Daming: Internship also counts as work experience

Chapter 7 Inference
At this time, Kuang Zhong walked to a tree and said, "He has some brains. It's a pity to send him to the barracks."

Jia Chuan was immediately grateful. He stepped forward to help Kuang Zhong sit down against the tree, and tore off half of the pancake in his hand and handed it to Kuang Zhong.

Haishou helped Zhu Zhanji sit next to Kuang Zhong, handed the water bag to Zhu Zhanji first, and then handed the cake to him, still not forgetting to roll his eyes at Kuang Zhong.

Zhu Zhanji took a bite of the cake and asked, "Do you think the barracks are full of reckless men?"

"If he is not the commander, it may not be a bad thing that they are all reckless men. If he goes like this, all the spiritual energy will be squeezed out before it can be promoted." Kuang Zhong replied.

Zhu Zhanji said nothing more.

Jia Chuan breathed a sigh of relief and wolfed down half the pancake with water.

"When do you think there will be danger?" Zhu Zhanji ate the pancake slowly, and suddenly looked at Jia Chuan and asked.

Jia Chuan didn't dare to talk nonsense at this time. He had to follow the character set by Kuang Zhong and perform well. Not to mention this imperial society, even in his previous life, if the leader really wanted to transfer you to a department you didn't want to go to, would you still go? Unless you resigned, your life would not be in danger, but in this world, disobeying the order would be fatal.

Jia Chuan sorted out his thoughts and said seriously:

"The closer we are to the capital, the safer it will be, Your Highness. This assumes they haven't discovered our whereabouts before Your Highness mobilizes his troops. I've noticed along the way that no suspicious individuals have overtaken us, or been overtaken by us. Of course, this isn't the only way to the capital. If the King of Han wants to succeed, he'll need to be able to deduce which route we're taking, when we'll arrive, and where. But I don't think he has that ability."

Zhu Zhanji smiled and said, "You don't know my second uncle. He followed my grandfather on all the expeditions and saved him from danger several times..."

Zhu Zhanji stopped laughing. There was really no need to say more about the rebellion.

Jia Chuan thought for a moment and said, "First of all, it's impossible for the King of Han to come looking for His Highness in person. There are six of us, six horses, and we are all dressed as inspectors. We should not be within their search range, unless he ordered a surprise attack on the Inspection Office after we left and got news of how we entered the capital..."

Jia Chuan glanced at Zhu Zhanji and continued:
"I think he might ask someone to find out. He wouldn't dare to take action, nor would there be any need. This is different from last night. If... they had succeeded last night and massacred the Inspection Office, they could have said whatever they wanted. But now is different. The final victory and loss are still uncertain, so the King of Han doesn't need to cut off his own retreat."

Jia Chuan looked up at the glaring sunlight:

"None of the people who were chasing him last night have returned. The person in charge of this matter under the King of Han is not sure whether His Highness has been to Huangluling. He has sent people to continue the pursuit and to the Inspection Office to inquire. If things were fast, the results would have been obtained by now. In addition to ordering people to continue the pursuit, this person also needs to find a way to quickly send a message to the King of Han. We are close to Beijing. Should we continue the pursuit?"

"My second uncle has no fear. Now that he has started, he won't stop."

Jia Chuan raised his eyebrows and thought to himself: The competition on this track that Zhu Gaoxu is on is indeed not fierce, but he can finally rank first.

"What the King of Han is thinking is not important right now. What's important is time. How big of a deal is this? If they want to really take action, they must wait for the King of Han's order. The vassal kings cannot leave their fiefdoms without permission. It's hard to say whether the King of Han is obediently staying in Le'an or secretly out in Dezhou or Cangzhou. It's impossible to predict when he will receive the news, when he will give the order, and when the people outside will receive the order."

Jia Chuan glanced at Zhu Zhanji, and seeing that the prince was listening attentively, he breathed a sigh of relief and continued:

"The message needs to be passed to the King of Han first, and then the King of Han will pass it on after he has considered it. This process can be done by carrier pigeon, or by express horse at the speed of 800 miles. A horse can run more than 60 miles an hour, and you have to change horses at the post station almost every hour or two. Regardless of whether he has the authority to do so, he must have a reasonable excuse and bribe the people in the post station in advance. This method is more troublesome. Once the news leaks out... Another method is to use carrier pigeons. The flying speed and daily distance of carrier pigeons depend on many factors, and carrier pigeons rely on their homing ability to complete the delivery. For example, its nest is in Cangzhou, Bazhou, or the capital. Bring it to the King of Han. After the King of Han receives the news, he uses it to deliver the message. It can indeed reach Cangzhou in more than an hour, which means that the people in Cangzhou can get the news before dark, but they also need to be well prepared before they can block the road. We should be able to pass Cangzhou by dark."

