Chapter 3 Yangguan (Part I)

Out of Lanzhou, the ancient Great Wall, the farther west, the more desolate the scenery along the way.

There was no figure in the long silk road for half a day, only rows of poplar trees, and the sword was pointed at the round sky. Those who have been dead for many years, those that have just grown to the thickness of the mouth of the bowl, and those that are one zhang tall and short, are separated by a hundred steps, echoing each other from afar. It is a plant unique to the Western Regions, which grows for 3,000 years, dies for 3,000 years, and does not fall down after 3,000 years.

Wang Xun, captain of the Zhaowu Colonel of the Flying Dragon Praetorian Guard, rode on an Anxi good horse, and his palm never left the hilt of the knife at his waist. The road was not safe, and three days ago, when the group passed under the heavy snow mountain, they found more than two dozen bodies in a sheltered earthen enclosure. All of them are in different places, and their deaths are extremely terrifying. And there was nothing left of anything of value on the corpse, including the dentures in the mouth of a fat man. According to the analysis of Lao Yue, a guide who often walks this road, the evil should be a group of desert robbers, or the Tubo people living on the other side of the snow-capped mountain. Only they are so greedy that they even scavenge the dentures of the dead, and they don't care about the revenge of the ghosts.

"Nonsense, there are no ghosts in this world at all!" Fang Ziling, the team leader, shrunk his neck and shouted to himself to be emboldened. Like Wang Xun, from childhood to adulthood, he has never even been to a place fifty miles away from Chang'an, but unexpectedly, this time he walked thousands of miles. For the first ten days, I still had the joy of leaving home for the first time in my heart, but now, the whole person has been tortured by the journey and almost crazy, and instinctively wants to draw a knife when I hear a little wind and grass.

"Who said there are no ghosts. It's just that you haven't seen it! Knowing that Fang Ziling was scared in his heart, the guide Lao Yue deliberately retorted mysteriously, "The year before last, by the Puchang Sea, one of my buddies saw it. At about the third watch in the middle of the night, I first heard the cry of a woman in the sea, and then I saw a white figure walking out of the water. The guy was also clever, and immediately stuck his nose in the sand, holding his head with both hands and refusing to look up. I finally stayed up until sunrise the next day, and when I got up, I saw that most of the merchants in the company were dead, and the rest were crazy, and I didn't even remember who I was! (Note 1)

"No way, it must be your companion making up nonsense, or he himself covets other people's money!" After listening to Lao Yue's description, Fang Ziling's already haggard face became more and more pale, and he pressed the handle of the knife with his hand and shouted loudly. "Yes, he must have thought of it because he wanted to make money, so he came up with such a means to do it......"

"Immortal Heaven is above!" Lao Yue immediately raised his right hand and cursed at the sky, "Those who do our business, if they want to make money, they will definitely get lost in the desert." Everyone who walks this path knows that the more people who walk together, the more peace can be guaranteed. If you go on your own, even if you are not targeted by the wolves, you may die lonely. ”

The last sentence is very powerful. Whether the Immortal Heaven will punish the bad guys, everyone is not sure. But the loneliness of the journey is really painful. Before leaving Liangzhou, everyone could pass through a village, town or fortress every day on average to talk to the people inside. On the road of more than 800 miles from Liangzhou to Suzhou, if you want to see a living person, you can only find it in the beacon tower under the command of the Hexi Jiedu envoy. And not all of those beacon towers have garrisons inside, because of the lack of funds from the imperial court, many beacon towers used to defend against the Turks have long been abandoned, and the high and thick earthen walls are covered with large and small gaps, and each gap has traces of the west wind.

Therefore, the guide will not murder the caravan who hired him to lead the way, not only because he is in awe of the immortal heaven, but also because he is afraid of loneliness. With his familiarity with the terrain, he was able to murder all the merchants, and he fled with his belongings. The problem is that the next thousands of miles will require him to go from beginning to end alone. Facing the same blue sky, the same yellow sand and the same traces of the wind on the top of the hill every day, I am afraid that before I see the next oasis, I am already tormented by loneliness and crazy.

