Chapter 161 When we first met that year, we stopped and recommended ourselves.
Although most of the people who came south from the north were old, weak, women and children, there were still many young and strong ones.
Compared with ordinary young farmers, they have experienced the farming system and are better trained than ordinary young farmers.
Moreover, they were originally from Jingzhou. In the ancient times, they had a strong sense of ruralism and were tied to their hometown. Their loyalty would definitely be better than that of the soldiers of Wu who were captured by Mi Yang.
Mi Yang selected soldiers from tens of thousands of people, and he did not search aimlessly. He opened several recruiting offices outside Xiangyang City.
In order to attract young men who had just moved south to join the army at his recruitment office, Mi Yang hung a banner of his general Mi Yang outside the recruitment office.
On the one hand, he ordered people to temporarily stay among the people outside Xiangyang City, shouting about the welfare benefits he proposed.
Just eight big words: "Three meals a day, one meat every seven days."
Mi Yang knew very well that most of the young and powerful people in the world who were born as farmers were illiterate. They didn't understand military merit and nobility, let alone righteousness.
Food is the most important thing for the people. For young people born in poverty, what they need most is to fill their stomachs.
In this case, Mi Yang will start from what they desire most.
Unlike later generations, the average family in this world only had two meals a day.
As for meat, it is a precious thing that ordinary families cannot even imagine in a year.
The eight-character treatment of "three meals a day, one meat every seven days" seems to be nothing to the ears of later generations.
But these eight words caused a violent commotion among the Jingzhou people who had just returned south.
Among the tens of thousands of Jingzhou people who returned to the south, they have never had enough to fill their stomachs since the war, let alone taste the smell of meat.
Now they are faced with generous treatment that they have never dreamed of, how can they not be excited!
Because it was too unreal, many people did not believe the eight words Mi Yang promised at first.
But those soldiers who were Mi Yang's mouthpieces were promoting Mi Yang's recruitment package on the one hand, and Mi Yang himself on the other.
When tens of thousands of people gradually learned about Mi Yang's identity and his reputation in the world, they were astonished.
Then many people began to be a little tempted by Mi Yang's generous treatment.
I'm already starving anyway, why not give it a try?
The nephew of the King of Hanzhong should not be able to lie to others.
After some pioneers started taking action, more people were mobilized.
Not long after, nearly 10,000 hungry young men, attracted by Mi Yang's eight words, immediately flocked to Mi Yang's recruitment office from all directions.
This spectacular scene, like a surging wave, has become a unique scenery outside Xiangcheng during this period of time.
It even attracted many Han generals in the city to come out to watch.
After they learned about Mi Yang's "three meals a day, one meat every seven days" recruitment treatment, each one of them felt a bit dumbfounded.
They looked at the soldiers behind them and found that they were also a little moved when they looked at Mi Yang's recruitment office.
This made them frown slightly.
In the words of later generations, Mi Yang was trying to get them involved.
But they could only silently complain about Mi Yang's approach, but they were not dissatisfied.
Because this kind of generous treatment is not unique among many Han armies, for example, the Baijie soldiers of the Hanzhong King's personal army had similar treatment.
Mi Yang dared to propose such generous conscription treatment because he had a rich father who used private money to subsidize the military and train elite soldiers to serve the country. Who could be dissatisfied?
Those Han generals could only sigh deeply in the end.
However, despite the generous treatment offered by Mi Yang, almost all the young men returning from the south outside Xiangyang City were attracted to his recruitment office.
However, Mi Yang's requirements were quite strict, so after several consecutive days of selection, many people did not meet Mi Yang's recruitment requirements.
In the end, after several days of screening, Mi Yang only selected less than two thousand elite soldiers.
Of course, Mi Yang cannot be satisfied with such a small number of people.
Therefore, in the past few days, he has been taking a few friends with him, shuttling between the recruitment office outside Xiangyang and tens of thousands of people, supervising the progress of the recruitment matter.
At this time, there was a long queue queuing outside a military recruitment office in the east of the city.
There were thousands of people in this long queue, and these thousands of young men all looked at the Mi clan's flag flying high not far ahead with fiery eyes.
Many of these thousands of people, who were from the same hometown, were successfully selected to become Mi Yang's soldiers.
According to the propaganda of the young people who were successfully selected, they ate meat on the first day after being selected.
In the next few days, we would have three meals a day just as Mi Yang promised.
When this news was spread by those who had experienced it personally, the hearts of those who had not yet taken action, or those who had just arrived, became extremely hot in their hearts.
They didn't believe that their fellow villagers would lie to them, not to mention that everyone said so.
And among this long queue of thousands of people, there was Deng Ai who had just gone south.
He looked at the Mi clan's battle flag in front of him with more anticipation and passion than anyone else.
Mi Yang has long become half of Deng Ai's idol because of her battle with the police.
