Yuhebao is a good place, located at the intersection of Wuding River and Yuxi River in the north of Yan'an Prefecture.
Northern Shaanxi is a good place guarding rivers.
Seventy miles to the north is Yulin City, the seat of Yansui Town, and ninety miles to the south is Yinchuan Station in Mizhi County. The official road used for military purposes has been in disrepair for a long time, and turf grass has grown on both sides of the wide dirt road.
Last autumn, hungry people passed by the official road and ate the ground clean, leaving nothing behind.
As night falls, the Yuhe Fort with its back to the mountains looks like a giant spider lurking in the shadows. The desolate fields outside the moat and the billowing sand beams west of the river are its broken spider webs.
On the path outside the city, the disgraced family members of the frontier soldiers were wrapped in tattered coats that could never be washed clean. They were squatting under the trees with soup bowls filled with new leaves and sprouts, their eyes numb and unfocused.
The village without chickens, dogs or even many people was silent in the spring, like a corpse that had been frozen to death for a long time in winter, lying outside the fort.
It’s not just the officials who govern the Qingming Festival and make the people happy who can stay open at night, anyone can do it as long as they are poor enough.
After bypassing the long and narrow path, the dried moat of Fish River Fort is within easy reach.
Reports to Yulin requesting funds to build the city were submitted every year, but every year they were like stones. The last time the fortress was built was in the fourth year of Wanli. Taking advantage of the east wind when General Qi Jiguang was building a defense line in Ji Town, he built a three-foot-high earthen wall.
Bricks.
However, after that, no matter whether it was the invasion of bandits in the second year of Tianqi or the rainy weather in the third year that a corner of the city wall sank, no money was given for repairs.
At this time, the dry moat and the two ditches outside the city formed three dry trenches. The wooden fences and deer villages at the bottom of the trenches were all decayed. The gaps in the sheep and horse walls near the city wall were scrawled with wood. There are still traces of the collapsed city wall in the southwest of the fortress.
.
It's like the war has just left.
In fact, the fortress has not faced an enemy for seven years.
The guard congratulated Ren Long years ago when he went to Yulin City to pay the General Military Office and has not returned yet. The defenders at the city gate were also listless. They only regained their energy when they saw the wild geese on the back of the red flag.
"Hey! Did the lion hunt the geese?"
The brothers guarding the gate gathered around, each swallowing their saliva and looking at the two wild geese hanging on the horse's buttocks, asking questions.
The mountains and rivers outside are clear, and it is a new thing to be able to bring prey back. More than ten servants in Baozi go out every day, and not many of them can bring back prey for ten days in a row.
Even if you can bring something back, it may not be prey. In the first month of the year, someone stole a goat from somewhere with a bell hanging around its neck.
Yesterday, a servant was too embarrassed to return empty-handed and caught two sand monks.
Monk Sand is a small desert lizard here, one palm long, and no one knows how to eat it. In the end, it was thrown away and fed to the Yuhebao Rat Control Team, which made the general manager frown.
Mei Dianmei is a seven-year-old calico cat. When she was born, the Yuhebao Rat Exterminator Team was an elite force of sixteen, and she had seven siblings alone.
When the rat plague broke out, the whole family died in the line of duty, and many people died at that time, but it was the only one that could survive the difficult years. After the company was laid off, the daughter inherited her mother's business, and was ordered to take over as the commander-in-chief of the Yuhebao Rat Exterminator Team when the situation was critical.
An important position in the fortress.
When the frontier soldiers in Yuhebao could still live a comfortable life, they were given a monthly salary of three Yuxi small carps and a number of performance-based mice, and they were very happy.
Now Mei Dianmei is the oldest group among the garrison of Yuhe Fort. Although she has lost weight due to hunger, her steps are agile and her agility is strong, and her majesty is still the same as before.
The hungry little Zuanfeng tried many times to ask for some food from the rodent control team, but was beaten back. To this day, there are still three scratches on the corners of his eyes.
After Liu Chengzong became a servant, his daily tasks outside of training included feeding cats and walking dogs. He developed a deep comradeship with the head of the rat extermination team. As long as the rat extermination team was open, there would be a Mecha cat sent to him under the window sill.
The mice even have a little Zhuanfeng aspect.
It can’t be done now. People don’t have anything to eat, so how can they take care of cats?
