In the early morning, the morning sun rises, and a ray of sunlight shines through the clouds and sprinkles on the ground.

Patches of golden leaves cover the ground, as if they are a gift to the earth in autumn, and the flowers and plants on the roadside also bloom their last fragrance in this season.

Mountains loom in the distance, their peaks undulating, and clouds and mist flutter gently like white fluff.

A loess avenue stretches from afar, winding through the foot of the mountain, only to be stopped by a wooden checkpoint.

Next to the checkpoint, inside the sentry box, several soldiers were lazily dozing off at their desks.

Outside the sentry box, an unlucky man standing guard by lot was leaning crookedly against the outer wall of the sentry box, with a spear in both hands and yawning from time to time.

His eyes were misty, his gaze was slow and dull, as if he had fallen into an endless drowsy, uninterested in everything around him.

Last night Zhao'an, there was a big celebration in the cottage, the wine and meat were unlimited, and everyone drank a lot, so that several people are still in a daze.

If it weren't for the habit they had cultivated over a long period of time, they would certainly not be standing guard at this customs office now, but would have slept lazily in the cottage.

But it doesn't matter, these days of hard daily training will soon be gone.

In a few days, the county will send someone to take over the cottage, and then everyone will no longer be bandits, but officials and soldiers.

The training of the officers and soldiers is very slack, far less hard than the cottage, and when the time comes, you can sleep as long as you want, and no one will take care of it at all.

The sun was rising higher and higher, and in the haze, the soldier standing guard seemed to hear the sound of the vehicles, and occasionally the neighing of horses.

He woke up suddenly, thinking that the brother of the owner of the village had come down to inspect, and hurriedly stood up straight, but after a closer look, he did not see the brothers of the owner of the village, but saw a team of chariots and horses coming from a distance, and he saw that he was about to reach the pass.

He hurriedly raised his leg and kicked a few times on the guard door to wake up the people inside.

"Hey, wake up, the merchant is here, it's time to collect taxes!"

Several people got up in a daze, rubbed their faces a few times, got out of the sentry box, lined up neatly, and stood on both sides of the checkpoint, ready to count the value of the goods, and draw 10% of the tax in proportion.

After the team of chariots and horses came to the front, everyone could see clearly, there was an old man sitting on the frame of the first carriage, with a small hat in a green coat and boots under his feet, who seemed to be a steward, but several people around him were dressed tightly, carrying knives in their hands, obviously being guards.

Seeing that someone was blocking the road in front of them, the three of them hurriedly stopped the carriage and did not dare to step forward.

The steward looked nervous, at a loss, and cried bitterly:

"Woe to you!"

"This must be a copycat thief blocking the way, how can this be good?"

The leader of the guard, however, was a knowledgeable man, and after a few glances from afar, he whispered to reassure:

"Don't panic, the surroundings are quiet as usual, there is no shouting and killing, obviously not a bandit."

"Even if they are really bandits, although these people have set up barriers to block the road, they are not many in number, and they are not the opponents of our sergeants, so they can easily rush through."

The steward was reminded, and when he looked again, he found that this was the case, so he was relieved.

"Woohoo lament, I don't know where the soldiers came from, they actually dared to set up a card here, almost bluffed me!"

"When I see them in a while, I have to scold them!"

The commander of the guards hurriedly reminded: "Old Duguan, we have a lot of things on our backs, but we don't dare to make extraneous branches, so it's better to send this birthday gang to Kyoto as soon as possible!" ”

The old man was frightened, and when he was impotent and furious, where could he listen to persuasion, but shouted:

"Don't worry, I have my own measure."

"If it's really a person with a background, I naturally won't make trouble, but if it's just a small official in a place, don't stop me from being angry."

Thinking of this old man's style of bullying the weak and fearing the hard, the guard commander hesitated for a moment, and finally took a step back and stopped talking.

There are thousands of miles to go to Kyoto, and it is not worth it to have a gap with the old capital for an irrelevant petty official.

After making up their minds, several people urged the carriage to move on, and soon came to the front of the level.

The tax collector came forward and shouted:

"Don't worry about a few merchants, we are not thieves, we are only here to collect taxes."

"After I pay the tax at this tax customs, I can get a small flag for tax payment, with this flag, you can walk freely within the boundaries of Yishui County, and you don't have to worry about being plundered by strongmen."

"If someone dares to rob, the merchant only needs to report the news to my Yushan, and my Yushan will naturally help the merchant to grab back the goods."

When the old man heard this, he was even more relieved.

I had never heard of a thief doing this, presumably it was a means for local officials to exploit past business travelers, so he immediately smiled and probed:

"I don't know which military state the military masters belong to, and which lord is the honorable?"

The tax man patted his chest proudly and said proudly: "My brother, ah no, it's my general, it's ......."

Halfway through speaking, he suddenly got stuck, turned his head and asked the brothers behind him: "What is the official position of our brother?" ”

Several people were stumped at once, and they exchanged words with each other for a long time, but they didn't think about it, but said: "It seems that you are calling some captain......

The tax collector turned his head and continued, "...... It is the captain of the imperial court, and he is an eight-grade official, only half a grade younger than the county lord. ”

"Oh......" Lao Duguan understood as soon as he heard it, this is the elder brother and the general, and it is actually a local turtle!

He is the steward of the Huainan East Road Governor's Office, and there is no shortage of officials around him.

How could a small eight-rank military attache in a place be looked at by him.

After finding out the details, his face changed immediately, he raised the leather whip in his hand, and beat the tax collectors to death, and at the same time scolded loudly:

"Blind your dog's eyes!"

"Whose convoy do you dare to stop?"

"Do you know what's in this convoy?"

"The old man is not afraid to tell you, this is the Birthday Gang!"

"Do you know what the Birth Tsunade is?"

"This is a gift that was shipped to Kyoto to celebrate Taishi Cai's birthday!"

"Don't talk about the petty official behind you, even the judges and soldiers in Yizhou don't dare to collect taxes from this convoy!"

"Why don't you open the level and let the convoy pass?"

How can these tax collectors be bullied like this on weekdays?

But whoever passes by here, who dares not to pay taxes honestly?

Although the background behind this convoy seems to be quite large, they have even killed a lot of gentry and heroes in the county, so why do they care about others?

Although they couldn't see it, their backbones had already been polished by Ghost Li, and it would be fine if nothing happened, but as soon as they were stimulated by the bullying, they had a seizure, their eyes were red, and they raised their spears regardless of the fact that they stabbed at the old thing.