Strange Tales from the Northern Qi Dynasty

Chapter 230 Joining forces to pick peaches
Han Qinhu sat on the ground, watching the military doctor pull out the arrow from his armor and treat his wounds.

The soldiers sat around, looking at the city in the distance, without saying a word.

Han Qinhu frowned and looked around, "To coerce the people to defend the city, this is the virtue of the people of Qi!"

"There are not many soldiers left in the city. They are just civilians. If we attack them forcefully next time, they won't be able to stop us!"

"After taking the city, I will personally submit a petition on behalf of the soldiers to double the farmland they were awarded!! I will also distribute my own rewards to everyone. If anyone dies in battle, I will support their family!! They will continue to be military households and will never leave their citizenship!!"

"If any soldier can kill one armored soldier, I will reward him with a warhorse! There is no upper limit!!"

Han Qinhu didn't care about the scars on his body and spoke loudly to those around him.

The soldiers' originally lost faces immediately relaxed and they all cheered.

On the city wall, Li Qihu held a spear and stared at the Zhou people in the distance. The soldiers were cleaning up the corpses, and many military doctors were walking back and forth on the city wall, bandaging the wounds.

A general stood beside Li Qihu with his head lowered.

"General.I."

"Why did you rush out in advance?"

"The situation is critical. I dare not wait any longer."

Li Qihu frowned, "What's going on with those civilians?"

The general panicked immediately, "I really don't know this, I just led the auxiliary troops to charge out, those behind me are not my troops"

At this moment, an old man with gray hair strode up to Li Qihu, "General Li!"

"Please don't blame Deputy General Lu, we acted on our own initiative."

The old man said solemnly with a straight face: "The general has been very kind to us. We have never found a chance to repay him. Now is the time."

"My whole family is alive because of you, the general. You granted me farmland and sent my two children to school as clerks. I have fought against the Zhou people in the past, and now I don't have much time left. If I can bring one Zhou person away for you, it will be worth it!"

Hearing his words, several leaders in the distance nodded.

"Even if there are ten or a hundred of us in exchange for one of him, it's worth it!"

"Unless we are all dead first, we will not allow these thieves to enter the city!!"

"kill!!"

"kill!!!!"

Someone shouted, and soon, people inside and outside the city wall responded. The shouts and sounds of killing were continuous and deafening.

Han Qinhu, who was outside the city, heard the loud shouts of killing coming out of the city. The smile on his face froze and his eyes gradually turned into one of fear.

Heng in the north, Xinshan and the Great Wall in the south.

Yao Xiong stood on the general's platform, looking at the many soldiers below.

He was a tall and strong man, wearing armor, with a solemn and extremely majestic look. He exuded the demeanor of a great general and no one dared to look down on him.

He looked at everyone and said loudly:
"The Pseudo-Zhou colluded with the Turks and attacked together."

"There are more and more Turks outside the Great Wall. Niuchuan, Huaihuang, Rouxuan, all the way to Anzhou, this thousand-mile road is full of Turkic cavalry!"

"Some say they have two hundred thousand!"

"Some say they have a hundred thousand!"

"I don't care how many there are!! In the past, we stationed here and made it difficult for them to move. Even now, there will be no change! I am only worried that there are too few of them! Not enough for us to share the reward!!"

"Zhang Heizu's reinforcements are on the way! How can we let him share our military achievements?! Before he arrives, we have to break a few teeth of the Turks! "

Several generals laughed, and the soldiers hit their shields with their swords.

"How dare these people brazenly set up camp outside the Great Wall? Do they think we dare not go out?!"

"Great military achievements lie ahead!! I will lead you all to take them!!"

"kill!!!"

Yao Xiong immediately jumped onto his warhorse, and the soldiers in front of him began to make preparations.

Outside the Great Wall, Turkic civilians were building camps, and large groups of cavalry were patrolling back and forth. The entire plain was almost entirely filled with Turkic cavalry.

The Turkic Khan arrived in person, and more than 100,000 cavalrymen were lined up at the border, stretching for thousands of miles. There were herds of cattle and sheep, and the laborers built temporary dwellings. They waited for good news from Yang Zhong, then they went south together, broke through many lines of defense, and killed their way into Hengzhou.

