Chapter 77 The tower
When Chen Hui got on the carriage to Jianbei, she keenly sensed that Li Youde seemed to be in a bad mood. She glanced at him secretly several times and realized that he was absent-minded and seemed to be worried about something.
Chen Hui retracted her gaze and sat upright far away. Presumably, he has some worries because she followed, right? He was the one who agreed, it has nothing to do with her…However, since the purpose has been achieved, it was better for her to be more well-behaved now. Don’t irritate him. It wouldn’t be good for him to have any irrational behavior.
Jianbei City was thirty li northwest of Fanyang. Both cities were surrounded by endless mountain ridges of Mountain Liyang. The two cities were connected by a mountain road that was not wide. In the middle, the road was wide and sometimes narrow. The wide area could accommodate several carriages. On the narrow area, Li Youde’s carriage moved with difficulty. Thirty li was not long nor short. With a normal speed, they could reach in about four hours.
- Li: approximately 500m
Chen Hui looked outside from time to time. When they came to a small place, she looked curiously and quickly retracted her head. Such a small terrain was really suitable for carrying out a surprise attack from the top to bottom. For example, if you throw a stone from above, a few people below would be done for.
“What are you looking at?” Li Youde had been absent-minded all the way and finally didn’t entangle anymore. Seeing Chen Hui’s weird expression, he asked that question. He decided to wait until the war is over and then think of a way to make Lady Chen a bit more behaved. Let her be like this for now.
Chen Hui told him her thought, what she got was a sneer from Li Youde.
“The mountain ridges are steep and there are soldiers patrolling the nearby roads. It is not easy to move with many people. They can’t escape the eyes of the patrollers. A small number of people can muddle through, but it won’t lead to a great achievement.”
Chen Hui glanced once at Li Youde and gave a slow response. She felt suspicious if this was Li Youde’s own judgement. She could only relax if this came from Lang Yu and the others. She thought about it for a while and felt that this should be what Lang Yu had said. So, she didn’t worry anymore.
The carriage wasn’t very stable on the second half of the mountain road. Chen Hui could hardly sit still. After a bump, she hit her head on the wall of the carriage and almost hit her injured nose. She was busy covering her nose with one hand and grasping the wall of the carriage with the other. She missed the modern car so much. It also jolted but didn’t jolt like this. Even the gastric acid was about to come out from the jolts.
Li Youde felt a bit of pain in his heart when he saw it, but he decided not to say anything and mocked, “You still said that you are not afraid of hardship and had to follow. Now, you regret it…um…”
The carriage jolted too much. While he talked, the carriage jolted up and down. He bit his tongue by accident.
Chen Hui originally wanted to refute. Seeing that Li Youde accidentally bit his tongue and his face darkened, she closed her lips rightly. She didn’t dare to say anything, but she was laughing crazily in her heart. Let him be so talkative. Courted the wrath of the heavens now! The gods really have eyes!
Li Youde felt pain and embarrassment when he bit his tongue. At this moment, he caught a glimpse of Chen Hui’s enduring-a-laughter expression. He got angrier in his heart, but he was helpless against her. He didn’t dare to let himself speak and scold her at this moment. If he bit himself again, he wouldn’t want to live anymore.
During the stalemate where Chen Hui secretly held back her laughter and Li Youde glared fiercely at her; the group finally reached Jianbei City. Not all the troop brought from the capital was brought over to here. A part of the troop and army provisions remained in Fanyang. The other part was brought to support Jianbei.
At first glance, Jianbei City was not much different from Fanyang. It was just that the city was smaller and the tension in the city was more intense. However, as Li Youde has said, this war couldn’t be considered big. Although, the people were nervous, most felt that defending the city shouldn’t be a problem. There were no people who fled the city.
The current high-ranked military officer of Jianbei City led the generals out of the city to welcome Li Youde and Lang Yu into the city. The military information that should be reported had been already been reported in Fanyang but now it is just a report on the latest development. A few days ago, the Xi tribe attempted a not very fierce attack and naturally they were not successful. They originally thought that it would become more frequent these days, but unexpectedly, the Xi tribe seemed to have become mute as if they have retired. The reconnoiter has just been dispatched. It would take the night to get news at the earliest.
