Zhang Hu, a native of Gaoyang, Baoding, Beizhili, entered the palace at the age of twelve, and went to Liaodong with Gao Huai with Kong Zhen at the age of nineteen.

Compared with the people in the inner court, Zhang Hu is not like a eunuch at all, he is very tall, and has great strength, he once competed with the generals of the local garrison in Guangning, and the result was 7 to 7 victories, which made the generals of Guangning all admire.

Because of his great strength, Zhang Hu first served as Gao Huai's personal guard after coming to Liaodong, and later helped Gao Huai recruit private soldiers to collect taxes, and became the commander of this private army at the age of twenty-five. The name of "Flying Tiger Army" comes from Zhang Hu.

Gao Huai was very trustworthy to Zhang Hu, and Zhang Hu was also extremely hardworking, and the "atrocities" of the tax soldiers listed in the complaint received by Wei Liangchen in Shanhaiguan can be said to have been committed by Zhang Hu.

At the time of the military mutiny, Zhang Hu was not in Shanhaiguan, but took the Flying Tiger Army to supervise taxes in Taiping Fort in Yizhouwei.

When I learned the news of the military mutiny, it was already the fourth day of the incident. In addition, the garrisons of the Guangning Zuotunwei and the Ningyuan Zhongzuo were gathering and rushing towards Taipingbao, threatening to capture Zhang Hu alive and slash with a thousand knives to quell the grievances of the people in Liaodong.

The incident was in a hurry, and the Flying Tiger Army was panicked, and more than half of it dispersed overnight. Zhang Hu was in a hurry, and he didn't know Gao Huai's whereabouts, so he listened to the advice of a captain who was born as a horse bandit, and led people to flee to Shuangshantai first, so as not to call the Liao army to suppress him.

The scar man was the captain who persuaded Zhang Hu to go to Shuangshantai, this person was a Korean, named Zheng Duo, who was born as a pariah, and fled to Liaodong to become a horse bandit because he killed his father.

Zheng Duo's father was a two-class nobleman in Joseon, and his mother was a pariah in his family. The so-called untouchables are slaves, and North Korea implements a fourth-class system, with first-class royal families and two classes of nobles, second-class middle-class people, third-class commoners, and fourth-class untouchables. It also adopts the method of motherhood, that is, the father is not a untouchable, but as long as the mother is a pariah, the child born is a pariah.

Dalits are like slaves in North Korea, with no dignity to speak of. Zheng Duo's father often beat and scolded his mother, and once strangled her mother to death after drinking. Zheng Duo, who was only 13 years old at the time, was so angry that he cut off his sleeping father's neck with a kitchen knife in the middle of the night, and fled across the Yalu River into Liaodong overnight. For the next twenty years, he lived a life of outlaw until he was recruited by Zhang Hu into the Flying Tiger Army.

When Zhang Hu led the rest of the people to flee to Shuangshantai, he asked Zheng Duo to lead people into the customs to inquire about Gao Huai's whereabouts. Zheng Duo and his entourage disguised themselves as merchants and sneaked into the pass, because they didn't know Gao Huai's whereabouts, Zheng Duo was ready to take someone to Jingshi to inquire.

Gao Huai has been a tax supervisor of Liaodong Mine for so many years, and he is also a eunuch in the court, and Beijing has its own power. Zhang Hu gave Zheng Duo a list of those contacts, asking him to inquire about the situation with these people after he arrived in Beijing, and at the same time asked these people to rescue Gao Huai. As a result, before entering Beijing, they heard that the imperial court had issued an order to lock up Gao Huai, and ordered Zhang Ye, the tax envoy of Tongwan, to concurrently lead the tax envoy of Liaodong Mine.

This news undoubtedly made Zheng Duo and the others feel desperate, because the Flying Tiger Army was built by Gao Huai, and if Gao Huai fell, the Flying Tiger Army would not exist. Not only did they not exist, but they also had no good end for the Flying Tigers.