Moreover, Mi Yang's status is precious and his future is limitless.
If you can follow such a person to fight, it will be the best choice for your own development and the pursuit of your own emotions.
There might even be a chance to save his mother.
So when he heard the news that Mi Yang was recruiting troops, Deng Ai was overjoyed.
He knew that the opportunity was too good to miss, so he immediately asked an old man in the clan to help him take care of his mother, and then he quickly came to the recruitment office at the east gate.
The "eight-character" conscription treatment proposed by Mi Yang also made Deng Ai identify with Mi Yang.
It is Deng Ai's philosophy of military management to first feed the troops and then feed the troops.
Now he saw that Mi Yang was willing to spend a lot of money just to achieve this point. This made Deng Ai feel that Mi Yang was what he had been looking for, the person who could help him do great things.
After a long queue, it was finally Deng Ai's turn.
Deng Ai stepped forward full of expectation and came to Wang An.
Mi Yang's army was a fledgling army with not many capable men. Although Wang An was not very talented, he was very loyal and diligent, so Mi Yang made him the head of his East Gate Recruitment Office.
When Wang An saw Deng Ai approaching him, he first took a good look at Deng Ai's figure.
Although he was thin, he was more than seven feet long, had a straight face, and slender limbs. From the appearance, he met the recruitment requirements set by Mi Yang.
Wang An nodded with satisfaction.
Seeing Wang An looking at him and nodding, Deng Ai felt happy.
But before Deng Ai could feel happy for a long time, when he heard Wang An ask him his name and place of origin, Deng Ai's heart sank.
Growing up, he suffered too much humiliation because of his stuttering.
Now that he has a chance to join Mi Yang, he doesn't want to lose this golden opportunity because of his stuttering.
But as he remained silent, Wang An's suspicion was instantly aroused.
Recruitment is important, but we must prevent the recruitment of unscrupulous people from the north.
The name, place of origin, and accent of the visitor are all important criteria for judgment.
Now Deng Ai remained silent in the face of Wang An's ordinary inquiries, which of course made Wang An suspicious.
Suspicious, Wang An once again urged Deng Ai to answer his questions quickly.
Seeing the doubtful look on Wang An's face, Deng Ai had no choice but to answer: "I, my name is Deng Ai, courtesy name Shizai, formerly of Yiyang."
This sentence was spoken by Deng Ai in the local dialect of Jingzhou.
Deng Ai was already a young man when he went north, so of course he could speak his hometown dialect.
And when he answered Wang An, he also spoke with an authentic Jingbei accent.
Originally, these were enough to initially dispel Wang An's doubts, but unexpectedly after Deng Ai opened his mouth to answer Wang An, a burst of laughter instantly broke out in the team behind Deng Ai.
No wonder why I didn't speak just now. It turned out to be a stutter.
Even the clerk next to Wang An who was responsible for registering the names and birthplaces of enlisted soldiers couldn't help but chuckle after discovering that Deng Ai stuttered.
Human prejudice is like a time bomb. Once it explodes, it will only cause harm.
Even though the people behind Deng Ai were not of higher status than him, it did not stop them from laughing at him wantonly.
After the ridicule, some people in Deng Ai's team began to clamor for Deng Ai to retreat.
"What the hell, someone who can't even speak clearly wants to join General Mi, why don't you just get out of the way."
"Working with such a person, if you let him deliver orders, it will harm everyone, so get out of here."
Even the people behind Deng Ai began to push Deng Ai.
All kinds of unpleasant words came to Deng Ai's ears, but they did not shake Deng Ai's determination.
Over the years, he has been humiliated and ridiculed countless times because of his stuttering.
Under this kind of torture, Deng Ai's determination has long been far stronger than that of his peers.
People with great ambitions must have great tolerance.
Facing the push and shove from the people behind him, Deng Ai's body remained unmoved.
He looked at Wang An with expectant eyes. He knew whether he could join Mi Yang's army now depended on the words of the man in front of him.
Among the people present, Wang An was the only one who did not show any intention of making fun of his stuttering just now.
Wang An saw Deng Ai's expectant eyes, and a look of embarrassment appeared on his face.
He was often laughed at because of his low background and illiteracy.
That's why he just felt sympathy for Deng Ai, who had a similar experience to him, and did not laugh at him like others.
It's just that he can't make a decision yet on whether he should recruit Deng Ai into the army.
Although Mi Yang did not explicitly say that people who stutter could not join the army, he rashly included people who could not speak clearly into the army. If Mi Yang was blamed for this, Wang Anke could not afford it.
Just when Wang An was in a dilemma and couldn't make a decision, just when the hope in Deng Ai's heart was losing little by little, a pure and honest voice reached the ears of Deng Ai and the people around him.
