Volume 2: Soaring! The Overlord of the Region Chapter 397 Li Sancai sees through
It was January 25, 1619. It snowed heavily near the Liaohe River and there was a strong wind. The outdoor temperature had dropped to around -20°C.
Such weather was, of course, extremely unbearable for Li Sancai, who was already 67 years old. However, at this time, he still insisted on standing on the east bank of the Liao River, looking at the two Korean and Japanese teams approaching slowly on the west bank.
"Zhijun, why are you doing this? This matter has nothing to do with you."
"Well, Commander Tian, so you haven't figured out the twists and turns here yet."
"Army?"
"Don't talk yet." Li Sancai, whose beard was frozen with ice, smiled slightly, then pointed his hand forward and said, "Look, they are about to start crossing the river."
Following the direction of Li Sancai's finger, the two teams that were almost parallel to each other on the west bank of the Liao River were seen to have gradually slowed down and finally stopped. The young man leading the team, accompanied by two knights, approached the other team. After a brief negotiation with the people outside the other team, he quickly turned back.
"Your Majesty, the orphan of the Toyotomi family just came over personally from the Japanese pirates, saying that Your Majesty is a prince and he is a person without status. And now there are officials from the Celestial Empire waiting to greet them across the river. So, when we cross the river later, we want our team to go in front."
"Humph, this Dongyi finally knows that he is just a commoner."
Along the way, the Japanese basically walked a long way ahead and then waited for the Koreans. As a result, at each post station, the Japanese arrived first, and the Japanese were the first to use hot water and food. Along the way, the Koreans complained: But Li Hui had no way - I also want to walk faster, isn't it because there are too many women in the team?
This time, the other party finally took the initiative to give in. It seems that Li Sancai is still useful. Well, after crossing the Liao River, we will reach Liaoyang. After entering Liaoyang City, we must take a good rest.
On the other side, Toyotomi Tohide had already ridden his horse to the carriage where Gao Panlong and others were riding: "Teacher, I have already followed your instructions and voluntarily let the King of Korea cross the river first."
"Well done. Dongxiu, you have to remember that you are still young. There is no need to compete with these bunch of chickens and dogs around you."
"Yes, the student will remember the teacher's teachings."
The teachers and students had just said a few words when there was a commotion over there: the North Korean troops began to cross the river.
It was late January, and the Liao River was frozen solid. So, the so-called crossing the river was actually crossing directly on the ice. Before the two teams arrived at the bank of the Liao River, Li Sancai had already cleared a path on the river: the soft, newly fallen snow had been swept aside, and a thick layer of hay was laid on the solid ice. The Korean team naturally crossed the river along this path.
Although the North Korean team was moving slowly all the way, the officers of the Korean Royal Guard who were walking in the front were still very responsible: they used their pathfinders to hit the ice surface they were about to cross hard, looking for any possibility of causing the ice surface to break.
However, their work was unnecessary: the temperature was minus 20 degrees, and the ice was too solid to be broken by human power with a mallet. So, very quickly, the officer in front walked to the other side of the river, and then raised a flag high to indicate that the road was safe.
Then, Li Hui's carriage also went up the river, and then the carriages of many nobles of Joseon also followed.
The width of this section of the Liao River is just over one thousand meters, so soon after Li Hui's carriage reached the river surface, it soon arrived in the middle of the river.
At this moment, something strange happened!
First, on both sides of the hay-paved road, the thick snow piles seemed to move a few times, and then a spark suddenly appeared in the snow piles, and then the spark quickly moved downwards, and then quickly extended to under the hay paving the road, and then "bang~~"
A huge explosion sounded, and the ice under the hay made a loud bang, breaking into several pieces in an instant! Then Li Hui's carriage fell into the water in an instant.
Just as the North Koreans who had not yet fallen into the water were panicking and shouting for help, explosions followed one after another. The ice under the entire road paved with hay melted in an instant, and most of the more than 2,000 North Korean troops fell into the water!
"Oh, what's going on? Go down and save them!"
