Wandering the Heavens

A moment later, Zhu Qizhen was brought over by the Wala soldiers who were monitoring him, and Xining came with him.

"Ming Dynasty's Retired Emperor, please take a seat!" Yesen's attitude was very polite and he tried his best to save Zhu Qizhen's face in front of others.

"Just tell me what it is!" Zhu Qizhen had been held hostage and marched for several months and had not yet adapted to the situation. He felt quite depressed. When he heard Yesen calling him the emperor, he felt angry but he could only pretend to accept it.

"Your Majesty, the Grand Tutor asked you to sit down, you'd better sit down, otherwise the Grand Tutor will be unhappy." Xining turned the tables here and became the master, and he belittled and tortured Zhu Qizhen to the extreme.

"How dare you! You have no right to interrupt when I'm talking to your master!" Yesen pretended to be displeased and scolded Xining.

"The Grand Tutor is right. I was overstepping my authority." Xining hastily slapped herself in the face and apologized.

"Ming Dynasty's Retired Emperor, have you seen this thing?" Yesen asked, holding a glowing copper cone between two fingers.

"Never seen it." Zhu Qizhen shook his head.

"To be honest, the warriors under my command encountered a mysterious Ming army. These are the copper balls fired from their muskets. I heard that they can shoot very far, accurately and quickly." Yesen sighed.

"Yesen, you slaughtered almost all of my Shenji Camp. You looked down on those muskets but you still picked up some to take back for hunting. When I was in the court, I indeed never saw the muskets you mentioned." Zhu Qizhen thought that Yesen was trying to save face because the war was not going well, but it was too naive to bring up the muskets as an excuse.

Although Yesen was not as good at strategizing as the civil and military officials of the Ming Dynasty, he was still good at judging people and reading their expressions, otherwise he would not have inherited the position of Grand Master from his father Tuohuan and unified Mongolia. Knowing that Zhu Qizhen was telling the truth, he despised the emperor even more. His country had an unknown army equipped with powerful firearms, but the emperor didn't even know about it!

Yesen sent Zhu Qizhen back, but kept Xining. The current tentative attack on Beijing City was thwarted, and Yesen had to ask this dead eunuch what to do next?

Xining's suggestion was not to attack first, but to send someone to pass on a message to the Ming Dynasty, saying that the Oirat had sent their emperor, and asked them to send someone to welcome him and discuss how to pay the Oirat's hard work fee.

In Xining's opinion, if the talks failed, it would be the Ming Dynasty's fault. They did not care about the life or death of the retired emperor, which was a violation of the core values of feudalism, namely rites and laws. If the talks were successful, the Oirat would get a windfall and might even be able to imitate the story of the Jin army taking away the Zhao Song royal family and all the civil and military officials in the court in the second year of the Jing Kang period.

Yu Qian didn't want to talk at all and sent two random people to deal with it. This move angered Yesen, who sent his younger brother to lead a large army to attack Deshengmen.

The result was that his younger brother and ten thousand elite soldiers were ambushed and wiped out, all killed by the muskets that he despised.

On October 13, Yesen personally led his army to attack Andingmen in the north of the city. He was stopped by the Ming army halfway and had to turn to Deshengmen. However, he was defeated by Shi Heng's uncle and nephew, so he moved to Xizhimen.

The garrison of Xizhimen, which was not the main direction of attack, was inferior to that of Andingmen and Deshengmen in the north. Yesen's joining further worsened the situation of the Ming army. The Ming army at Xizhimen was about to be defeated, but who would have thought that the old acquaintance Shi Heng and that mysterious firearms unit suddenly appeared on the battlefield.

Yesen's all-out attack on the first day failed completely. On the second day, he changed direction and attacked south of the city. However, he was attacked by the Ming army before he got close to the city wall.

After two consecutive days of attacks failing, Yesen had no choice but to lead his troops back to Tucheng to rest and adjust the next direction of battle.

He was riding on his horse, turning his head from time to time to look at the city of Beijing behind him in confusion. After two days of fighting, he knew that the Ming army could only passively defend and was unable to actively attack, but where did the chilly feeling behind him come from?

At 3:45 p.m. that evening, the Wala army, which had been engaged in high-intensity mobile operations for two consecutive days, fell asleep quickly after dinner. In the mountains southwest of Tucheng, Yu Xian received a report on the firing parameters of the artillery proofreading from the Beidouwei Central Command.

