"Fellow soldiers!" On the eighth day of the third month in the second year of Zhongping, when the snow had stopped and the first rays of morning sunlight shone on the parade ground in the city, I stood on the general's platform and issued my order to go to war.
"Do you remember Nanyang in late autumn last year?" Most of the soldiers were the Yellow Turban soldiers we took in, and they certainly knew what happened at that time. The local soldiers in Jingzhou also knew what Dong Zhuo had done at that time, let alone the generals. Kong Ming, Xu Shu, and Pang Tong's family, Dong Zhuo owed too much blood debt to the soldiers and civilians of Jingzhou. I deliberately stopped and looked around. I felt the murderous aura in the whole field. This army could be used.
"We are going to Hanzhong to fight Dong Zhuo to the death. In front of us are Dong Zhuo's 300,000 cavalrymen, and behind us are our Jingzhou's 8 million people. Last time, we let Dong Zhuo ravage our homeland once, but this time, with our 250,000 troops, are we going to watch Dong Zhuo run rampant in our homeland again? ... Send out the troops!"
My incitement was very effective. The atmosphere in the parade ground made the whole Xiangyang tremble. I thought it wouldn't be long before other soldiers stationed outside the city would also know the reason for the boiling noise in the city. Even the teacher nodded to me, and the master smiled and waved his arm at me.
We set out. This time, I will be accompanied by 120,000 troops from all over Jingzhou and the military camps near Xiangyang. And all the Jingzhou generals in my heart who came from various cities. Because, the front Pegasus reported that Hanzhong is in my hands, and our destination is in Hanzhong. In this team, the master is the absolute number one general. The teacher has to preside over the overall situation in Xiangyang City and cannot go with the team in person. However, the master's wife still came with her and brought some of her apprentices. I don't know why the teacher is not worried, but the teacher and I have been in Xiangyang for five years. Except for a few times when I go back, the rest of the time she takes care of the two children alone, and she also has to go around to see people. This time I can leave the children to him and go out by myself. She might be very happy, but the master's wife still misses the children very much. Along the way, she always nags that she always feels that the teacher is unreliable in taking care of the children. But when she thinks about it, it is really ridiculous for a Jingzhou governor to take care of the children at home. However, the master assured him that there are his wife and children to help take care of them, and the master's wife was a little relieved.
I wore the armor that Lü Bu had given me. I didn't expect it to be so big that it really fit me. I thought that Lü Bu and I were about the same height, so I guessed that this was what Lü Bu had worn before. I also took off the tall hat I usually wore, let my hair down, and simply tied it into a bun at the back with a cowhide belt. My sister asked me why I didn't tie it into a bun. I said I was afraid of trouble, and I hadn't had the crown ceremony yet. I had tied it up because I had to wear a crown before, and now it was a good time to relax. My sister thought about it and took off her crown too. In the past, there were only female officials in the palace, and there were even female cavalry shooters in the imperial city. There were no female official uniforms except female prison officials below the state. It was too difficult for my sister to wear men's official uniforms all the time and wear such a tall crown. The teacher's wife said that she must let the teacher find someone to make female official uniforms. The teacher looked at my sister carefully and said that she fully agreed. My sister also came to be our military advisor this time because the two regular candidates were still on their honeymoon. My sister resumed her makeup. We saw a delicate woman in a white goose-hair cloak boarding the carriage. My classmates needed to be reminded to wipe their saliva. As soon as we got on the road, I began to worry about my sister's lifelong event. According to her age, she should have been married. I asked her about it, and she laughed at my head and said, "It's all because of you." This is true. But to be honest, I can't even tell who is worthy of my sister. I don't want my sister to be unhappy. Later, it was my teacher's wife who enlightened me. She married my teacher at the age of 25, and she was the one who went to the police. But I still don't feel at ease. My teacher's wife can still meet such a handsome man as my teacher at the age of 25, because they are childhood sweethearts, but my sister may not! According to my sister, she only has a silly four-year-old brother like me. Don't let her hear it, or she will argue with me about whether she is four or five years old.
Kong Ming's body has basically recovered, but he is still weak. He was excited when he knew I was going to fight Dong Zhuo. I left in the morning when he was still asleep. We left him in the new mansion. My master's wife and Sister Huang, whom I have never met, will take care of him. I think they will soon know how powerful Kong Ming is.
"Where's my brother?" My thoughts were interrupted by Zhou Yu, a girl. Li Zhen also came over and said, "Zi Yu is missing too, and Zi Xiang didn't see him at all when he came back this time, and he didn't go out to be a governor. What's going on?" Then many people came over, and I knew they had a lot of questions to ask me. But I couldn't answer them all now.
"Zixiang. We will probably see him at night. He is waiting for us ahead of us. The others are waiting for us further ahead."
