After seeing off Mr. Zhuang, Zhang Yingchen returned to the study. He sat in the empty study for a long time, listening to the sound of Taoist students reciting scriptures in the hall in front. Literature Bar wxba He called Ming and Qing.
"You go to the main hall in front and tell the junior brothers not to do their homework today. They all come inside first. I have something to tell them."
"Yes, Master." Ming Qing bowed and went out.
After a while, dozens of his disciples came in - these were all carefully selected by him from the refugees. They had a certain culture and high understanding. They stayed by his side to teach. They are all future new Taoists. core seeds.
After all the disciples had seen the ceremony, he glanced at all the disciples: the older ones were older and the younger ones were younger. The older ones were fifteen or sixteen years old, and the younger ones were only ** years old. All of them had handsome looks and strange bones - ―I haven’t picked such a good seedling in Lingao for several years―Seeing that they all looked up to him like a god, Zhang Yingchen coughed lightly and began to lecture.
A large group of refugees are advancing on the land of Yizhou.
It is the time of the first month. In the past, the farmers who had just celebrated the New Year would still be resting at home, gathering farm tools and preparing for the upcoming spring sowing. However, now, they are trekking in the snowy wilderness.
After the spring and summer floods, there are no more fields on the land. The floods have destroyed the field edges and washed away the crops, leaving only yellow sand all over the mountains and fields. At this moment, the heavy snow has covered the sand again, leaving only a desolate and dead silence. of desert soil.
The trees had long been stripped of their bark and were dead, without any trace of green. The roads covered with ice and snow were trampled into mud. Groups of people were driven out of the hot land of their hometowns by the famine. Trekking on this cold and muddy road, there are people with backpacks, people carrying burdens, people pushing carts, people using sticks... all of them are sallow and thin, wearing rags and ragged clothes. Those expressionless faces, a pair of dull eyes .It seems that there are countless sorrows and endless sorrows, but no one can express them. There are fallen corpses scattered on the roadside. No matter whether the fallen people are still breathing or not, if no one takes care of them, they will be passed by immediately. People stripped off their clothes, leaving only emaciated corpses to be torn apart by wild dogs.
The dogs that luckily escaped the mouths of hungry people became ferocious because they ate too much human flesh during the famine years. They followed the crowds of refugees in groups and fought for the corpses that fell on the road. The old ones, If the young and weak ones are left alone, they will be knocked down alive by the dogs and bitten and eaten.
There is no smoke in the villages along the way, and the half-collapsed houses have dark openings without doors or windows. In the distance, there are a few piles of fresh loess in the graves under the dead trees with broken monuments. Green smoke rises. Paper money flutters... There are sad and sad sounds. The desperate cries floated far away with the wind.
Bai Puting was barely trudging through the mud with a walking stick. His family had always been a medium-sized farmer with more than 20 acres of land. He fed several large animals and lived a pretty good life. So he had a formal "official" "Name", he also went to private school for a few years when he was a child. He was not "blind". In good years, he used his surplus food to make some loan sharks. He was still a respectable person in the village.
However, in the past few years, the imperial court has been increasing its expenditures every year, and floods, droughts, and locust plagues have continued. Bai Puting is struggling hard. He can barely survive on his own land. He wonders if he can survive this - his hope lies in this
He collapsed in the flood water.
The flood destroyed the crops, drowned the livestock, and also destroyed the land that his family had worked so hard to save even at the risk of annihilating their family ties. After the old man of the Bai family fell ill, in order to prevent his family from selling their land for treatment,
He committed suicide due to illness and was also washed away.
The family finally had no choice but to embark on the road to escape. Hearing that the situation in Yizhou was good and there was a way to survive, he took the family south. The refugees along the way gathered and gradually became a turbulent flow of people.
His daughter-in-law, with her head covered, was sitting on a wheelbarrow pushed by her eldest son. With one hand she held her daughter sitting on the other side, and with the other hand she held the thick hemp rope that bundled some rags, household items, and luggage on the wheelbarrow. Look.
Looking at the tragic situation on the road, she shed tears constantly. She has lived for more than forty years and has never left a place twenty miles away from home. Now she has left her home and traveled far away. She really doesn’t know what is waiting at the end of this road.
What does my family belong to?
Compared to most people in this refugee crowd, the Bai family is considered to be in a better position. They have cotton-padded clothes and some dry food. There are also a few young people in the family who can protect themselves. So they only lost two members of their family along the way:
Bai Puting's youngest son and his mother, the grandfather and grandson finally did not die in the wilderness, but were buried in a wasteland.
She thought of her young son who died after being unable to withstand the bumps on the road, and of her relatives in her mother's family who didn't know what their plight was. Her heart was as sharp as a knife, but she didn't dare to cry loudly. She just cried silently and recited what the "Taoist priests" in the crowd had taught her.
