By the Jing River, Li Qianyou, who was sitting astride a strong horse, looked at the empty river, with dozens of cavalrymen standing silently behind him.
It has been nearly half a year since he took office as the Chang'an Order, and Li Qianyou has actually done a pretty good job. After all, as a descendant of the Li family in Longxi and a confidant of King Qi Li Yuanji, even the Prince of Qin's Palace would not provoke him at will.
However, during this period, Li Qianyou's life was a bit difficult. Refugees were causing trouble, bandits were infested, and the chaos in Beijing could only be his responsibility as the Chang'an Order.
if not?
Should the saint, Dong Gong, King Qin or those prime ministers and ministers take the blame?
Li Qianyou also had troubles to express. The imperial court spent all its resources to deal with the first large-scale Turkic invasion to the south since the founding of the dynasty. For this reason, Liu Heitai could be tolerated to cause trouble in Hebei. In this case, it was really difficult to deal with the refugees who caused the rebellion. There is nothing you can do.
It’s not that there is really no way, but that everyone in the government knows very well that the refugees are causing chaos because they have no food... Only by making peace with the Turks can we free up our hands to provide disaster relief.
Finally, the Turks gradually retreated, and Li Qianyou wrote a letter asking for relief to the victims, and the saint and the prime minister agreed. However, what Li Qianyou didn't expect was that while providing relief, the saint ordered General Youwei and Duke Dou Gui of Fu to lead troops to quell the rebellion.
Dou Gui is a descendant of the Dou family in Fufeng, and his cousin is Empress Dou, Li Yuan's wife. This man is brave and good at fighting and leads troops well, but he has a cruel temperament and kills a lot. In the past few days, the number of refugees in Jingzhao has decreased by at least 30%.
After waiting for a long time, the distance was filled with smoke and dust, and hundreds of cavalry were approaching from a distance. The cavalry brigade did not stop, and only dozens of people were separated and galloped towards the river.
"Meet the Duke of Fou."
The leading middle-aged man pursed his lips tightly, without a trace of a smile on his face, "The troublemakers in Jingzhao have been mostly pacified, and Ganyou needs to worry about the rest."
"This is the duty of a lower official."
After a brief exchange of greetings, Dou Gui was about to return to the city when his personal guards came to report.
"More than a thousand refugees?" Dou Gui was a little surprised, "The village was not destroyed?"
"The village is safe." The guard touched his head, "If I hadn't stepped forward to inquire, I wouldn't have known that he was actually a refugee."
"What village is it?"
"Zhujiagou."
Li Qianyou raised his eyebrows, "But Zhujiagou of Dongshan Temple?"
"Qianyou knows?"
"I heard it mentioned by the eldest son of the family and the seventh son of the third brother's family."
After Li Qianyou said a few words casually, dozens of riders turned into the side road and galloped towards Zhujiagou.
When they first entered the village, everyone saw dozens of men excavating soil with hoes in the distance, and a dozen single-person cars shuttled back and forth, carrying the excavated soil and transported stones.
"What is this for?"
Zhu Wei who came over carefully explained: "Although it is close to the Jing River, there is no stream around the village. We are planning to build a diversion canal that will go down from the east mountain and pass through the village."
Li Qianyou stopped and looked at it for a while, "Are the stones buried underneath?"
"Yes, when collecting water for washing, if there are no stones on the bottom, the water quality will be turbid."
"Are they all refugees?" Dou Gui stared at the dozens of men.
"They are all refugees, seeking food here." Zhu Wei answered as briefly as possible.
After walking along the canal and winding around the village, Dou Gui also became interested, "It does look a bit like the layout of Nanxiang."
"Indeed." Li Qianyou mentioned it seemingly unintentionally, "There is a young man here who came from Lingnan."
Without asking any questions while looking at Dou Gui, Li Qianyou could only take the initiative and said: "I think Dou Gong must have heard of Li Shan."
"Huh?" Dou Gui paused and his expression moved slightly, "Is he the person who caused a scene in Changlepo?"
"There were two troubles. I wonder which one Mr. Dou is referring to?" Li Qianyou was about to elaborate when he had already reached the entrance of the alley.
Outside the village is already outside. Hundreds of refugees are divided into several teams in a dark and orderly manner, digging soil and carrying burdens. There are fires rising in the distance. It is obvious that they are burning the mountain to get stones. Men as big as ants are carrying heavy stones down the mountain.
"The one who is thinking about it is Zhou Xiang." Dou Gui said casually: "Dig the lake to store water. If we don't build a dam, we will be afraid of flooding in the future."
"This is the east end of the village, and there should be a lake to the west." Li Qianyou said with a smile: "There are only three hundred households in the village, and there are only two to three hundred young people. It can drive several times more refugees, which is quite a way."
