There is a lake named Baitang in the eighteen miles west of Suzhou City, the origin of the name is not examinable, there is an unnamed island in the center of the lake, the green bamboo forest, there is a manor in the bamboo forest on the island, called "Tangbai Villa", the site of the Suzhou faceless meeting is located in the village,

At this time, it was already the autumn of the second year of Kaicheng, compared with the spring of the first year of Kaicheng, the external environment was much better, Yang Hao and Meng Bochang wore strong armor to patrol day and night, looking like a great enemy, at that time, in addition to the three towns of Hebei, Qiu Shiliang's cronies had Tianxian in their mouths, galloped in all directions, supervised the local liquidation of the stabbing horse camp forces, beat a few tigers, caught more than a dozen dogs and wolves, and killed a group of rabbits, mice, roe deer, and cats,

At present, although the Thorn Horse Battalion and the Eunuch Party are still in a hostile state, the contradiction has been greatly eased, and the Thorn Horse Battalion has gradually recovered from the fiasco of the Daming Palace, on the other hand, within the Eunuch Party, Qiu Shiliang, Yu Hongzhi, and Guo Qin have become a three-legged trend, Qiu Shiliang and Yu Hongzhi have ended the honeymoon period, and the contradictions between each other have gradually become public, in addition, the eunuchs and the courtiers continue to contradict, and the local feudal towns have a very strong voice of accusing Qiu Shiliang of dictatorship, which forces Qiu Shiliang to attack and defend the Thorn Horse Battalion, and now in addition to Chang'an and Guanzhong regions, The Stinger Battalion has largely recovered in all other provinces,

Suzhou Assassin Wang Zhe is the assassin of the horse camp is the fourth grade horizontal knife, although young, but extremely strong, in Suzhou is absolutely the master, that is, his top boss Li Deyu also has to give this junior a little thin face, Wang Zhe once did a speech official, because of the impeachment of Zheng Note was demoted to Suzhou Sihu, and then recommended by Li Yan to be promoted to the history of assassination, since then he has become a loyal follower of Li Yan,

Yang Hao and Li Yan separated before they entered Suzhou, according to the rules of the stabbing horse camp, a horizontal knife is not qualified to make irresponsible remarks in front of the chief manager.

Suzhou is far less prosperous than Yangzhou, compared with Runzhou, there is a gap, but the spirituality of the Jiangnan water town is still five bodies, go out by boat without horse, so that this group of people from the north is very novel, these two days he took a small fish in a small boat, wandering around the corners of Suzhou City, visiting the wind and asking the ancients, drinking wine and tasting tea, and bought a bunch of local rich silk and native products, Xiaoyu felt that this trip to Jiangnan was not in vain,

Three days later, in the afternoon, Wang Fuer suddenly came to the inn, greeted Yang Hao and then entered Xiaoyu's room, together to study the experience of sweeping the goods, after a cup of tea, Wang Zhe also came to the inn, as a landlord to come to the door to worship the guests is also etiquette, but with Wang Fu'er before and after the foot in, the deep meaning is quite interesting, after the greetings, Wang Zhe picked out the intention, hoping that Yang Hao can stand up to help him,

Yang Hao said: "Brother Wang can only give orders if he has something, but if he can help, the younger brother will never refuse." ”

Wang Zhe said: "Last night I received a letter from Huzhou, saying that there was a bandit in Taihu Lake who came ashore to loot villages and towns, killed 13 people, plundered 23 women and children, and burned more than 100 houses. ”

Speaking of this, Wang Zhe smiled self-deprecatingly and said: "Hundreds of bandits may not be worth it in Brother Yang's eyes, but Suzhou is not as good as Fengzhou, Suzhou only has some old and weak soldiers, it is okay to scare and scare the thieves who steal chickens and dogs, and fight against the bandits in Taihu Lake, it is a fight and a defeat, the battalion general is stupid, he has been absent from the battle formation for a long time, he can't ride a horse, he can't pull a bow, just ask how to fight the enemy, the people along the lake I have ordered to move into the city, but this faceless will ...... Alas, you can't change the location just because of a few bandits. ”

Yang Hao immediately understood his intentions, he wanted to use the pretext of guarding against bandits to let himself lead the troops to guard the venue, who is Wang Zhe, he is Li Yan's cronies, let him lead the troops needless to say that it is Li Yan's meaning, it doesn't matter whether the bandits are true or not, the important thing is that Li Yan put the military power into his own hands, after experiencing large and small conspiracies, Yang Hao is very clear about the role of the army in these conspiracy, this is Li Yan's greatest trust in himself,

"I am only shallow in my studies, and I am afraid that I will be entrusted by Brother Wang."

"Brother Yang is too modest, the 20,000 elite soldiers of the Heavenly Wolf Army are not your opponents, let alone hundreds of thieves, if you can't do it, I'm afraid no one in Suzhou can do it."

