Mang Shusheng's Ink Painting Practice

Chapter 150 The heroes see the same thing

Zhao Yifu returned to Fenglin County, which he governed. He looked around along the way and felt something was wrong.

Because the big families in each village and village actually armed their own family servants and checked every passerby.

There were fewer people going to the market on the road, and instead there were some ragged people wandering along the way.

"Refugee?"

Zhao Yifu asked in surprise.

Wu Zhong said beside him, "It's not likely. A refugee wouldn't look so healthy."

Zhao Yifu pondered for a moment and said, "They should still be refugees, but I'm afraid something has gone wrong."

"Let's go back to the county quickly. I wonder how that guy Li Liang is doing now."

To be honest, Zhao Yifu had made arrangements for a possible wave of refugees before leaving.

Although Zhou Suyang had warned him in advance, he did not find it difficult.

After all, when he left, the county government's inventory was full. If he needed money, he had money; if he needed food, he had food. Even if he needed people, he could directly recruit them from various families.

However, when he arrived near the county town, he realized the seriousness of the problem... In theory, it should be time for a new round of sowing, but there was no one outside the city.

There weren't even any pedestrians.

Zhao Yi Fu hurriedly looked towards the top of the city wall, and was slightly relieved when he saw that the flag of Da Xu was still hanging there.

At this moment, a cloud of dust suddenly came from outside the city.

Zhao Yifu looked closely and saw a group of people rushing out of the forest and surrounding him.

The leader was wearing simple leather armor that covered his vital parts, revealing a bald head that reflected the sun severely.

Behind him were more than thirty people in tattered clothes but holding weapons.

There were only ten steel knives among them, but these ten steel knives were enough to show the quality of this group of people.

Zhao Yifu looked across at the other side, then looked back at his own side...

"Uncle Wu, capture the leader and let's continue heading towards the county town. Don't waste time."

Wu Zhong suddenly became excited, and his eyes glowed red.

Seeing this, Zhao Yifu quickly reminded: "Just break them up, don't kill them!"

"You still have evil thoughts in your body that haven't been cleared. Although my true energy can help you suppress them, it will be bad if you let the murderous intent dominate you."

He just felt that this was wrong, but he couldn't really say how bad it was.

Wu Zhong responded with grievance. He really had so much energy and nowhere to vent it.

Zhao Yifu continued walking towards the county town.

At this time, there was no trace of Xiong San around him. That was because he was afraid that the bear would scare people, so he put it into his sleeve.

The originally spacious space in the sleeves suddenly became crowded, and the cats inside had nowhere to rest and could only hang on Xiong San's body.

When Zhao Yifu arrived at the foot of the city, the original shouting behind him quickly turned into screams, wails, and pleas for mercy.

A moment later, the people on the city wall recognized the visitor as their county magistrate and hurriedly ran over, shouting, "County Magistrate Zhao is back! County Magistrate Zhao is back! Open the gate quickly!"

Without any hesitation, the city gate below slowly opened.

Li Liang, accompanied by a dozen yamen runners, nervously rushed out of the city gate. He looked at Zhao Yifu and bowed deeply, saying, "Student Li Liang respectfully welcomes the county lord back to the city."

Zhao Yifu held him up with his hands and said, "How did this place become like this? Didn't I ask you to properly settle the refugees before I left?"

Li Liang said helplessly, "If it were just refugees, it would be fine, but there are also bandits from Jingshan mixed in here."

"These refugees have become bandits. When they entered our county, they plundered along the way. We have no garrison troops, only the county magistrates and the local militia. We can defend ourselves, but we can't drive them out."

"Now we are stuck in the city and can't even prepare for spring plowing."

"I can only ask the families under my jurisdiction to train their soldiers to protect their property, and then ask for help from Yuzhou Prefecture."

Zhao Yifu shook his head and said, "It's good enough that the prefect doesn't bother with us. Why would he come to our rescue? I'm afraid he's just hoping for bad luck for us."

"But it doesn't matter, I'm back now."

As soon as he finished speaking, Wu Zhong had already dragged the bald man to the city gate like a dead dog.

"Master, I brought the person to you."

The bald strong man was unconscious.

Wu Zhong bent down and pressed under his neck, and he began to wake up in a daze.

Zhao Yifu asked, "Where are you staying?"

The man's eyes gradually became clear, and then a ferocious look appeared on his face.

Seeing that Zhao Yifu seemed to be the boss here, he jumped up from the ground and pressed down on Zhao Yifu with his hands like a pair of iron tongs...

However, the loyal Wu Zhong was too lazy to pay attention to such actions.

