The demonic army retreated, and the officers and soldiers escorted the torture cart and continued on their journey. The water rose higher as they went forward. The narrowest part of the stone path on the shore was less than one foot. The torture cart had to be mostly in the water. Many Qi practitioners helped to lift it up. Because the Huoyunlu who pulled the cart were all caught by gods and demons, the wheels behind were pulled by manpower. Thousands of sergeants pulled forward and pushed, and finally walked out of the dark canyon and saw the light of day again.
After leaving the mouth of the bellows, we arrived at the boundary of Mingzhou, one of the five states in the Central Plains. It was originally a prosperous land, but there was too much rain this year and it kept raining. Several large rivers flooded and flooded the land.
Many sections of the official road were washed by water, and there was mud everywhere. The iron wheels were sunk into the ground several feet deep. Fortunately, the army got six golden-horned white oxen to pull the carts, so they could continue to move forward.
In the battle in the canyon, Liang Xingyang expelled swords to kill gods and demons, and at the last moment dispersed the will-o'-the-wisps in the sky. No one, whether it was a practitioner or an officer or a soldier, dared to look down upon him in the slightest. He even made many overtures and woos. Jian Dongcheng even ordered someone to do it for him. The first four-tusked golden-eyed tiger was given to him to ride on.
He was riding on the tiger, walking beside the torture cart, looking at the misty wilderness around him, and then at the girl in the iron cage.
Since leaving the canyon, the girl has been sitting quietly inside, motionless, like a statue.
Liang Xingyang observed her for many days, and finally couldn't help but say: "Are you really the White Bone Evil Queen?"
The girl turned to look at him: "My surname is Yan, and my name is Yan Wodan."
"Are you the White Bone Evil Princess?" Liang Xingyang asked.
The girl turned back and looked straight ahead. After a moment of silence, she said, "They do call me White Bone Evil Queen."
"You are the leader of the White Bone Sect." Liang Xingyang used an affirmative sentence this time.
Yan Wodan said: "My father was arrested by the government and taken to the capital to be executed. My uncles regarded me as the second generation leader."
"Is there anyone named Li Zhenghao in your White Bone Sect?"
Yan Wodan smiled and lowered his head: "I don't know."
"You don't know? He is known as the Rat King and is good at domesticating rats. The rats he raises can be so big." Liang Xingyang gestured while riding on the tiger, "He usually makes rats eat people, eat corpses, and then eat the rats. They serve as army rations, and they also pair living people with rats to make a rat feast. Do you think such a person is a disciple of your White Bone Sect?"
"Perhaps. Many people who rose up against the imperial court said they were taught by our White Bones, but we don't have the teachings on raising rats."
When Liang Xingyang saw that she had cleared away the relationship between him and Li Zhenghao in one sentence, he asked again: "You always know An Zhongyu, right? It is said that he is your father, the adopted son of the previous generation of the White Bone Sect leader."
"My father had a total of fifty or sixty adopted sons. He can't remember exactly how many, but he only took care of eight of them and raised them, and none of them had the surname An."
Liang Xingyang was silent. He looked towards the roadside. There was a turbid mud pit. There were two moderately decomposed corpses lying on the side. Judging from their clothes, they were a father and a daughter. The daughter was very thin and small, both lying on her back. His true face cannot be seen, and white bones are exposed on his face and hands: "As the leader of the White Bone Sect, you must bear all the sins committed by your subordinates."
Yan Wodan laughed self-deprecatingly, lowered his head and said, "Didn't I bear the responsibility?"
"It's not enough." Liang Xingyang's voice was low, "Your White Bone Sect swept through nearly 800 counties in the eleven prefectures of Sanyuan. Do you know how many people you killed? I came from the six prefectures of Kunyuan. There, the entire county was transformed. The city has become empty, and most of the people are dead!"
Yan Wodan turned around again and looked over: "How do you know that they all died because they met the White Bone Cult, rather than joining the White Bone Cult when they were about to die? If the death of all these people must be attributed to the White Bone Cult, What about them? Who killed them?"
She pointed to the dead bodies of her father and daughter lying in a puddle on the roadside: "How many people did the Great Xia imperial court kill every year? Much more than our Bone Sect! How many crimes does the emperor of the Great Xia Dynasty have to bear?"
Liang Xingyang looked at the two skeletons again and took a closer look: "They died of the plague, not the imperial court."
"They died of plague under the rule of the Great Xia Dynasty, and those in the northwest could not survive under the rule of the Great Xia Dynasty. The difference is that these two died in puddles rotting with maggots, while those in the northwest People chose to join the White Bone Cult, and they placed their hopes on my father, and later, on me."
"They hope that one day they can live under the rule of your father and daughter without dying and live in paradise, right? But they will still die in the end and become inhuman devil skeletons, still calling you the leader."
"I did let them down." Yan Wodan's eyes were red and full of tears. He no longer argued with Liang Xingyang, but looked up to the fields with tears in his eyes. "The essence of a human being is a set of bones. After death, The skin, flesh and internal organs rot quickly, and only the bones of the body can remain for a long time. When a person is alive, he has a backbone, but when he dies, the backbone is gone.
We are bullied to the ground by those corrupt officials and those 'adults'. They drink our blood and eat our flesh, but they can't break our backs! We also peel off their skin and eat their flesh, leaving them with nothing but their bones! If my father dies, I will die too, but the essence of the bones remains unchanged and the backbone is still there. After all, a new leader will be born, and he will eventually be able to overthrow this sinful dynasty! "
Liang Xingyang didn't want to talk to this "Evil Lady with White Bones", but she didn't look like the legendary leader of the Demon Cult. Liang Xingyang couldn't bear the thought of such a little girl being taken to the capital to be cut into pieces. , so he asked these questions and received the reply from the other party. Instead of being relieved, he became even more confused and panicked.
The further you go, the more corpses you see. Most of them are in a state of rotten state. Some have been eaten by birds, and some have been torn apart by hungry dogs. You can’t even see a complete sentence. Most of them died of the plague.
Anyone with a little bit of common sense knows that there was a flood here not long ago, and there was another plague.
After traveling for less than half a month, we arrived at Jinshui County. Outside the city, it was very muddy, and there were many shacks built with branches and wormwood. Between the shacks and the mud, there were piles of corpses lying on the ground. There must be nearly a thousand objects. The officers and soldiers went over to check, but there was no one alive.
It turned out that there was a plague here. The magistrate of the city sent people to drive all the sick people out of the city and left them to fend for themselves. People who were pushed out every day all died outside. They came from Ximen, Nan. There were more on the other side of the door. Yu Jian, a disciple of the Baiyang Sect, went over to see them and said they were piled up like a mountain!
The county town was sparsely populated and as quiet as a ghost land. Baiyang sent people to fly in and submit the documents, and then the county magistrate opened the city gate. The magistrate himself did not show up, only two soldiers, with their faces covered with cloth, frightened. The city gate is wide open, and the eyes looking over are like looking at the plague.
