The first volume of pearl curtains rolls up the western mountain rain at dusk Chapter 90: Guess
Xiahou Zhuo never asked Li Diudiu how many people he had killed, nor did he ask Li Diudiu how it felt to kill people.
Xiahou Zhuo knew that asking such a question was equivalent to hurting Li Diudiu, even if he looked as calm as ever.
But he is only twelve years old, just a few days short.
Xiahou Zhuo didn't like such seemingly caring questions at all. He had seen too many of them... For example, last year a heavy snowfall in Jizhou City collapsed many old houses. There was a family in which all the people except their children were crushed to death in the house.
I don't know what the official Lian Gongming Lian of Jizhou City was thinking, but he ran over to express his condolences. He probably wanted to show his people-loving side in front of the common people.
He squatted in front of the child like a kind elder and asked, "Your parents are dead, are you sad?"
After hearing about this, Xiahou Zhuo thought that if he were that kid , he would pick up a brick and hit Lian Gongming in the face, no... on the mouth.
Li Diudiu pretended as if nothing had happened, but he was just pretending. It would take a long time for a man of his age to calm down after seeing this bloody incident.
Not to mention his age, those soldiers from the Great Chu Palace who were in their prime and went to the battlefield and picked up swords to kill people for the first time were all trembling with fear .
So even though they were in a hurry along the way, Xiahou Zhuo always found some light-hearted topics to talk to Li Diudiu, and Li Diudiu would laugh so hard that he fell over.
But Xiahou Zhuo could see that he wanted to comfort Li Diudiu, and Li Diudiu was cooperating with him, so wasn't this cooperation also a way of comforting him in return?
The better Li Diudiu cooperated, the sadder Xiahou Zhuo felt.
Li Chi, you are sensible at a very early age.
He was very sensible at the age of four or five.
For some reason, Li Diudiu suddenly asked Xiahou Zhuo a question, which made Xiahou Zhuo a little confused.
"I didn't kill Wang Heita, so are there any rules for the Qingyi formation? I mean, will I be held accountable?"
Xiahou thought for a while before replying with a smile: "Don't worry, there's no fine."
Li Diudiu nodded with satisfaction: "That's good."
Xiahou Zhuo snorted and said, "Prosperity."
Li Diudiu said: "It's really big."
Ye Zhangzhu has been observing these two people. In front of them, Xiahou Zhuo looks so mature that he doesn't look like a young man of seventeen or eighteen years old, but like an old man who has experienced countless life experiences.
But when Xiahou Zhuo was with Li Diudiu, his intelligence seemed to be suddenly lowered to about seven years old.
Six years old is more than enough, but seven years old is just a little short.
Ye Zhangzhu didn’t understand at first, but later he found that this was good, very good, and extremely good.
So later on, Ye Zhangzhu also started to join in, and the three of them chatted about some fantastic topics along the way, and then laughed like three big fools.
Xiahou Zhuo has mentioned this to Ye Zhangzhu several times that after he leaves Jizhou City next year, he hopes Ye Zhangzhu can protect Li Chi more secretly. Ye Zhangzhu once asked Xiahou Zhuo why he values this young man so much.
Xiahou Zhuo thought about it carefully for a while and then replied with a smile...Li Chi, like me.
He looked into Ye Zhangzhu's eyes and said seriously, "He is unruly and he refuses to obey. He seems to be a sensible and obedient person, but he is a born rebel. He will not accept it and will fight if he refuses to obey..."
"But he is different from me... What is my background? When I was just learning to walk, I knew that few people in Jizhou City could afford to mess with me. I was already domineering with the smell of milk. I was a milk bully before I was weaned. But what about him? He is like me, so he has a hard time."
When he finished speaking, he let out a long breath, and after a long silence, he said, "It would be so sad if one day this world smoothed out all the edges of Li Chi."
Ye Zhangzhu thought of himself at that time. He was also a person whose edges were smoothed out by the world at an early date.
Two days later they arrived in Laihu County. They seemed a bit arrogant as they were carrying dozens of war horses along the way, but the badge of Prince Yu's Mansion was heavy enough. The guards at the checkpoints they passed by looked at the war horses with envy and wanted to snatch them away, but that badge was enough to suppress their greed back to the eighteenth level of hell.
