Why were they unafraid? Because Marshal Yuwen was in Ling family.
Yuwen Tong’s presence in Ling family emboldened all servants. As if there was a protective talisman on each of them, they looked courageous and seemed likely to yell “Come at me, burglar!” at any moment.
When Ling Zhang saw a handmaid walking almost like a soldier marching forward in a formation, he couldn’t help rolling his eyes.
‘Have these people taken leave of their senses?’ he wondered.
Behind him, Yuwen Tong could barely forbear from laughing. “Your servants are pretty interesting, just like you.”
Ling Zhang turned his head back and gave Yuwen Tong a dirty look. ‘Has this guy developed some kind of eye disease? With which eye is he seeing any resemblance between me and those maniacs?’
This dirty look given by Ling Zhang sent waves of hotness through Yuwen Tong, who felt an instant urge to hug him, knead him and kiss him, but currently, Ling Zhang was in deep concern over the situation in the Grand Mang Mountain as well as the imminent conflict with Zhang Chong. ‘If I do that, he will no doubt get angry.’
Marshal Yuwen couldn’t help but sigh secretly, thinking, ‘If only I can get back to the capital city right now and figure out a way to have him marry me.’
Ling Zhang was unaware of what Yuwen Tong standing behind him was thinking about. If he had known, he would definitely give Yuwen Tong another dirty look and say to him, “You are daydreaming. Who said I would marry you?”
When Ling Zhang justifiably made arrangements for security guards to stay with Ling Zhaowen protecting him, Zhang Chong and Tao Feng had returned to their respective places.
The moment Zhang Chong entered his tent, his face fell sullen in the extreme.
“Commander?” Deputy Commander Bai Jun looked at him in perplexity. ‘Wasn’t everything going smoothly in Ling family?’ he wondered.
“Commander, are there any remaining problems?” asked Deputy Commander Wang He.
“It’s that fledgling, Yuwen Tong. As long as he’s in Tanyang, I’ll never find peace of mind,” replied Zhang Chong, a sepulchral look on his face.
“But didn’t everything go as planned during this visit? Ling Zhang didn’t bring up any of our previous disagreements, which was a wise choice. And we’ve removed all problematic facilities in the encampment. Even if Yuwen Tong comes here right now, he definitely won’t be able to find anything suspicious,” commented Bai Jun in puzzlement.
“Deputy Commander Bai, the situation is far more complicated than you think it is.”
Before Zhang Chong could vent his annoyance, Wang He observed, “First, we have no idea when Yuwen Tong arrived in Tanyang, and neither do we know how long he has been here. Whether he has found out about anything during his stay in Tanyang is also unknown. In other words, we’re totally unaware of whether or not he has got the goods on us. Second, even if we have removed all questionable things in our encampment, Yuwen Tong is no common person. Can you guarantee that he won’t find any traces? It’s very risky to let him come here. We invited him only because we didn’t have any choice. Only by inviting him here on our own account can we prevent him from laying suspicions on us. Third, that Ling Zhang guy of Ling family is no fool either. Never once did Jia family get the best of him during their several previous conflicts. And now he’s got Yuwen Tong at his back, which means that Ling family has become a force no less powerful than us. Why did he choose to make peace with us so willingly? I keep having this feeling that there’s more to this matter than semblance suggests.”
Bai Jun was transfixed with shock after hearing this. He manifestly had never thought that there were so many hidden risks.
Zhang Chong flicked an appreciative glance at Wang He and then gave Bai Jun a displeased look, his eyes piercing.
Bai Jun felt a chill run down his spine and hurriedly lowered his head. “Please punish me for my being foolish, Commander.”
“If you are incompetent to perform the duties of a deputy commander, I’ll find someone else to replace you,” observed Zhang Chong directly.
Bai Jun knelt down on to the ground. “Commander, I promise I’ll do better. Please take into account all these years’ service of mine and all those things I did for you and for our encampment. Give me a second chance, Commander.”
Zhang Chong looked at him flintily, “Make sure this is the last time. Otherwise you’ll end up cutting firewood in the kitchen!”
After hearing this, Bai Jun didn’t even dare to raise his head.
“Then what do we do now, Commander?” asked Wang Ming.
The three points of Wang He instantly brought all others, whose wariness of Yuwen Tong had dissolved somewhat, on alert.
“Keep working on it. Destroy all other facilities except for the underground training chambers of heavily armored infantry. We’ve got more than enough weapons already. There’s no need to forge new ones for the moment. Since Yuwen Tong said that he would come here in two days, he will surely be here. Don’t let him get the goods on us.”
“Yes, Commander.”
“Wang He, send some men to stake out Ling family. Keep a close watch on Yuwen Tong’s every move. Find out exactly what it is that he intends to do.”
“Yes, Commander.”
“Wang Ming, make contact with those bandits on the Grand Mang Mountain. Tell them to make themselves scarce and not to leave the mountain during the next few days.”
“Yes, Commander.”
With a sepulchral look on his face, Zhang Chong thought for a while and then observed, “That fight we had with those bandits on the Lee Mountain actually has an advantage — since Yuwen Tong is here, we can just spill out all our troubles to him. Make sure that he will send word to the emperor and have the emperor approve our plan to expand our encampment and recruit more soldiers. We’ve lost a lot of men during that fight and we could use some replacements.”
