Chapter 322: The troops approach Wuyi, and all troubles are resolved After Hong Ming gave the order to hold on, Gan Ning cursed for a while and when he saw that the enemy did not come out, he returned to the formation to report. Qin Zhen saw him bringing over a bloody head in a short while, and he said with a smile: "It would have been fine if the enemy hadn't seen Xingba's courage, but now that they have seen it, I'm afraid they won't dare to come out again!" Gan Ning was pleased to hear this, but he looked a little indignant. "These Yiyue people are really cowardly. They only dare to defend their camps. If they don't fight, how can they win?" "From Xingba's point of view, if the enemy army does not fight, this stronghold cannot be conquered?" Qin Zhen was a little surprised to see him so indignant. You know, Gan Ning’s best skill is water kung fu. They are just a group of Shanyue people. Even Gan Ning can’t break into their camp? When he asked this question, Gan Ning pointed to the distance and explained to him: "You may not know, the terrain here is quite similar to that of Shuzhong. When I went out to fight just now, I saw the waterway upstream." "Its two sides are high with mountains, and its shape is like a narrow mouth, and there is only an open space behind the village." "They have built a camp by the water in this narrow pass, and it is really hard for us to get through."

"Even if we attack at night, we won't be able to survive unless we destroy the camp." "So only if they go into battle can our army defeat the enemy." After his analysis, Qin Zhen nodded and said: "Well, it's hard to break into the camp today. Let's head south and camp there, then discuss countermeasures!" After saying this, he led his troops south for more than 20 miles and set up camp in a narrow mouth in the mountains. When the meeting came at night, Lu Xun gave Qin Zhen an idea: "Today I saw that to the east of this place, there are long mountains, high and difficult to enter." "On the contrary, the mountains in the west are gentler, so there may be mountain roads to walk on!" "We can challenge them here for days, and ask the spies to explore the trails." "If there is a detour through the mountains, we can divide our forces and attack the enemy from behind!" After hearing this, Qin Zhen immediately ordered Xu Sheng to lead the spies to explore the mountain road. The next day, he asked Gan Ning to lead the boats north to challenge the Shanyue camp. Seeing Gan Ning approaching again, Hong Ming hurriedly ordered his men to shoot arrows to prevent Gan Ning from getting close. After two days of this, Gan Ning became very annoyed and ordered his subordinates to shout and curse from afar. Unexpectedly, news came from Xu Sheng that there was a small path in the west that led behind the mountain and directly to the enemy camp. After Qin Zhen inquired, he ordered Xu Sheng to lead a thousand men from his own army and two thousand Yue soldiers to go north via a detour. He led the army in front to help Xu Sheng attract enemy firepower. After receiving the order, Xu Sheng led his soldiers out of the camp. In fact, this place is west of Mount Jiuhua. Although it is called a mountain path, you still have to cross mountains and ridges. However, Xu Sheng had only a thousand soldiers under his command, and the rest were young and strong men from Nanyue.

Even though they are not good at fighting, they are good at crossing mountains and hills. It took only two days to cross the mountain road and reach the Shanyue people's camp. When Qin Zhen received the news, he ordered his men to prepare for a night attack on the enemy camp. So at night, at three o'clock in the morning, when the moon was bright, Qin Zhen ordered Gan Ning to lead three thousand navy soldiers to attack the enemy camp. Hong Ming and others knew that Qin Zhen was cunning and cunning, so they were naturally on guard against night attacks. As soon as Gan Ning led his troops to this place, the Yue soldiers reported it in advance. After receiving the letter, Hong Ming and others led their people to the front of the camp to defend. For a moment, the two armies fired arrows and fought endlessly, and the sound of drums echoed through the mountains. When Xu Sheng heard the sound, he knew that Qin Zhen was attacking the camp, so he ordered his men to sneak to the rear camp with straw and a lot of wood. Just in front of the camp, they heard a shout and it turned out that a sentry had discovered their tracks. When Xu Sheng saw this, he drew his bow and shot the man dead with one arrow. He then no longer concealed his intentions and ordered his soldiers to charge into the enemy camp. After entering the camp, the soldiers set fire along the way and the camp was immediately on fire. Hong Ming and others were shocked when they saw this, and quickly led their troops back to the rear camp to put out the fire. However, when Gan Ning saw that the camp's defense was weakened, he climbed into the camp with a grappling hook, and after a fierce battle, he finally broke through the camp gate. After receiving the letter, Qin Zhen led his troops into the Shanyue people's camp. At this point, the advantage of their equipment was once again apparent. Although the Shanyue people were able to make iron tools, their level of skill was not high. Most weapons were wooden poles with iron tips, and they had no power to resist the nearly four-foot-long horizontal swords of the Jiangdong navy. With one slash of the sword, a pile of swords and weapons fell to the ground with a clang. The swords of these Shanyue people were reused and became very dull. If you cut leather armor, you can still break it, but if you cut armor made of bamboo or iron sheets, it is difficult to break it. As soon as Qin Zhen's main force entered the camp, the battle became one-sided. The Shanyue army, which was almost twice its size, was defeated and fled in large numbers. After fighting for half an hour, the soldiers in the camp finally couldn't stand it anymore and surrendered. In this battle, Yuan Yu and Wu Mian were both captured. The soldiers under Qin Zhen killed more than 4,000 enemies and captured 10,000 people! As soon as dawn broke, Gan Ning brought Yuan Yu and Wu Mian to Qin Zhen. It should be said here that the attire of the Shanyue people is quite different from that of the Han people. Since I live in the mountains all year round, I seldom have the opportunity to take a bath. In order to prevent lice and fleas from infesting, most Shanyue people shaved their heads and cut their hair short.

