Chapter 687: Civil Unrest (5)

But Kong Sheng recruited him to the army when Yang Tong was busiest, and went with him to Deqing to quell the chaos, which made Yang Tong inevitably have some speculation in addition to being confused.

"Kong asked Mr. to accompany him, mainly when he arrived in Deqing, and there were some things that Mr. needed to plan and help. Kong heard that Mr. was a native of Deqing and had a high reputation in the local area. If it is ......" Kong Sheng didn't finish his words, he suddenly raised his head and stared at the smoke-filled place on the road ahead, and his brows tightened.

Although Kong Sheng's words were only half spoken, Yang Tong was a person, and he naturally understood Kong Sheng's deep meaning. It was nothing more than to use his popularity in Deqing to appease this rioting army of displaced people. It can be seen that Kong Sheng did not come to fight at all, but to appease the displaced people, which is enough to explain why he only brought more than 1,000 people and horses.

Yang Tong sighed lightly in the car, a person like Kong Sheng, who is selfless and cares about the safety of the world, is an official in the court and occupies a high position, which is really a blessing for the people of the Tang Dynasty and the court.

The voices of the people in front of them were noisy, and the sound of messy running and the sparkling shouts of cars and horses was endless. Kong Sheng waved his hand and ordered the army to stand by. Yang Tong also got out of the car with his tired body, standing on the side of the official road and looking forward.

The road ahead was full of smoke and dust, and I faintly saw groups of people helping the old and the young to drag their families and horses in the direction of Jiangning, Yang Tong held his forehead with his hand, and understood in his heart that this was probably the people who had fled from the direction of Deqing.

Kong Sheng's expression was awe-inspiring on the horse, and he shouted: "Li Biao, Yuan Chao, quickly go forward to check the movement and see what's going on!" ”

"The last general obeys!" Li Biao and Yuan Chao immediately galloped forward with their horses, and gradually disappeared from Kong Sheng's field of vision. Not long after, Li Biao and Yuan Chao galloped back, but their expressions were a little complicated. They were accompanied by a middle-aged man dressed as a scholar in green clothes.

This person is polite and polite, with clear eyebrows and beautiful eyes, and a slightly gloomy color between his eyebrows and eyes, which makes Kong Sheng dislike it.

Yuan Chao turned over and dismounted and bowed: "My subordinates meet the king of the county!" ”

Kong Sheng smiled: "No courtesy." Yuan Chao, what's going on? ”

"The king of Huijun is the people who fled from Deqing, there are probably thousands of people." Yuan Chao sighed lightly: "This is the second son of Shen of Wuxing Shen's grandson, the second son of Shen, please report the truth to the king of the county." ”

Yuan Chao and this person are obviously old acquaintances.

At the moment when Yuan Chao was talking to Kong Sheng, this second son of Shen had been secretly looking at Kong Sheng. Kong Sheng, the king of Jiangning County, has a great name, but for the people of Wuxing Shen's family, Shen Er is the first time to see Kong Sheng. Seeing that Kong Sheng was so young, with his white clothes and bright armor and extraordinary appearance, a trace of surprise flashed in this person's eyes.

Shen Er bowed without humility or arrogance: "Student Shen Er, I have seen the king of the county!" ”

For the wealthy children of Wuxing Shen and Yixing Zhou, Kong Sheng has no bad feelings, but he definitely has no good feelings. He smiled faintly, looked at Shen Er and said, "Second Prince Shen doesn't need to be polite, what is the situation on the Deqing side, how the people fled to Jiangning, you might as well tell this king." ”

Shen Er snorted, cleared his throat and said: "Back to the county king, that Yuan Ying was originally a Deqing gentry, this person is ambitious, secretly conspiring with local homeless people and gangsters, gathering thousands of people to burn down the Deqing County Ya, kill the county order, let go of the granary, and trick the villagers to vote, within a few days, hundreds of thousands of neighboring homeless people and people were bewitched. Now Yuan Ying has set up a private court in Deqing, set up an official position, and called himself the king of Baosheng......"

