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Du Xing smiled and said, “It wasn’t Huyan Jin, that kid who revealed the information to me, rather, it was Ma Ji who leaked it out to me, so it must be true from many points of view. Your earlier guess, other than me, who else?”

“Naturally it was Bai Ziting,” Xu Ziling replied, “He is the middleman; only he knew clearly the time and the place Da Xiaojie received the goods, thereby he had a good grasp of the route that she took to transport the goods back to Shanhai Pass.”

Du Xing cheerfully raised his thumb in praise, saying, “Outstanding! Just a bit more and you would have guessed it head-on.”

Ke Dazhi did not understand, “Didn’t Dage say it was Han Chao’an who did it?” he asked, “How come now you seem to indicate that Bai Ziting cannot escape responsibility as well by saying just a bit more?”

Du Xing spoke indifferently, “You were able to guess Bai Ziting; although it did not hit the mark, it was not far. Han Chao’an has become Funantuo’s believer. Kaishan told me this.”

Stunned, Ke Dazhi asked, “Is that true? This is the first time I heard it. A man like Han Chao’an, how could he believe a demon monk from Tianzhu?”

Du Xing said, “Which man does not like pretty face? Funantuo has a book ‘Kama Sutra’, specializing in explaining the joyous and good way between man and woman. Han Chao’an wanted to learn ‘Kama Sutra’ from him, naturally he must become the hunting dog. Ha! I am just joking. The real reason is that Han Chao’an wanted to draw close to the Wu Dao Ba [five saber overbearing] Gesuwen, and Funantuo has already colluded with Gesuwen, hence from time to time Han Chao’an becomes Funantuo’s hawks and hounds [fig. running dogs].”

Astonished, Kou Zhong said, “Unexpectedly it’s that guy who has five sabers hanging on his body without feeling that they are cumbersome?”

Overwhelmed with emotional stirring, Du Xing changed the subject, he said with a sigh, “Were it not for Xieli and Tuli’s reconciliation, how could we chat without the slightest bit of ill-feeling today?”

“Why did Funantuo want to rob Da Xiaojie’s eighty thousand sheets of sheepskin? Did all information concerning this matter come from Xu Kaishan’s mouth?” Xu Ziling asked.

Du Xing did not answer him. He spoke heavily, “Xieli is willing to convert enemies into friends with you guys, there is another reason.”

Kou Zhong and Xu Ziling exchanged eye signal, they spoke together, “Please bestow instructions.”

Du Xing said, “Three days ago, we received new information from the Central Earth. Song JinGang defeated Li Yuanji first, forcing him to flee back to Guanzhong in panic. And then as Song JinGang moved his army down south, Li Shimin led his troops from Longmen crossing the Yellow River to meet Song JinGang’s attack. The Tang Army was engaged in battle several times, each time was defeated by Song JinGang. Finally Li Shimin adopted the fortify defenses and raze the fields [idiom: to leave nothing for the invader/scorched earth policy] strategy, he closed his camp and built rampart to resist JinGang’s elite cavalry. He had seen accurately JinGang’s weak point in that he did not have enough army provisions and could not engage in prolonged war.”

Inwardly Kou Zhong was shaken violently; the military situation of the power struggle in the Central Earth, which he had not heard for a long time, finally entered his ears via Du Xing’s mouth.

Song JinGang was an astute commander-in-chief, of course he understood that rapid movement to the south was unfavorable to him. The problem was that part of his army were Tujue men, so that it could be easily imagined that it was difficult for him to go against the Tujue generals’ advice, and had no choice but to comply with Tujue people’s habit of swift battle and rapid victory, using battle to raise battle tactics. Therefore, as soon as he encountered Li Shimin, who was adept in defense, immediately he suffered big loss.

Du Xing continued, “In the end Song JinGang’s provisions exhausted, he withdrew back to the north. Li Shimin launched comprehensive attack, he defeated JinGang at Luzhou first, and then followed up a victory and pressed home the attack, in one day and night he marched his troops more than two hundred li, engaging the enemy ten times in succession, pursuing them straight toward Qiao Shu Gu [lit. freckled mouse valley], eight battles eight victories, he dealt a big blow to JinGang, capturing and killing tens of thousands of his men. JinGang retreated to Jiezhou, he lined up his troops disposition west of the city, with the city behind him, north-south distance was seven li. Li Shimin sent Li Shiji to battle, pretending to be defeated and withdrew. When JinGang pursued and attack, Shimin personally led his elite troops going around and attacking from behind. With pincer attack from both sides, JinGang was no match for them and was utterly defeated. Li Shimin recovered Jinyang.”

