Chapter 1049: The Quiet Years in an Instant

This is what He Lingchuan is worried about. Sun Fuling took the snails into the water to wash them, then took out scissors and cut off the tips of their tails one by one: "You worry all day, why not get rid of him sooner."

"That's exactly what I intend." Initially, Fu Shanlie led the Xiji puppet army to play Mobile Corps Commander warfare with He Lingchuan, wanting to exhaust Yuheng City until it was dry, but now the situation has reversed; it is He Lingchuan who is using the delaying tactic, wanting to eliminate Fu Shanlie's party and claws, wanting to make the cost of Yuheng City's suppression of remnants minimal, anyway, time is on my side.

Both have sufficient reasons for doing so, but now He Lingchuan has decided to speed up.

There is a large bamboo forest nearby.

He Lingchuan looked around to make sure no one was paying attention, and abducted Teacher Sun into the dense bamboo forest.

The dazzling sunlight passed through layers of leaves, leaving only a bit of mottled color. Teacher Sun was held in his arms, her back against the hard bamboo, and her eyes had just captured that bit of color when it was completely blocked by He Lingchuan.

This man was as thick as a wall, as hard as a wall, and could no longer be pushed away by her at will.

Then, he took away the air in her mouth.

This bright and refreshing spring suddenly became hot and sticky.

Sun Fuling's face was as red as the morning glow in the sky, and she suddenly closed her eyes, as if even that bit of light in the bamboo forest felt dazzling.

He Lingchuan took advantage of her being intoxicated and dizzy, and quietly picked her up and turned her around.

In his hands, she was no heavier than a blade of grass.

Just like this, Sun Fuling seemed to wake up, opened her eyes and wondered: "What are you doing?"

"Going home." Why should they accompany a large group of children to play here? "It's rare that there are no military duties in the afternoon, shall we play by ourselves?"

Sun Fuling blinked: "Isn't this an outing?"

"My ears are almost deaf, you call this an outing?" He Lingchuan chuckled, "A new shop opened in the city, specifically for playing maze arrays. Haven't you always wanted to try it?"

In Yuandu and Lingxu City, maze arrays were no longer fresh things. But here, it wasn't until the Longchuan trade route was opened that entertainment facilities like maze arrays were transmitted to Yuheng City from the outside world.

Sun Fuling spat at him: "Today is for a spring outing, it's work!"

"There are other teachers outside, the children won't get lost, they can find their own fun, they don't need you." Teacher Sun twisted a few times in his arms, and He Lingchuan locked her tight immediately.

Twist well, a few more times!

She laughed and beat his shoulder: "Stop messing around, put me down!"

Just then, footsteps sounded outside, fast and short.

He Lingchuan and Teacher Sun both heard it.

This should be one of the children coming.

"Little Fatty, it's Little Fatty." Sun Fuling wanted to push him away and walk out, but He Lingchuan seized the last opportunity, pressed her against a clump of dense bamboo, and stole another fragrance.

"Teacher Sun, Commandant!" Little Fatty walked into the bamboo forest.

Just walking out of the sunlight, the bamboo forest was a bit dark, and Little Fatty adapted for a while before daring to walk in.

Wow, it's empty here, where does it look like there's anyone?

Er Ya said Teacher Sun and the Commandant entered the bamboo forest, could she be lying to him? But the fish basket was left on the bank, it seemed to be Teacher Sun's? Little Fatty gathered his courage, crept forward another hundred steps, and called out twice more.

The bamboo four feet away suddenly rustled, giving him a shiver. But immediately after, two figures bypassed from behind the dense bamboo, and the Commandant's voice came leisurely:

"Little Fatty, what's the matter?"

Little Fatty looked closely, the Commandant was smiling and walking toward him, and Teacher Sun was two steps behind.

"What are you doing?" He shouted for a long time, and the Commandant and the teacher didn't respond.

He Lingchuan stretched out his hand and handed him a few black, muddy things: "Dug some bamboo shoots, for soup."

There is no delicacy like bamboo shoots, and no delicacy like fish. How can a spring picnic be without such a delicacy? "We threw bait four times, it seems we can't catch fish!" Little Fatty carefully took the bamboo shoots and forgot his complaints. "Also, Teacher Liu and the others are back, they picked a lot of mushrooms. Fortunately, fortunately, the fish in our basket are not few."

Sun Fuling stepped forward, holding Little Fatty's hand and walking toward the stream: "Okay, let's go back and cook."

She brushed away the hair on her temples and glared at He Lingchuan.

Tacit understanding.

Out of the bamboo forest, the noise was deafening.

He Lingchuan saw fifty or so half-human-high figures by the stream and couldn't help but press his brows.

Fifty or so divine beasts, wow.

The other two teachers led the wild vegetable army back, and the adults were busy dealing with the mountain treasures brought back by the children.

Wild vegetables were fine, but many poisonous mushrooms were mixed in the mushrooms.

The teachers found the poisonous mushrooms, explained the dangers and identification methods, and then distributed them to the children to read.

Teaching through entertainment was one of the purposes of the spring outing.

Taking advantage of this time, the kitchen workers of the Yuheng Academy began to clean the river fresh and prepare the soup.

The kitchen maids didn't think the children's harvest could be so much, and originally prepared a lot of hot dish ingredients, but now they were busy.

He Lingchuan didn't dare to join the children's group, and it happened that the two teachers had just caught four or five bamboo rats, so he simply pulled out a dagger and went to kill them.

The Commandant of Yuheng City personally helped them, and the kitchen workers nodded and bowed to him, very polite.

Only one person stared at him straight while washing fish. Other kitchen workers poked her arm and whispered: "Wang Ma, don't stare at the Commandant like that, it's impolite!"

