Chapter 10 Temporary Stay
At this time, there were changes in the city below.
The porridge team returned to the city. The officers and soldiers kept the gun formation unchanged, and more than a dozen horses rushed out.
A scribe in official robes in the middle took out a document and read something loudly.
He read a sentence, and the other soldiers repeated it loudly.
But the distance was too far, and Lu Ye and Wang Hu couldn't hear anything at all. They could only guess what happened through his shaking his head and the documents in his hand.
After the noisy refugee team was quiet for a moment, someone suddenly burst into cheers.
Large swathes of homeless people were like waves of wheat blown by the wind during the harvest, falling down row after row.
The crowd had already knelt down, chanting for the blue sky, and some people were crying with joy, and the sound shook the sky.
However, there were also a small number of homeless people in the crowd who stood still, even choked with tears, and seemed out of place in the joyful atmosphere.
Among the many kneeling refugees, many people squeezed out of the crowd and walked quickly towards the officers and soldiers, and soon they formed a large crowd in front of the moat.
The remaining refugees who stayed in the same place were the larger ones. They stood up and slowly gathered together. They stood on tiptoe, separated by a few meters, and surrounded their companions who were out of the queue for a month and a half. status, watch carefully.
Lu Ye and Wang Hu looked at each other, not knowing what was going on under the city. The two of them could only speed up and run towards the foot of the mountain.
"Brother, could it be that the government is recruiting soldiers? In the past, every time there was a disaster, the government would recruit soldiers. I'm afraid it's the same old way this time. If someone becomes a soldier and gets military rations, he can give it to his family. If you share the food, the whole family will not starve to death."
"Huzi, this is a good thing for everyone. If someone else becomes a soldier, the whole family will not starve to death. If a wealthy family recruits slaves, there will be many fewer people. If you compete with us, won’t our brothers have more opportunities?”
"Huh? Brother, what you said makes sense, let's walk slower."
At this time, there were changes under the city, and the scene began to become chaotic.
The crowd of refugees who came out formed a group, pushing and shoving each other. Each one seemed extremely anxious, and finally formed a wave and rushed towards the officers and soldiers. Some people even screamed and were pushed. Arrived inside the moat.
The cavalry were still waving their whips roughly, and the infantry were leveling their spears, with their spear heads like a forest, shouting loudly, and they were moving forward as a team, using the cold spear heads to raise their spirits. The rioting crowd suppressed the situation and barely restored order.
The officers and soldiers quickly set up dozens of vertical poles outside the long bridge of the moat. There was a red mark on the pole as high as a person, and a sack was placed at the bottom of the pole. Four or five people stood under each pole. The soldiers did not wait.
The large number of refugees who came out immediately were like a big river diverting, automatically dividing into dozens of long lines, rushing to get over.
After a gong sounded.
There were ragged refugees rushing to the front, standing under the pole with their feet up, their heads almost crossing the red line. Then they bent over and held their breath, holding the sacks in their arms, trying hard to pick up the sacks. His face turned red and his neck was filled with thick veins.
The tall and sturdy refugee succeeded easily in one attempt. He received a small triangular red flag representing passage, and happily crossed the moat bridge and entered the city.
There was also the refugee who was not tall enough and could not reach the red mark on his head even with his tiptoes. He was eliminated in the first round, but they were not the worst off.
There were those who were tall enough but were too weak to know their own strength. They tried their best to pick up the sack, but in the end they couldn't hold it in anymore. They lost their breath and spurted out a mouthful of blood. They fell to the ground sluggishly and even their breath became much weaker. .
Of course, some officers and soldiers dragged out the injured man who was vomiting blood, and threw them randomly in front of the crowd of onlookers, like throwing sacks.
This kind of thing happened under every assessment pole. Soon, the sacks set up for the assessment became stained with blood and stained with a dazzling bright red.
Among the crowd of refugees watching from the outside, some people burst out heart-wrenching cries from time to time and were snatched out of the crowd, kneeling in front of the injured man who was vomiting blood and crying.
The collapse of the mainstay of the family meant a disaster for the family in this famine year. I originally wanted to earn a share of food rations, but I didn't expect that I would have to pay for it with my life first.
Among the refugees, from time to time there are lucky ones who pass through the customs and enter the city, and from time to time there are unlucky ones who vomit blood and fall down. On the same land, there are different joys and sorrows.
