Zhu Yuanzhang stood in front of this group of people, coughed lightly, lifted his breath, and then shouted loudly: "I am Zhu Ba, the steward of the Baishui Ma family, and I am here to help you!" ”

The four family members of the Zhang Mansion raised their heads, revealing their godless eyes, the horror of the rest of their lives after the catastrophe had not yet been driven away from his body, looking at Zhu Yuanzhang's face, their whole bodies trembled. The seventeen women were all shrunk and their heads hung lower.

"Don't be in a daze, get up!" Zhu Yuanzhang drank in a deep voice, and there was an irresistible majesty in his voice, which frightened the surrounding family members and maids all over, and seemed to have a clear mind.

"Your master and young master are dead." Zhu Yuanzhang said very directly: "This family can only be handed over to your young lady in the future, Miss Gui has now married the second young master of our Ma family and has become the second young grandmother of Ma, so we are already a family, don't be afraid, I will help you deal with trivial matters and deal with the inquiries of the government, you quickly cheer up." ”

His words played a little role, these major things have never been the master, everything is under the master's orders, the maid of the family eased a little from the helplessness just now: the old master and the young master are dead, the sky seems to have fallen, but the young lady is still alive, she just went to Baishui, escaped the catastrophe, as long as the young lady is found, this can still be lived.

The four family members took the lead in cheering up, hugging their fists at Zhu Ba, although their voices were still a little trembling, they could already speak: "Are you the steward of the Ma family?" Great, our old master and young master of the Zhang family, all the stewards are dead, I don't know what to do, please take us to see Miss. ”

"Don't be in a hurry, clean up this home first." Zhu Yuanzhang waved his hand and said in an unquestionable tone: "Trouble the four brothers to come with me, carry the corpses of the family members to the front yard square and line them up, and move the corpses left by the bandits to pile them together, this matter is very important, otherwise the officers and soldiers will run around the house after they come, and it will be a big trouble." Seventeen girls, please go to the backyard to clean up, gather the property that the bandits have not taken, and dig a pit to bury it temporarily, although I will try my best to prevent the officers and soldiers from entering the house to rob, but it is better to be prepared. ”

His methodical tone had some calming effect in the hearts of the panicked family members and maids, and everyone involuntarily acted according to his orders, and the ten maids hurriedly ran to the backyard, locked the small door in the backyard first, and then began to clean up. Although Zheng Yanfu and his gang robbed a lot of things, they came and went in a hurry, and they did not rob completely, and there were still some valuable gold and silver in many rooms that were softly preserved, and the maids gathered these things and buried them in the back garden.

Zhu Yuanzhang and four living family members carried the corpses, and carried the corpses of the people in Zhang's Mansion to the front yard one by one, placed them in the square, and arranged them according to their status. The headless Zhang Douyao is ranked first, Young Master Zhang is second, followed by Zhang Douyao's wife, concubine, housekeeper, Young Master Zhang's personal maid, and so on...... A long string of corpses was arranged. The bodies of some maids were naked, apparently insulted by bandits before they died, and Zhu Yuanzhang wrapped their bodies one by one with curtains.

His movements were steady, his hands did not tremble, his heart did not beat, and his speech was calm and powerful, and the remnants of the servants and maids felt that he was very reliable, and they invisibly obeyed his orders.

"Steward Zhu, why do we line up the corpses of our family members like this?" One of the housekeepers had bloodied hands and couldn't do anything, and he really didn't understand the use of arranging corpses like this.

"Scary!" Zhu Yuanzhang said lightly: "There are many rich squires whose homes are bad for bandits, and the officers and soldiers come to inquire, and as soon as they enter the house, they rob them in the name of searching for the remnants of the bandits. As a result, the bandits robbed it again, and the officers and soldiers came to rob it again. That's fine, if they need to be the first to report it...... Hey, it's also very possible to kill a few of you, take your heads, and say it's the head of the bandits. ”

The four family members were taken aback and took a step back at the same time.

"Just a few of us, it is impossible to stop the officers and soldiers from robbing by brute force, so we have to use the dead to scare them......" Zhu Yuanzhang said calmly: "As soon as the officers and soldiers enter the door and see the front yard full of corpses, they will be frightened. In this way, it is convenient for us to protect this home, and it is also a means to protect ourselves. ”

The four family members were immediately convinced, this truth is not deep, but how can ordinary people think of it? Then they asked, "Then what are we going to do with the corpses of the bandits?" We can't wait to cut the bodies of these guys to pieces. ”

"You'll find out in a moment!" Zhu Yuanzhang didn't bother to explain to these people again, anyway, he would know soon.

After everything was cleaned up, it was already dark, and Zhu Yuanzhang asked the family to light many torches and lanterns, and hung them around the front yard to illuminate the yard clearly.

Zhang's mansion has become tidy, although the clotted crimson blood clots can still be seen on the ground, but the corpses are all concentrated in the front yard, the corpses of the people in Zhang's mansion are lying side by side, and the dozen or so corpses left by the bandits are piled together in a mess in the corner of the front yard.

