sovbooks Chapter 273 Joint Suppression? Substitute Fighter?
Chapter 273 Joint Suppression? Substitute Fighter?
Chapter 273 Joint Suppression? Substitute Fighter?
The day after Han De arrived at the foot of Huashan Mountain, people came to do business with him.
The Zhenjiang Wanhu Prefecture Gaotang Thousand-Household Office, stationed to their left, sent people to sell a beverage called "Sharibe," which greatly shocked Han De. Sharibe originated from Persia and was made by simmering fruits such as grapes, papayas, and oranges. It was originally a tribute item and has now gradually become a common household item.
"Hey Li, who's leading the team in your household? Darughachi, Wanhu, or—" Han De asked.
"How could a commander of ten thousand possibly come?" Commander Li Meng laughed. "A deputy commander of ten thousand has come to serve as the commander-in-chief, leading the five of us commanders on the expedition."
"Zhenjiang has over 10,000 households, right? How many thousand households do you have in total?"
"Ten," Li Meng said. "Besides our Gaotang Garrison, there are nine other garrisons: Zhengding, Puzhou, Weihui, Huaiqing, Zhangde, Jinan, Shunde, Guangping, and Yanjun. Each garrison has three hundred soldiers, sixty combat soldiers, and two hundred and forty military households."
"So how many people came this time? —"
"They said it was 1,500 men," Li Meng said with a grin. "In reality, it's only around 500, with about 100 combat soldiers and maybe 20 or 30 who can actually fight."
Han De was somewhat shocked.
The Zhenjiang Wanhu Prefecture wasn't bad in its foundation; nine out of ten thousand-household units came from the interior, and only one salt army unit was composed of descendants of newly attached soldiers. Yet, it has turned out like this, even worse than the Han interpreter army.
After the Han army of interpreters was separated from the old Song Dynasty's Hupu Imperial Water Fortress troops and gradually reduced to the Lower Ten Thousand Household Office, most of the personnel were tribal soldiers and their descendants who had come south from the Jin and Mongol territories to surrender to the Song Dynasty. Originally, they were not favored by their maternal relatives and were thought to be the weakest in terms of combat power. However, it was discovered that this was not necessarily the case, as there were some people who were even more outrageous than them.
"Commander Han, you've got nothing to do with business, you're really going to fight a war?" Li Meng patted him on the shoulder familiarly and said, "Your unit has quite a few people, so take it easy and don't send anyone to attack the mountains."
"We only have five thousand-household garrisons," Han De said. "My garrison in Yangshe has six hundred men on its roster, but now less than four hundred remain. Apart from the gatekeepers, I brought most of them with me."
Upon hearing this, Li Meng was filled with awe.
Over the course of sixty years, he only received salaries for two hundred people who were not actually employed, which can be described as incorruptible.
"How many of you came?" he asked.
"A thousand people."
"How many institutes?"
"Collected from five."
"Then you can claim to have sent 5,000 troops," Li Meng sighed. "You're too honest."
Han De was speechless.
Li Meng shook his head and said, "We've been owed rations and pay for more than half a year, what's the point of fighting a war? Do you still want the relics? I'll sell them to you cheap, ten strings of cash a bottle."
"Alright, give me some." Han De had someone bring two ingots of paper money and said, "Ten bottles first."
Li Meng was overjoyed and exclaimed, "That's truly magnificent!"
After saying this, he had his attendants bring ten bottles of relics, which he placed on the ground one by one. Then he asked, "Do you have any good items on hand? I'll buy them."
"What did you buy it for?" Han Deqi asked.
"Sell them to the soldiers," Li Meng said matter-of-factly.
"Won't you get investigated for doing business in the military?" Han De couldn't help but ask.
"Investigate? Who's investigating?" Li Meng sneered. "Each Wanhu Prefecture has sent a general, and they're not under each other's command. Who's going to investigate? The Prince of Zhennan hasn't arrived yet. Hurry up and do some small business. Does Liu Qin know about this?"
"Deputy Commander of the Yidu New Army?"
"Yes, neither the Darughachi nor the commander-in-chief came; he's the general. After being wounded, he's selling salt in the camp now."
"Selling salt?"
"Hmm." Li Meng nodded and said, "Before setting off, the soldiers of the Yidu New Army were not allowed to carry salt privately. After arriving at Huashan, they will need salt, right? Alright, we can buy some from General Liu."
People from big cities like Nanjing really know how to have fun!
Han De admired him greatly.
Doing this will cause trouble, but he wouldn't dare. He's already at his limit for receiving a salary without working; he's afraid of doing more.
After failing to buy anything, Li Meng took his leave.
While surveying the terrain, Han De sent people to scout out the surrounding area.
There wasn't much to investigate. They were defending a relatively gentle hillside. It would be difficult to prevent thieves from sneaking over a large force by digging ditches and erecting fences at the foot of the hill, but it was not impossible for small groups to infiltrate.
On the left is Gaotang Garrison under the jurisdiction of Zhenjiang Wanhu Prefecture, and on the right is Longwan Garrison under the jurisdiction of Yidu New Army Wanhu Prefecture. They were the ones who beat the drum to gather troops and recruited warriors with heavy rewards.
Han De was too lazy to bother with other people's messy affairs. He just wanted to live and, on that basis, bring back as many of the men he had brought as possible. Now that he was a commander of a thousand men, these soldiers were his "property".
After observing for an entire afternoon, he concluded that the defense at the foot of the mountain was alright, with trenches and fences that could slightly hinder the bandits. Once the neighboring friendly forces arrived to reinforce, they could force the bandits back, since they were outnumbered.
But a very serious problem is, will friendly forces really come to your rescue?
