Poor Family

  Chapter 41 Liao Kingdom Cavalry

The carriage was fifteen or six feet away from the official road, and a wheel fell into a snow-covered gully. The driver was extremely anxious, seeing that he could no longer walk, he hurriedly covered the body of the horse with an oilcloth. The Khitan barbarians hated Song people the most Horses can be shot with one arrow.

It was too late, and soon, twelve cavalrymen from the Liao Kingdom rushed past the busy official road just now. They wore iron helmets and black lacquer armor, with black scabbard swords on their waists, long bows and arrow pots on their backs, and arrow pots on their backs. It is filled with long arrows.

The whip in the hands of the leading cavalryman swung up into the air, roared in the sky, fell heavily, and hit the horse's buttocks. The healthy horse roared in pain, and rushed forward like a powerful arrow, heading straight to the south of the official road. , Other cavalry followed suit one after another, shouts one after another, twelve fierce horses passed by like a gust of wind, and the momentum was overwhelming.

  At this time, the leading cavalryman suddenly saw the carriage. He bent his bow and set his arrow while galloping.

  The horse neighed sadly, fell to the ground and died, and the Khitan cavalry who followed cheered unanimously and continued to gallop at an accelerated pace. In a blink of an eye, they turned into a few small black spots, coming and going like a whirlwind, leaving snow foam dancing all over the sky.

  The coachman lay on the horse and cried out loudly. Li Yanqing and the others got out of the carriage and surrounded the horse silently. The horse's body was still warm, the blood from the eyes was still dripping, and the snow was red in a puddle.

  People gathered around one after another, but no one spoke, and the crowd was silent. Song and Liao had fought for a hundred years, and everyone felt heavy. The Khitan barbarians unscrupulously killed people and shot horses in the Song Dynasty, making people think of their own fate.

  Yao Ding sighed, helped the groom to comfort him, and said, "It's lucky that people have nothing to do!"

  The groom wiped his tears with his clothes and said: "This is a two-year-old Qingkou, even if I sell my whole family, I can't afford to pay for this horse!"

  Wang Gui's blood rushed to his head, he stepped forward and patted his chest, "I'll make the decision on this matter, I'll go back and explain to my grandfather, you don't need to pay, if it's a big deal, it will be my reward."

  Yao Ding glanced at Wang Gui approvingly, this kid is responsible at the critical moment!

   "Fifth Brother, have the Khitan barbarians always been this arrogant?" Li Yanqing asked Yue Fei.

  Yue Fei nodded, "They are the palace tent army of the Liao Kingdom. They are kind enough if they didn't shoot anyone. If the Nanyuan army came down to threw grain and grass, it would be called tragic, and families would be destroyed everywhere."

  Beside Tang Huai said in a low voice: "This is the outpost of the envoys of the Liao Kingdom. I heard from my grandfather that Taiwei Tong went to the Liao Kingdom in the first half of the year. Now it should be the envoys of the Liao Kingdom who are returning to visit. It was like this before."

  At this time, all the people around had dispersed, the groom stopped a bullock cart for them, and everyone took the bullock cart to go back to Lushan Town along the path beside the Yongji Canal.

On the way back, everyone was very silent. Li Yanqing stared out the window for a long time. An arrow from the Khitan cavalry opened up his dusty memory. Ten years later, when the Jurchen Tartars swept across the Central Plains like locusts, he was born in Si, What kind of tragic fate will this piece of land that grew up in Si suffer?

Looking at the smoke rising from the village in the distance, shrouded in the quiet twilight, he thought of the poem again, "Mo Xiao's farmhouse is full of wine, and there are enough chickens and dolphins to stay in a good year." Ruthlessly ravaged and turned into a ghost land thousands of miles away, he couldn't help but feel a twinge of pain in his heart.

  What should I do? He had the courage to do justice generously, but hated himself for being young and incapable of turning his fate around. For a moment, Li Yanqing was filled with anxiety and helplessness.

  At this time, Yue Fei's eyes showed determination, and he clenched his fists and said to the crowd: "If we don't learn martial arts to protect ourselves, we will be slaughtered at will by the Khitan barbarians like that horse. We should learn martial arts at the same time as we study literature."

Wang Gui and Tang Huai promised with a bang, they were quite heroic, but they didn't see Li Yanqing answering, the three looked at him strangely, seeing that he was looking outside, Wang Gui pushed him, and asked in a low voice: "Brother Qing Son, what are you thinking?"