While chatting casually, they heard Zhu Wei's shout. The two of them looked sideways. On the hill, a young man whose clothes were blown by the strong wind turned around to look.
"Sure enough, the Fengshen is handsome, and the jade trees stand in the wind." Li Qianyou said with a smile: "Sure enough, he also has a dark complexion."
"Um?"
"This son was introduced by Qi Lang. He paid a visit to his third sister-in-law and received a gift of powder."
Even though Dou Gui was serious about his words, he couldn't help showing a few smiles on his stern face, "Senior Brother Ke was good at teasing back then. As the saying goes, those who are close to the red will be red..."
"I'm afraid that the one who is close to the ink is black." Li Qianyou chuckled and waved to Li Shan who was walking quickly, "This is General Youwei, the Duke of Fou, the prince, the king of Qin, and the king of Qi all call him uncle."
Li Shan saluted respectfully, "My dear, I pay my respects to Mr. Dou."
"Meet Magistrate Li."
"How do you call the father of Demou?"
Li Shan was stunned for a moment, then saluted again and said: "Meet Uncle Li."
Dou Gui unexpectedly turned his head and glanced at Li Qianyou, vaguely guessing something. After all, the court knew that the Danyang room in Longxi served the saints Donggong, King Qin and King Qi.
But Dou Gui doesn't care about this. In the future, whether the prince ascends the throne, or the King of Qin seizes the throne, or even if the King of Qi ascends the throne, the Fufeng Dou family is their mother clan. As long as they don't get involved, the wealth and glory will remain.
"Just now, we have to report that there are bandits attacking the refugees?"
"Five days ago, more than a hundred bandits came with hundreds of refugees." Li Shan told the story clearly, "It is not a pity that the bandits die, but the refugees are innocent."
"The bandit escaped?"
Li Shan was silent for a moment, glanced at Dou Gui's dead face, and coughed twice, "There are no doctors in the village, so the treatment was not enough. All the bandits died of serious injuries."
Li Qianyou turned his head. If he remembered correctly, the young man in front of him had medical skills.
Dou Gui suddenly showed a slight smile and said, "Those who cause trouble to the capital should be killed."
Dou Gui has always been a careful person, and he observed carefully when he passed through the village. There were only two households in the village with white papers, which meant that the invading bandits caused almost no casualties to the village. And Li Shan mentioned that the bandits were all seriously injured and died. Then They can only be killed to death.
The group of people bypassed the village and headed south. Soon they saw a dense crowd, mostly old, weak, women and children. Some of them had built a straw hut, but most of them were sitting on the ground.
Li Qianyou looked at it for a while and asked in a low voice: "Daily food?"
Although it was only five or six days, the village provided food every day. Although the refugees were still sallow and thin, they were obviously not in a dying state. They were in much better condition than refugees in other places. Li Qianyou could tell at a glance.
Li Shan nodded and admitted, "Each person has two bowls of porridge in the morning and evening, but young people who go to work can eat three meals a day, and meat every other day."
Li Qianyou frowned slightly, this was too generous, "How many refugees are there?"
"There were a total of 1,346 people in total. Sixteen people died of illness, leaving 1,330 people left."
"Among them are 638 young and strong, 472 old and weak women, and 220 children."
"The old, weak, women and children spend two and a half dan on cooking porridge every day, and the young and strong spend six dan on each day."
Li Qianyou listened to Li Shan's crackling report of data with a surprised expression. He thought that even if the data was calculated in advance, it would not be easy. He couldn't help laughing and said, "Do you want to take the math major?"
"Uh..." Li Shan huffed for a long time and avoided answering. He smiled wryly and saluted, "I'd like to ask for uncle's help."
Li Qianyou burst into laughter, "Dongshan Restaurant has made a lot of profits, isn't that enough?"
"Rescuing the victims is the responsibility of the government. How dare the villagers do it on their own?"
This sentence is a bit shameful. Indeed, it is the responsibility of the government to build roads and bridges and provide relief to the victims. If a wealthy family can do this, they need to act with caution. After all, the Chen family has learned from past mistakes, but Li Shan is no more than a commoner in the countryside... …
Li Qianyou, who was worried, didn't care, and only said that he would send someone to bring some grain and rice every day.
Li Shan breathed a sigh of relief. In fact, there was still a lot of grain in the Dongshan Temple granary, but it was better not to expose it.
It was dusk at this time, and there was a faint sound of gongs. The refugees stood up one after another and looked expectantly at the dozens of steaming cauldrons.
The young men who were working in distant places also gradually gathered and lined up under the command of the villagers. Although there was no laughter or laughter, there was no silence.
Dou Gui and Li Qianyou were deeply touched by the completely opposite scene from other places.