Late Yuan Dynasty: I am the true emperor

Chapter 366: The Northern Gate of Jiangxi
Deng Yu, whose original name was Deng Youde, had an elder brother named Deng Youlong and a father named Deng Shunxing.

Historically, Lao Deng built a stronghold in Longxuli, Hong County, his hometown, to protect himself. Because he was fair and good at fighting, he was recommended by the villagers to lead a militia. It didn't take long for him to become famous. People from nearby Lingbi and Xuyi came to join him, and his team soon grew to 10,000 people.

But maybe Deng Shunxing's forces really just wanted to protect themselves? Anyway, they never managed to capture a city.

Not long after that, Deng Shunxing was shot and killed in the battle against the Yuan army. The military power was transferred to his eldest son Deng Youlong, but not long after that, Deng Youlong also died of illness.

Perhaps he felt that he could not do it alone, and it happened that Zhu Yuanzhang had just conquered Chuzhou. The third brother Deng Youde heard of Zhu Yuanzhang's reputation for benevolence and righteousness, so he took tens of thousands of soldiers and horses to Chuzhou to join him. Because he brought capital as a shareholder, he was directly appointed as the commander-in-chief of the army, leading his own army, and was renamed Deng Yu by Zhu Yuanzhang.

It was already 1355, the year when Zhu Yuanzhang crossed the Yangtze River.

As for Hu Dahai and his son, they surrendered to Zhu Yuanzhang earlier than Deng Yu. The history books do not record the exact year, but it should have been after Zhu Yuanzhang captured Chuzhou. There are records saying that he went to Chuzhou to surrender to Zhu Yuanzhang, which was probably in 1354. In any case, it could not have been earlier.

Hu Dahai was originally a fried dough stick vendor. He was illiterate and could not read a single word. However, he was tall and strong with a stern face and was very brave. After he defected to Zhu Yuanzhang, he was quickly valued and was appointed as a vanguard by Zhu Yuanzhang. Before Chang Yuchun defected to Zhu Yuanzhang, Hu Dahai was the vanguard of the entire army.

Although he was illiterate, he respected scholars and was very kind and righteous. He often said, "I am a warrior and I can't read, but I know that there are only three things to remember when marching and fighting: don't kill people indiscriminately, don't abduct women, and don't burn houses."

Hu Dahai said this and did this, so wherever he led his troops to attack, many enemy troops were willing to surrender voluntarily, and the people were also able to return to their side quickly.

He also looked for local famous people wherever he went, and discovered and recommended many talents to Zhu. Zhu Sheng, who offered Zhu the nine-word mantra "build high walls, store up grain, and claim the throne slowly", was discovered and recommended by Hu Dahai. Others included Liu Ji, Song Lian, Ye Chen, Zhang Yi and others. Therefore, Hu Dahai was quite respected by Zhu's civil servants.

He was one of the few generals in Zhu's forces who was good at both civil and military affairs. Zhu also valued him very much and later let him lead a large army alone.

In the early period of Zhu Yuanzhang's group, the four generals who could stand on their own were Shao Rong, Hu Dahai, Deng Yu and Xu Da. Chang Yuchun was only the first vanguard, and Xu Da could only be at the end. If Hu Dahai had not died in an accident, Xu Da would have hardly had a chance to come to the fore.

Although Shao Rong was also very powerful, he and Zhu Yuanzhang were political enemies. Shao Rong was always a member of Guo Tianxu's faction. There was even a time when Shao Rong's position was higher than Zhu Yuanzhang's. He was the nominal commander-in-chief of the entire army. He was later killed by Zhu Yuanzhang.