These war horses were not of particularly good breeds, but the Great Chu was short of horses, especially good horses. Otherwise, the Youzhou Iron Cavalry, known as the sharpest in the world, would not have always maintained a strength of around 5,000 people.
For a man like Luo Geng, if you give him 5,000 good horses and 5,000 heavily armored knights, he will not take the Black Warrior Border Army seriously. But if you give him 50,000 heavily armored cavalry, he will dare to march straight into the Black Warrior Imperial Capital, Red City.
After arriving at Laihu County, Li Diudiu and Xiahou Zhuo went to look for Wang Heita's family, while Ye Zhangzhu took the dozens of war horses to the Da Chu military camp stationed there. The badge of Prince Yu's mansion was still useful, and he ran to the military camp in broad daylight to sell horses without feeling guilty at all.
In a small village with a small population, Li Diudiu and Xiahou Zhuo found Wang Heita's family. When the woman who did not look beautiful and even looked a bit old appeared in front of Li Diudiu holding the hands of two children, one big and one small, Li Diudiu only saw two words.
hardships.
"Black Tower..."
Tears welled up in the woman's eyes. She looked at the silver in her hand and was unable to utter the following words for a moment.
"Sister-in-law, don't let your imagination run wild."
Xiahou Zhuo tried to smile, took off the waist badge of Prince Yu's Mansion and handed it to the woman to look at: "Do you know it?"
The woman smiled bitterly and shook her head: "I don't know, I'm a farmer, I don't have much knowledge."
Xiahou Zhuo said: "This is the waist badge of Prince Yu's Mansion. Brother Heita was valued by our prince more than a year ago. He was pardoned from his crime and directly summoned into the army. What a coincidence..."
Xiahou Zhuo felt guilty for telling this lie, so he paused for a moment, then tried hard to force a smile and continued, "General Luo Geng of Youzhou came to visit the palace and took a liking to Brother Heita at first sight. He felt that Brother Heita was born to be a brave general, so he took Brother Heita with him without further ado. He has now gone to the northern border to join the army."
Li Diudiu quickly said, "Yes, he looks so majestic in armor."
The woman's eyes lit up, and although there were still some tears in them, those tears were like stars in the night sky, twinkling with joy and relief.
"Brother Heita is kind to others and has a good relationship with us. We were still young so we couldn't go to the Northern Frontier with him, so he entrusted these matters to the two of us."
Xiahou Zhuo smiled and said, "Sister-in-law, please don't tell anyone about this. These banknotes were hidden by Big Brother Heita before. No one knows except those of us who are close to him. He went to the Northern Frontier because he had to obey the military order. He wanted to come back to see you, but he couldn't."
Li Diudiu nodded: "Yes, such a big man, like a black iron tower, cried when he said that he might not see you for several years in the future."
"Really?"
The light in the woman's eyes became brighter.
"Did Heita really say he missed us?"
she asked, eagerly.
“Really?”
Xiahou Zhuo said, "He also said that he would come back to pick you up after he became a fifth-rank general. Sister-in-law, you may not know that according to the rules of our Great Chu, you can bring your family with you after you become a fifth-rank general."
"That's good. That's good."
The woman smiled and cried.
"I will take good care of the two children and wait for him. I will definitely wait until he comes to pick us up."
The woman's hands were shaking as she held the banknotes. Suddenly, she seemed to remember something and quickly handed all the banknotes in her hand to Xiahou Zhuo.
She said in a panic, "He is now a decent person, who knows how much money he will need. You can take all these banknotes back to him. He can use them. The three of us mothers won't spend much. And...even if I lose all that, I can go work for others and have a meal without worrying about it."
"sister in law!"
Li Diudiu wanted to persuade her, but he couldn't hold back the words when they came to his lips. He turned his head to shake the tears out of his eyes, pretended to sneeze, and raised his hand to wipe his face twice.
When his hands left his face, there was only a smile on his face, nothing else.
Li Diudiu said seriously: "Sister-in-law, Brother Heita expected you to say that. You don't know that the Northern Frontier Army has strict military discipline and does not need money. If you spend money to give to anyone, if you are caught, it will be a serious crime of bribery and you will be beheaded!"
The words "beheading" frightened the woman, and she quickly took the silver back.
She said with an embarrassed look: "I am a woman who knows little, please don't be offended, gentlemen. I can't do anything to help Heita, but I can't harm him. Okay, I'll keep the silver..."
