Chapter 766: Why Are You Wavering?
At Bold King's bellow, Luo Xi instantly erupted in fury. "You wretched scoundrel! How dare you try to sow discord among my troops? Guards, shoot this fellow dead with a volley of arrows!"
His retainers immediately drew their large bows, preparing to fire, but Li Daoxuan spoke up with a chuckle. "Don't shoot, don't shoot! Let him shout. Isn't it rather amusing to watch a buffoon's act?"
Luo Xi stammered, "Huh? But if he keeps shouting like this, I'm afraid..."
Li Daoxuan replied, "It's fine! Enjoy the show."
Bold King continued to bellow at the militia: "Brothers, think carefully! How have these landlords and wealthy gentry treated you? Half of the crops you sow in your fields are taken away as rent. While they feast and indulge, you're left to chew on tree bark and grass roots. They even forcefully snatch your daughters to be their maidservants! Can you tolerate such things?"
"Our Chuǎng Wang has come specifically to rescue you. Join forces with the Chuǎng Wang, let's kill these landlords and wealthy gentry together, wipe out all these cursed rich folk, and make this world ours to rule!"
"The Chuǎng Wang's army numbers a quarter of a million; you cannot stop them! Instead of helping these landlords and wealthy gentry, trying to stop a chariot with a mantis's arm and pointlessly throwing away your lives, you might as well join us!"
After his rousing speech, Bold King smugly awaited the militia's defection, a collapse in their morale, or perhaps a panicked retreat.
However, what he imagined would happen seemed not to materialize.
This wasn't right at all!
After the speech he'd just delivered, ordinary people shouldn't be making such faces.
Bold King was somewhat dumbfounded.
A quick-witted militiaman spoke up: "Who are these landlords and wealthy gentry you're talking about? Are you referring to our Master Li?"
Bold King didn't know who Master Li was, but following the militiaman's tone, he figured Master Li must be a great landlord, and that these militiamen were all his tenants. So, he decided to just go along with it.
"Yes," Bold King declared, "I'm talking about people like Master Li! Not a single one of them is good. What do they do besides oppress the poor? Think back carefully, what have such people done to you..."
The militiamen began to recall their memories!
Things the Heavenly Lord had done for them: distributed great quantities of rice, handed out white flour, held Hot Pot Festivals, bestowed special crispy rice crackers, granted the blissful "Happy Fat Water," invited opera troupes to perform for everyone, provided cotton for padded clothes, and allocated housing for all...
No, they couldn't go on. Just thinking about it made them feel impossibly blissful.
Their memories were overflowing with sweetness.
"Sweet, so sweet, your smile is sweet, like a blossom in the spring breeze..."
One militiaman even burst into song! It was an accompaniment tune that occasionally played during Gaojia News broadcasts, said to be sung by a goddess named Deng, and everyone absolutely loved listening to it.
As he sang, the soldiers on the city wall all joined in: "Blooming in the spring breeze, ah... in a dream."
Two thousand people singing a bizarre song together—it was utterly preposterous, and the atmosphere grew strangely eerie.
Bold King: "!!!"
Not just Bold King, even Luo Xi was dumbfounded. "What's going on? What happened? Why are they suddenly singing?"
Li Daoxuan chuckled. "Because they're happy! How can unhappy people be in the mood to sing?"
Luo Xi merely blinked, speechless.
Bold King listened for a moment, then understood: he was being mocked.
He indignantly cried out, "I'm trying to help you, and you dare to mock me? Do you truly enjoy being lackeys for landlords and wealthy gentry? Looting them clean is the only true path!"
A militiaman who had attended Gao Family Village School for a few days couldn't help but speak up: "So, everyone stops farming and just goes looting, right? And after all the rich are looted, who do we loot then? When there are no more rich people to loot, what will we eat?"
Bold King uttered a small, confused sound, "Eh?"
"Hahahahaha!" The militiamen roared with laughter. With this level of understanding, he thought he could incite them?
Within the Gao Family Village Militia, even the least educated foot soldier received many "political education classes" during their training. They all understood basic, simple truths.
Conversely, a ragtag bandit like Bold King understood nothing.
For someone who understood nothing to try and incite those who grasped basic principles, it was truly a complete farce.
Bold King, having failed to incite the city, slunk back in defeat.
He walked up to Sweeping King. "Boss, those fellows are incredibly stubborn. I couldn't get them to open the gates, and... they asked me a strange question that I actually think it makes some sense. We keep looting the rich, but what happens after all the rich are looted clean? What will we eat then?"
Sweeping King roared in anger, "I sent you to incite the city and undermine the enemy's morale! How did *you* end up wavering instead? Are you an idiot?"
Bold King whimpered, "But that question truly is strange."
"What nonsense! Get out!"
Sweeping King bellowed, kicking Bold King aside, and roared, "Attack the pass!"
Sweeping King and Sky Full of Stars, with their two divisions of rebel troops, began to slowly advance.
The terrain before Wuguan Pass was narrow, the road flanked by two mountains. Although the two leaders commanded tens of thousands of rebel soldiers, they couldn't deploy properly. Only two large square formations could be arrayed at the front, slowly pushing forward in dense ranks.
Against the Gao Family Village Militia, how easy it would be to defend against such an attack needed no further explanation. This time, even Luo Xi felt not a shred of fear. In Northern Shaanxi, he had personally witnessed how the Gao Family Village Militia dealt with Mongol cavalry.
If even the swift-as-the-wind Mongol cavalry couldn't break through their defenses, how could these sluggish infantry possibly charge past?
Luo Xi, not intimidated in the slightest, stood on the pass wall with hands on hips, laughing loudly. "You mere bandits, today you'll learn just how formidable we are!"
The rhythmic "bang, bang, bang" of musket fire rang out, as if to punctuate Luo Xi's bravado.
The rebel soldiers at the very front instantly fell in swathes. The narrow terrain forced the rebels to cluster together, making it virtually impossible for the muskets to miss, even with haphazard firing.
Hundreds of men from Sweeping King and Sky Full of Stars' two formations dropped in an instant.
The collapse of morale was almost instantaneous!
The front-rank rebel soldiers immediately lost their nerve and began to retreat. Due to the narrow terrain, those in the rear couldn't see what was happening ahead; they only heard the musket fire, followed by a sudden clamor as the front ranks began to fall back.
The military formation instantly broke. The rebel troops, as if a contagion had spread through their ranks, instantly receded like a tide.
Sweeping King and Sky Full of Stars had never imagined that their army of tens of thousands, facing only a few thousand militiamen, would be repulsed at the first clash.
Damn it, was there no logic to this?
"Don't run!"
"Go back and attack!"
"Damn it!"
The two leaders shouted themselves hoarse for a long time, but couldn't stop the routed army...
Tens of thousands of rebel soldiers retreated from Shangluo Road with frantic shouts.
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