Du Guoying saw that Liu Cheng's face was becoming more and more solemn, so he asked in a low voice, "My lord, is there anything wrong?" “

"What is the name of the leader of this group of thieves, and what banner is he wearing?"

"It seems that he claims to be the king of Chuang, or is he breaking or something!" Du Guoying smiled: "As for the name, I don't know very well, anyway, it's a fake name, what's the use of asking?" ”

"King Chuang?" Liu Chengqiang suppressed the huge impact in his heart, and said in a deep voice: "Then this guy's surname is Gao or Li?" ”

"Isn't that clear, what's the matter?" Du Guoying asked with some doubts, in his opinion, the surname of a thief leader did not matter at all, after all, most of the leaders of the peasant army at that time used random pseudonyms in order to avoid harming their families.

"Why don't you bring that messenger up and ask the lord personally?"

"No, just ask, don't let him know I'm here!"

"Yes, sir!" Du Guoying also guessed a little bit of Liu Cheng's intentions at this time, and bowed down to take the order. Min Min on the side asked, "What are your plans for this group of thieves?" ”

"If possible, I would like to capture its leader alive, or at least kill him!" In front of the girl, Liu Cheng did not hide his thoughts: "If I guess correctly, this will be a very troublesome guy." ”

"Why do you say that, because he distributes food not only to the young and strong, but also to the old and weak?" Min Min asked with some confusion: "But what's so scary about this?" In our grassland, if there is a shortage of food, the young and strong are first fed, and the old and weak can eat. ”

"Minmin, you don't understand this." Liu Cheng laughed: "You Mongolians make a living by grazing cattle and horses, and live in pursuit of water and grass, and the tribes on the grassland fight day and day for pasture and water. If the young and strong are not allowed to eat first, the tribe will lose the battle, and the tribesmen will either die of hunger and cold, or become slaves of other tribes, and life is better than death. But now these thieves were originally honest people, but they were only raised by the local famine for many years and the court was not sympathetic, and there was no way to survive, how can they be compared with you. “

Hearing Liu Cheng say this, the Mongolian girl's face showed pity: "In this way, these thieves are quite pitiful. ”

"Yes!" Liu Cheng sighed: "Let me ask you a question. Are there many bold or timid people in the world? “

"Naturally, I'm much more timid!" Min Min smiled: "Just like the herd of horses, there is only one head horse, but there are many children and mares who follow the head horse." “

"Yes, there is nothing more dangerous in the world than rebellion, even if you kill people in the street, it will only harm one person, and raising the flag to rebel will bring disaster to the three tribes. It can be seen that there was a thief, and there were ten farmers who held grudges in the fields and did not dare to cause trouble. Even hundreds. Those who only recruit the young and strong, no matter how powerful they are, can only pull those who are bold and reckless into the ranks, but those who are timid and weak and dare not do anything will not face him; But those who distributed food to the old and weak may have saved dozens of people. The lives of hundreds of people, but the hearts of those who were resentful but did not dare to make trouble in the fields also let him pull them all over, which one do you say is more threatening to the imperial court? “

"In this case, it should be the latter that is more threatening. But how is it that what you say is different from what I have heard since I was a child? Since I was a child, I have heard that only those who are strong can become great sweaters! ”

"If you talk about strong soldiers and strong horses. How can these thieves compare to the officers and soldiers? Liu Cheng said with a smile: "But no matter how powerful the officials and soldiers are, they can't kill all the grudge farmers in the fields." ”

At this time, Du Guoying came in from outside, bowed and saluted, "Tell your lordship." The messenger's mouth was very stiff, and it took me a while to come up with a word, saying that his surname was Li. ”

"Surname Li?" Liu Cheng suddenly laughed: "It's really a coincidence, I didn't expect to meet it here, maybe you will go and tell the messenger later, we agreed to their leader's conditions, and at noon the day after tomorrow, we will exchange people for guns by the hill by the river outside the city of Qianhu." ”

"Yes, sir!"

"Also, I ordered to kill all the cattle, sheep and livestock in the city, let the soldiers have a full meal, set off tonight on the third watch, and cut down the thieves tomorrow morning!"

Juzhou, prison.

