Chapter 8

Anji Meixi, the west bank of the lake after the rain is clear, the sun shines through the bottom and looks far away, as if a piece of crystal clear jade is inlaid between heaven and earth, Lin Tie and Chongzhou County Secretary Li Shuyi and others take a light boat to land, the microwave ripples, the Tianmu Mountain in the distance is verdant like jade, the waterfront of the mountain, the white stone pagoda of more than two zhang is shining in the sun, people sit on the boat, as if walking in the painting.

Along the way, wind and rain, there are few sunny weather, today's weather is so bright, Lin Jian stood at the bow of the boat and felt comfortable, this is the twenty-first day that he left Chongzhou and entered the three prefectures along the Taihu Lake to raise grain.

Meixi is a market town in Anji County, Huzhou Prefecture, Meixi Shu's family is not a family of Shixun, and there are no children in the family who have meritorious reputations. Lin Jian also only knew that the Meixi Shu family did not buy the Qu family to send people to attack the estuary.

From a distance, there were some people standing on the shore who were all dressed in long shirts and scarves, thinking that the Shu family had received the news and came to the lake embankment to greet them. It was still far away, Lin Jian also sat on the bow of the boat casually, and said with Li Shuyi, the secretary of the Chongzhou County household next to him, and said with a smile: "It is said that the local snakes in Anji County are not easy to mess with, I think they are quite welcoming and enthusiastic about us coming from afar to raise food......

Welcome a fart, enthusiastic fart, Li Shuyi secretly sighed in his heart, but said with a smile on his face: "Thanks to Lord Lin's fame, the squire of Anji County is open-minded and knows ......."

Lin Jian smiled slightly, he didn't care what Li Shuyi had to say about him, he came out to raise food and brought Li Shuyi with him, just because he was afraid that Li Shuyi would interfere with Lin Mengde, Fu Qinghe, and Hu Zhiyong in Xisha Island.

Li Shuyi was born in Xiucai, and he is also a person who reads poetry and books, and he has participated in several township examinations and has failed, and he temporarily lives in the county as a bookmaker, but he has no idea of being born in a foreign examination. Along the way, most of the time was on the boat, Lin Jian had nothing to do, and he also talked to Li Shuyi about the history of books and scriptures to pass the time, I don't know that Li Shuyi is resentful and incomprehensible, but he no longer regards him as a snake and scorpion in words and deeds, which can be regarded as a great improvement.

Li Shuyi glanced back, the shallow water near the shore, the "Jiyun No. 1" and "Jiyun No. 2" two ships with deep draft, could anchor in the middle of the water a little far away from the lake embankment, he and Lin Lian, Ao Canghai and others took a light boat, and more than 20 soldiers took the other two light boats to escort them ashore to meet with the Meixi Shu family and talk about raising grain.

The two armed warships "Jiyun 1" and "Jiyun 2" set off several small fishing boats around them very tall, and more than 100 soldiers stood on the deck in armor, in addition to the homeless brave and more than 300 boatmen and sailors.

The Qu family bandit case is not trivial and involves a wide range of people, and the Qu family, a powerful family that lasted for more than 200 years, disappeared overnight; The former Hubu Shangshu and the great Confucian Chen Xiyan were also forced to petition for the guilty table because of their relationship with the Qu family, and they lost hope of ascending to the throne; It is even more impossible for the Qu family to buy the forces of the Taihu Lake Water Village that participated in the attack on the estuary, and it is even more impossible to clear the relationship.

This is not a matter of the Qing people who have cleared themselves, more than 300 Taihu Lake thieves who participated in the attack on the estuary of the river have been charged into the Jiangning garrison, and dozens of bandit leaders have been imprisoned in the Jinchuan Prison Island Prison, it can be said that Gu Wuchen has any evidence if he wants. Besides, the Qu family has monopolized the rice and grain trade imported into Jiangning by the Pingjiang, Danyang, and Huzhou prefectures for a hundred years, and the power of Taihu Lake Water Village and the local gentry have some overt or covert connections with the Qu family.

It is good to say that there are many scholars who are officials, and they are self-contained in the government and the opposition, headed by Chen Xiyan, who is the Wu Party. The Wu Party lost in the struggle for the position of the Chu Party this time, and it was inevitable that they would be hit, and the sons and daughters of the officials would either be demoted or dismissed, but they would not have to worry about ruining their families and clans, and no matter how severe the situation of the struggle was, it would be impossible to throw themselves into the Chu Party.

The forces of Taihu Lake Water Village, which belong to the nature of self-protection, do not have this confidence.