"Aren't you 250,000 people? There are only half of them here. If you count Wen Dong's place, there are only 50,000 people. How can there be 250,000 people?"
"With more people, everyone feels at ease." Only my sister, the teacher and I knew this detail, so we couldn't.
"I heard that you also conscripted nearly 100,000 civilians this time. Where are they?"
"You'll find out tonight."
Everyone knew I was talking nonsense, but they couldn't get me to talk, so they had to talk about my new hairstyle. I knew the reason. Everyone thought it made sense. None of my classmates were under 20, so they followed my example. In an instant, all those annoying hairdos were thrown away. However, Brother Wen Zheng let his hair down instead of tying it up like me. Everyone asked him why, but he refused. But our number one female general gave the reason, saying it looked like a ponytail. Then a few fence-sitters all let their hair down again.
I began to pay attention to the barbarian woman that everyone wanted to see. I found that everyone was basically looking at her. She was wearing a rhino leather armor that was somewhat similar to the one I was wearing, except that it was painted with various patterns using various pigments. Her hair flowed down her left cheek like water, revealing a large round silver earring on her right ear. However, compared to the one Lu Bu wore yesterday, this one seemed to be a generation behind. But this one was just the right size. One point less would be unpleasant, and one point more would be too big. Her face was a little thinner than her sister's, and it looked like it was cut by a knife from below the cheekbones. With her exquisite and beautiful body wrapped in the rhino armor, she felt like a Valkyrie. However,... I moved closer to Brother Wen Zheng: "She doesn't seem to have changed much."
"She has changed a lot." He immediately retorted, "Yujun no longer paints on her face, and she no longer flies around the city. He..."
"But she is still barefoot and wearing straw sandals!" I replied with a smile.
"Look carefully, are those straw sandals?"
"Oh, cloth?"
"Yes, these are new cloth shoes, very cool! I wore them a while ago."
"Hey, brother, there's snow everywhere here."
Brother Wen Zheng suddenly leaned forward and whispered something to the Valkyrie. She was originally sacred and inviolable, but suddenly, her face and eyes were full of tenderness. After listening to Brother Wen Zheng's whisper, she thought about it, pouted her lips and smiled. Then, she saw Brother Wen Zheng calling a carriage from the back, and then the two of them got into the carriage.
"Hey, what are you doing? Why were you looking at me? I got into the carriage, why are you so disappointed? You just glanced at me, why did you lower your head?" This barbaric girl got angry with Brother Li Zhen again. However, I haven't seen her for only three months, and she has really grown up a lot, like a woman. I secretly asked Li Zhen: "Are you going to marry her?" "It's not a question of whether I plan to marry her or not, it's a question of whether I dare not to marry her?" "Understood." I secretly sighed that Zhou Yu was so powerful.
In the evening, the army arrived at Chencang, a fortress in the northwest of Jingzhou as planned. I ordered the army to enter the city and rest. Chencang is the only way from Yizhou to Jingzhou, belonging to Shangyong County. This place can only be a fortress, not a city. The inside of the city wall is full of military camps, and only a small area is provided for passing merchants and travelers to stay. Inspections have always been very strict. Now that Chen Liang has led the entire army to Hanzhong, most of the military camps in Chencang are empty. I pointed to the craftsmen who were still busy on the city wall and said to those people: "Now you know why I recruited civilians, right? They have been here to repair and raise the city wall, and the snow has not stopped. Moreover, they work in two shifts day and night without interruption. You may not sleep well tonight."
"You think we can't defend Hanzhong?" Brother Wen Zheng hit the nail on the head.
"We have to prepare for the worst, right?" Fortunately, I thought quickly.
Zixiang is the supervisor here and also the city guard. Li Zhen grabbed Zixiang who came out to greet him and said, "Zhou Mi, how does it feel to be the supervisor of 100,000 people?"
"One hundred thousand people?..." I quickly took over his words, "For those who are meticulous in their work, it's not a problem." Zixiang's name has always been a source of ridicule. But in the past two days, it seems that the names of the teacher's two sons have become more prominent. Everyone laughed when they heard me making fun of Zixiang's name again. Zixiang is the younger brother among us, but he is really meticulous in his thinking. He didn't refute me. It's just okay.
"Everyone has worked hard. We just arrived in Xiangyang and have to set off without rest. I'm sorry to all the brothers... and to Master's wife and Master..." I felt that I had a grammatical error, but everyone seemed really tired and didn't seem to notice anything. "Everyone, go and rest quickly." I finished the work quickly.
Everyone dispersed quickly. My sister also told me to go to bed early, and left hand in hand with Zhou Yu. They must have a lot to say.
"One hundred thousand people, what's going on, Brother Zirui." Zhou Mi patted my shoulder and asked.
