Chapter 5: Fallen Phoenix

Chapter 5: Fallen Phoenix

Chapter 5: Fallen Phoenix
More than five hundred rebels - ahem, Tian Xing's group called them "Anti-Qing Volunteers" - followed Tian Xing in a noisy manner and headed towards the official road leading to Rehe.

If you take each of these people individually, they are all strong enough to run a horse, but when put together - they really don't look like an army.

Tian Xing was knowledgeable and experienced, and he knew that fighting in this situation was a bit risky.

However, there is only one chance to kill the Qing Demon Emperor. If you miss it, you will never get it again.

In such a hurry, this was the greatest force he could muster. The elite troops of the Nian Army or the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom could not just fall from the sky, right?
Here, the organized bandits still had some combat effectiveness, equipped with more than a dozen muskets and two large polearms.

The believers who had been preparing for an uprising basically had goose-feather knives in their hands, while the ruffians who had just joined had a variety of weapons.

Even if the team is not good enough, there still needs to be some organization. Several flower-picking thieves with good light skills were sent to the front as scouts, and the Baguaquan brothers kept the rear guard to prevent anyone from wandering around and falling behind.

Not to mention, more than 500 people, regardless of whether they were disciplined or not, were all strong men. It was quite difficult for them to march in the dark without getting scattered. Even the regular troops of our Qing Dynasty might not have this ability.

After walking five miles, the scouts who were exploring the way ahead came running back - ahem, the scouts had no horses, but luckily they were good at Qinggong...

"The Dog Emperor's troops are indeed ahead, marching all night long.

The Royal Army Camp and the Vanguard Camp had only two thousand soldiers in total. Without the flag of the Guard Camp, they were probably all gone.

The Tartar emperor's carriage slowed down the progress and was moving very slowly, with hundreds of eunuchs and palace maids following behind, sitting in the carriage carrying the treasures."

It was not easy to find out so much information in the dark. At Tian Xing's command, the volunteers ambushed on the roadside.

The morale of Emperor Xianfeng's troops who were heading north to Rehe was at its lowest point.

The news of the defeat at Baliqiao arrived only last night, and the soldiers were hastily marched north this morning. They did not even have time to take the treasures from the Old Summer Palace with them, and most of the soldiers were in a daze.

In theory, the emperor's personal army should be the most elite force, but the Qing Dynasty had been established for more than 200 years, and the culture was lax and the military was weak. The training of the imperial guards was neglected, the military preparations were in disarray, and the troops were hastily dispatched without even food.

After only one day's march, the little rations they brought were all gone and they were about to starve. The imperial guards rode on their horses, their eyes blank.

"Bang! Boom!"

A few gunshots rang out, and several cavalrymen under the torches fell off their horses, followed by a "crackling" sound like popping beans.

A large number of black shadows rushed up from the darkness, shouting "Good Mao Ning", "Naisi Tu Loach", "OK", and the more professional ones shouted "Fei'er!" "Gou Gou Gou!" and all kinds of Shunyi English.

"Dead, dead" - this is obviously an outsider making a comment.

Oh no, the foreigners are chasing us!
The imperial guards were immediately in a panic. They threw away their torches and ran around in the darkness like headless flies.

The Minister of Revenue, the Minister of the Imperial Guard, Su Shun, glared and shouted, "Stop making trouble, protect the emperor!"

The expert guards of the palace wearing the yellow horse hexagram became determined, moved closer to Sushun, and surrounded the emperor's carriage.

In the darkness, Tian Xing put down the bucket in his hand, which was full of firecracker fragments, stretched out his hand to pull out the ghost-head knife, and ordered the Baguaquan disciples who gathered behind him, "Kill them and take down the Tartar emperor!"

Five hundred brave men attacked the two thousand demoralized imperial guards at night, and their tactic of pretending to be foreigners hit the imperial guards' weak spot.

The imperial guards had rarely seen foreigners, so they couldn't tell the authenticity of Shunyi's English. They were in a panic and ran everywhere, unable to form a battle formation and had no fighting power at all.

If all the heroes had attacked the emperor's carriage together, Emperor Xianfeng might have been killed here.

Unfortunately, the heroes were just a mob of thieves after all. Seeing that most of the imperial guards had been defeated, they did not follow Tian Xing to kill the emperor, but instead rushed towards the cart carrying jewels.

The imperial guards who were still able to fight escorted the emperor to his side. There were only eunuchs, palace maids and concubines on the carriage. They were immediately killed by the heroes and cried for their parents, with jewels rolling all over the ground.

When the heroes saw the jewels, they immediately started to grab them.