The city gate was slowly pushed open.

next moment.

"Boom~~~"

The heavy cavalry came out one after another. Yao Xiong was wearing armor, as were the horses under his crotch. The iron monsters formed the vanguard. When they started running, the entire ground began to tremble.

The Turks who were lazily setting up camp on the opposite side suddenly reacted. They quickly gathered and prepared to counterattack.

In the endless frontier, the cavalrymen began to collide with each other, and in a moment, people and horses were thrown to the ground.

Everywhere there were the neighing of war horses and the roar of soldiers.

Yao Xiong fought with great force. He ignored the numerous cavalrymen and rushed straight towards the flag tent in the distance. Having stayed in Beiheng for a long time, Yao Xiong had fully mastered the methods of fighting outside the Great Wall. The Turks were extremely difficult to defeat. They had a large number of ironwares, their weapons were equally sophisticated, and their horsemanship was superb. They had just defeated the overlord of the grassland. As a brand new force, their combat effectiveness was in a period of rising strength.

They have a large number of veteran soldiers who participated in the Rouran War, and their organizational ability is not inferior to that of Zhou Qi's elite troops. Even if they are defeated, they can gather together and fight again.

As soon as Yao Xiong attacked, he was almost surrounded. All he could see in front of him were weapons stabbing at him, and his army immediately began to lose men.

But Yao Xiong dared to rush out because he was confident. The Turkic cavalry was extremely strong in small-scale combat. When they fought in the form of a team of a thousand people, Yao Xiong was defeated several times and almost died in the battle formation several times and was rescued by his men.

But once they start to gather and fight in a scale of more than 10,000 people, chaos is inevitable. Moreover, there is no awareness of protecting the main flag. The main flag commander is only surrounded by his own personal soldiers, and the rest of the people just cooperate with his tactics to fight. Their commander does not regard the army as a whole, but as a way of cooperating as multiple wholes. Each officer can have his own ideas. There is no fixed formation and tactics, and the commander's command is rough, which makes it easy for accidents.

Yao Xiong attacked left and right, killing his way through the sea of ​​people towards the position of the enemy's main flag.

One hundred thousand people cannot be gathered together. The Turkic cavalry are distributed along the border line of a thousand miles. The army here has less than ten thousand people. Even so, it is still much more than Yao Xiong's knights.

Yao Xiong saw the enemy's main general, a young man with a childish face and wearing exquisite gold armor. He was constantly roaring to the left and right.

The flags kept changing and commands were given, requiring all troops to protect the commander.

This is the difference between commanding the whole and not the whole. If Yao Xiong encountered such a situation, he would certainly order one team to retreat and the second team to protect the flank. However, the order from the Turks was simple, which was to order the protection of the main general, but did not say who should come to protect him.

In an instant, the enemy began to panic. Some wanted to protect the flanks, some wanted to block Yao Xiong's way. The knights bumped into each other, blocking each other's way. It was obviously a wide plain, but the knights were forced to pile up together at this moment, and many people could not move.

Yao Xiong grinned and raised his lance again.

"kill!!!"

He rushed out with a roar, waving his lance left and right. The knights fell down wailing. He rushed to the commander, who immediately fled and the flag fell.

The officers led their troops to retreat to the surrounding areas. They wanted to see the situation clearly before making a judgment.

Yao Xiong picked up the flag and did not pursue the commander. Instead, he turned around and retreated into the city.

The knights rushed out and the city gates were wide open.

But the Turkish knights did not pursue, they were still recalling their own knights.

Yao Xiong was covered in blood, and the knights he led out were all injured, and many of them did not come back. He rushed into the city wall and showed the captured general flag to everyone.

The defenders on the city wall immediately cheered.

The Turks outside the city were still evacuating in batches at this moment, and began to move away from the city walls gradually, as if they were worried about being attacked again.

Not only the Turks here, but also the Turks in other places gradually retreated and stopped pressing so hard. They were unwilling to become the main attacker. They came to rob the Zhou people. The Zhou people haven't started fighting yet, but they are fighting to the death with the Qi people here. It's really not worth it!

