"Prince Nang, is he truly sent by God the Heavenly Father to assist King Wang in establishing his realm?"
"Certainly! God the Heavenly Father is King Wang's father in heaven. Establishing a realm is so difficult for King Wang, and I, as his third son of the Heavenly Father, almost got killed by Qingyao today. It's only natural for the father to send someone down to help! And by the way, didn't you see how this heavenly general came down?"
"I did see... a huge lightning ball, purple, and it struck him and he was blown out... but why did he faint? Shouldn't the heavenly general be very powerful?"
"Three Aunt, it doesn't matter if he fainted or not. Just say whether we won or lost in the battle of Suo Yi Du?"
"We won... but..."
"That's right, the key is winning... once we win, we are powerful! Extremely powerful!"
On a shaky wooden boat that seemed to be heading nowhere, Luo Yao Gu faintly heard a man and a woman conversing in Hakka dialect.
Hakka dialect is difficult to understand, but luckily he is a Hakka from Meizhou City, Guangdong Province. He shares the same ancestry as Luo Daguan, the leader of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, and Luo Fangboh, who established the Lanzheng State in Sarawak during the Qianlong era.
The man seemed to be called Prince Nang, the third son of God the Heavenly Father... What? The third son of the Heavenly Father? Isn't that South King Feng Yunsan from the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom?"
The woman is called Three Aunt, could it be that she's Lady Su San, the first female general of the Heavenly Kingdom?
That's right, they just fought a battle at a place called Suo Yi Du against a group of people called Qingyao, and they won... Wait, Suo Yi Du... Suo Yi Du Battle? The Taiping Army won? This is different from what I learned... What's wrong?"
Just as Luo Yao Gu was thinking about this, his previously hazy mind suddenly cleared up a lot. The image of himself single-handedly riding a bike and charging the Qing artillery formation at Suo Yi Du, almost getting chopped to death by a Qing martial artist, immediately flashed through his mind.
Is that... true?
Is this a dream?
Ouch......Luo Yao Gu secretly pinched himself —— it really hurts!
It must not be a dream!
I can't help but take a closer look......
Luo Yao Gu opened his eyes, carefully looked around, found that he was on a shabby wooden boat, and was laid on a stretcher made of broken door panels. A man and a woman wearing yellow robes and red hats were standing at the head of the boat, engaged in conversation.
The man was also in his thirties, short in stature with an ordinary-looking face, pale complexion, and a bandage wrapped around his forehead. He was leaning on a crutch in his right hand, clearly injured.
The woman, in her twenties and fifties, was tall and imposing, with fair skin, arched eyebrows, a prominent nose, bright eyes, and an indescribable aura of decisiveness.
Moreover, at the feet of the man and woman was a black delivery box with a kangaroo logo and the words "Meituan Takeaway" printed on it. On top of the box, there was a Xiaomi smartphone and a solar-powered charger.
He looked in the direction of the stern and found a rough-clothed man with a red headscarf and a thin boy in their early teens, both of them pushing a boat. There was also his electric bike, which was lying on the upper deck.
Looking further out, he could see several wooden boats stranded on the riverbank with black smoke billowing from them, and a busy beach. Countless "redheads" were busy with "civil engineering" on the beach — they were probably "building strong fortresses"?
Luo Yao Gu, who majored in history at the undergraduate level, was very knowledgeable about the Taiping Rebellion. He knew that "fortifying strong camps and fighting stupid battles" was not an exclusive strategy of Zeng Guofan; in fact, the Taiping Army was also adept at "fortifying strong camps and fighting stupid battles."
In fact, during the entire Taiping Rebellion, group battles that were decided in a few days and caused significant casualties were very rare, which was common in Napoleon's wars and the American Civil War.
Most of the battles between the Taiping Army and Qingyao were fortification battles, guillotine battles, siege wars, and sawtooth wars. The scale of each battle was usually not large, and the casualties on both sides were not high. However, the cumulative losses accumulated year after year were quite formidable.
The Battle of Suo Yi Du was one of the few battles that were decided in a day or two, and it caused huge losses to the Taiping Army — perhaps losing two or three thousand people, two or three hundred ships, plus the South King Feng Yunsan!
However, now, Feng Yunsan is still alive, and the number of burning ships on the river is not many. Moreover, the Taiping Army is fortifying their strongholds on the waterway at Shuidang Bay on the west bank of the Xiangjiang River.
This means that the Taiping Army has repelled the ambush by Jiang Zhongyuan's Chu troops and He Chun's Green Camp, and occupied the beachhead on the west bank of the Xiangjiang River. This can protect the soldiers of the water camp as they remove the wooden stakes at the bottom of the river, allowing the fleet to pass safely... Could history have been changed?
Who changed it?
It can't be... changed by me, can it?
Oh right, Feng Yunsan just said I must be sent down by God the Heavenly Father to help Hong Xiuquan build his realm! Could it be that I came as a godsent warrior, charging into the Qing troops' artillery positions all by myself on a bike... and thus saved the nearly defeated Taiping Army? It seems like there really is such a thing!
Luo Yao Gu has remembered some things!
He thought again: So it seems that time travel and changing the course of history are both possible? This is a groundbreaking discovery that could overturn physics and history!
Thinking of this, Luo Yao Gu became so excited that he couldn't contain himself. He felt that the two doors to the peak of life had already opened wide for him.
One of the doors went "get involved in science" and studied time travel techniques first, trying to return to the future, then continuing to deliver food and study for the postgraduate entrance exam... he had to study for a master's degree in physics and strive for future research on time travel!
But the problem was that he had a limited grasp of mathematics and physics knowledge, which might not be sufficient to support his research on time travel.
And it's quite difficult to become proficient in mathematics and physics through self-study...
It seems that to conduct research in this field, we first need to establish a science and engineering university in the 19th century to cultivate some world-class mathematicians and physicists.
The other door was to continue his original profession, research on modern history, mainly on the history of the Taiping Rebellion, and no need to study for a master's degree. Since he is now an academic giant in the history of the Taiping Rebellion.
Professors specializing in this field couldn't have met Feng Yunsan or Su Sanwang either!
Furthermore, he can explore a more cutting-edge direction in history — changing history after time travel!
Since the result of the Battle of Suo Yi Du can be changed, the failure of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom Movement must also be avoidable... And the reasons why the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom Movement ultimately failed, Luo Yao Gu, a history undergraduate, still knows some.