“Commander, should we inform bandit gangs on other mountains and tell them not to leave their dens lest they offend Yuwen Tong?” asked Wang Ming.
“A word of warning would be enough. Nothing more than that.”
“Yes, Commander.”
Wang He had a slight frown on his face, as if pondering over something. He opened his mouth and dithered for quite a while but eventually said nothing.
Zhang Chong was deep in his own thoughts and didn’t notice this.
After walking out of the tent side by side with Wang He, Dou Li, another deputy commander, who had been silent all along, asked Wang He, “What was it that you intended to say to Commander Zhang just now?”
“I felt that Yuwen Tong is too dangerous. If he has been in Tanyang for only a short time, there will be nothing to worry about. But if he arrived here quite some time ago, I’m afraid I’ll have every reason to be concerned,” answered Wang He.
“About what?”
“That there’s some kind of relation between him and all those troubles we’ve encountered in the Prefecture Encampment these days.”
Dou Li fell silent. After a few moments, he asked, “Then why didn’t you tell Commander about this?”
“Commander probably has also guessed something. It’s just that he is not certain about it, and he doesn’t want to make any rash decisions. After all, the identity of Yuwen Tong is so special. One tiny mistake and the whole Prefecture Encampment will be doomed,” replied Wang He.
As a result, it was fairly reasonable that Zhang Chong thought highly of Wang He, who was indeed the most resourceful one among all four deputy commanders.
Unfortunate for him, no matter how resourceful he was, it could never have crossed his mind that Yuwen Tong had cast a giant net at them head-on, and the time to close the net was drawing near.
…
After the noon shift relieved him, the prison guard that had made contact with Jia Yin started his vacation. He walked out of the Prison of the Prefecture Yamen and then left yamen.
Appearing somewhat listless, the prison guard walked back home at a gentle pace. Everything seemed normal.
But the moment he got home, he immediately perked up. The fatigue on his face, which seemed to have resulted from staying up for a whole night, instantly disappeared, and there was even an expectant look in his eyes.
He changed into a low-key, unobtrusive outfit and then left home through the back door. To get rid of potential stalkers, he intentionally traveled several winding circuits of the city center before heading for the location of hidden treasure that Jia Yin had told him.
It was a deserted dwelling located at one end of eastern city, while the residence of Jia family was located on the other end. There was a rather long distance between the two.
The dwelling had been deserted for many years, and weeds and spider webs were everywhere. Worms and ants were crawling around in clusters of weeds, and there was even a wild cat that had made a home of this place.
It took the prison guard some efforts to get over the wall and enter this abandoned dwelling. Subduing his unwillingness, he managed to get through those tall, dense weeds and arrived at a relatively more spacious area. After searching more than half of this place, he finally found the orange tree that Jia Yin had told him about. Due to a lack of regular trims, this orange tree had been growing rampantly for years and was tall and big.
The treasure was said to be buried under the mound beside the orange tree. He had to remove the mound first.
But the mound was pretty big, and it would take him a long time to remove it. There had been several occasions when the prison guard intended to give up, but for the sake of the treasure that Jia Yin had mentioned, he forbore from doing so and kept digging.
After about four hours, he finally managed to dig a deep pit in the mound, and there was indeed an iron case at the bottom of the pit. The prison guard rejoiced. Bursting with impatience, he quickly dig up the iron case and cracked the lock on it with his tools.
The outside of the iron case was somewhat rusty but when he opened it, he beheld a whole case of shiny gold!
“It’s real! Jia Yin didn’t lie to me!” The prison guard was wild with joy. Eventually, he didn’t take the case away but buried it elsewhere, planning to come back to get it at night.
He doubled back to the wall, climbed over and left the dwelling, intending to go back home, rest in the afternoon and come back here to get the gold at night.
Thinking about the gold, the prison guard was in very high spirits. His heart was full of excitement and he didn’t feel sleepy at all. For several times, he had felt an urge to go back to the dwelling and dig up the case for fear that somebody else might find out about it and all his efforts would be in vain.
“…My goodness. Is it true?”
“Of course it’s true. The nephew of the uncle of my maternal aunt was one of the guards who accompanied Lord Tao to Ling family. He was wild with excitement after going out and nearly set off firecrackers to celebrate. You tell me whether he really saw Marshal Yuwen or not.”
“Marshal Yuwen is really in Tanyang! My goodness. Then is it true that Childe Ling is engaged to Marshal Yuwen?”
“Absolutely true!”
Instantly, all people who heard these remarks fell into discussions with each other. Soon, people in the whole street were animatedly talking about this unexpected engagement.
The prison guard stood transfixed with shock for quite a while, unable to believe what he had just heard. ‘Marshal Yuwen? Marshal Yuwen is in Ling family? And he’s engaged to Childe Ling?!
Is Ling–Ling family going to make its way in the world?
These people are going to reach Heavens at a single bound!’
Everybody was envious, particularly the prison guard, whose eyes nearly turned green, but soon an awful thought struck him — Jia Yin.
‘All people in Tanyang know about the feud between Ling family and Jia family. If Jia Yin escapes from the prison, what will happen?’ The prison guard felt a cold shiver of fear run through him. He didn’t even dare to think about potential consequences.
‘If it comes to the knowledge of Marshal Yuwen that I’m the one who helps Jia Yin escape, will I stand a chance of survival?! No, I’ll sure as hell end up dead. Jia Yin is trying to get me killed!’ he thought in horror.
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