Feng's Sichuan border patrol army has 10,000 or 20,000 people, is a Jīng Rui unit that is dispatched from all over Sichuan, the mission of this force is to fight with the Sichuan and Tibetan Tusi armed forces, in order to ensure the smooth implementation of the new policy, and respond to the minister in Tibet, deterring the southwest border, after the outbreak of the "Xushen Revolution", received a letter of help from Zhao Erxun, Zhao Erfeng immediately led the troops to rush to Chengdu from the Batang garrison in the starry night, but due to the armed interception of Tusi and temples along the way, this patrol army moved extremely slowly, and fought all the way, and finally arrived at the arrow furnace, but the grain and grass ran out, and they had to stop advancing in the arrow furnace and raise grain and grass on the spot, but before they could raise enough grain and grass, Chengdu had been declared recovered, Zhao Erxun surrendered, and this army became a lone army.

How to deal with Zhao Erfeng's lone army has become a thorny problem in front of the republican army, after the recovery of Chengdu, the general staff of the republican army held a special military meeting to discuss this matter, and Zhao Bei decided to take a two-pronged approach.

On the one hand, he used the brotherly relationship between Zhao Erxun and Zhao Erfeng to persuade Zhao Erfeng to surrender. The day before the "Sichuan-Han Road Deficit Case" was officially revealed, Zhao Bei ordered Zhao Erxun to write a handwritten letter, and several Zhao governors took the letter to the archery furnace to meet Zhao Erfeng, and persuaded him to lead the army to surrender to Cheng, and these Zhao governors accompanied by a few horses in Zhao Erfeng's army, these people were ordered to rush back to Chengdu some time ago to ask Zhao Erxun for grain and wages, but before Zhao Erxun sent troops to escort grain and grass, the republican army had already attacked Chengdu, and the matter of transporting grain and helping was stopped, and these Zhao Erfeng's horses were also trapped in ChengduNow they were able to rush back to the riverside.

On the other hand, considering Zhao Erfeng's performance in the Xinhai Revolution and the impact of the Sichuan-Han Road fund deficit case, Zhao Bei did not put all his hopes on Zhao Erxun's letter of persuasion. After the recovery of Chengdu, Zhao Bei sent Bai Wenwei to lead the first division south to Zizhou, Jiading, and Xuzhou, and also sent the Zhang Licheng brigade of the second division to advance to the southwest, so as to recover Zhou and Meizhou, Zhang Brigade went smoothly all the way, and recovered the two states without much effort, and then continued to advance westward according to the plan On the day that Zhao Bei arrived at Fushun City, Zhang Licheng's troops occupied Yazhou City.

Yazhou City is the seat of Yazhou Prefecture, to the east is Meizhou, Zhou, Jiading, to the west for a few days, you can see the famous Luding Bridge, through this bridge to cross the Dadu River and then go west for a few days to the arrow furnace and Zhao Erfeng's patrol army is now trapped in the area of the arrow furnace, due to the lack of food, ships, and land roads blocked, this lone army can neither advance nor retreat.

Zhang Licheng's troops only subdued Zhao Erfeng's partial division by force, according to Zhao Bei's original plan to solve the stubborn forces in southern Sichuan, Bai Wenwei's first division will also send a brigade to escort the agricultural reclamation regiment from Fushun, through Jiading Mansion to Yazhou, this force will not stop after arriving in Yazhou City, they will continue to move westward after a short rest, force Zhao Erfeng's patrol army to surrender by force, and then reorganize them into a local armed force in the Sichuan area to continue to attack the Tusi forces by force, The "Sichuan West Reclamation Plan" formulated by the support army will escort the construction of the Sichuan industrial base in the future.

But this is just a plan, the plan can't catch up with the changes, the terrain in western Sichuan is complex and the transportation is inconvenient, the means of communication basically stay in the medieval Erfeng's troops are what kind of state they are in now, who knows that the troops who are out of grain will definitely not have any military spirit and fighting spirit, and for the troops of the Qing army, once they run out of food, it basically means that this army is about to disintegrate.

If the Central Plains region of the army disintegrates, the officers and soldiers may become bandits, but Zhao Erfeng's troops are on the riverside, and all around them are Tusi's territory, the local mountains are reckless, and the terrain is complicated.

The twenty unclothed slaves across the street seemed to confirm this speculation.

"Erfeng's troops have collapsed?"

Tian Jinfu asked, and everyone present asked. It's just that he is the only one who said it.

Zhao Bei looked at the fragment of the tea cup that Fu Huafeng smashed on the ground. asked, "Old man." You've been on the riverside for a while. Did those toasts often trade slaves to central and western Sichuan? ”

Fu Huafeng came back to his senses. Ponder for a moment. "It's not very common," he said. However, it is common for Tusi people to cause trouble in Chuanbian Prefecture and County. ”

"Well before. How does the local government deal with these troublesome subordinates? Zhao Bei asked.

