Chapter 87: I’m a Fraudster

Su Yan and Jing Hong mounted their horses after them and rushed to leave the camp fortress before that group of soldiers arrived, but didn’t go far.

After seeing Yan Chang chasing the soldiers into the fort, he stopped a petty official who was panting and chasing after him and asked: ”Is that the Zhang Qianhu of Ningxia Wei? Earlier 囿长 said that he came to demand horses. What happened?”

This is a small official is the receipt of the knocking gift let him in, but did not hide, replied: “Exactly. Zhang Qianhu wanted a thousand war horses, but also smacked the horses are thin and damaged, but also said that riding this kind of broken horse, before the charge will be down, but also to play a shit war, and had to be replaced by us 囿长. We don’t have any good horses to give him, so he got into a fight and rushed to the stables with his soldiers to pick them out himself.”

Su Yan pondered for a moment and tried, “Why don’t I leave my five hundred horses and tighten up the barracks first?”

“That’s not good!” The minor official was afraid that the share of profits would fly away, after all, if the chief eats meat, they can also follow the soup, so he blurted out, “The business that has been negotiated, what should be done, the other things, Mr. Su doesn’t have to worry about, leave it to us to handle.”

“There is a shortage of horses in the border barracks, and the cavalry is not useful; are you not worried about the Tartar army fighting its way in?”

The official said: “Tartars have been violating the border year after year, mostly robbing horses, money, food and women, and sometimes setting fire to villages, and have long been accustomed to it. Besides, Qingpingyuan is far away from the defense, it can’t come in.”

Su Yan lowered his voice and brought a bit of worry: “I am worried, in case this deal of ours leads to the loss of Ningxia Wei, what can we do? It is said that the dike of a thousand miles collapses in an ant hole ……”

The official said you a businessman, do your business well to earn your money is, but also care about what national events, all the temples are doing this, do not see the border on the collapse. But look at the face of money, or smile: “Su Prince really worry about the world first, but unfortunately, we are small people, which still care about so much, there is money to earn to hand, first live their own days is most important.

Foolish and short-sighted! Greedy and selfish! Truly a group of worms of the country! Anger rose in Su Yan’s heart, and even his fists couldn’t help but clench. Jing Hong chased after him from behind and held his hand, calling out in a low voice: “Sir.”

Now is not the time to attack, have to consider the overall situation. Su Yan silently read: don’t look at the current happy, in the future to give you a list. His face cleared up and smiled, “I am relieved in this case.”

The junior official nodded and said, “Please also ask Mr. Su to head to the Yamen to rest, we’ll deal with Zhang Qianhu’s side, but it’s always hard to explain when you bump into each other.”

Su Yan arched his hand in farewell and chased off with Jing Hong to the place where Wang Chen was buried.

Thief head mushroom is still planted in a patch of luxuriant grass, the only head that can move to forty-five degree angle looking up, is a “speechless ask the sky” posture, face green lips white, very miserable.

Su Yan looked amused and signaled Jing Hongchou to hurry up and dig him out.

Wang Chen, his hands still tied behind his back, climbed up with a gray head, glaring at Su Yan in anger and aggression, “Thought you were really going to bury me alive! Where is my brother?”

“Arrested, thrown in jail and executed in the fall.”

“What? You dare to kill him, I’ll kill you!” Wang Chen struggled hard to break the horse whip and slammed towards Su Yan like an angry rhino.

Su Yan was startled, dodged out of the way, and said, “I lied to you. Your brother ran away and said to leave you at our disposal.”

“No way! My brother wouldn’t leave me behind, you lied to me again!”

“I really didn’t lie to you this time, you see he didn’t even come to your rescue, as soon as he saw that cavalry coming, he ran faster than a rabbit.”

“–Don’t think I can’t see that this is a diversion, you dog officer!”

Su Yan laughed: ”You’ve also read military books? Not easy. With this ability, it’s good to join the army to serve the country, why be a robbing grass bandit.”

Wang Chen pooh-poohed him, “I’d be a pig to trust you in the future! Give me back the necklace.”

“I see that Wang Wu also has a string around his neck, these days, it’s still popular for brothers to wear couple necklaces, huh?”

