Without money, what is the point of being a traitor?

Chapter 258 There is still a way to survive
perhaps……

Pei Yuan's gloomy heart beat slowly.

Finally, it returned to its normal frequency little by little.

Pei Yuan didn't even cover the silver box and went straight to find Taoist Zhiwei.

When Taoist Zhiwei saw Pei Yuan, his face looked a little embarrassed.

After all, he was pretending to be cool yesterday, saying that there were signs of rain and snow in the sky, and he also threatened that it would be difficult today and even more difficult tomorrow.

I didn't expect to be slapped in the face so quickly.

Without waiting for Pei Yuan to speak, Taoist Zhiwei said awkwardly, "The weather is unpredictable. It is indeed beyond the ability of a mere mortal like me to predict."

Pei Yuan didn't respond and went straight to the point.

"The Taoist priest said before that the weather on the day after tomorrow and the day after tomorrow might not be good. How much truth is there in this statement?"

Upon hearing this, Taoist Zhiwei didn't dare to respond.

He hesitated and said, "I am just speaking from experience."

Pei Yuan seemed not to have heard what Zhiwei said, and continued to ask, "How much is true and how much is false?"

"This..." Taoist Zhiwei hesitated again, but saw that Pei Yuan's eyes were unusually serious.

At that moment, I could only honestly express my opinion, "Based on my experience, it is 70% to 80%. Qianhu, please look, the clouds in the sky are already very thick, but for some reason, it has been gloomy and there is no snow. The wind is not strong today, so the clouds are bound to pile up more and more. Maybe if there is an opportunity, it may snow at any time."

Pei Yuan looked at the dark sky and said to Taoist Zhiwei, "That means there is a 100% chance of rain."

Zhiwei Daoist corrected him, "Seven or eight points."

Pei Yuan stared at Taoist Zhiwei and corrected him, "It is 10 points, and it must be 10 points, otherwise none of us will survive."

When Taoist Zhiwei heard what was said, he probably understood that something had happened that he was not aware of.

He had also seen big scenes before. His expression changed slightly and he suddenly became more serious. "That's ten points."

Pei Yuan said seriously, "Also, you have to think of a way to make up for the fact that it didn't snow today. You are a Taoist priest, so you know better than me what to say when this doesn't work."

Taoist Zhiwei felt a little embarrassed, but he finally agreed.

After Pei Yuan and Taoist Zhiwei finished speaking, they immediately went to see Gu Dayong and Xiao Yan.

Pei Yuan's sudden departure without saying goodbye made these two people feel like they had lost their backbone.

After they panicked and confirmed with the scouts again and again, they fell into despair.

Now the road has been destroyed.

Rain or snow may fall from the sky at any time.

I don’t know how far it is from Yanggu County.

There are more than 20,000 troops rushing here.

The two felt that they had reached a desperate situation where "there was no way to heaven and no door to earth."

When the two saw Pei Yuan coming from afar, they hurried forward.

Xiao Yan couldn't help but complain loudly, "Where is the captain? We are still waiting for you to make a decision here!"

Pei Yuan rushed over and said to the two of them without any further ado, "There is still a way to survive."

The two were overjoyed when they heard this and hurriedly urged Pei Yuan to speak.

Pei Yuan said to the two of them in a deep voice, "It's not difficult to survive, but you must obey my orders completely."

Gu Dayong and Xiao Yan had already made the worst-case plan, so being able to try their best at this time was giving them hope.

They all agreed immediately.

Pei Yuan said to the two of them, "I'm going to go to the back first to see how bad the damage is and whether I can retreat along the same route I took yesterday."

Gu Dayong and Xiao Yan had no mind to do anything else at the moment.

Everyone must follow Pei Yuan to see it.

Pei Yuan only called for a dozen auxiliary soldiers to follow him, and then hurriedly headed towards the back road.

Gu Dayong and Xiao Yan rarely cared about the problem of insufficient guards. The situation was so dangerous at the moment that both of them were already in a state of confusion.

The group walked only a few miles before they saw the road that had been dug up.

In addition, there is a deep ditch on the ground separating the two sides.

The three of them watched it with their own eyes and felt very heavy-hearted.

The soil here is relatively soft, and the previous road was barely passable.

The fact that the road surface was dug up all over was troublesome enough, but on top of that, there was such a huge gully across it.

Xiao Yan said with a slightly gloomy expression.

"Even if we manage to fill the road, I'm afraid those baggage trucks won't have an easy time passing."

Pei Yuan's expression did not change. "There is still a way. We can lay more wooden boards and let the auxiliary soldiers take turns to put the boards under the wheels."

