Chapter Twenty: Heavy Responsibility

  Zhang Hu and the big man looked at each other, then took a few silent steps towards each other.

  The dull sound of clashing swords continued to ring out, and in the blink of an eye, the two had exchanged several blows. Zhang Hu's right chest was pierced by the tip of the big man's sword, leaving a small hole, while the big man's left shoulder armor was cut with a deep gash, from which fresh blood seeped out.

  Zhang Hu grinned triumphantly: "Huo Biao, you're no match for me!"

  A burly man named Huo Biao spat a mouthful of thick phlegm, took a few steps back, and sheathed his long sword. He glared at Zhang Hu with a sinister gaze, sneering coldly: "You little brat, you've brought upon yourself a calamity that will cost you your life! The man you injured is the treasurer of the Small Meng City Garrison. You can try to escape now, but I bet you won't be able to get out of here alive within fifty miles!"

  The scrawny man in the grasp of the bailiffs also shouted in a hoarse voice: "Rebellion, rebellion! You gang of cheap people, dare to lay hands on me, an official? Come and get them, come and get them, take them all down! The whole city is under martial law, and the Tiger House will be searched! Killing officials and rebelling, killing officials and rebelling!"

  The sound of footsteps echoed from all directions, and a team of black-clad city guards rushed over in big strides, their long spears and halberds raised, aiming at the Mong villagers surrounding the treasury house door. The men of Mong village looked at each other in dismay, some hot-tempered ones already drawing out the knives and swords they carried with them.

  Another slap landed on the face of the steward, this palm hit him so hard that his cheekbone cracked open. The steward let out a long wail and had no strength to scream anymore. Wu Qi slapped him again and again, looking at Huo Biao with a cold smile: "I bet, the one who can't make it in Xiaoming City is definitely you, do you believe it?"

  Huo Biao's face changed color, he looked at Wu Qi and then at Si Ku, suddenly retreating several steps back.

  Zhang Hu burst out laughing, pointing the knife tip at Huo Biao and shouting loudly: "Huo Biao, I also bet that you offended Wu Qi's little brother, it should be you who should escape from Xiaomeng City! Haha, without your gang of rascals in Xiaomeng City, the city will be much cleaner in the future!"

  The city guards outside the government house shouted in unison, and the leading general sternly shouted: "People inside listen up! Release the Minister of Finance, drop your weapons, raise your hands, and come out! Otherwise, we will kill without mercy, kill without mercy!"

  A loud clang, the villagers of Mengcun drew out their weapons, and at a glance, they were about to fight with the city guards. In these simple-minded villagers' minds, there was only one thought: Zhang Hu and Wu Qi were both friends of their village, and when friends got into trouble, they naturally had to help each other out. As for what consequences would come from offending the city guards, they hadn't even had time to think that far ahead!

  Lu Chengfeng looked at the villagers with a mixture of surprise and admiration, then cleared his throat and held up the iron plaque hanging from his waist. He shouted loudly: "I am Lu Chengfeng, the newly appointed General, put away your weapons and return to your posts!"

  As soon as the iron plate came out, the city guards immediately put away their weapons. The leader of the city guard led the soldiers to kneel down on one knee and pay a solemn salute to Lu Chengfeng.

  The steward, whose face was swollen and covered in blood, shouted unclearly: "You bunch of bastards, come and save me! If anything happens to me, my young master won't let you off! He's just a small military officer, but my young master is the city defender, the city defender!"

  Those city guards shook all over and stood up again, with their long guns and halberds pointing at the Mengcun people in front of the treasury gate once more.

  Lu Chengfeng was furious, and he shouted loudly: "How dare you! As a city guard, not obeying the orders of the commander is rebellion! Do you want to be executed? Put down your weapons and stand aside!"

  Some of the city guards' wrists shook and their weapons almost fell off, but they still held on to them tightly, aiming straight at the villagers.

