son-in-law

Chapter 904 Boiling the Sea (4)

Chapter 904 Cooking the Sea ([-])

Heaven and earth are like a furnace.

And history keeps turning.

In the 11th year of Jianshuo of the Wu Dynasty, the three behemoths in this world finally collided together. Tens of thousands of people fought and shed blood, and tiny creatures went through their lives in a hurry and fiercely. The beginning of this tragic war originated from more than ten years ago. On a certain day years ago, if we want to get to the bottom of the cause and effect, the line between the heaven and the earth may have to be entangled to a deeper distance.

Even spiritual gods may not be able to understand everything in this world, and they are as stupid as human beings. We can only intercept the small visible fragments of this world, in the hope of gaining insight into the truth or metaphors about heaven and earth contained in it. .Although this small fragment is already an unimaginable behemoth for us...

In the spring of the 11th year of Jianshuo, Liangshan was cold and barren in January.The accumulated food was exhausted in the early winter of last year. The men, women and children on the mountain fished as much as possible to feed their hunger. The 10,000+ Han army outside the mountain occasionally attacked or cleaned up. When the weather was getting colder, the weak fishermen They abandoned their boats and jumped into the water, many of them died.And on the days when the outsiders fight, there will be no fish to catch, and the people on the mountain will need to be hungry even more.

Old people die in the winter, young people are skinny and hungry, and even children suffer from hunger most of the time.The Huaxia Army and Guangwu Army, who were less than [-] people, depended on the geographical advantage and the good and bad of the army outside the mountain, and they fought a deadlock situation with the opposite side. In fact, the situation outside Shuibo was even worse at this time.

The Shandong area, where the folk customs are fierce and bandits are frequent, is not a prosperous grain-producing area.In autumn, before the grain was harvested, it was "requisitioned" by the Jurchen army. Before the late autumn came, a large number of people had already started to starve to death.In order not to starve to death, young people go to serve in the army, but the army is only in the village of fish and meat, and there is nothing left in the village. These days of the Han army have become extraordinarily difficult.

The 20 troops sent to attack Liangshan by Wan Yanchang have been struggling in such a difficult situation since late autumn.Too many people died outside the mountains. In the late autumn, there was a plague in Shandong, and often all the people in a village died, and it was rare to see living people walking in the towns. Some troops were also infected by the plague. The sick soldiers were isolated and waited to die in the epidemic camp. After they died, they were burned to death. In the process of attacking Liangshan, some sick corpses were even rushed to Liangshan by large ships.For a while, Liangshan was also affected to a certain extent.

After entering the winter, the spread of the plague temporarily stopped, and the Han army did not have any pay. Soldiers fished in the water, and occasionally two different armies met, and they would fight because of this.Every once in a while, the generals command the soldiers to attack Liangshan with simple rafts, which can maximize the reduction of the number of soldiers. The soldiers died in the war, or they directly surrendered to Liangshan's Black Flag and Guangwu Second Army. It doesn't matter.

The resources have been exhausted, and cannibalism is common outside, and no one can afford more mouths. Zhu Biao Wang Shanyue and others occasionally lead soldiers out of the mountains to launch raids. The army knelt down and begged for mercy, and even wanted to join the Liangshan army, only to ask the other party to stutter, and the hungry Zhu Biao and others could only let them go away.

Soon after, they turned the raid into a smaller-scale beheading battle. All raids only targeted the middle and high-level generals of the Han army. The soldiers at the lower level were already dying of starvation. Only the generals at the middle and upper levels still had some rations in their hands. If they caught them, they would often be able to find some food, but after a while, most of these generals became vigilant. They set up ambush on purpose twice, and almost turned Zhu Biao and others into the game.

