The so-called Shififififenggou is actually a trench built by the ancients. It is said that during the Sui and Tang Dynasties, Lu Mingyue, a traitor from Zhuo County, set up camp here in a trench to confront Sui general Zhang Xutuo.
Now hundreds of years have passed by in a hurry, and the ravines are covered with dense grass on both sides, and there are layers of thorns along the way. Although it blocks the outside view, if you are not careful, if you step on dead branches and leaves under your feet, it will make a rustling sound. Fortunately, Zhang Rong and others were used to walking and were careful along the way.
The most recent time, a few people passed by a group of Mongolian horses grazing. The horses were frightened by the figures shaking in the depths of the wormwood. They suddenly jumped and neighed. Several Mongolian knights came to comfort them. Fortunately, they had other things on their minds. No one came to check for clues.
The group of people bypassed the Mongolian army camp and approached the Xiaoqing River. They were still a mile or two away when they heard the roar of people!
Zhang Rong quickly signaled to his companions to lower themselves, then pushed aside the reeds, stepped on the water plants and cold wet mud, and slowly took a closer look.
Last year there was a severe drought in two areas of Shandong, with no rain for more than 200 days. This year it is also dry and cold. When the water is low in winter, many rivers dry up.
However, the Xiaoqing River was excavated by a large number of civilians during the Puppet Qi Dynasty, using the ancient Jishui Road to connect the Beiqing River and the continuous lakes and springs in the north of Jinan City. It was also repaired unremittingly in the following decades, so the water is still surging at this time and can Allow large ships to sail.
There were really big ships, lots of big ships!
Right in front of Zhang Rong, on the Xiaoqing River, at least dozens of large ships were connected end to end, and they were approaching!
"It's a ship like Tongzhou, a sea ship!"
Ma Wu whispered beside Zhang Rong.
Most of the ships used to transport salt in the Jin Dynasty were imitations of the Song Dynasty salt ships. They had square heads, square sterns and flat bottoms. They were more than forty paces long. They had no compartments or masts. They relied on oars or trackers to pull them and traveled on various channels. Caohe.
But these ships are all Tongzhou-style sea ships, with single mast and single sail, about seventy feet in length. This kind of boat is inconspicuous when sailing in the wind and waves on the sea, but it is very majestic when placed in Xiaoqing River.
What's more, there are dozens of ships of the same specifications, with masts and masts standing like a forest, which is really amazing!
This section of the river has a very wide water surface. There is a new grass market on the riverside, and there are piers and trestles on both sides.
But the Mongols attacked a while ago and burned the grass market to ashes. The docks and trestles were not spared either. At this time, they only built some wooden boards on the remaining bridge piles and spread a layer of straw. Walking on them was narrow and wobbly. .
The fleet was slowly approaching the pier at this time, and Zhang Rongdai wanted to take a closer look at the sailors.
An archer motioned to Zhang Rong to look south of the trestle.
"Brother, look!"
Zhang Rong was stunned as he watched the fleet. In the blink of an eye, he noticed that a large fence used by the Mongols to keep livestock had been built on the river beach near the trestle. Outside the fence, there were three to five hundred Mongolian cavalry. They were lazily on guard, and there were no less than thousands of men and women enclosed in the fence.
Most of the people were tortured beyond recognition.
Some people were skinny and numb; some were half-dressed and shirtless, revealing horrific whip marks on their bodies; some had their noses and ears cut off; some couples clearly looked like a couple, but they looked like they had just met. , the woman was wailing, and the husband was silently crying, perhaps because he missed his dead family members, or because he was crying for their respective experiences.
Where did these people come from? Without getting too close, you can tell by the accent that these are the hometown of Jinan Prefecture, the same hometown and neighbors of Zhang Rong and others!
Zhang Rong was instantly furious. He couldn't wait to get up immediately, draw his sword and arrows, kill all the Mongolians in charge, and free the people.
But he was sober and knew that he couldn't do it.
In such a terrible world, if you don't have power, you can't protect others. And what if you have power? Who can fight against the Mongols?
Zhang Rong felt that his forehead was hot and his heart was beating wildly. He tried his best to suppress his anger and said in a deep voice: "Don't be anxious, wait and see. The Mongols must be here for a reason."
Inadvertently, the wound on his cheek was torn open again, and blood continued to seep through the linen. Zhang Rong seemed unaware and said again: "There must be something fishy about that fleet! Watch carefully!"
Just as he said this, a large ship at the head of the fleet finally approached the pier, and several people came out of the cabin.
The leader is a fat monk. When he strode onto the trestle, his heavy body made the board shake.
The monk seemed to have injured his legs and feet and was walking a little unsteadily. He quickly put a big black stick in his hand at the end of the bridge. When the trestle creaked and stabilized, he stood still.
Behind the fat monk were several more people, all of whom were strong-looking and dressed as generals of the imperial court.
"Where did this group of people come from? Are they from the imperial court? How come there is any contact between the imperial court and the Mongols?"
Zhang Rong couldn't figure it out at all. He looked around and saw that his subordinates also looked at a loss.
Zhang Rong and other private salt dealers are active in a wide range of areas. It reaches Changshan in the east, Shanghe and Yanci in the north, associates with Taishan bandits in the south, crosses Dongping Mansion in the west, and becomes friends with Boshui bandits in Liangshan.
Within this scope, they have countless relatives, friends, and informants. They should have sharp ears and eyes, and no trouble can be hidden from them.
