"Oh? What did Miss Liu think of?" Ghost Face thought about it: "If these twenty-six people are fake tax collectors, doesn't it match the number of tax clothes and tax tags?"
"If we add Luo Bei and the three murderers who killed Xiaodou, wouldn't there be exactly thirty people?" Liu Ningshi made a bold idea. "
"How did Miss Liu decide that Luo Bei was a fake tax collector?" Ghost Face shook his head and said, "There seems to be no conclusive evidence for this."
"This Luo Bei once went to Li Laoshi Wonton Shop to cheat on taxes. The waiter in the shop saw a scarlet birthmark on the back of his right hand." Liu Ningshi's eyes were full of determination: "Besides, Luo Bei's appearance and his local accent It’s all the same as what the waiter said.”
"Accent?" Ghost Face was puzzled.
"The burly man among the three whom Yu'er saw has fought against me. He doesn't have a local accent." Liu Ningshi continued: "Although I don't know what the relationship between these three people is with the Pingman Army, but From the fact that the burly man secretly went to the Ministry of Household Affairs to return the real tax certificate, we can conclude that they are accomplices."
"Well! Considering the scale of Jinling City, it does need to reach thirty people. Luo Bei must know this." Ghost Face nodded in agreement: "As long as these people are caught, the deceived shopkeepers can You can tell if they are cheating on taxes by identifying them.”
"Then shall we arrest Luo Bei now?" Liu Ningshi stood up and waited for Ghost Face's decision.
"Those twenty-six people are gone. It must be in vain to catch Luo Bei at this time." Ghost Face had just finished speaking when the imperial guard knocked on the door: "Sir, there is a message from your flying pigeon."
"Come in!" A red-clothed imperial guard opened the door and handed the letter to Ghost Face.
"Huh?" Ghost Face looked happy after reading the message: "Take a group of people and follow me to the east city gate. Miss Liu, please go with me."
"Brother Ren, what happened?" Liu Ningshi was very surprised: "Are we just going to let these fake tax collectors do nothing?"
"How is that possible?" Ghost Face smiled mysteriously: "You will know when Miss Liu goes there, and maybe there will be unexpected gains."
At the third quarter of the Shen hour, it was almost time to close the city gates; there was almost no continuous flow of people in front of the east city gate, and it looked very deserted; a few soldiers in front of the city gate were also taking a nap holding their spears, waiting for the fourth quarter of the Shen hour to arrive. Then he closed the city gate.
Another group of carriages slowly approached the city gate. The leader was riding a maroon Western Region horse, wearing the uniform of the Ministry of Household Affairs. There was no expression on his fair face; the two carriages had four large iron boxes, There are two tax collectors from the Ministry of Household Affairs escorting the shipment.
"That one on horseback?" A soldier pointed his spear at him: "Who are you, dismounting for inspection?"
"We are from the Ministry of Hubu, and we have been ordered by Lord Sha to go out of the city to deliver goods." The leader was Luo Bei from the Ministry of Hubu. He got off his horse and came to the soldiers: "Look, it's almost time to close the city gate. If Don’t let the inspection be delayed.”
"No matter which department you belong to, if you want to go out here, you have to be inspected." Another soldier came forward and blocked Luo Bei with two spears crossed with the soldier who was talking.
"This Luo Bei is such an idiot. He has been working in the household department for so many years. Why don't we just give some money to the soldiers?" A burly man hiding in front of the right side of the first carriage cursed secretly in his heart.
"Why are you two guys so blind?" The fat man on the futon came up at some point and pointed at the soldiers and cursed: "Brother Luo is the popular man in front of Mr. Sha, the left servant of the household department. What else are you looking for? Hurry up. Release."
"It turns out to be Brother Huang." Luo Bei hugged the fat man and said, "Official matters are urgent, so Luo will go ahead and invite Brother Huang to drink when he comes back."
"It's easy to talk." The fat man patted Luo Bei on the shoulder: "Don't forget what you said, I only go to Zui Feng Tower."
"Haha, sure, we won't come back until we're drunk." Luo Bei got on his horse and waved: "Let's go."
The horse team slowly walked out of the city gate, and the burly man in disguise also breathed a sigh of relief and said to himself: "Fortunately, this Luo Bei knows the city gate official."
"The fourth quarter of Shenshi has arrived, close the city gate." The moment the cavalry team came out of the city gate, the soldiers shouted from behind.
"Creak! Bang!" The two iron doors of the East City Gate were tightly closed under the hard push of two soldiers.
The convoy had not taken two steps out of the city gate when eight men in black appeared in a herringbone pattern blocking the way. A man in gray walked out from among the men in black with a stern look on his face and stared at Luo Bei coldly.
"Who are you, who dare to block the way of the Ministry of Revenue official?" Luo Bei pointed the riding whip in his hand at the man in gray and shouted sternly.
"Stop pretending, you bastards who have brought disaster to the country and the people. You defrauded the shop tax money and framed my Su family. I will take you all down today." The man in gray said coldly word by word.
"This person is Su Xing, the head of the Su family. Don't get into any more entanglements with him. Business is more important." The first man on the left in the cavalry team entered the secret passage towards Luo Bei.
"Su Xing, you, a prisoner of the imperial court, dare to block the road and rob." Luo Bei shouted behind him: "All the soldiers obey the order, the two in front will stay to protect the convoy, and the rest will kill the enemy and the bandits together."
"Yes!" The six tax collectors from the Ministry of Household Affairs drew out the bright half-moon knives from the bottom of the carriage and rushed forward.