Speaking of this, Yang Hao had no choice but to respond: "It's rare that Brother Wang is so favored, and he is obedient." ”

Wang Zhe handed over the only two brigades of the regimental army to Yang Hao's hands, the regimental army belongs to the local recruitment of Tuyong, its recruitment, training, garrison, and mobilization are all up to the local decision, Yang Hao came to Tangbai Villa in advance, first took a small boat around the island, the island is densely covered with bamboo forests, the bamboo forest is full of pits, and a nest bow and medicine crossbow are set up, these things may be useless to block the army, but it is more than enough to deal with a few thieves,

The villa is in a big hollow shape, there are two layers of walls, the outer wall is about one zhang high, the city is built of blue bricks, there is a bluestone watchtower every hundred steps, there are three Zhuang guests guarding with bows on each watchtower, Yang Hao climbed a watchtower, found that the field of vision is very broad, the area controlled by the archers is very considerable,

Then Yang Hao checked the venue, this is a square hall, surrounded by black curtains, plus the courtyard is densely packed with evergreen trees, even in broad daylight in the hall is dim, a high platform is built in the south of the hall, Su embroidery "Ten Thousand Miles of Mountains and Rivers" in front of a tiger skin seat, left and right wings each set up three chairs, the tiger skin seat is the general manager, the six chairs on the left and right are swords, as a rule, no face will be presided over by a sword, the host only has no seat on the platform,

When the twilight was falling, the Suzhou faceless meeting of the Baoli Society opened,

In a festive welcome music, eighty-one horizontal swords and seven swords entered one after another, because they were all wearing masks, and they could not tell who each other was, so no one greeted them, but they each found their own places and sat down according to their ranks.

Suddenly the band played a majestic and passionate music "Mountains and Rivers Drunk", which is a special piece of music for the Thorn Horse Battalion to hold a grand celebration, the composer is ominous, in Yang Hao's ears, the melody of "Mountains and Rivers Drunk" is quite similar to the military song of a certain country in later generations, accompanied by music, Li Yan, who is wearing a golden mask, enters from the main gate under the escort of six guards with knives and halberds, and everyone stands up to greet each other,

In the sound of this majestic music, everyone chanted in unison: "...... The eunuch is in charge, mistaking my Tang Dynasty, my sons and daughters, hot-blooded and angry...... Auxiliary Holy Lord, Zhongxing Datang. ”

After revisiting the entry song of the Thorn Horse Camp, Li Yan waved his hand vigorously and sent the band out, and then said to Wang Zhe: "Open the window to breathe." ”

Wang Zhe was stunned for a while, and everyone was also a little surprised, the faceless meeting was secret, and he never opened the doors and windows during the meeting, this is the rule, Li Yan is not the first time to serve as the chief manager, doesn't he understand this truth, in the stunned eyes of everyone, the six swords and halberds around Li Yan went away and pushed open all the windows,

The cold night breeze blew in, and the turbid air in the hall became fresh, but many people craned their necks, they didn't seem to like the fresh air,

"Where is Zhang Lu in Yangzhou?" Li Yan suddenly asked,

The horizontal knife under the seat looked at each other, as usual, the host should have made a speech at this moment, what does the new chief manager want to do,

"The subordinate is Zhang Lu."

Zhang Lu, the deputy envoy of Huainan Jiedu, is the oldest qualified Zhengsanpin horizontal knife in the Baoli Society, and two of the seven swords on the stage were his students and subordinates, and seventy percent of the horizontal swords under the stage have an unclear relationship with him.

"Take off your mask." Li Yan said lightly,

There were exclamations in the hall, you must wear a mask to participate in the faceless meeting, this is customized, and there is only one possibility to take off the mask: to be convicted and expelled, because even if you are punished by demotion, you can still keep the mask,

"My subordinates don't know what crime they have committed." Zhang Lu said in a loud voice,

"You don't know, that's good, this seat will tell you that Zhang Cai bullied people, bullied weak girls in Yijiang Tower, and was broken by this seat, in order to cover up your crime and cover up your son, you actually mobilized ten ships of the Huainan Navy Division to pursue this seat along the river, Zhang Lu, do you still say that you are wronged?"

Zhang Lu sneered, and said unhurriedly: "Zhang has three sons, the eldest son died early, the second son is loyal to the country, only three sons and one lone seedling are left, the old wife dotes too much, so that this rebel son is idle all day long, not even an adult, ten days ago he was jealous and beaten up when he drank flower wine in Yijiang Tower, so that he was injured, Xiao Lu, the deputy general of the sailor, privately mobilized ten ships to avenge the dog, Zhang did not know that the person who disputed with the dog was the chief manager, nor did he know that Xiao Lu mobilized the navy without authorization, to put it mildly, it was just a crime of negligence, The crime of negligence should not be expelled from the country. ”

Zhang Lu's words attracted a lot of discussions, and some people openly echoed Zhang Lu's words, pointing out that there are not a few people who scold Huai.

Li Yan sneered, and said to the halberd holding the knife: "Drag down the person who makes a loud noise, and punish the forty military sticks." ”

The six halberds are not only the guards of the chief manager, but also the enforcers of the venue, and it is the host's business to maintain the discipline of the venue, but since the chief manager has spoken, the six people dare not disobey, and the six halberds grabbed the three horizontal knives and walked out, and everyone dared not speak.

Yang Hao secretly exclaimed in his heart: "Although Ma Wei said that he played a majestic role, he also cut off his retreat, Zhang Lu's intention to transfer troops was ill-intentioned, although it was the truth but there was no evidence, how should this subdue everyone, if this matter is not handled properly, everyone will inevitably attack it in groups, and at that time, will it really be a river of blood to kill." ”

After the three of them were beaten with forty military sticks, they were dragged back again, staring at Li Yan with gritted teeth one by one,

"Sit down and talk." Li Yan faced everyone's hostile gaze and did not give an inch,

The buttocks of the forty military sticks are rotten early, how can they still sit, but the rule of faceless meetings is to sit in a meeting, Li Yan refuses to make an exception, who dares to say a word,

In the first encounter, Li Yan won completely,

Just when everyone was indignant and brewing a counterattack, Li Yan said lightly: "Take Zhang Cuisine." ”

Several halberders wearing brass masks walked in with Zhang Yan, and when Zhang Lu saw this, his heart suddenly became angry, and he pointed at Li Yan and said, "What is my son's crime, you make such despicable means." ”

Li Yan said without showing weakness: "If you are guilty or not, you can ask him." ”