Chapter 400: “Excrement Punishment” Hong Chengchou
In the middle of the night, the Qing army opened the city gates and broke out from all sides, while the Red Army pursued and killed anyone with a braid, an accent, or who didn’t wear a white cloth.

Hong Chengchou was already over sixty years old and had difficulty walking, but he still managed to break out of Xiaowu Gate with a team of shrimp guards and rushed towards Meiziyuan. Along the way, the Red Army intercepted and killed them, and the shrimp guards kept falling behind.

At about 11:00 p.m., Hong Chengchou arrived at a small forest. He had a headache and was too tired to breathe, so he ordered them to stop and rest for a while.

The moonlight was like water, illuminating the world very brightly. Looking from a high place, I saw that the torches of the Red Army had gone far away, and the shouts of killing were also fading away.

Wang Dayuan came over, handed over a kettle, and said, “Sir, please have a drink of water.”

Hong Chengchou took a deep breath, took a big gulp of water from the kettle, and said, “A friend in need is a friend indeed, and a hero is known in times of turmoil. Dayuan, I never thought that you would always be by my side to protect me.”

“I am a rough man and do not know etiquette. If I have offended you before, please forgive me.”

Hong Chengchou had more than a hundred shrimp guards around him, led by Wang Dayuan and Wang Fuchen.

Wang Dayuan was a Liao person, his grandfather was Nurhaci’s personal servant, so he was loyal to the Qing Dynasty. He did not take Hong Chengchou seriously and often neglected him.

Wang Fuchen was from Shaanxi and was a surrendered general, but he was deeply appreciated by Dorgon and Fulin. He served Hong Chengchou very respectfully, but he was kind and righteous, and secretly surrendered to the Red Army. Hong Chengchou was suspicious and sent people to secretly follow him, but he could not get any definite evidence. Before the war, Hong Chengchou tried to get rid of Wang Fuchen. But Wang Fuchen was more skilled and escaped from Changsha in advance.

After being intercepted and killed by the Red Army, the Qing army had been scattered. Of the more than one hundred Xia guards, only sixty or seventy were left.

Hong Chengchou was very cunning. When breaking out, he deliberately avoided Shen Yongzhong’s large group of troops to avoid being implicated by Shen Yongzhong.

“Is the student’s seal of governor still there?” asked Hong Chengchou.

Wang Dayuan patted the bag on his chest and said, “Don’t worry, sir, it’s all very well.”

As they were chatting, several war horses stopped grazing at the same time and looked towards the direction of Changsha city.

Wang Dayuan was alert, lying on the ground listening, and quickly stood up and said, “Sir, something bad has happened, the Red Bandits are catching up with us!”

An autumn breeze blew by, and the sound of hurried horse hooves could be heard faintly.

There are pursuers!
Hong Chengchou was completely confused. With the help of his guard Xia, he mounted his warhorse and fled hurriedly to the south.

The pursuers were moving very fast, and the sound of horse hooves was getting closer and closer. Hong Chengchou looked back and saw the shadows of torches behind him, which made him even more frightened.

Soon, the sound of gunfire rang out, and it was very intense. The Qing army was injured by stray bullets from time to time, and some fell off their horses, groaning in pain.

It seems that they must be cavalrymen from Huben Town, and they can shoot on horseback. Hong Chengchou whispered to Wang Dayuan: “Dayuan, the Red Bandits are catching up, and we are too conspicuous if we are mixed together. You take a team of elite soldiers to escort me to the south, and let the rest of the troops turn east.”

Wang Dayuan was thinking this, so he immediately passed the order down. Suddenly, the shrimp guards split into two groups.

Unexpectedly, Hong Chengchou shot himself in the foot. The Red Army seemed to have figured out where Hong Chengchou was going, and they chased him closely, getting closer and closer. The guards and horses were shot down from time to time, but they did not dare to turn around and fight back against the Red Army.

The Red Army was large in numbers and quickly surrounded Hong Chengchou.

“Jiu Weng, surrender!” A familiar voice sounded from nearby.

Wang Fuchen! Wang Dayuan was so angry that his teeth itched, and he cursed: “Wang Fuchen, you are a surrendered general. The emperor trusts you so much and uses you. But you are a traitor. How can you have the nerve to persuade us to surrender?” “Haha,” Wang Fuchen laughed and said, “You and I are Han men. Why should we be accomplices to the Tartars? Jiuweng, if you surrender, you may be reused by the king. Dayuan, you are loyal to your master and you are a good man. If you surrender, you may even become a general of the Red Army.”

