Chapter 33, on the way back

The air suddenly smelled of gunpowder.

At this critical moment, I suddenly saw two people running out of the path behind the woodcutter. It was Azhong and others who had taken a detour before. When A Zhong saw seven or eight villagers besieging Zu Zhao, he couldn't help pulling out his sword and rushed over in three steps.

"Big son, there is a situation here. These villagers are very suspicious!" Azhong walked quickly and shouted.

Hearing this, the children around Zu Zhao immediately tightened their nerves and pulled out their blades.

The surrounding villagers were very scared. Many people quickly retreated a few steps, and some timid people left their equipment and fled home early.

Even the woodcutter panicked and was stunned on the spot and at a loss.

Zu Zhao looked around the villagers with cold eyes and said coldly, "Aren't you afraid to sit with the thieves who hid murder and crossed goods?" When he said the last half of the sentence, he almost roared.

The remaining villagers were very scared. After all, they didn't know what the identity of these outsiders were. Hearing the words of the leading teenager, they instinctively thought that these people should be spies of the government. Immediately, several people turned around and fled, and the remaining three or five people looked left and right, one by one panic and worried.

A thin villager shouted impatiently, "I knew that Deng Laosan was definitely going to get into trouble, right? Now he really got into trouble. This, this...what is this called?"

Another villager also said, "Yes, yes, this has nothing to do with us. It's all caused by Deng Laosan."

The woodcutter looked gloomy and said nothing more.

Zu Zhao did not pay attention to these villagers and went straight to meet A Zhong and others.

A Zhong said, "Just in front, Zhao Xian and A Bao are guarding there."

The group followed Azhong through an alley and came to a yard with only three rooms. Many weeds appeared on the wall of the courtyard, the door was dilapidated, and the whole house had not been repaired for a long time. Outside the door stood a son of the ancestral family. After seeing the arrival of Zu Zhao and others, he immediately greeted the door.

Zu Zhao came to him without asking. He looked inside the door and saw that the yard was sloppy, and there was a pile of randomly built straw in the corner of the courtyard wall. The whole straw pile was oozed with obvious blood stains. Bao stood aside. He had lifted the straw pile aside, and there was a horse's body buried underneath.

A Zhong said, "When we passed by here, we found that the door was not closed, there was some blood dregs on the threshold, and there was a stench, so we went inside to have a look."

Zui Zhao asked, "There are clues to the horse corpse."

Abao, standing beside the straw pile, said, "The horse has no rope. I'm not sure if it's our horse. However, the body is still very new. It should have died less than a day ago. Maybe this horse is the stallion bought by Uncle Hong and others, so there is no horse match.

Zuzuo pondered for a while and then asked, "Who's home is this?" What about people?"

A Zhong shook his head and said, "When I came, there was no one. There were traces of people living in the house, but it was tattered and there was no valuable possession at all."

Zu Zhao turned around and ordered, "Come to the village head."

As soon as his words fell, the woodcutter he had met outside had appeared outside the door. Several ancestors near the gate were staring at each other warily.

The woodcutter looked worried and sighed for a while and said, "There is no village head. The name of the person you are looking for is Deng Mao, Xing San. There is no one else in the family, and he is the only one.

Zu Zhao raised his eyebrows slightly and guessed in his heart: Deng Mao? Isn't it a leader of the Yellow Turban Army in the future?

There are not many records of the generals of the Yellow Turban Army in history. Most of them have fought hard battles with the imperial court officials. He remembered that Deng Mao was the deputy general of Cheng Yuanzhi, the leader of the Yellow Turban Army, and it was also rumored that Cheng Yuanzhi and Liu Bei were from the same hometown, that is, Zhuo County, Youzhou. Zhuo County is not too far away from here, and it is not impossible to say that Deng Mao is from Lingzhi County. Of course, there is no record of Cheng Yuanzhi in history, so Deng Mao dares not decide who it is at the time.

He didn't show his feelings on his face, and then asked, "Who is he and where is he now?"

The woodcutter shook his head helplessly and said with resentment, "Well, this thief is not a good person. He is usually idle, and his family's industry has been cleaned up a few years ago. Every day, he swims around the village and town and does some dirty things. Where is he now? I haven't been stable in the past few months. Sometimes I go out for several days, and sometimes I don't go out behind closed doors. No one in the village knows where he is, and no one wants to know.

Zu Zhao pointed to the horse on the pile of straw and asked coldly, "This horse obviously died yesterday."