As they gradually distanced themselves, the pressure on the northern defense line eased a lot.

Chengan.

Gao Chen stood at the entrance of the alley, staring secretly into the distance.

The carriage in the distance was slowly approaching.

There were two knights in front of them, and the common people along the road hurriedly made way, and some stood on both sides to salute. Cheng'an was extremely prosperous, with people coming and going. In front of him, there were several people surrounding a vendor. They also saw the approaching carriage, and hurriedly stopped what they were doing and saluted in the direction of the carriage.

Gao Chen gritted his teeth, looked around, and prepared to go.

The next moment, he rushed out and galloped towards the carriage. The two knights had seen him and hurriedly raised their spears.

"Lu Gong! I have been wronged!!!"

He flew out, but suddenly knelt beside the car, his whole body pressed against the ground.

The two knights raised their spears but did not put them down. They looked at the carriage behind them in astonishment. Lu Qubing stuck his head out of the carriage and quickly got off. When he was about to step forward, the knights hurriedly blocked him. The knights lifted Gao Chen up and fumbled up and down, but did not find any weapon, so they pushed him in front of Lu Qubing.

Lu Qubing looked at the man in front of him. He was tall, with clean skin and neat teeth, and did not look like someone from a lower class family.

"What's your grievance?"

Gao Chen raised his head, looked at the knights on both sides, and frowned.

Lu Qubing had the carriage parked aside and had the knights stationed at a distance, and asked again, "What grievance have you suffered?"

"Mr. Lu, I am a personal attendant of Heba Cheng, the Right Prime Minister of the Five Armies."

"My master sent me here to inform you of an important matter concerning General Anxi."

Lu Qubing was stunned, and pulled him into the carriage. The carriage continued to move forward. Lu Qubing saw that his arm was bleeding, and he was a little surprised, "What's going on?!"

Lu Qubing knew Heba Cheng. He had followed Taozi to attack the border town of Yidi Huiluo. As a result, he lost his post as general and was taken back to Yecheng. He was not punished and even became an official.

Gao Chen lowered his head, tears on his face, "Mr. Lu, after I arrived, I went to the county government office and told the gatekeeper that I wanted to see you. The gatekeeper said you were not there and asked me to come back another day."

"I just got back and was attacked. The four brothers who were traveling with me were all killed. I was the only one left alive. I hid from place to place and dared not go to the government office again. So I had no choice but to block your way here."

Lu Qubing was horrified, "I haven't left the office in the past few days, it's not good to guard the door!"

Lu Qubing immediately realized something. He quickly stuck his head out again and ordered, "Return to the office!"

"Send a few people to Xu Laoli's residence! If you see him, temporarily capture him! Capture him alive!"

The knights were stunned, but still rushed out.

Gao Chen then told Lu Qubing what had happened in Yecheng.

Lu Qubing frowned.

"Dog thief!"

“Traitor!!”

Lu Qubing cursed: "It is because of these villains that the country is in such turmoil! He Shikai, this villain, has always been like this. Cui Ang is not a good guy either. In the past, his son served as the chief priest here. You don't know that I thought his son was a good man at that time and respected him very much. He has a confidant named Fei Zongxian."

Gao Chen was stunned and interrupted the other party helplessly, "Mr. Lu, I have to go back and tell him the news in a hurry."

"The master said that you have sufficient food and fodder here. If the imperial court really stops sending money and fodder to the outside world, you have a way to solve the problem."

"There is still enough food in Cheng'an! Don't worry, I will find a way to solve it! But Cheng'an is too close to Yecheng, so I can't send food openly. Almost all the talented people in the court have been driven away, and I don't know anyone anymore."

"However, I know Lanling King. I can tell him about this and ask him to help!"

"Lanling Wang is the most talented person. He is kind and righteous. In the past, he was just..."

"Lu Gong!!!"

Gao Chen interrupted again.

"Then I'll go back and resume my life first."

"Don't worry, I'll find a doctor to check you out, and then send someone else to look for your master. The people outside must be eyeing you now."