Hunger, the most primitive and tragic torture of human beings, turned the war in Liangshan into a desolate and ironic hell.When the old people who starved to death on Liangshan were carried out every day, Zhu Biao, who was watching from a distance, had an unresolved powerlessness and resentment in his heart. He wanted to roar out with the greatest strength, but all the breath was lost. The feeling of being stuck in the throat.The hundreds of thousands of "Han troops" outside the mountains were driven by Wanyan Chang and died with them here, and the lives of these "Han troops" themselves became worthless in the eyes of others or themselves. Everyone knelt down in front of them, but only did not dare to resist.

In fact, even if they wanted to resist, neither the Huaxia Army nor the Guangwu Army would be able to bring out any food.The once dignified Wu Dynasty and the huge Central Plains have now been trampled and reduced to such a degree that the lives of the Han people are as ridiculous as ants in front of the Jurchens.Such anger is breathless.

Another battlefield is Jindi, where the situation is slightly better. Tian Hu's more than ten years of management have left some surplus for Lou Shuwan and others who usurped the throne.After Wasion was destroyed, Lou Shuwan and others turned to the western Jinxi area to help maintain a base in dangerous customs and mountainous areas.The offensive organized by the surrendering forces headed by Liao Yiren has continued. The long-term war and the chaos in the occupied area have killed many people. The tragedy of starvation, such as Shandong, has never occurred, and many people have been killed. Rather than starve to death, which is, in a sense, an ironic benevolence, I'm afraid.

Since the beginning of winter, people in the bottom class often eat porridge cooked with musty grains.When Lou Shuwan was under Tian Hu's command, she was in charge of the people's livelihood, and prepared to calculate the storage of the entire Jin land. In the spring of 11, spring plowing may not be able to resume amidst the ongoing war.

I'm afraid she will start cannibalism before the fall of 11... With such estimates, since last fall, Lou Shuwan has used iron fists to reduce the food expenditure of the army and government departments, practicing strict frugality.In order to lead by example, she also often eats food with a musty smell or bran powder. In winter, she fell ill twice during the busyness and travel, and only three days at a time. When people around her persuaded her, she shook her head She didn't listen, and the other time it was extended to ten days. During the ten days, she vomited and vomited, and it was hard to get water and rice. She has a long head, her face protrudes like a skeleton, and her eyes are terrifyingly sharp——she seems to have lost her beautiful face and figure back then.

She wrote in her notes: "... Yu Yu winter has become more chilly, white hair has begun to come out, my body is tired, and I am afraid that it will be soon... I have not dared to take a self-portrait in the mirror recently, I often recall the time in Hangzhou. , Although Yu is shallow, he is plump and beautiful, and there are men around him who praise him. Compared with Su Tan'er, he is no different. Now it is not bad... It's just that these torments, I don't know when it will end..."

While feeling sad, he wrote: "...when I die, the Liao family will always lead the way..." The words that wanted to kill the whole family suddenly became iron-blooded.

Over the years, she has often read official documents or letters written by Ning Yi, and over time, her grammar has become messy.Sometimes she threw it away after writing it, and sometimes it was saved by someone else.When spring came, Liao Yiren and other surrendering forces gradually lost their vigor, and the backbone officials and generals in the forces paid more attention to the stability and enjoyment behind them. Yu Yulin and Wang Juyun and other forces took advantage of the situation and fought several victories and even took the other side. some supplies.The pressure in Lou Shuwan's heart eased slightly, and her body gradually eased.

In mid-January, the second Battle of Xuzhou, which began to expand, became one of the focuses of attention.Liu Chengzong, Luo Ye and others led more than [-] people to attack Xuzhou, and successively defeated more than [-] puppet Qi and Han troops along the way.

At this time, most of the Eastern Route Army led by Zongfu had already crossed the Yangtze River. While attacking the defenses of the Wu Dynasty in Jiangning and Zhenjiang, they were eager to face the battle situation in Lin'an.The resolute retreat of Liu Chengzong's troops tensed everyone's nerves. General Nie Erbojin of the Jurchen East Route Army and others urgently mobilized nearly 15 troops from various places in the south of the Yangtze River to confront this black banner division in Xuzhou.

