The night is dark and windy.

Hukou County, on Phoenix Ridge.

In the darkness outside the red wall belonging to the Zen temple, there is a longing figure.

"Why did shopkeeper Wang call Pindao over?"

A young man with a paralyzed face wearing a greasy Taoist robe came over.

He was carrying a mahogany sword on his back and a baggage on his shoulder. He asked with a slight tilt of his head towards the back of the short young man who was deploying his subordinates at any time in the darkness.

Wang Caozhi looked back at Lu Ya who was being chased back, and seemed to let out a breath.

"Master Lu, come with me and go to the side to talk."

Lu Ya said expressionlessly:

"Why can't I bring you a message? If I come here, I might have to miss the night boat at the crossing, and I won't be able to keep up with Duan Quanwu and Bai Huwei. This matter was ordered by Young Master Ouyang."

After Wang Caozhi heard this, he immediately waved his hand:

"It's a small matter. While I sent someone to call Daochang Lu, I also sent a few cronies to follow. They have prepared ships and will follow Duan Quanwu and his official ship to replace Daochang Lu... Daochang Dao can stay here with peace of mind. The important things at hand are important.

"

Lu Ya shook his head and said frankly: "But I have to rush back to the palace before the morning after tomorrow. I'm afraid I won't have time to stay too long."

Wang Caozhi was quiet for a while, seemed to make some calculations, and immediately made arrangements:

"If we rush back to Prince Xunyang's Mansion, we have already missed a boat. The Taoist priest can only take the earliest boat in the morning. There is still time. There is still time. Come over here without delaying the Taoist priest. Taoist priest, go this way

.”

After receiving the answer, Lu Ya seemed to acquiesce. He withdrew his eyes from him, moved forward with his hands behind his back, and at the same time looked around and asked:

"Where are you going?"

"The back hill of Guanyin Temple."

"Pindao knows, it's written on the plaque at the door of the temple. Pindao is asking where we should go to the back mountain and what we should do."

"Go and arrest people."

"Arrest someone?"

Wang Cao's words were concise and concise: "The subject under surveillance has changed, and seems to be in contact with someone."

Lu Ya tilted his head in confusion and asked:

"Who are you contacting? Your people can't deal with it? Didn't you have a plan before? Do you need Pindao to take temporary action?"

Wang Caozhi, who was walking in front, seemed to hesitate and replied:

"The latest news came in the middle of the night. The situation is a bit unexpected. It's better to have Director Lu take action to be safer, otherwise an accident may occur."

Lu Ya became more and more confused, paused, and then reminded:

"It is not part of Master Ouyang's plan to keep Pindao behind. Shopkeeper Wang is ready to go back and explain himself if something unexpected happens."

The young man with facial paralysis shook off his sleeves and robe, revealed a thin hand, pinched his fingers to calculate, and continued:

"In addition, Pindao must get on the boat tomorrow morning, otherwise he will not be able to return to the palace in time and will not be able to stay here for too long. Shopkeeper Wang should pay attention to this..."

Wang Caozhi, who was walking in front, suddenly stopped and tried to lower his voice, interrupting Lu Ya's nagging:

"Shhh, here we are, Director Lu, right in front."

Lu Ya stopped instantly and looked around.

I found that the place where I stopped was a forest of stone tablets, with stone tablets that looked like tombs. During the day, it might be Sumuzhuang, but at night, when it was completely dark, it looked eerie and weird, but it was suitable for hiding my figure.

If he hadn't known in advance that this was the mountain behind a Zen temple, he would have thought that Wang Caozhi had brought him to a mass grave.

It should be the third watch now,

Lu Ya withdrew his gaze and looked in the direction pointed by Wang Caozhi's finger, which was one mile away in the northeast.

This forest of stone steles is very large. They have just arrived at the southwest edge. A mile away in the northeast, they are roughly at the edge of the other corner of the forest. The stone steles over there are so tall and numerous that they can't see any movement.

Two competent secret sentries waiting here saw Wang Caozhi and Lu Ya came over and sneaked forward.

"Shopkeeper, you are here!"

Lu Ya saw them whispering something into Wang Caozhi's ear.

Their voices were very low, but some faint intermittent words drifted into Lu Ya's keen ears with the night wind.

