Wind Rises in North America 1625

Chapter 490 Opportunity?

On October 30th, the cold wind, carrying snowflakes like countless tiny knives, howled across the continuous Qing army camps, emitting a "whooshing" roar, as if countless wronged souls were wandering outside the tents.

Inside the camp, the campfire burned weakly, the flames pressed almost to the ground by the wind, illuminating the soldiers' tired and numb faces.

They huddled in the corner of the tent, some wrapped tightly in their thin clothes, others rubbing their cheeks with their frozen hands, trying to draw some warmth.

Inside a huge central command tent, the charcoal in the brazier burned bright red, occasionally making slight crackling sounds, but it did nothing to dispel the chill in the tent.

Dorgon sat at a low table, clutching a silver wine jug in his hand. The wine was already cold, but he seemed oblivious to it. He was staring blankly at the direction of the opposite tent, his eyes unusually sinister, as if troubled by something.

Dodo sat opposite him, his face equally gloomy, holding a piece of dry, hard jerky in his hand. He took a bite, which hurt his teeth, and then disgustedly threw it back onto the plate with a soft "smack".

He snatched the wine jug from Dorgon's hand and took a big gulp.

"Cough cough..." The cheap liquor exploded with a spicy warmth in his throat, but it couldn't suppress the coldness in his chest.

He wiped the wine stains splattered on his face with his rough hands, revealing the gleaming brass buttons on the cuffs of his bearskin coat. "In this damn weather, if it stays frozen for another half month, the Eight Banners soldiers' fingers will freeze off. How will they even be able to draw their bows and shoot arrows? They probably won't even be able to draw the bowstring!"

"Aren't the Ming army also suffering just as much as we are?" Dorgon replied casually, his tone carrying a hint of perfunctoriness.

"How can this be the same as the others?" Dodo cursed under his breath, his voice full of resentment. He looked up at Dorgon, his eyes blazing with fury. "The Ming army has the city walls behind them, so they can take turns entering the city to rest, have a hot soup, and warm themselves by the fire. What about us? We have to roll around in the snow, without even a hot meal!"

He paused, then continued, "If this war continues like this, both of our White Banners will be completely depleted. Tell me, what is the Khan waiting for? Is he waiting for a windfall?"

Dorgon paused, holding his wine glass, and gave a cold laugh, a laugh tinged with helplessness and mockery.

He tilted his head back and took a swig of wine. The icy liquid slid down his throat, but it did nothing to quell the frustration in his chest; instead, it seemed to add fuel to the fire.

"He's waiting for a way out," he said slowly, his voice low and cold. "If he withdraws his troops, wouldn't our Khan be admitting defeat? Heh, his imperial authority will probably be gone, and how will he command the Eight Banners in the future?"

"If this drags on, not to mention the Han and Mongol people, even our own Eight Banners tribes might start making trouble!" Dodo slammed the wine pot down on the low table, making a dull thud that shook the plates on the table.

"Make a scene?" Dorgon smiled, a mocking smile playing on his lips, but his eyes held a sharp glint. "Will it be the Two Yellow Banners that make a scene, or the Plain Blue Banner? Or perhaps the Bordered Blue Banner?"

The two Yellow Banners were personally commanded by Huang Taiji, while his son Hauge commanded the Plain Blue Banner, and the Bordered Blue Banner was commanded by Jirgalang, who always followed Huang Taiji's lead.

In other words, no matter how much trouble the various banners caused, as long as these four banners closely followed Huang Taiji, the other four banners could not stir up any waves or make any big waves.

Moreover, Daišan of the Plain Red Banner and Luoluohun of the Bordered Red Banner (who temporarily took charge of the banner after Yuetuo's death) were both quite different. One remained neutral and did not favor either side, while the other had just inherited the title of Dorobele with Huang Taiji's support and was temporarily in charge of the banner. Their positions were not yet secure, so neither of them dared to openly oppose the Khan's decisions.

Therefore, Dodo's assumption that "all the Eight Banners tribes will start a riot" is simply unfounded.

At most, the two brothers, who were on the white flag, would utter a few discordant words to express their dissatisfaction.

However, they lacked the confidence and strength to truly challenge Huang Taiji's authority.

Dorgon was two years older than Dodo. Although he was not as physically strong as his brother and was also somewhat less brave, he was much more composed and was one of the few "brains" among his brothers.

At this moment, his always squinting eyes, like Dordog's, were covered with an unyielding layer of frost, and his expression was very gloomy, clearly feeling troubled and dissatisfied with the current situation.

