Gou was a member of the imperial family in the late Ming Dynasty

Chapter 281 Zhou Anmin's Blame

A few days after returning home, Zhou Anmin arrived in Pingyang.

On the way back from the grassland, Zhu Shenzui sent someone to deliver a letter to Zhou Anmin, and also sent a letter to his uncle Wang Rong.

Wang Jinwu was originally planning to bring him back with him, but after arriving at the grassland this time, Wang Jinwu didn't want to come back. After experiencing the two battles on the grassland and in the camp, Wang Jinwu was very happy. In his opinion, fighting on the battlefield was the life he wanted, not being a so-called centurion in the Ming Dynasty.

The original purpose of going to the grassland this time was just to train soldiers, but no one expected to experience the Galiba rebellion and tribal turmoil. These are things that ordinary people cannot avoid, but in Wang Jinwu's eyes, they are what he wants.

Wang Jinwu was never a law-abiding person. He had practiced martial arts since he was a child and dreamed of becoming a general on the battlefield. Unfortunately, he did not have this opportunity during the Ming Dynasty. At best, he followed Zhu Shenzhui to smuggle salt.

Even when he was running a smuggled salt business, there were not many cases of violence. You have to know that when he followed him, Zhu Shenzui's smuggled salt channels had basically stabilized, and he no longer had to risk his life to fight with other smuggled salt dealers for the market like he did in the beginning.

Apart from the competition with Li Hu on Yangtou Mountain that year, Wang Jinwu had hardly had any chance to fight in all these years. But this time when he went to the grassland, he experienced two wars, one was an encounter battle and the other was a sneak attack. These two battles made Wang Jinwu feel refreshed. In his opinion, the battlefield is where a man should stay, instead of staying in the Ming Dynasty to live a stable life. So when Zhu Shencui returned to the Ming Dynasty, Wang Jinwu refused to come back no matter what. He stayed on the grounds of helping Zhu Shencui stabilize the tribe and ensure the safety of Tana and Tenger.

In this way, Wang Jinwu and the two new troops stayed in the tribe temporarily, including nearly 30 new soldiers from the Ming Dynasty who formed a sentry. Even his apprentice Li You stayed, and after discussing with Lao Jin, he asked Lao Jin to stay temporarily and continue to serve as the sentry leader and training officer of the new troops. Wang Jinwu stayed in the grassland as Lao Jin's deputy.

The rest of the people followed Zhu Shenzhui back to Ming Dynasty. After entering Ming Dynasty and approaching Pingyang, they separated. The new army was taken back to Zhaowuling Hundred Households Office, where the training of the new army was still going on. Although Lao Jin did not come back, Zhaowuling had Lou Laoer and Yan Laosi, and with Lu Yisheng in charge of the Hundred Households Office, there would be no problem.

"This time it's too dangerous." Zhou Anmin said seriously. He had known about the situation on the grassland for a long time. To be honest, Zhou Anmin was scared out of his wits when he heard the news. He never thought that Zhu Shenzui would take such a risk. It was okay that a battle was inevitable, but whether it was killing Galiba or ambushing the Dilibortaiji tribe, it seemed to be easy to win, but he knew very well how dangerous it was.

"Haha, isn't this the time of day? Otherwise, the tribe wouldn't be able to stabilize so quickly." Zhu Shenzhui explained with a smile as he picked up the wine jug and added wine to Zhou Anmin.

"You are so bold. Don't you think about what to do if you fail?" Zhou Anmin glared at Zhu Shenzhui and blamed him.

Zhu Shenzhui grinned and said, "Isn't this not a defeat? And all of them are big wins. Brother-in-law, don't forget, if I'm not sure, I can do such a thing. I cherish my life very much."

"Bah! You still value your life? I think you should fight for your life! Is there anyone in this world who is more courageous than you?" Rolling his eyes at him, Zhou Anmin cursed him angrily.

How could he not know what kind of personality his brother-in-law had? Although Zhu Shenzhui looked gentle and refined like a scholar, he was crazier than anyone else when he went crazy.

Not to mention that Zhu Shenzhui had practiced martial arts since he was a child, he was not an ordinary person who dared to lead the people of Wangjia Village to smuggle salt, not to mention that he was a member of the Ming Dynasty royal family. Not only did he sell private salt, but he also personally fought with people with a knife. In the past few years, he killed more than one person for the private salt trade. How could a royal family do such a thing?

In recent years, Zhou Anmin originally thought that as Zhu Shenzhui's business grew bigger and his strength became stronger, he would no longer do things like picking up a knife and fighting with his own hands. But who would have thought that he would not do gunfights anymore, but actually start fighting wars.

This time on the grassland, Zhu Shenzui led such a small number of people to fight three battles, each of which was larger than the last. In the end, he not only killed Galiba, who launched the mutiny, and supported his son to the position of tribal taiji, but also led the tribal cavalry to directly defeat a Mongolian tribe of nearly 10,000 people. It was truly astonishing.

When the news reached Zhou Anmin, he could hardly believe his ears.

After confirming that these were all facts, Zhou Anmin was stunned for a long time. He never expected Zhu Shenzhui to be so crazy and so bold that he actually did such a big thing in Mongolia, especially the fact that the Dilibortaiji tribe was defeated in one fell swoop, and Dilibortaiji fled west alone. Half of the entire tribe was annexed by Zhu Shenzhui, and the other half was taken over by the elders and leaders of the original tribe. This meant that the Dilibortaiji tribe, one of the twelve Tumed tribes, was completely wiped out. Although these three battles were all great victories, Zhou Anmin was worried afterwards. No matter which battle was neglected, it would not be as simple as a defeat. The swords on the battlefield were blind, and the Mongols were always fierce. The Ming Dynasty and Mongolia had been fighting for nearly three hundred years. Although the Ming Dynasty had the upper hand overall, the Mongols were not vegetarians.

