The sun rises as usual in the east, the punctual rooster's loud crowing, the quiet mountain village also has a few moments of noise, each household chimney also slowly emits blue smoke, women fetch water and start fires to prepare for breakfast, men also begin their daily busy work, a peaceful scene unfolds before one's eyes.

  At this time, Tie Shan and Zhu Jiu, who had already woken up, stood on a hillside looking at the village. Tie Shan proudly said to Zhu Jiu: "This mountain stronghold once supported 500 households, most of whom were refugees from the previous dynasty. We brothers brought them here to open up this land in the desolate North Mountain."

  "At that time, we were full of vigor and confidence, and voluntarily joined the Ming dynasty just to make Pinggu County recognize the existence of our mountain village. Everything was great at first, and everyone developed our village with goods exchanged from the mountains. In just two years, our lives had greatly improved, and we even opened up a lot of land in the mountains to grow grain."

  "Unfortunately, everything changed when Zhao Chuhao arrived. The household register was no longer recognized, and mountain goods were not allowed to be traded, making our lives as mountain dwellers more and more difficult. Now there are only over 200 households left. If it weren't for him, we wouldn't have resorted to robbery, the account book wouldn't have fallen into our hands, and Fourth Brother wouldn't have died!" As he spoke, Tie Shan became more and more agitated, his teeth clenched in anger whenever he mentioned Zhao Chuhao's name, as if he wanted to swallow it whole.

  Zhu Jiu could only pat his shoulder to comfort him, this was a world where people were eaten, ordinary people like Tie Shan who kept a low profile would be devoured by officials like Zhao Chuhai without even leaving any residue. Now Tie Shan and the others wanted to rebel, they wanted to find someone who could eat Zhao Chuhai to take charge for them.

  Two people over there were chatting and laughing, while the second and third elders in the room were still hugging each other and sleeping. Only Zhang Feng was wandering around in circles in this small North Mountain.

  Originally, from last night's entry into the mountain, Zhang Feng hastened his pace with a strong desire to make achievements, but unexpectedly, after walking for quite some time, he didn't discover even a tiny bit of anything, and with a bitter face, Zhang Feng couldn't help but suspect that he might not have the talent for exploration.

  Old Liu stared at Zhang Feng, who was resting under a tree with dark circles under his eyes. Old Liu was so angry that he wanted to go over and beat him up. The whole night's running around had made Old Liu extremely tired. Originally, he thought this would be an easy task, but who would have thought they'd run into Zhang Feng, such a weirdo. Yes, Zhang Feng was a complete idiot when it came to directions, spending the whole night walking in circles. But Zhang Feng himself didn't realize it, thinking that the hideout was just too well hidden, and he had been searching for so long without finding any trace of it. He even suspected that the intelligence from above was wrong, wondering if the hideout wasn't actually inside North Mountain after all.

  Suddenly, Zhang Feng's ears moved slightly, and he heard a noise not far behind him. He immediately thought it was someone from the mountain stronghold, and with great joy, he got up to go over and capture them for questioning. Unexpectedly, when he stood up and looked, it was Old Liu who had been thinking of him and walked over here.

  Old Liu, who had been hiding in the dark, watched as daybreak approached and could no longer bear it. He was afraid that even giving Zhang Feng one more night wouldn't guarantee finding the location of the mountain stronghold and completing the mission smoothly. He could only take a step forward and expose his hidden trump card, taking him to complete this reconnaissance.

  Lao Liu didn't want to still be wandering around the mountain with Zhang Feng at noon today, and when he returned to report back, he was afraid that his comrades would laugh him to death.

  "Captain Zhang, do you know how far you walked last night?" Old Liu asked with a gloomy face as he approached.

  "It's at least several dozen miles, I really didn't expect this northern mountain to be so much bigger than it looks from the outside. A small mountain village is actually hidden that deep." Zhang Feng continued to analyze with a serious expression.

  Old Liu's forehead bulged with rage as he struggled to restrain himself, muttering "This person is favored by the Thousand House Lord". Hearing Zhang Feng's response, his pent-up anger finally boiled over, and he bellowed: "Do you know that I've been circling this place all night? Have you seen this tree? I carved nine marks on its trunk, and now I'm going to carve the tenth! Do you know what that means? Ten full circles!"

  "Ah?" Zhang Feng hurriedly ran over to part the grass and observe the tree that Old Liu had mentioned. Indeed, at a position near the ground, he discovered nine knife marks. His mouth immediately opened wide in astonishment as he stood there frozen.

  The news that they had been doing useless work all night completely stunned him, no wonder he walked for so long without even finding a single hair of the mountain bandits, at this moment their location was not far from where they entered the mountain, it's as if they saw a ghost.

  This reminded Zhang Feng of when he first arrived in Beiping City and would often wander around on his own, feeling that the houses and shops along both sides of the street were very similar. At the time, he had thought that Beiping City was not as big as Xiangyang City, but it turned out that he had never left that one street.

  And he also remembered when he was a kid on Wudang Mountain, every time he went out and couldn't find his way, he could always discover directional signs on the wall to guide him, as if Master had known all along that he was directionally challenged.

  At this time, Qingxuzi was walking on the road to Zixiao Hall in Wudang Mountain. Looking at the various route signs he secretly carved on the wall in his early years, he thought: "Disciple, you must be careful when you are under the mountain, after all, your road foolishness is so severe that it cannot be cured."

  ……

  Zhang Feng was immersed in the ruthless blow of reality and couldn't extricate himself, Old Liu came forward to wake him up, and could only helplessly sigh that Zhang Feng might be born unsuitable for being a scout, fortunately his sense of direction didn't affect other aspects much, if in the future he commands an army to march and fight it's no big deal to assign someone to guide him.

  "Come on, let's set off together. This time I'll decide the direction and you can take care of the action. After all, my old arms and legs aren't as good as yours, young people. You almost got me worn out last night!" Old Liu pulled up Zhang Feng, patted his back and comforted him.

  "Sorry to trouble you, I didn't expect you to follow me for a whole night, I'm really sorry. Don't worry, I'll take care of the rough work like grabbing the tongue." Zhang Feng said with a red face, feeling embarrassed.

  "Alright, time is running out, let's not drag this on any longer. Hurry up and complete the mission, it's urgent! I'm an old soldier, if I fail, no big deal, but you're the top new recruit in our unit, if you don't do a good job, how will we face our superiors?"

  After finishing, the two of them continued to move forward one after another. Old Liu did not think like Zhang Feng, who took big strides and ran with his head down, but instead proceeded slowly and carefully, occasionally flipping open the grass on both sides to observe for a while. Under Old Liu's unhurried leadership, the two of them turned left and right in the forest, finally arriving at a small riverbank.

  This left Zhang Feng stunned, he had been searching all night and only found trees and grass, but Lao Liu had discovered this water source after just a short while. With the discovery of the water source, finding the hideout would be much easier, as people can't live without water, so the hideout must be built near the water source. Moreover, it's unlikely that there would be another river like this in the small North Mountain.

  Watching Old Liu make a discovery so quickly, Zhang Feng couldn't help but secretly recall Old Liu's actions and movements from earlier, silently taking note of them in his heart, striving to use them next time. However, he didn't think that even if he had some method, it would be impossible for him to counter the attribute of being 'directionally challenged'...

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