Dominate the Country

One day in May, at the seaside in the northeast corner of Annan.

In the morning, the rising sun casts soft sunlight through the clouds into the sea. On the vast blue sea, waves keep coming and crashing on the dock on the shore, making a rustling sound and splashing white foam.

The sea breeze is calm, and even the sound of the waves is particularly light. Everything seems to be still asleep and has not woken up.

The sea surface is as soft as green silk, and there are many white clouds floating in the blue sky. Seabirds with wings spread are circling in the air, looking for food everywhere.

Two Chinese sailing ships are quietly docked at the cement dock that has been built in Hongji Port. Hundreds of workers in uniform red short-sleeved uniforms are nervously unloading the cargo on the ship under the leadership of the foreman. Their movements are very agile. Under their skilled operation, the animal-driven jib crane quickly and safely lifts boxes of cargo from the deck of the ship. It can be seen that the workers are already familiar with this kind of work.

Some of the sailors on the two ships stayed on the ships, while most of them had already gone down to the dock with laughter. As the only dock operated by Chen Han in Annan, Hongji Port has all the necessary facilities in the dock area, even though it has just been built not long ago. Eat, drink, and have fun, and even spend one or two silver coins to have something with those Vietnamese maids, as long as you are willing, just let it go.

Since those Vietnamese women are willing to come to the dock area, they are already prepared.

There are four reinforced concrete turrets around the dock.

Hongji Port is located in the waters of Halong Bay. There are more than 3,000 islands of various sizes in this place. It has been the nest of Annan pirates since ancient times. The Nanyang Navy used the excuse that Annan pirates fled to Qinzhou to commit crimes years ago, and sent troops to attack and encircle Halong Bay without notifying Zheng Zhu. It has been less than half a year since then, and they have not been completely cleared out.

In addition to the battle to clear out the pirates, one of the spoils obtained was more than 2,000 Annan pirate captives. In fact, there were many Chinese from Guangdong and Guangxi. Historically, at the turn of the Qianlong and Jiaqing periods, a large number of Chinese pirates went south here and served as Vietnamese naval officers.

There is also a marine battalion stationed outside Hongji Port. Including the garrisons of four artillery forts, there are more than a thousand marine troops alone. Chen Han and the Zheng regime in the north of Annan easily reached an agreement. With 3,000 matchlock guns, 1,000 flintlock guns, 30 cannons, 600 rattan iron armors, and 5,000 swords and guns, they exchanged for the "right to use" of this vast land extending from the Hongji coal mine to the seaside, and also included the complex terrain of Halong Bay into their own sphere of influence.

The Vietnamese have not yet realized the value of a super large coal mine.

In addition to the military camp and the dock area, the entire port area also built rows of small wooden houses, which are temporary resettlement houses for employees working at the dock. When conditions permit in the future, they will naturally build more solid brick and tile houses for them.

All the cement transported from Hainan to Hongji Port was used in the construction of docks and warehouses, granaries, arsenals, material reserves and other facilities. This simple cabin will be under great pressure in the typhoon season.

Unlike two months ago, the port and its surroundings are already full of people.

At this moment, the smoke from cooking rises, and the residents who are rushing to work are already making fires and cooking. It is rare to see adult men in the residential area during the day, and even children running around are almost invisible. Chen Han has set up schools and nurseries here. Children under six years old go to the nurseries, and the women who take care of the children are mostly family members of dock workers.

And children over six years old go to school.

However, the conditions in the dock area are limited, and it is not possible to divide boys' schools into girls' schools, but only boys' and girls' classes.

At this time, there are only two types of people who are willing to leave their homes and come to Hongji Port: the first is the poor who have nothing but four walls and no food at night, and are so poor that only their family lives are left; the second is the real supporters of the Fu Han Army.

Zhang Fusheng, the current captain of the second transport team of Hongji Port Terminal, is the latter.

He is an old man of the Fu Han Army. When Chen Ming went to Jiangnan, Zhang Fusheng joined the Fu Han Army. Of course, Zhang Fusheng did not go to Jiangnan with Chen Ming, but stayed in Nanyang, and soon he was transferred from the army to the horse team of the local grain bureau.

A few months ago, he arrived at Wusongkou, and now he has transferred from Wusongkou to Annan.

The members of his transport team are from Henan, Anhui, Hubei, Hunan, Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Fujian, Guangdong and Guangxi. The people in one team speak like four or five foreign languages. Up to now, it has been two or three months, and they are still in the process of running-in. According to Zhang Fusheng, if the people in the team have not learned Mandarin, then don’t think about it!

