At this moment, Cui Zhong and the other two were all thinking about the same question: Was it possible that the person Hong Niangzi knew was actually this soldier, and not Deputy General Peng?
"Ahem." Cui Zhong and the other two heard the deputy general sitting directly in front of them cough softly, and then the soldier who had received the letter quickly handed it over.
Peng Xian took the letter, quickly glanced at it, and frowned slightly: "Go and find out which battalion Nie Qing was sent to."
"Boss, according to past practice, Nie Qing should have been sent to the vanguard camp," Ying Hai immediately replied. "Should I go and take a look first?"
Peng Xian paused for a moment, then stood up and said, "You entertain them, I'll go check on things over there myself." With that, he turned and walked out.
"Boss, you haven't had dinner yet," Ying Hai muttered to himself, watching his boss's retreating figure.
Once the figure was out of sight, he turned to Cui Zhong and the others and said with a smile, "You haven't had dinner yet, have you? Come on, let me take you out for some drinks."
Cui Zhong wanted to say no, it was good that the letter had been delivered, but the other party didn't seem to give them a chance to speak, so he could only follow behind.
Meanwhile, Peng Xian left his tent and led a few of his men straight to the vanguard camp.
The vanguard battalion, as the name suggests, is responsible for charging ahead when two armies clash. However, within the vanguard battalion, those who walk at the very front, wading through traps to test whether the enemy has an ambush, are either criminals exiled from various places or soldiers from various battalions who have committed serious offenses.
People who have made mistakes have no value in life. They are the ones who do the most dangerous and arduous work. If they die, they die. The higher-ups don't care what happened.
Those who were exiled here were generally not taken care of, because if they had connections along the way, they would never have been sent to such a place.
With no war currently underway, the prisoners sent here are either assigned the most arduous tasks or used for torture and amusement by the people in the camp.
At this moment, Nie Qing was cleaning the latrine, his stomach growling with hunger. The nauseating smell was so strong that even stuffing cotton in his nostrils was no use. He knew in his heart that the other party was deliberately making things difficult for him and humiliating him, but he had already thrown all his so-called self-esteem to the back of his mind.
He needed to live. Lady Hong had already promised to check on his mother and sister, so no matter how these people toyed with him, he couldn't get angry; he had to grit his teeth and endure it.
The officials escorted them all the way without mistreating them, but once they entered the military camp, it felt like entering hell.
No one cared why he was sent there or whether he was wrongly accused.
Therefore, he didn't need to go to any futile places to explain. Although he had just arrived, he already understood that this was a place that devoured people without spitting out their bones.
Having just finished cleaning one outhouse, he moved to another gap and saw half a multigrain steamed bun in the corner. He quickly picked it up and stuffed it into his pocket, intending to take a few bites when no one was looking.
Before he could even get a chance to eat a steamed bun, he was whipped and told, "Take this new scum to the stable and clean up the horse manure."
Nie Qing stumbled and followed a soldier toward the stables.
He bit his lip; the pain would keep him awake. For his mother and younger sister, he had to fight to live. And if he received bad news soon, he would fight to live even more.
If his mother and sister were really murdered, then he had no hope of living. But even in death, he would drag the people who harmed him and his sister down to hell with him.
Has that young lady arrived in Tongling City yet? That young lady is his only hope.
Qiao Geng, a guard of the vanguard battalion, was drinking in his tent, thinking that he would use patrol as an excuse to go to Widow Liu's house on the street tonight.
Suddenly, a subordinate came to report that Peng Xian, the general's capable deputy general, had arrived.
"Why would he come here?" Qiao Geng was very puzzled, because he had never had any interaction with that person.
But since he was in a lower position than the other person, he quickly straightened his clothes and went to the door to greet them.
"If you have any instructions, you could just have sent someone to let me know. Why did you come all the way here in person?" Qiao Geng said with a fawning smile.
"Enough with the nonsense. Let me ask you this: did you pick up a man named Nie Qing who was being exiled this afternoon?" Peng Xian asked bluntly.
"Nie Qing?" Qiao Geng genuinely didn't know; these kinds of things were usually handled by his subordinates.
Upon hearing this, his attendant immediately stepped forward and whispered in his ear, "There is such a person."
"But I don't know what you mean, sir?" Qiao Geng couldn't determine what this Deputy General Peng meant.
“I need someone to do odd jobs, give me the man,” Peng Xian said.
That excuse is a bit far-fetched; in the military, there's never a shortage of menial workers.
Qiao Geng was a shrewd man. Upon hearing this, he understood perfectly well that it was probably Nie Qing's family who had pulled some strings and found this Deputy General Peng to take care of them.
"Please wait a moment, I will send someone to fetch the person," Qiao Geng said immediately.
He didn't care what connections the other party had used; he was determined not to offend this person.
Before long, Nie Qing, who reeked of the stench, was brought into the main tent.
"Nie Qing, from now on, you will follow Deputy General Peng." Qiao Geng looked at the exiled criminal seriously and said.
“Yes.” Nie Qing didn’t understand what was going on, but it wasn’t his place to ask why.
Peng Xian successfully obtained the man and, without further pleasantries, led him away from the vanguard camp towards his own camp.
Nie Qing was actually unsure of herself, wondering if the person who framed her was unwilling to let her go and was now trying to harm her since she was still alive.
He had mentally prepared himself for any danger, but to his surprise, after arriving at the camp, the first thing they did was take him to bathe.
After washing, a clean military robe was prepared for him.
Not only that, the kitchen staff also brought him hot meals. Although they were just the most ordinary mixed grain buns and the most ordinary stewed radish, it was clear that they were all freshly made.
Nie Qing didn't have time to think too much and ate heartily.
After he finished eating, someone led him to a tent and told the people inside to take good care of him.
The mattress and blankets on his berth were clean, and the soldiers in his tent were very friendly to him.
Nie Qing was confused. What exactly was going on?
I slept very soundly that night.
The next morning, when he opened his eyes, the soldiers in his tent laughed and called him to wash up and do morning exercises. Only then did he realize that he was not dreaming.
Although morning drills and exercises in the military camp are tough, they feel completely different from what I did in the vanguard battalion.
Even the junior officers in charge of training him treated him extremely well.
When Nie Qing had a spare moment at noon, he couldn't hold back any longer and whispered to the leader to find out what was going on.
"What happened? You should know best, young man, right? You have connections, you pulled some strings..."
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