Sure enough, the next moment, the emerald green bamboo stick in Zhao Yifu's hand, which served as a 'crutch', suddenly struck the back of the strong man's hand like a phantom.

"Ow!"

He screamed in agony.

He hugged his arms and rolled to the ground.

Everyone looked at his hand that was hit...his entire palm was limp, it must have been broken!

Zhao Yifu had no intention of holding back against this kind of person. He glanced at the man who was sweating profusely from the pain and said, "Since you don't want to drink the toast, then take him away and lock him up first."

Wu Zhong immediately said, "Master, leave him to me. I guarantee I can make him tell me everything about when he wet his pants as a child!"

Zhao Yifu knew he was going to torture her, so he shook his head and said, "Don't do that. I told you not to kill people or torture them."

Ever since Wu Zhong killed the eyebrowless monk, the old servant's mental health became Zhao Yifu's biggest concern.

Wu Zhong looked disappointed, he felt that this was not a happy thing at all.

If he can no longer do dirty work for the young master, what is the point of him living?

But then he cheered up.

Because Li Liang said: "Those bandits are entrenched in Xiaoliupo in the north. They have been looting some of our government's temporary grain storages for a while now, and they have finally calmed down."

Zhao Yifu frowned upon hearing this and asked, "Is the loss large? Did the tenant farmers suffer any losses?"

Li Liang said: "The grain stored in those granaries was all for spring plowing. The main losses were actually suffered by the tenant farmers. Not only were their homes looted, but they were also taken hostage. I don't know what happened to them."

"Humph!"

Zhao Yifu snorted coldly, then raised his hand and hammered the city gate in anger.

"Boom!"

A dull reverberation echoed from the city gate. Looking at the gate again, it was clearly marked by the impact of Zhao Yifu's blows. The gentry and yamen runners who had accompanied him were horrified. Although they had long heard that the county magistrate was extremely brave, seeing it with their own eyes made them feel that even the heavy city gate was not enough for him to build alone. This was too much.

Zhao Yifu had no idea that he was already being portrayed as the "Ancient Evil Man" in people's minds. Furious, he ordered, "Uncle Wu, go to Xiaoliupo and bring the leader back to me."

"Yes!"

Wu Zhong responded happily.

This time he clearly felt that Zhao Yi Fu was actually beginning to rely more and more on him.

Now that he had a task to do, he no longer felt lost.

He went straight out of the city and headed north to Xiaoliupo.

Although Xiaoliupo has the word "small" in its name, it is actually a stretch of rolling hills.

It is difficult to build official roads in this hilly area, so it has become a geographical dividing point between Fenglin County and the area directly under the jurisdiction of Yugzhou.

If we look at it from the perspective of a county or a state, this place can be considered an important pass guarding the northbound passage of Fenglin County.

After Wu Zhong set off, Zhao Yifu asked Li Liang again, "Gather the forces of the county's major clans and organize the entire county. Invite the local militia to cooperate. We must restore peace to Fenglin County in the shortest possible time."

Li Liang said anxiously, "The militia in the city can certainly muster a thousand or so, but if they all leave, what will happen to the county?"

Zhao Yifu said, "I'm staying here. What do you have to worry about?"

Li Liang thought it was true. Anyone who could withstand the iron fist of the county magistrate could be considered a warrior. With him in charge of the county, there was nothing to worry about.

As a result, Fenglin County, which was originally in chaos, was immediately brought together after Zhao Yifu returned.

When the big families and common people in the county learned that the county magistrate had returned to clear out the refugees in the county, they immediately and spontaneously mobilized their men and gathered towards the south of the city.

Originally, Li Liang could also use his prestige in Fenglin County to order these gentry to do something, but it would definitely not be as easy as it is now.

He immediately realized that there was still a huge gap between him and Zhao Yifu.

Originally, he had thought about gathering local militia to fight off the bandits, but the problem was that his mobilization ability was different from Zhao Yifu's.

Zhao Yifu waited in the south of the city until his men gathered, intending to assign someone to take charge of this matter...

But on second thought, where could he find any reliable subordinates?
The only useful person around him was Li Liang, and Li Liang had to help him handle county affairs.

Then he thought about it and decided to let each family organize their own militia to capture the refugees.

He did not promise anything, but the patriarchs of each family sent out the strongest and most capable members of their tribe to do this.

In fact, if someone else did this, it would easily cause chaos, because it is equivalent to a miniature version of "local separatism".

But when Zhao Yifu, the "Central Government", has a real "iron fist", then all of this will no longer be a problem.

