Nanming Yiming

Chapter 125 Siege of Ganzhou
The injured Wang Deren was not convinced, and led the army to attack for 3 days, but the result was still defeated.

At this time, the helpless Ming army finally accepted the reality. After paying a heavy price of tens of thousands of casualties, Jin Shenghuan still chose the same strategy as countless predecessors to besiege Ganzhou.

So the Ming army dug deep ravines outside the city of Ganzhou, fortified the walls and cleared the fields, and fired a few cannons at the city from time to time.

The navy of the Ming army on the river also patrolled day and night, not letting go of any boat that sneaked out of the city to fish.

The Ming army wished to shoot down every bird that flew towards Ganzhou City. They must trap the Qing army to death in Ganzhou.

More than a month has passed since the Ming army began to besiege the city on February 2.

Wang Xiaoniu's family has been out of food for many days, in fact, their family originally had a lot of food in storage.

Two months ago, someone bought grain at a high price in Ganzhou City. Someone paid three times the price for grain that was originally 2 renminbi a stone.Seeing that he could earn twice as much money by changing hands, Wang Xiaoniu, like many neighbors, only kept a small amount of rations and sold most of the stored food.

I originally thought that I could buy enough grain and make a fortune by going to nearby areas to buy grain, but the grain in nearby towns was also purchased.Empty-handed, he could only go back to Ganzhou first, ready to settle down and go further to Huguang to buy food. Unexpectedly, the Ming army attacked Ganzhou.

Soon the food stock at home was exhausted, and my relatives and friends were in a similar situation. At the beginning, I chose to sell my rations at a "high price" of 1 tael, 5 silver coins and 1 stone, but now the grain tanks at home have bottomed out.

So Wang Xiaoniu had to take the 3 taels of silver from selling grain to the grain store to buy grain.

When he saw the price of food, he was dumbfounded.

The wooden sign in the grain shop reads: Today's grain price is 1 tael and 5 yuan per bucket.

Gosh, 1 stone equals 10 buckets.At the beginning, they sold 3 Shimi at a "high price" of 2 taels of silver.

Now these 3 taels of silver can only buy back 2 buckets, which is a full 10 times higher than before.

Looking at the pile of rice mixed with so much sand and gravel, Wang Xiaoniu felt unwilling; but his stomach was rumbling, forcing him to buy rice.

He also has his parents, wife, three younger siblings, and his own 3-month-old child. If he doesn’t bring rice back today, the 3 members of his family will starve to death.

And he has no choice, because this is the last rice shop in the city that still sells grain.

In addition to their ordinary people, the same is true for the wealthy households in the city. Faced with a three-fold high price, they did not hesitate to sell the grain in their hands. It’s just that the wealthy households kept more grain than they did, but there was no surplus grain. Used to sell.

Now here are all the people waiting to buy rice like Wang Xiaoniu. If the county government hadn't sent many officials to maintain order, I'm afraid this place would have been in chaos long ago.

So Wang Xiaoniu cheered up and tried his best to join the grain buying team.

After a long time, it was finally his turn, but just as he took out his silver to buy rice, the shopkeeper removed the original wooden signboard and inserted a new wooden signboard.

That's right, the price of rice has risen again, and now it has risen to 3 taels of silver per bucket of rice.

The people who bought the rice just said they were lucky, but the people who were still waiting in line were angry!

Wang Xiaoniu cursed: "You bunch of profiteers, your skills have doubled in the blink of an eye, and you're letting people live."

The people behind also began to follow suit, and even a few impulsive people wanted to grab food directly.

But facing the sabers drawn by the officials, they faltered again.

The shopkeeper of the rice store has long been accustomed to this. He cleared his throat and said, "Don't you look at where there is still food in the city now. My master is pitying you, so he took out the last bit of food in the house for sale. This is left, whether you like to buy it or not. To tell you the truth, the rice store will have no food tomorrow, and you will not be able to buy food even if you hold gold."

The shopkeeper glanced at Wang Xiaoniu, and asked nonchalantly: "Are you going to buy it or not? If you don't buy it, just leave me. Don't delay my business."

Reluctantly, Wang Xiaoniu could only exchange three taels of silver in his hand for a bucket of rice filled with sand and chaff.

After leaving the rice shop, Wang Xiaoniu immediately rushed home with the bag of rice.

