Lin'an Never Night

Chapter 160 Fighting the Fire with Oneself
The branches were swaying, but Song Laoshi's figure was even lighter than the swaying branches.

A knife in his hand turned into the most terrifying killing weapon.

As a cold light whizzed back and forth in his hands, it was full of killing moves. If it were on the battlefield, he would have killed countless people.

But the person in front of him was swaying in the wind like a fallen leaf, like the leaves blown off by Song Laoshi's knife.

If you advance, I will retreat; if you retreat, I will advance. He always keeps a relative distance from Old Man Song.

Only when Song Laoshi's knife was too strong for him to dodge with his body skills alone, did he wave his sleeves and take out the knife from under his robe to block a few attacks.

Therefore, the number of weapon collisions heard in the forest was not frequent.

However, the sounds of collision every time the two weapons collided were extremely close, with at least seven sounds heard each time.

This shows how dangerous each fight between them was. Although it seemed like there was only one move, at the moment of contact, there were at least seven fatal blows.

Suddenly, Song Laoshi used a fatal move and almost opened the chest and abdomen of the masked man in green robe.

The masked man in green robe quickly retreated about ten and a half feet away, quickly putting some distance between them.

Song Laoshi stepped hard and was about to pounce on him like a leopard, but the man had already raised his hand and took off his face mask.

"Song Laoshi, even though you have a lame leg, you are still as brave as ever!"

Song Laoshi stepped hard on the ground with his front foot, leaving a deep footprint, which stopped him from rushing forward.

Seeing the other person's face clearly, Song Laoshi couldn't help but be shocked: "Fat Commander!"

The man in green robe laughed: "Song Laoshi, when you came to me to ask to leave due to injury, you used the excuse that you were lame and couldn't swing the knife anymore, and you were staggering when you walked, so I had to reluctantly let you go. What do you say now?"

Song Laoshi snorted coldly and put away his knife: "If I wasn't lame, even if you were the fat commander, you might not be my opponent. Doesn't this mean you can't swing a knife or a gun?"

Commander Fei naturally knew why he retired from the army. It was just because he was disheartened by the incident involving Yue Xianggong.

He shook his head and sighed, then asked, "Let's not talk about him for now. Since you have retired from the army, why are you secretly following the Enping County Prince's motorcade? It can't be that... you have become a thief?"

Song Laoshi rolled his eyes and ignored him.

Commander Fei's eyes flickered, and he suddenly shouted, "Are you here for Yang Yuan?"

Song Laoshi was immediately startled and looked at his old boss with wide eyes.

Commander Fei shook his head and smiled: "You don't have to be so surprised. I also heard from Prince Enping yesterday that I had to help Yang Yuan with something. Naturally, I had to find out his identity first, and then I found out that he was a tenant of your house."

Fei Tongzhi sighed and said, "Alas, if it weren't for this, I wouldn't have known that you are now settled in Houshi Street."

After saying this, he smiled again and said, "I have actually seen this Yang Yuan before. But... I didn't expect that he, a lazy guy, would have such great abilities, and now he has caught the eye of Prince Enping!"

The man in green robe in front of me is General Fei, whose real name is Fei Tianlu.

The former deputy commander of Yue Fei's Tabai Army, and now the owner of the "Moshanghua" embroidery workshop.

Of course, this cannot be his only identity.

All the intelligence officials of the Song Dynasty who were mainly responsible for external affairs rather than working in government offices had a public unofficial identity.

In order to travel around conveniently, they usually prefer two identities: monk or merchant.

Obviously, Fei Tianlu chose the second identity as a cover, and he was very successful, even becoming an imperial merchant.

After Yue Xianggong was killed, almost all the senior generals in the Tabai Army were demoted or transferred to idle positions.

Only some generals who had lost their integrity and defected to Qin Hui were able to survive.

However, there are a small number of exceptions. Although they did not defect, they were not affected or were affected very little.

For example, Li Dao and Fei Tianlu of the Tabai Army.

Li Dao, a native of Tangyin, Xiangzhou, followed Zong Ze in fighting against the Jin army in his early years.

Later, he was transferred to Yue Fei's elite army as its commander. After recovering Xiangyang and other counties, he was transferred to be the commander of the Tabai Army.

However, he transferred Yue's army very early.

After being transferred out of Yue's army, he was first promoted to the commander-in-chief of all the armies in front of the emperor, which meant he was a general of the imperial guards at that time.

Later, he followed Liu Qi to resist the southward invasion of the Jin army and made many military achievements.

By the time Yue Xianggong was killed, he had been out of Yue's army for many years.

He was not a general promoted from Yue Family Army, and he was transferred out early. He did not have a strong label of Yue Family Army. In addition, he was very tactful in his dealings with others, so he was not implicated.

Fei Tianlu was less affected because he was a close confidant of Li Dao who was valued and promoted by him.

When Li Dao was the commander of the Tabai Army, Fei Tianlu was the person he valued and promoted.

Just like when Fei Tianlu was the deputy commander of the Tabai Army, he discovered the talent Song Laoshi and cultivated him, making him the first scout of the Tabai Army.

After Yue Xianggong got into trouble, there were too many people, too important people, for Li Dao to protect them.

But he was still able to protect Fei Tianlu, who was the deputy of the Tabai Army.

Therefore, under Li Dao's care, although Fei Tianlu lost the power to command an army, he also saved himself.

However, when Song Laoshi retired from the army due to injury, Fei Tianlu was still a general in the imperial guards.

