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Volume 1: Fierce Battle in Changsha Chapter 173: Paying Respect to Second Brother Guan

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    In the military tent, after Xiao Yungui made up his mind, he ordered Tang Erniu to find Bai Zetang's spy from the army. He squatted on the ground with a pen, spread the paper on the stone, wrote a few words, and handed the secret letter to Bai Zetang's spy.  The secret agent said: "Later, I will release the hundreds of Qingyaos captured in Kunshan. You can mix among them and sneak into Jiading City disguised as a refugee. Find Zhou Zhaoyao in the city and ask him to act according to the instructions in the letter."

    Zhou Xiuying secretly admired this King of the West. He seemed rude, but he didn't expect to be able to write like Xiu Caigong. Moreover, seeing how fast he wrote, he must be very knowledgeable.  Zhou Xiuying, who could only write her own name, naturally admired the literate Xi Wang, but she didn't know that this boy's traditional Chinese characters were terribly ugly, and many of them lacked pens and strokes.

    The spy was a leader in Bai Zetang, and he often sent letters back and forth. The braid on the back of his head was also real. After receiving the letter, he sealed the letter into a wax pill and swallowed the wax pill with one mouthful.  Zhou Xiuying exclaimed in surprise when she saw it. Xiao Yungui smiled and said, "Don't be surprised, Miss Zhou. This brother's name is Long Yan. He has a unique skill, that is, he can hide an egg in his mouth. He can eat and talk normally."  You can¡¯t even see it.¡±

    Zhou Xiuying¡¯s pretty face turned red and she mumbled, ¡°I thought he swallowed the secret letter.¡± Everyone laughed together.

    After Long Yan hid the letter, he changed into a very slovenly outfit. Most of the Kunshan Qing army drills were strong men. Many of them did not have uniforms and wore their usual village clothes. This Long Yan changed  After dressing up, he looked like a regiment training soldier who had lost a battle.

    After bidding farewell to Queen Xi, Long Yan was taken to the prisoner camp by the Taiping Army as a regiment training prisoner. After Long Yan entered the camp, he squatted in a corner without saying a word. He saw that these regiment training prisoners were exhausted from transporting the Taiping Army's baggage during the day.  , many people fell asleep in the end, and no one cared about Long Yan's arrival.

    At midnight, the torch at the entrance of the camp flashed. Long Yan saw the agreed signal light up and reached out to push a regiment trainer next to him. The regiment trainer turned his head sleepily and was about to scold him, but Long Yan covered his head.  She shut his mouth and whispered: "Brother, the long-haired thief guarding us is asleep. Let's escape. I heard that they will take our sacrificial flag early in the morning. If we don't escape, we will die."

    The soldier was startled and followed Long Yan's gaze. Sure enough, he saw several Taiping soldiers at the gate of the camp sleeping soundly leaning on wooden stakes. In surprise, he whispered in a low voice: "Then let's sneak away.  .¡±

    Long Yan said in a low voice: "No, I don't know if there are any hairy patrols outside. Get everyone to run away together. If there are more people, it will be chaotic and it will be easier for us to escape."

    ¡°At that moment, the two of them woke up more than a hundred regiment training prisoners in the camp. When everyone saw that the guarding Taiping soldiers were asleep, they escaped from the camp one by one.  Not long after leaving the camp, they were discovered by the Taiping Army patrolling the camp. As soon as everyone shouted, they fled in all directions. Long Yan led dozens of people and ran towards Jiading City.

    When we arrived at the foot of Jiading City, a regiment coach came up and shouted. There were many Jiading people among the regiment coaches in Kunshan. Most of the Qing troops in the city were local regiment coaches, and they also recognized the people below the city.  Qian Zong, the Qing army guarding the city, was still very cautious and asked them why they were here. They all replied that they ran out during the chaos.  Mr. Qian still didn't believe it. He lowered the basket and pulled the two of them over for closer questioning, and then he no longer suspected him. However, he did not dare to open the city gate late at night, so he ordered people to put down ropes and baskets to pull dozens of people into the city one by one.

    After Long Yan arrived at the city, he took advantage of everyone's unpreparedness, smeared and sneaked down the city, and went straight to the foothold of Bai Zetang in Jiading City.