Lu Qubing frowned. "That gatekeeper Xu has been in the county for many years and is very friendly with us. He can't be someone sent by He Shikai, but the attack you encountered is clearly related to him. In recent years, Cheng'an's bandit army has been extremely rampant. I think he may be a spy of the Pseudo-Zhou Dynasty!!"

When they returned to the office, Xu Laoli had disappeared. He said that he had taken leave and returned home the day before.

Not long after, the knights sent by Lu Qubing returned. Xu Laoli's mansion was empty and no one lived there, but the city gate officials had never seen him and he had never left the city.

Yecheng.

He Shikai returned to his mansion exhausted.

His mansion was extremely luxurious, much more luxurious than Gao Guiyan's at the beginning. After serving the emperor for a whole day, He Shikai felt sleepy and was about to go back to sleep when a servant came to report.

"Homeowner!"

"A Taoist priest came and said he had a great gift for you."

He Shikai started laughing. Ever since he became the Minister of the Interior, there were always people coming to him for help, including many extraordinary people, and he never refused any of them.

He slowly sat down on the upper seat and waved his hand, "Great! Go call Zheng Daoqian over. I'll ask him to help me see what this alchemist's abilities are."

Some servants changed his clothes, and some brought him many delicacies.

He Shikai was eating with big mouthfuls. After Zheng Daoqian arrived, He Shikai asked him to sit beside him and eat with him.

As the first person to surrender to him, He Shikai attached great importance to Zheng Daoqian and rewarded him with many beauties, money, and an official position.

He Shikai was never stingy with his subordinates.

While they were chatting, the alchemist was brought over by two people.

An old man and a woman.

He Shikai looked at the pair in amazement. He pointed at the woman and laughed, "Could this woman also be able to tell fortunes?"

The old man took a step back and lowered his head, but the woman laughed, "He Gong is right, I am best at divination."

"Oh?"

He Shikai realized something was wrong, he looked to his left and right, and immediately a warrior stood behind him.

He Shikai then asked, "What do you want to divine?"

"I'm telling you about the important things that He Gong is doing now."

"Oh? Big thing?"

He Shikai narrowed his eyes, "Then you tell the fortune first, I'll see if it's right or wrong."

The woman slowly wiped the dust off her face, revealing her beautiful face. However, He Shikai did not even look at her for long. His eyes were cold as he had played with many beauties before.

The woman said softly, "I predicted that the event that He Gong is planning will fail."

"I divined that the conspiracy between you and Cui Ang was discovered by the Right Prime Minister Heba Cheng, who sent someone to inform Lu Qubing of Cheng'an. At this moment, Heba Cheng's retainers are beside Lu Qubing, and they are preparing to inform Gao Changgong, Gao Yun and others about the matter."

"They will ambush in Sizhou in advance, waiting for your people to start exchanging food, and then suddenly rush out to force the emperor to take action against Cui Ang and you with solid evidence. Of course, at the same time, they will smoothly deliver the food to Liu Taozi."

He Shikai stood up suddenly, snatched the sword from the warrior's hand, and rushed to the woman.

He pointed the sword in his hand at the woman's throat.

He Shikai's whole body was shaking with anger, his eyes were wide open and his lips were trembling.

"You, who are you?!"

"I am just an alchemist. I came here to seek wealth and fame. If you don't believe me, you can send someone to Heba Cheng's mansion and ask him to come over. If he is willing to come, it means he is unaware of the situation. If he runs away, or brings people to kill you, it means he is aware of the situation."

"how?"

He Shikai's eyes widened, "Bullshit! You were clearly sent by Liu Taozi."

"He Gong, don't panic and lose your mind. If I say it's true or not, you can send someone to try it and you will know."

"As for my identity, you can treat it as an alchemist. What good will it do you if you ask clearly?"

"Like you, I want to kill Liu Taozi. Apart from that, I have no other purpose."

"If you are willing to accept it, I have a lot of information, I guarantee that it is all unknown to you. Let's join forces to kill Liu Taozi. After Liu Taozi dies, you will never see me again. How about that?"

(End of this chapter)