The master and apprentice continued to walk towards the town, and when they saw those gangsters blocking the road, Lao Dao stepped forward, clasped his fists and said, "Heroes, please borrow the road!" ”

The first bearded man said, "Who is the Taoist chief?" ”

The old Taoist said: "The poor Dao is the hanging Taoist priest of the Lingyan Temple, the name is Qingxu, this is the little disciple Yuanrui of the poor Dao. ”

The bearded man glanced Qingxu up and down, pointed to the portrait held by his subordinates and asked, "Have you ever seen this person on the road?" ”

Qingxu squinted at the portrait a few times, and then said, "I haven't seen it." ”

The strong man glanced at Yuan Rui's body twice, and then turned sideways to get out of the way: "Dao Chief, please." ”

This monk and nun, who walks the rivers and lakes, is not a very easy character to mess with. The strong man didn't want to do much, so he asked a few words, and let the master and apprentice into the town.

The master and apprentice entered Anhua Fort and invested in an inn on East Street in the town.

The two asked for a guest room, and after having eaten at the wine shop on the street of the inn, they were about to go back to the guest room to rest, but they heard a faint sound of horses' hooves, and galloped towards the town. Hearing the sound of hooves, he rushed straight to the front of the shop, and as soon as the sound of the horses' hooves stopped, several riders jumped from their horses to the ground.

I only heard the shopkeeper say outside the door: "Everyone is hard, there are ready-made tea, wine and rice in the store, please come in!" ”

But one of them said in a rough voice: "Hurry up and feed the horses, we have to hurry after eating." Listening to his Chinese dialect, it is quite blunt, it should be the Qiang people or the Tibetan and Hui people.

The shopkeeper agreed, and called other companions to come and lead the horses and feed them.

With the sound of footsteps, a total of five riders dressed as samurai walked into the store.

Qingxu looked secretly, and saw that the hair on the top of these people's heads was shaved bald, leaving only two manes and three locks of hair braids on the back of their heads, looking at their dress, he knew that these people were all Qiang or Khitan warriors. I thought to myself, this Longyou, Hexi area of Tibetan, Han, Qiang mixed people, Qiang people, but these people rarely come to Guanzhong, today I saw several groups of Qiang warriors, see that they are immediately good martial arts. This situation is really rare in the Weizhou area of Guanzhong.

The five of them found a window seat and sat down, only to hear the rough voice just now The man instructed the shopkeeper: "Shopkeeper, cut ten catties of beef, and then four kinds of stir-fried vegetables, a jar of old wine, and twenty cooking cakes!" ”

But I heard a young warrior with a scar on his face say to the knight who seemed to be the leader: "Third brother, you said that the young master of the Tuoba family is young, can he hold it down from the tribes?" Why should we listen to him? He spoke the Qiang language, but the Qiang people in the north have lived in Han for a long time, and the language is also mixed with many local languages in the north of Guanzhong, and Qingxu Lao Dao often dealt with the Qiang people in the north when he was young, but he probably understood what it meant.

I only heard the leader known as the third brother say: "If you can't suppress it, we don't count if we talk about it." He took the last order of Li Lao's family, so we have to follow the rules of the past. Our tribe swore an oath at the beginning, no matter whether it succeeds or not, we always have to protect him with all sincerity and loyalty. Although this person spoke in a loud voice, he was full of confidence and full of energy, and the old Taoist knew that he had superb internal skills, so he didn't dare to listen carefully, so he picked up the teapot in front of him and poured a bowl of tea and drank it himself.

I only heard the short, stout man with a meaty face say in a rough voice: "It's all to blame on that bastard Zhang Pu, who has to snatch some seal letter, so he wants to deceive Liangzhou into his hands without a knife or a shot." Who knew that in the end, nothing would fall, causing our brothers to run around, and there was no time to live in peace! There are few good people in this Han family, and they are all bad in their stomachs! ”

The third brother glared at him and said, "Shut up, this Zhang Pu is valued by the young master, don't chew your tongue behind your back, otherwise I won't be able to protect you at that time!" ”

At this time, the store brought a large plate of cooked beef, and served a large jar of Fengxiang shochu made with millet and sorghum. These Qiang warriors drank wine and ate meat at the same time, but they talked about other miscellaneous matters. Qingxu Lao Dao can't hear a reason, and I don't know who the young master of the Qiang tribe is that these people are talking about?

Lao Dao didn't dare to stay longer, and after drinking a bowl of tea, he left the wine shop with his apprentice Yuanrui and returned to the guest room in the backyard.

He intuitively felt that these Qiang warriors and the Najinghe gang should be related to the officer of the Liangzhou Tianping Army that he buried in the morning, but he didn't know what was going on? Listening to the tone of those people, it must have been to snatch some token.

Early the next morning, Qingxu did not leave in a hurry, but waited until the sun was three poles, and then left Baiyan Town with the two apprentices. After leaving the town and walking for more than an hour, about twenty miles away from Na'anhua Fort City, Na Yuanrui asked, "Master, are we still going to the Zhougong Temple in Naqishan?" ”

Qingxu Lao Dao slapped Yuan Rui's head and said, "Go, why don't you go?!" The more important this thing is, the more we will pay for this trip. If you don't earn money, do you have to work hard to deceive others...... Make hay?! Just be careful, who knows what we're up for? ”

Na Yuanrui said with a bitter face: "I heard that Liangzhou is going to go a long way, how long are we going to go with our two legs?" ”

Qingxu smiled: "Stupid baby, of course you can't walk on two feet when you go to Liangzhou." Let's find something first, see what it is, and then find a caravan and follow the people. ”

Speaking of this, he couldn't help frowning. At this time, the world was not yet stable, and the rule of the imperial court was still very weak, and the local security was not very good, and there were many bandits. The "heroes" formed groups to rob and travel to and from the merchants, and there were not many caravans walking in the Western Regions.

As the saying goes, there is no endless road to heaven, and this thing can only be seen when the time comes.

……

To the north of Weizhou, the Party Department in the area of Dalong Mountain (Liupan Mountain) gradually moved inward, and it had already become the pasture of the Qiang Department, which was originally a chaotic place where the Qiang and Han people lived together. Moreover, Li Jichang was not in Weizhou, but went to Baoji to assist the eldest brother in transporting grain and grass for the Jinyang army. The local garrison was already unable to clear out the bandit cottages all over the place, and now Li Jichang has taken most of the soldiers and horses, and the garrison can't even take care of defending the city now, where can they care about what is going on in the wilderness.

This kind of Qiang tribe robbing and killing caravans and even envoys in the northwest is also a common occurrence in the northwest, and the king of Jin and the king of Qi have sent troops to crusade many times, but they have not been able to eradicate the scourge. Due to the large strength of the Qiang Army, most of the time the result of sending troops to recruit is also anticlimactic, and in the end, it will not be done.

This robbery and murder case of the Hexi mission finally caused a big mess, and I will explain it later.

Now the northern army is gathering in Chencang and preparing to conquer Hanzhong in the south.

In Xingyuan Mansion's Shannan West Road Jiedu, Zhang Yun got the news and urgently rescued Luoyang.

Li Siyuan took Li Congke as the general of the left guard, sent him as the commander-in-chief, and the generals Liu Yanlang and Chang Congjian as the deputies, and went from Dengzhou to aid Xingyuan Mansion through Jinzhou. In addition, Shi Jingjiao was ordered to recruit envoys to the north, and led the soldiers and horses of Youzhou, Cangzhou, Weibo, Qingzhou and Zhaozhou to attack Zhenzhou and Dingzhou, and the Second Northern War in the post-Tang Dynasty was opened......