Five or six days later, a Dongchang team of more than fifty people crossed the Guanzhong Plain, entered the Qinling Mountains, and arrived near Chencang.
After the continuous rapid march, everyone was exhausted, and the military horses under their crotches had also obviously lost weight.
Next to the official road, there is a clear stream flowing slowly, and the grass on both sides is green and glowing with a plump blue light.
Early in the morning, I set off from the official post in Fengxiang Mansion and ran another hundred miles without taking a breath.
At this moment, seeing everyone's mouths dry and hearing the heavy breathing of the army horses under his legs, Xiao Chen reined in the horses, looked around, and said slowly: "Rest on the spot for half an hour."
Hearing Xiao Chen's order, the fatigue of the captains disappeared, and with the sound of laughter, they drove their horses toward the stream.
After a while, people were sitting on both sides of the stream. They were holding water in their hands to quench their thirst.
And those military horses also began to eat heavily in the grass on the shore.
Lying quietly on the grass, Duan Tianming held his head in his hands, looked at the blue sky above his head, and said casually: "We have traveled more than two thousand miles along the way. The weather is smooth everywhere, and there is no trace of it at all.
Signs of drought."
"After leaving the Qinling Mountains, take a look. Further west, the further you go, the less rain there is and the more drought you get." Xiao Chen on the other side replied.
"Have you been to Gongchang?" Duan Tianming couldn't help but ask.
"I joined Jinyiwei as a handyman when I was thirteen years old. How could I have been to Gongchang Mansion?"
"Then what you said was impressive. I thought you had been there."
"I have never been there. After Xiao Lizi left for Gongchang Mansion, I checked a lot of information about Gongchang. It's not like you, who always fights unprepared battles." Xiao Chen laughed on the side.
"Isn't this about you?"
"Just rely on me. What if I'm not here? Who can you rely on?"
"If you're not here, of course I have to rely on myself." Duan Tianming chuckled.
"I wonder if Liu Rufeng has returned to Jinyiwei? This time, the task given to him is still very difficult." Xiao Chen easily broke off a grass branch and held it in his mouth.
"It's been five or six days, I should have gone back."
"He has gone back. The master of the factory will probably arrange for Du Shaoqin to manage the training of the Divine Machine Soldiers."
"Besides him, where else can anyone be used in Dongchang?"
"That's right, now that the Gongchang Mansion disaster relief is over, it's time for us to train some talents for Dongchang."
"No."
Half an hour passed in a hurry, Xiao Chen stood up, greeted everyone, mounted his military horse, kicked up billows of dust on the official road, and galloped away.
Halfway up the mountainside facing the river beach, two figures emerged from behind a big tree.
Wearing a powerful outfit, he held a three-foot-long ghost-headed sword in his hand.
"Looking at how they are dressed, they must be from Dongchang."
"Let's go, light the beacon fire, and notify the gang leader to intercept and kill them in the valley."
After glancing at the dust on the official road in the distance, the two of them hurriedly ran towards the top of the mountain.
Not long after, a line of blue smoke rose into the sky from the top of the mountain.
Although the official roads in the hinterland of the Qinling Mountains are three or four feet wide, they are all built according to the trend of the mountains, and are basically located in valleys close to rivers.
Like an earthworm, it meanders forward.
Xiao Chen and his group were in a hurry to get on their way, and they bypassed the mountain in a blink of an eye, not noticing the smoke on the top of the mountain at all.
Half an hour later, everyone arrived at an area that looked very dangerous and had sharp turns.
On both sides are cliffs towering hundreds of feet high and extending for dozens of feet in depth.
"Xiao Chen, Xiao Chen." Duan Tianming, who was behind him, chased after him on horseback.
"Is something wrong?" Xiao Chen slowly reined in the horse's rein.
"Look at the valley in front of you. It's easy to defend but difficult to attack. Is it the same place where Han Xin secretly assassinated Chen Cang?"
"What nonsense are you talking about?" Xiao Chen laughed, "Han Xin is going south, he wants to enter Shu. We are going west, in two directions."
"If this were a war-torn era, it would be a heavily guarded place, right?"
"Perhaps. However, there are many such dangerous places in the Qinling Mountains, and they must be heavily guarded. How many troops will it cost?" Xiao Chen said with a smile.
"Guard one place, it's one place. If you retreat step by step like this, it won't take more than a few passes, and you can probably retreat the enemy."
"Ah, I don't know that Captain Du has such insight. If he was born in the Three Kingdoms, he must be someone like Han Xin." Xiao Chen looked at Duan Tianming and joked.
