Winter had arrived. Heavy snow began to fall to the north of the Yellow River.
Wozhou was shrouded in a somber atmosphere after the war.
This was a city close to the northern frontline of Prince Jin's territory. Ever since the Jurchen showed signs of moving south, in the past two or three months, the city's defenses had been gradually reinforced. During the preparation period, Lady Prime Minister Lou Shuwan, who was under only one person in Prince Jin's territory, had also personally visited Vaud twice. Now that the war had broken out, the wounded soldiers who had retreated from the frontline and thousands of refugees had gathered here. In a short period of time, the situation near Wozhou had become extremely somber and chaotic.
There was once a minor official named Mu Yi who had gone on a rampage in the city because his family had been killed. In such a situation, not many people remembered him.
North of Wozhou, the line from the ruins of Taiyuan to Yanmen Pass had been the fiercest battlefield of the Jurchen people. For more than a decade, the population had plummeted and the people had no way to make a living. A leader named Wang Juyun had come here and gathered the residents with a purpose similar to that of the Manichaeism. He wanted to fight against the Jurchen people and equalize the rich and the poor. After overturning the remaining rich families, he gathered a million righteous soldiers. In the words of the fake Qi and Jurchen people, they were called the 'Rebel Army'.
Li Xizhi, together with the garrison near Yanmen Pass, launched two attempts to annihilate this "rebel army". However, both times they returned in failure. The elites under the "rebel army" were brainwashed by religion. They shouted "God's name" and did not fear death. Wang Juyun was good at using his troops. Both times, he had ambushed the enemy's logistics. Li Xizhi and the others failed to annihilate the 'rebel army' and instead lost a lot of supplies to the enemy.
This time, when the Jurchen Eastern Army moved south, the first to bear the brunt was Wang Juyun's righteous soldiers. Then, Tian Shi in the south responded to him and a million soldiers came one after another, turning the north of Taiyuan into an Asura's killing field.
In just a little more than a month, four major battles had broken out from Yanmen Pass to the ruins of Taiyuan. With the assistance of Xi Yin, Wanyan Zonghan commanded the valiant generals of the Jin Kingdom, Yin Shuke, Shu Liesu, Ba Lisu, Wanyan Saba, and the others to defeat Wang Juyun's two invasions. Then, they defeated the vanguard troops of Prince Jin. Not long after, they defeated the joint army of Wang Juyun and Tian Shi. Below Taiyuan City, which had been burned to ruins ten years ago, the blood and corpses of the Han people once again covered the plains.
However, even after four defeats, Wang Juyun's teacher, Tian Shi's King Jin Faction, didn't collapse. After several battles, a large number of wounded and routed soldiers gathered in Vaud and other places. The refugees who had fled from the north also followed them to the south. Vaud and other places did not reject the arrival of these people. In the chaotic situation, the government took care of the wounded and arranged for the deserters to return to the army. Even for the skinny refugees who had fled to the south, they also prepared enough porridge to at least survive and arranged for them to continue their journey south.
In the more than ten years since the Jurchen came south, the Han people had struggled to survive. No one had seen such a selfless act of righteousness for many years. In a short period of time, countless people were moved by Prince Jin's righteous act. Some of the skinny people tearfully picked up weapons — they had already had enough of this inhuman life and did not want to continue their journey south to be tormented. In such weather and such a world, even if they continued to flee, what awaited them was likely to be a dead end, or a torment that was even more difficult than death. In that case, it was better to throw away their lives here and perish together with the Jurchen Zhenren. Sensing this atmosphere, a portion of the defeated soldiers who had fled picked up their weapons again and joined their original troops …
In war, there were such scenes that made people tear up, and of course, there were also all kinds of cowardice, despicableness, terror, and cruelty.
Within the King Jin Faction, Lou Shuwan's high-pressure and purge continued with the cooperation of the Takeshi forces led by Zhan Wu. In every city from the south to the north, all suspected defectors were searched and arrested. Every day, there were confiscations and beheadings.