As soon as the sun set, the courtyard of the prison seemed very quiet, only the guards on duty carried wooden sticks, and walked around the courtyard every once in a while, playing the watch, with a hoarse voice, "The weather is dry, be careful of the candles!" ”。 What is very different from normal life is that this gloomy courtyard is no longer held by criminals, farmers who cannot afford to pay taxes and rents, and other poor people, but by dozens of the richest and most powerful people in the original state. These fortunate men, who were once pampered and high-ranking men, are now locked up in prison cells, awaiting their fate, and if their families pay a corresponding amount of money and food according to the demands of the leader of the thieves, they will be able to regain their freedom; Otherwise, they'll have to stay here. They sat in the dim trumpet, listening to the high courtyard walls from far to near, and from near to far, over and over again, over and over the towering courtyard walls, through the iron windows plastered with hemp paper, and knocking on their hearts at once. The number was very crowded, and it was very difficult for them to turn over, they were bitten by fleas, smoked by the agitation of urine buckets, and of course, what made them feel most heartbroken was their own fate and unknown fate, they did not know whether the people in their families would take out money and food to redeem themselves, and they did not know whether the leader of the thieves who got the money and food would keep his promise to release them. In the darkness, everyone was listening intently to the movement outside, hoping for the good news to come.

In a separate trumpet in the backyard of the prison, there was only a little light on the oil lamp on the windowsill, which made the room even darker, and with the help of this pitiful light, it was vaguely seen that there was only a small bed, a table, a stool, and a brazier, and a few pieces of charcoal in the brazier had only a few white embers left, emitting a little residual warmth. There was a person sitting cross-legged against the wall on the bed, with iron shackles on his feet and his eyes closed, after a while, he only heard the sound of the iron shackles, and the person got down from under the bed, and sighed indignantly: "I really didn't expect that my Ma Ziyi would have today!" He went to the windowsill, and turned the lamp with a stick, and made the lamp grass long, and the room was brightened up, and he went to the brazier again, and took his chopsticks and stirred the ash in the brazier. Revealing the red charcoal underneath, he picked up a few pieces of black charcoal from the brazier and put them under the coals, and restacked them. Soon a fire broke out in the brazier, and the cell was much hotter. Ma Ziyi walked a few more steps in the room, but with each step he took, the iron shackles on his feet rattled, and he didn't want to hear the sound, so he sat back on the bed and thought about it for a long time.

I don't know how much time passed, but the moonlight shone in through the hemp paper of the iron window. Ma Ziyi couldn't help but shudder, he was about to add some charcoal to the brazier, when he suddenly heard the iron lock on the door outside, immediately sat up straight, and shouted: "Who? ”

"It's me, sir!" A suppressed voice came from outside the door: "Qi Jiu! ”

"Qi Jiu?" Ma Ziyi hurriedly walked to the door, looked out through the crack in the door, and saw a man in a green coat and a small hat standing outside the door, it was Qi Jiu. He couldn't help but be surprised and delighted, and hurriedly asked in a low voice, "Why are you here?" What's going on outside? ”

"Sir, I came into the city disguised as a hungry man, and time is pressing. Just stop gossiping! Qi Jiu's voice was full of anxiety: "Lord Liu has already led the troops back, and he asked me to save you and Lord Lu." ”

"Come to save me and Lord Lu?" Ma Ziyi was first overjoyed when she heard this, and then asked with a burst of fear: "You are alone?" ”

"Naturally not!" Qi Jiu said in a low voice: "There is also Zhao Sanye, President Wang Qian." He was letting out the wind over there, and the thieves were all focused on the four gates, but they didn't watch out for it. Step back, I'll get this lock open!" ”

Ma Ziyi hurriedly took two steps back, only to hear a crisp sound, the door was pushed open, Qi Jiu rushed in, and said in a low voice: "Master, come with me!" “

Ma Ziyi didn't move, and asked in a deep voice: "You said that the thieves are very tightly guarded at the four gates, you are a fresh face who can blend in, but I and Master Lu are familiar faces, how can you get out?" ”

"Master, please rest assured, Lord Liu has already thought about it before I came, after you and Lord Lu escape, you will find a secret place to hide for a few days, the thief will not stay here for long.!"