Either tie your hair into a braid or keep it short. Qin Zhen felt quite familiar with this appearance. "You are the Shanyue heroes here, are you willing to surrender to our army?" Compared to Qin Zhen's leisurely and contented attitude, Yuan Yu and Wu Mian were both filled with fear. They looked at the not-so-strong Han official in front of them and said hurriedly: "Your Excellency is in front, I dare not call myself the commander, we are all willing to surrender!" Qin Zhen looked at the cowardly look of the two and raised his eyebrows in confusion: "Since you are willing to surrender, why don't you surrender earlier? Why wait until you are defeated?" As soon as he asked this, Yuan Yu raised his head and said: "Your Excellency is in front. It's not that we don't want to surrender, but it's because Hong Ming and Hong Jin are forcing us to surrender." "He summoned us into the village, and we would be killed if we didn't obey." "We have no choice but to follow your orders. We don't dare to engage in battle with your army!" Wu Mian listened and agreed, adding: "Your Excellency may not know that we have another leader named Hua Dang." "This man wanted to lead us to surrender, but he was killed by two people!" "The two were the culprits, but they have nothing to do with us!" Seeing the two people pushing each other and putting all the blame on Hong, Qin Zhen raised his head and asked: "Did we capture the bandit leaders Hong Ming, Hong Jin, etc. in this battle?" Seeing his question, Gan Ning thought for a while, then shook his head and said: "When I entered the camp, I killed a man named Hong Ming. "As for Hong Jin, I have never seen him, and I have never heard of him." "Perhaps he escaped from the camp during the chaos last night and was not caught!" In the chaos of war, it is common to miss enemy generals. Qin Zhen did not take it seriously and looked at the two of them and said: "Since you are willing to surrender, why don't you lead me north and recruit your troops?" "If you cooperate well, I can spare your lives." "If you dare to disobey, you will be killed immediately and I will exterminate your clan!" In fact, he always kills Shanyue Haoshuai whenever he catches him! Because these Shanyue heroes are like a great patriarch and have extremely high prestige in their tribe. Besides, most of these people are useless, so it will not be wrong to catch and kill one. But now he is in the eastern frontier, surrounded by mountains, making it difficult to transport prisoners. This forced him to make some compromises and bring in some people to help him manage. Therefore, he plans to save the lives of these two people for the time being!