"That Yuan Ying and his gang of murderers did all kinds of evil in Deqing, burning, killing, looting, and the local gentry and people all fled from Deqing. The king of the county, that Yuan Ying thieves are powerful, and they are currently planning to attack the five counties on the first line of Dexing, and ask the imperial court to send a large army to exterminate them quickly, otherwise it will definitely cause trouble in the south of the Yangtze River......"

Yuan Ying was portrayed as a murderous demon in Shen Er's mouth. Yuan Chao frowned secretly when he heard this, although he didn't say anything, he was quite unimpressed in his heart. He admits that Yuan Ying is a person with great ambitions, otherwise he would not have used the homeless people to rebel, but Yuan Ying is definitely not an impulsive and murderous person, he is currently using the people to rebel against the imperial court, and it is most unlikely to hurt the local poor people.

But obviously, Yuan Ying needs a lot of food and salary to get into trouble, and where do these come from? It can only be a robbery of the gentry and wealthy families.

But in front of everyone, Yuan Chao couldn't defend Yuan Ying.

What made Yuan Chao feel even more uncomfortable was that their brother originally had a very close relationship with Shen Er, and was known as a close friend. Unexpectedly, after the passage of time, this Shen Er actually slandered his former friend. However, thinking about Yuan Chao, he will be calm, Yuan Ying is currently a traitor, once he loses, the court will inevitably kill and behead him, and even the entire Yuan family clan will be implicated by him.

Kong Sheng's profound gaze swept over Yuan Chao's body, and then projected it on Shen Er's body, and said indifferently: "Then Yuan Ying really has more than ten thousand people?" At present, they only occupy the county seat of Deqing, or are they plundering the state capitals and counties everywhere? ”

Shen Er took a deep breath and said loudly: "If you go back to the county king, then Yuan Ying used the excuse of opening a warehouse to release grain to trick the homeless people into joining the gang, and now he has gathered more than ten thousand people and plundered the state capitals and counties. ”

Regarding Shen Er's words, Kong Shengxin didn't believe it either.

According to the records of the history books, Yuan Ying's rebel army expanded to 200,000 people in just a few months, occupied several nearby state capitals and counties, and was very powerful for a while. If it weren't for the imperial court's order for Li Guangbi to lead elite officers and troops to be stationed in the encirclement and suppression, I'm afraid it would really become a climate.

This should have been the largest uprising in the middle of the Tang Dynasty. However, the peasant rebels rose up in a hurry, without the necessary military training and without actual combat experience. In the face of the elite soldiers under the command of Li Guangbi, the "famous general of Zhongxing", the strength of the two sides was very different, and they fought hard with the official army, so they were quickly defeated.

Kong Sheng fell silent.

Shen Er's eyes were blazing, but he looked back and forth on Kong Sheng. Li Biao and Li Hu frowned behind him, but he suppressed his anger. A son of a wealthy family in the south of the Yangtze River, who has no official position, in the face of Kong Sheng, the king of Jiangning County, dares to have no shying away from it and no sense of awe, which makes the two very unhappy.

"Since it was the people who fled, Yuan Chao, passing on the order of the king, ordered Jiangning County to quickly prepare houses and food, and go out of the city to resettle refugees, and not to be lazy. Tell Liu Pingshan that if a fleeing person is embarrassed or turned away in Jiangning, this king will ask him! Kong Sheng waved his hand, and said with a vague smile on the corner of his mouth: "The second prince of Shen also went to Jiangning City to live temporarily for a few days, but this king put down Yuan Ying's rebellion, and he will wait for the day when he returns to his homeland!" ”

Shen Er bowed and saluted: "The student thanked the county king!" On behalf of the families of the fleeing people, the students thank the king of the county for his kindness! ”

Shen Er immediately returned to the ranks of the refugees, the refugees came all over the mountains, there was no order and formation at all, some of them rode on the official road with their family wealth, some of them wandered in groups of three or five in the wilderness, and herds of domestic animals were driven to Jiangning City.

