Song Tantan had prepared for the worst. If anything unexpected happened, she would take out all the food in the supermarket and eat it. In short, she couldn't let her uncle go hungry.
Ye Moxun's idea was to leave all the dogs behind to protect Song Zhuiyan and her two children, but she disagreed, saying, "Your journey is long and you'll be transporting grain, which is fraught with danger. What danger could I possibly face at home? Besides, we have guards watching over us, and Azhu and Shuisheng are here too. Don't worry about us."
After some initial refusal, Ye Moxun decided to keep the two dogs behind to put his mind at ease. "Seventh and Sixth can stay. There's no need to argue anymore. Otherwise, Tantan and I won't feel at ease."
Seeing that she couldn't refuse, Song Zhuiyan agreed, "Alright, let Seventh Brother and Sixth Brother stay and keep us company. You can go without worry. I'm in good health now. If anyone comes looking for trouble, I can take down a dozen of them by myself without any problem."
That's true. Her aunt's fighting skills are reliable. Looking at the twins being held by the two maids next to her, Song Tantan suddenly felt very reluctant to leave.
"Alright, stop with this mushy act. Let's hurry up and get the food over there as soon as possible. Your uncle is waiting," Song Zhuiyan said, feigning composure, but her eyes were red. "A-Xun, take good care of Tantan on the way. Don't let her cause any trouble."
Song Tantan: "..." Is she really that unreliable? In critical moments, she should be the one protecting A-Xun.
After they left, Song Zhuiyan was worried all day long. Since that day, for some reason, she kept having the same dream: Zhong Qingyi was covered in blood and lying in a sea of corpses. She wanted to save him but couldn't reach him no matter what she did.
Song Tantan was also afraid that her aunt would reveal her depression, so she would go online to chat with her aunt every night and tell her about her progress on the road.
It took almost two months to reach the border. It would be a lie to say that they didn't encounter any dangers along the way, but they dealt with them all. It was just some small fry trying to steal food, or some refugees trying to rush up and steal food, but they were quickly dealt with. It was a close call.
Zhong Qingyi's army was stationed in a border town called Jiagu Pass. When Ye Moxun and his group tried to enter the town, they were stopped at the city gate. After they gave Zhong Qingyi and Bai Pingfeng their names, the soldiers guarding the town went to report, only to find that the two were still fighting with the Hu people and were not in the town.
“We’re here to deliver food. The army is short of supplies, and General Zhong ordered us to bring this food over,” Lin Yu interjected from the side.
When the soldiers guarding the gate heard that it was a supply of provisions, their expressions softened slightly. To be honest, they hadn't had a full stomach in a long time. Without going to the battlefield, just standing at the city gate made their legs weak and they couldn't muster any energy.
Even so, they couldn't be let in at will. Although these people had official documents and travel permits from Xifeng, they weren't from the capital, and they hadn't received any news that Xifeng had sent grain.
All they knew was that the new emperor had sent grain to replenish their supplies, but they had been waiting and the grain hadn't arrived yet. They wondered what the people escorting the grain were up to.
Ye Moxun secretly regretted his carelessness. He should have known better than to act so aloof. He should have asked Liu Chengyu for a token or a pass, so he wouldn't be stopped anywhere. After all, power is still very important.
For example, right now, even when they try to deliver grain, the soldiers block them at the door. They talk until their saliva is dry, but they still can't let them through. My uncle doesn't know how long this battle will last. Should they find a place to settle down first and then deliver the grain later?
When the soldiers guarding the city saw that they were about to take away the grain, they immediately became anxious and tried to stop them from leaving. They said, "Since this grain is for the army, then leave it here. We will definitely report to General Zhong and General Bai when they return."
They wouldn't let them into the city, but they wanted food. They'd have to ask him if he was willing. Ye Moxun naturally refused, saying, "This food is a personal gift from me to General Zhong. It has nothing to do with you."
"With so much grain, how could the general possibly eat it all by himself? Naturally, it must be distributed to all the soldiers. Why are you so fixated on this?" The leader of the guards looked rather grim, his eyes greedily fixed on the grain carts, as if afraid that the grain would vanish into thin air if he looked away.
"The grain must be handed over to General Zhong personally, otherwise there's no point in talking." There's more than one general at the border, Zhong Qingyi. He's just a deputy general. There's also the commander-in-chief and a group of other deputy generals. If the grain isn't handed over to him and is intercepted by other armies, it won't be the soldiers brought by Xifeng who will be fed.
They were just waiting for the new emperor to send grain, but something went wrong on the way. The grain-delivering team had set off several days earlier and had already delivered their grain, while the imperial army was still nowhere to be seen.
What's even stranger is that they didn't encounter any grain-delivering armies on the way, which is quite puzzling.
Seeing the other party's aggressive stance, Ye Moxun narrowed his eyes, his gaze sharp and cold. He had been traveling for nearly two months and was exhausted, which put him in a bad mood. If these people dared to be forceful, he would make them wish they were dead.
Chunsheng and A Si were on high alert, with the medicine powder ready, waiting for the soldiers to cause trouble so they could strike immediately. The others also gripped the knives at their waists, ready to fight at any moment.
Song Tantan had already drawn the knife. She moved too fast, and Ye Moxun couldn't stop her in time. He thought to himself that this was bad and that a big misunderstanding had arisen.
Sure enough, he saw the soldiers draw their swords and point them at him. The leader shouted, "What do you want? It turns out that delivering grain was a pretense. Your real intention is not what you think. I think you are spies of the Hu people, trying to sneak into the city under the guise of delivering grain. I only provoked you a few times and you have already shown your true colors."
"Pah! You're the spy! If you hadn't tried to steal our supplies, would we have been so scared that we drew our swords?" Song Tantan couldn't help but curse. "You want to steal our supplies? No way! These are for General Zhong and General Bai, not just anyone. We're their relatives. Who are you?"
My uncle mentioned several times in his letter that there was not much harmony in the army. He and Bai Pingfeng had only so-so relationships with the other generals. When they first arrived, they were often targeted. The commander-in-chief even tried to strip them of their military power. Fortunately, they were capable enough to prevent others from trampling on them.
The barbarians have invaded our homeland, and the Great Jin Dynasty is practically rendered useless. Yet these so-called generals still have the leisure to scheme against each other; they truly don't know the gravity of the situation.
Actually, this is just Song Tantan's prejudice. Anyone who targets Zhong Qingyi is a bad person. They are all incompetent cowards who only know how to fight for power and profit. They have no other skills except to bully their own people.
But the truth is not so. When Emperor Pingkang was still the Prince Xian, he had many capable subordinates. None of those who followed him were good-for-nothings; they were all quite capable. If it weren't for the lack of weapons and provisions, the Prince Xian and his generals would not have suffered such a crushing defeat.
They fell into the trap because they tried to steal the Hu people's grain. At that time, the Xianwang's army had been starving for three days. If they couldn't get any more food, the entire army would starve to death. Liu Chengyu had just returned to Jiangnan and was at a loss about how to get food.
The Great Jin Dynasty was plagued by internal strife and famine for several years, and the most scarce resource was food, making it extremely difficult to move forward.
At that time, Liu Chengyu had thought about borrowing grain from Ye Moxun, but he didn't have high hopes. No matter how high the grain yield of Songlin Village was, there were only about a hundred people farming the land, and no matter how much they farmed, it wouldn't be enough for hundreds of thousands of troops to fight.
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