Lu Ye and Wang Hu naturally couldn't catch up with the test on the hillside, and they couldn't experience the sadness and joy in the scene.
They only saw a small number of people among the dense group of refugees crossing the moat bridge, entering the dark city gate, and disappearing.
When the two of them hurriedly and slowly arrived at the foot of the mountain, they only heard the sound of a gong.
It turned out that there were no more people queuing under dozens of vertical poles.
As the gong sounded, the officers and soldiers pulled out the wooden poles and returned to the city, leaving only the holes in the ground where the poles were inserted and the earth around the holes that had been dyed red. The large group of refugees had dispersed long ago, lingering and lying back in their shacks to conserve their strength.
In front of the moat, there are occasionally a few refugees who vomited blood after passing the test, lying on the ground, groaning miserably, with no one to care for or protect them. It must be that the whole family is dead and only the bachelor is left. One can only wait to die.
Lu Ye and Wang Hu supported each other and rushed for the next meal of relief porridge.
However, Wangshan was a dead horse, and the two of them lacked physical strength. By the time they arrived at the refugee shack gathering place, it had already been an hour.
In the shacks, some people were moaning and wailing, some were sobbing softly, and some people's voices were brisk and even laughing.
Lu Ye hurriedly found someone to understand the situation. Fortunately, he was a local speaker. After asking a few more people, he finally learned the whole story.
It turns out that the prefect of Dongsai Prefecture issued an official document today. According to the practice of this dynasty, soldiers will be recruited from the disaster victims. No martial arts will be checked. As long as they are over five feet tall and can hold a fifty kilogram sack upright. , you can be selected.
The selected candidates must go to the city to practice, organize, form a team, and train. Their families are not allowed to enter the city, but they are promised to give half a person more rations to the selected candidates every day. They can go out to the camp at night but are not allowed to stay in shacks outside the city.
Correspondingly, due to the need to recruit refugees into soldiers and food shortages, the relief food distribution will be halved from now on, and the original two meals a day will be changed to one meal a day.
Therefore, the refugees enthusiastically signed up one after another. In the end, some people estimated that about two to three thousand strong men entered the city.
In addition, since we have let go of food once today, there will naturally not be a second time.
Wang Hu was so angry that he slapped his legs red.
“I missed another meal.”
Lu Ye also had a wrong expression on his face.
There is also bad news, that is, because there are many refugees and there are rebels and thieves inside and outside the province, the government officials are cautious and are afraid of traitors and spies sneaking into the city, so the city gates are not open to the outside world.
Of course no wealthy family recruits slaves from the refugees.
The two of them didn't care about regrets and found a place to settle down first. Fortunately, there were many homeless people here, and there were naturally many shacks. People often disappeared, so they found a place to settle down without much effort. .
Fetch water, light a fire, chop up the hard buns in your arms and soak them in them. After you are full, you can hear the sound of wind, coughing and crying. It is a mess.
Wang Hu couldn't sleep, his eyes were full of longing for the future.
"Brother, when do you think this gangster will be put down? When can we join a wealthy family and become slaves?"
Lu Ye's eyes were deep and he said a few perfunctory words quickly, soon.
He was unsure.
It is written in the history books of the previous life - ten houses and nine empty houses, dynasties change...
I only hope that I and Wang Hu are not nine out of ten.
I hope that this city is reliable and can protect the safety around the city. Even the worst order is better than precarious chaos.
If he could wait until the order stabilized, there was no chance that the city gate would be opened. As long as he and Wang Hu entered the city, they would be one step closer to their ideal of joining a wealthy family and becoming slaves.
The next day, Lu Ye and Wang Hu woke up. They had divided half of the hard buns and were huddled in the shack to recuperate, preparing to conserve their strength so that they could grab the only disaster relief porridge every day.
Suddenly, they heard noises outside, ranging from small to loud, and the chaotic sound waves roared and washed over the entire land.
The two hurriedly left the shack.
I saw the city gates wide open, with generals riding tall horses ahead, followed by armored soldiers on the left and right, followed by a long marching line of infantry wearing cotton armor.
The infantry was divided into two columns, with young refugees who entered the city yesterday sandwiched between them. These young men walked slowly along the official road with mournful faces, trembling legs, and some even shed tears.
(End of this chapter)