It would have been fine if they hadn't reminded her, but as soon as this was said, Wang Ma dropped the water bucket and walked over. Her companion wanted to pull her, but was shaken off by her.

Then, she stood in front of He Lingchuan: "Commandant He!"

She was less than fifty, very thin, and her posture was already a bit hunched; she wasn't much taller than He Lingchuan sitting down.

"Wang Ma?"

Wang Ma was stunned when her identity was called out by him. She didn't know that He Lingchuan had excellent hearing and could hear the discussions of the kitchen workers seven or eight out of ten.

But she steadied herself, swallowed, and said: "Can I ask you one thing?"

He Lingchuan saw that she had gathered all her courage to walk over, so he said gently: "Please speak."

"How long will you wait before you take down Longchuan?"

He Lingchuan raised his eyebrows: "Why does Wang Ma ask this?"

"My eldest son was a city patrol guard, but he was ambushed by water bandits on the Longchuan trade route last year and died." Wang Ma's skin was rough, and she looked like she had no expression, "Later, you recruited the Longchuan water bandits and gave them a lot of money."

These two sentences connected together meant dissatisfaction. He Lingchuan stood up at once: "That's called road tax. They collect it while also maintaining the security of the trade route. Yuheng City recruiting them is because we don't want unnecessary fighting, and we don't want more good soldiers to sacrifice in the bandit suppression battle."

Fighting for many years, the people of Panlongcheng and Yuheng City had paid a huge price.

As General Nanke said, whose family didn't have warriors who died in battle? Wang Ma didn't understand these things very well, but she knew: "I heard that there are no obstacles in Longchuan, why don't you take down the puppet army quickly?"

There was emotion in this sentence.

"There are no obstacles in Longchuan? Who did you hear that from?"

"This..." Wang Ma choked, "It's rumored in the city! Saying we could have taken down the water bandits long ago."

He Lingchuan smiled: "Find the person who said this, and we will confront them face to face. I'm quite curious what kind of strategic plan they have to make such a prediction."

Wang Ma naturally couldn't find this person, so she decided not to entangle with He Lingchuan on this, and returned to the origin of the problem: "Then when will you fight Longchuan?"

"Why is Wang Ma so anxious?"

"My younger son was killed by the Xiji puppet army, and now my younger son is shouting to join the army every day to avenge his brother." Wang Ma pulled a long face, "I don't want him to join the army anymore! I just want to ask the Commandant, when can you make the murderer who killed my son pay the price!"

"The puppet army is the biggest obstacle; they have several forces supporting them behind their backs, each one stronger than Yuheng City. If there were no puppet army, Longchuan would have been taken by us last year." He Lingchuan was amiable, "To deal with them, I would rather spend more time and money, and I hope to sacrifice fewer lives. Every patrol guard warrior is very precious to Yuheng City. Doesn't Yuheng City have an old saying, rather spend money to die, than spend people to die."

Dealing with commoners like Wang Ma, he couldn't talk about strategy or policy; those were too macro. He could only lower his perspective and say a paragraph she could understand best.

These last two sentences made Wang Ma choke for a while.

She was still blocked in her heart, but she didn't know what to say.

The kitchen worker behind stepped forward and dragged her away: "Sorry, Commandant, she just likes to think and talk nonsense."

He Lingchuan said sternly: "Wang Ma doesn't need to worry, your son's revenge will be avenged soon."

Wang Ma didn't say a word and finally left with someone.

Others were still pondering how fast "soon" was, but the Commandant had already grabbed the fat bamboo rat and chopped off its head with one knife.

Over the past half year, the voices of dissatisfaction with him in Yuheng City had been getting louder and louder, saying he used the people's money to raise water bandits, and saying he was lazy and inefficient.

He Lingchuan's method of governing Longchuan banditry was long time and slow effect, but the sequelae and losses were small, and he wanted to use the power of the system to squeeze the Xiji puppet army out of Longchuan.

This kind of gentle means was rarely used in Panlongcheng, and there was a lot of criticism from the military and civilians.

It was still because the propaganda work was not done well, He Lingchuan sighed at the sky.

However, it was almost time to close the net.

He returned the slaughtered bamboo rats to the kitchen workers and found that the river fish had also been processed and were waiting to be put into the pot. The stream stone loach he and Teacher Sun caught were also among them.

He was not at ease, walked over to pick out a stream stone loach and checked, and sure enough, there were roe in the abdomen.

Fish roe is usually a good thing, and the kitchen worker who cleaned it would remove the fish internal organs and leave the fish roe.

"This can't be left, the roe of the stream stone loach is poisonous."

When Wang Ma heard this, she hurried over, turned out six or seven stream stone loaches from the fish pile, and found that half of them had roe after checking.

Hurry up and remove the roe.

Not long after, the hot dishes were ready and served one by one.

He Lingchuan had been busy for a long time and could finally eat.

He had just squeezed to sit beside Teacher Sun and had just put a small fried fish into his mouth when rapid hoofbeats came from not far away.

Another rider rushed through the peach forest, stepping on the fallen flowers all over the ground and rushing straight to the small stream.

He Lingchuan had also come this way just now, and Teacher Sun pointed with her chopsticks and smiled: "It seems you can't be idle this afternoon."

The visitor was a messenger from the City Guard Office. He Lingchuan saw his posture and knew there was urgent military intelligence.

(End of chapter) ===== CHAPTER 1050 =====

He Lingchuan had come the same way just moments ago. Master Sun pointed with his chopsticks and smiled, "It seems you won't have any leisure time this afternoon."

The visitor was a messenger from the City Guard Bureau. As soon as He Lingchuan saw his posture, he knew there was urgent military intelligence.

(End of chapter)