The transport team belongs to the ranks of dock workers and is stationed here for a long time. The construction team is different. They are temporarily dispatched.

In addition to repairing docks, artillery positions, bridges and roads, they also need to level the foundation, build walls, dig ditches, and build houses. They are busy like spinning tops, but under the strong constraints of the team officers and battalion officers, they are in order, just like the hardworking workers in the ant nest.

With the offensive of the Fu Han Army against Guangxi, a large number of prisoners have been newly added to the labor camp sequence. The Fu Han Army also slowly dismissed the Annan civilians summoned from the surrounding areas, and successively transported five batches of prisoners of war here. Now there are more than 3,000 prisoners of war in the entire Hongji District, organized into eight labor camps.

At the same time, the number of graves in a cemetery has increased from nothing to more than 100 now. But of the more than 100 people who died here, few of them died of exhaustion, but were accidentally injured, and then died of inflammation, diarrhea and dysentery. Vietnam has a tropical and subtropical climate. Even if the Fu Han Army was well prepared, it was still inevitable.

"Take all these broken bricks and waste materials to fill the sea and build the pier."

Nguyen Chun came to the construction site early today. Looking at the piles of waste bricks and waste materials piled up like a small mountain on the roadside, he shouted at his foreman in Vietnamese.

Wearing a Ming-style Hanfu, if Nguyen Chun didn't speak, he looked more like a Chinese than a Chinese with a net scarf on his head and a bun. But once he spoke, his image was completely ruined.

Nguyen Chun is a real Annan.

During the New Year's Day this year, he was still a small official under Zheng Zhu, but now he is the number one henchman of the Fu Han Army in Annan. Because he can speak fluent Chinese, when the two sides negotiated, it came to the actual division of the region, and Nguyen Chun was one of the many small officials sent by Zheng Zhu to negotiate. Then he became a member of the Fu Han Army.

Especially after his family was taken to Hongji District by the Fu Han Army two months ago, Director Nguyen Chun became even more "devoted" to Chen Han.

He is the director of the Annan Labor Recruitment Office in Hongji Port, and his subordinates are all native Annan people. Even though a large number of Annan laborers have been dismissed now, he still has three or four hundred Annan natives in his hands.

Nguyen Chun is very loyal to the Fu Han Army because he knows that he can't get off once he gets on Chen Han's ship.

Now his reputation as a "traitor" and a "lackey" is very loud in Quang Ninh and Haiphong.

If the Fu Han Army abandons him, Nguyen Chun will really have no way to follow, and it is even possible that his life will not be saved.

His fate has been tied to the Fu Han Army. If the Fu Han Army prospers, Nguyen Chun will also prosper. If the Fu Han Army cannot gain a foothold in Annan, then he will have nothing to do.

There is no shortage of "traitors" in any country, nation, or region. The same is true for Annan, especially since this strong force comes from China, which has been their suzerain since ancient times. This makes it easier to overcome that hurdle psychologically.

Several Annan people nodded and bowed to Nguyen Chun and smiled charmingly. Chen Han is Nguyen Chun's sky, and Nguyen Chun is also the sky in front of them!

One ox cart after another was driven over, and the waste and broken bricks were shoveled onto the carts one by one, and then pulled to the seaside for reclamation.

As the most important coal producing area in southern China in the future, the scale of Hongji Port will be much larger than it is now. At most, by next year, after the iron factory on Hainan Island produces iron, the Fu Han Army will build a horse-drawn railway in Hongji District. Before that, the dock area will continue to expand, expand, and expand.

At this moment, outside Cat Ba Island, five small Annan boats went around the north end of the island, and then went straight west to see Hongji Port.

Nguyen Hue looked at the destination of this trip from afar, and his young face was full of expectation. He brought almost all the gold and silver treasures of his own army. A month ago, the Tây Sơn Army had just captured Qui Nhon Prefecture in a very dramatic way. Nguyen Hue's elder brother Nguyen Ngoc ordered people to tie him up and put him in a cage, and then carry him into Qui Nhon City to present him to the governor Nguyen Khữc Xuan. Nguyen Khữc Xuan was overjoyed and believed it to be true. He took Nguyen Ngoc and his people into the city without any precautions. Then in the middle of the night, Nguyen Ngoc broke out of the prison and cooperated with the Tây Sơn Army outside the city to successfully capture Qui Nhon City. Nguyen Khữc Xuan himself was also captured. After the Tây Sơn Army occupied Qui Nhon Prefecture, its momentum was greatly boosted, and it also collected a lot of precious jewelry, gold and silver treasures. Nguyen Hue hoped that he could live up to his mission and buy enough swords, guns and firearms with these gold and silver treasures!

