Strange Tales from the Northern Qi Dynasty

Chapter 107 South City Butcher
"Boom! Boom! Boom!"

The rude knock on the door caused great dissatisfaction among the host.

"Who is it?! So rude?!"

Then someone was heard questioning loudly, and then a man who looked like a servant opened the door. This man had a pointed face and opened the door angrily, and was about to curse, but when he saw the many petty officials outside, his heart trembled and he quickly put away his anger.

"Sirs, what orders do you have?"

The ferocious servant, who was usually arrogant and rude and didn't take the passing officials seriously, now had a smile on his face, guessing the other party's intentions.

The mounted officer pushed him aside and rushed straight into the courtyard.

The servant was thrown to the ground, and hurriedly got up. His attitude became more friendly, even to the point of flattery, "Gentlemen, is there any misunderstanding? The master of my family is the old steward of the Li County Marquis family."

"There was no misunderstanding."

The official said, picking up the document in his hand and checking it. "Well, Li Shuan, is he your master?"

“Exactly.”

"Then who are you?!"

"My name is Li Shuang, and I am a servant of the family."

"Why aren't you on the household registration?!"

"I just arrived, and the head of the family hasn't reported it yet, gentlemen, why is that?"

The official laughed grimly, "Come and collect taxes!"

"The farmland of the county marquis' family was all granted by the imperial court. Where did the grain tax come from?"

"Oh, we are following the order of the county magistrate. Liyang's tribute grain is insufficient this year and needs to be shared equally by the whole city."

The servant was totally confused, he had no idea what was going on, but before he could say anything, the officials began to force their way into the backyard. The servant started shouting, but how could they be stopped? The official raised his whip in anger and whipped the servant, who screamed in pain.

This movement attracted everyone's attention. A moment later, an old man came out with the support of two people. "What are you doing?! Are you trying to rob my house in broad daylight?"

“Spread evenly!!!”

The official shouted.

Before the old man could say anything, an official broke open the door of the warehouse. The grain inside the warehouse was piled up like a mountain. The old man's eyes widened. He raised his cane and said, "Catch these robbers! Catch the robbers!!"

When his servants stepped forward, the county official drew his sword and chopped them down. The servant who rushed the fastest was knocked to the ground, and the rest of the servants were frightened and fled in all directions.

The old man rushed forward to argue, but the official pushed him casually and the old man fell to the ground, motionless.

This group of strong county officials picked up the bags of millet and wheat and loaded them onto the donkey cart, which was soon full.

"Send these back first, then make a second trip!!"

When the evil officials, as fierce as tigers and wolves, appeared in the south of the city, they immediately began to display the style of the Great Qi.

They broke into every house and began to collect taxes from them without any explanation. They knocked down their slaves, broke into their storehouses and granaries, snatched the mountains of almost stinking grain, and took it back.

When these bandits scattered, the entire south of the city fell into chaos.

There were cries, screams, and roars coming from every household.

Then I saw donkey carts filled to the brim, and officials holding bloody knives walked out of the tall vermilion gate.

Yao Xiong rode a horse and traveled back and forth between places.

Someone shouted, "You Jiao Gong! Rebellion!!"

Yao Xiong hurriedly led everyone to help. When they rushed in, they saw more than ten servants holding sharp weapons, chasing the county official and making him dodge everywhere. When Yao Xiong joined the battle, the situation suddenly changed. Those servants were hacked to death. The others wanted to escape but were caught. Yao Xiong chopped off the heads of all the people in the mansion, then hung the heads on the waists of horses and asked the officials to take a few heads with them.

Some officials rode back and forth on horseback, shouting, "Those who disobey and rebel will die!!"

He saw a raging fire burning from a mansion. Shi Yao was about to ride forward but was stopped by Liu Taozi.

Shi Yao almost popped his eyes out of shock at the scene in front of him.

He looked at Liu Taozi in disbelief.

The donkey carts were soon filled to the brim, and more than ten of them headed towards the county government office.

Liu Taozi was always riding on the green lion, looking at everyone calmly.

"Mr. Liu, this is a little inappropriate. What are you doing?"