"Block them." The men in black beside Su Xing didn't hesitate at all. Except for two who were left to protect Su Xing, the others caught and killed each other one by one.
"Ding-ding-ding-ding-ding." The long sword of the man in black collided fiercely with the half-moon knife of the tax collector. But after all, they were ordinary servant guards. They were not as powerful as the plain barbarian army under Luo Bei. After a while, A servant in black had already been hit in the left arm by a knife.
"Squeak." The originally closed city gate opened again for some unknown reason. Ghost Face and Liu Ningshi led a group of imperial guards to surround the cavalry: "Luo Bei, why don't you just surrender without mercy."
"Brothers of the Pingman Army, how long will it take if we don't come out at this time?" Luo Bei looked at the imperial guards who rushed forward and shouted. Twenty men from the Tianfeng Blacksmith Shop who were ambushing outside the city gate were holding half moons. Dao rushed out and started a scuffle with the imperial guards.
"Sir, should we go up and help?" A guard soldier holding a spear felt eager to try when he saw the melee in front of him.
"Help you, don't you want to die?" The fat gatekeeper patted the soldier on the back of the head: "You are in your position to do your job. Your mission is to guard the city gate, not to fight, so what are you doing? , close the city gate."
"Oh!" The guard soldier spared his life and worked together with several other soldiers to close the city gate again.
"Bang!" Looking at the city gate that was closed again, Ghost Face cursed in his heart: "These grandsons are really loyal."
Liu Ningshi held the unsheathed dragon-shaped dagger in her hand, stepped on Phantom Step, and instantly rushed behind a fighting plain barbarian soldier. The dagger sheath pointed at the Fengmen point behind him.
"Dang!" A short silver blade blocked Liu Ningshi's dragon-shaped dagger: "Beauty, your opponent is me."
"Is it you?" Liu Ningshi's eyes flashed with burning anger: "Did you kill those children and old people in the west of the city?"
"I killed those little brats, who made them so noisy?" The burly man's eyes widened when he looked at Liu Ningshi: "By the way, that old woman seemed to have said that Miss Liu was you, right? Why are we fighting? You see, I want skills and money, so why not just be my woman."
"Shameless." Liu Ningshi's cute face sometimes even looked angry, but she still looked a little smiling; she dodged, and the dragon-shaped dagger in her hand unsheathed and pointed directly at the burly man's back. .
The burly man had fought with Liu Ningshi twice, and he gradually adapted to her way; he did not look back, but blocked the black eagle short blade with his backhand, and collided with the dragon-shaped dagger again; Liu Ningshi was like several Like an afterimage, they surrounded the burly man and attacked fiercely. The cold light within three feet of the two men flashed from time to time. If anyone approached at this time, they would be cut to pieces by the wind.
Ghost Face waved the iron ruler and just hit a barbarian soldier. Seeing that Liu Ningshi couldn't fight for a long time, he moved towards the direction of the melee between the two men. Suddenly, a cold light only hit his face. How could Ghost Face be an ordinary person? , without delay, he passed by the sword with his back on his back, but the iron ruler in his hand pointed at the waist of the attacker.
At the moment when the iron ruler was about to reach his waist, the attacker swung his body to the left of Ghost Face, and pierced the door on his left with the dagger in his hand.
"What a quick reaction." The iron ruler move in Ghost Face's hand was already worn out, and he had no time to save it; he suddenly raised his left arm and blocked the sword with his left wrist.
"Dang!" The attacker's dagger and the iron wrist guard on Ghost Face's left hand rubbed fiercely, causing fierce sparks. Under this collision, the two of them took half a step back, staring at each other coldly.
"Hehe! I didn't expect the police officers in Jinling City to be so unambiguous. No wonder the third child was having so much fun." The person who attacked Ghost Face was the burly man's second brother, another person disguised as a tax officer.
"Are you one of the fake tax collectors who attacked the west of the city?" Although Ghost Face was wearing a mask and couldn't see any expression, his emotions were already reflected in his chilling voice.
"Oh! How should I say it? I went to the west of the city, but I wasn't the one who did it." The man with the short sword said with a sinister smile: "It was all the actions of the boss and the third child."
"It doesn't matter if you don't tell the truth. I will capture you later. First, I want you to taste the secret of the criminal law of my Tingwei Mansion." The ghost-faced iron ruler turned in the right palm, and the whole person rose up from the ground and struck at the dagger like a mountain. Man.
The man with the short sword did some somersaults backwards. At the same time, he pressed the mechanism on the hilt of the sword with his right hand, and several silver needles flew out from the pinhole of the hilt. The ghost face's right palm moved with internal force, and the rotating iron ruler sent several silver needles flying. All the needles flew away and hit the soil beside him.
Seeing that he had an opportunity, the man with the short sword kicked hard in the dirt with his left hind foot, holding the sword in a straight line and hitting the ghost face; his body merged with the wind in the air, and he discovered the "chichi" sound. Scratching sound.
"Boom!" The thunder blow of the man with the dagger did not touch the ghost's face at all. It only shattered the transparent wall of light, leaving a white command flag on the ground.
"Boundary? Formation master?" The man with the short sword narrowed his eyes into a straight line when he saw Ling Qi: "The formation master is actually fighting in close combat with others?"
"It's rare to see many strange things." The ghost-faced Iron Ruler pointed at the man with the dagger: "Who stipulates that formation masters can't attack close stations? I will keep you today!"
"Interesting, the blood in my body is a little warm." The man with the dagger muttered a spell silently, and the dagger in his hand separated into three sword shadows, spinning around him like a sword and shield.
