"I think this face looks familiar." Gu Yun held a wooden stick and looked at the "woman" on the ground repeatedly for a while before coming to a conclusion.

The Wolf King's tent of Calais Yinghuo was turned upside down by the people of the Black Iron Camp, and they found that there were neither rare pearls nor iron net corals inside. It looked magnificent, but it was extremely poor inside. It was obvious that before draining the wealth of the nobles, he even spared himself. He was truly a selfless madman.

What greatly disappointed Gu Yun was that they were unable to find the legendary witchcraft secrets.

Come to think of it, only the Liang people like to write everything down on paper and compile them into a book. Many primitive customs are preserved in the Eighteen Tribes. Some things that need to be recorded may be engraved on stones, tortoise shells, furs... or simply passed on by word of mouth. The voodoo secrets they are looking for may only be hidden in Calais's mind and burned to ashes.

In the end, only this strange statue was brought back to the Northern Frontier garrison at Chen Qingxu's insistence.

"Miss Chen just said this thing might be something?" Gu Yun asked the soldier beside him, "What doll?"

"Soul doll." The personal soldier replied. Seeing Gu Yun poking around with the wooden stick without any taboo, he couldn't help but say, "General, I think this thing is very vicious. Maybe there is something dirty in it. You should stay away from it."

The "soul doll" is life-size and weighs only twenty or thirty kilograms. After being washed, its face and skin appear to be exactly the same as a real person at first glance, as if it could speak as soon as it opened its eyes.

It is said that this is not actually a complete human skin, but a piece of the best human skin from many young boys or girls, which is processed by some voodoo method and then formed into a whole piece and wrapped on wood. The wood has been cut into a complete human shape in advance, so that the human skin and wood are stuck together tightly to imitate a lifelike mannequin.

The Eighteen Tribes believe that this kind of soul doll can summon the souls of people who died in a foreign land.

At first, the soul doll was covered with a layer of dust, but after being washed, it looked exactly like a naked real person. Shen Yi thought this thing was too indecent, so he specially asked someone to find some clothes for it to "put on".

Gu Yun stared at the closed eyes of the soul doll and vaguely felt that it looked a bit like Chang Geng when he was a child. He stretched out his fingers to stroke his chin, trying to recall his memory, and asked: "Are you saying that this move is the soul of the Barbarian Concubine back then?"

The personal soldiers believed in evil and were a little afraid to look at it. They said in fear: "Marshal, you'd better move out quickly. These ghosts and spirits are so scary..."

"It's okay," Gu Yun glanced at the face of the soul doll and said casually, "I think she is pretty."

Bodyguard: “…”

During this period, General Gu has been taking care of the battlefields in the north and south, and he must have been a little crazy due to exhaustion.

At this moment, Chen Qingxu, who was originally worried about going to see Shen Yi, suddenly rushed in: "I remembered!"

Gu Yun: "Hmm?"

Chen Qingxu pulled out a knife from somewhere, half-knelt on the ground, and under the watchful eyes of Gu Yun and his superstitious personal soldiers, he cut open the soul doll's chest with one knife.

Gu Yun: “…”

His personal soldier shuddered with fear, turned his back and chanted "Amitabha". Gu Yun looked at him, then looked at Miss Chen who was butchering an ox like a butcher, then he reached out and handed the wooden stick to his silent personal soldier, and said with pity: "Take it to ward off evil spirits and protect yourself."

Chen Qingxu ignored his surroundings and concentrated on the tip of the knife. The human skin looked smooth and even soft on the outside, but after it was cut open, there was no flesh or blood inside. The two sides separated cleanly, and the texture was like tanned cowhide. Chen Qingxu controlled the strength very well, just enough to cut open the human skin without damaging the wood underneath.

Gu Yun just stood there watching idly at first, but suddenly, he narrowed his eyes, rolled up his sleeves, squatted down, and without hesitation, he put his hands on it, gently lifted up the peel, and carefully touched the surface of the wood.

The soldier's face turned green. He made a messy apology and ran outside to guard the door with the evil-repelling stick given to him by the Marshal.

Gu Yun fumbled with it for a while and asked in confusion: "Why, there are words on this wood?"

Chen Qingxu had already cut the human skin from beginning to end. She changed to a smaller knife like peeling a raw eggshell and carefully peeled off the human skin bit by bit until the whole human-shaped wood was exposed. She breathed a sigh of relief and took the time to reply to Gu Yun: "Yes, but the carving is very small and shallow. Only people with extremely sensitive touch can feel it. Ordinary people may need to use tools to see it. Marshal, can you help me figure out what is written on it?"