Kou Zhong and Xu Ziling suddenly saw the light. They grasped the meaning behind Du Xing’s speech.

If the one defeated was Li Shimin’s side, Song JinGang would force entrance into Guanzhong, then Xieli would disregard everything and move his troops to attack, he might even ask Bi Xuan to get rid of Kou Zhong and Xu Ziling, so that there would not be any powerful adversary in the Central Plains. Unfortunately, things turned out contrary to the way he wished, the victor was Li Shimin, he had no choice but to change strategy. Not only he had to establish friendly relations with Tuli, he even had to release Kou Zhong and Xu Ziling to go back to the Central Earth to control Li Shimin; it would be best if both sides suffer. Otherwise, if he let Li Shimin sweep the Central Plains like a hot knife through butter, the next one he was going to deal with would definitely be him, Xieli. Furthermore, the only thing Xieli had in his hands right now was a terrible mess. The two defeats, the Rushing Wolf Plains and Song JinGang – had made Eastern Tujue lose, as well as greatly damaged their vitality. The bigger headache was that because he became enemies with Tuli, various tribes of the prairie began to stir, the situation became chaotic. Therefore, Xieli’s current top priority was, to the greatest extend, to act with urgency to unify the prairie first, before he could conspire against the Central Plains. Under this kind of situation, naturally he was unwilling to take the risk to offend Tuli by dealing with Kou Zhong and Xu Ziling.

Jinyang was the Li Clan’s home base of operations. Furthermore, it was a barrier into Guanzhong. If it fell, the Tujue main forces might go down south to Guanzhong at any moment. More importantly, this region was the source of grain to Guanzhong; its survival was the lifeblood of the Li Clan. Pingyao was precisely the economic hub of this area; its importance was very obvious.

Kou Zhong spoke heavily, “Is Li Shimin currently in Jinyang?”

Ke Dazhi shook his head and said, “Li Shimin dispatched his subordinate Li Zhongwen to guard the frontier, while he himself led his troops to rush back into Chang’an.”

Kou Zhong sighed and said, “Luoyang is in danger!”

Du Xing spoke heavily, “What’s Shaoshuai’s plan?”

Kou Zhong shot a glance toward Xu Ziling, he sighed and said, “What can be planned? Who would think that the brilliant divine-military commander Song JinGang would be defeated that quickly, that tragically? Presently we could only take one step at a time.”

Ke Dazhi smiled and said, “If Shaoshuai agrees, Xiaodi can make arrangement for Shaoshuai and Great Khan to sit together and talk properly.”

“What?” Kou Zhong was stunned.

He looked at Xu Ziling, but then quickly he shook his head and said, “This is not my, Kou Zhong’s style of work; if I want to win, I should rely on my own strength, only then will the victory be meaningful. Thank you very much for Ke Xiong’s good intention.”

Du Xing laughed aloud and said, “Good man! The fact is that Xieli already knew what kind of man Shaoshuai is. But if we all could sit down to use wine to rinse our mouth and chat and laugh, it would not be a bad thing, would it?”

Smiling wryly, Kou Zhong said, “Let’s talk about that later, shall we? Presently, the most important matter is how to get rid of Shen Mohuan and Huyan Jin, two kids, other things can wait till tomorrow to discuss. Old Du, you still have not answered Ling Shao’s question just now.”

Xu Ziling sighed inwardly. Kou Zhong’s judgment that Luoyang was in danger was not shooting without aiming at all. Li Shimin did not send Li Shiji, Li Jing, or other great generals with enough weight to guard Taiyuan, but only let Li Zhongwen, whose fame and position [or official rank] was not clear to stay behind to take care things, it was precisely because he wanted to concentrate his entire force to attack Luoyang, one of the three most famous and strongest fortified cities in the world, but also because he saw accurately that for the time being Xieli was unable to personally take part in military expedition or supporting his other puppets to go down south. He hurriedly returned to Chang’an, it was to arrange preparation for the attack against Luoyang. The key to victory or defeat was whether Kou Zhong could help Wang Shichong defending Luoyang and made Li Shimin, who triumphed in every battle, to suffer defeat or not.