Chen Xiyan has no hope of being in a position, Chen Xinbo is lonely, no one in the DPRK and China can restrain the Chu Party's forces, and how broad and deep the Qu Jiatong bandit case will be implicated depends entirely on the face of the Chu Party.

At this time, all the forces of Taihu Lake Water Village are in danger and panic, and those who have a door think that they are not deeply involved, and they move around early, at this time, Gu Wuchen is engaged in the name of war preparation and food raising, how can they not know the good and bad?

The local government and county yamen completely ignored Lin Tie's entry into the country under the banner of the tiger skin, but as long as the Qu family was not bribed this time, the Taihu Lake Water Village forces that sent people to directly participate in the attack on the estuary were eagerly looking forward to the arrival of Lin Tie's "food raising envoy".

Li Shuyi left Xisha Island with Lin Tie, entered Jiyang Lake from Donglai River, entered Taihu Lake through Chenghu Lake and then entered Dianshan Lake, and entered Huzhou by Zhuxi.

For the Shanshui Zhai forces, this is an opportunity to spend money to clear their names and defend their innocence.

Lin Jian is also very clear about the purpose of his trip, the bid is low, but it makes the forces of the water village feel uneasy, and they will sit on the ground and start the price when they go to the place, of course, they will also let the water village bargain, in short, everyone must be happy.

In the past 20 days, a total of more than 60,000 stones of grain have been raised, and more than 80,000 taels of silver have been raised.

Raising grain, Lin Tie made each Shuizhai self-prepared grain ship to Xisha Island and Dongyang respectively; There are 40,000 stone of relief grain on Xisha Island, which is enough to cope with three months' worth of relief for the victims of Xisha Island.

Except for some of the money raised, which was used to purchase a large number of porcelain, iron, bricks, wooden mules, horses and other disaster relief materials along the way to Xisha Island along the way, most of them were intercepted by Lin Tie and loaded on the ship.

In addition to obtaining so much food money, the key is to stabilize the situation in the Taihu Lake Basin.

Li Shuyi complained bitterly in his heart, according to the inspection and envoy division, the Xuanfu envoy and the prefecture and county yamen belong to two different systems, he worked so hard with Lin Lian, greedy for less than a penny of silver, not only did it not benefit his career at all, but he got along with Lin Tie for a long time, and he may be suspicious and ostracized by his colleagues in the future.

The most important thing is that Li Shuyi knew that Lin Jian was killing in Jiangning, and more than 300 people from Taihu Water Village died under his knife, more than 300 people were arrested and confiscated into the army, and dozens of leaders were imprisoned in the Jinchuan Prison Island Prison under his jurisdiction.

Along the way, every time he accompanied Lin Jian to land in a light boat, negotiated with Zhushui Village and bargained about raising food, Li Shuyi was afraid that people who were good would suddenly fall their cups, and countless men with knives would pour out from behind the screen to chop them into meat scraps, and he was even more afraid that everyone was drinking tea and eating wine in a good manner, and suddenly he covered his throat and rolled around on the ground and poisoned.

Along the way, Li Shuyi felt that he was a live fish dragged onto the cutting board by Lin Lianqiang, waiting for the knife to chop down with his eyes open, this kind of fear is really not something that people can bear.

In the first ten days, in addition to the continuous harassment of small groups of lake bandits along the way, the negotiation with Zhujia Shanshui Village to raise grain was very smooth, and no special incidents occurred. No matter how stupid Li Shuyi was, he could guess that Lin Jian had an accurate list in his hands, which also made him hate Lin Jian so much, and he was frightened for more than ten days in vain, and a lot of his hair fell out every day.

The same is true for people, once they think through and let go out, the fear in their hearts will recede like a tide, and suddenly disappear without a trace.

The 200 sturdy men selected from the victims of the disaster traveled with the boat to supplement the shortage of manpower, and at first they were at a loss for what to do on the boat, but in the past few days they have been able to assist the boatmen in operating the boat in an orderly manner, and assist the soldiers to fight back against the harassment of the lake pirates along the way. There are more than 200 people, and the four leaders of the disaster victims led by Ning Zechen are even more vigilant.

Of course, the displaced people on Xisha Island suffered a disaster, and the local government in Chongzhou County abandoned them like a cover, regardless of whether they were left to live or die, only Lin Tie stepped forward, rescued the needy, gave them a way to live, and even gave them a way to settle down and other hopes.

