Withered vines and old trees, no crows.
It was windy and snowy, and there was no one around.
After leaving Huangji Town, Li Chenan and his party walked on this official road for four days.
There was deathly silence between heaven and earth, as if we had entered a chaotic space.
Li Chenan felt a little weird.
This journey is not in the mountains.
Although there are hills here and there, most of them are still flat.
Why is there no one else?
The large area covered by snow didn't know whether it was a field or a wasteland.
If it's a field, how many hectares is it?
If it is a wasteland, how much food can be produced in a year if it is reclaimed?
For the first time, he realized how sparsely populated Ningguo was.
In such an extremely backward era, people are the greatest productive force.
If a country wants its population to grow significantly, it must first be stable.
The second thing is to make sure that all the people are well fed, clothed, and worry-free... There is no other nightlife this night, so they will naturally have babies.
But now...
Ningguo is now on the verge of war and chaos!
There are strong enemies on all sides, bandits everywhere, and even more vicious traitors inside.
Although the officials in Kyoto have been thoroughly cleaned up, none of the officials in the five seventy-two states and the counties below them have been touched.
This is like a person whose whole body is sick. Although he has changed his mind, his hands and feet are still full of abscesses.
This will inevitably require a major purge across the country.
The land south of the Yangtze River is the top priority of the entire Ning Kingdom.
This first blow must fall in Jiangnan.
Whether it's Jiangnan's Jianghu or Jiangnan's officialdom!
Li Chenan was perfecting the plan for the trip to the south of the Yangtze River on the bumpy horseback. Xiao Baozi seemed to have become accustomed to the hands tightly hugging her waist. She still squinted her eyes, which allowed her to see the front more clearly.
She just felt the warmth of the man coming from her back. She gently waved the riding crop in her hand, and suddenly felt that riding a horse like this was more comfortable than riding a donkey.
Dusk falls.
There was a dim light ahead.
It was a city at the junction of Guangling Prefecture and Pingjiang Prefecture.
It's called Wangjiang City.
When we get here, we are still roughly five days away from Zhouzhuang.
Li Chenan and his party dutifully paid the city entry tax and entered the city.
Five people and five horses walked slowly and leisurely on the streets of Wangjiang City. After a while, Li Chenan saw a rather grand inn, and he suddenly felt happy——
It's also called Yuelai Inn!
"Stay here!"
The five people dismounted and were greeted warmly by the waiter.
"My guest, it's been a hard journey!"
"What a handsome horse!"
"My guest, please give the horses to the little man. I promise to take good care of them!"
Saying this, he took the reins from Xiao Baozi and shouted toward the inside: "Mrs. Boss, pick up the customers!"
As soon as he finished speaking, an attractive woman in her thirties rushed out of the inn with a happy face.
"Ouch, rare visitor!"
"Oh, what a handsome young lady... Come on, please come inside, it's so cold outside, don't let this delicate young lady freeze to death!"
Look, big places are just different.
This shouldn't be a black shop anymore.
As the group walked in, they immediately felt a warmth coming to their faces.
Li Chenan took a look at the lobby. The decoration was certainly not elegant, but it was still grand.
In addition to the counter on one side, there are six tables in the entire lobby.
There were not many people at the moment, there were only two tables with people sitting at them.
In one, six people were sitting drinking.
At first glance, it seems that they are all from the world.
Because they carry swords on their backs, or put knives on the table.
The innermost table is an exception.
There were two men sitting at that table, an old man and a young man.
The old man's back was turned towards Li Chen'an, and his age could not be seen. The young man had a fair complexion, wore a blue cotton robe and a Confucian crown, and looked to be seventeen or eighteen years old. He was probably a scholar.
They did not carry swords on their backs or shoulder knives.
The old man was carrying a piano case on his back, presumably a servant of the young man.
Li Chenan withdrew his gaze. The proprietress was already standing behind the counter and asked with a smile:
"Sir, our store happens to have three upper rooms. The five of you... what do you think?"
