"But if we really surrender, they will really forgive us. After all, we are all rebels!"
One of the young generals hesitated.
After hearing his words, everyone's ideas, which had already been somewhat shaken, became even more wavering.
Yes, if he and his men really surrendered, but still could not escape death in the end, it would be better not to surrender, but to hide with the troops, or go into the mountains and become the king of the mountain. Wouldn't that be great?
For a moment, everyone was divided into two factions. One faction was afraid that if they surrendered now, they would be held accountable by the court in the future, so they were unwilling to surrender. The other faction wanted to return to the court. What they meant was that they originally belonged to the court, and although they were bewitched by Prince Qing and embarked on this path, now they had the opportunity to return to their normal status, so naturally they strongly supported surrender.
At this time, Lu Qiu came out of the mountains with a thousand soldiers and horses. There were many women and children in his entourage, including Prince Qing's wife, several concubines and maids, as well as Prince Qing's children. The oldest was only in his twenties, and the youngest was still in his arms.
Lu Qiu had already informed Lu Zifeng through his consciousness that all of Prince Qing's family members had been captured, and Lu Zifeng was finally relieved.
Now Lu Zifeng is waiting for Situ Hao and Situ Yi to bring all the soldiers in the city back to the court.
When leaving the capital, the emperor had already told Situ Hao and Situ Yi to handle these matters, so Lu Zifeng did not intend to interfere. Interfering too much would easily make the emperor wary, so he just had to do his own job well.
In the military camp outside the city, Situ Hao had just sent away the soldiers who came to report, and then he looked at Situ Yi and said.
"Okay, this matter is about 80% complete. What remains is to gather the rebels in the city. Do you have any good ideas?"
Situ Yi curled his lips. "What else can we do? Just send someone to the city gate to call them out for negotiations. To put it bluntly, these soldiers are just following orders. They haven't done anything wrong. There's no need to kill them all. Besides, we can't kill them all. There are tens of thousands of them."
Situ Hao glanced at Situ Yi when he heard this, "Why don't you go? Why do I have to go?"
Situ Yi smiled.
"Brother Hao, you should know that my father is still commanding tens of thousands of troops in southern Xinjiang. Do you think our palace is suitable for another person to lead the troops? Haven't you noticed that the three of us brothers usually do very little? It's best for us to just muddle through right now."
Situ Hao knew very well that what Situ Yi said was right. His father had basically not been involved in military power over the years, and his father had no interest in it, so he had been valued by his uncle the emperor over the years.
"Okay, I get it. I'll go later! Don't get involved in this matter anymore. Let me do it!"
Situ Yi then smiled and returned to his tent. This was what it was like to be born into a royal family. As a young and frivolous boy, how could he not have the desire to make great achievements? However, he was born the eldest son of Prince Jing's Mansion, although not the crown prince. His father was a prince commanding troops stationed on the border. His family was already conspicuous enough, so his father repeatedly told him every time he left the capital that if the emperor asked him to do something, he must not think about getting involved in military affairs. He remembered this very clearly, so this time, he listened to Situ Hao in everything, and rarely expressed his opinions or participated in military affairs.
On the second day of the winter month, after several days of negotiations, Situ Hao finally gathered all the rebels in the city and reorganized them into his own army. He also arranged for more than a dozen generals to be deployed. With this, Prince Qing's rebellion in Lianzhou Prefecture was finally settled.
Lu Zifeng also came out of the city, entered the military camp, and sent Prince Qing directly to Situ Hao.
"I've brought the person here and handed him over to you. Don't come to me for the rest."
Situ Hao looked at the unconscious Prince Qing.
"What happened? Did you feed him drugs?"
Lu Zifeng sat crookedly on the soft couch in the military tent.
"I have nothing to do. The drugs are free, right? He's fine, just hungry. I forgot he hasn't eaten in three days. But he's fine, he won't die. Without food, as long as he has water, he can live for seven days, right?"
Situ Hao looked at Lu Zifeng speechlessly, "How careless are you that you actually forgot to arrange a meal for him?"
Lu Zifeng didn't even look up. "It's not that I forgot, it's that I don't want to feed him. Have you forgotten how many people died, and how many starved, when our Lu family came to Luzhou from Bingzhou because of his and Shen Laiqing's selfishness? Now, letting him starve for two or three days is doing him justice. He should be thankful his last name is Situ, otherwise he would have died that day. He's the first person I wanted to kill but ended up sparing."
Situ Yi walked in, squatted down, looked at the unconscious Prince Qing, and tested under his nose with his finger.
"Well, he won't die. Let someone feed him some porridge later. He will definitely wake up in half an hour."
Situ Hao glared at the two men, then ordered the soldiers to take Prince Qing to the next tent and keep him there. He repeatedly reminded them to keep good guard and that if anything went wrong, they would be punished with military sticks.
"When are you planning to return to the capital? It's only about a month away from the New Year. If you delay any further, I suspect you two will spend the New Year on the road."
When Situ Yi heard this, he turned around and said.
"No, Brother Feng, you don't plan to go back to Beijing with us?"
Lu Zifeng looked at Situ Yi as if he were a fool.
"I'm stupid. I'm following you, and I don't know when I can return to the capital. Anyway, military affairs are not my business, so why should I accompany you to suffer here? Besides, it snowed heavily in the capital, and the disaster is quite serious. My family also set up a porridge stall outside the city, and I want to go and take a look."
"Oh, by the way, find that kid Lu Ziyan for me, I'll take him back with me."
Situ Hao knew that Lu Zifeng definitely didn't want to stay here for long, so he ordered the soldiers to call Lu Ziyan over.
In less than a quarter of an hour, Lu Ziyan walked in. When he saw that his elder brother was there, the smile on his face disappeared without a trace.
Situ Yi and Situ Hao burst into laughter when they saw this.
Lu Zifeng glanced at Lu Ziyan.
"You're incredible! You actually dared to leave home and come to the military camp without permission. If you hadn't run into those two, I, your elder brother, wouldn't have known you were in Lianzhou Prefecture."
"Go down and pack your bags. Come back to the capital with me tomorrow. Don't even think about running away. You can't escape."
Lu Ziyan didn't dare to say a word. With a bitter face, he walked out of the tent and headed towards his own tent.
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