    Since the establishment of Baizetang, Tong Qiangsheng, He Bin, Zhou Zhaoyao and others each led a group of brothers to go eastward separately. Tong Qiangsheng went to Shanghai, Zhou Zhaoyao was active in Jiading, Kunshan, Taicang and other places, and He Bin went to Songjiang and Jiashan.  and other places to collect information from various places.  At the same time, Guiyun merchants and Baoqing Chamber of Commerce also began to send caravans to Shanghai and other places to establish branches. Zhou Zhaoyao established a branch of Baizetang in Jiading City.

    Long Yan found a house where Zhou Zhaoyao and others were hiding and handed the secret message to Zhou Zhaoyao.  Zhou Zhaoyao opened the letter and looked at it. It was a letter written by the King of the West. Although the traditional Chinese characters of the King of the West were hard to read, Zhou Zhaoyao still understood clearly. At three o'clock tonight, the King of the West would send troops to pretend to attack the south gate and wait for the Qing army at the north gate to reinforce the south gate.  At that time, he asked Zhou Zhaoyao to gather the people in the city and set fire everywhere, causing chaos to the Qing army. Finally, he opened the north gate and joined forces with the outside to attack Jiading.

    After Zhou Zhaoyao was killed, he immediately arranged for dozens of brothers in the city to split up. Fortunately, there was a caravan from Guiyun Company in the city. Zhou Zhaoyao found the leader of the caravan and asked his men to copy the guy. He followed the brothers from Bai Zetang to prepare something to ignite the fire.  .

    At the third watch of the night, gunfire rang out at the south gate. Hundreds of Taiping troops stormed the south gate under the fire. Zhou Zhaoyao saw the Taiping troops' feint attack outside the city and immediately ordered everyone to start fires in the south and east of the city to create chaos.  Many of the Qing army trainees in the city were new recruits. Seeing the fierce artillery fire of the Taiping army, they were already panicked. Seeing the fire in the city, they were even more nervous. The Qing army defender saw that the momentum was not good.?We had to mobilize troops from the north gate to come to support.

    Zhou Zhaoyao and others who were hiding in the street corner saw the Qing troops at the North Gate being mobilized and leaving. After Zhou Zhaoyao fired a loud arrow into the sky, he immediately led Bai Zetang Xizuo and nearly a hundred Guiyun Chamber of Commerce guys to shoot the Qing troops at the North Gate with knives.  The Taiping troops waiting in ambush outside saw the shouts of killing coming from the north gate and began to attack the north gate fiercely.  In less than a stick of incense, the north gate was breached, and the Taiping army broke into the city and started fighting in the streets with the Qing army.

    "Surrender and avoid death!" The Taiping soldiers fought fiercely and shouted slogans of surrender. Seeing that the north gate had been broken, the Qing troops in the city lost all fighting spirit and quickly collapsed. Most of them surrendered, but a small number opened the west gate and headed for Shanghai.  Escape.

    It was hundreds of Taiping troops led by Tang Erniu who pretended to attack the south gate. Xiao Yungui led Li Zuoche and Zhou Xiuying to break into the north gate. They joined forces with Zhou Zhaoyao, Long Yan and other Bai Ze cousins ??at the city gate. Finally, the north and south sides  The army met in the south of the city.  After the two armies met, Xiao Yungui immediately ordered Li Zuoche to clear out the remaining enemies in the city, while Tang Erniu led people to rectify the prisoners. This time Xiao Yungui came lightly armed, without any accompanying soldiers or civilians, so he could only use the prisoners to carry the heavy artillery and baggage.  .

    After the cleaning was completed, tens of thousands of taels of silver and a large amount of grain and cloth were found in the Jiading County Government Office Warehouse. Xiao Yungui ordered more than a thousand prisoners captured to carry the materials and distributed a batch of silver and grain to Zhou Xiuying and other Qingpu rebels.  Cloth, and finally the food and cloth that could not be taken away were distributed to the poor people in the city.  Following Xiao Yungui, he left the guards behind, and the rest of the soldiers and horses rested immediately after having a full meal.

    At dawn, Zhou Lichun and more than 2,000 Qingpu rebels finally arrived in Jiading to join the Taiping Army.  Zhou Lichun originally thought that when he arrived in Jiading today, he would attack Jiading together with the Taiping Army. Unexpectedly, in one night, the Taiping Army had already captured Jiading. After arriving with more than 2,000 people, Zhou Lichun entered Jiading City in a swagger.