"Hahaha." Duan Tianming laughed happily.
"Let's go. If we can reach Gangu before dark, we can reach Gongchang tomorrow. Xiao Lizi has brought five captains from the Shenji Army with him. I'm a little worried about him."
"I understand your feelings." Duan Tianming chuckled.
He clamped the army horse under his crotch with his legs and rushed out.
Xiao Chen shook his head, smiled, and followed closely.
The team of more than fifty people is getting closer and closer to the canyon.
"Squeak." A strange voice came.
At the top of the mountain, an arrow, trailing a long line of blue smoke, was shot towards Duan Tianming, who was at the front of the team.
When he heard the sound, Xiao Chen had already raised his head to look for the source of the sound. When he saw clearly that it was an arrow trailing green smoke, it was too late to stop it.
"Be careful, there's an ambush." Xiao Chen shouted, and the blade at his waist was in his hands in an instant.
Hearing Xiao Chen's shout, Duan Tianming subconsciously reined in the horse in his hand.
The military horse neighed and leaped high with its front hooves.
The arrow passed close to the ear of the army horse and hit a stone next to the official road.
"boom."
There was a loud noise, and the gunpowder tied to the arrow exploded instantly, blowing the stone into pieces.
One of the flying stones hit the horse's belly hard, and the other hit the horse's neck.
The severe pain caused the military horse to neigh again, and in an instant it rushed out more than three feet. Its front hooves gave way and it fell to the ground.
Duan Tianming, who was on horseback, was shocked. At the moment when the horse was about to fall to the ground, he exerted force on his feet and jumped more than ten feet high to avoid falling to the ground together.
In an instant, strange sounds sounded one after another.
Arrows trailing green smoke flew towards the crowd like flying insects.
At the same time, huge boulders rolled down from the hillsides on both sides.
"Come on, everyone rush out first." Xiao Chen's eyes widened with anger, he glanced at the figure looming on the top of the mountain, and then slapped the horse's butt hard with his hand.
The army horse under his crotch rushed forward like lightning.
Duan Tianming, who landed on the ground, no longer cared about checking the life and death of the horse, and stretched out his right hand towards Xiao Chen.
Leaning forward, almost leaning on the horse's back, Xiao Chen grabbed Duan Tianming's arm, swung him hard, and threw him behind him.
The captains at the back already had swords in their hands. They pressed their bodies close to the horse's back and waved them rapidly to block the flying arrows and stones.
After the army horses completely rushed out of the canyon, Xiao Chen said in a deep voice: "Take the brothers and rush until you reach the safe zone."
As he spoke, he slapped the horse's back with both hands and leapt into the air, leaving Duan Tianming alone on the horse's back to continue rushing forward.
After landing on the ground and looking at the several military horses lying in a pool of blood, Xiao Chen's eyes spurted out two bursts of anger, and he exerted force on his feet and rushed towards the top of the mountain.
A boulder as big as a grinding plate hit him head-on. Xiao Chen did not dodge, and hit hard with the sharp blade in his hand.
With a "bang", the boulder turned into powder, and Xiao Chen was knocked back more than a foot.
Before he could regain his footing, two more boulders struck him.
Still not evading, Xiao Chen drew his sword again.
The two boulders instantly turned into powder.
Before the dust dissipated, bursts of strange noises were heard again, and five or six arrows tied with gunpowder were shot at Xiao Chen at the same time.
Xiao Chen was well aware of the power of gunpowder.
Although his heart was filled with rage and anger, his reason was still there. He exerted force on his feet and moved more than two feet out of thin air, dodging the arrow attack.
Five or six arrows exploded at the same time, and the air wave generated almost knocked Xiao Chen over.
Looking at the ten-foot-sized pit with lingering fear, Xiao Chen stopped being reckless and swayed left and right, dodging boulders and arrows, and rushed towards the top of the mountain.
The hillside here is a full one hundred feet long from the bottom of the valley to the top of the mountain.
Going around left and right, having to avoid boulders and arrows, even if he tried his best, when Xiao Chen rushed to the top of the mountain, not a single figure of the ambushers was left.
What caught his eyes were only dense jungles and endless mountain peaks one after another.
Standing on the top of the mountain, looking at the messy footprints on the ground and the path in the weeds that extended into the jungle, Xiao Chen's eyes were red, as if they were about to burn.
He took a step forward and suddenly stopped.
He glanced at the dense jungle, then looked at the official road where the Dongchang team escaped, turned around, and rushed towards the bottom of the valley.