Standing together with General He Yong's soldiers and gatekeepers, who was also a descendant of Mizhi named He, he said a few polite words and left the sentence "I will send you the wild goose feathers at night", and then lifted the two wild geese.
Go and happily report to the general manager.
Wild goose feathers are similar to goose feathers. They are very common arrow feather materials and not very valuable. However, for people like Liu Chengzong who often use bows and arrows, it is cost-effective to repair arrow feathers by yourself.
When he entered Yuhe Fort, he saw several people sitting on the inner slope in the shadow of the torches on the city wall, waving to him, letting him recognize them as his brother Liu Chengzu, Shi Changtian Shoujing and Gao Xian.
Liu Chengzu was his biological eldest brother, four years older and twenty-two this year. In the seventh year of Tianqi, he and he were spotted by He Renlong and recruited to Yuhe Fort as servants.
Last year, there was a team leader named Zhang Wu who led the team and became a deserter. The two brothers were ordered to go out to recruit refugees to join the army. When they came back, they gave a captain to fill Zhang Wu's vacancy, as if there were no deserters.
Recruiting soldiers is not easy at all. There are disasters everywhere and refugees everywhere, so being a soldier can at least make a living.
It's hard to be hungry all the time, but it's better than starving to death.
Who doesn't want to live?
As for deserters, there are many ways to desert. They have armor and weapons, and they have learned killing skills in the army. If they fall out of the grass and become thieves, they may die badly, but they may not have to worry about food and clothing.
Tian Shoujing and Gao Xian were both frontier soldiers who did not follow Zhang Wu at that time. The former's hometown was Fushi County, Yan'an Prefecture, just a few mountains away from Liu Chengzong's home; the latter was from Ansai County, which was a little further away.
point.
They were both ordinary sergeants in the past, but after recruiting new soldiers, both of them were promoted to captains.
In one escape and one mention, the quantity of the Yuhe Fort border troops did not change, but the quality dropped by another level.
"Catching geese?"
Liu Chengzu sat on the slope, pointed to the land beside him, where there was a wooden basket, and said: "I guess you are very hungry, so I left some food for you."
Not to mention, Liu Chengzong was so hungry that he couldn't scream. He was not polite. He sat on the slope and opened the lid of the basket, took out the golden millet rice inside and started to devour it.
Millet and millet look similar.
Although it has cooled down and the mutton fat on top has solidified, and the smell is a bit strong, it is very fragrant to people who are very hungry.
It's so fragrant that the more you eat it, the sadder it becomes.
When I joined the army, my family suffered hardships, but the conditions of the old Liu family in Longwangmiaoshan were not bad, otherwise they would not have been able to support their two sons to study and practice martial arts for more than ten years. Although they suffered from hunger before serving in the frontier army, they were not three-year-olds.
I don’t have enough to eat every day.
A low-level officer like the captain is not an official of the imperial court, and he is not paid any salary now, but his rations are enough. Liu Chengzong often looks for his brother to eat and drink, so he can only do it reluctantly.
"I hit it, two, and the arrows were not shot well... The third arrow was not drawn, and when it was attached and it flew, I couldn't hit it."
Liu Chengzong was eating and talking, and suddenly he remembered that he had other gains. He stood up with the bowl and took off the clay pot from the horse, saying: "Brother Shoujing, I picked up a mirror and half a candle. I can't see it."
bad."
"Help me see who has the beans left in the fire. I can exchange them for one or two handfuls."
Their military rations are divided into two types, rations and monthly rations. Rations are like meal supplements for business trips. They are given only after they have to leave the station forty miles to perform tasks. Basically, they are given in full.
Last autumn, Yuhe Fort selected a group of cavalry to go out to burn the wasteland, but they were reluctant to eat. Some of them still have a surplus to this day.
"Okay, I'll ask you something when I get back." Tian Shoujing folded his arms and looked at Hongqi's funny dyed hair under the slope, and said with a smile: "Hello, Hongqi? What's wrong with the name Sanfa? Look at this person who has lost weight after changing his name.
."
Tian Shoujing made a witty remark, but Liu Chengzong, whose mouth was full of millet rice, was not in the mood to respond with a joke. He picked up the water bag and poured two mouthfuls into his mouth, put the food down, and turned to look at his brother.
"It's not a big deal if the horse is thin." In the light of the swaying torch, Liu Chengzong's face showed a rare seriousness: "Brother, I have to think of a solution. I didn't draw my bow when I was hunting today.
If this continues, our martial arts skills will be useless."