  Lu Chengfeng's face turned extremely ugly, he turned his head to look at the blood-covered steward, coldly smiling and saying: "So, a mere steward's order is more effective than my own as a general. The city guard of Xiaoming City is indeed... wonderful, too wonderful for words!"

  The leader of the city's garrison looked at Lu Chengfeng with difficulty and whispered, "General, please don't make it difficult for us!"

  Lu Chengfeng hadn't made a sound, but Wu Qi was already laughing loudly. He threw the storehouse manager to the ground and stepped on his right shoulder with one foot. With a "crack" sound, the storehouse manager started twisting wildly, screaming in a hoarse voice, covering his shattered right shoulder with his left hand, his body writhing like an eel for a few moments before fainting with rolled-back eyes.

  "Lei shouted loudly: 'Lu Guo's military law, those who disobey military orders will be punished!'"

  Lu Chengfeng gritted his teeth and shouted: "Kill!"

  Xiao Hei let out a roar like a mad bull, his muscles bulging as he tightly gripped the long spear and thrust it into the chest of the stunned city guard commander. The commander had never dreamed that Lu Chengfeng would actually give the order to kill him. The spear pierced through his leather armor, protruding from his back by a full three feet.

  Xiao Hei let out a loud laugh, his arms exerting force as he swung the corpse of Jiangling outward. The corpse brought with it a fountain of blood, flying far away to land over ten zhangs distant, crashing down in front of the main hall of the Imperial Censor's office, splattering large patches of blood everywhere.

  The onlookers outside the grand hall of the Imperial Censorate suddenly shrieked in terror and scattered. Several subordinate officials inside the grand hall rushed out, looking around nervously, but not a single one dared to make a sound.

  A large group of city guards rushed over in a hurry, looking at the corpses of their colleagues on the ground with horror. About 700-800 city guards stood stiffly on the square, their complex eyes constantly scanning back and forth between Lu Chengfeng and the fallen general.

  He walked to Lu Chengfeng's side and shouted sternly, "This is an example for you all to watch! Whoever disobeys Commander Dian's military orders will be killed without pardon! You are the city guards of Xiaoming City, and you must obey Commander Dian's orders. Otherwise, you will all be considered as disobedient rebels!"

  The city guards were startled by the sound, several mid-level generals slowly loosened their grip on their weapons, and lowered their heads without saying a word.

  Lu Chengfeng coldly shouted: "Pass the order, summon all military officers above the rank of Wei. Today, I will inspect the troops. Anyone who fails to arrive after hundreds of calls will be beheaded!"

  Xiao Hei walked to the front of the military drum outside the Dianjun Hall and directly pounded on the drum with his fist. The dull drum sound buzzed and spread out, and in the blink of an eye, it had spread throughout the entire Xiaomeng City. Every time he hit the drumhead, Xiao Hei counted loudly once.

  Soon, dense footsteps came from outside the square, and several high-ranking generals rushed over. When they saw the blood and corpses on the ground, they couldn't help but pause for a moment, and several people's faces turned very strange, with a hint of fear in their eyes as they looked at Lu Chengfeng.

  Zhang Hu and others saw that things were not right, so they quickly pulled the Mengcun villagers and drove away with those thirty or forty large carts. Before leaving, he made a gesture to Wu Qi, expressing his gratitude. Wu Qi only returned a fist bump as a courtesy, without saying much.

  After Xiao Hei had beaten the military drum one hundred times, the main hall of the military camp was already filled with more than 130 high-ranking generals above the rank of lieutenant. These generals were the commanders of the nearly 8,000 city guards in Xiaoming City, and among them, there were eighteen deputy generals who held the highest military positions.

  Don't ask about the unclear military system of Lü Guo, but Lu Chengfeng was so angry that his teeth were chattering.