"If people who stutter join the army and should be fired, then shouldn't those who push and push the front row and disrupt the recruiting team deserve to be killed?"
"What Zi Sheng said is true, of course he should be killed!"
When two gentle but murderous voices reached the ears of everyone present, the recruiting team, which had begun to commotion, immediately fell silent.
Perhaps the deterrence brought by the two sounds was not enough, but as the two sounds came out, dozens of cavalrymen had already drawn the swords from their waists.
They rushed to the recruiting team and surrounded all those in the front row who had just pushed Deng Ai.
Under the threat of the shining cold blade, everyone present was suddenly frightened.
At this time, Deng Ai turned to look in the direction where the sound came from, and he looked at the person who was rescuing him.
He saw several young generals coming into view, and the first one was a young man wearing Hu robes and a military crown.
When Mi Yang, riding on a tall horse, with a frightening and heroic look, fell into Deng Ai's eyes, Deng Ai's eyes showed various complicated expressions.
There is emotion, excitement, joy, and admiration.
Throughout his life, no one except his mother would save him when he was laughed at because of his stutter.
there has never been!
This made his heart feel warm.
And the person who came to his rescue was the one he had been thinking about all this time, Mi Zisheng, who became famous all over the world in one battle.
This is also the General Mi he wants to serve for.
When Wang An and the surrounding Han troops saw Mi Yang appearing, they all knelt down to salute Mi Yang and shouted loudly for the general.
The Mi family's battle flags above everyone's heads were flapping in the cold wind. When Wang An and a group of Han soldiers shouted the word "general", the rest of the people present had no idea who the young man in front of them was.
Seeing that the world-famous Mi Yang had arrived in person, the long queue of thousands of people instantly fell to their knees, and those who had just laughed and pushed Deng Ai were so frightened that their faces were ashen.
Mi Yang looked at the scene in front of him, his face a little gloomy.
Just now, when he and Guan Ping and others inspected the east gate, they noticed some commotion at the recruitment office at the east gate. When they got closer, they discovered that someone was actually laughing at a young man who stuttered.
This made Mi Yang very unhappy.
Whether such a person is suitable to join the army is not mentioned for the moment.
In his previous life, Mi Yang hated this behavior by mocking a disabled person at will.
Mi Yang pointed his horsewhip at Wang An and asked him to come under him and report to him the details.
Wang An immediately ran to the foot of Mi Yang's horse, and Mi Yang leaned over to listen to all Wang An's reports.
When he heard Wang An say that the name of the person in front of him was Deng Ai, also named Shizai, Mi Yang couldn't help but tighten his hand on the reins, and his eyes flashed with surprise.
Isn't this the vanguard who destroyed the big man in his previous life?
But Mi Yang is now a person who has seen the world, so he quickly concealed his surprise.
After listening to Wang An's report, Mi Yang whispered a few words to Wang An.
Then he straightened up and ordered to the cavalry that surrounded the people who had just disturbed the recruiting team: "Take them all away and bring them to the prison."
When Mi Yang's order came out, those people's faces turned pale, and they all knelt down to beg for mercy, but Mi Yang's cavalry would not care about them.
Under the threat of a long knife, these people could only be taken away in full.
After doing this, Mi Yang pretended to glance at Deng Ai inadvertently, and then he was about to leave with Guan Ping and others.
But when Deng Ai saw that Mi Yang was about to leave after just glancing at him, he felt very anxious.
He thought Mi Yang was just rescuing him and had no intention of recruiting him into the army.
Thinking of his old mother who was suffering from illness in the shantytown, thinking of his own aspirations, and thinking of the humiliation he had suffered in the past twenty years, Deng Ai made a decision that was unexpected by everyone present.
He quickly rushed in front of Mi Yang with his strong body, and then stretched out his hands to block the path of Mi Yang's horse.
This scene was also beyond Mi Yang's expectation. At this time, the horse had started to take off under his driving, but fortunately Mi Yang reacted very quickly. In order not to hurt Deng Ai, Mi Yang held on to the reins tightly and forced the start.
The starting horse stopped.
A huge horse's cry sounded, and the strong horse's hooves were raised high three steps in front of Deng Ai, and then fell heavily, stirring up a cloud of dust on the ground.
And Mi Yang leaned back on the horse because of inertia.
Immediately after this scene happened, dozens of people shouted: "Bold!"
Dozens of sounds of sabers being unsheathed were heard, and dozens of surrounding soldiers stepped forward to surround Deng Ai.
Facing the dangerous situation of being surrounded by dozens of powerful Wuhan troops, Deng Ai showed no fear on his face.
He bowed deeply to Mi Yang in front of him and implored with expectation: "Ai, Ai has a plan for the general."
Give me a chance to fully explain it, just once!
Deng Ai's eyes were full of pleading.
(End of chapter)
This chapter has been completed!