troops to destroy their bandit lair, and the two men had since become his trusted generals.

  Although Wang Pu was greedy for life and feared death, he also knew how to win people's hearts. He brought the old mother, wife, and children of Big Beard and Scarface to Datong to be supported, and Big Beard and Scarface were grateful and repaid his kindness. In the past two years, they had followed Wang Pu through thick and thin and made some contributions, which could be considered loyal and dedicated. The two men also accumulated merit and were promoted to Qianzong, responsible for commanding Wang Pu's thousands of household troops.

  "General."

  "General."

  Big Beard and Scarface quickly followed Xiao Qi to stand before Wang Pu, clasping their fists in greeting.

  "Hmm." Wang Pu nodded and said in a low voice, "I had Xia Qi bring you here just to tell you one thing: this time we're going to attack Shengjing."

  "What? Attack Shengjing!? That's Jian Nu's lair!" Little Qi exclaimed in surprise.

  "Jian Nu's old nest must have a large number of troops stationed there." Big Beard also exclaimed, "How can we, just over a thousand people, do it?"

  The three of them looked at each other in dismay, their faces filled with incredulous expressions, thinking to themselves that either the general had gone mad or they had misheard him.

  "You didn't hear wrong." Wang Pu said coldly, "We are going to launch a surprise attack on Shengjing and stab directly into the heart of Jian Nu!"

  ■■■

  Wang Pu is certainly not acting on impulse, but has made a well-considered decision after careful thought!

  The surprise attack on Shengjing seems crazy, but it's actually possible to succeed. Of course, if he had a choice, Wang Pu wouldn't want to take this risk, but the cruel reality forced him to take risks and seek survival in the midst of death.

  According to Wang Pu's understanding of Ming history, at this time the Manchu slave owner Huang Taiji had already conquered Mongolia, Korea and the indigenous people of the Heilongjiang River basin. The surface area under the control of the Qing dynasty stretched for thousands of miles, with a population of over 10 million people, seemingly possessing enough powerful forces to destroy the Ming Empire. In fact, however, this was just an illusion on the surface.

  An indisputable fact is that the Qing dynasty's foundation was really too weak!

  During the reign of Nurhaci, the total number of Jurchen people in all of Liaodong was only around a few hundred thousand. It wasn't until the reign of Hong Taiji that large numbers of Han Chinese, Mongols, and Koreans were assimilated into the Jurchen people, collectively referred to as Manchu people, which brought the population of Manchuria to thirty million! Here it needs to be specially explained that originally there were over two million Han civilians in Liaodong, but during Nurhaci's several decades of rule in Liaodong, these two million Han civilians were slaughtered almost entirely. In the end only a few tens of thousands of Han people remained and were incorporated into the Eight Banners by Hong Taiji, becoming Manchu people, who were actually still Jurchen slaves.

  The history books say that Nuerhachi and Huangtaiji, father and son, were great talents with grand strategies, and from the beginning they had determined to implement a policy of equality between Manchu and Han peoples. This is fundamentally nonsense. In fact, Nuerhachi only wanted to guard Mount Changbai as a tribal leader, while Huangtaiji only wanted to guard Liaodong as a minor national monarch. Neither of them ever thought about conquering the Central Plains, nor did they ever treat the Han people well.

  Take the most typical example, Fan Wencheng, a big traitor who strongly urged Dorgon to lead the Qing army into the pass (this guy claimed to be a descendant of Fan Zhongyan), was almost caught and beheaded during the reign of Nurhaci, and during the reign of Hong Taiji, he was just an insignificant small official. It wasn't until Dorgon came to power as regent that this guy was truly reused. It was precisely because of the strong urging of traitors led by Fan Wencheng that Dorgon made up his mind to lead the Qing army into the pass, taking a big step that Nurhaci and Hong Taiji had not dared to think about.

  Let's get back to the point. Due to the Manchu people's constant wars of aggression, a large number of men were consumed, so among these 300,000 people, there were at most around 100,000 men. After subtracting children who had not yet come of age and elderly men from these 100,000 men, the actual number of able-bodied adult males who could take to the battlefield was at most 60,000! If Nurhaci hadn't established the Eight Banners system and brought the Jurchen people's war potential into full play, with such a thin population base, the Jurchen people would not have been able to unify Liaodong, let alone conquer the Central Plains.

  Until Dorgon led the Qing army into the pass, the total population of Manchu did not exceed 300,000 (excluding tens of millions of Han people slaves captured by the Qing army's six entries into the pass, these Han people slaves were lower than the remaining tens of thousands of Han people in Nurhaci's period, and even had no qualifications to become banner slaves), the total military strength of the Eight Banners Army was always maintained at around 60,000, even if adding the Han army Eight Banners (mainly led by Geng Zhongming, Shang Kexi, and Kong Youde) and Mongolian Eight Banners, the total military strength of Manchu would be about 100,000, and would not exceed 120,000 people.

  It's not hard to understand that the Jurchen people had a strong defensive psychology against the Han and Mongolians, and would never allow the total number of troops in the Han Eight Banners and Mongolian Eight Banners to exceed that of the Jurchen Eight Banners.

  Due to the limitations of population and military strength, the several major battles between the Jurchen people and the Ming Empire, such as the Battle of Sarhu, the two Battles of Ningyuan, and later the Battle of Songshan, were all-out efforts. Especially in the Battle of Songshan, the Qing army was initially at a disadvantage, and Hong Taiji even mobilized all males between 13 and 60 years old from "Manzhou Guo".

  Of course, the elderly and children will not go to the battlefield. Their task is only to replace adult men in defending the rear.

  That is to say, the Qing dynasty's old nest Shengjing is now only a group of old people and children in the garrison, with a maximum of three to five thousand people. This is indeed an opportunity, at least worth trying. Of course, Wang Pu can also choose not to sneak attack Shengjing, but directly escape to Korea and then return to Dengzhou by sea. However, once Wang Pu returns to Dengzhou, he will be arrested and imprisoned, and then like the historical Wang Pu, he will be taken to the capital for execution.

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