The sun hanging in the sky was just a white shadow without any warmth, and it even slowly disappeared into the clouds.
The main gate of the Xizhou camp in the distance was more than two meters high. Not counting the archers on the watchtowers on both sides, there were more than a hundred guards on duty at the gate alone.
A bloody man was hanging in the middle of the gate, and the blood from his body had dyed a large area of the sand red.
It's a pockmarked face.
Liu Cheng had cold sweat on his forehead. If the gap in the fence on the poplar forest side had not been sealed, he would not have risked walking here.
He tightly grasped the bag on his shoulder that contained fifty taels of silver, and did not dare to look at the half-dead pockmarked face. He walked straight to the guard on duty and handed over his card: "Sir, I'm from the Fire Battalion. I'm going out to do something."
The guard took the cards and looked at them, then glanced at the scaled armor on his body.
Liu Cheng felt frightened by the look in the guard's eyes. He had stolen this set of scale armor to avoid being hunted down by the Tiger Step Battalion.
He was just feeling anxious when he saw the guard waving behind him: "There's a spy here! Tie him up!"
The guards surrounded him instantly, with dozens of spears pointed at Liu Cheng.
Liu Cheng was shocked: "I am really from Huotouying, and Li Touer on the stove is my master..."
The guard sneered: "You are from the Fire Head Battalion, why are you wearing infantry scale armor?"
In the Xizhou camp, only the soldiers fighting on the battlefield had scale armor uniforms. The firemen were far away from the battlefield and were only responsible for cooking in the rear, so they were not equipped with scale armor uniforms.
Liu Cheng was speechless. He had managed to avoid the Tiger Step Camp by changing into this military uniform, but he was treated as a spy when he was only one step away from leaving the camp.
The thought that if Chef Li also died, he would be responsible for two lives!
Liu Cheng's eyes were filled with hatred. He knocked down a guard and rushed towards the gate of the camp without caring about anything.
"Catch him!"
The guards at the gate had been replaced by Liaonan Army since the day Feng Shuo's army entered the Xizhou camp. All of them were veterans of the battlefield. When they saw Liu Cheng trying to run, they threw their spears and pierced his left leg.
Liu Cheng screamed and fell to the ground, and all the silver in his bag spilled out.
"Silver! My silver!"
Like a mad dog, he took all the silver in his arms, looked at the camp exit just a stone's throw away, bloodshot eyes burst out, and he dragged his injured left leg to crawl towards the gate: "I have money now, I want to go out, I want to live a good life!"
The guards stepped forward and mercilessly stabbed his right leg with their spears.
Both of his legs were pierced and Liu Cheng screamed like a pig being slaughtered, but he still held the silver in his arms tightly and refused to let go.
He looked at the sky outside the Xizhou camp with despair in his eyes.
The sun completely disappeared into the clouds, and the sky was covered with dark clouds, as if a heavy rain was about to fall.
***
Xing Yao hurried into the big tent, "Master, the accomplice of the fire army has been caught!"
Feng Shuo raised his head from a pile of official documents. He was wearing a black robe with a pattern of coiled dragons and clouds embroidered on the collar with red thread. He wore a golden crown on his head and a jade belt around his waist. His handsome face had his usual cold expression.
"What did you find out?"
Xing Yao briefly told the story of how Liu Cheng and Chunxiang instigated Pockmarked Face to murder Jiang Yanyi for the fifty taels of silver reward.
Feng Shuo's eyes flashed with impatience. He was not interested in the intrigues of the slaves. He asked directly, "Who made the gap in the fence of the poplar forest?"
This was the main reason why he sent people to arrest Liu Cheng early in the morning.
The crack in the wood of the fence is an old mark, and it is obvious that the gap has existed for a long time.
There are blind spots in the sentry tower, and there are hidden passages leading to the outside in the blind spots. Such a military camp is simply a joke!
I interrogated the pockmarked man last night. He said that he didn't know there was a gap there until last night. It was Liu Cheng who told him.
Xing Yao said, "The fireman surnamed Liu couldn't stand the torture and confessed everything. He was the one who made the hole. Fan Wei's youngest son is a womanizer. A few months ago, he robbed a group of decent girls to entertain the army. Among them, there was a foreign girl who was very favored, but somehow she fell in love with Liu. The foreign girl instigated him to make the hole so that the two of them could have an affair in the poplar forest."
When Fan Wei was in office, although there were camp prostitutes in the army, there were rules. If someone went to visit a prostitute after the hour of Hai, he would be punished with a whip.