A commotion could be faintly heard outside the tent, mixed with curses from the Mongol Eight Banners, filled with anger and complaints, along with coughs and weak, timid explanations from the Han Bannermen. Then came the harsh and brutal reprimands from the Manchu Eight Banners officers, like a pot of boiling porridge, bubbling and gurgling, but then the lid was quickly put on and the sound fell silent, presumably forcibly suppressed.

“Just you wait and see, in the end, this war, which has brought us no benefits and instead resulted in heavy losses, will continue. Even if we, the two White Banners, don’t say anything, the two Yellow Banners will jump up on their own!” Dodo turned his head and glared at Dorgon.

"What's the rush!" Dorgon said with a smile, trying to ease the tension: "Back in the day, the old Khan lay in the snow in February for days and nights at Sarhu, and he still managed to break through the Ming army's camp. What is our little bit of hardship compared to that?"

"How can that be the same?" Dodo was very dissatisfied with Dorgon's cold words, and his voice suddenly rose a few decibels. "Back then, the Khan attacked with speed, knowing that the Ming army was cowardly and could be defeated in separate directions. But look at us now, hundreds of thousands of Ming troops are huddled together, digging trenches and building fortifications, with several strong cities behind them, defending like an iron barrel, confronting us in a stalemate. There is absolutely no hope of winning. It's simply a waste of effort!"

“Go and see the camps of the two white banners. The Ashan Niru of the Bordered White Banner can’t even muster fifty banner soldiers who can draw a bow! Last month, when we attacked the Ming army’s Songshan camp, almost all of your Santai Niru of the Plain White Banner were wiped out. Their bodies are frozen in the muddy puddles in the trenches and can’t be retrieved. There isn’t even a complete corpse!”

He became more and more agitated as he spoke, and suddenly ripped open the loosened ropes of his armor, revealing the blood-stained cotton armor underneath: "The Two White Banners have never suffered such a great loss since they were handed over to us! More than a dozen Niru have been wiped out! ... More than a dozen Niru! They are our foundation!"

Dorgon silently gripped the wine glass, his knuckles turning slightly white from the force. The sediment at the bottom of the glass mirrored the turbulent and heavy emotions swirling within him.

He recalled two months ago when Ajige set off to seize the Ming army's grain and fodder camp at Bijia Mountain. His twelfth brother, full of vigor, led five thousand iron cavalry toward the sea. The copper buckles on their armor gleamed in the torchlight, and the sound of hooves broke the silence of the night. At that time, everyone thought they would return with a full load and deliver a heavy blow to the Ming army.

But as dawn broke, he was carried back to the camp by Bayara's personal guards, wrapped in a felt blanket, like a blood-soaked gourd.

His lower leg was cleanly sliced ​​off by Ming army cannons, and blood flowed all over the ground, staining the snow beneath him red. He died in less than a day, his eyes still open, filled with resentment.

"Ajige's coffin is still in the Lama temple in Shengjing." Dorgon's voice suddenly lowered, as if afraid of disturbing something, with a trace of sorrow. "The Khan forbade a funeral, saying that he would wait until Songshan and Jinzhou were captured, and then use the heads of Hong Chengchou and Zu Dashou as offerings to comfort his spirit in heaven."

“But I think Ajige died for the Khan. If he hadn’t forced a quick battle and a great victory over the Ming army, why would Ajige have led five thousand cavalry to charge into the Ming army’s artillery position? That would have been suicide!”

Upon hearing this, Dodo paused for a moment, and his expression turned serious.

He then reached for the leg of lamb on the table and took a bite, trying to mask his emotions with the food. The meat was already frozen solid, chewing it like swallowing sawdust, completely tasteless, but he still chewed it forcefully.

The wind outside grew stronger, making the tent's supports creak and groan, as if they might be torn down at any moment and swallow the small tent whole.

"The Khan is determined to drag this out," Dodo sighed, his voice full of helplessness. "But he can afford to wait, we can't! In our two White Banner camps, we only have a hundred bushels of wheat bran left. If we don't find a solution soon, we'll be eating snow dumplings wrapped in tree bark. By then, we won't even need the Ming army to attack; we'll collapse on our own!"

He suddenly leaned closer to Dorgon, lowered his voice, and looked at him with a hint of inquiry and suspicion, "You tell me... is the Khan delirious from his illness? Knowing that Hong Chengchou is stalling, why is he still going to drag things out with him? The problem is, how can we possibly outlast the Ming army! Their supplies are far more plentiful than ours!"

Upon hearing this, Dorgon's lips twitched, and he pinched a deep mark on the jerky with his fingers.

He recalled the meeting ten days earlier in Huang Taiji's tent. The Khan was coughing so badly he couldn't straighten up, blood gushing from his nose, his face ashen like an old sheet of paper, yet he still gritted his teeth and roared at the crowd: "Hold on, hold on for a few more days. Hong Chengchou will definitely reveal a weakness, and the Ming army will definitely give us an opening. In this battle, our Great Qing will achieve its goal in one fell swoop, completely crushing the military power of the Ming army in Liaodong! At that time, Liaodong will be ours!"

