The New Destiny of the Ming Dynasty

After listening to Xu Changyong's words and Yuan Jin's words, Yang Zhen realized that they made sense. This era had its own way of doing things, and he didn't need to be pretentious. He should just follow the usual practice.

Thinking of this, Yang Zhen noticed that Xu Changyong and Yuan Jin had both spoken, but Zu Keyong remained silent, so he asked him, "Brother Zu! What are your thoughts? Tell me!"

Zu Keyong didn't want to speak at first. He had already said yesterday that in terms of merit, no one could compare with Yang Zhen and his subordinates. Moreover, in terms of position, Yang Zhen was now the commander of the Ningyuan Vanguard Battalion, which had been clear for a long time.

Although the Ningyuan Vanguard Battalion is currently only a temporary battalion, it still needs to follow the proper rules.

Take the matter of reporting merits, for example. This is Yang Zhen's responsibility. Whether to report it, when to report it, and how to report it should all be up to Yang Zhen.

Although Yang Zhen did not consider himself a subordinate, to the generals of the vanguard camp, Yang Zhen was undoubtedly their superior. Even if he did not treat them as subordinates, they could not help but treat him as their superior.

Therefore, he did not have a very good impression of Xu Changyong and Yuan Jin.

At this moment, Yang Zhen asked him a question, and he thought for a moment before saying, "The matter of reporting merits is something that Commander Xie should decide! I have no objection! However—"

At this point, Zu Keyong looked at Yang Zhen, paused slightly, and then said to him, "Although none of the units brought back a single Tartar head, according to my rough calculation, the number of Tartars or two Tartars that my unit shot and killed must be at least 180!"

"As for the Tartars who later died in the musketeer corps, grenadier corps, and especially in the artillery bombardment, the number was probably not just in the hundreds! In terms of the dead and wounded, according to my rough estimate, it should be more than two thousand!"

"Although most of them are what the Commander-in-Chief calls 'second-class Tartars,' in past battles, as long as they retained their 'money-tail' (a type of slang term for a lowly rank or tail), they were still considered Tartars! So—"

It seems that Zukeyong is not just straightforward; he also has a flexible side.

Yang Zhen already understood Zu Keyong's meaning, so he smiled and said, "Don't worry! I'm not stupid! I know the tricks to reporting credit! Since you all think we should report credit as soon as possible, let's settle it now and send them off this morning!"

Yang Zhen didn't bother with any fancy formalities; he simply recounted the whole story from beginning to end. He explained how he went to scout, how he and his generals devised a plan, how he led his troops to break through the Tartar camp, how he burned the Tartar's supplies, how he killed the Tartar prince Loto, and how he covered the retreat of his generals, as well as the casualties of his own troops. He explained everything clearly in a few simple sentences.

The list also specifically mentions the names of Xu Changyong, Yuan Jin, Zu Keyong, Zhang Degui, Zhang Chen, Yang Shen, Li Lu, Zhang Guogan, Yan Shengsan, Yang Zhanao, and Pan happy.

Finally, Yang Zhen recounted the events, then asked Xu Changyong, Yuan Jin, and Zu Keyong for their opinions. He made slight changes to the numbers of enemy kills, the number of Tartar provisions burned, and the number of Tartar warhorses burned to death, and that was the final decision.

The generals were quite satisfied to see that Yang Zhen had not claimed all the credit, and that he had described the simultaneous advance of all units to "break through the camp" as so difficult, and the retreat as a near-death experience.

Yang Zhen had no literary figures around him, and his own calligraphy was truly awful. Although he spoke eloquently, he couldn't put his words into practice.

Fortunately, Yuan Jin's ship at the naval camp, the so-called "flagship," always had a cabin prepared for Yuan Shu, the imperial supervisor of supplies, and also provided the scholar-official Yuan Shu with the finest writing brushes, ink, paper, and inkstones.

Yuan Jin immediately sent someone to fetch it, and it was brought back in no time. A quarter of an hour later, a letter reporting the victory, dictated by Yang Zhen, written by Zu Keyong, and with Xu Changyong and Yuan Jin adding embellishments, was completed.

Before sealing the seal, Yang Zhen specially invited Xu Changyong, Yuan Jin, and Zu Keyong to join him in signing their names with brushes, and then they all pressed their fingerprints on the ink with their index fingers.

Xu Changyong, a rough and uncultured man who had never done anything like this before, and Yuan Jin, a naval garrison commander who came from a pirate background, were both laughing and very happy.

After all this was done, Yang Zhen carefully handed the sealed letter reporting the victory to Yuan Jin, saying to him, "Brother Yuan! This letter is for you! This morning, send some capable men with a large ship to Ningyuan as soon as possible to report the victory!"

Upon hearing this, Yuan Jin didn't say anything more. He clasped his hands in a salute, turned around, and left to quickly arrange for his men.

