Chapter 31 The night attack begins

"Your Highness is in danger!" Wang An had just come out of the South Prison with Yu Nu, and Chen Huaian, who had been waiting in the lobby, drew his sword and rushed forward, stabbing straight at Wang An. "Your Highness, get out of the way."

Wang An was slightly stunned but his body's instinct was still there. He did not listen to Chen Huaian and move away. Instead, he stepped forward and grabbed Chen Huaian's hand holding the knife.

"Huaian..." As soon as the words came out, Wang An understood, "Yu Nu is now one of us, so don't be so rude in the future."

"One of our own?"

The other party was obviously an assassin. He was thinking of killing Wang An two days ago. How come he became one of ours in just two days?

This huge impact made Chen Huaian subconsciously ignore Wang An's skills, and he was able to easily grab his wrist.

Wang An smiled and nodded, formally introducing the two to each other.

"From now on, everyone is a member of my palace, so we must work together."

Chen Huaian put away the knife sullenly without saying much, but he still looked at Yu Nu with a vigilant look.

After being betrayed by her fellow disciples, Yu Nu seemed to have become much more relaxed. She just had a smile on her face and bowed slightly to Chen Huaian.

Seeing that the two had temporarily put aside their differences, Wang An said, "We have more important things to do now. Let's have a drink and chat after we finish what we have done."

Chen Huaian heard this and knew that Wang An was talking about going into the mountains to suppress the bandits. There was still a trace of worry on his face: "Your Highness, there are still 800 bandits on Crescent Moon Mountain, but I only have 100 black armored guards. Even if you count the 70 or 80 guards, there are less than 200 people. The runners in the government office are useless..."

Wang An raised his hand to stop Chen Huaian from continuing, and said meaningfully: "If we attack by force, these two hundred people will naturally be useless, but when did I say that I would attack Crescent Moon Mountain by force?"

"But there is only one path through Jingshan. Is there any other way except to storm it?" Chen Huaian was puzzled.

Wang An did not answer, but just looked at Yu Nu.

Chen Huaian also looked at Yu Nu and frowned, saying, "Although Yu Nu is quite capable and is also very good at assassination, it will be difficult to capture Crescent Moon Mountain even with her joining us."

Wang An smiled and said, "Huai'an, I want to ask you, if two armies are facing each other and one side is not in an advantageous position, is there any way to win by surprise?"

Chen Huaian frowned and said puzzledly: "There are many ways to do this. It always depends on the actual situation."

"What if we regard us and Crescent Mountain as two armies confronting each other?" Wang An asked again.

Chen Huaian thought carefully, thinking about what Wang An said about suppressing the bandits tonight, and considering the situation of both sides, Chen Huaian was slightly surprised and asked: "Your Highness, do you want to launch a surprise attack late at night?"

"But even if it's a surprise attack in the middle of the night, there's only one way up the mountain, and the bandits will definitely be prepared. Once the bandits guarding the mountain sound the alarm, it's easy for them to be caught there."

Wang An raised his lips slightly and looked at Yu Nu behind him: "But what if we can quietly eliminate the thieves guarding the mountain?"

Chen Huaian also looked at Yu Nu with sudden realization.

Seeing the two men staring at her, Yu Nu's face turned slightly red, and she said unhappily, "The thing I just surrendered to has become so ruthless that it has forced Yu Nu to do such a dangerous action in just half an hour. I really didn't make a mistake about him."

"Haha," Senior Colonel Wang An said, "You will get the credit after this is done!"

In the pitch-black night, the gate of Baicheng, which had just experienced a strong storm, suddenly opened, and a team of about 200 people walked out of the gate in the dark.

Wang An ordered the team not to light torches, so everyone could only rely on the faint stars in the sky to barely distinguish the road to Crescent Moon Mountain. Crescent Moon Mountain is high in terrain, and if everyone moves forward with torches, it will be like a fire dragon. The bandits on Crescent Moon Mountain can hardly fail to discover Wang An and others as long as they look in the direction of Baicheng.

In order to avoid failure, an order was issued to ban the use of torches.

Everyone marched in silence. After three hours of marching, when they arrived at the foot of Crescent Mountain, it was the darkest time of the moon before dawn.

This hour is also the time when a person is most sleepy in a day.

Wang An carefully inquired about the intelligence about Crescent Mountain and the general situation of the Crescent Mountain bandits' defense from the captured bandits.

On this rugged mountain road, there is a guard post every ten steps and a sentry every thirty steps, with one person on each sentry post and two people on each sentry post. Once one person is alarmed and makes him cry out, the subsequent bandits guarding the mountain will also be awakened.

Afterwards, they were similar to the blue smoke from the border. When they heard the news from the front, the patients behind also started shouting, one after another, until the warning reached the bandits' base camp on the top of the mountain.

Although primitive, it is also effective.

The black-armored guards on horseback had dismounted and walked two miles away. Except for a few people left to guard the horses, the rest of them walked to the foot of the mountain with the guards.

At this time, Chen Huaian was half squatting on the ground, waving to the soldiers behind him, asking them to squat down as well.

The soldiers were informed of the purpose of the trip before setting off. Although they were a little nervous, they were not too scared and they held their breath unconsciously while moving.

Wang An squatted in the shadow of a big tree, looked at the jade slave in front of him and said softly: "It's up to you from now on."

Yu Nu took the dagger handed to her by Wang An. That was the weapon that was confiscated from her when she was captured.

Feeling the familiar touch in his palm, his eyes flashed with a strangeness, "Your Highness trusts me so much? Aren't you afraid that the Confucians are just pretending to submit?"

"The moment you took the knife, you killed the prince?"

Wang An's chuckle was heard in the darkness, and a pair of bright eyes could be vaguely seen reflecting the stars in the sky, with a calm and relaxed look.

"I am confident that I will not make a mistake in my judgment of you, but if I do, I will die with no regrets!"

"Yu Nu, do you think that I have misjudged you?"

Yu Nu didn't say anything. After a long time, Wang An only heard a burst of sparse sounds, and after a moment there was no sound at all.

And the faint fragrance in the breeze gradually faded away.

As an excellent assassin, Yu Nu was like a leopard cat hunting in the jungle, appearing silently among the grass and branches, with his feet floating in the air without making any sound.

The bandits did not try to hide themselves, but some built sheds to avoid the wind and rain, and some even hung lanterns and lit weak campfires.

It was because in Jizhou, the power of the government was virtually non-existent. As long as Zhao Yi's garrison troops did not cause trouble, almost no one could do anything to them.

This also led to the bandits in Crescent Mountain acting extremely arrogantly and domineeringly.

(End of this chapter)