Zhu really established his leadership position in the group after he captured Nanjing. After that, he rarely went to the front line in person. It was precisely because he established his leadership position in the group too late that many Huaixi nobles later disobeyed him.
In this time and space, Lu Jin started the rebellion earlier than Guo Zixing, and crossed the river three years earlier than Zhu Yuanzhang in the original history. By the end of 1352, he had already occupied the entire northern Zhejiang and northern Jiangsu. He had also occupied the Taihu Plain among the three lakes originally planned. Now the population under his rule is at least more than million, which accounts for a quarter of the total population of the country at the end of the Yuan Dynasty!

Perhaps it was because Lu Jin rose too quickly, or perhaps it was due to the butterfly effect caused by other things, which led to Hu Dahai and his son not going to Chuzhou in 1354, but instead joining Deng Shunxing, who was also a native of Hong County.

However, Lu Jin did not forget Deng Shunxing's forces. Before crossing the river, he asked the Intelligence Bureau to look for them. After finding the Deng family forces suspected to be Deng Yu, he sent people to infiltrate them, preparing to pull this army over at the right time and use it for his own purposes.

Among them, Gong Xiuwen passed by Longxuli on the grounds of "being introduced by a friend to go to Luzhou", and was "forced" to be intercepted by Deng Shunxing. The four young generals, Tang Shengzong, Lu Zhongheng, Guo Ying and Song Guoxing, were specially sent by Lu Jin to find Deng Shunxing to join the army as "defectors of the Yuan army".

As for Hu Dahai and his son, they joined the army after Tang Shengzong and the other four.

Because Lu Jin remembered that Deng Yu's father died of an arrow wound, before the four of them went to join the army, he asked them to take a few more sets of armor captured from the Yuan army. When they first joined the army, they brought their own weapons, armor, and horses.

The four men were born as "military households of the Yuan army". They were skilled in martial arts, understood military tactics, knew how to train soldiers, and were good at handling affairs. As soon as they arrived, they presented their leader with two sets of armor, which were very scarce among the militia. This move not only made them quickly valued by Deng Shunxing and promoted the four men to be thousand households, but also saved Deng Shunxing's life, so that he did not die by an arrow as happened in history.

Tang Shengzong and his four companions had the intelligence support of the Intelligence Bureau, which secretly provided them with intelligence several times, allowing them to win several small victories. As a result, they quickly gained a foothold in the Deng family militia and consolidated their position.

When they first joined the army, the Deng family militia had only four or five thousand people. Now, after more than half a year of development, the strength has been greatly expanded. Deng Shunxing and his two sons each lead two thousand, for a total of six thousand. Tang Shengzong, Guo Ying, and Song Guoxing each lead two battalions, which is 5100 people. Lu Zhongheng is also in charge of the only one hundred or so cavalrymen in the entire army. The remaining Hu Dahai and his two sons each lead a thousand, for a total of fourteen thousand.

Gong Xiuwen, as the military advisor who was forced to stay, had been urging them to join the Shengwu Army. Deng Shunxing had not had any idea before, but they had Zhima Li to the north, the Shengwu Army to the south, and Gaoyou Prefecture of the Yuan Army to the east. There was really no room for development, and being able to expand the army to 14,000 people was already the limit.

Moreover, they never captured the city. The large number of troops also led to a shortage of food and fodder. If they continued to waste time, it would be difficult to support an army of more than 10,000.

In addition, Lu Jin crossed the river in September and occupied the north of the river in October, completely blocking their development space. Now Tuotuo led an army of more than 100,000 to fight against Zhima Li in the north. Both sides had hundreds of thousands of troops fighting. Although they had an army of 10,000, they were just a small shrimp in the eyes of the three surrounding forces.

Therefore, in order to avoid being implicated, and seeing that Gong Xiuwen and Tang Shengzong unanimously agreed to join the Shengwu Army, Lao Deng had no choice but to agree to them.

After the army arrived at the north bank of the Huai River in Haozhou, they sent people across the river to explain their purpose. The person who came forward to deliver the letter was Guo Ying. His brother Guo Xing was also the battalion officer of Lu Jin's imperial guard. Yu Tongyuan still had some impression of him. But when Guo Ying said that they were sent by Lu Jin as undercover agents and returned with more than 10,000 troops, Yu Tongyuan found it unbelievable.