  According to the national military system, three thousand people form a brigade, and the highest officer of a brigade is the deputy general. The city guard army in Xiaoming City has less than eight thousand people, and there can be at most three deputy generals. Now, there are eighteen deputy generals in front of us, more than forty captains, and all the others are high-ranking military officers. What's going on? It's clear that the number of officers is excessive, and these people are all mixed in the city guard army to eat idle rice.

  Apart from these redundant generals, the four major officials, Sikou, Sima, Siyi and Siman, also had their surnames changed. Like Sikou who was beaten by Wu Zetian, the other three were all close servants of Yi Xian's family.

  Lu Chengfeng sat solemnly on the high platform, his right hand heavily pounding the desk in front of him.

  Don't beg for a plate, sitting next to Lu Chengfeng, whispered: "The 8,000 city guards, how much is the annual military salary? What about the annual military expenditure? And so many generals, captains, and lieutenants' food, drink, and entertainment expenses! Is there really an army of 8,000 in Xiaoming City?"

  Lu Chengfeng's body trembled slightly.

  Don't think that he would easily believe that the dead fat man would take out private money to support these superfluous generals. So the answer is obvious, these generals are eating empty salaries, and may also have other dealings such as selling military equipment, in short, there are all sorts of messy things going on.

  Lu Chengfeng let out a cold snort, his icy gaze slowly sweeping across the many generals in the hall. After a long while, he finally spoke in a low voice: "Tomorrow at noon, there will be a full-scale military review of the entire city. You generals, if any of your soldiers do not meet the military's requirements, you can strip off their armor and roll out yourselves!"

  The generals all looked up at Lu Chengfeng, some of them suddenly revealing a mocking smile. Many people didn't even salute General Lu and turned around to leave the general's hall.

  Lu Chengfeng's right palm exerted force, his hand silently and quietly sank into the wooden desk made of sandalwood, the falling wood shavings were as fine as dust, blown away by the wind without a trace. He muttered in a low voice: "It's simply lawless, lawless!"

  He let out a sigh and shook his head with a smile, "Young master should still prepare for the big bloodbath, this small Meng City's city guard army has already rotted through!"

  Suddenly, he remembered the Tianzi Bing number camp garrisoned in Mengcun Village. That was a crack troop, and the general who led them had an aura of ferocity, which was completely different from the atmosphere of the more than 100 generals below the hall just now, and it was unknown what kind of reason it was.

  After a moment of silence, Wu Qi suggested: "Those Sima, Siyi and Siman should also be driven away, shouldn't they?"

  Lu Chengfeng silently picked up the pen and paper on the desk, quickly wrote four official documents, and drove away the four deputy officers under his command, including the treasurer, marshal, executive officer, and barbarian officer. After a moment of contemplation, he rewrote the four documents again, appointing Lao Hei as the new treasurer, Xiao Hei as the new barbarian officer, Wu Qi as the new marshal, and Zhang Hu as the new executive officer.

  Don't bother reading Lu Chengfeng's new appointment document, just keep shaking your head.

  Lao Hei is Lu Chengfeng's old servant, loyal and mature, managing the city's military warehouse is also useful.

  The work is not much, every day is just counting the number of people's heads, one head for 100 yuan exchange, this job is easy, Xiao Hei is that kind of rough person who can do such things.

  As for himself, he was not modest at all. Let alone the small Sima of Mong City, in this era of cold weapons, he thought that being a general who commanded troops was not a problem at all. With the support of Hua Xiaobai's abnormal intelligence and knowledge, marching and fighting were not difficult.

  But is it really the last appointment document? It's hard, very hard.

  "Big Brother Zhang Hu, I'm afraid he's unwilling to be a servant!" Wu Qi told Lu Chengfeng bluntly.

  Lu Chengfeng rolled his eyes and glared at Mo Qi sideways, saying: "As the chief door guest of this young master, it's your job to handle such things!"

  She stared blankly at Lu Chengfeng, her mouth agape and unable to make a sound.

  **

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