Before joining the Flying Tiger Army, including Zheng Duo, the tax soldiers were almost all horse bandits and thieves with murders. They joined the Flying Tiger Army, on the one hand, because Zhang Hu's high price code made them excited, and on the other hand, because they also wanted to have a place to stay. After all, no matter how high your skills are, you will miss one day. Running away all day long is not a matter of peace.

Zheng Duo was unwilling, in the past ten years, there had been an impeachment of Gao Huai every year, and when it was most dangerous, Gao Huai took them to sneak outside the gate of Guangqu in Beijing to prepare to cry to the emperor. In the end, the danger was turned into a disaster. Although there was a military mutiny this time and the will was down, Gao Huai may not really fall.

So Zheng Duo continued to bring people into Beijing, but after entering Beijing, none of the people on Zhang Hu's list saw Zheng Duo. The trees fell and scattered, these big men who were heavily invested by Gao Huai in the past, at this time, they are worthy of Gao Huai's filial piety, where will they think of rescuing him.

In desperation, Zheng Duo had no choice but to take people out of the customs. On the way, he met the Ming army who was patrolling, and after a fight, he finally escaped, but Zheng Duo also called the Ming army to slash in his face. If he hadn't retreated quickly, the knife would only cut the flesh and skin, otherwise, this fate would have been confessed.

"So, Grandpa Gao is real... Finished? ”

After listening to what Zheng Duo said, Zhang Hu sat on the chair dejectedly. One is prosperous, one is lost, he and Gao Huai are already grasshoppers on the same rope, Gao Huai is finished, and he is next. With all the things he has done in Liaodong with the Feizhen Army in the past ten years, it is no wonder that the generals of the Liao Army did not skin him alive.

"Grandpa Zhang... Someone said they wanted to see you. Zheng Duo hesitated for a moment and said this.

Seven days earlier, while he was hiding in Songshan, a man claiming to be one of Kong's father-in-law had brought him a secret letter saying that Wei Liangchen, a scholar from the Middle School, wanted to see Zhang Hu.

"Wei Liangchen, a scholar from the middle school?" Zhang Hu thought about it repeatedly in his mind, and he didn't remember that Gao Huai had dealt with this person when he was there.

"Why did Gonggong Kong send you a letter, and where are the others now?" Zhang Hu did not doubt the authenticity of this letter, because Kong Zhen and his Flying Tiger Army had their own secret means of communication, which was also a means arranged by Gao Huai when he was impeached as a precaution, and it is finally useful today.

"According to the person who sent the letter, Gonggong Kong and Gonggong Gao were locked up by Jinyiwei together." Zheng Duo's Chinese is very fluent, and he can't hear the slightest North Korean accent, no matter who listens to it, he will only think that he is a native of Liaodong.

"Since he was locked up, how could Gonggong Kong have any contact with this Wei Liangchen?" Zhang Hu was a little suspicious.

Zheng Duo said: "I heard that this Weishe person is a person sent by the emperor after the Guan Change. ”

Zhang Hu nodded, so it makes sense why Kong Zhen in the cage still has contact with the outside world.

Zhang Hu pondered for a moment, a little puzzled: "What does he want to see me for?" ”

"I don't know." Zheng Duo shook his head and said, the person who sent the letter to him at that time didn't know why this Wei She person wanted to see Zhang Hu.

Zheng Duo asked, "Gonggong Zhang, is this person seen or not?" ”

"See, why not... But let him come to Shuangshantai, our family can't go. Zhang Hu frowned, he has lost a lot of weight these days, and his face has become thinner. Intuition told him that this Zhongshusheren surnamed Wei must have a purpose, but he couldn't think of what this purpose was.

If you talk about wealth, the gold and silver that Gao Gonggong has made over the years are all in charge of Kong Zhen, and he has some on hand, but not a lot. If the surnamed Wei wants to take advantage of the chaos to rob and make a windfall, the abacus is wrong.

But if you don't want money, what does this guy want?