Chapter 296: Brutal
Ye Shuo did not waver at all in the questioning. Instead, he was full of confusion: “I think my request is not high. It’s just 20 million taels of silver. When my Great Zhou won the victory, we paid more than this amount. But you keep delaying. I have to wonder if you Beiting did it on purpose.”
What Ye Shuo was talking about was naturally the things that happened during the time of his step-grandfather. At that time, his step-grandfather lost too much money, and it was enough to infuriate both humans and gods if it was singled out.
Hu Yanguang took a deep breath and managed to regain some rationality: “Our Wolf King is a man of his word. Isn’t this enough to prove our sincerity? Emperor Zhou is too cruel to even wait for a few days.”
As soon as the word “brutal” came out, Ye Shuo didn’t know how the other party had the nerve to say it.
“I don’t know how many people you Beiting have slaughtered in my Great Zhou. The number of Beiting soldiers I killed today is just a drop in the bucket.”
Besides…
“Have you not torn up enough agreements between Beiting and my Great Zhou?” As for the so-called agreement between these three countries, it was almost like a piece of waste paper, signed and torn up, and it had lasted for so many years.
Hearing this, Huyan Guang’s face couldn’t help but turn red.“I don’t know about the little tricks you have been doing in private recently. I hope you can send the ransom as soon as possible. We don’t have much food left here, and we really don’t have time to wait any longer.”
Huyan Guang didn’t expect that he actually knew that Beiting asked Chen State for help. When such a secret was exposed, Huyan Guang’s momentum immediately dropped.
“No matter what you say, I will not release you unless I get the silver.”
“Someone, show them away!”
The moment he finished speaking, Huyan Guang was driven out again. Huyan Guang did not bother to express his anger and hurried back to report the situation.
When the wolf king learned about this, his face immediately turned pale.
“This is really too much!”
But at the same time, the Wolf King also felt a little powerless.
Chen State went back on its word and refused to send troops. The odds of victory and defeat between us and the Great Zhou were only fifty-fifty, and we really couldn’t afford to gamble. The more decisive and ruthless Ye Shuo was, the more the Wolf King feared him.
The lethality of an unreasonable emperor is completely different from that of an emperor who can reason with reason.
In the past, it was always them, Beiting, who were unreasonable, but now the situation has changed and it is finally their turn.
Even King Zuo Xian who was standing by found the situation difficult, if not for anything else, just because that group of soldiers was difficult to deal with. åNŐΒĚȘ
It would be fine if all of them were rescued or all of them died, but now half of them are dead and half are left, neither up nor down, which is the most distressing thing.
However, now that things have come to this, I can only close my eyes and keep moving forward.
Wait, if you think about it carefully, it seems that there are other ways to remedy the situation.
Out of habit, King Zuo Xian and King Wolf naturally felt that the small State of Chen would not dare to resist. Although they trusted the wrong people and took the wrong path at the beginning, they still had a chance if they wanted to correct it now.
Just when the Wolf King was helpless and finally started to raise money, he heard the Left Wise King beside him suddenly say: “I have a plan, I wonder if Your Majesty is willing to listen to it?”
The Wolf King relies on him the most, so naturally he will respond to everything he asks.
“you say.”
Zuo Xian Wang took a deep breath and then lowered his voice: “Your Majesty, don’t be too anxious about the money. Even if we can successfully raise 20 million taels, we should wait a few more days.”
The wolf king pondered for a moment, and suddenly an idea came to him.
“You mean… using the Great Zhou Emperor’s hand…?”
As expected, he was the one who promoted Zuo Xian Wang to the position, and the Wolf King knows him best.
Zuo Xian Wang did not hide his true feelings and said bluntly: “If I were the Emperor of Zhou, I would not miss such an opportunity to sow discord.”
Think about it, the emperor of the Great Zhou ordered people to randomly select 5,000 people from the prisoners of war every day. Now the survivors live in despair and fear every day. After a long time, wouldn’t they feel resentful?
If it were him, he would definitely hate it.
As the emperor of the Great Zhou was from an enemy country, it was natural for him to kill them. Instead of hating him, those soldiers could have saved their own country…
“Your Majesty, even if those people are rescued, I’m afraid they can’t be used anymore. It’s better to use Emperor Zhou to deal with them.”
It is one thing to be afraid that those people will have other ideas, but even if they don’t have other ideas, I am afraid they have already been scared out of their wits and become useless. It is even questionable whether they will have the courage to confront the Great Zhou again in the future. In addition, resettlement will cost a lot of money. Beiting is not rich now, so how can it afford it?
If we can’t kill the enemy, we have to feed them with food and grass.
It would be better to recycle the waste and divert the trouble away.
The wolf king thought about it carefully and felt that this made sense.
The Wolf King is now over seventy years old, but his character has not softened or become nostalgic as he grows older like Emperor Jingwen. Instead, he has become more cruel and ruthless. Especially in recent years, the Wolf King has become more suspicious, irritable, and intolerant of resistance.
Previously, the Wolf King’s cruelty was only seen in the Great Zhou and the State of Chen, but now he is targeting his own people.
Hu Yanguang, who was standing by, couldn’t help but feel a little scared after hearing this. That being said, it was too cruel. However, he was just an insignificant prince who was about to be expelled from the power centre of Beiting. In Beiting, there were a lot of people like him, so although Hu Yanguang was afraid, he didn’t dare to say a word.
Then Ye Shuo discovered that after being shocked by him, Beiting’s movements did not become faster. He didn’t know if it was his illusion, but it felt even slower than before.
Even if the Beiting Treasury couldn’t gather enough money at once, it wouldn’t be the case that not a single silver ingot was missing, right? If they really cared, it would never be like this.
They asked questions diligently, and envoys like Huyan Guang seemed very busy running around, but they did not take any substantial action. How could Ye Shuo believe that Beiting really wanted to redeem the person?
After so many days, Prince Ding had already gotten used to his brother killing the group of prisoners of war in Beiting from time to time.
But the strange thing is, for some reason, he suddenly stopped today.
Seeing that the time was about to pass, Prince Ding couldn’t help but ask.
Ye Shuo frowned and shook his head: “We can’t kill them anymore, or we’ll kill them all.”
Beiting’s abnormality forced Ye Shuo to pay attention.
“I always feel like something is wrong.”
Prince Ding was startled by his sudden serious expression and said casually, “What’s wrong with that? Beiting wouldn’t even abandon his own people, would he? Even if more than 10,000 have been killed, there are still 10,000 more.”
Prince Ding was just joking, but when Ye Shuo heard it, his heart skipped a beat. Then, as if he had figured something out, Ye Shuo’s pupils shrink.
Perhaps he still underestimated the cruelty of ancient wars.
Human life is like grass, and all things are like straw dogs. This is not just a saying.
After a long time, Ye Shuo slowly exhaled.
“What if they really don’t want it anymore?”
The moment the words fell, Prince Ding’s smile froze on his face.
“No, not really…”