It is said that as long as you recite it repeatedly, your deceased relatives can escape reincarnation and enter bliss, disasters will disappear early, and your family can return to their homeland...
Along the way, everyone was telling legends: There is a demon in Yizhou. As long as the demon is killed, the floods can be resolved and the deceased can die. The key point is: this demon has accumulated a large amount of food, which is enough for everyone to let go.
Eat - eat until you are full.
At first, these words were just rumors among the refugees. Gradually, many people wearing monk robes but not shaving their heads mixed in on the road. They kept preaching about going to Yizhou to "eliminate demons and defend the Tao", muttering to themselves along the way.
No one could understand the scriptures, and various long banners with scriptures written on them were also displayed.
The conchs and drums and trumpets were played all the way, making a mournful sound, mixed with endless scriptures, which caused an inexplicable fanaticism among the refugees who had already fallen into despair. More and more refugees participated in this madness.
While chanting sutras, they can only recite one sentence over and over again.
Xiao Chuba read scriptures loudly and forced himself to move forward. He was a young man in his twenties, but he was almost as old as a man in his forties or fifties. Hunger took away his youth and made him become like this.
A member of the shambling army of refugees.
He had no feelings about leaving his hometown. It had been more than twenty years since he was born - he didn't know exactly how old he was - but his hometown had not given him any benefits, and he had never had a clean meal.
He wore a piece of clothing that didn't reveal his flesh. He did endless hard work and endured endless bullying. His parents died silently when he was still an adult, leaving him alone.
"I'm about to die..." Xiao Chuba felt like his stomach was on fire. The bits of ground bark and bran residue he had eaten the day before yesterday had long since disappeared. He only felt dizzy and his legs were as heavy as lead.
. Several times he couldn't help but want to sit down on the roadside, but he knew he couldn't sit down: many people were like him, who wanted to sit on the roadside to catch the relay and catch their breath, but as a result, they stooped and could not get up again.
The sound of the mantras is getting smaller and smaller in my ears, and getting further and further away. Those "Taoist priests" said: as long as you recite it repeatedly, you will enter the paradise after death, and you can still see your parents - but I can't remember it.
Their faces are different, will they still recognize each other? It's always possible, parents always remember what he looks like - thinking of this, his sunken eyes overflowed with tears, and the tears on his face
The dirt broke out black grooves.
Maybe he should just die? However, a spasm in his stomach made him wake up again. He rubbed his eyes hard and read loudly: No matter what, if you want to die, you have to eat well before you die - kill the demon.
, have a full meal!
A burst of false fire aroused his vitality again. He recited the unexplained "scripture" loudly and continued to walk forward.
At this time, there was a sudden commotion, and someone was shouting: "The saint has spread her blessings! The saint has spread her blessings!"
Three times a day, the Nanwuliang believers who were mixed among the refugees used the method of spreading blessings of saints to distribute some grains and cereals. The quantity was not large, just to be able to gather the refugees.
A burst of music from drums, flutes and flutes, accompanied by the thunderous sound of mantras, came from far and near. Sixteen big men in colorful clothes, half naked, were carrying a shoulder chariot, on which stood a man in red and green clothes.
The woman - in Xiao Chuba's opinion, she looked like a fairy. It was covered with a red umbrella, surrounded by many hand-held flower baskets and girls wearing colorful clothes.
Many believers gathered around, chanting scriptures loudly. Wherever they passed, refugees gathered around like a tide, chanting mantras loudly, raising their withered arms high, praying for relief.
"Fu" can fall into one's own hands.
From the chariot, grains and grains are continuously being scattered, and every time a batch falls, the crowd will stir up a violent wave, fighting, pushing, screaming, shouting, crying... The weak ones,
He was pushed to the ground and trampled to death.
Xiao Chuba didn't know where he got the strength. He rushed towards the chariot madly, chanting mantras wildly in his mouth, pushed past the crowd in front of him and squeezed towards the chariot. He shouted wildly and raised his hands, hoping to receive a steamed bun -
―It was precisely because of a steamed bun he received a few days ago that he managed to survive until now.
But he was unlucky today. By the time he squeezed to the front, the chariot had already passed. Xiao Chuba was burning with hunger, and he saw a woman next to him who was hurriedly hiding a steamed bun in her arms and grabbed it.
He reached out and grabbed the woman's arm and snatched it away.
How could the woman let go and tear with all her strength, but in the end she could not withstand Xiao Chuba's strength. Seeing that the nest was about to be taken away, she suddenly opened her mouth and bit Xiao Chuba's finger fiercely.
This bite immediately caused Xiao Chuba to feel pain in his heart and lungs. However, he couldn't get away at all. Xiao Chuba kicked the woman's chest fiercely. The woman screamed and fell to the ground. She was immediately beaten.
When someone stepped on it, he let out a few screams and then stopped moving. Xiao Chuba's fingers were in severe pain, and when he looked at it, a section of his finger was already missing. Donating blood dyed the buns red.