After putting the treasure in his arms, he saw a pretty palace maid and immediately forgot everything and started tearing her apart on the spot. The palace maids, concubines, and eunuchs were screaming everywhere, and the battle was a mess.

A hero of the White Lotus Sect followed Tian Xing to kill the emperor. He was holding a Qinglong Yanyue Sword "borrowed" from the Guandi Temple. He chopped Huashan Mountain with all his strength, killing a guard. He subconsciously said, "Mother of No Life, the hometown of Zhenkong!"

The hero had a very loud voice. Sushun heard this from afar and immediately shouted, "They are not foreigners, they are the remnants of the White Lotus. Line up and meet the enemy!" Not foreigners? Listening carefully, it seems that there are not as many gunshots as the British and French devils. The black shadows in my eyes have all kinds of weapons.

The imperial guards running around immediately calmed down. What are the remnants of the White Lotus? If I can't beat the foreigners, can I beat you?
The imperial guards holding sabers gradually gathered together and began to fight with the heroes. By the time the musketeers of the vanguard camp gathered more than thirty people and started firing volleys, the situation on the battlefield had already tilted in the direction of the imperial guards.

Dozens of imperial guards were skilled in martial arts. Even Yang Luchan and Dong Haichuan were not qualified to serve in front of the emperor, and could only enter the Prince Su's Palace. There were still quite a few strong men around the emperor.

Tian Xing led a small number of elite troops but failed to reach the emperor. More and more imperial guards gathered around the emperor. Seeing his fellow Baguaquan disciples die one by one, Tian Xing sighed to the sky, "All efforts have been wasted at the last moment! The wind is blowing!"

Tian Xing escaped from the battlefield and looked back, only one eunuch from Prince Su's Palace, Eunuch Hai, a disciple of Dong Haichuan, was following him. This attack on the emperor's carriage was a big loss.

Eunuch Hai looked at Tian Xing and said, "Sir, shall we go back to Prince Su's Mansion?"

Tian Xing shook his head. "You can't go back. Maybe even your master Dong Haichuan will be implicated this time."

After thinking for a while, he said, "It seems that what Brother Shao said is right. We can't achieve anything by relying on gangsters. We need to train the army and have a regular army as a foundation before we can really do great things.

Come on, Haiqing, let's go back to Longwan Cave, pick up our luggage, and change our clothes. Tomorrow, I will take you to a powerful man."

The figures of the two disappeared in the darkness. The heroes here had no ability to follow orders and were still desperately snatching jewels and chasing palace maids everywhere.

The imperial guards formed a line and started to fight against the bandits. They fought fiercely with the heroes and the battle could not be over for a while.

…………

Shao Quanzhong rode his horse back to his shabby house, tied up the horse, and walked into the house.

There is nothing here, nothing to be nostalgic about.

He took out 1,000 taels of silver from the bottom of the box and put it in a saddle bag. It weighed more than 60 kilograms, and even Shao Quanzhong, who was thin, had a hard time carrying it.

Sitting down, he poured himself a glass of water, wiped the sweat off his face, and touched the hard silver ingots in his sack. Shao Quanzhong felt a sense of security in his heart.

This silver is so much better than banknotes. I have several brothers at home, and they are too poor to support them. They are just waiting for me to take the money back for emergency use.

As the eldest son, he took the initiative to beg for food, saying that he wanted to save money for the family, but in fact, he wanted to do something big.

Things like being possessed by ghosts in the future cannot be told to anyone, but with the old ghost's life experience, I can't just be a farmer in the countryside anymore.

Now I can't tell whether I am a person of later generations or the original Shao Quanzhong. Anyway, I still have to respect my parents and my younger brothers still have to study.

With this money, I don't have to worry about my family anymore, I can do whatever I want...

Shao Quanzhong frowned as he heard shouts of killing in the distance. Thinking carefully, he didn't remember any foreigners coming to Shunyi to kill people.

"Bang bang bang!"

Someone banged on the door.

Who the hell is coming to the wilderness to smash my door at this time? Could the shouting and killing just now be caused by bandits?
The bandits came to the wrong place to cause trouble for me. I was the ancestor of bandits!

Shao Quanzhong picked up the oxtail knife and pulled the door open.

Outside the door, unexpectedly, there was a pretty woman in her twenties, holding a boy of three or four years old.

The woman was wearing a wrinkled palace maid's dress that was covered in dust and dirt. The dress didn't fit her properly, and it was tight enough to reveal her curves.

The boy was dressed like a little eunuch, and his clothes were so big that they dragged on the ground.

The maid was calm in front of the oxtail knife, her pretty face showing a fierce look, "Look at the horse outside, you are a public servant of Shunyi City, right?
We are from the palace, if you protect us well, there will be a reward."

(End of this chapter)