Outside a mountain lodge

A Taoist priest with bare feet, a yellow scarf on his head, and a long white beard strolling towards this mountain village.

"Stop! Who? Several Yellow Turban Taoist priests with knives and guns saw the comer, stood up and shouted loudly.

"The Great Sage and Good Teacher of the Poor Dao... Zhang Jiao! ”

"Great sage and good teacher??"

——

Cheng Zhiyuan and Deng Mao knelt on the ground, and Zhang Jiao, who was sitting opposite him, slowly read the scriptures, as if Cheng Zhiyuan and the two did not exist.

Sweat slowly rolled down from the foreheads of the two to the ground, kneeling for a while is fine, kneeling for a long time is a kind of torture for anyone.

"That's it, get up." Zhang Jiao exhaled lightly and slowly opened his eyes.

"Master, I was wrong, please punish me." Cheng Zhiyuan didn't dare to get up, kowtowed, and said on the ground.

"What's wrong with you?"

"Disciples shouldn't let out the black plague."

Zhang Jiao shook his head, his eyes were full of helplessness that hated iron and steel, and said in his mouth, "Since Ma Qiang can beat you in Taoism, he is definitely not a person, the black plague is controlled by you, you don't want to control it, but you just give up a practice, but why don't you tell the people the treatment method in time after you release it, I have come all the way, I have heard that Mr. Ma is curing, and I have not heard that Taiping Dao saves people, you are confused, I Taiping Dao has been operating in Youzhou for more than ten years, and you have made such a fuss, how many people's hearts are available?" Don't you understand what our foundation is? ”

As he spoke, Zhang Jiao's tone became faster and more severe.

"The court is corrupt, the family is greedy, the people can't live, so they are not afraid of death, after you released the black plague, you didn't know that you used this to promote my Taiping Dao and destroy my teaching industry for a little boy, the fault is not you, it's me! I shouldn't have let you be the chief canal commander of Youzhou! ”

Cheng Zhiyuan suddenly panicked in his heart, he knelt all the way to Zhang Jiao's feet, hugged Zhang Jiao's feet and cried, "The apprentice knows that he is wrong, the apprentice will never dare again, please don't blame yourself, the apprentice will definitely atone for his sins!" ”

"How do you atone for your sins?" Zhang Jiao asked coldly.

"In vain. . . In vain..."

"I will punish you to go to Jixian County, when the people make a big wish, this epidemic will not be eliminated, you are not allowed to eat a meter and a side, only drink water, and then sit on the head of the city, until there is no more black plague in Youzhou, go!"

"Master, in this case, Senior Brother will starve to death!" Deng Mao suddenly shouted anxiously when he heard this.

"Starvation? If you really starve to death, you deserve it! Zhang Jiao glared at Deng Mao and shouted, "Deng Mao, as the deputy chief Qu Shuai, you didn't try your best to prevent your senior brother from making mistakes, and you should be punished, I will punish you for leading people to go to the counties of Youzhou to give Fu Shui and save the people, remember, not only can you not go against Na Ma this time, but you have to cooperate with him, understand?" ”

"In vain... I don't quite understand..."

Zhang Jiao looked at Deng Mao with a puzzled expression, and sighed helplessly, whether it was Cheng Zhiyuan or Deng Mao, they were all homeless people who almost starved to death back then, and it was Zhang Jiao who saved them and taught them skills.

But when Zhang Jiao rescued them, they were already too old and missed the best time to study, and Zhang Jiao was anxious to let them preach here.

"How many times has the teacher said that the reliance of our Taiping Dao is on those displaced and poor people, the more difficult they are, the more they will rely on us, but if they find that we cannot rely on, they will look for new ones.

Remember, these people who can't survive will only follow hope, so they must not let others give them hope, especially the government!

If Guo Xun is curing the plague now, then we can really leave it alone, because he doesn't have that ability, we just need to wait until the situation is out of control before appearing, but now that Ma Qiang really has the ability to cure the plague, if it continues like this, the hearts of the people of the entire Youzhou will go to Ma Qiang.

Remember! Without the people's hearts, our Taiping Road would be useless, and the Taiping Qing Dynasty would never come! ”

"Yes, Master!" Deng Mao and Cheng Zhiyuan both knelt at Zhang Jiao's feet in admiration to admit their mistakes, Zhang Jiao looked at the sky outside the window, and his heart had drifted to Jixian County.

Ma Qiang... Who the hell are you?

——The old house in the north of Jixian County

"Look, sir, it's this corpse."

What appeared in front of Ma Qiang was a highly decomposed female corpse, the upper body of the corpse was constantly crawling with white and fat maggots, half of the mouth seemed to have been bitten off by mice, one eye was gone, the black hole hole seemed to be telling something, the lower body was extremely swollen by blisters, and the pants were torn, and the smell of the corpse decaying made the whole yard frown.

"Gross!!"

Ma Qiang helped Yan Rou to vomit for a while, and when he turned around, he vomited again.

Yan Rou was a little embarrassed, he didn't expect that Ma Qiang, who had always shown that he couldn't do anything, would be made like this by a corpse.

Aren't corpses very common? In the past, in the grassland, every time I fought with Xianbei, I would be full of this thing.

Ma Qiang finally recovered a little, this was not the first time he had seen corpses, he had seen a lot of corpses in the battle before the crossing, but those corpses were fresh, and they smelled of blood, which was completely different from this highly decomposed one.

This is the end of the Han Dynasty, a troubled time when tens of millions of people are about to die, and you must get used to all this.

Ma Qiang closed his eyes and gave himself a psychological hint, then stood up, wiped the corners of his mouth, approached the corpse again and opened the collar with a small wooden stick to check it.

"It's been rotting for too long, but some traces can still be seen... This corpse has been left for at least ten days, and it should be an ordinary person dressed up... It should be a villager, which means that there should be a place where the black plague broke out first, and then someone transported the corpses of people in this place to various places to spread the plague. ”

"In this way, as long as you find this village, you will find the source?" Yan Rou said happily.

"It would be nice if it was a village, but what if it was a hermit?" Ma Qiang glanced at Yan Rou and said, "What's more, this dress may not be her own, what if she is actually a Wuhuan or a Xianbei person?" ”

Yan Rou squatted down directly when she heard this, not caring about the smell of the corpse, and directly checked it.

"It's not a herdsman, a herdsman is good at riding horses, both men and women, and there must be traces of long-term riding friction on the inner thighs, she should be a farmer."

As she spoke, Yan Rou pointed to the corpse's feet and smiled, "Sir, look, there are still traces of straw sandals on this foot... Mr? ”

"Vomit !!"

Ma Qiang was convinced, this Yan Rou is worthy of being a person who came all the way from Wuhuan slaves, and her adaptability is much better than herself. No way.. I still have to vomit again.