Wang Chen was so angry that his eyelids trembled, “What nonsense! That was the first wolf we brothers hunted together when we were young, and we made two necklaces with the wolf teeth to symbolize that brothers are of one mind. Who is like you, the brain is …… all …… all ……” He gritted his teeth and thought, how could he have thought that this person was beautiful, extraordinary, and straightforward in character, really blinded the dog’s eyes!

Su Yan also knows that he is sometimes quite indebted, I do not know whether it is too much water on the network in his previous life, leather words come with his mouth open, now in ancient times, in formal occasions and in front of the high-ranking people can still be controlled, once you feel that the scene is under their control, they began to be unscrupulous, for example, in the face of the Ah Zhui.

So what? Since the first day into the palace, in the golden temple unintentionally offended the powerful, almost died under the scepter, after that, he in the officialdom to speak and do things extra careful eyes, so as not to one day and then lost their hooves. Wearing a mask on the officialdom long-sleeved dance tired half dead, private is not allowed to fly fly fly?

He laughed and said, “That necklace was lost in the camp fort, and it seems to have been picked up by your brother. But you’re going to squat in jail now, so you can’t get it, so when I put your brother in jail too, you can ask him for it yourself.”

Wang Chen was almost in seventh heaven, and tried to hit him again, but Jing Hong chased him down and yanked him by the back of his collar, warning in a grim voice: “If you dare to offend His Excellency one more time, whichever of your fingers touches, I will cut you off!”

“Go, go back to the Yamen and see how Chu Yuan and the others are doing with their inventory.”

Nineteen brocade guards and two boys, together with the petty officials of Qing Ping Yuan, picked out only two hundred horses in half a day, all of which were official horses branded with a seal on their hindquarters. These horses that were picked, much better quality than the ones released outside, were driven into a small piece of pasture that was specially circled, waiting for the inventory to be completed before picking up the goods.

Su Yan knew that he couldn’t finish picking that day, nor did he want them to – after all, he simply couldn’t shell out fifteen thousand taels of silver for the purchase of a horse.

False claims of buying a horse were merely to find out what was going on in the Temple Court, and now that he knew all about it, he was going to slip away.

He said to the junior official, “囿长 is busy dealing with Zhang Qianhu, I’m afraid he doesn’t have time to greet me. Seeing that it’s getting late, I’m going to go back to my residence first and come back tomorrow to pick the remaining half.”

The minor official was busy saying, “Don’t bother Mr. Su, we’ll pick the rest overnight tonight and put them in this C-size horse pen, tomorrow Mr. Su can come directly to pick up the goods. Deal on the spot, money and goods paid for.”

This suggestion was just what Su Yan wanted, he thought of a good place for these 500 horses, and immediately smiled and said, “It’s a deal, C-size Horse Circle.”

After walking out of the yamen, he instructed Chu Yuan, “Take a few men and go collect some dried horse dung, wrap it up and take it away.”

Chu Yuan didn’t know why, but did as he was told.

Su Yan left Qing Ping Yuan with his guards, stuffed Wang Chen, who was bundled into dumplings, into the second carriage, walked along the official road for a few miles, stopped, and said to the guards, “Go to the woods beside the road to rest, and wait for the fish to take the bait.”

Chu Yuan asked in disbelief, “What kind of fish?”

Su Yan smiled and sold out without answering.

The group was tired from working for most of the day, so they rested under the shade of a tree, took out dry food and water, and ate and drank.

Since they were out of Qingping Yuan, the Rattlesnake Pirate scouts who were watching their every move went back to report to Wang Wu: “That group of people are resting in the forest next to the official road, Big Boss, should we take action now and snatch the second Boss back?”

Wang Wu said suspiciously, “He knows that a large group of my men are waiting nearby to receive them, but he still dares to stop and rest his feet? Could it be a trap.”

“They’re just two dozen men, and we’re over a thousand, so what’s Big Boss to worry about?”

“Yes, hurry up and save the Second Lord, in case he is thrown into the government office prison, it will be much harder to rob the prison again.”

The bandits have persuaded each other, Wang Wu is a little hesitant. Although Su Yan and his party are few, but the sword Jing Hongchou is a master of one against a hundred, the remaining twenty guards with swords are not vegetarian, not only good hands, but also good at formation to kill the enemy. When the three hundred brethren in the fortress sneak attack these twenty people, was beaten, their own loss of seventy to eighty, the other side of a dead are not, and now obviously put on an undefended posture, there may really be fraud.

