With 100,000 elite soldiers at the start, what should you call me?

……

Xinghua Prefecture, Fujian.

The Lu Regent's court did not actually send troops to ambush Zheng Cai from behind. Instead, it chose to send Liu Zhongzao to Xinghua Prefecture to block Zheng Cai's path and wait for Li Tian's army to arrive.

The city gates of Xinghua Prefecture were closed, blocking the path of Zheng Cai's army.

Zheng Cai stared at Liu Zhongzao on the city wall with a dark expression.

"What does Minister Liu mean by this?"

"The imperial court has ordered that Xinghua Prefecture and Quanzhou Prefecture in Fujian be placed under martial law to prevent a surprise attack by the Qing army. I request that your army be stationed outside the city. If you need food or supplies, just send someone to let me know, and I will arrange it for you."

Looking down at the Duke of Jianguo below, Liu Zhongzao's face was practically contorted with rage.

Seeing Zheng Cai get the short end of the stick, Liu Zhongzao was overjoyed.

Last time he attacked Fu'an City, and it seemed he was about to breach the city, Zheng Cai stopped pretending and openly sabotaged him, causing him to suffer a defeat in Fu'an City, with his men suffering heavy casualties and in a sorry state.

He had been looking for an opportunity to get revenge on Zheng Cai, and now his chance had come.

"Is this what the Prince of Lu intends?"

"Lord Jian Guo, the Qing army's tactics are unpredictable. Please forgive me." Liu Zhongzao avoided answering the question.

"Fine, you won't open the city gates, huh? Then I'll just stay here."

Zheng Cai stationed his troops in the local area.

Inside the army tent, Zheng Cai was cursing and swearing.

"Damn it! They're all a bunch of dogs who only know how to fight among themselves!"

"I'm leading my brothers in the fight on the front lines, and this pedantic scholar just knows how to trip us up from behind!"

"Lord, shall we return to Fuzhou by sea?" Wu Hui, the adjutant, suggested.

Zheng Cai shook her head and decisively rejected the idea.

"They can't go back by sea either. They know to lock down the city, but don't they know to lock down the ports?"

"Then we'll force our way in." Wu Hui's face darkened, and he said viciously.

"No way, why would the imperial court dare to openly oppose me? Do they have the power? Isn't it because they found Li Tian outside to back them up?"

Thinking of this, Zheng Cai became even more annoyed.

The reason why Lu Jianguo and his party were able to land again and seize Fuzhou and other places was because Zheng Cai led the Zheng family army to fight hard.

Without Zheng Cai, the Lu Jianguo group would probably still be living like savages on some island.

Now look what's happened! Only a few months have passed, and they've already gotten involved with outsiders, wanting to join forces with them to drive him out and seize the empire he worked so hard to build!

At this moment, Zheng Cai is like a laborer who married a scumbag woman. He wants to get a divorce after only a few months of marriage, and the dowry, house, land, and port that he was given before will be ruthlessly taken away.

"Duke, didn't you write a letter to Li Tian before? What did Li Tian say? Is Li Tian on the side of the court or on our side?" Wu Hui asked worriedly.

Li Tian commands 100,000 elite troops, armed with sharp firearms, and has just won several battles, his military might is at its peak.

If Li Tian were on the side of the imperial court, they probably wouldn't dare to do anything to the court.

On the contrary, they would face retaliation from the imperial court.

Zheng Cai was arrogant and domineering, and killed the minister Xiong Rulin at will. Wu Hui also forced Marquis Yixing Zheng Zunqian to his death.

The two had quite a few enemies in the imperial court.

Even the King of Lu was hostile towards them.

"Still no news. I'll send someone to Li Tian to sound him out."

"If he stands on my side, we can take over the whole of Fujian and control the Zhu Ming Grandmaster. If the Prince of Lu is disobedient, we can find another member of the imperial clan to ascend the throne. At that time, he and I will be the regents and control the court. I don't believe he can resist such a temptation."

Zheng Cai then wrote to Li Tian to sound him out.

Li Tian even refused the imperial decree, so he must have had considerable ambition.

"Brother Li, how have you been? How have you considered the matter before? If we join forces to control the court and command the armies of the land, the pacification of the world will be just around the corner. In the future, when the world is at peace, the old dynasty can be replaced by a new one. Going further, we can each control half of the country and not interfere with each other..."

This time, Zheng Cai was even bolder in his letter, even expressing his desire to ascend the throne and become emperor.

