General Guo Xiao reluctantly got up to send Bai Shan and the others off.
He glanced at the army that had already set off, and then looked back at General Meng, Bai Shan and the others, and said solemnly: "Take care."
Bai Erlang also said cheerfully: "You take care too."
Bai Shan nodded calmly, "We're not here, military doctors may not be able to help you with blood transfusions."
General Guo Xiao: "... It's time for you to set off."
Little General Meng just reached out and patted his shoulder, then got on his horse and looked at Bai Shan and the others.
Man Bao was also riding on the horse, and tightened his cloak. The weather was getting colder, and it was even colder while riding on the horse.
Although the weather turned cold, General Ashina did not plan to stay in Kucha for a few more days. On the third day after the city-wide meeting was held, he reorganized his troops and horses, and went directly to the place where the Turks retreated, and captured two soldiers along the way. Dozens of small towns.
It is really small, only the size of a town, but the land here is sparsely populated, and such a place is also a city.
This time he didn't think about subduing the people, so he was much faster. He almost took the city, gathered the food and grass, and left. He only stayed at the important pass, and the rest followed the army.
The Western Turks were shocked, and the Shule Kingdom, which had only escaped the catastrophe, was also shocked, and immediately reinforced the border towns. As a result, General Ashina was still invincible and defeated twelve cities in a row.
There was a rebellion in Shule, and a king was directly replaced internally, and then he surrendered the form to General Ashina, pleaded guilty, and sent gold, silver, food, grass and beautiful women.
General Ashina gave the beauties to his subordinates, kept the grain and grass for his own use, and sent the gold and silver registers back to the treasury, and then he took his people to Khotan.
From Shule to Khotan, you can just walk along the Tudo River, which is much closer than Kucha to Khotan, and the desert journey in the middle is only two days.
When the King of Khotan heard that the army was coming to Khotan, he was so anxious that he would have known that he would not have listened to the rumors and started arguing with Qiuci and Western Turks. Grandma, who the hell said that the gods punished the emperor of the Central Plains and made him suffer from smallpox? of
Does this look like smallpox
The king of Khotan did not dare to neglect, and even ignored the dispute with Tubo, he immediately prepared a batch of grain, grass, gold, silver and jewelry and sent them to Ashina's army tent.
In the medical tent, Man Bao looked at the soldiers who were sick today, and checked some wounded soldiers, then washed his hands with warm water, clutched his cloak tightly, and went out to watch the excitement.
Bai Shan and Bai Erlang were all standing there watching the fun, Man Bao leaned over, looked at it for a while and asked, "Is General Ashina still going to Khotan?"
Bai Shan said: "Definitely go!"
Bai Erlang: "I have already taken money and food from other people."
"So what?" Bai Shan said, "I must meet the King of Khotan in person. He should have thought of this when he made trouble with others."
He said: "Because of them, the trade routes in the Western Regions have been cut off for a year."
Originally, when the smallpox epidemic in Xiazhou was over, the business routes should slowly recover. It was because they kept spreading bad comments about Da Jin and conniving at their soldiers to plunder passing merchants that the business routes were cut off.
He even spoke disrespectfully to Da Jin and His Majesty, which greatly damaged the image of Da Jin and His Majesty.
General Ashina did decide to go to Khotan, so he accepted the things he sent, but after receiving them, he still left camp and went to Khotan.
King Khotan suffered from insomnia all night when he heard about it, and finally he got up and drafted a confession letter, and then led people to the border with a mournful face, where he met General Ashina's army.
General Ashina glanced at the grain, grass, gold and silver he sent again, snorted coldly and then looked at the confession letter he sent up.
He thought for a while, then glanced at the clouds in the sky, it was so dark that he couldn't see the sun.
When the confidant saw it, he said caringly: "General, it seems that it is going to snow soon."
General Ashina pressed the confession letter and asked, "Are the winter clothes of the soldiers alright?"
The confidant paused and said: "It's still a little weak, there are some soldiers from the south in the army who are unwell, and there have been more sick soldiers reported in the medical bill recently.
General Ashina tapped the confession letter under the palm of his hand, and finally said with a soft snort: "Please come in and meet King Khotan."
The confidant bowed away.
At this point, after Yanqi was merged into Anxi and lost the royal family, Qiuci and Shule changed their kings, and Western Turks lost two warriors and the land of twelve cities, King Khotan temporarily relied on the confession letter and Food, grass, gold and silver kept the throne and the city.
He proclaimed himself a minister to the Jin Dynasty again, and found many treasures from the treasury of the palace to give to General Ashina, and asked him to bring them back to the capital to pay tribute to the emperor.
Of course, he also sent a team of envoys to go back with General Ashina, and he sincerely asked the envoys to go to the capital to plead guilty again.
General Ashina was very satisfied with his wit, so he collected his things and took the people away.
Man Bao and the others have seen a lot along the way. If the king of Khotan hadn't overreacted, they might have entered the royal city of Khotan to take a look.
They regretfully followed General Ashina back, discussing: "I heard that if you go down to Khotan, you will go to Tubo and Dabolu. After Dabolu, you will go to Tianzhu. Master Zhiren wants to go to Tianzhu the most."
Bai Shan regretted again, "It's a pity that Master Zhiren and the others didn't accompany the army. Otherwise, if we go with them and meet the King of Khotan, maybe the King of Khotan can help him cross Dabolu to Tianzhu."
Bai Erlang: "Didn't you hear that Da Bolu was fighting with Xiao Bolu?"
"They beat them, but it didn't affect Da Bolu's win over the King of Khotan."
Man Bao raised his eyes and looked ahead, a little excited, "Are we going to go to this big desert?"
Bai Shan nodded, "Let's take the Chiyu River, cross the desert and return to Kucha, which is half the distance faster than detouring Shule."
From here to Kucha, it is basically a desert, except that there is an intermittent river in the desert called the Chiyu River. With this river, there are oases along the way. They got the gift from Shule and Khotan. For food and grass, there is basically no need to worry about food and drink.
The marching of the army is different from the walking of Bai Shan and others in small groups. Twenty thousand people go in and out at the same time. Basically, as long as they don’t encounter storms or get lost, they have nothing to fear in the desert. Even the animals are early. dodge.
Man Bao felt that when he slept in the open at night, he felt that the world was peaceful, as if they were the only ones under the whole sky.
General Ashina heard their emotions and said: "It's cold, scorpions and rats are all hidden. When it's hot, let alone 20,000 troops, even 100,000 troops will pass by. rustling."
So there is no need to feel this way.
A few people from Manbao: ...
General Ashina didn't notice, so he asked them directly, "I want to return to the imperial court as soon as possible. After returning to Xizhou, will you follow me back to Beijing?"
Bai Shan couldn't help asking: "What about Xizhou? What if the army leaves and the countries of Kucha repeat themselves?"