Fu Huafeng smiled bitterly: "How to deal with it?" Some of the Kawabe toasts are quite strong. Sichuan merchants and horses helped them sell goods. It's all up to the toast to take care of. The local people also relied on the toast to restrain them. And so it goes. The local government is naturally a rat trap. Even if Tusidi's subordinates committed something in the jurisdiction. The local prefectural and county orders will never dare to dispose of it without authorization. You must ask the prefect. And the prefect is usually worried about not making a "brute change". Therefore, it is often perfunctory. Never dare to really take people's land. Besides. The Qing court has always advocated the use of Han to control Yi and the use of Yi to control Han. as long as

Flag Man. Do not rebel. Who cares about those little toasters

"Humph! The Qing court doesn't care, this commander cares! Yiren, let's go, let's all go out and have a look. ”

Zhao Bei stood up from the table, walked towards the outside of the teahouse, and glanced at the two Mauser rifles leaning against the table by the two toast slave dealers, and understood their origins.

Walking out of the teahouse, surrounded by the guards, Zhao Bei came to the corner across the street, carefully looked at the twenty men and women squatting on the ground, and found that all of them were not wearing shoes, some of them had wrapped a piece of leather on their feet, and some of them were barefoot, and they didn't know how far they had walked, and their feet were rotten.

Some of them looked depressed, some looked angry, the women had tears in the corners of their eyes and whimpered, and the men were angry, but they could only let out a low roar of indignation.

The reason is simple: all of them have a rope tightly wrapped around their mouths, and it is impossible to speak.

"Yiren, they can't speak, how do you know their identity?"

Zhao Bei was very surprised and asked Tian Jinfu.

Tian Jinfu raised his chin towards one of them and said, "Look at this person's feet." ”

looked north and immediately understood what Tian Jinfu meant.

I saw the man rubbing his feet against the ground, rubbing some words on the mud:

"We are waiting for the patrol army on the border of Sichuan, and we are framed by Tusi, and I hope that the heroes will help."

The man wrote with his feet, and then glanced at the onlookers, but except for Zhao Bei and his subordinates, the other onlookers were indifferent, perhaps illiterate, or cowardly, in short, there was no one to help at present.

At this moment, the two toast slave dealers who were drinking tea in the teahouse came over, waved their rifles, shouted a few times, and ordered the four men to drive the twenty slaves from the ground.

The man who was writing on the ground with his feet wailed, knelt down on his legs, and kowtowed to the onlookers, and several women whimpered and knelt down.

"Smack!"

A toast slave raises the Mauser gun in his hand and fires it into the air.

The people scattered in a hurry, only Zhao Bei and his subordinates remained motionless, and the commander-in-chief's face had turned iron-blue, standing in a small circle formed by the guards and gritting his teeth.

"It's really like Lao Tzu is air!"

The commander-in-chief gritted his teeth in the midst of the guards, and Fu Huafeng stepped forward to negotiate with the leading slave traders.

"This Zhuowo, where are you going to take these people?"

"Go to the salt pan and change the salt." The leading strong man glanced at Fu Huafeng. "Do you want to buy it?"

"Let me tell you, you can't sell these people, this is no better than your toast, even in the former Qing Dynasty, this person can't buy and sell casually."

Fu Huafeng hadn't finished explaining this truth, and Na Zhuowo stretched out his hand and pushed him to stumble.

Before Fu Huafeng could attack, he heard the commander-in-chief's reprimand.

"Tian Jinfu, what are you still doing? Unload the gun, take the man! ”

In fact, the guards had been waiting for the commander-in-chief's words for a long time, and at this time, the military order, all of them pounced like tigers pounced, and all the grappling and fighting they usually learned came in handy, and it took almost no effort to press these six toast's men to the ground, and six revolvers were also pressed against their heads.

"It's all tied up for Lao Tzu! Tied tightly! ”

Tian Jinfu held the commander-in-chief's bag of orchid beans and scolded a few words.

The guards untied the ropes from the twenty slaves, tied up the six toast men, and then lifted them from the ground, and took a long string of ropes, the same ropes, but with a different object.

"Thank you! Thank you, good guy! ”

The man who was writing on the ground with his feet knelt down and kowtowed a few times to Zhao Bei, and the others were equally grateful, and several young women hugged each other and cried bitterly.

"You don't have to kowtow, stand up and go back with us first, I have something to ask you. Tian Jinfu, ask someone to go to the teahouse to buy some old clothes and put them on for these people. ”

Zhao Bei waved his hand and motioned for everyone to stand up.

"Who are you? Dare to tie us up? Do you know who we are? We are all the subordinates of the Great Snow Mountain Luo Tusi! Kalo Toast is now a friend of the Revolutionary Army! ”

The "Zhuo Wo" struggled and shouted a few words.

"Phew! Where is the revolutionary army with such 'friends' as you! ”

One of the guards rolled up his sleeves, went up and slapped him twice, kicked him over, and scolded while beating.

"How dare you hit me! How dare you hit me! You leave your name! You leave your name! I'll go back and tell the big toast Kalo! ”

The "Zhuowo" lay on the ground, still stubborn, and because the six toast men were strung together by ropes, one fell to the ground, and the others fell with him, and the guards swarmed up, punching and kicking.

Zhao Bei pulled the angry guards away, walked over, leaned over to look at the official of the toast, and reached out to slowly tear off the two pieces of dog skin plaster that were attached to his face.

"Kalo Toast, right? Lao Tzu remembered his name. You can also see clearly, Lao Tzu is the commander-in-chief of the Republican Army, the vanguard of the revolutionary army, Lao Tzu does not change his name or surname, Lao Tzu is Zhao Zhenhua of Zhaobei! ”