In the sub-city of Jiaozhou City, it was already late at night when the lights were flickering, and the curfew patrols began to resound in the streets and alleys, but it was completely impossible to curb the traces and figures of some sneaky shuttles between the Gaomen mansions. And sometimes they are bumped into in the face, and even those soldiers who patrol the night seem to be blind to the wrong past.

Among them are the Jiaozhou Thorn Shi Yan, who had just returned from attending a banquet and was one of the troika in Jiaozhou City.

Compared with Zeng Gon, who was looking at the enemy at the head of the city during the day and was full of thoughts, the Jiaozhou Thorn Shi Yan, who was sitting on the manpower lifting arm, was full of regret and unwillingness, he was originally from a literary background; There's nothing brilliant or different about it.

Although he was one of the vanguard soldiers and horses under the command of his uncle Gao Yu, he actually did not lead a day of soldiers, nor did he take the lead in facing the enemy. It was only because Gao Biao was transferred to another town that he needed someone to guard and operate the industries he had accumulated and purchased in the local area, that he was specially described as the assassin of Jiaozhou.

And those local officials and Tutuan generals also respected him as the nominal governor and highest official of Jiaozhou because he was a generation of famous generals Gao Biao Congsun; But once Lingdong and Lingxi fell one after another and the imperial court was cut off, they made up their minds to join those grass thieves, and his assassination lost its greatest usefulness, and was hollowed out in name only.

But because of his relationship as a contemporary famous general's family, he is quite courteous and carefree, and he has not even violated the private property and farm house in his name, but can still breed evil and produce for him. But this Zeng Yan came to be different, he copied all the big families in the city to replenish military funds and rewards, and even did not let go of the net worth of the collaborators led by Yan Yan, and ordered them to "break the family" for the imperial court.

And Gao Cheng, who has paid all this before and after, is still the Jiaozhou Thorn History that was erected high and used as a walking movable print; Even the 300 generals and subordinates that Gao Biao left him to take care of the industry and his body at the beginning were taken away on the grounds of unified life. Therefore, when he thought of the treasures and treasures that had been removed from his house, he felt a burst of pain and distress;

In contrast, that Guiguan Jingluo Li Zan is much better than him, relying on the thousands of pieces gathered together, as well as those wealthy family soldiers who are attached to him, and now the official worships Annan, the deputy capital protector and the envoy of Yingtiandu, and has become the actual number two person in the city.

To be honest, he thinks that he doesn't have much ambition and desire, he just wants to make a few more years of peace and stability in this Jiaozhou assassin history, and casually double the properties under his name, isn't this okay. Therefore, he couldn't help but secretly resentful of Zeng Yan's quick turn of mind into hatred; If it weren't for the other party, a grass thief who started by killing officials and rebelling, he was afraid that he would find another way out.

It's just that after he returned to his mansion and closed the door of the aconite, he found a familiar figure waiting in the moonlit courtyard, and couldn't help but be surprised:

"Tu Zhen, you're still alive. Aren't you all in the grass thief? ”

Immediately, he reacted, and suddenly his face turned cold and he said fiercely to one of the former tribesmen.

"You still have the face to come back, I am a descendant of the famous Gao family, a relative of the Duke of Bohai, no matter how unbearable I am, I definitely have no reason to be a thief."

However, although what he said was righteous and stern, a series of complicated calculations had flashed in his heart.

This general, named Gu Liumeng, whose name is Tu Zhen, is from the capital of Mingzhou, the east province of Jiangnan. This time, he was able to be released back and easily infiltrate the heavily guarded Daluo City as if he was facing a great enemy, but I am afraid that there are people in the army who echo and cover it up.

"What Ming Gong said is very true, my generation should not dare to pollute the lintel of Gao Linggong."

Gu Liumeng continued more humbly.

"It's just that please take a clear look at one or two, the villain is all this crippled body, but I really can't bear to see it... Endure the great foundation left by Ling Gong. It's buried in other people's selfishness.。。 ”

"I can't bear to see the hard work and kindness of Ming Gongjiu Town Jiaozhou, all of which are in vain and it is difficult to be alone."

"What do you mean by that? Do you dare to talk about the courtiers of the court? . . ”

His tone became more and more severe, but he secretly sighed in his heart.

"What virtue do I have, what can I do..."

"Why should Ming Gong be presumptuous."

