in2ebook Chapter 359 Arrival at the Border Town
Chapter 359 Arrival at the Border Town
The carriage started up again, heading towards the western border town.
"Your Highness, these bandits are so easy to defeat! Look, I took care of them all by myself with ease. It wasn't challenging at all, so boring." Tingxue was sitting leisurely in Su Nuannuan's carriage, fiddling with an unfinished down jacket in her hands, muttering to herself, seemingly quite disappointed with the battle with the bandits.
Upon hearing this, Su Nuannuan couldn't help but smile slightly and teased, "Oh ho, I didn't know that you were the kind of girl who liked to solve problems with force."
Upon hearing this, Tingxue immediately pouted and said in a coquettish tone, "Your Majesty, please don't make fun of me!"
Rewind to an hour earlier, Tingxue, like a ferocious little tiger, unleashed her power, routing the second wave of bandits and wiping them out in a short time. At the same time, Commander Wu and his men returned.
Commander Wu gave Su Nuannuan a detailed report of the situation and expressed his sincere gratitude to Jinse. After all, if Jinse hadn't given them the antidote before their departure, they would probably be dead by now and wouldn't have been able to return alive.
As for the follow-up issues, Su Nuannuan naturally entrusted them entirely to the Dark Dragon Guards. The Dark Dragon Guards' methods for handling these matters were always simple and brutal. They would simply drip a drop of dissolving liquid onto each corpse, ensuring that the bandits' bodies would instantly turn into a pool of blood and disappear without a trace, leaving not even a bone fragment behind.
As for the problem of the bandit village, the squad leader of the Dark Dragon Guard acted decisively and immediately sent a message to the nearby garrison, ordering them to come and wipe out the bandit den as soon as possible, lest things get complicated.
Knowing the value of time, they decided without hesitation not to linger, for protecting the Imperial Concubine was their top priority. Although the Imperial Concubine did not seem to need their protection, they could not afford to be careless.
Su Nuannuan sat in the carriage, feeling somewhat annoyed. Looking out the window at Commander Wu beside the carriage, she asked, "Commander Wu, how much longer until we reach the border town?"
Upon hearing Su Nuannuan's question, Commander Wu hurriedly and respectfully replied from his horse, "Your Majesty, at the current pace of progress, it will take approximately seven more days."
Upon hearing this, Su Nuannuan felt a surge of helplessness. Seven more days of carriage travel seemed far too long for her. She couldn't help but recall the modes of transportation in her previous life: airplanes and high-speed trains allowed people to travel thousands of miles in a short time. Now, however, she could only sit in this slow-moving carriage, enduring the arduous journey.
Su Nuannuan sighed helplessly. She felt she had grown tired of the scenery along the way. No matter how beautiful the scenery was, it had become dull and uninteresting after so many days of travel.
At this moment, Jinse noticed that Su Nuannuan suddenly became listless, so she asked with concern, "Is Your Highness tired? Why don't you lie down and take a nap?"
Su Nuannuan looked at the seats laid out in the carriage, shook her head, and said, "I can't sleep." The convenient means of transportation in her previous life kept flashing through her mind, forming a stark contrast with the horse-drawn carriage of today, which made her sigh even more.
"Your Majesty, how about we rest for a couple of days after we reach the next city?" Tingxue cautiously raised her head, looked at Su Nuannuan, and suggested softly.
"Forget it, the sooner we get here, the sooner we'll be free. If we keep dragging this out, I'll become more and more listless," Su Nuannuan shook her head and refused.
Time flies like an arrow. On this day, the sky was overcast, as if shrouded in a thin gray veil. The cold north wind howled, rustling the trees along the roadside. All of this foreshadowed the approach of winter and meant that Su Nuannuan and her group had finally arrived at the western border town—Huiyang City.
"Your Majesty, we've finally arrived at Huiyang City!" Tingxue couldn't hide her excitement. She quickly lifted a corner of the carriage window and looked outside, her eyes sparkling with joy.
"Tingxue, quickly lower the curtains and let the wind in." Jinse, who was sitting to the side, suddenly felt a gust of cold wind and couldn't help but shiver. She hurriedly said to Tingxue.
Upon hearing the sound, Tingxue quickly lowered the carriage curtain and muttered, "It's already this cold in Huiyang City. How cold will it be in the dead of winter?"
Su Nuannuan also felt the temperature drop inside the car. She wrapped her cloak tighter around herself and said thoughtfully, "Therefore, we need to speed up the production of down jackets, at least to prevent the soldiers from freezing."
“I truly do not know how the soldiers survived the winter in the past, nor have I had the time to care. However, now that I have arrived here and a sample of the down jacket has been successfully made, we can recruit workers to make down jackets after we reach the border town. The first batch of down jackets must be distributed to the soldiers first, and we must not let them fight in the freezing cold.” Su Nuannuan said with a firm expression.
"Your Majesty, rest assured, Steward Qin has already properly processed the purchased duck down before sending it to Huiyang City. It should be on its way by now," Jinse quickly replied to reassure Su Nuannuan.
As everyone was talking, the carriage slowly drove to the city gate, but was suddenly stopped by the soldiers guarding the city.
Upon seeing this, Commander Wu quickly urged his horse forward, took out a waist token from his pocket, and handed it to the soldiers guarding the city to check.
The city guard took the waist tag and looked at it closely. He saw the words "Imperial Guard" engraved on it and knew that the visitor was no ordinary person. He quickly handed the waist tag back to Commander Wu and asked respectfully, "Sir, may I ask who is sitting in the carriage?"
Seeing this, Li Desheng dared not delay and hurriedly took out the waist token that Su Nuannuan had given him earlier and handed it over.
This waist tag is no ordinary item; it is Su Nuannuan's exclusive waist tag from Cuiwei Palace. On the front of the tag, the three large characters "Cuiwei Palace" are written in a vigorous and powerful style, as if telling the story of the palace's splendor and nobility. On the back of the tag, the title and rank of the master of Cuiwei Palace are clearly engraved—"Zhuang Gui Tai Fei" (Imperial Consort Zhuang).
When the soldiers at the city gate saw the waist token, their attitude changed immediately. Their already respectful faces became even more respectful, and they let him pass without hesitation. At the same time, they quickly dispatched a soldier to the prefectural government office to deliver the news that a distinguished person had arrived.