The one thing that Xu Ziling was most unwilling to see was pressing in on his eyelashes [idiom: imminent].

If Luoyang fell, even if Kou Zhong was able to survive, Li Shimin would definitely pursue him relentlessly to strike him, and would not stop until this formidable opponent was removed.

In such a dangerous and inferior situation Kou Zhong still flatly refused Xieli’s so-called with-neither-peace-nor-kindness assistance, it showed that Kou Zhong was a man able to persevere with national virtuous cause.

“Good man!” Du Xing shouted again.

Only then did he leisurely turn his gaze to Xu Ziling and said, “The information mostly came from Kaishan. As for why Funantuo did so, my guess is that this man has enormous ambition that he unceasingly stocks up wealth using despicable means, thereby expanding his power.”

Ke Dazhi asked in astonishment, “In the prairie, gold does not do much. Even if Funantuo has wealth equivalent to that of an entire nation [idiom: extremely wealthy], he is, after all, an outsider, he has no clansmen of the same bloodline to support him; what can he do?”

Shrugging his shoulders, Du Xing said, “It’s really hard to say. Perhaps he wants to bring the gold back to Tianzhu, to establish his demonic-monk kingdom?”

Kou Zhong nodded and said, “Du Ba Wang’s words are very reasonable. Back to the topic, I wonder if you, LaoGe have any information on Meiyan?”

Du Xing shook his head and said, “I already told Dazhi, Meiyan’s whereabouts is secretive, although I spread my spies to find out, I am afraid it is still difficult to get any result today.”

Kou Zhong spoke resolutely, “Since that’s the case, we might as well not think about her. Presently there is only one chance remains to kill Shen Mohuan and Huyan Jin.”

Greatly interested, Du Xing said, “I’d like to hear the details!”

Kou Zhong said, “The fact that the two of us are injured has been known to everyone. Even more, Shen Mohuan knows better than anybody else that they had successfully inflicted serious damage on us. Therefore, they will surely come again as quickly as possible to strike, and the best opportunity will be the moment we leave the Palace after the banquet tonight. Since they have Funantuo on their side, the timing and the route of our departure will also be grasped completely in their hands. If you were in their place, would you let this opportunity slip by?”

Du Xing shook his head and said, “If I were them, I would never let go of this once-in-a-thousand-years opportunity.”

And then he smiled and said, “Are you really seriously injured? On the surface I cannot see it at all, only your countenance is not as good-looking as before.”

Kou Zhong responded indifferently, “Our injuries are indeed very bad. If you, LaoGe and Dazhi Xiong making your all-out move right now, there is a great chance that you would be able to kill us. Do you want to try?”

Du Xing laughed involuntarily and said, “The hundred-foot worm died without showing any sign of rigor mortis, much less Kou Zhong and Xu Ziling who are famous to be beaten-but-not-dead? Don’t make a joke!”

Frowning, Ke Dazhi said, “Shaoshuai seems to speak about this matter as if everything is easy. If tonight, the three most powerful horse thieves in the prairie carefully laid out the second round of the assassination operation, if you could hold out without losing, that would already be very rare. If Funantuo, whose martial art skill’s depth is hard to fathom, personally made his move, even with the addition of Du Dage and myself, at most we could only fight to a draw, and that will only work if the two gentlemen’s injury does not affect your martial art skill. Can Ba Fenghan come back in time?”

“The chance of Old Ba rushing back is very small,” Xu Ziling replied.

Kou Zhong laughed and said, “This is what makes this thing more interesting, the so-called to win by a surprise move. Our wonder troops [i.e. troops appearing suddenly (in a raid or ambush)] are precisely two gentlemen. How many men can you deploy? I want genuine martial art masters.”

Du Xing said, “The number of men that we could use is between a hundred to a hundred and twenty; all are veterans of a hundred battles, elite troops with plenty of training. The problem is that the horse thieves combat fight is that one strike fails, they would immediately scatter away. Longquan’s streets and alleys are crisscrossing each other, pedestrians and vehicles are numerous; as soon as they see something is wrong, they will scatter to escape. I am afraid even if we have double the number of men, we still could not intercept too many men.”

Having a card up his sleeve, Kou Zhong said, “Therefore, we must narrow down the point of attack, focusing our effort to deal with Shen Mohuan, one person. If they scatter to escape, then they fall into Laozi’s trap.”

