Leaving Xiaoguan in the west, the drought disappeared.
But the conditions along the way made Liu Shishi feel familiar.
He still didn't go out of the mountains, he just passed one mountain and headed to the next mountain. When he looked up, he still saw a mountain, and when he looked down, he was still a mountain.
Passing through the villages, it was clear that we were two thousand miles away from northern Shaanxi, but every village had the flavor of his hometown, and the people were not happy.
It's just that there's still one straw left before despair.
"General, you don't need to remember them. You can't remember them. Even if you remember them, it's none of your business."
Cao Huachun rode a docile pony. He lowered his head and glanced at the list of Xining chieftains he brought out when he left the palace. He said to Liu Chengzong who was riding forward: "It is enough to know that there are twenty-five Namafan families in Xining."
Liu Shizi frowned slightly and pursed his lips and said, "Isn't that right? I am the Qinghai Provincial Envoy, and they are chieftains. How can you say it is none of my business, let alone none of my business... Why did Eunuch Cao tell me what they were doing?"
Cao Huachun glanced at him and said with a smile: "They are all colleagues from now on. The commander-in-chief should know them. The chieftain in Xining belongs to Shaanxi, not Qinghai."
Liu Chengzong nodded: "Yes, we are all colleagues, and we should look after each other in the future."
Cao Huachun was so frightened that he hurriedly waved his hands. If it weren't for the riding skills he had learned while hunting with Emperor Tianqi, he would have fallen off his horse and died young. He said: "No need to take care of them, let them take care of themselves in the mountains. General Liu, don't rob... "
Cao Huachun was so anxious that he accidentally said what was in his heart, as if he had borrowed his words and was eager to pay them back. He said quickly: "No, just leave them alone."
To be honest, Emperor Chongzhen gave Cao Huachun a lot of explanations before coming here.
Cao Huachun thought very well at that time!
A scholar who was knowledgeable, loyal, filial and benevolent, as a man who had no choice but to plunder and rebel, tried his best to write a sincere and touching letter to His Majesty with words from the bottom of his heart, asking for a seal to be sent to Qinghai, a place as remote and cold as the sky.
At that time, Cao Huachun constructed a figure similar to Xu Huang in his mind. He was a Baibo thief in his early years, and later changed his past and made great achievements.
Entering the Hehuang Valley where Qinghai is backed by the richest man in the northwest, there are not many things that Qinghai Xuanwei Envoy should do.
Relying on Hezhou, Lanzhou, and Xining, we only need to implement the national policy of isolating the captives on behalf of the imperial court.
Speaking of which, Liu Chengzong's father and brother were pretty much what Cao Huachun imagined.
The father is a thoughtful old man who served as a local official in the imperial court; the brother also looks like a young general. Both father and son are organized, disciplined and decent people.
Only when it came to Liu Chengzong... he was careless. He was still a good general with five sons. Where is Xu Huang? It's clearly Dong Zhuo.
To be honest, Liu Chengzong didn't do anything, but it just made Cao Huachun scared, not knowing what he would do next.
From the bottom of his heart, this man had no respect or fear for the imperial court. He felt as if An Da had paid tribute.
I still expect him to isolate the Fanlu.
Cao Huachun thought that in the future, Hehuang, Gansu Province would not only need to isolate the Fanlu, but also the Fanlu and Liu Chengzong.
"Where's Zuo Guangxian?"
Eunuch Cao was thinking about it when he saw a few thieves running over and handing over some paintings. Liu Chengzong asked someone to call Zuo Guangxian.
It was not easy for Zuo Guang, who was sent by Yang He. He brought a total of four to five hundred men and horses, and he had to protect the front and the rear. From time to time, he encountered officials who wanted to blackmail him, and he had to bring out Cao Huachun to scare them. .
It's really interesting to say that there are officials who want to extort Liu Chengzong's food.
Liu Chengzong's team was frighteningly large and moved slowly on the road, especially carrying a lot of troops, food and property.
Cao Huachun didn't know how much food Liu Chengzong had until now. He only knew that thousands of mules and 4,000 horse and donkey carts could not transport it in one trip.
The team at the front has been stopping and going, and the team at the back has been transporting people back and forth.
Too much money and food at this time of year will definitely arouse jealousy and temptation.
Cao Huachun has dealt with similar matters twice. One was to extort grain, and the other was a sixth-grade official who wanted to extort bribes from Liu Chengzong.
When he saw Cao Huachun, he said something shamelessly, why did the father-in-law protect him?
Cao Huachun said in his heart, silly boy, we men are protecting you, and it made him anxious. Not to mention your ancestral graves, even my ancestral graves will be raised.
"General, General Zuo is opening the way ahead. What's wrong?"
"Look at this road. Where is Zuo Guangxian going? After passing Anding, he is about to go to Lanzhou. How can he go south to Gongchang?"
Cao Huachun was speechless for a moment, and the diversion was discovered.
Lanzhou is a large grain storage camp in the northwest. Now in autumn, the entire Gansu military grain is there, but there are no soldiers there. There is only one Lanzhou battalion, led by Shaanxi's Lanzhou general.