He said his doubts, but most of the bandits around him did not think so, thinking that the big boss is overly cautious, not just two dozen people, even if they are all three-headed six-armed Nezha, in front of an army of thousands of people can not turn over the sea, if you do not save it now, what to wait for.

Wang Wu was persuaded and decided to surround the woods, attack and kill Su Yan and his group, and rescue Wang Chen.

Gao Shuo tailed with the ringing horse thief scouts and excellently played the high standard of the Jinyiwei scouts, did not alarm any of the thieves and bandits, and came back immediately with this news to report.

Su Yan asked the distance between each other, like a magician made a “pinch a finger” gesture, secretly took out his pocket watch and looked at it, estimating that after fifteen minutes, a large number of people will be killed by the ringing horse pirates, commanded: “a quarter of an hour after the enemy attack, you collect the horse dung piled up on the side of the official road, lighted up. “

Chu Yuan exclaimed, “Enemy attack? Lord Su hurry to leave this place, we swear to guard your safety.”

Su Yan waved his hand, “No go, no go, there will be someone to take care of it for us. You guys do what I tell you to do, hurry up!”

Chu Yuan knows that he is extremely opinionated, usually look at the small things on the good talk, the decision on the big things can not be questioned by others, only to act on orders.

The burning of dry horse dung produced a large amount of black smoke, similar to wolf dung smoke, in the form of a column straight into the sky. Su Yan copied his sleeves and tilted his head to see the rolling smoke.

Jing Hong pursued, “Your Excellency is …… trying to draw out Zhang Qianhu inside Qingping Yuan?”

Su Yan nodded and said, “Ningxia Wei is a major border defense town, fending off the northern barbarians all year round, the leading generals should be extremely sensitive to the wolf smoke, and regardless of whether they believe it or not, they will be ready to meet the enemy and come over to find out what’s going on.”

Sure enough, a quarter of an hour later, the sound of miscellaneous footsteps rang out in all directions, and it was obvious that there was a large group of people encircling over; it was not advisable to charge on horseback within the woods, and the Rattlesnake Pirates didn’t have that many horses, so most of them were still infantry oriented.

Su Yan ordered, “Gather, move towards the direction of the official road, if there are any besieging thieves and bandits, just tear an opening, no need to get involved in the battle.”

Twenty guards covered him and the two carriages, swords and knives, like sharp arrows quickly broke through the encirclement and rushed onto the official road. Behind them, countless thieves and bandits with sharp weapons shouted and came towards them like a tidal wave.

The afterglow of the setting sun was like sprinkling gold all over the sky and earth, Su Yan squinted his eyes in the direction of Qing Ping Yuan, and seeing the smoke and dust roiling up, he drank, “You guys guard the carriage at the same place, don’t let Wang Chen be robbed. Give me a horse!”

He rolled over and mounted his horse, Jing Hong chased and stabbed through one of the thieves and bandits, pulling out the tip of his blood-dripping sword, and leapt onto his horse, shielding Su Yan in front of his chest.

Su Yan urged his horse to gallop, and the distance of several hundred feet was reached in a short time, and he shouted to the cavalry team that was going to wear armor and hold a sword: “Rattlesnake thieves have robbed and killed the merchants, and I beg for the help of Lord Qiandu!”

The leader of the cavalry was a big man with leopard eyes and ringed beard, when he heard the cry for help, he raised his whip and came forward, seeing that on the back of the horse was a sixteen or seventeen years old brocade-clothed handsome male, being escorted by the guards who were riding with him, he immediately drank, “How do you know my identity!”

Su Yan gasped: “I just came out of the Qing Ping Yuan, heard Yan Chang, 囿长, called the general ‘Ningxia Wei Zhang Qiandu’, so I learned. I don’t want to be rattlesnake thieves early on, halfway robbed and killed, I hope that the general to solve the people overhanging.”

Zhang Qiandu waved his horse whip, “Don’t make this whole literal thing, I can’t understand it, anyway, you’re just begging me to save your lives, right?”

Su Yan nodded his head, “Yes, yes, I beg Lord Qianhu to save my life, I will be grateful.”