Everyone knows that in order to get the coal-producing area of ​​Hongji, the Chinese gave a large number of swords, guns and firearms to Zheng Zhu of Beitou. Zheng Sen equipped his own army with these weapons and handed them over to his trusted general Huang Wufu. Now the troops are stationed in Liangshan area. They are intimidating the defeated Qing soldiers who fled from Guangxi to the mountainous areas of the northern border of Annam.

The newly established Tây Sơn Army certainly could not be favored by China. Although there are coal mines in Qui Nhon Prefecture, they are very small. More importantly, the Annan people of this era did not care about coal mines at all and did not understand the preciousness of coal mines at all. So Zheng Sen did not care that Hongji exchanged so much arms, and he was complacent and thought he had made a big bargain.

The three brothers of the Nguyen family also wanted to sell land, but the Chinese did not come at all.

Their brothers originally had the surname Guo, and in order to win the support of the people after the uprising, they changed their mother's surname without hesitation. Would the three brothers who didn't even care about their surnames still regret the coal mines?

These three brothers, especially the eldest brother Nguyen Yue and the third brother Nguyen Hue, are all typical "those who achieve great things do not care about small details". Some false reputation is not worth mentioning. As long as it does not involve justice, their eyes will only focus on actual interests!

Sighing at the good luck of Zheng Zhu, Nguyen Yue sent the third brother Nguyen Hue. At this time, the Tây Sơn Army had no surface force at all. Only two of the five small Annan sailboats that Nguyen Hue took were equipped with artillery, and they were equipped with more hand-to-hand combat soldiers. There were more than a hundred people in the five small sailboats, otherwise Nguyen Yue would not feel at ease.

The three brothers of the Nguyen family, who were well-known for the reputation of the pirates in Halong Bay, knew that in the past six months, the Chinese navy had been vigorously clearing out the pirates in Halong Bay. But they were still nervous, fearing that they would be robbed by pirates.

As a result, the five sailboats had just gone a short distance from Cat Ba Island, and Nguyen Hue and his men saw an amazing scene.

A tall Chinese navy warship, like a wild elephant, crashed into the fragile "crowd" - more than a dozen Annan pirate boats, firing guns and cannons, the roar of cannons resounded on the sea, and the light blue smoke enveloped the tall Chinese warship, and then more than a dozen Annan pirate boats scattered. Only three pirate ships that were injured by several rounds of bombardment by the Chinese navy were left. These three pirate ships have completely lost the ability to fight back. Most of the pirates on them were shot into sieves by shotguns, and now they are floating on the sea like three coffins.

The red blood flag fluttered on the mast of the warship, which is the symbol of the Fu Han Army Navy!

"Three generals, it's coming towards us."

The sailor's terrified shouts rang out beside Nguyen Hue. This shout caused greater panic on the ship. Only Nguyen Hue and a scholar beside him remained calm, because he knew that he had no ill intentions. And with the speed and power of the opposite ship, any resistance and avoidance would be futile. "Lower the sails, stop the boat, and throw away all the swords and guns in your hands." Nguyen Hue shouted loudly.

"General San, they want us to stop the boat for inspection." An old sailor on the boat shouted loudly.

...

The first exchange between the Fu Han Army and the Thai Mountain Army unfolded like this. When Chen Ming didn't know it at all, he was paying attention to the summer grain harvest while watching the development of the Korean War. At this time, Chen Ming couldn't even take care of the southwest battle, so how could he pay attention to an inconspicuous little information from Hongji Port.

After April, Hailancha, a general of the Qing army in the court, personally led 3,000 new troops of the Eight Banners and 10,000 Northeast Bannermen, plus 10,000 surrendered Korean soldiers, and went south from Seoul, sweeping Chungcheong Province and heading straight to South Korea.

Fu Kangan's actual position in the new army was still a battalion officer, but he was accompanied by a full 1,000 bannermen and 3,000 Korean soldiers. As a detachment, Fu Kangan led his troops alone into Jeonju [Jeolla Province].

Helin had a scar on his face. It was three inches long and slid down from his cheek to his left ear.

Such a scar did not frighten Helin. The scar on his handsome face made Helin look more heroic and brave.