The onlookers outside the house never had astigmatism, and they walked in batches and came in batches, probing their brains in front of the mansion gate, and occasionally a person probed in, and when they saw the corpses all over the courtyard, they exclaimed in surprise and hid their faces and retreated.

Not long after it was completely dark, the onlookers suddenly began to shake, and the people on the periphery began to shout: "The officers and soldiers are here...... The officers and soldiers are finally here......"

The people got out of the way, and about forty officers and soldiers, led by a general, walked through the crowd. The onlookers obviously knew these soldiers, and even a member of the Zhang family knew them, and whispered in Zhu Yuanzhang's ear: "Steward Zhu, this is the person from the Changchong Military Cantonment...... This military cantonment is five miles southeast of Chengcheng......"

Although Chengcheng is a small county, it is located at the junction of SX1 and SX2, and it is also a relatively important border county, so there are three hundred households in total, which are in the southeast (Changchong Juntun), southwest (Chengjuntun), and due north (Kaiyan Juntun). Each hundred households had one hundred household officials, one hundred soldiers, ten small flags, and two general flags, making a total of one hundred and thirteen people. The sum of the three hundred households was three hundred and thirty-six soldiers, three hundred households.

Such a force is indeed more than enough to protect a small county town, but due to the corruption of the military system in the late Ming Dynasty, many officers have the vice of "eating empty salaries", so the actual amount of each hundred households is only thirty or forty. Zhu Yuanzhang looked at the only forty-three officers and soldiers who came over from the people, and sighed in his heart: The actual number of the Changchong military camp seems to be only these forty-three people, but the officers are receiving the military salary of one hundred and thirteen people from the imperial court, how can the burden of the country not be heavy?

He dragged a chair from the side, put it in front of the pile of Zhang's corpse, and then sat on the chair with his butt facing the door.

The name of the 100 households of this Changchong Juntun is Ye Yuxuan, he is three years Chinese New Year's Eve old today, he is in the prime of life, because he has eaten a lot of empty salary, he is doing well, his body will be raised with a big waist and a round waist, he is covered with a set of green clothes and iron armor, with an iron pointed helmet on his head, and a big red cloak on his back, which is a bit powerful, but he is actually a good look, with a powerful appearance, but there is no martial arts on his hands and feet, and he has lived to be thirty-three years old, and he has not fought a serious battle.

This afternoon, when he was drinking tea in a daze in the hundred households, he suddenly saw an old soldier riding a thin horse running from the direction of the county seat, which turned out to be the gatekeeper of Chengcheng, and told him that there were rioters rushing into the county seat, and asked him to quickly lead the troops to quell the chaos.

As soon as Ye Yuxuan asked, there were two or three hundred rebels, and he was immediately startled, as far as the forty-three under him were shrimp soldiers, how could he dare to quell any chaos? Hurriedly sent a fast horse to inform the Chengjun Tun in the southwest and the Kaiyan Juntun in the north, so that the other two military tuns could send troops at the same time, so that he would have the courage to come to the county seat to have a look.

The other two hundred household officials in the military tun received the news and were also shocked, and the three hundred household officials all had the same thoughts: Just the dozens of people in my hands? Quelling the chaos? Don't flatten yourself.

So the three hundred household officials walked slowly with their subordinates, from the afternoon until dark, and finally walked outside the county seat, with one army, with one hundred and forty people, and then they dared to enter the county seat to see. When they found out that the thief was gone, they breathed a sigh of relief.

Two of the hundred household officials stayed at the yamen to deal with the aftermath, while Ye Yuxuan volunteered to go to Zhang Douyao's house to have a look.

He was more slippery than the other 200 households, and knew that he couldn't get any benefits from the yamen, but he might be able to get something when he went to Zhang Douyao's house, and he heard that Zhang Douyao and his son were killed, and there were only a few family members and maids left in the family, so he moved the mind of the Zhang family's belongings, and planned to come over to "search" Zhang's house, pick up the valuable things inside, and move them back to his own hundred households. In recent years, Zhang Douyao's county magistrate has not been in vain, he has embezzled and accepted bribes in Chengcheng, forcibly seized and robbed, and got a lot of property and land, although the land property because of the existence of the title deed, can not be taken away, but all kinds of property can always be grabbed to get it.

Ye Yuxuan walked into the gate of Zhang's Mansion with forty-three subordinates, raised his head, and planned to roar "Lao Tzu is so-and-so" to calm the scene. Suddenly, my eyes lit up, and I saw that under the light of lanterns and torches, there was a young man sitting in the middle of the front yard of Zhang's mansion, he was wearing a clean and neat cotton coat, looking like a steward, and behind him, dozens of nearly a hundred corpses were lined up......

What a gloomy corpse array, the bloody breath is coming......

Ye Yuxuan's heart chuckled, his legs trembled, and all the prepared lines were pressed back into his stomach......