Chapter 362: Chapter 362

Li Hou’s tears fell, he was truly saddened, crying uncontrollably, "The Li Family only has a small Wu Castle; not long ago they came to my Wu Castle to requisition grain. Knowing I couldn’t defeat them, I was willing to gather food for them, but who knew they’d come again after two days, ultimately not sparing us, letting their soldiers pillage and plunder. Of the Li Family members, along with the villagers in the Wu Castle, only one tenth survived."

The middle-aged man and young man beside him also shed tears.

Li Hou held the hands of the middle-aged man and young man, saying, "Now the only close ones left by my side are my nephew and grandnephew. I beseech you, cousin, to show compassion and grant them a way to survive."

Zhao Hanzhang glanced at the two men, then asked Li Hou, "So the people here are all..."

Li Hou wiped his tears and said, "Most are civilians pillaged from various villages, some are villagers from my Wu Castle, and a few are my clan members."

Li Hou hurriedly asked Li Lai to gather the clan members to pay respects to Zhao Hanzhang.

Zhao Hanzhang did not refuse; after taking their homage, she said, "To let you know, cousin, we are currently at war and cannot return to Xiping immediately, so I can only send you to Guan City."

Li Hou’s face grew even paler, hastily saying, "But Guan City is besieged by the Xiongnu, and even though General Beigong is formidable, he has few soldiers and lacks supplies; I’m afraid he won’t hold out for long."

If Guan City falls, wouldn’t the civilians inside face the same fate?

Either killed or captured and conscripted into the army.

Zhao Hanzhang said, "We are here this time to support General Beigong."

Li Hou was surprised, then eyes brightened, "Is a large army coming?"

Zhao Hanzhang did not deny, just saying, "We only attack, not defend."

Li Lai said, "Will General Beigong leave?" Follow current novels on N0velFire.ɴet

Zhao Hanzhang said, "That depends on General Beigong’s choice."

Li Lai lowered his eyes to think for a moment, then looked up to say, "We are willing to enter Guan City."

The young man behind him knelt down, saying, "I want to follow the lady into battle, drive all Xiongnu out of Yu State."

Zhao Hanzhang looked at the young man, asking, "What’s your name?"

"Replying to Prefectural Governor, the young one’s name is Li Zhao."

Zhao Hanzhang praised, "Good name, and good ambition. But do you have martial skills? Have you killed anyone?"

The young man raised his slightly pale face and said, "Killed! When they invaded, I killed!"

It was just that when he was exhausted, his father forcefully threw the sword far from his hand and pressed his head to the ground, surrendering to the invading Xiongnu soldiers, thus temporarily saving his life.

Only then did Zhao Hanzhang nod in approval, directly accepting the young man.

Li Hou and Li Lai did not express any objections.

In these times, who can say whether dying early in Guan City or faster on the battlefield with Zhao Hanzhang?

So they let the children be happy. Perhaps following Zhao Hanzhang, they might live longer instead?

Li Hou’s expression became vacant, exuding an aura of death and sorrow. His sons and grandsons had died, who would have thought that he, being the oldest and most useless, would actually be the last to survive?

After asking Li Zhao’s questions, Zhao Hanzhang turned to see Li Hou’s expression wasn’t right, then sighed, gently gripping his wrist, pulling him painfully back to reality.

Seeing him look over, Zhao Hanzhang then smiled at him, helping him up strongly, "Cousin, the camp is still quite chaotic. You’ve been terrified these days, so you should rest first. I’ll have someone take you to a tent to rest, and we can talk again at sunrise tomorrow."

Li Hou nodded, assisted to settle in the nearest tent.

The camp just experienced a battle, corpses and blood everywhere, and tents burned by flames—there aren’t many intact tents left.

Zhao Hanzhang uses half for her own wounded soldiers, half for the pillaged civilians. The wounded and women and children are arranged in the tents to get through the night.

Fu Tinghan had just gone to tally the casualties; now he came over to find Zhao Hanzhang with two unfamiliar men by her side, and couldn’t help but give them a glance.

Zhao Hanzhang introduced them to him, "This is my nephew Li Lai, and this is my grandnephew Li Zhao."

Fu Tinghan looked at Li Lai, who was similar in age to Zhao Ming, then glanced at Li Zhao who was slightly older, and after a moment of silence, nodded, greeting, "Hello, nephew; hello, grandnephew."

Li Lai and Li Zhao: ...

Zhao Hanzhang then introduced them, "This is Fu Tinghan, my strategist, also my fiancé."

After all, he is the reliable support their direct uncle (granduncle) found for them, the two forced a smile, one called, "Mr. Fu."

The other called, "Granduncle."

Father and son couldn’t help but exchange a glance, Li Lai silently looking at his son, never expecting his son to be so shameless;

Li Zhao also looked at his father, never expecting his father, at such an age, to still be so oblivious to the circumstances.

The two quietly looked away.

Fu Tinghan fully accepted these two titles, and with Zhao Hanzhang said, "Our tally of casualties is ready, and the number of captives is clear; most are not Xiongnu."

Zhao Hanzhang frowned, "Not Xiongnu, then what?"

"Jiehu and Xianbei, it’s a mixed army."

Zhao Hanzhang was slightly surprised, nodded to Li Lai and Li Zhao, then turned to Fu Tinghan to deal with these Xiongnu.

Quite a few Hu Soldiers were captured, numbering twelve hundred.

The number is too great, Zhao Hanzhang does not plan to keep so many people, after all, she only has two thousand troops herself, some casualties during this time, and some replenishments, basically maintaining this number.

"Not many, and we have people guarding the west route, panicked they all ran east, temporarily unable to reach the west."

Zhao Hanzhang nodded in approval, looked around and said, "Bring their captains and centurions to meet me."

Being a chaotic army, not many captains and centurions are left, but enough for Zhao Hanzhang to question.

When questioning and handling business, Zhao Hanzhang is reluctant to occupy a tent, so she finds a fallen burning wooden post to sit beside, waving to let people bring those few captains and centurions over.

There are only five people in total, two captains, three centurions, the rest are ordinary soldiers, of course, perhaps some are hiding among the ordinary soldiers,

But Zhao Hanzhang doesn’t care much about that, after all, the main commander was killed by her with a single shot, they’re now scattered and hiding among the crowd doesn’t help much.

Zhao Hanzhang first asked the names and ethnicities of the five, learning they are either Jiehu or Xianbei, not a single Xiongnu, cannot help asking, "How many Xiongnu are in your army?"

"Not many, probably only over a hundred people," a Jiehu named Cheng Da replied, "Our general is a Xiongnu but is not favored, so he recruited mainly Jiehu and Xianbei."

Zhao Hanzhang said, "In terms of bravery, Jiehu and Xianbei are no less than Xiongnu; why is there a distinction of inferiority and superiority?"

Cheng Da raised his head to look at Zhao Hanzhang upon hearing this, then lowered his head saying, "But in Han Kingdom, Jiehu and Xianbei’s status is just beneath Xiongnu, even less than Han people."

Wei You beside him said, "Han Kingdom was established by Your Majesty, Your Majesty is Xiongnu, thus Xiongnu are regarded as superior, like Jin State; it was founded by Han people, thus regards Han people as superior. Isn’t this normal?"