Especially since Zhao Yifu had chopped off the evil monk's head with a sword in front of almost all the gentry in the county, and made the prefect wet his pants in the process...

The fresh fist mark on the city gate seemed to have left a steel mark on the minds of these people.

Anyway, everyone is very obedient.

After arranging everything, Zhao Yifu returned to the county government office to lie down...

【So annoying. 】

He casually sent a message to his online friend.

"What happened? Oh, by the way, you said yesterday that you would return to the county government office today. How come something went wrong after being away for so long?"

Zhao Yifu replied: [Yes, things went beyond my expectations. The contingency plan I had originally left behind was insufficient, and when I returned, things were a mess.]

Ying Cong said: [Please tell me what happened in detail. After all, I have been the emperor for many years and have experience in handling various government affairs. I can give you some advice.]

This really is treating Zhao Yifu as a friend, actually offering some advice on how to become emperor...

Zhao Yifu then told them all about his troubles.

Of course, he did not mention what his solution was. After all, he felt that it was obviously not appropriate to tell the emperor about letting Wu Zhong go alone to attack someone else's village.

However, Ying Cong immediately responded after hearing this: "Isn't this simple? First, send a good general to seize the bandit's stronghold, then have capable subordinates disperse throughout the territory to gather the refugees and settle them down."

After reading it, Zhao Yifu blinked and found that the strategy given by the emperor coincided with his timing!
He replied: [Okay, let’s do it.]

Ying Cong didn't think there was anything wrong. According to his thinking, there was nothing wrong with doing this. After all, as an emperor, how could he be short of resources and manpower?

However, he really put himself in Zhao Yifu's shoes and seriously considered it. He asked, "Do you have enough money and grain? Otherwise, I will issue an order to have the governor of Yuzhou send more money and grain to you."

Zhao Yifu said: [There are still some, don't worry.]

He also didn't want Ying Cong to know about the dirty dealings between him and the prefect. After all, it wasn't a good thing.

The two of them just brushed the matter over, and then it was Ying Cong's turn to talk about his troubles.

"Little Taoist priest, you're only dealing with a few bandits, but the problem I'm dealing with is much more serious. The rebellion in the entire Jingshan area hasn't subsided yet, and I don't know what the situation is like."

Zhao Yifu replied, "Don't worry. My mentor, Lord Haoran, has already led his troops into the battle. With him, we will surely be able to quell the Jingshan Rebellion."

Ying Cong asked in surprise: [Your master? Are there any Taoists serving as officials in our dynasty?]

Zhao Yifu's scalp tingled. Could it be that he had exposed the secret of his own sect just by saying it casually?
He quickly made amends, "That was my academic teacher, Lord Haoran Zhou Su... As for whether there are still people practicing in the court... Aren't there many people who practice both Confucianism and Taoism?"

Ying Cong replied, "Don't mention that 'dual cultivation of Confucianism and Taoism' to me. I think it's just a way of flattering yourself after reading a few Taoist books."

There was a hint of disdain in the words.

Zhao Yifu touched his nose guiltily. It seemed that the 'dual cultivation of Confucianism and Taoism' had become a 'meme' in the court of Great Xu. But the problem was... this meme was real!

Ying Cong continued, "But I remember Zhou Su. He was originally an academic official. Later, he submitted a petition to me requesting to recruit soldiers to suppress bandits... I approved it and even gave him the position of provincial governor to facilitate his work."

I quite like this guy. Most of the civil officials these days despise military affairs, so it's rare to find one willing to join the army. I just hope he can be trained well and become another Ban Chao.

Zhao Yifu patted his chest and promised, "Don't worry, my teacher is extremely talented in military tactics. Although he has only been exposed to military affairs for a year, he is already better than many veterans."

After hearing this, Ying Cong could only regard it as a beautiful hope.

He said: "I hope so. I'm tired and have to attend court early tomorrow. I'm going to bed first."

[By the way, remember to call me tomorrow after you've wiped out that bandit gang. I want to see how you conduct the trial.]

This emperor seemed to take the solution of the Xiaoliupo bandit problem a little too much for granted?
Zhao Yifu said: [Okay, let me know when you're free tomorrow. I guess the people I sent out should be back by then.]

As a result, Zhao Yifu took this as a matter of course.

He paused and said, "Good night, let's talk tomorrow."

Ying Cong replied: [Good night.]

For him, it was magical to have someone to say goodnight to.

This was a feeling he had never experienced with the Queen.

He felt that he was gradually becoming inseparable from the little Taoist priest far away in the sky...

(End of this chapter)