Naturally, there were also spies and lobbyists sent by Wanyan Xiyin who were active. Similarly, there were more than one case of wrongdoing. If it was a normal regime, such a purge would be enough to shake the foundation of the regime. However, in the face of a powerful enemy like Wanyan Zonghan, and now that there were no reinforcements, only this kind of cold high-pressure could ensure the frontline battle.
Some soldiers were not willing to fight anymore and fled into the mountains. At the same time, there were also people who were afraid of death or wanted to take advantage of the chaos to rise up and wait for the arrival of the Jurchen "King Flag" in the chaotic situation. The situation was especially serious near the canton of Vaud.
In the mountains to the north of the canton, in more than a month, five or six groups of bandits announced their allegiance to the Jurchen and waited for the arrival of the King's army. Their momentum varied, but taking advantage of the chaos, these people robbed homes, destroyed villages, and burned forests. Some people even specifically intercepted the fleeing soldiers on the road. They blocked the road and threatened small groups of soldiers to join them. If they did not agree, they would be killed immediately, and their corpses would be stripped and hung on flagpoles. There was also a group that intercepted the supplies of Prince Jin's army coming from the south. When they failed, they destroyed the road and even threatened to sneak into the canton of Vaud and kill people at will. When the Jurchen arrived, they would open the city gates for them, causing panic among the people nearby.
On this day, the heavy snow had stopped. Smoke rose from a village dozens of miles to the east of the canton. A group of bandits had already looted the place. The group consisted of about five or six hundred people. On the large flag they raised was a nondescript "Grand Jin's Provost Army of the canton of Vaud". After the village was looted, all the strong men in the village were slaughtered, and most of the women were raped and taken away.
The group left in a long line. The leader of the group was tall and strong, wearing strong armor and a long sword. A woman was tied to the back of the horse and was struggling. As the man rode forward, he waved his hand and slapped the woman a few times. The woman no longer dared to resist. He laughed, feeling very proud of himself.
The leader of the group was called Wang Gan. Previously, he was the tyrant of the mountain bandits near the canton of Vaud. He was strong in martial arts and had a high opinion of himself. After the Jurchen came, he was secretly recruited and wanted to serve well to earn some fame. These days, he had been looting everywhere. He even followed the plan of the Jurchen envoy who came to the south and released all kinds of fake news to the canton of Vaud, causing panic among the people. At this time, he carried out a massacre of the village, killing the young and strong, leaving the old and the children, causing panic and burden to the canton of Vaud.
When the Jurchen went south, the combination of Wanyan Zonghan and Wanyan Xiyin could be said to be invincible. In a head-on battle, no one felt that they could win. With this understanding, whether it was Wang Juyun, Tian Shi or Yu Yulin, they were not thinking about defeating the enemy on the battlefield in one go. They could lose, but there was no harm in escaping. As long as they could harass and delay the army on the eastern road, they would have achieved their goal in the war north of the Yellow River. The two armies of the Jurchen were anxious to attack the Wu dynasty. Even if all the jars and jars in Prince Jin's territory were destroyed, they would retreat to the mountains. Zonghan and Xiyin would not have the leisure to kill them all.
Even if they gathered all the forces in the world and defeated the Jurchen, as long as the world still belonged to the Han people, there would definitely be a position for Prince Jin north of the Yellow River. Even if the world changed, with such a reputation in the future, it would not be impossible for him to rule the world.
It was also because they had been mentally prepared for this that the command system of the two armies was not completely destroyed in the several defeats at the front. Wang Juyun kept gathering the defeated troops after the defeats, and Prince Jin's side had long been ready to fight after the defeat. However, in such a situation, the control of these chaotic areas became slow. Wang Gan had committed several crimes. In this world after the snow, he focused on the city and the garrison forces around the city, but they were unable to rescue the surrounding areas in time.
It was the same this time. The team that slaughtered the village left quickly along the path with the plundered goods and women. Returning to the mountains, Wang Gan was in high spirits. He boasted to his deputies next to him about the achievements this time and the future riches and honor. At the same time, he reached into the woman's clothes and caressed her. Although the northern part of Vaud was the real battlefield of the army, he was not afraid of being intercepted by the army near Vaud. This was because the Jurchen emissary from the south had already confirmed to him that if Tian Shi rebelled against the Jin, he would die. Even if the female minister in the court was cruel and merciless and had killed countless people, spies who would choose to secretly report to the Jin would still not be killed.