At this time, the situation in Ganzhou became more and more serious, and there was a serious shortage of food. The people who had no food in the city ate wild vegetables such as bark and grass roots to satisfy their hunger.

At a glance, there is almost no leaf on the trees in the city, and all of them are bare trunks.

Some even started eating dirt to increase their satiety.

Pedestrians on the street are like walking corpses. Their thin bodies, yellow and black withered faces and tired eyes make people unable to bear to look directly at them.Some people were already dying of illness, fell to the side of the road, and spread all over the streets of the city like starved to death.

Compared with them, Wang Xiaoniu was luckier. Thinking of this, he unconsciously clenched the rice bag in his hand.

Although these grains are small, they can last for seven or eight days if they save some food. Maybe the Ming army will retreat by then.

At this time, Wang Xiaoniu was walking alone in the gloomy alley.Suddenly, he felt a heavy back, and was attacked from behind.

Maybe the person who attacked him didn't have much strength anymore, so he didn't knock him out.In a daze, Wang Xiaoniu grabbed the rice bag tightly with both hands, but there seemed to be countless hands competing with him.The rice bag was torn during the tearing, and the grain was scattered all over the ground. Wang Xiaoniu didn't care about being beaten, so he quickly grabbed a handful of grain from the ground and held it in his hand.

After an unknown amount of time, Wang Xiaoniu finally woke up.Spreading out his palm, he found that the grain was still there, but how could this little grain save the lives of his family.

Although starving and bruised, after hiding the only handful of rice left, he decided to try his luck by the river.

However, hundreds of people gather by the river every day to catch fish and shrimps. After more than a month of fishing, the river is now crystal clear. Not to mention fish and shrimps, not even a single aquatic plant can be seen.

Suddenly his eyes went dark, and Wang Xiaoniu fell into the river with a "plop". Although he could swim, he didn't have the strength to struggle at all.

He felt that it was good for him to die like this, because then he would not have to go back and face the expectant eyes of his family, and he had no face to see his family.

When he woke up, he found that he was not dead. It turned out that his neighbor Zhang Tiejiang was also looking for food by the river. Seeing Wang Xiaoniu falling into the water, he jumped into the river to save him.

The people around were full of disappointed expressions, as if they were saying: It's all the fault of this nosy person, if this person drowned, it would be great.

At this time, Wang Xiaoniu finally understood why there were so many people guarding the river every day, even though there was no food in the river.Almost everyone in Ganzhou faces the river on three sides and is good at water, but now we can hear news of people drowning in the river almost every day.

It turned out that what they were waiting by the river was the "overboard" person, and he didn't dare to think about what happened next. If he hadn't met Blacksmith Zhang today, he would have been in trouble now.

For the first time, two terrifying words came to his mind. Even though he was starving with hunger before, he never thought of these.But now he has to think about this issue. In order to survive, he can only eat some things he doesn't want to eat.

Tiejiang Zhang said with concern: "Wang Xiaoniu, are you okay, you scared me to death, let me take you home."

If it was just now, he would definitely accept Blacksmith Zhang's "good intentions".

But now he didn't dare. Looking at the yellow and thin passerby, and then at the handsome Zhang Tiejiang, he suddenly thought of something.

So he braced his body to stand up, raised his voice and said: "Thank you Brother Zhang for saving your life, just now I slipped and fell into the water, I can go back by myself, so I won't bother Brother Zhang to see you off."

At this time, Blacksmith Zhang smiled slightly, as if he had seen through the doubts in Wang Xiaoniu's heart, and said: "Then you have to be careful along the way, the city is not peaceful now, some people will do anything to get food, you can Be careful."

He also said: "Looking at you like this, you must have been out of food for a long time at home. You have a lot of people in your family. If you really can't do it, you can go to Guanxifang to have a look. Maybe it can help you."

Hearing the words "Guanxifang", Wang Xiaoniu seemed to think of something, his face turned pale from fright, and he ran home quickly.Tired and frightened all day, and beaten all over his body, he collapsed on the bed as soon as he entered the house.

Soon Wang Xiaoniu fell asleep. He dreamed of his eldest brother and second sister whom he hadn't seen for a long time.

Wang Xiaoniu is actually not the eldest son in the family. He used to have his own brother and sister.Only in one famine, they all starved to death.

At that time, Wang Xiaoniu was still young, so he didn't know exactly what happened, but he remembered the three words "Guanxifang" very clearly.

