Chapter 35 Harvest
Wang An couldn't help but feel worried when he saw this situation. Although Guoshanhu had been killed, there were still more than a thousand bandits in the bandit camp. If their families, wives and daughters were included, there would still be more than two thousand people.

The number of garrison soldiers led by Xu Huang was less than a hundred. They took advantage of the narrow mountain path and could not deploy their troops on both sides. In addition, each of them was wearing armor of the garrison troops, so they were able to barely scare off the panicked bandits.

But if we delay too long, there are plenty of clever bandits on Crescent Mountain and we will be exposed sooner or later.

Then, we will be in big trouble.

Wang An frowned, pondered for a moment, then turned sideways and gave a few instructions to the black-armored guard beside him.

Immediately, the leading flag officer agreed and led his men back to the Juyi Hall.

Soon, more than a dozen bloody heads were brought out. Wang An was relieved and strode towards the chaotic crowd.

Chen Huaian, who was leading people to burn and kill everywhere at this moment, also cooperated with Xu Huang to disperse his men behind the shadows of trees and bushes, and beat drums and gongs to make a loud noise.

With the words "surrender your weapons and you won't be killed" shouted, the bandits in Crescent Mountain became even more confused.

Most of the bandits' families reported their gold, silver, valuables or children, and squatted down obediently to surrender.

Only some hardliners holding knives and guns were still shouting and trying to gather people to attack the mountain road.

But at this moment, Wang An reached out and took the head of the mountain tiger from the black armor guard, raised it high and shouted loudly: "The bandit leader is dead, the rest will not be killed!"

After shouting this twice, the other black-armored guards wisely raised the heads of the other bandit leaders in their hands and shouted: "The bandit leader is dead, the rest will not be killed!"

At this time, the flames in the mountain village had already shot up into the sky, and the raging fire illuminated the entire mountain as if it were daytime.

The loud shouts of Wang An and his group of more than 30 people were initially drowned out by the noisy chaos, but as Wang An and his group got closer, people gradually heard them. Turning around, they saw the ferocious head of the mountain tiger, which scared people out of their wits.

Slowly the crowd began to quiet down, and more and more people noticed the head of the mountain tiger held high in the air.

Gradually, even the small leaders among the bandits noticed the movements of Wang An. They slowly stopped gathering and stared blankly at the heads of the leaders who were squeezed in the air.

Xu Huang, Chen Huaian and others immediately changed their slogans, shouting in unison: "The bandit leader is dead, the rest will not be killed!"

The bandits dreamed that their leaders were dead, and they thought that this was a conspiracy trap by the government. Now that they were surrounded by a large army, they immediately lost the will to resist and one by one dropped their swords and guns and surrendered.

Only then did Chen Huaian lead the Black Armored Guards and rushed out from all corners in a menacing manner, confiscating weapons while attacking those bandits who refused to surrender.

After all, most of these bandits were farmers who could not make a living in their hometowns, so they came to Crescent Mountain with their families to become bandits in order to survive.

Seeing that even the notorious boss had been beheaded by the government, how could they dare to resist anymore?
There were only a few who were truly extremely vicious, and they were hacked to death immediately by Chen Huaian and his men, which further frightened off many people who were wavering in their thinking.

Commander Wang An found some ropes and tied up the young and strong bandits head to tail. By the time he finished these tasks, it was already dawn.

It was only then that the bandits realized that there were no government troops on the mountain road. There were only more than a hundred people at most. They immediately regretted it.

But at this time, their hands and feet had been tied, and their family members were all old and weak and had also been guarded. If they wanted to resist again, they would have to consider the consequences.

Therefore, he could only accept defeat dejectedly.

At this time, the people who stayed at the foot of the mountain to meet the people also led Chen He and other government officials up the mountain. This was what Wang An had agreed to long ago. These government officials were not good at fighting and suppressing bandits, but they were perfect for guarding prisoners.

With the addition of these hundred or so yamen runners, the shortage of manpower was improved.

Wang An finally freed up some manpower to return to Juyi Hall. Although the bandit leader Guoshanhu had been killed, there were still many issues that needed to be dealt with.

Boxes filled with valuables were piled up on the open ground. The seven or eight women who had been imprisoned by the tiger were also covered with clothes and placed away in a daze.

Chen He roughly recorded the wealth of Yueya Mountain while being shocked, "I never thought that this small bandit camp could have plundered such a huge wealth."

"Just these dozen boxes of silver, I'm afraid there are not 70,000 or 80,000 taels?"

Wang An was moved when he heard this and asked, "Are there many bandit camps like Crescent Moon Mountain in Jizhou?"

Chen He sighed and said, "There are five or six bandit camps of the same size as Crescent Moon Mountain in Jizhou, and there are even more of the smaller ones."

"The people of Jizhou already have a hard life, and now with the addition of these bandits, life has become even more difficult."

Wang An patted Chen He on the shoulder and consoled him, "This Zhouji is my fiefdom, and I will never allow these bandits to harm the people of Jizhou!"

"Just wait, I will slowly remove these slanders one by one!"

Wang An's words came from the bottom of his heart, and his words were extremely firm. Chen He was stunned, and then nodded heavily and said, "If someone said this before, I would definitely not believe it, but now..."

Chen He glanced at the captured bandits all over the mountain, a glimmer of hope flashed in his eyes, "I have full confidence in Your Highness!"

"It's good to have confidence, but before we remove the various hills and mountains in the territory, our top priority is to build the city wall first!"

Wang An smiled and said, "Otherwise, before these bandits are wiped out, the city will be breached by others."

Chen He showed a trace of embarrassment on his face, and said shamefully: "It is my incompetence that failed to protect the people of Baicheng."

Wang An waved his hand and said, "You are just a chief clerk. You have done a good job in your current position. It is the court that should let down the people of Baicheng, not you!"

"Your Highness, that's too kind!" Chen He was surprised.

Although the people of Jizhou were almost all dissatisfied with the imperial court, believing that the imperial court had never treated them as the people of Daliang, leaving them to fend for themselves in the desert next door, and even remaining indifferent to the looting by foreign races.

But these were not things Chen He could say. After all, he was an official appointed by the court. No matter how dissatisfied he was, he was still the court's spokesperson in Jizhou.

However, Wang An had no scruples and directly accused the court of causing the current situation in Jizhou.

This was not Wang An's attempt to win people's hearts, but he truly believed this.

Two hundred years ago, before Jizhou was naturalized, it was just an unowned land.

(End of this chapter)