"That's what he deliberately made up to scare people! Save you from robbing him of his job! "After all, he grew up in Chang'an City, Fang Ziling is far from being as easy to deceive as the locals in the Western Regions, and after a little groaning, he continued to fight with Lao Yue.

Guide Lao Yue shook his head, too lazy to meet him in general, "Since I met the ghost, my guy has never been a guide again." He was lucky to come back alive. Pulling a couple of madmen, stumbling in the desert. If it hadn't happened to meet the cavalry under the command of General Geshuhan, it would have turned into a pile of bones! ”

At this time, Fang Ziteng was completely speechless. If it was for money and murder, he would not have returned with a few stupid businessmen. If he made up nonsense to scare his peers, then what was he doing by giving up this path of making a living?

Could it be that in this desert, there is really ........ Thinking of the mirage he saw yesterday morning, Fang Ziteng trembled in his heart. Along the way, everyone saw too many strange things, and they didn't dare to think deeply. If you're really being targeted by ghosts and gods, then everyone......

"Don't listen to his nonsense, we haven't done anything wrong!" Seeing that Fang Ziteng's face was getting more and more wrong, Elder Zheng gently chased forward and gave the other party a loud voice. "I don't do bad things in my life, and I'm not afraid of ghosts knocking on the door in the middle of the night. A few of us are doing right, walking straight, and there are three feet of righteousness gathered above our heads......."

Before he could finish speaking, another group elder Zhou immediately retorted angrily, "Don't talk nonsense. If you do it right, you shouldn't be unlucky if you go straight, then let's ......"

Glancing at the guide Lao Yue, who was close at hand, and a few Hexi soldiers who were ordered to escort everyone not far away, he suddenly closed his mouth again. There are some things that the fewer people who know, the better. lest anyone take advantage of the opportunity to fall into the well.

This obviously vigilant action made the guide Lao Yue very unhappy, shrugged his shoulders, and took the initiative to walk away. If it weren't for the fact that he couldn't provoke the soldiers of the Hexi Jiedu Embassy, he wouldn't want to take this job at all. There is a world of difference between leading the way for an army and leading a merchant for a businessman. The former is basically a loss-making business, while the latter, as long as he is good at observing words and feelings, can always reap several times the reward in addition to the established reward.

Seeing that Lao Zhou was the only person who could talk to everyone to relieve their boredom and left, Elder Zheng was very unhappy. Twisting from the horse, he whispered to his companions: "If you don't speak, who will treat you as a mute?" How do you know that we are not fat this time, and we have to think about crooked ways? If you want to die alone, don't always pull us! ”

"It's hard-mouthed!" Lao Zhou, known as the crow's mouth, immediately sneered, "It's not like you don't have eyes." Take a good look, who are on this business trip? Why did the brothers all serve on duty by the Qujiang Pond in those days! ”

At this level, Lao Zheng didn't think about it, but he couldn't believe that Gao Lishi would be so vicious. After hesitating for a moment, he continued to retort, "You still said that we couldn't make it to Yangguan alive!" General Geshu has sent his own soldiers out to escort us, if it is really like what you think, why should he bother so much! ”

Unlike pure generals such as Feng Changqing and Gao Xianzhi, Hexi Jiedu makes Ge Shuhan a man who can grasp every inch. At that time, his immediate boss Wang Zhongji was unjustly imprisoned, and his colleagues persuaded Ge Shuhan to bribe Li Linfu with a large amount of money to exonerate his boss, but he himself insisted that this was a case personally handled by His Majesty the Emperor, and bribery could not solve the problem at all. When he was recruited back to Beijing to report on his work, he pulled the corner of the emperor's clothes and kowtowed to bleed, begging the other party to raise his noble hand. As a result, not only was Wang Zhongji released, but Ge Shuhan himself also left a good impression on the emperor and the civil and military officials as 'upright, loyal, and righteous to his friends'. was unusually promoted to the envoy of Longyoujie, and replaced the original position of the old boss Wang Zhonghei in one fell swoop.

