Chapter 72

Mu Fulan walked into the dungeon and ordered someone to remove the shackles for the spy who had been detained here for nearly half a year.

Zhu Liuhu slowly opened his eyes.

Young and beautiful face, noble and gorgeous clothing. Her appearance made this dark dungeon seem to have become brighter.

He stared blankly, not knowing why she appeared here, let alone why he was stopped when he raised his dagger to commit suicide, until he heard her say, “Do something for me.”

“Give Xie Changgeng’s mother back to him.”

Zhu Liuhu was stunned. After a while, he came to understand, and in those eyes that were already stagnant water, a breath of living people slowly appeared.

He got up from the ground, and with gratitude, kowtowed to the woman in front of him.

When he straightened up, he wanted to ask how she was doing now, he pressed his lips together with difficulty, but swallowed the words back.

This woman gave him a chance to face his boss and accept the punishment that should belong to him as decently as possible. This is already a great favor. He is not qualified to think about anything else, let alone such an opportunity.

His life doesn’t belong to him anymore.

At this moment, he knelt in front of the person who controlled his life and death, bowed his head deeply to the ground, and felt ashamed.

“She has nothing to say except asking you to take my mother back?”

A cold voice came from the opposite side. He immediately took out a small box of black sandalwood with four corners wrapped in gold from his arms, held it in his hand, and held it high above his head.

“The master also asked the humble post to hand over this thing.”

Xie Changgeng held the box and opened it slowly.

Inside the box was a snake-new golden seal that seemed to have been split in half by a sharp weapon.

He stared at it for a long time without even blinking his eyes.

Zhu Liuhu didn’t dare to raise his head and waited a moment before saying, “My humble position has ruined King Qin’s affairs, and even death is not enough to apologize!” After he finished speaking, he took a dagger and was about to pierce his heart, when he suddenly heard the man on the opposite side ask: “When you came out, Do you know the situation of Fuzhou Li Liang’s attack on Changsha?”

Zhu Liuhu stopped and looked up.

Xie Changgeng looked at him blankly.

When the court returned to Shangjing, just after Ding, when Xie Changgeng was about to lead troops to Changping Pass in person, the ministers also criticized the country of Changsha, one of the culprits. Although Mu Xuanqing died of illness on the way to retreat, this did not eliminate the resentment of the ministers. People wrote letters one after another, demanding that they be suppressed. As a neighbor of Changsha, Li Liang, the governor of Fuzhou, took the opportunity to stand up and submit a letter to himself, claiming that he would share the worries of the court and lead troops to destroy Changsha.

“When the humble post came out, Li Liang and the Changsha general Yuan Handing were fighting in Yunmeng. As for the battle situation, the humble post did not know.”

“You and Liang Tuan have been with me for the longest time. They are shrewd and prudent, and they have never made mistakes in their work. This time, why did they neglect their duties so much?” He heard Xie Changgeng ask again.

Zhu Liuhu was so ashamed that he didn’t dare to look at him, and said in a low voice, “I don’t dare to hide it. Two years ago, when I was ordered to settle down in Yuecheng, I met a woman as my neighbor…”

He paused and kowtowed deeply to the ground again.

“It’s all because of the humble job, indulging in comfort, slack in the heart, forgetting the mission, so blind and deaf, ruining the important affairs of the King of Qin, and having nothing to do with others.”

After being silent for a long time, he heard the icy voice resounding again.

“I have read you for many years. For the sake of meritorious deeds in the past, I will save your life. According to the rules, cut off a finger and take this as a warning.”

Zhu Liuhu could hardly believe his ears, and he reacted with gratitude.

He cut off the thumb of his left hand with one knife, ignoring the gushing blood, gritted his teeth and endured the pain, and kowtowed heavily towards the figure in front of him who had already turned away with the box in his hand: “Thank you King Qin for not killing him!”

…

A few days later, Fuzhou, hundreds of miles away, Li Liang, the governor of Fuzhou, was caught in a dilemma, unable to sleep or eat.