At this time, the cooks on the right wing of Yang Zhen's musketeer team had already prepared the mixed flour porridge and baked a batch of mixed flour pancakes. Zhang Guogan came over to invite Yang Zhen to have breakfast, and Yang Zhen simply took Xu Changyong and Zu Keyong with him.

Xu Changyong and Zu Keyongye did not refuse and went along.

Upon arrival, the group, carrying wooden bowls and flatbreads, ate their breakfast while gazing westward as they chewed.

"Commander! When I was writing the victory report just now, I had a question I wanted to ask but didn't—what are your plans next? After our advance detachment rests, will we continue ashore to rescue Songshan, or will we stay here and await orders from Ningyuan?"

These questions were asked by Zu Keyong. After last night's battle, among the generals of the vanguard, only Zu Keyong still insisted on using the somewhat unfamiliar title "Lord Xiezhen".

Yang Zhen, of course, didn't take this to heart, and he also had his own plans for what to do next. However, before he could speak, he heard Xu Changyong, while chewing on a flatbread, shout:

"Why fight anymore?! With this achievement, we can live on it for a year! There's no need to fight anymore. After we rest today, we'll board the ships and retreat! I think that's the right thing to do!"

"Besides, we breached the Tartars' rear camp, burned their supplies, and even killed a Tartar prince—since he was a prince, he must have been a close relative of the Tartar chieftain! Do you think the Tartar leader would let us go?! If you don't leave now, when will you?!"

Yang Zhen never expected that Xu Changyong's thought process would be like this.

Xu Changyong didn't intend to capitalize on the victory and make another contribution, which he could understand. However, he never expected that Xu Changyong would abandon his own camp and quickly leave by boat.

We've won the battle, not lost it. If we continue like this, what's the difference between us and losing?!

Of course, Xu Changyong's idea was unexpected not only by Yang Zhen, but also by everyone else.

Before Yang Zhen could speak, Zhang Degui, who was somewhat familiar with Xu Changyong, interjected: "Hey, Guerrilla Commander Xu! Did we win or lose? If we lost, it would be perfectly reasonable for us to retreat! But we clearly won! You just reported a great victory today, and tomorrow you're boarding ships and retreating to the sea. If word gets out, where will you put Lord Yang's face? Where will you put the advance detachment's face?!"

"That's right! If we hadn't reported a great victory, we could have done this as a last resort! But now that we've reported a great victory, it's unreasonable to do this! We haven't brought back a single head, and the people in Ningyuan City will probably say we're claiming credit for others' work, or even falsely reporting our achievements!"

Xu Changyong didn't care about Zhang Degui's words. After fighting for so many years, he didn't care about face anymore. As long as he was alive, that was enough!

However, he had to think carefully about what Zukeyong said.

This time, most of the generals who followed Yang Zhenbei to rescue Songshan were people who were not popular and did not have any strong backers.

Zu Keyong's problem stemmed primarily from his poor interpersonal relationships, while Xu Changyong's problem was a combination of poor interpersonal relationships and a lack of powerful backers.

Upon hearing Zu Keyong's words, Xu Changyong immediately thought of his own situation in Ningyuan City and in Zu Dashou's army.

This time, he had made a great contribution and gained so much recognition, so he was eager to report his achievements, partly to show those who rejected and looked down on him.

However, if things go wrong and those people accuse me of exaggerating my achievements, that would be a real problem. When things fall apart, everyone will kick me while I'm down, and when things break, everyone will beat me. It would be even more dangerous. Not only would I lose face, but I might not even be able to save my life.

"Then tell me, what do we do next? I, Old Xu, am not cut out for these brain-teasing tasks!"

After Xu Changyong said this, he indeed buried his head in his food and stopped talking. The others all turned their attention to Yang Zhen.

"Actually, what Brother Xu said earlier wasn't entirely without merit! We've breached the Tartars' rear camp and burned their supplies; how could they possibly let this go unpunished?!"

When Xu Changyong heard Yang Zhen agree with his words, he became happy and grinned as if to speak again, but Yang Zhen quickly waved his hand to stop him.

Next, Yang Zhen continued, "As long as we remain stationed here, the Tartars will definitely find a way to attack us! Moreover, as long as we don't attack them first, they will have to attack us first!"

"People might think this is very dangerous for us! Actually, it's not. There is certainly danger, but eating and drinking water can also be dangerous; you can choke to death if you're not careful! —"

Before Yang Zhen could finish speaking, Xu Changyong couldn't help but interject, "Brother Yang, the Tartars are coming to attack us; it's not as simple as just eating and drinking!"

"Of course I know, I was just giving an example! We can't stop eating or drinking just because we might choke, nor can we retreat prematurely just because the Tartars are about to attack us and we're in danger!"

Xu Changyong thought for a moment, shook his big head, and still couldn't figure out what it meant.

He just felt like something was off, but he couldn't quite put his finger on it. Yang Zhen's words left him speechless.