After hearing Ye Li's question, Zhang Hua pondered for a while and said, "If you ask me, their overall strength is not much different from ours. This group of fish thieves are very proficient in camouflage and surprise attacks, and their abilities in these two aspects are worse than ours. However, they are not as good as us on the front battlefield. Therefore, if a big battle breaks out between the two sides, it will be difficult to tell the winner."
Hearing Zhang Hua's words, Ye Li's eyes lit up. After all, if the fish thieves were as strong as the yellow-clothed bandits, then after recruiting them, he would get a well-trained and powerful force.
"So, it is still necessary to persuade these guys to surrender?"
Ye Li said.
Zhang Hua nodded and said, "Although I don't like them, to be honest, they are indeed worthy of your surrender.
Their number of people is not much different from ours, also about 400 people. After you recruit them all, I think the number of private troops will be full!"
Ye Li did not explain in detail about the number of private troops, as he needed more talents than just these.
Li Rushan told him before he came that he should think of ways to recruit enough people from different places.
After all, there are 10,000 places, and the court can assign him a maximum of 3,000 people. He has to find the remaining 7,000 vacancies by himself. But Ye Li wanted to give up. After all, it was a waste of time to ask him to recruit people everywhere.
However, Ye Li also knew that the legion he was forming now was the same as the army he formed on Pushan Island, and both would be powerful forces to fight against the Dahuntian organization in the future.
Therefore, he cannot be lazy now. If he is lazy now, if an all-out war really breaks out in the future, the strength of his subordinates will be much smaller.
After discussing with Ding Si and Zhang Hua, Ye Li decided to take the two of them to attack the fish thieves that night.
Qian San was left behind by Ye Li near the manor, leading the newly joined yellow-clothed bandits to continue building the camp.
According to Zhang Hua, the fish robbers' leader Ruan Bailang is a guy who is extremely afraid of death. As long as Ye Li can threaten his life and leave him with no way to escape, he will definitely surrender.
After knowing this, Ye Li felt a lot more relaxed.
After all, a leader who is afraid of death is very beneficial to his control over the entire fish-stealing thieves organization. As long as he can threaten Ruan Bailang, the other party will obediently surrender and lead the entire organization to join him.
When night was about to fall, the three of them rode on fast horses and galloped towards the Qingjiang River.
Qingjiang is a wide river that runs across the entire Dongfang County. It passes through most of the Tang Dynasty and parts of the Yuan Dynasty, and will pass through many other countries along the way.
Therefore, there are many merchant ships traveling back and forth on weekdays, and many merchant caravans gather along the way to load and unload goods.
The fish thieves originally robbed these ship merchants, but now that they are stronger, they rarely go out to rob merchant ships themselves.
After all, most of the merchant ships that frequently travel along this waterway will pay them a certain amount of protection money.
As long as the caravan has paid protection money, they will not attack. After all, even thieves have their own code of conduct, and as bandits, there are still some rules to follow.
Ding Si had also investigated the fish thieves' camp before, but he did it in a hurry, so he didn't have a clear understanding of the situation here.
Fortunately, Zhang Hua knew a lot about the fish thieves, and Ye Li got a lot of useful information.
After observing the enemy's camp for a while, Ye Li said: "Look carefully, the places in front of you are all secret sentries, and the places over there are open sentries.
The invasion route we will choose is as follows. We will pass between the light and dark sentries and blend into the camp.
This fish thief has some problems with the arrangement of the sentry post, even worse than you yellow-clothed bandits, it is too easy for him to invade."
Hearing Ye Li's words, Zhang Hua touched his nose and said, "After all, many of us were soldiers in the past, so we know a little about the arrangement of the sentry posts.
There aren't that many soldiers on the fish thieves' side, and even if there are, most of them are naval forces, so they definitely don't know much about setting up sentries on the shore."
Ye Li nodded and said, "Let's go. You two follow me and keep your footsteps as quiet as possible. We will sneak over there."
After giving instructions to the two people, Ye Li rushed out first, taking an extremely strange and twisted route, and sneaked towards the camp of the fish thieves. Ding Si and Zhang Hua followed closely behind him.
It didn't take much effort for the three of them to sneak into the fish thieves' camp, which looked not much different from the camp of the yellow-clothed bandits.
After some effort, they found Ruan Bailang's residence.
At this time, Ruan Bailang was practicing in the house. He seemed to be more diligent than Zhang Hua and the other two. However, there was a gap in aptitude between people, and his cultivation was still a level lower than Zhang Hua's.
When Ye Li and the other two stood in front of him, he had already woken up from his meditation. The moment he saw the three people, he was ready to attack and take the opportunity to escape.
Although his idea was correct and his reaction was quick, his strength was too weak after all. Before he could jump up from his seat, Ye Li pushed him back.
Feeling the terrifying mountain-like pressure from Ye Li, Ruan Bailang's body softened and he finally gave up resisting.
"Who are you, sir, and why... why are you here!?"
Ruan Bailang looked at Ye Li in horror. After knowing Ye Li's strength, he couldn't help but ask stutteringly.
"Ruan Bailang, this is our Lord of Dongfang County, Ye Li!"
Zhang Hua stood beside Ye Li and said to Ruan Bailang.
Only then did Ruan Bailang notice Zhang Hua next to him, and his expression became even more surprised.
"Zhang Hua, why are you here too
You helped Wang Yue and his men deal with the county governors who came before, so why are you standing on the lord's side this time!!!"
Ruan Bailang asked Zhang Hua puzzledly.
Zhang Hua laughed awkwardly and said, "Lord Ye Li is very powerful. I have brought everyone in my village to serve him and become his private army.
Since this is the master's territory, he naturally does not allow bandits like us to exist. After we surrender to him, you will be the only gang left here.
So now you should understand why the master is here!!!"
Hearing Zhang Hua's words, Ruan Bailang looked at Ye Li, swallowed his saliva and asked tentatively: "Sir, do you still need subordinates?"
His words made Ye Li stunned. Before he even opened his mouth to surrender, the other party actually wanted to surrender directly.
"If you are willing to surrender with all your men and take a poison pill, then you will be mine from now on.
I am now going to form a legion and I need a large number of people. If you submit to me, you will be part of my legion in the future. You will also serve as a centurion leader like Zhang Hua and the others. How about that! ? "
Ye Li's attitude towards this guy who knew the current situation became much gentler.