The Red Mansion: From a Small Pawn to a Leader

Chapter 30 July
Li Hu has never been to Shaanxi. In his impression, Shaanxi is a place where people face the loess and back to the sky, wear headscarves and beat waist drums, and the dust is flying.

It has both the Loess Plateau with its numerous ravines and gullies and the vast Guanzhong Plain. The Guanzhong Plain of the 800-li Qinchuan Plain is deep and steady.

Not to mention Xi'an, Xianyang and other places, Baoji made Li Hu completely change his stereotype of Shaanxi.

Baoji, the birthplace of Qinqiang opera and the hometown of Emperor Yan, is the birthplace of the Zhou and Qin dynasties. It has mountains, waters and grasslands. It is suitable for summer escape and autumn viewing.

Of course, Li Hu didn’t come here to enjoy the scenery, he came here to suppress bandits.

Ever since the rebels defeated the government troops in Guanzhong, all kinds of monsters have emerged, especially the bandits entrenched in the border area of ​​Shaanxi and Gansu.

They were all bandits, and they hit it off immediately. These bandits transformed themselves into "legal bandits", seized local military and political power, and began to amass wealth unscrupulously. Some bandits even killed people to silence them after robbing them of their money, and their methods of killing were extremely cruel. Li Hu felt horrified when he heard about it.

The news that the Beijing army had wiped out 70,000 rebels at the western foot of Mount Li quickly spread throughout Guanzhong. The bandits, big and small, entrenched in various parts of Guanzhong were all frightened and lived in a state of panic. In less than half a month, more than 30,000 bandits in Xi'an, Qianzhou and Fengxiang surrendered voluntarily. Among them, there were 18 large groups of more than a thousand people.

As for those bandits who refused to surrender, Li Hu did not waste any time and directly wiped them out, eradicating all evil and leaving no future troubles.

By the end of June, Li Hu had completely eliminated the banditry in Xi'an and Qianzhou. He then turned his attention to Fengxiang Prefecture.

In order to wipe out the remnants of the rebels and bandit gangs entrenched in Fengxiang Prefecture, Li Hu carefully designed a comprehensive bandit suppression action plan to completely eradicate the bandit problem in Fengxiang Prefecture.

The first thing was to mobilize troops. At this time, Li Hu had a strong army (at least in his opinion). He first selected more than 800 old soldiers who had recovered their combat capabilities from the wounded camp. The number of troops under his command exceeded 3,000. He also transferred 3,000 officers and soldiers from the Shaanxi Patrol Camp, plus 3,000 young and strong people and 2,000 bandits who "voluntarily redeemed their sins", a total of more than 11,000 people.

Next, Li Hu sent out cavalry to drive the bandit forces entrenched in the towns and villages towards Fengxiang, the capital of Fengxiang Prefecture!
During this period, battle reports came from Hanzhong Prefecture. After the army entered Hanzhong Prefecture, it swept across the prefecture, recaptured the two county towns of Yangxian and Chenggu in one day, and then went south to recapture Xixiang and meet the reinforcements from Hubei.

Li Hu calculated the time and thought that if everything went well, the army should be approaching Zheng County, south of Hanzhong Prefecture. So he immediately led his army westward, successively recovered Fufeng, Qishan and Baoji, and controlled the Dasan Pass and other passes.

The cavalry led by Wang Daniu, Jia Yun and others also drove most of the bandits to Fengxiang.

Fengxiang was the land of Yongzhou in ancient times. King Wen of Zhou and his son first accumulated strength here and eventually destroyed the Shang Dynasty. The Qin State also built its capital here before moving its capital to Xianyang.

The Loess Plateau in the northwest of China is formed by water erosion, which is a terrace-like landform with steep surroundings and a relatively flat top, and is called the Loess Plateau. The Bailuyuan is the largest loess plateau in Xi'an.

Fengxiang City is located on a loess plateau with a radius of dozens of miles. The surrounding area of ​​the plateau is full of gullies, forming a natural defense barrier. Fengxiang City occupies the highest point on the loess plateau, forming a special terrain with high inside the city and low outside the city.

The day is bright.

About three miles away from the moat is a high ground. Li Hu, wearing a coarse cloth short coat, holds up a monocular telescope and looks at Fengxiang City, paying attention to the defense situation on the city wall.

Fengxiang City originally had no moat, but the bandits recruited civilians to build an earthen wall outside the old city wall, and then dug a trench outside the earthen wall, and led water from the East Lake in the north of the city to form the current moat.

These bandits have the guidance of an expert! If the Fengxiang prefect had this brain, he wouldn't have lost his life.