Zhu Zhanji looked at Jia Chuan inquiringly and asked, "How do you know so clearly?"

Jia Chuan shrugged and said, "I'm not good at studying, but I'm interested in other things."

"Do you think he will use horses or carrier pigeons?" Zhu Zhanji asked again.

"If they were using horses, we should have seen fast horses galloping over, but there aren't any for now. As for carrier pigeons, I don't think the chances are high either. Raising such creatures requires training. Would he dare to train so openly? Not to mention training in his fiefdom, that would be pointless. Carrier pigeons have fixed destinations and can only choose one. It would be difficult for him to build a nest in every city. It's possible to have one in the capital, but what's the point of flying back there? Carrier pigeons can indeed fly continuously... for five hours, hundreds or even thousands of miles, so the chances of being shot and captured are also high. What's more, the most unlikely scenario is intercepting Your Highness outside Beijing. If Your Highness hasn't dispatched troops to escort him by then, uh..."

"According to your inference, I should have no danger along the way?"

"No, that kind of express delivery requires frequent changes of horses. He doesn't use that. He uses a slightly slower one, five hundred miles, three hundred miles, and riding one horse after another is still effective. That's why I said I don't know where he is now, and I can't judge the time. Although we are riding horses, they don't run fast. If someone is chasing us from behind, they will definitely catch up before we reach Bazhou. And those people who were ahead of us last night, they chased for several hours without seeing anyone, so they would definitely not be stupid enough to continue chasing. Maybe they would go back. They should have met us this morning. If they didn't meet us, it means they took different roads. They probably didn't expect us to take the official road."

Kuang Zhong said:
"While horses can travel at high speed, they need to rest, sweat, and feed along the way. Muddy roads are difficult to navigate in heavy rain, and in dry weather, rat holes can trip and break the horses' legs. They have to move slowly over potholes and drag on slopes, which is extremely troublesome. Our dynasty has three major postal stations: the Express Post, the Water Horse Post, and the Post Office. The Express Post is the most advanced, also known as the Express Post. They mostly travel on foot. Upon receiving a document, they immediately gallop out to the next post. This relay system, delivering the documents in shifts, can cover three to four hundred miles in a day and night, much faster than even riding horses."

Jia Chuan said "Oh" and replied respectfully: "My horizons are too narrow and I have forgotten these ways."

Zhu Zhanji glanced at Jia Chuan and asked, "You mean, it's more dangerous in the afternoon and the pursuers might arrive?"

Jia Chuan was still pondering these express delivery methods. When he heard Zhu Zhanji's question, he hurriedly said:

"Not in the afternoon, but after dark. The people in front are not scary because they don't know how many of us there are, and they may not react if they pass by us. The pursuers behind know, of course, the premise is that someone has indeed asked the Inspection Office and has received the order. The process of receiving the order takes time, and the fastest time is the afternoon, right? We are more than half a day faster than them, but they are faster than we are, so it will be dangerous after dark. Don't leave and hide? There will definitely be obstacles ahead tomorrow. Travel at night? Traveling at night is like admitting guilt."

"How should we respond?" Zhu Zhanji asked. Jia Chuan looked around. The six men were old, weak, and sick. If Captain Xia were still alive, Jia Chuan wouldn't be so worried. He figured the King of Han couldn't predict which way his nephew would take, so he naturally divided his troops to track him, thus dispersing his forces. If five or six came after him, Captain Xia could handle them. They also had an archer, so their chances of victory were much greater. But what should they do now?
Jia Chuan dusted himself off and pretended to be calm, saying, "I bet he's still in Le'an. If that's the case, no matter how he passes the message, they won't catch up until we mobilize troops in Bazhou."

"What if Second Uncle stayed in Cangzhou after leaving Le'an?"

"Is Zhu Qizhen born?" Jia Chuan muttered to himself.

"What?" Zhu Zhanji didn't hear clearly and asked.

Jia Chuan was still stuck in the pond of historical knowledge, trying hard to find the trace of that generation of "God of War", but unfortunately he found nothing.

He turned to look at Zhu Zhanji and thought: "He must be at least 25 or 26, right? In ancient times, people got married early, so he should have been a father by then. If Zhu Qizhen was already alive and kicking, would history be rewritten?"

Zhu Zhanji was looked at in bewilderment. Hai Shou could not help but frown and scolded him, "Don't forget the rules!"

