Distant Mountain Battle Song

Chapter 35 The Beautiful Red Girl
A rebellion was about to break out, but the rest of the people in the relocated camp knew nothing about it.

A few people with strong martial arts skills and high status can easily decide their fate. It may seem like a joke, but it is actually the predetermined fate of these laborers.

Perhaps, until the moment the authorities dragged them away to behead them, they would never understand why they were being beheaded.

When Eji finished cooking, many children still came over. This time, they no longer robbed, but learned to exchange things, such as a bunch of wild vegetables or a pretty stone.

The wild vegetables weren't tasty, so Eji gave them half a cake. The stones weren't pretty, so Eji also gave them half a cake. Everyone was satisfied, except for Yun Ce, who held that yellowish-brown stone and stared at it for a long time.

This thing should be natural gold nugget; judging by its weight, it should weigh over 500 grams. He casually tossed it into the Dragon Ball; this thing is very precious and should be worth a lot in return.

Gold has been in use since the time of the Yellow Emperor. If that King Huo was Huo Qubing, his understanding of gold should be even more profound, and the gold should be even more valuable, or perhaps it was money itself.

Thinking of this, Yun Ce shook his head. So far, he was still wandering around in the wasteland. The people and things he encountered were extremely basic, even in this big man's world. He desperately needed a higher knowledge platform to understand this world and then make a relatively accurate judgment about it.

Yun Ce sat at the highest point all day, watching the entrance to the relocation camp, waiting to see the girl in red. Unlike Pei Chuan, he had personally witnessed the rebels who loved to dance. They loved victory and were fearless of death. When they bid farewell to their fallen comrades, there were no tears, only enthusiastic singing and dancing.

One hero emerges from a hundred, one hero from a thousand, one outstanding individual from ten thousand, and a paragon of virtue from a million.

That girl in red was able to command over a thousand people in a desperate battle; she truly deserves the title of hero.

Unfortunately, the heroine never appeared, even as darkness fell.

The moon that appeared tonight was a blood moon. Because there were no clouds in the sky, a dark red eye coldly stared at the earth, causing the people in the resettlement camp to go to sleep early.

Eji was too tired from playing with the children all day, and soon after dark she fell asleep in the sheep cart. She didn't like to be covered with a blanket, but preferred Yun Ce's sleeping bag. This sleeping bag could wrap her up tightly, leaving only her head sticking out. She said it felt like her mother used to hold her while she slept.

Yun Ce didn't sleep. He used a knife to cut the bow he had made. The bow arm was not long enough, but it was very powerful. Therefore, Yun Ce planned to modify it into a crossbow.

The most important component of a crossbow is the trigger mechanism. Yun Ce melted down E Ji's beloved green coins and poured them into a sand mold to create a suitable crossbow mechanism. Initially, he was worried that the crossbow mechanism made from green coins, which have a density similar to aluminum, would have problems with strength. However, after he started polishing it, this worry became unnecessary. Green coins are a good thing, with both strength and toughness.

There are just too few of them; otherwise, they would be great for making some personal equipment.

Yun Ce blew away the wood chips from the crossbow, then inserted the crossbow mechanism coated with resin. While heating the bottom with fire, he blew cool air into the top to make the resin solidify quickly. Only by inserting the resin in this way could the resin on the crossbow mechanism's outer shell be evenly spread, preventing air pockets or resin leakage.

Pei Chuan had been there for a while. Seeing that Yun Ce was busy, he stood by and watched him work. Only when Yun Ce put down his crossbow did he say, "Miss Hong wants to see you."

Yun Ce followed Pei Chuan to the thatched hut where someone had died. Upon entering, he saw Hong Guniang. After seeing her, he no longer wanted to participate in their rebellion.

Yun Ce admitted that although he was a very objective person, he was still influenced by Earth's film and television works. In those works, whether it was female bandits, female robbers, female thieves, female rebels, or female knights-errant, they were all beautiful and charming. Even if they were bold and forthright, their pure and alluring gourd-shaped figures could tell you very clearly that they were real women.

The man in front of him was over 1.78 meters tall, with a robust build, long and slender fingers with distinct knuckles, and a face... well, Yun Ce couldn't detect any feminine features in her face; she was square and looked very much like a northern man.

She has no breasts, her breasts are flat, and her buttocks are not visible, but judging from the vaguely exposed outline from the front, they should be quite large.

Perhaps Yun Ce had been sizing up the red girl's figure for too long, because a calloused hand, accompanied by the sound of wind, blew towards Yun Ce's face.

Before her hand could even touch Yun Ce's face, it was firmly grabbed by the girl in red. Releasing her indignant companion, the girl in red said, "I am a woman. What you men dare not do, I dare to do."

Yun Ce chuckled and said, "I want to hear how the leader will lead us and what we will do."

I thought I wouldn't get an answer to such a question, but to my surprise, the girl in red said firmly, "Occupy Pingyuan City."

Yun Ce was taken aback for a moment and asked, "When?"