"...The thin man slipped out of the courtyard in the middle of the night... He got in for half an hour... There has been no movement... We didn't get too close... He probably didn't notice us..."

"Before you, the shopkeeper, came here, some strange men who were spotted by us while walking up the mountain in the evening also sneaked over and slipped in... It turned out to be a joint..."

Wang Caozhi, who was listening attentively, suddenly turned his head and asked in a somewhat serious voice:

"Are you sure you saw clearly that group of people coming?"

The secret whistle man nodded vigorously:

"You're right, I have very good eyesight. When I pretended to be a passerby passing by in the evening, I took a look. Under the collar of my soap jacket, I definitely had armor. There was a high probability that I was carrying a weapon. Few of us dared to get close. It was obvious at first glance.

It's so annoying, so I can only call the shopkeeper..."

"Okay, you go down and call everyone here."

"Yes, from the shopkeeper."

The two secretly sentry men did not dare to look at the paralyzed young man in Taoist robes strolling beside Wang Caozhi, and quietly retreated.

There were only two people left in the same place.

Wang Caozhi turned around and looked at Lu Ya.

The latter had a paralyzed face.

The two looked at each other silently for a moment.

"How many people?"

"We have found seven people so far, including the man named Qian Chen."

After a pause, he added: "I don't rule out whether there are others lying in wait."

Lu Ya suddenly stretched out his hand: "Take off your socks."

"Socks? Are they here?"

Wang Caozhi stared blankly at the paralyzed face.

But Lu Ya nodded and stretched out his hand expressionlessly.

Wang Caozhi felt a little embarrassed, looked around, quickly bent down and took off his boots, and took off the red stockings on both feet.

At this moment, after taking off his socks, he belatedly realized that both pairs of socks were on backwards. After receiving the news at night, he hurried out without paying attention...

After Wang Caozhi took off his socks, he hurriedly handed them over to Lu Ya's hands while they were still warm.

Lu Ya lowered his head and looked at the angry red socks, then looked up at Wang Caozhi who was blushing.

The latter covered his mouth and coughed, looked away, and whispered:

"A girl from the tribe gave it to me, saying nonsense that I am guilty of Tai Sui this year and need to hide. Wearing this thing can not only hide, but also transport... Ahem, I don't know if it is a crime of Tai Sui, but the transport... As expected, at the beginning of the year

I met good brothers-in-law and good sisters.”

Lu Ya ignored it, took out a yellow talisman from his arms, threw it to him, and casually told:

"Stay here, and after half a stick of incense, make some noise, preferably something that can be heard by the entire forest of stone tablets. If a fish that slips through the net approaches, throw out this talisman, then turn around and run away."

As Lu Ya spoke, he took out an incense stick and a fire stick from his sleeve. He folded the incense stick into two sticks and lit half of each stick.

Half of the stick was inserted at Wang Cao's feet, and the other half was twisted between two fingers and put into the sleeve of the robe.

Wang Caozhi nodded like a chicken pecking at rice: "Okay, by the way, do you want to wait until all our people are here... Hey, wait, don't leave yet, remember to stay alive, alive!"

Before he could finish his words, which he tried to lower his voice, the figure of the young man with a paralyzed face next to him had disappeared without a trace.

Took away a pair of red socks from him.

Only half a stick of incense was left in the soil at his feet.

I don’t know if I heard what he said later.

Wang Caozhi was speechless. He lowered his head and looked at the yellow paper talisman. It was too dark to see the talisman clearly. He only felt a little wet and sticky on his hands.

When he thought of Lu Ya's dirty monk's robe that had not been washed for an unknown amount of time, he pinched his nose in disgust as he had a mysophobia.

By the way, the Sanqing Taoist priests should be abstaining from sex, so this sticky yellow talisman should not be dirty, right...?

Wang Caozhi couldn't help but murmur in his heart.

However, Daochang Lu is so good, why do you want his hot socks? Is it because he likes them? Some men like women's feet? Could it be that Daochang has the opposite hobby? If I had known, I would have asked him, if he was really determined by the latter

Can't give it!

Even though it was a critical moment, he still couldn't help but think about everything.
To be continued...