Gu Liumeng continued to speak more and more decisively in his heart under the observation of his words.

"The head of the thief still has a word to tell Yu Ming Gong: If it is not my race, its heart will be different. Since ancient times, no matter who is in power in Annam, they are all subjects of my Han family."

"But if Annan is in chaos and the other party is empty, then it will be cheap for those barbarians; That's why the opponent came here... ”

"What a clever word."

He snorted heavily, but he stretched out his hand to signal him to enter to avoid suspicion.

。。。。。

The territory of Wu'e Prefecture (near present-day Taiyuan, Vietnam) in the northwest of Jiaozhou is also full of beacons.

On the edge of the small town, which was littered with corpses and burned white, an army of barbarians in mixed clothes was regrouping, along with the horses and mules full of things, and the women who were weeping and crying in their hands, bound in strings of ropes.

Most of them are wrapped in green cloth towels and stomping on their feet, and are equipped with (bamboo) bucket armor, leather pockets, spears, hand marks, partial knives, rattan cards, mountain crossbows, bamboo arrows, hammer arrows and other equipment. Among them, the brave ones get the tattoos, and the more tattoos they have, the more warriors they win before the battle.

In the middle of these barbarian armies is a group of silver-embroidered Big Dipper stars, and on the accompanying banner is a gilded tiger-headed human bronze beast representing the ancestral god of the clan. In the open space under the flags, many cattle and sheep were dragged down on the yellow sand in front of the tent, and one by one they were slaughtered and divided into meat for the warriors of each tribe to be eaten and eaten;

He also took out the entrails and threw them into the roaring fire surrounded by the witch priest with a feather crown on his head, and sent out bursts of pungent scorching stench and smoke clouds, which were considered auspicious; Then the blood of livestock collected by copper horns was poured on the mottled and green copper drums in the forest on that side, and the patterns on the drums that describe the legends of ancient hunting battles were engraved, making them more and more hideous and terrifying.

In the newly built brown animal skin tent, Luo Fengyi, the big chief with a rough appearance and short body, was chewing and eating with a silk cloth on his chest and belly full of oil stains and residues, but he unconsciously held a horn cup and drank roughly.

Amid the rhythm of many brass drums, and the shirtless warriors of the caves engaged in fierce gladiatorial fights in the open space in front of the tent, even though the sweat of the battle was dripping with blood and they were unmoved, until one of them fell completely, and was dragged out and replaced by the others in a cheer and roar of cheers and roars throwing gold and silver ornaments at the winner.

Luo Fengyi sat and watched all this happily, full of some kind of surging longing and ambition. At the beginning, the ancestors of the Luo clan were only a certain branch of most of the Huang clan, and a small village under the command of many vassal tribesmen, because they stood out among the "enemies" who fought for land in various caves, and replaced the original buckwheat head cave owner who was gradually declining; Later, when he took advantage of the Huang Rebellion and the imperial court's crusade against the soldiers and horses, he got rid of his vassal status to the Huang clan's suzerain, and accepted exile in Linxi Prefecture to stand on his own.

Today, most of the Luo clan has hundreds of thousands of people in the three small states of Linxi, Dehua and Langmang, and there are 19 large and small caves in the five small states of Tangquan and Lusuo, and they dedicate money, grain and products and Dingkou labor all the year round;

Because as early as more than ten years ago, the assassins and cave masters of the Huang clan and the Nong clan, who were originally the most powerful, were killed and slaughtered by the officials and soldiers due to collusion with the Nanzhao rebellion, and they were weakened one after another and have not been able to recover their old views; On the contrary, the other tribes that sat and watched the fall into the well like Luo took advantage of the situation and annexed many peripheral villages and populations.

Since then, over the years, the Luo clan led by Luo Fengyi has become a first-class barbarian force in the entire Western Plains, and even among the barbarians of the thirteen departments and twenty-nine states under the custody of the Annan Prefecture.

Because they have lived for generations in a mountainous place with canyons and small basins, they naturally form a large and small caves and villages with the topography of the settlement; Among them, the big ones are in the same county, and the small ones also have a township; The village is the most basic rural unit than the Han land; Each village has a corresponding leader and nobles, and the place where the bronze drum is cast is called "Du Lao".

