The spy fled into the door of the master's house, and as soon as he said half a word to Gongzi Jia, Gongsun Xia led the patrol to call the door. Gongzijia broke out in a cold sweat, he thought that Zixi had solved the case; But Gongsun Xia pretended not to know and told him that the spy had just been discovered in the city, and that person had disappeared into the area. He told Gongzi Jia to strengthen his vigilance in case of accidents.

Gongzi Jia was relieved at this time. After sending Gongsun Xia away, he was depressed and fearful. He knew that it was impossible to pass on information, but he did not know if he had been exposed; He weighed the pros and cons and had no choice but to put an end to the rebellion.

On the Chu side, Wang Ziwu is also anxiously waiting for news. According to the prior agreement, Gongzijia should have sent the information out a long time ago; However, the Chu army has launched an attack on Chunmen for two days, and there is still no news in the city. Wang Ziwu didn't want to continue to pin his hopes on that chaotic minister and thief, and quickly lifted the siege of Xinzheng.

On the day the left army left Xinzheng, it encountered very bad weather. In the afternoon, a steep north wind blew and the clear sky was suddenly covered with dark clouds, followed by cold winter rain.

At first, Wang Ziwu didn't take it seriously. But the winter rains are getting heavier and heavier, and there is no sign of stopping. The clothes of the Chu people were already very thin, but now they were soaked, and tens of thousands of people shivered, silently marching in the cold and muddy wilderness.

Wang Ziwu also felt the biting cold, and he ordered him to set up camp. The Chu people hid in tents, but the tents were soon dozen. When night falls, the winter rain gradually turns into sleet, and the clothes freeze into hard shells and stick to the body; At nightfall, the sleet turns to goose feather snow and the ground begins to freeze.

Although there were countless fires in the Chu people, there were still people who could not get warm due to the lack of firewood. Later, people raised torches, brought axes, and searched helplessly for trees in the snowy night, but many never returned.

The soldiers were generally physically strong and better dressed; But the miscellaneous servants were miserable, and they had to huddle together to keep each other warm. It snowed heavily all night. When the sun rose the next day, those who survived were not shocked and wept at the tragic sight before them: the barracks were covered with objects of their own shape, covered with heavy snow. People pulled objects out of the snow, but they saw that they were piles of handymen huddled together and frozen to death, and they couldn't tell the difference; There are countless people with frostbite, and some of them are stroking their unconscious feet, as if they want to wake up a sleeping friend, trying to wake up their own feet.

It was impossible to bury them in situ, and Wang Ziwu could not bear to leave the bodies of the victims in the wilderness, so he used all means to transport them to a place where the graves could be dug for burial.

Speaking of the coalition forces, Jin Pinggong was worried about Zheng Guo's attack, but Shi Kuang said: "The prince doesn't have to worry. I played the music of the north many times, and I played the music of the south; Nanle is not strong, and most of them are mourning deaths. The Chu people will not succeed. ”

Uncle Dong, the doctor, said: "The way of heaven (the trajectory of Jupiter) is in the northwest, and when the southern army goes out to fight against the sky, it will inevitably return in vain. ”

Shu Xiang said: "Both of them are right, but even so, the root cause of the defeat of the Chu army is still the weak virtue and wrong decisions of the monarch. ”

The alliance of princes turned around from Yishui and marched eastward, and then held a bloody ceremony in Duyang City. The book reads: "From now on, the big country must not invade the small country!" "The Jin people arrested the Duke of Qi again, because the State of Yi always acted as a pawn of the Qi people; The Jin people re-surveyed the boundary between Lu and Lu, and assigned a large area of land to Lu.

Jin Ping Gongzhi returned home ahead of schedule, and the coalition forces also left. Lu Xianggong held a grand thank-you banquet for Jin Liuqing, and he gave Liuqing three lives and a doctor's one life. After the meeting, he privately gave it to the Bank of China Yanbao Baobi and Shoumeng Baoding.

At this time, it was the first month of the nineteenth year of Lu Xianggong, and Wu Gao said that the prophecy of the Bank of China "not living this year" was self-defeating. Bank of China Yan inspired confidence in his future life, and even felt that Wu Gao was a mediocre witch who relied on alarmism to deceive and cheat.

Bank of China talked about Gaowu with his uncle Sun Leopard in a playful tone, and Uncle Sun Leopard couldn't bear to extinguish his newly rekindled flame of hope, but he had to remind him: "Lu State uses Zhou Calendar and Jianzi, Jin State uses Xia Calendar and Jianyin; The summer calendar is two months later than the weekly calendar. According to the summer calendar, it is still not entering the second year. ”

Zhongxingyan's heart fell silent again, and the ministers advised him to cross the river as soon as possible in order to break the spell imposed on him. He said, "I have sworn a heavy oath, and the river gods have given me what I want, and now the time has come for me to keep my promise, and I cannot fail to keep my word!" ”

Early the next morning, Zhongxingyan felt some pain in the back of his neck. He touched it with his hand, and felt an induration bulging in the occipital bone, opposite the mouth, and it was very painful to touch. He muttered to himself, "It's finally here, the Heavenly Emperor River Divine Fruit won't deceive me." ”

The doctor came in a hurry and quickly made a diagnosis, and the Bank of China was suffering from an incurable disease - "mouth sores". It is also known as "head gangrene", and the scientific name is "encephalogenous", which is caused by damp heat and evil poison in the body. The mouth sores grow larger and larger, gradually spread, and ulcerate in the shape of a honeycomb, and the sores can reach deep into the spinal cord, as if they have been cut. The disease was painful and terrifying, and at the time there was almost no cure, and the patient would soon die in excruciating pain.

Refusing to heal and alleviate the pain, he endured the inhuman punishment of the king's killers. The Jin army began to move west, and when he reached the land of the ferry, he was bedridden and unable to move. The doctors who had already crossed the Yellow River all returned, ready to send the stubborn Chinese general on his last journey.

The sergeant came to the tent of the Chinese army and asked to see the last side of the Zhongxingyan. At this time, Zhongxingyan's head was in severe pain, his eyes were protruding, and his sores emitted a rotten breath, which was unpleasant, and there was only one person by his side. His haughty disposition made him unwilling to be seen by his friends as horrible, preferring to die alone and with dignity, and said, "I will see no one." ”

He said to his companions, "Ask the Master, who he wants to appoint as his heir." ”

Zhongxingyan replied, "Zheng nephew." These were his last words. Zheng nephew is Bank of China Wu, and his mother is Zheng Guoren, so he is called "Zheng nephew".

In the middle of the night on February 19 (the 19th day of the 12th month of the summer calendar), Zhongxingyan passed away in endless pain.

Only then was the scholars and the scholars able to enter the big tent to collect his body. Seeing that he couldn't close his eyes and mouth, and that he was holding his head with his hands (just like the posture that Zhongxingyan dreamed of protecting his head and walking), he stroked his eyes and said, "Master, don't worry, how dare we not serve Wu like we serve Master?" Bank of China's eyes still don't close.

Luan Ying said: "The master is still worried about the great cause of Vaqi!" After all, the Qi State has not yet succumbed. He also stroked Zhongxingyan's eyes and said, "Master, look away, if you can't complete Master's unfinished business, let the river god punish me!" ”

Only then did Zhong Xingyan close his eyes, his mouth could open, and Shi Kuo immediately put a piece of jade into the corpse's mouth.

Shi Kuo walked out of the tent, looked at Xinghan Yinhe and sighed: "My genius is too shallow, I am not as good as a young man, I am really ashamed of the three words 'big husband'!" ”