Ke Dazhi’s pair of eyes lit up, he said, “To fight side by side with Shaoshuai is indeed a delight in life. It’s just that I’m a bit worried, under that kind of melee, how do we recognize Shen Mohuan? He will definitely disguise himself in some foreign official attire.”

Kou Zhong said, “Reasonably speaking, Bai Ziting might use a horse-drawn carriage to take us, two distinguished guests back to our residence, which will also make us an obvious target of arrows and darts. Can Shen Mohuan refrain from using his Flying Cloud Bow? Ke Xiong, don’t worry.”

Slapping the table, Du Xing said with a sigh, “F*ck his eighteen generations ancestors, now even I feel that I am not without any accomplishment at all.”

Kou Zhong smiled and said, “Under those circumstances, to kill martial art masters like Shen Mohuan and Mu Ling is in fact still more difficult than ascending to the sky. But if Ke Xiong could pin him down, we could see in which cave he is going to escape, and then we could exhaust our manpower to heavily besiege him and attack him that he has no time to deal with it.”

Ke Dazhi cheerfully said, “That is a small matter, leave it to Xiaodi.”

Du Xing frowned and said, “If Shen Mohuan, husband and wife, flee into the Palace, and hide inside Funantuo’s Tianzhu Temple in the Palace, won’t we gaze at the ocean and lament our inadequacy [idiom: to feel powerless and incompetent (to perform a task)]?”

Kou Zhong said, “Although that is one possibility, but the chance is not high. Unless Bai Ziting has a part in this matter and informs all the imperial bodyguards defending the Palace complex to allow those two come and go freely, otherwise they will never escape into the Palace. No matter whether they succeed or fail, they should escape out of the city in order to avoid retaliation or perhaps implicating Bai Ziting.”

Du Xing nodded to indicate that he agreed that it made sense; he said, “If Bielegunatai brothers can come to lend their fists, our operation to kill Shen Mohuan will have even higher chance of success.”

Kou Zhong cast a glance toward Xu Ziling first, and then he shook his head and said, “We are not going to get any helpers. Because of the distance, I am afraid the Gunatai brothers will not be back before tomorrow.”

Hearing that, Xu Ziling was shaken inwardly, and then a chill crept up in his heart. Why did Kou Zhong lie? They practically did not know whether the Gunatai brothers were on their way back; perhaps they could even reach Longquan before dusk, yet he spoke with such confidence. Kou Zhong would never lie to his comrade-in-arms, unless he had his doubt toward Du Xing or maybe Ke Dazhi. Where exactly had they revealed the cloven foot to make Kou Zhong be on guard against them?

His mind was flashing at the speed of light, immediately he acted in concert with Kou Zhong, saying, “Too bad Shi Guniang does not wish to be drawn into the struggle and vendetta in the world, so that even if we tell her this, I am afraid it would only defile her immortal ears, otherwise she would be a tremendous help.”

Du Xing laughed aloud and said, “The four of us join hands, could it be that we still cannot put a trivial Shen Mohuan in order? Two gentlemen only need to be the bait in peace, Dazhi is in charge of following Shen Mohuan’s track, me and my men will be the link between you, I guarantee that Shen Mohuan will not be alive tomorrow.”

Ke Dazhi cheerfully said, “Dage is willing to make your move to uphold justice, our chance of success definitely increases considerably.”

Letting out a cold snort, Du Xing said, “Evildoers who only know how to rape and loot, anybody can punish them. I already thought that they are unpleasant to the eye. Before, I regret that I had no chance, but this time, how could I be willing to let it slip by?”

After discussing the details, the four men broke up in order to pull the wool over people’s eyes.

Kou Zhong and Xu Ziling took shelter from the rain under a bridge nearby to talk.

Kou Zhong spoke with serious expression, “Luckily you cooperated. This time Du Xing is going to fall into the trap.”

Puzzled, Xu Ziling said, “I was only following the tone of your voice, but until this moment I still don’t know what’s wrong.”

Kou Zhong replied, “First of all, Du Xing should not show such enthusiasm in assassinating Shen Mohuan. We came to him mainly to ascertain Xu Kaishan’s identity, but he, intentionally or otherwise, became our comrade-in-arms instead.”