As he arrogantly walked through a bend in the mountain, a 'boulder' lying quietly in the snow beside the mountain road was suddenly lifted up. Under the 'boulder', an iron rod flew up and whistled. A soldier walking next to the team did not react at all. It was as if someone had suddenly dragged him by the neck and pulled him up by half his body. His flesh and blood splattered everywhere.
"I … f * ck —"
The 'boulder' was originally a disguise. The place where it was lifted was less than ten feet away from Wang Gan, and there were only two soldiers between them. Wang Gan was the first to react to the sudden movement in the snow. He roared, pulled the reins, and immediately swung his sword. Another soldier on the side had already stretched his waist and swung his rod forward, hitting the buttocks of an assistant walking in front of him. The figure fiercely charged forward, covering a distance of more than ten feet. As Wang Gan swung his sword, the hairs on the back of his neck stood up. He hastily leaned to the side, and the roaring shadow of the rod swept past his forehead. With a loud bang, it hit the back of the warhorse's head. It was as if a stone drum had been broken, and then the warhorse was sent flying with a loud bang.
The warhorse fell like a landslide, crashing into two soldiers on the other side at the same time. Wang Gan tumbled to the ground with the warhorse. He awkwardly made a defensive roll, only to feel something fly over his head — it was the woman on the warhorse that had been thrown by the intruder. Wang Gan quickly got up from the roll, scooped up the snow with one hand and threw it behind him. His body was already running towards the team behind him, shouting, "Stop him! Kill him! Kill him! "
The figure running in pursuit was also very fast, almost following the tumbling warhorse's corpse in a small circle. The snow on the ground was kicked up by his footsteps, and before the snow at the back fell, the snow in front of him had already exploded, like a blooming lotus. Behind the formation, there were six to seven infantry soldiers, one after another, and the long spears were like a forest. Wang Gan shouted and ran in that direction, and the assassin chased after him. Facing the forest of spears, Wang Gan turned around and retreated. In front of him, there were fierce eyes that were like fire.
This assassination came out of nowhere, like a tsunami or a landslide. He had no time to measure how good the opponent's martial arts were. He only used a round shield in one hand and a long sword in the other to defend himself. The soldiers behind him had already reacted, and the long spears pierced past him like a forest. The assassin dashed forward, the iron cudgel in his hand flying, stirring up the snow around him, like a huge tornado. More than ten long spears were not made of iron, and when they came into contact with the shadow of the cudgel, they were swung away, and several white wax spears flew in the air.
In the blink of an eye, the figure approached, and the iron cudgel pressed forward, colliding with Wang Gan's long sword and round shield, and at the same time pushing him towards the soldiers behind him.
"Roar!"
Following the violent collision, the man who rushed forward roared, and Wang Gan's body couldn't help but step back. The people behind him couldn't keep their balance in such a hurry, and some stumbled back, and some fell to the ground. Wang Gan flew back a few steps, retracting his iron cudgel, and then the shadow of the cudgel swept towards him. He blocked it with his round shield, but his arm was numb from the impact. The shadow of the dancing cudgel attacked from the other side, and with a loud bang, it hit his shoulder, and then he saw the wild attack engulfing him.
At this time, only the front of the formation had passed the bend, and the shouting suddenly sounded in the back. Before they could react, they saw the wall of people in front of them suddenly being pushed away, and a figure waving the iron cudgel pushed the crowd away in the blink of an eye. General Wang Gan also flew back to the side of the hill while shouting crazily. Some people tried to stop him, and some tried to attack from the back, but in the chaos of the iron cudgel, someone suddenly fell to the side, and his head was hit by the iron cudgel. In a short moment, the shadow of the cudgel was waved, and like iron being struck, Wang Gan was pushed through the chaotic crowd, and almost flew eight or nine feet back up the hill, and the people behind him were all left behind. The shadow of the cudgel suddenly stopped, streaked across the sky, and stabbed back. With a loud bang, a large rock in the snow cracked, and the iron cudgel stuck there. The assassin approached Wang Gan, who seemed to be drunk, step by step. With one hand, he grabbed the knife, and with the other, he pulled off his helmet, and pressed the blade on it.