Thinking about it at this time, Li Shuyi felt that he didn't have any special prejudices against Lin Bin. Shilin Qingliu regarded Lin Jian as an anomaly, mostly because of his arrogant and domineering words and deeds, Li Shuyi had been with him for nearly a month, and felt that it was not so much that his words and deeds were arrogant and domineering, but that this person was a bit of a maverick. As far as the disaster relief on Xisha Island is concerned, it is hard to imagine that there are people in Chongzhou County who can do a better job than Lin Lian.

Li Shuyi did not agree with the abandonment of the disaster-stricken people on Xisha Island at first, because their middle- and lower-level officials were all in Chongzhou City, and once the displaced people of Xisha Island followed the example of Liu An'er, the thief of Hongze, Chongzhou City would be in danger; Ninghaizhen's garrison in the Junshan Fortress is not worth relying on. However, Li Shuyi is soft-spoken in the county, and his opinions cannot affect Chen Kun, the county magistrate. Seeing Chen Kun deflated in front of Lin Lian, and even Geng Weide, who usually relied on Chen Kun's trust to be powerful in the county, gave Lin Jian a cruel lesson, Li Shuyi was not unhappy in his heart.

The lake embankment is getting closer, and he can almost see the expressions on the faces of those people on the shore, Li Shuyi thought in his heart that after the harvest of Anji County, there would be no further delay along the way to return to Chongzhou, and the journey would be smooth sailing, and it would only take three or two days to arrive in Chongzhou, and this drudgery would be the end.

Li Shuyi was thinking wildly, suddenly heard the sound of horses' hooves, looked sideways, a jujube red horse galloped quickly from the west, the knight crouched on the horse's back and couldn't see his face clearly, but it attracted the attention of everyone in the lake and on the embankment.

Seeing this anomaly, Lin Jian decisively signaled the oarsman to stop the boat, frowned and looked at the situation on the embankment, and many people wearing long robes who greeted him on the embankment had different faces, only to see the knight who suddenly broke into the vicinity to rein his horse and turned sideways, raised his hand and raised the hunting bow hidden under the horse's belly before, and pulled the bow with an arrow, and heard a sharp sound piercing the air and shooting towards this side.

Li Shuyi was startled when he saw the arrow shooting towards this side, and subconsciously wanted to hide behind Lin Lian, but he was afraid that he would take Lin Lian lightly, so he stopped stiffly; The guards on the left and right had stepped forward to protect them behind them.

"It's a messenger arrow, scoop it up." Lin Jian said calmly.

Lin Lian's voice fell, and the white pole arrow that was thrown away by the head of the arrow fell into the water three or four feet away from the bow of the boat, Li Shuyi was secretly ashamed, and felt that Lin Lian was really not as calm as an ordinary person, so he calmly judged in advance from the trajectory of the arrow that the arrow would fall into the water three or four feet away.

The guards scooped up the white pole arrow in the water and handed it to Lin Tie, Lin Tie untied the small oil paper bag tied to the tail of the arrow shaft, unfolded the note inside, and said: "I always thought that the luxury family would not make me too comfortable, but I didn't expect them to endure until this time before they started to do anything, there are ambushes on the shore, let's go back to the big boat!" Be careful with fishing boats left and right and don't let them approach easily. He handed the note to Ao Canghai on the side, and motioned for the oarsman to turn around and row back; The soldiers were also on guard, and the bow of the ship was even erected with a large shield to prevent ambushes hidden in the several fishing boats scattered on the left and right.

Li Shuyi didn't know who Lin Lian was referring to when he said "luxury family", was it true that he was in Jin'an Hou Luxury Wenzhuang? But someone on a flying horse shot an arrow from the shore to report the news, which also made him aware of the lurking danger.

When the three assault boats turned their heads, Li Shuyi looked back, the archery messenger was turning his horse's head and running back, and more than a dozen horsemen galloped out of a peach grove far away from the lake embankment to intercept him, Li Shuyi felt a chill down his spine: There were really ambushes in the peach trees! Li Shuyi didn't know why someone would report to them in time, he saw that the messenger stabbed the ambush soldier who rushed out first, and he didn't know if he was injured, so he saw that he could get rid of the entanglement and flee into the distance before closing the siege.