    Thinking that last year, with the support of the Luohan Gang, Zhou Lichun led his men to capture Jiading City, but then the Qing army launched a massive counterattack, and Zhou Lichun and others had to retreat to Qingpu. At this moment, walking through the gate of Jiading City, Zhou Lichun couldn't help feeling a little emotional.

    Entering the city, Zhou Xiuying and a few big men wearing turbans greeted you at the city gate. This silly girl waved from afar and said: "Dad, the Western Prince of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom is here to greet you!"

    Zhou Lichun was surprised. He didn't expect the King of the West to personally greet him at the city gate with several Taiping Army generals. Zhou Lichun became a little panicked and hurriedly jumped off the old oxcart. He took a few steps forward and saw the few big men in front of him.  Among them, the leader was different from the others in that he wore a yellow scarf on his head. Although Zhou Lichun was born as a peasant, he also knew the dignity of yellow. He immediately bowed his head and bowed: "I will pay my respects to the King of the West at the beginning of next week."

    A pair of big palm-like hands supported Zhou Lichun. The King of the West, who was wrapped in a yellow scarf, said with a smile: "Hero Zhou, no courtesy. I have heard about Hero Zhou's name for resisting the Qing Dynasty for a long time. I have admired him for a long time. It is really a blessing to see him today."

    Zhou Lichun knew as soon as he heard that the King of the West was a learned man, and he always spoke in four-character words. He also smiled and said: "I am just a country farmer. I can't survive anymore. Thanks to the support of my relatives,  It is the King of the West who leads the big guys to fight against the government, and he is the great hero."

    Xiao Yungui admired the frankness of Zhou Lichun and his daughter, and also valued that they were natives of the counties surrounding Shanghai. There were more than 3,000 of them. If they could join the Taiping Army, they would naturally be a big help to the Taiping Army in conquering Shanghai. At the moment, they were also  Instead of beating around the bush with Zhou Lichun, he asked directly: "Now that our Taiping Heavenly Kingdom is looking for talented people, I wonder if Zhou Yingxiong and the brothers from Qingpu would like to serve as officials in our heavenly kingdom?"

    Zhou Lichun looked happy, but hesitant. Xiao Yungui saw it and asked with a smile: "Old hero Zhou, if you have any unspeakable secrets, you might as well speak up."

    Zhou Lichun clasped his fists and said, "Your Highness the King of the West, I dare not hide this from you. Most of us brothers worship the second brother Guan. The big guys are afraid that after entering the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, we will worship the god of the foreigners."

    Xiao Yungui understood the words and said with a smile: "Master Guan is a Taoist god. So you believe in Taoism." Most of the people in the Tiandi Hui worship the second brother Guan, especially the Tiandi Hui in Guangdong is the most prosperous. They  I believe that if you worship the second brother Guan, your loyalty will be the same. Until the Heaven and Earth Society was gradually replaced by the triads, this custom still continued. Later, the triads infiltrated into Hong Kong and other places. In later generations, many gangsters in Hong Kong still worship the second brother Guan.  This is also where it comes from.

    Xiao Yungui said in a deep voice: "It is true that my kingdom of heaven believes in God, but the Heavenly Father Emperor is the god that we Chinese people have worshiped since ancient times. Hero Zhou, when you first come here, you can listen to our teachings first. If you feel that our teachings  Okay, whether you convert to God or still worship Second Brother Guan, I won¡¯t force it here in the West Palace.¡± Xiao Yungui didn¡¯t want to discuss God and Second Brother Guan at this juncture. He had long been opposed to worshiping God.  He was dissatisfied with the exclusion of other teachings. For this reason, many people turned to the Qing court. He planned to gradually start to dilute the teachings of the God-worshipping religion. From now on, Shanghai, Suzhou and Hangzhou would be his own territory, and he did not want toSeeing that the common people and heroes here had turned away from him because of the issue of doctrine, he immediately spoke about freedom of belief without thinking. Xiao Yungui did not expect that from then on, the doctrine of the West Palace would also begin to change.

    Zhou Lichun and others' last doubts were dispelled. Zhou Lichun immediately announced that the entire army would join the Taiping Army. For a time, Jiading City was filled with thunderous joy and excitement.
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