Changsha is located in the southern corner. At the beginning of this dynasty, when it was first conferred to King Mu as a feudal state, except for a few larger cities near Yuecheng, the rest of the place was sparsely populated and spread over wasteland. However, after going through the governance of the King of the Mu clan, filling the land and implementing benevolent governance, the population gradually became prosperous, the fish and rice were plentiful, and the warehouses were rich. Li Liang had long coveted it and bullied the weak and incapable soldiers of Changsha. Offensive, intending to **** territory. Unexpectedly, the opponent killed a sharply armed army out of thin air. At that time, he was defeated and defeated, but he was extremely unwilling. This time, seeing that Changsha failed to revolt with the King of Qi, and lost the king, the country was in turmoil, and many people were in a state of disintegration. I was overjoyed, and determined that the opportunity would come again, so I wrote a letter to the court. One was to show loyalty to Xie Changgeng, and the other was to take advantage of the opportunity. Grab some food and pay, and it’s coming.

The so-called Tiangao emperor is far away, as long as he can win the battle and conquer Yuecheng, he can fish in troubled waters, which is a great benefit.

He didn’t expect that the Changsha kingdom without a human king would actually stand out as a regent. Not only was Changsha not as scattered as he thought, and the army had become more and more sympathetic to the enemy, its combat power was astonishingly sharp.

Since he once again sent troops to the border of Changsha to invade Yunmeng, in less than a month, he has lost three consecutive battles, lost his troops and lost his generals, and was in a state of embarrassment.

He was unwilling to retreat. He wanted to regroup and attack Yunmeng again, but his subordinates began to complain. Yesterday, he killed a few deserters who had been captured, and promised to let the soldiers loot the city for three days, so he was barely holding back.

Yunmeng was only a small city, and it couldn’t be conquered for a long time. The longer it dragged on, the worse it would be for morale.

He plans to attack again as soon as possible. If he loses again this time, I am afraid there will be no chance to turn over again. He didn’t dare to care, and he was still deploying plans in the battalion and his subordinates at night. However, the two generals disagreed over who would lead their subordinates to act as the vanguard of the siege, and they shied away from each other, so they drew their knives toward each other.

Li Liang was furious, and was scolding him sharply, when he suddenly heard someone reporting that the newly promoted King of Qin, the Jiedu envoy of Hexi Xie Changgeng, actually came here in person.

Outside the Yuanmen, a group of men and horses stopped. In the lead, sitting high on the horseback, it was Xie Changgeng.

Li Liang knelt down to greet him, put the person into the tent, and said with a smile, “King Qin has come a long way, but the lower official was unable to go out to greet him, please forgive me.”

He felt guilty, how dare he take the initiative to ask him the purpose of going south. Come to think of it, it is for this war with Changsha.

Xie and Changsha, he naturally knew the origin of grievances, from in-laws to enemies. The Mu clan rebelled with King Qi, causing Shangjing to fall for a time. He must have hated the Mu clan.

Xie Changgeng glanced at the military map that was still scattered on the case. “I heard that you are here, the war is not going well?”

His expression was calm, and there was no joy or anger in his tone.

Li Liang hurriedly knelt down: “Xiaguan has lived up to the high expectations of the court and the King of Qin! It’s just not that Xiaguan was slack. I really didn’t expect that Mu’s Weng Lord, the regent, would come here to supervise the battle in person, bewitching and bribing people’s hearts, and the rebels would be difficult to suppress.”

He puffed out his chest and said: “Don’t worry, King Qin, this is just a temporary situation! The subordinate officials are already deploying, and they planned to attack again soon. Moreover, the King of Qin came here in person, if the soldiers found out, they would be greatly encouraged and swear to death. Allegiance!”

After he finished speaking, he solemnly kowtowed toward the person on the seat.

There was silence in the tent. After a long time, he heard a voice saying: “Withdraw. Without my order, you must not send troops without authorization.”

“Otherwise, it will be punished with resistance!”

Xie Changgeng got up and walked out.

It is night, the bright moon is hanging in the sky, and the cold river is deserted.

Xie Changgeng wandered alone, walking along the riverside a few miles away from Fuzhou Camp.

He went down to the river bank, and there were piles of rocks under his feet. At the end of the line of sight, above the river, it was pitch black.

In this deep winter night, as if there was nothing else, between heaven and earth, there was only water running under his feet, rolling endlessly.

Until far away, there was a sound of ship numbers drifting in the wind. Above the heart of the river, a black boat came from afar.