Lin Jian had no time to take care of the messenger on the shore, so he took off the waist knife and held it in his hand, took off his green robe and threw it on the board of the boat at will, revealing his short cardigan, and while asking the guards to help him put on the scale armor, he kicked a shield at Li Shuyi's feet, and said: "You take the shield in the middle of the boat, cover your head and chest, and be careful to fall into the river, no one will be able to take care of you later." ”

A few times before, Li Shuyi and Lin Tie were on the big ship, he hid in the cabin, and watched Lin Tie fight back on the deck, at this time, standing on the assault light boat without a canopy, the width of the hull was not even as long as a spear, Li Shuyi was inevitably flustered, took the shield, sat in the middle of the cabin, and saw that Lin Tie had already put on his armor, holding a shield in his left hand and a knife in his left hand, ready to fight, thinking that Lin Tie was just a move, he could not panic the enemy, and he couldn't be too dumbfounded, and looked ahead calmly.

Seven or eight fishing boats scattered on the lake before saw that the three assault boats suddenly turned back after receiving the news, and they all tore off their camouflage and came to intercept them together, and each fishing boat had seven or eight armor guards coming out from under the canopy, half of them were holding big bows in their hands, and a total of more than 30 big bows were shot at arrows every seventy or eighty paces.

The sword and shield hand raised a large shield on the bow of the ship, and the cluster of arrows struck the large skin shield with a dull dull sound. The sword and shield hand in front couldn't bear the pain and let out two screams one after another, Lin Jian looked over, only to know that it was not simple to hide the enemy on the fishing boat, there were many iron arrows at a distance of seventy or eighty steps through the skin wooden shield, one of the sword and shield hand was close to the shield, and the arrow was shot under the flank, and the palms of the two sword and shield hands were nailed together with the wooden shield.

There are no more people on board, and there is no more space. Except for the person who was hit by the arrow under the flank and replaced, the two sword and shield hands with their palms and wooden shields nailed together with iron arrows only took off the wound medicine bottle from their waist and sprinkled half a bottle of medicine powder to the wound to stop bleeding and relieve pain, and the arrow was not able to be pulled out, and the big shield was supported by his shoulders and continued to hold on to the bow of the ship.

"Double shields on the bow of the ship! Pay attention to the protection on the side side, watch out for the enemy throwing arrows, and prepare to shoot back! Ao Canghai ordered in a deep voice.

Ao Canghai had previously served as a military attache of the forward battalion for a long time in the Chen Zhihu Department of the Eastern Fujian Army, and his understanding of cold weapons and hand-to-hand combat was deeper than that of Lin Tie, and the assault light boat soldiers were naturally commanded by him.

Lin Jian clenched the hilt of his sword, his eyes fixed on the enemy ship in front of him.

He never thought that except for a few innocuous lake pirate attacks, he would be able to raise food and pay all the way and return to Chongzhou safely.

The main purpose of the extravagant family's integration of the Donghai Kou forces on the islands of Changguo County was to attack the economic foundation of the imperial court in the southeastern counties. As long as the luxury family sent someone to kill him in Taihu Lake, they could easily disintegrate the disaster relief situation on Xisha Island, so that the nearly 30,000 displaced people on Xisha Island could be brought back into chaos, and the luxury family would be given the opportunity to take advantage of the chaos to grasp or instigate rebellion.

Even though he knew that this trip was dangerous, Lin Lian, as a "food envoy who prepared the army according to the inspection envoy", could not help but personally come forward to contact various Shuizhai forces to raise food and wages.

Along the way, Wu Qi accompanied him, but no one else stayed on the boat with Lin Lian, but sneaked along the way to reconnoiter for anything abnormal.

After all, due to the lack of manpower, it is impossible to monitor all the passages into the Taihu Lake Basin, not to mention that in addition to sending elites to infiltrate, the luxury family can also directly buy the Shuizhai forces to set up ambushes in advance, so Wu Qi can only send people to monitor the Shuizhai that Lin Jian is about to visit in advance.

This side can reconnoitre, the luxury family rebellion has been ten years, and the experience of various struggles is unusually rich, so he is naturally proficient in counter-reconnaissance.

Lin Tie didn't know who the opponent behind the command was this time, but it was by no means simple, and he could endure it until Anji County, Huzhou, not only to wait for Lin Tie to relax and respect, but also to see that the reconnaissance force that Lin Tie could send was limited, and they could calmly lay out in Anji County and wait for Lin Tie to take the initiative to jump into the trap.

Wu Qi also waited for the other party to deploy the ambush soldiers into the peach grove at the last moment before he noticed the abnormality, and sent someone to rush in on horseback in time to shoot arrows to report the news.

The more he got to the end, the more careful Lin Jian became. came to contact the Meixi Shu family, although he still landed on the shore in an assault light boat as usual, but Lin Jian only planned to negotiate the food on the shore, and in addition, he also prepared more big shields and strong crossbows in the assault light boat than before, just to prevent the Shu family from buying the luxury family.