Hearing this, Ma Ziyi already understood Liu Cheng's intentions, and couldn't help but secretly admire the other party's cleverness, and laughed in a low voice: "Okay, I understand, Qi Jiu, you have made a great contribution this time, and I will definitely reward you when I go out this time!" “

"Thank you, Master Ma!" Qi Jiu outside the door said in a low voice: "Sit down, I'll help you break the shackles!" “

Ma Ziyi walked to the side of the bed and sat down, Qi Jiu took out the prepared hammer and steel drill three times and opened the iron shackles, and helped him out of the door, and saw Wang Xingguo helping Lu Boqi to walk over here, and the group came out of the prison and found a secret place to hide.

At dawn the next day, a little fish belly white was just revealed on the horizon, Li Zicheng got up and practiced martial arts in the courtyard according to his usual habits, although his martial arts were quite good, but the most outstanding was archery, especially mounted archery. For the warriors of the ancient Oriental peoples, mounted archery was the most important and effective of all martial arts, because this martial art perfectly combined a high degree of mobility with long-range attacks, and before the advent of firearms, mounted archers were the most feared military system in the arid and semi-arid plains of the entire Old World. For Li Zicheng, in addition to exercising his own martial arts, practicing archery also has a special role - he likes to clarify his thoughts and calculate gains and losses at this time.

"Uncle, uncle!" Li Guo's voice interrupted Li Zicheng's thoughts, he let go of the bow and turned around, only to see Li Guo running over with an anxious face, shouting: "Oh no, those two thieves are gone!" ”

"What thief? To put it bluntly! “

"It's the gentleman surnamed Ma and the old man Zhizhou who we plan to use to exchange firearms with the officers and soldiers, the guards who just took their shifts found that the cell door was opened, and these two people were gone!"

"What about the guards on duty?" Li Zicheng's brows immediately furrowed.

"It's gone." Li Guo replied: "I don't know if I was killed or I took the benefits and fled!" “

Li Zicheng anxiously threw the bow in his hand to the ground, this unexpected change made his mood suddenly worse. He panted and walked around the yard for two times, and suddenly asked, "What about the others?" “

"The rest of the people are still in prison." Li Guo replied with some fear.

"Since the other people are in prison, there must not be many people who come to save them, the four gates are in our hands, they can't escape, you go to the city immediately to step up the search, you must arrest these two guys for me!"

"Yes, uncle!" Li Guo answered, turned around and ran out of the yard. Li Zicheng bent down and picked up the bow, took a deep breath and shot for a while, wanting to calm the irritability in his chest, but he didn't expect to shoot more and more annoyingly, and in the end, an arrow actually missed the target, he threw the bow to the ground in annoyance, and scolded: "Are you also against me?" Li Zicheng scolded a few words angrily, the anger in his chest gradually subsided, he was about to lean over and pick up the bow, but he heard a shout from outside: "The officers and soldiers have arrived, the officers and soldiers have attacked the city of Dunzhou!" When he looked up, he saw a few puffs of smoke rising from the sky in the direction of Juzhou, followed by a sky-high fire, reflecting the sky that had just lit up, like a nightmare.

Dunzhou, Dongguan.

Due to the peasant army's distribution of grain to the hungry, a large settlement has been formed outside Dongguan, and there are nests and shacks temporarily dug by the hungry people everywhere. As soon as the day dawned, many hungry people crowded to the porridge shacks outside Dongguan, waiting for the soup to begin. Tian Jianxiu, who was fortunate to be in charge of the soup kitchen, was steady, and he divided the porridge shop into several passages for men, women, the old and the weak, and each hungry person went to their own passage according to their gender and age to line up to receive the porridge, so that there would be no strong oppression of the weak and a fight, so although the hungry people in Dongguan were blocked, the basic order was still maintained.

But the situation on this day seemed to be a little peculiar, and several passages originally intended for old and weak women were occupied by a group of large men with round waists and thick shoulders, although they looked ragged and dressed like homeless people, but their faces were full of muscles, and their eyes showed a fierce light, and they did not look at all like the hungry people with withered faces and panic. The person who was distributing the porridge saw that something was wrong, so he greeted him.

"Why don't you fill me with porridge?" Hao Shaoqi put the big bowl with two missing openings in his hand in front of the other party.

"Look, this is only for the elderly over fifty years old!" The man who made porridge pointed to the wooden sign next to him with a wooden spoon and sneered: "If you want to eat porridge, go to the queue over there, but there is no one here!" (To be continued.) )