Jia Chuan quickly bowed and said, "Don't blame me, Your Highness. I tend to forget where I am when I get lost in thought."

"What were you thinking about just now?" Zhu Zhanji asked with narrowed eyes.

"Uh... I was thinking that His Highness is no ordinary man, and should be protected by the gods. Furthermore, the possibility that the King of Han is near Huangluling is not very high, and we left in time... But if something goes wrong... we will have to fight for our lives, and the outcome will be determined by heaven."

Zhu Zhanji smiled heartily, a rare occurrence. He patted his thigh, stood up, and said proudly, "Get on the horse!"

……

The question that has always puzzled Jia Chuan but he dared not ask is, even though he knew there was danger, why was Zhu Zhanji still unwilling to go to Cangzhou or the garrisons near Cangzhou to mobilize troops?

On the way, he encountered Kuang Zhong walking side by side, so he quietly asked about his doubts. Kuang Zhong seemed to admire him very much, so he did not hide anything. He said that when he passed by Shaoyang Lake, he, the prince, and Haishou were captured. On the way, he heard those people talking. They said that they did not expect to succeed here, and thought they would have to go to Shandong. They also said that Cangzhou had arranged it in vain...

"They didn't take action right away, but instead took you all away?"

"I was also puzzled at the time, but you helped me solve the mystery in the land temple. They knew the King of Han's character very well. If they took action, he would be doomed. Moreover, Haishou and I were both injured at the time, and it seemed that he would not live long..."

"He didn't attack His Highness, perhaps because of the King of Han, but he didn't even kill me and instead stabbed himself first. I'm a little confused. I didn't have time to think about it last night, and I still haven't figured it out today..."

"That person was just afraid of killing the wrong person." Zhu Zhanji turned around and said.

Killed by mistake?

Jia Chuan raised his eyebrows. He was in his early twenties and thin, which was a world of difference from Zhu Zhanji. This could be... But Jia Chuan then thought again. There were no photos for reference. The prince was not someone who could be seen by everyone. There must be someone around Zhu Gaoxu who had seen Zhu Zhanji. It happened that the person who rushed into the temple last night had not seen him. It seemed that the person was also a newly promoted one. He only knew the prince's approximate age and the situation of the entourage. With the addition of this person, the person would be at a loss as to what to do.

Jia Chuan couldn't help but take a breath when he thought about how he was so brave last night and saved his own life.

He thought: That person must be well aware of the rules of the Prince of Han's Palace, so he injured himself first so that he could give an explanation when he returned.

"Luckily, we didn't go far before the guards who had gone ahead to scout the way came back and rescued us." Kuang Zhong continued, "Those people were killed or escaped, and we didn't catch a single one alive. Your Highness then chose a longer route. We traveled day and night, but we were still ambushed in Shandong. The guards around Your Highness and several thousand households from the Zhenfu Division when we left Nanjing were all killed in Shandong. Although we escaped, we couldn't shake off the people behind us. By the time we reached Huangluling, we were the only ones left, and Your Highness was stabbed in the shoulder... Fortunately, Your Highness remembered the Huangluling Inspection Division and thought of using your help to force the people behind him to retreat..."

"Your Highness is afraid of ropes after being bitten once. He cannot fully trust our Inspection Office, so he did not notify us in advance..."

"Not entirely. His Highness said that if you had prepared in advance, those people would not have advanced, and we would not have been able to leave the forest. If you had not been bribed, you might have survived by fighting both sides under cover of night."

Jia Chuan smiled bitterly and said:
"Doctor Kuang, please don't give us face. Your Highness has been in the army before, and he has some understanding of us... He knows that if we go head-to-head with them, even with the advantage in numbers, we won't have much chance of winning. So when I suggested last night that we turn off the lights and pretend we can't see anything, and wait for those people to withdraw on their own, Your Highness agreed with me. But..." Jia Chuan suddenly realized the key point and said hurriedly, "I just made a lot of dry-mouthed inferences, but in fact, you all knew that Cangzhou would be difficult to pass!"

Kuang Zhong smiled and said nothing.

Zhu Zhanji raised his head and said, "I don't know whether my second uncle is looking for a civil official or a military general, but he must think that if I manage to escape to Cangzhou, he will definitely order someone to mobilize troops, and then I will be caught in a trap."

Jia Chuan's heart was filled with turmoil. Wasn't he just teasing this fool? But then he breathed a sigh of relief. If Zhu Gaoxu was just waiting for Zhu Zhanji to fall into his trap, then there would be no chance. Then he sighed inwardly: I wonder how many civil and military officials in Cangzhou will suffer.

……

(End of this chapter)