He only remembered that the situation at that time was similar to the present situation. Every household in Ganzhou had no food. His father was just like himself now, helpless about it.

Praying to gods and worshiping Buddha at home every day, maybe the Bodhisattva heard their prayers.Soon a miracle happened, the family suddenly had food, and Wang Xiaoniu was saved.

But at this moment, he suddenly found that his brother and sister had disappeared.

Not only their family, many playmates in the neighborhood also disappeared.He once asked his father repeatedly, where did they go?

His father only told him three words "Kanxifang".The young Wang Xiaoniu once naively thought that this was a place that could bring hope to people.

He didn't understand the meaning of these three words until he grew up...

Regarding the tragic situation in Ganzhou City, Liu Wuyuan, the governor of southern Ganzhou, is naturally very clear. At this time, Ganzhou City is like a city of death, full of various tragedies.

But he was powerless to stop all of this, the little food in the army could not help the people in the city at all.

At this moment, Hu Yousheng, the commander-in-chief, ran over sweating profusely, and said, "Master Governor, it's not good, the army has run out of food."

Liu Wuyuan asked in surprise: "There should be more than 3000 shi of food in the army, why is it running out of food?"

Hu Yousheng said: "At the beginning of the year, someone purchased grain at a high price in Ganzhou. The treasurer in charge of the granary secretly sold the grain in the army to earn the difference, and then bought grain from other places at a low price to fill the gap. fill a vacancy."

Liu Wuyuan was furious, and said: "Damn bastard, spoil my big business, and kill his whole family."

Hu Yousheng said: "Now that the Dongchuang incident has happened, he knew he was going to die, and he committed suicide in fear of crime. The humble officer confiscated 10 taels of silver from his home."

"Now the army has run out of food. In order to stabilize the morale of the army, the humble officer has ordered people to kill the army horses and feed the soldiers, but the horse meat can't last long, and we will run out of food soon."

Liu Wuyuan said: "The price of grain in the city has now risen to 60 taels, and there is basically no grain on the market. The strange thing is that all the grain stores have been sold out, but some grain still flows out."

"I suspect that the big households still have food in their hands. Hu Zongbing, you take people to the homes of several big households to collect food, and if it exceeds 3 shi, it will be handed over to the army."

Hu Yousheng said: "Nowadays people in the city are in panic, if we do this again, we may stir up a civil uprising!"

Liu Wuyuan said fiercely: "We buy grain, and we will give him 1 tael of silver for every stone of grain. Now that the country is in crisis, these wealthy households should contribute to our Qing Dynasty. If there is speculation in hoarding grain, anyone who hinders the purchase of grain will be killed on the spot!" "

Finally, he gritted his teeth and said, "Those seriously injured brothers, stop their rations!"

Hu Yousheng hesitated for a moment, but still said: "The last general obeys!"

It's a pity that the landlord's house didn't have any leftover grain at this time. Hu Yousheng led people to search the houses of those rich households upside down, and found more than 100 shi of grain. The rich households were so frightened that they rushed to donate money to save their lives, but they got more than 20 taels of silver. .

After such a commotion, the price of grain in Ganzhou has now risen to 120 taels of silver per stone, and there is only a small amount of grain on the black market, which is sold by bucket by bucket.

Just when Liu Wuyuan was at a loss, his subordinates came to report: "A businessman asked to see him, and he said he could get food for our army."

Liu Wuyuan was immediately overjoyed and went to greet him in person.

I saw a fat businessman saying: "Little Hu Hansan, I pay my respects to the governor."

Liu Wuyuan asked: "I don't know how your Excellency can get food for our army?"

Hu Hansan said with a smile: "I have someone in the navy of the Ming army. As long as the governor pays the money, I can send food to Ganzhou city through the water gate every day!"

"Governor Liu ships 1 taels of silver and places it outside the city every day. Naturally, someone will take the silver and ship 100 shi of grain. Hu will never raise the price, and I will inform the adults of the time every day."

"In addition, there will be a small amount of grain for sale in the city, please Governor Liu to make it easier."

Liu Wuyuan asked: "How can I trust you?"

Hu Hansan said with a smile: "You can only trust me."

When Hu Hansan walked out of the governor's yamen, he couldn't help sighing: "Your Commander is really amazing. I swept away the grain in Ganzhou more than 2 months ago. Now I, Hu Hansan, have made the biggest order in the history of the Intelligence Department." Business!"

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(End of this chapter)