"Okay, how much does one room cost?"
"Young Master, it's very cheap. An apartment only costs two taels of silver."
Seemingly seeing the surprise on Li Chenan's face, she quickly said: "Master, it's worth it!"
"You can see the Xiujiang River from the window in our upper room. The winter view of the Xiujiang River is amazing!"
"Besides, the charcoal fire in our upper room is constantly burning for 12 hours... The young master looks at it and it is extremely expensive. You don't know that the price of charcoal this year is not cheap."
"And our upper room provides hot water at any time. You only need to yell, and a servant will bring it to your room... If you still feel it is not warm enough, you can add more bedding."
"Don't worry, they are all brand new."
"Look at the way the young masters are coming... from Guangling, right? There is no human habitation in that long stretch of road for hundreds of miles. Not to mention gentle people like the young masters, that's where the knights in the world come from. I’m quite exhausted when I get here.”
"For two taels of silver, I can take a comfortable hot bath, have a meal with good wine and food from our kitchen, and then lie down on that warm bed... This little lady is the young master's wife, right?"
Xiao Baozi did not deny it, and the landlady suddenly burst into laughter:
"It's obvious at first glance!"
"They look so good as a couple!"
"The young couple rolled into bed...tsk, tsk, tsk, they are really gods!"
"No, I even beat the gods!"
A eloquent tongue made Xiao Baozi very happy.
As soon as she finished speaking, Xiao Baozi had already taken out a ten tael of silver from his arms.
She placed it on the counter.
Her slender eyebrows raised slightly, and she said very calmly: "Just three upper rooms!"
He added boldly: "No need to look for it!"
The female boss immediately took the ingot of silver with a smile on her face and said, "It turns out that the young lady is the master of the house. She is very good. She brings prosperity to her family and future generations!"
"From now on, the young master and his wife will definitely have a house full of children and a prosperous family!"
"Master, Madam, wait a moment..."
She turned her head and shouted at the people on the second floor: "There are three rooms in the sky, little one, come and take the guests up to have a rest!"
"Okay!"
The little girl, about twelve or thirteen years old, ran downstairs, but Li Chenan suddenly asked the landlady:
"That stretch of hundreds of miles has mountains, water, fields and land, but why is there no human habitation?"
The landlady looked at Li Chenan, looked around again, and then whispered:
"Ding!"
"A few years ago, when the imperial court asked people to fight, a guy whipped the whole young man clean."
"Then another group of bandits came..."
"Starting from Huangping Town to our Wangjiang City, the mountain is called Tulong Mountain!"
"In the past two years, there has been a bandit force of more than a hundred people in the mountain!"
"There are only a few young children, the elderly, the weak, and women left in those villages. How can they stop the bandits from looting? Naturally, they all moved away."
"Young master, you are also lucky. Maybe the heavy snow has sealed the mountain. Otherwise... if you don't hire someone from the escort agency to escort you on this road, you will be in trouble!"
"oh……"
Li Chenan nodded thoughtfully and followed the little girl named Xiaobu Dian up to the second floor.
The young man sitting at the end of the hall turned his head and looked at the backs of Li Chenan and others.
The old man opposite him also raised his head and took a look.
Then the old man and the young man drank and ate vegetables as if nothing had happened.
The six tough men from the world at the table on the other side picked up their wine glasses, looked at each other knowingly, opened their mouths, and downed a bowl of wine.
His eyes sparkled:
Fat sheep!
A group of fat sheep with no experience in the world of martial arts!
…
Jiangbei.
At the foot of Jingning Mountain.
Ning Chuchu looked at the corpses on the ground, as well as the food and fodder for more than a hundred carriages, and the trembling carriage handlers.
She grinned too.
"Fat Sheep!"
"Chen An is right. If you want to get rich suddenly, you really can't take the ordinary path!"
"Let's go, let's keep looking for fat sheep!"
