Chapter 537: The fish is dead and the net is broken
Dead silence.
In an instant, the entire hall seemed to suddenly fall into the void, and there was no sound except for the faint sound of falling snow outside the house.
In the end, Li Wutong chose to give up.
Abandon more than one million people in Huailing City in exchange for the survival of Dafeng.
As I said before, it's hard to say whether her decision was right or wrong.
But if we analyze it solely from the current pros and cons, it seems that she has no other choice.
Reject? Then Ning Yongnian would undoubtedly kill Li Qi immediately, and Huailing City might still be massacred.
In this way, they are truly "dying to make their will known".
He would rather die or see his country destroyed than bear the false accusation. It was obvious that Li Wutong did not want Dafeng to be destroyed at all.
Therefore, she had no choice but to accept this condition.
“.”
“Plop.”
Min Zhongguang fell back into the wooden chair weakly, sighed painfully, but said nothing in the end.
The same goes for other envoys from Dafeng.
Everyone's expressions were different, but they all chose to remain silent at this moment.
There is no doubt that no matter what the considerations were, they all acquiesced to Li Wutong's decision.
Even though everyone knew the consequences of this decision.
"emperor."
On the other side, Sima Cong's expression was also somewhat complicated.
He turned to look at Ning Yongnian, and saw that the latter nodded slightly, and then he once again called the eunuch to his side.
Pick up the pen, dip it in ink, and start writing.
Soon, the fifth and final article of the "Huai Ling Alliance" was recorded in writing.
Sima Cong took a deep breath and handed the note to the young eunuch.
The latter took it in his hand and immediately walked towards the palace door under the gaze of everyone . Ten breaths later, the note would be handed over to the ceremonial officer waiting outside the palace.
After twenty breaths, the drum sounded three times.
After thirty breaths, the ceremonial officer will read out the contents of the note to all the people waiting on the long street outside the government office.
Afterwards, the 100,000 Daning troops stationed in Huailing City would seal all the city gates and then massacre the millions of unarmed civilians in the city.
The massacre might take one day, or two days, but no more than three days.
After Huai Ling completely becomes a dead city, Ning Yongnian will return to Daning with the "Huai Ling Alliance" signed by both parties and the troops still left in Dafeng.
By that time, Li Wutong would have "gotten what he wished for" and saved Dafeng and Li Qi's life.
She has given up too much for this result.
It can even be said that everything that can be sacrificed has been sacrificed.
So, when she saw the young eunuch walking towards the palace gate step by step, she felt a feeling of both despair and relief in her heart.
"Squeak"
The palace door was pushed open a crack, and the cold wind mixed with snowflakes squeezed in from outside the house.
The moon is dim and no one is looking at it, the snow is all over the tomb.
The Daning soldiers on the city walls had already prepared for a massacre, and they would just block the city gates and draw their swords at Wu Ding's command.
However, at this last moment, just before the young eunuch was about to walk out of the hall, the person who should not have spoken at this moment suddenly spoke.
"stop."
"I don't agree!"
“.”
The wind was chilly and biting, chilling to the bone.
The center of everyone's attention was Li Qi, whose face was extremely calm.
From the time he opened the city gates and surrendered to today, the Emperor of Dafeng has been pretending to be stupid for more than a month.
He was hung on the city wall and suffered humiliation.
He watched with his own eyes as batch after batch of Dafengwu soldiers died tragically under his feet.
Even just now, Meng Shi, who had fought for him through thick and thin, committed suicide behind him without a word . Li Qi endured all of this.
From Ning Yongnian's eyes, he could tell that the former had already believed that he was really stupid.
But even so, Li Qi couldn't pretend any longer at this moment.
"emperor!"
The first exclamation came from Min Zhongguang.
The latter didn't know that Li Qi had been pretending to be stupid before, so he couldn't help but feel surprised now.
He staggered to Li Qi, fell to his knees with a plop, raised his head and cried out with tears in his eyes: "Your Majesty! You, you are okay!"
"emperor!"
"His Majesty!!"
“.”
The next moment, more envoys from Dafeng also reacted, and they all prostrated themselves on the ground trembling with extremely excited expressions.
Some of them may have guessed that Li Qi was pretending before, while others just thought that he suddenly "recovered from his illness."
But no matter what, now that Li Qi has recovered, they have a backbone.
Just like that, the hall instantly fell into chaos.
While the officials of Dafeng were extremely excited and the envoys of Daning were extremely shocked, Li Qi just looked straight at Ning Yongnian and snorted coldly: "Humph, what a calculation."
“.”
"You're not bad either."
Ning Yongnian narrowed his eyes, and the surprise in his eyes slowly faded away: "I almost thought you were really stupid. What? Are you going to continue acting?"
"I just don't think there's any need to act anymore."
Li Qi shook his head calmly, without any cowardice that a "surrendered king" should have.
"Ning Yongnian, I know exactly what you are thinking."
"Now that the Wei family is becoming more powerful, your army must withdraw to Daning."
"But you were unwilling to leave like this, so you wanted to use this method to alienate the government and the people of Dafeng."
"Humph, you really have a plan!"
“.”
With just a few words, Li Qi completely revealed Ning Yongnian's plan.
However, Ning Yongnian did not deny it. Instead, he nodded with a smile.
"Yes, that is exactly what I intended."
"But what can you do?"
"There are 100,000 Daning soldiers in Huailing City now. Whether you agree or not, everyone in the city will die in the end."
“And you will lose your life in vain”
"Lie down on your life in vain?"
Li Qi showed no sign of panic or hesitation, and interrupted with a sneer, "Ning Yongnian, there is no need for us to talk about this."
"You should know the meaning of my death."
“.”
What is the meaning of my death? When Li Qi said this, everyone instantly understood the meaning.
Yes, whether Li Qi agrees or not, Ning Yongnian has the ability to massacre the city.
But if Li Qi was really dead, then the nature of this massacre would change from "Dafeng abandoned the people of Huailing" to "Ning Yongnian massacred the people of Huailing."
By then, even if the Dafeng royal family no longer exists, the people of Dafeng will definitely hate Ning Yongnian to the core, and the latter will undoubtedly have to pay a greater price if he wants to swallow up Dafeng in the future.
Therefore, if Li Qi did not agree, Ning Yongnian would most likely not really massacre the city.
On the other hand, if the "Huai Ling Alliance" cannot be reached, Ning Yongnian will most likely kill Li Qi directly and take Li Wutong away, causing Dafeng to be temporarily "destroyed" at least in name.
Thinking in this way, the game between the two sides is actually very clear.
Ning Yongnian hoped to leave behind a Dafeng that was riddled with holes and existed in name only.
Li Qi's purpose is exactly the opposite -
Even if he died and Dafeng was destroyed, he would protect the reputation of the Li family and the lives of more than one million people in Huailing City! (End of this chapter)
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