"Don't you know about such a thing as a claim? Think about the Battle of Muye. Shang Tang's army claimed to have ten thousand chariots, but in fact, there were less than a thousand chariots. Go to sleep, aren't you tired? I am tired." I ignored him and left.
The next day, snow began to fall again at dawn. We continued to head towards Hanzhong. I was not in a hurry because I had started to consider the slippery roads caused by the snow. According to the plan, we would arrive in Hanzhong two days later, which was within the plan. I was not in a hurry. I helped my sister onto the carriage and got on the horse myself. Brother Wen Zheng suddenly came up to me and said, "You and your sister are dressed very conspicuously!" I suddenly realized that I was dressed in black, with black armor, black cloak, black boots, black horse, black hair, and a dark face. Even the wolf hanging on the horse and the iron bow behind me were all black. My sister was just the opposite, with a fair face, white shirt, white skirt, white shoes, white hat, white cloak, and even the four horses in the carriage were white.
"Who are you mourning for?"
"Haha..." The barbarian girl behind him laughed out loud, and the other students also laughed. I bowed to the barbarian girl and said, "Hello, sister-in-law."
"Okay." It seemed that she couldn't grasp our words very well, and the taste of her words was not right, but it seemed that she had learned our etiquette from Brother Wen Zheng. She bowed to me politely immediately.
"Sister-in-law, do you still want to ride in the carriage with Brother Zheng?"
"Okay." She was very frank, and I secretly said sorry in my heart.
"Then you can take your time to go to Hanzhong, I won't bother you." I waved and called a carriage, and finally saw the angry Wen Zheng being pulled into the carriage by Hu Yujun. The students left outside laughed together.
My sister waved at me through the side window of the carriage, and I quickly stuck my face in. My sister grabbed my beard again and said, "You little bastard, you're talking dirty again." I hurriedly said that this was the last time, and my sister scolded me for a while before letting me go.
We were all laughing along the way. Everything was the same except that it didn't feel like going to war. I was also asking myself, is war fun? Why aren't people afraid? Do they have confidence in me? Really, I wasn't very sure myself. I just don't know why, the closer I get to the front line, the less nervous I get.
At noon on March 11, the second year of Zhongping, the sky cleared up and the snow on the ground began to melt. We arrived at the right time. If we were a day later, the road would be difficult to walk on. The weather became colder, and it took a lot of effort to open the city gate because the gate was stuck with ice. After settling everyone, I went straight to the north gate tower because a lieutenant general had been planning there. Chen Ou was there. However, Brother Wen Dong was nowhere to be found.
"Brother Ziyu, everything is fine."
"Brother Zirui, you are here!"
"What's wrong? Is Dong Zhuo calling?"
"No, I'm just bored! My classmates are not here, and Brother Wendong is running around. Ah! Brother, your armor is so cool, when can you help me get a set like this?" I nodded in agreement.
"The big banners with the characters of "Chen" and "my teacher" flying all over Hanzhong, just as expected."
"It's different. Look at this loyal and brave Xinye Bo Chen. The flag is so big and the words are so big. Look at the one next to it. This delicate Chen is me." Chen Ou has always been like this. He likes to compare this and that. But he never forces anything. He is just greedy.
"What's the matter with this big flag with the word 'Deng' on it?" I suddenly saw a strange flag. "It's new, just made. Who is he? The surname Deng, I have never heard of the surname Deng (there is no such surname in the Hundred Family Surnames, but some people use this character as their surname - author's note), who is this person?"
"Ah, what a coincidence, they are here." The sound of Brother Chen and someone discussing came from the stone steps on the parapet. Chen Ou smiled and said to me, "I can't tell you, why don't you ask yourself?"
I have heard for a long time that people from the Western Regions are different from us. This is the first time I have seen a real Western Regions person. He is tall and strong, with a high nose bridge, deep eye sockets, and brown curly hair. I can't tell if he looks good, because he does look weird, but I can at least feel that he seems to be a close combat expert, because he has a short knife on his waist. And he has the temperament of a commander, because his eyes are like torches, and he looks very calm. Brother Chen came over happily to introduce us to each other. When the man knew that the person in front of him who was taller than him had a higher official rank than Brother Chen, his expression was slightly surprised. He made a gesture to me that was similar to our bowing, but he only placed one hand in front of his head. I guess it meant to bow, and I also bowed slightly in return.
"Your last name is Deng?" I was very interested.
"No, this is the pronunciation of my name. This is how my name is written." I didn't expect him to speak our language fluently. He turned over his clothes, and there were several tadpole-like words "denspartarcus" and some circles in some strange places.
"These first few... are they your name? Pronounced 'Deng'?" He nodded.
"Then there is this long list..."
"It's my last name."
"How do you pronounce it?" I was quite interested. This was the first time I saw the writing of another ethnic group.
"Spartacus." He was very proud.