C2 (1/2)
Chapter 2 - Blending in a legal identity
”Child of the Lord, it is God's guidance that you meet me. Let me ask you, do you know God? Do you know Christianity? ” ”I am a priest from the United States, my name is Louis, and that black man is my follower, the young Sai Men …”
”I know, I know, of course, that Christianity originated in the teachings of the first Jews in Palestine, and then spread to the Ancient Rome and split into Orthodox Church and Catholic Church. I know that there are a lot of people who trust Protestantism. Also, isn't the civil war in the United States right now? Lin Ken is about to win, you still have the mood to teach? ” Xiao Letian's mouth was like a machine gun's, stuffed Louis speechless.
”My God, my God, how do you know so much?” Louis drew the cross on his chest with all his might.
”Don't pray. Resolve my problem first. Save me. If I were to be treated as an adult, I wouldn't be able to live …” Just as they were talking, the Qing San Ye had already brought over ten servants over. ”Enough, you long-hair, stop pretending, you know how to speak English is amazing, don't think that the Master Yang will help you, did the Master Yang help you guys when you were making trouble in the south?”
With that, Qing San Ye shook his hand. ”Men, tie him up for me. Haha, I never thought that my Qing San Ye would also be able to catch a long-haired man alive. When the time comes, the clan's people's residence will report to me.
Just as the servants rushed forward like wolves and tigers to tie Xiao Letian up, the priest Louis suddenly stood up and stretched out his hands to stop the servants, ”You can't do this, you are doing this in violation of the Beijing Treaty, Tianjin Treaty, this young man is a priest, he's one of my followers …” After saying that, he actually took off the cross on his own neck, and hung it around Xiao Letian's neck.
Qing San Ye was stunned, he did not expect Priest Liu to openly stand on the side of this weirdo, causing the entire caravan to be shocked. But now, after the Second Opium War, the Qing Dynasty had completely given the foreigners the rights to preach and do business in the interior.
”Yang...” Master Yang... You better not be joking with me. You did not know this person just now, yet you accepted a follower just because of his blabbering? Are you kidding me? ” Qing San Ye still wanted to work hard, but he saw that Xiao Letian seemed like a moving manual no matter how he looked at it.
It was a pity that Priest Louis rejected his request righteously, ”A treaty is a treaty. Your emperor has already accepted our conditions, do you dare to defy it?”
”No, no, no, don't think too much. I was just randomly asking …” ”Alright, you can continue …” When the Qing San Ye heard about the title of Emperor, he couldn't believe his eyes. Hurry up and call it a day.
Louis returned to the caravan, he did not know what the Manager Fan was talking about, but the two of them looked extremely serious, but in a short period of time, Xiao Letian was safe. The black Sai Men found some food for Xiao Letian.
However, while he was busy eating, his eyes were not idle. No matter how he looked at this caravan of a hundred people, they looked strange. Manager Fan and his shop assistant had the largest number of people, a total of more than 90. Furthermore, almost every shop assistant in the shop had weapons and sabers in their hands. It looked like it was not just the ordinary caravan, but more so, the shop assistant had the attitude of a bodyguard.
As for that Qing San Ye, Sai Men had also introduced him earlier. He was a whatever field officer under the Eight Banners, and it sounded like he was an inherited little noble title. And the thirty Eight Flags Soldier s who were guarding the Qing San Ye were partly his sons from his family, and the other part was the protection of the Yi County's Western Tomb.
It was already weird for a group of merchants and a group of Eight Flags Soldier to get together, but he never thought that there would actually be two foreigners in the group, and one of them was a preacher. However, Xiao Letian had always been good at public relations in his previous life, so he could read words and expressions quite a bit. Not long after, he managed to get some clues from Sai Men and a few brave fellows.
It turned out that this caravan started from Shanxi, travelling from Xinzhou in Taiyuan to Dai County, Lingqiu, Laiyuan and Yi County, and finally to Baoding before continuing north into the capital city. The Manager Fan was an illustrious member of the Fan family, and would be celebrating the New Year in the late autumn after entering the capital.
As for the Qing San Ye, Fu Qing, he took the Ministry of Internal Affairs's mission and went to work for Duke Shan Xi. On the way back, he met the Manager Fan, and the two seemed to have some friendship with each other before, but in the end they left together. This was a common occurrence in the Taihang Mountains. There were many beasts and bandits here, but the sheer number of them was still a force to be reckoned with.
Fortunately, this route went past the Yi County, which was the territory of the Qing Dynasty's West Tomb. Qing Government had very strict control over this mountain range, and other than a few small robbers, there were no other bandits that set up their mountain stronghold.
That's right, if the Qing Government couldn't even protect the place her ancestor slept at, then that would be too unfilial.