However, the Mongols carried out a killing spree. In just over ten days, the local people either died or fled, and not a single one of them was left alive. They were trapped on Hongtang Ridge, and there had been very little inquiring in the past few days, so they didn't know that this fleet belonged to Guo Ning, the military commander of the Ding Navy.
This fat monk is naturally Guo Ning's right-hand man, Monk Luo, whose monastic name is Huifeng.
Monk Luo has always been bold. When the Mongolian army first arrived in Shandong, he proposed to use elite troops to take boats and go along the Xiaoqing River to the Jinan city to harass them and give the Mongols a good look. Unfortunately, the situation changed and his suggestions were not realized.
Later, Guo Ning captured the fourth prince Tuo Lei and used Tuo Lei as a hostage to extort a huge amount of ransom from the Mongolian army in Shandong. The two families made a verbal agreement, and the troops and horses dispersed without threatening each other; the two armies directly sent people to complete the delivery of horses, slaves, ordnance and armor in person.
The delivery of large items of money, food, personnel, and craftsmen were all placed on the Xiaoqing River, north of Zhangqiu, where the river winds. The navy will dispatch its own fleet to receive and transport ships.
The main reason why the delivery office is placed here is that most of the original residents here have fled and there are few people around. Therefore, no one will watch the Mongols' various deliveries. In this way, the Mongols, who were deeply humiliated by the defeat, could feel slightly better, and at least the humiliation could be tolerated.
Guo Ning caught fire that day and suffered a headache and hit Tuo Lei twice in the prison cell. Later, the medical officer said that three of his ribs were broken.
This kind of action was really inconsistent with diplomatic etiquette, so he did not hesitate to accept the Mongols' request for a delivery place and readily agreed.
The fleet and boatmen under Guo Ning's command were all obtained by Wang Shixian's assistance to Li Yun in Zhigu Village. The task of leading the fleet up the river should have been Wang Shixian's.
However, Wang Shixian's troops suffered heavy losses when fighting the Mongols. He has been busy comforting the soldiers these days and really can't get away.
So Monk Luo happily accepted the task. Regardless of the fact that he was missing two toes, he limped to Jinan Mansion.
The two officers accompanying Monk Luo were called Liu Yue and Zhao Xuan.
On that day, Monk Luo fled with the monks from Xuanzhong Temple in Datong Prefecture, Xijing. He recruited desperadoes along the way and fell into the trap of Baozhou Shenyuan Park. His deputy is Pei Ruhai, a junior fellow of Xuanzhong Temple, known to outsiders as Monk Pei.
But among the monks, there were few who were brave and good at fighting, so his other capable subordinates were all well-known local bandits in Hebei.
For example, Liu Yue was a murderer who killed a wealthy local businessman and fled, and was wanted by more than a dozen military states. As for Zhao Xuan, he was a wealthy businessman who followed his parents all over the country since he was a child. It was only because his family was being bullied by local officials that he took action and killed officials.
The two of them had one thing in common. It turns out that Liu Yue often dreamed that he was the right eunuch of Yulin in the Han Dynasty and the emperor's confidant; while Zhao Xuan always claimed that in his previous life, he was a scholar in Liangzhou and was good at bow and horse.
Everyone else knew that Monk Luo knew nothing about Buddhist scriptures, and he was even more entangled in Buddhist principles, but no one dared to tell him in front of him, so Monk Luo always regarded himself as an eminent monk.
The tunes described by the two people were like the wisdom of previous lives in Buddhist scriptures. Monk Luo found it interesting and attracted the two people as his confidants.
In fact, most of the military lieutenants and generals knew that the two men were in favor of Monk Luo, and they made it up for fun. As for whether Monk Luo himself understood or not, others did not dare to ask.
Despite this oddity, both of them were capable military academies. Their bravery on the battlefield was even praised by Guo Ning.
After Pei Ruhai's death, these two men became Monk Luo's lieutenants.
At the moment, Liu Yue, accompanying Monk Luo, stood on the trestle and watched coldly. Zhao Xuan, leading a soldier, stood in front of the Mongolian cavalry formation and shouted.
Those Mongolian cavalrymen glared at Zhao Xuan, as if they were about to spit out fire. Zhao Xuan was really bold, and he nonchalantly raised his head and shouted at the Mongolians on horseback. He actually knows some Mongolian.
After a few words and gestures, a man who looked like a hundred Mongolian households came out.
The hundreds of Mongolian households looked up at Monk Luo, ignored him, and shouted sharply at Zhao Xuan: "The first batch is five thousand people, and there will be five more batches after that! We will pick out the people you want on the spot! Pick out Strong men and women are like picking out jumping yellow sheep, like picking out cheerful horses!"
Zhao Xuan was stunned for a moment. The previous agreement with the Mongols included 30,000 people. That was estimated by Guo Ning and his generals.
After the massacre by the Mongols, the remaining population of Jinan Prefecture was approximately this. In that verbal agreement, it was only mentioned that the Mongols could not use all the old and weak to make up the number, and the 30,000 people were sent in six batches.
Other than that, there are no other details. It should be noted that the Mongolians did not even have writing, and everything was transmitted orally through compilation and lyrics. The calculations were so detailed that Naminfu could not remember much, so it was a waste of time.
At this moment, the Mongolians are willing to give all the young and strong, which is naturally good, but they have to choose on the spot... Doesn't that mean they are inspecting people like animals?
Zhao Xuan felt a little unhappy. But he knew that this move would not harm Ding Haijun, so he nodded slightly and said proudly: "Then hurry up!"
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