The Black Iron Camp and the Eighteen Tribes were two generations of enemies. Many senior generals in the Black Iron Camp knew the common barbarian language. Gu Yun fumbled around the neck of the wooden figure for a moment, and after a long hesitation, he replied, "They are all very unfamiliar words, steaming... what... I don't know, and there's a number behind it... um, it seems to mention something about sunlight..."

Gu Yun looked at Chen Qingxu in confusion: "Why is there a mysterious recipe engraved on this soul doll? Uh... Miss Chen, what's wrong with you?"

Gu Yun had never seen such an excited look on Chen Qingxu's face. There were almost tears in her cold eyes.

She picked up the human-shaped wood with both hands, as if she had never seen wood before, took out a piece of silk and carefully wiped off the dust on it, as if she was holding a rare treasure.

"For a soul doll to be able to attract souls from a foreign land to return, it needs to communicate between life and death. The usual method is to hide a personal item of that person in the heart of the wood. However, since this method is used to commemorate the dead soul, the dead are usually thousands of miles away, and it is often impossible to find their burial place. Therefore, personal items cannot be obtained every time. I just remembered that in this case, the caster will usually use the last words left by the dead, or an inscription that can represent the dead instead."

"Back then, the barbarian sisters fled from the palace. The elder sister died in a foreign land, and the younger sister and her child were stranded in a bandit's den. Before the imperial concubine died, she left a very important thing to Hugel. Later, it passed from Hugel's hands and finally fell into the hands of the wolf king Calais..."

When Gu Yun heard this, his heart started beating wildly without warning.

"It is the secret technique of the goddess." Chen Qingxu pointed out what he was thinking. "I... I originally thought that this was a possibility, but who knew it was really..."

Everyone's impression of the "barbarian goddess" is that of a crazy woman named Huger, and the imperial concubine has little sense of existence. She died too early, and fell from the lofty "demigod" of the grassland to the tightly closed harem. Whether she was resentful or resentful or resigned to her fate, it is still unknown.

And what is her attitude towards her own children?

I think according to human nature, one should hate her. Even Jia Lai couldn't help but have murderous intentions when he saw Chang Geng's face when he was young, which resembled the goddess's sisters. What about the person involved?

But the voodoo techniques of the eighteen tribes were so mysterious that even the Chen family had been at a loss for many years. As the heir, the imperial concubine could have aborted an unborn fetus without anyone knowing. So why did she keep the child?

Did she know that the child was eventually turned into Ur-bone by the cruel Hugel?

Almost all the old people have died, and no one will ever know whether the barbarian goddess decided to keep the child out of a mother's reluctance to let go, or because she happened to learn that Huger was pregnant with another child and out of hatred for the extinction of her race, she planned to create an unparalleled evil god.

But no matter what, after all the twists and turns, it was still the goddess's soul that left Chang Geng with a glimmer of hope.

This almost has a mysterious meaning of cause and effect.

Chen Qingxu didn't want to discuss karma, she was completely focused on this piece of wood, and before Gu Yun could react, she picked up the wooden man and ran away, not even bothering to pick up the silk that fell on the ground. Gu Yun was stunned for a long time, and he exhaled a breath belatedly, and was hit in the chest by unspeakable hope. After he stood up, his eyes were almost black, and it took him a long time to recover, and his ears were still ringing.

He couldn't help but rub his chin with his hand, trying his best to put on a normal and serious face. His brows were subconsciously wrinkled together, but the corners of his mouth were smiling uncontrollably. The tense seriousness and the uncontrollable joy intertwined into a standard "ridiculous" expression. Gu Yun himself felt that his image at this moment might be a little crazy.

At this time, General Shen's personal guard next door peeked out of the tent for a moment and asked, "Has Doctor Chen finally left?"

"Let's go," Gu Yun heard his personal soldier reply, "Why, is there something wrong?"

The soldier who was asking about the whereabouts of the miracle doctor shook his head and ran back to report.

The next moment, Gu Yun heard a scream of pain coming from General Shen's tent, which seemed to have been suppressed for who knows how long.

Shen Yi's back was covered with bruises and burns, and he looked extremely miserable. However, he still stubbornly refused Miss Chen's treatment and visit. He repeatedly locked Miss Chen outside when she came to visit him, and was determined not to let her see his miserable appearance. He also resolutely found a military doctor who was good at slaughtering pigs to treat his wounds. During this period, he sent people to secretly check on him four or five times. He held it in until Chen Qingxu finally passed away. Finally, he had endured it enough and could howl at the top of his lungs.

