choke element

Chapter 1020: Turbulence (Part )

In every organization, there are people like Wei Deng, who do not hold high positions, but have a long history, extensive connections, and a strong backer. Their actual status and influence far outweigh their positions. The warning effect of beheading such a person is also far greater than punishing ordinary officers.

The person in charge of carrying Wei Deng's head on a bamboo pole and patrolling various sections of the city wall was one of Guo Zhongyuan's trusted soldiers. Guo Zhongyuan also sent ten other soldiers with loud voices to follow him.

With just this amount of personnel, the number of regular troops around Guo Zhongyuan dropped to less than 100. There was originally a group of prison soldiers accompanying him, but they were sent out last night as an emergency measure and could not return for a while.

The commotion last night was extremely dangerous.

Kaifeng was a huge city with many businesses and a mixed crowd. More than 30,000 people had fled into the city. If someone panicked and started a riot, rumors would spread among the people, and they would be threatened. A big mess would happen immediately. Therefore, Guo Zhongyuan had issued a strict order to clean up the streets. No one was allowed to go out without a military order, day or night.

However, a group of wealthy merchants from the Song Dynasty did not obey the order. They were frightened by the Mongol army's reckless performance, and they believed that they had no duty to live and die with the Zhou army and people. So they relied on the connections they had accumulated by spending money everywhere when doing business, and colluded with others in private. These people were really rich and willing to spend money. They quickly bribed a team of soldiers guarding the city gate with a large sum of money, intending to use them as a cover to open the city and escape at night.

If Kaifeng's defenses were solid and the troops were sufficient, it would be fine to send some troops out of the city to cover their escape. After all, these people were big money holders, and they would have to do business in the future. Moreover, the Southern Dynasty did not distinguish between officials and businessmen, and who knew whether some powerful people behind them would be useful in the future.

However, Kaifeng City was in a weak state at that time. If they escaped, they would almost certainly fall into the hands of the Mongolian army. The lack of military force in the city could not be concealed.

The Mongolian army was not good at attacking cities, and judging from their sudden appearance, they did not seem to be able to carry various siege equipment. But if they knew how desperate the military forces in the city were, and that General Guo Zhongyuan was only accompanied by a hundred people to suppress the rebellion, how could they not come and attack?

Even if they are unwilling to climb the city walls like ants, they can still force the people to fill the moat with their lives!

Fortunately, this group of people did not succeed. Monitoring various unusual movements is the specialty of the Recording Department. This time, the Mongolian raid was not forewarned by the Recording Department. Everyone felt ashamed and was on high alert in the city. They got wind of the situation in advance and informed Guo Zhongyuan to send troops to intercept them. Guo Zhongyuan immediately sent out more than 200 prison soldiers to block the group in the street, first killing several leaders and then the lieutenant who accepted the bribe.

The people from the Records Department immediately proposed to occupy the taller buildings in Kaifeng City to monitor the movements. Another suggestion was that in peacetime, a certain type of person could walk around in Kaifeng and was also a guest of honor for local officials. But the rules were different in wartime, and in order to prevent danger before it happened, some things had to be done.

So Guo Zhongyuan ordered the prison troops to assist in gathering together in advance the wealthy people, merchants, and Song people who came to do business in the city who might be shaken, in the name of protection, but in fact for confinement.

Everything needed manpower, and each team of manpower had to be dispatched by Guo Zhongyuan. Every time Guo Zhongyuan gathered a few available people, they were immediately dispersed back to the huge city for various reasons. He felt like a shovel soldier, busy shoveling soil into the turbulent river, but every time he shoveled a little, it was swallowed up by the surging river water, and there was no effect at all.

However, there were still those who ate raw meat and drank blood outside the city, eyeing them covetously. Guo Zhongyuan could only try his best to stabilize the situation in the city, so that the outsiders would not know the truth and dare not act rashly.

The major cities in the northern border of the Great Zhou Dynasty were close to Mongolia, and small-scale battles were constantly fought on a daily basis. The garrisons were generally well-equipped, well-trained, and numerous. However, Kaifeng was different from the cities in the northern border. As the old capital of the Song Dynasty and the central city of Henan Province, its political and economic significance had always been far greater than its military significance. In terms of military, Kaifeng's significance as a logistics and military supply distribution center was far greater than that of a defensive node.

Therefore, once a serious situation arises, the small number of troops are busy suppressing internal unrest, and they can do nothing about it by relying on civilians to implement the strategy of confusing the enemy with an external force.

The situation was really bad, and Guo Zhongyuan had no means to break it. He just hoped that no more troops would retreat to Kaifeng. If they came, they would only be killed by the Mongolian cavalry, and their heads would be used to intimidate the defenders; even if they managed to escape, they would not bring any good news, and would only cause continued unrest in the city. Why bother?

Guo Zhongyuan held onto the battlement and looked out.

The attendant said, "General, be careful of the Mongolian arrows."

Guo Zhongyuan hummed, but did not retreat much. The morning mist outside the city had dissipated, but the winter sun seemed to have no energy and was slow to rise above the treetops. Guo Zhongyuan squinted his eyes and tried to look as far as possible. He saw many bodies lying in a mess between the road outside the city and the affine. Some were soldiers of the Zhou army, some were ordinary people, some had just died, and some had been dead for several days, attracting flocks of birds to circle and peck at them.

The wind blew over the top of the city, bringing with it the faint sounds of children crying, women wailing, and people who were hacked by the Mongols but not yet dead, groaning and uttering painful curses from time to time.

The only thing missing was the Mongolian cavalry.

Guo Zhongyuan knew that they had retreated far away. The Mongolian tactics of luring the enemy into a field battle did not work in Kaifeng. The defenders on the city were on high alert from beginning to end, but never left the city. So the Mongolians were suspicious. They were watching and waiting.

Guo Zhongyuan was also waiting, waiting for the power in his hands to slowly grow stronger.

Progress in this area has been a bit slow... He didn't want to complain about his subordinates; they had done their best, and it was the continuous withdrawals over the past few months that had made this originally simple task too difficult.

He was very sure that the powerful war machine of the Great Zhou would definitely respond to the Mongol surprise attack, but it was hard to predict when the reinforcements would arrive. As the commander-in-chief of the Nanjing Road Military Command, he had to do something.

Guo Zhongyuan suddenly started coughing, and his staff quickly brought him a cloak.

At this time, there was a rumbling of footsteps under the city, and a large group of people lined up to rush over. It turned out that the local officials had cleared out the able-bodied men from several cart-making workshops in the nearby Jiacheng. A total of more than 3,000 people rushed to the top of the city.

The previous waves of civilians sent were all slack, and Guo Zhongyuan didn't even dare to equip them with weapons such as bows and crossbows, only long spears and a large number of flags. In addition, more than ten veterans had to be added for every hundred people in order to comply with military orders in a timely manner.

This batch is much stronger.

Guo Zhongyuan knew that this was because most of the newly established cart manufacturing workshops in recent years were not based on commercial companies, but were funded and built by independent transport teams. These transport teams generally had close relations with local post offices and took on many veteran soldiers who retired from the army to the post offices and then retired from the post office knights to become civilians.

The rules for making carts came from the army. Many craftsmen were from the military, so they were divided into groups and issued orders in the workshop, which was different from ordinary people.

There was a military academy arranging weapons, and the civilians raised their weapons to show him. They were axes and chisels commonly used in workshops, and they looked fierce.