How can you surrender?
Inside the palace, Gu Qingling trembled with anger. "Even defeat is better than surrendering without a fight. If we surrender, other cities will follow suit, and the outcome will be beyond our control."
Upon hearing this, a hint of hesitation flashed in Perrin's eyes, but his master's order was to voluntarily hand over Lingzhou.
“Your Majesty, Marquis Dingyuan only wants to take Lingzhou and has no intention of taking other cities,” Peilan said softly. “If we go to war with Lingzhou, we will inevitably suffer heavy casualties and it may even affect the morale of our troops.”
"Perrin!"
Gu Qingling called Pei Lan by her name, her face filled with anxiety.
"Your Majesty, please do not be anxious. A general in the field may not obey the emperor's orders. Besides, the Marquis of Dingyuan will start the battle at noon tomorrow. Even if an imperial decree is issued at this time, it will be too late."
Gu Qingling gave Pei Lan a deep look, then silently lowered her head and continued reading.
Seeing Gu Qingling's reaction, Pei Lan also left the main hall.
"What? The Emperor is unwilling to surrender?" He Yu guessed Gu Qingling's reaction from Pei Lan's expression. "Actually, the Emperor's unwillingness to surrender was within our expectations."
“He Yu, I have a feeling that the Emperor has changed somewhat.”
Pei Lan was a little unsure of what to do. If it were any other time, the Emperor would have been furious, and then she would have coaxed him gently. But this time, the Emperor chose to remain silent.
"Don't overthink it, let's just do as the Lord says."
Inside the hall, Gu Qingling twitched the corners of her mouth.
"Your Majesty, please have some tea to soothe your throat," Qingyu said softly. "Your Majesty has been reading for a long time; be careful not to hurt your eyes."
"Qingyu, am I really that useless?"
Gu Qingling clenched his fists. Nowadays, even official documents rarely passed through his hands; he was merely a puppet whose power was being undermined.
"They initially dumped all the memorials on me, deliberately making it impossible for me to handle them, so that they could take them away legitimately when I couldn't take it anymore."
"Furthermore, my decision has absolutely no effect."
"Your Majesty." A pang of heartache flashed in Qingyu's eyes. The Emperor had risked his life to take him, a mere eunuch, away. He was grateful to the Emperor. "No matter what, this servant will always stay by your side."
"You are the eunuch that Cen Hai chose for me." At that time, the emperor still had high hopes for him.
Gu Qingling rubbed her temples. "Right now, you're the only one who can truly be good to me."
"Lingzhou cannot surrender."
A heavy sigh rang out, and the twelve-year-old emperor let out a resolute roar with all his might.
An imperial edict was urgently dispatched to Lingzhou, and the one escorting the edict was a man in blue robes.
"You intend to go against the master's wishes?" Perrin's face was frosty as she coldly stared at the man in blue holding the imperial edict.
“You know, this imperial edict won’t be delivered to Lingzhou in time. Since that’s the case, why not put on a show for the Emperor?” Qingyi popped a sugar cube into her mouth. “Peilan, sometimes you have to be flexible.”
"you!"
The woman in green smiled and then disappeared from Pei Lan's sight.
......
The Lingzhou garrison waited for news from Licheng like birds in a cage. The soldiers on the city wall kept a close eye on Jiang He's direction, fearing that Jiang He might make any move.
"General, the Emperor hasn't issued any decree yet. Should we defend or not?" In Lingzhou Prefecture, everyone was as anxious as ants on a hot plate.
"This time, it's the Marquis of Dingyuan who's come, along with the secret guards carefully trained by the Jiang family. If he wants to massacre Lingzhou City to avenge the late Marquis of Dingyuan and his wife, it's not impossible!"
Everyone chimed in with their own words, as if facing a formidable enemy.
To these people, Jiang He's name was like that of Yama, the King of Hell.
When the midday sun was high in the sky, Jiang He picked up the wine bowl in front of him and drank it all in one gulp.
"Grab your weapons and come with me."
The wind howled, and Jiang He's eyes were fixed on the direction of Lingzhou.
Almost at the same time, Qingyi arrived in Lingzhou with Gu Qingling's decree: "The Emperor has decreed that Lingzhou must be defended to the death."
"Hold on to the death?"
Upon hearing Gu Qingling's decree, the officials of Lingzhou nearly fainted. "This...we truly cannot bear this..."
"His Majesty said we must defend it to the death."
The prefect of Lingzhou swallowed hard. "Sir, Lingzhou has already been ordered to surrender. The city hasn't even been properly defended. How can we possibly hold it?"
The man in blue's eyes sharpened instantly. He had come running all the way here, and these officials dared to openly defy the imperial decree.
Before Qingyi could say anything more, the bugle call for the charge sounded outside the city.
Jiang He stood alone at the front of the group, and none of the guards on the Lingzhou city wall dared to shoot an arrow at him.
"Open the city gates!"
Suddenly, a large wave of Lingzhou citizens surged out, shouting, "Quickly open the city gates and let Marquis Dingyuan in!"
And so, the city gates of Lingzhou slowly opened before Jiang He's eyes. When the people saw Jiang He, they all knelt down spontaneously, saying, "Greetings, Marquis Dingyuan! Greetings, Marquis Dingyuan!"
A soldier who hesitated to draw his arrow was kicked hard by the person next to him. "Are you stupid? If you wound the Marquis with this arrow, your father will remove you from the family tree when you get home."
The soldier looked at the person next to him in disbelief, "Exterminate the clan?"
"Back then, the late Marquis Dingyuan and his wife protected the people of Lingzhou until their deaths. Now you are shooting arrows at their descendants. Isn't that disloyal and unfilial?"
The soldiers, reprimanded, sheepishly lowered their bows and arrows, watching helplessly as the people cheered and thronged around Marquis Dingyuan as he entered the city.
In Lingzhou Prefecture, the man in green raised his knife and slashed down, tearing the throats of all the officials.
Then, the man in green tore off the robe of one of the officials and used their blood to write the four characters "I would rather die than surrender".
Then he sneered, "A bunch of useless trash."
I thought they had some backbone, but they turned out to be just a bunch of spineless cowards.
The man in green quickly disappeared into the crowd. His master was becoming increasingly strange, as if he had forgotten the goal he had set and was becoming more and more reluctant to kill Gu Qingyan.
Since that's the case, he, in green robes, will find an opportunity to kill for his master.
On the other side, facing all the people of Lingzhou dressed in plain clothes, Jiang He's eyes were a little moist. The people of Lingzhou were using this method to commemorate his father and mother with him.
When the coffins of Marquis Dingyuan and his wife entered the city, all the people knelt on both sides of the street, scattering white paper flowers that had been prepared in advance.
"Are these the Marquis and his wife who saved our family back then?" a little girl asked, her eyes red. "Why are they dead?"
“They are not dead.” The little girl’s mother kissed her forehead. “As long as we remember them, they will never die. They will live forever in Lingzhou and in our hearts.”
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