Gu Yun listened attentively for a while, and felt that even giving birth to a child would not be so miserable, and he couldn't bear it, so he picked up the piece of silk that fell on the ground, shook off the dust on it, went out and stuffed it into his little personal soldier, and ordered: "Hurry and send it to General Shen, it's for pain relief."

No matter what the silk was rubbed with, the effect was very effective. As soon as the thing was delivered, Shen Yi's howling immediately became much quieter.

After Gu Yun had finished making fun of his brothers in a heartless way, he returned to the commander's tent. He had intended to review a dozen battle reports and a pile of letters from various garrisons that were piled up on his desk, but when he picked up the pen, he realized that he couldn't calm down at all.

He knew every word on the battle report, but he couldn't see any words that would form a sentence. He thought aimlessly for a while, "Could it be that the wood only records the method, but not the solution?"

After a while, he thought again: "That doesn't matter. As long as we know the ins and outs of the Wuer bone, the Chen family will always be able to find a way."

Then after a while he thought to himself, "You're not going to let me burn incense for those bald asses in Huguo Temple, are you? Damn it..."

...I've been thinking about this and that and I still have no clue.

And an indescribable longing fought its way through the myriad of thoughts and leapt into his heart.

A drop of ink fell from the tip of Gu Yun's pen, and he finally came to his senses. He simply pushed aside all the official business, took out the letter paper as if he was having a secret affair, and began to openly use his official time to pursue personal relationships.

In April, the beauty of the two rivers is about to fade, and the long plum rain is rising from the rivers and seas.

Chang Geng had been in Jiangbei for more than a month. He first handled the funeral of General Zhong, and then Fang Qin wrote a letter to Emperor Long'an suggesting that he keep Prince Yan in his place to assist the court envoys in advancing contacts with Westerners.

Although Prince Yan has stepped down from politics, Fang Qin still feels that his presence in the capital is a thorn in his side.

It stands to reason that one should kill political enemies with one blow, but the reason for Prince Yan's resignation was not planned by Fang Qin himself, and the whole thing was not under his control. Moreover, Prince Yan's identity was very difficult to deal with, and apart from the crime of treason, there was really nothing that could kill him.

Fang Qin had no choice but to find ways to keep him away.

The word "assist" is very subtle, meaning that this matter is not led by King Yan, he only has obligations, not power. After the matter is completed, it is also the credit of the envoy, but if there is any trouble, there will be more things to make fun of King Yan.

Unfortunately, the "chaos" that Fang Qin hoped to see did not occur. King Yan was very popular in the Jiangbei camp. He was very likable, and he had a good relationship with the soldiers. He also had the face of General Zhong and Gu Yun to protect him.

The envoys sent by the court were very discerning. After arriving in Jiangbei, they followed King Yan's lead in everything. In addition, Gu Yun kept writing letters and would come to visit every ten days or half a month. The work of bullying Westerners along the two rivers was very smooth. During this period, three or four small-scale water battles were fought, and the advantages were gained and the soldiers were trained. Li Feng could not say anything, but instead felt vaguely a little sorry for King Yan - this is the so-called fragrance from afar smells bad near.

At the same time, another unexpected event occurred, which prevented Fang Qin from finding the energy to take advantage of the opportunity to establish his forces in Liangjiang.

The first batch of beacon tickets have expired and it is time to pay back the money.

The status of the first batch of beacon tickets was very special. It was no exaggeration to say that it was the elixir that revived the troubled Daliang Dynasty. If it had not been for this batch of supplies that supported Gu Yun's victory in the Western Regions, with heavy pressure on the northern battlefield and the domestic purple gold running out, it would only be a matter of time before the Westerners besieged the capital again.

The first batch of people who subscribed to beacon tickets have done a great favor to the country, and it is only right that this debt must be repaid. If the court does not come up with the money, it will not only be a breach of trust, but it will certainly not be able to issue beacon tickets in the future. The decree that King Yan had worked so hard to implement before, "Beacon tickets can be equivalent to gold and silver among the people, and merchants are prohibited from refusing to accept them", will also become a dead letter.

In this way, even if others agreed, those court officials who had subscribed to a large number of beacon tickets in order to keep their official hats in the early days of the civil service reform would not be able to agree.

It was not until this point that Fang Qin had to admit that although Prince Yan was ruthless in his methods, never showing mercy in using a knife to kill his political enemies, and wielding the knife of reform to gouge out the flesh of whomever he wanted, even offending a large number of people...but he had planted a seed long ago, and tied the entire court to his pirate ship without distinguishing between friend and foe.