Pei Yuan said to the auxiliary soldiers he brought with him, "Avoid the potholes on the ground and try to fill up the ditches."

After hearing this, the dozen or so auxiliary soldiers looked at each other in bewilderment.

They only brought some shovels and pickaxes and other tools for building camp.

It is not easy to fill the deep ravine in front of us.

But Pei Yuan had already given the order, so they could only awkwardly avoid the bumpy ground and try to get closer to the ravine.

Pei Yuan looked at the sides of the road again.

The ground on both sides was not much affected, but it was overgrown with weeds, tree roots were slanting, and it was even more wet and muddy.

There's no problem with simply leaving.

But in this case, all the baggage carts would have to be abandoned.

You have to know that the baggage is not just the money of the three people, but also a large amount of weapons and equipment, as well as wood, felt, tools and other miscellaneous things they need for camping.

If they abandoned their baggage, even without the threat of rain or snow, the cold early spring night alone would be enough to cause their morale to collapse.

Xiao Yan also saw the situation clearly, and he said firmly, "No matter how we deal with it, we must build the road."

Pei Yuan's face still had that gloomy look.

They observed from a distance for a while and found that the auxiliary troops were too few in number and their efforts were not effective.

Although they were working hard to shovel the soil, relatively speaking, there was little achievement.

But even so.

The landfill had just begun when a large number of archers rushed out from the forest and shot arrows at the ravine.

Perhaps it's because they are blocked on both sides of the ravine.

Those Bazhou bandits behaved extremely boldly. They rushed to a place only a dozen meters away and shot indiscriminately at the auxiliary troops.

Those auxiliary soldiers did not have strong fighting spirit to begin with, and when they discovered that the bandits were approaching, they decided to retreat.

But they were not too panicked because there was a ravine separating them.

When the Bazhou bandits started shooting arrows, even without Pei Yuan's order, the auxiliary troops did not dare to stay and retreated directly to the back.

Those auxiliary soldiers came to see Pei Yuan with some timidity, not knowing what punishment they would receive.

Pei Yuan was calm.

"Go down, the blame is not yours. If it were me, I would run away too."

Many auxiliary soldiers were surprised by Pei Yuan's understanding and retreated gratefully. Xiao Yan suggested with a grim expression, "We should also send archers up to shoot at them. Our bows can shoot farther, which is enough to suppress them."

Pei Yuan shook his head and said calmly, "It's meaningless."

Then he said to Xiao Yan, "It's troublesome for us to fill the soil, let alone them digging the soil?"

"The enemy was able to cut off the roads in front and behind us overnight. Can you imagine how many troops they actually have?"

When Xiao Yan was pointed out by Pei Yuan, his face changed drastically and he blurted out, "Didn't they say they only have a team of over a thousand people?"

Pei Yuan pointed out a detail that even he had overlooked before.

"At that time, when we interrogated the captured prisoners, it was in Juye County next door."

"If our previous guess is correct, this 'Little Wu Song' is from Yanggu, then if such a powerful person returns to his own small piece of land, will there still be only a thousand people?"

Everyone's heart sank.

I didn't expect that this small negligence would hide such a deadly danger.

Gu Dayong seemed a little unconvinced, "But from what we just saw, there weren't many people in ambush."

Pei Yuan said with certainty, "The others should be hiding nearby. Either they want to wait until we have exhausted our strength to fill the gullies, and then launch a fatal attack when our men and horses are exhausted. Or, their new reinforcements are farmers gathered nearby, and they have no fighting power at all."

"Those bandits are probably afraid of my bravery and don't dare to fight us head-on."

Pei Yuan's words were very impolite.

Xiao Yan, however, thought there was nothing wrong with it.

Xiao Yan also privately asked someone about the events of the two previous battles.

After listening to it, the fighting image of that person gradually corresponded to the guy who was waving door panels on the long street and defeating the elite troops of the Northern Pacification Division.

From Xiao Yan's point of view, one has to say with full conviction that he is very awesome.

Among all people, only Eunuch Gu Dayong disagreed with this and even suspected that there was some false rumor.

After all, no one knew better than him what the quality of Pei Yuan's first place in the martial arts examination was.

Xiao Yan was a little anxious and asked Pei Yuan directly, "Captain Pei just said there is a way out. Where is it?"

Pei Yuan looked at Gu Dayong, then at Xiao Yan, and said calmly, "It seems that we have to be prepared to abandon our baggage."

Gu Dayong's face changed drastically, and he subconsciously shouted, "No."