At this time, a burst of hurried horse hooves sounds came over, and Li Hu turned around to look.

A horse galloped towards this side. Li Hu's eyes flashed, it was the personal soldier who stayed in Yangzhou.

The soldier ran to Li Hu, pulled the reins, jumped off the horse, and shouted, "General, it's a letter from Miss Lin." He quickly took out a letter from his arms and handed it to him with both hands.

Li Hu took the letter, tore it open and read it. His face suddenly changed. He then held the letter tightly and asked the soldier, "What's going on?"

The guard replied, "It is said that the pleasure boat hit the Wuting Bridge. Madam Lin and the daughter of the Yangzhou prefect were enjoying the view at the bow of the boat. Madam Lin fell into the lake, and the daughter of the Yangzhou prefect was thrown onto the bridge pier by the impact and died on the spot."

At this point, he swallowed his saliva, "The boat girl was beaten to death in the lobby by the Yangzhou prefect. She kept shouting that it was unfair until her death!"

Li Hu was silent for a moment, then asked, "What did Lord Lin say?"

The personal soldier: "Unexpected."

Accident? Could it be that I was overthinking it?
Li Hu thought about it and read Lin Daiyu's letter again. He read it very carefully.

The guard suddenly remembered: "I heard from Steward Lin that in early May, Lord Lin, the Salt Transport Commissioner, and the Yangzhou Prefect jointly seized five ships carrying 100,000 tons of smuggled salt."

One hundred thousand leads!
Li Hu was shocked. How dare these people be so bold? Every salt importation taxed 2.167 taels of silver (1.075 taels of silver for regular tax and 1.092 taels of silver for miscellaneous tax), which is taels. Could it be related to this incident?

The guard continued, "Before we came here, Lord Lin said that Madam Lin's illness is not serious and that she just needs to be taken care of. Lord Lin assured the general that she can rest assured."

At this time, an old farmer was brought over by Jia Yun. Li Hu said to his guards: "You can go back and have a rest. I will send someone else to deliver the letter to Yangzhou."

The personal soldier answered: "Yes." and turned to leave.

Li Hu raised his hand to signal Jia Yun not to speak, then approached the old farmer and asked softly, "Old man, where have all the people around Fengxiang City gone?"

The old man bent his legs and was about to kneel down.

Li Hu supported him with both hands: "Don't be polite."

The old man: "Shangguan, please let me kneel down and answer."

Wang Daniu shouted, "Stand still!"

The old man stood up straight with a start.

Li Hu glared at him and asked the old man, "Did the people around here enter the city or flee?"

The old man looked at Li Hu and replied, "In response to your Excellency's words, the young and strong were captured by the bandits and taken into the city. The rest of the people who could escape have all fled."

Li Hu: "Why are you running?"

The old man looked around and said softly, "The bandits in the city said that Fengxiang City has high walls and is easy to defend but difficult to attack. The government troops will be beaten and defeated!"

Wang Daniu: “Bullshit!”

The old man's legs went weak and he knelt down: "General, spare me, this is all said by the bandits in the city, it has nothing to do with me"

Li Hu turned around and shouted to Wang Daniu, "Stay away!"

Wang Daniu curled his lips and took two steps back.

Li Hu helped the old man up and said with a smile, "Just say what you heard."

Old man: "Can you tell me this?"

Li Hu: "You are providing information, so you should tell the truth."

The old man said, "Yes. The bandits said that the government posted notices in Xi'an and Qianzhou, saying that anyone who helped the bandits defend the city would be killed even if they surrendered, and they would be punished together, leaving no one alive."

Li Hu raised his eyebrows. He even knew how to start a public opinion war!

The old man continued, "There is nothing we can do. Those bandits have knives and guns. Anyone who dares to resist will be killed without a trace." At this point, he timidly asked, "Are they telling the truth?"

Li Hu looked at him: "Of course it's not true."

The old man felt relieved when he heard this, and then told everything he knew.

Li Hu looked at the moat and asked, "Do you know this moat?"

The old man quickly replied, "Shangguan, you have asked the right person. If it were someone else, they would not know. This river is three feet wide and two feet deep. However, near the East Lake in the north of Fengxiang City, it is less than one foot deep."

Li Hu: "Oh? How do you know so much?"

The old man shuddered and said, "To answer your question, this moat was dug by the evildoer from my family who led a group of young men. He is now in the city. There are no ordinary people in the city."

Li Hu glanced at Jia Yun and motioned him to take the old man away.

Jia Yun walked a few steps to the old man and supported him: "Please come in."

The old man opened his mouth but said nothing. Supported by Jia Yun, he walked towards the camp in the distance.

(End of this chapter)