According to the original plan of the Grand Council, a follow-up plan was prepared when the first batch of beacon tickets were first sold: the third batch of beacon tickets would be released exactly one month before the expiration date. According to past experience, about 70% of them could be sold in a month. Part of the money raised was reserved for repaying the first batch of debts, which was more than enough in terms of time and amount.

But what no one expected was that after King Yan left, all the merchants, big and small, would no longer buy into the deal!

Fang Qin knew that the Thirteen Tycoons were secretly on the side of King Yan, but Daliang was a vast territory. Could it be that apart from these few ambitious people who wanted to participate in politics, no one else would do business? Moreover, there were officials who wanted to climb up the ladder. If the provinces gave them quotas, it would be easy to raise the money.

But he underestimated the merchant alliance network.

This was something that Du Caishen had been promoting at full speed during the post-war period at the behest of King Yan. Each industry had its own chamber of commerce, and all the chambers of commerce formed a large alliance. Although members were bound by the chambers of commerce, they also enjoyed benefits, not to mention the preferential treatment in importing and exporting goods from other members. In the turbulent times when bandits were rampant, if there was a seal from the chamber of commerce, one could request protection from the garrisons of local governments - this was a privilege given by the court to the first thirteen tycoons who subscribed to the beacon tickets, and Du Wanquan generously gave it up to share.

Many merchants gradually discovered that accepting constraints was not a bad thing. With the logo of a large chamber of commerce, the trust of private buyers has increased a lot, and they no longer have to fall into price wars with those merchants who sell inferior products as good ones.

This merchant alliance network was soon spread across the country. Perhaps there would be various problems decades later, but at this early stage of its establishment, the loyalty of its members was very high, and it became a solid barrier for Fang Qin.

The third batch of beacon tickets encountered obstacles at the very beginning of its launch. Except for some officials who were eager for quick success and instant benefits and digested a little at the beginning, it was almost impossible to push it forward. The inexplicable non-cooperation of the Chamber of Commerce caused a lot of doubts in people's hearts, and the old foxes in the court were unmoved and followed suit in shirking responsibility.

But bribery and coercion failed. The new elites, led by the thirteen tycoons, had become powerful, and it was no longer easy to move them.

The beacon tickets were promoted by the Grand Council, but the Grand Council was only responsible for promotion, and all the money coming in and out came from the Ministry of Revenue. Fang Qin wished he could ask his cronies to pay for it out of their own pockets - but it was a drop in the bucket. Not to mention whether the major families were willing to pay this money, even if they were willing, they would not blink an eye to pay such a large sum of money. The poor people in the two houses who had scolded even Prince Yan in the past would definitely rush in and not stop until they got to the bottom of it.

As the day approached, even Li Feng could no longer sit still and personally inquired about the situation several times. Within three or four days, he called Fang Qin and the people from the Grand Council into the palace and reprimanded them at least eight times. The pressure was finally too great to bear, and the six ministries had to jointly write to the Grand Council, asking Prince Yan to return to the court.

When the decree arrived in Jiangbei, Chang Geng accepted it very calmly, and then arranged the handover of military affairs in an orderly manner, maintaining an attitude of "not being surprised by praise or criticism" and seemed to be in no hurry to go back. It was not until the second express order was delivered that he calmly packed his bags and prepared to go north.

Just as they were about to leave, news of a great victory in Northern Xinjiang arrived.

The whole of Jiangbei was in an uproar for a moment. Chang Geng listened to the cheers and cries while receiving the letter from the messenger.

Some of the letters Gu Yun sent to Chang Geng were purely private, while others were instructions to King Yan. Chang Geng was very experienced and could tell whether the letter was official or private by pinching it before opening the envelope. Gu Yun's official letters were usually just a thin piece of paper with a few words. When he took the letter from the Black Eagle messenger, he was a little disappointed for a moment because it felt very thin, so there must be no private words.

Chang Geng casually told Xuan Ying, "General Gu may not know yet. I will leave for Beijing today. The matters in Jiangbei have been handed over. Please go back and let him know."

After saying that, he opened the letter in front of everyone without any hesitation.

There was indeed only a piece of paper inside, with a hand drawn on it, and Gu Yun wrote a line of words: "I will send this hand to Jiangbei, to help me measure whether the belt of my beloved is wide or not."

Everyone looked at King Yan in confusion, not knowing what he was looking at for so long, and then his face turned red.