Considering that the Black Flag Army led by Ning Yi in the Northwest War had a record of beheading and beheading the city through secret passages, the Jurchen army launched several repeated searches in Xuzhou. Some places cleaned up were quickly cleaned up, and then I felt relieved.The Huaxia Army's troops camped outside the city, and even launched two fierce attacks in mid-to-late January, deterring Xuzhou as tightly as a cobra.

At this time, Lin'an encountered the same situation in Xuzhou for a period of time.On the eighth day of the first lunar month, Wushu attacked outside the city, only retreated on the tenth day of the first month, and then kept circling outside Lin'an City.Although Wushu is lacking in grand strategy, the use of troops on the battlefield still has its own rules and regulations. Several King Qin troops outside Lin'an City failed to obtain benefits in his flexible but resolute offensive. A small defeat, a fiasco.

The pressure in Lin'an City is condensing. In the city of one million people, officials, gentry, generals, and common people earn their lives. More than ten officials in the court were dismissed and imprisoned. There were also several assassinations and battles in the city. More than ten years ago, during the first Bianliang defense war, the Wu Dynasty could at least have one heart. This time, more complex thoughts and series are intertwined and surging in secret.

But in any case, in this January, more than [-] Imperial Guard troops surrounded the entire Lin'an City, and the people defending the city held the city's eager thoughts.In the direction of Jiangning, Zongfu ordered the army to attack Jiangning, and at the same time divided the troops and tried to go south several times to echo Lin'an's Wushu. Victory comes.

In mid-January, Yue Fei led the Beiwei Army eastward along the Yangtze River and inserted it into the Jiangning battlefield at high speed. In late January, Xiyin and Yinshuke troops, who were slow in action, moved along the Huaihe and Dalian with the boat divisions they had mobilized last winter. The first line of the canal enters the Jiangning and Zhenjiang battle circles.

Even bigger chaos is breaking out everywhere in the Wu Dynasty. The uprisings led by Fujian Road, Guan Tianxia, ​​Wu Heilong and others captured several prefectures and counties; Xuanzhou, the Central Plains refugees headed by Cao Jinlu rebelled and broke the prefecture. City; Dingzhou, Hu Yuner revolted in the name of Manichaeism... At the same time as the anti-Jin uprising gradually appeared in the Central Plains, in the Wu Dynasty, the various contradictions that were suppressed in the past ten years, the oppression of the southerners on the northerners, At this time when the Jurchen arrived, it also began to explode.

In this context, in late January, the Huaxia Army squads from all over the country started their missions one after another. Wu'an, Changsha, Qimen, Xiazhou, Guangnan... various places appeared one after another with evidence of crimes and cheating books. Organized assassination incidents, planned confrontations over such things, and various incidents of pretending to be murders also broke out one after another.Part of the Huaxia Army team wandered in the dark, privately connecting and warning the swaying forces and big clans.

During this period, a group of 120 soldiers of the Huaxia Army headed by Zhuo Yongqing came out from Shu, along a relatively safe route, lobbying and visiting forces that had previously done business with the Huaxia Army. There were two loosely organized fights, and some gentry forces who hated the Huaxia Army gathered "righteous men" and "civilian groups" to block them. The scale of one time was about 500 people, and the other time reached a thousand people. Both times after the assembly Another team that secretly followed Zhuo Yongqing was defeated by a beheading strategy.

In order to respond to the actions of these special teams that left their hometowns, in mid-January, [-] Huaxia troops from the Chengdu Plain were dispatched from Zhangcun to reach the borderline of the forces in the east and north, and entered a state of war preparation.

The expansion of various things and the dissemination of news also require time to ferment.In the world where all this is boiling, in mid-January, there was a news, which gradually spread to the green forests and markets of Wu Dynasty through the words of traders and storytellers walking around.

There was an old man named Fu Lu, who took his former master's last clothes and reappeared in the green forest. He was heading east along the Yangtze River to Jiangning and Zhenjiang, which were caught in the war.