With Pingliang and Guan Ning having a 3,000 battalion for three days, and excluding the experience of being crippled during a day's march, how could Cao Huachun dare to let Liu Chengzong go to Lanzhou!
Take the Gongchang and Lintao line into Xining, bypassing Lanzhou. There is a general military mansion there. Although the general general is not at home, after all, the troops are sufficient.
Cao Huachun said: "Commander, let's go to Gongchang to avoid any misunderstandings in Lanzhou."
"Don't come here. When you say nice things, I call you Marshal. When you're not, I call you General. When I return to the Forbidden City, I'll be Liu... Can there be any misunderstanding?"
Liu Chengzong said: "Eunuch Cao, think about it carefully, Lanzhou has more military rations than I do? I don't care about robbing them. I eat two hundred shi of horse chews per day, which delays the journey for ten days. One shi of rice grain is calculated as five taels. How much space do I have to rob to make my money back?”
As soon as he heard the word "grab", Cao Huachun felt guilty and hurriedly sent the Jing army to the front to call Zuo Guangxian and ask him to leave Lanzhou obediently.
Cao Huachun was helpless. The prices in Liu Chengzong's mind were different from his.
Originally, he thought that taking a detour, one stone of rice and grain would cost nine taels of silver, which would not be a big waste; but when he arrived at Liu Chengzong's place, one stone of rice and grain cost five taels of silver, so he would be wasted.
After the Jing army left, Cao Huachun said: "Commander, there is still a palace in Lanzhou. You must not disturb Su Fan."
"What I'm looking for is King Su."
As soon as Liu Chengzong said these words, Cao Huachun felt a chill in his heart, but he followed him and said, "His Royal Highness the King of Han asked Su Fan to help prepare a bowl of candy, which is a must-have when going to the south of Qinghai."
After saying that, Liu Chengzong glanced at him and said, "You don't want me to go to Lanzhou, do you want me to just sit in Xining?"
Cao Huachun was relieved. As long as Liu Chengzong had no intention of robbing Su Fan, everything would be easy to discuss.
Zuo Guangxian was eating in front, and he was very worried.
He now understands very well why Liu Chengzong went to Qinghai. If he were Liu Chengzong and brought two to three hundred thousand dan of grain, he would not want to fight.
Let alone fighting, these days Zuo Guangxian's guerrilla unit, with more than 400 soldiers, no longer wants to fight with him.
They were all Yulin soldiers. They used to eat and drink with him every day until they became skinny and skinny.
Leading the way to Liu Chengzong was indeed a hard job. In order to prevent Liu's troops from fighting with other officers and soldiers, they guarded the front and prepared the rear. The entire team spanned twenty or thirty miles of mountain roads. The cavalry soldiers could maneuver on the official roads in the mountains in one day. Baili just to spread the news.
But it’s not because of this that Yulin soldiers don’t want to work with him. His soldiers are very happy. Running a hundred miles a day is nothing. Not to mention being able to ride a horse. Even if they run on their feet, they will exhaust themselves to death. They are all happy. .
Just now, several of his servants were sitting on a tree stump next to the official road.
People hold wooden bowls in one hand, and in the bowls are soup soaked with a little vegetable sauce, a piece of vinegar cloth, and a piece of smoked horse meat; with one hand, they make rolls, two to one. The sky is hard.
But Yulin Bing's burrito was very happy to be dipped in the soup. He took two bites of the pancake and then had another one.
The waiter said while eating: "Dashuai Liu treats everyone equally. It's no big deal to our Yulin brothers. He is ten times better than Du Wenhuan."
The surrounding servants and Yulin soldiers from the guerrilla department nodded in agreement and ate more enthusiastically.
I eat these every day without getting tired of them. I eat them every day until the corners of my mouth are oily. After half a month, everyone has gained six or seven pounds.
Every three to five days, they would be given two kilograms of fried noodles for them to eat when the march was inconvenient, but no one in the entire guerrilla department ate the fried noodles.
Zuo Guangxian didn't give any orders, but they all saved the fried noodles. Now each of them has five or six kilograms, hiding them like treasures where others can't find them.
They plan to save the fried noodles for when they return to Yulin, saving ten kilograms, which will be enough for two months.
This scene made Zuo Guang feel dizzy at first.
He is a martial arts scholar from Yulin Town and has served in the army for a long time. But at this moment, he just feels that all the military books he has learned are nonsense.
Even if Yue Wumu came back to life, he would not be able to arrange his troops to attack Liu Chengzong.
Zuo Guangxian took a vicious bite of the dough pancake. The dry and hard pancake made his cheeks hurt. What happened to this world?
The arrogant Jingjun came on horseback and conveyed the news condescendingly that there was no need to detour, and the guerrilla sergeants immediately complained.
"General, no need to take a detour?"
There was disappointment in the soldier's eyes, and he said what everyone was thinking: "Then, wouldn't it mean that we would lose ten days of military rations?"
Zuo Guang first sighed in his heart.
Following the order, the sergeants drank the broth as fast as they could without dipping the pancakes into their stomachs. They wiped the pancakes clean and stuffed them into their mouths from wooden bowls, ready to go.