It would be nice if there was a night vision device, but what a pity! Especially the industry version of DJI Mavic 3 Pro is still a high-end version, it must be very cool to use it here, Yu Xian sighed secretly while flipping through the reviewed data.

If No. 9527 knew what Yu Xian was thinking, he would definitely call him shameless. In this era, he has developed thermal weapons equivalent to those in the late th century in the real world, and now he wants to engage in informationized warfare. Why doesn't he fly into the sky!

"fire!"

After giving the order, Yu Xian quickly covered his ears and ignored the noise outside the tent.

The artillery position was very noisy. Yu Xian blocked his ears but could still hear the deafening explosion. The noise in Yesen's camp was even louder. He was already unable to sleep and was staring blankly in front of the fire outside. This saved his life. His tent was hit by several shells and was blown to pieces without even a decent tarpaulin left.

Fortunately, the psychological quality of the Wala soldiers could still hold on. They gathered under the artillery fire and took Yesen with them to leave Tucheng and head north under the cover of night. They entered the mountains, marched day and night, and finally escaped into the vast grassland in the north.

The flashes of light and the earth-shaking explosions in the northwest direction attracted the attention of the defenders of Beijing. However, under the current circumstances, they did not dare to leave the city rashly. They could only suppress their curiosity and wait until dawn.

As soon as day broke, Yu Qian could not wait to take Shi Heng and hurried out of the city to Yesen's camp.

When they arrived at the city, they saw the bodies of Wala soldiers and horses everywhere, some of whom were seriously injured but not yet dead, waiting to die in despair. Houses were blown down, and the city was full of craters of varying depths caused by gunpowder.

"Hurry up and find out if there is any trace of the retired emperor." Yu Qian, regardless of his doubts, quickly whispered to the accompanying Jinyiwei.

Shi Heng brought his men back.

"Minister Yu, I have counted the number of people and found that there are more than a thousand pits of various sizes. I wanted to ask the local people, but I couldn't find a single one. Among these corpses, in addition to the Wala soldiers, there were also a few people wearing Ming Dynasty clothes, like eunuchs and soldiers in the palace. I think the people here had fled before the Wala army arrived." Shi Heng's brows were so furrowed that they could kill a fly. This was a battlefield he had never seen before.

"Besides this, what else have you discovered?"

Yu Qian naturally saw what Shi Heng said, and he wanted to know the rest.

"The Ming Dynasty does not have this kind of firearm. I suspect it is a punishment from God." Shi Heng said mysteriously.

"Ridiculous!" Yu Qian scolded in a low voice.

You still have to give Shi Heng some face in front of others.

"I may know who did it." Yu Qian's words and tone were completely different.

Shi Heng was puzzled and could only scratch his head before ordering the soldiers to gather the bodies and burn them, and to arrange for people to treat the wounded. Don't get me wrong, this was not Shi Heng's original intention, but Yu Qian's order.

In the afternoon, Yu Qian finally left Tucheng and returned to Beijing to report the results of the survey to the Emperor and the Empress Dowager. The Jinyiwei had already reported that Tucheng was bombed and the Wala army had withdrawn and was missing. What was uncertain now was whether the retired emperor died in the bombing.

"Thank you for your hard work, Yu Qing. How is Tucheng? Is there any news about your brother?" Zhu Qiyu finally waited for Yu Qian to come.

"Your Majesty, I have ordered the accompanying Jinyiwei to conduct a detailed search, but no trace of the retired emperor was found. I believe that the retired emperor is currently safe." After saluting, Yu Qian quickly reported his current inference.

"I'm glad you're safe, I'm glad you're safe! The Imperial Guards said that there is no trace of the Wala army at the moment. Do you know where they went?"

This is the most important thing. At this time, all the troops have been transferred to Beijing, and the Wala army is nowhere to be found. If they attack other cities of the Ming Dynasty to the south, it will be a serious matter.

Yu Qian wanted to roll his eyes. I left the city in a hurry before dawn and came back just now. If there is any situation, the local memorials and military reports from various garrisons will reach you first.

"Your Majesty, I have ordered Shi Heng to lead his troops to search southward. If he finds any trace of the Wala cavalry, he will report it immediately. For now, we can only wait for reports from various places."

"The Queen Mother is here!"

Zhu Qiyu wanted to ask something else, but he heard Jin Ying's voice coming from outside the hall.