In the thick blood, the head was cut off, and Wang Gan's body seemed to have no bones. As the armor fell to the ground, thick blood seeped out.
"A man shouldn't be a slave! All of you deserve to die! "
A voice full of anger came out under the pressure of internal force, and it passed through the snowy mountains like thunder. The assassin turned around with the head in his hand, and the iron cudgel stuck in a rock to the side. For a moment, no one in the hundreds of bandits dared to come forward. He said, "Why are you still not kneeling?"
Of course, no one would kneel, but with this shout, a bugle suddenly sounded in the nearby forest, followed by the sound of an army charging through the forest. The hundreds of people under Wang Gan's command were nothing more than a motley crew. Seeing the assassin kill their leader in front of hundreds of people, they fled in an uproar.
The assassin pulled out his iron cudgel and gave chase, knocking the bandits around him down into the snow with each hit. Then he saw some people in the distance who had stolen gold and silver and kidnapped women in an attempt to escape, so he gave chase. At this moment, a group of people charged out of the forest. Some of the bandits knelt on the ground to surrender, while others threw down heavy objects and ran for their lives.
By the time two to three hundred bandits had thrown down their weapons and knelt in the snow, most of the people in the forest had come out as well. However, there were only about thirty of them in total. Some tried to sneak away, but the cudgel wielding man who had rushed out first caught up to them and beat them to a pulp. In a short time, the thirty or so people had tied up nearly three hundred captives and saved a group of kidnapped women. The mountain road was filled with the sounds of begging and crying.
The cudgel wielding man looked at the kidnapped women from afar with a sorrowful gaze, but he did not approach them. Seeing that most of the captives had been tied up, he looked in the direction the bandits had fled in. No one knew what he was thinking. At this moment, a woman in martial attire with a scar on her face came up to him and asked him about the next step. The cudgel wielding man said, "Send the women back to the village and take the people who are still alive. Escort these bastards to the city of Vaud … I'll chase after the ones who escaped."
He paused. "The Jurchen emissaries are heading south. I'm going to find them."
This man was naturally the nine-patterned dragon, Shi Jin, who had returned to Vaud. Ever since he had reunited with Lin Chong and later confirmed that Lin Chong had died while delivering the letter, he had been disheartened. The only thing he was worried about was the whereabouts of Lin Chong's son, Mu Anping. It was just that the only thing he knew about this matter was the name Tan Lu.
After Shi Jin returned to Vaud, he investigated several times and even asked for the cooperation of the government. However, he still couldn't find out Tan Lu's whereabouts. Right now, the situation in the surroundings was getting increasingly tense. Shi Jin was extremely anxious and gathered some of the companions who were still willing to follow him after the Crimson Peak Mountain disbanded. Although the first priority was still to look for the child, seeing that the situation was getting chaotic, it was hard for him to ignore such a disaster.
It was just that with the precedent of the Crimson Peak Mountain, Shi Jin was only willing to carry out small assassinations in the dark. Now that he had ambushed and killed Wang Gan, Shi Jin didn't rest for long. He headed toward the forest ahead and gave chase. His martial arts had already reached perfection. Right now, he was chasing after one of Wang Gan's assistants. On the third day, he finally found some clues about an emissary sent by the Jurchen emissaries.
This emissary was a Han from Liaodong who was under Wanyan Xiyin. Shi Jin captured this person and interrogated him for half a night, but he didn't obtain much information. He had roamed the world and lived an upright life. Although he was facing an enemy now, he still felt a little disgusted by such torture. In the latter half of the night, the spy committed suicide. Shi Jin sighed and buried the man's body in a pit.
The next day, when he returned to Vaud, the news of a righteous man killing Wang Gan and saving the villagers had already spread through the city. Shi Jin didn't wish to become famous and quietly returned to the inn where he was staying. His companions sent him an unexpected piece of news. Someone claimed to know the whereabouts of Mu Yi's son and hoped to meet him.
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