five 3
Li Mingxin blushed and smiled, saying, "It's just the wish of all the uncles and aunts. My father has been missing for many years. I'm afraid he has been killed by the Tartars, but my mother is still looking forward to his return... In fact, in all these years, apart from Uncle Tashan, it is Uncle Wang who has taken the most meticulous care of us mother and daughter. His love for my mother..." When she said this, she looked back, and Liu Qingye followed her gaze and saw Wang Chunshan handing a water bag to Wu Shuiqing in the middle of the oasis. Li Mingxin continued, "Well... everyone hopes so... I think my father would also hope so if he is still alive."
Liu Qingye thought, people say "don't talk about love in troubled times", but the head of Tashan tribe once said "love is deeper in troubled times", it seems to be true, the head of Tashan tribe, the master and the junior uncle, Uncle Wu, Uncle Li and the hero Wang... and himself, Moller, Dan Ying... Ah, Dan Ying, I think of this flying red headscarf again, I wish it was her instead of Li Mingxin beside me at this moment - even if, a mirage appears again...
As he was thinking, he suddenly heard Li Mingxin shouting, "Brother, look, what is that——"
He looked up and saw a man riding a horse on the distant horizon. He was staggering and it was obvious that he had come a long way without sleep and was extremely tired.
Liu Qingye felt an ominous shadow in his heart, and he jumped up and stared at the movement over there. Li Mingxin saw his expression and stood up, calling to the back: "Mom, Uncle Wang, look, someone is coming——"
The man and his horse came closer, and the horse finally couldn't hold on, tilted its body, and fell down. The rider fell down, but immediately got up and staggered to rush over here. Liu Qingye opened his mouth in astonishment - this man, this man is Moller!
He rushed forward in two steps, held Moller and said, "Junior brother, you...how did you get here?"
Moler's face was covered in blood and dust, and he could barely open his eyes. He spoke incoherently, "Liu Qingye? Ah... I finally met you guys... Where's Master?"
Liu Qingye helped him walk to the oasis: "Master is here... everyone is here... you... what happened?"
Moller could hardly move a step. He dragged himself to Cao Mengsheng and fell to the ground with a plop: "Master... Aunt Wu... You are finally back... Something terrible is happening... The Junggars... The Junggars are attacking..."
Moler brought news that not long after Cao Mengsheng and his disciples left, the Junggars launched an attack on the Uyghur tribe, captured the Jiajimu tribe in one fell swoop, and killed all the men, women, old and young in the city. Then, they turned to the Satamong tribe and besieged the city for three days and three nights. The Satamong tribe was about to lose the city, so they asked for help from the other twelve tribes. Because the Ale tribe was adjacent to them, the chief of the Tashan tribe had already led all the young men to go to war. Before leaving, in order to prevent the Junggars from taking advantage of the situation, Moler asked Moler to quickly ask for help from the Lantern Festival.
How could the people of the Lantern Festival dare to delay after hearing this? They jumped on their horses and rushed to the Ale tribe. Although Moler rushed here without sleep, he only changed his horse and caught up. He rushed to Liu Qingye and said, "Liu Qingye, you promised me that you would protect Miss Dan Ying well!"
Liu Qingye glanced at him and said, "I will, Junior Brother."
Moller said: "Okay, I should have gone to the battlefield with the master. Now that you say this, I feel relieved. Even if I die in battle..." He didn't say anything else, he squeezed the horse's belly hard, and overtook Liu Qingye.
Liu Qingye looked at his back, speechless, and urged his horse to hurry on.
After running wildly through the night, they could see the tall poplar tree outside the Ale tribe in the early morning of the next day. In the dim morning light , it looked like a demon with carrion crows perched on its shoulders. When it saw the Lantern Festival group coming, it croaked miserably and flew away into the sky.
Liu Qingye suddenly felt an inexplicable panic in his heart, and he hurried his horse a few steps, rushing to the front of the team, riding side by side with Moller. At this time, he saw several swaying black shadows running over from the horizon.
Moller seemed to be greatly surprised. He slapped his horse's buttocks several times and rushed over, shouting at those people: "Wutan, Asu, Zai, why are you here? Where is the master?"