Hong Guniang said, "We will set off at dawn and attack Pingyuan City as soon as we arrive at night. I heard from Pei Chuan that you are a master of martial arts. If you can be the first to scale the city walls, you can take the women, children, and treasures from the city after we break through."

Yun Ce glanced at Pei Chuan, who had already drawn his knife, and nodded, saying, "I don't want children or wealth. If I am fortunate enough to achieve merit, please give me all the silk books, bamboo slips, and wooden tablets in Pingyuan City."

Hong frowned, then nodded seriously and said, "Okay, let's go back and rest now. We'll set off at dawn tomorrow and march towards Pingyuan."

Yun Ce smiled, cupped his hands in a gesture of respect to Miss Hong, and left. As a marginalized person, he should have the awareness of a marginalized person. Once outside, he strolled leisurely towards the sheep cart with his hands behind his back. Inside the house, the figures were either assessing whether he would betray them or cursing him. They probably even suggested killing him once they took Pingyuan City.

The reason why Miss Hong told him so directly was to test him. If he had dared to say a word of dissent, Pei Chuan and the others would have certainly brought their knives down on his head.

These people are arrogant, or rather, they have never seen anything good or any powerful people. As the leader, Hong Guniang dares to meet strangers so brazenly. Isn't she afraid of dying?
Just now, Gouzi had done a rough analysis of the combat strength of the people in the house, and the result was that it would take Yun Ce about five minutes to kill everyone in the house.

Yun Ce's interest in the uprising process surpassed his urge to kill. In the past, when the Northwest had just been liberated and the Yiguandao sect was rampant, emperors, queens, princes, prime ministers, and generals would often appear in the mountain valleys. In the end, they were all dealt with by the local police station.

Yun Ce was born too late. By the time he went to the countryside to serve as the director, this thing had long disappeared from the rural areas. Therefore, he was always very curious about how perfectly normal people could go to such a crazy state.

Therefore, he now wants to study how Hong Guniang gradually went from being an ordinary citizen to a rebel. At the very least, Hong Guniang's complete mental journey must be included for a complete grassroots investigation report.

Even on Earth, a high-quality local investigation report remains highly valuable. As the saying goes, "a falling leaf heralds autumn," if the quality of such reports continues to improve and more and more problems are discovered, it indicates that the problems are serious and can, to some extent, influence high-level decision-making.

This refers to the whole, not individual problems. Even if an individual problem is extremely serious, it becomes insignificant when considered in the denominator of 1.4 billion people.

As he pondered and reminisced, Yun Ce returned to the sheep cart. E Ji was fast asleep, still wearing the monkey mask that Yun Ce had carved for her during the day when he was bored.

After helping Eji remove her mask, Yun Ce thought for a moment, then found a piece of wood and began carving a pig's head mask. He didn't want anyone to see his face clearly when they attacked Pingyuan City the next evening.

The nights here are incredibly long, so long that they make you feel like you're wasting your life. Yun Ce would put the wood on his homemade wood stove and burn it for a while, then take it off and use a knife to remove the charred parts. By burning and scraping like this, time would fly by.

Hong Guniang came over, alone. Yun Ce felt that as the leader of the rebels, it was very unwise of her to do this.

Yun Ce served her some of E Ji's fried beans. She was very interested in these beans, which could be used as military rations. After carefully inquiring about the preparation process, she asked Yun Ce, "Are you from a noble family?"

Yun Ce shook his head, took out the identity slip Zhao Jin had given him, and handed it to Miss Hong.

The girl in red reached out and took it, glanced at it, and then handed it to Yun Ce, saying, "I can't read."

Yun Ce continued cutting the wood with his knife and said in a low voice, "You must learn. General, you must be literate, otherwise you will be easily deceived."

The firelight fell on the girl's face, making her originally dark complexion appear rosy.

"It's not that I wanted to be a general; I only became a general because I had no other choice."

Has something happened at home?

"It wasn't my family. Something happened to me. I couldn't stand the constables bullying people, so I accidentally killed one of them. I had no choice but to run away. During my escape, I killed even more constables. After I wiped out a group of government soldiers, I'll have to become a general, even if I don't want to."

Yun Ce stopped what he was doing, looked up at the girl in red and said, "You were the one who led a group of long-pole soldiers in the battle, weren't you?"

Upon hearing this, Hong Guniang's previously gentle eyes suddenly sharpened. She put one hand on her waist and pointed at Yun Ce with the other, saying, "How did you know?"

Yun Ce ignored Hong Guniang's dangerous actions and continued to scrape the pig's head mask, saying, "I saw it with my own eyes. In that battle, only the long-pole soldiers you commanded were useful. The rest were just a rabble."

The young woman frowned and asked, "You're not from the government?"

Yun Ce shook his head and continued working with his head down.

"I am not confident about attacking Pingyuan City tomorrow."

"Has the city sent an inside agent?"

"No."

"Then send more. During the siege, have them set fires all over the place, create chaos in the city, and assassinate key officials and generals..."

(End of this chapter)