Before going to rest and waiting for the news, Chen Hui followed Li Youde and Lang Yu to the city wall. She had been to the Great Wall once before. Some sections were really difficult to climb. Moving up and down with no iron railing to grasp, she couldn’t climb at all. She had always been curious about how ancient people walked on the Great Wall…However, the walls of a city were naturally different. The stone underneath was very smooth with some blood stains occasionally. The wall was very wide and could even be used for horse racing. Looking at the bottom from the top, the height of more than ten meters was an excellent barrier. There was an arrow tower at a distance and one could shoot an arrow from a higher place. If the number of archers and arrows were enough, a round of volley would probably take down a lot of enemies.
Many corpses and horse’s corpses were stacked on the muddy ground outside the wall. There were few pools of blood around some people who had died. Even the pool of blood became a blood clot.
Chen Hui came with the mentality of visiting at the beginning. Even if she knew that war was not child’s play and that many people would die. However, seeing so many corpses without being mentally prepared at all, she paled abruptly and turned away her eyes.
Li Youde had ordered people to be beaten to death and framed to death. He had watched countless people be executed by the emperor. He didn’t put importance on a few people who had died on the battlefield. When he turned his head and saw that Chen Hui’s expression was not very good, he fell behind a few steps and whispered, “If you are afraid, go down.”
Chen Hui didn’t know how long she would stay on this battlefield. If she was afraid of corpses, how could she stop Li Youde from courting disaster?
“I’m not afraid,” After meeting Li Youde’s squinted eyes, Chen Hui changed what she ssaid again, “I’m a bit scared…but after I take a few more looks, I will get used to it.”
“Why should a girl get used to this? Could it be that you still plan to go into battle and kill a few enemies?” Li Youde said displeased.
Chen Hui said solemnly said, “If lord goes into battle, this Lady Chen will definitely follow!”
“Very well, you mock me now?” Li Youde smiled from anger.
Chen Hui shook her head and said with a look of innocence, “Lord, this is my way of showing my loyalty to you!”
“Loyalty? Heh.” Li Youde snickered. It was unknown what his meaning is and said, “Are you really not going down?”
“Really not,” Chen Hui said firmly.
Li Youde said, “Okay, up to you.”
He looked in the front. Those corpses were really nothing special in his eyes. He looked at Chen Hui casually, only to see that she forced herself to look at the corpses. She was obviously scared but forced herself to look.
Li Youde suddenly wanted to raise his hand to cover Chen Hui’s eyes so as not to let her see the bloody scenes. But at this moment, the tight bugle horn sounded.
Li Youde and Chen Hui were both dumbstruck. Then, they heard one after another shout.
“Enemy attack! Enemy attack!”
Chen Hui’s eyes widened and looked into the distance, only to see a puff of smile billowing. She couldn’t see how large the army approaching quickly was. She also wanted to look closely when her body was suddenly hit by someone and being embraced by Li Youde to stabilize her.
When the alarm was issued about the enemy’s attack, the soldiers on the wall immediately took action. It could be seen that they were well-trained. Even though Lang Yu was a civil officer, he was quite calm at this time and started to command his soldiers about how to respond to the enemy. In comparison, Li Youde and the people he brought were much inferior. When they were bumped on by the soldiers coming and going, they somewhat were at loss about what to do.
“Lord Li, please go downstairs first,” Deputy general Gong looked solemnly and came to lead Li Youde downstairs.
Li Youde was still a bit hesitant at first. As a supervisor of the army, it was a bit wrong for him to go downstairs like this. But looking at the aggressively rushing army of the enemy, he still became timid. Under the guidance of deputy general Gong, he hurriedly down the wall.
Chen Hui followed Li Youde and also waked fast. She was originally timid, so, she didn’t feel the slightest guilt for her behavior, but Li Youde…She cast him a glance. She saw that even though he tried his best to remain calm, his tensed appearance wouldn’t deceive anyone.
After Li Youde accidentally slipped on the last step of the stairs and almost fell, the ridicule in Chen Hui’s heart finally took shape…Letting you pretend on the wall, now you are exposed!
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