However, because the land is narrow but still fertile and rainfall is abundant, agriculture and animal husbandry are quite developed. Therefore, the places in each cave are known as "Li Shu is very numerous, and the grain is abundant"; and the possession of a large number of slaves and maidservants as a driving force; Thus being in the social mindset between primitive clans and slavery; Among them, it is close to the Han land and civilized, and there are corresponding official offices, bazaars, temples and schools.

Among them, there are many names of raw gold, silver, copper, lead green, dansha, cuiyu, hole, lianbu, fennel, grass and fruit, often along a number of water systems in the mountains and release down, to sell in the plain area for their own profits, so as the upper class of the adults of each cave live quite rich, often in the mountains and fields and the manor is even clouds, and the slaves and servants are tens of thousands.

Among them, the cave masters chose to lead the brave and strong people, and practiced swords, guns, bows and crossbows, and called the cave ding. These cavemen are often energetic and hard-working, wearing leather shoes and good at shooting and hunting, and not pausing up and down the mountain. When they kill each other, they set up each other's arrays, and each has two wings to wrap each other, and the elders with many wings win it. Therefore, these Western Plains barbarian lords and cave masters usually belong to the mountains, water sources, grasslands, fields, forests and trees, and frequent armed fights and even generations of vendettas, and they have also cultivated quite fearless folk customs and blood (traditions).

Although they fought with each other on weekdays, they maintained the tradition of taking each other's goods and plundering people as slaves; But once there is a strong man's wrist to unite it into one; That will become a great scourge for going out to plunder and wreaking havoc on the place; In history, it has continued intermittently for hundreds of years, and the "Huang's Cave Rebellion" that has been rebellious and uncertain, and even more than ten years ago, Li Duyou, the great leader of Qiyuan Cave and the assassin of the history of Nanzhao, and Zhu Daogu, a native who led Nanzhao into Kou, are the best portrayal of this period.

And most of the Luo clan, which is now taking advantage of the times, is obviously one of the successors of those who want to learn from the law. In fact, his name of righteousness was given by the tutor hired by the previous Rabe lord, and he was taken from the righteousness of his loyalty and righteousness.

But Luo Fengyi is not the eldest son who is naturally popular, nor is he the favorite youngest son of the previous generation of adults; But among more than a dozen brothers of the same generation, with a rough appearance and contemptible style, he stood out and even had the last laugh, which is obviously not a matter of luck. Although there has always been a legend, he is the choice of the stars favored by the ancestral gods.

This time, most of the Luo clan from which he was born also brought those vassal tribes, and pulled out a total of 30,000 dongding and enveloped the various departments along the Xidao River, and since then the lineup of the 50,000 army has been called not only for the appetite of the children of the wealth and silk of a few states and counties; According to his strategist Duan Jie, who was taken over from the defeated army of Nanzhao in the early years, now that the Tang court is weak and the civil strife is not stopping, and the land of Anhai is desperate and there is internal strife, it is time for Luo Bu to rise and claim the position.

What's even better is that just like the will of heaven, his army just came out of Fuxian Mountain, and he bumped into the powerful representatives of the Han land who came to look for his in-laws as foreign aid, which made it even more famous and easy to do. As he thought so, he saw his chief hurriedly cross the drunken crowd and send him a silk cloth with a blank face.

"Now that there's a better name, those people are useless."

After a while, Luo Fengyi suddenly stood up, revealing a smiling expression.

"Let's go out and cut down the gods."

Suddenly, the tattooed warriors rushed in, and dragged out some of the leaders who were drinking and feasting in the hall, and turned into bloody heads on the tray.

This sudden scene and the familiar expression on his face couldn't help but remind some people of the scene when he, who was still young and stout many years ago, rushed back with dozens of retinues to break into the residence of the seriously ill and dying minister, and then turned the entire manor into blood.

"What a happy event, what a great event."

Then, Luo Fengyi said aloud to the cave masters and generals who were silent with different expressions and still rubbed their greasy stubby palms.

"It was the protector of the Han family who invited me to beg for a thief."

"Ancestral God bless, the time has come for most of my Luo clan to become the lord of Annam."

"Where the great (red) river flows, the land of the Han family, the children of wealth and silk can take it."

"Everyone can be a thorn history, a general, and the treasures and goods in Daluo City, waiting for us to enjoy."

"The big boss finishes the race (10,000 wins),。。。 King Luo finishes the race. ”

Immediately, the audience shouted with joy.

(End of chapter)