"Even."

Shi Yao wiped the sweat from his forehead and was speechless.

On weekdays, the county officials really did distribute the spoils in this way, but the objects of their distribution were not here. They also robbed, beat, and even raped, set fire, and killed people elsewhere.

Shi Yao hated such evil villains the most.

He never imagined that one day he would go out to rob with such evil bandits.

The anomalies in the south of the city continued to spread, and the situation became increasingly chaotic.

At this moment, a group of people appeared in the distance. They were very powerful. They were all lined up in battle formation, holding various weapons, and some were even riding horses. There were hundreds of people in total, completely occupying the road ahead, and slowly approaching the direction of the county official.

The leader was riding a tall horse. He was very young and dressed elegantly. At this moment, his face was gloomy. He stared at the front with anger and shouted loudly.

Seeing this man, Shi Yao's eyes flashed with a fierce light, and he said, "Several people from the Li family are serving as officials outside. The leader is the youngest son of the current county marquis family. His name is Li Shen. He is the most brutal. He studied in Ye in the past and accidentally killed someone. The family was not easy to mess with and threatened to kill him, so he hid in Liyang and dared not go out."

"In the past two years, he has been rampant in the city, beating and killing innocent people and bullying officials."

"My chief clerk was beaten to death by him, and I, the county magistrate, was unable to seek justice for him."

Liu Taozi looked at the other party calmly. He looked around and motioned Yao Xiong and others to come over.

A group of six riders passed directly among the officials and approached the opposite side.

Shi Yao followed Liu Taozi with his hand on the hilt of the sword.

The two sides met on the road.

The Li family's guards were piled up on the road, it was packed with people.

The main road in the south city was not narrow, but with a few hundred people armed with weapons and cavalry, the road suddenly became insignificant.

As these people slowly approached, the county officials under Liu Taozi began to panic, and some even dared not to move anymore.

The distance between the two sides is getting shorter and shorter, and they are getting closer and closer.

They could see each other's expressions clearly, and even see the malice in each other's eyes.

Li Shen suddenly looked at the green lion under Liu Taozi's crotch. Once he saw it, he couldn't take his eyes away. Fire almost shot out of his eyes. He just stared at the warhorse with a fanatical look and said nothing.

Liu Taozi was much calmer. He looked around and slowly drew out his sword.

"kill!!!"

The next moment, Liu Taozi roared, raised his knife and rushed forward.

At that moment, the blue lion suddenly became excited, as if it had regained the feeling it had at the frontier. Its front hooves flew up, almost level with the humans. The blue lion was like an arrow shot out at an extremely fast speed. Before anyone could react, the warhorse had already swept up the dust and rushed towards the hundreds of people.

Li Shen shuddered, then he reacted and looked up, and saw the warhorse galloping towards him. The man on the warhorse had a ferocious expression on his face, staring at him intently, with the knife in his hand flashing coldly.

Li Shen's whole body was stiff. He wanted to do something, but suddenly he couldn't move or even make a sound.

"Pfft!!"

When the two sides encountered each other, Liu Taozi slashed with the knife in his hand, and Li Shen's head flew high.

Yao Xiong behind him had envy in his eyes. He also became ruthless, raised his knife high, and chopped it down hard.

The moment Li Shen was beheaded, the guards began to riot, and several of them screamed. Qingshi took Liu Taozi and rushed into the crowd. Qingshi was tall and rushed forward. Liu Taozi on horseback lowered his body, and the knife in his hand flew left and right. His knife was so fast that flashes of cold light could be seen. All the people who stood in front of Liu Taozi and on his left and right were stabbed by the knife.

Yao Xiong and the rest of the people also rushed up at this moment and started swinging their swords randomly.

Only Shi Yao was still standing there in a daze. He watched everyone rush out and then followed them to fight.

The guards were terrified and were trying their best to run backwards, but the whole street was blocked. The man in front turned around, stabbed his own man, and stepped on his dead body to move forward. For a moment, the guards were in chaos, killing each other, trampling on each other, and crying and wailing.

"Mad, lunatic!"

