The Lucky Farmgirl

Chapter 2272 - 2247: Disguise (March Bonus - 12)

Junior General Meng held his stomach and took a deep breath, only after the pain subsided did he ask, "Have the people requesting aid left?"

Assistant General Nie: "They left early, three in total, light cavalry, carrying only food, water, and letters. They should reach Gaochang for help within three days."

Junior General Meng exhaled and, after praying to all the gods and Buddhas, remembered, "Isn’t there a monk in your caravan... no, a high monk?"

Manbao: "Yes, why?"

Junior General Meng coughed lightly and said, "Could you bring him over, so I can pray in front of him again to Buddha and Bodhisattva?"

Manbao and the others: ...

They didn’t think this was a good idea, so they all rode away.

Junior General Meng, seeing them all leave, pursed his lips and leaned on the cart, feeling a bit down.

With Zhou Man and Zhou Liru in the team, along with sufficient and complete medicinal supplies, everyone recovered well. After two days, most of those lightly injured could gallop on horseback again.

Naturally, they weren’t completely healed, but the pain was within bearable limits, and they could still wield their swords, so Assistant General Nie had them on horseback.

He thought that the Tubo reinforcements who could catch up at any time were a serious crisis. Even if injured, they had to try to survive and let others survive, so even with injuries, they needed to adapt to being on horseback.

Their marching speed wasn’t very slow, and with deliberate shortening of the midday break, their speed was quite good. On the third day, Assistant General Nie stood atop a high desert, looking into the distance and said, "If nothing unexpected happens, we should reach Gaochang tomorrow. From here, it looks as if I can see the city of Gaochang."

Manbao, also on horseback beside him, looked into the distance for a while, "You must be mistaken, there’s only clouds over there."

Bai Shan silently pointed to the direction on their right, "Gaochang is over there."

Manbao was a bit embarrassed, turned to look, and after looking for a while, nodded, "Sure enough, it’s still far away; I can’t see anything."

Assistant General Nie’s face turned red, but since he was dark-skinned, it was hard to tell. He glanced at Zhou Man and then at Bai Shan, feeling that he wasn’t being mocked, so he nodded, "Indeed, it’s still far; you can’t see anything."

The caravan moved below the sand dune; Bai Erlang lifted the curtain and glanced at the high sand dune, immediately lowering the curtain. The wind was strong recently, blowing the sand everywhere, which was annoying.

Bai Erlang wanted to go out and play, but didn’t want to be in the sun, "With such a big sun, what exactly are they talking about on the dunes? Why are they talking so long?"

Yin Huo said, "If you’re interested, you can go and have a look."

Bai Erlang took another look outside and shook his head, "Forget it, I’m not as clueless as Assistant General Nie."

Yin Huo couldn’t help but laugh.

Assistant General Nie, considered clueless by Bai Erlang, was smiling and about to leave the dune to give the space to the two of them when suddenly Daji pointed into the distance and asked, "Young Master, Miss Man, look over there."

They turned to look in the direction he pointed. It was too far to see clearly, but they saw the dust rising.

Assistant General Nie, experienced, saw at a glance that it was a large number of troops approaching.

Glancing at the direction of Gaochang, then turning to look at the opposite direction, he immediately said, "It might be an attack, let everyone be on guard, quickly—"

But it’s all desert, where could they hide?

However, Manbao and the others quickly rushed down the sand dune, shouting warnings.

Assistant General Nie also knew there was no place to hide in the desert, so he turned directly to Zhou Man and said, "Madam, leave the luggage here and head to Gaochang for help immediately."

Manbao said, "I am the main officer, how can I abandon the team and escape alone?"

"But you are a civil officer, not a military officer," Assistant General Nie said, "Madam, on this mission to the Western Regions, only you can accomplish the task of obtaining the smallpox vaccination method."

Manbao pressed her lips together, glancing at Bai Shan.

Bai Shan, unwilling to run away alone, held her hand and said, "Let the gentlemen go first, we’ll stay with you."

Assistant General Nie couldn’t help but glare at Bai Shan, thinking this man was a troublemaker causing all this mess.

Sure enough, as soon as Bai Shan spoke, Manbao immediately became firm, "I’ll stay."

After thinking for a moment, she added reassuringly, "If there’s no other way, we’ll escape. Don’t worry, we surely won’t care about you."

Assistant General Nie: "...No need to go that far."

Master Zhi Ren also arrived, saying to them, "If they are Tubo soldiers, perhaps I can try something."

"What will you try?"

Zhi Ren said, "I can use Buddhist teachings to appeal to them."

Manbao and the others: ...

Zhi Ren smiled when he saw their reactions, "But it requires some disguise, you all should remove your armor, leave behind anything with Jin army insignia, and modify a cart. Do you have any Buddhist artifacts in your luggage?"

Manbao and Bai Shan exchanged glances; indeed, they did. During bandit raids, they almost collected all the Buddhist artifacts.

Knowing that the countries of the Western Regions believed in Buddhism, they thought bringing Buddhist artifacts wouldn’t be a loss, and there weren’t many, so they picked them.

Since Zhi Ren needed them now, Manbao nodded to indicate they had some.

Zhi Ren was merely asking, not expecting them to really have any, and feeling pleasantly surprised, said, "That makes it easier. Let’s do this: you all will pretend to be my attendants and this convoy belongs to me. Keep Jin Kui’an under watch, but place the other Turk prisoners outside, and it’s best to give them slightly better clothes..."

Because the people were still a bit far, Zhi Ren was detailed in his instructions. Bai Shan, after listening for a while, finally understood that they were all servants of Zhi Ren and Jiechen.

He exchanged a look with Manbao, albeit unsure if it would work, but turned to organize accordingly.

Liu Huan’s carriage, which hadn’t been specially modified, was taken apart. Manbao took out brightly colored silk for the guards, who, after removing the blue covers, hung up the silk instead.

Zhou Liru carefully arranged silk and gauze to make them look more natural and beautiful.

Mr. Zhuang also changed clothes, and after discussing with Master Zhi Ren, understood what he had to do.

He turned to look at the confused prisoners and said to Manbao, "Have the guards take out their best clothes for them to wear, and they will wear the prisoners’ old clothes."

Manbao, dazed, went to relay the order.

The guards, equally puzzled, went to strip clothes off the prisoners, then reluctantly gave them their precious good clothes to wear.

The guards were unwilling to do so, not knowing how long the prisoners hadn’t bathed; even from a distance, they could smell them, let alone wearing their clothes.