"There are too many Junggars. We can't stop them!" Liu Qingye also recognized the one running in the front. He was a good wrestler named Wutan. At this moment, his face was unrecognizable. His right arm was cut off at the shoulder, and there was a scar on his face that extended from the left corner of his forehead to the right lower jaw.
“Master Tashan led everyone to fight with the Junggar people outside the city of Satamong. The master alone hacked to death more than 30 Junggar soldiers, and the blade of his sword was broken…” This time it was Asu who spoke, “We couldn’t see what was around us. It seemed that they were all Junggar soldiers… There were too many of them… The master said that there were too many Junggars and we couldn’t defeat them, so he asked us to go back first and tell Miss Dan Ying to find a hiding place for the elderly, women and children… I was about to leave… I heard the sound of arrows being shot from all directions. I didn’t know what happened. It seemed that I was shot in the leg, and then someone next to me hacked me with a knife… I thought I was dead, but Master Tashan pounced on me… I heard the Galdan people’s shouting stopped… The master just… just…”
"Then...what's the situation in the village now?" Moller asked anxiously.
Zai burst into tears: "Village... There is no village anymore... We ran back to the village and it was on fire, fire everywhere... It was the Junggars, they rushed into the village, broke into the houses, and stole everything they saw - food, clothes, furs... If someone was wearing jewelry, they would cut off their hands and feet and stuff them into a bag along with the jewelry... Then they set fire... They stole the horses, drove away the cattle and sheep... They..."
"What?" Moller and Liu Qingye were stunned for a moment.
At that time, Cao Mengsheng and others had rushed over. Wu Shuiqing pulled the three young men aside and asked, "What is the situation now? Where are the enemies?"
"They dispersed after they looted everything..." Zai cried, "We helped Miss Dan Ying kill Dzungars in the village... There were Dzungars everywhere... And the Han Chinese that you, Liu Qingye, brought back that day also helped us kill the enemy... Miss Dan Ying and I protected the elderly and children as they escaped... Miss Dan Ying, she was besieged by seven or eight Dzungars... There were so many people... I wanted to help the lady, but... but... they slashed my chest with a knife... How could I faint? Why did I faint... Miss Dan Ying... Miss Dan Ying is missing now... We have looked everywhere..." His voice was heavy and tears flowed down, flushing against the bloodstains on his face, as if the tears were blood.
"What did you say!" Moller roared furiously, and suddenly kicked the horse's belly hard like a madman, jumped over Asu and the others' heads, and rushed straight towards the village.
"Mole--" Li Mingxin and Wu Shuiqing called him twice from behind, but he just didn't turn around.
"Everyone, hurry into the village!" Wang Chunshan ordered.
Everyone at the Lantern Festival responded and galloped their horses. But Liu Qingye's mind was blank, and a voice kept repeating: Dan Ying is gone, Dan Ying is gone... Ah, she is gone, what happened to her? If she is in trouble, how can I live alone in this world?
"Junior brother! What are you still standing there for?" Li Mingxin called him.
Liu Qingye was stunned: Yes, why am I still standing there! He hit the black general on the buttocks with the scabbard of his sword, and the black general screamed and ran away.
Liu Qingye didn't dare to think, didn't dare to look - what kind of change is this. He left only a few days ago, and the prosperity turned into nothingness, the living beings turned into dead people, the corpses were piled up, the blood coagulated, and the beloved was lost - he just hit the black general randomly, just hoping that each time he hit him - if he hadn't avoided Tashan's problem that day, hadn't been afraid of the master's blame, and hadn't followed Shanshan to show off, maybe, none of this would have happened today!
Dan Ying, where is she? Was she captured by the Junggars? Or did she fight to the death and was...
He urged General Black to run fast. He just wanted to find the Red Eagle. If it was in the hands of Galdan of Junggar, he would kill it in Junggar. If it was in the hands of the King of Hell, he would chase it to the underworld!
It was a bloody dawn, the sleepy sunlight was about to sleep lazily below the horizon, but suddenly, it heard the cries of the dead in the sand and wind, and was surprised by the bright red sorrow in the ashes of the remaining Mars. It was startled and jumped into the sky, but below, there were only fragmented corpses.
