Wang Xuan first entered Tongbai Mountain when she was only twelve years old. She met Liu Qiong'er, and Liu Qiong'er had to take care of many things. The second time they met was the first southern invasion of the Chihu people, and Wang Xuan and her grandmother took refuge in Chushan.
After more than a month, I heard that my grandfather Wang was seriously ill, so he returned to Bianliang with Xu Huai, and then returned to his hometown with his coffin in his arms. They were separated for nearly five years.
Ordinarily, she should be overjoyed to meet again after five years of separation, but when she thought of Xu Huai going to Jianye to meet the Holy Spirit and taking Liu Qiong'er along with him, Wang Xuan felt a special feeling that she could not express and had to bury in her heart.
"...If Xu Huai hadn't arrived in time, Xuan'er would have been separated from Sister Liu, and she would never have the chance to see Sister Liu again." Wang Xuan stretched out her hand to pull Liu Qiong'er out of the carriage, and wanted to be affectionate.
He pulled her towards the yard and talked endlessly about the dangers of Shuangliu Village when it was besieged by the bandit army.
"I just heard someone say that Xuan'er, you are wearing armor today and leading the villagers to guard Shuangliu Village. You are full of heroism, but you have the demeanor of the king in his youth! The Wang family has a female governor!" Liu Qiong'er said no.
He hurriedly entered the yard and stood in front of the carriage to look at Wang Xuan.
When the Red Husbands invaded the south for the first time, Wang Xuan was still a somewhat innocent girl who temporarily lived in Chushan. At this time, she was already over the age of 20, and she was a completely slim beauty with soft and bright cheeks, but she had the characteristics of her age and the world
A rare perseverance in a woman.
The situation was so tight that there was no room for too much love between children, and there was no time for Liu Qiong'er and Wang Xuan to reminisce about the past. Xu Huai and the others just walked down from Xiaoquehe Ridge when someone came over to report:
"Another group of thieves came to the west ferry by boat..."
Xu Huai had long guessed that the bandits had a far-reaching plan to raid Hanchuan. After the flood season, the lakes on the Jianghan Plain were connected with the Jingjiang and Han Rivers. They didn't know how many Dongting Lake bandits were lurking in the deep waters of the lakes.
at.
The bandits who landed in Hanchuan were frustrated, and new bandits came to reinforce them. What should Xu Huaineng be surprised about?
At this time, he was not interested in climbing up the wall of the village. He wanted to see for himself how many bandits were coming to the ferry at this time. He looked at Xu Sheng and asked:
"Zhou Jing hasn't come back yet?"
"Isn't Zhou Canjun here?" Han Gui asked doubtfully.
"Zhou Canjun personally took people to the nearby area to check out the situation. He hasn't come back yet, but he will be back soon!" Xu Sheng said.
There were only three to four hundred sword archers under the Hanchuan County Weisi. Even if more than a thousand rural soldiers were urgently recruited to defend the city, Xu Huai was not very confident about the Hanchuan local's ability to conduct reconnaissance and spying on the military situation.
As for the post road between Hanchuan and Jiangxia (the prefecture of Ezhou), which runs through Qianchapu, it was flooded after the flood season, and the connection detoured more than a hundred miles from the east. At present, Xu Huai can only confirm that it is within Jiangxia
There is no big abnormality, but the messenger he sent to Jiangxia has not returned yet, and it is not clear whether the Jingbei Supervision Bureau has more detailed information.
Zhou Jing then personally took people to the surrounding area to check out the situation.
Of course, they were not familiar with the surrounding area, so it was difficult to carry out in-depth reconnaissance and spying in a hurry. Xu Huai asked Zhou Jing to rush back to Shuangliu Village before dark, regardless of whether he could find out the news or not, to avoid happening.
Accidents beyond their control.
Xu Huai, Lu Xiong, Liu Qiong'er, Han Gui and others walked to the yard and just sat down when Zhou Jing rushed back.
"I took a trip to the nearby villages and found nothing unusual,"
Zhou Jing sat down, drank herbal tea and said,
"The main reason is that the hungry people who went south were relatively completely expelled near Hanchuan County. The villages to the north and east of Shuangliuzhuang did not accommodate the hungry people very much. However, we were too short of manpower and too hasty to rush into Qianchapu to spy.
But the situation is not too optimistic. Although Ezhou has long tried its best to drive hungry people to eastern Hubei, the terrain of Qianchapu is complex, and there are fish and crabs for hungry people to catch to satisfy their hunger. It is estimated that there are still a large number of hungry people stranded there. Now there are no
The unusual movement is more likely because the rebels were hit hard by us as soon as they landed at Xiaoheling Ferry, and they haven't recovered yet. I also talked to the officials in charge of fishing in Hanchuan, and they said
We know very little about the water village boat owners within the Qianchapu area. We may have to wait for Jiangxia to send someone to contact us before we can know more about the situation..."
Qianchapu generally refers to the lake group in the northern part of Ezhou, consisting of more than a dozen lakes of various sizes, including Suolong Lake, West Cha Lake, and Dong Cha Lake.
In autumn and winter when there is less rain and dry season, most of the land in Cheonchapo will be exposed to the water.
More than a dozen lakes will appear completely on the land of northern Hubei south of Hanchuan County.
In the late spring of every year, the rainfall becomes abundant, especially after the flood season. Qianchapu receives the Chuanshui River, and dozens of rivers, including the Tianmen River, originate from the southern foothills of Huaiyang Mountain, the southern foothills of Tongbai Mountain, and Zhushan Mountain (Green Forest Mountain).