Moreover, there were less than 100 prostitutes in the camp, while the generals had hundreds of prostitutes. It was a situation of too many monks and too little porridge. Liu Cheng was a small man, and it was impossible to get his turn even if he tried his best. When a foreign woman took the initiative to flirt with him, how could he refuse such a good thing
He lived a very happy life by bringing midnight snacks to the camp prostitutes and having sex with them at the same time.
The more Feng Shuo listened, the uglier his expression became. By the end, his face was so gloomy that it was dripping with water. "Catch the foreign spies immediately."
He sneaked into the military camp as a camp prostitute and dug a secret passage. If he wasn't a spy, what else could he be
Xing Yao bowed and clasped his fists, saying, "I will send someone to leave after I have interrogated the cook named Liu."
Feng Shuo's expression eased a little, and he ordered, "Bring the list of camp prostitutes here."
He took the list of prostitutes in the Xizhou camp last night, but hadn't had time to look at it yet.
Xing Yao found a booklet from the high table beside him and handed it to Feng Shuo.
Feng Shuo read through the entire article quickly and discovered that there were more than ten camp prostitutes whose crimes had not been registered with the government, and four of them were unable to provide accurate household registration information.
He identified from the names that one of the four was the foreign spy.
Feng Shuo circled the remaining three people with a red pen and said, "Send someone to keep a close eye on them."
Xing Yao should be.
He continued to look down, and his gaze paused for a moment on the name "Jiang Hua" at the end of the list.
Among all the camp prostitutes, there is only one with the surname Jiang. I guess she is the cook in Huotou Camp.
Her registered address on the list was written in great detail and did not appear to be fake.
But there was an epidemic in Fengxian County, Dengzhou, two years ago, and people from several villages died. In order to prevent future troubles, the government simply set fire to the village.
The county magistrate was afraid that the court would blame him if too many people died, so he forged a new household register that only kept the household registers of half of the people in those villages. After the original household register was destroyed, there was no way to verify the names of the other half of the people in the village.
The way this household registration is filled out is really clever.
Feng Shuo narrowed his eyes slightly. If this "Jiang Hua" was a fake identity, he would admire the cook's talent to some extent.
He tapped the roster with his fingertips and asked, "How is the investigation of the Jiang family's daughter going?"
Xing Yao replied respectfully, "The spies in the capital reported that the daughter of the Jiang family was sent to the army outside the pass to serve as a prostitute because she had many conflicts with her concubine sister. After her concubine sister entered the palace, she was favored by the emperor. The emperor issued this secret order to vent his anger on the concubine."
"boom-"
A thunder sounded outside the tent, the cold wind blew the tent curtain, and the dazzling white lightning reflected on Feng Shuo's face. His expression was very sarcastic.
Perhaps recalling some bad memories, his eyes seemed to be frozen, and a hint of mockery formed on his lips: "As expected of that man's precious grandson, when it comes to this kind of tactics, the grandfather and grandson really have the same way."
Isn’t the grandfather of the current emperor the previous emperor
Xing Yao didn't dare to answer.
Feng Shuo threw down the list in his hand, leaned back on the chair, and with a look of sarcasm in his eyes, he hid some unknown emotions. He said, "I asked you to check whether the person who died a few days ago was the daughter of the Jiang family. How is your investigation going?"
Xing Yao then spoke: "I asked the two soldiers who collected the bodies that day. All the prostitutes in the camp went to the Huotou Camp that day. Only one of them died at night. She was about 28 years old, with an average appearance and a scar on her forehead. Her name was not on the list of prostitutes in the camp, so she is quite consistent with the eldest daughter of the Jiang family."
"However, Guo Xiaoqi, who is in charge of the camp prostitutes, has just taken office. I don't know when she was sent here. I will go and question the camp prostitutes tonight."
It had started raining outside, and the big raindrops hit the canvas on the tent roof, making a "puffing" sound.
Feng Shuo obviously didn't have the patience to wait any longer. There was a chill in his casual voice: "Dig up the grave, open the coffin and examine the body."
For some reason, the delicate collarbone and half-round shoulders of the little cook under the moonlight appeared in front of my eyes, as well as the water-red belt that extended to the back of her snow-white neck, and the cherry lips that were bloodless but made people want to kiss them...
Feng Shuo narrowed his eyes slightly.
If the one who died was indeed the eldest daughter of the Jiang family, then this "Jiang Hua" was most likely also a spy.
Or a spy trying to seduce him.
Thinking that this spy might know a way to restore his sense of taste, his eyes darkened.