Helin's position was not actually promoted. He acted as a deputy team officer, but this was only temporary.

One of Fukangan's team officers was shot and died. According to the Qing Dynasty's regulations on the Eight Banners New Army, if there is a vacancy in the battle, the deputy position will replace the position of platoon leader. However, if you want to get a real position, you must report to the Ministry of War for discussion.

South Korea - the actual control area of ​​​​Yi Sun, that is, mainly Jeolla Province and Gyeongsang Province. A large number of volunteer soldiers were organized in the local area. But God seems to not protect the Koreans. In this national crisis, neither a famous general like Yi Sun-sin emerged in the Korean official army, nor a capable minister like Guo Zaiyou emerged in the volunteer army.

Fu Kang'an marched all the way to the city of Jeonju with less than 5,000 soldiers, most of whom were Korean soldiers.

Jeonju is a very important place in Korea. It is surrounded by steep cliffs and is one of the famous ancient cities in Korean history. It is also a very important strategic location.

When the Qing army's vanguard arrived at the outskirts of the city, it was already dusk, and Helin could not deny that the terrain of the city was indeed very dangerous. But when Helin saw a camp set up by the Korean army outside the city, he smiled, and then he no longer had any worries.

The entire camp of the Korean army was full of people. Some people were playing and playing on the open ground in the camp, some were drinking in groups, and he even saw a singing girl in the telescope, but there was no military training.

A group of officers and some people dressed as civil servants gathered together, with wine and meat. Under the influence of alcohol, some were cursing, some were talking and laughing loudly, and some were crying. Moreover, the camp gate was open, and He Lin could clearly see people coming in and out with a telescope, which looked more like a village or a market than a camp where soldiers were stationed.

Of course, some people were arranged to patrol outside the camp, but the number was not large. And although the number of He Lin's troops was not large, there were four or five hundred Qing soldiers and Korean soldiers together. How could the other side not find them? In addition, there seemed to be no cannons in this camp...

He Lin immediately made a decision - to fight. He wanted to fight.

The Koreans were so lax in defense, and they were calm and playful, but they didn't have cannons. It would be a shame not to fight them!

The general swept Chungcheong Province. As Korean soldiers in Jeolla Province, shouldn't they be more vigilant? Even if they had a large number of volunteers, they should have the most basic patrols, reconnaissance and military security, right? These people are so lax now, who will die if Korea doesn't die?

There is nothing to describe about the battle.

He Lin didn't have a cannon, but only two sub-cannons and a few portable cannons.

He Lin used half of the new army to hold the line, dozens of Qing cavalrymen were also ready for the assault, and about 300 Korean soldiers and the other half of the new army were ready to attack.

The attacking troops advanced at a relatively slow speed until the Koreans discovered the Qing army and the whole barracks was in a panic. He Lin ordered the sub-cannons and the cannons to fire.

A group of musketeers poured out of the Korean barracks, and the queue was so tight that it seemed that they could not be arranged neatly. And when He Lin asked the cannons and sub-cannons to continue bombarding them, the group of musketeers, who numbered three or four hundred, became even more scattered.

The Korean officers who commanded them were shouting loudly, but until the Qing army approached them a hundred steps away, these Korean musketeers did not line up in the team the officers wanted. Then the sporadic gunfire from the opposite side opened fire.

Fifty Eight Banners New Army soldiers walked to a distance of about 15 meters from the Korean soldiers before pulling the trigger of their muskets.

Then the fifty Eight Banners New Army soldiers roared together, and rushed towards the Korean musketeers on the opposite side with about 300 Korean soldiers. The Korean musketeers collapsed immediately...

Not only did this group of musketeers collapse, but this Korean barracks also collapsed. The Qing soldiers charged while throwing grenades.

The sound of grenade explosions rang out one after another, and there was a ghost howling in the Korean barracks. In fact, the lethality of these grenades is extremely limited, but the huge "influence" caused by them is absolutely not to be underestimated.

A "key point" guarded by three or four thousand people fell into the hands of the Qing army so easily. It's like a joke!

"Mud can't be helped!" Chen Ming, who received the report of Hailancha's sweep of South Korea in May, shook his head helplessly. Fortunately, the Qing Dynasty really had few soldiers, and the combat effectiveness of the Korean soldiers who surrendered to the Qing Dynasty did not seem to increase much, otherwise the entire Korea would really be swallowed up by the Qing Dynasty.

Hey, when he was about to die, he was still able to destroy Korea. He destroyed a country. "My Great Qing" is really awesome!