The news of the appearance of the old man came out, and people from all over the country heard it. First there was silence and then whispers. The sun rose and the moon set. Gradually, some people packed up their packages, and some people arranged their families and started to go north. Among them, there were some. There are old people who have already become famous, but took the opportunity to come down, there are middle-aged people who are performing on the street, and they are displaced, and there are beggars who are in the crowd of refugees and beggars...

In Yizhang County, Jin Chenghu, a notorious underworld murderer, opened a strange flow of water.

Jin Chenghu is in his forties, with a fierce face and a body like an iron tower.After ten years of hard work, it was not easy to accumulate a whole body of savings. In the eyes of others, he was really young and strong. In the next ten years, the Yizhang area will probably be his territory.

On the [-]th day of the first lunar month, there was neither a wedding or a new house move. Jin Chenghu insisted on opening this water table. The reason was really difficult for many people to understand. His former opponents were even afraid that this guy would make excuses because of something. For example, "It's been over. Lantern Festival, you can start killing people" and so on.

The running water seats were opened on the small school grounds in Yizhang County for three days. At noon that day, the sky suddenly snowed. Jin Chenghu drank some wine, stood on the high platform, and looked up at the snow.He opened his mouth to speak.

"Everyone... villagers and fathers, brothers, I am Jin Chenghu. I wasn't called Jin Chenghu originally. My name is Jin Cheng. When I was in the Northland, I was... a bandit!"

He held up the wine bowl: "The cottage I am in is Dahu Village on Hedong Road! My head is called Peng Dahu! He is not a good person, but a man! He has done two things, I will remember them all my life! Jinghan was 11 years old , there was a grain shortage in the east of the river, and Master Zhou Dong went to Dahuzhai to ask for food. He left the rations in the village and asked for 210 six shi, and the village owner gave it without saying a word! Three servants, we have more than a hundred men, why are we afraid of him! The village owner said at the time that Zhou Tong robbed us for the sake of the world, not for himself! The village owner took us and handed over 210 six shi of grain without any tricks play!"

"The second thing!" He paused, snowflakes fell on his head, face, and wine bowl, "Jing Han! The autumn of 13! The golden dog has gone south! Master Zhou Dong didn't say a word, stab sticky Rare! Many people followed him, and my village owner, Peng Dahu, was one of them! I remember that day, he happily told us that Mr. Zhou’s martial arts skills are world-class. Last time he came to our village, he asked Mr. Zhou to teach him martial arts. The master said, I will teach you when you stop being a bandit one day. The village master said, Master Zhou will definitely teach me now!"

"My village owner is one of the righteous people who followed Zhou Tong Tashi Nianhan!" He almost shouted out these words, with tears in his eyes, "He disbanded the stockade and said that he wanted to follow Zhou Zongshi, so you are gone. Right. I'm scared, I'm scared when the Jurchens come! After the stockade was scattered, I came to the south. My name is Jin Cheng! I changed my name to Jin Chenghu, so it doesn't look fierce with the character tiger! I've been thinking about the meaning of this name for more than ten years. The righteous people who followed Zhou Zongshi to stab Nianhan were almost all dead, this time, Senior Fu Lu came out, I want to understand."

Among the falling snowflakes, Jin Chenghu glanced at the gang who followed him, several concubines he had married over the years, and then raised the wine bowl in his hands with both hands: "Family and elders, Brother! The time has come—"

"—Let's go!"

His whole body is muscular and like an iron tower, and his face is usually quite frightening, but at this moment he is standing upright, but he doesn't look handsome at all.There is snow falling all over the world.

Time has passed through the distance of more than ten years, and the influence of a figure in the long time has not disappeared for a long time.His life and death have left a huge imprint on people's hearts.His spirit, in the years and decades after his death, is still running through and changing the lives of many people...

Zhou Tong.Zhou Tong.

　02:30... The emotion I wanted was too intense, I overturned it several times...

(End of this chapter)