The woodcutter was helpless and said, "I saw a movement in his family this morning. As for where the person is now, the villain really doesn't know."

Zu Zhao believes that the woodcutter's words are true. Anyway, he finally has a crucial clue. After a little thought, he first thanked the woodcutter and told him that if he found Deng Mao's whereabouts, he would send someone to the North Guoting Station in Xu Wu County to inform him. After sending away the woodcutter, he ordered Azhong, Abao and others to live in the town, dress up and take turns to monitor this room every day, and immediately return any wind blowing.

In this matter, he must leave more hands. The woodcutter and Deng Mao are in the same village. Even if he looks down on Deng Mao, a prodigal son, he will have some feelings. If he is soft-hearted for a moment and let Deng Mao go, or gives false news, it will not be worth the loss. After ordering, he led people to search around the village and the town.

When I came to the town, I happened to meet Zuji and others. Zuji didn't get any useful information at the horse farm. After all, horse dealers never care about people who come to see horses, and they even want more and more people to pay attention to their horses.

Then he tossed around for more than an hour. In addition to hearing that Deng Mao usually had a good date with several rangers in Xilitun, and occasionally went to the abandoned land temple in the west to contact the two wandering Taoist priests, he was still uncertain about the whereabouts of the other party. As for those rangers, it is not easy to find, and they often travel around the whole county; they have also been to the land temple and have not seen the so-called wandering Taoist priest.

Finally, I returned to the restaurant in the center of the town, had some refreshments, and specially arranged for four children, including Azhong and Abao, to stay here in detail. It was getting late, and Zu Zhao had to rush back to Xu Wu County as soon as possible.

As soon as the order was completed, Zu Zhao took the rest of the children of the ancestral family out of the door of the restaurant and came to the stable outside the door to pick up the horse.

At this moment, there was a sudden noise in the distance, and from far to near.

Zu Zhao raised his eyes and looked at the noisy place and saw more than a dozen young men holding tied instruments on the street in the center of the town. They were holding several dirty and bloody people coming to the intersection. As they walked, they cheered loudly, like warriors who had returned home. This scene attracted many good people on the sidelines, some followed, some echoed, and several playboys participated in it, throwing stones or fists on those who were kidnapped.

"Oh, what's going on!?"

"Isn't it a thief?"

The two ancestors speculated curiously.

Zu Zhao was not a very lively person. After looking at it casually, he continued to sort out the rope of the mount and prepare to get on the horse. However, as the noisy crowd gets closer and closer, shouts such as "horse thief" and "to kill Hu Yi" can be faintly heard in the crowd. Now he is very ** with the word "horse thief" and immediately turned his head to look at it.

I saw several barbarians who were held hostage by the crowd. When I looked closely, I felt that these barbarians were very familiar.

"Son, isn't this the barbarians in the fruit forest just now?" A son with sharp eyes quickly pointed and shouted.

"It's really them. How could such a thing happen?" Another son said doubtfully.

Zuzuo also felt a little strange. He was fine at noon, and he was arrested only a few hours later. He subconsciously searched the crowd, but did not find the beautiful Hu girl, and the women and children in the fruit forest tent were also missing.

"Da Zhuang, go and find out what's going on?" He told a child who was close to him.

"Yes."

The son answered and ran to the intersection to inquire about some onlookers.

After a while, the son returned and informed Zu Zhao of the news he had heard. It turned out that as the restaurant clerk said at noon, these unreferred Hu people offended a local rangers a few days ago. Just now, the rangers gathered the local rangers and colluded with Li Zheng, the pavilion chief, the stingers and other officials to find these Hu people' troubles. It happened that a horse was found in the woods where these barbarians lived, so it was logically planted as a horse thief.

"Men were tied to the county to plead guilty, and women and children were sentenced to be sold by officials." Da Zhuang said.

"Horse thief? Didn't the eldest son say that the horse was given to them? Zu Ji had heard about the experience in the fruit forest earlier, and he frowned and said.

"There is no excuse for the crime. How can there be any fairness for people of different races? Zu Zhao said coldly. He has no psychological burden on this, just a little morally unhappy.

"What should I do now? Is that horse..." Zu Ji asked.

"Don't make extracurriculars. Since the horse has given it to others, it is his business. Zu Zhao didn't hesitate too much. He really doesn't want to pay attention to such idle things now. After saying that, he jumped on the horseback.

The children of the ancestors did not discuss it any more and went on the horse one after another.

----

[Recommend Jia Zhangke's "Xiaowu" and Lu Chuan's "Looking for Guns", two really good movies!]