It seems that this kind of thing to transmit news to the enemy with letter arrows is not uncommon, He Zongbing has fought all his life, basically any battle has been encountered, the Ming army in the city picked up the letter arrow and presented it to He Zongbing, He Zongbing felt that this matter was tricky. Immediately summoned He Renlong, Wang En, Xing Zhongshan and other generals to a meeting in the general's mansion at Hutou Pass.

On the desk were neatly placed three letters of persuasion to surrender, which He Renlong and the others circulated separately and sat back.

Qingyang garrison He Renlong was the first to jump up and strongly object.

"What a joke in the world! How can I, a dignified garrison general, surrender to the rebellious ministers and thieves? General He, what else is there to discuss, if you don't surrender, you'd rather die than surrender! ”

He Zongbing knew He Renlong's temperament, he was straightforward, he didn't think about things going around the bend, listening to He Shoubei's almost roaring voice, his brows furrowed, he didn't make an evaluation, and instead turned his gaze to Wang En, the chief soldier of Ningxia, and asked, "Wang Zongbing, what is your opinion?" ”

General Wang glanced at the three volumes of surrender letters that were put back on the desk, and after a long silence, he said quietly: "General Ben thinks that Zhu Zijian has spent so much effort and written so sincerely in the letter of persuasion, if our army refuses, it will inevitably anger Zhu Zijian." General Ben thought that surrender was not unavoidable......"

"Wang En! You coward! Before Mr. Wang's words fell, the Qingyang garrison He Renlong jumped up again, glared at Mr. Wang angrily, and jumped to his feet and scolded.

"He Shoubei listened to General Ben's words!" Wang Zongbing stretched out his right hand to his ear, patted his ear, looked at He Renlong and said in a deep voice.

"Say, you say!" He Renlong was furious and said, "General Ben wants to listen." How can you, General Soldier Wang, be shameless, and tell the story of the surrender of the thieves! ”

He Huchen listened. looked at He Shoubei unhappily and said, "He Shoubei first controls the anger. When Mr. Wang finishes explaining clearly, it's not too late for you to get angry. ”

He Shoubei snorted.

Wang En said in a deep voice: "Speaking of which, the surrender is also full of knowledge. There is no surrender, real surrender, fraudulent surrender, first surrender and then surrender. When General Ben said about surrender, he naturally did not mean to really surrender. The Holy Lord and the court have treated us with such kindness, how can we do such a thing! ”

"Then you still ......"

"I said it's okay to surrender." Wang Zongbing explained: "It is considered that the Hutou Pass has indeed reached the point of exhaustion, and if the enemy army does not come in, we will not be able to fight out, and the so-called cloudy day to beat the child is also consumed, since Zhu Zijian wants to play with us to persuade him to surrender, then we might as well play with him, first, to delay some time, and second." But all persuasion is conditional, and we can't say that we can get some benefits from Zhu Zijian's hands. ”

He Huchen nodded slowly after hearing this, remembering that there was another person who had not spoken, so he turned to Xing Zhongshan, the deputy general of the Liang army. He asked, "General Xing, what do you think?" ”

Xing Zhongshan said: "You can give it a try." ”

He Huchen nodded, and turned to He Renlong again. Said: "He Shoubei, what do you say now?" ”

Qingyang garrisoned He Renlong to take a look at He Zongbing. He looked at Wang En again and said, "Engage in a conspiracy." Tricks, He is not good, if the two chief soldiers think it is feasible, then He has no opinion. ”

Seeing that no one objected, He Huchen made up his mind and discussed with Wang En how to "surrender." ”

In the evening, a drum suddenly sounded from the tower of Hutou Pass.

Zhu Zijian, Gao Zilin, Huang Ziren, Ye Yanqing and others in the rebel camp were gathering around the fire, and they could hear the sound of drums on the city tower, and everyone ran out of the camp gate and looked towards the city tower.

After watching it for a while, everyone breathed a sigh of relief, and their faces were happy.

I saw that the three archers of the Ming army on the city tower bent their bows like a full moon, and each shot an arrow at the bottom of the city, and the arrow was actually wrapped in red cloth, and the three arrows were shot out, like three red lines, falling to the ground, conspicuously tight.

Zhu Zijian and the others naturally knew that this was the reply of the Ming army in Hutou Pass, and hurriedly sent someone out of the camp to retrieve it.

Everyone hugged Zhu Zijian into the big tent of the Chinese army, sat down in the main order, and waited diligently for Zhu Zijian to report the good news that the Ming army was willing to surrender.

Zhu Zijian opened the rolled up letter, his hands trembled slightly with excitement, and the expression on his face was even more nervous and expectant.

The letter was unfolded, held in the palm of his hand, Zhu Zijian looked down carefully, and after reading it, the expression on his face changed from sunny to cloudy, and his expression seemed to cry and laugh, which was extremely weird.

Everyone looked at Zhu Zijian's expression, and they didn't know what Ming Jun said in his reply, so they couldn't help but look at each other.

Military advisor Gao Zilin anxiously asked, "Lord Wang, what did He Huchen say above?" Is the Ming army willing to die rather than surrender? ”

Zhu Zijian raised his head, looked at Gao Zilin with a strange face, and said, "He Huchen is willing to surrender." ”

When the military advisor heard this, he immediately breathed a sigh of relief, and a smile like a chrysanthemum bloomed on his face. When Huang Ziren and Ye Yanqing heard this, they were also happy.

"But," Zhu Zijian said again, "he has the conditions!" ”

"On what terms?" The military advisor asked.

Zhu Zijian handed a scroll of reply to Gao Zilin and said, "The military advisor will read it for himself." ”

Gao Zilin took it and looked at it, with a crying and laughing expression on his face, pinching the reply, and hating the root of his teeth.