He made his fortune in the river, and knew this waterway very well. This section of the river has branched so far, with many reefs in the middle of the river, and it is extremely dangerous to travel at night. The owner of the boat did not know whether it was profiting from the trade or rushing ahead, and despite the danger, he sailed so downstream at night, a lonely boat seemed to come from the sky, and floated in the middle of the river. The boatman Kongwu, who was walking on the waterway in 2010, was holding a pole, and he lit a piece of river rock protruding from the center of the river. He shouted his horn, and with all his strength, he turned the bow of the boat smoothly, followed the flowing water, and turned into the branch road.

The sound of the boatman’s horns gradually faded away, and the ears also fell silent, returning to peace.

Xie Changgeng was independent on the bank of the river, letting the waves of river water wet the corners of his clothes.

He watched the lonely boat go down the river, gradually swallowed into the night, and disappeared from sight.

Following this tributary and winding down, you can take the shortest route into Dongting.

Many years ago, a young man, also in such a late night, with unspeakable ambitions, took such a black boat, a light boat under the moon, and entered Dongting from here.

This young man is planning to marry the princess of Changsha Kingdom as his wife.

But at that time, he was just a river bandit. And the woman he wants to marry has a noble identity.

He has always tried his best to do things, let alone such an important thing. After following the river into Dongting, he did not go ashore immediately, but quietly went to the center of the lake to visit an old friend whom he met by chance in Junshan.

The purpose of the visit was naturally to know more about what he wanted to know.

Time flicks the fingers, and the troops and horses fly across. These old events from many years ago, in his memory, have long been blurred.

But at this moment, or the riverside is the same as before, the moon is still bright, and the black boat that has passed away, he suddenly realizes that everything seems to have happened only yesterday, and he even remembers what happened when he went down the mountain. an accidental little thing.

As if passing through a mountain road, he came across a girl who came to him helplessly for help for a chick that was blown off a cliff by the mountain wind.

The girl he never remembered later…

That blurry face appeared from memory. Xie Changgeng’s heart suddenly jumped slightly.

A strange feeling, as if the tide of the river was rushing towards him at the moment, came to his heart.

He frowned, closed his eyes slowly, and tried to recall the girl who had long since disappeared from his memory.

The shadow gradually became clearer.

I remember that it was a spring day, the girl was half-year-old, with cardamom branches, black hair and pink shirt, crescent eyebrows and pale moon, she was all charming, and at a glance, she knew that she was raised and raised, but she didn’t know the dangers of the world, how could she know that she was wearing a Luo skirt The kind-hearted person who rushed to seek help was indeed a wicked person, and just before he was called to a halt by her, he was still thinking about the hidden secrets in his heart.

Although he was surprised, but with a little effort, he still became a good person. According to her request, he helped her bring the bird up and send it back to the nest.

She looked up at a delicate and jade-like face like a flower, her eyes were bright, she looked at him, and thanked him happily.

Facing the girl’s splendid smile, he was not used to it, but he nodded at her, smiled back, and left immediately.

Xie Changgeng suddenly opened his eyes, turned his head suddenly, and looked in the direction of Dongting under the dark night sky, separated by a water.

He remembered.

That day, under the old cypress on Junshan Mountain, if the little girl he met, if she took off her delicate face, she would clearly be the princess of Changsha, Mu Fulan, whom he married three years later!

Jiang Feng whistled in his ears, his heartbeat kept accelerating, and his hands were covered in hot sweat.

He remembered again what she had said to him before.

She said that before marrying him, she met the person she liked in Junshan.

But later, the man died.

He used to be convinced of this, and because of this, he was jealous and resentful until he had no choice but to accept it. Later, he didn’t care about it at all, and even knelt down in front of her, just asking her to treat him better, forget the person before, and look at him. He is her real man.

However, she was hard-hearted, abandoning him like a shoe.

At this moment, Fang’s intuition made him vaguely understand. It turned out that he should be the person she used to love.

If so, he is clearly still alive and married her as she wished.

What happened later, he didn’t know, she was so cruel to treat him like this?

Even today, he allows Li Liang to put pressure on her with soldiers, and she doesn’t want to see him again even in the negotiation!

By the river, Xie Changgeng’s figure was condensed, like a rock pillar.

He fixedly looked at the dark sky in the distance, his eyes gradually turned red, after a while, he suddenly turned around, climbed up the river bank, and walked away quickly, and his figure quickly disappeared under the moonlight.