He immediately asked Guo Ying, "Since the Marshal sent you there, do you know that you are coming back now?"

Guo Ying said immediately, "You probably don't know, but Deng Shunxing's militia can no longer develop. He now has 14,000 troops. There are too many soldiers and insufficient food and grass. He can hardly feed his soldiers. The four sides are occupied by our army and Zhima Li, and he has no place to expand.

"Plus, Tuotuo and Zhima Li are fighting fiercely in the north, it's too dangerous, we are afraid of being affected, so we persuaded Deng Shunxing to surrender quickly."

Yu Tongyuan nodded, and then asked, "How should I cooperate with you now? Pretend not to know you?" "Yes." Guo Ying nodded, "General Manager Yu will let us cross the river and settle down first, and then tell us that he agrees to take us in. Then he will send someone to inform the Marshal that we are back, and the Marshal will naturally make arrangements when the time comes."

Yu Tongyuan immediately said, "Okay, then I'll go out with you and take you across the river."

Guo Ying breathed a sigh of relief and said with emotion, "I can finally come back. Being a spy outside is always very scary. By the way, Chief Steward Yu, where is our army? Where is the commander now? How is my brother now?"

Yu Tongyuan said immediately, "The Marshal crossed the river in September, and the Marshal's headquarters has now moved to Jiankang. I became the deputy general manager when the Marshal first expanded the army after crossing the river. After moving to Haozhou, Zhu Liangzu's 36th Army went to attack Jiangbei.

"On the fifteenth day of the winter month, the army marched eastward to Jiangsu and Zhejiang. Your brother was in the Imperial Guards Musketeer Regiment, so he should have joined them. I don't know the details, but last time there was a report saying that they had already taken Jiaxing and were about to march to Hangzhou. Calculating the date, they should have already marched to Shaoxing now."

Guo Ying was immediately shocked and asked, "So fast? They have already reached Hangzhou. Do we have that many soldiers now?"

"Yes, there is. After crossing the Yangtze River, the Marshal has expanded the army several times. The previous regiment numbers were almost 60. After this Eastern Expedition, together with the 36th Army in Jiangbei and the Eastern Expedition Army, there will be another round of expansion. It is estimated that even if the entire army does not have a hundred regiments, there will be eighty or ninety."

"This, so much?"

Guo Ying was stunned. It took them half a year to expand from 4,000 to 5,000 people to more than 10,000 people. He thought he was very capable, but he didn't expect Lu Jin's expansion speed to be so exaggerated.

"Of course there are more. Without so many soldiers, how can we defend so much land?" Yu Tongyuan patted his shoulder and reminded him, "Be careful. We still have to pretend that we don't know each other. Don't show up at the doorstep. Tell those little brothers later and ask them to be careful too."

"Well, I see."

Guo Ying quickly adjusted his mood, and then went out of the city with Yu Tongyuan to meet Deng Shunxing's army at the Huai River.

Deng Shunxing and his men had more than 10,000 soldiers, but more than 30,000 of them came. Many of them moved here with their families. They thought that the Shengwu Army might not accept the elderly, the weak, women and children they brought with them, but they didn't expect that Yu Tongyuan was very easy to talk to and took them all in immediately.

The area north of the Huai River in Haozhou is still an uninhabited area because of the previous policy of clearing the countryside. The population in the northern part of Haozhou has been dispersed and relocated to Dingyuan and Chuzhou.

After the battle between Tuotuo and Zhima Li, Zhu Liangzu had already fought to Huai'an. Haozhou would be the rear area from now on and should no longer be threatened by the Yuan army. It would be a good opportunity to settle the families of the soldiers brought by Deng Shunxing in the northern part of Haozhou.