Water from streams and rivers, the Han River, and the Jingjiang River are also swollen, making it difficult to discharge quickly downstream, causing the south of the Han River to flood into a puddle, sometimes even connecting to the Han River.
Although the Jinghu North Road Supervisor and the Ezhou Prefectural Government were on guard against the possibility that the Dongting Lake bandits might incite the hungry people who stayed in the Jianghan Plain to rebel, and had tried their best to drive the hungry people to the east as early as possible, Zhou Jing did not believe that the local government had the ability to
The hungry people were driven away from the complex terrain of Cheonchapo.
Cheonchapo also has large and small water villages that rely on the lake to make a living by fishing for fish and crabs.
Now they don't know how many Dongting Lake bandits are lurking in Qianchapu, nor do they know the water village forces inside Qianchapu.
At the same time, the hungry people stranded in Qianchapo are suffering from hunger, and they are more like a volcano on the edge of eruption, which will erupt at any time——
The crisis faced by Ezhou is far from being resolved. Even in places such as Jingfu west of the Han River, the situation may be equally serious.
Ye County and Wuyang, where Chushan's elite troops were stationed, were eight or nine hundred miles away from Hanchuan. Even if the messenger rushed back with Xu Huai's order as quickly as possible, it would take six or seven days for the cavalry to arrive at Hanchuan.
.
Xiangyang is much closer, but Zuo Xiaosheng's army has replenished new troops and horses for less than half a year. Xu Huai sent people to Xiangyang to find Wen Hengyue. Yang Qiye reported the news, hoping that Xiangyang would send troops to move along the Han River as soon as possible.
The land route from the west bank went south to reinforce Jingzhou, Fuzhou and other places where the situation was also critical, in case there were changes.
If you want to wait until Wang Fan leads the Jingbei troops to rush back from Shouzhou, Luzhou and other places, it will take even longer.
Therefore, the next six or seven days will be the key to whether this crisis will further erupt or even become more severe.
Xu Huai's headache now is because he is not familiar with the terrain of Qianchapu and the situation of the refugees... "Let's take a short rest and sneak into Qianchapu overnight to do some spying." Seeing Xu Huai frowning, Zhou Jing said.
"The Dongting Lake pirates lurked in in large numbers, and the local area was not aware of it at all. It can be seen that the rebel army has done a lot of work before. It is likely that most of the water village forces have secretly colluded with the rebel army," Xu Huai shook his head and said, "We will
With this little manpower, I'm afraid I can get in, but I may not be able to get out. There's no need to take this risk..."
"It is not clear which water village forces in Qianchapu are colluding with the Dongting Lake bandits at this time, but Miss Xuan has drawn a detailed map of Qianchapu's topography and distribution of water villages, and it is quite detailed!" Lu Xiong said.
"Yes, yes, Miss Xuan sent us to Qianchapu Village many times before." Zhao Heng said.
"Oh?" Xu Huai had heard Wang Xuan talk about the Ezhou Prefecture's expulsion of hungry people and his lack of confidence in the Jinghu North Road Supervisor's expulsion of the Dongting Lake bandits. He didn't think too much about it for a while, but at this time, the court was quite surprised.
Wang Xuan looked over, "Have you ever had an in-depth understanding of Qianchapu and drawn a map of it?"
"I used to hold memorial ceremonies in front of my grandfather's tomb. I had nothing to do. I wanted to understand the people's livelihood in Hanchuan and other places, and I also tried to learn surveying methods. But I just used these things to pass my time. I only had a rough understanding of many things," Wang Xuan
He stood up and said, "I'll bring it over to show you, but don't laugh at me..."
Wang Xuan guarded the tomb of Wang Zhen on behalf of her father and lived in Shuangliuzhuang for three years. However, when Wang Fan took up the post of Jinghu North Road Military and Horse Command, she mainly lived with Wang Fan in Ezhou City; like the family members of Zhao Heng and others,
They were all placed in Ezhou City, with only a few servants guarding the old house.
Wang Xuan came to Shuangliuzhuang for a temporary stay this time, and she was able to take the painting of Qianchapu with her, which shows that she still attaches great importance to this matter.
But there was more than just a single volume of maps. Wang Xuan and her maid quickly took out a large handful of scrolls from the back house.
Xu Huai, Zhou Jing, and Xu Sheng took over the pile of papers and were surprised when they opened them. Wang Xuan's investigation of Qianchapu and the collection of relevant information were more detailed than they imagined.
The official map drawn by the Jinghu North Road Supervision Department also includes the Qianchapu section, but on the one hand it only depicts the relative positions of large lakes such as Suolong Lake and the East and West Cha Lakes and the official (post) road, as well as the seven or eight buildings with a population of more than 1,000.
The remaining large villages, Dashui Village, are relatively simple. On the one hand, there have been no new revisions in 20 to 30 years. Many changes in the shape of the lakes and roads have not been reflected in the Kan map in time.
The Kanyu map drawn by Wang Xuan has detailed markings on lakes, beaches, depressions and other terrains, roads, and more than a hundred waterside villages and boat households. In addition, Wang Xuan also wrote a special article on the changes in topography and roads on the old and new Kanyu maps.
Comparison with the additions and subtractions of village settlements shows that even the migration of these villages and settlements and the changes in population reproduction are recorded in detail.
At this time, Wang Xuan also drew a sketch, envisioning large-scale construction of embankments and reclamation of beach fields in Qianchapu...
"I was joking just now that the Wang family had a female governor, but I didn't expect that a female prefect was really born!" Liu Qiong'er read these documents and said in shock, "There are so many prefects and county magistrates in Vietnam.
How many people can know such a detailed and thorough knowledge of a place?"