But he wasn't afraid at this point, since he and the Lu Regent's court had already begun to clash, and were just one step away from a complete falling out and taking direct action.

The letter was quickly delivered to Li Tian in Jianning Prefecture.

Jianning Prefecture, General Staff Headquarters.

After reading Zheng Cai's letter, Li Tian tossed it aside and then looked at the letter that Prince Lu had just written in his own hand.

The two letters arrived almost simultaneously.

He smiled slightly; "Zheng Cai is really bold, he even wants to be the emperor."

"I suppose the Regent Lu is being petty, only wanting to bestow upon me a two-character title of King of a different surname."

"The Qing army has just suffered a major defeat, and they are already thinking about fighting amongst themselves. If we hadn't defeated Chen Tai and Kong Youde, I'm afraid both the Lu Jianguo and the Zheng family would have perished this year," Zhang Yonghao said with a cold laugh after reading the two letters.

"Let's just stall for time. Keep the replies as ambiguous as possible, but we can station the Fourth Army of Longxiang near Xixi Town."

"It's hot, please be careful not to get heatstroke. That concludes today's meeting. Meeting adjourned."

Li Tian would never take action before a direct conflict erupted between the Lu Regent's court and Zheng Cai.

He's dragging his feet, waiting for a reason to send troops and an opportunity to reap the benefits.

Meanwhile, we're still waiting for summer to pass.

Now that summer has arrived, the buckwheat he planted has been harvested, and he no longer has to worry about food.

At the same time, farmers in Shaowu Prefecture and Jianning Prefecture were mobilized to plant rice.

The south has a well-developed water system, allowing for two rice harvests a year. Moreover, rice is nutritious, so if possible, it's better to eat cooked rice normally.

If Li Tian could have another summer to develop, he would be able to command several formidable armies.

The summer heat seemed to quiet the whole world.

Li Tian's ambiguous attitude towards both sides seemed to have calmed down the previously confrontational relationship between Zheng Cai and the Lu Regent's court.

Zheng Cai then retreated to Huian City to rest.

Li Tian was busy with his daily tasks, and during this period he also had all the soldiers receive ideological education.

The general spread the core ideology of "Revitalizing China, Leading the World, and Moving Towards the Future" to all the people within the controlled territory.

At the same time, the military discipline and rules were rectified, and the shooting training and tactical exercises of the newly formed six Longxiang Armies were supervised to make the army more standardized and move closer to modernization.

In terms of government affairs, most of the management is handled by assassins, so Li Tian basically doesn't have to worry about corruption or breaking the law.

"After this summer, the steam engine will be built, and our army will be equipped with more than 40,000 Jian'an-made rifles, more than 200 mortars, and a number of siege explosive packs. Oh, and there's the naming of the heavy machine guns. How about we call them the Jianning Heavy Machine Guns..."

The technology department has recently made a major breakthrough in weapons development, developing a new type of heavy machine gun.

Similar to the Maxim heavy machine gun, but lighter and with better heat dissipation.

The heavy machine gun weighs 35kg, has a caliber of 7.92mm, and uses 7.9mm bullets, the same bullets as the Hanyang Type 88 rifle, but the bullets are machined and sharpened. It has a rate of fire of 600 rounds per minute, is fed by a 200-round canvas belt, and has an effective range of 1100 meters.

Currently, the entire army has only two Jianning heavy machine guns: one remains in the laboratory, and the other is a mass-produced model that has just been manufactured in the factory.

Fei Hongyun from the Ministry of Military Industry told Li Tian that this thing was not technically difficult and could be manufactured as long as the industrial conditions met the requirements.

Currently, the military industry department can produce about 100 units per month.

Therefore, Li Tian was not in a hurry to go on expeditions to the east and west; he was unusually steady.

But the summer, which had quieted down because of the heat, was made famous by two pieces of news.

The Ming court issued a proclamation to suppress the rebels, and Li Chengdong, the Duke of Hui, was appointed as the General Who Pacifies the North, leading an army of 100,000 to attack the traitor Li Tian.

The Qing court also issued a proclamation to the world to punish the rebels, appointing Lekedehun as the General Who Pacifies the South and Hong Chengchou as the Grand Secretary of the Military Affairs Department who is in charge of pacifying the South, leading an army of 200,000 to pacify Jiangnan.

Li Tian's new army is about to face simultaneous attacks from two major forces.

This caused a stir within the new army.