Therefore, the sunlight is no longer golden, and on the tips of the grass, there are no jumping seeds, but drops of blood, sticky, making the long grass tangled, bloody, attracting groups of black crows, summoning the demons of the desert.
Liu Qingye didn't know which lake he had galloped to. On the pebbled ground on the lakeshore, there were patches of dead water grass. In the deathly silence, he saw the Rouge Horse - and then, he saw the bodies of many Junggar soldiers lying beside the Rouge Horse.
"Junior sister!" He jumped off his horse and shouted as he ran, "Junior sister! Dan Ying!"
He stopped suddenly - Dan Ying was there, half of his body was in the water, his back was facing him, but his body was completely naked.
Liu Qingye's ears buzzed.
"Miss Dan Ying!" Moller and his horse galloped past him and rushed into the lake. Then Moller stumbled off the horse and waded towards Dan Ying.
Liu Qingye was stunned and couldn't move - he saw Moller rush forward and grab Dan Ying's arm: "Miss Dan Ying, what are you doing? Come back with me!"
Dan Ying didn't look back. His body was as stiff as a corpse, but his arms were clearly pushing him away.
"Dan Ying—" Liu Qingye felt a heart-wrenching pain, and he also took two steps at a time to wade through the freezing lake water—but he stopped and didn't dare to get closer. He didn't dare to look at Dan Ying's face, didn't dare to look at her body, and her exposed skin was covered with traces of being ravaged.
"Ms. Dan Ying, let's go back... go back..." Moller pleaded painfully, "It's all my fault... I didn't stay with you..."
Dan Ying half turned his body, but still avoided his face. He used his other hand to pry open Moller's fingers: "Let me go...let me go..."
But Moller did not relax.
Dan Ying suddenly raised his voice: "Let me go...let me go!" Then he turned his face and his whole body around.
Moller was startled and relaxed his fingers. Liu Qingye was even more stunned and turned his head away.
Dan Ying saw Liu Qingye and was stunned for a moment. Suddenly, she walked deeper into the water, holding the water in her hands, ruthlessly rubbing and slapping it on her body. "I want to wash it clean! I want to wash it clean!" She said fiercely, "I want to wash it clean!"
The slightly salty lake water in the grassland condensed into water droplets on the red eagle's snow-white skin, forming water lines and flowing down. Every scar was so shocking, and the beatings left behind large patches of red marks.
"I want to clean up! I want to clean up!" Dan Ying muttered like crazy, "Clean up...clean up..." Her voice gradually lost its resentful power and turned into a troubled, helpless murmur. "I want to clean up...I want to clean up..."
These sounds tore at Liu Qingye's heart. He couldn't stand it anymore and tore off his clothes.
But Moller got there first, hugged Dan Ying and wrapped her in his clothes. "You are clean... You are as clean as before..." He muttered painfully, "You are clean, Miss Dan Ying... You will always be clean in my heart..."
Liu Qingye was stunned, clutching his clothes, looking at Dan Ying who finally burst into tears - she sobbed so hard that her heaving shoulders seemed to shake the entire lake, rippling it, and transmitting the pain to Liu Qingye's body and heart.
Moller held Dan Ying in his arms and waded over step by step. He looked deeply at Liu Qingye and handed Dan Ying into his arms. Without saying anything, the young man bit his lips fiercely and ran wildly to the shore. He fell into the mud several times because of the obstruction of the waves. He stood up with a fishy face and rushed to the shore. Then he howled like a beast and rode away on his horse.
Liu Qingye felt pain in his chest - pain, that body was trembling in his arms, through the thin clothes, the chest was rising and falling because of sobbing. He wrapped her with clothes - for the first time, he hugged her tightly. He was a little impulsive and wanted to claim her lips - wasn't this what he longed for? If he had spoken frankly at the beginning, how could he have ended up in such a situation? But Dan Ying was crying , crying loudly, and the sound and tears were all in his arms. He felt that Dan Ying was like a broken porcelain, broken into thousands of pieces, barely put together. Hugging her so tightly like this would definitely break her, but he was afraid that if he didn't hold her, he would lose everything in an instant - he wished that he could make Dan Ying a part of his body, and from then on, protect her to the ends of the earth.
He had a thousand words to say, but he couldn't say a single word.
