Chapter 500: Doubt

Translator: Atlas Studios Editor: Atlas Studios

“That’s why it’s extremely dangerous.” Anger flashed across Qi Haoran’s face. “West Xia’s army is equipped with a kind of broadsword. I’ve fought with their soldiers before and know the characteristics of a wound caused by that kind of blade. There are more than 200 people in the village. If there were only a few people, it could be considered a coincidence. However, there are more than 200 people, including children, who all have that kind of knife wound. The way they were slashed is also characteristic of West Xia’s army. Tell me, could this be a revenge killing or an accident?”

Deputy General Zhong’s hands trembled and he couldn’t help but cover his face. He didn’t want to admit this fact. If this was true, it meant that the enemy had already entered their door and rushed into the second courtyard. The family head and family members who lived in the third courtyard didn’t know anything and lived as usual. No, perhaps the enemy hadn’t just rushed into the second courtyard. They might even have disguised themselves and sneaked into their backyard.

At the thought of this, Deputy General Zhong shivered.

Qi Haoran’s heart trembled as well, but he had never been a person who avoided difficulties. On the contrary, the more difficult the situation was, the stronger and calmer he became.

No matter how many thoughts and schemes he had previously, when facing an invasion from foreign enemies, matters such as suppressing bandits, controlling the army, or even rebelling had to be temporarily cast to one side. If he left them be, what was the difference between him and the Tartars and the Great Zhou royal family that he despised? At this moment, nothing was more important than resisting external humiliation.

Looking up at everyone, Qi Haoran saw the fear in their eyes. He knew that they were afraid of fighting the Hus and still harbored hopes that this matter wasn’t linked to the West Xia’s army. Hence, he said, “The cost of building West Xia’s saber is not low. If they are not from West Xia, what is worth them doing this in this village? Moreover, why would they pretend to be from West Xia? Isn’t it best to frame the bandits now, considering there are so many bandits on the south road of Jinghu? Even if the government office is suspicious, surely they can’t investigate the bandits one by one? Since the incident happened so suddenly, the other party clearly did not have time to consider further and could not even stop them. What they have shown now is the most real. They didn’t dare to burn the corpses and destroy the evidence because they were afraid of attracting the people from the nearby villages. Also, they couldn’t guarantee that they could finish cleaning all the traces. Furthermore, they were in a hurry and only wanted to leave the scene as soon as possible…” Qi Haoran met everyone’s eyes and said word by word, “This was done by the people of West Xia.”

“In order to suppress the bandits, His Majesty has already dispatched various armies to provide support. The troops sent from the south and north of Jinghu might not only be from the garrison on the main road in the southwest and northwest, but also from the garrison guarding the border. I don’t know if the West Xia troops have bypassed the line of sight of the garrison or directly advanced. In any case, a West Xia army has arrived here. Perhaps the people in this village had discovered them, or maybe the existence of this village got in their way, so the villagers were slaughtered. As of now, it’s been five days since we received the latest news from the Imperial Court…”

At this point, Qi Haoran could not continue. He sighed and said, “It’s all my fault. Previously, in order to avoid the pursuit of the bandits, I led everyone to hide everywhere. When I wanted to seek information, I could only look for the commoners. Since the information they know is, after all, limited, I don’t know what the situation at the border is like now…”

■’General, you can’t be blamed for this. We only have so few people, and most of the south road of Jinghu is occupied by bandits. If it weren’t for you, we would have been torn apart by those bandits long ago,” a regiment commander hurriedly said. Another person followed suit and said, “General, just tell us your idea. We’ll obey your orders. Anyway, we knew before we joined the army that it would be difficult to return alive. Now that we have survived that ordeal, our lives belong to you. If we can fight with the Hus before we die, we won’t have come to this world in vain.”

“Yes, aren’t they just Hus? Let’s fight them.” A regiment commander slammed the table and shouted.

Three of the five regiment commanders expressed their stance while the remaining two looked at Deputy General Zhong hesitantly. They opened their mouths but lowered their heads and didn’t say anything.

Qi Haoran looked at Deputy General Zhong. Deputy General Zhong took a deep breath and felt bitter. However, he said resolutely, “As long as there’s concrete evidence that West Xia is behind this, I’ll follow your orders and fight West Xia to the death!”

Qi Haoran nodded and said, “I’ve investigated the traces in the village. There should be no less than 500 of them. It’s impossible for so many people to walk all the way from the border to here without leaving any traces. Therefore, as long as we search carefully, we’ll definitely be able to find traces.” “I’ve also investigated the entrances and exits. I can see some very slight traces, but I can’t see anything further away. It’s either all kinds of traces overlapping or they’ve already disappeared. If this place is already like this, let alone a place that those people passed by long ago.”

Qi Haoran took out a map and said, “Based on the situation in this village, they should have taken a mix of the main roads and the byways. If they encounter places with more people, they take the byways to avoid other people. Once they reach a remote place, they take the main roads. This village is only two days away from Tongren. Tongren is very small, and some places have dangerous terrain. There are only two byways out of this village. Send someone to walk along these two byways and see if they can find any traces.

Qi Haoran looked at Deputy General Zhong and said, “If we find out that this matter is really a vendetta, or that it’s targeted at the people in this village because of other interests or conflicts, although I will feel sad for the people in the village, I will still be happy because our Great Zhou has avoided a calamity.” Deputy General Zhong heaved a sigh of relief, glad that Qi Haoran was not stubborn.

The next morning, Qi Haoran sent two teams to investigate along the two paths that he had pointed out. In order to prevent anyone from deliberately creating or hiding evidence, Qi Haoran mixed the people who were loyal to him with those who were biased towards Deputy General Zhong and asked them to monitor each other.

After they left, Qi Haoran got someone to dig more than 60 huge pits not far from the village, planning to bury all the corpses. At this moment, because the weather was hot, the corpses decayed very quickly. Although they had only died for two days, the air was already filled with the stench of rotting corpses. Qi Haoran originally wanted to burn it all down, but when he saw the families arranged in rows, Qi Haoran felt that allowing the families to be buried together might be the only consolation after their deaths.

Hence, Qi Haoran gave the order to dig more than 60 huge pits, one for each family.

The people who had been placed aside previously were confirmed after they found the genealogy and household registration of each family. When they buried everyone, Deputy General Zhong, who had stayed behind to guard the village, also brought people to sweep the entire village. Everything that could be eaten and used was gathered in the large square.

Seeing the ugly expression on Qi Haoran’s face, Deputy General Zhong immediately explained, “Since these things will rot if we keep them, we might as well let the soldiers have them. Besides, aren’t we going to avenge these victims by finding the murderer? We can consider this as a compensation.” Qi Haoran snorted and said, “Did I say no? But what if it rains after you gather the things here? Are you thinking that we haven’t eaten enough moldy rice these few days, so you plan to make another batch?”

Upon hearing this, Deputy General Zhong immediately got someone to move the grains to a larger room. The other supplies were also placed in different rooms.

Qi Haoran stood at the window and looked outside for a while. Then, he turned around and sat on the chair, looking down at the small token in his hand.

Fei Bai asked in confusion, “Master, why didn’t you take this out? If you did, who would suspect that this wasn’t done by West Xia? We wouldn’t need to spend so much effort to find evidence and traces then..”