In the Battle of Tumubao, even the emperor fell into the hands of the Mongols. If it weren't for Yu Shaobao's efforts to save the situation, the Ming Dynasty would have been gone long ago. Let's not talk about the distant past. Let's talk about the recent past. During the Wanli period, there were many border violations by the Mongols, such as the Battle of Xining in the 16th year of the Wanli period, the Battle of Huangzhong in the 23rd year of the Wanli period, and the border violations caused by the Mongol rebellion in the south of the desert in the 43rd year of the Wanli period.

Every once in a while, the Mongols on the grassland would invade the border for one reason or another, thus engaging in battle with the Ming Dynasty. The Ming Dynasty set up important towns in the nine borders and maintained a large number of border troops all year round in order to guard against the Mongols. Even so, the Mongols were never defeated by the Ming Dynasty. They were like weeds on the grassland, which would grow again after the spring breeze the following year after being cut off, and have continued to this day.

In the eyes of the people of the Ming Dynasty, the Mongols were a symbol of barbarism. Shanxi was close to the Nine Borders and was much more aware of the situation of the Mongols than other places in the Ming Dynasty.

The concept that the Mongols were brave and good at fighting has long been deeply rooted in people's minds, but who would have thought that Zhu Shenzhui could win three battles in Mongolia with such a small number of people? Winning so easily? Have the Mongols become soft persimmons now? If it is so easy to defeat them, then are all the elite border troops of the Ming Dynasty useless?

Faced with Zhou Anmin's doubts, Zhu Shenzhui told him that the situation was not like that at all. The Mongols were not easy to fight. He had completely taken advantage of the three battles. If it were not for the special circumstances at the time, it would not have been so easy to win.

The first battle was an encounter, when Zhu Shencui took advantage of his rest to fight against the arrogant and tired Galiba's pursuers, and used his chariot formation and powerful Portuguese cannon to catch them off guard. When the enemy was beaten dizzy, the new army used the mandarin duck formation to directly restrain the Mongolian cavalry who had lost their speed, and thus won the battle.

As for the second battle, it was a complete sneak attack. After sneaking into the camp, Wang Hai and others first set fire to cause chaos in the camp, and then concentrated their forces to directly raid Galiba's location. Even so, they almost failed. If Wang Hai hadn't rushed back in the end, Galiba would have escaped.

Moreover, although Galiba had taken over the tribe at that time, he was far from being able to completely control the tribe. If Galiba could be given more time, the situation would be different. By then, Galiba would have completely controlled the tribe and all the strength of the tribe would be at his disposal. Zhu Shenzhui might not be able to take over Galiba, or even his entire army might be wiped out.

The third battle was a cavalry attack. The cavalry led by Zhu Shencui was not weak in terms of military strength. Although the Dilibortaiji tribe had a large number of people, its overall military strength was not strong. Even in a head-on battle, the cavalry that the other side could muster would only be slightly more than that of Zhu Shencui.

In this situation, taking advantage of the night before dawn to attack the unprepared with the prepared, plus Zhu Shenzhui also brought Portuguese cannons when attacking, and after entering the camp, he raised the banner of Ligdan Khan. The panic-stricken Liboltaiji tribe had no ability to resist, so it was inevitable that they would be defeated in one fell swoop.

Although these three battles seemed thrilling, except for the encounter battle in the first battle, the other two battles were well planned and the victory was reasonable.

After listening to Zhu Shenzhui's story, Zhou Anmin finally breathed a sigh of relief. He looked at Zhu Shenzhui deeply, his eyes were somewhat complicated and he didn't know what he was thinking.

After a long time, he sighed, shook his head and smiled bitterly: "You, you are really troublesome. Never mind, I am too lazy to say anything to you. Don't be so reckless in the future. By the way, I didn't tell your sister about this because I was afraid she would worry too much."

"Thank you, brother-in-law." Zhu Shenzhui chuckled and poured another glass of wine for Zhou Anmin. Zhou Anmin took a sip from the cup, put it down, looked at Zhu Shenzhui and asked, "What are your plans next?"

"I have handed over all matters concerning the business to Kang Youfu. From now on, I will have nothing to do with the business. After all, the trade between the tribe and the Ming Dynasty will officially begin soon. If I get involved, there will inevitably be some trouble. After all, I am a member of the Ming Dynasty royal family, and this identity is somewhat sensitive..."

"You also know that you are a royal family? If you know that, why are you still making such a fuss?" Zhou Anmin said unhappily, but he didn't continue talking after he finished speaking. It was meaningless to talk about it now. Besides, Zhu Shenzhui was not without preparation. One of the things was to clear the relationship between him and the business. However, there is no such thing as a wall that can't be penetrated. After the canonization of the Tenger tribe, the Tenger tribe had already fallen into the eyes of the Ming Dynasty. Including Tana, it was no longer an ordinary tribe in both the Ming Dynasty and Mongolia.

Zhu Shenzhui had always used an alias in Mongolia, and few people knew his true identity. But even so, who could guarantee that Zhu Shenzhui's identity would not be leaked? Apart from other things, Zhou Anmin, as a captain of the Imperial Guard, had some information about Zhu Shenzhui. If Zhou Anmin had not deliberately suppressed it and made some cover-ups, everything Zhu Shenzhui did would have been known to everyone long ago.

(End of this chapter)