A servant shook his head and said: "I used to think Xining was far away, but now I just hate that Xining is so close. I really hope this road will never end."
Then a servant didn't know what he said, and everyone burst into laughter and pushed the servant towards Zuo Guangxian's position.
Zuo Guang first put the saddle hanging on the tree branch back on his mount. With a smile in his eyes, he deliberately said with a straight face: "What are you making!"
Then his tone softened and he urged: "Go pack up quickly, we are about to set off."
"General, he said otherwise, hahaha!" The servant next to him said with a strange smile: "He said otherwise the general would take us to join the Qinghai Propaganda Envoy!"
Zuo Guang, who was holding the saddle, was stunned for a moment. The smile slowly faded from the corners of his eyes, and his whole face became cold.
The atmosphere is visible to the naked eye, dropping to freezing point.
A servant hurriedly came to the rescue and pushed the man: "Your parents are gone, and the general still has family members in Yulin. Do you want to kill your mistress and your son? Hurry up and put on your helmet."
The servant carefully glanced at Zuo Guangxian and quickly apologized: "General, calm down!"
Then they each ran to pack their bags.
Zuo Guangxian was not angry, but he seemed to have been drained of energy.
His loyal army was corrupted. There was no gold, no silver, and it was actually corrupted by the miso soup burrito.
In fact, Zuo Guangxian had long known that the soldiers would say this.
Zuo Guangxian knew from the time when they called their own commander-in-chief Du Wenhuan and other people's leaders called Marshal Liu that the soldiers would say this sooner or later.
He did not vent his anger on anyone, although he really wanted to be angry, but he knew that the imperial court owed the Shaanxi soldiers too much, and venting his anger would only further hurt the morale of the soldiers.
So be it.
Go west again, pass the Scalegou Bay Horse Station and arrive at Jinxian County.
According to Cao Huachun's order, the post station sent people to deliver news to Lanzhou and Xining, asking them to send people who were familiar with the Qinghai captives' information to tell Liu Chengzong the situation along the way.
At the same time, we also looked at how Lanzhou Sufan was preparing bowls of candy, so as not to offend Liu Chengzong.
The closer he got to Lanzhou, the more Cao Huachun worried that Liu Chengzong would suddenly order an attack on the city.
Fortunately, Liu Chengzong was not even interested in entering the city. After Su Fan sent people to transport two carts of candy, he set off directly to Xining.
Because Zuo Guang, who was in front of him, sent someone to tell him that the chieftain from Xining was here.
Cao Huachun flipped through the list of chieftains and said as he read: "Xili, Dongli, Xiqi, Dongqi... I found it. Chen Shiwen was born in the 33rd year of Wanli. His ancestral home is Shanyin. He is not very old yet. He is in charge of the fourteenth fortress. , with a population of more than 100 or more than 600 households, under the jurisdiction of one chief Tuqian, two chiefs Tubu, and twenty-five horsemen and infantrymen."
These words attracted Liu Chengzong's eyebrows: "Can these twenty-eight people be called President Qian?"
"The northwest is not as good as the southwest. Here in Xining alone, there are 14 chieftains. Moreover, the chieftains are responsible for their own affairs. They still need Xining guards to fight. Even if the chieftain of Dongli, the most populous, has more than 20,000 people, it is only the amount of horse and infantry. Just three hundred.”
Liu Chengzong nodded after hearing this. The Dongli chieftain mentioned by Cao Huachun was more in line with Liu Chengzong's expectation of a chieftain, but there were too few people in charge of chieftain Chen.
Not long after, Zuo Guang led a few people through the formation from the front, and then one person stepped forward and prostrated, saying: "Commander Chen Shiwen of the Xining Guard, pay your respects to the angel!"
Liu Chengzong was waiting at the front. When he heard this, he stepped aside and said to Cao Huachun, "I'm looking for you."
This made Cao Huachun extremely embarrassed, and he quickly stepped forward and said: "Commander Chen, that is Liu Xuan's comfort envoy."
Only then did Chen Shiwen realize that Liu Chengzong was also here, and he thought that the man riding the red-haired horse was the squad leader.
He quickly bowed again: "Chen Shiwen pays homage to Ambassador Liu Xuan."
Then he smiled apologetically and said: "From now on, the Han chieftains in the West Sea will not only be members of the Chen family, but I also hope that Ambassador Xuanwei will take good care of them in the future."
Cao Huachun frowned and said, "Chief Chen, General Liu is the ambassador of Qinghai and has no control over your chieftain in Xining."
Chen Shiwen smiled apologetically at Cao Huachun, but still looked at Liu Chengzong, and continued: "The angel said so."
This made Liu Chengzong feel that Chieftain Chen should be seeking something from him.
At this moment, Zuo Guangxian's horse soldiers in front ran over and said: "General, there are more than a dozen chieftains, clan relatives, chiefs, and generals sent by each chieftain's family. They are all waiting in front."
Both Liu Chengzong and Cao Huachun couldn't help but look at Chieftain Chen in confusion, and heard Chen Shiwen laugh and say: "They walked slowly, I came here first."