  Li Yanqing glanced back at them, still unable to get out of his thoughts, he said slowly: "I was thinking, when the Jurchen barbarians came to kill me, how can I keep my fathers and folks in my hometown?"

   "Jurchen barbarian?" Everyone looked at him in puzzlement, even Yao Ding's eyes were full of doubts.

"It was a tribe that was ten times more ferocious than the Khitan barbarians. The Khitan people we saw had actually fallen. They were just old, sick tigers, but the Jurchen barbarians were fierce tigers that devoured people. Wherever it passed, The bare bones, thousands of miles of red wilds, will kill us one day."

   "Brother Qing, how do you know?" Yue Fei asked in a deep voice.

  Li Yanqing came to his senses and knew that he had slipped his tongue. He hesitated and said, "It was Li Guan who knew the state who told me."

  Everyone was silent again. Since these words came from the mouth of Li Guanren, they must be credible. Thinking that the war is coming, they are young and powerless, and they can't even protect themselves. How can they talk about protecting their relatives? Everyone fell into a daze.

At this time, Yao Ding said to the crowd: "Do your best and obey the destiny. You just need to study hard and practice martial arts in your spare time to keep fit. If that... Jurchen savage really comes to kill you, you should pick up your knife and fight to the death. It's destiny to fight hard, so what do you think about it now?"

  Yao Ding also figured it out. In the past, he firmly opposed students practicing martial arts, thinking that martial arts practice was useless. Today, when he witnessed the scene of the Khitan shooting a horse with his own eyes, his heart was strongly shocked.

  He finally realized that he should encourage the students to practice martial arts to strengthen their bodies. When the northern barbarians came, the students could pick up their swords to protect themselves, instead of being slaughtered like that horse.

  . ． ． ． ． ．

  Back to Lushan Town, it was already midnight, Yao Ding arranged for everyone to stay in the inn, and slept for several hours. When they woke up, everyone's eyes were red, it seemed that they didn't sleep well last night.

  The four of them are teenagers after all. Although they were stimulated by the Liao cavalry yesterday, after a night of sleep, they returned to their cheerful and lively nature.

   "Brother Qing, come to my house after school in the afternoon!"

  Wang Gui invited Li Yanqing with a smile and said, "Go shoot arrows in the backyard of my house. I'll bring out a few straw figures in Khitan barbarian clothes, and let everyone shoot arrows to vent their anger."

  Li Yanqing scratched his head, "I'm afraid it won't work today! I just came back, I have to go home and have a look."

   "That's right, let's do it next time!"

  Wang Gui suddenly remembered that he himself had a lot of work to do, and he probably didn't have time to invite everyone to shoot arrows. He originally wanted to invite Fifth Brother Yue again, but now he swallowed the invitation.

The two of them got dressed and went to the yard to wash their mouths and faces. Tang Huai just came out with a basin. He pulled Li Yanqing and said, "I'm not wrong! I asked the shopkeeper just now, it is indeed the mission of the Liao Kingdom. Yesterday we passed through Lushan Town one step ahead of us, and I heard that there were thousands of people, and the momentum was very loud."

   "Hmm! Where's Fifth Brother?" Li Yanqing didn't see Yue Fei.

"I'm here!"

  Li Yanqing turned his head, only to see Yue Fei in a short jacket, steaming in through a small door, "I went out to practice martial arts early in the morning!"

  Li Yanqing gave a thumbs up and praised sincerely: "I admire Brother Wu's character of doing what he says and doing. I will get up early to practice martial arts tomorrow."

   "Tomorrow I also want to get up early to practice martial arts." Wang Gui obviously lacked confidence when he said this.

Yue Fei nodded and said: "I thought about it all night last night, but what Master said is right, it is better to retreat and form a net than to envy fish in the abyss. We talk little about major events in the world, but we can change ourselves and practice martial arts. In the future You can also defend your country.”

Li Yanqing's heart became brighter, and he smiled happily: "Guan Li said that it will take at least ten years for the Jin soldiers to come over, and these ten years are enough for us to learn something. You can’t even ride a donkey, let alone a horse-drawn bow.”

  Everyone immediately remembered the incident of Li Yanqing falling from the donkey, and couldn't help laughing together.

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  (end of this chapter)