Chapter 42 On the Road
Lu Ye drove his horse forward and led the team along the official road.
He noticed that on both sides of the city gate, the piles of corpses pulled out of the city after the city was breached a few days ago were gone. After a fire burned that day, only a large black area was left in place. ash.
The flames of the burning corpse smoked the walls on both sides of the city gate black. On the damaged bricks of the city wall, there were traces of smoke and fire from the battle between the two armies that day. A terrifying dark oily sheen.
Despite the past few days, there is still a lingering smell of burnt corpses in the air.
He turned to look at the city wall carefully.
I can see that these days have passed, and the damaged city wall is still the same as that day. The parapets above are covered with cracks, and some have completely collapsed without any repairs.
On the base of the city wall below, there are many large holes dug by the servants that day, revealing the pitted adobe inside.
On the city wall, there were small teams of refugees patrolling alternately. The atmosphere was quite serious. A large flag with the word "Chuang" stood above it. Because there was no wind in the air, it was hanging on the flagpole.
From the lack of repairs on the city wall, it can be seen that the refugee army may not hold on to this city. If a large number of officers and soldiers attack, they may give up quickly.
He turned around and asked Zhang Cunyi.
“Lao San, I have been in seclusion for the past few days and have not heard anything outside the window. How is the situation in the city these days?”
“Just now we were rushing to the city gate, but the road was so empty. "It seems that the county is quite depressed."
Zhang Cunyi sighed, not only was it depressed, there were almost no civilians on the streets except for the homeless soldiers.
He whispered to Lu Ye about the recent situation in the city.
After Chuang Potian conquered the city, he and the other three kings divided the city into four parts, and then the kings of each family searched the city with all their strength.
Mature men were conscripted into the army, and beautiful women were divided among themselves by the leaders.
The old, weak and useless are left alone and the people suffer, needless to say.
Livestock, food and grass were the focus of the search, and countless other gold and silver equipment were also plundered.
The subordinates of the kings of each family swelled up as if they were puffed up, but the city was inevitably depressed.
Not to mention that when the kings and their subordinates entered the city, they rushed to occupy the good houses. There was a lot of killing. Many old and weak people in the city were afraid, so they lived outside the city and became new refugees.
The refugees in the city mixed with the original refugees, and many shacks were built outside the original shacks on the city wall.
Because there is no food, the natives in these cities cannot leave if they want to.
Fortunately, most of the soldiers recruited by the refugee army are from refugees, so these kings also want to face them.
Now that we have occupied the city, we have enough food and grass, and we have set up porridge sheds to support them every day. The natives are hiding in the shacks, having a meal every day, and they are still starving to death.
Lu Ye nodded and said nothing.
There is a saying in the past life: prosperity brings suffering to the people, and death brings suffering to the people.
Nowadays, drought is rampant in the Jin Dynasty, grass-headed kings are rising together, the government is inactive, and both sides have no bottom line. Isn't this common people just suffering more and more?
He led everyone past the shacks outside the city and found that the area of these shacks was even much larger than before the siege.
The cavalry marched through the shacks, and the refugees on both sides cowered and hid in the shacks, fearing that they would bump into the gentlemen.
Lu Ye noticed that many refugees were still wearing relatively complete clothes, and even saw a barefoot old man wearing a tattered brocade robe among the crowd.
It is estimated that some unlucky wealthy family in the city ended up like this.
These people should be the original residents of the city, but now they have no choice but to become refugees.
The current refugee army coerces the refugees to form a large army. They do not engage in production. They capture the city and rob the men and women in the city of food and grass, and then leave the gold, silver and equipment.
Wherever it went, it disrupted the old order, but failed to establish a new order.
It can even be said that the chaos is amplified, constantly swallowing up the shaky foundation of the inactive government.
He sighed. In troubled times, all living beings suffer, so you should take care of yourself first. When the horse team walked out of the siege shack, the official road immediately became empty. It was hard to see even a ghost, let alone a human figure.
When two armies are fighting, the first to die may not be the soldiers who go into battle, but may be the people in the middle border area.
This is the so-called struggle between two strong powers. The innocent and weak one dies first.
The villages along the road have either been conquered and cleaned.
Either guard the village, mobilize the whole village, and be careful with any soldiers who come along. No matter he is a bandit or an officer or soldier, it is a routine to steal food, money and kill people. It makes no difference to them, as long as they are provoked If it doesn't happen, it will be a disaster that destroys the village.
I don’t know how far the team has walked. The dusty dirt road is monotonous and seems to be reaching the end of the world.
Everyone moved forward. Originally, there were still people in the team chatting with each other. When they got here, the atmosphere gradually became depressing and everyone became silent.
Lu Ye’s attention is all on the horse, and he is still in the realm of skilled copper-skinned martial arts.
Now he has abundant zhenqi. If the original zhenqi was just a shallow pool of water, now it can be regarded as a stream.
I used to ride horses, and my buttocks would hurt when the horses ran. After riding for a lap, it felt like I had been beaten hard. My buttocks were bruised and swollen, and the sides of my thighs were even worn.
Even if you have become a young warrior and have greater strength than ordinary people, you are still no match for the brute force of a horse. You have just learned to follow the trend, and after one lap of the horse, your body is very tired.
But now that his energy is strong and his legs are strong, Lu Ye can truly understand what it feels like to ride on a horse. What used to be a violent horse power for him has now become much gentler.
It gave him the illusion that he was riding not the tall horse carefully selected by Pan Furong, but an obedient short-legged pony.
He couldn't help but spur his horse to gallop, his speed suddenly increased, and the whole team also accelerated.
This acceleration does not matter.
Plop! thump!
With a few screams, a third of the people in the team fell to the ground. One unlucky guy even sprained his foot and groaned loudly.
Lu Ye then remembered that he was not leading elite horse soldiers, but a group of rabble-rousers.
Zhang Cunyi's face turned dark immediately. These people were all trained by him recently.
He hates the fact that iron cannot become steel and wields his whip.
“Get up, get up quickly!”
“With the way you are, when can you get to Dongsai Mansion?”
“We are really going to encounter officers and soldiers, you guys You can’t even escape on horseback, everyone is a living pile!”
Lu Ye raised his hand to stop him.
"Third brother, stop fighting and explore the Dongsai Mansion. The three of us are enough. The rest of us should find a place to hide nearby and wait until we return to meet up..."
If these mobs didn't hide, Lu Ye was afraid that when the three of them came back, these people would be picked up by the King of Hell who was passing by.
Zhang Cunyi and Wang Hu were shocked and hurriedly objected.
Lu Ye shook his head.
"Two brothers, listen to me. Even if you beat them to death, they won't be able to run fast. When we get to Dongsai Mansion, it will be dark, and what useful information will we be able to detect?"
"Besides, even if we take them with us, it will be dark by the time we retreat. How can you safely let these people gallop in the dark? I'm afraid they will all fall to death."
"If there are only three of us, quickly Go back quickly to avoid these troubles."
"It's just bad luck to encounter a large group of officers and soldiers. With or without them, it makes no difference to the three of us."
"We can fight. The three of us can handle it if we can; if we can’t beat it, the result will be the same if we add them.”
(End of this chapter)