But looking at his current appearance, Song Laoshi is not sure whether he is retired or has another identity.

Fei Tianlu obviously saw Song Laoshi's confusion, but he did not introduce his current identity to Song Laoshi.

It's not that he doesn't trust Song Laoshi, but because he has to accompany Prince Enping to the palace tonight to do something important. He doesn't have time to chat with his old subordinates at this time and place.

When Prince Enping Zhao Yu found him yesterday and asked him to make arrangements for Yang Yuan, he quickly conducted an investigation on Yang Yuan.

Yang Yuan’s public information was not difficult to find, so he quickly found out everything about Yang Yuan, and also discovered the whereabouts of his old subordinate Song Laoshi.

He had already learned what Yang Yuan had done through Prince Enping, and through investigating Yang Yuan he learned about his relationship with Song Laoshi.

Fei Tianlu knew Song Laoshi very well. When he found out that Song Laoshi was following Prince Enping's convoy, he naturally guessed why he did such a sneaky thing.

Therefore, Fei Tianlu directly said to Old Man Song: "When I asked you to serve in the army, you refused and insisted on retiring."

"Now that you have retired, stop interfering in the affairs of the court and go back to open your 'Fengweilou'."

"Don't follow me. I'm telling you the truth. Yang Yuan is indeed in the convoy. But he won't be in any danger."

"Prince Enping brought him into the palace to gain a great merit, which will be of great benefit to him."

Fei Tianlu turned and walked away: "You go back and wait, he will be back soon, and he will return with glory and wealth!"

……

Ouyang Lun, Qin Chumu, Li Defu and other military leaders and ten generals had specially switched their guards with other generals on duty in the palace, and all the people they were connected with were adjusted to today.

Only in this way can the secret letter be ensured to safely pass through all the checkpoints and be delivered to the harem.

There were also eunuchs who had been bribed in the harem, who could quietly pass the secret letters they received to the Empress Dowager's palace.

The entire line is now open.

Delivering things to the palace without permission is a serious crime.

Even if you just send a pot of wine or a plate of food to the palace without permission, or deliver a letter for a eunuch or palace servant, it is a capital crime.

Because this gap must never be opened.

If we let you off the hook today, someone might send poison into the palace tomorrow, or spread news of collusion between the insiders and the outsiders.

Of course, there are many ways to transmit collusion between internal and external parties and information sharing, and it is impossible to completely ban it.

But this is not a reason to relax the palace ban.

Ouyang Lun and his companions also knew that this was extremely dangerous, but they had already boarded the pirate ship and had no way to retreat.

Moreover, after accomplishing this, the remuneration they received would be enough to allow them to live a carefree life for three lifetimes even if they found an excuse to retire tomorrow.

In this case, they had no choice but to take the risk.

They had also vaguely guessed what the content of the letter might be.

There has long been a folk legend that after Empress Dowager Wei was captured and taken to the north, she was taken as a concubine by Wanyan Zongxian, Prince of Guangping of the Jin Dynasty, and she also gave birth to two sons for Wanyan Zongxian.

Wanyan Xian was a great king with a good reputation in the northern kingdom. During his tenure as the governor of Guide Army, his policies were lenient and taxes were light.

When he was transferred, the scholars and common people came together to ask the imperial court for an imperial decree to keep him.

When his term of office in Wuding Army was over, the local people, carrying their elderly and children, saw him off for dozens of miles.

These should not be the kind of show tricks like making the Wanmin Umbrella by yourself.

One reason is that the Jin people at that time did not have the official habit of boosting popular support.

Because... the upper echelons of the Jin court don’t really care about this kind of popularity.

Secondly, wherever Wanyan Zongxian went, he had a very good reputation as an official and was considered an official among the northerners who knew how to govern the people.

After Empress Dowager Wei was brought back to the Song court, some public information showed that she was 48 years old when she was abducted to the north.

However, if you compare the age of her good friend Qiao and others who served as maids in the palace with her, and work backwards from the age when she was selected as a maid in the palace, you can find that she should have been 38 years old when she was abducted to the Northern Kingdom.

This will inevitably make some people suspicious.

Could it be that the imperial court deliberately adjusted the empress dowager's age in order to cover up the scandal?
After all, the possibility of Forty-Eight being favored by someone and taken as a concubine is not very high.

But if she was 38 years old when she drifted to the north, then it is not impossible.

Having children for the new husband at this age is conditional.

Could this letter be written to his mother by her son who was left in the north?

Ouyang Lun and the others already had this guess in mind, but they felt more relieved because of it.

Because they were certain that if it was true as they guessed, the Queen Mother would burn the letter after reading it and would never let anyone see it again.

Di Jiuzhou followed Yu Hou Shi Jiuxiao, Defense Envoy Xiao Shan and other imperial guards generals and ambushed in the side hall of Chuigong Hall.

This is the only way to the harem.

They wanted to rush out when Ouyang Lun and others were handing over letters to the eunuchs who had been bribed in the harem at the palace gate and catch them all in one fell swoop.

Di Jiuzhou was very excited.

Just imagine, even in modern times, taking the civil service exam is still very attractive to many people.

What's more, it is this era, and as long as he steps over that threshold, he can immediately become a high-ranking and powerful general of the imperial guards?

For a prodigal who has been wandering around for many years without achieving anything, how attractive would such an opportunity to achieve success be?
Even if he is like a moth to a flame, he will not look back!
(End of this chapter)