After a short pause, he continued, “Second reason was his well-intentional explanation that due to Xieli and Tuli’s reconciliation, from being enemies, he and us become friends. He also performed in-depth analysis that because Li Shimin defeated Song JinGang, Xieli changed his attitude toward us. All kinds of actions, none conforms to his usual surly and unreasoning, overbearing, Laozi-will-do-whatever-Laozi-wants-to-do style. It was enough evidence that he himself is having a guilty conscience and is using deceit.”

Xu Ziling nodded and said, “Your intuition is not without any reason. But if on the basis of these two points you determined that Du Xing’s mouth does not match his heart, it’s still a bit subjective.”

Muttering to himself irresolutely, Kou Zhong said, “Do you remember during the banquet at Xiao Taoyuan in Shanhai Pass, when we mentioned that the wolf-bandits were escaping into the prairie, we sensed the horror in Du Xing and Xu Kaishan’s heart? That was definitely not a fancy pretending. They were afraid that we would really overtake the unprepared wolf-bandits, hence they disguised themselves as wolf-bandits to lure us toward Yan Yuan Ji; it was one move, two gains.”

Shaken, Xu Ziling said, “You begin to convince me. Recalling the situation just now, he was indeed trying to sense our foundation.”

Kou Zhong said, “This is a different time compared to the past; the two of us did not have much bargaining chips to contend with the enemies. If we are not being careful and fall into heavy siege, we will undoubtedly die; therefore, there can be no mistakes.”

Knitting his brows, Xu Ziling asked, “Do you think Ke Dazhi has a problem?”

Kou Zhong replied, “As far as I can see, Ke Dazhi is not that kind of person at all, the problem is entirely on Du Xing. He practically knows Xu Kaishan’s real identity; moreover, they are villains colluding together.”

Xu Ziling could not help recalling what Yin Xianhe told him; he said that Du Xing was a two-faced man. On the surface he was distributing money, fighting for virtue [idiom], upholding justice. Yet in the dark he did not shrink from any crime, conniving with Xu Kaishan’s Bei Ma Bang. Kou Zhong was getting more and more formidable, deceiving him was no longer easy. He said, “In that case, shouldn’t we make it clear to Ke Dazhi that we have our doubts about Du Xing? If Du Xing really worked together with Xu Kaishan to do bad things, there is great chance that he could also collude with Shen Mohuan, Huyan Jin, Han Chao’an, and the others. Unaware of these inner things, Ke Dazhi might be easily duped.”

Shaking his head, Kou Zhong said, “There is kindness and friendship between Du Xing and Ke Dazhi, a relationship that can be changed based on our few words; we could make a complete mess of this matter instead. Don’t worry! Let’s not mention that Ke Dazhi has enough ability to defend himself, with his position as Xieli’s trusted general, even if Du Xing had gargantuan guts, he would not dare to do anything to Ke Dazhi. Besides, having someone like Ke Dazhi by Xieli’s side to say good things on his behalf will only bring him benefit without any harm.”

Xu Ziling could not help sighing; he said, “You, this kid, have become more and more astute and formidable.”

Kou Zhong reached out to put his hand on Xu Ziling’s shoulder, he laughed and said, “These are all forced by circumstances. In fact, ever since Du Xing was willing to tell us who robbed the sheepskin, I have already had doubt in my heart, and when he said that it was Han Chao’an, I really find it hard to believe. Why did Du Xing do that? To cut a long story short, the sheepskin should be robbed by the wolf-bandits. Ma Ji and Du Xing have very close relationship, one is responsible to receive the stolen goods outside the Great Wall, the other distributes the goods inside the Pass. It is a big business with small capital but rich profit.”

Xu Ziling said, “Is it possible that Du Xing really does not know Xu Kaishan’s identity within the Da Ming Zun Jiao? When we were talking about evidence, his shock was not fake.”

Kou Zhong nodded and said, “Highly possible.”

And then his spirit greatly aroused, he said, “The second round of assassination tonight must be exceptionally dangerous. We must seek other helpers. You go find Shi Xianzi and Yin Xianhe, that weird fellow. I go look for Yuekepeng and Song Shidao. And then we’ll attend the banquet at the imperial palace together, to see whether Funantuo really has lustrous lotus flower tongue, his eloquence unimpeded. Ha! This is really getting more and more interesting!”

Looking up at the sky, Xu Ziling said, “This heavy rain is our best cover; before the rain stops, we must quickly get things done.”

The two boys used the umbrellas that Du Xing presented to them, they parted ways to do their respective task.