As for how to accommodate Deng Shunxing's more than 10,000 troops, Yu Tongyuan temporarily placed them in Haozhou and immediately sent someone to report to Lu Jin.

Lu Jin has been extremely busy these days. Not only does he have to deal with domestic and foreign affairs, but he also has to keep an eye on military affairs on all sides every day, fearing that he will be defeated by the Yuan army and arrive at Jiankang. His internal forces are extremely scarce, and all the available forces have been thrown into external expansion. If the Yuan army really attacks his base, he will probably have to run away.
The battle situation in eastern Zhejiang was not bad. The Shengwu Army had an absolute advantage in military strength. The only dangerous time was probably the surprise attack by Fang Guozhen's navy, but fortunately it was blocked by Bai Guangtai.

The battle situation on the northern front is currently mainly Tuotuo fighting desperately with Zhima Li, while Zhu Liangzu is doing flanking containment in the Huai'an area. Although the two armies are not allies, he still understands the principle of "lips and teeth are cold". Although he does not intend to help directly, Lu Jin is also keeping a close eye on the battle situation in Huaibei. After all, once Zhima Li can't hold on anymore and the Yuan army attacks, it will be Zhu Liangzu's turn.

On the Anqing defense line in the south, Yu Que, Xing Ji and Yang Tongguan led 40,000 to 50,000 troops to attack Susong, but were blocked by Miao Daheng and his son. The Yuan army was unable to break through the Susong and Lei Chi defense lines.

However, Liao Yongan's 35th Army had too few troops. It was only responsible for defending the cities, but it had no extra troops for counterattack. Therefore, it could only passively take the beating and was unable to drive Yu Que and his men away.

It was not until Zhao Yong brought three regiments of the 111th Division to support that Liao Yongan had the troops to counterattack. He immediately transferred a total of 30 cannons from Congyang Fort and Wanshui Fort in the rear, and formed a counterattack group together with Zhao Yong's 111th Division, which was unified under the command of Miao Daheng on the front line.

After receiving reinforcements, Miao Daheng immediately organized a counterattack. He used the spies he had developed in the opposite Huangmei County more than half a year ago. He first burned the food and grass of the Yuan and Miao armies, and then ordered his eldest son Miao Youzhen to lead the navy to raid Huanglianzhai, causing the Yuan army to be unable to take care of both ends and panic.

Zhao Yong took this opportunity to attack fiercely from the rear of Lei Chi Fort, and with the help of thirty cannons, he defeated the Yuan army in front of him in one battle and killed more than 8,000 people. The Yuan army immediately retreated towards Huangmei County.

Miao Daheng asked Zhao Yong to send a regiment into the city to relieve him in advance. When the Yuan army was defeated, he personally led the main force and rushed out, chasing and killing the defeated Yuan army for dozens of miles and killing more than 10,000 Yuan soldiers again. The Yuan army was so scared that they dared not even enter Huangmei County and fled directly to the south. Miao Daheng took advantage of the situation to occupy Huangmei County.

Although this battle failed to kill important officials and generals of the Yuan army in Jiangxi, it killed one-third of the invading 40,000 to 50,000 troops, defeated the counterattack of the Yuan court, and took over Huangmei County, leaving the Yuan army in Jiangxi with no foothold north of Lei Chi.

Now the offense and defense changed, and it was the Yuan army's turn to defend. Miao Daheng reached the south bank of Lei Chi, and the Yuan army in Jiangxi retreated to Jiangzhou (Jiujiang), Caishan, Guangji, Qichun, and Hukou.

After this loss, it is estimated that Yu Que and his men will not be able to organize troops to attack again within a month or two.

As for Miao Daheng in Anqing, the 35th Army was only thirty or forty miles away from Jiangzhou city. As long as Lu Jin could provide them with reinforcements, the 35th Army could immediately march south to capture Jiujiang.

However, Lu Jin is still paying attention to Tuotuo in the north and has no plans to attack Jiangxi for the time being.

(End of this chapter)