Xiahou Zhuo thought for a moment and said, "Sister-in-law, before leaving, Brother Heita said that this amount of money was enough to buy a house in Jizhou City, and you don't even have a bank here, so you can't exchange the banknotes, so he wants you to move to Jizhou City, where we brothers can take care of you."
Li Diudiu said, "That's right. Now Brother Heita has a legitimate identity, so there's no need to hide. But there's one thing. When you get to Jizhou City, you can't say that you are Wang Heita's wife. After all, you are guilty. The prince has pardoned you, but you can't tell the common people. If you do, it would undermine the justice of the country, so you can't tell them."
"I know I know."
The woman nodded repeatedly: "I will listen to you and Heita, but the prince said he is not guilty, so we really don't have to worry?"
Li Diudiu gestured and said, "Your Majesty is so powerful, of course he has the final say."
Xiahou Zhuo hummed: "The prince is very big... just, um, that big..."
Xiahou Zhuo and Li Diudiu looked at each other, and there was a hint of relief and heaviness in both of their eyes.
"Sister-in-law, go pack your things. We'll wait outside the door."
Xiahou Zhuo said something, and the woman quickly responded and took the two children to pack up. It was obvious that they were not living very well in this village.
In this world, it would be strange if the people in the village didn't bully the orphans and their widowed mother who are outsiders.
"I can guarantee it for a year."
Xiahou Zhuo said.
Li Diudiu nodded and said, "I can guarantee it for five years."
Xiahou Zhuo hummed, looked at the older boy, and said to himself, "Five or six years later, he will be a man."
Just at this moment Ye Zhangzhu came back riding a horse with a smile on his face, and it was obvious that he had embezzled a lot of money.
“How much did you sell?”
Xiahou Zhuo asked.
Ye Zhangzhu lowered his voice and said, "Twenty-six horses, and each horse cost the government soldier eighty taels."
Li Diudiu raised his foot and was about to take off his shoes. Xiahou Zhuo was confused and asked him, "What are you doing?"
Li Diudiu said excitedly: "My fingers are not enough, I'll take off my shoes and count how much they were sold for."
During the Zhou Dynasty, there was an extreme shortage of horses, so a good warhorse was worth a hundred taels of silver, and an inferior one was worth seventy or eighty taels. After the establishment of the Chu State and the conquest of the grasslands, the price of warhorses dropped by more than half, and a warhorse was worth about thirty taels of silver. But that was when the Chu State was prosperous.
Nowadays, the grassland has long stopped listening to the orders of the imperial court and the emperor of Great Chu. The Chu army is short of horses. It is normal for a war horse to be worth sixty or seventy taels. Ye Zhangzhu sold one horse for eighty taels because of the status bonus of Prince Yu's Mansion.
If it weren't for the people from Prince Yu's palace who dared to sell war horses, they would have chopped off as many heads as they wanted.
Li Diudiu said excitedly: "Three points, one for each person."
Ye Zhangzhu smiled and said, "I don't want it, you two can just share it."
Xiahou Zhuo said: "I was just joking on the way, the silver is all yours."
Li Diudiu refused. He insisted that although he had robbed the warhorse, he would not be able to sell it without the identity of Xiahou Zhuoye Zhangzhu.
In the end, after much persuasion, Xiahou Zhuo and Ye Zhangzhu each took 30%, and Li Diudiu took 40%. It took a long time to convince Li Diudiu, who insisted on dividing it equally into three parts.
Just from this one thing, Ye Zhangzhu knew that Li Chi was a brother he could keep for life.
Xiahou Zhuo smiled and asked, "Now that you are rich and powerful, please treat us to a good meal when you return to Jizhou."
Li Diudiu said: "It's meaningless to just invite someone directly, why don't we take a gamble?"
He took out a copper coin and said, "It depends on fate. I will throw it out and I will guess. If I guess wrong, I will treat you. If I guess right, you will treat me."
Xiahou Zhuo said, "Okay, go ahead and toss it. One of us will guess with a word and the other will guess without a word. You can't win. How can a smart little fox like you get stupid sometimes?"
Li Diudiu threw the coin and said, "Guess if it will break. I guess it won't. If it breaks, I'll treat you. If it doesn't, you treat me."
Xiahou Zhuo: "I'll help!"
