Feeling utterly speechless, Fang Er bid farewell to Han Shizhong. He absolutely would not agree to the latter's proposal.
The scoundrel, he was dreaming!
But then again, should he go to another parallel world and find all the Chai Yues?
Tsk tsk tsk, how exciting~
Immediately, Fang Er cast the thought aside from his mind. A true man wouldn't linger over matters of love!
But in the next moment, the system's voice sounded in his mind.
"Old lady feels like you can't afford the travel expenses?"
"Sister Tong~ Can't you spare me the embarrassment by not saying it out loud~~"
Quickly covering the embarrassment on his face, he complained to the system before pretending nothing was amiss and heading towards the imperial palace.
Upon meeting Li Shimin, he cupped his hands and said, "Father, there's nothing major happening here. Your subject wishes to visit the Western Regions."
Li Shimin did not answer his question but instead let out a sigh of melancholy.
"Alas~ Sister Hong Yu didn't return yesterday..."
Fang Er: !!!
She went back to her own home, alright!
Speaking of which, if you miss someone else's wife so much, does the Empress know?
But these thoughts could only be grumbled internally; saying them out loud would be rather inappropriate.
Fang Er thought for a moment and smiled at Li Shimin, "Father, Marshal Yue is about to launch his northern expedition. If you're bored, you could accompany him~"
Li Shimin stroked his beard, deep in thought. After a moment, he suddenly slapped his thigh.
"That's right! Since those beasts initiated the 'Sheep Herding Ceremony', we should give them a taste of their own medicine!"
"Hurry, go do whatever you need to do. I'm going to have a good chat with that kid Yue Fei~"
With that, the old man Li left without looking back.
Fang Er was quite stunned. He had merely made a casual remark to change the subject, and the man had completely disregarded his own status and rushed off to find Yue Fei~
This was outrageous!
After a brief word with Li Xiuning, Fang Er left the imperial palace.
He intended to visit the pyramids again. Besides the golden sarcophagus, he also wanted to understand the meaning of the stone carvings inside the pyramids!
There were rumors in later generations that they were built by aliens, but Fang Er didn't believe them one bit.
However, within those stone carvings, there were things resembling flying saucers lifting massive granite blocks. This content greatly puzzled him.
Accompanying him were Wang Xuance and Xue Rengui, along with several old men from the Imperial Academy. With the many poisonous scorpions encountered in the pyramids last time, having these imperial physicians along made him feel more at ease.
Of course, they had also prepared plenty of antidote medications.
Three helicopters slowly ascended. The imperial physicians, who had been roped in as conscripts, sat in the cabin, moving their itching limbs with extreme caution, afraid of touching anything they shouldn't.
As their departure point was further south, their route this time was different.
They traveled westward from Lin'an, crossing over the Dali Kingdom, directly to India, and then entering Central Asia along the southern side of the Himalayas.
However, two days later, as they appeared over the lands of the two rivers, they discovered two groups of people engaged in a fierce battle below.
The helicopters lowered their altitude, flying low over the battlefield, attracting the attention of both warring factions. They stopped their attacks in unison and looked up at the helicopters.
Suddenly, one group of people knelt down in unison, offering a reverent salutation to the helicopters, and seemed to be shouting something.
The other party, however, turned tail and fled, showing no inclination to take advantage of the situation.
"Let's go down and take a look~"
Fang Er pointed towards those below who were performing the reverent salutation and said to Wang Xuance.
As the helicopters landed, he opened the cabin door and stepped out. Seeing the attire of these people up close, Fang Er was instantly dumbfounded~
Good heavens, they had encountered the Crusades?
The individuals before them all bore red cross emblems on their right arms and shields~
It was evident that these were Crusaders from Catholicism!
And the identity of those who had just fled was also obvious; they must be Arabs, or perhaps Turks!
Seeing Fang Er and his companions emerging from the cabin, an old man with a golden halo on his head and holding a cross walked out from among the Crusaders.
He approached Fang Er, placed his left hand on his right chest, and bowed respectfully.
"Bara bara xi mo xian~~~~"
Fang Er: !!!
It's over~ I don't understand!
He could only discern that the man was speaking Greek, and he was guessing and improvising!
"Can you speak English?" he asked tentatively.
However, he found the old man looking at him blankly, equally unable to understand what he meant.
Alright, England at this time was still in the Plantagenet dynasty era, its influence hadn't even spread beyond Western Europe~
"Est-ce que tu parles français?"
Fang Er tried speaking French again, but the old man also indicated he didn't understand.
Damn it!
In the Middle Ages, Europe could have n+1 languages, but not a single one was similar enough to the modern language!
Logically speaking, given France's status in Europe at the time, these Eastern Orthodox followers should definitely understand French.
Since he indicated he didn't understand, the only explanation was that French had undergone too much change over the next thousand years.
"Can you speak Song dialect?"
After saying this, Fang Er turned and walked back towards the helicopters, having lost all hope.
Since communication was impossible, he'd let them play on their own~
But in the next moment, he heard broken Han Chinese from behind.
"Yes, yes, yes~ Are you an angel sent by Teacher God?"
Turning his head, he saw the old man looking at him with utter piety.
What the heck!
Not only could this guy understand, but he also spoke fluent Henan dialect!!
Fang Er just wanted to say to the merchants of the Song Dynasty, "You guys are truly amazing~"
He nodded at the old man. Since the man considered him an angel, he couldn't be impolite, right?
"What are you doing here?" he asked the old man in the same Henan dialect.
"Yi~~ You really are an angel? Oh my heavens, I've finally seen what an angel looks like in this lifetime~"
The old man excitedly slapped his thighs. His words, coupled with his actions, made him look exactly like an old farmer from Henan~~
After speaking, he fell to his knees with a thud, crawled forward a few steps, and began kissing Fang Er's small cowhide military boots incessantly.
The content of his words left Fang Er completely bewildered.
Geez, the person who taught him Henan dialect definitely didn't explain what "heavens" meant!
If these words were to get out, this old man would probably be burned as a heretic the next second!
"What are you doing here?" Fang Er pulled him up, looking at his gleaming boot soles from being kissed, and couldn't help but worry if the man would get diarrhea upon returning~
Hearing this, the old man squeezed out a few tears from the corners of his eyes and tearfully recounted, in a rather aggrieved manner.
"Yi~ Lord Angel, you may not know, but those bastards, the Turks and Arabs, snatched our territory years ago~"
"Our leader then sent me to bring people to drive away those bastards and reclaim our territory for Catholicism~"
"That's right, I am a Knight Guardian of Catholicism, Kukhajoncha~"
Fang Er looked at the Crusaders staring in their direction. He estimated them to be around three to five thousand at most.
And those who had just fled were also around the same number.
With a combined force of less than ten thousand, could this truly be called the Crusades, so grandly proclaimed in the West?
Weren't they said to have had a hundred thousand troops at their peak in Catholicism?
Why were there so few?