Lin Jian stared ahead, these ambush soldiers began to prepare to shoot the second round of arrows, the two sides were close to fifty paces, and the other side also realized that there would be a defensive shield on this side, and more than a dozen people were divided to raise the bow body, and they wanted to change the flat shot to a projectile. They didn't see the "Jiyun 1" and "Jiyun 2" behind them, although they were three or four hundred steps away from this side and had no time to raise their sails to rush to the rescue, but the lacquered cloth on the bow of the ship was lifted, revealing the four bed crossbows that had been wound up a long time ago.

The three-bow bed crossbow was fixed on the deck, and a bed crossbow was operated by five people at the same time, and the iron cluster of giant arrows as thick as a giant spear flickered with a deadly cold light, and after shooting, it rubbed the air and made a sharp sound of breaking the air. As the enemy fired the second round of arrows, four crossbow arrows, one pierced a fishing boat and two fell into the water, but the only one shot pierced the three ambushes from the chest, abdomen to thigh.

Ao Canghai also made the guards fire crossbow arrows in time, disrupting the rhythm of the second round of archery shooting by the ambush soldiers; The ambush shoots in the second round to disturb the front and back, and it is much more sparse.

Although the crossbow is slow to open the string, the bow power is so great that it is beyond the reach of ordinary foot bows, and at a distance of sixty steps, only scale armor and plate armor can effectively prevent the shooting of the crossbow. Although the enemy soldiers all wore armor, there were very few people who wore scale armor, and there was no big shield to cover them, and the twelve crossbows on this side shot together, and suddenly five or six ambush soldiers were shot, and three fell into the river.

Seeing that there were no other enemy ships coming around, Ao Canghai knew that the enemy was afraid of seeing through this side, so the ambush troops were mainly deployed on the shore, and there were only these seven fishing boats in the water. In this way, Ao Canghai no longer took the initiative to break through the battle, but took advantage of the speed of the assault light boat to distance himself from the fishing boat, and used the crossbow to shoot at the other side, and then gave the three-bow bed crossbow on the two thousand-stone ships to find an opportunity to shoot vigorously.

"Jiyun 1" and "Jiyun 2" raised their sails one after another, and when the fishing boats saw that they could not find a favorable fighter plane for fighting on the water, they dispersed to the shore and helped each other with the ambush soldiers on the shore.

Lin Jian climbed up the bow of the "Jiyun One" from the rope ladder, stood on the deck and looked at the lake embankment, most of the people who had greeted him had already dispersed, and there were still three or five people left for the ambush soldiers to stand there and point to this side.

Although there are only two or three hundred ambush soldiers on the shore, there are only more than 100 armor soldiers that can be used in Lin Lian's hands, and the other 300 people, in addition to the boatmen and miscellaneous laborers, are the 200 people who have been newly recruited to make up for the lack of manpower.

"Is the ambush an extravagant thing?" The big loach lord was wearing scale armor and asked with a solemn expression.

"Although it has not been found yet, but in addition to the luxury family, who else can give the Shu family a suitable bargaining chip?" Lin Jian said.

According to the information that Lin Jian obtained, the Meixi Shu family did not send people to attack the estuary, and they had contact with the Qu family but were not very close, but they ambushed Lin Jian in Meixi Lake at this time, and even the yellow mud in the crotch of his pants turned into - only the luxury family could open a bargaining chip to make the Shu family's yellow mud turn into, maybe the Shu family had already bought it for the luxury family, and it was the hidden stake of the luxury family cloth at the junction of Jiangdong and Zhejiang.

"What now? I don't think the silver in Anji County is easy to collect, so I think we should withdraw from Meixi Lake and return to Dianshan Lake through Zhuxi to return to Chongzhou. Li Shuyi also regained his composure at this time, listening to Lin Jian discussing the enemy situation with his subordinates, he couldn't help but come over and interject a word, after all, he and Lin Jian were court officials.

"I'm worried that before entering Zhuxi, we will encounter ambushes at the mouth of Meixi Lake, and even if we break out of the lake, the road ahead will not be peaceful," Lin Jian said, "This trap, we will not be so easy to break out of." ”

"Are they still rebelling?" Li Shuyi asked, "It's really not good, we can go to Anji County for a while." ”

Lin Jian shook his head slightly, he had to wait for Wu Qi to be brought onto the boat before he could further understand the situation on the shore, at least to roughly find out how many Donghai Kou had infiltrated before he could determine what to do next.

**************

PS: Ask for a red ticket, the update is a big chapter of 6,000 words.