"Cut that long staff in half and see if there's anything hidden inside!" Liu An shouted sternly.
"Yes!" Li Tong cut the wooden stick into two pieces with a knife, checked it carefully under the torch, and threw the wooden stick on the ground in disappointment: "No, there is nothing!"
Wang Wenzuo picked up the silk strip and looked at it under the firelight, then picked up the half of the wooden stick that was thrown on the ground and compared it. He already had some calculations in his mind and carefully put away the half of the wooden stick.
"Tell me, who asked you to come? What is written on this silk?" Liu An said sharply. But the man sat on the ground, silent, with a sarcastic look in his eyes.
"Brother Liu, it's not that easy to pry open this guy's mouth!" Wang Wenzuo whispered: "Let's leave it to the superiors and let them go away the headache! The most important thing for us now is to ensure that he is sent back alive. All of a sudden, he lost a lot of blood!"
"Yeah!" Liu An also realized at this time, and immediately asked someone to take him to the hut, and bandaged him first. At dawn, everyone stopped hunting and hurried back to the city.
Si Xiang City.
"Did you find this from this guy?" General Zuo Xiao, the guard general of Xiongjin, Liu Renyuan, looked at the silk strip in his hand and asked Liu An, who was looking down.
"good!"
"Tell the story from beginning to end!" Liu Renyuan put the silk cloth on the cases with a solemn expression. As the saying goes, "When a prime minister comes out of Guandong, a general comes out of Guanxi." He was born in the Liu family of Diaoyin County (today's Suide, Shaanxi Province). It is said that his ancestors are descendants of Liu Bao, the right virtuous king of the Xiongnu during the Western Jin Dynasty. They have been a wealthy family in Suizhou for generations. His great-great-grandfather He served in the court of the Northern Wei Dynasty and moved to the Guanzhong area with Emperor Xiaowu of the Northern Wei Dynasty. After the Northern Wei Dynasty split from east to west, the descendants of the Liu family of Diao Ying were incorporated into the army, along with the Turks, Tuyuhun people, Rouran people, and Guandong people in the north. Northern Qi and Southern Liang and Chen fought to the death. Although Liu Renyuan himself obtained the official position through the influence of his ancestors, he still maintained the simplicity of a Kansai warrior. As a high-ranking official, his clothes were not elegant, his utensils were not inlaid with gold and silver, and he was not at all flashy as the descendants of the nobles in Luoyang and Chang'an at that time.
"Yes!" Liu An went hunting in Luwei Ze after everyone left the city. He stayed at the edge of the lake at night. He heard a noise and took advantage of the darkness to search for it. He narrated it carefully from beginning to end. Liu Renyuan listened quietly without any urging. When Liu An finished speaking, he asked: "Then who found the messenger at that time?"
"Fire Chief Wang Wenzuo!"
"Call him in!"
"yes!"
After a while, Wang Wenzuo came in and saluted Liu Renyuan. Liu Renyuan looked up and down and said with a smile: "You caught the thief's messenger, I will reward you with five pieces of silk!"
"Thank you, General!" Wang Wenzuo thanked him quickly.
"Send the order, let the doctor check this guy's injuries first, and then torture him severely. We must find out the whole story!"
"General!"
The eyes in the room immediately focused on Wang Wenzuo. Liu Renyuan frowned and asked unhappily: "What's wrong? Do you have anything else to do?"
"Without execution, my subordinates can figure out what is written on the silk cloth!"
Liu Renyuan became serious. He took off the iron-horned black gauze turban on his head and placed it on the table beside him. Then he picked up the spatula, placed it across his knees, and said in a cold voice: "Just tell me!"
"Please give that silk strip to your subordinate!"
Liu Renyuan nodded, and the attendant handed the silk strip to Wang Wenzuo. Wang Wenzuo asked someone to bring the half of the wooden stick, fix one end of the silk cloth on one end of the wooden stick, and then carefully wrap it tightly around the wooden stick, and then read: "General Qi, this silk cloth strip What is written on it is 'His Royal Highness Feng will cross the sea next year, big help is coming, and he will burn food and start an uprising on November 10th. Daochen and Guishi Fuxin.'"
The attendant took the wooden stick from Wang Wenzuo and presented it to Liu Renyuan. I saw the silk cloth spirally wrapped around the wooden stick, with the words dictated by Wang Wenzuo written from top to bottom. It turns out that the person who wrote the letter first wrapped this long thin piece of silk around a wooden stick and then wrote on it. After taking the cloth strip off the wooden stick, there was only a bunch of chaotic gestures left on the cloth strip. No one can understand what is written on it unless it is re-wrapped around a stick of the same thickness.
"What a cunning intention!" Liu Renyuan snorted coldly, put the wooden stick and silk strips aside, and a smile appeared on his face: "Wang Huochang, the thief's method is very clever. How did you come up with it?"
"Reporting to General, this was not thought up by my subordinates, but recorded in a book I read when I was young."
"Oh? What kind of book would record this?"
"It's a copy of the Shurangama Sutra at my subordinate's home. Someone wrote it down in the gaps between the lines!" Wang Wenzuo said according to the originally made-up answer: "Who wrote it specifically, I don't know, but I don't know?"
"Do you still have the Shurangama Sutra at home?" Liu Renyuan opened his eyes curiously. No wonder he was so curious. At that time, knowledge was monopolized by many aristocratic families, and military generals like him, who had been serving as generals for generations, could simply read and write. , slightly more formal articles and letters had to rely on office clerks, and Wang Wenzuo, a fire chief, actually had the Shurangama Sutra at home. This was like a white crane suddenly appearing among the crows.
Wang Wenzuo knew something was wrong as soon as he said the words, but he couldn't change it at this time and had to nod his head in agreement. Liu An on the side interjected: "Tell me, general, Wang Wenzuo is a descendant of the Langya Wang family!"
"Oh? It turns out that he is a descendant of the Wang family of Langya, why didn't you tell me earlier!" Liu Renyuan's expression changed drastically, he took away the knife from his knees, put on the iron-horned black gauze headdress that was placed on the table, and said with a smile : "Please get up quickly!"
"It is indeed a vicious feudal society. If you have anything to do with the nobles, your attitude will be completely different!" Wang Wenzuo slandered and stood up. Liu Renyuan asked the guards to send two beds, and Liu An also got a seat. Liu Renyuan asked a few questions about Wang Wenzuo's family situation, and Wang Wenzuo recounted the life story he had memorized.
"My ancestors were ordered by the imperial court to go south to Jiankang, where they sat side by side with our great ancestor Wang Yuanchang (the sixth grandson of Wang Dao, Prime Minister of the Eastern Jin Dynasty, a writer of the Southern Qi Dynasty, and one of the Eight Friends of Jingling). We thought it was too late to meet him. Today you and I meet each other in a foreign country, which can be regarded as fate!"
"Great Ancestor? Isn't this friendship going too far? Don't say that I have nothing to do with that Laoshi son, the Langya Wang family. Even if he is really a descendant of the Langya Wang family, who knows that the two ancestors met hundreds of years ago? Once? But it seems that this ancestor was not doing well at the time, otherwise he would not remember the incident so clearly." Wang Wenzuo thought to himself, but he pretended to be filled with emotion on his face. Regardless of whether his identity as Langya Wang Clan is true or false, he is now the dignified Zuo Xiaowei Lang General and Protector. If there is a pole hanging down, can he still climb along it?