When the two men saw that Qin Zhen did not kill them, they were naturally grateful and immediately helped to persuade his subordinates. So after resting for a day, Qin Zhen's troops headed north again and directly entered Jianyang. When I arrived here, I heard the news that Hong Jin had returned to the mountains after escaping from the camp. At this time, he was guarding the mountain with his troops, fearing that Qin Zhen would go up the mountain to kill him. Seeing this, Qin Zhen brought his troops to the foot of the mountain and prepared to launch a violent attack. Unexpectedly, as soon as the troops arrived, they saw a Shanyue strongman carrying the head of Hong Jin out of the camp and saying: "This man killed my father for his own selfish desires. I have killed him!" "We are all willing to surrender. We hope the general will forgive us and accept us!" I saw that this man was tall, over eight feet tall. He did not look like the short Shanyue people, but had some of the chivalrous spirit of the Han people. Seeing his burly figure and his initiative to come over, Qin Zhen couldn't help but ask: "What's the name of that man, and who is your father?" Upon hearing this, the strong man knelt down on the ground and bowed respectfully: "My name is Huachen, my father's taboo name is Dang, my father and I have been planning to join your army." "I didn't expect Hong Ming and Hong Jin to trick my father into entering the village and harm him." "He teamed up with the two thieves Yuan Yu and Wu Mian to attack our stronghold and harm our people." "I was no match for you and was captured and imprisoned in the village." "Yesterday, when I heard that your army had won, I called my people to charge out of the village and take Hong Jin's head when he was off guard." "I am offering my head to the general now. I hope the general will make the decision for my tribe!" After hearing the whole story, Qin Zhen narrowed his eyes and said: "Yuan Yu and Wu Mian are now in our army. If I make the decision for you, who among their tribes will surrender?" When Hua Chen heard that both of them were under Qin Zhen's command, he was overjoyed and said hurriedly: "As long as the general and I are here, I can persuade the tribe to come down the mountain for you!" "Go ahead and tell me, and I'll give you the heads of these two men!" Qin Zhen did not give him a chance to negotiate and directly had someone take away Hong Jin's head. Seeing him like this, Hua Chen gritted his teeth and led his men up the mountain. After two days of this, he finally returned, and actually convinced the people on the mountain to come down one after another. When Qin Zhen saw this, he secretly thought that Hua Chen was a talented person, so he ordered his men to tie up Yuan Yu and Wu Mian and give them to him. Anyway, he only promised not to kill the two people, but he did not promise not to send them to others. The result was that both of them were taken to Hua Dang's tomb by Hua Dang's son Hua Chen and killed one by one.

At this point, the threat posed by the Shanyue people in the southern part of Wuyi Mountain was eliminated, and a large number of Shanyue people were transported to Dongzhi by boat. Only Hua Chen and several thousand men remained in the mountains to guard the crops that had already been planted. Until this time, Zhuge Jin, who had previously emphasized that there was not enough arable land in Dongzhi, was overjoyed. No matter how many Shanyue people Qin Zhen sent, he would accept them all. Qin Zhen saw that he had two different attitudes towards the Shanyue and Nanyue people, so he smiled and said to him: "The Nanyue tribe has only tens of thousands of people. Ziyu only lamented that there were not enough fields to cultivate and advised me to slaughter them." "Now the Shanyue tribe has many times more people than them, but Ziyu is able to take them all in. What's the meaning?" Upon hearing this, Zhuge Jin blushed with shame and dared not reply. He couldn't say that he despised the people of Nanyue who were difficult to educate! Although the number of people in Nanyue was small, he had to spend a lot of manpower and resources to resettle and manage them. The Shanyue people's main occupation was farming, so if he could just hold out for half a year, he could bring all of them under his rule. Comparing the two sides, even if Dongzhi has less arable land, he will take it over! Qin Zhen knew Zhuge Jin's little thoughts, but he didn't expose them directly. In fact, he also wanted to expand the scale of Dongzhi, preferably so that it could radiate to Izu in the south. In this way, when the population of Dongzhi grows in the future, he can immigrate people from here to fill the border. After all, at this time, Quanzhou, Putian, Xiamen and other places in later generations were still wastelands! The more port cities like this there are, the faster maritime transportation can develop! With this in mind, Qin Zhen waved his hand and exempted Dongzhi from taxes for two years after Ming Dynasty. That is to say, starting from next year, they will not collect land rent in Dongzhi for two years. And two years is enough time for these Shanyue people to settle down in Dongzhi. However, the price to pay is that Zhuge Jin must educate the people of Nanyue! It would be best to first build a branch city in Quanzhou to facilitate their garrison. This made Zhuge Jin frown, and he complained: "Your Excellency has given me an order, and I dare not disobey, but the Eastern Administration is already short of officials." "Now there are many Shanyue people who need to be resettled. How can we educate them?" "It's okay. Just teach them how to farm and build. I'll find someone to come over tomorrow!" Qin Zhen waved his hand and casually agreed to find a group of Confucian scholars to go south to help him. As for the candidates, he had already thought of them, namely Tao Qiuhong and other Confucian scholars who accused him of being cruel. Since these people are preaching that the barbarians need to be educated, it is just right for them to help him educate these cannibals. He wanted to see what these Confucian scholars would think when they saw the sacrifice! (End of this chapter)