"I"

Zhao Kai was riding on a horse, cursing very harshly.

The officials around him all lowered their heads. They had never seen Zhao Juncheng lose his composure like this. Zhao Kai gritted his teeth, with unspeakable resentment in his eyes.

When he learned that Liu Taozi led people to rush to the south city to plunder, he was completely dumbfounded. Since the founding of the Great Qi Dynasty, he had never heard of a county magistrate leading county officials to rob the city! !
The targets of the robbery are the wealthy families in the city!

This is simply lawless and treasonous! They should be executed along with their entire clan! They should be torn into pieces by five horses!

Zhao Kai felt like he was about to explode. Thinking of the many troubles that would follow, he got an unbearable headache.

He was riding an exquisite white horse, which was completely white and had many ornaments on its neck, which looked very beautiful. Behind him were more than twenty officials and more than a hundred county soldiers.

They walked all the way to the south city. On the road, they saw a county official driving a donkey cart loaded with grain, heading towards the county government office.

When Zhao Kai saw these people, he became furious.

"Everyone, stay here!"

He started to scold, but these people seemed not to hear him and completely ignored Zhao Kai and continued to drive forward. Zhao Kai was so angry that he almost fell off the horse. He had just raised the whip in his hand when the county official next to him spoke.

"Mr. Zhao."

The county official's voice sounded a little strange, as if he was trembling.

Zhao Kai was stunned and looked forward following the county official's gaze.

In the drainage ditches on both sides of the main road, blood was flowing slowly.

The South City has the highest terrain, and small drainage ditches have been built on both sides of the road, which can divert the stagnant and dirty water in the south of the city all the way to the north of the city, protecting the wealthy families from the intrusion of sewage.

At this moment, what was flowing in the sewer was not sewage, but bright red blood.

The blood gathered into a stream, flowing along the sewage ditch, and continued to move past the crowd towards the north of the city.

Zhao Kai's hand holding the whip couldn't help but tremble.

Several officials were terrified and took a few steps back, trembling.

Zhao Kai took a deep breath and ignored the officials driving the car. "Keep going!"

No one spoke anymore, including Zhao Kai, who couldn't utter a word at this moment.

When they approached the south of the city, the smell of blood filled the air and almost suffocated everyone.

At the southern entrance of the city, there are several small hills.

That’s right, these are small hills made of human heads. There are four of them in total, standing right at the entrance. Those heads all have their eyes wide open in fear, with all kinds of expressions, which is chilling.

When everyone looked inside, they saw a group of people riding on horses. Their bodies were red and almost covered in blood.

As if aware that someone was watching her, Liu Taozi slowly turned around.

His whole body seemed to be rolled in blood, covered from head to toe. His calm face was stained with blood. When Liu Taozi looked at Zhao Kai, Zhao Kai's mind buzzed.

“Ahhh!! Ahhhh!!!”

Zhao Kai shouted three times in a row, each time his voice was much louder than the previous one.

He finally fell off the horse. His face was pale and his eyes were dull. After falling off the horse, he rolled and crawled, running towards the north of the city regardless of anything. After running a few steps, he fell to the ground again.

An old soldier helped him up, but found that Zhao Kai's mouth seemed to be stuck together. Zhao Kai looked at the county soldier in horror.

His mouth kept trembling, but he couldn't speak.

The old soldier saw his situation, hurriedly took out his water bag, took a sip of water, and sprayed it on his face.

Zhao Kai shuddered and finally came to his senses. "Call the county lieutenant! Tell the governor!"

"Quick! Quick!!"

Led by Zhao Kai, a group of people fled to the south of the city without looking back.

Liu Taozi rode his warhorse calmly, watching those people flee, and then looked forward again.

The guards were kneeling not far away. They were all tied up and dared not raise their heads. Yao Xiong was bandaging his wounds, cursing under his breath.

Shi Yao looked at the scene in astonishment, his eyes dull, not much different from Zhao Kai's.

He also saw Zhao Kai running away, but he was not surprised.

As one of the people who had experienced it, he now wanted to run away, let alone Zhao Kai?
He looked at Liu Taozi stiffly, "Mr. Liu, is this really okay?"

