Chapter 736

Chao Qian explained, "Which caravan is on the road, when they are on the road, and even what goods they are transporting—some bandit gangs can know in advance. We have caught quite a few insiders, but we can never catch them all." He Lingchuan said, "A bandit gang that has become a climate should be like this."

The sand bandits outside Black Water City and on the Red Cliff Road played like this. Flying thieves scout the place before taking action, and killing and robbing is naturally even more particular. Some sand bandits even collude with local officials; this is called 'colluding in evil'.

His father, He Chunhua, was very clear about these tricks, and Young Master He had been influenced by what he saw and heard, so he no longer felt it was anything new. Fortunately, the bandit problem in Yuheng City had not yet worsened to this extent.

"It's useless for us to strictly catch and fight alone; they can still get news from Baishawan and other places." He Lingchuan pondered, "What about the bandit gangs' channels for selling stolen goods? Have you figured that out?"

You can spend stolen silver directly, but you have to find a seller to exchange stolen goods for money, otherwise why rob them? "These bandit nests have a division of labor; some specialize in robbing, and some specialize in cleaning up and selling stolen goods. Some bandit nests even share a channel for selling stolen goods. But the bandits we caught were all out robbing and hadn't dealt with buyers of stolen goods, so they didn't know their ways, only heard—"

Chao Qian exhaled: "Heard that there are people selling stolen goods in Yuheng City!"

He thought He Lingchuan would be furious, but this newly appointed commander had a look of 'it's only natural': "Of course, when selling stolen goods, you have to find a place that is both lively and wealthy to sell them as quickly as possible. Look at which bandit nest would go to a poor, remote place to sell goods? Yuheng City is the closest city to Longchuan, and it has many people, so it is indeed an ideal target."

"Heard they also sell to the Jin Tao nation." Chao Qian added, "Longchuan is connected to the Yin River; when the bandits are pushed to the limit, they will run to Jin Tao."

"This rat hole is also accessible in all directions, so it's not easy to catch them all in one net." He Lingchuan asked him, "Have we sent anyone to infiltrate Longchuan?"

Suppressing bandits is just a process of sending secret agents to each other, right? "Three people were sent in more than a month ago, but they haven't made a name for themselves yet and haven't provided any useful intelligence."

He Lingchuan instructed him: "First, figure out the distribution and composition of the bandits in Longchuan, especially the Xi-Ji remnants who have recently entered Longchuan to become bandits!"

Chao Qian responded with a solemn 'Yes'.

He Lingchuan called for the Peregrine Falcon again: "You make a trip to Panlong City and find the skinny one; I have an important task for him. Tell him the task reward is generous, enough to save up his younger sister's tuition all at once; also, I have a list of twenty people here; you go find General Hong and ask for these people for me."

These twenty people were all experienced Great Wind Army soldiers. Training soldiers requires instructors, and he had to find people he knew well.

Coming to Yuheng City is a pay raise and promotion; these guys shouldn't be able to refuse.

The Peregrine Falcon tilted its head and looked at him. This kid used to coax and persuade it with plenty of benefits when asking it to run errands; why was he giving orders so smoothly now? He Lingchuan's face stiffened: "Military order, why aren't you going yet?"

There was indeed no military or political official here with a rank higher than his. The Peregrine Falcon had no choice but to take the list, flap its wings, and fly west.

At this time, Liu Tiao came to report that the bandits captured yesterday had confessed.

"Oh? You mean this nest of robbers was almost driven out of Longchuan themselves?" He Lingchuan became interested, "Let's go, let's go listen."

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The sky was getting dark, but fortunately, the reflection of the white snow on the ground meant the dense forest was not dim.

The road ahead was exceptionally rugged, sometimes even without a path, only jagged large rocks and deep ravines.

This road had never been opened, and horses couldn't walk it, but for He Lingchuan and Mother Zhu, it wasn't a problem, so the rock goat, which was good at climbing, temporarily became Dong Rui's mount.

Even so, he was still jolted by the rock goat jumping around until his butt hurt.

Mother Zhu looked at his listless appearance and ridiculed: "Wasn't this road chosen by you?"

Dong Rui's small eyes could fly into the sky to scout the road ahead, so the job of guide fell to him. Who knew this guy would abandon a perfectly good main road and choose a sheep-gut path, and later there wasn't even a sheep-gut path, just dead ends.

"I wanted to take a shortcut." From the sky, the route looked very clear, who knew the ground would be so convoluted.

After leaving Lingxu City, they fled west without stopping, experiencing several adventures in between, but finally said goodbye to Beijia on the twenty-third day!

A victorious escape.

Their escape speed was faster than the news of the Xushan incident and faster than the spread of the Lingxu City wanted posters, so the further west they fled, the safer they were. When they left the Xuluo nation, the local vassal demon king had just received the news from Lingxu City, but the demon nation hadn't had time to react.

Beijia was simply too big; the time difference for news to travel from east to west was significant.

In any case, they had already left the northwest border of the Xuluo nation, which meant they had completely walked out of Beijia's territory. From that moment on, they were truly safe.

"Look, there's a village ahead!"

Fifteen zhang ahead, a small village was hidden behind the forest.

The three walked over and saw that this village had more than twenty houses, but seven or eight of the roofs had trees growing on them, and the outer walls were tightly wrapped in vines.

Clearly, this village had long been abandoned.

But this was the destination for He Lingchuan and the others.

They needed a secluded place.

A desolate mountain village was just right.

At this moment, there was a rustling sound in the forest ahead. Both became alert, but Mother Zhu was overjoyed: "My sister is here!"

Sure enough, a massive spider crawled out of the forest, nearly one zhang high, with thick, sturdy chelicerae, like a moving house.

This one, He Lingchuan was truly familiar with: Zhu Erniang had arrived! The moment He Lingchuan blew the spider ocarina in the Xushan array eye, Zhu Erniang, far away in the Demon Nest, felt it.

Ancient immortals naturally have some unimaginable means, and she and Mother Zhu, who were born from the same egg and lived together for over three thousand years, had long ago developed a kind of peculiar telepathy. Learning that He Lingchuan had stolen the immortal slough from Xushan, she decisively moved out of the Demon Nest and advanced along the periphery of Beijia to come and meet Mother Zhu.

Although she had operated in the Demon Nest for many years, the Heavenly Palace knew the origin of the immortal slough very well, and for Zhu Erniang, the Demon Nest was no longer safe.

She had to abandon many belongings and leave decisively.

"Erniang, you finally..." The last two words hadn't come out yet before he swallowed them himself, because several more giant spiders had crawled out one after another behind Zhu Erniang!

One, two, three, four, five, a full five giant spiders, and each one was even larger than Zhu Erniang!

This clearing in the forest couldn't hold them at all; two spiders had climbed over giant rocks to get here, their bodies almost perpendicular to the ground, standing steadily just like that.

Including Zhu Erniang, the oppressive feeling of the six giants gathering together scared the rock goat back several steps.

After the initial jaw-dropping and hair-raising, He Lingchuan suddenly realized that weren't these five all Zhu Erniang's sloughs?

Their appearance was exactly the same, even the star map on their bellies was identical, only the size was slightly different.

(End of chapter)