Dozens of unsuspecting Hun infantry, in the hands of Xiao Qianli now, is just a matter of incense. Walking through the corpses all over the ground, carrying a long sword with a flickering cold light, Xiao Qianli flicked his left hand, and a sharp finger turned into an invisible sword qi, piercing the last Hun soldier who fled in embarrassment from behind, and fell to the ground, dying of anger.

To his surprise, the hundreds of craftsmen watched him slaughter wantonly, but they only looked blankly a few times, stood up straight, and stood there blankly with their tools, without any intention of taking the opportunity to escape, and no one spoke. From their eyes, Xiao Qianli only saw numbness and dead silence.

"Who's going to tell me what you're doing here?"

No one answered, and no one even looked at Xiao Qianli's eyes.

Xiao Qianli asked three times in a row, but still no one spoke, he shook his head helplessly, and said loudly: "You are free, let's go!"

There was silence, and after a while, a young craftsman laughed miserably, "You set us free, where can we go?"

Xiao Qianli's sharp eyes stared at the person who spoke out, and said slowly, "Don't you have a home to go back to?"

"It's gone...... It's long gone......" The man slowly walked out of the group, "I know you're Han, and so am I, they are!"

Xiao Qianli was slightly surprised, thinking that these people were all low-level people of the Huns, but he didn't expect that they were from the Central Plains. Immediately relieved: "Since you are both Han Chinese, it will be better, I will take you out!"

The man shook his head and said with a wry smile: "Thank you for your kindness, it's just that our people are already worse than dead, and even our desire to survive is pitiful, how can we cross the border of this hundreds of miles of wasteland?"

Finally there is someone who can communicate, Xiao Qianli asked him to sit down on the side, the man hesitated for a moment, sat down tremblingly, as if he couldn't believe it, reached out and touched the wood under his buttocks, it seemed that even the act of sitting down and resting has become an unattainable luxury.

The man was lacking in qi and had some difficulty speaking, but fortunately, the organization was quite clear, Xiao Qianli could hear it clearly, and gradually understood, and couldn't help but suddenly realize.

It turned out that the people here were all plundered from the Central Plains by the Huns over the years, and most of the Han people who were taken as prey were tortured and killed, but some of them were skilled or strong, and they were filled into the Xiongnu generals, specializing in craftsman labor.

"I was arrested a year and a half ago...... "the man recalled," the man recalled, "and we were arrested more than 200 people at that time, and I was the only one who survived, and I still had some thoughts of escaping." ”

"And they ......," the man's voice had already deepened, "for five years, eight years, every day like this, they can barely speak, they have no desire to communicate except mechanical labor, and they have lost the ability to live. ”

"As you can see, the trees here are the best ingredients for poisoning arrows, even though they are poisonous. We've been here for three months, and about forty people have died. Although the water in the pool here can detoxify, if you are poisoned too many times, or accidentally stabbed too deeply by a branch, you will not be able to get it back. ”

"From here, all the way west, there is a camp about sixty or seventy miles. That's where we came, and every half a month there would be a cart of food and poisoned arrows. ”

"At the beginning of this year, a Xiongnu master discovered the characteristics of the trees here, so he built a general camp. Since the beginning of autumn, we have been transported here from all over the world to start making poisoned arrows. Today, about four or five hundred thousand have been made, all of which are stored in the camp. When the thaw thaws in the spring, it will be distributed to the front-line barracks one after another. ”

"I know you're a very capable Han man, but you can't do anything by yourself, and you can't help us. The man's tone was very sincere, "Before those people come, you better leave quickly! They still need to rely on us to make poisoned arrows, and they won't kill us!"

Xiao Qianli was silent for a long time, and suddenly asked, "The next time they send someone over, what day is it?"

"Just three days ago, a shipment of grain was delivered, and 80,000 arrows were transported. It's still early, so let's go!"

"Let's go?" Xiao Qianli said with a smile, "The show has just begun! Little brother, do you know that these trees are not easy to burn?"

“......？”

As night fell, hundreds of ragged craftsmen, carrying large and small bags of food and water, stood at a loss by the waterhole outside the dense forest. Looking at the black smoke rising from the dense forest, the craftsman who still spoke clearly was completely messy.

"Let's stand upwind and won't be poisoned. Xiao Qianli comforted a few words, "There is also a waterhole here, I don't know if there is an antidote effect?"

"The water quality of that waterhole inside is special, it's just ordinary clear water here......"

The climate in the north is dry, and by the bleak autumn wind, an open fire soon ignites in the dense forest, and in a short time it burns into the sky, and large areas of black smoke continue to swallow and drift to the west.

"Burned...... It's all burned......" Among the craftsmen with blank eyes, someone suddenly shouted.

"It's burned well!" the man fell to his knees, holding his head, and wept bitterly.

The crying brought more people's emotions, one by one, the skinny and bony craftsmen covered with whip marks burst into tears, some kept beating their chests and feet, some were crying and rolling on the ground, and some even grabbed the ground with their heads, wailing and crying.

Xiao Qianli didn't stop it, he knew that these people who had been completely numb suddenly came to such a strong stimulus, which could stimulate their inner desire to survive, which was a good thing for them.

Covering an area of thousands of acres, there are many highly poisonous trees in it, and the poisonous smoke spread for dozens of miles, even Xiao Qianli, who was standing on the upwind outlet, felt a little dizzy, and these ordinary craftsmen were even more unbearable. Fortunately, they were experienced, and each covered their mouths and noses with soaked cotton cloths, and some even untied the water bags, poured out the water from the detoxification pool that had been stored in it, and distributed them one by one.

"Look, they have the same unwillingness in their hearts as you, but they have been numbed by long-term oppression and labor, and once they break out, they yearn for freedom the same!"

An old craftsman with gray hair bowed his body and respectfully entrusted a piece of cotton cloth soaked in the water of the detoxification pool to Xiao Qianli, although Xiao Qianli did not need it, he still returned the salute to the old man and reached out to take it.

"We Han people in the Central Plains have never been humble people by nature, we are obedient, we are just waiting for an opportunity to rise uprightly, and we have the dignity of a great country in our bones!" Xiao Qianli patted the stunned young man on the shoulder and said with a smile, "I am giving you such a chance now, a chance to live and regain your freedom!"