Even if the other party didn’t have a heavy thank you, Zhang Qiandu was planning to beat up these horse thieves – the ringing horse thieves broke into Yan’an City to rob the prison and killed a lot of officials and soldiers guarding the city, and the whole Shaanxi Division had put out a wanted notice, and those who killed the bandit leader, the Wang brothers, would be rewarded with a thousand gold by the civilians, and the officers of the military generals would be promoted to the next level.

If he was lucky and there was a bandit leader in this batch of robbers, he, Zhang Qiu Cheng, could be promoted to the position of Deputy Commander of Ningxia Guard if he was merited for suppressing the bandits, so why didn’t he save them?

At that thought, Zhang Qianhu said, “The two soldiers are fighting, so you should hide far away, lest a stray arrow accidentally injure you.”

Su Yan resoundingly said, “I still have some guards and boys left by the carriage, I can’t leave them behind, I’ll go with Lord Qianhu.”

Zhang Qiandu glanced at him unexpectedly, and in his heart, he couldn’t help but think highly of this outwardly soft and inwardly strong male, and raised his arm and shouted, “Kill the bandits and save the people! Brothers, follow me!”

The five hundred cavalrymen under his command then shouted, “Charge!” The entire cavalry charged forward like a dragon, cutting into the ranks of the Rattlesnake Pirates from behind.

Jing Hongchou held the reins in his hand and asked, “My lord, may I help them kill the enemy?”

Su Yan put his hand on his small arm, “No need, we can just watch from the side. The terrain here is flat, five hundred well-trained cavalrymen are enough to fight against ten times the number of infantrymen, not to mention that the rattlesnake bandits are all ragtag, not having gone through the regular army’s drills, they are simply no match for them. It won’t take long for these bandits to flee in all directions, just watch.”

Sure enough, ringing horse pirates were caught off guard by this sudden cavalry team, was shot dead by arrows, by the cavalry lance spears stabbed to death, I do not know how many, leaving all over the ground scattered corpses. Less than half an hour, they died hundreds of people, many people panic regardless of the leader’s orders, disorganized as birds and beasts dispersed.

Wang Wu saw that the situation was not good, and could not care less about his brother, and with all his bravery, he killed his way out of the world, and led the remaining remnants of the defeated soldiers to flee to the dense forests of the mountain slopes.

The mountainous terrain was unfavorable for cavalry pursuit, and Zhang Qianhu could only regret losing the reward of deputy commander, but it was still quite cost-effective to put a bandit-fighting battle record on the military merit for the negligible loss.

Before the dust settled, Su Yan rushed to the carriage, counting his precious guards, found a no less, around the stacked circle of thieves and bandits corpses, are Chu Yuan their battle, Xiao Bei and Xiao Jing hiding in the carriage, also safe and sound, he was greatly relieved.

The fact that Wang Chen hadn’t been robbed was naturally the icing on the cake, and even if he had been robbed, it wasn’t an irreparable loss. The fact that the guards and the boys were all safe was what he really cared about.

Su Yan walked up to Qianhu Zhang and bowed to the end, saying gratefully, “Many thanks, Sir Qianhu! I will honor my word and send 500 warhorses with you as a token of appreciation.”

Zhang Qiandu’s face changed dramatically, pointing his lance in his hand toward him and shouting, “Who are you? Where did you get that warhorse!”

“I’m a merchant who came from afar, and I just made a deal to buy 500 horses for freight transportation. Although they are not good steeds, they can be handled and ridden, and in order to show my gratitude, I am willing to give these horses to the officers and soldiers of Ningxia Wei, and contribute a little to the defense of the country.”

Hearing his explanation, Zhang Qianhu’s face slightly eased and asked, “Five hundred horses, not an ordinary number, where are the horses?”

Su Yan laughed: “It’s in Qingpingyuan C size horse circle. However, they haven’t finished picking it out yet, and when it’s early tomorrow morning, Lord Qianhu will first keep quiet and kill directly in front of the horse circle, and then he’ll be able to see the thank you gift.”

Zhang Qiandu’s brain turned around three times before he realized that the other party seemed to have laid a trap for someone, but it was always not for himself. On the contrary, he had really given himself a generous gift.

He rounded his eyes and asked again, “You …… are a smuggler?”

Su Yan humbly shook his head, “Actually, I’m a fraudster.”