“Bullshit!” Wang Dayuan was about to curse but was stopped by Hong Chengchou.

“Minister, may I ask how you found me?”

“Nineth Master, you have been smart all your life, why are you so foolish? In the military headquarters, even the lowly servants know how to be loyal. If they just steal a piece of clothing or a tobacco pipe you have used, wouldn’t your whereabouts be exposed?”

A few dog barks were heard, and Hong Chengchou suddenly realized that his headquarters had been infiltrated by the Red Army. It was no wonder that Wang Fuchen was able to escape unscathed and the Red Army was able to chase him here.

“Stop talking nonsense here!” Lu Shouyi, the intelligence bureau detective, said, “Hong Chengchou, order your men to surrender, otherwise the Red Army will kill them without mercy!”

Because they didn’t want to die, Hong Chengchou, Wang Dayuan and others finally surrendered.

Hong Chengchou originally thought that the Red Army treated prisoners well, and that he was the governor of five provinces of the Qing Dynasty, so he would definitely be treated differently by Cen Danchu. If that was the case, he might as well surrender sincerely and actively offer advice to the new master. Anyway, he had already lost his integrity, and it would not matter if he lost it again. If he did it well, future generations would even say that he had achieved great success late in life!
Unexpectedly, the next day, Hong Chengchou was escorted back to the Red Army camp and was tied next to the toilet.

He loved cleanliness the most in his life, and would not tolerate a speck of dust on his clothes. He would eat fine food and burn incense at home. But now he was standing next to a toilet, not only had to endure the stench of feces and urine, but also had to be ridiculed by the soldiers using the toilet.

At noon, a staff member from the Education Bureau came over with a table and chair, a set of writing brushes, inkstones, and a cold rice ball made of steamed brown rice. Hong Chengchou usually didn’t even look at it, but now he was drooling as he looked at the rice ball.

The staff officer covered his nose and asked unhappily, “Are you Hong Chengchou?”

Hong Chengchou swept the floor politely, enduring the stench in the toilet, and said, “I am a student.”

“Do you know how Ni Zan died?”

Ni Zan was a famous scholar in the late Yuan Dynasty and early Ming Dynasty. He suffered from mysophobia and was a famous painter in Chinese history. According to folklore, Zhu Yuanzhang, the first emperor of the Ming Dynasty, summoned Ni Zan to be an official, but Ni Zan refused to accept the appointment. He used the Jiazi year instead of the Hongwu year in his paintings. Therefore, the jailer guessed the emperor’s intention and invented the “excrement punishment”. He tied a dung bucket on Ni Zan’s back and made Ni Zan, who had a lifelong mysophobia, live with excrement. Later, Ni Zan fell ill and was pushed into the dung pit and drowned.

Hong Chengchou swallowed his anger and whispered, “The students know.” He could not have imagined that even if he wanted to curry favor with the Red Army, the Red Army would not want him.

“Do you know how Zhang Cunren died?”

During the Battle of Zhaoqing, Zhang Cunren was captured and wanted to remain loyal to his country. However, the Red Army chopped off his feet, tortured him to write a confession, interrogated him for confidential information, and then scalped him, cut off his hands and feet, and sent him to Guangzhou to intimidate the Qing army.

Hong Chengchou felt extremely regretful when he thought that he might follow in the footsteps of Ni Zan and Zhang Cunren. If he had known earlier, he would have died in Songshan. Why did he have to be despised by his relatives and friends, and why did he have to suffer humiliation from the Red Army?
With tears streaming down his face, Hong Chengchou continued, “The students know.”

“Since you know this, write a letter to persuade us to surrender.”

“Yes,” Hong Chengchou asked like a helpless student, “May I ask, General, to whom did you write the letter of persuasion to surrender?”

“Written to your good student, Wu Sangui.” The staff officer sneered and said, “Hong Chengchou, if you had known this would happen, why did you do it in the first place? Persuade Hong Chengchou to surrender, and tell him all the intelligence you know about the Tartars. This can be considered as making up for your crime with merit, and maybe the king will give you an official position.”

He could no longer bear the stench of the toilet, so he covered his nose and left, instructing the guard, “Take good care of the governor!”

The guard sneered softly and said, “Yes.”

(End of this chapter)