In the reply, Mr. He said very politely. First of all, he greatly praised the great benevolence and righteousness of Zhu Zijian, the king of Shunyi, to the Ming army in a desperate situation, and He Zongbing was very moved, and said that from the bottom of his heart, He Zongbing was very willing to surrender to the king of Shunyi, but there were many factions among the generals of the Ming army under his command, and the opinions were very different on the question of whether to surrender or not. I hope that the benevolent and righteous prince of Shunyi will give He Zongbing some time, so that He Zongbing can do the ideological work of the opponents smoothly, and he is very grateful. In the end, He Zongbing anxiously requested, in order to facilitate He Zongbing to do the ideological work of several opponents better and more smoothly, he led the Ming army in the pass to surrender to the king of Shunyi very early, and asked the prince of Shunyi to send some emergency herbs to the city first......

In the evening under the same sky, in a small town more than thirty miles north of Hutou Pass, Xu Liang and Luo Rucai, as well as more than ten Tsing Yi guards, had already changed the clothes of ordinary people, each dressed as a mountain hunter, and was sitting around the only roadside hotel in the town that was still open, eating and drinking.

The owner is a couple in their fifties. The shopkeeper and the second brother are the husband, and the wife is the boss. The rice and dishes are of the utmost common type, and the sake is ordinary home-brewed rice wine, which is faint. Xu Liang and the others escaped all the way, and they didn't have the heart to pay attention to it, and when the food was served, except for the two Tsing Yi guards who were on guard at the door of the store, everyone had a hearty meal.

Xu Liang ate quickly, and after a while, he had two bowls of rice in his stomach, and he felt that he was eight or nine points full, so he stopped his chopsticks and beckoned the shopkeeper to come and settle the bill.

Xu Liang was very curious, so he asked the shopkeeper casually: "Shopkeeper, we have come all the way, within a radius of thirty miles, we met your restaurant, now the world in Hanzhong Mansion is not peaceful, the court and the rebel army are fighting, your hotel is open as usual, aren't you afraid of encountering soldiers and bandits?" ”

The shopkeeper glanced at the weapons placed next to Xu Liang and the others, and was not afraid at all, grinning, revealing two rows of big teeth.

The guest officer laughed! In fact, whether it is a troubled era or a peaceful and prosperous world, the safest thing is really the old man who opened a hotel restaurant. The shopkeeper smiled, "The guest officer is young, and his accent is not like that of a local, and he has not experienced the things of the old man over the years, no matter who he is, officers and soldiers, robbers, bandits or hooligans, they always have to open their mouths to eat, don't they?" Who would not be upset with a common man who runs a restaurant for no reason? ”

Xu Liang smiled dumbly, "You can think about it as the shopkeeper." ”

The shopkeeper said: "It's not that the old man can think about it, it's actually like this." Let's talk about the old Han village, when the war is in chaos, the people in the village can live to the age of the old man, except for those old guys, the others who are the same age as the old man, not much older age, were either dragged to be soldiers and died, or were implicated in the war and died. ”

"Oh!" Xu Liang sighed, secretly saying that this shopkeeper is really lucky. Seeing that the shopkeeper had collected the silver, he reached into his pocket and took out the broken silver to make change, Xu Liang waved his hand generously and said: "Sensei has found it, and the rest of the brother will give the shopkeeper a few rewards." ”

"Hey, thank you so much, guest officer." The shopkeeper nodded and smiled. After getting Xu Liang's silver, his smile became a little more sincere, and he leaned over to Xu Liang and smiled mysteriously: "Actually, I don't hide it from the guest officer, you said, the old man, my store can still be opened now, and there are other reasons." He pointed in the direction of Hanzhong Mansion and whispered: "This time in the rebel army that occupied Hanzhong, my mother-in-law's younger brother was in the rebel army, and he became a small leader, and it happened that my cheap brother-in-law happened to be in charge of this piece, with him covering, and few people dared to come to the store to make a mess, even if the rebel soldiers came to the store to eat, they had to give money." ”

The shopkeeper said with a bit of pride.

Suddenly, Xu Liang saw the Tsing Yi guard who was outside bringing the wind in, and made a warning gesture. It is only a warning that the danger is still under control.

Xu Liang remained silent, still chatting with the shopkeeper. The Tsing Yi guards on the surrounding tables touched their hands on their sabers.

A group of more than a dozen people was walking from the road next to the hotel, looking at the costumes, which were the costumes of the rebels.

The first person, with a short beard on his face, a cloth hat on his head, and a simple knife on his shoulder, shouted at the top of his voice before he entered the hotel: "Sister, brother-in-law, quickly give my brothers a whole table of wine and food, and I have inspected this way, and I am hungry." ”

When the shopkeeper heard this, he left Xu Liang and walked towards this person, and said with a smile: "Is Xiao Wu and the brothers here?" Come in and sit down ......"

A pleasantry.

Luo Rucai, the vanguard officer of the Liang Army who was sitting next to Xu Liang, turned his head sideways and whispered to Xu Liang: "This person's name is Sun Wu, nicknamed Xiao Wuzi, and he was originally the personal soldier of the leader of the rebel army, Shangtianlong. ”

Xu Liang was shocked in his heart, and asked in a low voice: "So, he should recognize you?" ”

Luo Rucai sighed lightly and said, "The last general was originally the sworn brother of the Heavenly Dragon, as long as this Sun Wu is not blind in his eyes, he will naturally be able to recognize it." ”

Xu Liang sighed helplessly: "After a long sweat and a rainy day, I met my old acquaintance in a foreign land, but it is not a good thing for us at this time." (To be continued......)