Looking at Shen Er's back, Kong Sheng suddenly said lightly: "Yuan Chao, the foundation of this Wuxing Shen clan is in Deqing, right?" They also gave up their family business and fled this time? I heard that there are thousands of people in the Shen clan alone, with groups of slaves and maids, but this king seems to have only two or three servants with Shen Er? ”

Yuan Chao was stunned, he didn't notice this problem. But according to his grasp, although the Shen family also fled with most of the people this time, there don't seem to be too many Shen family members mixed in the refugee group, especially the descendants of Zhengzhi, who seems to have only one second-generation Shen Er.

Yuan Chao suddenly realized that this seemed to be a question worth savoring slowly.

The Shen family is one of the two wealthy families in the south of the Yangtze River, based in Wuxing, that is, Deqing, it can be said that more than half of the land, assets, shops, and business names in Deqing are the industries of the Shen family. From this point of view, it was the Shen clan that suffered the most from Yuan Ying's uprising. And since the Shen family is the largest landlord in the local area, it is bound to be the most suppressed and plundered, and it stands to reason that it should be difficult to count the Shen family who fled.

Yuan Chao took a deep breath and said, "King Jun, the foundation of the Shen family is indeed in Deqing, but the Shen family ......"

For a while, Yuan Chao suddenly didn't know what to say. He can't say that the Shen family and Yuan Ying colluded to rebel together, right? In fact, as a wealthy family with vested interests, the Shen family is the least likely person to create a rebellion against the Tang Dynasty.

Fortunately, Kong Sheng did not continue to dwell on this issue, he immediately waved his hand and said softly: "Yuan Chao, you take a few people to Deqing quickly, if you can see Yuan Ying, persuade him to surrender to the imperial court, don't be obsessed." ”

Yuan Chao sighed: "Subordinates obey orders!" Please rest assured that his subordinates will try their best to persuade Yuan Ying to give up the rebellion and confess his guilt to the court! ”

Kong Sheng nodded and remained silent.

Yuan Chao didn't dare to slack off, and immediately after receiving the order, he took his entourage and quickly followed the path to Deqing. In fact, Yuan Chao didn't have much hope for persuading Yuan Ying to surrender, because he knew his cousin too well, and he had ambitions since he was a child, and now he saw that there were more and more displaced people in the south of the Yangtze River, the court was tyrannical, the wealthy families wantonly squeezed, and the people's grievances were boiling, so he took advantage of the situation and prepared to learn from An Lushan, if he could occupy the Tang Dynasty, then he would be the founding emperor.

The so-called prince will be a kind of Xiangning?

If Kong Sheng led tens of thousands of Jiangnan troops to suppress the border, Yuan Ying might still be willing to negotiate with the government, but Kong Sheng only brought such a thousand men and horses to make Yuan Ying return to the avatar, it was simply a fool's dream.

Yang Tongyi stood on the sidelines and watched. Now that Yuan Chao was ordered to go, he stood up and hugged Kong Sheng and said: "King Jun, in my opinion, Yuan Chao's departure will not only have no results, but will even endanger his life." ”

Kong Sheng smiled: "What Mr. said is very true, that Yuan Ying has been planning for a long time, and now he is inciting more than ten thousand people, and the momentum is huge, how can he give up the low-hanging fruit situation because of Yuan Chao's three or two sentences?" Apparently impossible. ”

Yang Tong frowned, and said in his heart, since you know that Yuan Chao has no result here, and he is still worried about his life, why do you still let him go? Isn't this asking Yuan Chao to send him to death?

As if seeing Yang Tong's concern, Kong Sheng shrugged his shoulders and smiled: "But although Yuan Chao's persuasion to surrender is fruitless, it will not endanger his life. Yuan Ying and Yuan Chao were originally cousins...... The reason why Kong asked Yuan Chao to persuade him to surrender was actually to make Yuan Chao feel at ease. ”

Kong Sheng is right. When Yuan Ying got into trouble, Yuan Chao must have a heart disease in his heart. And his relationship with Yuan Ying can't be kept secret for a long time, once it spreads, it will be difficult for him to do things by Kong Sheng's side - whether it is for his own psychological comfort, or to show outsiders, Yuan Chao must go through such a journey.

Yang Tong took a deep breath, clenched his fists and bowed: "It's shallow below, I don't know the deep meaning of the county king, it's really embarrassing!" ”