Pei Yuan ignored Gu Dayong again and looked at Xiao Yan.

Although Xiao Yan was only a deputy captain, he had an excellent background and Xu Feng tried to curry favor with him all the way.

With Xu Feng's assistance and acquiescence, Pei Yuan was able to take over the troops smoothly.

If Xiao Yan had objections and joined forces with Xu Feng, then the Xuzhou soldiers that Pei Yuan could command might only be those influenced by Ding Hong.

The last time Xiao Yan faced danger, he showed an indifferent attitude towards money.

The situation was more dangerous this time, and Xiao Yan acted more decisively.

"You can abandon the baggage."

After saying that, he felt it was a pity, and then he made amends, "Captain Pei needs to carefully consider whether to abandon the baggage."

Pei Yuan said, "Okay, it's settled."

Gu Dayong was furious. "Well, Pei Yuan, we were just planning something to do together a few days ago, but now you dare to do this to me."

Intentionally want to take the opportunity to threaten.

But he suddenly realized that Pei Yuan's series of plans were to help him get rid of the crime and help him take back the Western Factory.

Why would I use this to threaten Pei Yuan?

Although he was frustrated, he also saw the situation clearly.

If they don't make a decision quickly and are trapped here, they will just have to wait for death when the armies of "Big Tiger" and "Starry Sky" arrive.

Gu Dayong sighed and said, "Forget it, it's all up to you."

Seeing this, Pei Yuan didn't want to offend Gu Dayong.

He thought for a moment and said, "It may not be that there is no chance to make amends."

He asked Xiao Yan, "Let's be frank. How much is the value of the property that Captain Xiao brought with him?"

Xiao Yan didn't know why Pei Yuan asked this. He had a backer and was not afraid of being exposed. Besides, who among those present was clean?
So Xiao Yan answered directly, "More than seven thousand taels."

Pei Yuan said, "I brought 10,000 taels."

Thinking of Gu Dayong, the creditor, who was right beside him, he added, "This is what Captain Han asked me to escort to the capital to open up the situation in Beijing."

After saying this, Pei Yuan looked at Gu Dayong and asked, "How much valuables did Eunuch Gu bring with him?"

Seeing that the two men were honest, Gu Dayong did not hide anything and said, "There is always 30,000 to 50,000 taels of silver."

The range of thirty to fifty thousand taels of silver is a bit too large.

Pei Yuan asked carefully, "Can you tell me the exact amount?"

Gu Dayong hesitated for a moment and said, "There are some antiques, jades, calligraphy and paintings. It's hard to say how much they cost."

Pei Yuan asked, "Where's the cash?"

Gu Dayong thought for a while and replied, "About twenty-seven or eight thousand taels."

Pei Yuan finished his question without saying much, and just said, "Since you two are willing to trust me, how about I take full charge of the next matter?"

They both solemnly confirmed it.

After all, the only one we can rely on now is Pei Yuan.

The three men then returned to the army.

Pei Yuan immediately gave orders to the soldiers who were scattered around to explore the way to regroup, and then the entire army set off to head towards the rear.

Xiao Yan and Gu Dayong were somewhat worried.

Didn’t you see just now that this road is difficult to travel?

After a while, the team arrived at the front of the ravine in a mighty manner.

The unusual movement here immediately attracted the attention of the bandits on the other side of the ravine.

A large number of archers appeared vaguely in the distance.

Perhaps because they saw that these were just soldiers coming over and had not yet started to fill the ditch, they were not in a hurry to shoot.

Pei Yuan ordered the ambush troops to push the baggage carts forward and build a simple defense line.

Xiao Yan and Gu Dayong both noticed that their cart loaded with valuables was pushed to the front. Thinking of their previous promise, they remained silent.

Pei Yuan urgently called Chen Toutie, Cheng Leixiang and Ding Hong and gave them some instructions.

After hearing this, Ding Hong immediately led the cavalry to retreat far away.

Chen Toutie and Cheng Leixiang silently gathered troops behind the defense line.

The 250 men led by Chen Toutie all wore cotton armor and carried bows and arrows.

The two hundred and fifty men of Cheng Leixiang were all wearing cotton armor, full armor, and carrying swords and shields.

When Xiao Yan and Gu Dayong saw Pei Yuan gathering his troops, they knew that Pei Yuan had made up his mind and it all depended on what he would do next.

After Pei Yuan arranged the combat soldiers, he went to the auxiliary soldiers who were somewhat panicked.

Pei Yuan ordered them, "Take all the axes, saws, and shovels, and don't take anything else. When I say three, rush directly to the other side."

(End of this chapter)