After taking office, Ge Shuhan changed Wang Zhonghe's passive defensive strategy and actively launched an attack on Tibet. Step by step, the blade was pushed directly to the shore of Qinghai Lake. The Tubo people raised troops to attack many times, but they were all defeated by Geshuhan with superior forces, so they had to retreat to Dafeichuan. In the eighth year of Tianbao, Ge Shuhan led 60,000 troops to attack, and at the cost of 15,000 people, he took Shibao City, an important town in Tibet. The "great victory" of capturing more than 400 enemy soldiers completely blocked the passage for the Tibetan army to enter and exit the northeast side of the plateau.

When the news came back to Chang'an, Prime Minister Li Linfu thought that Ge Shuhan was so happy that he had lost too many ** soldiers, and implored the emperor to issue an order to remove this person. Yang Guozhong, however, believed that Ge Shuhan had seized a strategic place for the imperial court to attack the plateau, and suggested that he be rewarded. After some wrestling, the Tang Emperor accepted Yang Guozhong's suggestion. Gave Geshu Han Shu a thousand horses, a manor, plus the regent Shi Dafu, and then added the Kaifu Yi with the three divisions, Longyou and Hexi Jiedu envoy. And Ge Shuhan also reciprocated the favor, supporting Yang Guozhong in the power struggle of the imperial court, and did not take Li Linfu in his eyes at all.

Because of this, the crow-beaked old Zhou insisted that everyone should be careful everywhere on the territory of Ge Shuhan, the envoy of Hexi Jiedu, so as not to be instructed by Yang Guozhong to kill people and destroy their mouths. But now everyone is about to walk out of the Hexi territory, but it has been calm, and the performance of the Hexi soldiers and horses who came to escort them is also in order, and there is no sign of being ready to do it.

Thinking of this, several other colleagues also felt that Lao Zhou was too worried, so they stepped forward, lowered their voices and said, "Lao Zheng's words make sense. Just a few of our stinky fish and rotten shrimps, General Ge Shu can be crushed to death with a finger casually, why send troops to escort them, and ask for guides on their behalf, so much trouble? ”

"yes, isn't that a fart off your pants?"

"You're stupid. He is escorting us, escorting this batch of baggage! Crow's mouth Lao Zhou is always pessimistic when he sees things, and he doesn't agree with the opinions of his partners at all, "If something happens to this batch of baggage under his rule, it will definitely leave people with a handle to attack." So he sent us out of Hexi safely first, and then waited for us on the way back. While we're not prepared, ......"

He held out his hand and made a head-cutting gesture. frightened several colleagues around him and shrunk their necks one after another. Unexpectedly, the always timid team Zheng Fang Ziteng heard this, but he sneered, looked at everyone, and his face was full of disdain.

"Scared silly, you?" Lao Zheng was so laughed that his heart was furious, slapped him, and asked in a low voice.

"You're fools, you're worried!" Fang Ziteng pursed his lips and responded in a low voice, "Ghosts are not easy to deal with, but people may not be difficult to provoke." As long as a few of you follow me, I guarantee that not a single hair is missing! ”

"Just you?" Lao Zhou, Lao Zheng and several other colleagues shook their heads slightly. After getting along for so long, everyone really didn't see that the team was more capable of being a person.

"See?" Seeing that everyone didn't believe in themselves, Fang Ziteng was not annoyed. He picked at Wang Xun's position with his chin, and lowered his voice to explain: "Who is that, the little marquis of the Wang family, the protégé of the four towns of Anxi Jiedu envoy Feng Shuai." There is a Yangguan ahead, but it is the territory of Feng Shuai. As long as we keep up with him at all times, we are not afraid of being killed! ”

"That's right!" It was as if the sun was shining on the heart in an instant, and the dark clouds that had accumulated on everyone's faces for days were swept away. Wang Xiaowei's history has long been heard in private, as long as he is on the territory of the four towns of Anxi, who eats the leopard's gall and dares to fight this person's idea?

"Of course it's okay when we go, but what are we going to do when we come back?" Old Zhou Wu was uneasy, thought about it, and continued to ask.

"If he doesn't come back, let's not come back." Fang Ziteng smiled, his face full of pride, "That incident has been forgotten for a long time, and I will return to Chang'an for a long time." Hide in Anxi for two years first, maybe you can make some contributions, and finally return to your hometown with beautiful scenery! ”

Note 1: Dude. Market slang for peers, friends. Pu Changhai, that is, Lop Nur.