"Kuosuo! Hurry up and go down to save them!"
On both sides of the Liaohe River, the Chinese and Japanese troops were somewhat caught off guard by such a sudden change. But in any case, the order to rescue people was issued quickly.
But at this moment, dozens of people in white emerged from the snow piles on both sides of the hay road that had been piled up for road clearing. They first threw dozens of grenades at the Korean nobles who had fallen into the water and were struggling. Then they took out their flintlock rifles in unison and fired at Li Hui's carriage, which was still floating on the water. Finally, the leaders threw a lot of hidden weapons at Li Hui's carriage .
"Your Highness, be careful with this style of kunai. It's an Iga ninja." Seeing through the telescope the assassin in white clothes throwing kunai on the river, Sanada Yukimura and others became extremely alert and quickly surrounded Toyotomi Takehide.
"Iga Shinobi? So, these guys are actually targeting me?"
"It is very likely. After all, the Ming Empire is now preparing a large army to conquer the Tokugawa traitors. If Your Highness shows up in Japan, it will be a fatal blow to the Tokugawa clan. Therefore, it is very likely that they are thinking of assassinating Your Highness halfway."
After saying this in a solemn tone , Sanada Yukimura breathed a sigh of relief: "Fortunately, your highness's teacher asked you to give way to the King of Korea, but...hahahaha, regardless of whether we can save the King of Korea afterwards, we should all express our gratitude to them."
While the Japanese were imagining things, on the other side of the river, although their men were in chaos, Li Sancai and Tian Ergeng, who were standing on a high place, did not look panicked at all.
"Commander Tian, your men did a great job! But I have always been curious, why are those so-called Jonin from the Japanese pirates now so obediently serving you?"
"Hahaha, this is a simple matter. It's nothing more than coercion and inducement. I killed their leader Hattori Hanzo alive in front of the other six ninjas. Then I put a pile of gold and silver on the other side. I told them that they had to choose between this pile of minced meat and this pile of treasures. Okay." He shrugged like a time traveler: "That's it."
"Hahaha, so, good methods are all simple."
"Um, the military commanders and the Joseon royal family members are all here, right?"
"Haha, how is this possible? Lee Seong-gye founded the country at almost the same time as our dynasty. Over the past two hundred years, there are already more than 200,000 descendants of the Ming Dynasty. I'm afraid there are also tens of thousands of descendants of the Lee family. However, the descendants of the first two kings of Joseon are all here. Li Hui was also afraid that the Japanese would support the close relatives of the Joseon royal family, so when he fled, he took his younger brother and various cousins with him."
"Ha, that would save a lot of trouble. However, Li Zhijun, I don't really understand why you came to this mess. You should know that if something happened to the King of Joseon, I definitely did not fulfill my duty as a guard, and I would be dismissed at that time. But now you are at the scene... If the news spreads back to the capital, the guys in the Censorate will impeach you."
"What if I tell you that I came here just for this impeachment?"
"ah?"
"Hey, Commander Tian, I'm old. I retired from the position of Prime Minister and became the Governor of Liaodong because I was involved in too many things. If I retired all of a sudden without a transition, I might have been worried about my life. But now, not only has the transition period been many years, but the funds and attention of the Huaiyang salt merchants who might have threatened my life back then have been attracted to Southeast Asia. It's the right time for me to retire now."
"Moreover." Li Sancai looked at Li Hui's carriage that had completely sunk into the water in the distance, and a cruel smile appeared on the corner of his mouth: "People like me have long been fed up with North Korea, and I am happy to wipe out its royal family this time. But you can't stand the fact that North Korea has been a loyal vassal state of my Ming Dynasty for more than two hundred years, and the general impression of ordinary people and officials of my Ming Dynasty is still very good. The Korean royal family has been in trouble on the land of my Ming Dynasty. No matter what, your official position as the commander of the Jinyiwei can't handle it. I must add my official hat as the governor of Liaodong and the former prime minister of the Ming Dynasty to barely shut up the world's gossip..."