Han De was literate and knew the fate of the nine military governors who besieged Xiangzhou during the Tang Dynasty. The nine military governors each commanded their own troops, were not under each other's command, and failed to provide assistance or coordinate their efforts, leading to a major defeat.
They're showing signs of this now, and if the bandits weren't so few in number, the outcome would be hard to say.
While defensive blocking might be passable, offense becomes far more problematic.
The mountainous terrain is vast, and you never know where someone might be. If we were to conduct a large-scale search of the mountains, we would need to deploy personnel to every inch of land, and the current number of troops would probably be insufficient.
In addition, if a search party encounters bandits and its numbers are small, it will surely be defeated, because the soldiers lack fighting spirit and morale is low, and they will collapse after a short time.
Having a large number of troops isn't actually very useful. The terrain in the mountains is what it is, and you can't really deploy your forces. Sometimes, if the terrain is unfavorable, the effect of 10,000 men is the same as that of 100 men. You can't deploy your troops, and the contact area is limited to just a few people. It might even be worse because 10,000 men eat more and have more expenses.
Having figured this out, Han De began to speak.
Let whoever wants to fight this damn war do it. If they don't call my name, they can just stay put. Even if the bandits come down the mountain at night, as long as they don't enter my defense zone, I'll turn a blind eye. It's none of my business!
So, starting in early June, he kept visiting people in the neighborhood, going to this commander's place one day and that commander's defense zone the next. Besides doing business, he drank and made merry. Some people even invited girls from brothels to keep him company. He was having a great time.
During this time, Daji, a thousand-household commander from Songjiang Wanhu Prefecture, arrived with grain and brought some news from the east: Cai Luantou had robbed more than ten grain transport ships in April and obtained 10,000 shi of grain. The court failed to appease him and decided to suppress him. However, it was unknown where Luantou was hiding, and the coastal Wanhu Prefecture (stationed in Qingyuan Road, with more than 10,000 households, mainly composed of naval forces) could not easily subdue him.
Well, with Cai Luantou robbing cargo ships at sea and Huashan bandits holding their positions on the shore, this world is definitely not going to get any better.
On June 15th, having finally escaped the officials' welcoming and seeing-off procession, Prince Boluobuhua of Zhennan arrived at the front line.
Enraged by the chaotic state of the military camps, he ordered the generals of each route to lead their troops into Huashan to search for and suppress the bandits.
The outcome was obvious: the two armies from Yidu New Army and Zhenjiang Wanhu Prefecture encountered Huashan bandits during their search of the mountains. They were defeated in both battles, losing a centurion and dozens of soldiers. When other units heard about the fierce battle, their first reaction was not to come to their aid or surround the bandits, but to run away. Han De was among them.
In an instant, tens of thousands of government troops fled in panic, abandoning many weapons and living in constant fear.
The bandits even rushed down the mountain and stole some of the supplies.
The only commendable thing the government troops did was to wound one of the bandit leaders, Zhu Sanshan, forcing him to retreat to Baohua Temple in the mountains to rest.
During the battle, Han De, with his sharp eyes, even noticed that most of the bandits were clad in iron armor, equipped with sophisticated weapons, and almost every one of them carried a crossbow and seven or eight firearms. He wondered which family had given them to him.
This defeat was also a heavy blow to Bolokho.
He couldn't understand why, if several thousand government troops and naval forces in eastern Zhejiang couldn't capture two or three hundred of Cai Luan's leaders, then tens of thousands of government troops in Huashan couldn't wipe out dozens of bandits.
The war has reached such a point that it has become a "spectacle".
If you can't win, you naturally have to find a way.
The generals collected opinions from their subordinates and summarized them, with the core message being: hire someone to fight for you.
The commander-in-chief of Zhenjiang Wanhu Prefecture suggested inviting Zhou Xian, a chivalrous knight from Xijindu in Dantu County, mentioning that he had more than twenty men under his command who were skilled in combat and that he himself was a sworn brother of Dachaer, the Darughachi of Dantu County, and was very reliable.
The Yidu New Army recommended Lu Demao, the head of Lujiazhuang in Gexian Township, Liyang Prefecture, Jiqing Road, saying that he was skilled in archery and horsemanship and had some trained servants and tenants under his command, who were capable of fighting.
Changzhou Wanhu Prefecture requests the transfer of Mo Tianyou, a renowned member of the Zhang family from Wuxi Prefecture.
When the interpreter arrived at the Han army, General Commander and Deputy Commander of Ten Thousand Households Zhao Ting accepted Han De's suggestion and reported the name of Cao Luo, a righteous man from Jiangyin Prefecture, to the staff of the Prince of Zhennan. Zhao Ting's great-grandfather was named Mulinchi. After he went south to surrender to the Song Dynasty, he was granted the surname Zhao. After the fall of the Song Dynasty, he inherited the title of Commander of a Thousand Households and was now the Deputy Commander of Ten Thousand Households.
Among these people were wandering knights who roamed the countryside, local lords who controlled their territories, gangsters who ran brothels and gambling dens, and smugglers who sold contraband salt. In short, "the immortals were lined up like hemp," all of them talented individuals, full of vitality in the relaxed social environment of the Yuan Dynasty.
The Prince of Zhennan did not place all his hopes on these people.
In fact, he had made two preparations: one was to send people to various states to contact the people mentioned and discuss the conditions for their recruitment; the other was to increase the number of troops.
So far, troops from Jiangsu, Zhejiang, and Henan provinces have been mobilized. If that's not enough, he'll bring in more from Jiangxi. Anyway, it's quick to go downstream by boat.
This time, let the Huashan bandits witness the iron fist of the Great Yuan! The three provinces of Jianghuai will join forces to annihilate the "fifty bandits" and will not give up until their goal is achieved!
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