But two snowfalls had already fallen outside the tent, the snow was ankle-deep, and even the warhorses were shivering from the cold. How could they possibly hold on?

Moreover, we're almost out of food, and we're about to go hungry!
Huang Taiji, you're going to bury all my Eight Banners soldiers here!
Dorgon cried out in his heart, filled with grief and indignation.

Just then, the tent flap was suddenly flung open, and a blast of cold air rushed in. The flame of the mutton oil lamp went out with a "poof," and the light inside the tent dimmed considerably.

A heavily armored Manchu bannerman stumbled in, his knees slamming heavily onto the ground with a dull thud. The clanging of his armor plates was particularly jarring in the otherwise silent tent.

"Echun, you dog slave, are you courting death?" Dodo said coldly, reaching out to grab the scabbard at his side.

"Master! Something terrible has happened!" E Chun's voice was filled with panic and a slight, almost imperceptible tremor. His forehead was covered with fine beads of sweat mixed with snow water, which slid down his cheeks.

Dodo drew his sword, its cold gleam flashing, and held it to Dodo's neck: "You dog slave, have the Ming army sneaked in?"

"No...no..." Echun shook his head vigorously, took out a letter with a wax seal from his pocket, and presented it to Dorgon with both hands, his fingers trembling slightly with nervousness. "It's...it's an urgent report from Along, who was left to guard Shengjing! Liao...Liaoyang...is lost!"

"What?" Dorgon suddenly stood up, his movements swift and powerful. The hem of his armor swept across the low table, scattering cups and plates all over the floor with a loud crash.

The calm on his face was instantly shattered, replaced by shock and disbelief.

He snatched the letter, unfolded it by the last remaining oil lamp, the paper trembling slightly as his hands shook. He skimmed through it, his face growing increasingly grim until it turned ashen.

Dodo sheathed his knife and hurried over. When he saw the words on it, his pupils suddenly contracted, as if he had been hit hard by something. His face was filled with shock and anger.

"...On October 26th, the Xinzhou Army, together with a part of the Ming army from Liaonan Garrison, attacked and occupied Liaoyang. The defending general, Ortai, and all his soldiers were killed in battle. The entire city was massacred, the Manchus scattered, and Shengjing was placed under martial law!"

"The New Continent Army?" Dodo swung his sword, splitting the low table at his feet in two, sending wood chips flying. "Why are they always getting involved everywhere! They're like a persistent ghost!"

“Master…” Echun said in a low voice, his voice tinged with worry, “This servant reckons that the other banners must have received this news as well…”

The tent fell into a deathly silence, with only the north wind howling outside.

Dorgon and Dodo exchanged a glance, both wearing meaningful expressions.

His expression contained shock and anger, but even more so, an indescribable sense of relief and anticipation.

The opportunity to withdraw the troops has arrived!

Suddenly, a rapid horn sounded in the distance, followed by the rapid sound of horses' hooves and faint shouts, which were spreading from afar and becoming clearer and clearer.

“Master, it’s the camp over there on the Bordered Red Banner…” Echun lifted the tent flap, looked around for a while, and then turned back to Dorgon and his brother, his tone tinged with unease.

Dorgon laughed, grabbed a fur coat from the bed and put it on, then turned and walked out of the tent: "No need to ask, there must be someone more anxious than us."

"Where are you going?" Dodo followed behind and came out of the tent. The cold wind blew on his face instantly, making him shiver.

Dorgon waved for his Bayara personal guards to bring over a warhorse. He took the reins, stroked the horse's mane, and said, "Let's go see if these loyal ministers are going to force the Khan to retreat back to Shengjing. We can't be left out of this show."

With that, he mounted his horse, pulled on the reins, and galloped toward the camp of the two yellow flags.

Dodo followed closely behind, the two warhorses galloping across the snow, with more than ten Bayara guards protecting them on either side, leaving a trail of messy hoofprints behind them.

In the distant camp, torches lit up one after another, like sparks, and soon they connected to form a swaying sea of ​​fire, turning half the sky red, and a restless atmosphere filled the air.

Inside the yellow tent in the camp of the two Yellow Banners, Huang Taiji coughed violently, the blood he coughed up staining his handkerchief red.

He listened to the commotion outside the tent, but his eyes showed no anger or panic. Instead, they were filled with a mocking expression, as if he had expected all of this.

"Heh, this might be an opportunity!" he muttered to himself, a complex smile playing on his lips.
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(End of this chapter)