"Gathering the guards and robbing and killing the county magistrate is a crime of treason, and he deserves to die."

Liu Taozi replied.

Shi Yao was silent for a long time, then suddenly laughed bitterly, "I never thought that the revenge for my poor chief clerk would be this way."

Tian Zili stepped forward and asked cautiously, "Brother, what should we do if Zhao Kai asks the county lieutenant to lead the troops?"

Before Liu Taozi could say anything, Yao Xiong burst into laughter. "The county soldiers here are different from those in Cheng'an. If they see this Skull Mountain, they will be scared to death. How can they dare to approach it?"

"I've been to the parade grounds before. These people rarely train, their food and wages are mostly withheld, and they haven't even been given winter clothes. They have no fighting spirit at all, so there's no need to be afraid."

Tian Zili stroked his chin and said, "Brother, since things have come to this point, why not just head straight to the governor's mansion?"

"No!!"

Shi Yao interrupted Tian Zili in time and said, "Li Shen has no official position. If you say he wants to rebel, and we kill him, the court will believe it. But this governor is different. Even if he is not a governor, he is still the nephew of the queen mother. We must not do anything to him, otherwise it would be treason!"

Tian Zili glared at him.

What Nai Gong wants is rebellion!

Shi Yao looked at Liu Taozi, "Later, push the matter to me and say that it was me who gave the order. Lou Rui has long disliked me. If you say it was me, he will be very happy to arrest me and send me to Yecheng."

"I've only read a few books, and I don't have any abilities. I can't even lift a wooden door, let alone carry the world."

"I'll die if I want to. I'll leave all the affairs of Liyang to you!!"

Seeing Shi Yao's determined face, even his few minions who disliked him changed their minds at this moment.

Yao Xiong looked at him and murmured, "County Magistrate Shi is truly a hero."

The petty officials around were still collecting taxes from house to house, but now, those families were quite cooperative. They huddled in corners, or locked the doors of the inner rooms, hugged each other, and no longer dared to come out to resist.

The work of the petty officials went very smoothly.

Taozi was riding a horse and looking into the distance.

The pagoda in the distance was still so conspicuous, the many gates of the temple were tightly closed, and the noisy patrol team was nowhere to be seen at the moment. It was so quiet that it seemed like a real Buddhist quiet place.

The ground began to tremble slightly, and Liu Taozi turned around again.

The county soldiers were trotting towards this side, led by a knight with a strange Xianbei beard similar to the bandits, wearing armor and a helmet, and running wildly towards them.

The knight stopped in front of the Jingguan. His warhorse rubbed its hooves nervously, backed up continuously, and shook its head. The knight seemed to have encountered such a situation for the first time, and he kept comforting the horse under his crotch.

Just as Yao Xiong said, when the county soldiers saw the mountain of human heads, they were so scared that they dared not move, and some even dropped their weapons.

These foreign county soldiers, who were forcibly conscripted from local civilians, were completely not on the same level as the professional Xianbei warriors in Jinyang and Yecheng.

Many of these county soldiers were just farmers. One day they were suddenly captured by officials and taken back to the parade ground to become county soldiers. They had not undergone many military trainings and could barely remember military orders.

The knight raised his spear and issued orders in Xianbei.

When the county soldiers heard the order, they raised their weapons skillfully, but the weapons were still shaking.

Liu Taozi also drew his knife, and everyone mounted their horses again.

At this moment, another group of people came running towards here from a distance. It was a very luxurious carriage with knights following it.

These knights showed no surprise when they saw Jingguan. They roughly pushed away the county soldiers in front of them. Some of them were unable to dodge and were trampled by the horses.

The county lieutenant shouted and reluctantly made way for the group, and the group stopped at the south gate of the city.

Lou Rui got out of the carriage in dishevelled clothes and hurriedly put on mourning clothes.

He raised his head and saw Jingguan nearby. Instead of being afraid, he was laughing.

He finally looked at Liu Taozi in the distance.

With a smile.

"My dear nephew!!!"

(End of this chapter)