My house was confiscated and I was exiled. I emptied the emperor's warehouse and fled.

The officers and soldiers walked out of the prison and looked at the empty streets that were completely different from yesterday, and felt a lot of discomfort in their hearts.

Su Yunwan, who was waiting outside the prison, saw him and said: "I have emptied the government offices you wanted and returned them to you so that you can take care of yourself."

"Wait a minute, Mrs. Wu, can you give us some food in exchange?" An official said to Su Yunwan with a flattering smile.

Su Yunwan did not refuse outright, but said: "Okay, just exchange it for the market price when we first came here. How much do you want?"

The other party's expression suddenly changed. At that time, the price of food had already skyrocketed, rising more than ten times.

But now Jizhou has become an empty city, and there are no people for them to exploit. They have no choice but to exchange the silver they carry with them for rice, flour, and food, and then can't wait to go back to the government office's kitchen to cook.

Su Yunwan and Qin Junyi found an inn near the government office to take a break and witnessed the second batch of officers and soldiers arriving in the city.

In the afternoon, the two of them stayed far behind the officers and soldiers, followed to the county where the prefect settled, and secretly explored each other's movements.

The prefect heard that all the people in Jizhou had left the city. After a period of confusion, great fear came into his heart.

If the court found out, it would be a huge defeat.

It can range from taking off the black gauze hat, to property confiscation and annihilation of the clan!

The most important thing right now is to figure out their route and quickly chase back the people under their control!

But with a population of tens of thousands, it cannot be done by just a few hundred officers and soldiers in the government office.

The prefect of Jizhou rushed to the Jizhou army station overnight and asked the supreme commander, General Zhu, to send troops to intercept.

General Zhu asked: "Are there any patients with the epidemic among those people?"

"This..." The relief had only been carried out for a few days, and it was impossible to eradicate the disease in the entire city. No matter how eager the prefect was to send out troops, he could not tell the lie of "no".

General Zhou also knew the answer and said coldly: "Now that there is a lack of medicine everywhere, it is impossible for me to let my soldiers contract the disease and implicate the entire camp. I forgive me for not sending troops."

"They must have brought medicinal materials with them on the way..." the prefect said hastily.

General Zhou waved his hand: "So what? Once they are in a hurry, they will set off a fire to burn up the medicinal materials. Where can I find the medicine? Don't tell me that it is impossible!"

Prefect: "..."

"Didn't I tell you, what are you doing in such a hurry? Why don't you wait until the epidemic in Jizhou City is eradicated before going back? It's okay now, isn't it self-defeating?"

Magistrate: ...He is not afraid that the couple will run away as soon as the epidemic is resolved. Then he will look for special medicine somewhere.

However, these words cannot be said on the table at all.

"Aren't I afraid of chaos in the city?"

"Humph." General Zhu tilted his lips and chuckled, but did not say any more sarcastic words.

He and the prefect knew exactly what was going on with the epidemic in Jizhou City this time.

Unlike the prefect's full cooperation with the emperor's secret edict, General Zhu felt disheartened by the emperor and the court's persecution of the Qin family. He was unwilling to participate in the epidemic and harmed people, so he found various excuses to passively slow down his work.

At present, the people in Jizhou City are leaving the city, which is entirely done by the prefect himself. It has nothing to do with him at all, so why bother to do nothing about it?

All the prefect's good words and various benefits in exchange failed to make General Zhu change his mind.

He could only resort to his last resort: "It must be the Qin family's fault. They absorb the population with the intention of rebelling. If they succeed, the emperor will blame them. Can you afford it?"

"Where's the evidence?" General Zhu's expression suddenly turned cold.

"Other than the Qin family, who else is so capable?"

Seeing that he had no substantial evidence, General Zhu said lightly: "The Qin family moved to Youzhou. Even if they really want to rebel, the Youzhou pastoralists are not controlling it properly. What does this have to do with me, general?"

"It was you who secretly helped and sent troops to the Qin family!"

"If you say so, I will write a letter and send it to the capital to explain to the Holy Emperor the ins and outs of the empty city in Jizhou."

"Don't! Don't! I said the wrong thing. I hope General Zhu will respect you." The prefect broke out in cold sweat and apologized urgently.

General Zhu was unmoved: "I must let the court know the rights and wrongs, so that one day in the future, a scapegoat will suddenly be placed on my head."

The prefect said a lot of apology and promised the benefits just mentioned. Only then did General Zhu reveal the matter and asked him how he planned to hide it.

Now that we have entered the cold winter, the refugees who fled the famine have been resettled in place, and very few people are moving around.

Even if the prefect wanted to absorb refugees to fill the gap, it would be difficult to fill such a large gap in a short period of time. If we miss next year's spring plowing, the paper will not be able to cover the fire at all.

The most important thing is that the more he thought about it, the more he felt that the relief work was done by the Qin family.

If the Qin family were to take away the people, once the court held him accountable, even ten of his heads would not be enough to cut off.

"General Zhu, this must be the work of the Qin family, and you also know the stakes. Let's do this. I am willing to pay fifty thousand taels of silver and ask the army officers to intervene."

General Zhu also knew that those people must not fall into the hands of the Qin family. He thought for a moment and said: "One hundred thousand."

"This..." The prefect's face was colorful, and he hated General Zhu for taking advantage of the situation. However, he had to rely on the other party's troops, so he had to grit his teeth and said, "Okay! One hundred thousand is one hundred thousand, and please ask General Zhu to send out men as soon as possible." .”

"Whenever the silver taels arrive, the soldiers will set off."

"Then I will go back and order someone to deliver it."

......

In a pavilion a few miles away from the Jizhou army camp, Su Yunwan was doing two things, recounting the conversation between the prefect and General Zhu to Qin Junyi one by one.

Qin Junyi said coldly and solemnly: "As expected, let's set a trap on the road and stop them."

"Don't worry, since the prefect has so much money, it will be free if you don't take it." Su Yunwan smiled.

The two followed the magistrate to the bedroom where he lived. After he turned on the mechanism and walked into the secret room, Qin Junyi brought him down with a knife.

Su Yunwan looked at the large boxes piled high, opened the front one, and saw white money lying in order.

"This kind of packing costs one thousand taels per box." Qin Junyi said.

Su Yunwan counted them and put them away. After putting away the first ten boxes, she found that the remaining boxes were different. When she opened them, she saw that they were replaced by golden gold bars.

"Three years of clearing the county, one hundred thousand snowflake silver." Su Yunwan put all the boxes into the space, and after a rough calculation, it was definitely not less than three hundred thousand taels, which was more than the money collected in the treasury!

Su Yunwan did not stop doing anything, and ransacked the mansion at night, not even sparing the horse food.

The next day the magistrate was woken up by his confidants and looked at the empty secret room, almost going crazy.

When he finally regained his consciousness and walked out of the secret room, he saw the empty dormitory and felt like he was in a dream. When he floated out of the room, the servants all reported that the items were stolen, and with a "thud", he fainted again.

On the other side, General Zhu didn't see the money sent by the prefect, so he sent two soldiers to the house to inquire. When he learned that the mansion was mysteriously stolen last night, he felt bad and dragged the prefect into a carriage and brought him to General Zhu.

After some negotiations, the prefect made a bloody decision, and General Zhu sent three thousand cavalry to set off.